- [Narrator] Funding for this edition of Think Tank with Steve Adubato has been provided by RWJBarnabas Health.

Learn More at RWJBH.org.

The Turrell Fund, a foundation serving children.

The Burke Foundation New Jersey Sharing Network.

Operating Engineers, Local 825.

New Brunswick Development Corporation.

Eastern Atlantic States Regional Council of Carpenters.

IBEW Local 102.

Lighting the path, leading the way.

And by The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

Moving the region through air, land, rail, and sea.

Promotional support provided by NJ.Com.

Keeping communities informed and connected.

And by New Jersey Globe.

[MOTIVATIONAL MUSIC] Hi, everyone, Steve Adabato.

For the next half hour we have him back.

He is... The honorable United States Congressman, Robert Menendez.

Rob, good to see you.

- Good to see you, Steve.

- Hey, by the way, 8th Congressional District.

Rob, let everyone know what the district is.

- I appreciate that, most of Hudson County, with the exception of Secaucus, it's parts of Newark, and that's also the entirety of Elizabeth.

So densely populated, urban area, Hispanic majority district where I grew up and where I'm raising my family.

- Let's do this, Congressman.

I was ready to do this segment on trust in our elections saying, "Hey, listen, let's have an honest dialogue.

Our elections should be trusted."

You saw the New York Post today.

We're taping on the 22nd of July to be seen later.

Obviously, this situation happened in New Jersey, 400 people got to vote who weren't supposed to.

6,600 people who were non-citizens, the motor vehicle folks somehow screwed up or the vendor screwed up and they weren't identified that way.

You know there are millions of people starting with the president who are saying, "See?

I told you."

What do you say?

- It's entirely unacceptable.

And I agree with the governor's sentiment that this is something that once it was brought to her administration's attention, she took action.

I mean, we need to have transparency.

When things don't work as they should, we need to look into why it happened, demand answers, demand accountability.

I believe that's exactly what the governor and her team are going to do.

It's very unfortunate this happened.

It is unacceptable that this happened.

We need to figure out what transpired that led to this.

But we have to remember that overwhelmingly in all of our elections, not just in New Jersey, but across the country, we do have safe and secure elections.

We always need to do more work to ensure that they always are, and that's the work that we should be doing here in Congress.

And I know that in New Jersey, the governor's going to lead this effort to ensure that New Jerseyans feel confident moving forward in our elections and who's voting in them.

- But Congressman, if the president says or implies we need to nationalize our elections, which is why there's a piece of legislation he wants passed as we do this program and has not been passed, it isn't just Democrats, but many Republicans are against, it's called the Save America Act, why is it, from your perspective, a problem to have the feds run our elections?

- Well, especially with this administration, there's a number of problems.

We've seen over the last several years efforts by Republicans, and you've seen in the last 19 months this administration to disenfranchise voters.

I mean, that's the opposite of what we should be doing in a democracy.

New Jersey and other states have taken steps to bring more people into the process because that makes our democracy healthier.

As we do that, we need to think about things like vote by mail, which have been a success not just in New Jersey, but across the country, the president himself votes by mail, right?

So these are things that have made participating in our elections more accessible to more people.

I believe that's a good thing.

What you're hearing from Republicans are ways to make it harder to participate, and that's not something that I can support.

- Congressman, real quick, and then I'll get off the- - Yeah.

- Just the argument of many who support the legislation is just show your ID.

Just show an ID and you can vote.

Why is that a problem?

- So for a number of reasons.

One is if you look at the legislation that they've tied to bills that we're going to vote on this week, for instance, if you're going to vote by mail, they want you to scan a copy of your license, mail that in with your ballot, and if you fail to do so, then your vote won't be counted.

We also know that in terms for many women in the country who have changed their names with a marriage or with a divorce, that their voting record may not have the same name as their license.

A number of things like that in terms of what the requirements are.

I am open to any recommendations that are good faith efforts, good faith efforts to make our elections more secure.

We should have that conversation.

I just don't have much trust in this administration, which has tried to undermine elections that they have not been successful in.

- Okay, Congressman, our team's going to show some video of you, Congresswoman McIver, Mayor Baraka, and Newark at Delaney Hall.

Delaney Hall is one of countless detention centers across the country.

The case involving the Congresswoman, your colleague, Congresswoman McIver, we'll talk to her in the future, we'll see how that case plays out.

Not only what happened that day, but more importantly, what's the lesson of Delaney Hall?

Because there are countless people, including Jeff Van Drew, your Republican colleague in the congressional delegation who said, "I saw nothing but the food was fine.

The place was clean.

I don't know what these people are talking about."

What do you say, Congressman?

- I'll say two parts.

One, in terms of the lessons from Delaney Hall is that it's a reflection of a broken immigration system.

Something that I think we need to do, we all need to do work on both Democrats and Republicans.

You have many of the people at Delaney Hall, Steve.

You have mothers, fathers of U.S.

citizen children.

You know, we had a pastor from Elizabeth who was being detained there.

- Yeah.

- I've seen pregnant women there.

I've seen 18-year-olds who should be in high school there.

And to me, the main lesson of Delaney Hall is that we have a broken immigration system.

This administration has exploited that broken immigration system to detain as many people as possible, to remove as many people as possible.

What we need to do is reform our broken immigration system.

There are people in our communities that we live side by side with that are contributing to our communities, contributing to our economy.

We should give them protected status, permanent status here so they can come out of the shadows, not be in a position where they may be apprehended on their way to work and sent to Delaney Hall.

The second thing about the conditions there, I disagree with Congressman Van Drew about what he saw in his one visit there.

I've been there countless times now.

There are significant issues.

And this is what happens when you have for-profit entities like the GEO Group, which runs Delaney Hall, making money off of this administration's, in my opinion, cruel immigration enforcement policy.

- Name it, Congressman, respectfully.

- Yeah.

- Name what you have seen that you believe is either a problem, inhumane, whatever you want to say, make the case, because again, we'll try to get Jeff Van Drew to make the case.

Sometimes it's hard to get every member of the delegation, some of whom I still think they're in office, but they don't appear in public and, that's not for me to decide- - Well, Steve- - Yes, Congressman.

- First, let me say... Let me say this, if there's an opportunity that you can have Jeff and I on the show at the same time, I'll be here in a heartbeat.

At any time of his choosing, I will make it work on my schedule 'cause I feel confident in what I've seen at Delaney Hall talking to the individuals there.

So you asked me for specific examples, let me give them to you.

A woman had a miscarriage at Delaney Hall.

The health professionals there told her it was a psychological pregnancy, that she wasn't actually pregnant.

I saw an individual there who has a condition that limits him to either crutches or a wheelchair.

For over a month, he was not given crutches or a wheelchair because he was told that they could be used as weapons in general population.

Only after he had a significant injury was he put in a wheelchair.

It gets worse.

He was put in a wheelchair, and because they treat it as a weapon, he was put in isolation for over four months.

Steve, that is something that I don't believe any medical professional would sign off on too.

You know, the food has been an issue.

The GEO Group, ICE, they will tell you every individual gets seen within 24 hours.

There are people who there with long-term conditions that aren't being treated.

Let me give you another example.

When people are taken to the hospital because they can't be treated at Delaney Hall, they're taken there in handcuffs and full body restraints.

And even when they are at the hospital, supposedly to get medical treatment, ICE retains jurisdiction over that individual, won't tell their family members, keeps them handcuffed to the bed in which they're receiving medical attention.

These are just a small litany of things that are happening inside Delaney Hall each and every day.

- Okay, one more quick follow-up.

We're gonna go back to the Congressman, Congressman Van Drew from South Jersey.

And either we'll do it together with Congressman Menendez or he'll do it by himself.

But we are working very hard.

There are three Republican members of the delegation.

Congressman Kean, Congressman Smith, and Congressman Van Drew.

Let's just say we try to get every member of the delegation.

It's been harder to get certain members to come on to make their case, so we'll make that offer.

Real quick, we have an initiative around childcare, creating greater public awareness around affordable, accessible childcare, and childcare's connection to the economy.

The initiative is called Start Strong NJ.

That's the organization that's... We'll put up their website.

You're involved in what's called the Dads Caucus.

What does the Dads Caucus have to do with the issue of childcare, Congressman?

- I appreciate that question.

You know, a lot of us newer members have young families.

My kids are six and three.

My son turns four in September.

And so we live these challenges that so many families are facing on any given day.

I mean, childcare is prohibitively expensive in this country.

In the state of New Jersey, I think it's $35,000 a year per child.

That really crushes people who are trying to advance their family, make ends meet, keep a roof over their family's head.

You add all the cost of childcare, which isn't even always available, much less it's not just expensive, it's also sometimes you can't even get it.

These are issues that impact American New Jersey families every single day.

The dads in Congress want to lean in on these conversations, make sure that we're trying to come to solutions often on a bipartisan basis.

I've introduced- - Hold one second, are they all Ds, are they all Dems in the Dads Caucus?

- In the Dads Caucus, yes.

It's all Democrats.

But I've worked with Republicans on a bill, a tax incentive or a tax credit for small businesses so they can install family-friendly changing stations at their small businesses.

That way... - Where's that?

Where is that, Congressman?

- That's a bill that we have.

We introduced this Congress.

We can get you all the info for it.

But that's something that we've done on a bipartisan basis.

So listen, I think childcare touches every family.

We know it does.

We know that's an economic issue.

If people are able to have that childcare, they can work different jobs, work different hours, maximize their earning potential, and they're not having to do another job because it's so prohibitively expensive on the childcare front.

Also, you know, we know that if you can subsidize, provide universal childcare, that really enables people to take advantage of their either educational growth, professional growth.

That's good for our communities, it's good for our economy.

This is 2026.

I think these are issues that we can solve, not as Democrats or Republicans, but as Americans.

And this is one that I do believe there's an immense amount of bipartisan support for.

We just need to get across the finish line so we can support families across the country.

- 30 seconds left.

There's a big election coming up.

I think you heard about it, right, in November 2026.

How confident are you that you believe the Democrats are going to take the House of Representatives?

- I'm fairly confident, but we're gonna work at it every single day.

We have great candidates, including in New Jersey, but across the country, that want to put the American people first.

I mean, unfortunately, you've seen how broken government is with a Congress that's been the least productive Congress with a Republican majority.

And you see a president who has said he's not concerned about the American's economic wellbeing.

It doesn't even cross his mind.

That shows how people are feeling across the country.

Democrats are ready to deliver.

- And Congressman, next time you join us, we'll also talk about the fact that many people believe that there are two Democratic parties.

One very, very far to the left, Democratic socialist and beyond, and then other Democrats, possibly like yourself.

But there are very different points of view on a range of issues.

The next time with Congressman Rob Menendez from the 8th Congressional District.

Congressman, thank you so much for joining us.

Best to you and your family.

- Thanks so much, Steve, likewise.

- You got it.

Stay with us, we'll be right back.

- To watch more Think Tank with Steve Adubato, find us online and follow us on social media.

- She's back by popular demand.

She is State Senator Holly Schepisi, a Republican from Bergen County.

She's the conference leader in the Senate with her party.

Good to see you, Senator.

- Great to see you too, Steve.

- Let everyone know what a conference leader is.

- So essentially, I'm the one who gets tasked during budget season and voting sessions when we get a data dump of a hundred new bills, a budget nobody's ever seen, over a thousand pages of reading material on a Sunday night for a voting session on Monday to actually read through everything, sit with my caucus and try to cogently explain what it is we're voting on.

- You did not give a lot of confidence to voters just then.

What do they do down there?

So how about this?

Okay.

So one of the first things I wanted to talk to you about, and then we're taping on the 22nd of July, this will be seen later, was we have a graphic that'll come up right now.

It's called Trust in Our Elections.

And Holly, we've known each other for more than a few years.

And straight up, I was about to say, look, our elections are secure.

Senator Schepisi is gonna reaffirm that our elections are secure.

No election was stolen and that we need to have confidence in our elections.

And then I look today, this is the New York Post.

It's got a great sports section, but it could be the Post, Wall Street Journal, New York Times.

You may have heard about this, Senator.

The governor, Governor Sherrill, admitted yesterday that the state registered 6,600 non-citizens to vote because of a software glitch in quotes by an outside vendor, and at least 400 of those people voted in the last, well, in 2025, I think it was.

Senator, A, are you surprised?

- Unfortunately, no.

And I have been a firm proponent of talking about elections are secure.

We need confidence in our electoral system.

But back in 2018, when I was then an assemblywoman, I was up vigorously opposing certain initiatives that my Democratic colleagues were putting forth indicating that they were going to erode confidence in the system.

2018, they implemented the legislation that would make it automatic opt in, if you went to the Motor Vehicle Commission, you would be automatically registered to vote.

In 2019, right around Christmas, they decided to move forward with an additional proposal allowing everybody who was an undocumented resident of New Jersey to get driver's licenses.

I went back and I checked my own Facebook posts.

I looked at speeches I gave at that time.

And it is literally foretelling the future of where we are today.

The way that those bills were implemented, there were no checks and balances.

And it at anytime-- - Checks and balances on what, Senator?

- No checks and balances on ensuring that only citizens were in fact voting.

So for any of my Democratic colleagues who express awe or, oh my god, how did this happen?

It's garbage because the system was done in such a fashion as to ensure that we did not have that ability.

Yes, 6,600 people were identified thus far due to this software glitch.

The vendor is now pushing back issued a statement last night and said, no, this is firmly on the state of New Jersey.

But out of those 6,600 that they identified, these are people who affirmatively indicated and checked off, no, I am not eligible to vote.

We have had-- - Because I'm not a citizen.

- And because I'm not a citizen.

And yet somehow, after affirmatively indicating that they weren't eligible to vote, not only did they get put on voter rolls, but we know of approximately 400, which is about 8% of those who affirmatively said I am not eligible to vote, that cast a vote nevertheless.

We've had conservatively, in the first three months after the law got passed, allowing undocumented to get driver's licenses in New Jersey, we had over a hundred thousand people who applied and came in for driver's licenses who are undocumented residents of this state.

And that was, what, five years ago?

- You're saying do the math.

I don't want to answer for you, but Senator, you're saying do the math.

You think it's much higher?

You think it's much higher?

- It is unequivocally much higher.

And just assume that we take a number of a quarter of a million.

There are approximately half a million eligible driving undocumented in the state.

You take, you know, 8% as a blended average.

We're looking at, you know, a minimum 40, 50,000 people who probably may have voted.

And that is meaningful.

We've had elections since that time with the assembly.

We lost two of our colleagues, one in D8.

He lost his seat by only 54 votes in 2023.

We had D2, Claire Swift.

She lost her seat by, I think it was 845 votes.

This is not just something we gloss over.

This is something that we need to be open and transparent about.

We need bipartisan, you know, sitting down with our election officials.

- Yes but Senator, here's the other side of it.

Anyone who tries to defend this, explain it away, it's not credible.

However, the President, the leader of the Republican Party, the leader of our country is arguing in many ways for the federal government to take over elections.

See?

See what happened in New Jersey?

It proves my point.

- I respectfully, sorry.

- You can disagree, but I'm not saying what I think.

I'm saying what the president is saying.

He's saying, see, this is an example of what I'm talking about.

But the president also goes around saying constantly that the 2020 election is stolen, was stolen.

See?

You have always been a reasonable, moderate, thoughtful, excellent legislator.

I know you don't believe that.

But now you know this horrific situation, embarrassing, terrible, which you foretold earlier, what you just talked about.

You know this is gonna be used to do all kinds of things that I know you don't want to see happen because we don't want the feds taking over elections, do we?

- Oh, if we don't want feds taking over elections, New Jersey has to do the right thing.

- Agreed.

- New Jersey has to allow a full audit internally bipartisan to take place.

And wherever we end up, we end up.

But we need to ensure for our population, our residents in New Jersey, people like myself who have always been balanced and fair on this, to actually have trust that we are doing the right thing in New Jersey.

And right now, there is nobody I know of in the past 24 hours that has that trust.

And so this is a critical juncture for our state.

We just had at our last voting session the day of the budget, you know, the Voter Empowerment Act.

We specifically on the floor asked for amendments to ensure that only citizens can vote.

And in New Jersey, it's the tip of the iceberg.

You have people who are dead, who are still getting vote by mail ballots with repeated calls saying, please take my dead father off the rolls.

You let people who are being now as they leave prison being automatically enrolled to vote.

- Senator, I'm sorry for interrupting.

I'm gonna say this.

Everything you're saying is legitimate and credible.

That's not the same as the president and others saying the election is rigged.

That's sloppy, crappy administrative efforts that don't make any sense that the bureaucracy's not working and no one's gonna disagree with you that we need to do better.

And the audit, bipartisan.

You know and I know that's not the same as rigging an election to make sure.

How could it be that the president says that 2020 was rigged?

2016 was not rigged.

2024 was not.

The elections I win, they were good.

The elections I lose, rigged.

The elections of people I support, they lose, they're rigged.

The other way, they're good.

That's not what you're talking about, Senator.

- No, I'm not talking about that.

But in fairness to President Trump and his administration, I don't think this would have been released had they not written the letter to the state and had he not had his little thing saying that he's doing an investigation that this is what they found at the federal level.

Because it's come out in the past 24 hours that the state was aware of this issue back in 2024.

It's been two years.

- In the Murphy administration?

- Yes.

- So hold on one second.

You're saying that the head of Homeland Security, Mr.

Mullen, appointed by the president who sent a letter to the Secretary of State, I believe in New Jersey, that happens to be the Lieutenant Governor Dale Caldwell.

Hey, we need this, this, and this information.

And if we don't get it from you, we are going to withhold federal funding.

You believe that's what caused this?

- Unequivocally.

Unequivocally, it is the only reason that this came out the week that it came in.

Otherwise, people have had knowledge.

The legislature hasn't had knowledge.

The press hasn't had knowledge.

The people at the state haven't had knowledge.

But this is something that they've been aware of for two years.

And that does not sit right.

- When you say they, when you say they, Governor Sherrill has not been in, I'm not here to defend Governor Sherrill.

She's been in office since January.

The Murphy administration were there before that.

She actually said publicly this wasn’t... this happened in a previous administration.

- The fact that it happened in a previous administration.

Look, I'm not blaming Governor Sherrill for this at all.

- Who's responsible, Senator?

- My Democratic colleagues who willfully put through back-to-back legislation and stripped out any protections to ensure that this would not occur, and the prior governor.

And when we got up and really logically and impassioned and, you know, spoke about this, real time, we were dismissed.

We were called xenophobes.

We were called a whole host of terrible things where it was a very legitimate point, and there were so many better ways to do this.

You know, they included language in that bill that prohibited the Motor Vehicle Commission from sharing information with fellow New Jersey state agencies.

That's wrong.

- Senator, there's so many other issues we need to talk to you about.

And I want to apologize to our audience for making this all about trust or lack of trust in our election process.

That is State Senator Holly Schepisi, the conference leader.

Holly, I want to thank you so much for joining us, Senator.

- Thank you.

- You got it.

I'm Steve Adubato.

Thank you for watching, we'll see you next time.

- [Narrator] Think Tank with Steve Adubato is a production of the Caucus Educational Corporation.

Funding has been provided by RWJBarnabas Health.

Learn More at RWJBH.org.

The Turrell Fund, a foundation serving children.

The Burke Foundation New Jersey Sharing Network.

Operating Engineers, Local 825.

New Brunswick Development Corporation.

Eastern Atlantic States Regional Council of Carpenters.

IBEW Local 102.

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

Promotional support provided by NJ.Com.

And by New Jersey Globe.

- At the Turrell Fund, we know that all New Jersey families deserve access to affordable, high quality childcare.

Early childhood education supports healthy brain development and provides essential support to power the economy, enabling parents to work, businesses to operate, and communities to thrive.

The Turrell Fund is proud to be part of Start Strong NJ, a statewide initiative to put affordable, high quality childcare within reach of all New Jersey families.

Learn more at TurrellFund.org and StartStrongNJ.org.