Yeah, son.

It's a good likeness.

Fifties.

Look, look.

Woo, woo, woo, woo.

Time to show it's your time.

Good day and welcome to the Washington Report.

This month in June, we acknowledge and celebrate our diverse Caribbean American contribution to American history.

For the 17th year.

I'm Congresswoman Stacey Plaskett, child of two Virgin Islanders, and I'm blessed to serve as the Virgin Islands delegate to the U.S. House of Representatives.

The Washington report was created to inform Virgin Islanders on current federal issues that directly affect our community.

I'm tremendously honored to have Congressman Greg Meeks as my guest today.

He proudly serves the constituents of the this congressional district of New York and is serving his 13th term in the United States Congress.

Y'all, That's 26 years.

Congressman Meeks is the ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, formerly served as the chair of that committee and is also the first black member of Congress to serve as chair of foreign affairs.

Welcome to the Washington report, Congresswoman.

It's great to be here at these days.

Thank you.

We have very similar upbringings and a number of parallels in our journey to Congress.

Can you share a little bit about your background?

Both of us of New Yorkers, both have been prosecutors in New York.

You've done some amazing things, however, before you even came to Congress.

Well, you're right.

We have a very similar background.

New both Queens, Brooklyn, you know, and that regards.

I am both raised in housing, community housing communities.

Exactly right.

And grow up in families that pushed us, you know, strong disciplinarian in the house.

Very much so.

To make sure that it was more the disciplinarian.

Your mother, your father.

My mother was the disciplinarian.

My father was the enforcer.

I love that.

I love to go, oh, but she was definitely the disciplinarian and my father was the enforcer.

Unless she knew she wasn't going to be he was going to be around.

So then I would get it twice.

She would do what she could do and then said, And then I pray as she wouldn't tell my father yourself, because then he would reinforce thereafter.

So, you know, you don't have to say anymore.

We know what that means.

But I was always taught, you know, to make sure that that I would contribute to my community.

You know, I grew up actually initially in public housing, and my mother was head of the tenant patrols.

And, you know, try and make sure we've taken care of the building.

And she was the one that was involved in various community affairs.

In fact, she would get involved in politics with petitions and working with the local profession, local politicians.

My dad was the one that was he was the Little League coach, the football coach, the basketball coach.

And so we had this family in the household.

That individual would come in all the time.

So I was kind of bread.

It was bread in me early on that be involved in the community and try to make a difference.

Right.

Did you have family members who would come up from the South?

And, you know, I family remember they came up from the south.

But more importantly, what happened almost every summer I was in the South, right.

So they sent me down to south out of South Carolina to be with my grandfather and my aunts and uncles.

That because both of my parents come comes from York County, South Carolina.

And shout out to your toddlers was that shout out, Shout out, big shout out Rock Hill And York is a big shout out to them.

But so every summer I was there and every summer and I learned, you know, I'm actually old enough, Stacey, to remember taking the train down south.

Right.

And having to get off the train once it passed.

Marilyn, Joe, D.C. And at that point, you have to change.

The car had to change, and it was to get into the front of the train.

It was the most uncomfortable part.

Back then, the caboose was the part where they had the dining room and everything else.

There was nothing up front.

That's why we had to bring in and my family would always have a brown paper bag where we would eat, right.

And because that was cold and it was the hottest part of the tray, no accident or anything of that nature.

So we had to do that.

And then when I got off the train, our first thing I would see are bathrooms and water fountains saying white and colored.

So that also instilled in me the fact that I want to be a change.

I'll be a part of a change, even as a young man.

And of course, sitting at the dinner table talking to my relatives there and my parents being very influential in my life, telling me and teaching me the rights and wrongs at our at our dinner table, I made all the difference in the world.

Now, how what was your entry into deciding I'm going to go to Congress?

Well, that was kind of by accident, to be quite honest with you.

I always wanted to be involved in politics, and I had the pleasure of, you know, and I thought that using my legal background, being at the time a prosecutor, I could help behind the scenes and I could help others get elected, because in the district that I lived in at that time, they had very little, if any, black representation.

Finally broke in with a state senator getting elected.

And then there was an election for Congress.

And the Dr. Reverend Floyd Flake was one of the cancer.

Floyd Flake and I got involved in that campaign like never before.

We became focused on registering people to vote and turning them out to vote.

Reverend Flake was elected and then the redistricting took place and still we were trying to figure out in the Rockaways who could work for the state assembly seat.

Folks told me that they had decided who should run, that I had to run for that office.

That was my introduction to elective office of the state assembly.

Never thinking that, you know, or looking at being a member of Congress, because we had what I believe was one of the best members of Congress ever and the very that the Floyd Flake was very effective.

But lo and behold, he decided that he was a preacher and not a politician.

In 1998, I got elected and here I am some 20 odd years later.

Do you think it would be this long?

No.

That we, you know, been living in a historic good time, you know, things that I'd never dreamt would take place, both good and bad.

Yeah, I rather emphasize generally the good.

And what do you think?

I know you've been involved in President Clinton's campaigns and his administration, President Barack Obama's campaign and his administra ation, You know, even those in between.

You've been influential in the Bush's administration as well.

And then who would have thought in their lifetime?

I know I did write that a person who looked like me and you would be elected president of the United States of America and do that.

Amazing, right?

So it you know, I couldn't leave doing that those eight years, that's for sure.

And then getting into the majority, having the opportunity to work there.

And as we all right now, I could get we are on the cusp of electing the first African-American to be the speaker of the United States Congress and the first African-American to be a leader of one of the two major parties, historic times of which I'm very proud of.

It's good.

Well, we know that you've done a lot of the work to bring us there.

So that's really important.

You know, And with that many of us that are here in the Congress know that you built a tremendous reputation as a strategic leader.

Very thoughtful, particularly in the area of foreign affairs.

But how do you believe and I'm, of course, very focused on the Caribbean region.

You know, I feel a great affinity have being a Caribbean American representing the English speaking, Caribbean American, American interest there.

How do you think the U.S. can best support the economic growth of the Caribbean right now?

We are so up number one.

You know, say that again.

Show up right?

Right.

Right.

And we've got to show that we care about their economic well-being by encouraging investment and try to make sure that we're not putting laws in place that that prevents it from happening and prosperity from growing.

So for us to find their economy working with them are looking at what our rules are and how they affect them.

You know, that makes all the difference in the world.

Otherwise, you know, we the United States, becomes the ones that loses because we know that China particularly would love to be there.

And I say that, you know, can I blame China for trying to be there?

No, I can't.

But I got to say, we need to be there.

And when I talk to our of our Caribbean countries, they want to do business with us.

They're asking to do business with us.

And so that's important.

And it's important, you know, to work collectively with CARICOM and to look at what we need to do.

You know, with reference to some of the banks that are there and how we can make sure that that other than tourism is other areas of which they can grow an economy.

And that's, you know, when even people when we talk about it and look at it, that's what will also help spread throughout the region in that regard.

If we have that focus.

Number of most Americans still to the number a large part of my constituency come from the Caribbean.

Yeah, probably the largest Caribbean.

And second to Yvette Clarke.

Okay.

But you have a tremendously large Caribbean little city.

No question about it.

Do you see any trends with where they're coming from?

All over is all over.

You can go Jamaica, Trinidad, Barbados.

You know, you have a large Guyanese, Guyanese, Haitian.

It's all over to all throughout the Caribbean.

You know, when you hear people talk about supporting the Caribbean and its economic development and how important it is for the Caribbean, we often don't make the argument about how important it is to the United States.

And we have both economic as well as national security interests by supporting the Caribbean, where I would Caribbean is our third war.

Right.

I mean, that's really the truth.

They first, if you look at whether it's drugs that transport it to the Caribbean, when you look at one reason why I think that, you know, China and Russia would love to do because they would like to encourage have the incursion into our third border.

If you look at, you know, and for us, the economic opportunities that are presented there for folks from America and the Caribbean, there should be a natural a meeting of the mind.

The Caribbean represents 14 votes at the United Nations.

Absolutely.

That's a really important bloc for us to be able to support.

And when they're trading with China, that makes them reticent to try and go against China, whether it's for sanctions or other policies that are supportive of the United States when they're sitting there in the United Nations.

Right?

You're absolutely right.

I talked to Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield about that.

And I had that experience actually when they had the vote at the UN in regards to Ukraine, Ukraine, and as as and on the continent of Africa and those that abstained and there were few.

The reason why is they said, we haven't heard from you, we haven't seen you, you know, we need you.

But they have, you know, you know, the way of sending us a wakeup call on our policies that makes it are we got to wake up to them?

And and I know that.

But I got to tell you, Stacey, there's been no one more on the forefront on that battle than you and and fighting and talking to us in the CBC.

But going beyond CBC, whether you a day in the New Deal, whether they are a conservative party with a Democrat, all Republicans, you have been working very hard to make sure that they and the Caribbean islands are on the front burner.

And believe me, it makes a difference.

Yeah, I mean, I think people oftentimes just forget, right, when they're making decisions or discussing policy, whether it's trade or others.

They just don't think about the Caribbean and think about its importance and the actual economic potential of trade and goods.

I mean, these are islands that they can't make these things right.

They can't make the manufactured goods, LNG from LNG to manufactured goods.

They need us.

And so there's that's a market for us to be able to work with that that we haven't tapped into before.

You know, I and we we talk about China.

Several years ago, I went to the reopening of the Panama Canal, and the first ship that went through was China, showing the importance of China in that region, trying to get from Asia to Africa to Europe through a different trade route.

We've got to be able to show up as well, as you say.

Absolutely do that.

I just put a bill in that we're looking to pass to get done called America cooperating with our neighbors and is geared focused on the Caribbean and is talking about the economic cooperation that we need to have with them.

Nice and listening with them in that regard so that we can make sure that we're help particularly look, you know, was huge right now.

And I know the vice president has been dealing with that with the pack piece is coming and, you know, the devastation that we haven't with climate change, etc..

Helping the Caribbean with dealing with some of the horrific storms that take place and what we need to do and to make sure that it is secure in that regard.

So, you know, the vice president is there.

This piece is looking at that.

We've got to make sure.

And those are things that I think is our job to do and to make sure that they understand that we are interconnected in that in that regard.

And well, I know you're your fellow New Yorker and I know you were instrumental in him working on this bill.

Was Adriano Espaillat right in the last Congress passing legislation that really focuses on supporting Caribbean nations with resiliency, climate?

It's absolutely key.

And, you know, given what the conditions are and given climate change was taking place, is something that we've got to work very closely and collectively with, along with technology moving forward, along to access to to capital.

Those are all things that are very much important because, you know, they you know, we put those pieces together, those islands can thrive.

And as a result, it makes us safer and opportunities for us here in America also.

So success is a win win situation, but an area that is not so much of a win win presently and really needs a lot of attention.

You've really been the forefront person about this is Haiti.

Yes.

What are your thoughts about what's happening right now?

And how should everyday Americans be thinking about it, particularly people who are in the Caribbean?

Look, the first thing is that we've got to make sure that we listen to the people of Haiti.

We've got to listen and make sure that we listen to civil society particularly, and that civil society and that those that are in the political parties or anything else, they're the ministers.

They're the people that work, the nurses, the doctors.

They don't want to run for any office.

They just care about their country.

They want to have a voice.

And what, you know, the Constitution should look like none of them want to run for office or anything of that nature.

They want security.

They want safety.

They want to get a they want to get rid of the gangs and the corruption that's taking place there.

We need to listen to them.

Too often in the past, we've tried to impose things on them without including them in the conversation.

And as a result, we we cause probably more damage than we do in help it.

So now, for example, working on with various civic society, the Montana Group is an example of that.

And there were others and try to make sure that before is not just a cry for elections.

They're not crying for elections that sometimes say, Oh, we got to have an election, but we have an election that's flawed or where people don't have the opportunity to elect someone that's from them.

And the gangs really make the determination who votes and who doesn't.

That doesn't happen.

So what we need to do is to make sure that we're giving security.

And that's another thing that we were talking about with the Canadians.

So is not the United States by themselves is not sitting down.

A military government is talking about how you can train and support a police force that's there listening to what the what the again, what the civil society is saying so that we can and then making sure that we do sanction and make sure that those gang leaders and the bad cannot move around with impunity.

So those many of them go back and forth from Haiti to the to Florida to parts of the United States.

We need to sanction them.

And when we get them, we need to lock them up in jail to give the people the confidence that they're not just going to come back because the United States is not going to do anything on those areas.

We can really focus and make a difference in that regard.

And I think that's what, you know, from what I'm getting from talking to the people on the ground, that's what they want.

If we can do that and show that these folks will not go along with impunity, we're going to hold them accountable.

We're going to sanction them if and whether or not they're in the government or not.

And we know who some of these people are that it will make all the difference in the world.

And then once you can get that moving and in control, then you can start talking about elections, because then you would have individuals who want to run, who are who are honest in the moment and focus on just trying to make the country better.

And but we need to do it with, you know, with with Canada and with, you know, other countries, the Canadians, the black elected officials that we saw there, some of the European former colonialists in the region.

Was I was going to bring that up, especially France, for example, if we come together, you know, then I think that we can then collectively put that pressure on France to do the right thing.

And, you know, I'm scheduled to go to a trip and jelly, you know, especially as chair even now as ranking member, any time I travel, I meet with black folk, people of African descent who's elected.

And so I would mean starting to talk to some that are elected into the French parliament who are of African descent and they say working collectively together, we can put the pressure on all of our governments to do the right thing for Haiti and to try to make sure that we're assisting in that in that struggle, to make sure that we're rooting out the gangs and those that are corrupt and preventing some progress.

Because Haiti, for all of us, of our of African ancestry, those that were brought and enslaved here, you know, they are shoulders that we stand on the first nation to break away from the oppression of colonialism.

Be very sure you know, the price that they paid for that freedom, the price, you know, just monetarily with France and the exactness that they have had on their the landscape even is just tremendous.

And I think we all.

Yes, you're correct.

Yes, they will suffer from it.

Yeah.

You know, some people think, you know, if you've been put down and held down for three or 400 years, 100 years is a short period of time to break those chains and what they did to you.

Because the first thing that they made sure the French was to punish them economically and to make sure that they would had no opportunity for growth and moving and moving and moving forward in that regard.

So they is a deep debt.

Mm hmm.

That the French are.

Mm hmm.

And as a result, those of us close.

Now, the United States, Canada were built, have immigrated to, etc., to make sure that we do the right thing.

But because we didn't stand up, that's exactly for them.

And the way they stood up for us in their revolution.

That's exactly right.

True.

Well, you know, the discussions that we've had and the work that you're doing in the Caribbean, in Africa to bring the United States along and push us to not only support our own economy and our own national security, but to make the world much safer is really, really important.

And I'm really grateful for that work.

What do you see moving forward in the areas of foreign affairs that we should be thinking about?

Well, you know, look, the world is is a place that, to a large degree, is on fire.

And so I'm looking and I think that the Biden administration has made great strides in trying to keep the democratic societies together.

Mm hmm.

So working in Europe with our European allies, NATO's tremendously important president.

G-7 folks were just in the Indo-Pacific to make sure that Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, you know, working together with our allies is important Australia.

You know, that's important to put it there.

Then we need to do the same thing.

Trinidad.

You know, in the CARICOM 50th anniversary, we should have a strong presence there.

We've got to work in alliances and that America along with America by itself, you don't need anybody, you know.

And as with the prior administration, we're talking about America don't need anybody else.

We just do.

That's not leadership.

Leadership is pressuring people is not true.

That's right.

So I think that what I see the Biden administration trying to do is make those alliances that we have come together to stay strong.

We've got to make sure that we put though, action into it, particularly economically.

But I think of the continent and the Caribbean, I want to do more.

I want to be more forceful about that.

So I see that happening.

You know, I see that unfortunately, what a lot of folks are doing is looking at America itself, because as we get ready for the next election, democracy's on the line right here.

Yeah.

And so it's hard, you know, talking to some other countries, I go around and I'm talking to them about their democracy and they look at me with brow was raised and saying, what's going on in America?

Are you talking to me?

You know, we still got people saying that your elections were rigged and all that's going on.

I have a come back because we did make sure that Joe Biden was, in fact, inaugurated on time without a problem.

No coup d'etats or anything of that nature.

Right.

But I think that we've got to make sure that we are stabilizing and making sure that democracy and we're caring about people moving forward.

We've got that issue right now as we speak with the with with the question on the debt ceiling.

Debt ceiling and this manufactured crises that some of our Republicans have have presented themselves.

Elections do matter.

Simple distractions do matter.

When you talk about, you know, the debt crisis, the Biden administration working overseas trying to remind everyone that we're still there, we're still supportive of them.

One of the other issues that I see constantly that the administration and we have to deal with is immigration.

Right.

And you are also in foreign affairs very involved in that temporary protected status, the Dreamers finding a mechanism to support them.

Doca.

Where do you see us now?

Look, if the America and one imagines that, you know, people always think of brown people and Latinos when it comes to that, but that affects Africans and Caribbean people as well.

Right.

First, we got to you know, Congress has to get serious.

The first way to deal with this is a comprehensive, comprehensive immigration and reform, the reform system.

The immigration system is broken.

There's no question about that.

And so we've got to fix it.

And that's Congress's responsibility.

I happen to believe that some of my Republican colleagues deliberately don't want to fix it.

They want it to be an issue.

And they want to prevent folks that look like you from coming into this country.

Sure.

And have you talk to them privately?

They tell you that.

So we've got to continue to fight to make sure that we're doing just the opposite.

And that's why elections matter.

Bringing those issues to the American people, not be silent about it.

All right.

But let's bring it to the American people.

And I think that all people want to resolve the immigration crisis, and we can do so.

That, I think, is beneficial.

Part of it is also making sure that we get involved in some of the root causes of life issues.

Why isn't migration to their place to come home?

If you don't deal with the root causes, you always are going to have issues with reference to migration.

And so we've got to focus on the root causes.

Well, you know, when you talk about I think the best part of America is the fact that we all come from all of these diverse places.

That's what brings us our ingenuity, our inventiveness.

Being able to be re-imagine ourselves over and over again is that diversity.

And in your own home, you've got diversity, right?

Because your wife, Samoan, is also my country woman.

Her mother's family comes from Saint Croix and her father's family, I believe, is from Guyana.

Great.

How does that diversity, even in your own house, affect?

You know, I'm sure she talks to you and she's got lots of opinions on issues.

How does that inform how you work?

How do you as a couple work together as as a unit to try and address some of these issues?

Well, my wife is fantastic.

Strong woman, brilliant.

And she makes sure that I hear and understand.

So we have that discussion.

Right.

And and, you know, it it makes sure that I have a broad spectrum of ideas and thought of which to move.

And I got to tell the people of the Virgin Islands, Saint Croix, Saint Thomas, I'm the STEM your second member, because she makes sure that issues that are important that I'm listening to.

And the first thing, any time something comes up, particularly with reference to the Virgin Islands, she says, Well, Stacey Dolan, you follow Stacey.

You do what she tells you to do.

So there's a strong advocate.

Listen, I got the text right there with her.

She's amazing.

She is, you know, a brilliant woman who her experiences with her, her relatives, her mother, her aunt, who are still there, part of a political family.

Yes, we are family.

Yes.

The Malloy's are well known.

You know, her her uncle Tappy Malloy and my dad were compatriots as well.

In fact, that was the, you know, when we were dating.

The first one of the things when we were on the islands was in Saint Thomas.

You know, first thing that she wanted to make sure that I wanted she wanted some Johnny cake and fried fish.

And then she was, you know, teaching me how to because, you know, I'm from the south.

My mother flayed the fish.

She got the head of the head on on the fish so that you could see the eyes and make sure that it was fresh and is fresh and everything else.

I she told me, well, the protein that's in the eyeball that's important to eat.

So yeah, I she, she taught me very well.

Now I'm an expert at eating and enjoy.

Well, listen, I have enjoyed your leadership and traveling with you and how you are very, you know, just how you talk about with someone, your wife.

But wherever we go, you're very in tune to people's culture and their thoughts in a respectful of that.

What I mean, bring that back here to the House and the way that you engage with people.

And I thought it was just really important for a Caribbean American Heritage Month to have you as our guest, someone who is really there is everyone.

He is the front line for us in the Caribbean, and our interests are always top of mind for him.

So I want to thank you, Greg.

Thank you for your friendship.

Thank you for your love of our islands.

And we welcome you all the time.

You know, you don't need them all.

You come on down when you want to say.

I know you were just there in Saint Thomas.

I want to thank the people of the Virgin Islands for sending you.

And look, you've made all of us proud.

Thank you, people.

Sure.

Well, we've see every day on a glimpse when you were heading the impeachment trial, they saw in all of America, we all go, who is that lady?

You know, so you made us.

But now you're like everybody else.

I said, Hey, that's right.

That's the leader, Hakeem Jeffries, to put you on one of the most difficult committees to deal with some of the craziness that's taking place and just watching you perform and keeping people in check.

Bergen, I thank you for Stacey Plaskett.

Stay with us.

You know, she is just fantastic.

So I just want to thank the people.

Well, we love you.

Thank you.

Love you so much.

Thank you so much, Greg.

And thank you all.

This wraps up this edition of The Washington Report.

Happy Caribbean American Heritage Month.

And thank you for joining us.

You.