Tom Perez Quotes

Donald Trump has shown no interest in working toward increasing the minimum wage, no interest in doing anything but immigrant baiting, no interest in doing anything but filling the swamp with a band of billionaires who are simply trying to help the wealthy.

- Tom Perez

Every president since Nixon has embraced a policy of 'self-determination without termination' - the idea that Native Americans are best equipped to govern themselves. Trump is breaking with this position.

- Tom Perez

Responding to a natural disaster is a complex problem.

- Tom Perez

I was in the U.K. and Germany and went to Volkswagen and learned about their apprenticeship model - young people become paid apprentices in trades. It's not a coincidence that youth unemployment is far lower in Germany than the United States because there are paid opportunities for young people to get experience.

- Tom Perez

The Democratic Party has learned from the terrible mistakes of the past. Our platform requires that we honor, fulfill, and strengthen the federal government's trust responsibility to American Indians. We take this responsibility seriously.

- Tom Perez

Frankly, what we need to be looking at is whether this election was rigged by Donald Trump and his buddy Vladimir Putin.

- Tom Perez

I am proud of our diversity, and when you attack the federal workforce, you are having significant impact on women - many of whom are single moms working to support their family - and you're having a significant impact on communities of color.

- Tom Perez

I remember a good friend of mine whose father worked at Bethlehem Steel for 40 years with just a high school degree. That was a remarkable pathway to prosperity that sustained generations of working families.

- Tom Perez

As long as we're united, and as long as we continue to organize, invest, and lead with our values, we'll be unstoppable.

- Tom Perez

When you recruit good candidates and you have a good message and you have energy and organization and partnership, you always have a fighting chance.

- Tom Perez

Growing up in Buffalo, I saw shuttered factories that once housed thousands of steel manufacturing jobs. I remember the hollowing-out of the middle class in our community. I witnessed hope turn to hardship as a once-thriving city reckoned with a fast-changing world.

- Tom Perez

We're the party that has fought for Medicare. We're the party that has fought for Social Security. The Republicans have tried to privatize Social Security and voucherize Medicare.

- Tom Perez

Our message of opportunity and inclusion is, I think, a very powerful message that does indeed speak to Americans, but we've got to do a better job of listening.

- Tom Perez

Joe Arpaio built a wall. His was a wall of distrust, and when you don't have the trust of the community, you don't have anything. He claimed to be a law-and-order sheriff, but he was really lawlessness and disorder.

- Tom Perez

You're more likely to see someone fatally struck by lightning than witness a case of in-person voter fraud.

- Tom Perez

Sometimes you have to push the envelope in pursuit of the right thing.

- Tom Perez

If you're going to be a big tent party as we are, and you're going to help elect democrats who have generated support in their communities... the will of those voters is the will that we must respect.

- Tom Perez

Budgets are moral documents. They reflect the values of any government and when you're compromising clean air, clean water, and lead, you're making a statement about communities you don't care about.

- Tom Perez

I've said that we need to elect Democrats from the school board to the Senate.

- Tom Perez

Donald Trump is anathema to America.

- Tom Perez

When my grandchildren ask, 'Where were you when Donald Trump took a sledgehammer to Lady Liberty?' I want to make sure I can tell them I was there protecting America.

- Tom Perez

Donald Trump is a fraud. Listening to him talk about how he's going to put American first again, he's spent his entire career putting his own profits first.

- Tom Perez

The Democratic Party and DNC have to be a very conspicuous face of the opposition to Donald Trump and all his divisiveness. At the same time, we have to communicate our, I think, positive and inclusive message to everyone.

- Tom Perez

Our message has been muddled, especially in 2016. Voters in Ohio heard from Trump, 'I'm going to save your coal jobs.' And while that was a lie, what it told them is, 'I'm going to feel your pain.' What they heard from the Democratic side was, 'Vote for us because Donald Trump is crazy.'

- Tom Perez

I happen to think Donald Trump is crazy, but that's not an economic message.

- Tom Perez

Donald Trump, you don't stand for our values.

- Tom Perez

If Donald Trump wants to raise the minimum wage to $15, yes, I will work with Donald Trump.

- Tom Perez

If Donald Trump wants to acknowledge that we have a pay gap for women and we need to address it, I would work with Donald Trump.

- Tom Perez

If Donald Trump wants to pass comprehensive immigration reform, I will work with Donald Trump.

- Tom Perez

The Republican playbook is voter suppression.

- Tom Perez

We have to have a conversation where we bring in all the stakeholders and say, 'What is the vision of the Democratic Party?'

- Tom Perez

As Republicans try to trample on our most sacred freedoms, Democrats will do everything we can to end discrimination and protect the one right that preserves all others - the right to vote.

- Tom Perez

When you cut investments in worker training, you're cutting investments in the middle class.

- Tom Perez

Federal government has been a gateway to the middle class for people of color for generations.

- Tom Perez

Our message in rural America is just as powerful as it is in urban America. But because we haven't been a physical presence there in any sustained way, we have a lot of voters there who no longer believe that the Democratic Party is working for them.

- Tom Perez

Our universal message of access to economic opportunity resonates with the ironworker in northeastern Ohio and the immigrant in South Florida. And we sometimes have a relationship deficit with our voters, because we're not communicating that message.

- Tom Perez

You can't show up at a church every 4 October and say, 'Vote for me,' and call that persuasion.

- Tom Perez

It's not only inhumane to treat Puerto Ricans as second-class citizens. It's deeply un-American.

- Tom Perez

Here's the reality: when Hillary Clinton won the nomination, the DNC handed her insufficient and substandard tools for success.

- Tom Perez

We're the party that's fought for increased wages, fought for the union movement, fought to make sure that collective bargaining is not eviscerated, it's strengthened. And when we communicate those messages, we succeed.

- Tom Perez

Our economic future and our energy future are one in the same, and it's a future America can't shrink from. We must shape it, just as we've always done. We have to protect our planet from the threat of climate change and ensure that workers have the skills to compete for good middle-class jobs.

- Tom Perez

The politics of division are not what we want in New Jersey and Virginia and elsewhere.

- Tom Perez

The 3.5 million people in Puerto Rico are American citizens. They deserve fair and equal treatment as Americans.

- Tom Perez

There is no price tag on an American life - whether it's in Florida, Texas, or Puerto Rico.

- Tom Perez

I'm a proud Dominican American. My folks always taught me that it's important to keep the ladder down and that to whom much is given, much is expected. That's why I have pursued a career in public service. I can't think of a better way to give back what this nation gave to us than to try to make sure that opportunity exists for everyone.

- Tom Perez

Organizing has to be a 12-month endeavor.

- Tom Perez

Infrastructure done right can help working people; infrastructure done wrong is just more money for private equity.

- Tom Perez

I met a person on my rural tour in northwest Wisconsin who said to me, 'I feel politically homeless.' And we need to re-engage that person.

- Tom Perez

We need bold leadership to bring America back to its first principles of diversity inclusion and opportunity for everyone in every ZIP Code, and music is that vehicle to summon our better angels. Music is that vehicle and always has been a vehicle to challenge us to build a better America.

- Tom Perez

What you learn growing up in a place like Buffalo is that your job isn't just your paycheck, it's your identity. It doesn't just give you dollars, it gives you dignity.

- Tom Perez

We believe that health care is a right, not a privilege.

- Tom Perez

You can't eat cake and lose weight.

- Tom Perez

I've memorized 'Hamilton.'

- Tom Perez

People are so sick of these Twitter tirades. They want leaders they can be proud of.

- Tom Perez

Smart growth is having the courage to say yes and having the courage to say no.

- Tom Perez

Trust is not something that's given because you win an election; it's something you have to earn.

- Tom Perez

Michigan is a state we should have won in 2016, and we didn't, and I want to understand why.

- Tom Perez

I think our big tent is our greatest strength.

- Tom Perez

Every Democrat, like every American, should support a woman's right to make her own choices about her body and her health. That is not negotiable.

- Tom Perez

Donald Trump's vision of America, his nativist vision of America, his fear mongering - that's what we have to fight.

- Tom Perez