On SiriusXM, Gallego Discusses His Economic Policy Plan to Save America’s Middle Class, Rips President Trump’s Russian Oil Deal

WASHINGTON — This week, Senator Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) joined SiriusXM’s “The Julie Mason Show” to discuss his expansive economic policy plan to rebuild the middle class. During the conversation, Senator Gallego noted specific provisions from the plan that would bring the American Dream back within reach, including raising the federal minimum wage to $20-an-hour and creating a New Deal-style jobs program in the wake of uncertainty brought on by Artificial Intelligence. The senator also addressed President Trump’s diesel deal with Vladimir Putin, which Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky called “a gift” to Putin. Listen: The Julie Mason Show On increasing the minimum wage: “We need to start raising the wage and get it to 20 dollars-an-hour … so, that way, people actually have a decent chance to save some money and … breathe a little easier. “I hear all the time, and I heard this in Arizona when I was running for Senate 2024: [Americans] feel like they’re just drowning. And they’re treading water as much as they can. But every time the end of the month comes, they pay a bill and they realize that there’s just nothing left. And, so, people are just working to survive instead of working to actually have [a] real life.” On union density and sectoral bargaining: “[Some people] always talk about these amazing days in America … they’re usually talking somewhere between the late 1950s and late 1970s. One wage could get you enough to buy a house and get a car… that’s also when the United States had the highest union density in its history. And it’s not a coincidence that the buying power of middle-class America has gone down as union density has gone down. On his proposed FDR-style job program: “[This program is] going to be mostly an answer to what, potentially, is going to come from a lot of job losses from AI. “The goal is to make sure that people don’t have massive disruption like we saw in 2008, for example. As someone from Arizona that saw what happened with bad economic turns, this actually gives an opportunity for people to make wages.” On the recent diesel deal with Russia: “It’s a corrupt deal. Number one, it’s not in the best interest of this country for us to actually help Russia. The diesel deal is bad to begin with, just on paper. “In the end, Russia is a country that does not care, and could care less, about the United States and will gladly turn on us at any point. And, so, the fact that Donald Trump fell for that, and we’re screwing over Ukraine in the process, is why most Americans are just aghast by this deal.”