November 2, 2010
[transcript]
Van Hollen: Good
evening everybody. Good evening and welcome. We want to
thank all of you first of all for your terrific support for our
candidates across the country, who are right now working very hard
until the polls close as are their supporters and volunteers throughout
this great land. And as we speak, as we speak, voters are proving
the pundits wrong the pundits who said the Democrats were not going to
turn out, because Democrats are turning out. Democrats are
turning out. We saw the early signs of that in the early voting
states, in the vote by mail and the in-person voting, and today, as
people open their doors in the morning and went to the polls, we saw
strong Democratic turnout, much higher than had been predicted, and I
want to thank all of you for being part of that process. Every
one of our candidates has the strongest field and volunteer network
they've ever had in any of their campaigns, and we've had thousands of
volunteers knocking on doors, making telephone calls and reminding the
American people of their responsibility to get out and exercise their
right to vote in this great democracy of ours and people are
responding. Those volunteers, those people who are making those
calls, are fighting for the future of our country.
No one has fought harder, working with our great President Barack
Obama, no one has fought harder than the Speaker of the House Nancy
Pelosi. We all know that the night before President Barack Obama
was sworn in as president 700,000 Americans were losing their jobs
every month, every month in this country. We have now seen eight
consecutive months of postive private sector job growth. We have
seen that. Are we where we want to be? Of course not.
No one is satisfied; millions of Americans are hurting economically and
we need to keep the country moving forward. We cannot go back to
the same failed policies that got us into this mess and we cannot turn
the Congress back over to the special interests. That's what the
Speaker's been fighting for; that's what the President's been fighting
for, that's what the volunteers right now all over this country have
been fighting for, and that's what our great Majority Leader Steny
Hoyer has been fighting for on issue after issue after issue. I'm
very proud to call him a friend, I'm very proud to call him a fellow
Marylander, and I want to thank him not only for what he's done for the
Democratic caucus but most importantly on this great election day, as
we celebrate our democracy, I want to thank him for all he's done to
work to move our country forward. Steny Hoyer.
Hoyer: Well thank you
very much Chris Van Hollen and thank all of you. You have been
very spectacular over these last two years working with us to do what
we pledged to do, and that's being on the side of working men and women
in this country and trying to make their lives better. We haven't
done it, as Chris said, fast enough or big enough and we're going to
keep on keeping on until they are in the place that we had them in the
1990s, doing very well and wanting to do better.
Ladies and gentlemen, I want to say how proud I am of all of you.
I want to say how proud I am of our candidates. I want to say how
proud I am on behalf of the voters of this country, who are coming out,
as we speak, as we speak are coming out, as we speak are going to the
polls and expressing their views on where they want this country to
go. And we're going to be listening; we're going to be listening
to the. And as the Speaker will tell you, her polls have a number
of hours left to go and we've got tens of thousands, tens of thousands
of people in the neighborhoods urging people to get out and vote.
Now I want to urge every American who has not yet voted and who still
has that opportunity to take it, to take that precious gift of our
Constitution and of our country and vote. Express your
opinion. Make your voice heard.
And so with all of you, we're going to be listening, we're going to be
listening closely, and we're going to be expecting the American people
to say let us move forward together. Let us solve these problems
that confront us, let us solve these challenges that have concerned us
so, and we are speaking up and speaking out and we want you to make a
difference. We are pledged to do just that. Ladies and
gentlemen, an individual who has made an extraordinary difference on
behalf of working men and women in this country, on behalf of those who
feel powerless in the eyes of special interests, whether they be large
Wall Street firms or insurance companies who would tell them when they
can go to the doctor and when they can't or other interest groups that
would take from them the power over their own live. We've heard
that cry. We want you on our side. Let me tell you
something ladies and gentlemen. Somebody who has been on their
side and who has been a strong and compelling and courageous voice on
behalf of average working men and women in this country, the Speaker of
the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi.
Pelosi: Thank you
all. Thank you all very much. Thank you all very
much. Across the country, across the country polls are still
open. So many of us have to get back on the phone to urge people
to get out the vote, so I'll be brief. I want to thank Chris Van
Hollen for his tremendous leadership of the Democratic Congressional
Campaign Committee, candidates across the country volunteers who are
working for them, acknowledge his leadership and say that we have the
best ground operation to get out the vote. As we gather here,
hundreds of thousands of volunteers are walking precincts, are making
phone calls, are ringing those door bells for our democracy.
They're out there because they know the tremendous difference that this
election will make. They know the distinction between Democrats
who want to protect Social Security and Medicare and Republicans who
want to privatize both of them. They know the distinction between
Democrats who want to make it in America, manufacture it in America so
that the American people can make it in America. And I thank
Steny Hoyer for coining that phrase which has captured so much of the
imagination of our grassroots people. We must not allow the
erosion of our manufacturing base, we must make it in America.
And as we do that, as people walk precincts across the country, we have
to remember that this election is an election from sea to shining sea,
from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and so people all over the country
are not going to be told by people in Washington how this election will
turn out; they will speak for themselves by going to the polls.
I want to acknowledge that we are in the district of Eleanor Holmes
Norton, the District of Columbia, where hope is always alive.
From one side of the continent, and acknowledge the presence of
Congresswoman Anna Eshoo from California. So I know that many of
us have to get back on the phone. I thank all of you for what you
have done. These hundreds of thousands of volunteers are our
VIPs, our volunteers in politics; they are the guardians of our
democracy; they are saying that this election will not be bought by
special interests but will be earned by convincing the American people
and convince them they will that we have taken the country in a new
direction under the leadership of our great President, Barack
Obama. We have taken the country in a new direction. We are
not going back to the failed policies of the past. We are
fighting for the middle class. Thank you for being part of that
fight. I join our distinguished Majority Leader, Steny Hoyer, in
calling upon people to get out and vote. He has been so much a
part of advancing this agenda. As people are walking precincts,
every step they take advances the agenda to improve the lives of
America's working families. Let's go out there and continue the
fight for a great Democratic victory. Thank all of you.
Onward to victory.