Top 55 Pramila Jayapal Quotes

When bosses, leaders, and powerful men and women ignore or deny the accounts of harassment victims, they reinforce the idea that harassers are playing the game as they should and that the rest of us should fall in line.

Having a strong race lens means you understand racism is threaded through and institutionalized in all of our systems and our very perceptions, threaded through how someone looks at you, treats you, thinks about you and your potential.

President Trump has harnessed the fear and prejudice that have accompanied every wave of immigrants in United States history, and stoked those fears to further his own agenda.

I come from a state in India that is a matrilineal state, Kerala. And so women really are seen as very powerful.

Every hour that goes by with family separation policies in effect is another hour that mothers weep thinking of their children, another hour that kids are fearfully wondering where their parents have been taken, another hour that trauma deepens.

Corporations and special interests have their voice in Congress, and they have too many members scared of their power. What Congress needs is a progressive voice who is unafraid to take on these powerful interests – who is willing to fight for all Americans, not just the wealthiest 1 percent.

I’ve always thought of the United States as a place where so much was possible and so many opportunities were out there.

I’ve always believed that immigration is really about who we are as a country and what we’re willing to stand up for.

I came to the United States by myself when I was 16 years old. My parents had about $5,000 in their bank account, and they used it all to send me here because they truly believed that this country was where I was going to get the best education and have the best opportunities.

For immigrant women, the very act of immigration is about opportunity, equality, and freedom. Women immigrants come to America to care for their families, escape gender-based violence, or express their sexual identity.

I would attend a State of the Union by a president with whom I disagree if I felt she or he was otherwise respectful and adhered to basic moral values or basic tenets of civility and respect.

Civil rights icons, famous journalists, big-time movie producers may all have credits to their name that we can recognize and be grateful for, but their record of good works cannot excuse their harassment of women.

When I was a little girl, my dad always said to me that I was going to be this great businesswoman, that I was going to be the CEO of IBM. So that’s what I came into the world thinking, that I was going to go into the business world and make my mark there.

I am on the side of the working person across the country.

The vast majority of immigrants – regardless of the conditions of war and poverty that may wrack their home countries – come and contribute to their new home country: building our roads, caring for our homes, children, and elders, and serving as doctors, lawyers, employers, and innovators.

What makes America great is our commitment to our values of inclusivity and opportunity for all.

Trump has hated Amazon for a long time, and I think that that came out in many interviews that he’s done with ‘Vanity Fair’ and with others.

We are a country that has always been known for providing opportunities to people. We have lost a lot of that opportunity.

I like being on a plane with no phone service because I get so much work done.

I’m an organizer at heart. Organizers know that giving information, being in front of people, talking to people, to build our movement for the kind of country that we see is the most important thing.

Racism, sexism, and age-ism are all alive and well in the U.S. House.

I love my district, the 37th Legislative District in Washington State, where I have lived for more than 20 years.

History has always judged silence and complicity harshly in these times of moral consequence.

Those who have the most power – whether famous TV anchors, rich Hollywood moguls, judges, Members of Congress, or the president of the United States – must decide how to exert that power: for corruption or for good.

Individuals whose asylum claims have been accepted have gone on to become professors, soldiers in our military, artists, and more.

Sometimes when really terrible things happen, something beautiful emerges out of it.

We can never be afraid to stand up for what is right, no matter what others may say. And sometimes, if that means taking a lonely road, if what we are standing for is true, then perhaps moonlight or sunshine will light our way and make it less lonely.

It is always easier to have somebody to blame, but immigrants are not the cause of the country’s economic woes.

Getting a college degree used to be free or low cost because, as a society, we saw providing higher education to young people as an investment – in them and in the future of our own country.

Immigrants contribute more than they take. It is a lie that they take public benefits, because they don’t qualify for just about every benefit.

There isn’t really precedent for asylum seekers’ being criminally prosecuted at the border before they’ve had a ‘credible fear’ hearing. You come seeking asylum. Seeking asylum is not illegal.

Ripping children away from their parents has a particular shameful history, both in this country and around the world.

When women are told that sexual harassment is ‘part of the job’ or when assistants of both sexes enable harassing behavior, they have bought into the culture that says such behavior is not just permissible, it is a desirable expression of power.

I feel like young people, more than anyone in the country, always have their moral compass on perfectly straight.

I usually wake up really early because I keep myself on East Coast time.

It took me 17 years to become a U.S. citizen.

As we say we fight for working people, we have to make sure our policies reflect that.

As an immigrant, I have lived, in a way, the American dream, and I want to make sure that opportunity is available for everybody.

I’ve been told to go back to my country so many times, I can’t even count.

I am grateful for my family, friends, and all those who send constant love and support – you are my energy and my hope. You teach me, love me even when I’m wrong, and let me ride the challenges and come out whole.

I have an incredibly supportive family.

I’m conscious of my race and ethnicity in the legislature – it’s hard not to be.

I have a little yoga ritual that I do just to move my body around. Whatever I do, it’s usually very fast because often I don’t have the kind of time that I would like to.

OneAmerica worked over the course of a decade to bring the movement of immigrants and communities of color together with the movement for marriage equality in Washington.

If you look at the future of the Democratic Party, things like raising the minimum wage – Democrats need to get behind raising the minimum wage and be clear on where we stand on trade deals.

If someone tells me that something can’t be done, that makes me more determined to do it.

Fundamentally, I’ve always been a fan of actually looking at our whole state tax system and really figuring out how we reform our tax system so that everyone’s paying their fair share but we don’t have a lot of nickel and diming with 100 taxes that end up hitting people that maybe can’t bear it the most.

Trump can embrace dictators and gulags, but we the people stand for human rights, for dignity, for keeping families together.

We on the Left are very good at criticizing people, but we need to build the base to pull people to the Left.

We the people are sick and tired of the criminalization of immigrants, sick to our hearts to see Trump’s family separation policies rip families apart across our country.

Regardless of who is elected president in 2016, we all still live together. Each of us has a different role to play, but we all have to hold the collective space for movement-building together. It’s the only way we move forward.

There’s nothing normal about graduating with massive student debt, where you live in fear of predatory debt collectors and wage garnishers even as you are starting to live your life.

We need to expand the idea of choice to be about all the choices we make in our lives: including which country we choose to live in so we can be whole and full women.

Immigration is about more than just who comes here and who is allowed to stay. It is about who we are as a country and what we are willing to stand up for.

After 9/11, I had just become an American citizen, and I remember sitting in front of my TV set watching the news of the attacks, in tears. I remember thinking to myself, ‘Nothing is ever going to be the same in this country for people who look like me.’