{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.gallego.senate.gov/news/press-releases/watch-gallego-calls-congressional-republicans-cowards-for-only-now-condemning-the-iran-war/", "WATCH: Gallego Calls Congressional Republicans \u201cCowards\u201d for only now Condemning the Iran War", "2026-09-23", "2026", "2026-09", "Democrat", "Senate", "AZ", "Ruben Gallego", "G000574", "www.gallego.senate.gov", "gallego", "https://www.gallego.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/", "scraper", "NEW YORK \u2013 During his visit to the United Nations General Assembly, Senator Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) joined MS NOW and slammed congressional Republicans for speaking out against the Iran War only after Speaker Mike Johnson sent members home until after the November midterm elections, denounced Trump\u2019s imperialism in Venezuela to enrich American corporations, recapped his meetings with world leaders, and gave his reaction to President Trump saying he will \u201cannihilate\u201d Iran.\n\nMS NOW: All in with Chris Hayes\n\nOn cowardly Republicans only now speaking out against the Iran War: \u201cCourage is found when session is out. All three of those Republicans literally are saying this as soon as Speaker Johnson has said we\u2019re not coming back to vote anyway. There\u2019s even no way to actually test them, right?\n\n\u201cLet\u2019s just be honest, they\u2019re just a bunch of cowards. They\u2019ve been literally living in this cowardly way this whole time. The American public have been hurting the whole time. Our families have been hurting, especially those that serve overseas.\n\n\u201cAnd now when it\u2019s convenient, now when they can\u2019t actually be called to the carpet to actually answer for this, they are seeking kind of the last-minute reprieve to be able to say, look at me, I am now independent of this man.\n\nOn Trump using the United States military in Venezuela enrich American corporations: \u201cAs someone who, unfortunately, had to see the outcome of really bad wars, a war that we are chasing just for profit\u2014a war that only benefits a bunch of big oil executives and anyone else whose family ends up using insider trading to actually pump up their own portfolios, it\u2019s disgusting.\n\n\u201cWhen we\u2019re using our military to basically enrich ourselves and enrich our rich, crony oligarchs who are in charge of this country, then we actually don\u2019t have the friends we need when things really go bad.\n\n\u201cSo, when we\u2019re attacking a country to basically be colonial, to bring back this imperialistic point of view that some of Latin America is very, very used to and pretty aware of, it only makes sure that we have fewer and fewer friends going into the future, when we need more and more friends going into the future\u2014especially if we want to actually deal with China.\u201d\n\nOn the Pentagon\u2019s disregard for the lives of our service members: \u201cThey\u2019re not actually looking at these men and women as actual human beings. They\u2019re looking at them as numbers and as political tools. That\u2019s the grander problem.\n\n\u201cBut the fact is, the way they\u2019re treating them, it reminds me of what I dealt with and the fact that, you know, my friends\u2014the way they died, how we died\u2014we were basically treated as just kind of a side spectacle to this bigger issue, this bigger war. And this is what\u2019s happening again.\u201d\n\nMS NOW: Morning Joe\n\nOn if the United States will come to aid Poland, a NATO member, if Russia invades them: \u201cSo if you talk to Poland, they do believe we\u2019ll come there. But what they\u2019re afraid of, because of this kind of inconsistency from this president, is that Russia\u2019s going to make a mistake. They\u2019re going to make a miscalculation, and that\u2019s how most wars start, actually, is through massive miscalculation.\n\n\u201cNow, the Polish government \u2014 the military is the strongest it\u2019s ever been. It\u2019s actually one of the fastest-growing economies. Their military is modernizing very quickly. They will be able to defend themselves, but the best wars are the ones that you never start, or you never have to get into. And they\u2019re afraid that this president\u2019s instability, his lack of leadership, his inability to actually stand up to Putin, is actually going to encourage them to actually attack or anything else.\u201d\n\nOn what the United States needs to end the war in Iran: \u201cThere is no way out of this unless we go really, really deeper and deeper into war, which the American public doesn\u2019t want, and I don\u2019t think it actually ends up getting us where we want.\n\n\u201cThe problem is you have [Steve] Witkoff, right? Witkoff is a real estate lawyer\u2014like, salesman, zoning training. Why is he and the other son-in-law negotiating for the United States right now.\n\n\u201cThese are not the best negotiators we should be sending to. We need to sit down and have long-term negotiations, and we\u2019re not getting that right now. We\u2019re not getting the smartest people in the room. Actually, we\u2019re getting part of the dumbest people in the room. And we\u2019re going against some of the best negotiators that Iran has offered.\u201d\n\nOn Senator Gallego\u2019s reaction to Trump saying he will \u201cannihilate\u201d Iran after he dodged serving in the Vietnam War: \u201cWell, there\u2019s a lot of people that avoided the Vietnam War, but there\u2019s very few people that avoided the Vietnam War and then look at war in such a positive manner and use terms like \u2018annihilation.\u2019\n\n\u201cYou know, seeing 18, 19-year-old boys having to make some really hard decisions, some life-and-death decisions at the last minute, and then seeing some of these politicians, when I got back, kind of treat us as if we\u2019re just like toys and that somehow our decisions didn\u2019t have consequences. And we have consequences. I still carry the consequences from the war.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s going to affect these men and women forever, and it\u2019s going to affect our country forever. And not just, obviously, our men, but even there, as much as I tried to help the Iraqis, certainly there was a lot of downsides, and there were some bad effects that happened there. I can\u2019t imagine we want to do that to another society willingly, especially people that just aren\u2019t even involved in this war, just civilians.\u201d", 1, "2026-09-24T09:44:48Z", "2026-09-24T09:45:52Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.gallego.senate.gov/news/press-releases/watch-gallego-calls-congressional-republicans-cowards-for-only-now-condemning-the-iran-war/"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 1.4208562206476927, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}