INTERVIEW WITH KESHA ROGERS

‘Stop Greedy Al Green’s Impeachment Drive Against Trump’

This is an edited transcript of an interview with Kesha Rogers, Independent candidate for U.S. Congress in the 9th CD in Texas. She was interviewed by EIR Co-Editor Tony Papert on Sunday, Sept. 23, 2018.

EIR: We’re on the phone with Kesha Rogers, who is on the Nov. 6 ballot as an Independent candidate for Congress in Texas’ 9th Congressional District. Kesha, what are your reasons for running, and why an Independent campaign? Many people would think an Independent campaign would have to be purely symbolic.

Kesha Rogers: I’m running in the 9th Congressional District of Texas to challenge and defeat incumbent Al Green. I am running as an Independent, even though I grew up as a Franklin Roosevelt Democrat—in the tradition of Franklin Roosevelt, fighting for the forgotten men and women of this nation. I ran two congressional campaigns, successful campaigns, to secure the nomination of the Democratic Party in 2010 and 2012, winning those nominations. And, as a Democrat, I forced a run-off election in 2014 on a platform of saving NASA and impeaching Obama. I took on that campaign fight because it became clear to me that the Democratic Party has become increasingly controlled by Wall Street and the warmongering interests that are for regime change wars and bailing out the financial interests of Wall Street, moving away from the tradition of Franklin Roosevelt.

Unfortunately, this has now become the standard for the Democratic Party. But the deciding moment for me in leaving the Democratic Party came after the grotesque nomination process of Hillary Clinton and when I saw that she was clearly going to be a continuation of the Bush/Obama drive toward regime change and war, and would continue supporting the speculative interests of Wall Street.

In the 2016 election, a real shift occurred, in which the American people voted to elect a President, Donald Trump, who was making it very clear that he stood in opposition to the policies that had existed not only under the Obama Administration, but also under the Bush/Cheney Administration before.

We saw many blue-collar workers, Independents and even Democrats change over to vote for Donald Trump because he clearly enunciated his desire to go back to the productive standards of the United States. However, there continue to be forces within the Republican Party, also, which don’t understand what those American System productive standards are. And that’s why my campaign as an Independent is so important right now. And it’s important because of the nature of this midterm election, campaigning nationally, going after the forces behind people like Al Green and others who stand with him, with their number-one objective being the impeachment of this constitutionally elected President.

The American System,
Not Wall Street

EIR: Do you want to tell us more about your background? I know you’re pretty well known in your district and beyond.

Rogers: Sure. I have been, first of all, a student of the American System of political economy. I have campaigned for many years on the economic platform of bringing about growth and economic development through committing to an advanced science driver approach, restoring our high-technology manufacturing, and restoring our industry generally.

This has been a result of a 15-year association and friendship with a leading economist and scientist, Lyndon LaRouche, with whom you are very familiar. My growth and experience developed from being able to know Mr. LaRouche and study not only his breakthroughs in the science of physical economy, but also his enrichment of the ideas of our first Treasury Secretary, Alexander Hamilton. In his writings on economics, together with his role in the development of our Constitution, Hamilton established the essence of what the productive standard of a nation should be. That work has been advanced by the breakthroughs in the scientific and economic methods of Lyndon LaRouche.

In addition to my opposition to policies of war, regime change and geopolitics, a lot of my campaigns and my organizing over the many years now, has been the result of going out and fighting for legislation to reverse the continuing destruction of our economic process, where you’ve seen a collapse in the real economy, a collapse in job growth, in the commitment to scientific advancement. As a candidate for Congress, my number-one platform has always been to save NASA, and fully fund our space program as the economic driver or engine for real productive growth.

In my past campaigns, this really moved and transformed Texans and Americans, because they saw something in me different from what have been accepted as the left/right political norms. They saw in my campaign something different—a commitment to economic growth led by a science-driver, something not being presented by the establishment party factions.

As my campaign is unfolding, the institution of the Presidency is under total and continuous attack. One of the leaders of that attack is a leading money-making crony who sits on the Financial Services Committee in the House of Representatives—a man who has continued to support the policies of bailing out Wall Street, who has continued to support the policies of drug legalization, who has continued to support the war policy, and who is now campaigning on a one-note agenda: to impeach the President of the United States. He claims—publicly—that the President doesn’t even have to commit a crime to be impeached! That’s my opponent, Al Green.

Let me repeat that: Al Green—now being joined by Representatives Nancy Pelosi and Maxine Waters of California, and Jim Clyburn of North Carolina—has said that the President need not commit a crime in order to be impeached. No crime. None!

This is the standard that we’re up against right now. The American people know that this is a complete hoax and a fraud, and that what such people represent is to the detriment of the entire nation.

This May Be the Most Important Election

EIR: Do you want to say more about Al Green in the District?

Rogers: I have issued an Open Letter to the people of the 9th Congressional District, titled: “You Deserve a Better Future than Rep. Al ‘Impeachment’ Green Would Allow You.” We have printed 20,000 copies, and we are circulating them throughout the District right now. We’ve been hitting businesses and going door to door in the community; the responses we’re getting are quite overwhelming in support of our campaign against the hypocrisy and the insanity of Al Green.

For the more than twelve years that Congressman Green has been in Congress, many people have noticed that he is the “unseen Congressman.” He has not been around to care for his constituents.

Congressman Green just spoke to the Congressional Black Caucus on September 13, in a panel titled something like “Impeachment, a Necessary Remedy for Bigotry.” Al Green did not go into the Congressional Black Caucus to discuss with them strategies for dealing with poverty, the unprecedented crime rate, drug trafficking and overdosing, human trafficking, and all the other things that are killing members of his constituency. No discussion about flood control, or infrastructure, or how to reverse the downward economic trend, while the people of this District are being driven deeper and deeper into economic despair. Instead, he strutted around, using the “race card” to attack the President, to avoid any discussion related to his responsibility to help the residents of his own District, my District.

More and more people in the District have come to recognize that we have a congressman who has not held a real town hall meeting—directly addressing his constituents—in years. It has become apparent that his concept of poverty alleviation is more of “how to make people a little bit more comfortable with their poverty,” instead relieving them of it, of actually eradicating poverty.

This is something that people now see, and something they completely despise. People don’t want handouts. They are looking for a hand-up, they’re looking for ways to improve the economic conditions of their lives, and right now, we have a Congress member who is either oblivious to this or simply doesn’t give a damn.

This is the difference between him and me. There are many things in my Platform and my Open Letter that address precisely this. Over the past years, my Platform has focused on looking at the standards set by the Presidents who promoted real economic growth, such as John F. Kennedy. We are using the example of the space program as the great engine, the real economic driver in boosting the society, one that put millions to work, that advanced the capital-intensive growth in our society.

I was just reading an article that describes it quite well, that we now have an economy of “financialization,” i.e., the taking of quick money profits instead of actually advancing our manufacturing, our industrial growth, and the development of our skilled labor. The article describes how financialization is starving manufacturing, because a lot of start-up companies are having a very hard time getting capital and the tax credits they need to get started, which hurts manufacturing, and it strangles new ideas in science and technology.

This is what we’re up against right now, and this is why I have been in the forefront of fighting for the economic approach embodied in Lyndon LaRouche’s Four Economic Laws, starting with the re-imposition of Glass-Steagall. We would already have this—and many other positive measures as well—if we didn’t have people like Al Green in Congress.

The election is less than two months away. In Texas we have an early voting process, which begins October 22.

This is what we now see going into this election. This may be the most important national election in our lifetimes, not only for the people of the 9th Congressional District, but for every citizen in the nation.

No Visible Support for Al ‘Impeachment’ Green

EIR: Before we conclude, could you say a little more about Al Green, just so it is as clear as possible?

Rogers: The key to this is, who is lining Al Green’s pocket book? He is one of the richest Congress members, worth millions of dollars. He sits on the Financial Services Committee, and his District is one of the poorest, with one of the highest crime rates in the country. I think those facts really need to be contrasted with the breakdown that ordinary men, women, and their families are experiencing, and contrasted to my platform for economic growth to do away with, as I said before, the war policy, the regime change policy, the drug trafficking.

I will finish by saying this: One thing that’s very important for people to know in this election, especially if they live in the 9th Congressional District and have the opportunity to vote for me: I’m running as an Independent. And to go back to the first question you asked, which is, do people see the Independent campaign as just a lost cause? Well, I’m the only Independent candidate, that is going toe to toe in standing up in defense of the President against the ongoing coup. My Independent candidacy and my platform represents a more important and greater potential than any campaign out there, a greater power and potential for actually addressing the future needs of our country right now, making sure we shut down the British Empire control over our American System and the institution of the Presidency.

I am running as an Independent, but in Texas, our election process still revolves around a two-party system of straight party votes for Republicans or else Democrats. We have to break that. I am calling on everyone to break their straight party ticket and deliberately and decisively vote for me. Look for my name on the ballot: Kesha Rogers, Independent for Congress. It’s there.

That is an important message, because unless voters do that, they’re going to miss the opportunity to vote for me. There’s no Republican running in the District, so voters have to go and vote for me as an Independent.

We have been non-stop on the campaign trail. We have a sound truck going around the District. We are dropping in at local businesses and going to community events, where I’ve received a very positive response. There is almost no visible support for Al Green. There is a large, international community in the 9th CD, including Chinese, Vietnamese, Nigerian, and Caribbean, including Haitian. There is also a large Latino constituency in the District. My platform of bringing the United States on board the Belt and Road Initiative has resonated very strongly among these groups. This has also been the case for American-born constituents, among labor especially.

I have spoken before a number of these groups, and I have also addressed a number of political meetings of Republicans and other groups, on the importance of this election for the future of mankind. I have received an overwhelming response of support. I have a national team of phone-bank callers and others, organizing to get the word out on the national importance of this campaign for the future of all of us, and recruiting people in the District to support me.

EIR: Thanks so much.