Transcript of Rebecca Cooke on Fighting to Defeat MAGA Congressman in WI

Wisconsin voters are absolutely pissed at Donald Trump and all of the MAGA sycophants in Congress, especially in Wisconsin's third Congressional district, where you have this MAGA Republican Congress member, Derek Van Ordon, who appears to be more focused on throwing ranger parties in his Congressional office than actually helping the people. It seems he actually wants to betray the people in his district. This is a real photo right here per a source. Here's a photo from late July of this beer keg party in Van Ordon's office. They were partying loudly and yelling at the teenage Senate pages. It's interesting that that's where he wants to spend his time versus actually holding in-person town halls. He does these fake virtual town halls where they come up with the questions in advance, but people want to know what the hell is really going on because he betrayed and through the people of Wisconsin under the bus. It should be noted, unfortunately, Wisconsin went for a Trump in 2024. Take a listen to these Wisconsin voters, how they feel. Let's play it.

We aren't going to forget these cuts because you hit them after the midterm elections.

We're going to make sure everyone in Wisconsin knows that you betrayed us for out-of-state billionaires.

The voters are right there. One of the things that these MAGA Republicans did in getting rid of rural health care, health care in general, gutting all these programs, is they tried They did it right after the midterm so they can try to go back and claim that they're actually helping the people. But the people are not stupid. They know what's going on here. It's just so interesting because Derek Van Orden had previously said in, I think, one of these virtual fake town halls of his It's a bright line for me. I will never vote for a budget bill that has Medicaid cuts, especially rural Medicaid cuts here. Watch what he says.

Just because we live in rural areas doesn't mean that high quality health care should be rarely accessible to us. I have very, very few hard lines when it comes to these issues that we talk about regularly. One of them is this, that I've been crystal clear with the leadership in the house here If during this budget reconciliation process, they're going to try to cut rural health care, I am not on board. I will not be on board with a package that if anybody is trying to cut any type of rural health care, it's just not going to happen on my watch.

It did happen on your watch, and you actually promoted it. You also promoted getting rid of women from our armed forces. You said, I'll talk about that in a second, But you also wanted cuts to the VA. You said to Doug Collins, the VA Secretary, When are we going to cut the VA? Here, play this clip.

Here's what happened, Mr. Secretary. I had my crack graphics team draw this up so I can explain to some people what's What's going on. Here it is right there. That's the whole VA. This is the problem with the VA. This is the increase in bureaucrats. These are the doctors. It's almost a flat line. Then we have an increase with the veterans because of the PAC Act. When we are going to cut the VA, and I hope you do, sir, this is where you need to make the cut, right there in this line, right there, sir. Mr. Secretary, if you cut this, then this-Okay.

Then he doesn't want women in the armed forces. Here, play this clip.

Okay, as far as standards, the standard is the minimum. That is the minimum level of performance that someone will reach or they're not qualified for the job. The NFL does not have a standard for females. If you're a lady and you want to join the NFL, go try out for the team. How many women play in the NFL? Anybody? The answer is zero. Why is there an NBA and a WNBA? Why? Because as they acknowledge biology. We can have as many whiz-bang, high-tech things available. But at the end of the day, to win a war, you need someone to go in a room and beat someone to death with their hands.

Finally, he calls Donald Trump God. Let's play it.

My last question for you before we run out of time because I know you're busy and you're doing other things. With regard to getting all of the identified corruption, all of the identified elements from DOGE. They've given you guys a lot to work with.

Getting that stuff out of our budget, how close are we? We are closer than you would think. We've been working very, very diligently. What we need to do is codify these things because, God forbid, we don't have a Republican that follows up Donald Trump. Then all of these executive orders are very easy to reverse.

Then even just the overall Congressional Delegation in Wisconsin just doesn't like this Van Orden guy. Here's the Democratic Congress member, Mark Puket. He's a guy, though, who gets along with mostly everybody. Watch his interaction with Van Orden here. Let's play this clip.

Way that you're not going to have those safeguards, that's the real problem.

Anything else? There he is.

Derek Van Orden. You can put that on the news.

Was that on me? No.

That's the nicest thing he did to me all day.

Hey, Derek. Classy as always, man. We love it. Thank you. Have you lost your mind? People read this stuff. I saw your drunk and tweed at 1: 30 in the morning last day. No, I got done with Andy. I got you. That's for the show. That's for the show. I don't know what it is, but I encourage you to see the Mental Health Council. It's absolutely disgusting. Derek, why don't you debate me? Why are you so afraid to debate anyone here? We could do this in the media. Why don't you want to debate the big, beautiful Bill? Why are you afraid to have a debate on the Bill? Mark Copan has never had a job in his entire life other than in politics, and he doesn't understand. I've owned a small business for Tony, you're on a small business. That's a little work, isn't it? He fundals over $500,000 a year of his campaign money to buy signs from his company. Okay, look that up. Oh, my God. Are you drinking right now, Derek?

That's the real question. All right. When you look at Derek Van Oord, this bag of Republican congressmen from Wisconsin's third, is everything that's wrong with Washington, DC, right? Let's bring in Rebecca Cooke right now. Rebecca grew up in a dairy farm. She ran a small business. She's been in Wisconsin pretty much her entire life. You're running for Wisconsin's third Congressional district. What's going on? I showed you those clips there at the outset. What is going on with this Van Orde guy?

Yeah, look, I mean, it's no surprise to folks in this district. He really brings a laundry list to the job from his participation also in the insurrection to his decorum and the votes that he has taken in Congress are just so opposite of our values here in Wisconsin 3. And it's been really frustrating. And that's part of why I stepped up to run is to push back on him, hold his feet to the fire in this administration accountable for the things that he's doing that are so opposite of our values here in the region.

So he refuses to hold in-person town halls. He does these virtual town halls where they, I guess, pick the questions in advance. And as I showed at the outset, he basically lies about what his positions are, even in those artificial settings. You held a town hall recently with Bernie Sanders. It was in a barn. It was a community town hall. What are you hearing from community members right now? What are their concerns? And what are you hearing in general?

Yeah, we've been talking to folks all across the district all summer, from dairy breakfast to county fairs, really trying to meet voters where they're at. Was grateful for Senator Sanders to come to Wurl, Vernon County this last weekend to host a town hall with me to ask people what's really keeping them up at night. And I've been hearing from a lot of folks their concerns around health care, just what access looks like and affordability. We've already had two major hospitals close in this district in the last couple of years in my hometown in Eau Claire. So the repercussions from this bill are going to continue to be really great in a region that is already reeling from cuts to health care. Around 30,000 people are going to be cut from Medicaid. When you think about Van Orden, he lost by, or he won, excuse me, by 11,000 votes. I think that those 30,000 people are going to have something to say when 2026 rolls around.

Yeah, so you ran against him in the last election. It was super close. Super close. Trump ended up winning. Van Orden ended up winning. When you're out there right now, do you see the tide shifting? I mean, we covered in the past day or so in Iowa, in a ruby red district, the Senate district One, flipping a 20-point swing. Democrats are overperforming now 10 to 15 points in the special election. So do you think the tide is shifting?

Absolutely. I mean, I think that you can just see it in the way that people have been active since the last election. I mean, folks are protesting in our communities at least once a week, all across this district and showing up in big numbers. And they're doing not on top of caring for their aging parents or making sure that their kids are getting off to soccer practice. They're finding the extra time to really exercise their voices. And so I certainly think that we're going to see the tide's churn when it comes to 2026. But it's also important, I think, for us to have a vision of not just why the other side is bad, why all of these cuts, why these things are hurting folks, but what are the opportunities that exist, I think, for us to be able to build back our big tent. I spend a lot of time going to rural communities that I think have often been overlooked by the Democratic Party to make sure that people know that no matter where they live, whatever zip code that they're in, that we're going to be showing up and talking to them.

One of the theses or theses that I have here at the Midas Touch Network is Americans are sick and tired of these culture war issues being spread by MAGA, whether they're talking about Sydney Sweeney's jeans or cracker Barrel or whatever the thing is when there are real things that are impacting America. And I think people are waking up to say, Oh, these tools are just used to distract and divide. What are you going to be... I think that's been the commonality in these special elections where you've had MAGA's running the MAGA playbook on culture war divisions. They're talking about bathrooms, and people are like, I'm going to lose my health care. I don't have a job. Exactly. I can't afford things. So talk to us about that. Talk to us about the message of what you're going to do for people, as you say, not just what you're opposing, but what are you going to do?

So a couple of things. I was a 2024 nominee in this district last cycle. We outperformed every Democrat on the ticket, including Harris, by 9,000 votes, and Senator Tammy Bolden, by 5,000 votes. And it's because we were talking about the things that we knew were keeping people up at night. We were focused on talking about the economy. We were talking about securing the border and not running away from topic or issue. And I think that that was a big difference. We're still talking about lowering costs. I think that's the thing that I hear from folks most is that they're concerned about how they're going to make their rent, how they're going to pay or pay their mortgage to get groceries, fill up with a gas pump, and even have a little bit of money left over. So my campaign is really focused on talking about lowering costs. Health care really remains at the top of my platform. One of the things that I'm campaigning heavily on that also coincides with Senator Sander is is expanding Medicare to cover vision dental and hearing the things that deteriorate as folks age. My parents are retired farmers, and they take a once a year trip down to Mexico.

That's their vacation. But while they're there, they get their dental work done because it's cheaper to do there than it is in our own country. I'm talking a lot about how we're going to take on big pharma. My dad was diagnosed with prostate cancer while I've been running for Congress. And when he went to the Walgreens for the first time, it was an $1,800 supply for one month of one drug, $1,300 for another one month supply of another drug. So he ended up getting his drugs through Mark Cuban's Cost Plus. But that's just too damn expensive. And then you've got people in Congress that are in bed with all these corporate special interests. And that's why I've taken the North Corporate PAC pledge. So I think lowering costs, protecting our agricultural heritage, combating corruption, those are some of things that I'm running on because I know that that's what I'm hearing from people. I take my cues from the folks that I'm meeting out on the campaign trail at town halls, at gatherings in our communities. And it's not the polls that are going to tell me that. And in fact, I think our polls are wrong a lot.

I mean, you look at what 2024 looked like, and people were not deeply connected with what regular folks were worried about and what regular people were going through. And I think that that's why my campaign has been successful in the past. And the campaign that we're running is very authentic and really trying to meet people's needs.

Where can people find out more about the campaign and any closing message you want to have to We have nearly six million subscribers? Yeah.

You can check out our campaign at cookforwisconson. Com. There's a link. Would love to have your financial support, but also check out, we're on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or or whatever you want to call that now, if you want to share that message. But I think the last thing I'd like to say is that I think we need more working class voices to represent us in Congress that have lived failed policy and are going to fight how to build back the middle class. And I'm your candidate in that respect.

Thanks for joining us. Rebecca Cooke, come back. Keep us posted on the campaign, and we'd love to have you back as a guest.

Great. Thank you so much. Appreciate it.

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