just two pills for all day pain relief. aleve it, and see what's possible. that delicious scramble was microwaved? get outta here. everybody's a skeptic. wright brothers? more like, yeah right, brothers! get outta here! it's not crazy. it's a scramble. just crack an egg. good afternoon, everyone. i'm ayman mohyeldin in new york. obamacare has survived its third major challenge at the u.s. supreme court. today the justices rejected an effort by a group of republican-led states to declare the law unconstitutional because the 2017 tax law eliminated the penalty for not complying with the mandate to buy health insurance. president biden issued a statement calling the decision a

victory for all americans, and house speaker nancy pelosi who played a key role in getting the law passed also hailed the decision. >> today's supreme court decision is a landmark victory for democrats who work to defend protections for people with pre-existing conditions. >> we are also watching the white house where later this hour president biden is set to sign a bill to make juneteenth a day marking the end of slavery in the united states, a federal holiday. the president also catching up on what happened in washington during those eight days he was in europe. where support appears to be growing for an infrastructure plan negotiated by a bipartisan group of senators. west virginia democratic senator joe manchin putting together a list of demand for his support for a comprehensive voting rights bill including requiring voter i.d., 15 days of early voting and banning partisan gerrymandering.

today he got an endorsement from former georgia gubernatorial candidate and voting rights contributor stacy abrams. >> what senator manchin is putting forward are basic building blocks that we need to ensure that democracy is accessible no matter your geography and those provisions that he's setting forth are strong ones that will create a level playing field. >> but we begin this hour with the big news coming out of the supreme court earlier today. let's go to pete williams, good to have you on this. break this down on for us, the significance. >> it wasn't a ruling on the law itself, it was a rejection on the challenge, let me explain that. what the court said is these 18 states led by texas couldn't show that the law as it stands now harmed them in any way. remember what happened here. obamacare was originally passed and if you don't buy insurance you have to pay a penalty on

your income tax. later a republican congress took away the penalty and the state sued well, it's just the mandate and that's unconstitutional and the court said without a penalty the mandate doesn't require you to do anything. so you can't show you were harmed by it and it rejected the challenge on the basis that they didn't have the proper legal standing and they didn't survive the threshold test to show that they had some particular injury caused by this law, but in ruling this way, it makes it pretty hard for anybody else to come along and make a similar challenge, if there's nothing left of the mandate that harms you, it's hard to see how anybody else can come up with a lawsuit that would survive this standing question. so it's a big victory for obamacare. let me ask you about another big decision today and a significant ruling between the city of philadelphia and the charity group, catholic social services and this one was unanimous. what was the significance of that decision.

>> right. this one unanimous and the other was 7-2 and this one was unanimous catholic social services took the city to court after the city canceled the city's contract to provide foster children because catholic social services said it would not put foster children in the homes of same-sex parents and the city said that violates our non-discrimination law. you're a city contractor and you have to abide by those laws. the catholic social services said doing that would violate their religious beliefs. they asked the supreme court to say there should always be a religious exemption to generally applicable laws. they should basically trump discrimination laws, but the supreme court didn't go that far today. this is a very narrow ruling. it ruled in favor of catholic social services because of the complexity of the way the city contracted sometimes imposing certain restrictions and sometimes not. so on those very narrow grounds it sent catholic social services

win, but it did not go further. it did not say that claims of religious freedom can trump non-discrimination laws, ayman. >> two very important rulings. pete williams in d.c. thank you. the supreme court rulings come one day after president biden returned to washington to find what may be progress on important parts of his domestic agenda while he was away. ginning us now nbc news capitol hill correspondent garrett haake and white house reporter from the associated press. i'll take a stab at it and you're probably suffering jetlag after getting off of that whirlwind trip to europe. i'll begin to garrett and give you a second to catch your breath there. what do congressional democrats have in mind for the law now that the supreme court has effectively shut the door on future legal challenges as pete was suggesting? >> congressional delegates were celebrating what was the last supreme court challenge and the challenge from republicans have

tapered off over the last few years with republicans failing to come up with any serious replacement plan for obamacare. democrats are pretty unified around the idea that they'd like to take on prescription drug costs as one of the next major health care initiatives that they would like to pursue, but after that there's a little bit more of a divergence of opinion over what's the best way to continue to expand coverage to americans. is it through a public option? is it through lowering the age for medicare? is it to further incentivize states who haven't done so to apply the medicate expansion that was outlined in obamacare? that's something that congressional democrats will have to continue to work through as they add yet another item to their to-do list here in the next year before the midterms. >> jonathan, the white house responded to the ruling by saying that the affordable care act remains as then vice president joe biden described it in 2010, and i quote, a big f-ing deal. those are his words, not mine.

what does the biden administration want to do to strengthen the law, if anything? i don't think those were quite his words. >> no. i made it tv-friendly. a decision on your part and probably a wise one. the white house, of course, is happy with today's ruling. there was real concern this could have gone a different way, remember the budget director for the white house? when her nomination was pulled and when it was clear she wasn't going to get enough confirmed, one of her jobs was going to be mounting the sort of appeal process. the defense of the affordable care act which now doesn't seem perhaps necessary, but we have seen -- that the white house has taken up a point of pride in expanding those on the rolls of the affordable care act, and we heard from former president obama and the two of them, obama and biden appeared together in an ad recently celebrating that

success. so this is a piece of what is, of course, a sweeping legislative agenda ahead of the president and you're right. we are all a little tired who were on this trip for the last week or so, but joe biden is right back to work. he is down today for beyond the juneteenth signing. it's his anniversary, he and the first lady and this is crunch time for an infrastructure deal and other huge, sweeping programs. >> garrett, when we spoke yesterday i thought it was early next week when we would start seeing movement on infrastructure. i was wrong. you are back to work on that today. there are other issues including 11 republicans and ten democratic senators throwing their support behind this infrastructure plan and then you have west virginia democratic senator joe manchin putting forward a list of demands that would make it more likely for him to support or get behind a comprehensive voting rights bill. to jonathan's point, could it help lead to actual legislation on these issues and could stacy

abrams' endorsement make a difference in all of this? >> on infrastructure yes. on voting rights, probably no. the infrastructure negotiations, and some of the group briefed senior white house aides about it. it was our understanding that those white house aides were going to brief the president possibly as early as today. his resumption of involvement in those talks could be very telling and every republican that gets added, democrats are wear they their goals might get smaller and whether or not as subsequent reconciliation of the democrat-only effort it pass the priorities that get left out of a bipartisan bill will be big enough, but that said, you'd rather be negotiating on infrastructure than you would be on the voting provisions here. this manchin plan which was pretty well received as you noted by stacy abrams who has been talking about these issues with marchin and by fellow senate democrats who said we're

happy that at least joe is pulling in the same direction with us was very quickly rejected by the republican leader and by other republicans who manchin would like to see brought along on this conversation. here's what minority leader mitch mcconnell had to say about manchin's counteroffer to the democrats earlier today. >> it still turns the federal election commission from a judge to a prosecutor by taking away the 3-3 ballots and making it 3-2 democratic and in what in what is dubious reconstitutionality redistricting legislatures and hand it over to computers. equally unacceptable, totally inappropriate, all republican, i think will pose that as well. >> the bottom line, ayman is these are two very different types of issues, on infrastructure the disagreements are by matter of degrees and on voting provisions, sen rat

republicans broadly believe this is not the place for federal government fingerprints on state voting laws and they don't intend to move off that position and what i think we'll see next week is likely this vote on moving the for the people act to the floor if joe manchin believes he might get an amendment floor and you'll have a 50/50 split most likely with republicans blocking any further consideration on that bill. >> jonathan lemire, what is the development on both these and senator manchin's demands on the voting rights bill? >> well, i think that first a brief voting rights bill, the white house was thinking some of these were steps in the right direction and they're encouraging and they can count votes as anybody, and frankly the fact that there seems to be some support from stacy abrams only strengthened mcconnell's opposition and his belief that republicans would oppose it.

>> i asked the president before wheels up in washington about this new plan, the bipartisan proposal and he admitted, look, my focus has been on this foreign trip. i haven't been fully briefed and i read on this, and his chief of staff, ron clain thought there was room to maneuver and we know this white house for a while has wanted to get this done in a bipartisan fashion even if it is half of it, the infrastructure, bridges, broadband and things like that and go a party-line only for the rest of it and the cares economy, if you will. so this is, i think, we'll know a lot more in the next week or two, but these are hopeful signs and the democrats are leery of losing if they compromise too much, perhaps losing progressive democrat support, but at the end of the day, they feel if the president comes out for it, they can keep the party line and they can keep it in a bipartisan fashion and it may be the last thing it goats done for quite some time. >> gentlemen, thank you both.

joining us now to continue the conversation on all of these issues virginia senator tim kaine. good to see you again. thank you for your time. let me start with the big news today. your thoughts and reactions to the supreme court rejecting yet another major challenge to the constitutionality of the affordable care act. >> for the third time the supreme court has said this law is good law and gop or not you're not taking health insurance away from tens of millions of people. the sheer amount of energy that the gop has devoted to this, the administration, the trump administration through regulatory mischief, congress trying to repeal the aca and dozens of court cases, it's just been horrible because we could have taken this energy and used it to make it better. now that the supreme court has said for the third time this is good law, my hope is that we can

move toward improvements to continue to bring down costs and expand coverage and that's what my colleagues and i on the pension committee in the senate, that's what we're all very focused on now. how did we make this better? >> senator, it's been almost 20 years for the initial authorization since the military forces use in iraq has passed. the presidents since that time have used to justify military actions around the world. today 49 republicans joined house democrats in voting to repeal that 2002 aumf. the white house says president biden will sign it if it reaches his desk, but let me play for you what senate minority leader mitch mcconnell said about it. he obviously opposes it, but take a listen to this. tossing it aside without answering questions in the region are reckless. the 2002 aumf is important because it provides authority

for u.s. forces to defend themselves from a variety of real, existent threats. it's arguably each more important in syria where our personnel are present against the wishes of the brutal assad regime supporting local kurdish and arab forces and conducting strikes against isis. >> how do you respond to senator mcconnell's comments there and are you confident that you will be able to get this -- get past this opposition to get the aumf repealed in the senate? >> ayman, i am. i co-sponsored this bill with senator todd young, republican of indiana. we have numerous republican co-sponsors. my answer to senator mcconnell would be what he's talking about is the 2001 aumf, to go after the non-state terrorists that purpose traited the attack of 9/11, that's the authorization that is used in iraq to help american forces repel attacks by non-state terrorist groups.

that's the authorization used by american troops to justify defense in syria. the 2002 authorization and the 1991 authorization which were authorizations designed to attack the sovereign nation of iraq and to topple the iraqi government and those have want cited in any legitimate way to cover any operation for a very long time and iraq is not an enemy now. iraq was an enemy in '91 and '02 and iraq is now a security partner. our goal is to repeal the iraq aumfs in '91 and '92 and work on the revision of the 2001 authorization to make sure that the issues that senator mcconnell has on the table. we have to think about those carefully, but we can do it and the key is we finally have a white house that is competent enough in their own article 2 power that they don't see congress asserting article 1 power as threatening and joe

biden was the chair of the senate foreign relations committee and he understands that the article 1 power is important and congress shouldn't be able to just dump these issues. >> 11 republican senators and they're prepared to support a plan that's negotiated by this bipartisan group of senator, but you also have ten democratic senators who actually do support it, but there are others who say they won't because it's simply not doing enough when it comes to the fight against climate change. where do you stand on this proposal? do you think that has a chance of going anywhere in its current form? >> so, ayman, i'm a member of the budget committee, and we're working on a budget reconciliation reduction to do infrastructure, to do education and to do a whole lot of things. i am encouraged by the bipartisan discussions. i just have one caveat about them. i would like to get a bipartisan deal, but every democrat who votes for it has to be willing

to look at each other and say, and we will do a reconciliation bill to pick up the things that republicans won't support. republicans won't support meaningful climate legislation, the nation needs it. republicans are not that likely to support meaningful immigration legislation. i hope that they would, but if they don't we should try to do that in a reconciliation bill, if we can. so there's a number of items that are not part of this bipartisan deal. that doesn't mean the items in the bipartisan deal are bad, but i don't want democrats to vote for a bipartisan deal and say, good. now we're done and let's move on to talk about something else. we need to maintain democratic willingness, all 50 of us to do the reconciliation, what we can't get republicans to do in a bipartisan deal. >> tim kaine of virginia, thank you very much for your time. greatly appreciate it, senator. >> glad to be here.

thanks. it has been three weeks since the belarusian government forced down a plane and detained a dissident journalist in what is being called a state-sponsored hijacking and now the opposition leader is calling for new sanctions. we will talk to her next. you're watching ayman mohyeldin reports. start 'em young. let them fail. and be there when they do. believe in their dreams. the more wild and absurd, the better. ♪♪ because bringing out the best of them, takes the very best of us. ♪♪ [lazer beam and sizzling sounds] ♪♪

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putin was belarus' forced landing of the ryanairplane and the detention of protasevich. it comes after svetlana is calling for international sanctions to target individuals and businesses who support the regime of aleksander lukashenko. joining us now is svetlana who fled the country after the belarusian elections. thank you very much for your time. i wanted to get your reaction to president biden saying that he discussed belarus with president vladimir putin yesterday in geneva. what do you make of the united states' response so far? >> i think we really perceived this conversation between president biden and the president of russia about

belarus and what was the conclusion of this meeting is that both of them recognize crisis in belarus, but they both see solutions differently. we don't know what in particular, but i'm sure that president biden is as well as belarusians want a peaceful resolution of this crisis with respect of the belarus for human rights and laws, and we really think that it's important that belarus is discussed on such a high level, and i'm sure that putin put more pressure lukashenko to release political prisoners in belarus and use sanctions. that is very important. >> let's talk about sanctions for a moment. the u.s. ambassador julie fisher told senators of the senate foreign relations committee that the biden administration was

preparing, excuse me, a new wave of sanctions. what additional steps are needed to force president lukashenko to change course? >> it is the most powerful reach to put pressure lukashenko because we have already in our history that only sanctions helped belarusians to release political prisoners nine years ago, and it's very important to act jointly with european union, with canada and the uk just to aid lukashenko economically and politically, but that is one side. on the other side, we need to support civil society in belarus who is suffering a lot and since august and at the moment it's 495 political prisoners and it is destroyed in belarus and the

workers have been fired from the enterprises we need to support political prisoners. we need to support their families and we need to support sportsmen and students and all of the civil society and the point is that we have to -- we are looking for justice abroad and there is absolute lawlessness inside belarus and we have to collect evidences checked by lukashenko's cronies and nobody will avoid impunity. >> let me ask you, finally, do you have any updates on the condition of roman protasevich and his whereabouts right now? >> lawyer has access to roman, but she can't say a lot because it is forbidden in our country to say peculiarities about the state, but lately we saw roman

in press conference made by lukashenko's cronies and he was telling there that he is now supporting lukashenko and he's fine, but we don't believe this because we understand that people in prison, they are being tortured there and they are forced to say what regime wants. so we don't have right to discuss the content of this conversation, and the content of this press conference, but we have to discuss with international community how to release roman and all other political prisoners. >> all right. svetlana tsikhanouskaya, thank you very much. a judge told them get the vaccine or get a new job. their fight is not yet over. you're watching "ayman mohyeldin reports."

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>> in texas, a battle is under way at one of houston's biggest hospitals and it started when houston methodist announced $500 bonuses for workers who get the covid vaccine then changed course a bit by mandating the vaccination and some of those workers pushed back by suing. a federal judge ruled in favor of the hospital dismissed by the lawsuit brought by 117 employees who argued that the vaccine requirement was unfair, but the group is now appealing and an

nbc news senior national correspondent kate snow sat down with four nurses that are part of the group that's suing. >> reporter: a hospital once inundated with covid patients, now the stage for a different battle. >> my company could ask me to jump off a building if i wanted to, it doesn't mean i have to do it. >> i don't believe i should have to choose to put this in my body to continue to do a job that i've been doing successfully for 14 years. >> asking us to do things that could be contrary to our own health and could be detrimental to our health for the sake of making other people feel comfortable, i don't believe it's right. >> i survived it actually getting the virus. it makes no sense to me to go and get a shot for something that i've already survived. >> jennifer, cara, sarah and kathy have all chosen not to get vaccinated and are all losing their jobs at houston methodist. they're concerned the vaccine

didn't go through extensive clinical trials before being given to the public. >> if i were to take a vaccine therefore i am a part of a clinical trial that i do not want to be a part of. >> there were trials. this is not the trial. there were trials. >> i do not trust the safety of this. i do not believe it has been tested adequately by any means. >> none of them agree with the guidance from all major health authorities in the u.s. that the vaccines are effective and safe. >> every public health organization, the cdc and the fda say that it is safe and effective. you don't believe those organizations? >> no, i don't. i do not believe them at all. >> federal agencies and the vast majority of medical experts say adverse reactions to the vaccines are exceedingly rare and that staying unvaccinated is much more dangerous. >> the science is also very clear about unvaccinated people. you remain at risk of mild or severe illness, of death or spreading the disease to others.

>> yet these nurses all argue they've seen adverse effects. >> people that i have worked with, people that i know, family members, close friends that have had serious side effects. >> jennifer claims she's treated hundreds of patients at houston methodist who had adverse reactions to the vaccine, a statement the ceo of the hospital completely disputes. >> it's a shame when we see misinformation being put out there that's completely inaccurate. of course we all see side effects of the vaccines, we know sore arms and low-grade fevers, but for her to imply that there's been something more than that is downright offensive to the people who work at houston methodist. >> dr. mark boom say 99% employees were vaccinated. kathy says she resigned shortly after boom reacted to the lawsuit. it is unfortunate that the few remaining employees who refuse

to get vaccinated and put our patients first are responding in this way. >> i felt that that was just another knife to the back. we had been there every day to go to work in an environment that wasn't safe. first, we were heros and now i feel like i'm the villain. >> i'm disappointed that she felt that way. what i've heard repeatedly time and time and time again from the vast majority of employees is a big, resounding thank you. a thank you for leading the way. a thank you for putting patient safety first. >> kate snow joins me now. quite a fascinating conversation, kate. i'm curious, where does this go from here? >> so they have appealed and they say the nurses and the plaintiffs say they're willing to take this all of the way to the texas supreme court and if needed to the u.s. supreme court and that's where it stands legally. these women are all losing their

jobs and three of them told me they're trying to find another work in nursing and kathy says she's done with nursing and so disappointed by what happened. we should point out 117 nurses and other medical professionals out of 26,000 employees at houston methodist and it is a small percentage objecting to the vaccine. they say there are more who went and got the vaccine because they need the paycheck. ayman. >> kate snow, thank you very much for that report, kate. >> joining me now is dr. vin gupta at the institute of health metrics and pulmonologist and global health approximately see expert. of course, he is an msnbc medical contributor. dr. gupta, great to see you again. first off, your reaction to those workers fighting off vaccinations? >> good afternoon, ayman. it's disappointing. whether you go into nursing or you become a physician and you

n harm and to serve the collective good. so if they have misgivings about the vaccine, i don't know how they reconcile that with their chosen profession which is right now across the country, ayman, what we are seeing because of the variants and because of still high rates of unvaccinated individuals across the country are individuals young and old coming out of the hospital unvaccinated with severe illness from covid. so their personal misgivings aside, they should be staying true to the tenets of their profession and not drawing attention to themselves and very disappointing to see, frankly, selfish. >> let's pivot away from vaccinations to treatment for a moment. the biden administration announced a new plan for the antiviral pill and how big of a game changer would a pill breakthrough be? >> of course, it would

dramatically change how we respond to the pandemic and any potential fall, winter surges and the next pandemic. i would temper expectations, though. we've trialed other therapeutics over the course of the last 18 months and nothing has worked out aside from steroids and severe critical illness from covid. so i would temper expect eggs that this is a short term play and this is a wise area for investment. >> you have emphasized in the past how important it is for young people to get vaccinated and raising questions for families in this country and around the world. do you express concerns to make young people and their family members less likely to get the vaccine? >> no, i don't, because we just have to over communicate and provide anticipatory guidance to parents and to young men who predominantly are coming down with this condition mio carditis

explain that the vast majority of people came down with this exceptionally rare side effect which is fine, ayman. went to the hospital and were discharged and no intervention and everyone ends up being totally fine. in my view, this shows that the system works and the reporting system works and we litigate on air, every rare side effect and hopefully that gives reassurance to parents and young ones that it's okay to take the vaccine. we actually have a chest image that i'd love to show your audience of a young individual. we have a chest x-ray. if we can draw that -- perfect. this is a patient of mine in their late 20s, an individual that was unvaccinated having on any chest x-ray, ayman, the lungs should look black and you're seeing a lot of white there. that's pus from covid-19. that's the exact type of chest x-ray that we're seeing amongst young people across the country because covid has changed.

the delta variant has changed and our threat perception, if you're young and unvaccinated it's fundamentally more dangerous to remain unvaccinated now than when people had an access to a vaccine and a different virus becoming vast me more dangerous and we should be calling it covid 21 because that is a different threat to young people now. so if you're unvaccinated and the virus is more risky to you and your health and your long-term well-being and any potential, rare side effect and vaccine. >> to your point of the delta variant and jeffrey has been calling it covid on steroids and it gives you a sense of how dangerous and risky that variant is. dr. vin gupta, thank you very much for your time. >> the family of brian sicknick, the capitol police officer who died after the january 6th riot is making a plea. you're watching "ayman mohyeldin reports."

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all right. we are following breaking news out of the white house where any minute now we are expecting president biden accompanied by vice president kamala harris to be signing the bill that essentially makes juneteenth an official federal holiday. for more on this we want to bring in msnbc news correspondent jeff bennett. it's great to have you with us. quite a remarkable turn of events here coming out of the white house just because of the history of juneteenth and the significance that it has now taken in this country. i want you to talk to us about this and what this moment means. it looks like the vice president has already taken to the podium and let me interrupt you, jeff and listen to her. apologies. >> liberation day. emancipation day and today a national holiday. [ applause ]

>> and looking out across this room, i see the advocates, the activists, the leaders who have been calling for this day for so long including the one and only miss opal lee. [ applause ] [ laughter ] >> we just received a very special recognition from the president of the united states. [ laughter ] >> and i see members of congress, members of the congressional black caucus,

members of the united states senate who passed this bill unanimously, and all -- [ applause ] and all of whom collectively were responsible for delivering this bill to the president's desk, and i thank you all. we thank you all. your nation thanks you all. you know, when we establish a national holiday, it makes an important statement. national holidays are something important. these are days when we as a nation have decided to stop and take stock, and often to acknowledge our history. and so as we establish june teepth as a national holiday,

let us be clear on what happened on june 16th, 1865, the day we call juneteenth because, you see, that day was not the end of slavery in america. yes, on that day the enslaved people of galveston, texas, learned that they were free, but in fact, two and a half years earlier, the emancipation proclamation ended slavery and the confederacy, so think about that. for more than two years the enslaved people of texas were kept in servitude. for more than two years they were intentionally kept from their freedom. for more than two years, and then on that summer day, 156 years ago, the enslaved people of texas learned the news. they learned that they were free and they claimed their freedom.

it was indeed an important day. [ applause ] >> and still let us also remember that day was not the end of slavery in america. the truth is it would be six more months before the 13th amendment was ratified, before enslaved people in the south and the north were free, so as we commemorate the history of juneteenth as we did weeks ago with the tulsa race massacre, we must learn from our history and we must teach our children our history because it is part of our history as a nation. it is part of american history. so let me end by saying this. we are gathered here, in a house

built by enslaved people. we are footsteps away from where president abraham lincoln signed the emancipation proclamation, and we are here to witness president joe biden establish juneteenth as a national holiday. we have come far and we have far to go but today is a day of celebration. it is not only a day of pride, it is also a day for us to reaffirm and rededicate ourselves to action. and with that, i say happy juneteenth, everybody. with that, i introduce the president of the united states, joe biden! [ applause ]

>> thank you. thank you, thank you, thank you. thank you, madame vice president. 156 years ago. 156 years. june 19th, 1865. john, thanks for being here. major general of the union army arivered in galveston, texas, to enforce the emancipation proclamation and free the last ebb slaved americans in texas from bondage. i'll repeat some of what was said. came to be a day that reflects what the psalm tells us. weeping may endure for a day but joy comes in the morning. juneteenth marks both a long, hard night of slavery and

subjugation and a promise of a brighter morning to come. this is a day of profound weight and power. a day in which we remember the moral stain that the terrible toll that slavery took on the country and continues to take. what i have long called america's original sin. at the same time, i also remember the extraordinary capacity to heal and to hope and emerge from those painful moments and a bitter version of ourselves. but to make a better version of ourselves. today we consecrate juneteenth for what it ought to be, must be, a national holiday. as the vice president noted a

holiday that will join the others of our national celebrations. our independence. our laborers who built this nation and those that died in the defense. the first new national holiday since martin luther king holiday nearly four decades ago. i'm grateful to the members of congress here today, in particular, the congressional black caucus that did so much to make this day possible and we showed the nation that we can come together as democrats and republicans to did commemorate this day. i hope this is a beginning of a change in the way we deal with one another. we're blessed to mark the day that the miss opal lee. as i mom would say, god love

her. i had the honor of meeting her more than a year ago. she told me she loved me and i believed it. i wanted to believe it. miss opal, you are incredible. a daughter of texas. grandmother of the movement to make june teenth a federal holiday. miss opal, it is -- you won't believe it. she is 49 years old. or 94. you are incredible woman, miss opal. you are. as a child growing up in texas, she and her family would celebrate juneteenth. and juneteenth, 1939, when she was 12 years old the white mob torched her family home. but such hate never stopped her anymore than it stopped the vast

majority of you i'm looking at from this podium. over the course of decades, she's made it her mission to see that this day came. it was almost a singular mission. she's walked for miles and miles, literally and figuratively to bring attention to juneteenth. to make this day possible. i asked once again, we all stand and give her a warm welcome to the white house. as they say in the senate and i said for 36 years, if you excuse me for a point of perm

privilege. i regret that my grandchildren aren't here because this is a really, really, really important moment in our history. by making juneteenth a federal holiday all americans can feel the power of this day and learn from our history and celebrate progress and grapple with the distance we have come but the distance we have to travel, jim. i said a few weeks ago, marking the 100th anniversary of the tulsa race massacre great nations don't ignore the most painful moments. they don't ignore those moments of the past. they embrace them. great nations don't walk away. we come to terms with the mistakes we made. and remembering those moments, we begin to heal.

and grow stronger. the truth is it's not simply not enough to commemorate juneteenth. after all, emancipation of an enslaved black american didn't mark the end on the work of the promise of equality but only the beginning. to honor the true meaning of juneteenth we have to continue toward that promise because we've not gotten there yet. the vice president and i and the entire administration and all of you in this room are committed to doing just that. that's why we have launched an aggressive effort to combat racial discrimination in housing. address the cruel fact that a home owned to this day by a black american family is usually appraised lower rate than a home owned by a white family in a similar area. that's why we committed to

drives home ownership and making it possible for more black entrepreneurs to access capital because their idea's as good. they lack the capital to get the fair share of federal contracts. so they can again to build wealth. we are working to give children 3 and 4 school, in a school. [ applause ] that's why -- we're unlocking creative and innovation of the historical black colleges and universities. providing them with the resources to invest in the research center and laboratories to help graduates prepare and compete for good paying jobs in the industries of the future. folks, the promise of equality is not going to be fulfilled until we become real, becomes

real in our schools and the main streets and the neighborhoods. our health care system. ensuring that equity is at the heart of the fight against the pandemic. and the water that comes out of the faucets. and the air that we breathe in our communities, in the justice system so that we can fulfill the promise of america for all people, all of our people and not fulfilled so long as the sacred right to vote remains under attack. [ applause ] you see this assault from restrictive laws, threats of intimidation, voter purges and more. assaults the very democracy. we can't rest until the promise of equality is fulfilled for everyone in every corner of this

nation. that to me is the meaning of juneteenth. that's what it's about. so let's make this very juneteenth tomorrow the first that our nation will celebrate altogether as one nation. but juneteenth of action on many fronts. one of those is vaccinations. tomorrow the vice president will be in atlanta on a bus tour to spread the word like you have been doing on life saving vaccines and this weekend including washington people will be canvassing and going door to door to encourage vaccinations. we have built equity into the heart of the vaccination program but we still have more work to do to close the racial gap in vaccination rates. the more we can do that the more we can save lives. today also marks the sixth anniversary of the tragic deaths of mother