“You have to knock doors, make calls, and build a relationship with voters long before Election Day.”
― Keith Ellison
“Not voting is not a protest. It is a surrender.”
― Keith Ellison
“We need a strong farm bill that gives assistance to farmers during times of drought, creates markets for local goods, protects our environment, and helps struggling families bridge the gap between hard times and a full dinner table.”
― Keith Ellison
“I have always been a fierce fighter against anti-Semitism. I oppose it and always have.”
― Keith Ellison
“We must invest in and empower our state and local parties by creating effective field operations, an enhanced and advanced voter file, and a culture of collaboration between candidates at every level. Let’s put the voters first.”
― Keith Ellison
“I was born and raised in Detroit.”
― Keith Ellison
“There must be something in the water in Minnesota because historically, despite its seemingly homogeneous population, the state has produced some of our more radical political thinkers, and its people have put their prejudices aside to vote for them.”
― Keith Ellison
“When you’re a leader, you cannot ignore parts of your constituency, even if you know they’re not going to vote for you.”
― Keith Ellison
“Pragmatism is not always a good thing. Experience is not always a good thing.”
― Keith Ellison
“You approach faith with humility. You can have some idea, but it boils down to do you see religion as a club, or do you see religion as a path? Do you see it as a wall that separates you or do you see it as a bridge that connects you to God and other people? When you see it as a bridge, you aren’t so worried about bringing others over to your side.”
― Keith Ellison
“People like, George Soros, Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, Paul Krugman, Joe Stiglitz, Jeffrey Sax, Dean Baker, Robert Poland, Larry Summers have said they all support a transaction tax.”
― Keith Ellison
“Our democracy is not something to be taken for granted. You have to fight for it. You have to commit yourself to working for it – for the long haul.”
― Keith Ellison
“A Republican philosophy goes something like this: If you take your car to the mechanic, and instead of fixing it, they take out the engine and charge you an arm and a leg, you should conclude that mechanics can’t fix cars and you should probably just take yours to the junkyard and sell it for scrap metal.”
― Keith Ellison
“Environmental spending creates jobs in engineering, manufacturing, construction, materials, operations and maintenance.”
― Keith Ellison
“Vehicle emissions standards directly sparked the development and application of a wide range of automotive technologies that are now found throughout the global automobile market.”
― Keith Ellison
“If you can make a movie, make one. If you can sing a song, sing it. If you can write a play, write it. If you want to run for office, run. But do something to make this world a better place.”
― Keith Ellison
“Those who seek the divine want to make this world a better place, which first requires that we communicate.”
― Keith Ellison
“Middle class families should not be forced to scrape by with less while oil companies get away with more.”
― Keith Ellison
“Americans used to be able to depend on their jobs to provide a stable retirement.”
― Keith Ellison
“The middle class should not continue to foot the bill for tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires.”
― Keith Ellison
“Clean air and a healthy climate benefit all of us, but it will take a diverse coalition to step up to the threat posed by unchecked climate change.”
― Keith Ellison
“Every now and again, people on the far right take a quote from a progressive out of context and use it to attack them.”
― Keith Ellison
“We’re Americans – in times of crisis, we step up.”
― Keith Ellison
“Progressive economic policies lead to a sustainable economy.”
― Keith Ellison
“Progressive policies implemented since the early 1900s launched America into the modern age and created a vibrant middle class.”
― Keith Ellison
“Republicans profess to be against deficits, but they are experts at creating and exacerbating deficits.”
― Keith Ellison
“I’m not against T.V. advertising for campaigns, but we need to emphasize field campaigning much more than we do.”
― Keith Ellison
“People spend money on negative campaigning because it works.”
― Keith Ellison
“If people want to protest, to get out there and express themselves, as long as they do it peacefully, they should be encouraged to do so.”
― Keith Ellison
“Democrats need an organizer who will energize the grass-roots across this country to build the party from the bottom up.”
― Keith Ellison
“I support Israel. And I have long supported a two-state solution and a democratic and secure state for the Jewish people, with a democratic and viable Palestinian state side-by-side in peace and dignity.”
― Keith Ellison
“At the end of the day, the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott had to be converted into the 1964 Civil Rights Act. We don’t want politicians who’ve gotta be coaxed, cajoled and protested. We want them on our side from the beginning.”
― Keith Ellison
“Serving my neighbors in Congress and fighting for them has been the best job I’ve ever had.”
― Keith Ellison
“When I started running for Congress, it actually took me by surprise that so many people were fascinated with me being the first Muslim in Congress.”
― Keith Ellison
“I would really like to hear somebody who is really articulate about the elements of their faith conversion. I’m not.”
― Keith Ellison
“My faith and my identity as a Muslim – I never saw it as something that made my job harder. It’s just an aspect of who I am.”
― Keith Ellison
“Faith really should be a bridge, not a wall. Because at the end of the day, we should be focusing on what you believe, not what your religion is.”
― Keith Ellison
“I understand the risks associated with being a soldier. But I think as members of Congress, we should not intensify the chance that we’ll have to commit troops to a military conflict unless it’s absolutely necessary to defend the nation.”
― Keith Ellison
“I think that anybody who is going to be the standard-bearer, the spokesman for the progressive movement, in the context of a presidential race, has got to learn to master the language and really get their finger on the pulse of how people are feeling. I think that’s really important.”
― Keith Ellison
“I’m not a scholar of Islamic history or jurisprudence or anything.”
― Keith Ellison
“I’ve never gotten up in front of a Muslim congregation and played the role of a religious leader, and I decline those invitations because that’s not what I am.”
― Keith Ellison
“When I hear about these terrorist ideologies, they are completely foreign and strange to me. I mean, to me, it’s, like, antithetical.”
― Keith Ellison
“The United States’ job is not to police the whole world.”
― Keith Ellison
“While there are corporal descriptions of what the afterlife is like in Christianity, Islam and Judaism, what’s going on there is the finite trying to describe the infinite. If God knows everything, started everything and is the only one who knows how it’s going to end, how can any human know what God wants?”
― Keith Ellison
“People will politicize religion; we see it in every faith, in every religion. We see it with Pat Robertson, in my opinion, and we see it with the Taliban.”
― Keith Ellison
“I try to live tolerance in my own way, which is why, as a politician, one of my key priorities is to stand up for human rights.”
― Keith Ellison
“When voters know what Democrats stand for, we can improve the lives of all Americans, no matter their race, religion or sexual orientation.”
― Keith Ellison
“All I’d like to say is that I am a patriotic, loyal American. I love my country and the values that it stands for. And I am a Muslim.”
― Keith Ellison
“Anybody that’s ever been to Israel and to Palestine knows that you can’t look at a person and tell if they’re Israeli or Palestinian. You can assume. But I’ve seen Palestinians who look Swedish, and I’ve seen Israelis who are black.”
― Keith Ellison
“I study these bills. I read them carefully. If it makes sense, I’ll sign on them. If not, I don’t.”
― Keith Ellison
“How are we all going to pitch in to fix this party to make working America know that the Democratic party is absolutely on their side? That’s the real question.”
― Keith Ellison
“The truth is that we have got to make America work for working people again.”
― Keith Ellison
“I’d tell you whose brand was tainted is Donald Trump. I mean, this guy was tainted every kind of way you could imagine. I mean, no way in the world that Donald Trump is a champion of working people.”
― Keith Ellison
“I’m going to be fighting to rebuild the Democratic party no matter what. I’m going to be fighting to make sure the Democratic party is known among working people that we are their champion no matter what.”
― Keith Ellison
“Americans deserve journalists who provide responsible, objective reporting.”
― Keith Ellison
“For Ben Carson, Donald Trump, or any other Republican politician to suggest that someone of any faith is unfit for office is out of touch with who we are as a people.”
― Keith Ellison
“There’s nothing wrong with any group of Americans using our democratic system in order to advance their policy views.”
― Keith Ellison
“My mom, Clida, taught my four brothers and me about her father’s work to organize black voters in rural Louisiana in the 1950s. We carried her dad’s legacy of activism with us. The Civil Rights Movement was present in the daily life of my family in Detroit in the 1970s.”
― Keith Ellison
“I’ll never forget working to get my college, Wayne State University, to divest from the government in South Africa. This was the beginning of my activism, and the fight for social and economic justice has been a constant thread in my life.”
― Keith Ellison
“My values – going back to my childhood – were always based on respect for all people and rejection of bigotry and racism.”
― Keith Ellison
“Throughout my work as a state legislator and member of Congress since 2002, I have worked as hard as I could to build bridges. I’ve worked to combat anti-Semitism and confront Holocaust denial. I’ve organized dozens of meetings to promote interfaith dialogue and joint projects.”
― Keith Ellison
“I’m an energetic person. I work hard.”
― Keith Ellison
“I think debates are healthy. I think they include more people. And I don’t believe most people, if they don’t win, are just going to take their ball and go home.”
― Keith Ellison
“I think that whenever businesses harm the economy, harm workers, harm consumers, or undermine human rights in any way, then it is the role of the government to make sure that they don’t do that and to make sure that markets are fair and they operate properly.”
― Keith Ellison
“Why can’t we get real, sane, sensible gun legislation? Because the NRA, funded by Mossberg, Smith & Wesson, Glock and all the rest of the big dogs in the weapons industry, you know, spread around donations and won’t let it move through.”
― Keith Ellison
“I am not one of those people who has contempt for Hillary Clinton. I think she’s served our nation. I think there are things that she’s done that are very good.”
― Keith Ellison
“I have a deep and personal aversion to anti-Semitism regardless of its source, and I reject and condemn the anti-Semitic statements and actions of the Nation of Islam, Louis Farrakhan, and Khalid Muhammed.”
― Keith Ellison
“I think it’s dangerous to prosecute people for their political views and their political associations. I think you prosecute people for what they do, for their acts.”
― Keith Ellison
“We need more leaders speaking up for minority groups who have been marginalized and attacked.”
― Keith Ellison
“I think there are real dangers to escalating military conflict with ISIS, and we need to be aware of them. But at the same time, you have to understand, you know, that this whole thing started with Bashar al-Assad and how he is the one who continued to escalate against the people of Syria who were trying to get democratic reform.”
― Keith Ellison
“The idea of a financial transaction tax on Wall Street trades is gaining momentum. I have a bill called – nicknamed the Robin Hood tax also. It’s a bill that taxes stock trades, derivatives and bonds, and would generate in the neighborhood of $300 billion a year.”
― Keith Ellison
“Decent wages keep people out of homeless shelters. Decent wages allow families to afford books and, I don’t know, school fees and things like that.”
― Keith Ellison
“I know a lot of police officers who are on the force to do the right thing to protect people. But how can you deny this pattern, this disturbing pattern, Alton Sterling, Mr. Castile in my own community, Philando Castile, but then Tamir Rice, Mike Brown, Eric Garner, Sandra Bland?”
― Keith Ellison
“The real problem for Democrats is we’ve got to help people believe, and then we’ve got to deliver the message to them. Believe what? That we are absolutely, unshakeably on their side, and we’re going to fight for them every single minute.”
― Keith Ellison
“We got to make sure that the Democratic Party is not just Democratic, but seen to be Democratic. That means we got to have systems in place that makes sure that everybody who participates in a primary is perceived to have an equal shot with everybody else.”
― Keith Ellison
“We’ve got to make sure our veteran, Democratic veterans are strengthened and feel like they are fully included.”
― Keith Ellison
“What is it to be white? It does mean something to be Norwegian. It means something to be Polish or German or Spanish. But ‘white’ is simply a catchall for ‘light-skinned person.’ It doesn’t really mean anything.”
― Keith Ellison
“One of the things that will decline over time is the demand that the society or the government bring forth a particularized racial remedy based on a history of deprivation. That will be even more difficult to do in the future.”
― Keith Ellison
“I believe that Israel and the U.S.-Israel relationship are, and should be, key considerations in shaping U.S. policy in the Middle East. Americans with roots or interests in the region should be involved in advocacy and discussions of public policy concerning the region.”
― Keith Ellison
“The government has a right – the government and the people of the United States have a right to run the programs of the United States. Health, welfare, housing – all these things.”
― Keith Ellison
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