 President Joe Biden has passed the 100 day milestone and a lot of folks are kind of stepping back and reflecting on everything that he's done and hasn't done thus far. I do have a video coming out on Saturday at 8 a.m. where I kind of give you my comprehensive breakdown. It's not an exhaustive list of every single good and negative thing that Joe Biden has done. Having said that though I do try to be really objective and go through a lot of the most significant things that this administration has done. Having said that they're putting aside my breakdown and my grading of Joe Biden's performance thus far, members of Congress are also speaking out and Republicans of course obviously hate every single thing that he's doing even if it is in their interest and what they want because they're just hacks. But in theory if somebody in Congress is going to be the most critical of Joe Biden I would expect that to be the progressives. However they don't actually seem that displeased with Joe Biden and actually AOC not necessarily in a leadership position but widely viewed as the leader of the squad at least. She actually said that she believes that Joe Biden has done a great job. In fact he's exceeded her expectations because she was expecting him to be a lot more conservative than he is in actuality. Take a look at what she had to say. One thing that I will say is that I do think that the Biden administration and President Biden has definitely exceeded expectations that progressives had. I'll be frank, I think a lot of us expected a much more conservative administration and I think that is not only what has ultimately come out but the active invitation and willingness and collaboration with progressives in his first 100 days for almost 100 days has been very impressive and so while there are very you know there are areas where there are just plain areas of disagreement. I think that the actual content of the administration has absolutely been in good faith but not just in good faith but active incorporation of progressive legislation and also for those of us individually. I can at least say that there has been a lot of openness and willingness and flexibility in incorporating many of our goals, requests, demands, etc. Okay, that's going to be a hard disagree from me AOC. Listen, I think that if I'm going to be charitable here, if your expectations are already really low like if your expectations are below the floor then any one good thing that that individual does that's pleasantly surprising you could see that as oh wow I didn't expect this you know I am surprised therefore my expectations have been exceeded but even by that standard has Joe Biden exceeded my expectations just personally? No, he's met my expectations because my expectations were there'd be a couple of good things but a lot of really bad and harmful things namely as it relates to foreign policy and immigration. So I don't like that she's saying this because here's the thing if you want to give Joe Biden credit and try to cultivate goodwill with this administration so that way he hears you out and he factors you into the equation when it comes to legislation. I understand that from a strategic perspective but what AOC did here is actually incredibly harmful because now Joe Biden he's going to see this he's going to think oh great progressives are satisfied I exceeded their expectations I didn't just meet their expectations I exceeded their expectations so therefore they're a beast I can not listen to what they have to say because they're already satisfied we're 100 days in and this group who I expected to give me the most trouble is already satisfied wow that's fantastic and AOC you know she basically speaks for the progressive so yeah that's not what we want we want Joe Biden to take away now it is the case that I don't believe we should come off as petulant children who are unreasonable unwilling to ever give Joe Biden credit for anything that he does I mean sure applaud him give him credit where it's due when he does good things but don't censor yourself don't go out of your way to compliment him especially if those compliments aren't warranted has Joe Biden done good things yes he has done good things I think he's handled the COVID-19 pandemic far better than Donald Trump but at the same time there's a lot of things in this country right now that need to be fixed and to say that is an oversimplification because there's a crisis right now when it comes to health care we are facing climate catastrophe so I'm sorry just like having your low expectations exceeded that's not any reason to be excited or give him credit for that I'm sorry it's just that's not the case now as much as the mainstream media tries to pretend as if they didn't hear the more radical things that AOC says they definitely heard this and they've been asking other lawmakers about what AOC said and thankfully Nina Turner had a much better response she basically said I mean you can give Joe Biden credit for the good things that he does but of course we should have the courage to ask for more but on CNN the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus from Milla Jayapal was asked to comment on AOC's remarks and she not only agreed with the AOC but she took it a step further and she gave him a grade of an A one of your progressive your fellow progressives in the house Alexandria Ocasio Cortez says that he's exceeded her expectations and expectations for progressives do you agree I do you know I think that this has been a really interesting time for us to see how the progressive movement at large all the progressive voters young voters voters of color that came out and turned out for the president in November helping us to win the White House the Senate and the House and the pandemic and the way in which it has just really shines such a bright light on all the inequalities that have existed I think President Biden has risen to the moment and I really do give him an A in what he's done so far it's been bold it's been progressive it's been what the country needs he hasn't shied away from it he has leaned into it and we're hoping that the same continues to happen as we go through the process to pass the jobs and families plan I mean that's it I know you haven't been completely on board with all of his plans and you've expressed some disappointment the refugee cap for instance and in terms of his public polling it's about how he's handling immigration that he gets some of his lowest marks so what do you need to hear from him tonight well on immigration I have spoken with the White House directly about this they are going to fix the refugee cap issue you know I I think it was a big mistake I've told them that I said it publicly I said it privately but they're going to fix it on immigration the president has you know he's sort of gone back and forth he released a very strong day one immigration bill and we really applaud him for that it's a great vision coming from the top but if we are going to be successful Democrats cannot do what Democrats and Republicans have done for too long which is you know use immigrants as a political football and run away from the issue or cave in to people who are using immigrants as a political football so I want to hear from him that he is deeply committed to getting this done and that he's going to lean in to the incredible you know promise that immigrants have and I as an immigrant member of Congress of course feel very strongly that we contribute so much and we want to be recognized for that contribution and for the values that America holds so dear they are so grounded in welcoming immigrants. Pramila Jayapal is the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus this is supposed to be the loudest opposition within the Democratic Party to conservative leadership and I've got to read back the quote I think President Biden has risen to the moment and I really do give him an A in what he's done so far it's been bold it's been progressive it's been what the country needs this is borderline parody I don't like to grade or rate things on a scale from 1 to 10 a through f but if I had to grade Joe Biden I would give him an F a D minus to be charitable and the reason why I give him an F is not to you know detract from the positive things that he's done his positive handling of COVID-19 but you know if you are grading a paper for example and you score 55% that doesn't necessarily mean that you got every single question on that quiz wrong you got some questions right you did good in some areas but ultimately you still failed overall because you didn't grasp the material enough you didn't do what was needed to do to pass that test so I would like to know what criteria Pramila Jayapal uses to grade Joe Biden because if the standards are this low then imagine what Bernie Sanders would have been graded as would he have gone like an A plus plus plus would our heads all collectively exploded if he said the words Medicare for all on a national stage I mean listen you can acknowledge that Joe Biden at his State of the Union he adopted the rhetoric of Bernie Sanders he said health care is a right but having said that though I don't necessarily care what he says I care what he does and to say that he's met the mo he's risen to the moment he still doesn't support Medicare for all in the middle of a pandemic and it's worse than that actually he moved away from a public option and a public option is trash right it's going to be overburdened and underfunded Republicans are going to point to its inevitable failure as proof that government-run health care doesn't work but I mean it's still better than the status quo currently but he isn't even proposing a public option I mean he seemingly moved away from it not a people about a public option but you say he's risen to the moment are we serious are we just overly naive representative Jayapal you are the chair of the congressional progressive caucus you set the tone for the rest of progressives in Congress you saying this is a signal to everyone in Congress members of the squad progressives to unilaterally disarm let your guard down because Joe Biden is based Joe Biden has risen to the moment he's bold he's progressive he's exactly what this country needs and even the CNN host it seems like she disagrees with you because she noted correctly so that Joe Biden has a high approval rating but where he gets the lowest marks is when it comes to immigration and Pramila Jayapal correctly identified his unwillingness to lift the refugee cap now he's postponed it he's gotten a lot of pushback for that but that's not the only issue Pramila the reason why he's getting low scores when it comes to immigration is because what he's been doing has been comparable to Trump there are children in cages are you just pretending like that's not happening so it's deeply frustrating because what this is doing is you're poisoning the well for future progressives there's a lot of new progressives that are right now launching their campaigns and they're trying to encourage people to donate to you know canvas for them sign up and volunteer for them and the takeaway when progressives see things like this see you just capitulate and die like that in a hundred days they're gonna think well why am i going to give up my hard earned dollars to these new progressives running if they're gonna just get elected and immediately roll over and die not even try to fight for a second like do you understand we need to see a spark we have to see some signs of life within progressive lawmakers but it's just they won't fight they they're not doing it and i know that the most popular response that i'll see to disappointment with the squad of people who are really genuinely demoralized and i don't blame them for this is i will you know this this proves it you just i can't vote for anyone who's running for congress as a democrat except even if you were able to elect someone from a third party a socialist or green party that would be really difficult to pull off in the first place but even if that were the case i mean if you're an independent in congress you still have to caucus with the democrats i said this in my last video about the squad uh you you can caucus with the republican you have to caucus with the democratic party and work with leadership so the same institutional factors that seem to not necessarily co-opped but silenced members of the squad or you know uh bully them into obedience for lack of a better word that's gonna apply to anyone else and if you don't believe me look at bernie sanders bernie sanders is not a member of the democratic party he's been an independent for uh forever and uh you can see he's overly differential to joe biden is it because they're friends i don't know but it's the institution itself that makes it very difficult so i've said this once i'll say it again the key ingredient is that um we can't just keep electing folks and expecting them on their own accord to do the right thing because there's there's just too much pressure in congress and they just they don't have the courage to fight to put it frank they're they're too afraid to fight they don't have spines that they're they're either clueless or spineless uh either way them just being there isn't enough so the there needs to be a groundswell of pressure from the bottom it has to be a bottom-up approach we have to pressure them to pressure joe biden we have to make demands we have to fight and it's tough you know it's hard to recommend grassroots activism and direct action in the middle of the pandemic but that really is the missing ingredient here and i don't necessarily blame people for getting demoralized here because think about how far we are from actually achieving anything that's truly transformative so on one hand joe biden is a conservative democrat he could speak the language of progressives as much as he wants he could sound like bernie sanders on the state of the union uh during the state of the union address rather uh but i don't care what you say i care what you do talk is cheap but actions are what actually make the difference so we have progressives who need to pressure joe biden to do better but they won't and then even if they were successfully able to pressure joe biden to do better that still doesn't necessarily mean that joe biden has the spine to stand up to conservatives within his own party i mean he needs to put pressure on kirsten sinema and joe manchin to kill the filibuster otherwise nothing you want is going to get accomplished whatever you're able to do i mean good luck getting 60 votes for it right and people cite the uh the covet relief package as like this huge achievement and it was it was truly beneficial right but the stimulus checks alone isn't enough even donald trump passed stimulus checks so we have to expect the squad to pressure joe biden and then even if they're successful there joe biden has the pressure joe manchin and kirsten sinema to do the correct thing and i think that joe manchin and kirsten sinema actually are aligned with joe biden but they're a convenient cover for joe biden so that way of things don't get accomplished that he doesn't actually want to get accomplished it could just say well look i tried to kill the filibuster but i have members of my own party that don't want to do that and i mean this goes back to what aoc said she made a comment about i think the conduct of the administration has been in good faith has it though because he's patting you on the head and listening to you i mean these are social techniques that are effective but if you're a member of congress you should take into account the fact that you know joe biden is doing his job to make you feel like you're listening to but that doesn't actually mean that he's taking into account what you want i mean the squad progressive members of congress they've been legislatively irrelevant anything that they want is not getting put into any bills and anything that they boast about is what you know just random rank and file democrats also support so is that really something that you can claim credit for it's just it's really frustrating and they have to turn it around like trying to kiss up to joe biden i think that sure you can argue strategically maybe there's some value in that but it hasn't paid off you kissing his ass rolling over and dying to leadership it hasn't paid off it hasn't been beneficial and if you're trying to somehow make it so that way you're playing a 40 chess and you're using reverse psychology you're trying to make it seem like joe biden is a good guy so joe mansion and kirsten cinema seem like the bad guys i mean whatever strategy you have it's not working and that's even if we assume that you have a strategy because i mean when i hear cori bush go on cable news and say iana pressley told me that my vote is my own i can't help but deduce okay so they literally are just like occupying the seats right now they're not fighting so you have to do better you have to do better with peace and love you have to actually fight because guess what you have a two-year window you have to assume that democrats are going to lose at least one chamber of congress in the 2022 midterm elections so everything that you're unable to accomplish now will soon be politically impossible come 2022 so if you think it's difficult now just wait so that's why i say i mean are we going to see a single achievement squarely out of you know congressional progressives are they gonna put up anything uh i'll tell you not if they continue on this current trajectory they have to turn it around they have to be courageous and they have to be indivisible and congress stick together and actually fight actually make demands and actually threaten to withhold their votes from key legislative initiatives if they don't get what they want it's exactly what joe manchin and conservative democrats do and they get what they want so it's time that progressives do the same and flex their muscles but i mean things like this from aoc and premilla jai paul this ain't it chief do better