Bo knows: Val Hoyle isn’t calling it genocide

A long-time activist challenges Rep. Val Hoyle. Speaking after a performance by David Rovics, Congressional candidate Boris ‘Bo’ Wiedenfeld-Needham:

Bo Wiedenfeld-Needham: So I didn’t write a speech because quite frankly I’m getting kind of tired of politicians’ speeches, that tend to always promise you the moon and then they don’t do a whole lot. So I’m just going to talk to you as a person, as me, and then I hope to hear from you a little bit.

[00:00:29] So, who am I? A local activist. I’m a local employer and a small-time philanthropists. We do what we can. How am I qualified to run for office? Well, this is a good question, because what makes you qualified for this office, and I love this about this country, which is my adopted country, I’ll get into that later, in that there are no qualifications other than that you are a citizen and you are of a certain age. I believe for this race it’s 25 and I’m, you know, 26. What can I say? So yes, I qualify for this.

[00:01:14] But why am I running? Well I have this character trait where I cannot sit idly by while stuff is happening that is obviously bad for everybody, and something that I think I have some chance, some power to do something about. And that has always been my driving thing.

[00:01:40] It’s been the thing through so many ventures of mine over the years, like when the war in Ukraine started. I told people, ‘Well, don’t just change your social media platform picture to your Ukraine picture, you need to do something.’

And then a friend of mine came to me and said, ‘You want to do something? I’m going to hook you up with people in Ukraine, and you can do something.’ And we did something, because we raised over $10,000 right for the front line.

[00:02:14] What we are doing right now is very important, but, you know, in terms of why I’m running, I also have a family history. So, I’m an immigrant. As I said, I came here in the very early ‘90s. I’ve been a citizen for exactly 20 years this year. This was in part because George W. Bush was president and I was always a political muckraker and I thought, ‘Let’s make it harder for him or his people to deport me.’

[00:02:53] So I became a citizen and I’m very glad that I did because man, we had George W. We didn’t think what was possibly coming. And it came.

But yeah, so my family is in Germany, and I was born and raised there, and Germany has a terrible, terrible, obviously, history. We are guilty of some of the worst crimes against humanity as people there have been in World War II with concentration camps, killing millions of Jews, homosexuals, political dissidents, be anybody back then.

[00:03:33] And this is something that cannot be forgiven for a very, very long time. And ever since I was a kid, I wondered, ‘Well, what would I have done?’ Because my dad was born in ’28. My mom was born in ’41. My mom was a tiny child who barely remembers anything from the war. My dad was drafted into the German army at barely 16 when the life expectancy was two weeks for people. The vast majority of his classmates and friends were killed within the first month.

[00:04:11] He managed to survive, and he didn’t want to talk about the war for decades, and I understand that, because that’s a lot of trauma. But when he got older, he opened up, so we spent many, many hours and I’m very glad he got to spend time with our son talking about this for hours too about what it was like.

[00:04:32] And I said, ‘Dad, why didn’t you do more? Why couldn’t people do more?’ Because by the time because he was a kid it was too late for him, by that time. It had progressed to: If you dissented, it’s an instant bullet to the head. There is no dissent anymore. We are at the stage that’s getting pretty close to that stage.

[00:04:54] So never in my life did I think that me, of all people, that I would find myself facing fascism in the United States of America, the country that liberated my country of birth from fascism.

[00:05:12] Let that sink in for a second, that’s it’s an imperative for you if you ask yourself all your life, ‘What would you have done,’ and you obviously think, ‘Well, I would have done more.’ Well, what are you doing? So I’m doing the little that I can and one of the things in this country’s Constitution is that it allows people like me, who are naturalized citizens, to run and make a difference. Thank you.

[00:05:49] So this is why I’m running. Why am I running as a Democrat? Free Gaza, yes, we’re getting to that. Why am I running as a Democrat? I’ve been a longtime member of the Green Party.

[00:06:05] I decided, for me, personally, in my opinion, this is the one way to stop them. And let’s face it, 2026, if there are free and fair elections, which is an optimistic thing to believe, but if there are, it is the most pivotal moment in American political history in my lifetime. Because one of two things can happen, and nothing that happens in the Republican Party makes any difference. The only thing that matters is what happens in the Democratic Party.

[00:06:41] So there are two choices. Number one, a whole bunch of people, like the Val Hoyles, the Chuck Schumers, the Nancy Pelosis (retired as she might be now) get kicked to the curb and get replaced by rabble-rousers and people who are for the people and not for the corporations, like me.

[00:07:06] Because if that doesn’t happen, then we might as well kiss this longest-existing democracy goodbye, because then it’ll be Trumpistan. And that is a sad truth. But those are the only two outcomes here.

[00:07:23] So we have to address Val Hoyle. And why am I running against her? And I get some people who would, you know, very nice people who said, ‘What’s wrong? I thought she’s good.’ Well, I believe that we were all sold a bill of goods in 2002. And that is that we, as a community and as a voting district, have become lazy because we had Pete DeFazio.

[00:07:53] And Pete was great. He’s not perfect, but Pete was an excellent politician. He knew how to get stuff done. He actually was what I would consider a progressive, and Pete stayed true to his word. Pete was okay with everybody. So Pete retired and keep in mind especially for those younger youth. Pete spent so much time serving the American people. He got elected into his office in the House when I was in high school, and I am maybe not 26.

[00:08:34] Pete was there and Pete said, ‘Well, I’m retiring, very well-deserved, and well, I’m endorsing Val Hoyle, that’s the Democratic Party candidate.’ And I said, ‘Okay, well,’ and like so many people, I just went like, ‘Well, good enough for Pete, good enough for me,’ so I just voted for her. I didn’t even check into who she is.

[00:08:54] And then you listen to speeches from her, and they sound, you know, great. ‘Hey, yeah, these are good things, okay, keep going.’ And then you examine her voting record, and it is terrible. The voting record has nothing to do with her speeches… so Val, I’m sure is a fine person, you won’t hear any personal attacks from me on her, but she’s no progressive by any means, okay?

[00:09:27] And where does her money come from? Well, that’s another good question. Where does the money come from that maybe shouldn’t be coming from there? Why is she taking so much money from all these huge corporate PACs? And there are some disputes right now as to what the percentage is, and we’re in the prospect of reviewing it.

[00:09:50] Some of them, I believe, just been quoted, statistic that goes up to 91% or so, but of her money comes from corporate and political PACs. But I know who does give her money, which just AIPAC, which is an organization that is designed to foster the Zionist state and to further the genocide in Gaza that’s going on.

[00:10:19] She also gets some money from sources that you’re just like: ‘Why would you give her money?’ Lockheed Martin, you know, Raytheon, defense contractors. They have no business in Oregon. Why are you taking money from them?

[00:10:39] So yeah, she could be an okay politician in very normal times. These are not normal times, though. This is like: She’s a bureaucrat, she checks her boxes, and let’s all admit it. I’m not sure why she won’t say anything public on the record. AIPAC is why you couldn’t get her to say the word ‘genocide.’ And it was so painful to watch her last town hall. But yeah, she just couldn’t say it because she takes too much money from those other interests.

[00:11:10] But these are not normal times, and we need somebody who’s not a vanilla yes-woman, but someone who’s a ruckus. What we need in this 2026 election is 50 more AOCs, 50 more Ilhan Omars, 50 more Bos, 50 more you name it. That is what we need. We need 20 more Bernie Sanderses in Congress. Those are my peeps and if you elect me I can tell you those are the peeps that I am going to for mentorship and to consult with not Chuck Schumer not Hakeem Jeffries but AOC and Bernie and Ilhan and those crowds

[00:12:06] Okay, so let’s talk about Gaza. So what’s happening in Gaza, what is happening there is very clear and simple. In Gaza, and that is genocide. The idea of the Israeli Defense Forces are killing innocent men, women, and children, and it is genocide.

[00:12:25] Saying that does not make you an antisemite, I am not an antisemite in any way, form or shape, but that doesn’t change what it is. It’s genocide and our country, the United States, with your taxpayer money, is funding this.

[00:12:43] Every bomb that kills 30 more children waiting in a line for food or bullets that get shot at them, those are almost certainly paid for by you and we send them over there. That needs to stop and to have a representative in our Congress who cannot say that this is happening. I’m sorry, this is like a break-it point for me.

[00:13:12] She may win this primary, we don’t know, I hope I win certainly, but if she does this is a make-or-break thing for me. If she can’t get herself to say what’s happening there, I cannot vote for her.

[00:13:31] And if that happens and she’s running and you can’t vote for her, I would strongly encourage you to vote for my friend Justin Filip over there from the Green Party who has a very similar platform as mine and Justin is a good dude.

[00:13:48] Okay, so let’s call other spades a spade. The Trump regime, let’s call the Trump regime what they are. They are fascists. They very much are, any definition you type into any, even AI, what they are and they will tell you they are fascists. That is pretty simple. Their goal is dismantling our republic for their own personal monetary and power gain. That is it. That is why they’re there and that is what they’re doing.

[00:14:26] But it gets worse because a lot of people are even worse than that. A lot of people in the administration like Stephen Miller, who is a huge part in the administration, Russell Vought. These people are straight-up Nazis. That is what they are. And we need to call them what they are.

[00:14:45] The Republicans have had, in the House and in the Senate, have had enough time to distance themselves. A few of the old staid Republicans have chosen to get out of this by retiring gracefully.

[00:15:03] But every single person who is in the Republican Party right now, including Susan Collins and the other ones that the left wants to sway, which will never happen, all of these people are 100% on board with genocide with taking rights away from LGBTQ people, from immigrants, deporting immigrants, building concentration camps around the world where we send people. That’s another bad memory for somebody who grew up where I did. They are all guilty.

[00:15:42] So please don’t call them your esteemed colleague on the other aisle because they are not. They’re enemies of the American people and we need to defeat them.

[00:16:00] Presenter: Bo Wiedenfeld-Needham explains why he’s running for Congress. Field recordings for KEPW News by Todd Boyle. You can catch the hour-long video, with a benefit performance by David Rovics, at Todd Boyle’s YouTube channel.