We need to be fighting and rallying around the common American values. This is where the Democratic Party needs to learn and grow as we move forward.

What happens with identity politics sometimes is there's a competition among the oppressed: You're more oppressed than me and if not, then unfortunately you may not receive as much attention. What we need to do is make sure we're focusing on what our core American values are, and ensure that everyone feels as though we are in this together.

You bring up identity politics and I think that this is really causing a divide in the American left where we're rallying too much around identities. We should celebrate our heritage, we should organize by identity, but we shouldn't advocate and push for certain identities. We shouldn't talk about women suffrage, or plight of Muslims, or refugees; we should talk about our common American values.

The lack of fairness that we have in the richest country in the world is something that hits my district pretty hard. Eighty-three percent free and reduced lunch. We have the fourth-highest Medicaid population per capita in Virginia. There are folks that are just making it, literally day to day. When I'm knocking on doors, I'm reminded constantly of the struggles that people have. And, sometimes, we realized there are so few people that are advocating on their behalf that we want to be a real solid voice for them, and that drives me on a regular basis.

Losing elections all across America, and the American people clearly saying the Democratic Party is no longer the party of the people, I don't know how much more objective you can get than that.

We need to be fighting and rallying around the common American values. This is where the Democratic Party needs to learn and grow as we move forward.

When we talk about defending Muslims, defending women, we're automatically by default excluding someone, but when we talk about defending liberty, when we talk about defending the freedoms that are enshrined within our founding documents, that is inclusive of every American. That's a message the American left needs to learn as we move forward.