YouSaid · the spoken record

Thomas Perez

lines on the record: 60
first: 2015-12-28
most recent: 2015-12-28
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“In 1989, I came on. And, you know, the thing about the Justice Department. Is that like all the three agencies I've been able to work at, the career staff are the spine of the agency? And I'm just as proud of the work I did under Attorney General Thornberg as I was the work I did under Deval Patrick and Janet Reno. And the work of the department, so much of it was and should have been apolitical. And when I came back to run the Civil Rights Division in 2009, the biggest tragedy was that in the Bush administration, they”
2015-12-28 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 19 - Sec. Thomas Perez · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, one of my memories, two stories about that very quickly. One of my memories that summer was we had an opportunity to meet him and the person coordinating it before all the summer clerks walked in said, wagging her finger at us there will be no booing of the attorney general. Now she didn't have to tell us that because you know what I had a great respect for the institution of the Justice Department and I actually came I got hired as a career person under I was hired in'88 at the end of the Reagan administration I came on under Dick Thornburg who has since become a friend and a mentor. He and Jinny as you know were gone.”
2015-12-28 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 19 - Sec. Thomas Perez · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And growing up in Buffalo taught me the value of hard work. It's a city that has taken a number of punches and they get up. And so I feel like I've taken a few punches personally and just some of our family's challenges, although frankly I had such a good community in Buffalo. I always felt like I was a millionaire because I had so many parents around and other folks, you know, when I went to a Jesuit high school in Buffalo and whenever the father-son breakfast came around, there were always five dads who said, hey, come with us. So I didn't know I was anything less than the wealthiest guy on the face of the earth.”
2015-12-28 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 19 - Sec. Thomas Perez · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“He was a teamster And after the economy hollowed out in Buffalo, he lost his home. He worked at our gas station at the corner of our street, pumping gas. He did anything he could do to feed the kids. And he was just a remarkable person. And my dad died june 29th, 1974. He died june twenty ninth, two thousand eight, and my surrogate mother, his wife, died june twenty ninth, two thousand thirteen, and you'll never be able to persuade me, David, that that was a coincidence because those were three remarkably meaningful people in my life. And they taught me the value of hard work and working on the back of a trash truck or picking up golf balls, which is another thing I did or working at Sears. I always tell my kids and I always tell students that I've had the privilege of working with whatever job you have, do your best at it. Give 100%. That's what you got to do.”
2015-12-28 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 19 - Sec. Thomas Perez · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“He did a little better than that. I actually went to school at Brown in Rhode Island, and he was definitely different SES than me. But you know what? The thing I loved about Buffalo was... Buffalo taught me the value of hard work. You know, my surrogate father growing up after my dad died was a guy who had a ninth grade education. He was the wisest man I ever met, and he really led me to believe that there's a difference.”
2015-12-28 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 19 - Sec. Thomas Perez · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, I mean, I never met him, but my favorite senator growing up was Claiborne Pell because Pell grants and getting jobs. Not a guy who ever worked.”
2015-12-28 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 19 - Sec. Thomas Perez · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, that was I think a big part of what motivates me and gives me kind of a sense of purpose and mission is that I don't take any day for granted. I mean, if you were to ask my team of folks that I work with, when does Tom get angry? And the answer would be when he feels like we're wasting time. Because I think watching my dad die and then my mom have a series of chronic illnesses gave me that sort of fear surgency of now. And yesterday is history, tomorrow's a mystery, today is a gift. That's why we call it the present. And that's sort of how I've been trying to live my life.”
2015-12-28 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 19 - Sec. Thomas Perez · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I lost Right. Well, 1974 was the year my dad died. And if you had told me January of 1974 that one of your parents was going to die, we would have all said it would have been my mother because my mother had a series of chronic illnesses. She had major surgery January of that year. She was just recovering when my dad had his first heart attack on Easter Sunday of nineteen seventy four. And unbeknownst to me, it was a very serious one, but they just said it, don't worry about a time, it's mild, he'll be fine. And then the end of June, he dropped dead in the basement of our house. And then after we got back from the funeral in the Dominican Republic, my mom got sick again. So she was in a hospital for a couple weeks. Don't worry, mom's going to be okay. And I remember thinking, fool you want shame on you, fooled you twice, shame on me.”
2015-12-28 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 19 - Sec. Thomas Perez · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“When you're an immigrant family, politics is your lifeblood because when your family's been uprooted by political upheaval, that's a big part of your life. And I remember growing up, politics was the currency in our family. And the experiences that my parents had, they taught my siblings on the youngest of five. They taught all of us to make sure that we loved this country because it gave us opportunity and that we give back. And so actually all my siblings are doctors and I had to promise never to go wrong. Well, I had to promise never to be a plaintiff's personal injury lawyer. And I kept that promise. But people often ask me, why didn't you become a doctor? And I think part of it is the fact that I was 12 when my dad died and I didn't really have the exposure to his professional life in the way that some of my siblings. How that shape you.”
2015-12-28 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 19 - Sec. Thomas Perez · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“My life, David, is the intersection of Buffalo, New York, and the Dominican Republic. My maternal grandfather was actually the ambassador from the Dominican Republic to the US in the early thirties, and there was a brutal what turned out to be a very brutal dictator. And once it became apparent that he was brutal in the aftermath of a brutal execution of about 20,000 Haitians that he ordered, my grandfather spoke out and said, this person's terrible and he was declared non grata. And so our family, my mom's family got kicked out. My dad was part of the student activism movement he left, came to the States. He was drafted as a legal immigrant, served with distinction in the US Army. My parents met, got married, and after my dad got out of the army in Georgia, he got a job at the VA hospital in the late 50s, and that brought them to Buffalo.”
2015-12-28 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 19 - Sec. Thomas Perez · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source