It's the Brian Lera Show on WNYC.

Good morning, everyone.

Hope you had a very good three-day weekend if you were off.

And with a thank you, as I always like to do, to those of you who work the holiday

weekend so that other people may play. And of course, this particular three-day weekend is not

a celebratory one. So our thoughts go to anyone for whom Memorial Day meant grieving a loved one

whose life was lost serving in the United States military. We will give our first words today to one of those Americans

who survived his service with bravery in a time of war.

Former Congressman Charles Rangel of Harlem in parts of the Bronx

won a Purple Heart and Bronze Star during the Korean War

and then went on to serve more than 40 years in

Congress, including as Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee for a while.

Congressman Rangel, if you haven't heard yet, died yesterday on Memorial Day at the age of 94.

One of his appearances on this show was in 2015 after he announced that he would retire from Congress after that term,

he lamented even then people's loss of faith in government that he said was already leading

to interest in Donald Trump, which he could hardly believe as a candidate for president at that

time, 2015. He also lamented benefits cuts to poor people already being passed by what was a Republican

Congress at that time.

And we're going to play a minute and a half excerpt from that appearance here to pay

tribute to Charlie Rangel.

And the congressman says in this clip that people of all backgrounds and faiths needed to come

together and register to vote what we believe in jesus moses al or mohammed the truth is that

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