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On this episode of The Voice Podcast, host Fred Kowal talks with Congressman Tim Kennedy about his work in Washington, D.C. and what it's like to be in the minority of a Republican-led Congress. 

Kennedy, a longtime friend to UUP, and Kowal discuss several bills Kennedy has sponsored, including the  DHS Release Transparency Act—a strong response to the death of Nurul Amin Shah Alam. 

Alam, a blind, disabled Burmese refugee, was left by Customs and Border Patrol agents at a closed Buffalo coffee without shoes on a frigid February night after being detained. He died of hypothermia and dehydration days later.

In May, Kennedy joined Congressmember Debbie Wasserman Schultz in Buffalo to call for passage of three bills that would provide more funding for cancer research, screening, education and prevention. 

Kennedy was outspoken in calling for the removal of ousted Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem for the cruel, violent and often unconstitutional immigration sweeps that took place across the country under her watch. Kennedy was one of Noem’s most vocal critics on the House Committee on Homeland Security.

He also took aim at ousted Attorney General Pam Bondi, leading a coalition of Democrats to stop Bondi and DOGE from weakening the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and loosen crucial federal gun regulations. 

In Labor Lookback, Mike Lisi chronicle the history of Chicago's WCFL-AM radio station, the first and longest-running union-owned and union-operated station in the country. The station, owned by the Chicago Federation of Labor, debuted in 1926 and was sold in 1978. 

In Kowal's Coda, Fred spotlights three books he's reading. They are:

• "Razorblade Tears" by S.A. Cosby; 
• "Hero of Two Worlds: The Marquis de Lafayette in the Age of Revolution" by Mike Duncan; and 
• "Unthinkable: Trauma, Truth, and the Trials of American Democracy" by Congressman Jamie Raskin.