Neal, Markey Reflect on U.S. Political Climate / SouthBerkshire.com

LEE, Mass. — U.S. Rep. Richard Neal and U.S Sen. Edward Markey shared the reflections on the nation's political climate during separate swings through the Berkshires this week.

"I watched the whole thing and I've known Tim Walz for a long time and I thought that the debate showed the vigor of where we find ourselves," Neal said at Lee Town Hall after bringing news of a $1 million earmark for Lee's proposed public safety building. This was one day after the vice presidential debate.

"And I thought it was pretty interesting."

On Monday night, Democratic nominee Tim Walz and Republican nominee James David "JD" Vance debated at the CBS Broadcast Center in New York. The 90-minute program included foreign policy, reproductive rights, immigration, and more.

Neal observed that the candidates spent the evening talking about the respective presidential candidate of the other party. He did not identify a winner in this debate, which was not the case for the presidential debate between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump in September.

"So in terms of outcome, I think media have a tendency to try to declare winners and losers and I thought last night, I don't think moves the needle much one way or another," the Springfield Democrat said.

"The presidential debate was entirely different. I thought even Republicans said they thought that the vice president won the debate."

"I think both candidates made the pitch for their presidential candidates very well," said Markey at Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art on Thursday. "However, it's going to come down to Donald Trump and Kamala Harris, and I'm very confident that the energy level on the Democratic side is so high that we're going to get out the vote. It's a very small percentage of all voters who are undecided right now across the country, it's only going to come down to seven states altogether.

Massachusetts and California have already decided, the Democrat said, and so has in Texas and Mississippi. "So we're down to just seven states."

Most of the last presidential elections have come down to the general election as ties, he said, so it will matter who gets out the vote. He was heading to Pennsylvania on Friday to speak to Democrats.

Neal was asked about his thoughts on immigration and if the Democratic Party's stance has drifted to the right over the past few years.

"I don't think I would say that it's drifted right," he said. "I think it's drifted to a reality. I think and have professed for a long period of time, you need a process."

He said the problem is you need to know who is in the country and how they arrive.

As a grandson of immigrants, he said that the country needs them and they "make a difference every day."

Neal pointed to the country's fertility rate of 1.8 children per family and said that if you look at the economic impact over 20 years, immigrants make a positive contribution.

"Where I would also be quite emphatic is that you need a process," he said, explaining that there should be a period of using green cards and then subsequently applying for citizenship.

"What Joe Biden has done, to his credit, is he has said that he would make some alterations in the asylum process and I think the positions that the president has outlined have been entirely reasonable," he said.

"I also think when you start to suggest that in Springfield, Ohio, that people are kidnapping cats and dogs for dinner, that ill serves the national conversation for two reasons: No. 1, it's not true and not to denigrate overall the role that immigrants play in American life."

During the presidential debate, Trump claimed that immigrants in the Ohio city were eating house pets.

"The people that came in, they're eating the cats. They're eating — they're eating the pets of the people that live there," he said.

This was fact-checked by moderator David Muir, who explained that ABC News reached out to the city manager and there were no credible reports or specific claims of pets being harmed, injured, or abused by the immigrant community.

"We know we have a better organization. Kamala is vastly out fundraising, Donald Trump," said Markey. "So we have the enthusiasm, we just have to now deliver on election day on the issues that Tim Walz was raising on Tuesday."