State of the Union: Interview With Rep. Tom Emmer (R-MN)
Interview
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Well, actually, he doesn't have to negotiate.
The Republicans in the House, led by Kevin McCarthy, have passed the solution. And I take a little issue, Dana, with the cuts language that the media likes to use all the time. This is a transformational bill. It would limit spending.
The savings in it would be close to $5 trillion over the next 10 years. And it starts out by taking a Joe Manchin idea of going back to F.Y. '22 budget levels, which, I might remind all your viewers, was passed by President Biden and Nancy Pelosi. It was just four months ago, the numbers they're talking about, and then capped growth at 1 percent over the next decade.
It would save you almost $3.5 trillion.
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So to keep calling these cuts, this is really spending reforms that will put this country on a better path and, by the way, prevents us from defaulting on our debt.
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So, our recommendation is, we passed it through the House, take it up in the Senate and pass it.
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Well, first off, the White House, since this Congress began, has had no ideas whatsoever, except jacking up taxes and spending even more money, for a country that is in trouble financially. We got to get this right, Dana.
And the Senate -- the Schumer Senate, they have no ideas either. It's just repeated rhetoric. So, to say that it's debt on arrival in the Senate, when you have got even Joe Manchin suggesting support for this type of approach, I think that's not exactly accurate.
We have got a debt ceiling, a debt issue that's going to arise, I guess, now in July, is what the Treasury is saying. If they are refusing to provide any ideas -- and I guess I'd put it this way, Dana, to answer your question. We have passed it.
You now have the solution that is good for all of America and Americans. Pass it if you don't have any ideas. If you don't like something in it, if you have ideas of your own, our speaker is more than willing, I'm sure, to listen to those.
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I can, assuming that our president and the Schumer Senate recognize the gravity of the problem.
This is no longer about politics. We have passed a debt ceiling solution. We will not, House Republicans will not allow America to default on its debt. We showed that last week. The solution is in the Senate right now. Again, you pass that solution, that solves the problem.
But, by the way, where the president's going to get into it with the House is going to be over the appropriations process, because this is not the end of the job. We're moving into appropriations seasons. We have got some major bills to pass, and we have got to be looking at all the spending across this entire government.
This is just one piece. And I might remind everybody, Dana, that, in the last 30 years,the only real significant spending reforms that have been negotiated by Democrats and Republicans came out of debt ceiling negotiations. President Biden himself said that this was what you have to do back in 2011.
Nancy Pelosi said in 2019 you can't do a no-strings-attached deal. Again, Kevin McCarthy and House Republicans have given you the solution. The Schumer Senate should take it up and pass it. And if you don't like it, then I suppose your next step is to start to talk to our speaker and tell him what you would like to change so that you make sure we don't default on our debt.
House Republicans have already done that.
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Well, I actually challenge it.
You have got a president who was just told by "The Washington Post" that his claims on the deficit get 22 Pinocchios. They're just not true. And what you just said is just not true either, because you should scrutinize what the administration is talking about.
What we did was, you go back to F.Y. '22 baseline budgeting, Dana. That's just four months ago. That's just last year. And the budgeting -- the level we're talking about was passed by Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi. So to suggest that House Republicans are doing something now, when you passed it just last year, and this was the numbers you were living under, that just isn't accurate.
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What this would do is, this would be transformational. It would put this country on a trajectory where we can start to address our budget deficit.
We're spending $1.29 for every dollar we're bringing in, Dana. This does not end well unless we start to fix this problem.
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Again, I know that's your opinion. I would hope this becomes the law of the land.
And the use of cuts, these are spending reforms. And all we're doing is going back to the Biden-Pelosi budget of last year, that limit, and then with Joe Manchin's suggestion, limiting growth over the next decade by 1 percent annually. That's entirely reasonable.
I -- and, by the way, we aren't having any substance coming from the White House, Joe Biden or Chuck Schumer's Senate saying, look, this is what we should do to solve the debt ceiling. Kevin McCarthy and House Republicans have given you the road map of how to do that. You don't have any ideas.
Let's protect this country and Americans by not defaulting on our debt. Just take the bill we passed last week, Dana, make it law.
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Thank you.
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