NBC "Meet the Press" - Transcript Interview with Dick Durbin
Interview
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CHUCK TODD:
And joining me now for another perspective is the number two Democrat in the Senate. It is Dick Durbin of Illinois. Senator Durbin, welcome back to Meet the Press. I want to start with something Peter Navarro just said. He said "In negotiations, one side has one number." And he said "There needs to be something in the middle." And when I heard that, I thought, "Well, that sounds like potential progress." Did you hear that as suddenly the White House wants to move to the middle? Because that doesn't seem to be what Mnuchin and Meadows did.
SEN. DICK DURBIN:
Chuck, let me just tell you. If that is the standard, we've not only accepted it, we've offered it. We were at $3.4 trillion in the bill that Nancy Pelosi and the House Democrats passed 12 weeks ago. 12 weeks ago. And now, we've come down to the range of 2 trillion. They were at a trillion. We've asked them to come up a trillion. It does exactly what Navarro suggested. We are ready to meet the White House and the Republicans halfway. We've said that from the start. We have priorities that may be different than theirs. But in terms of a dollar amount, we're exactly where Mr. Navarro suggested.
CHUCK TODD:
I'm curious. There's a lot of legal questions about the president's authority to do these things. In order to get the courts to look at it, do you think Congress ought to file suit on, for instance, the payroll tax EO or the unemployment EO?
SEN. DICK DURBIN:
Well, this is a moral dilemma. We want unemployed people to receive benefits. We never wanted them cut off at all. So I'm not going to suggest that we run out to court at this point. I think some will. There'll be some challenges. This country club fix suggested by the president is going to be a cut in the unemployment benefits for 30 million Americans. It's either going to be cut from 600 to 400 or from 600 to zero, where it is right now, if the president's executive orders don't stand. You know, the bottom line is this: These people are not lazy people. We have five unemployed Americans for every available job. This urban legend, which I say is an urban lie, about people sitting at home bingeing on Netflix and eating chocolate-covered cherries, listen, I've met with these families. They're desperate to get back to work. 70 percent of the people who have gone back to work have taken a cut to wages below the unemployment benefits, but they want to be back on the job and they understand unemployment is a temporary helping hand. So this notion that they're lazy and if they tried a little harder they'd find jobs just doesn't work.
CHUCK TODD:
I want to put up a comment from a House Democrat who's in a swing district. And listen to what he said yesterday. Representative Tom Malinowski of New Jersey, he's a first-term Democrat. He warned that a lack of an agreement by the two parties would prompt his voters to declare, quote, "A pox on all our houses. Congress is broken. Washington is broken. And that is great for challengers," he added. The question is: Do you feel pressure that you have to cut a deal, even if you don't get -- even if you don't like what you're getting? I mean, do you worry that the Democrats are taking too hard of a line here and at some point you have to move more than you want to?
SEN. DICK DURBIN:
Chuck, that is the nature of a negotiation. You've got to give a little to get a little. That's how it boils down. And look what happened back on March 26th, or March 16th, when we passed the CARES Act, 96 to nothing, bipartisan. We now have 20 Republican senators who said not a penny, zero, nothing at this point. And we have Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader, who is not even attending negotiating sessions. He's stayed out. His chair is empty. Same thing with Kevin McCarthy, the House Republicans'. But what we've said is, "Look at the first priority." And the first priority, of course, is unemployed. But even higher than that is doing something directly about the coronavirus. When I heard Mr. Navarro with his talk about testing, I'm thinking, "Are you in touch with the real world?" The president's been saying for weeks and maybe months, "Oh, if you want a test, you can get it." Well, for the longest time, that wasn't even possible. And then this notion that you're going to have the same instant results of testing that he does with his White House visitors or Major League Baseball does overnight, that isn't the real world out here. The people are waiting in line for testing, and they're waiting for results from 5-12 days, which makes them almost pointless. That is a priority for us. Testing to deal with coronavirus is key to opening the environment, pardon, opening the economy and opening our schools.
CHUCK TODD:
Right. Final question, a little Democratic politics here. I want to put up this tweet from David Axelrod. You know him. Longtime chief strategist for President Obama, an Illinois guy these days. And he says this: "I can't remember any VP selection process where so much oppo research has been dumped. If I were Joe Biden, looking for a good and loyal partner, that should be a source of concern." David Axelrod didn't imply who was behind this, but there has been a lot of negative stuff dropped on a couple of candidates, Susan Bass -- Susan Rice and Karen Bass in particular. Are you concerned about how all this looks?
SEN. DICK DURBIN:
I'm concerned but I'm not surprised, Chuck. This is the political world we live in. It never was beanbag. It's always been a tough game but it's gotten much worse over the last several years. The level of preposterous claims, the charges that have been thrown, I mean, they've just gone out of sight. You know, "Lock her up. Lock her up." For goodness sakes. That goes way beyond anything any of us had seen in presidential campaigns. And that is the nature of this business. And those who stick with it, you know, my colleague Tammy Duckworth, for goodness sake, she's all but an American hero for what she's given to this country. And there have been those on right-wing television shows that have criticized her as not being worthy of consideration for this office. You know, that to me shows the extremes that they'll reach.
CHUCK TODD:
Dick Durbin, I'm going to have to leave it there. Number two in the U.S. Senate, Democrat from Illinois, the senior senator from Illinois. Thanks for coming on and sharing your perspective, sir. I appreciate it.
SEN. DICK DURBIN:
Thanks, Chuck.
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