MSNBC "The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell" - Transcript: Interview with Susie Lee

Interview

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O`DONNELL: Leading off our discussion tonight is Democratic Congresswoman Susie Lee of Nevada.

Thank you very much for joining us tonight.

You were in the meeting with the speaker today. Where do you think the state of play is? Will there be a vote on the bipartisan bill by, say, Thursday and how soon after that or around that time will the reconciliation bill go?

REP. SUSIE LEE (D-NV): Yeah, listen, thank you for having me on and today during the caucus meeting, I think there was a lot of recognition that we can`t fail and that we need to come together and, again, this was a compromise. We were planning on voting on this bipartisan bill at least that was what was requested of the speaker, to vote on it today.

So, there was a obviously a compromise to move it to Thursday. I believe we`re going vote on it on Thursday. We`re going pass it and then have a general framework of what the Build Back Better Act will be and pass it in the next few weeks after that.

O`DONNELL: So it sounds like there is compromise now from both sides of this discussion within the House, which is the smaller group that was really hoping for the Monday, demanding the Monday vote today that didn`t get it, they`re going get a vote on Thursday. The much larger progressive group in the House that wants the reconciliation vote to go first before this bipartisan vote, from the bipartisan bill from the Senate, they`re going to go along. It sounds like you`re saying they`re going to go along with a Thursday vote. They`re going to go along with voting for that bill before they get a chance to vote on reconciliation

LEE: Well, listen, Thursday is the scheduled vote I think that we will come together and have a general agreement on what will be in the Build Back Better Act. And then be able to get the progressives who had threatened to not vote for the bipartisan bill, get them to agree, you know, listen, we have to come together and work within our own caucus. These are both large, large bills. We know what`s at stake and that we need to work together and get a compromise and get something done for the American people

O`DONNELL: Let`s listen to what President Biden said about this today.

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JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I`m more an optimist. I think things are going to go well. I think we`re going get it done. Have I meetings tonight, tomorrow, and for the next little bit.

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O`DONNELL: So it sounds like what`s going to happen in Tuesday, Wednesday is a very intense work on getting an agreement on what the $3.5 trillion bill is going to look like, what it`s going to amount to, what the real number is going to be, what`s going to be inside that real number.

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And once that`s understood and agreed to by all of the Democrats in the House, at least agreed to, not voted on, but agreed to, then you will vote on the bipartisan bill that`s already been written

LEE: That`s the plan. That`s what I think will transpire here in the next few days. Again, I think that we`ve all come to recognition that number one, we need to pass this bipartisan bill. As you know, I`m a member of the problem solvers caucus, was instrumental in helping craft the framework on which that was based.

And so important to get that passed everyone across this country needs to have investment in infrastructure in their state. But then there is also recognition that we need this investment in families again, it`s a big bill, $3.5 trillion. There is a lot of work to be done to make sure what`s included in this bill meets the rules of reconciliation.

So we have a lot of work to do in the next few days. But I think we`ll have a general understanding of what that will look like to get enough progressives on board to support the bipartisan bill on Thursday.

O`DONNELL: Do you expect that to be a $3.5 trillion bill at the end of this negotiation

LEE: You know, I`ve heard -- I haven`t been in the discussions on the inner works of exactly what`s going into the bill in terms of the cost, but there is understanding given Sinema and Manchin, that it`s going to be less than $3.5 trillion. I think it`s really up to us to decide what it is we want to accomplish and work on getting those key pieces into the bill and then coming to a compromise on how we`re going pay for it.

O`DONNELL: Congresswoman Susie Lee, thank you very much for starting off our discussion tonight.

LEE: Thank you, Lawrence. Good to see you.

O`DONNELL: Appreciate it.

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