Media Stakeout With Senate Democrats

Press Conference

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SEN. REID: (In progress) -- and one of the unsung heroes, as far as I'm concerned, who hasn't received much of the attention, but was with Chairman Baucus from the very beginning to get that bill out of the committee -- that's Olympia Snowe.

I've spoken to her several times today. She is always in the -- usually in the background, but when the heavy lifting comes, she's always available to us. And I hope Chairman Baucus will say another word or two about her.

We are moving forward on President Obama's economic recovery plan. It's a plan that we have developed in conjunction with the entire Senate now, but I am very comfortable with where we are. We actually could finish this legislation tonight. I rather doubt that we will, but we could. Some of the people on the other side want to talk for awhile longer, but I think this is keyed up to get it done in the next couple of days.

Chairman Baucus.

SEN. BAUCUS: Thank you, Leader.

It's very important for people to realize that Olympia, I mean, she anchors this agreement. She's a rock. I mean, she is so solid on the committee. We talked to her. She's reasonable and she wants to do the right thing. That's quintessential Olympia Snowe. And it's also somewhat typical -- she's not grandstanding. She's just there. And Olympia Snowe's very, very strong support for this measure, I think, helped provide the wherewithal, the impetus and the foundation for other senators to come along and join her.

Second, I think it's important for all of us to remember -- this is historic. When history's written, historians are going to point out that the United States Congress and President Obama in 2009, in facing the recession and the joblessness that we have in America, did the right thing.

And contrasting it with the Great Depression -- in the Great Depression, the president and the Congress stood by. They watched as people kept getting in tougher situations. They lost more jobs as the economy faltered. But here now, the United States Congress -- led by President Barack Obama -- is not standing idly by. We are very aggressively doing all we possibly can to help turn this recession around to get people back to work. It couldn't be a more stark contrast. And that is why this is so, so important. It's why this is so historic.

The third point is for us to remember: These are major spending increases and major tax reductions. On a net basis, they're very significant! Some are concerned it's not as significant as they'd like; some think it's too significant, but the bottom line -- whether the figure is $780 billion total or in that neighborhood -- still, that's a very, big strong positive stimulus to the American economy.

Economists pointed out there's about $1 trillion gap between the real economy and the potential economy. This gets close to helping -- closing that gap -- and I'm very proud of the effort we're taking. Some of you quibble with some of the various provisions in it, but overall on balance, I think it's a major step forward and it's going to give the American people some confidence.

SEN. REID: Senator Durbin.

SEN. DURBIN: The focus of President Obama's plan is the workers of America and the unemployment facing our nation. It's about jobs. And we all know that the report this morning and the reports that we've received in previous weeks tell us that thousands -- hundreds of thousands of Americans are losing their jobs.

The Obama administration came to office with a sense of urgency and we share that sense of urgency. It is unfortunate that all the members of the Senate don't feel exactly the same way, but thank goodness, three of them have shown extraordinary courage stepping forward to join us in this effort to find a solution to the economic problems facing this country.

Senators Olympia Snowe, Susan Collins and Arlen Specter have really gone out of their way to show that they understood what the last election was about. It's time for change! And if there's going to be change in Washington, it will take courage -- the courage of these three Republicans to step forward. And I hope in the final roll call that even more will be there.

We have a lot of work to do. We want to finish this bill. We want to bring this bill to conference. We want to have it signed by the president. Most of all, we want to use our good offices and the leadership of our president to enact this plan and turn this economy around. It's the highest priority for this administration. It's the highest priority for America.

And tonight is truly an historic night in the Senate. I'm really proud of all the effort that was put into this on both sides of the aisle that led us to this moment.

SEN. REID: Senator Schumer.

SEN. SCHUMER: Thank you.

You know, it's easy to quibble over details, but when you hear that 596,000 jobs were lost in one month, the time is to act, the time is to move, the time is to create jobs, not have partisan fighting. And that's what we did here today.

Because of the courage of three Republican members, because of the flexibility of our Democratic caucus -- which certainly didn't get everything it wanted -- we came together behind President Obama's plan. Why did we do that? Because the nation's economy demanded it! To do nothing could have sent us into a downward spiral, deflation from which we'd never recover.

So everyone had to give a little. And thank God more than 60 have. And that's why we're able to be here today and report some good news -- not only to President Obama, but to the American people. And that is that we are going to turn the corner in this recession by strong, concerted action that will turn our economy around, create jobs and leave in the longer term, America with a much strong infrastructure.

SEN. REID: Senator Murray.

SEN. MURRAY: It's been a long day with a lot of long meetings and a lot of hard decisions that had to be made. And I am so proud of everyone who worked on this -- Republican and Democrat -- who put aside their partisanship and said, as hard as this is, it's much harder for the thousands of Americans out there who are getting up tomorrow morning without a job.

And we kept focused on them and focused on finding a decision and a solution here that would move us forward so that we can begin to turn this ship around and get this country back on track. The investments that we're going to be making in this bill will give security and confidence back to the American people, that their leaders -- when the times are tough -- can put their differences aside and begin to move forward.

We're going to stand with the president to keep moving this bill forward -- whether it's tonight or tomorrow or Sunday -- to get this done and to make sure that Americans know that their leaders can make tough decisions and put their tough battles aside and remember them at the end of the day. And to me, that's what this bill symbolizes.

SEN. REID: We'll take some questions here.

Q It sounds like there might be a filibuster against the amendment -- (off mike).

SEN. REID: Well, we're in the process of the gathering the signatures for a cloture petition. I had hoped that would not be necessary, because we've had such a good time this Congress debating amendments and moving forward.

And I think it speaks volumes about those in the country who serve in Congress and want to get things done and those who don't. And that's why every one of us has stood and said we so appreciate the two senators from Maine, the senator from Pennsylvania and others who were involved in the negotiations getting us to this point.

So I hope not, but we're ready in case that happens. We have been told that we can go to conference. We will see if that, in fact, is the case. But whether we can go to conference or not, we can get something back. We're going to get something back that's a good product, just like the product that's going over to the House is a good product.

Q Senator, when you say cloture, are you talking about on the amendment or on the bill?

SEN. REID: Well, we're going to see. We're going to see what they want. You know, I can't imagine how anyone would benefit having two cloture votes, but you know, we'll see how serious people are about legislating.

Remember, we have to have this on the President's desk before the President's Day recess.

Q So you're talking about the initial cloture being on the -- (off mike).

SEN. REID: I'm talking about moving forward on this and finalizing this, I hope, on Monday. We had some preliminary discussions with the Republican leader and I think he is also acknowledging that this is something that we need to move down the road.

Q Senator Reid, Senator Murray talked about how difficult these negotiations when we saw everybody going in -- (inaudible). Could you give us a couple of examples of some either programs or spending that you got back into this? Meaning some of the things that Senator Collins and Nelson had proposed those cuts and you said, no, no, we need that.

SEN. REID: I appreciate everyone's interest and I think that's a good question, but I don't think we should answer that because as we've been told a long time ago, watching legislation move forward is sometimes uglier than making sausage. And it was pretty ugly on an occasion or two, okay?

Q Is the overall package now around $780 billion?

SEN. REID: It's 780 (billion dollars) and 790 (billion dollars).

Q (Off mike.)

SEN. REID: Well, we're going to deal with those at the right time, okay?

Q But they are not in the package --

SEN. REID: We're not dealing with the amendments. We still have a bunch of them out there and we'll deal with those one at a time.

Q Are you confident the size of this package is still big enough to do -- (off mike).

SEN. REID: The question -- for those of you who couldn't hear this booming voice from behind me -- is, am I satisfied that this package is big enough?

Keep in mind, it's approaching $1 trillion! It's a piece of legislation that is job creating. Did we get everything we wanted? No, we didn't. But remember, as Senator Baucus said, there are no cuts -- no one lost anything. Everything in here is new money!

So I am very, very happy with what we have. It's a product, as Senator Murray said, that we should be proud of and we are proud of.

One last question.

Q Senator, are you going to need Senator Kennedy?

SEN. REID: I always need Senator Kennedy.

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