CNN "Newsroom" - Transcript: Interview with Mark Warner

Interview

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BROWN: Democratic Senator Mark Warner of Virginia is here to discuss.

Hi, Senator. Nice to see you. Welcome to the show finally.

SEN. MARK WARNER (D-VA): Hey, Pamela. Thank you. And I want to get --

BROWN: So let me ask you this.

WARNER: Can I just -- I know we want to get to Build Back Better, but I think it's really important as the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee that I weigh in not on the specific allegations that have been made in your earlier stories. But for too long, too many American companies have turned a blind eye to the Chinese Communist Party's actions, to their almost Orwellian state, the way they have used data from their Chinese tech companies, the fact that they literally steal $300 billion to $500 billion of intellectual property every year, and they have created a surveillance state.

And too many American and Western and Japanese companies turn a blind eye because they don't want to miss the Chinese market. Let me be clear, when I mentioned this, I'm not calling out the Chinese people. The Chinese people are great people. It is the Communist Party of China, Xi Jinping's leadership. It is not about Chinese Americans and the Chinse diaspora anywhere, but it is, you know, there's never been an economic threat the way China poses not only to America, but the development of technology and democracies around the world.

And it's time that companies, I think, not just in sports but across the board are going to have to choose which side they're on.

BROWN: So then what is your message to the companies like Nike? I was just talking about Nike with Enes Kanter there as you well heard. What is your message to these companies?

WARNER: My message is, for too long, companies have said, well, we know we may be having an intellectual property stolen. We may know we're being forced into joint ventures, but we just can't miss the Chinese market. And unfortunately, as we see in the 21st century, the challenge is I believe going to be less about military but about who is going to make the great next technology breakthrough. There's 5g technology where Huawei, a Chinese company, is frankly

running the whole marketplace with enormous security concerns. Artificial intelligence, quantum computing, hyper sonics. The United States of America needs to invest with our allies, and one thing the American government should and must do right away is we've already had a bipartisan bill come out of the Senate that would invest $52 billion in making sure that semiconductors, some of those are actually built right here in America.

You wonder why we've got great inflation, while we've got cars that can't be sold because they are missing semiconductors, that's because we ceded our American leadership. Now this is not us against China, this means us with democracies, South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, the E.U. working together. But just this first story was so powerful, I don't think it could go unanswered about too many companies who frankly turn a blind eye.

BROWN: Thank you for sharing that, Senator Warner. I'm really glad that you did. It's an important conversation to have. I do want to ask you about Build Back Better before we let you to go. Leader Schumer has said he wants it to get passed by Christmas. There's a lot of sticking point as you well know for certain senators like Manchin, Sinema and Sanders.

Given how much negotiating needs to be done, is that timeline realistic? And I'm going to add -- throw one more in there in the essence of time. Do you think Manchin can get on board with paid family leave?

[18:20:02]

WARNER: Well, Pamela, I'm not going to weigh in on what Joe is going to do or not going to do. But the great thing about, and as somebody who was part of the infrastructure bill that was broadly bipartisan, widely popular, we should have passed it three months ago, but now with the Democrats can get past talking about tough lines, and talking about what this next bill does, yes, we need to get more people back in the work force.

Well, the best way to do that is provide child care, do universal pre- K and try to make sure that folks who got aging parents have got somebody to take care of them. We've got a lot of families, Pamela, you know my family. I've got a daughter with type 1 diabetic. The price of insulin has quadrupled. This bill will make sure that no family pays more than $35 a month for insulin.

And it will also finally take on the kind of major needs we need to deal with in terms of climate change. We talk about the specifics of what this will affect people's lives and bring down their costs. We're going to be successful and we will get it done by Christmas.

BROWN: All right. Democratic Senator Mark Warner, thank you so much for coming on the show. Senator, I hope you'll come back soon.

WARNER: Thank you, Pamela.

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