'This Week' Transcript 5-21-23: Rep. Jodey Arrington and Sen. Chris Van Hollen

Interview

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Well, it's good to be with you, Martha.

We're in an insane situation right now. I've heard what Congressman Arrington said. What we have right now is Speaker McCarthy and MAGA House Republicans saying that they are going to push the default detonator and blow up our economy if they don't get their way on their budget proposals. That would destroy the American economy.

What President Biden has said is we'll talk about reasonable budget proposals. He's put a trillion dollars of cuts on the table already. It's not true that the president hasn't put forward his own proposal. He put forward a budget, a very detailed budget with $3 trillion in deficit reduction by closing tax breaks for a very, very rich people and big corporations.

And Republicans won't accept one penny in deficit reduction from closing tax loopholes.

The farce of this whole thing is that under Donald Trump, we raised the debt ceiling three times, 40 percent of our national debt actually was accumulated during the four years of the Trump administration. And now, and now, they are not willing to talk about any revenue from the very wealthy people as part of this effort.

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Sure. And that is the important points.

So, Republicans are saying if they don't get things their way, they're going to blow up the economy. That's a very different position than what President Biden is saying.

President Biden is saying, look, let's sit down and find a reasonable way to reduce the deficit and debt. He put a trillion dollars of cuts on the table. But he is not saying if you don't do it my way, if you don't close these tax breaks for very rich people, I'm going to blow up the economy. And that's the difference here.

So, you know, I'm extremely worried about where we are now. I think the markets are going to get shaky.

I think we need to move to plan B, which is what's called a discharge petition in the House, which is where you have Republicans, we only need five, work together with all 213 Democrats to put together the kind of proposal that even about 30 Republicans we're talking about as recently as May, which had the number of elements including cuts, but a number of other ingredients.

It seems to me we're going to have to move in that direction pretty soon.

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Well, let me just say, Plan A needs to be our focus for the next 48 hours. Plan B, which is a reasonable proposal, if Speaker McCarthy would just let the House work its will, we can have a discharge petition, we could get a majority in the House for a reasonable proposal to prevent default. Plan c would be the 14th Amendment. Look, my -- my view is, the president should use all legal options out there. I think that is a legal option. But it's not the preferred option because there's a lot of uncertainty around that approach. It will be litigated.

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Well, the difference is, it -- a -- that option would be better than a default. The United States has never defaulted in its history. It would create a -- a catastrophe in the economy. So, the 14th Amendment is not the preferred alternative. A lot of people predict that even if you go the route of the 14th Amendment you go into a recession, but if -- if you default, we're talking about depression. We're talking about 18 million people out of work. We're talking about interest rates going up. We're talking about everything getting much more expensive for the American people. That is what Speaker McCarthy and the MAGA Republicans and Donald Trump are threatening if they don't get their way.

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Well, Martha, I've always been skeptical about this. We have a very weak speaker in Kevin McCarthy. We saw how many rounds of votes it took him to be elected speaker. He does not control his caucus. So, he cannot take back a reasonable proposal to his caucus and expect it to get the votes, especially when you have Donald Trump egging them on and saying, don't give an inch, default, don't give an inch. So, that's what we're facing right now.

I, again, want to emphasize a really important difference. It's not just both sides saying this or that. The Democrats, President Biden, is not saying that if he doesn't get his way on how we reduce the deficit over a period of time that he's going to blow up the economy. That's the difference. Speaker McCarthy and the MAGA Republicans are threatening to blow up the economy if we don't do things exactly their way.

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Good to be with you.

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