CNN Inside Politics - Transcript
CNN Inside Politics - Transcript
Tuesday, June 7, 2005
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KING: The bruising battles over President Bush's nominees have dominated the goings-on in Congress for a good part of Mr. Bush's second term. With me now from Capitol Hill, the Senate Republican whip, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky. Senator, thank you for joining us today.
Some progress, at least from the White House and the Republican perspective, some progress when it comes to confirming judges, but still no scheduled floor vote just yet on John Bolton, the president's choice to be the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. When will see that come back to the floor?
SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY), MAJORITY WHIP: Well, we've had a very productive-we're in the process of having a very productive week. By the end of the week, we will have confirmed-either this week or the week before last-five circuit court appointments by the president, one of whom had been held up four years, the other two, at least a couple of years.
So we're getting a lot of judges confirmed and having a pretty good level of cooperation from the Democratic side. Senator Biden said on a Sunday show and Senator Dodd said on your Sunday show that I was also on, that he expected Mr. Bolton to get an up or down vote, and we anticipate that will happen. It could happen as early as this week. If not, we expect it'll happen next week.
KING: Senator Dodd also said though that he'd like to see some records that John Bolton wanted to see when he was at the State Department, still at the State Department. Some Republicans have said that the White House is drawing too harsh of a line there, that they should at least share some of that information or try to find a compromise. The White House says no. What do you say to that, Senator?
MCCONNELL: Gosh, I mean, there's been a lot of material handed over. I mean, he's had eight hours of testimony, 800 pages of documents have been turned over. All reasonable requests have been honored. Surely, over this issue, we won't fail to give Bolton an up or down vote.
I mean, look, I hope they're not going to fall back into the old mode of operation in the Senate, obstruct, obstruct, obstruct. I think we've sort of worked our way past that, and as Senator Biden and Senator Dodd both said on Sunday, they anticipate Bolton getting an up or down vote and if he does, he'll be confirmed, whether or not all of these requests are honored.
KING: Senator, the progress, as you've put it, on the judges came because of a deal, seven Republican senators met with seven Democrats. They brokered a deal to end the threat of filibusters at least in the short term. Some chatter in Washington after that that the leader, your leader, Senator Frist, had lost control of Republicans in the Senate. What do you think of that?
MCCONNELL: I think what you need to focus on is the fact we will have gotten five and probably going to get six circuit judges here shortly after that agreement between the 14 senators, and then we're still where we were only we've gotten more judges confirmed. If filibusters are used, the majority leader will exercise the constitutional option and I believe if we ever have to exercise the constitutional option, we'll have the 50 or 51 votes that we need.
In the meantime, we're kind of enjoying the cease-fire and reaping the benefits of it by getting all of these judges confirmed.
KING: Amid the cease-fire, there's a controversy about the leader of the other party in the Senate, Senator Harry Reid who has been quoted as calling the president of the United States a liar and a loser. He said he apologized for calling him a loser but not for a liar. What does that tell us about the partisan atmosphere in this town right now?
MCCONNELL: Gee, I don't know. You'd have to ask Senator Reid about his comments about the president. We are trying to get along and to move the agenda forward, and I think Senator Reid will have to answer for his own observations about the president. Obviously, I think they're off-base.
KING: Off-base, Senator Mitch McConnell being very gracious, a chance to fire back at the Democrats. You obviously hope for the cease-fire to continue. Sir, we thank you for joining us today.
MCCONNELL: Thank you.
KING: Take care, Senator.
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