CNN "Inside Politics" - Transcript

Interview

CNN "Inside Politics" - Transcript

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HENRY: OK. Thank you very much. Eric Lamar a hazmat expert at the International Association of Firefighters. Thank you for joining us.

As you can see, the fire is still raging. We will be checking back in in Ft Worth throughout the afternoon and evening as news warrants. Now back to INSIDE POLITICS.

Democratic House leader Nancy Pelosi today had some tough comments about Republican efforts to secure last night's victory on the Central American Free Trade Agreement. Pelosi even questioned whether some questionable deals might have been made by Republicans in getting votes. I spoke with Nancy Pelosi a short while ago and asked her about those allegations.

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PELOSI: What I said was that the Republicans turned the floor of the House of Representatives into a "Let's Make A Deal" set. It was reminiscent of what happened at the time of the Medicare prescription drug legislation that evening. And again this time they kept the vote open a long time.

But many of the overtures that were made to members was made before even going to the floor. So this is about, again, an abuse of power, in an unethical way of passing legislations. And depending on what members decide to do, may require further attention.

HENRY: But now, it seems to me, you have a responsibility as a leader in Congress if, in fact you believe there was some corruption, whether it was rules broken or laws broken to come forward and explain and get specific.

PELOSI: Well, what I will say to you very clearly is that I do think there is a culture of corruption in the Capitol of the United States. That they have turned the gavel of the speaker into an auctioneers gavel. And that's what I am talking about. And that would have been a abuse of power in that regard. And I have said that over and over, again. And last night was a further manifestation of it.

HENRY: But madam leader, we also heard that union leaders were going around saying that any Democrat supporting this Central American Free Trade Agreement would not get political support, not get political money down the line. What's the difference there? It seems like Democrats are also bean muscled.

PELOSI: There's plenty of difference. If the labor movement, or the Chamber of Commerce says to members of Congress, we support those who support us, that's what they do. They are outside groups. When taxpayer money is being used by the administration, or by the Republican leadership in the Congress to persuade members to vote a certain way, I think that's something quite different.

HENRY: What do you think it says about the president's political standing right now, that he put his personal capital on the line, the vice president spent several hours last night personally lobbying members, they had half the cabinet there, and yet they still won by basically a vote? What does that say?

PELOSI: Well, it says they didn't have a good idea in the first place. Democrats stood ready to work with the president and the Republicans in a bipartisan way to have a good CAFTA agreement. We could have had over 400 votes. But they refused to put workers' rights and environmental principals as a core part of the treaty. The Central American countries would have accepted that. But the U.S. rejected it. So members are smart. They have to -- they represent their district. This is a job loser, yet again another job loser, and it also undermines the workers' rights in Central America. So, it's not good for anyone.

HENRY: But madam leader, now as we come to this August recess, the Republicans are saying they have a lot of accomplishments, whether you liked it, whether it was pretty or not, they got this trade agreement through, they're about to get the energy bill, the highway bill, they've done tort reform, bankruptcy reform. Don't you have to admit there were some accomplishments there, whereas Democrats have just been trying to oppose them in every step of the way.

PELOSI: Well, what I say is this has been a Congress of missed opportunities and make matters worse. As far as CAFTA is concerned, even their own members had to be strong-armed into voting for it, because it's not the right way to go, to use the most recent example. Today on the floor is the Energy Bill, which even the secretary of Energy says will not lower prices at the pump for a long time to come and will not reduce our dependence on foreign oil. As far as the Transportation Bill, it is a good bill. It's two years late.

HENRY: What about one final issue, retirement security? The Republicans have been demanding that you put a plan on the table for months now. You finally have put one on the table this week, but it does nothing to address the issue of Social Security solvency. Aren't you ducking that?

PELOSI: No, we're not ducking at all. Democrats have said from the start, we are the protectors of Social Security, we will not allow privatization to undermine Social Security. We will not allow the Republicans to continue to rob the Social Security trust fund. We are about solvency. We are about a lock box. We are about pay-as-you-go, so that the budget deficit does not drain the trust fund of it's resources.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HENRY: That was House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi.

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