Fox News "The Ingraham Angle" - Transcript: Interview with Reps. Chip Roy and Tom McClintock
Interview
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INGRAHAM: Well, try $1.375 billion. She might not want to call it a wall, but that's what it is. And that's not all bad. And that's "The Angle."
Hearing live from Capitol Hill, Republican Congressman Chip Roy of Texas and Tom McClintock of California. Congressman Roy, you have, to say the least, reservations about this framework. What do you say to those who think, well, that's the best offer out there, and it's better than another shutdown where the President just could get beaten up every day?
REP. CHIP ROY, R-TX: Well, good evening, Laura. Thanks for having us on. I wish I was in Texas instead of being here in the swamp where I'm forced to try to prevent Republicans from making yet another "boneheaded deal," quote-unquote, where right now we should be focusing on the fact that the American people are with us, that they are with us because they know that they want their border secured.
I was just down in the Rio Grande Valley last week and visiting with Border Patrol, where we see 400,000 people that are going to be streaming across the Rio Grande Valley this year. Of them, 200,000 will not even be apprehended. And of the 200,000 who are, 90 percent will be caught and released like you know because we allow judicially created catch-and- release to govern our border security.
The cartels have operational control of our border. It's time for us to do our job. And this deal isn't doing our job. $1.375 billion is the baseline. We need to get the money that is necessary so the border patrol aren't down on the border, without the radio signals they need, without the ability to have the fencing to stop the flow. And where fences are in place, they work. We've seen a 90 percent reduction where fence has been put in place. And it's time that we do our job instead of cutting--
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INGRAHAM: All right. Yes. Congressman, we've got to move the - we've got limited time. Let's move the conversation forward. That has already been established. And you're right about that 100 percent.
Congressman McClintock, first of all, your Governor has pulled back his National Guard troops from the border. He made a big stink about that. And we're not talking about the bullet train fiasco that blew up today. That fiasco. But this broke from The Washington Post just moments ago. And I want to quote it for you, Congressman.
"The bill was still being written tonight, Tuesday night, and lawmakers from both parties were pushing to include a number of favored provisions." Those are called pork provisions. Well, "Some Democrats wanted to add language that would provide back-pay to federal contractors who were caught in the middle of the recent shutdown, but it's unclear if lawmakers would be successful in getting the provision included."
Now, I'm hearing tonight that that could destroy any possibility of this thing even going forward, but people have to understand, we don't even have the language yet and we know stuff gets slipped in, Congressman McClintock, at the last minute. It happens every single time to the American taxpayer. Your thoughts?
REP. TOM MCCLINTOCK, R-CALIF.: Well, Laura, as long as the Democrats control the House, nothing good is going to come out of the House of Representatives. And as long as the Republicans have given Chuck Schumer and the Democrats a filibuster veto over any appropriations bills, we are not going to get a good bill through the Senate either.
The good news is the President has statutory authority to move ahead with building the wall. He can actually draw about $13 billion to do so, far more than he's asking from Congress. He has the legal authority to do so, he has the responsibility to do so, and ultimately that's the only way the wall is going to be built.
INGRAHAM: Well, I understand the White House Counsel's Office is looking at a provision of the U.S. code, I think it's 287, that would allow the President to move money into wall building that has a relation to stopping the flow of drugs across the border. Is that what you're hearing as well, Congressman?
MCCLINTOCK: Well, no - not only that - no, no. Not only that, but he can reprogram unobligated military construction funds for that purpose. That law dates back to 1976. It's been invoked 58 times, including for the civil war and Sierra Leone. This is clearly a priority national defense issue, and the President has a legal authority to declare that and to pull those funds from other military construction projects and put it into the most important project we have, the defense of our Southern border.
INGRAHAM: Yes.
MCCLINTOCK: And to those who say, well, that's going to come out of military construction funds, my question very simply is, what's more important, securing the border of Iraq or securing the border of the United States? Again, 60,000 people a month--
INGRAHAM: Yes. That's beyond - it's so frustrating now.
MCCLINTOCK: --that are now illegally crossing.
INGRAHAM: And now, what everyone has to understand, who's watching the show tonight, everyone has to get. And Congressman Roy, I want you to chime in on this. That nothing in this proposal would deal with the family units crossing the border. The Democrats are so dishonest on this.
And the Republicans frankly dropped the ball in the first 100 days. Republicans should have handled the President's agenda and he should have insisted on it in the first 100 days. That was his instinct, and he listened to Paul Ryan and the crew. And that was a huge mistake in the end.
MCCLINTOCK: Well, it's worse than that. It's worse than that.
INGRAHAM: But these family units can still cross the border, Congressman. Right? And they're going to be released. Because the court makes them be released, they're going to be released. And that's going to continue huge influx into this country. Today The Washington Post wrote another piece about it.
ROY: That's absolutely correct. I mean, look, the asylum issue that we're dealing with as well as the floor's (ph) decision, the point where I said the judicially-created mandatory catch-and-release, that's the core problem. And we've got to address that issue and not allow the judges to decide how we're going to secure our border.
And I think the President is right to be focused on emergency declarations. And the things we're not talking about are the extent to which the cartels have literal operational control of our border. Tamaulipas, the state just across the Rio Grande Valley, is a level-four state. It's a danger zone. We're not allowed to travel. We're not supposed to travel. That's an emergency level kind of operation that we're dealing with at our border. And the President is right to be focused on that. And Congress ought to do its job and step up in having the obligation to secure our border.
INGRAHAM: All right, gentlemen. Thanks so much. And - well, we have to go, but thank you so much. We'll have you back as this continues to develop.
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