CNN "The Lead with Jake Tapper" - Interview with Elissa Slotkin [16:27:24-16:30:00]
Interview
BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT
Congresswoman, a pleasure to have you back.
More than 100 of your Democratic colleagues are co-sponsors of this bill. You are not, at least not yet. You have not said if you will support it. Is there anything in the bill that you're concerned about?
REP. ELISSA SLOTKIN (D-MI): I mean, look, we got the bill this morning. It's over 100 pages, so I just have a rule they read everything before I support things. I have no reason to believe that I'm going to have a problem supporting it, but I do read, and that hopefully gives my constituents some comfort.
But, listen, I think -- I think we need to listen to what people are telling us in the way that they're marching on the streets, in the way that the leaders in the communities are coming forward and talking about this systemic issue.
So, I just -- I think it's like just about the perfect timing to be talking about something substantial that we're going to vote on this month.
TAPPER: OK. One of the big issues that a lot of critics of House Democrats have is that, obviously, you have the majority in the House. You can pass whatever you want, but Republicans control the Senate, and very often, Democrats in the House don't seem to communicate at all with Senate Republicans so that the legislation can actually head to the president's desk, getting through the Senate first.
Have you spoken to any of your Republican colleagues in the House or Senate about this legislation or legislation in general to approach this -- approach this issue of police reform?
SLOTKIN: Yeah. I actually have. I'm part of something called the Problem Solver's Caucus, so it's equal numbers of Democrats and Republicans in the House. And the head of the Congressional Black Caucus, Representative Karen Bass, came to one of our meetings and briefs us all on some of the ideas that are now contained in this piece of legislation, and I was really heartened to hear some of my Republican colleagues say, hey, we want to be on this bill. Can you include us in the conversation? We want to be able to vote on something.
That is how you know that things are really different and people are --
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