CNN "CNN Newsroom" - Transcript: Interview with Congressman Bennie Thompson

Interview

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WHITFIELD: All right. Manu Raju on Capitol Hill. Thanks so much. Check back with you.

All right. Here to talk more about this, the chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee Congressman from the great state of Mississippi, Bennie Thompson. Good to see you, Congressman.

REP. BENNIE THOMPSON (D-MS): Thank you for having me Fredricka.

WHITFIELD: So how optimistic are you that there might be a deal made in this $900 billion relief package?

THOMPSON: Well, I'm very optimistic. I can't give you a timetable. If we have to give ourselves another day or so to get it finalized, I think Congress will do that. But I don't think will leave here without getting a package complete.

WHITFIELD: And what would make that package complete. What needs to be in there that should not be negotiated away?

THOMPSON: Well, I think obviously the unemployment benefits, the stimulus payments, the moneys that go to state and local and to the school systems that have to have it. And from my understanding, those are not in contention anymore. So what we have to do is to move forward with that.

As you know, the House for the most part has always been ready to negotiate. We passed the Heroes Act months ago. So we're just getting to the point now of getting our Senate colleagues to join us in this effort to get relief to our communities.

WHITFIELD: If a deal is embraced, what are you telling your constituents in terms of how soon they would actually feel some of the relief coming from this package whether it be individual, small businesses, schools? I mean is it a matter of days or weeks?

THOMPSON: Well, first of all, we would say those who received the $1,200 stimulus checks, the first go-around, they would get a $600 check. So you won't have to say do I qualify or anything like that? You are automatically qualified simply because you received the $1,200 earlier. The PPP loans and other things for small business they will be available also.

So this is more or less an extension of earlier programs that worked and we just now have to, you know, codify, put it in writing, allow the members to have some time to read the language that's in there, and then ultimately vote on it, to give that relief to our communities.

One things we have to do there are a lot of communities and individuals who are suffering from lack of food. Food insecurity is a major, major issue all over the country. So in this bill, there's also relief for that.

WHITFIELD: This is all a consequence of the pandemic. Your state of Mississippi has been hit very hard by coronavirus -- nearly 200,000 cases and 4,400 deaths. Hospitalizations are also on the rise in your state.

And now, here it is, you know, in your state where the first shipments of the latest FDA approved Moderna vaccine, you know, started departing out this convoy of trucks yesterday.

But this really is an interesting convergence, you know, of hope and despair. How are you looking at the days ahead?

THOMPSON: Well, first of all, I took my shot yesterday. I made sure that I convince my constituents that there's nothing wrong with taking it. It's absolutely important. But as important, there are so many of my constituents, as you know, Mississippi was void (ph) of any hospital beds because we had none.

So what we are saying to them is with the leadership that the House and Senate is demonstrating, in due time you will have an opportunity to get vaccinated. We encourage you to do it when that opportunity presents itself.

Every time I call my constituents, Fredricka, someone is telling me, well you know, so-and-so is sick. Unfortunately, we lost so-and-so. We've lost too many people to this pandemic because we did not address it in the beginning.

[14:09:56]

WHITFIELD: You received the Pfizer vaccine, the one of two doses. Was there any hesitancy whatsoever for you to receive -- I mean as a member of Congress you're, you know, you're right up there with being able to get it first. But was there ever any hesitancy, and I ask you that, because a number of your constituents, you know, are reticent. There's a good deal of the American public who are so reticent about this vaccine. So what's the example that you're trying to send by doing it yourself?

(CROSSTALK)

THOMPSON: Well, thank you very much. We're trying to say that we allowed the system of testing this vaccine to work. I trust the validators (ph) in this system. Now we need to push it out. But there's a natural suspicion, especially in African-American communities with always we're mindful of what happened with the Tuskegee study, where we were absolutely used as guinea pigs.

And so that is still resonating across the land so we want to mitigate that. I compliment the former Presidents of the United States who will get their shots in the not-too-distant future. So we have to have validators out there to encourage the public that this is the right thing to do.

Beyond that, you know, we have yet about 200 million citizens vaccinated in order to mitigate this pandemic. So we have a long way to go. But glad that we have two vaccines on the market, so to speak, and with an additional two set to come on in the not-too-distant future.

WHITFIELD: As a chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, I want to ask you about this ongoing investigation concerning the cyberattack. It's impacted government agencies, private companies are the ones who made in discovery, and now we're learning more and more about this cyberattack going as far back as March.

And this morning Senator Mitt Romney said Russia, you know, laid the groundwork to cripple our communications, electricity, water -- something he likened to a wartime setting. How do you see this cyberattack? And do you see it as an act of war?

THOMPSON: Well, there's no question about. It compromised a lot of our system. We really don't know the full extent of it. We just found out about it as an entity last weekend.

And ultimately when members of Congress started trying to get information, our own government was resistant in sharing information even with committees of jurisdiction.

So we do know Russia has attribution for what has occurred. We know that some 18,000 companies and organizations potentially impacted. We know that some eight government agencies that we know of at this point.

But we still have some more work to do, to be honest Fredricka because Russia has compromised our systems. Now, first thing we have to do is make sure that we have the resources to address it. One of our --

WHITFIELD: Well, actually on that note, I want you to hear what the former director of the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency, CISA, you know, Chris Krebs said this morning about that very matter. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHRISTOPHER KREBS, FORMER HEAD, CISA: Yes, it happened on my watch at CISA and we missed it. A bunch of other folks missed it. But there is work that we have to do now going forward to make sure, a, we get past this. That we get the Russians out of the networks. But b, that it never happens again. And we really need congressional support, we need the resources, we need the authorities to be able to make sure that again, it doesn't happen again.

But going back to the beginning, the Russians are exceptionally good at this sort of work. And they found a seam in our defenses.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: So is this cyberattack, does it exemplify a lack of resource or even commitment from this country to get ahead of adversaries such as Russia who could carry out cyber attacks like this.

THOMPSON: You know, it says we were good at the moment, but that was not good enough because they used a trusted validator to come into our back door, Fredricka.

The other problem is we don't have anyone in charge of coordinating our cyber defense system. We've had -- not had someone since March of 2018. And that person usually is in the White House.

[14:14:55]

THOMPSON: In the NDAA legislation that I hope will get passed before we adjourn, we put that individual back into the legislation. President-Elect Biden has indicated that he supports it.

So what we need is an all hands on deck coordinated effort, to making sure that we can defend ourselves because as Chris Krebs said, we're challenged right now.

But I'll tell you what else is concerning to me is the president fired the number 1, the number 2, and the number 3 person at CISA and put no one back at that level in place. So really we have an organization without real leadership at this moment in time. And that puts us at risk, too.

WHITFIELD: Is that willful in your view or an example of negligence?

THOMPSON: Well, you know, when a president tries to blame China for this hack, when all of our systems and experts say it's Russia. The secretary of state said it was Russia. But for some reason our president is focused on China and voting machines, rather than this hack of some 18,000 companies here in America.

So for whatever reason, our president is reluctant to call out the Russian government as being the culprit in this matter.

WHITFIELD: All right. We'll leave it there for now, thank you so much, Congressman Bennie Thompson. We covered a lot, appreciate you. Thank you.

THOMPSON: Thank you.

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