CNN "The Situation Room" - Transcript: Interview with Senator Dick Durbin

Interview

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[17:18:44]

BLITZER: Major breaking news this hour, the Attorney General of the United States William Barr breaking publicly with President Trump. Telling the Associated Press there is no evidence of widespread fraud in the presidential election. We'll have more on that in just a moment.

But first, there's new developments unfolding in the Biden transition as CNN Political Correspondent M.J. Lee reports the President-Elect introduced his economic team today.

(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)

JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENT-ELECT OF THE UNITED STATES: But I want you to know that help is on the way.

M.J. LEE, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Fifty days from his inauguration, President-Elect Joe Biden formally introducing the team that he hopes will start leading the nation out of an economic recession next year.

BIDEN: First raid team that's going to get us through this ongoing economic crisis and help us build the economy back, not just build it back but build it back better than it was before. A team that's tested and experienced and includes groundbreaking Americans who come from different backgrounds --

LEE: Alongside Vice President-Elect Kamala Harris, Biden touting a set of historic nominees, including Janet Yellen to lead the Treasury Department. If confirmed, she would be the first woman to serve in that role.

JANET YELLEN, TREASURY SECRETARY NOMINEE: To the American people, we will be an institution that wakes up every morning thinking about you, your jobs, your paychecks, your struggles, your hopes, your dignity and your limitless potential.

[17:20:10]

LEE: Also nominated for top positions, Cecilia Rouse, to lead the Council of Economic Advisers, Wally Adeyemo to be Deputy Treasury Secretary and Neera Tanden to be the director of the Office of Management and Budget.

NEERA TANDEN, OFFICE OF MANAGEMENT AND BUDGET DIRECTOR NOMINEE: I believe so strongly that our government is meant to serve all the American people, Republicans, Democrats and Independents alike.

LEE: Biden's new economic team confronting the daunting task of getting the economy back on track while the COVID-19 pandemic ravages the nation. The appointees pledging to direct urgent aid to underrepresented communities hit hardest by the virus.

JANET YELLEN, TREASURY SECRETARY NOMINEE: The pandemic and economic fallout together, have caused so much damage for so many and have had a disproportionate impact on the most vulnerable among us. It's a convergence of tragedies.

LEE: Already, Tanden's nomination which require Senate confirmation drawing widespread and fierce opposition from Republicans.

SEN. JOHN CORNYN, (R) TEXAS: It's pretty crazy to me to think that she can go back and, you know, eliminate all the tweets that she sent out over the last whatever, months years. And I think it's a really messed up by the administration. I just think she's going to be radioactive.

LEE: The flurry of personnel announcements coming as the former vice president and his transition team prepared to hit the ground running on January 20.

At the top of their agenda an ambitious and expansive stimulus bill to pump new funding into the economy containing the COVID-19 pandemic and tackling racial inequality, particularly as the coronavirus has disproportionately hurt communities of color.

BIDEN: My transition team is already working on what I'll put forward in the next Congress to address the multiple crises we're facing, especially our economic and COVID crisis.

LEE: Sources also telling CNN that Biden is ready to take executive action in his first days in office, including rolling back Trump era executive orders seen as harmful to the environment.

(END VIDEO TAPE)

LEE: Now Biden also called on Congress today to quickly pass a stimulus bill, though he did say that anything that gets done during the lame duck session will only be the beginning. Interestingly, he also told reporters that he has still not spoken to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.

Of course, Wolf, so much of what he can get done next year legislatively will come down to the two Senate runoff races in Georgia next month. Wolf.

BLITZER: Early in January. All right, M.J., thank you very much.

We're joined now by Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois. He's the Minority Whip, the number two Democrat in the U.S. Senate leadership.

We're going to get to the Biden transition, Senator, in a moment, but how significant is it that we hear the Attorney General of the United States Bill Barr, one of the President's closest allies over these years, publicly rebuked President Trump on his phony election fraud claims?

SEN. DICK DURBIN (D-IL), HOUSE MINORITY WHIP: Isn't it interesting that it's a news story when the Attorney General is caught red handed telling the truth? I can't understand, Wolf, why this has become such a novelty in Washington out of the Trump administration, but it has. This Attorney General time and again, has been willing to say whatever this President wanted him to say. Today, he spoke the truth and it made the news.

BLITZER: And why do you think he did so?

DURBIN: Maybe he's trying to rehabilitate his resume. I don't know his motive. But it's refreshing to hear it. Well, it's not just refreshing, it's startling to hear it.

BLITZER: Yes, it was a very significant development, very huge development, indeed.

The President has been tweeting that he quote one Michigan, that the Nevada results are, "fake," that the error is Arizona results are fraudulent. So how far do these words from the Attorney General go in convincing the President to accept reality?

DURBIN: The President's reality is $170 million that he's raised since the election by these baseless foundationless charges that he's made over and over again. And been proven wrong time and again, even by Republican elected officials, who have told us the election was fair and square.

BLITZER: Let's turn while I have you, Senator, to these revived desperately needed COVID economic relief talks that are underway right now. The Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, he has his own plan, the House Speaker Nancy Pelosi spoke to the White House, to Steve Mnuchin, the Treasury Secretary once again today about her plan.

There's a different bipartisan group of senators putting out their proposal. Where does this leave the millions and millions of Americans who are desperately struggling right now and need help?

DURBIN: Well, unfortunately, Mitch McConnell is ignoring some stalwarts in his own caucus, who have been working. And I've been sitting at the table with him for weeks to find a plan that was reasonable, a bipartisan approach to give some help to people who are saying for you this economy, the unemployed, the people in businesses that are struggling to survive, they've come up with a $908 billion plan. It's a good one.

[17:25:09]

There are some aspects of it that causes some questions in my mind about liability. But beyond that, I can tell you the dollars are well spent in this plan. But senator, Mitch McConnell will not accept this. He wants something else.

It's unfortunate, but the day of reckoning is coming. You know, when the day is, it's the day after Christmas. Because the day after Christmas, if we do nothing, 12 million Americans will fall off unemployment insurance, 12 million out of the 20 million currently on that period. So it's important for us if we want to go home and celebrate with a families with a clear conscience to do something.

BLITZER: Are you ready to work out a compromise from your perspective and accept some sort of middle of the road deal at least to help some of these people get through Christmas and beyond?

DURBIN: Well, that's exactly what we did. You know, here is Mitch McConnell with his 500 billion, here are the democrats with 1.5 or $2.2 trillion.

And we came in with a plan for $908 billion, and it was crafted by Democrats and Republicans after a long, long weeks and hours and hours of deliberation. This is a middle ground. This is a compromise. It's a good bill.

BLITZER: Senator Durbin, good luck. Thanks so much for joining us.

DURBIN: Thank you.

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