CNN "The Situation Room" - Transcript: Interview with Senator Mark Warner

Interview

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[18:20:00]

BLITZER: There's more breaking news up on Capitol Hill, where we're awaiting a House vote on a $900 billion coronavirus relief package.

It includes a $600 direct payment to people below a certain income level, and extends the $300-a-week jobless benefit. There are $284 billion in forgivable loans for small businesses under the Paycheck Protection Program. The package also contains $82 billion for schools and colleges, as well as $25 billion for rental assistance.

We're joined by Senator Mark Warner of Virginia. He's on the Finance Committee. He's also the vice chairman of the Intelligence Committee.

Senator, thank you so much for joining us.

In the last hour, I spoke with your colleague Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders here in THE SITUATION ROOM. He told me this coronavirus relief agreement doesn't go nearly far enough, although he says he will vote in favor of it. What do you make of this deal?

SEN. MARK WARNER (D-VA): What I make -- and I'm actually very proud of this deal.

There were a group of us, bipartisan, that came together right after the election. We should have done this election before the election. Neither side really wanted to get it done there.

We came together on these categories that you just outlined, as well as assistance for food banks, as well as assistance for broadband, as well as assistance for mental health, and came up with a $908 billion package. I would have liked to have seen more in terms of state and local assistance. I would have, frankly, done more for the unemployed, as opposed to some of the direct checks.

I think we needed to target this to people who are most in need, but we got a deal done that, otherwise, the leadership of both parties were frankly sniping at each other, but not willing to get something done.

So, I'm proud that this is exactly the same range of what we presented a few weeks back. It's been massaged a little bit by the so-called leaders. And, tonight, we're going to prove that Congress won't be the Grinch that stole Christmas, and we will make sure this relief will get out to people, starting as soon as the day after Christmas, when people otherwise would be losing their unemployment.

BLITZER: Yes, there's millions of people who have actually gone into poverty over this past several months because of the coronavirus pandemic.

But are you saying that the Democratic leadership in the House failed before the election; they should have accepted what Steve Mnuchin, the Treasury secretary, was proposing, $1.8 trillion?

WARNER: I'm saying that neither side, for, I think, a host of political reasons, really were all in to getting a deal done before the election.

And I'm saying that thank goodness a bipartisan group of senators, and, for that matter, 50 members of the House in the so-called Problem Solvers Caucus, said, we cannot sit idly by while people's lives are destroyed by the economic nature of COVID, as well as the health care issue.

We can't allow hundreds of thousands of black-owned businesses that have shut down, we can't allow that kind of economic destruction to continue. So, we said we're not going to wait for the folks, the so- called leaders to decide. We're going to put out a plan. We put out that plan.

We found wide bipartisan support. The folks on the extremes, far left and far right, never want to get to yes. They will have some problems. But the vast majority of us -- and I think you will see that vast majority vote in overwhelming numbers both in the House and later tonight in the Senate to get that relief out.

BLITZER: Yes. It's so, so important, because there are so many Americans -- hard to believe in our country, the richest country in the world, so many Americans right now, millions, are actually food- hungry. They don't have enough food to feed their kids and they're worried about getting kicked out of their homes and becoming homeless.

Hard to believe it. And I'm grateful to you and your colleagues for doing what you are doing. Not perfect, but you can't let the perfect be the enemy of the good, as I keep on saying.

WARNER: Amen to that.

BLITZER: Let me quickly get your thoughts. Put your hat on, as the vice chairman of the Intelligence Committee, Senator.

Chris Krebs, the former director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, who was fired by the president, he told CNN yesterday he agrees with assessments that Russia was behind the cyber-hack, adding: "They're exceptionally good at this. They're quiet. They're deliberate." He says they're patient and they're careful.

Why is President Trump discounting his own officials, refusing to condemn Russia for this breach?

WARNER: Wolf, it's worse than that.

Not only did Chris Krebs say it. Mike Pompeo, the secretary of state, Marco Rubio. I think shortly our government will formally attribute. And the truth is, when the president of the United States refuses to call out this adversary -- and this adversary is very good. They took their time. They brought their A-team.

It shows that virtually any private company, and many of our government agencies, at least on the unclassified side, it's tough to go against this kind of focused adversary. And we need a president that's willing to stand up for our country and stand up against Vladimir Putin.

We're also going to need -- it will take us literally weeks to fully discover the extent of this hack, and literally months to remediate. And I think certain rules that need to be in place -- there's not even an obligation for a government agency to report to CISA, Chris Krebs' old enterprise.

[18:25:11]

There's no obligation for a public company to report this in a timely manner to law enforcement. Thank goodness FireEye, one of the nation's best cyber companies -- cybersecurity companies, came forward and they acknowledged this breach, or we might still be in the dark.

We're going to need to up our game, as well as make some policy changes, coming out of one of the deepest and most extensive attacks in our history.

BLITZER: Yes. And you're right.

The acting chairman of your Intelligence Committee, Senator Marco Rubio, says it was the Russians. The president can dream that it was the Chinese, but everybody else says it's the Russians.

Senator Warner, thanks so much for joining us. Thanks everything you're doing.

WARNER: Thank you, Wolf.

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