Fox News "Fox News Sunday" - Transcript: Interview with Sen. Bill Cassidy

Interview

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And joining us now from Louisiana is Republican Senator Bill Cassidy.

Well, Senator, as David just mentioned, you have the Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, calling for a vote on Wednesday. A cloture vote to end the possibility of a filibuster on that infrastructure bill, which hasn't even been completed yet.

Two questions. First of all, will you vote for cloture on Wednesday? And, two, how confident are you that ten Republicans will vote, which is the number you need, to block a filibuster?

SEN. BILL CASSIDY (R-LA): How can I vote for cloture when the bill isn't written? Unless you want program failure, unless Senator Schumer doesn't want this to happen, you need a little bit more time to get it right.

It can absolutely happen but you need the pay-fors. Senator Barrasso spoke to that. If we get the pay-fors, we can pass this.

That leads to the second issue, we need Senate leadership, Schumer, and the White House to work with us. Right now I can -- I can frankly tell you that they've not. We're competing with their $3.5 trillion plan. They want everything reasonable on their side. Not helping us. Again, we can pass this, we just don't need programed failure.

WALLACE: OK. I just want to lock this down before I move on to the $3.5 trillion. You're saying that if Chuck Schumer goes ahead and puts a cloture vote to cut off the possibility of filibuster on Wednesday that it will fail?

CASSIDY: I just don't know how you have a cloture vote when you don't have the bill written, when you don't have the pay-fors established. And so, if you will, he's asking us to vote on things that they've not cooperated on how we bring it about. So I have to kind of get my mind around, how do we vote on something which is not yet written as we try and get it right. We can get it done, but if they refused to cooperate on the pay-fors, it's not going to pass. They know that.

And so, again, how do you pass -- how do you vote for cloture on something which is not yet ready? I just don't know how to answer that question, Chris.

WALLACE: And, briefly, could it be ready by Wednesday, or are there too many differences and it won't be ready by Wednesday to have a cloture vote?

CASSIDY: I think it could be ready. Again, we need cooperation from the White House and Schumer on our pay-fors.

We've offered pay-fors, Republicans have. Good faith pay-fors that both sides agree are good. And we offer them and the White House takes them and says, no, we want them. We want them for our $3.5 trillion.

Now, if you really don't want a bipartisan package, if you want to kind of make the point that Congress doesn't work because you make it so it can't work, then take all our pay-fors. If you want to actually have it bipartisan bill that the American people strongly approve of, then cooperate a little bit, we can get this done, we just need a little help.

WALLACE: OK, let's assume, for the sake of this interview, that you do get a compromise on the pay-fors and on the bipartisan comprehensive infrastructure bill. At the same time that Chuck Schumer is pushing that on a bipartisan basis, he's also pushing for a $3.5 trillion massive spending program, which he wants to pass on a straight party line vote.

Question, can you separate the two, support the bipartisan compromise on infrastructure while you oppose the $3.5 trillion social spending?

CASSIDY: Absolutely, because the $1.2 trillion infrastructure is over five to eight years, depending on what aspects. The American people universally want. The spending is somewhat on the back end. It won't worsen inflation, it will create jobs. That is very different than what is being offered with the 3.5 trillion, which even Larry Summers, a left of center economist, a Democrat, says in an overheating economy is problematic.

So I think our 1.2 is where the American people want us to be, 3.5 is where the progressive socialist wing of the Democratic Party wants to be.

WALLACE: But are you concerned, Senator, that President Biden and the Democrats are using you, that they are going to be able to claim that they worked in a bipartisan fashion, hold a big signing ceremony for the infrastructure built in the Rose Garden at the same time that they pass the rest of their agenda on a straight party line vote?

CASSIDY: You know, all I can do -- you do what is right, and it's right.

The $1.2 trillion is good for the United States of America. It would be bipartisan, representing the interest of all 50 states, not just those represented by Democrats. It actually addresses pent-up demand for roads and bridges in my state, across the nation, and other things important.

Now, the 3.5 trillion, if they want to go there on a strict party line vote, fueling inflation, making people more dependent upon the government, they can address that. I'm just trying to take care of the infrastructure that our country needs, that my state needs.

WALLACE: So if you add up all of the Biden plans, you had 1.9 trillion for COVID relief, now you're talking about 1.2 trillion for infrastructure and then $3.5 trillion for social spending, that adds up. I didn't know the math was going to be included here. That adds up to more than $6 trillion.

And, Senator Schumer, the Senate majority leader, has been very clear about his intentions, which is to transform the American economy.

Here he is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER (D-NY): It will allow us to pass the most significant legislation, to expand support for American families since the era of the new deal and the great society.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALLACE: Now, you say you can separate the two and say, look, I'm for this, I'm against that. Do you think that ten Republicans, which is what you're going to need to pass bipartisan infrastructure, can separate the two and not feel, well, they're a little bit complicit because they went for this

$600 billion in new spending on the infrastructure plan?

CASSIDY: So, first, absolutely I think we can if we get our pay-fors right.

That's where we need the cooperation from the White House and from Schumer's office. If we get those, this spending is over five to eight years. It is something which Republicans and Democrats, President Trump advocated for. I think it's something that we can do.

The other spending, which is going to fuel inflation, I mean they're going to transform our economy. They're going to transform our economy back to where it was in the '70s where inflation was so high it ate away middle class families' savings. That's what they're trying to do.

And so we can separate those. One's good for the United States, one's good for the American people, the other is fueling inflation.

WALLACE: I want to switch subjects on you in the minute or so that we have left.

Your state of Louisiana is the fifth lowest in vaccination rates, only 36 percent of people in your state have been fully vaccinated. You're a medical doctor. Your thoughts about that? About the resistance to the vaccine in Louisiana and is there anything you can and plan to do about it?

CASSIDY: A couple things.

First, people are surprised when citizens don't trust government. When you have partisan comments coming out of the White House regarding next Jim Crow laws, are people like Senator Schumer and the White House not cooperating on a bipartisan bill -- oh, here we're going to be partisan but overhear you better trust us. That just doesn't work.

But I would also argue as a physician, you need to -- you need to go back to your health care workers. It shouldn't be the president advocating.

Again, he's -- he's -- he's -- he's depicting himself as uber partisan. You need to have your doctors, your nurse, your physician's assistants, who's speaking to the patients they normally care for, they see at the PTA meeting, they otherwise communicate, this is good, it saves lives.

What I'm doing, I'm trying to educate. Yesterday one of my former students had a nice video, we're choosing between vaccination or accepting higher rates of death. Put it on my social media today. Where pushing that. That's our choice. You choose either to be vaccinated or to accept a higher rate of unnecessary death. That's the way to communicate through your physician, your nurse, your PA, et cetera, not through some uber partisan person who's

-- who asked us to trust them except when they're making incredibly partisan statements.

WALLACE: Senator Cassidy, thank you. Thanks for joining us. It is always a pleasure to talk with you, sir.

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