CNN Newsroom: Interview With Rep. John Garamendi (D-CA)

Interview

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Well Fred, it's good to be with you this morning and Phil did a good job laying out some of the issues.

But the reality is Congress rarely acts ahead of a very serious deadline. Really, I've been around long enough both in the state and the federal level to know that it is up to the last moment when people have to either give in or pay the consequences of not doing so.

We're not quite there yet. 11 days out. We're going to see some back and forth. But the president has been very, very clear. It is wrong. It is wrong to use the debt limit which has catastrophic economic effects in the United States and around the world as a fulcrum (ph) upon which to leverage appropriations.

The appropriation process takes place every year. And that remains available to the Republicans in the days ahead. Let's get this debt limit out of the way. And I would hope that when the president lands here in Washington in the hours ahead, that he gets off the plane and he says ok, Mr. McCarthy, we'll meet, but my lawyers are writing up how to use the 14th Amendment to put all of this foolishness behind us. And then you and I, we'll get on, we'll talk about the appropriations process over the next several weeks and months.

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Well, I'm certainly not a constitutional lawyer. But top constitutional lawyers, Tribe among them, have said to do this. Get this foolishness, get this debt thing out of the way.

It has been in the way back in 2011, we came within 72 hours of a debt crisis. The result of that was ten years of sequestration in which the budget of the United States was seriously hindered and reduced compared to inflation.

Now, it appears as though the Republicans are going to go back and play that same play once again using the debt limit to restrict appropriations into the future.

At the same time they are demanding a 5 percent increase in military spending while looking to a 20 percent cut on everything else. And also keep in mind that they have demanded, although this is not discussed much, I think it is still on the table, still a demand of the Republicans, that the Inflation Reduction Act which has a tax increase on corporations and on the super wealthy and most important of all $360 billion over the next five years to move the American economy from a petroleum oil economy to a green renewable economy.

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The Republicans have demanded and as far as we can figure out are still demanding the repeal of that legislation. And I should also mention significant health care cuts.

So you look at the -- they are demanding the end of the green technologies, the continuation of oil and gas, and the elimination of the tax increases on American corporations that have paid no taxes for the last decade, 15 percent minimum tax for those corporations.

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Well, we have had work requirements since well, back in 1998 when Clinton agreed to work requirements. They have been modified over time. It really depends what are the Republicans demanding here. Are they demanding that the age of the infirmed, the people that have mental illness, the people that cannot work, they want them to work? Is that what they're talking about.

Do they want children and families to go hungry because parents are unable to find a job and they need the food stamp program?

What are they talking about here? So we have to be really careful. There is a lot of hurt. There's a lot of hurt in America. There is a lot of people that are seriously hurting. Hurting for food, hurting for housing, hurting for support, medical support.

What are the Republicans talking about here? You either go to work, what kind of work, how many hours a day, where are the jobs, where is the preparation for the work. All of those things are critically important in the discussion about work requirements and thus far Republicans are very, very simplistic about a very important and difficult process.

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Well, immediately. Interest rates on credit cards will go through the roof. Interest rates on government borrowing, all kinds of corporate borrowing, business borrowing all of that.

And importantly in terms of national security, the American dollar has been the reserve currency for every country in the world including China. If we cannot pay the interest and redeem the bonds that come due, then the American dollar will fail as reserve currency. Guaranteed. China will step in. It is extremely important who controls the reserve currency around the

world. Right now America does. Do you want to hand that to China? Is that what the Republicans want to do? They want to give China one more advantage? They already have other advantages.

The reserve currency, China has been trying to make beyond the reserve currency of the world. They failed because the American economy is coming back, is strong, has been stable.

Republicans are about to throw all of that over the bridge and let China have that advantage. No way, no how. This is a major international security issue for the United States.

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Well certainly the concern has always been how would those fighter jets be used. They can reach into Russia and we don't want that to happen. So apparently there has been some agreement with Ukraine about that issue.

Also the Russians have a very powerful air defense system called the S-400. It sits just inside the Russian border. It has a 500 mile reach, way into Ukraine.

There has been serious concern about the use of these F-16s up against the S-400. Obviously we like our Lone Patriot. But we know that the S- 400 is near equal and perhaps equal to the Patriot in its lethality.

So we want to be very careful here about how these jets are going to be used. The Ukrainian pilots have been extraordinarily successful with the MIG-29. Being able to use a very old jet very successfully and countering the Russians' much more advanced jets .

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They get their hands on the F-16, then within the Ukraine border, keeping an eye on those S-400 air defense systems that the Russians have, they can be very, very useful Particularly in an offense that Ukrainians are about and perhaps are already doing to provide support on the frontlines.

We'll see what happens. I think that the decision by the president over the previous time was wise. The decision to move forward now is probably out of date. Should have happened a little bit earlier. But here we are. Let's move forward.

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Thank you, Fred. Have a good day.

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