MSNBC "Morning Joe" - Transcript

Interview

MSNBC "Morning Joe" - Transcript

MR. SCARBOROUGH: We've got Chuckie T. back with us. We've got, of course, Harold Ford, the very dapper Harold Ford.

MS. BRZEZINSKI: Harold Ford -- very dapper, getting wired up.

MR. SCARBOROUGH: By the way, look, his jeans are scuffed up. Do you know how much you have to pay in a boutique Upper East Side store in Manhattan?

MS. BRZEZINSKI: You pay for that.

MR. SCARBOROUGH: (Inaudible.)

MR. FORD: This is some hard work.

MR. SCARBOROUGH: Chuck Todd, you know politics as well as anybody. Harold Ford, you do too. I would think, in a year where Democrats won Mississippi 1, where they won Baker's seat in Louisiana in a special election, then they won Hastert's in Illinois, these are seats that haven't turned in, like, 50 years. But the guy running the DCCC should probably pick up 30 -- you think 30 seats?

MR. TODD: Maybe 40.

MR. SCARBOROUGH: Forty, maybe 40, because they picked up 30 last year.

MR. TODD: Sure, right. You add another 10 on it.

MR. SCARBOROUGH: Harold, what do you think, about 30, 35 seats Democrats should pick up in the House?

MR. FORD: Look, as long as they pick up, I'm happy. I think Chris Van Hollen, who succeeded Rahm Emanuel, who did as good a job as any, is off to a better start.

MR. SCARBOROUGH: Oh, stop being a politician.

MS. BRZEZINSKI: (Inaudible.)

MR. FORD: I think he picks up 20. I think he picks up 20.

MS. BRZEZINSKI: Get your clipboard out.

MR. FORD: He picks up 20.

MR. SCARBOROUGH: Why don't you just read the talking points?

MS. BRZEZINSKI: You can just hold the clipboard.

MR. TODD: In defense of Chris, we have never seen back-to-back elections where the same party was able to pick up massive pickups.

MR. SCARBOROUGH: All right. And actually the joke at home is we're setting expectations unusually high. And you're exactly right; had Democrats not picked up 30 seats two years ago, perhaps there'd be 35, 40 seats they could sweep in this time. But they picked up a lot last time.

MR. TODD: But they have. And there's an argument that they may never see an environment like this back to back ever again.

MS. BRZEZINSKI: Yeah.

MR. SCARBOROUGH: Yeah.

REP. VAN HOLLEN: But we're going into very tough territory now, as you know. I mean, having won 30 seats last time around, we're going into seats like the ones in, you know, Mississippi, where you have 61 percent of them voted for George Bush last time around, that we have to compete in. So it's tough territory going in there.

MS. BRZEZINSKI: Wait a minute.

MR. SCARBOROUGH: But most people expect, though, do they not, Democrats to pick up 15 to 20 seats this year?

MS. BRZEZINSKI: Yeah. How tough is it?

REP. VAN HOLLEN: I think the key is to pick up some seats this time around. As Chuck said --

MR. SCARBOROUGH: About 15 to 20 at least?

REP. VAN HOLLEN: We don't have a number yet. I think it's going to be, you know --

MR. TODD: How many Republican retirements?

REP. VAN HOLLEN: We have 30 Republican retirements, and so that provides obviously lots of opportunities now. You also have a lot of challengers, folks going after incumbents in a good political environment.

MR. SCARBOROUGH: I'll ask all you guys, if -- let's say Republicans lose 15 to 20 seats in the House, and that right now is the consensus number. Add that to the 30 they lost two years ago. Won't this be the Republicans' lowest ebb since 1978? Won't this be the worst --

MR. TODD: Oh, I think it had gotten actually lower. I mean, there was a time -- but don't forget, that was back --

MR. SCARBOROUGH: This was '78.

MR. TODD: There's two ways of looking at this, and I think that the Democrats will start talking about this. There's a governing majority and then there's your actual numbers. In the old days, when Democrats just controlled Congress just because that's what you did, when people in Pensacola were Democrats by party registration but not by ideology, they'd have 275 members in the House, but maybe only 230 governing majority because you had the Phil Gramms of the world who were Democrats when they got in, the Boll Weevils.

So the question is, what's a governing majority? And I think that's the definition that everybody -- I know that's what I'm curious about. I'm curious what Congressman Van Hollen thinks.

REP. VAN HOLLEN: Well, I think if you look at the diversity of the party these days, from the folks who come from down in southern states, the more conservative areas, as well as others from around the country, putting together a working majority on any one issue is very tough. I mean, Speaker Pelosi has to work very hard to get that majority for votes on any particular issue, and you have shifting alliances. So the extent that we can increase our numbers by a significant amount, it's going to put ourselves in a position to help on that front.

MR. SCARBOROUGH: The thing you guys have done, though -- I remember '94, '96, it was hard to find a Democrat in the South that was pro-Second Amendment, that was pro-life. If you were pro-Second Amendment or pro-life, the DCCC threw you overboard and wanted no part of you. The Democratic Party did not want those people coming to Washington. But the second you started opening the door in '98, 2000, 2002, saying, "We're a big tent," suddenly these guys started picking up seats in the South, right?

MS. BRZEZINSKI: Yeah.

REP. VAN HOLLEN: I think the special elections we were talking about are a great example. We are a big-tent party. In fact, if you looked at those special elections, the Republicans tried to run against our candidates by talking about Nancy Pelosi and Barack Obama, and it totally backfired.

MR. SCARBOROUGH: But those Democrats were pro-gun, pro-life, right?

REP. VAN HOLLEN: They were. But on the essential economic issues, the issues of economic opportunity, trying to expand the middle class, Social Security, economic security issues, they were with the Democratic Party.

MR. SCARBOROUGH: But Harold, to get elected in the South, pro- gun, pro-life, those are pretty essential, right?

MR. FORD: Those are the staples. If you don't have that, it's like the pi in the circumference equation. You've got to have that.

Let me ask Chris this. What's the signature issue, do you think, for Democrats? I read some of the articles where it said that Democrats are there on a lot of these big issues, but they're moving away on offshore drilling in some of these districts. Are you giving them the latitude and the leeway to campaign? I think the Second Amendment is a big issue, but it seems like this drilling issue has sprung up as an important one, particularly in some of these swing districts that you're looking at.

REP. VAN HOLLEN: Well, sure. I think the overall issue is the economy and the squeeze that people are feeling in their day-to-day lives. And obviously energy policy and gas prices are a part of that. As the speaker said, we're going to have a comprehensive energy strategy we put on the floor of the House for a vote when we get back in September. It's going to focus on renewable energy and energy efficiency. But it's going to have a drilling component.

I mean, we already had a vote to try and require the oil and gas companies to accelerate development on the 68 million acres of federal lands that they already have. But we are also going to look at offshore as a component, maybe use the royalties from that to go into a fund to invest in renewable energy and energy efficiency. Again, the particulars need to be sorted out.

MS. BRZEZINSKI: But real quickly, you say it's going to be a tough landscape, tough fight. If you guys can't pick up significant numbers, what's that going to say in this atmosphere, with the polls, people very disenchanted with what's the status and the future of our country, where we're headed -- what does that say about the Democratic Party if you don't?

REP. VAN HOLLEN: Well, I think we will pick up numbers. And the question is how many. As Chuck said, historically, after you have a big-wave election, like we saw in 2006 where the Democrats picked up a net of 30 seats, historically the wave comes in and then the wave goes out. In fact, in almost every case after one of those big waves, you lose seats in the next election. So we have to beat history.

We will pick up seats. I don't have a particular number. But the good news is we're competitive in the South, in the mid-Atlantic, in the Northeast, in the Midwest and the West. We have 50 seats in play around the country right now. Some of those are going to come through. Some will have tougher times. But we've got a great opportunity here.

MR. SCARBOROUGH: You know, Chuck, isn't it fascinating? You talk about back-to-back years. Think about the huge landslide years -- '64 for the Democrats, followed by a '66 correction for Republicans in 1966; 1980, Reagan revolution, followed by an '82 correction; '94 Republican revolution, followed by a '96 Clinton victory and a Democratic correction. It really -- this could be unprecedented this year.

MR. TODD: It would be. I mean, Tom Davis, who's probably the Republican ace when it comes to House districts and elections, he was pointing out to me that -- and he expects this to be a close election, not looking at the polls but simply at history -- '46, you saw a huge Republican year -- backfire, Truman wins; '74 -- '76 ends up a close election; '86, Democrats have a big year -- '88, Republicans win the election. I mean, every time there's been a snap-back.

MR. SCARBOROUGH: Bill Clinton, 1992, leads to Republicans in 1994, which leads back to Bill Clinton in 1996.

MR. TODD: Right. You see these snap-backs.

MR. SCARBOROUGH: But this year -- well, Chris has it made. I mean, you might as well just party here all week, go back, hang out --

MR. TODD: Well, your party helped them. They all left. You know, the number one job in recruiting is not finding candidates; it's keeping candidates. And the Republicans lost too many incumbents.

MR. FORD: How many retirements were there, Republicans this year?

MR. TODD: Well, it's 30 --

REP. VAN HOLLEN: There were 30. But I must say --

MR. FORD: But about 20 of them are competitive seats of the 30.

REP. VAN HOLLEN: But they were unable to find strong candidates -- (inaudible).

MR. FORD: I think -- (inaudible) -- between '94 and '96, that there's one. I think these retirements have to be factored in.

MR. TODD: It's a big deal.

MR. SCARBOROUGH: All right, so a big, big year for the Democrats. I mean, boy, I don't see how they can screw this one up. All right, Chris, thanks so much. Congratulations on 30 seats.

(Cross talk.)

MR. SCARBOROUGH: Yeah, exactly. We want 300. It's going to be like what Tony Blair won in '97.

REP. VAN HOLLEN: Great to be here.

Source