MSNBC "The Rachel Maddow Show" - Transcript

Interview

MSNBC "The Rachel Maddow Show" - Transcript

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Joining us now is a man who caucuses with the Democrats but who is a proud independent from the state of Vermont, Senator Bernie Sanders.

Senator, thanks very much for coming back on the show.

SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (I), VERMONT: Good to be with you, Rachel.

MADDOW: Let me ask you to dispute my premise right off the bat. Do you think that there are zero votes for health care reform among Republicans in the Senate?

SANDERS: Rachel, I believe that for many, many months. And it‘s sad to me that it took the administration that long to finally catch up with what reality clearly is.

Republican Party today is enormously obstructionist. They have no desire to address the enormous crisis that the American people are facing in health care, with so many people uninsured and underinsured, 1 million people going bankrupt. You know, you talk about death panels -- 18,000 people a year die because they don‘t get access to a doctor when they should.

So, no, it doesn‘t surprise me that the Republicans have not come onboard. I don‘t believe they ever had any intention to.

MADDOW: The last time you and I spoke, you said that if Republicans were going to stonewall on something like the public option, you could support using budget reconciliation rules to beat a Republican filibuster, to pass health reform without any Republicans. Do you think that is going to be the way that this moves forward?

SANDERS: I think there are two things that have to be done. Remember, in the Senate we have 60 people in the Democratic Caucus. That, in fact, once Massachusetts sends another senator, that is enough to beat back Republican filibusters. And every Democrat in this country must demand that every member of the caucus stands firm against Republican filibusters.

And then we can develop a strong health care reform plan which focuses on prevention and increases primary health care, which makes sure that every single American has coverage which begins to deal with the absurdity of the insurance companies, cutting people off because they have pre-existing condition or because they got sick in the previous year.

So, I think what we need to do is get 60 votes to stop the Republican filibuster and where we can—it‘s a little bit tricky—but where we can certainly use the reconciliation package.

MADDOW: So, just to be clear, you are separating the issues of cloture, the filibuster, and the bill that‘s actually voted on. So conservative Democratic senators like Mary Landrieu and Ben Nelson and other people who have not said that they would support the kind of legislation that you would, for example, you are saying that activists who want health reform should pressure them to vote no, to stop the Republican filibuster.

SANDERS: Absolutely.

MADDOW: . and so that there can be an up or down vote on the bill.

SANDERS: Absolutely. Because it‘s a lot easier to go forward in a comprehensive way to regular order. And that means stopping the Republican filibuster and then bringing forth vote. And as I‘ve said many times, if some of the conservative Democrats don‘t want to vote for final passage because we have a strong public option, because we‘re taking on the insurance companies and the drug companies—fine. All we need is 50 votes plus the vice president.

So, that is the preferred route. If you can‘t do that, then you use reconciliation. That is a harder approach to bring forth comprehensive reform.

MADDOW: I guess—and this is—I am outside the Senate, I am outside Washington and don‘t know how the politics of these things work, but I‘m guessing that since there has been a de facto 60-vote rule to get anything through the Senate in recent years since the Republicans have been in the minority and the Democratic leadership has not made a ton of noise about that, I‘m guessing that they are not interested—they are not inclined towards trying to hold all the Democrats together to stop that Republican filibuster.

Are you getting any support for this idea from the leadership?

SANDERS: Well, Rachel, we are. I mean, it‘s been hot and cold.

MADDOW: OK.

SANDERS: The leadership, on occasion, has made it clear that they expect everybody to vote against the Republican filibuster. Unfortunately, the next thing, sometimes, there has been reversal on that. But I think that the bottom line is what we need is the president—we need the Democratic leadership to be articulating very clearly what real health care reform means, take on the right wing echo chamber which is lying and distorting what we are trying to do, rally the American people—as the president did so brilliantly during the campaign.

In my view, once the American people understand the distortions coming from the right wing, once they—we can rally people who have no health insurance, small business people who are going out of business today because they can‘t afford soaring costs—I think we can bring forth a strong bill and make the American people proud.

MADDOW: Senator Bernie Sanders, independent of Vermont—thanks for joining us tonight, sir. It‘s always great to have your very clear perspective on this stuff. Thank you.

SANDERS: Good to be with you, Rachel.

MADDOW: Coming up: There is a place where torture yields totally reliable intelligence -a place where threatening to kill someone‘s children is just one way to earn a medal. That place, of course, is “planet Cheney.” We will suit up and visit with our friend Chris Hayes for safety in just a moment.

Stay with us.

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