Fox News "On The Record with Greta Van Susteren" - Transcript

Interview

GRETA VAN SUSTEREN, FOX NEWS HOST: It's a simple but explosive question. Are your taxes going up? We went to Capitol Hill, where Republican senator John Thune went "On the Record" about the battle over extending the Bush tax cuts and much more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

VAN SUSTEREN: Senator, nice to see you, sir.

SEN. JOHN THUNE, R-S.D.: Nice to see you, Greta.

VAN SUSTEREN: Well, you just had a vote. "Don't ask, don't tell" went down?

THUNE: Correct. This was a cloture vote, which in procedural terms, in layman's terms, it was basically to -- a motion to get the bill on the floor. We were able to get the number of votes that was necessary to prevent that. What they're trying to do with the defense authorization bill is vote it up with a lot of unrelated things, one of which is the Dream Act, another issue is "Don't ask, don't tell," all of which I think are designed to spike turnout for Democrats on election day and don't have anything to do with the underlying bill, which is the legislation that provides the funding that we need for our men and who are uniform.

VAN SUSTEREN: Well, you (INAUDIBLE) the fact that the Dream Act and "Don't ask, don't tell" -- I mean, we're obviously very close to the mid- term elections, and we've also got the problem and the reason that I originally came to talk to you about was the -- the extension of the Bush tax cuts. And we knew that all these things were going to happen about now. How did the Democrats -- not to make you argue for the Christians. How did they explain to us that it's not political since it's being done right before election?

THUNE: It's -- that's -- well, obviously, we need do a defense authorization bill. But it's hard to say with a straight face that this doesn't -- this isn't politically motivated when you look at where we are relative to the election and how just incredibly fraught with political implication these types of amendments are.

Now, what's interesting about it is the defense authorization bill, which contains a lot of things that are national security-related, would not be open to amendment on national security-related issues because Senator Reid did what they call filling the amendment tree, which essentially is making it impossible for Republicans who want to offer defense-related amendments to offer those amendments.

So it's all sort of inside baseball here in Washington, but the short of it is they wanted to have a debate about things that they thought would be good for them politically going into the mid-term elections and are preventing a debate on the substance of the biggest national security bill that we deal with every year.

VAN SUSTEREN: All right, so I understand it, one of the issues, "Don't ask, don't tell" -- you for it or against it?

THUNE: Well, I'm...

VAN SUSTEREN: For getting rid of it.

THUNE: I'm for -- I'm obviously -- I think we ought to let the military conduct the study. And that's really what was supposed to happen. The military was going to consult with all the commanders, the troops in the field and get their assessment of this before they moved forward. I think that's really important. I mean, this is a very significant change, and obviously, it affects morale. It affects cohesiveness. And all the service chiefs today have weighed in against this process that they're trying to use here in the Senate right now and in favor of allowing the study to be completed before they move forward with any kind of a decision about that.

VAN SUSTEREN: All right. So it's not even a question of whether it's good or bad or indifferent, but it's a question of how do we arrive to have the discussion.

THUNE: Well...

VAN SUSTEREN: The process is really what people are fighting about right now.

THUNE: It's important that military families be consulted and that commanders in the field be consulted. I happen to have big concerns about that policy. But nevertheless, before anything is done, we certainly ought to consult with the people who are most impacted by it.

VAN SUSTEREN: All right, tax cuts, the Bush tax cuts. President Obama wants to extend it for those who make less than $250,000 and to exclude those who make more than $250,000 a year. Has anyone figured out what these numbers mean?

THUNE: Well, I think, in the real world, obviously, what the $250,000 for couples and $200,000 for individuals means is you're going -- there are going to be a significant number of people that are going to be paying higher income tax rates many of whom are small businesses. Now, the Democrat argument is only 3 percent of small businesses pay at those top two rates, but 3 percent does represent 750,000 small businesses. And 50 percent, we're told by the Congressional Budget Office, of all small business income is taxed at those two top marginal income tax rates. So you're going to have a lot of small businesses that are going to be faced with higher taxes at a time when you're asking small businesses to help get us out of this recession and create jobs.

VAN SUSTEREN: Would it make any difference -- and I know there's a huge debate whether it's fair to ask more of different people, whether they make a lot of money or a little money, percentage-wise. But what about raising it to, like, you know, instead of $250,000 threshold, a higher threshold, make it you know, a $2 million threshold. Would that make any difference in the debate?

THUNE: There -- I suspect maybe at some point, that may be something that they'll entertain doing. But I think right now, what we understand the debate to be about is the $250,000 threshold. And again, that impacts an awful lot of small businesses who are the job creators, the economic engine in our society. And so it doesn't make sense to me that you would want to raise taxes on the very people that you are asking to go out there and invest and create jobs. And that's essentially what we would be doing.

VAN SUSTEREN: But the interesting aspect from -- at least from the taxpayers -- that there really isn't any sort of debate, discussion or negotiation going on in Washington. It's basically take it or leave it, whether you're a Republican or a Democrat. There doesn't seem to be much talk between the two sides.

THUNE: I think that there is a big divide also in the country right now about the size of government, about spending, about taxation. And what I think you see -- the reason you see so much intensity, I think, at the grass roots level right now is people are really frustrated. They don't think that Washington is listening. They see this massive expansion in the size of government in Washington. And they don't want it financed with their taxes when they think that the government is growing too fast and spending too much.

VAN SUSTEREN: (INAUDIBLE) reference (ph) the Tea Party movement?

THUNE: Well, the Tea Party movement's a good example of that. But there are a lot of people who maybe aren't even active in the Tea Party movement, who I believe -- and particularly political independents, who care a lot about fiscal issues -- that are really concerned about the direction that the country is headed and the direction that Washington is headed, which is why I think you see so much intensity and so much engagement in the political process this year.

VAN SUSTEREN: Is your party going to support -- pretty heavily support Christine O'Donnell in Delaware?

THUNE: I think everybody has rallied behind her. She's our nominee. You know, obviously, there was a spirited primary up there, and the voters -- you always trust the voters. The voters decided, and now we'll get behind our nominee and do everything we can to help her get elected in November.

VAN SUSTEREN: Interesting times, isn't it.

THUNE: They certainly are.

(LAUGHTER)

VAN SUSTEREN: It's fascinating, what's going on in politics.

THUNE: Yes, it is.

VAN SUSTEREN: Thank you, sir.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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