MSNBC "The Ed Show" - Transcript

Interview

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Senator Sanders, you first. You told me earlier today that Senate Democrats are ready to go on the offensive about this and it was a very contentious and animated caucus meeting today. Where does it stand at this hour?

SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (I), VERMONT: I think you"re hearing more and more Democrats saying that it is absolutely absurd that at a time when the middle class is collapsing and poverty is increasing that the Republicans are attacking all of the programs that working families depend on including Pell grants for college, Head Start, Social Security Administration, the Environmental Protection Agency which keeps our air clean and our water safe. All of these programs.

And today, Ed, as you have heard, Congressman Ryan came out with a grand plan and that is to devastate and voucherize Medicare, block grant Medicaid, and what he wants to do is basically dismember all of the programs, all of the programs that working families depend on.

By the way, in the midst of all that, he wants more tax breaks to millionaires and billionaires, more tax breaks for large corporations.

Rich get richer. They get tax breaks. The poor get poorer. They lose programs that are life and death to them.

And more and more Democrats are saying, enough is enough. We need some revenue in this picture. We need shared sacrifice. The wealthy and large corporations have also got to contribute to deficit reduction.

SCHULTZ: Yes.

SANDERS: Not just working families.

SCHULTZ: Congresswoman Edwards, if Speaker Boehner brings $40 billion worth of cuts to the floor, would it pass?

REP. DONNA EDWARDS (D), MARYLAND: Well, you know, I think it"s really up to the Republicans to demonstrate some leadership here. I mean, they"ve got control of the reins right now.

And I think Senator Sanders said it all. Republicans are standing there. Speaker Boehner is being led by the ear by these Tea Partiers and he is willing to sacrifice young people and their college education, Head Start students, seniors, veterans, military service members.

SCHULTZ: What do you think would pass in the House? What is the breaking point? What is the number that the Tea Partiers are holding John Boehner to? What do you think would pass?

EDWARDS: Well, I think that they said very clearly, they want $61 billion in cuts. The reality is that the president has proposed a reasonable approach to a continuing resolution. The Democrats have signed on to that approach. And the Republicans would rather shut the government down than to accept a compromise that even I"m not happy with but I"d accept it, because it means we could continue government and get on with the business that we"re supposed to do.

SCHULTZ: President Obama went on the offensive today. I thought he had just a hell of a press conference. Here he is saying what he thinks the American people are concerned about.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: They"re worrying about gas prices and that"s what they want us worrying about. They"re worrying about jobs. And that"s what we should be focused on. They"re worrying about what--everything happening in the Middle East. What does that mean for them? And that"s certainly what I"m spending my time worrying about.

And I shouldn"t have to oversee a process in which Congress deals with last year"s budget where we only have six months left, especially when both parties have agreed that we need to make substantial cuts and we"re more or less at the same number.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCHULTZ: Senator Sanders, I want to point out--today on MSNBC, Congressman Tom Price said on this air, that this budget would increase production, create jobs, and keep jobs from being shipped overseas. You want to respond to that?

SANDERS: Yes. This is the same, old trickle down theory of economics works so well under the eight years of the Bush administration that we"ve lost 600,000 private sector jobs.

Look. This is their litany. This is what they believe.

At a time when the richest 1 percent earn more income than the bottom 50 percent and the wealthy are get wealthier, their solution is more tax breaks for the very, very rich. At a time when working families can"t find child care, they want to cut back on Head Start. Families can"t afford to send their kids to college, cut back on Pell grants.

This is the same old litany. What they are doing now is simply reflecting the needs of the millionaires and billionaires of this country who fund their campaigns. That"s all that it is.

SCHULTZ: Donna, Congresswoman Edwards, this does hit minorities and the poor extremely hard. Do you agree?

EDWARDS: Well, it does. I mean, it hits the poor especially hard. I mean, if you look at the proposals, for example, in the Ryan budget dealing with Medicaid, half of the children on med--half of the people on Medicaid are poor children.

Look at the attempts to call a voucher system not really a voucher system for Medicare, and the reality is that that would hit seniors and the disabled harder than it hits anyone. And so, the Republican budget that"s been proposed is one that"s about attacking the vulnerable and then leaving the wealthy to take all of the spoils.

SCHULZ: Yes.

EDWARDS: We had a decade of that and we don"t need another decade.

SCHULTZ: And, Senator Sanders, finally, do you think the Democrats will give up any more to Boehner?

SANDERS: I certainly hope not. Enough is enough.

I think the American people are on our side. They want shared sacrifice. They don"t want to balance the budget as Donna just said on the most weak and vulnerable people of this country.

SCHULTZ: Congresswoman Donna Edwards, Senator Bernie Sanders, thanks so much for your time tonight and for your passion on this issue.

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