CNN "State of the Union with Candy Crowley" - Transcript

Interview

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CROWLEY: Joining me today from the U.S. Congress, Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi.

Madam Leader, thank you for joining us.

PELOSI: My pleasure.

CROWLEY: It's good to see you.

I want to ask you first about Afghanistan. You were disappointed in the president's decision, feel that troops should be -- more troops should be drawn out of there faster, and you promised to continue pressuring the president. In what form does that pressure take place?

PELOSI: Well, it wasn't really pressuring the president, it was making sure that the Afghanis did what they were supposed to do in the bargain so that the president's timetable can be honored and perhaps facilitated. What I had said was that, really, it's time.

We have been there nine-and-a-half, almost 10 years. For the first seven-and-a-half years, the Bush administration did nothing. They had no plan. President Obama has a plan. He has announced the good news that we will be gone by a date certain.

He has -- I had hoped that they could take more troops out sooner for a number of reasons. The lives and limbs of our precious treasure, first and foremost, the cost to the taxpayer, but also the message to the Afghan people, the Afghan government that they have to do their part of this and the sooner the better. And the sooner they do, the sooner our troops will come home.

CROWLEY: And beyond rhetorically, is there a way to pressure - I mean, obviously you could remove funds, which I'm assuming...

PELOSI: Oh, no.

CROWLEY: ... you would be against.

PELOSI: Yes.

CROWLEY: But is there some way that you feel you can make that pressure felt?

PELOSI: Well, I communicate with the president of Afghanistan. I was there this spring. I met with the ambassador this week. And our message continues to be we want to see progress.

Now, when I was there this spring, really for the first time I saw progress, the plans that the president had put in motion are showing benefits, whether it's the training of their forces, be it police force or military force, that's really moving along in a much better way. Whether it's anti-corruption initiatives, we have great people in place to help with that.

But I see progress being made and that the framework that President Obama has, if it moves more quickly, I don't see any reason why our troops couldn't come home sooner. The longest war in our history.

CROWLEY: It is. And the fact is that if it goes the way the president's plan is laid out, there will likely be two times as many troops in Afghanistan in November when he runs for re-election as there were when he took office. Is this the foreign policy you expected when candidate Obama was campaigning?

PELOSI: Well, what I said at the time was the American people are weary of this war, we will do anything to protect our people. How is it our national interest to stay there? Can we do it a quicker, better way? Not in haste, but with some plan to come home?

And the president has put that into place. He has evaluated what the challenge is. I commend him for the capture, the apprehension of Osama bin Laden. This was a very, very big deal. He connected the dots. He got it done. And he now has a plan for Afghanistan.

Yes, now I would have hoped we would have had a way to bring our troops home sooner, but that depends on actions taken by the Afghanis as well. I think we sent him (ph) a clear message.

CROWLEY: Do you think that the president -- since there will be twice as many troops in Afghanistan when he runs for re-election as there were when he first ran, do you think he will pay for this in his liberal base? Do you think they hold it against him?

PELOSI: Well, I certainly hope not. I think that he has taken us on a course to end this war. He is finishing the war in Iraq. The -- he is the president. He has a plan, and that's something that we have not had before.

I think that our progressive base, of which I consider myself proudly a part, is -- will turn out for the president because...

CROWLEY: Despite some disappointments?

PELOSI: Well, in other words, unless you want to run for president yourself, you are never going to have it all your own way. And as a base of its nature, God bless the base, is of its nature, dissatisfied, persistent, relentless, and that's a good thing.

The president has a different role. We do too in Congress. But I would hope that the base could influence, if not make the decision, influence the decision, and I think they have. The president has taken out more troops than some others wanted him to do.

CROWLEY: Madam Leader, let me ask you to stand by a minute. We are going to take a quick break, and when we come back, the debt ceiling.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CROWLEY: Back now with the leader of the Democrats in the U.S. House. Madam Leader, thank you for being here again. Is it time for the president and the Republican speaker of the House to sit down together and work out some sort of deal to raise the debt ceiling?

PELOSI: Well, let me just say this, there won't be any agreement for such an agreement -- unless the House Democrats are part of that. Unless the speaker comes to the table with 218 votes. But I think that the president has been involved. He's talked about bipartisanship. He's talked about balance in what we do. The obstacle has come because Leader Cantor has walked away from the table because he doesn't want to deal with special interests tax subsidies and the need for them...

CROWLEY: They don't want -- the Republicans don't want any tax increases in the debt ceiling?

PELOSI: Well, it's not a question of tax increases.

CROWLEY: Sorry, they don't want any -- yes, right, they don't want changes in revenue.

PELOSI: Well, yes, but what we're talking about here, some of the things that Leader Cantor can't handle the truth when it comes to these tax subsidies for big oil, for corporations sending jobs overseas or giving tax breaks to the wealthiest people in the country, and asking seniors to pay more for less to be on as they abolish Medicare.

CROWLEY: well, in the end I guess they refer to tax increases as subsidies, anything that changes the tax base or the tax rate for corporations or for individuals. But let me ask you...

PELOSI: But, still, make sure we understand, closing special interests tax subsidies is what they have walked away from.

CROWLEY: So you said that there will be no deal unless House Democrats are in on it, so as far as you are concerned, just because the president of the United States and Speaker Boehner come to some agreement, should they, you have to be sitting at the table as well?

PELOSI: Well, I have no objection as a former speaker myself to the president and the speaker trying to reach some level of agreement, some framework for how we go forward. That arrangement works if the speaker has 218 votes. If they expect Democrats to vote for the agreement, then Democrats will have to be part of the agreement.

CROWLEY: Mitch McConnell, the leader obviously on the Senate side, said I think I can safely say that this congress is not going to raise taxes so why are we still talking about it? Isn't there a point here? Because his point is even when Democrats controlled the House and the Senate and the president was in the White House they couldn't pass any kind of tax increase, they could not deal with any of the subsidies so why either bother to fight for it at this point?

PELOSI: Well, they could not pass them because the Republicans obstructed it...

CROWLEY: Right. And they still would, so I guess the point is isn't this sort of pointless?

PELOSI: No, it's not pointless, unless it's pointless to not reduce the deficit. This is a -- remind, this is a 10-year proposal. This will affect -- this isn't like the six-month agreement that they had with the continuing resolution. This is a 10-year proposal. And if we agree on values that say we are going to educate our children, we're going to respect the dignity of the retirement of our seniors, we're going to create jobs, we're going to do so in a way that reduces the deficit, you couldn't possibly just buy into the cuts without the revenue and the recognition for the need for growth so our timing is affected by that. So it's not about...

CROWLEY: So would you vote for a debt ceiling that has attached to it a package that has only spending cuts?

PELOSI: That would be very hard -- what would it accomplish? How much deficit reduction could you achieve? You cannot -- you cannot achieve what you set out to do if you say it's just about cutting. It has to be about increasing the revenue stream as well.

And there are many things can you do in terms of, again, special interests tax loopholes that the tax code is rampant -- is just full of.

Now let me just remind all this talk about tax cuts in the Bush years, the Republicans said tax cuts will produce jobs, they didn't, they produced a deficit, they produced a deficit...

CROWLEY: Along with two wars.

PELOSI: Two wars -- two unpaid for wars. Well, are these people not patriotic, they want their special interest tax cuts and they don't want to pay for the war in Iraq to protect our great country and our freedom? In the second year of the Obama administration, last year, more jobs were created in the private sector than in the eight years of the Bush administration under the regime of tax cuts will produce jobs.

CROWLEY: Madam Leader, thank you so much for joining us. We appreciate your time.

PELOSI: Thank you.

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