MSNBC - Transcript

Interview

EZRA KLEIN, MSNBC: Congressman, thank you so much for being here.

REP. CHRIS VAN HOLLEN: Ezra, good to be with you.

KLEIN: So what about it, Congressman, what if President Obama stood up tonight and said he would not sign any legislation coming out of the supercommittee that does not include action on jobs, what would the response be?

VAN HOLLEN: I do not know what the response would be immediately, but I do believe that the so-called supercommittee, joint committee, has to make jobs part of its mandate. I said that in my opening statement today and made the points that you have emphasized here which is that the best way to deal with our deficit in the short term is to get people back to work and get the economy moving again. You can deal with that in the context of long-term deficit reduction, but not only should we do nothing to hurt the fragile economy in the short-term, there are things that we can do to give it a little bit of a boost, and we should be doing that.

KLEIN: And you know what, I think it is always worth defining what the supercommittee has and the powers it has, because it is really a procedural advantage, right? What the supercommittee is is a committee that once it agrees on a proposal, if it indeed does, that proposal cannot be filibustered, it cannot be amended and it is backed up by this trigger. And so, in effect, what we have made happen here is that we have made it much easier to pass deficit reduction than it would normally be in this country, but we have not given the jobs the same types of procedural advantages. Is that a fair enough way of explaining it?

VAN HOLLEN: Yes, except for the fact that the supercommittee has the power to include anything it wants within this package. I would argue that, in fact, putting people back to work, making sure that we generate and create more jobs, is part of a deficit reduction mandate. And again, you have to look at this over the space of time. But you are right about the procedural advantage. This is what we call a fast-track proposal. It's used with respect to closing military bases around the country, which is always difficult politically, and the idea is that you put all of that plan in one place, and have a up or down vote. And so that is what it will be. And again, the committee is not limited to simply cutting, for example we have made it very clear because that deficit reduction has to be done in a balanced way. Nor is it prohibited in any way from saying part of our strategy for reducing the deficit is to get the economy moving more quickly and getting more people back to work.

KLEIN: And this morning in the opening statements, Representative Hensarling made the point, he argued that deficit reduction was itself a jobs program, that you didn't need more action for short-term support because if you reduced the long-term deficit that is enough. Is that enough for the Democrats on the committee?

VAN HOLLEN: No, it is not enough. Look, we all recognize that in the short term especially, for example, just cutting, as some of my Republican colleagues have proposed, is actually counterproductive and it's not just me saying that, that's the Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Chairman Bernanke, saying that deep cuts would hurt the economy. Even the bipartisan commissions, you know, Simpson-Bowles, Rivlin-Domenici, made it very clear that the deficit reduction plans should take the long view, and do nothing to hurt the short-term. Again, for the reasons we're talking about: the longer the economy is stalled, the longer people are hurting and out of work, but also the worse the deficit gets. A big part of the current deficit that we are facing right now is due to the fact that we have been in this sluggish economy. So, let's get the economy moving again as part of a deficit reduction plan. That's not enough to deal with the deficit in the longer-term -- you have to do other things. But you can phase them in over a period of time. When you are dealing with the deficit you want a glide-path land, not a crash landing.

KLEIN: I think generally you want a glide-path landing, not a crash landing. I can't think of too many alternative scenarios there. And tonight, what are you hoping to hear from the President? What is helpful to you and your work?

VAN HOLLEN: Well, he has to lay out the vision of where the country needs to be on jobs. From what we have heard, it is going to have a lot of very important elements to it, and he has to make it clear and with, you know, with conviction that has taken on this and other issues, that he is really going to be planting a flag in the ground on this issue. That this is the conversation that America needs to have and he is going to be engaging in the country in this way. The only thing that I would add to the elements that you talked about earlier, Ezra, as part of the plan, is the whole housing issue which may not be a big part of the President's speech because a lot of the decisions in that area are not totally within his control, they're under the control of the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac conservatorship, but if you were able to give a lot of people who were current on their mortgages, but under water, the same refinancing rates that others have in the marketplace, that could be a considerable boost above and beyond what the President may be talking about tonight and above the particular dollars and size of the package that you were talking about.

KLEIN: Right. It could save the federal government money by preventing foreclosures among folks who we are backing-up their mortgages.

VAN HOLLEN: Yes, that is exactly right. And in terms of the impact on the real economy that could be a very important piece of it. Again, it is not totally within the White House's control, although they are obviously part of the conversation and I really hope that that decision will be made going forward.
KLEIN: Representative Chris Van Hollen, thank you for joining us.

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