MSNBC "The Ed Show" - Transcript
Interview
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Joining me tonight is New York Senator Charles Schumer on the Democratic leadership team.
Senator, congratulations.
SEN. CHARLES SCHUMER (D), NEW YORK: Well, thank you.
It`s a victory for the middle class -- middle-class people over Tea Party politics. That hasn`t happened enough this last year, but it happened fittingly at the end of the year. And we hope it`s a metaphor for
2012.
SCHULTZ: Well, have the Republicans been exposed for the party that puts politics over people? I mean, I think the way this whole thing has played out, it has not been good for them.
SCHUMER: I think that`s right. What they`ve done this whole year is play brinksmanship and paralysis. But they`ve been very clever about it. And you know, people have sort of said a plague on both your houses.
What began with the debt ceiling and now continues with this issue, people -- you know, the American people have pretty good sniffers and they`re beginning to smell that this Tea Party is extreme and not really
interested in what`s good for Americans. It`s not simply that they might have a different viewpoint, they want to cut government more than others, but rather that they`re basically trying to paralyze government and get nothing done.
And it is true that people are upset with government. But it`s not because it`s doing too much, it`s because it`s doing too little to help them.
SCHULTZ: There hasn`t been this much political light so, to speak, between the Senate minority leader and the speaker over in the House. What do you make of that? Is this really a dividing point?
SCHUMER: Well, let`s hope so. In the past, Speaker Boehner and Mitch McConnell have worked in tandem, and it`s been pretty effective because the House by its rules can pass something by a mere majority. So they send stuff to us, and Mitch McConnell and the Republicans don`t let us pass anything and they say the House has passed a bill, why hasn`t the Senate?
When the real question is: why haven`t the Democrats and Republicans come together because you need both to pass things in both Houses.
But I think that McConnell, he`s a very smart politician, and he realized that Boehner simply following the Tea Party, the hard right people, was hurting the whole Republican Party and in fact risked his goal
of both defeating Obama and gaining a Senate majority. They`re a lot further away from it today than they were two weeks ago.
SCHULTZ: Do you think there`s going to be any problems tomorrow with unanimous consent?
SCHUMER: Well, you never know.
SCHULTZ: I mean there, might be some radical Tea Partiers.
SCHUMER: Yes, you could have had five of these guys call each other up and say we`re flying to Washington and we`re going to block it on the floor. But then because very smartly, Leader Reid said we`re not going to support this until Speaker Boehner publicly does.
And the fact he now has to publicly support this on the floor of the Senate means -- on the House, the floor of the House, the fact is if they call the whole House back, every Democrat will vote for it, enough Republicans will vote for, it hopefully Speaker Boehner won`t just totally go back on his word. That it will pass.
So they`re stuck.
SCHULTZ: I want to get your reaction to something the speaker said tonight. Here it is.
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BOEHNER: Politics will be politics. Our team believes it`s always right to do the best thing. If you do the right things for the right reasons, the right things will happen. Everybody`s already agreed that the
best policy is a one-year extension of these policies. All we`re fighting for is what everybody`s already agreed to.
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SCHUMER: Yes, there`s a lot of fallacy in that statement. Two weeks ago the majority of Republicans, a while ago, Eric Cantor, were for no middle-class payroll tax cut because they thought that it would help the
economy too much. And now, of course, they said two months isn`t enough.
Well, if two weeks ago you`re saying I don`t want any of it and now you`re saying I want a bigger one, it doesn`t pass the laugh test -- and again, the American people sort of saw through that.
So what Speaker Boehner said isn`t right. His party, if they had been resolute for this middle-class tax cut for the last six months, maybe they`d have a leg to stand on. But they didn`t. They were against it,
against it, against it.
SCHULTZ: Have you -- could you point to any other time where the Democrats have held together so strong on an issue?
SCHUMER: No.
SCHULTZ: There was no caving at all.
SCHUMER: But I will tell you, since September we`ve done a lot better.
SCHULTZ: Yes.
SCHUMER: Why? Well, we have focused on the economy, jobs, and income inequality. We came out united, finally, for the tax on incomes over a million dollars. We came out for a jobs program. And we said, look, even
if it doesn`t pass, we`re going to put it on the floor of the Senate over and over and over again.
And here`s what`s happened -- people now believe that Democrats are much better at helping the economy than Republicans. This is the first time in 30 years when you ask the American people, who`s better at tax policy? They prefer Democrats to Republicans because we separated the middle class from the millionaires.
SCHULTZ: Does that carry over to 2012 with political momentum?
SCHUMER: I believe if we stick with it, it will. We have to stick to the three issues of jobs, the economy, and income inequality. The American people are with us. Not with the Republicans on those issues.
f we stick with them and don`t expect, you know, every week we`re going to have a major victory but it`s like Stalingrad, you fight it house by house by house, we will be in good shape in 2012, even if the economy is not rip-roaring back, which I hope it is.
SCHULTZ: Senator, great to have you with us tonight.
SCHUMER: Good to be here.
SCHULTZ: Thanks so much.
SCHUMER: It`s a good evening.
SCHULTZ: It is a good evening. It`s a good evening for the American people.
And I have to say this. This was all so unnecessary, wasn`t it?
SCHUMER: Totally unnecessary. Look, I said at the beginning of the week on your fellow MSNBC show that if we held tough they would have to cave because the American people are on our side.
SCHULTZ: And the American people are with the Democrats on a lot of issues, not just this one. So I hope --
SCHUMER: We have to stick with them. And the dissension in the Republican Party, Ed, is for real. My guess is there are a whole lot of mainstream conservatives who are not Tea Party people who are calling
Boehner and says, you can`t lead us over or you can`t follow the Tea Party over the cliff because it`s going to hurt us.
SCHULTZ: You bet. Well, we`ll have more on the Tea Party.
Senator, thanks. Happy holidays. Good to have you with us.
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