MSNBC "The Ed Show" - Transcript: Alan Gross
Interview
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Joining me tonight Congressman Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, Congressman good to have you with us tonight. You of course were personally involved in this venture to Havana to see the release of the American Mr. Gross. Is the President doing the right thing or let me ask you this, are Republicans on the wrong side of history here?
REP. VAN HOLLEN, (R) MARYLAND: They`re totally on the wrong side of history. And they`re totally on the wrong side of all the evidence of the last 54 years because the policy of isolation of trying to punish Cuba has been a miserable failure by its own goals, right? The goal was squeeze Cuba. That will get rid of the Castro brothers. That will bring about democracy.
In fact, isolating Cuba has only isolated the Cuban people. It`s only squeezed the Cuban people. The Castro brothers have survived eight American Presidents and they`re doing just fine, thank you. So, the reality is that, the burden is on people like Senator Rubio to show why another five or ten years of a policy that has failed for the last 54 would get a different result.
Because, we all know the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different result.
SCHULTZ: It seems that Mr. Rubio is focused on a bad deal that`s made by
the President that we didn`t get enough. What`s your answer to that? I mean diplomatic relations are the beginning. It`s almost like he has such a revengeful attitude towards the country of Cuba because of history and can`t see the light of day in the future. But -- what about the points that he`s making that the President got nothing?
VAN HOLLEN: Well, he totally misunderstands the fact that we are not doing a favor to the Cuban regime by changing the policy that has helped empower the Cuban regime for so long. In other words, the policy we`ve had in place has not hurt the Castro brothers, they are doing just fine. It has hurt the Cuban people, and so what the President is saying is, let`s engage the Cuban people, more travel, more trade, more exchange of ideas and goods.
And over time, not tomorrow, but overtime that will open more space for the Cuban people. That the current policy is simply backfired, it may have been well-intentioned but it clearly did not achieve the result. So let`s try something very different.
So this is not doing a favor to the Cuban regime. In fact the Cuban regime is probably the one that`s taking a greatest risk here because they even perpetuated and strengthened by the policy we`ve had in place for the last 54 years.
SCHULTZ: Well I think that`s a very profound point because, if anybody is
going to change on this deal it`s going to be them not America. That`s how
I view it. So what`s the downside here?
VAN HOLLEN: Well I don`t -- there`s not a downside. And this is why the President has wanted to pursue this from his very first campaign when he was running for President.
SCHULTZ: Yeah.
VAN HOLLEN: He said even he was campaigning in Florida, its good for the United States to push Cuba to open. And the way you do that is not through a failed policy of 54 years. The way you do that is through greater exchange, a greater flow of ideas and goods.
You know, my friend Congressman Jim McGovern from Massachusetts who`s done a lot to promote a change in policy towards Cuba said that the two words that the Castro brothers most fear is spring break. Meaning, American college students coming down to Cuba and opening up Cuba because the reality is Ed, as we`ve seen by trying to build a wall, it`s allowed the Castro brothers to hide. Because...
SCHULTZ: Yeah.
VAN HOLLEN: ... what they`ve used s an excuse this, right? They say to their people, hey, the Yankee threat requires us to take emergency measures. You know, we`ve got to clampdown on freedom of the press, we going to clampdown on human rights to protect ourselves from the Yankees.
They won`t have that excuse anymore.
SCHULTZ: Yeah. Congressman, I`ve got to ask you on an unrelated story. Let`s talk about the next session of Congress. What is your position going to be with the Democratic leadership team? Is there going to be a vote for the position Steny Hoyer holds right now? What`s happening there?
VAN HOLLEN: Well no, we`ve got our leadership team in place. We did those elections right after the general...
SCHULTZ: So there`ll be no change and that`s not going to be challenged at all?
VAN HOLLEN: No, but I will continue to serve as the senior member on the budget committee and I believe Ed, that the budget will present of the Democrats with a real opportunity to show the contrast between our approach to try and empower the American people from the bottom up and a review of the -- a repeat of the trickled down approach that the Republicans have.
And you`re going to see in the coming weeks Ed, I think a number of proposals that many of us are going to put forward to try to deal with this whole issue of wage stagnation, right? We`ve seen growing productivity over the years. Workers have been more productive than ever.
SCHULTZ: Yeah.
VAN HOLLEN: Wages flat. We need to change that and we`ve got some policy ideas to begin to do that.
SCHULTZ: All right. Congressman Chris Van Hollen, and Ed Show favorite, great to have you with us tonight. I appreciate it very much.
VAN HOLLEN: Thank you, Ed.
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