| Speaker | Time | Text |
|---|---|---|
|
unidentified
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Have benefited financially from corrupt financial dealings involving Ukraine, China, and other countries. | |
| Six different banks had filed 175 suspicious activity reports against the Bidens, most of which were while Joe Biden was vice president of the United States. | ||
| And then they were subject to another 50 suspicious activity reports. | ||
| So let me put that into perspective. | ||
| No bank would file a suspicious activity report against the son of a prominent politician unless they were darn sure that a financial crime had been committed. | ||
| Because when you file one of those, the bank examiners roll in your bank and it causes a lot of problems. | ||
| So the banks knew that there was some bad things going on here. | ||
| And that's when the investigation really took off. | ||
|
unidentified
|
James Comer with his book, All the President's Money, Sunday night at 8 Eastern on C-SPAN's QA. | |
| You can listen to QA and all of our podcasts on our free C-SPAN Now app. | ||
| Our guest is Representative Gabe Amo. | ||
| He is with the Foreign Affairs Committee. | ||
| He serves as the vice ranking member, also a member of the budget committee. | ||
| Representative Amo, welcome to Washington Journal. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Great to be on with you. | |
| There's a discussion going on on whether to keep on a continuing resolution until later on this year. | ||
| Where are you on that? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Look, where I am is I'm looking at Republicans who exhibit some leadership here. | |
| They claim a really big mandate, which is false, but they are in the majority in the House, in the majority in the Senate, and they have the White House. | ||
| So they should be able to demonstrate to the American people that they have a capacity to lead. | ||
| And the consequences of their inability to leave fall on them and them alone. | ||
| Will Democrats support it at all? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Look, I think, as you've heard and has been widely reported, they've walked away from the negotiation table. | |
| So, frankly, again, they have the burden of leading. | ||
| And frankly, time has taken and they need to demonstrate leadership to avert challenges for the American people. | ||
| When you say they walk away from the negotiation table, can you elaborate on it? | ||
|
unidentified
|
No, I think it's been widely reported that they have sort of shut Democrats out of this process. | |
| I think this morning I read that the president is pleading with members of the Freedom Caucus to support their plan for a continuing resolution. | ||
| So they should proceed, see what happens. | ||
| But if they want to be partners in governance, they have to behave differently. | ||
| It seems like they want to do this alone, so it's on them. | ||
| If Democrats were to support it, what would Democrats seek in order to get that support? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Well, I think negotiations will happen in public. | |
| So I think that that has yet to be determined. | ||
| Again, the burden is on Republicans. | ||
| They know that they've got the numbers to pass if they can get everybody in unanimity around passing the continuing resolution. | ||
| So let's see if they can do that. | ||
| As far as the actual budget process, why do you think that the inability to actually pass a formal budget didn't take place? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Well, look, as you saw, in December, we had the opportunity to proceed to have a full fiscal year budget. | |
| But instead, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle responded to ex-post tweets or whatever they're called now by Elon Musk and then the president-elect and decided to follow that vision instead of the vision and will of their constituents, which is to have an effective government that is making sure that things run. | ||
| So, look, again, burden is on them. | ||
| When you walk away, when you decide to follow the Musk-Trump agenda, this is the consequence for the American people. | ||
| Our guest is with us. | ||
| And if you want to ask questions of him in the 25 minutes or so he has with us, 202-748-8000 for Democrats, Republicans 202-748-8001, and Independents 202-748-8002. | ||
| Text us at 202-748-8003. | ||
| Today, the House is going to consider a censure move against Representative Al Green. | ||
| What do you think of that move? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Well, look, I think this is, again, a distraction. | |
| Because if you look at the chamber and the hoot and the hollering that was coming from the Republican side, the lack of decorum in the MAGA hat that one of my colleagues on the other side was wearing, that it's inconsistent application. | ||
| Now, what I will say is, let us not focus on the act of censure and the performance of moving someone out, but what Mr. Green was saying. | ||
| You know, he was sharing that he didn't think the president had a mandate to cut Medicaid. | ||
| And let's be clear: the Republican House budget resolution, I sit on the budget committee, I sat there in a markup for 12 plus hours, and over and over again, to a person, no Republican deviated, they decided to push forward a plan to cut at least, remember, it's at least $880 billion in Medicaid, hurting many Americans, hurting in my district, | ||
| 22.6% of people who receive Medicaid coverage. | ||
| So we can be distracted by the performance of a censure and the folks who all of a sudden have decided to be high and mighty about the activities in the chamber. | ||
| That's one thing. | ||
| But I'm not going to stray away from policy because that is actually what we're sent to work on, not the policing of the free speech of colleagues. | ||
| Going back to Tuesday, one of the constant criticisms since then of Republicans for Democrats was they consistently sat during the whole thing, even when young people were recognized or heroes were recognized. | ||
| What do you think of that criticism? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I asked my Republican colleagues when they're going to stand up for the people that they're cutting Medicaid from. | |
| When are they going to stand up for the people that they're going to cut SNAP benefits from? | ||
| Look, performance in a speech is one thing. | ||
| And I was sympathetic to so many of the Americans who were reflected in those that were recognized in the chamber. | ||
| But let's be very clear: that is one speech. | ||
| Speech is different from the legislative action that is required from my colleagues to ensure that people don't suffer in this country. | ||
| And they are plotting ahead with great intention and a great ferocity to cut Medicaid, to cut SNAP, to hurt those in nursing homes, to hurt those in long-term care, to cut those with disabilities. | ||
| So again, let's not be distracted. | ||
| Let's focus on the substance. | ||
| If you were sympathetic, why not stand up at least express that sympathy? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I was sitting there clapping. | |
| You can pan the room. | ||
| I was clapping. | ||
| Standing itself does not denote a specific acknowledgement. | ||
| Again, this is performance and distraction. | ||
| Let's worry about the core. | ||
| They did not hear from the president of the United States. | ||
| Our president, Donald Trump, did not speak to how he was lowering costs for the American people. | ||
| Instead, he spoke to the fact that he said, well, there might just be a little disturbance for the pocketbooks and the bank accounts of the American people while he pursues a reckless tariff agenda that is raising prices on Americans now. | ||
| Representative Gabe Emmel of Rhode Island joining us for this discussion. | ||
| Our first call for you comes from Tony. | ||
| Tony is in Detroit. | ||
| Democrats line for our guest. | ||
| Tony, go ahead. | ||
| You're on. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning, Pedro and Congressman. | |
| You just actually kind of like spoke on a thought. | ||
| So I have a thought and a question. | ||
| The thought is about oversight. | ||
| Okay, Doge. | ||
| Elon Musk is in charge of the Doge and he is going through there and he's messing around with the nuclear stuff. | ||
| This guy builds rockets. | ||
| Who's to say he's not stealing information on the nuclear stuff and storing it? | ||
| It does seem like some kind of smokescreen that Donald Trump and the Republicans are doing to make us not pay attention to what Elon Musk is doing. | ||
| My question is, is there any kind of oversight on Elon Musk and Doge? | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| Well, sir, you identify one of the things that distresses my colleagues on the Democratic side and causes us real significant concern. | ||
| It is why I am on a piece of legislation that's led by Congressman John Larson from Connecticut, the ending Doge Conflicts Act. | ||
| I may have the name slightly wrong. | ||
| But the idea here is that people with the special status of special government employee people like Elon Musk, who have to have their time in office and service re-upped every 130 days, have the same financial disclosure requirements that anybody else has. | ||
| When I worked at the White House, I filed an annual ethics report. | ||
| You could see how little an outside money that I received. | ||
| In fact, nothing. | ||
| But you could see that transparently. | ||
| I was banned from owning stocks, banned from conflicts of interest. | ||
| Why is someone with tens of billions of dollars in government contracts yielding and wielding so much power across our federal government? | ||
| That is a conflict that has to be explored. | ||
| Moreover, you identified the issues with Doge, which is the mass firing of technical experts in letting these 22-year-old coders, whoever they are, go in and eliminate staff at the nuclear administration, which protects our nukes, the FDA, NOAA, so many vital agencies where we require expertise. | ||
| And these folks who don't understand government are causing great chaos and disrupting services that will disrupt our lives. | ||
| In Florida, Republican line, this is John. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi. | |
| Hi, Congressman. | ||
| I'd ask you how you're doing, but I need to ask you a question. | ||
| As you as a park as in a congressman, do you have to do a mental health evaluation? | ||
| Because I'll tell you, looking at what you disrespectful, not standing up to that kid the other day who survived cancer and all those angel moms. | ||
| I was a Democrat from Massachusetts, Pocahontas' home state. | ||
| I traveled the country now and I went to where one of the people. | ||
| We take you live now to the State Department, where spokesperson Tammy Bruce is holding her first press briefing. | ||
| You're watching live coverage on C-SPAN. | ||
| I'm Tammy Bruce, the spokesperson for the U.S. State Department. |