| Speaker | Time | Text |
|---|---|---|
| Compromise that everybody can live with. | ||
| Look, when you have a bill this big with this many pieces and this many components and this complex and comprehensive, virtually no one's going to be 100% satisfied with every piece of the bill. | ||
| It's just not possible. | ||
| Everybody's having to give a little, and they're willing to do that because they know the stakes are so high, as my leaders here have articulated. | ||
|
unidentified
|
So we'll get there. | |
| We're going to get this done, deliver it for the American people, and I remain as confident today as I was when we started this process. | ||
|
unidentified
|
So thanks so much. | |
| Thank you. | ||
| House Democratic leaders talked about the Trump administration's budget bill and its potential cuts to Medicaid during a press conference on Capitol Hill. | ||
| In their remarks, Caucus Chair Pete Aguilar and Vice Chair Ted Liu also addressed President Trump's plan to accept a $400 million jumbo jet from the government of Qatar. | ||
| Yeah. | ||
| Well, it's really a big... | ||
| David, I'll try it. | ||
| I'll try it. | ||
| Oh, yeah. | ||
| I'll try it. | ||
| Hold that up. | ||
| I'll try it. | ||
| It's actually... | ||
| That's exactly what it is. | ||
| Adds up. | ||
| Adds up. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
| Pleased to be joined. | ||
| Still morning. | ||
| Pleased to be joined with Vice Chair of the House Democratic Caucus, Ted Lieu. | ||
| This week, Republicans have laid out exactly who they are fighting for. | ||
| After weeks of promises that they wouldn't cut Medicaid, their budget contains drastic cuts that will throw millions off of health insurance. | ||
| After campaigning on helping working-class Americans get ahead, their budget once again rewards billionaires and wealthy corporations and makes it harder for families to make ends meet. | ||
| They are watching prices go up because of Trump's reckless tariffs, and their response is to take food off of the table for women, veterans, and children. | ||
| The Republican budget doesn't address the cost of living crisis. | ||
| It makes it worse. | ||
| The cost of groceries, clothing, and everyday necessities are still too high. | ||
| And Republicans want to add to that and make health care more expensive on top of it. | ||
| This isn't about helping people find good-paying jobs or a shot at a better life. | ||
| This is simply about helping people like Elon Musk pay less in taxes. | ||
| House Democrats believe that we can shore up these basic needs, programs, and help everyday Americans reach their full potential. | ||
| It's long past time that the wealthiest of Americans pay their fair share and we make it easier for working families to afford basic needs like health care and housing. | ||
| These devastating cuts will make Americans, particularly children, sicker, hungrier, and poorer. | ||
| They're short-changing the future just so their friends can continue to get richer. | ||
| The American people cannot afford the Republican budget, and House Democrats are using every tool at our disposal to stop it. | ||
| I want to thank our energy and commerce members who continue to meet the Ways and Means members who continue to highlight the unfairness of this plan that Republicans are putting forward and the Agriculture Committee who will continue to fight for nutrition programs throughout the day. | ||
| Vice Chair Ted Liu. | ||
| Thank you, Chairman Aguilar. | ||
| Omaha, Nebraska, is the sixth largest city in America, led by a Republican. | ||
| And last night, in a stunning upset, Democrats flipped that seat from red to blue. | ||
| I want to congratulate Mayor-elect John Ewing Jr., who's going to be the new mayor of Omaha, Nebraska. | ||
| We also know that voters are very angry at Republicans who continue to enable Donald Trump's harmful policies. | ||
| And the Republican mayor in this case aligned herself completely with Donald Trump, and the voters spoke out in Omaha, and now we have a Democratic mayor-elect. | ||
| I also want to talk about now the Qatari luxury palace in the sky gift to Donald Trump. | ||
| There is no such thing as a free palace in the sky. | ||
| What do foreign countries want when they gift massive amounts of money and other gifts to the president? | ||
| Donald Trump should reject this gift of the luxury palace in the sky, Boeing 747, completely and righteously, because we are the United States of America. | ||
| We don't need gifts from foreign countries. | ||
| We can build our own very impressive Air Force one. | ||
| We don't need to fly a Qatari plane around as our Air Force One. | ||
| That's also un-American. | ||
| I also want to note, new reporting came out showing that to retrofit this Qatari 747 would take perhaps up to a billion dollars because you can't just fly a palace in the sky from a foreign country. | ||
| You have to actually make it safe and secure. | ||
| You have to make this plane ready to launch nuclear weapons. | ||
| You can't have people eavesdropping on it. | ||
| And so it's going to cost way more money to do it this way. | ||
| And again, people need to ask why is a foreign country trying to give this massive gift to Donald Trump and think of the precedent it would set. | ||
| Would it be okay if Brunei gifted a luxury 757 to JD Vance for Air Force II? | ||
| Would it be okay if Germany gave a Porsche SUV to Senator Thune as his official car? | ||
| Would it be okay if Italy gave a bunch of expensive Armani suits to Speaker Johnson for his official duties? | ||
| No, it wouldn't be okay. | ||
| Also, because the Constitution says you can't do this. | ||
| It requires congressional approval for the president to accept a gift of this size. | ||
| And we urge the Republicans in Congress to stand up, speak out, and call for a vote if Donald Trump were to accept this essential bribe from a foreign government. | ||
| And then let me now conclude on Medicaid. | ||
| We now know that the Republicans lied when they said that they weren't going to cut Medicaid. | ||
| They're cutting Medicaid by a massive amount of money. | ||
| One of the largest cuts in U.S. history. | ||
| Over 13.7 million people will be kicked off Medicaid. | ||
| I also note that two-thirds of Medicaid, two-thirds of nursing home patients rely on Medicaid. | ||
| This is also going to close down rural hospitals. | ||
| It's going to make it so that health care for all of us becomes more expensive. | ||
| Because if you don't have health care under Medicaid, you're still going to get treated. | ||
| You just walk in the emergency room and it costs even more money for all of us. | ||
| So we urge the Republicans to reject this massive Medicaid cut. | ||
| And I just want to say we told you so. | ||
| We told you that Republicans were going to cut Medicaid and now we know that they are doing it. | ||
| So they lied. | ||
| We told the truth again. | ||
| Questions? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Nick. | |
| I understand leadership is going to vote to table Congressman Thanadar's impeachment resolution today. | ||
| Does leadership also plan to do so with Congressman Al Green's impeachment resolution? | ||
| Well, resolutions in order to force a vote, resolutions of privileged have to be ready. | ||
| And the individual, the maker of the motion, has to go to the floor and ask for that. | ||
| We will deal with what is being offered this week. | ||
| I have said before from this podium that this is not the right approach we should be taking. | ||
| I'll join, we'll join members of the leadership team in voting to table that motion. | ||
| Right now, our focus is on health care being stripped away from the American people. | ||
| That is the most urgent and dire thing that we could be talking about this week. | ||
| Everything else is a distraction. | ||
| Andrew? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Oh, yeah, I was giving that question. | |
| That's it. | ||
| That's all you got. | ||
| Michael, then. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I actually have a question for Mr. Liu this week. | |
| These are my favorite questions. | ||
|
unidentified
|
The House Energy and Congress Republicans put a provision in their bill. | |
| It's a 10-year moratorium on artificial intelligence, most artificial intelligence models at the state and local level over the next 10 years. | ||
| They pass the communications title. | ||
| So it looks like it's going to be in the final bill. | ||
| Given your role on the Artificial Intelligence Task Force last Congress and the interest that you have in this industry, what's your reaction to that particular provision? | ||
| Do you think that it's helpful to prevent states and localities from regulating this industry? | ||
| And what does it say that Congress hasn't really taken any meaningful steps to regulate artificial intelligence over these last few years? | ||
| So thank you for your question. | ||
| First of all, this has nothing to do with the budget. | ||
| So I don't see how this survives the Senate where I think the parliamentarian will out of order. | ||
| Just on their policy itself, I don't mind if we have federal preemption. | ||
| We do have federal preemption in a number of areas in the law, but we can't preempt with nothing, right? | ||
| There is no federal law or idea that we're preempting the states on. | ||
| And so it doesn't make much sense to me to basically preempt with nothing. | ||
| I think if we're going to preempt, we should say we want to do X, Y, or Z at the federal level. | ||
| And that's why you states cannot regulate in this area. | ||
| I also know that 10 years is an awfully long time. | ||
| If what Congress wants to say is, look, give us a year to figure this out, that might make more sense. | ||
| But there's no reason to have a 10-year preemption with nothing in its place. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| I just wanted to follow up on Congressman Tanadar impeachment articles. | ||
| This morning he admitted that some members of his party strongly disagree with him, and he kind of said, I'm moving forward anyway because I think that it's always the right time to do the right thing, regardless of what members of my party think. | ||
| So what would you say to the fact that he's pretty much admitting, I know my party doesn't want me to do this and I'm doing it anyway? | ||
| I'll keep the conversations I have with members, you know, between members. | ||
| Many of us have made our positions known. | ||
| Like I said, this is such an impactful moment when our colleagues are locking themselves in a room for 24 hours to protect and defend health care for their constituents. | ||
| We should be talking about uplifting that hard work. | ||
| We shouldn't be talking about this proposal that is not ripe, and not timely. | ||
| That's what is most important. | ||
| Impeachment is a tool. | ||
| Like I said before, this president is no stranger to impeachments. | ||
| He's been impeached twice. | ||
| Impeachment is a tool that can be used, but it takes weeks and months to do. | ||
| Right now, the issue of the day is will four Republicans stand up and support health care in this country for their constituents? | ||
| That is a fundamental issue. | ||
| Everything else is just a distraction. | ||
| And we're seeing that play out in real time in the Energy and Commerce Committee. | ||
| And we will see that again as this bill goes to the Rules Committee and comes to the House floor. | ||
| That's what House Democrats are focused on fighting for. | ||
| And I understand, as we've said before, it is a broad mosaic of opinions within the House Democratic caucus that the vice chair and I get an opportunity to lead. | ||
| But this is one that is a pretty easy call. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Go ahead. | |
| Mike Johnson said this morning that he supports a ban on stock trading by members. | ||
| Jeffries has said the same. | ||
| Do you think that's something now that should be moved on very swiftly now that there's agreement from both parties' leaders? | ||
| This has been a bipartisan issue. | ||
| Members on both sides of the aisle have talked about this. | ||
| There's a lot of details behind it. | ||
| I support a ban personally, but there's a lot of details that would need to be worked out. | ||
| What is difficult for members to also comprehend is, yes, we believe that members shouldn't be trading. | ||
| We don't believe that members should use any knowledge that they have in order to execute trades. | ||
| Marjorie Taylor Greene and chairman of committees have recently engaged in some of this that is questionable. | ||
| What is also questionable is the President of the United States being able to trade his likeness with meme coins and he and his family profit to the tune of potentially hundreds of millions of dollars in order to continue this grift on the American public and not just the American public to be able to profit from people around the country. | ||
| So I'm in favor of a ban, but let's not also lose sight that there are plenty of things in which we need to hold the executive to when it comes to conflicts of interests and trading as well. | ||
|
unidentified
|
You spoke a bit about the Omaha win yesterday. | |
| And what are some things that, and Democrats have also done very well in a lot of special elections since the 2024 election. | ||
| What are some things that these candidates are doing well that you think House Democrats should be incorporating as we move into the midterm cycle? | ||
| And what do you think is indicative of how the midterm cycle will go? | ||
| I want the vice chair to speak to this too because he pointed to it. | ||
| But look, I think candidates across the country are talking about the issues. | ||
| They're talking about providing a better quality of life and lowering the costs that people face. | ||
| That is fundamentally what folks want to talk about. | ||
| And in the case in Omaha, you have one candidate who's talking about social issues and then you have another candidate talking about potholes. | ||
| The person at the local level who talks about potholes is probably going to win. | ||
| And so I think keeping your eye on the ball and making sure that you're focused on the needs of your constituents is the absolute most important thing that you can do. | ||
| And I think that's what those successful candidates are doing. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| Donald Trump is not popular. | ||
| In fact, he's the least popular president in over 80 years at 100-day mark. | ||
| His policies are not popular. | ||
| Some of them are also lawless. | ||
| And when Republicans align themselves completely with Donald Trump, then the voters get angry and they're going to start taking them out in elections. | ||
| And that's what happened. | ||
| The Republican bear was there, and she completely aligned herself with Donald Trump. | ||
| And her voters removed her from office and installed a Democratic mayor who's going to work on issues such as what Chair Maglar said, fixing potholes and improving people's lives. | ||
| Last question in the back. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you, sir. | |
| I wanted to ask your response to President Trump's executive order that he signed earlier that he said was aimed at cutting drug prices. | ||
| Hey, if Republicans were serious about this issue, they would join with Democrats. | ||
| They would have joined with Democrats when we lowered the cost of prescription drugs across this country. | ||
| Right now, they and their friends are working to sue to unwind those efforts. | ||
| That's unacceptable. | ||
| There are bills that Democrats are carrying that would lower the cost of prescription drugs, actually put more money in people's pockets. | ||
| All of this is just a disingenuous effort on the House, on the part of House Republicans and Donald Trump to pretend like they're looking out for people. | ||
| If they were serious about it, the policy would be placed within their reconciliation plan. | ||
| It's not. | ||
| This is just a performance effort by the president. | ||
| Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Coming up Thursday morning, Wall Street Journal Supreme Court reporter Jess Braven on Thursday's oral argument before the Supreme Court on the issue of birthright citizenship. | |
| Then-Bloomberg Government Congress reporter Jack Fitzpatrick talks about the latest on the Republican budget reconciliation process. | ||
| And we'll continue the conversation on the Supreme Court's birthright citizenship case, first with John Malcolm of the Heritage Foundation and later with Vermont Democratic Congresswoman Becca Ballant. | ||
| C-SPAN's Washington Journal. | ||
| Join in the conversation live at 7 Eastern Thursday morning on C-SPAN. | ||
| C-SPAN Now, our free mobile app or online at c-SPAN.org. | ||
| Here's a look at what's coming up live Thursday on the C-SPAN networks. | ||
| On C-SPAN, the House is back at 10 a.m. Eastern to consider legislation dealing with law enforcement during National Police Week. | ||
| Over on C-SPAN 2 at 8, members of Congress will discuss national security at a summit hosted by Politico. | ||
| And at 10, the Senate gavels in and will work on more Trump administration executive nominations. | ||
| And over on C-SPAN 3 at 10 o'clock Eastern, Supreme Court oral argument in a case involving birthright citizenship for people born in the United States. | ||
| Then at 2, VA Secretary Doug Collins will testify before the House Veterans Affairs Committee on his agency's 2026 budget request. | ||
| You can also watch live coverage on the C-SPAN Now app or online at c-span.org. | ||
| American History TV, Saturday is on C-SPAN 2, exploring the people and events that tell the American story. | ||
| This weekend, at 3 p.m. Eastern, Holocaust survivors speak at a remembrance ceremony marking the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Nazi concentration camps in 1945. | ||
| The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum hosted the event at the U.S. Capitol. | ||
| Then at 5:45 p.m. Eastern, Tom Hanks' immersive the Moonwalkers film on the Apollo missions to the moon and the astronauts who walked its surface. | ||
| Mr. Hanks co-wrote the script and narrated the film. | ||
| At 8 p.m. Eastern on Lectures in History, University of Texas history professor Mark Lawrence on the rise of Ronald Reagan, his impact on the conservative movement, and the Reagan administration's performance in his first term. | ||
| And at 9:30 p.m. Eastern on the presidency, presidential historian Lindsay Chervinski talks about First Ladies Abigail Adams and Betty Ford, both known for their independence of thought and as political advisors to their husbands. | ||
| Exploring the American story, watch American History TV Saturdays on C-SPAN 2 and find a full schedule on your program guide or watch online anytime at c-span.org/slash history. | ||
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