During a government shutdown because Congress sidelines itself and isn't doing its work.
And frankly, in this case, that's due to the Democrats in the Senate.
The House has actually passed a clean CR.
We've done our work.
We're waiting on the Senate.
And the people holding up the Senate aren't the Republicans over there.
It's not even all the Democrats.
It's Mr. Schumer and the majority of his caucus that decide the government shutdown is better for their political interests than actually making sure the American people get the services they need and deserve.
Congressman Tom Cole, Republican of Oklahoma, the chair of the Appropriations Committee in the U.S. House, thank you as always for talking to us this morning.
You know, a negotiation is always a back and forth, right?
But what we are standing on the line of is protecting health care, cutting the cost for working families, and having an ironclad, enforceable deal that Donald Trump and Russell Vogt can't cut up with resistance or other measures.
The Washington Post notes that three of your own two Democrats, one independent in the Senate, broke with party ranks in that chamber and voted with Republicans to have a continuing resolution, a so-called clean one, no policy riders that would keep the government open until November.
Listen to Angus King, the independent from Maine, talking about why he decided to vote with Republicans, and we'll get your response on the other side.
The irony of this vote is many feel that this was an opportunity to stand up to Donald Trump, to vote no and to fight back.
The irony, the paradox is by shutting the government, we're actually giving Donald Trump more power.
And that was why I voted yes.
I did not want to hand Donald Trump and Russell Vogt and Stephen Miller additional power to decimate the federal government, to decimate the programs that are so important to so many people.
Here is what Donald Trump said just this afternoon: We can do things during a shutdown that are irreversible, that are bad for them.
He means the Democrats, like cutting vast numbers of people out, cutting things that they like, cutting programs that they like.
We can do things medically in other ways, including benefits.
We can cut numbers of people out.
Maya Angelou once said, If someone tells you who they are, you should believe them.
Donald Trump, in this quote, tells us what he plans to do if there's a shutdown, and it will not be good for the American people.
I know that that's a talking point for them, but 100%, we are absolutely protecting the American people by trying to take away their ability to just do what they want with whatever negotiated settlement or deal that comes out of us.
All right, Joe, I'm going to go on to Sherry in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, Republican.
Sherry, it's your turn.
unidentified
Thank you for having me.
My comment is that President Trump is doing a fabulous job.
And the thing that he needs to keep doing, we need every immigrant that is not a U.S. citizen out of our country.
If they have children in the USA, then they, yes, can be a U.S. citizen, but not until they are 18 years old.
So their parents need to take them back to where they were born.
And when they get 18, if they want to come back to the United States, then they can come back to the United States.
I worked for the DNV for quite a few years.
And I know if you come over illegal, that takes a little while.
But if you start the process when you come, then you can become a U.S. citizen and get the paper that says that you are a U.S. citizen.
So there should not be any immigrants in this United States.
I wish they would come to Myrtle Beach and take every Mexican, every one of them that when I'm my job and I take money from them, they have a wallet full of $100 bills.
Yeah, you know, what the color is saying is not unusual across the United States.
I think people are really concerned about their families.
People are struggling to survive, paycheck to paycheck.
And when people are struggling and not making ends meet, they start looking at others who might be making it harder for them.
I very much believe that what we are seeing right now, this conflict over immigration, is because everyone across this country is feeling like they aren't getting a leg up in the world.
And when people are struggling, they look for someone to blame.
And I don't mean this individually.
I think people deserve a stable platform.
And we have not provided it in this country.
Now, I will also be very clear.
We are a country of immigrants.
Birthright citizenship is protected in the Constitution.
There are things that I absolutely disagree with, but the sentiment that the caller said, but the sentiment that things are not okay and people need to have stability, that is across this country.
And that is something that we need to address.
And we also need those workers.
I'll just say the hospitality industry, the hospitals, the home care industry, agriculture.
We don't have enough workers in Oregon here.
We need immigrants to help us do the work.
And we should build efficient pathways, legal pathways for them to have permission to work and stay in this country.
And let me just say the last thing that I think a lot of people don't really understand is that these undocumented immigrants are paying taxes and they cannot receive any benefits.
And so that is going to hurt our economy as we are removing these people from the workforce.
Social Security taxes, federal taxes are going to be, the revenue is going to go down.
Congresswoman, the Republicans point to the emergency Medicaid program, where hospitals in emergency rooms have to provide care for illegal immigrants that come into the emergency room.
And it's this emergency Medicaid program.
We read from the Congressional Budget Office over five years it cost $27 billion is the number.
That that is what Republicans point to when they say Democrats are trying to close the government over giving funding to illegal immigrants.
Yeah, so I just want to say it as clearly as possible.
Illegal or undocumented immigrants do not have access to Medicaid in the same way that any American has it.
Any other citizen has it.
What they are saying is totally disingenuous.
I'm not going to say they're lying.
I'm going to say it's disingenuous to suggest that illegal immigrants are somehow getting Medicaid.
What happens?
I'm a doctor, critical care doctor.
If someone shows up in our hospital, we are going to take care of them.
We don't check documentation when somebody walks in the room because our job is to help people.
So if someone is in our community, shows up in our emergency room, we are going to take care of them.
And we aren't going to send them out before they're healthy and ready to go home.
So what that does is it puts uncompensated care on the hospitals in the communities.
So taxpayers are paying for this care no matter what.
They're just going to pay for more expensive care if people don't feel safe coming to the hospital.
And right now, people can get care regardless of documentation.
But this bill has nothing.
What we are standing up for is Medicaid cuts for American citizens that have already been cut and the premium enhanced tax credits that are ending.
People this month, today, are getting huge increases in their premiums and they're going to lose the tax credits.
It's going to, it's almost half of the costs that we are trying to recuperate right now that have been cut.
27%, I think, of the cuts are from the ACA tax premium enhanced credits that are going away.
The working families across this country making $60,000 to $150,000 per year are going to be paying an enormous amount and they're going to see it today.
When we cut Medicaid with the work requirements, and that's going to bleed people from the system and getting rid of these enhanced tax credits, people are going to be uninsured.
And so they will be uninsured showing up into our hospitals sicker, you know, a preventative intervention that could have kept them healthy or, you know, antibiotics that could have treated an infection before it became sepsis.
Those things are not going to happen anymore.
And we all are going to pay more.
It's a penny saved, a pound foolish.
It really does not make any sense for us to cut people from our health care roles.
We fixed this 15 years ago, and now we're going to go back and do it all again.
Yeah, I mean, that is also something that I am very much hearing in Portland.
And I feel strongly that the caller is right, that we need to stand up against the authoritarian actions that this president is taking, whether it's sending troops into my home or it's cutting federal workforce workers without any reason and certainly without the process that is supposed to be in place to protect them in their places of work, many of which have been there for decades.
What this president is doing is dangerous, and this shutdown is absolutely necessary to help the American people understand that their health care is at stake, that their affordability of their lives is worse.
It is the great betrayal that he ran to say he was going to cut costs for people while people are going to see their premiums go up 75 to 200 percent.
It is egregious, the disingenuity of this president.
And we need to hold the line on this.
We cannot let him cut health care for 20 million Americans and make it much less affordable for everyone else.
The president on Truth Social around 8 a.m. this morning posting, I have a meeting today with Russ Vogt, he of Project 2025 fame, to determine which of the many Democrat agencies, most of which are political scam, he recommends to be cut and whether or not those cuts will be temporary or permanent.
I can't believe the radical left Democrats gave me this unprecedented opportunity.
They are not stupid people, so maybe this is their way of wanting to quietly and quickly make America great again.
I used to live in your congressional district back when Earl Blumenauer was there.
And then I moved to New Jersey in Frank Pallone's district.
And he's the ranking member of the House Subcommittee on Health, which I know that you're on.
My question is about a threat to health care in Portland, Oregon that exists today under the Trump administration under the Controlled Substances Act.
Oregon legalized psilocybin services centers.
Those are magic mushrooms, psychedelic mushrooms.
As you know, they are still under threat of federal authorities coming in and arresting all of those people going there for help, all of those people working there.
I've been asking this question of the Democrats that represent my congressional districts of where I've been living.
If you're pro-choice on reproductive freedoms, you believe that heterosexual couples who don't want to have, you know, your body, your choice, and I think cloned this in 2022.
He totally evaded.
He told me Orbalum and I was never asked him about amending the Controlled Substances Act for Suicide and Services Centers.
So my question is, if you're pro-choice and you are for all of the mental health care and you're on the Veterans Affairs Committee as well, how many more months do we have to wait for you to amend the Controlled Substances Act under Donald Trump with RFK Jr. as the Eric?
What action is being taken that you want to reference the Constitution?
unidentified
Well, everything we have to do every day, we're getting tied up in the legal matters, and everybody's wanting to take the Constitution to a different area.
I don't understand.
And the thing with the Army, the regular military, we're not even following the laws of the Constitution.
The Passe Comitadas Act said that the federal troops should not be used against its own citizens.
That is being violated in areas where Donald Trump is against the governor's wishes sending federal troops in.
It also, he's invoking Title 10, or Pete Hugseth is invoking Title 10, which says there has to be an invasion, a rebellion, or some catastrophic inability to enforce federal law for federal troops to be used against a governor's wishes.
So that is the title theoretically that's being used.
But let me just be clear: there's no invasion, there's no rebellion, and our local police forces are able to enforce the laws just fine here.
So it is in violation of the Constitution.
Any action to bring troops into my city, my home, I agree with the caller.
I'm just concerned with the Democrats are saying this shutdown has got to do with the medical for everybody, and the Republicans are saying that the shutdown is due to medical for undocumented immigrants.
But they're deporting all the immigrants.
So if you're deporting all the immigrants, why aren't they working with the Democrats to solve this issue and just get it done?
I mean, they're contradicting themselves and it makes no sense to me.
In St. Louis, Missouri, Oliver is watching there on our line for Democrats.
Morning to you.
unidentified
Good morning.
I'm just, I just had a couple things.
I mean, first, the responsibility of the governing party that's in power is supposed to keep the government funded.
Right now, that's Republicans.
End of.
That's the bottom line.
They're supposed to keep the government funded by working with Democrats.
They refuse to do so.
At this point, I don't see any incentive for Democrats to come to the table.
I mean, if you're not going to, if you're not going to negotiate, we're not going to talk to you.
Second, the Party of States Rights of separate, you know, to be owning states' rights, which is allegedly the Republicans, seem to have no problem violating that principle by having the federal government come into everyday communities to impose a rule of law.
So I just, I don't really, I guess my question to the representative is what can governors do instead of placating Donald Trump?
What are they able to do to say no to him so that way they don't, they're not in fear of losing federal funds?
It's Simeon Nunnane, candidate for Congress in the 13th district.
Congresswoman, my mother died of breast cancer in my face.
To say that this party here does not care about women in health care is very, it's very insulting.
The thing is this, you have asked for $1.5 trillion to be injected into the nation's economy.
Currently, the nation's inflation is at 2.9%.
So the question is, for 343 million citizens, how do you expect the citizens to keep up with inflation rate if we put in $1.5 trillion into the nation's economy?
Everything that you're asking for, eventually the citizens would not be able to afford.
We are just asking those to not be gotten rid of or ended.
The premium tax credits are current law, but those end imminently.
So if we don't do something, we are actually dramatically higher than that 2.9% inflation that people across this country are feeling.
It's 200% inflation for some families of four who are going to not be able to afford their premiums, their health care premiums.
And for some families, their premiums are higher than their rent or their house payments.
So I absolutely agree with the premise that people can't afford this, but I am arguing with or taking issue with Democrats actually adding to the deficit.
I will also say that the billionaire tax credits that are in here that these Medicaid cuts and ACA premium tax credit cuts are funding, that adds $3.5 trillion to the deficit.
That is absolutely egregious.
It's disgusting that we are placating and playing to billionaires across this country while we let women like your poor mother, I'm so sorry, sir, die.
And we need to take care of everyone.
I'm a mother.
I'm a doctor.
I absolutely want to take care of every person and they all deserve to have health care.
C-SPAN's Washington Journal, our live forum inviting you to discuss the latest issues in government, politics, and public policy from Washington and across the country.
Coming up Friday morning, we'll discuss the latest in the government shutdown.
First with Republican Tennessee Congressman Chuck Fleischman, a member of the Appropriations Committee, then with the American Enterprise Institute's Yuval Levin.
And Max Steyer from the Partnership for Public Service talks about the shutdown's impact on federal workers.
C-SPAN's Washington Journal.
Join in the conversation live at 7 Eastern Friday morning on C-SPAN.
C-SPAN Now, our free mobile app, or online at c-span.org.
I'm Dasha Burns, host of Ceasefire, bridging the divide in American politics.
Ceasefire premieres October 10th.
Debates Unfold, Decisions Made00:00:25
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