Mike Pence and Rahm Emanuel reflect on their six-year congressional collaboration, bonding over voting walks and military family ties—including an unpaid $10 bet on Obama’s 2008 Indiana win. Praising Trump’s ceasefire deal in Gaza, they clash on healthcare during the shutdown, with Emanuel framing GOP resistance as a failure amid $37T debt neglect while Pence defends Indiana’s Medicaid pilot. Both warn of deeper threats: Emanuel’s division vs. China, Pence’s debt legacy—highlighting how bipartisanship, even amid differences, remains vital for progress despite today’s polarized climate. [Automatically generated summary]
Then we'll hear from Senator Bernie Sanders at the No Kings Rally held here in Washington, D.C. After that, President Trump meets with New York City Mayor-elect Zorhan Mamdani in the Oval Office.
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Coming up, we'll show you C-SPAN's inaugural ceasefire episode.
Host Dasha Burns is joined by former Vice President Mike Pence and former Obama Chief of Staff and Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel.
It was a divided Congress back then, familiar to people right now, but do you think at that time it was a little bit less taboo to work across the aisle or was it pretty hard back then too?
Well, I think it's, I mean, one of the best kept secrets in America is that most of the people that get elected to Congress actually come there to actually do the job and to make progress.
They're here to advance an agenda, and Rah and I have different agendas and different policy prescriptions.
But I think we are living in a time when a lot of the rewards go to what I think is more performance art than policy.
And the thing that I appreciated about Rahm is while we differed, particularly after he led the charge for the Democrats to defeat the Republican majority in 2006, I always later got over it.
I would tell you, I will say this about Rahm, that, and I still feel that way, that he was one of those people that when he told you that his conference was going to do something, they did it.
And that's the way, you know, democracy depends on heavy doses of civility.
And maintaining the ability to find things that we can agree on begins with civility.
I mean, well, I mean, I don't want to speak for the Republicans or for Mike on this situation as the vice president is everybody knew when I took over the campaign committee for the House.
That was my job.
That was my responsibility.
It didn't mean that when we were in the halls and in committees, we weren't going to work together.
I didn't mean that.
And we do have different agendas.
But Mike and I just saw each other right before we got here at the table.
First thing we always do.
He gives me a rundown on his kids.
I give him a rundown on my kids.
He has a son and a son-in-law in the armed forces.
I have two, out of my three children, are in the armed forces as well, same branch.
But the serious thing is, we disagreed on things, but we didn't see this as brave heart hunger games where we were going to try to kill each other.
Now, I do think, and I kind of, I'm resistant to this, because I don't think blaming social media for everything means you absolved yourself of your own judgment and responsibility.
But social media has forced people into ideological ghettos.
And it exacerbates, and the fundraising apparatus also exacerbates that.
So, you know, one of my first bills was the Great Lake Restoration Act to restore funding for the Great Lakes.
All the members of Congress from the Midwest who boarded the Great Lakes signed on to it.
I mean, look, we've got a lot of way over the National Defense Authorization Act is being debated.
And as Rah said, we both have members of our immediate family serving in the military.
And I think the ability to work together when it comes to our national defense, when it comes to national security, when it comes to regional issues, it's all still there.
I think in terms of size and scope of government, Rahm and his party have supported solutions that I consider big government solutions, expansions of the welfare state.
But where I want to take a second and commend him is I'm grateful for the role you played as ambassador to Japan.
Thanks, Mike.
I think one of the accomplishments of our administration was that we changed the national consensus on China.
And up to that time, there were differing opinions about the approach to China.
Our administration took a strong stand saying we're going to end this era of trade abuses, intellectual property theft, military provocations, human rights abuses.
And I will say that our ambassador to Japan was one of the most clarion voices in the Asian Pacific calling out China unapologetically.
And I've said that publicly.
I say it again today.
I'm grateful for it.
And obviously this morning, we all are heartened by the progress toward peace, the very idea that the hostages will be restored to their families.
And I also want to acknowledge on issues affecting Israel, while we've had different views of leadership in Israel.
I'm a very great admirer of Prime Minister Netanyahu, but I recognize that Rah, with a deep personal history, family history, your father fought in the War of Independence in Israel, has played a leading role in ensuring that our support for Israel is not partisan.
First of all, look, one, and I have no problem with saying it, President Trump deserves credit here.
Some of my part won't say that.
He does.
I also think it accrues to America's benefit.
And that is the United States is the essential power around the world.
We shouldn't back off from that responsibility.
And we just proved this in space, something that neither Russia, China, or any other country could have done what we just did.
And that's good for the United States, and that means power doesn't stay in the region.
It exudes and goes into other regions of how important.
I also want to call out neither B.B. Netanyahu who the leadership of Hamas would have done this if it wasn't also pressure from the Israeli public or the Palestinians in Gaza spirit.
They deserve a call out for their own pressure, never giving up going down to the vigils for the hostages, never giving up in the sense of pressuring today in an election Hamas couldn't win.
And they know that.
And so to me, this is an example of, yes, President Trump and his administration, I had no problem saying that.
But one thing I do know about the Middle East, and it's not a but part, this is the first chapter of what comes next, not the last chapter of what just closed.
Where this goes, will the president administration stay, not only engage, but shape this to something better?
And the second thing is, and we have an agreement on another issue, Ukraine, will the president take the lessons of how he applied pressure on B.B. Netanyahu to apply pressure on Putin, who is in a very vulnerable, weak position across the globe and in the region and in this war, which is a huge mistake and he knows it.
Will he take this lesson and do what he has never done in his career, apply pressure to Putin?
Look, I think that the President's consistent support for Israel doing what it had to do after the horrors of October 7th, two years ago.
I mean, Dasha, I traveled a few months after October 7th to communities that were struck.
There were literally still bullet holes in the walls and blood on the carpets in Kafaraza.
I went to the field where the young people had been brutalized and cut down and murdered.
And the ability to stay with Israel as they did what needed to be done and the president's relentless pursuit for peace here and that of his team I think is to be commended.
In the spirit of your show though, I will say I strongly agree that we ought to welcome this first step, pray for the comfort of the families who will be laying to rest, loved ones that have been restored to them.
But it's important that next steps happen.
In my judgment, it's absolutely essential that Hamas be disarmed.
It's absolutely essential that a new governing body be established in Gaza.
We were in the Congress when the Bush administration made what I believe was a historic error of forcing the election.
Turning Gaza over to what would become the clause of Hamas and literally bulldoze synagogues in Gaza and essentially remove the Jewish community that there's got to be a different future here.
But this 20-point plan, I believe, is a framework for that.
What I would say is, look, In Congress, across lines, in the region, trust is essential.
And the ability of the President of the United States, realizing Bibi Netanyahu, in my view, made a massive critical strategic error bombing Qatar.
Massive.
Forcing him publicly then to apologize, get on the phone, showing Qatar that leadership, showing Qatar whether it's a security treaty or not.
We're going to put that aside because we debate for a long time.
And then aligning the Arab world, meaning Egypt, Qatar, and Turkey most principally, to force Hamas, while he pressured and showed that he was willing to pressure Bibi at the right time, created the conditions that basically you could say yes or yes, sir, but those were the only two choices.
But Dasha, on this thing to me, having gone through Oslo, Y plantation, Camp David with President Clinton towards the end, in the end of the day, what I think is missing in Washington is this is the first of what's next.
Now, this ball can go that way, it can go that way, it can die and not bounce again.
So the question is, will the administration and all the other partners seize this as an opportunity to do something and take this in an advance at 20 yards rather than two yards?
But Ron makes a really good point here, and that is the direct involvement of the president.
You served as chief of staff or president.
I served alongside Juan.
I'll never forget when Secretary of State Pompeo and others had reached a point of negotiations with the Taliban for bringing an end to the Afghanistan war.
The president insisted on a phone call with the head of the Taliban.
Now, I have very strong opinions about the Taliban and their brutality and ruthlessness and oppression of women and destruction of other cultures.
But I'll never forget the president had the head of the Taliban on the phone in the Oval Office.
And the deal was, look, you can never harm another American soldier or the deal's off.
And we went 18 months without an American casualty in Afghanistan.
He said you have to work with the Afghan national government and you can't harbor terrorist organizations.
That was the framework of the deal.
And I'll never forget hearing the Taliban leader say, yes, Mr. President, yes.
Frankly, when the Taliban broke the deal in the Biden administration and they moved on Masr al-Sharif in the north and we continued the withdrawal, to me that was a catastrophic error that resulted in the disastrous withdrawal, very likely emboldened Vladimir Putin toward Ukraine.
But I think the president's word, the president keeping his word, seeing it through.
And I know a lot of the things that President Trump said about Israel and the peace deal this week was he has said all parties will be treated fairly.
And to your point, I think he's created the conditions where people can accept it.
I was advising the White House when I was mayor about the 2014.
One is, I would say, the Trump White House has made a mistake because you could have made this a Democratic shutdown, and because of the way the President acted, they co-own it, if not own it.
Because it's not being perceived as a Democratic force shutdown.
It's being perceived, if anything, pocks on both your houses, if not driven by the Trump.
So they've avoided the downside.
If I was the Democrats, I would sharpen the message right here.
You spent $20 billion bailing out Argentina, and 20 million Americans are about to lose their health care.
And I'd make this a really binary choice that I think they're making a good faith ether, and they're winning the argument about health care.
You saw Congresswoman Green already came out and said we should restore ACA funding.
So it's clearly the winning the argument and the pain level.
It's about pain threshold.
You wrote a $20 billion check to Argentina for bailout, which we were out of the money already.
It's lost.
And 20 million Americans are about to lose their health care.
And I think in this case, the government shutdown is the members of Congress are going to feel the pain when you have air traffic controllers, military families not being paid.
I've spent a lot of years trying to repeal Obamacare and reform health care in this country.
I think that the argument Republicans could make and should make is that during the early days of the Biden administration, in the name of a COVID response, premium support that largely goes to big insurance companies was dramatically increased.
But it was sunset.
It was supposed to go away the end of this year.
I think Republicans could make that case.
It's a case for limited government and fiscal responsibility.
I'm somebody that has always believed that greater transparency in health care, empowering the American people to be health care consumers, health savings accounts like President Obama permitted me to introduce into Medicaid when I was governor of the state of Indiana, and it was enormously successful.
That's a pathway for a different vision than Obamacare, which I would argue has largely failed.
Well, you know, it's the old rule of politics that Mike just articulated.
You can't beat something with nothing.
And every time we have proposed, whether it's Medicare, Medicaid, or ACA/slash/Obamacare, the only thing they do is try to either end it or in any way try to basically debilitate it with cuts.
And I think this is only going to extend the argument about health care as the primary in this area.
The only time that Republicans actually did something, which we resisted, was the expansion of Medicare under President Bush on the prescription drugs for seniors.
But here's the thing: is that when you say what would be my advice is you are literally resisting things, reinforcing a negative.
And the biggest issue on health care today is not the expansion which Democrats made.
The biggest issue going forward is that you have uncontrolled insurance companies determining what a doctor can tell a patient or prescribe a patient and what kind of medications you get.
And I bet you you could draft a bill that these and I was going to agree.
I'll bet you that Republicans could point out that those premium increases that Democrats are going on the wall to defend go to insurance companies.
And so, you know, but I honestly do believe, and look, I want to give some credit to your old boss.
Indiana had a pilot program to introduce health savings accounts in Medicaid.
It had never been done before.
I wanted to dramatically expand that program, which essentially free market empowers patients.
I received great resistance in the Obama administration until I had a chance to speak to President Obama on the tarmac at the Arizona, or excuse me, the Evansville airport.
There's some pictures around the internet you can find fairly easily.
We spoke for about 30 minutes on the tarmac, and he looked at me and said, I'm not philosophically opposed to what you're suggesting.
And we ended up working with the leadership at Center for Medicaid Services.
We received a waiver, and we were able, with a Republican vision of empowering patients, first dollar benefit, health savings accounts, that to me is the way forward.
And look, the other dirty little secret in Washington, D.C. is everybody actually wants to solve problems for Americans.
And the issue of affordability of health care, first dollar benefits for health care, particularly for the underserved community, is a goal that I think Republicans have an obligation to bring Republican principles to.
Look, having run for president, I always tell people I ran for president in 2023, not so where you'd notice.
But we got in that primary.
And, you know, it is a very deep personal decision.
I respect anybody that's willing to step forward, not only at the national level, but step forward, run for Congress, run for a state legislative seat, run for mayor.
You're going to find out, as he found out, that it's one thing, all due respect, Dasha, it's one thing to be on television and to be a commentator and to reflect on things.
Governing is a different thing.
And, you know, I, for my part, my parents, you wouldn't know this, my parents grew up on the south side of Chicago.
All my extended family is from there.
I love Chicago.
It's broken my heart what's happened in certain precincts in Chicago and the violence that's happened.
I give Rah a lot of credit for having tried to drive education reform and make progress in Chicago.
His career led in a different direction.
But I think at the end of the day, at the end of the day, I have a lot of respect for anybody that's willing to step forward.
Look, Mike's been vice president and he's been a governor.
I've been a chief of staff mayor without going through the resume.
The one thing we both know as mayor and governor, that when you have big choices, and this is true also in the Oval Office, the choices are usually bad and worse.
And you've got to have the judgment and the character to know the difference between bad and worse.
And, you know, we'll both make, we've made decisions to run, not to run, et cetera, in our career at different points in our lives.
I'll evaluate that.
But I think that the key thing, as I've said to you before, is do you have something to say?
I happen to believe about the American dream and the importance of education to achieving that dream.
And it's basically unaffordable to the American people.
If I got something to say that nobody else is saying it in a way that I feel is important, and I'm not going to look back in life and say, I woulda, coulda, shoulda, then I'll run.
If I can't, and I don't think I have something to say on this very important topic, because I think we're at a crossroads as a country, not a ceasefire, but a crossroads, then I'll say it.
At the end of the day, I don't think I've served with anybody better politics than Rahm Emmanuel.
And I know he has respect for me and my abilities.
But at the end of the day, we're all Americans.
We really have large challenges facing the country.
We have a national debt of more than $37 trillion that the one consensus in Washington is that both political parties today are essentially saying, we're going to do nothing about the national debt.
We're going to leave it to our children and grandchildren.
We have, as Rahm said very forcefully in his role in Japan, China continues its military provocations.
It continues to menace in the Asia Pacific.
Russia continues to storm forward in Ukraine.
We've made progress in the Middle East, but there are real issues that we're going to confront as a nation, and we're going to have to figure out a way to talk to each other.
One, what the Republican Party is missing is more Mike Pence.
If you had a Republican Congress and Senate that was more like Mike Pence, there'd be guardrails and bumpers against what President Trump's trying to do.
It's an unhinged, he has no control, there's no control, there's no stopping, there's no kind of pause here, and it's a mistake.
And the Republicans in Congress and Senate own what's happening here, and obviously we disagree about what it is.
I think this is a very bad moment.
Second, one thing I learned in Japan is a lot about America.
There is nothing China's doing that scares me.
What scares me about the future is division in America and the fact that we see each other as enemies, not as Americans.
Mike and I disagree about 99.9% of the things.
But I never doubted his commitment to the country and his commitment to public service.
Today, we have a sense that we are in a politics.
And I put this on the president.
His job is to find the ceasefire.
His job is to lead and not have a moment where every American is pitted against another American.
I joke, I did a bike when I was mayor.
I did a bike trip around Lake Michigan.
And I found that the worse the cell phone service was, the nicer people are.
This Friday, on a special edition of Ceasefire, host Dasha Burns features key moments from Ceasefire's inaugural season, highlighting moments of friendship and humor, respectful disagreement.
What I appreciated about Rahm is while we differed, particularly after he led the charge for the Democrats to defeat the Republican majority in 2006, and I always felt like 20 years later he got over it.
We ought to just commit ourselves to love and justice, not hatred and revenge.
unidentified
One of the wonderful things that I've been able to experience with my very dear brother Robert George is that I love the brother when he's right.
I love him when he's wrong.
I love him when he's wrestling in his quest for truth.
Watch our special bipartisan moments from the season of Ceasefire this Friday at 7 p.m. Eastern, only on C-SPAN.
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