McConnell on ‘The Faulkner Focus’
WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) joined Harris Faulkner on Fox News Channel’s ‘The Faulkner Focus’ this morning. See below for highlights or click here to watch the full interview.
On Democrat Threats To Abolish The Legislative Filibuster:
“They're very anxious, Harris, to transform the country immediately even though the American people sent a 50/50 Senate and a narrowly divided House. I don't think they were sending a message it was a mandate to completely transform the country in every way liberals want to do that. And so they view the Senate rule, which has been there forever, that requires a super majority of 60 to do most of the things we do as an unnecessary inconvenience. Bear in mind this is the same Dick Durbin who two years ago was defending this as the essence of the Senate. I guess where they stand depends on where they sit. And so when they are in a position to advance the ball they don't care.
“In contrast, President Trump tried to get me to orchestrate the elimination of the filibuster for a number of years, even tweeted about it. I said no, Mr. President, that's not in the best interest of the institution and actually not in your best interest, either. I said no. They are prepared to steam roll the Senate into a majoritarian body just like the House because it inconveniently gets in the way of all they want to do to run up the debt, raise taxes, and you've seen the disaster at the border.”
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“The Senate was created on purpose, Harris. Not to function like the House, [but] to slow things down, to kill bad ideas, to force bipartisanship. All the things the Democrats believed in as long as there was a Republican in the White House are conveniently thrown aside, as soon as they think there is a chance they could advance their steam roller agenda, which the American people certainly did not give them a mandate to pursue in last November’s election.”
On The Biden Administration’s Far-Left Agenda:
“Well, so far the President is not supporting things that many Republicans think are a good idea. We certainly will oppose the things that we feel are not in the best interest of the country whether we are able to do that by requiring 60 votes or whether it's done with a simple 51.
“What we signed up for with the Biden administration will depend on what they try to do. You mentioned infrastructure. If it’s infrastructure, that's one thing. If it's a Trojan horse that includes a massive tax increase that's another. That’s exactly what I think, Harris, they have in mind is to call it an infrastructure bill but in it they'll have a massive tax increase to in effect reverse the tax reform that we enacted in 2017 when we had a Republican government.
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“The definition of bipartisanship is to meet in the middle. Harris, so far they haven't chosen to do that on anything I can think of. When they do want to meet us in the middle we’ll be happy to talk. If they are trying to jam a hard left agenda to put that on the American people-- a hard left agenda, you can expect us to put up a stiff fight with the 50 Republican senators that the American people sent us last November.”
On The Crisis At The Border:
“My definition of a crisis is when you send the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which only goes to emergencies, down to the border. It is by definition an emergency. This administration walked away from the policy-- the previous administration was able to negotiate with the Mexican government-- where people are detained on the other side of the border.
“That allows that influx into our country. And then they are caught up in the system, which is largely going to remain under this administration a catch and release approach. Certainly we want to take care of the children. But this is about a lot more than these youngsters. This is about whether or not the federal government will contain the border.
“The previous administration did an excellent job on border security. This administration is stopping funding for the wall, as an example. How is that helpful? Stopping the agreement with the Mexican government to contain people on the other side of the border. How is that helpful? This is a crisis. I don't care what the Secretary of Homeland Security wants to call it. It’s a crisis that they created. This administration.”
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