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John Boehner New House Speaker

Aired January 05, 2011 - 14:18   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST, "SITUATION ROOM": All right. That was a moment indeed.

The new Speaker of the House of Representatives sworn in, John Boehner, elected -- easily elected -- by the 242 Republicans in the House of Representatives. And John Boehner -- as he walking in on the House floor, by the way, you saw him several times take out his handkerchief. He's a very emotional, very sentimental kind of guy. Had to wipe away some of the tears. His eyes were welling up.

I'm sure he struggled during his formal remarks, especially when he was acknowledging his family up there.

There you see John Boehner, someone we have gotten to know as someone who gets sentimental. And as one of his brothers said earlier today, the older you get, the more sentimental you get at the same time. I think I can appreciate what John Boehner is going through as I get older myself.

John King, you're not that old yet, so you don't necessarily appreciate the sentimentality, the emotions of these historic moments.

JOHN KING, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Wow, Wolf. You're saying I'm not a sentimental guy? I'm heartbroken by that.

As a student of politics, though, and as someone who has known the new Speaker for quite a time, it is interesting to watch this moments. You know, in some ways, John Boehner, some of this is true, some of it is caricature -- you know, he likes to golf, he likes to tan, he's not afraid to tip the occasional drink.

But here's the challenge going forward -- he likes to legislate. That has been his history.

And we were talking to Senator McCain beforehand, just at the beginning of this moment. And then when we had to go to the historic coverage, Senator McCain and I were talking. And he said he believes this will be vital going forward. He said John Boehner actually has a lot of friends, long-time personal relationships of a decade or more, with many of the Democrats with whom he will now do battle.

So that will be interesting to watch as we go forward. Again, divided government is not new to us.

We had it in the Reagan days, we had it in the Clinton days. We have had it many, many times in our history when George H. W. Bush was president of the United States, in the very end of the George W. Bush presidency.

The question is, with so many fundamental challenges and so much of that restive Republican energy, how does John Boehner manage the two jobs he has -- one, dealing with a Democratic president, and, two, dealing with a very impatient new Republican conference in the House of Representatives?

Wolf.

BLITZER: And they just turned off the lights on the floor of the House of Representatives, as they told us they would do after all the members were sworn in.

Dana Bash is just outside the floor of the House of Representatives.

Dana, you're going to have another opportunity to grab John Boehner as he walks behind you. Let's see if you can convince him as he walks outside of the House floor momentarily to come over and say a few words. I'm not raising our expectations.

DANA BASH, CNN SR. CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I'm going to keep lowering those expectations, Wolf. I don't think this is a day where he's going to stop, but we will try.

I just want to give you one little bit of information on what we saw.

If you saw during the ceremony, Nancy Pelosi held up that very, very big gavel and said that it's what he wanted. I was just told by an aide to John Boehner that it was actually made by one of his constituents. That's why he chose that.

I also want to just bring one little bit in here. Look, I mean, obviously, this is an historic day, an historic moment, but just one piece of a reality check.

You heard John Boehner say that there are going to be open rules. That is sort of House speak for saying that when they bring measures to the floor under Republican control, people will be able to offer amendments.

Well, already, even before Republicans took control of the House, Democrats are complaining that they're going back on that, backtracking on that promise that he just made, because the very first thing we're going to see, a big piece of legislation, will be on Friday, at least the beginning of moving towards repealing health care. Guess what? Democrats, even Republicans, no one will be able to offer an amendment.

So, already, we're seeing some cracks in these promises, and certainly criticism from Democrats.

BLITZER: Never easy to govern. Never easy to be a leader.

There's John Boehner just a few moments ago.

Fifty years ago -- 50 years ago, the -- well, hold on one second. Are these live pictures? Is he going to speak again?

I'm just being -- all right. Here's John Boehner.

He's bringing the House into order right now for some official business that's under way. Let's see what's -- we'll watch to see what happens, what the first official business in this new House is.

But I want to go to Cincinnati right now. Mark Preston is standing by.

Let's see what he says. Hold on.

(JOINED IN PROGRESS)

BOEHNER: -- the chairman of the Republican Conference, Mr. Hensarling.

BLITZER: Let's see what the first official business --

BOEHNER: The gentleman from Texas.

REP. JEB HENSARLING (R), TEXAS: Mr. Speaker, as chairman of the Republican Conference, I'm directed by that conference to notify the House officially that the Republican members have selected as Majority Leader the gentleman from Virginia, the honorable Eric Cantor.

(APPLAUSE)

BOEHNER: The chair recognizes the gentleman from Connecticut, Mr. Larson.

REP. JOHN LARSON (D), CONNECTICUT: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And congratulations to you, Mr. Speaker.

And congratulations to my colleague and chair of the Republican Conference.

As chairman of the Democratic Caucus, I have been directed to report to the House the Democratic members have selected as minority leader the gentlewoman from California, the honorable Nancy D'Alesandro Pelosi.

BOEHNER: The chair recognizes the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Hensarling.

BLITZER: All right. So they're going through the new leadership. Nancy Pelosi will be the Minority Leader in the House of Representatives, and Eric Cantor will be the Majority Leader in the new House of Representatives.

I want to go to Cincinnati, Andy's Cafe, specifically. That's the bar where the Boehner family grew up, really. Fifty years ago, when he was a little boy, he was sweeping the floors, he was cleaning up there, John Boehner.

Mark, you're there. I assume of lot of his friends, acquaintances, they're pretty happy in Cincinnati right now.

MARK PRESTON, CNN SR. POLITICAL EDITOR: They certainly are, Wolf.

Look, this is a neighborhood bar at its core, this blue collar neighborhood where John Boehner (AUDIO GAP) whether they're related to him or they grew up with them. In fact, when Nancy Pelosi handed that ceremonial gavel to John Boehner, this group right here did a shot. And they were very loud about (AUDIO GAP) Andy's Cafe, where John Boehner, as you said, Wolf, took the American dream of being a bartender, someone who grew up here, to be the next Speaker of the House of Representatives.

(APPLAUSE)

BLITZER: All right. So he's got some friends there. All right. We'll check back with you, Mark.

That's in Cincinnati.

He's got an incredible story. You think about it, he's one of 12 kids, 11 brothers and sisters, 10 of whom came to Washington to celebrate this special day for John Boehner and his family.

It's a day that a lot of us will remember, Candy Crowley, especially as you make that transition from Nancy Pelosi, four years as Speaker, to John Boehner now. We don't know how many years he's going to be Speaker, but politics is fluid. What happens today could be undone tomorrow.

CANDY CROWLEY, CNN SR. POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, exactly, or at least two years from now. And it has been more fluid than usual.

We had a very long four decades, I think -- more than four decades of Democratic control of Congress before it got broken in the Reagan years. So, certainly in more recent history we have seen fluctuation from -- we've seen three watershed, really, swings back and forth in the last three elections. So that's enormous.

So -- and I think you saw that and heard that in the speech that Speaker Boehner made, saying, look, we're here at the will of the people, this is the people's House, we're going to listen to them. Because, frankly, you know and I know when you go out and talk to people, they say, well, I don't think they know anything about my life, I don't think they -- and Boehner's background, I will say, I think -- and I'd have to look this up, but my recollection is those 12 kids were raised in a two-bedroom house.

GLORIA BORGER, CNN SR. POLITICAL ANALYST: Right.

CROWLEY: So this is no -- you know, here's John Boehner, he plays golf and he loves his whiskey, and this and that and the other thing. But this is a guy who kind of grew up from nothing.

BLITZER: Not only in a small house in Cincinnati, but with one bathroom in that house.

CROWLEY: Twelve kids.

BLITZER: Can you imagine growing up in a house like that, 12 kids, a mom, a dad?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It would be difficult.

BLITZER: The parents are working really hard. It's a real rags to riches story.

BORGER: It is, Wolf. And in talking about the swing elections that Candy's talking about -- the last three elections have been swing elections -- I think you also heard a little bit of that, or a lot of that, in Nancy Pelosi's speech.

Because at the beginning of the speech, I was kind of surprised, actually. She was really defiant and said -- and maybe, Donna, you're not surprised -- but she was very defiant, saying, this is what we did for you, the American people, no regrets -- Pelosi, right, as we heard earlier this week?

And then she sort of switched her tone and became very gracious to John Boehner. We thought he was going to cry then, there, but he didn't. Became very gracious to him and to all the Republicans who had won. But it was very clear that Nancy Pelosi is going to continue to defend what Democrats did and what they passed in the House last year.

BLITZER: Jessica Yellin is here with us as well.

Jessica, it's fascinating to me that Nancy Pelosi, the woman, she's not crying, she's not showing that kind of emotion. But John Boehner, the man, he's got his handkerchief out there all the time, his eyes are welling up. He's on the verge of tears. He's a very sentimental kind of guy.

JESSICA YELLIN, CNN NATIONAL POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Reversing gender stereotypes, huh, in the U.S. Congress?

We all know this is John Boehner and how he is. There are even people taking bets today, how long would it take him to cry going into his speech? He beat everybody by crying right away.

He also likes to comment on people's hair. These are, like, the idiosyncrasies of this new Speaker.

I've been touching base with a lot of Tea Party activists today, asking them how they're feeling, and responding. A lot of enthusiasm, a lot of hope that John Boehner gets it, as they put it.

But there's also watchfulness, and there are people already in John Boehner's district saying that they have organized to keep an eye on him. They're all very worried about the debt ceiling in that debate coming out, which should be the first big clash of this new Republican Congress.

In a way, it's a happy day for John Boehner today, but tomorrow, the new speaker may have the hardest job in Washington.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Let me bring CNN contributor Erick Erickson, who knows a lot what's going on in the Republican Party and the conservative, the Tea Party movement in particular.

Eric, how much -- how much, let's say, skepticism is there of John Boehner among some of those Tea Party activists?

ERICK ERICKSON, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: You know, there's some; most of them really like him. He was one of the very first Republican leaders in Washington and when the Tea Party movement got steamed to say, you know, we should pay attention to what these people are saying and embrace them -- much more so than, really, any other member of Congress.

So, there's a lot of trust for him. More so that trust comes from the very background that you all have been talking about -- he grew up, rags to riches story. His brother owns a restaurant just south of here, the Front Porch. The whole family is very working class. They're very good people.

And so, the Tea Party movement largely connects to that and they'll put a lot of trust in him that they wouldn't for a lot of other people. It was very interesting to begin with, there was some angst among conservatives in Washington over whether they should side with Boehner or try to get Eric Cantor or Mike Pence elected speaker. And it was actually a lot of Tea Party activists say, no, we're going to back Boehner.

BLITZER: Donna Brazile, remind our viewers why the Democrats, even though this historic setback they suffered on November 2nd, losing 63 seats in the House of Representatives, decided that after all the dust is settled, they still want Nancy Pelosi to be their leader, albeit their minority leader this time?

DONNA BRAZILE, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: Well, Wolf, the Democrats believe that despite all the rhetoric that you hear from Republicans, that the 111th Congress was a very productive Congress. Under her leadership, they were able to pass some important legislation for consumers, for students, for women, minorities and for, of course, jobs and middle class.

And so, Pelosi last night went to the caucus. She explained to the Democrats how she intends to defend those policies, to continue to fight. But she's also a prolific fundraiser. She knows how to bring members of the Liberal Caucus with the Blue Dogs and others. And so, I think that's one of the reasons why they chose to keep Ms. Pelosi in that position.

CANDY CROWLEY, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDETN: The other reason we should say -- and this was true on the day she was -- we began to know that she was going to be elected as minority leader and that they would stick with her. As I talked to a lot of Democrats that day that said, we're not actually afraid of what John Boehner is going to do. We're afraid of what President Obama is going to do. And they wanted a tough -- remember when the administration and some Democrats on Capitol Hill began to kind of lose their faith that they could actually get a big old health care reform bill? It was Nancy Pelosi who went and said, yes, you can, guys. You know, let's just buck up here and move forward.

So, she is tough. She managed to keep that caucus together, which is every bit as diverse as the Republican Caucus is now. There are very moderate Democrats. And so, you know, they wanted her there as the buffer guest for President Obama to go to him. So, that's another reason she's still there.

BLITZER: All right, guys, hold a second because we have more to digest. More is going on on this historic day, including what's going on in the United States Senate as well. We'll take a quick break. We'll continue our coverage of the new Congress right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: We're following what's happening here in Washington, but there's some breaking news happening elsewhere.

Fredericka Whitfield is monitoring that.

What's going on, Fred?

FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, Wolf.

Well, out in Phoenix, Arizona, apparently, a shopping mall is now being evacuated because police say that a suspected robber fired shots at police officers outside of the Chandler Fashion Center Mall in Phoenix and then ran into the mall. So, now, that popular and very busy shopping center is being evacuated.

You see pictures right now from our affiliate KTVK. SWAT teams are on the scene as they try to isolate the suspected robber. We don't know if there are any reported injuries. We don't know where they are in the evacuation, if they're in the beginning stages or if they believe they've secured the area.

But it's an ongoing situation, this breaking story out of Phoenix, Arizona. The Chandler Fashion Center Mall is the place where you're seeing these images right now. SWAT teams on the scene there as police officers look for a robbery suspect, one that also fired shots at officers outside of the mall and then ran into the mall. And again, they are trying to secure that area.

When we get more information about it, we'll be able to bring that to you -- Wolf.

BLITZER: We'll check back with you, Fred. Thanks very much. Breaking news out of Phoenix, Arizona, shooting at a mall and lots of questions yet to be answered. We'll stay on top of this story.

We'll come back to Washington and the history of what is going on on this day on Capitol Hill, right after this. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Just a little while ago up on Capitol Hill, a historic moment as the gavel was transferred from Nancy Pelosi to John Boehner. Let's watch it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D), CALIFORNIA: I now pass this gavel, which is larger than most gavels here, but the gavel of choice of Mr. -- Speaker Boehner. I now pass this -- I now pass this gavel and the sacred trust that goes with it to the new speaker.

God bless you, Speaker Boehner.

(CHEERS AND APPLAUSE)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: God bless you, Speaker Boehner -- those are historic words right there. There he is. He's very happy. John Boehner, the new speaker of the House of Representatives.

Our senior congressional correspondent Dana Bash is up there on Capitol Hill, right outside of the floor of the House of Representatives -- with two special guests, Dana. Who are they?

DANA BASH, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Wolf.

I have two members of the new majority -- in fact, two of the new members, Republican members -- Adam Kinzinger from Illinois and also Bobby Schilling, also from Illinois.

I want to ask you first both about the moment. Starting to -- you've never served in office ever. You own a pizza parlor.

So, what is this like now to be a member of Congress?

REP. BOBBY SCHILLING (R), ILLINOIS: It's just very, very humbling and honored to be a servant to the people basically.

BASH: How about you?

REP. ADAM KINZINGER (R), ILLINOIS: You know, it's an incredible feeling. I think that's what I hear from the freshman class, humility. You know, this is -- this is amazing. It's incredible. It's a great feeling. But ultimately, it's humbling because you know that Congress is going to go on after this. It occurred along time before us, and we're just a piece of it. And all we can do is try to do the mission of the people.

BASH: Now, for those of us who obviously have never experienced what you're experiencing -- is there something that you just didn't expect that really stands out to you in terms of what you just --

KINZINGER: You know, it's really busy. That's something you realize, everything is --

BASH: Welcome to Congress.

KINZINGER: Yes, everything is scheduled in 10 and 15 minute increments. And ultimately, though, you just do the right thing, press ahead and have a great time.

SCHILLING: I agree with that. It's super busy. A lot of information coming in, sometimes overwhelming. But you just have to take it in as best you can and it will slow down eventually a little.

BASH: Obviously, you both came in with a pretty clear mandate that John Boehner talked about in his speech just now. But you're expected to do things differently and expectations are pretty high.

How much do you take that seriously and how do you expect to hold your leadership's feet to the fire to make sure that you do things differently, the Republican Party?

KINZINGER: Yes, I take it very seriously. I mean, to me, obviously, people put us in with a mandate. Cut spending, get people back to work, let's reduce unemployment and believe in the private sector again. That's what I believe in. Let's go to energy independence. There's all these things.

But you know what? It's going to be difficult. It's going to take a while. We got to keep pressing ahead.

BASH: And let me ask you this. There are a lot of promises. In fact, I have the Pledge to America, which I know that you both generally endorse. This was a campaign document that came out from the Republican Party, the speaker and others earlier in the fall. That said you all are going to cut $10 billion in spending in the first year.

Already we're being told by some Republican aides that you're going to have to maybe scale back on that. They blame the Democrats for not living up to their budget needs. But, look -- I mean, I think that is an example of a pledge that everybody heard Republican leaders make, $100 billion and now, it sounds like it's going to be maybe half of that.

SCHILLING: Well, you know, it's got to be a lot better than what was going on the last couple of years. You know, our kids and our grandkids are going to get stuck with over, you know, $14 trillion of debt right now and the Republicans have a plan to reduce this thing down rather than continue all the wasteful spending. As a small business owner, I understand the target on our back and it has to be removed to put people back to work.

Full employment takes care of a lot of the problems our country is facing today. So, it's a start somewhere. You got to live by example.

BASH: OK. Thank you very much. Congratulations to you both.

KINZINGER: Thanks.

BASH: We'll see you in the hallways. Thank you very much.

Wolf, back to you.

BLITZER: All right, Dana, thank you, and thank these two members of Congress. Congratulate them. A lot of happy people up on Capitol Hill right now, especially if they are Republicans.

Ali Velshi is standing by.

Ali, spending -- they all say they want to cut spending.

ALI VELSHI, CNN CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Yes.

BLITZER: That's a lot easier said than done.

VELSHI: Right. And Dana was just asking these new congressmen about this Republican undertaking that they seem to be going back on about cutting $100 billion out of the budget. The federal budget is $3.5 billion.

OK. This pie represents the federal budget. Now, you can see the red part of the pie, the biggest part of it, 60 percent, is mandatory spending. There's nothing -- there's nothing this Congress can do about that mandatory spending.

Five percent is interest on the debt. And, by the way, that's not getting smaller. That's going to get bigger.

But, basically, that leaves 35 percent of the pie. That's the part in orange there. That is discretionary spending. So, that's what they can tinker with, one third of the budget.

OK. Let me show you what they can start to tinker with in terms of discretionary spending, OK? This is the discretionary part, one third of the budget.

Fifty-seven percent of our discretionary spending is defense, $720 billion. At the moment not much they can do about that. They can tinker around the edges. Not much they can do.

Forty-three percent of that third is everything else, $530 billion. They want to cut $100 billion out of $530 billion.

How do you do that? What do you target? Let me show you.

You start with things like education. That's something that you can touch. Health care, health reform didn't cut enough out of that some people say. International affairs, diplomacy, veterans affairs, commerce, agriculture -- all of these things, that's what you have to cut if you want to try to get that $100 billion.

Now, the budget goes from October to October, so we're well into the 2010 budget. That's why some Republicans are saying they're not going to achieve that $100 billion that they were talking about, but they'd like the discretionary part of the budget to go back to 2008 spending levels.

But, Wolf, as you said when you introduced me -- much easier said than done.

BLITZER: Ali, thanks very much. Good points as usual.

When we come back, we'll hear from the latest father/son sensation here in Washington. Congressman Ron Paul and Senator Rand Paul together with our own John King , right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Some other breaking news we're following at CNN. Let's go right back to Fredericka Whitfield.

Another shooting elsewhere around the country, Fred? What's going on?

WHITFIELD: That's right. This time in Omaha, Nebraska. We understand that there's been a shooting that took place at a high school, Millard South High School. The school is in lockdown as are some of the schools in the nearest vicinity. No information is being released at this point about the suspects, what may have happened, why this shooting took place. But right now, lockdown at Millard South High School in Omaha, Nebraska.

Meantime, there's also another shooting that took place this time at a shopping mall in Phoenix, Arizona. And right now, that mall, you're looking at images from KTVK. That mall has been evacuated, SWAT teams are on the scene. Apparently, there was a robbery suspect that police say fired shots at police officers outside of the mall and then ran inside the mall. And that's why they've now evacuated the area.

I have with me on the line, Andy Hill, who is with me now to give me an idea exactly what may be taking place there, how they are trying to go about trying to locate this suspect -- Mr. Hill.

ANDY HILL, RET. PHOENIX POLICE SGT. (via telephone): Hi, Fredericka. How are you?

WHITFIELD: I'm good.

Now, you are retired Phoenix police sergeant. Give me an idea how they might be going about trying to locate this robbery suspect. We know the evacuations are underway. But at what point do they move to the next stage?

HILL: Well, the most important thing obviously is the public safety. And without knowing any of the information what would be going on is that they want to contain and make sure they contain the suspect wherever he is. And then, of course, safely remove all the people that are in that area before they begin to go ahead and search systematically to try and find the suspect who's probably trying to go ahead and hide amongst the crowd somehow or may try to escape by pretending to be just an innocent person.

So, there's a lot they have to do in order to make sure they had containment before they can go on and try and find him.

WHITFIELD: Retired Phoenix police sergeant, Andy Hill -- thanks so much for your time. Appreciate that.

We'll continue to watch these developments there in Phoenix, Arizona, as well as Omaha, Nebraska, when we get more information.

Wolf Blitzer, back to you in Washington.

BLITZER: All right, Fred. Thank you. And I know we'll have much more at the top of the hour on this.

Let's get back to Capitol Hill right now. John King is standing by.

John, you had a chance to speak with what I call the latest father/son sensation team here in Washington, a senator from Kentucky, a congressman from Texas.

JOHN KING, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: The Pauls, Wolf, Rand Paul and Ron Paul.

And one of the fascinating questions at this big moment in Washington is what happens with all these new, young Republicans, the first- termers, who ran on a promise to cut spending and shrink government, what happens when they get here and not only do battle with the Democrats, but long term Republicans who say you can't go so fast? Well, what a better pairing to talk to the new Tea Party-backed senator, Rand Paul of Kentucky and his father, the veteran Republican Congressman Ron Paul of Texas.

And that's where I started. Can Republicans keep their big promises?

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KING: There are some saying, already, they see signs of some retreat, that the pledge that the House Republicans ran on said, we will cut at least $100 billion in the first year. Now, we're hearing that number, well, maybe that's hard, we'll be in the middle of the year, maybe we should do 50 or 60 or 30 or 40.

Is that a retreat on your --

REP. RON PAUL (R), TEXAS: Well, I think it's facing up to reality. I mean, they don't have the votes. They don't have the support.

I predict the budget this year will be bigger than last year. I don't think the budgets are going to shrink because just the cost of living increases and other things. There's so much momentum, I don't have high expectations that we're going to be cutting much.

KING: Well, if you don't, if high expectation, you're going to be cutting much, what does it say about the credibility of the campaign platform you just ran on if the budget is going to be bigger?

SEN. RAND PAUL (R), KENTUCKY: I'm a little more optimistic than that actually. And I think, actually, we're introducing a bill that would be $500 billion in cuts. If you simply go back to 2008 levels, that's $100 billion.

We will push the leadership, House and Senate, to try to listen to the Tea Party. The Tea Party does want spending cuts. We do want to address the deficit. And I'm more optimistic. I think we will get some concessions.

KING: How much tension is there between the new breed coming in with this new grassroots support. And you've been here a while, and you've challenged the establishment while you've been here. But you know the folks who have been here a long time who say, oh, go slow, go easy. We've got a lot of people who be mad at us if we do it so hard and so fast.

RON PAUL: Well, I think we're going to have an easier time in the House. I think they will do much better than they ever did. It is when we had a Republican president sending orders down to the Republican Congress, they did whatever the president told them. Now, with a Democratic president, it's very healthy to have a Republican House, I wish we have a Republican Senate, then maybe we would have a much better chance.

But, no, I think the House -- the people that have been in the House got the Tea Party message and I think they're going to come in this direction. A big test is going to be on this raising the debt limit. That will tell us a lot about how steadfast --

KING: And if you want cuts to go along with raising the debt limit, let's be specific, people. What are we talking about? Because these are hard choices you have to make. You think the government is spending money it doesn't have? Are you talking about Pell grants, reducing Pell grants? Are you talking about maybe limiting the amount of money that goes to medical research?

What is it that has to be cut?

RAND PAUL: If you go to 2008 levels, that's $100 billion.

KING: Across the board?

RAND PAUL: Across the board is your baseline. And the Secretary Gates talked about $100 billion from military spending. The debt commission talked about $100 billion. Absolutely, you're going to have to have a compromise and we'll have to cut from the military, as well as from the domestic budget. That's the compromise that has to happen. You have to look across the board for spending.

KING: And if six or nine months, the Republicans have not kept those promises -- what should the American people think?

RAND PAUL: They should kick them all out and send us all home.

RON PAUL: Well, I think they should kick the people out who voted incorrectly. I mean, if we've been voting the right way, why would you get kicked out for that? No, you should kick out the people out who vote for the spending.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KING: And, Wolf, you see there a bit of disagreement between the father and son team, Ron Paul saying vote out those who vote the wrong way, Rand Paul saying, if we don't keep our promises, kick us all out.

John McCain in my conversation not long ago said he believes if Republicans don't keep their promises to cut spending and shrink government, the Tea Party will end up being a third party in the next election -- Wolf.

BLITZER: All right, John, thank you.

Erick Erickson, how serious is this threat from some of these Republicans not to raise the debt ceiling, let's say, at the end of March or April when that debt ceiling expires and bring the United States Treasury into default?

ERICKSON: Oh, I think they're very serious. And what you'll probably see them do is give extended limits on certain items. The Treasury secretary already has the power to pick and choose to extend within those limits. And otherwise, we may see government shutdown. And contrary to the myth, it didn't really hurt in 1996 and the new guys know that.

BLITZER: Didn't hurt who in 1996?

ERICKSON: It didn't hurt the Republicans. Republicans picked up seats in the Senate in 1996 and only lost p nine seats in the House. Bob Dole, I think, lost for a different reason. And a lot of the freshmen Republicans don't buy into the story that the shutting down government in '95 cost them the election in '96.

BLITZER: Donna, you remember those days. And a lot of folks think that the Republicans shutting down the government in effect helped the Democrats and helped Bill Clinton.

BRAZILE: It did, Wolf, and let me just tell you this. The Republicans want a chance -- a chance to help govern and a chance to sit at the table and come up with solutions with the president and the Democrats in the Senate. This is an opportunity for the Republicans to help lead in a very difficult time. Remember, Congress is still as popular as a root canal. So, I think that's something the Republicans --

BLITZER: What are you going to be looking for right now, Jessica?

YELLIN: There's not just a leadership change with Boehner, but we have all these new committee chairs, Darrell Issa, new head of the financial services committee who wants to drain the Wall Street reform bill by not funding it; major changes that are going to be roadblocks for the White House and a lot more subpoenas ahead.

BLITZER: And, Gloria, and huge changes at the White House as well.

GLORIA BORGER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes, huge staff changes at the White House after two years. And the thing I'm going to look at is John Boehner because he believes, unlike Erick Erickson, that actually Republicans did suffer as a result of what Newt Gingrich did in 1994. He lived through it.

Unlike Newt Gingrich, John Boehner didn't lead this revolution. He's a beneficiary of this revolution. So, he's going to pay attention to his new members, but he remembers history and he thinks it hurt them to shut down.

BLITZER: Candy, what are you looking at?

CROWLEY: I'm going to look at the relationship -- intraparty relationships, how the president deals with his left and how John Boehner deals with his right, because I think that's where you'll find out whether they can meet in the middle anywhere.

BLITZER: Guys, stand by. We're going to have much more of our coverage, including more of our coverage of the breaking news: two shooting incidents around the country. Fredericka Whitfield is standing by.

We'll be right back.

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