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Furloughed Workers Speak Out; Obama About to Comment on Shutdown; Obama Speaks from Maryland Construction Company

Aired October 03, 2013 - 10:30   ET

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

CRYSTAL CAVALIER, FURLOUGHED ANALYST FOR HOMELAND SECURITY DEPARTMENT: So I just, I don't know, I just think the American people, they need to reach out to their lawmakers and say ok, enough is enough. We need to come up with a plan, we need to go into an office and see what needs to be negotiated. You know make a deal. Make it happen.

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Ok so one word description, how do you -- how do you feel when I say that some lawmakers are continuing to accept their paychecks?

CAVALIER: Well, it kind of disappoints me. Just sad.

COSTELLO: Just sad. Crystal Cavalier, thank you so much. And much luck to you.

CAVALIER: Thank you.

COSTELLO: You're welcome.

Still to come in the NEWSROOM big concerns over small business -- just minutes from now, President Obama speaks out on the government shutdown. His backdrop, a construction company.

We'll tell you why next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: Good morning. I'm Carol Costello. Thanks so much for joining us and welcome back.

Just minutes from now, President Obama is set to speak on the government shutdown and its impact on everyday Americans. He's visiting a Maryland construction company -- you see it there -- to show that small businesses could be the big losers in this if Washington remains gridlocked over the shutdown and the upcoming debate over the debt ceiling.

Wolf Blitzer is in Washington and he's going to lead us into the President's event. But Wolf I want to pick your brain first. So the President called congressional leaders to the White House last night. They met and he basically told them "I'm not going to negotiate."

So we remain in this stalemate with seemingly no -- so what could the President say today that will move things along? WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST, "THE SITUATION ROOM": Well he's clearly trying to use this event and a lot of other events as sort of a public forum to put pressure on the Republicans, especially those -- let's say those more moderate Republicans who would be willing to go along with an up or down vote strictly on whether or not to keep the government open without any attachments to Obamacare or other issues. I think he's trying to use this -- this forum as a pressure -- pressure point, if you will, on the Republicans because clearly, nothing positive happened as far as we can tell in that meeting last night.

The President was there with the -- was the one of five people in the room, the two Republican leaders of the Senate, the two -- excuse me, the two Democratic leaders in the House and the Senate and the two Republican leaders in the House and Senate, just five people in the room, and they emerged and they clearly made the point that there was no agreement and this stalemate continues.

And as the stalemate continues, as you know, Carol, and all of our viewers know, the pain continues as well. And as difficult as this is, two weeks from today, if the country doesn't raise that debt ceiling, who knows what the impact will be on the value of the dollar, the U.S. economic recovery, whether the country goes back into recession. We're hearing all sorts of doom and gloom scenarios out there if the debt ceiling isn't raised two weeks from today. The country runs out of money presumably and so there are a lot of issues here at stake.

COSTELLO: But it seems that more and more, more moderate Republicans are saying "Look, we can't be controlled by the conservative base of our party anymore. We're willing to vote on a continuing resolution with no strings attached." Is that true? Because we hear different numbers of Republicans; we hear --we hear some people say "Oh John Boehner he has enough Republican votes in the House right now for such a thing to pass." And then we hear from others that no, no, he doesn't.

So from your perspective, what's true?

BLITZER: What's true is that if the Speaker, this is a huge "if", decided to put that to a vote on the floor of the House of Representatives, let all 435 members vote according to their own conscience, do you go ahead and pass a six week continuing resolution as it's called, legislation that would keep the government fully funded for the next six weeks, during which you can negotiate all sorts of other issues, that would pass.

Almost all of the Democrats would vote for it, presumably, and a lot of Republicans would vote for it as well. In the House of Representatives, though, nothing really comes up for a vote unless the Speaker decides he wants it to come up for a vote. He probably wouldn't get a majority of the Republicans on board but he would get a lot of Republicans to support it and if you get 20, let's say, given the majority that the Republicans have and all the Democrats, almost all of them vote for it, it would pass.

But it's up to the Speaker. It's his decision and his decision whether to allow that to go forward.

Hold on for a moment Carol. I want to go to the White House. Brianna Keilar is standing by, our senior White House correspondent. Actually, we're going to go to Brianna in a second. We're going to hook her up.

Athena Jones is up on Capitol Hill. Athena is there any movement at all within the Republican Party, in the House of Representatives, right now? The pressure, is there significant pressure from Republicans on the Speaker to let this so-called clean resolution come up for a vote?

ATHENA JONES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Wolf, if there is, it's not very visible right now. I just came from a press conference held by Majority Leader Eric Cantor on the House Republican side with several other House Republicans, some of whom have been doctors in the medical community, one nurse, one congresswoman who was a nurse, appearing with doctors, urging them to -- urging the Senate, I should say, to pass this piecemeal spending bill, the one that would fund the National Institutes of Health.

They are doing this of course because of these headlines we've seen about people, including children with cancer, being turned away from clinical trials and so this is really part of the messaging here. They held this press conference, folks wearing doctors' coats, saying this is life-saving stuff and what's interesting argument that Majority Leader Cantor made he said that if this NIH funding bill is brought to the floor of the Senate, then a majority of senators on both sides of the aisle would vote to pass it because we're talking about critical care for these sick people.

Now, that's an interesting argument to make because as you were just talking about, the other argument is that if you were to bring this clean spending bill with no strings attached, no anti-Obamacare provision to the floor of the House, that would pass with support from both parties.

So even though Cantor was asked about this whole idea of some in his party wanting to support and wanting to vote on a clean spending bill, he ignored that question and stuck to the message of the day, which today at least is urging the Senate to pass this NIH spending bill, so urging this piecemeal approach as they go along -- Wolf.

BLITZER: Athena, stand by. Brianna Keilar is over at the White House. So what's the answer, what are they saying over there, Brianna? White House officials, the President and others, when they say "look, you're not going to get at least for the time being that complete spending bill passed without any extraneous measures like Obamacare or whatever". But why not do for the National Institutes of Health or for veterans or for the national parks what you already did for military personnel, pass legislation, sign it into law that allows them to get their salaries? Why not accept some of these piecemeal pieces of legislation, especially when they involve life and death issues, for example, clinical trials at NIH for young children who have cancer? BRIANN KEILAR, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Wolf, they look and they are sort of I guess you could say solidified with congressional Democrats on this, they are saying that Republicans are cherry-picking the easy things and not dealing with the hard things. So what they'll try to do is get these things that are so popular through and that really what Republicans are trying to do is not fund the things that support Obamacare.

So they're saying that in a way, this isn't just them finding kind of -- this isn't about finding a bipartisan agreement that actually I think they don't want to give on that because they're unable to get what they want, which is certainly funding for other parts of the government, and they feel that obviously, this kind of plays to that ideological difference that you're seeing between Republicans and Democrats that we've seen play out over and over in these battles, that Republicans want a more limited government, Democrats do not want to capitulate to that and they feel like going along piecemeal is something that would really give in to that demand, Wolf.

BLITZER: And I want to get back to you in a minute but Sanjay Gupta is with us as well. Sanjay, you're in Maryland today, right? In Baltimore, is that where you are?

SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: That's correct, sir.

BLITZER: All right so let's talk a little bit about this. It's a real dilemma. And you're a physician, you want to save everybody's life, if you possibly can and certainly young children who might be saved if they get into these clinical trials at NIH.

This is a real dilemma right now that these Democrats will have in the Senate. Do they vote in favor of this legislation that the Republicans are pushing through the House, even though it doesn't fully fund the federal government, it does provide funding for NIH and so there's a real dilemma here.

GUPTA: Yes, look, I mean and it's a collision of politics and medicine for sure. You know I mean I will say though putting my doctor hat on for a second, obviously I think it's a good idea to fund these clinical trials. The kids, the people who would be the beneficiaries of these clinical trials are the most obvious reason why.

But keep in mind Wolf, these are clinical trials. This is part of how medicine and science and everything moves forward. I mean these -- these patients in the clinical trials now could benefit if these trials work, but the real point is that any time you start to slow things down, then people down the road, months, years down the road, who may benefit from the science that emerges from this, they could be affected as well.

And let me put even a broader sort of brush on this Wolf with regard to health overall. You think about the NIH, but the CDC, you may have heard today, stopping distribution of the flu shot in some places. Some people may say well how big a deal is that? Tens of thousands of people die from the flu every year. It's a big deal for you know lots of people out there. And think about things like food inspections. Every time there's a food outbreak, you and I talk about the impact of those food outbreaks in the whole country. Food inspections, I talked to Dr. Tom Freeden, who is the head of the CDC. He said food inspections will be adversely affected.

These are things that you may not feel immediately right now. They may not have the same drama as we're hearing about with regard to the clinical trials which obviously are very important, but this extends far and deep and in ways that maybe we haven't fully understood.

BLITZER: Yes. There are real ramifications from this government shutdown. And the stakes are only in the days to come going to get even more significant.

Christine Romans, we heard from the Treasury Department today about an enormous crisis that would erupt two weeks from today if the federal government, Congress doesn't raise the nation's debt ceiling. Are they over exaggerating the impact potentially of not raising the debt ceiling? What's going on here?

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN BUSINESS ANCHOR: Well, it certainly sounds dire and scary what they're talking about here. And they're saying you can't precisely measure what would happen in the global economy if we don't raise the debt ceiling and how soon it would happen because we have never been here before.

The United States always pays its bills on time, every time. That's why it's the center of a global financial complex. That's why it is the gold standard for borrowing and it is you know a model that other countries are trying to emulate.

So we have never been here before. The Treasury Department in that report basically saying that if you don't raise the debt ceiling, the kind of knock-on effects to capital markets freezing, stock markets plunging, all kinds of business grinding to a halt would rival the crisis in 2008, if not the Great Depression Wolf. That's what the Treasury Department is saying.

And it's interesting because for the first time in five years, you have America's big bankers and the White House singing the same song. Yesterday we heard from Lloyd Blankfein the Goldman Sachs CEO who said, you know, you have to raise the debt ceiling, America has to pay its bills. You don't do budget negotiations through something that is simply the accounting of the United States Treasury. You know, that just doesn't -- it just doesn't make sense.

Now, when you talk to people on the right Wolf they say this is an intervention that the American financial system needs, that they are trying to simply say business as usual is not going to be allowed. But you know, I'll tell you, we don't know what will happen. We just don't know what will happen. And even among CEOs and economists, they are arguing about how quickly the damage would happen if we went -- if we didn't raise the debt ceiling and privately, they are all saying they hope it doesn't come to that, that Congress must act -- Wolf.

BLITZER: Everybody hopes it doesn't come to that. Two weeks from today, it's a huge, huge deadline.

All right, stand by. Everyone stand by. The President of the United States, he's in suburban Maryland, right outside of Washington, D.C. in Rockville, Maryland at a local construction facility there. He's going to be speaking on the government shutdown. We'll have live coverage as soon as we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: The President of the United States getting ready to speak there, Rockville, Maryland. That's just outside Washington, D.C. at a local construction company. He's going to talk about the government shutdown, what Congress needs to do right now to avert even more serious pain in the days and weeks to come.

Brianna Keilar is standing by over at the White House. This event today clearly designed, Brianna, to put pressure on Republicans in the Senate and the House to go along and pass some immediate legislation that would reopen the government -- fully reopen the government. I assume we're going to hear a lot more from the President saying he's willing to talk about everything, but not in the context of negotiations over a government shutdown or over raising the nation's debt ceiling.

KEILAR: That's right, Wolf. And what's interesting I think about this event at this construction company in Maryland not far outside of Washington, D.C. is you're seeing him really start to talk about the ramifications of if the debt ceiling isn't increased, what a default would mean. And what he's talking about here is what it would mean for small businesses.

He will make the case in this event that this is a company that has benefited from getting more loans, being able to access more capital so that it can expand and really obviously contribute to economic growth. He'll be making the point that if there is a default, it will make it more difficult for small businesses to access those funds so that they can strengthen the economic recovery and really be part of it.

This is part of I think the strategy that we've seen from the White House and from Democrats in general -- wolf. They're trying to highlight what's going on that the debt ceiling may not be raised, and they're trying to highlight as well stated objectives of Republicans.

In this case, you always hear Republicans say they want small businesses to grow, that that's the engine of the economy, that they're with small business. So he's trying to say but actually what you guys are doing is hurting small businesses; we've also seen this in other ways as well. He's made the point that when it comes to Obama care, Republicans obviously do not like the program, but he points out that they're shutting down the government and that that doesn't actually defund or delay Obama care, the same way as well we've heard Democrats, politicians make the case on the deficit.

The Republicans say they're very concerned with deficit spending and yet many Democrats have said that's what a government shutdown actually increases costs and therefore, is something that Republicans say they're not a fan of -- Wolf.

BLITZER: The President is now at the microphone. I think he's going to thank a whole bunch of local politicians, state politicians first, some of the special guests.

Let's listen in to the President, within a minute or two he should get to the substance of his remarks.

(BEGIN LIVE FEED)

(APPLAUSE)

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Congressman John Delaney is here.

(APPLAUSE)

And we have the acting head of the Small Business Administration, Jeanne Hulit, is here.

(APPLAUSE)

OBAMA: And I also want to give a big thanks to your bosses, Cedelia (ph) and Natalia (ph), for being such gracious hosts.

I had a chance to meet them at the White House and...

(APPLAUSE)

Thank you.

Now I know where they got their good looks from, because I had a chance to meet mom and dad and their -- their beautiful families, and so I'm so glad to be here. And I had a chance to learn a little bit about their story.

So when their parents brought them from Portugal to America -- almost 40 years ago -- no one in the family spoke a word of English. But that didn't stop their father, Manuel, and their mother, Albertina, from having a big dream, believing that if they worked hard they could get ahead and that even though they never had any schooling, maybe their daughters could go to college. Maybe in America, you could make it if you tried.

That's what they believed.

So they started their own construction company with a pick up truck and a wheelbarrow. And when Cedelia (ph) and Natalia (ph) turned 14, they began to help cleaning tools, translating documents, and they became the first in their family to go to college. And after graduation, they started their own business. And later, they bought the family business from their parents.

So today, M. Luis Construction is a $60 million company with about 250 employees.

(APPLAUSE)

And I understand you're opening your fourth office at the end of this month. So this story is what America's all about. You start off, maybe you don't have a lot, but you're willing to work hard. You put in the time.

OBAMA: Opportunity is out there. And you're able to pass on an even better life to your family, your children, your grandchildren.

And it's good news that after how hard the construction industry got hit during the recession, things are starting to get a little better. Remember, it was just five years ago that our economy was in a freefall. Businesses were shedding hundreds of thousands of jobs every single month, and the recession ultimately cost millions of Americans their jobs, their homes, their savings, everything they had worked hard to build.

Today, over the last three and a half years, our businesses have added 7.5 million new jobs.

(APPLAUSE)

Our deficits are falling. Our housing market is healing, which means construction is improving. Manufacturing's growing. The auto industry is back. America's on pace to become the number one energy producer in the world this year.

(APPLAUSE)

More small businesses have gotten loans so they can grow and they can hire, just like when Luis did with the help of the Small Business Jobs Act that I signed three years ago. So that's part of what allowed this company to grow.

(APPLAUSE)

So we still have a long way to go. We've still got a lot of work to do, especially to rebuild the middle class, but we're making steady progress.

OBAMA: And the reason I'm here is we can't afford to threaten that progress right now. Right now, hundreds of thousands of Americans, hard-working Americans, suddenly aren't receiving their paycheck. Right now, they're worrying about missing their rent or their mortgage, or even making ends meet. We can all relate to that.

Imagine if suddenly you weren't sure whether you were gonna get your next paycheck with all the bills that might be mounting up.

Well, that's what's happening right now to hundreds of thousands of Americans across the country. Companies like this one worry that their businesses are gonna be disrupted because, obviously, particularly in an area like Maryland, Virginia where there are a lot of federal workers, you don't know how that's gonna impact the economy. Veterans, seniors, women, they're all worrying that the services they depend on will be disrupted too.

And the worst part is, this time it's not because of a once-in-a- lifetime recession. This isn't happening because of some financial crisis. It's happening because of a reckless Republican shutdown in Washington.

(UNKNOWN): That's right!

(APPLAUSE)

OBAMA: Now we've all seen the offices locked down, the monuments closed. We've heard about services denied. We've heard about benefits that are delayed.

But the impacts of a shutdown go way beyond those things that you're seeing on television. Those hundreds of thousands of Americans, a lot of whom live around here, don't know when they're gonna get their next paycheck. And that means stores and restaurants around here don't know if they'll have as many customers.

OBAMA: Across the country, you've got farmers in rural areas and small business owners who deserve a loan, but they're being left in the lurch right now. They might have an application pending as we speak, but there's nobody in the office to process the loan. The SBA gives a billion dollars of loans a month to small businesses; $1 billion a month goes to small businesses all across the country. Right now those can't be processed because there's nobody there to process them.

Veterans who deserve our support are getting less help. Little kids who deserve a head start have been sent home from the safe places where they learn and grow every single day. And, of course, their families then have to scramble to figure out what to do. And the longer this goes on, the worse it will be.

And it makes no sense. The American people elected their representatives to make their lives easier, not harder. And there's one way out of this reckless and damaging Republican shutdown: Congress has to pass a budget that funds our government with no partisan strings attached.

(APPLAUSE)

Now, I want everybody to understand what's happened, because sometimes when this gets reported on everybody kind of thinks, "Well, you know, both sides are just squabbling. Democrats and Republicans, they're always arguing. So, you know, neither side's behaving properly."

OBAMA: I want everybody to understand what's happened here. The Republicans passed a temporary budget for two months at a funding level that we as Democrats actually think is way too low because we're not providing help for more small businesses, doing more for early childhood education, doing more to rebuild our infrastructure. But we said, "OK, while we're still trying to figure out this budget we're prepared to go ahead and take the Republican budget levels that they proposed."

So the Senate passed that with no strings attached, not because it had everything the Democrats wanted. In fact, it had very little of what the Democrats wanted. But we said, "Let's go ahead and just make sure that other people aren't hurt while negotiations are still taking place."

So that's already passed the Senate. And we know there are enough Republicans and Democrats to vote in the House of Representatives for the same thing. So I want everybody to understand this. There are enough Republicans and Democrats in the House of Representatives today that if the speaker of the House, John Boehner, simply let the bill get on the floor for an up or down vote, every congressman could vote their conscience, the shutdown would end today.

The only thing that is keeping the government shut down, the only thing preventing people from going back to work, and basic research starting back up, and farmers and small business owners, getting their loans -- the only thing that's preventing all that from happening right now today, in the next five minutes, is that Speaker John Boehner won't even let the bill get a yes or no vote because he doesn't want to anger the extremists in his party.

OBAMA: That's -- that's all. That's what this whole thing is about. And we've heard a lot from congressional Republicans the past couple of days saying they don't want this shutdown. Well, there's a simple way to prove it. Send the bill to the floor. Let everybody vote. It will pass. Send me the bill. I will sign it. The shutdown will be over, and we can get back to the business of governing and helping the American people.

(APPLAUSE)

Could happen in the next -- next half-hour, national parks, monuments, offices would all reopen immediately, benefits and services would resume again, hundreds of thousands of dedicated public servants who are worrying about whether they're going to be able to pay the mortgage or pay the car note, they'd start going back to work right away.