Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

The Search For Brian Laundrie; Interview With Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-TX); Pressure on Capitol Hill. Aired 3-3:30p ET

Aired September 29, 2021 - 15:00   ET

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

[15:00:00]

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN HOST: It's the top of the hour. I'm Alisyn Camerota.

And the next 24 hours could define the future of President Biden's presidency, as well as the Democrats' fate. President Biden must convince lawmakers in his own party to strike a deal, or watch some of his biggest promises disappear.

Democrats are trying to make progress on those two major bills on infrastructure and the social safety net, but neither side seems willing to bend at this moment.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says she plans to hold a vote for the bipartisan infrastructure package tomorrow, and that she's optimistic that the factions can come to agreement on the bigger social safety net.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA): I think that, if we come to a place where we have agreement in legislative language, not just principle, in legislative language, that the president supports, has to meet his standard, because that's what we are supporting, then that I think we will come together.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: But one of the moderates leading the pushback on that -- on the cost for the package says that agreement is not going to happen by tomorrow.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MANU RAJU, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: And she said that they need by tomorrow legislative language agreed to. That means...

SEN. JOE MANCHIN (D-WV): That won't happen. That won't happen.

RAJU: That won't happen? Why is that?

MANCHIN: Well, listen, we're not -- we haven't been negotiating in good faith. No one has been negotiating along those lines with the other party to see what would be acceptable. (CROSSTALK)

MANCHIN: All we need to do is pass the bipartisan infrastructure bill, sit down and start negotiating in good faith. That's it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: CNN chief congressional correspondent Manu Raju is here.

Manu, that was so interesting. Senator Manchin says, because we haven't been negotiating.

All we have heard is that these negotiations are ongoing. Are they negotiating or not negotiating?

RAJU: Well, I think he's referring to negotiations with House Democrats.

He has been talking directly with the White House, but he even said yesterday he had not come up with a top-line number. Now, what he's being very clear about here is about the larger package, that $3.5 trillion bill that the Democratic liberals, most of the Democratic Caucus wants to approve. He wants that pared back substantially.

But Nancy Pelosi, as you played there, says that there needs to be an agreement of some sort on what that package looks like with the White House, and presumably with Manchin and Sinema signing off on that as well, in order for that to reassure progressives in the House who are threatening to vote en masse to sink that separate bipartisan infrastructure plan headed to a vote tomorrow.

Now, at the moment, Nancy Pelosi is still moving forward with that vote, but she could potentially delay it if their votes simply are not there. And in talking to a number of progressives, they are making clear they are ready to sink this tomorrow because they view this as leverage to get Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema on board behind that larger plan.

And Kyrsten Sinema was behind closed doors for the fourth time with White House officials earlier today talking to them about coming to some sort of agreement. But talking to progressive today, it was clear they were frustrated at these talks.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. CORI BUSH (D-MO): It's a hard no tomorrow. I'm an absolute no. You can write it on the wall with Cori Bush next to it. I'm a no.

Come to my district. Have Kyrsten Sinema come to my district and meet with my folks in St. Louis. Come and talk to those people who are spending all of their money on their prescription medication that they need, that's lifesaving, but also cannot afford their rent at the same time. Have her come and talk to those who are sleeping in their car.

[15:05:00]

She has her own story that I feel like she's forgotten.

REP. STEPHANIE MURPHY (D-FL): I think that, if the vote were to fail tomorrow or be delayed, there would be a significant breach in trust that would slow the momentum in moving forward in delivering the Biden agenda.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

RAJU: Now, that last point critical. That's from Stephanie Murphy, someone who is a Blue Dog Democrat, one of the more moderate Democrats.

I asked her if that infrastructure vote is delayed tomorrow, what will that do for her vote for that larger Democratic-only plan? She said a breach in trust that could damage the full agenda going forward.

So there you have it, Alisyn, the dilemma, the two sides debating the process, the procedure, the policy. Can they get an agreement an open question, and an open question if it will all just collapse -- Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: And hard to see how they're going to work it out at this hour.

But, Manu Raju, thank you very much for all the developments. Maybe we can get some answers now.

Joining us now is Democratic Congressman who is aligned with the moderate wing on this, and that is Congressman Henry Cuellar. He represents Texas.

Congressman, thanks so much for taking the time to do this.

I know that these are 11th-hour moments right now. You are aligned with the moderate wing. In other words, you're not sold right now on that $3.5 trillion social safety net bill. Let me just pull up some of the things that are in it, so that everybody knows we're not just talking about dollar signs.

This is about universal pre-K, child care support so that women can get back into the workplace. This is about free community college, about Pell Grants, paid maternity leave, again, to help working moms, child tax credits, aid for seniors who are on Medicare, Obamacare subsidies, reduced drug costs, meaning prescription drugs, and, of course, help for the climate crisis.

So what part do you want in, what part do you want out, if you're not sold on it?

REP. HENRY CUELLAR (D-TX): Well, first of all, you mentioned things that I support. There's nothing wrong with that. And we certainly support that.

Well, what we want to do is, as you remember, is, we want a vote on the bipartisan infrastructure bill. And then, second of all, we will go ahead and negotiate on this bi -- on this reconciliation bill. There are things, of course, that we support. But, again, keep in mind that we want to make sure that we vote on

something that has 50 votes on the Senate. That was the agreement that we made. And I think we can get there. We will get there. There are some differences between the House and the Senate. But we cannot forget one thing that's very important.

We're in the legislative environment. Isn't this what the legislative body does? They go ahead and they work things out. And that's exactly what our jobs are as members of Congress.

CAMEROTA: Yes, here's the problem.

Progressives say they have tried it your way. They say they have tried it your way to do it incrementally on things like voting rights, police reform, and every time they get almost to the finish line the rug is pulled out from under them.

So now they have leverage. And you just heard there, in the piece that you just heard, Congresswoman Cori Bush of Missouri say, you have forgotten what people, what real people need. Yes, they need bridges and tunnels, but they also really need child care. And so it's not going to just help to have a good bridge if you can't get back to work.

What would you say to her?

CUELLAR: Of course. Of course, we want to make sure that we have education. We're not against that. We want to have health care. Some people want Medicare-plus. Some people want to have -- fill up the Medicaid expansion gap, that there's 12 Southern states, like Texas that has 771,000 people, that don't have any coverage at all.

We want to help that. So there are some little differences that we need to work out. But at the end of the day, we are going to work this out. This is a legislative process. So, I mean...

CAMEROTA: OK.

But what's your dollar sign? I mean, what's -- in other words, if you don't start with something to offer in negotiation, how can you negotiate in good faith? What is the dollar figure you want to get to?

CUELLAR: Well, again, I think -- I think what we're seeing is, I think this is where the Senate is working out.

Look, I was here in 2010, where we went big, we went bold. We did that. We passed the Affordable Health Care Act. I voted for that. I voted for other...

CAMEROTA: And so was that a mistake?

CUELLAR: Let me finish. Let me finish.

So, we went big last time. All we're asking right now is that, whatever the House votes on, because we lost 63 members in 2010, all we're asking is that we vote on something that has the vote of 50 Democrats in the Senate and the House majority here. That's all we're asking.

CAMEROTA: OK.

CUELLAR: So we're negotiating right now.

CAMEROTA: OK, I understand.

But part of the problem is that Senators Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema don't seem to have been able to articulate exactly what defines their terms. We have heard President Biden say, they're not giving me a number.

So what is the number? What exactly defines those terms that you say?

CUELLAR: Well, again, you need to get Joe Manchin and Sinema on the show to ask them that question.

[15:10:01]

Like I said, I'm ready to support a reconciliation bill. I'm ready to vote tomorrow for the infrastructure. These two bills make up, they make up Joe Biden's agenda. I want to support the Joe Biden agenda. And we are going to do that.

We're in the legislative process. People need to understand, this is what happens in the legislative process.

CAMEROTA: Yes.

CUELLAR: It's what we do every year and every day.

CAMEROTA: OK, so you say you are ready to vote on that reconciliation bill. You will vote for $3.5 trillion in spending in that bill?

CUELLAR: No, I -- no, I did not say that.

CAMEROTA: OK, what number -- OK, what number are you comfortable with?

CUELLAR: No, no, no, no.

Look, I'm not going to give you a number. All I can tell you is, we support a bipartisan -- somebody come up with $3.5 trillion. I'm sorry. I was not in that room. Somebody was in the room. They said we're going to couple the infrastructure bill together with a reconciliation.

I'm sorry. I was not in that room. What I want to do is, let's go ahead -- I sit on Appropriations. We deal with numbers all the time. We put money in Pell Grants. We put money in health care. We put money to make sure we fight climate change.

We do that in Appropriations every single year. But, again, the reconciliation...

CAMEROTA: Yes, but, just so I understand, are you saying that 3.5 is arbitrary? You don't believe that that number has been reached through actually crunching the details of it together?

CUELLAR: I was not in that room. Who came up with that number? Were you in that room? I'm sure you were not. I was not in that room.

Somebody came up with 3.5. I want to support a reconciliation where we can meet the basic needs, where we -- reconciliation is another term for we need to remake, redo the safety net, where we can help the people that need the help. I support health care. I support education. I want to make sure we fight -- we fight the problem with climate change. I want to do all that.

But were you or I in that room? Somebody came up with $3.5 trillion. I don't know who came up with that number. If you can tell me, please tell me who came up with that number.

CAMEROTA: So, it sounds like you have a long way to go. So should the vote tomorrow...

CUELLAR: No, no, no, no.

CAMEROTA: Should the vote tomorrow be postponed?

CUELLAR: No, of course not.

Do people think that making this part of Joe Biden's agenda, a historic $1.2 trillion, knocking that down, is that going to be helpful to the precedent? No.

Do people think that, if we knock down that bill tomorrow, that's going to get people closer to each other? No, it doesn't. We have got to understand that we got to work together. I want to vote for the reconciliation.

We got to have a number that passes 50 Democrats on the Senate side and, of course, the majority here. That's what I'm saying. I'm for health care. I'm for education. I'm for fighting climate change.

CAMEROTA: Yes, but wouldn't it be helpful to know what that number is that would pass the 50 Democrats on the Senate side?

CUELLAR: Well, I think that's what the president and Senator Sinema and Joe Manchin are trying to figure that out. They're going to figure that out. They're going to figure that out.

Like I said, I'm ready to vote on a reconciliation for health care, education, fight climate change that passes 50 -- with 50 senators on the Senate side. I'm tired of being BTU, what happened to the Democrats in 1990s. I saw what happened in 2010. We're not going to be BTU by anybody that just came up with the number.

I want to support reconciliation, education, health care, help the vulnerable. I want to do that. But I need something that will pass with 50 votes on the Senate side, so we can send it straight to the president.

CAMEROTA: Congressman Henry Cuellar, we appreciate getting your take on where you are right now. Thank you for your time.

CUELLAR: Thank you so much. Thank you, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: With us now to discuss, we have CNN political analyst Margaret Talev. She is the managing editor at Axios. And CNN senior White House correspondent Phil Mattingly.

Well, Phil, should be easy. You heard Congressman Cuellar there say should be simple. All you need is 50 Democratic senators to pass it. What's the problem?

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, how long do we have here?

No, look, it's actually -- it was a very good interview and in the end kind of zeroed in on the key point here, right, that congressional Democrats on the House side of things are very concerned about voting for something that isn't going to pass muster in the Senate. That is why the president has been so focused on two senators in particular over the course of the last 48 hours.

As complicated as this moment is on Capitol Hill, as complex as kind of the knitting of the policy is together here, the reality remains, if two senators sign off on a top line, that is the top line that can likely pass. And that means that everything underneath it can start to get to work.

What they don't have at this moment, despite the meetings between the president and those two senators, the staff and Senator Sinema, multiple times over the course of the last 24 hours, is that top line.

CAMEROTA: Margaret, how about Congressman Cuellar there saying, I don't know how they got to that $3.5 trillion, I wasn't in that room?

[15:15:00]

It that an arbitrary number that they made up out of whole cloth? Has anybody seen the math on that?

MARGARET TALEV, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, we know what some of the major pieces, Alisyn, of what they're talking about could cost.

And, like, as we also know, because so much of these negotiations have happened actually in public, we know that there are any number of ways you could get from $3.5 trillion to sort of that $1.5 trillion zone that Manchin has hinted he'd be more comfortable in and anywhere in between.

And, honestly, it just involves like which pieces of the spending are in and which pieces are out? What are you going to do with Medicaid? What are you going to do with free community -- two years of free community college? What do you have to do with electric car tax credits?

I mean, there's a laundry list of a million things that could go in or could go out. But the bottom line is, from President Biden's perspective, this is the -- this is -- like, something has to happen. If he has nothing and Democrats have nothing to take into the midterm elections, they're in real trouble.

And, also, let's say they lost the majority a year from November. This is what the Democratic Caucus in some form wants to deliver anyhow, right? If you may not even be able to keep power, at least you want to have something lasting from your time there that you feel will benefit your constituents.

So that's really the moment they're in. There's a million ways they get across the finish line. I will say this. If you're just like a member of the public at home watching this, you're thinking, what is so important about tomorrow?

There's really two different things happening the same week. One is the C.R., which we thought was going to pass today. I don't even know at this point -- well, it's 3:00. I don't know if that's happening. But that's to avert a government shutdown. That does have to happen by the end of this fiscal year. And that is -- we're at the fiscal year, right.

CAMEROTA: Tomorrow, yes.

TALEV: The infrastructure/spending stuff, the only reason it has to happen is because of an agreement that they thought they could patch together between the moderates and the progressives.

CAMEROTA: Yes.

TALEV: As long as everyone agrees to extend it, they can keep talking. The question is, is more time going to get them anywhere closer than they are right now?

CAMEROTA: Right.

Phil we talk about this as threatening President Biden's agenda. Isn't it also threatening his reelection? I mean, what we just heard there from Congressman Cuellar, he said, I was around in 2010 with Obamacare.

And it basically sounded like he thought that they were punished and Democrats lost seats, because it was too big, and that he wasn't going to make that mistake again. So, I mean, it threatens the Democrats' majority. It threatens President Biden's reelection.

Am I overstating it?

MATTINGLY: No.

Look, I think the reality is, is this is the agenda the president campaigned on. This is the agenda most Democrats who won in 2020 campaigned on as well. And if this domestic agenda falls apart, like on the whole, then they have nothing going into the midterms.

I think that's an argument you have heard from White House officials. We campaigned on this. You supported this. You supported the president. These are the key tenets of that agenda. You have to get it across the finish line. The alternative is you go into the midterm election with absolutely nothing.

It's just the reality right now that this is complicated. And I think a point that people sometimes miss is the vast majority of both Democratic Caucuses in the House and the Senate are fully on board with this. They support the scale, they support the scope, they support the policy.

When you only have a majority of three votes or space of three votes in the House and zero votes in the U.S. Senate, one and two, three people matter. And that's where they're at right now. No matter how much support you have, if you don't have all of it in the Senate, you have problems.

CAMEROTA: I would hate to see what lack of support looks like.

So, Margaret, as we sit here right now, is this vote going to happen tomorrow, the infrastructure vote, or not?

TALEV: Boy, I mean, Pelosi's brand, right -- you're asking me like the unknowable question.

Everyone wants to know the answer this question. Pelosi's brand is, never put a vote up that's going to fail. And she reiterated that as early as, like, yesterday. She's saying this all week: I don't put up those that aren't going to pass.

So, I just -- I'm trying to understand the strategy and the logic of setting up a failure. I guess it could be to scare people into action. I just don't see that being where this goes. I think what I think what they're -- what we're still talking about is the speaker trying to figure out, how much give is there on the progressive side, how much give is there on the moderate side?

Would the moderates rather have their infrastructure vote fail and the world's fury who want a deal turn on the progressives, or would they -- would an extra day or some additional negotiations by the time -- I think we just don't know the answer that right now.

And Biden's tactic is not to be engaging as much on the House side. It is, as Phil said, to be working with the two senators who can unlock the key to all of this.

CAMEROTA: OK, we will be watching.

Margaret Talev, Phil Mattingly, thank you both very much.

All right, we have some new details about Brian Laundrie's whereabouts in the days right after Gabby Petito went missing.

[15:20:00]

So, we have the latest on the investigation and the puzzling timeline ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CAMEROTA: It's been two weeks since Gabby Petito's fiance, Brian Laundrie, was last seen. And the Petito family lawyer is doubtful that Laundrie's parents will ever help authorities find him.

CNN has learned that Brian went camping with his parents in early September, just after returning from his cross-country road trip alone,

[15:25:03]

Leyla Santiago joins us now from the North Port City Hall, where a memorial for Gabby has been set up.

So, Leyla, walk us through the timeline, as we now know it, and where this camping trip fits into it.

LEYLA SANTIAGO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Right, Alisyn.

And these tidbits that we're learning and slowly confirming are really painting the picture of how we got to where we are today, how there is now a growing memorial behind me for a young woman and the tragedy and a search for her fiance.

So, yes, let's walk through that. Let's take you back to September 1. That is when Brian Laundrie came back from a cross-country trip that he had had with Gabby. But he came back alone. What we have learned is that, a few days later, September 6 and 7, he went on a camping trip with his family about 75 miles north of where he lives at De Soto State Park.

Now, we have talked to neighbors who said they did see him return after that. They saw him at the house after that camping trip. A few days later, September 11, Gabby Petito was reported missing. A few days after that, police say that the Laundrie parents -- that Laundrie's parents claimed that was the last time they saw their son and he was headed to a reserve.

Now, they didn't report that until a few days after that, September 17. And then this search ensued, bringing us to where we are today, searching for Brian Laundrie and, quite frankly, searching for answers for what happened to Gabby Petito.

We have seen the FBI carry out or execute search warrants at the Laundrie house. An arrest warrant has been put out there for Brian Laundrie. And the Petito family says they don't have any faith that the Laundrie family is going to help them with answers.

Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RICHARD STAFFORD, ATTORNEY FOR FAMILY OF GABBY PETITO: For the Laundries' silence, the Laundries did not help us find Gabby. They are sure as not going to help us find Brian.

For Brian, we're asking you to turn yourself in to the FBI or the nearest law enforcement agency.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SANTIAGO: And Laundrie's family attorney insists that they are worried, that the parents are worried about Brian Laundrie and his well-being, saying they don't know where he is and they did not help him in any way get away.

CAMEROTA: Leyla Santiago, thank you for the update.

Well, top military officials warning of the real possibility that terrorist groups will reform in Afghanistan -- when they think that could happen.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:30:00]