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Interview With Rep. Jimmy Gomez (D-CA); Infrastructure Negotiations; President Biden Speaks at MLK Memorial Celebration. Aired 1-1:30p ET

Aired October 21, 2021 - 13:00   ET

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

[13:00:00]

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Gone are the days when you have to pull up to a McDonald's and sit in the parking lot with your child to do their homework when there's virtual learning going on.

Dr. King said, of all the forms of inequity, injustice in health care is the most shocking and most inhumane. This is a once-in-a-century pandemic that's hit this country hard, and especially the African- American community.

And it's like you have all lost someone to the virus or know someone who has lost a loved one. One in 600 black Americans have died from COVID-19. That's been reported that black children are more than twice as likely as white children to have lost a parent or a caregiver to COVID-19, to have to experience the trauma and loss.

Many of my colleagues in the Congress are working on what we have to now work on even more fervently, and that is mental health care, helping people through the difficult periods we have. It's been devastating.

(APPLAUSE)

BIDEN: But we can find purpose in pain. We can find purpose in this pain.

Equity is the center of my administration's COVID-19 response. The vaccination rates among black adults is now essentially on par with white adults. In the midst of this pandemic, we're building the Affordable Care Act to extend coverage to lower health care costs for millions of black families.

We're also working to lower prescription drug costs by giving Medicare the power to negotiate lower prices. And how do you know the plan will work? Because the drug companies are spending millions of bucks to try to stop it. That's how you know.

Together, we're making health care a right, not a privilege in this nation. Now, for the millions, the millions of you who feel financially squeezed in raising a child while caring for an aging parent, the so-called sandwich generation, we want to make eldercare affordable and accessible, so your aging loved ones can live with greater independence and dignity. We also wanting to make sure child care costs for most families are

cut at least in half. No working family -- if we get what you all are helping me get done, no working family in America will pay more than 7 percent of their income on child care for any child under 5.

(APPLAUSE)

BIDEN: We want to give raises millions of care workers and home workers, so they can increase their capacity, increase their knowledge, increase their opportunities.

Health workers and child care workers are disproportionately women, women of color and immigrants, and workers like the ones Dr. King stood for when he marched and gave his life.

Look, folks, just imagine, instead of consigning a million of our children to under-resourced schools, we gave every single child in America access to an education at age 3 and age 4, quality preschool. We can afford to do this. We can't afford not to do it.

(APPLAUSE)

BIDEN: And we do now, no matter what the background or circumstance a child comes from, when given that opportunity, they have a better than 58 percent chance of making it all the way through 12 years without getting themselves in trouble and maybe going beyond that.

This will change lives forever. So will historic investments in higher education, significantly increasing Pell Grants to help millions of black students in lower-income families attend community colleges and four-year schools.

(APPLAUSE)

BIDEN: I tell you, let me be clear. In the shadow of the Morehouse men -- I hear a lot about that, guys.

(LAUGHTER)

BIDEN: And with a Howard alumni.

(LAUGHTER)

BIDEN: I keep making the case, if you excuse the point of personal privilege -- we used to stay in the Senate, the best HBCU in the country is Delaware State.

(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)

BIDEN: That's where I got started. Come on.

But here's what we have done, in addition to putting the president of Delaware State, who used to work for me, a doctor, in charge of all of this, we're committed to nearly $5 billion this year in historic investments, with more historically black colleges and universities to make every single student -- give them a shot at the good-paying jobs. (APPLAUSE)

BIDEN: And you all know what I mean.

But for anybody watching this, one of the problems is, black students in college, they just have every single capability any other student does. But guess what? Because they don't have great endowments, they can't compete for those government contracts that are out there that the big schools are able to go out and get.

Cybersecurity, for example, starting salary is 100,000, 125,000 bucks, but you don't get to get that contract unless you have laboratories, unless you have the facilities you can, in fact, train on.

[13:05:11]

We also know this is about the promise in America. Economic injustice also means delivering environmental justice to communities on fenceline communities, dividing homes in toxic areas.

My state has one of the highest cancer rates in the history in America, because I lived in a fenceline community called Claymont, Delaware. We used to get up in the morning -- not a joke -- when I would get driven to the little school I went up the street, turn on the windshield wiper in the fall, in the fall, first frost and literally be an oil slick in the window. Not a joke. An oil slick in the window.

That's why an awful lot of us, including me, have bronchial asthma. It means reducing pollution, so our children can develop and avoid these consequences. Every one of you have an alley in your state. We call it Cancer Alley in our state going down Route 13.

Look means building up our resilience to the climate crisis or the next extreme weather events. And these have been of biblical proportions, biblical proportions, 178-mile top winds in a hurricane down in Louisiana. More people dying in Queens in their basements because 20 inches rain, they flooded and couldn't get out of their basements? They drowned?

Superstorms, droughts, wildfire, hurricanes. This is the promise for America, urban and rural, and all across America, not just for any one area. And as we fight for economic justice to fulfill the promise of America, for all Americans, the work continues on delivering equal justice under the law.

Look, I know the frustration we all feel that, more than one year after George Floyd's murder, and the conviction of his murder about six months ago, meaningful police reform in George's name has still not passed Congress.

I remember many times maybe with his little daughter, and she would say to me: My daddy's changing history. He is going to change history.

Well, we haven't fulfilled that yet. I understand we got to keep fighting. Let me be clear, though, we're going to continue to fight for real police reform legislation. And the fight is not anywhere near over. Despite Republican obstruction, my administration is acting.

We have already announced changes to the federal law enforcement policies, a ban on choke holds, restriction on no-knock warrants, requirement that federal agents wear and activate body cameras, ending Department of Justice use of private prisons, rescinding the previous administration is guidance to U.S. attorneys to require the harshest of penalties.

The Justice Department has opened a pattern and practice investigation of systematic police misconduct in police departments in Phoenix, Louisville, and Minneapolis. Just because we can't get it done in the states, we are not standing back. We have much more to do.

In this, these important steps, my administration also wants to advance some meaningful police reform that includes additional executive actions to live up to America's promise of equal justice under the law. Our work continues to create safer and stronger communities in critical ways.

With my American Rescue Plan -- and thank you in the Congress for supporting it. Everybody kind of forgets that was $1.9 billion -- trillion dollars. We got a hell of -- a heck of a lot done, that it did so well, people don't even know where it came from.

(LAUGHTER)

BIDEN: No, I'm serious. Think about it. Like, what do you do for me lately? Well, we have $1.9 billion we took care of.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Trillion. Trillion.

BIDEN: Well, we made historic investments in community policing, in violence intervention programs. And we're shown to reduce -- some of these programs reduced violence by 60 percent.

We're expanding summer programs and job opportunities and services support to keep young people safe and out of trouble. We're helping formerly incarcerated people successfully reenter their communities. In the past, you would get 25 bucks and a bus ticket. And you go back right under the bridge you just were there before.

You should have access to Pell Grants. You should have access to the housing. You should have access to all the things. You have paid your price. And we shouldn't put you back in a spot where you have no options.

(APPLAUSE)

BIDEN: We're also working to stem the flow of firearms from rogue gun dealers to curb the epidemic of gun violence.

I know I get criticized for being the guy who passed the assault weapons ban. I'm proud of having passed the assault weapons ban. But here's the deal. We heard Dr. King paraphrase Mica (ph). He said, give us the ballot, and we will place judges on the benches of the South who will do justly and love mercy.

Well, in just nine months, we have appointed more black women to the federal circuit courts and more former public defenders to the bench than any administration in all of American history, because of you.

[13:10:01]

We're going to change it. We did it in record time. And we're just getting started, because of all of you in the audience here. You have been the engine behind all of this.

But we also know this. To make real the full promise of America, we have to protect that fundamental right, the right to vote, the sacred right to vote.

You know, it's democracy's threshold liberty. With it, anything is possible. Without it, nothing is. Today, the right to vote and the rule of law are under unrelenting assault from Republican governors, attorneys, general, secretaries of state, state legislators.

And they're following my predecessor, the last president, into a deep, deep black hole and abyss. No, I really mean it. Think about it. This is what got me involved in civil rights as a kid when I was 26 years old. It gave me -- I had never -- I love reading about how Biden knew he was going to run for president.

Hell, I didn't know I was even going to be able to run for the county council. I didn't even want to.

(LAUGHTER)

BIDEN: But, look, this struggle is no longer just over who gets to vote or making it easier for eligible people to vote. It's about who gets to count the votes, whether they should count at all.

Jim Crow in the 21st century is now a sinister combination of voter suppression and elective -- election subversion.

My fellow Americans, I thought, at one point, that I had been able to do something good as chairman of Judiciary Committee. I was able to get every member of the committee, including some of the most conservative members that ever served, clearly who had racist backgrounds, to vote to extend the Voting Rights Act for 25 years.

I thought, whoa. One of the proudest things I ever did as a senator. But guess what? This means that some state legislatures want to make it harder for you to vote. And if you do vote, they want to be able to tell you whether or not your vote counts. That has not happened before.

They want the ability to reject the final vote and ignore the will of the people if their preferred candidate, black or white or Asian or Latino, doesn't matter, if that -- their candidate doesn't win.

And they're targeting not just voters of color, as I said, but every voter who doesn't vote the way they want. I have to admit to you, had been as a senator my whole 36-year career

involved in, as I have worked with a lot of folks out here, in civil rights issues, I thought, man, you can't turn us back, that you could defeat hate.

I thought we could get actually defeat hate. But the most un-American thing that any of us can imagine, the most undemocratic and the most unpatriotic, and yet, sadly, not unprecedented, time and again, we have witnessed threat to the right to vote and free and fair elections come to fruition. Each time, we fought back.

And we have got to continue to fight back today.

I want to thank Martin Luther King III for leading marches on voting rights during the anniversary of the March on Washington on August 28. The vice president and I and our colleagues here have spent our careers doing this work. It's central to our administration.

On the anniversary of Bloody Sunday, I directed each and every federal agency to promote access to voting from each agency heeding that call. For example, the Department of Veterans Affairs, I asked them to make it easier for veterans and their families to register and to vote at VA facilities, so it will be open.

In addition, the U.S. Department of Justice has doubled the voting rights enforcement staff. We have got a long way to go, though. It's using authorities to challenge the onslaught of state laws undermining voting rights, whether in old or new ways. To something like 20 percent of the -- or half the Republicans, or registered Republicans. I am not your president. Donald Trump is still your president.

As we Catholics say, oh, my God.

(LAUGHTER)

BIDEN: But, look, the focus is going to remain on discrimination and racial discriminatory laws, Georgia's various new anti-voting laws.

And let's be clear about Georgia, Dr. King's home state and the home state of someone who has literally stood in his shoes, as -- I think some of you guys knew this was -- next line was coming. That's why you had the jets come up.

[13:15:00]

Stood in his shoes, as a Morehouse man.

(LAUGHTER)

BIDEN: That's what I keep getting from Cedric. Oh, anyway.

(LAUGHTER)

BIDEN: And as a preacher in the pulpit of Ebenezer, United States Senator Raphael Warnock, the first black senator in Georgia's history.

(APPLAUSE)

BIDEN: Senator Warnock won his election on the battle of ideas. He earned the trust and confidence of a broad coalition of voters in Georgia. And response of Republicans of Georgia, what was it?

It's not to try winning on the merits and ideas. It's by changing the rules to make it harder for people to vote, deny the franchise. The vice president has been leading our administration's efforts, and we have supported Democrats pressing to enact critical voting rights bills since day one of this administration, making sure we have unanimous support.

But each and every time, the Senate Republicans block it by refusing even to talk about it. They are afraid to even just debate the bills in the U.S. Senate, as they did again yesterday, even on a bill that includes provisions that they have traditionally supported.

It's unfair, it's unconscionable, and it's un-American.

And this battle is far from over. The door has not been closed. John Lewis Voting Rights Act will soon come up for vote, named after our dear friend who we still miss dearly, but whose voice we hear every day in our hearts and our conscience.

It's a law that helped lead the reauthorization, as I said, for 25 years that I served of the -- in the Senate Judiciary Committee expanding the Voting Rights Act, traditionally received bipartisan support. We have to keep up the fight and get it done.

And I know the moment we're in. You know the moment we're in. I know the stakes. You know the stakes. This is far from over.

And, finally, we're confronting the stains of what remains a deep stain on the soul the nation, hate and white supremacy. There's a tough through line of subjugation of enslaved people from our earliest days, to the reigns of radicalized terror, the KKK, to Dr. King being assassinated.

And through that -- though that line continues to be the torches emerging from dark shadows in Charlottesville, carrying out Nazi banners and chanting anti-Semitic bile and Ku Klux Klan flags, and the violent, deadly insurrection the Capitol nine months ago, it was about white supremacy, in my view, the rise of hate crimes against Asian Americans during the pandemic, and the rise of anti-Semitism here in America and around the world.

The through line is that hate never goes away. It never -- I thought -- and all the years I have been involved, I thought, once we got through it, it would go away. But it doesn't. It only hides. It only hides, until some seeming legitimate person breathes some oxygen under the rocks where they're hiding, and gives it some breath.

I have said it before, and all my colleagues here know it. According to the United States intelligence community, domestic terrorism from white supremacists is the most lethal terrorist threat in the homeland. To that end, our administration is carrying out the first ever

comprehensive effort to tackle the threat passed by domestic -- posed by domestic terrorism, including white supremacy.

(APPLAUSE)

BIDEN: We're doing so by taking action to reduce online radicalism and recruitment to violence. We're also disrupting networks that inspire violence and domestic terrorists by providing resources to communities to build resilience.

We cannot and must not give hate any safe harbor, any safe harbor.

My fellow Americans, standing here reminds me of the goal of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, which Dr. King led.

And I quote. He said his goal was to -- quote -- "redeem the soul of America." That's what's at stake here, the soul of America. And we know that it's not the work of a single day or a single administration or even a single generation.

But here we stand with Dr. King to show, out of struggle, there's progress. Out of despair, there's hope. From the promise of equality and opportunity, of jobs, justice and freedom, we see black excellence, American excellence, black history as American history and a defining source of the might of this nation.

That's why we're here today, to renew our own courage in the shadow and the light on the shoulders of Dr. King, Coretta Scott King, and all those known and unknown who gave their whole souls to this word, the courage to confront wrong and to try to do right, the courage to heal the broken places of the nation, the courage to see America whole, to acknowledge where we fall short, to devote ourselves to the perfection of the union that we love and we must protect.

[13:20:24]

If we can summon the courage to do these things, we will have done our duty, honored our commitments, brought the dream of Dr. King just a little bit closer to reality.

It's the highest of callings. It's the most sacred of charges. And it's what, with the help of God, we can do now.

So, let's go forth from this sacred place, tumult and turmoil, with hope and promise of a nation always seeking, always thriving, always keeping the faith, because, folks, I know my colleagues in the Senate used to always kid me for quoting Irish poets on the floor.

They thought I did it because I was Irish. It's not the reason. They're just the best poets in the world.

(LAUGHTER)

BIDEN: There's a line from -- and I believe this to be true. There's a line from a poem "The Cure at Troy." And it says that, once in a lifetime, that tidal wave of justice rises up, and hope and history rhyme. It's not the whole quote. I won't bore you with it all, but hope and history rhyme.

I believe the American people, the vast majority, are with us. I think they see much more clearly what you have all been fighting for your whole life now. It's in stark relief.

The bad news is, we had a president who appealed to the prejudice. The good news is that he took the -- he ripped the Band-Aid off, made it absolutely clear what's at stake.

I think the American people will follow us. But guess what? Whether they will or not, we have no choice. We have to continue to fight.

God bless you all, and may God protect our troops.

(APPLAUSE)

ANA CABRERA, CNN HOST: Hello, and thanks for being with us. I'm Ana Cabrera in New York.

You have been listening to President Biden's speaking at the 10th anniversary celebration of the dedication of the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial in Washington, talking about the promise of America and his goal to lift up all Americans, especially when it comes to addressing racial and socioeconomic inequality and opportunity, themes that will likely be echoed later tonight in a CNN presidential town hall, as the president then fields questions from the American people.

Job one may be using his prime-time stage tonight to sell his economic agenda, still ambitious, but shrinking, and he appears closer to finding the elusive middle ground to win both competing ends of this party, the progressives and the moderates.

Now, as the negotiations drag on, one Senate moderate, key holdout Kyrsten Sinema, is facing growing hostility from her fellow Democrats. And several of her advisers resigned just a short time ago.

CNN's Kaitlan Collins is in Baltimore for tonight's town hall. Manu Raju is on Capitol Hill. Let's start there.

Manu, tell us more about the backlash Senator Sinema is facing from her party.

MANU RAJU, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, it's mostly from liberals, who are frustrated about her positions and the way she has handled these talks.

Remember, she has not really divulged publicly where she stands on many of these issues. But one issue by issue continues to leak out about where she stands. And liberals are seeing their dreams of getting this massive plan scaled back dramatically, not just the $3.5 trillion price tag. They're now talking about $2 trillion, but also some key issues, tuition-free community college, an issue that I have learned that Kyrsten Sinema raised concerns about. And she's also now making clear she opposes increasing corporate tax rates and individual tax rates, raising a major question about how exactly they plan to fully finance this program, as the Democrats have been promising for some time.

Now, there's now concerns of the she potentially could have on the left facing a possible primary challenge come 2024. One Congressman, Ruben Gallego, told me that he would not rule out the idea of challenging her, said that voters in Arizona are very upset with her.

And one Democratic liberal told me on Capitol Hill, Ritchie Torres, a progressive freshman, said: "There's a sense in which we no longer live in a democracy. We live under the tyranny of Kyrsten Sinema."

And now he goes on to say: "I welcome the ideological diversity of the party. I can live with dissent. My colleagues and I have trouble living with what we perceive to be erraticism."

Now, I asked Nancy Pelosi, the House speaker, about Kyrsten Sinema's opposition to raising taxes and how they would actually pay for this program and whether or not Kyrsten Sinema has conveyed those concerns directly to her. This is what he said.

[13:25:03]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RAJU: The tax question, Senator Sinema, from what we understand, has opposed increasing corporate and individual tax rates.

Has she conveyed that to you? And to follow up on Jake's question, could this be fully paid for, as you have promised, if her view prevails?

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA): The deal there would be fully paid for. And the matter is in the hands of our chairs of the Finance Committee and the Ways and Means Committee.

RAJU: Has she conveyed that to you, her position to you?

PELOSI: Well, her position is well-known.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

RAJU: So she's made -- conveyed that position to the president, who has told Democratic leaders that you will not accept those higher taxes.

So now they're scrambling, how do they pay for this? They're looking at other things, such as a possible minimum corporate tax, possible tax on billionaires and the like. But will Sinema agree to that? Will Senator Joe Manchin agree to other divisions within their caucus they are trying to resolve right now?

Major questions ahead if they can get this done. Democrats want a deal by the end of the week. Uncertain if they can do that. CABRERA: Kaitlan, it sounds like President Biden has a Sinema

problem. What is he doing? And what more can he do?

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, I think it was really telling what Speaker Pelosi said to Manu about this, not committing to still raising corporate taxes, because, of course, that has been one of the chief proponents that the White House has pushed, because they know it's very politically popular to raise taxes on corporations and high earners.

And that has been something the president often talks about and was talking about last night when he was in Scranton, Pennsylvania. And so, yesterday, the White House had kind of left open the idea that maybe Senator Sinema could be pressured into changing her position on that if every other Democrat was on board.

Obviously, it sounds like now they are thinking of alternatives and different tax structures that they can use here to pay for this bill to make sure it is fully paid for, which they have said repeatedly.

And so that's a big question facing the president over how that actually shakes out, because it's obviously critical to getting that framework that the White House really wants to have, A, by tonight, so when the president is here in Baltimore at the CNN town hall, he can work on selling what that proposal is going to look like, because, so far, he's had to stay away from specifics in the last few days, as they are still hammering out the final details here.

And so that's one big thing. It's not new that these negotiations with Senator Sinema are happening. The White House has been speaking to her at length on a daily basis, almost, including Senator Manchin, over the last few weeks when it comes to this. And so those will be big questions that are facing the president tonight over what his tactic is going to look like to get all 50 Democrats on board.

But just going back to what the president was just saying there, his comments really stood out to me when it came to voting rights, because, obviously, of course, that's another big subject facing this White House and over what they're doing, because there has been a lot of criticism from usual allies of the president and Democrats saying that the White House isn't doing enough here.

And you heard the president there talking about steps that the Justice Department is taking. Of course, those are steps that they can take on an executive level, as, of course, we have seen that the legislation Capitol Hill on voting rights hasn't gone anywhere, but also just the president talking about the reality of where there was an outcome in the election, and maybe some people in certain states did not like it.

But instead of kind of taking a step back and thinking and reflecting on the loss, they moved to change the voting rules in certain states, of course, referencing Georgia several times there. And the president was saying -- he seemed exasperated, saying that there are still Republicans out there who think that he is not the president, that Donald Trump is still the rightful president. And he did the cross and said, as Catholics say, oh, my God, talking

about the reality of what they're dealing with when it comes to what Republicans in state legislatures are saying. And I thought that was really notable because, of course, people have urged the president to speak up more when it comes to voting rights.

CABRERA: Right. And the Senate tried to move forward on debating a new voting rights bill. And that was squashed just yesterday.

Kaitlan Collins, Manu Raju, thank you both very much.

Let's talk more about what's in, what's out of this spending bill and the president's economic agenda. Of course, it is constantly evolving, but this is what we know right now, the cost still hovering between $1.75 trillion and $1.9 trillion. What's in? Free universal preschool, a one-year extension of the child tax credit, at least four weeks of paid family leave, help with child care and eldercare and some expansion of Medicare.

Those priorities come at a cost. We are told tuition-free community college is out and in limbo programs dealing with climate change and carbon reduction.

Our next guest is a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. He met with President Biden in the Oval Office for the first time this week.

Congressman -- Congressman, thank you so much, Jimmy Gomez joining us from Capitol Hill.

And you can't get all of this, of course, without paying for it. The president has vowed the pay-fors will be there. But where's this money going to come from if Senator Sinema is against raising taxes on big corporations and the wealthiest Americans?

REP. JIMMY GOMEZ (D-CA): Great question.

One of the things -- I'm on the -- also on the Ways and Means Committee. This is the committee that raises the revenue in order to pay for all of it. We passed an increase in the corporate rate and the individual tax rate.