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Inside Politics

Departure Ceremony For U.S. Capitol Officer Killed In January 6th Riot; President Signals Willingness To "Better Target" Stimulus Checks; Joe Biden Meets With Democratic Senators On COVID Relief Bill; Joe Biden Tells House Democrats To "Stick Together" In COVID Relief Push; CNN: No Deal Between McCarthy & Hoyer On Marjorie Taylor Greene. Aired 12-12:30p ET

Aired February 03, 2021 - 12:00   ET

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

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JOHN KING, CNN HOST: I'm John King in Washington. You're watching sad, solemn, sobering images there, Officer Brian Sicknick on his way to his final resting place at Arlington National Cemetery after lying in honor in the Capitol Rotunda.

It is another Wednesday of reflection here in the United States of America lying in honor in the rotunda of the building where officer Sicknick was killed four weeks ago today doing his duty defending that building, defending the people who work in that building, defending his government against an insurrection by a trump-inspired mob that attacked the United States' Capitol building.

Brian Sicknick again he will be buried in a private ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery. You see that metropolitan police escort there, Capitol police officers, his colleagues, his brothers and sisters also part of these ceremonies. You see the hearse now leaving the Capitol grounds.

The Concertina Wire still there, the fencing still there added after the insurrection at the United States Capitol building again four weeks ago today on January 6th. It's a short drive across the Potomac River to Arlington National Cemetery where officer Sicknick will be buried as he deserves as an American hero.

It was a decision by the congressional leadership to have him lie in honor. And congressional leaders were outside there to watch the hearse drive away. Are also paying tribute to him, both the president and the vice president, President Biden and President Harris also stopping by during those ceremonies? Again, Brian Sicknick killed four weeks ago today at the United States

Capitol now on the way to Arlington National Cemetery for a private burial. We're going to take a quick break. We'll be right back.

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KING: Welcome back to INSIDE POLITICS. I'm John King in Washington. A very busy and very important day in the Biden reset here in Washington. Just moments ago the President of the United States in the Oval Office with key Democratic Senators, the president saying full speed ahead when it comes to a big, and he wants a very big COVID relief package. Let's listen.

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JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Great. I said welcome all home. This is your new home for a while anyway. And it was a little bit of luck, the grace of god and the good will of the neighbors, the good not raisins is going to be longer than just four years. So, thanks.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (Inaudible)

BIDEN: I will get some Republican support.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (Inaudible)

BIDEN: I think we'll get some Republican. Thank you, guys. Thank you.

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KING: Come back in a moment, a little joke or not joke. The president made at the top of that conversation we'll come back to in a minute. But the meeting there with Senate Democrats coming just a couple hours after the president also called in remotely to a meeting of House Democrats up on Capitol Hill.

Again the message was the same, full speed ahead when it comes to a big COVID relief package. Our Chief Congressional Correspondent Manu Raju has some details of that call from the president, Manu?

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I got a copy of - actually attain the audio of that conference call Joe Biden speaking to House Democrats. He made clear that they are going to go big on this push. He said he did not want to sacrifice what he has been promising the American public during the campaign.

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RAJU: He said he would not turn back on his pledge to pass a major COVID relief package. He implored Democrats to stay united. But he also John indicated he's willing to pare back the stimulus checks that are at $1,400 under the plan in order to more target those to people who need it the most, while making clear he wants the Democrats to be on his side. Take a listen.

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BIDEN: This package gets money into the pockets. I don't believe we - American people need, we can't walk away from an additional $1,400 in direct checks we proposed because people need it. Frankly they've been promised it. Maybe we can - I think we can better target the number.

I'm OK with that. But we're going to start - I'm not going to start my administration by breaking my promise to the American people. I don't think the problem is that we're going to go too big to deal with this crisis. The problem is we're going to go too small.

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RAJU: Yes. And that last point, that point that he made about better targeting the stimulus checks could be important in the United States Senate where some centrist Democrats, mainly Joe Manchin of West Virginia has raised concerns that it could be two, why too many people can be eligible for that.

People make perhaps $300,000 a year or families that they could get those checks; perhaps they can narrow those stimulus checks in the proposal and win over the support of critical Senators like Joe Manchin. And also John he went on to say that Democrats have narrow majorities in the House and the Senate.

He said let's stick together. He also said that each one of us will face a tough - we've seen these tough midterm losses that happened in the first midterm of a new president. But he said we have small majorities, he said we are going to succeed or fail together. So pretty stark language there from the president to his Party. John?

KING: Pretty smart language in the sense that Democratic discipline will be absolutely critical to the Biden agenda going forward. Manu stay with us if you can. I want to bring in to the conversation, our Chief Political Correspondent Dana Bash and Jackie Kucinich the Washington Bureau Chief of "The Daily Beast."

And Dana so the first meeting in the Oval Office will be with Republican Senators. President Biden thought it was important to do that. But today first you call into House Democrats, we have to stick together. Let's do this. You have my back, I got yours.

Then you bring the new Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and the key Democratic chairman and chairwoman to the Oval Office and say, let's go. Essentially we will do this with all Democratic votes and if Republicans come along in the end, great, but let's not wait.

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: That's exactly right. Look he made a down payment in the relationship that he promised he would have with Republicans in that Monday evening meeting. He didn't go in there saying I'm going to somehow find a compromise between 1.9 trillion and 600 billion. That was never on the table.

But what we're seeing today is real negotiation. And it's real negotiation among and within the Democratic Party. That's how he needs to get this done. Because the margins are so narrow in the House but especially the Senate, Manu mentioned Joe Manchin.

He's talking about making some changes like targeting the stimulus checks really focusing on those who need them. And you know that might be a Republican idea, but it's also a necessity if he wants to get some moderate Democrats like Joe Manchin. So right now, that is the name of the game making sure that they have all of the Democrats on board because there is literally not room to lose even one Senator.

KING: And night and day, Jackie. Number one, it's important to listen to the new president say I'm not going to break a promise. I promised big. He did in the election. And Democrats also say after Biden promised big and won the election then they won the both Georgia Senate races.

When that was the big issue right, Republicans saying don't give Joe Biden a blank check, keep the Senate. So he believes he has the American people on his side. But it's also just striking he has now called into the Senate luncheon, called into House Democrats, brought Republicans to the White House and brought Democrats to the White House.

We only saw congressional leaders meeting with President Trump when it was a crisis, when the train was about to go off the tracks and they had to have a meeting. This is a very different president. The Republicans during the Trump years often said it's better if the president stays out of the negotiations because he only messes them up. This is a new day.

JACKIE KUCINICH, WASHINGTON BUREAU CHIEF, THE DAILY BEAST: That was a different president because you couldn't tell what Trump was going to do the next day. He might say one thing to one group of people and then end up tweeting something else.

So it is as you said, completely night and day. And while Joe Biden is meeting with all of these groups, he has really tried to assure Democrats that he's not going to give away the store.

In the recording that Manu was talking about, he said specifically that the Republican bill is not in the cards. Because remember during the campaign, during the presidential campaign, particularly during the primary, there was concern that Biden would perhaps work with Republicans in a way that would be a detrimental to Democratic priorities.

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KUCINICH: And so by this first push, by this first giant piece of legislation that he's helping to bring everyone together and shepherd through, it appears that he's trying to show them no, we're going to do it with or without Republicans. They can join if they want. But if not we're going to plow ahead no matter what.

KING: And Manu, what does this do to the timetable? There had been this question of if you're going to get into prolonged negotiations with Republicans would take over. Today the president making clear Democrats go full speed ahead in the House and the Senate.

If Republicans come along in the end maybe we will make some changes to see if they will. Great, but move ahead. Plus Chuck Schumer now is clearly the majority leader and the Democrats now that they have this organizing agreement in the Senate get the committee chairmanships after this sort of two-week only in Washington delay after the inauguration. So how much does that affect the timetable?

RAJU: Well the timetable is by the end of the month or early March. So there's no harm for Joe Biden to have negotiations talk with Republicans, see if it goes anywhere. Because it's going to take time for the process to play out in the House and the Senate because they're planning on using the budget process that essentially allows them to pass legislation without Republican support in the Senate.

And that take there is a two-step process, the first step is happening this week. They're trying to pass a nonbinding budget blueprint. That will trigger their efforts to pass the legislation without Republican support. So that process takes a few weeks.

So in the meantime, Biden's going to have these conversations if they go anywhere near what he's talking about $1.9 trillion perhaps they'll think about something different. But John at the moment they're going forward without Republican support.

It's going to probably get done by the end of this month or early next month. And then the question will be can they keep the Party united particularly in the Senate where they're going to need all 50 Democrats if no Republicans join them.

KING: Will be fascinating to watch it play out. Manu, Dana, Jackie, stay with us. When we come back it's a big day for Republicans too, especially House Republicans. Two family feuds inside the House GOP, a big leadership test for Kevin McCarthy.

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KING: House Republicans meet today and put simply, they are a mess. One topic for discussion is Congresswoman Liz Cheney's job as the number three in the House Republican leadership. She you might remember voted to impeach Donald Trump, and many of the former president's supporters among House Republicans want Cheney punished.

The second big family feud is very much related to the first. Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene is among the most vocal Trump supporters in the House. She is also a conspiracy theorist with a history of anti-Semitism, racism and supporting violence against political opponents.

Democrats say Taylor Greene has no place in the congress. And they vow to strip her of committee assignments if Republicans don't clean up their own mess. But Congresswoman Greene says she will not voluntarily stand down from her committees and the Republican leader, Kevin McCarthy, so far unwilling to take a stand on his own. So a House Republican group that helped settle committee slots is now

considering this question that the answer isn't obvious is being used by Democrats to make the case that House Republicans are under the spell of Donald Trump and the QAnon conspiracy.

Back with us CNN's Manu Raju, CNN's Dana Bash and Jackie Kucinich of "The Daily Beast" Manu, this is a Republican mess, the House Democratic Majority Leader though Steny Hoyer is involved in the conversations because he says if Republicans don't clean it up, Democrats are ready to act tomorrow, right.

RAJU: Yes and actually they're going to be taking their first official steps today. A statement that just came out from House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer says that the Democrats are planning to move forward to strip Marjorie Taylor Greene from her committee assignments both in the House education committee and House budget committee.

This after Hoyer and Kevin McCarthy had a conversation this morning. It did not turn out that they reach any sort of an agreement. I'm told heading into that meeting Kevin McCarthy wanted to see if he could head off this floor vote and see if they could come to some sort of resolution.

They had discussed a variety of options among the Republicans last night into a meeting that laid into the night about whether they can punish her in other ways and - from the committees, from both committees maybe just take her off the education committee, given the conspiracy theories that she said before she was a member of congress about the Parkland Mass - in 2018 being a false flag operation.

Obviously, that is 100 percent not true and that has caused alarm on all corners here on Capitol Hill. But Republicans are grappling with how to deal with that contending that it's not necessarily appropriate to move ahead and punish a member for things they said before they were a member of congress.

So that's how they were thinking about it and debating what to do behind the scenes last night. They took it to Steny Hoyer this morning. Hoyer said no, she needs to be punished the same way that Steve King the former Iowa congressman was punished after his racist comments came to light in the last congress.

At that time John remember, he was stripped from his committee assignments. Hoyer and the Democrats want Greene to be stripped from her committee assignments. And the Republicans don't ultimately make a decision today, and then they will move tomorrow to strip her from those spots, a pretty dramatic escalation here.

But one in which Democrats say they have no choice but Republicans are warning about the precedent it would set John.

KING: A warning about the precedent Dana and Jackie, but at the same time this is a mess of their own making. Again you could get the idea that nobody's perfect, maybe she said one or two things before she came to congress if she were contrite. If she would say I'm sorry, if she would say I've learned a lesson,

that's one thing. She says she will not apologize. She has backed off a little bit on the school shootings under pressure.