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Joining us now, as we promised, live from Capitol Hill is the US Speaker of the House, Mike Johnson. Welcome back to Bloomberg TV and Radio, mister Speaker. But looking forward to the conversation, and I appreciate your time this evening. I'm sure you're having a ball and you don't want this to end anytime soon. But I'm just wondering what your gut check is here and how long you think this is going to go on.
This is a very frustrating exercise for us. It's no fun at all, Joe. And that's because real Americans are feeling real harm because of this. It's political games being played by Democrats in the Senate. There is one reason, and one reason alone, that they've all just magically changed their tune. I mean, they've done one hundred to eighty degree turn. And what they have always said and done emphatically in keeping the government open. They said as recently
as March of this year. We're playing the highlight reel tape outside the Speaker's office right now. They all said, in their own words, you can't shut the government down. It's too painful. Something change. What changed was the political calculation. Chuck Shermer is worried about, as was just said, an
attack or a challenge from his left flank. He's afraid that the Marxist wave in New York is going to take him over as well, because he represents that state, and so he's got to pick a fight with Trump and show that he's fighting. Well, they picked a fight that has nothing to do with stop gut funding. They're talking about the Obamacare subsidies, for example. That's a December
thirty one policy issue. We were always going to negotiate that and debate it and deliberate over it in October November. That always has been on the schedule and they know that. But they're trying to pretend that's the issue of the day.
It's not.
It's a red herring. It's a distraction. They're not doing their jobs and real Americans are getting hurt.
Well, we spoke just a few moments ago with Congresswoman Catherine Clark who said, we just want to gesture, mister speaker, would you consider a promise to bring that negotiated legislation to a floor vote up or down. We'll make sure that happens before the end of the year.
Well, the Speaker of the House is in no position to project forward what the outcome of a big policy debate is going to be. That'd be unprecedented for anyone to do that, and I won't.
What we have told them.
Is the obvious fact that there are ongoing negotiations and discussions going on today between Republicans and Democrats, and certainly within our own caucuses about how some of that would need to be reformed. Look, there's a lot of conservatives who have real problems with the Obamacare subsidy. Okay, when the government subsidizes something, it means it's not working. It's like the ev mandates. You know, people didn't want to
buy electric vehicles. The government said we'll give you seventy five hundred dollars cash if you do, and they still didn't buy enough of them. Right, when the government subsidizes something, it means the market's not working. Obamacare was supposed to bring down the cost of health care. Premiums of skyrocketed since it was created in two thousand and ten. They're
up like sixty percent, So something's not working. There's real reforms that are needed, but it's a complex issue that takes a lot of time for members on both sides of the island, in both chambers to negotiate. They're trying to search short circuit all that. Right now, that's not how this process works. The clean cr is so simple, Joe is twenty four pages in length. It has exactly zero Republican policy writers on it.
We made it so simple. We just said, do what you've always done.
Let's keep the lights on and keep the appropriations and the negotiation process going. They refuse to do it because again they want to show a fight because they can't stand President Trump.
That's what this is.
And in the meantime, American people are being used as pawns in this game, and it is so frustrating to us. I think it's shameful. I think it's immoral for them to do what they're doing right now.
Well, I know your position on that, and you we hear about the Schumer shut down a lot around here. Tom Emmer was with us just a couple of days ago making the point that we've heard this over the past couple of weeks, but what happens if Chuck Schumer doesn't come around for you? What happens if weeks go by. If members of the military are not being paid, are there off ramps here for you? Mister Speaker, Will you
start reaching out directly to Democrats? Do we need another meeting in the Oval office.
Look, I am a good faith operator. I am a negotiator. I like to find common ground. Here's the problem, because we were operating in good faith and doing the most basic simple thing, I mean, the bare minimum piece of legislation to keep the lights on. I literally don't have anything to negotiate on the CR. I can't go into that document then say, oh, let me pull off these Republican priorities and see if we can get some more Democrats to.
Vote on it. I don't have anything to pull off of it.
I sent over a clean continued resolution, and by the way, very important. It continues Biden era policies and spending, which we conservatives don't like. We're trying to change that, but we need the appropriations process to finish it. All we needed was seven more weeks on the clock to finish the process. And the Republicans and Democrats who are appropriators are the ones that decided that date and decided it should be clean. And everything was going smoothly until Chuck
Schimmer decided to blow it up. Is he going to fold? I don't know, but I'll tell you what needs to happen. Some other Senate Democrats need to come to their senses and realize they should not be blamed for the pain that's being inflicted on the people. Make it stop as soon as possible, do the right thing and join your Republican colleagues and open the government back up.
That's why I ask if you're reaching out to some of the Democratic senators, mister speaker, have you talked to Chuck Schumer since your Oval Office meeting?
No? Not since the Oval Office meeting. But I'll tell you what.
The President made an impassioned plea while we were there to please not do this, Please don't shut the government down, Chuck, and he was spurned, and Chuck Schumer and HACKEM. Jeffreys walked out defiantly. You know they wanted to pick this fight. It's very clear. The question everybody's asking is how long October fifteenth troops begin to lose a real paycheck, and you've got TSA agents and Border patrol agents and all these people sacrificing their own safety. To protect everyone else,
and they won't be paid. You've got nutrition programs and health services and femous services and all sorts of other things stalled, and half the civilian workforce of the federal government is now furloughed. This is dangerous stuff. Real people are being hurt. Air traffic controllers are falling back on the job because they don't have enough personnel. It's a serious stuff, and we need the Democrats to come to their senses and do the right thing.
Well, of course there's.
A thread of mass layoffs coming from the president. He said maybe four or five days he would make a decision on that. But there's also been a conversation and I heard you speaking earlier in your briefing about back pay for federal workers who have been furloughed. There's, of course a law on the books around furloughed workers getting back bay today, and I know that you have been
speaking to the letter of a law. The President yesterday yesterday said though that there are some federal workers who do not deserve the quote was to be taken care of. Is this issue the purview of Congress? Do you plan to follow this law or is this somehow up to russ vote. Now.
Well, look, there's different legal analyzes that are floating around right now, and I've been so busy with this i haven't had a chance to dig into it.
I am a lawyer.
I'm looking forward to reading through that because I kind of get into all the scholarship side of this. It has always been my understanding that the law requires furloughed workers to receive back pay, and of course that's been the tradition. And I'm not sure exactly what the President is referring to there there. I haven't had a chance to talk to him about that specific issue yet, but
we will. I can tell you this though, the view of the White House, the view of the President himself, is that he doesn't want federal workers to be used as ponds.
Here.
We've got some great patriotic Americans who work for our agencies and provide essential services to the people. They should not suffer the harms of people who want to pay political games. And I think this really important principle for us to advance.
Do you worry about mass layoffs coming as early as next week and that actually poisoning the well even more between Republicans and Democrats? What would be the impact of a.
Move like that, well, look, I'm worried about all sorts of adverse effects because of how it affects the American people. We had some analysis today that every week that the Democrats shut down continues, we could lose fifteen billion dollars in gross domestic product. I mean, it's a real hit for real people, and it has a reverberating effect. And if you keep it closed for a month, then one of the estimates I saw today is you lose forty
three thousand civilian employees. You know, because it has a ripple effect throughout the economy. We can't afford to do that.
Right now.
Things were going in the right direction and this is a terrible setback for the country. It also has implications for national secure I mean, you look at things like nuclear deterrence. Those programs are stalled right now, right and every day you do that, it has real world consequences for us. Not a game, and we need to end it right now.
I know that you've said it to House Republicans at least reportedly, that you would give them forty eight hours notice if they had to come back into town. When folks left following the vote on the CR in the House, if they're talking next door in the Senate, if some sort of deal is broker that might alter the CR as it stands. Now, do you plan to call your members back?
Look, the devil's in the details, but I don't know how they could possibly alter it. We made it so simple there Again, there is nothing to take off of that. It is virtually identical to what Chuck Schumer himself championed in March of this year. And so we're not going to strap on extraneous policy issues and all of that. That would take a long time. Because the government's now closed down, they need to pass the clean CR, turn the lights back on, and get everybody back to work.
I'm just so frustrated with the nonsense around this, and I think more and more people at Homer as well. I saw a rass must and poll that came out a couple of hours ago. Forty nine percent of the American people were polled. So that Democrats did this to give benefits to illegal aliens.
They are not wrong.
Two hundred billion dollars in their counter proposal would pay illegal aliens the benefits that hard earned, hardworking American taxpayers provide.
We're not doing that.
We're not going to add a trillion and a half new dollars to spending. We're not taking Chuck Schumer's ridiculous counterproposal. We're going to do the right thing for the people, and the Republicans are on the job to do it.
I know you had a couple of visitors at your office today, mister Speaker, a couple of Democratic Senators. I believe Kelly and Diego had a lot of things to say about the swearing in of a new member of Congress from Arizona. I also saw Congress with Mike Lawler from New York get into an altercation with HAKEM. Jefferies as he was coming out of his office here. I know that elbows can be sharp on Capitol Hill, But mister Speaker, what's happened to decorum?
Is this a new law? Oh?
Look, I work on decorum around here all the time. Everybody knows that's my record. I started it when I came to Washington in January twenty seventeen. I authored the Honor and Civility Caucus Pledge and the Commitment to Civility.
I mean, we have to maintain this.
There fights about policy, but it shouldn't be personal. I try to model that myself. I try to encourage colleagues to do it. But I would tell you the tension here is very high because it's high because the stakes are so high, and you get real Americans, real constituents back home who are really suffering because of the nonsense, and it gets as upset here sometimes, you know, I understand that emotion. We've got to keep it in check. We've got to get everybody working together, and we've got to.
Get the lights back on.
I want to ask you about that new member Grihalva, the congress woman elects from Arizona. The senators were asking you to swear her in, or I guess they were urging you to swear her in, which I know you've done a couple of times for Republican members in pro forma sessions. These two senators were yelling about Jeffrey Epstein, I think to make a point here, and they did get some on that. Mister speaker, Is this an Epsteine issue or is this a process issue?
They're master's at distraction. To go back and watch the video of Senator Reuben Gego. These are the two Democrat senators from Arizona, Mark Kelly and Gayego, and they're voting to keep the government closed. I told them, if you want to get your House colleague from your state, take the oath of office, then open the government so we get back to regular session. They claim everything's about Epstein.
It's a joke, master's a distraction. We did. This is a long standing tradition in the Congress when you administer the oath after a special election, you do it the first time that the Congress is back in session. After that, we did change that modify it earlier this year. On one occasion, we had two Floridians who came in on the same special election, but it was a very different set of circumstances. I explained to them very quickly. We had a scheduled date for the oath office ceremony. The
House went out of session unexpectedly. They already had their family and friends here and it was already pre arranged. So we just went ahead and went through the motion. We're going to recollect Grihalba. We'll be sworn in as soon as we get back to regular session. She never had a scheduled date because you got elected after the House went out of session. This is real simple. We're going to do that as soon as we get back.
But they are in charge of turning the lights on so Congress can get back to work.
Well, I appreciate your answering that for us, mister Speaker. Lastly, if you were to join me, say next Wednesday, would we be having the same conversation about a shutdown.
I am on my knees praying that we would not be. We have got to get the government operated again. It's the most basic function of the federal government is to serve the people, keep the people safe, and keep the lights on. And we need the Democrats that we're here to see the light and do that.
We appreciate the conversation. House Speaker, Mike Johnson, thank you. You're always welcome on Bloomberg TV and radio.