Sen. Thom Tillis Talks Powell, Foreign Policy

We begin live on Capitol Hill on a very busy day here once again in Washington, intentions escalating with Iran, a power struggle over control of Greenland, and of course, questions this week about the independence of the Federal Reserve. We tackle it all now with a special guest. Republican Senator Tom Tillis of North Carolina is with us. He serves on both the Senate Banking Committee and the Senate Judiciary Committee, and Senator is great to see you. Thanks

Look, if he's heard that from sources on the ground, I'd have to say the sources. But this is a murderous regime that never stops killing. It's just a matter of how many, not whether or not they're pursuing it. So I'm very skeptical that something overnight could have actually occurred.

To have a to have.

Gotten from thousands to zero just doesn't make sense to me.

Pretty remarkable. You had a speech on the floor of the Senate the other day in which you said that you are sick of stupid, made a headline on the Washington Post, and you were talking in that speech about the people around the president, not Donald Trump himself. Is he getting bad advice?

I think the president is. I've enjoyed a good relationship with the President. It's probably different from other members. I'm very direct.

Look.

I spent twenty years in top tier management consulting. I spent twenty years in legislative politics. I like to think that I can help look around corners. I see advice here that's not taking care of the president's best interest. The Greenland position is a good example. We need people to make sure the president has a fully weighted set of criteria before he moves forward on some of these policies.

I see no.

Path where his aspiration for Greenland occurs unless it's a negotiation and something far short of what he has in mine.

We talked to Senator Chris Koons at this time last evening, who I know is taking part in a bipartisan codell to Denmark with you and others. He was strident in his language, making it clear that NATO is at stake.

Is that where we are no.

I think we're going to get into a little bit of a hyperbolic language here. Chris is a friend of mine, he's a Democrat. I could see where he may take that position. But I've been the Republican leader of the Sennato Obserber Group since twenty eighteen. I'm going there to resure every reassure everyone that unlike what angered me last week, was one of the President's advisers making the statement that it was the position of the US government that Greenland.

Would become a part of the United States.

He doesn't have an election certificate, he is not a member of the Article one branch.

I am.

It can be his position, it can currently be the position of the President. But the people, the people in Denmark, the NATO countries, our allies, our partners, the people who have gone to war with us, fought side by side with us, lost life when they came to Afghanistan, and consistent with their Article five commitment.

In NATO, I want to make them very.

Aware of the fact that there is not support for this in Congress, regardless of what they may say in the White House. I think that an illegal taking of another territory from a sovereign nation and a member of NATO is just not good advice. And I'm going there to tell them there's at least one branch of government that stands with the NATO Alliance and still wanting to achieve the President's goals. Of course, we need to project

We've heard a lot of justifications for this idea. It was critical minerals, it was strategic importance, the fact that it was a neighbor. Today President says we need Greenland to build the Golden Dome. Would you be able to officials in Copenhagen that there will be no military action against Greenland.

If there is military action against Greenland, I will be one of the first people to file and co sponsor war Powers resolution it will pass. That is what I'm trying to communicate to the President.

We want to help him.

I support the vast majorities of the President's policies have in the past well in the future, but we have to speak truth to power when the single most important alliance in the history of the democratic world is put into question, and it shouldn't be so.

If you know, if I.

Understand with the meeting with the foreign ministers that they came away frustrated and that Vice President Vance may have taken a different position, I just respectfully disagree. This is not the way you strengthen alliances that are vitally important for the safety and security of this world.

Understood to be clear, the existing arrangement that we have with Denmark and with Greenland would allow.

Us to positions. That's why that's what you.

Know, as a fiscal conservative think about this. We don't have to pay whatever we have to pay or go to the expense of whatever it would take to take this country and then have a discount with all the loss of alliances. At our height, we had as many as seventeen military installations there.

There's no question that.

Denmark and that Greenland would like to have American technology to potentially fully realize the rarer minerals potential they have there. There's no doubt that the infrastructure that at one point allowed as many as seventeen military basis could be modernized and we could be there with an ally projecting power in a contested part of the world.

That's what I mean.

It would cost us less money, it would produce less tumult and give us the same sort of capability. What is not to like about that plan? The question I have is did anyone actually tell the president that all that was possible? And it was possible not because of some future planning, but it's been that way in the past.

Right, Yes, all of that said, we've also got something cooking in Venezuela.

Oh yeah.

Should there be a war powers No?

I see that's a I think that by voting for the war powers resolution that Senator came, it's a messaging exercise, right, how are they different? Let me well, I'll explain Number one, it's a messaging exercise. Does anybody really believe that this president wouldn't veto it?

And it is subject to veto authority?

Sure, there's also a question as to whether or not the House would even whether it would be successful in the House.

So at the end of the day, it's a messaging exercise.

That they have the war powers in the House, I know, but I thought it.

Sends a message that I didn't support, that I would not be supporting what the President did in Venezuela. I am thrilled with the precision and the exquisite execution of what it took to get Maduro and his wife into custody and now, you know, have to defend themselves in a court of law. I don't want anyone to think that I'm the least bit concerned with the execution of that.

Week that I'm happy with what they did.

In the future, if boots go on the ground, of course, we're going to have to have a war powers resolution.

That's the line for you.

Yeah, yeah, we're going to need all that because at some point, if we really want Venezuela to be successful, we've got to have a long term plan that goes far beyond this President, so they can achieve what their real potential is in Venezuela, and it's enormous.

We're talking about a ten year build out there.

For core I've worked.

I worked in Venezuela around the turn of the century, and I've always said they were one of the most extraordinary, their natural resources, their geographic positioning, they could be the envy of the Western hemisphere if we help them, and I think that's what the President wants to do.

Interesting, I have to ask you about what's going on with the Chairman of the Federal Reserve.

This has put you on the content riach week.

Say it's only Wednesday, Senator, You've been on front pages all over the country as essentially the face of opposition to this idea, at least from the Republican side of the isle. President Trump says, you didn't know what was coming. The idea of J. Powell in an orange jumpsuit has upset a lot of people up here on Capitol Hill. Is that where this is going.

Yeah, Look, I think I probably leaned in more heavily than other people, but everybody should look at the statements made by House and Senate members about their concern The President said he wasn't aware of it. I wasn't either when I when I saw something like that, I thought we had to move very quickly again to make sure that the markets. I think the markets could have reacted very differently this week if everybody thought that the independence of the FED was about.

To be shredd like, it didn't take it that seriously.

I think that the markets saw statements from members of Congress and others who are saying, look, you want to go through this process. It's remarkable to me that someone in the DOJ would move without the President's knowledge, but apparently they did. But look, if suddenly the threat of a lawsuit can take a chair out of play, how can anybody think that that's anything more than a de facto ending the independence of the FED?

And we all know what that does to markets worldwide.

You said that you would block President's efforts to name a new chair until this matter is resolved? How do we define no?

Actually, to be clear, I will block any effort to name any member of the FED board until this matter is resolved.

What we find resolved with charges withdrawn.

Or it's either got to be fully adjudicated, or they don't move forward with an indictment, and they close the case and they explain reasons why it'll take as long as they've chosen to take that. I didn't put them here. They put them here. Yes, And I think that why because to me, to move on would almost validate that this is a way that you can actually get the FED under heel. I mean, that's why I'm not trying to be cantakers. Again, I support this president in this case.

Yeah, as I mentioned, this is upset a number of people up here at the markets.

MA anymore.

Look at former Treasury secretaries, look at I mean, this is a Bob partisan.

Concerned happy about it either.

I'm not going to speak for him, but he didn't appear to.

He did not appear to be. So would we end up in a world where J. Powell says, you know what, I'm not going anywhere, and he's on the board till twenty eight.

He could be, but you know, I think that everything that I've heard from Chair Powell is that he was stepping down from the chairman's role and he may or may not serve out his entire term. But with this sort of a flex from some person in the DCA district, I know how I would react to it. And we'll just have to see how mister Powell does after the underlying matters adjudicated.

We just walked through three big buckets here.

Yeah.

Do you like the way you're being framed in the media as to check on Trump the Republican?

No, I don't can say nothing.

I don't you said, you've never had an argue with an argument with him, Presidently Trump.

And I'm going to throw this phone over here because somebody's trying to call me, and I'm tired of I think you're tired. It's probably a friend of mine, because I do for you. I played tricks on them. I call him during you all's interviews. I did it with mckenry the other day. Thanks, So maybe it's getting me back then anyway, was so you know, look, I am

So you think you're surrounded by the wrong people.

I know, I haven't said that he's got some good people there. I'm going to go through a list because I've decided I've talked to him individually. Going through a list, I'm saying, the majority of you guys are good stuff, but some people are given the president.

Advice is problematic, and it's my job.

To speak truth and hopefully we'll maintain a good relationship that's entirely up to the president.

Well, we appreciate your candid very much and I always enjoy the time. Yeah, you're spending some time with us to see if down Capitol Hill centator.

Thank thank you, Joe.

That's of course, Tom Tillis of North Carolina