Next, The Source is with a powerful Republican voice who has been pushing for Russia sanctions to happen. House Speaker Mike Johnson joins me now. Thank you so much for being here, Speaker Johnson, because you had said before that you thought sanctions on Russia were long overdue, in your words. Do you think that these moves tonight go far enough?
Well, it's a very important step. We applaud the President. He's returning peace through strength, and that's a common theme now that we've seen exhibited around the globe. The strength of his personality. You heard the UN Secretary-General, who you caught earlier this afternoon. He said in his own words, "President Trump is the only figure on the planet strong enough to help bring an end to that war." And you have to compel Russia to engage in the peace process. They've shown they cannot be trusted. There's a big appetite in Congress to have sanctions like this, and I think it's a very important step.
And of course, right now we're here on Capitol Hill. The government shutdown is very much still underway. One question I think a lot of people have tonight is how long they should be prepared for this to go on for. In your view, do you think the American people should be prepared for this shutdown to last until November?
You know, the only person who can answer that question is Chuck Schumer and his Democrat colleagues in the Senate. They've now voted a dozen times to keep the government closed. And this is really important, Kaitlan. Today, there was a big development on Capitol Hill. The second highest ranked House Democrat in leadership, Whip Katherine Clark, admitted openly that they have shut the government down and that they are using hard-working American families as leverage. For what? So that they can show a fight against Trump. And also so that they can restore $200 billion in free health care paid for by US taxpayers to illegal aliens. Yes, that's in their bill, and it's just part of the $1.5 trillion that they have demanded to spend. We're not going to do that. They know we're not going to do that. And she said in her own words today, "We know that families will suffer, but this is only one of the leverage times that we have." She said that in her own words, and it was pretty shocking today to hear them say that. They usually don't say the quiet parts out loud.
You're saying Democrats are making that argument, talking about what Katherine Clark said today. I do want you to listen. We've heard an argument similar to that one before.
Why shouldn't we be trying to force this government shutdown fight to get something out of it that's good for the American people? How else are you going to get moderates to vote for spending cuts if they are not up against the fact that they need to pass these things to get out of a shutdown themselves? What other good can come down from shutdowns?
That was the President just the other day, but Russ Vought and J.D. Vance before. I mean, some people might look at that and say, "Well, how is what Democrats are doing now different than what Republicans have argued before?"
It's very different. Those were different times and different circumstances. Let me explain why. This is the first time in history that any party has chosen to close the government down on a clean CR. In previous shutdown battles, you had a lot of different competing priorities, and you had the party who was engaging in the shutdown making demands and adding their partisan priorities to the CR itself. We didn't do that, Kaitlan. We have a totally clean, totally non-partisan, good faith CR. We passed it 33 days ago, and they have kept the government shut down because they refused to do it. It's the first time this has ever happened in history, and it's very audacious. We don't know when the end of this is. Only the Democrats in the Senate can answer that question. And I pray that there's at least five centrist Democrats left who will give up this gambit, do the right thing, and get the government open because real people really are suffering because of this.
Republican Senator Tommy Tuberville said that if he thinks if President Trump got involved here, he could move this. We heard the similar sentiment from Jeff Van Drew, the Republican House member. He said we absolutely need the President involved. If we're hearing Republicans saying that, and even Democrats like Chuck Schumer saying that Trump's got to get involved, shouldn't the President be directly involved here?
The President was directly involved. Remember, before this whole thing began, a few days before the shutdown began and that deadline hit us, the President invited Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries into the Oval Office. I was there. Leader John Thune was there in the Senate. And the President tried to negotiate with them. He tried to appeal to their common sense and asked them to do the right thing. And he was rebuffed. So, the President has said he's anxious and willing to sit down with them and talk about any issue under the sun, but they have to reopen the government first and not hold the American people hostage. Because, Kaitlan, that's what's happening right now. You have troops on the verge of not being paid. You have air traffic controllers who are not being paid. Border Patrol agents, TSA agents. You have nutrition services to people in need. You have veterans health services. All these things are suspended because the Democrats are playing games right now, and it's a really dangerous thing to do.
We heard from one of your members today, Marjorie Taylor Greene, who wrote this morning that on y'all's GOP conference call, she said, "Speaker Johnson said he has ideas and pages of policy, but did not say a single policy plan." She said, "I find it unacceptable that Republicans are sitting on the sidelines doing nothing to fix this health care disaster that is leading many Americans into financial ruin." That's her words. She says you're sitting on the sidelines. What's your response to Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene?
Well, bless her heart. That's an absurd statement. Obviously, we're not — these conference calls are monitored by media, so we're not going to have actual strategy discussions on a line where you have hundreds of people listening in because it would be reported on the front page. We have been working on this for a long time. We worked on it today. We've been working on it every day. Marjorie is not here in Washington. She's not on the committees of jurisdiction, and she's not involved in those specific discussions, but she will be soon because they'll be related to all the House Republicans. This was always going to be a discussion and a debate that was going to be held in bipartisan fashion, by the way, in the month of October and November. We know that the end of the year is the end of those COVID-era subsidies, and there's real reforms that have to be made if they're going to be extended. The Democrats knew that. The Republicans knew that. And it was always on the table for discussion. They have made that a red herring issue for now again because they wanted to show a fight against Trump. This is purely about Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries in New York trying to avoid a challenge from a Marxist candidate in their next re-election cycles. 100%. That's why they're doing a 180-degree turn and doing exactly the opposite of what they did as recently as March of this year.
Speaker, she's saying that the Republicans aren't doing anything to address the health care issue here that Democrats are arguing about. Are you saying that there is a Republican plan and you're just not talking about it?
No, I'm saying there's lots of discussion about it, but we don't relay it on a conference call with hundreds of people listening in. We have many ideas on how to bring down the cost of health care, to continue to do that, and we've already demonstrated it in the Working Families Tax Cut. We had real reforms to Medicaid that you and I discussed that have brought down the cost and saved about $185 billion for taxpayers and made the program stronger for the people that actually rely upon them because we got ineligible enrollees off the program. We have many ideas like that to bring down the cost of health care and increase access and quality of care. And all that will be rolled out in the days ahead. We have plenty of time to do it. It was always going to be done at the last quarter of the year, and that's what we're waiting on, and that's why we need the Democrats in the Senate to stop this crazy gambit, do the right thing, and reopen the government so we can finish all that work.
But if you have ideas and you have plans, why not have that out there to talk about in the public so the people can hear that debate happening? I mean, you could have committees in session right now talking about this.
I think the question is maybe when we can get back to regular session. We can't.
No, we're not going to allow Chuck Schumer to play selfish political games and hold the American people hostage. We will not negotiate with legislative terrorists. We're not going to let them do that. We can't. We owe it to the people to get this government operating again. Republicans have now voted 12 or 13 times, counting the House and Senate, 13 times to open the government, and the Democrats have voted 13 times to close it down. It is wrong. There is no reason for it, and they can't even tell you tonight what it is they're demanding, except for one and a half trillion dollars in new spending, $200 billion for illegal aliens to get health care. They want to send billions of dollars overseas for wasteful foreign aid programs and all sorts of other stuff.
