Harry Reid: The Senate has gone astray

LAS VEGAS – Former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid thinks Republicans have been seduced by President Donald Trump and have forgotten the interest of the US Senate.

Sitting at his desk in his old Senate chair with his name engraved on the back, Reid complained that the Republican-run upper house had become too submissive to the president, led by the current leader of the majority, Mitch McConnell.

"I can not imagine how Republicans are so consistent with any [Trump] "I want to," Reid told me during a recent interview in his Las Vegas office. "What is the role of the Senate?"

It's not because Trump is an aberration, he warns: "Trump did not create the Republican Congress; the Republican Congress created Trump.

If Reid thinks the Senate is a shell of itself, Republicans would likely tell the former Senate majority leader that he had helped speed up his demise. Reid was an effective but controversial leader. He will be remembered for his "nuclear transfer" in 2013, by exploding the obstruction of the Senate, long considered sacred.

Reid attributes this to a practical question, saying he had "no choice" over McConnell, who was interfering with the choices of the court and the cabinet of former President Barack Obama.

"It was the right thing to do," he said bluntly.

Reid blames Congress Republicans for the fall of the Senate – recalling their conduct on Obama's choice of the Supreme Court, Merrick Garland, who never got a vote. More recently, he has seen Senate Republicans allow Trump to issue an emergency statement to fund the wall of his border. With this precedent now created, Reid warned that Democrats could do something similar in the future on a subject like gun control.

The 79-year-old former executive is now retired for three years and is back at work after receiving treatment for pancreatic cancer (which he recently spoke to is in remission). Reid is largely confined to a wheelchair nowadays but seems to be in top form. While many Democrats run for president to ask his opinion on the policy to be followed, he is certainly still an influential player in Nevada and national politics.

Reid has not endorsed a Democrat in the 2020 race. But he warns the entire party that winning the election is not a given and that Trump could very well succeed again. "We must first address this issue recognizing that he could be reelected," Reid said. "We can not let this man be elected again. I think that it must be taken. You must fight him, but not on his terms, on your terms. "

And it was clear: Democrats should try to beat Trump by 2020, not to waste their time trying to dismiss the president. Even with the current "tribalism" on Capitol Hill, Reid said it was crucial that Congress do its job rather than bogged down in dismissal.

"We will not have done anything if there is an impeachment procedure," he said. "We would devote all our time to that. nothing else. "

In a lengthy interview, Reid discussed the state of Congress politics and democratic politics, as well as his signature burns.

Ella Nilsen

I wanted to ask you questions about the buccaneer. Do you maintain your decision to get rid of the obstruction for most presidential appointments in 2013?

Harry Reid

Let's go back and look where we were. Obama was president of the United States. We had the DC circuit that had four or five members. DC Circuit is the second largest court in the country, just below the Supreme Court. Republicans do not like organized workers, they can not face them directly. They marched in front of the National Council of Industrial Relations. They could not even have a quorum because they would not approve the arrival of new members to the board.

We had Cabinet members and deputy ministers that Obama could not get approved. We had no choice. I did not have a choice. And that's why the Democrats have agreed to change the rules. Now, first of all, understand that the rules have been changed in the Senate over and over again. I did it; He was the right thing to do. We have approved more than 100 judges for Obama, we have filled all the members of his cabinet and his deputy ministers with few exceptions, we have dealt with the National Labor Relations Board, we have done a lot of good things . And that would not have happened otherwise. We had to do that or the White House, the president, would become a meaningless person.

Ella Nilsen

Some 2020 candidates, including Elizabeth Warren, have called for the total elimination of systematic obstruction. Do you agree?

Harry Reid

No, I do not think it should be done gradually. I did not write but I approved an article written by one of my longtime collaborators, Bill Dauster, in NYU Law Journal. It was a good and good article, because unless things change, it was said that the House of Representatives was simply going to cross the Capitol and you would have two rooms. Now, would it be the end of the world? No, because it would always be bicameral. But you would have a simple majority to determine what is happening in the Senate. As I said, the Senate is not the end of the world, but it would be better if we did not do it.

In the past, the buccaneer was used sparingly. However, the Republican Congress in recent years has all filibustered so that 60 votes have become the vote. As we have written in this article, unless it changes, the House of Representatives will move down the hall and we will only have two more chambers.

Ella Nilsen

With this question about obstruction, when you look at what the Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell, did, what brand do you think he left in the Senate?

Harry Reid

Well, I think the worst thing that was done by the Republicans is what they did with the Supreme Court. To think – now, first of all, the president of the Republican Judiciary Committee when they were in the majority, [Orrin] Hatch of Utah, said that the most qualified person to be a Supreme Court judge is Merrick Garland. He said that. I do not do that; that's what he said. And so when Merrick Garland arrived … we were all very happy, but Orrin Hatch got away from it and this man never even had the right to vote. That's what the Republicans provoked in the Senate. If they have a black mark against them, it is certainly what they did with the Supreme Court.

Ella Nilsen

When you got rid of the buccaneer in 2013, were you worried that it would go further with the Supreme Court? And now, given what McConnell did with the Supreme Court?

Harry Reid

Well, it's possible. As I said, the rules in the Senate have been amended many times over the years. But what's happening comes around. Republicans, for example, voted to give – difficult to mention his name as president – President Trump the power to make an emergency statement for this wall. If they do so, they create a precedent by saying, "Okay, it seems to me that if he can do that for a wall, then we can do something for the weapons to fire". Every year, 57,000 Americans are killed. So, I repeat, what's happening comes around. They'd better be careful.

Ella Nilsen

If we got to the point where we eliminated the filibuster, do you believe it would be possible to govern in such a divided Senate?

Harry Reid

Oh, of course, of course. It would probably be easier to do that than the Republicans are doing now, causing a filibuster on everything. You need 60 votes on everything – it's not as it should be. Congress would always work, [but] it would not work as well as in the past because of Senate rules. But if we changed them, the Senate would still have a six-year term. as Jefferson said, they should pour the coffee into the saucer and let it cool. It would not end the world of Congress.

Ella Nilsen

What do you think of McConnell getting so close to Trump?

Harry Reid

Well, I know Mitch McConnell; I consider him a friend. I can not imagine how Republicans are so compliant about everything that it [Trump] wants. What is the Senate?

As I always said, I did not work for the president, I worked with him. We are a separate branch of government – we are the legislative branch of government. Let the White House, the executive arm of the government, do what it wants. But we should be a stumbling block to prevent the White House from going crazy, like this one did.

Ella Nilsen

So you do not think this is happening now – do you think the Senate or McConnell serve the president?

Harry Reid

I think the Senate has gone astray.

Ella Nilsen

Do McConnell and Trump match your legacy and Obama's appointment of judges at this stage?

Harry Reid

[long pause] Matching … if you just get numbers, of course, they are pretty equal at this point. But I think if you look at the quality, they are not close.

Ella Nilsen

Are you concerned, however, about the number of Trump / McConnell judges who will now make life appointments, given their background?

Harry Reid

Yes, but of course they are also concerned about what we did. But I hope that judges who appear in court across the country will understand that they are separate from the government. Once they are judges, they should no longer please Donald Trump. These are appointments for life. And we find in the country that many of these judges who, I think, thought that many people would just roll and be killed so that this administration does not do it.

Ella Nilsen

How do you think Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer have treated President Trump so far, with the closure of the government and now all this speech about the dismissal?

Harry Reid

Well, I held the position of leader when Pelosi was the speaker in the first round, and I have such admiration for her, and the audience feels pretty much the same as me. She was one of the few people who attacked Trump and did not answer his questions or his pressure. Senator Schumer and I have a longstanding relationship. Everyone knows that I brought him to the Senate leadership. He has done very well. As a leader, I hope I helped prepare him for that, but I'm in no way [going] to guess it. I'm thinking of Chuck Schumer's world; we will always be friends. So, I'm not the good guy to ask, because I have prejudices.

Ella Nilsen

Well, looking at the challenges that Trump has posed. The stop, when I covered that, I had the impression that DC was caught in this chaos.

Harry Reid

Well, during my political career, I've heard people talk about the Constitution and the framework it has to protect our country. I never really felt that until Trump was elected president; I really feel it now. I think we will defeat Trump because of our Constitution. We will miss him in less than two years, then we will have a new day. As Pete Seeger says, "I can see a new day, soon, when the storm clouds will soon pass." But I think so. I think Trump will be gone because of our great Constitution. Our country will go forward and go beyond that.

Ella Nilsen

There has been a lot of discussion about the impeachment since the publication of the Mueller report. Do you think the Democrats should pursue this?

Harry Reid

Some say that the Mueller report is only an invitation to dismissal. Now, it would be a better view if it was a year ago. But that's now; the 2020 elections will not be long. I do not have a problem with hearings being organized on the basis of Mueller's information. But I think that now having an impeachment procedure would take precious time before the general election, and even if there is a lot of tribalism in Congress, some say, "Well, we're not going to do anything anyway. . "I do not believe that. We have to do a few things, we can do it, and nothing will be done if there is an impeachment procedure. We would devote all our time to that, nothing else.

Ella Nilsen

Trump talks with Speaker of the Pelosi Chamber and the leader of the Schumer senatorial minority about an infrastructure plan. Do you have hope that something bipartisan will happen?

Harry Reid

We can not do anything except on a bipartite basis. That's how it is, no matter the chair. And Trump, although he was not good at most things … he's a great starter, but a lousy finisher. He starts a lot and rarely finishes anything. So I think we have to hope for a good agreement on the need for infrastructure. A trillion dollars is more than that, but let's start with a trillion dollars. We have highways, roads, bridges, dams, waterways, sewer systems, to name a few serious problems. We have water pipes leaking all over America and why do not we repair them? Because people do not have money to do it. Governments do not have money to do it.

Now, we all agree that something has to be done about infrastructure, so how are we going to pay for it? I do not even think we can find a Republican writer, a journalist, who praises the merits of Trump's tax cuts. It just did not help; it did not help anyone. And I hope we can use some of this money for the infrastructure. We need money to pay for the infrastructure. It's good to attend a meeting at the White House and say how much we need to improve our infrastructure system. It's another thing to say that we have infrastructure issues, but we have to pay for them, and then describe how it's going to be paid for.

Ella Nilsen

If the Democrats can not show a bipartite realization as an infrastructure or another bill, could it hurt the party in 2020?

Harry Reid

I do not think it's possible to blame the Democrats for the problems we have in Congress. Trump did not create the Republican Congress; the Republican Congress created Trump. It would be really exaggerated to blame the Democrats for doing nothing during this Congress.

Ella Nilsen

What do you think of the current campaign for medicare for all in the House? They have recently held hearings.

Harry Reid

Obamacare is one of the things for which I am very happy to work hard and have accomplished. It was very, very difficult to get the votes to adopt it. Pelosi and I were leading the Congress at that time and we were able to do it. A remarkable achievement for this country and we know what it has done: it has improved the healthcare delivery system in America today. Republicans have done everything possible to reduce it to pieces and try to get rid of it; they were not able to do it. They are afraid of getting rid of it.

But I think what we need to do is go back, restore Obamacare and continue to progress in this way. It's easy to talk about Medicare for all, eliminate it all and change it tomorrow, but it's a lot harder to do; It is not so easy. And I think we'd better go back and take care of Obamacare, who has done so many good things for so many different people. It allowed people with previous disabilities who could not get insurance [to get it]. Insurance companies have abused everyone. They could not do that with Obamacare. But now they have weakened that a lot. So now, what I'm saying is going back and restoring Obamacare to make it better.

Ella Nilsen

How are the Democrats defeating Trump in 2020?

Harry Reid

We must first address this issue recognizing that he could be reelected. We can not let this man be elected again. I think that it must be taken. I keep telling the American people what the Mueller report says, what they see every day about their fabrications, things that people can not believe it is making. This man who is President of the United States boasts of what he can do to women, from what he has done to women. I think that it must be taken. You can not take it lightly, but you can not get away from it, be afraid to fight it. You must fight him, but not on his terms, on your terms.

Ella Nilsen

What do these terms look like?

Harry Reid

Take it on. Let's talk about a problem. Talk about the delivery of health care. Talk about what he did with external relations, our trade policy, what he did with renewable energy, which is nothing. What he did to destroy the environment is a lot. It ignores climate change – the most important problem facing humanity today, or perhaps never. He does not think it exists.

Ella Nilsen

Do you think it's better for Democrats to say, "Look at these questions, here's what he's done on these issues," rather than focusing on the Mueller report and Russia – that thing that consume Washington?

Harry Reid

I think it's a mix of both. I think you can not put your playbook and just have a play; you must be able to adjust over time.

Ella Nilsen

Looking at some of the candidates who show up, you see that leftist populism coming from Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren. Do you think it's an effective way to counter the right-wing populism embodied by Trump?

Harry Reid

It's a little noisier than in the past. But since I got involved in national politics, Republicans are being watched and pushed by the far right. That's how it always has been. Democrats have always been pushed by the left. That's why we had the big outbreak in Chicago when [Hubert] Humphrey was a presidential candidate [in 1968]. So it's always been there. It's just stronger than in the past.

Ella Nilsen

Same as in the 60s?

Harry Reid

Oh, yes, I think so.

Ella Nilsen

Why do you think it has become so much stronger?

Harry Reid

Because of Trump. I think it's so outrageous in so many things that people are trying to find a way to respond to that. And as I said, I think, for example, in terms of health care delivery, we will not change the world in a day, but we can change it a few hours at a time and restore Obamacare to what it was before. even better. When it comes to climate change, we will not change it overnight, but we have to do these things. Renewable energy is something … we have to get rid of coal – we have to get rid of it! Fossil fuels, do everything in our power to get rid of them. America can provide all the energy it needs with wind and sun, geothermal energy and biomass, among others. We do not need fossil fuel.

I fought coal in Nevada; we do not have a plant in Nevada anymore. It's endangered. People do not want coal. We have Trump – he had false hopes for the coal industry. It's gone, it's all about knowing how long it will stay and we must accelerate its disappearance.

Ella Nilsen

What are the 2020 candidates you are watching? There are so many now.

Harry Reid

Well, I had the chance to visit almost everyone. I have a meeting this weekend with Beto [O’Rourke]. So we are lucky to have the right people running. I have of course served with Joe Biden in the Senate for 34 years; he is a friend of mine. Our caucuses will be here next February, so I will be very, very careful and not support anyone. But everyone knows my affection for Joe Biden.

Ella Nilsen

It seemed that Biden's speech, at the time of his announcement, was aimed first at taking Trump very directly. And then it also seemed like a throwback for the Obama years, and I'm curious if you think it's an effective speech for the American people.

Harry Reid

Joe Biden's deployment was very, very good, because it contrasted with what we are doing now under the Trump administration and what he did. But he did it very very subtly and very well, because remember that he was vice president of Obama for eight years. So I think everyone quickly realized that he was not going to have Obama before elementary school holding up banners for him, but everyone is aware of their close relationship.

Ella Nilsen

What about Elizabeth Warren? According to some information, you have encouraged him to apply for the presidency of the board of directors for 2020. Why, and have you encouraged anyone else?

Harry Reid

These reports are absolutely true. His chief of staff and campaign manager was my former press officer. I therefore have a longstanding relationship with Senator Warren. I helped her get started and put her on this board; she did a great job. In summary, we wanted her after spending Dodd-Frank in charge of consumption at the White House and that the Republicans prevented her from doing so, so she went to the Senate . I wish they had given him this job. She did well. I think the world of her; she knows I can not approve her, any more than Joe. But that does not mean I can not tell everyone how good they are.

Ella Nilsen

What do you think she brings to the campaign?

Harry Reid

First of all, she brings a Harvard brain with her. As a law professor at Harvard, she is a very, very bright woman. She is a person who, in my opinion, is respected for what she did, not what she plans to do, but what she did. … She started with nothing, became a single mother, left school because she was smart and that she was successful.

Ella Nilsen

In Nevada caucuses, what did the Nevada Democrats do to get the Latino-Hispanic vote that other states struggled to make?

Harry Reid

An article published today was so good. He talked about why [Jacky] Rosen beat [then-Sen. Dean] Heller was the strong, very Hispanic vote. I was a fan of Hispanics and their organizations for a very long time and people made fun of me. "Why are you doing this? Many of them are illegal. they never register to vote. If they are registered to vote, they do not vote and the participation is awful. "

When I ran last time, they thought that they had me. The first announcement that they ran [was] "Harry Reid, the best friend of the illegal immigrants," and all those dark people had the impression of crossing the water or something. And that only made Hispanics mad. So they got together and reelected me. People said I could not be re-elected, the leaders were never doing well in this state and it hurt to be a national leader. I have done well, and from this day on, people across the country have realized that Hispanics are making a difference, and they are doing it.

Ella Nilsen

Do you see that happening in 2020 with Trump's rhetoric on immigrants?

Harry Reid

Oh, of course, yes, I think so. As I said two years ago here in Nevada, they make all the difference. [They] Congressman Jacky Rosen, who had served only one term in the House and became a senator.

Ella Nilsen

I have the impression that states like Texas have had a hard time doing it the same way. Do you think that other States Parties have not yet understood how to proceed?

Harry Reid

Texas has always been a difficult state. I have tried several times to elect a senator there. The problem we had in Texas is that there are 22 separate media markets. It's so expensive. But Beto is well done. I wish that he had run against [John Cornyn]but he decided not to do it. But I just think Texas is demographically a democratic state; it's only a matter of time before they become it.

Ella Nilsen

How important are Nevada caucuses in 2020?

Harry Reid

Well, I worked hard to establish them. It has also been good for the country. The first four states – South Carolina, Nevada, Iowa and New Hampshire are the only direct votes; the others are caucus states. Nevada is the only representative state of our country: Hispanic at 30%, African American at 9%. Our balance is so interesting. We have a strong Filipino population here. The caucuses are so remarkably good for the country. If you want to succeed in the West, you have to come to Nevada because we educate people on public lands, we advise them on renewable energy, we educate about nuclear waste.

Ella Nilsen

When you look at the power of Iowa and New Hampshire, do you see Western states like Nevada and California taking some of that power and deciding on the president?

Harry Reid

Oh yes, of course. And look what happened in recent years. Two Democratic senators in California, two in Washington and two in Oregon. The west coast is pretty democratic, and we even have a Democratic member from Utah, can you believe that?