Pelosi Remarks at Announcement of Corporate Accountability Tax Amendment

Leader Pelosi Opening Remarks

Leader Pelosi.  Good morning, everyone.  I am honored to be here with two champions of America's working families the Vice Chair in the Senate, Ron Wyden – we take pride in his leadership there as he is a former member of the House – and our Ranking Member on the House side, Richie Neal.  I rise in support, in our House, the Higgins Amendment, which will hold the Republicans accountable for their words.  But first let me say – we will shortly be joined by the great Senate Leader Chuck Schumer and he and I, both, view what is happening in these rooms not as tax reform, not as tax cuts, but a tax scam.

Right now, President Trump is in China with an entourage of corporate CEOs.  While he is over there cutting deals for corporate America, maybe, Republicans are writing a tax bill that gives tax breaks to corporate America to send jobs overseas.  It's just not right.  It's just not right.

While the Republicans are saying –

[To Leader Schumer] I just acknowledged you in great praise, did I not?  For the distinguished Leader from the Senate.

While the Republicans are, again, working on their tax scam which is not reform, it is not a cut for many Americans.  They are trying to sell it as a bill of goods to the middle class while they raise taxes on millions of American families across the country while they have tax breaks for corporate America to send jobs overseas.  They are trying to tell middle America that if they give corporate America a $1.5 billion tax cut it is going to be good for them.  Okay, if that's what they think then they should accept the amendment that is being put forth by the House and Senate Democrats which challenges them to accept the accountability amendment – no wage growth for workers, no corporate giveaways.

And so, we believe, as Senator Wyden said, we can come together in a bipartisan way and write real tax reform that promotes growth, that creates good-paying jobs for all Americans and reduces the deficit.  Democrats are proposing A Better Deal and that's what we would like to come together – better, real tax reform that starts with the middle class and, with that, I am pleased to yield to the distinguished Leader of the Senate, Chuck Schumer, and did I say of New York state.

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Q:  Republicans lost badly in Virginia and local races last night.  Is this the beginning of a Democratic wave?

Leader Schumer.  The Republicans should look at the elections last night and it should be a giant stop sign for their tax bill.  Where do they get clobbered?  The suburbs.  Where does the tax bill clobber middle class and upper-middle class people?  The suburbs.  [Congresswoman] Barbara Comstock – her district went overly Democratic and she – 49 percent of the taxpayers in her district take the state and local deduction at a cost of $13,562.

But it was not just in Virginia, it was in New York.  In 2010, we lost the county executives of our two biggest suburban counties – Westchester and Nassau – we won them back last night.  The town of Hempstead, a town of 800,000 people, largest town in America has been Republican for over 100 years – for the first time – it elected a Democrat.  So we are saying to our Republican colleagues: if you continue to take away the state and local deduction, you're going to kill suburban legislators who are already in trouble because the suburbs already don't seem to like Donald Trump.  So we say to our Republican friends on this tax bill as Clint Eastwood said, ‘You want to pass this tax bill, you want to hurt the suburbs?  Make our day.'  Nancy!

Leader Pelosi.  I associate myself, of course,  with the remarks of the distinguished Leader from the Senate.  Let me just say from the standpoint of some issues.  What was interesting to observe was that, overwhelmingly, the leading issue that people said they voted on was health care and I think the Republicans in Congress should take heed of that as they try, once again, to inject certain repeals into their tax bill.  It was far and above – almost twice as much as the next issue which was gun safety and after that taxes and down the line.

Of course we always observe elections – elections are what happened that day – it was a great day for the Democrats but as we go forward we have to recognize that there were many good days before that and the President coming out and saying the reason that his candidate for governor – [Ed] Gillespie lost there was that he was not like Trump enough or something like that.  Let them think that.  I hope they continue to think that because if they go into the next race and say, ‘Oh he wasn't enough like Trump' – we will have even bigger victories.

Last night was historic in the numbers – look at the numbers – look at the way the women voted – look at the narrowing of the gap of blue collar workers, a much smaller margin – a much smaller margin among seniors.  So across the board, the electorate paid attention to what was happening and what they see here – what they see coming out of this tax debate and what they saw on the health care debate—was not in their interest or in the interest of their family and they voted accordingly and they voted, overwhelmingly, Democratic to the point where the state legislature may be in play because they went into last night with a 46 vote majority in the legislature.

Q:  Do you think you can win back the House?

Leader Pelosi.  The door is certainly opened for us.  In '05, right now, we had President Bush down to 38 percent – that is approximately where President Trump is now.  That opens the door –  that means we get the fresh recruits, they get the retirements.  We get the A-team and the candidate is very important in the election.

Leader Schumer.   In 2005, I was head of the DSCC [Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee] and you could smell a wave coming.  The results last night smell exactly the same way.  Our Republican friends better look out.

Senator Ron Wyden.   Kasie, I want to make a point to your important question.  As [Virginia State] Senate Democrats were winning those huge victories last night, Democratic Senators were telling the White House you could get 70 to 80 votes for a bipartisan tax reform bill if you put the focus on the middle class.

So the question with respect to what you're interested in – does the White House get that message?  I don't think it could be clearer.

Q:  When you saw the results last night, in the context to tax reform, and Senator [Ron] Wyden you talked about the call the President had with Democrats yesterday.  We have been told that whatever they pass in the House is not going to be the final product.  They're going to rely on the Senate.  Do you think that is a way they're going to try to mitigate –

Leader Schumer.  Well I'll just say and then call [Congressman] Richie [Neal].  In some cases they're making it worse, any of our House friends, some of New York colleagues in the House said, ‘oh we'll have a compromise on state and local [tax deductions].'   The Senate is saying, ‘no compromise, get rid of the whole thing.'  And because the Senate rules are tougher, that's what will happen.  Anyone in the House who comes from a district that benefits from the state and local deduction ought to be very, very careful because they're headed to eliminate the whole thing.  The whole compromise is going to go the way of all flesh.

Congressman Neal.   And you know exactly how they're being instructed by their leadership, ‘just take it out of here, we'll fix it in the Rules Committee.'  And I know what they're saying in the Rules Committee, ‘oh, just pass it out of here we'll fix it when it comes over to the Senate side.'

There are a series of votes they're going to have to pass to move this in the next 24 hours.  Including ending the deduction for state and local taxes, ending the deduction for student interest loans, calling this middle class and removing the estate tax, calling this middle class and removing the AMT [alternative minimum tax] – they're asking their Members in there to cast a very difficult vote.

Leader Pelosi.  I would just add to that, that they are asking the Republicans on this Committee and perhaps the floor of the House to walk the plank on a bill that may not be the final product, they're asking them to reject the concerns of their own constituents.  In California, 14 Republicans voted for this tax plan, that very seriously hurt – to the tune to thousands of dollars in each of their districts.

So when you combine these two questions – this tax bill is a moment of truth for America about what opportunity there can be, who pays the price, and again the failure of their trickle down that they're trying to sell to the American people, obviously, last night unsuccessfully.

But these poor victims, the Republicans on the Ways and Means Committee, who are voting this way to get back to [Kasey]'s questions – they keep saying, ‘if we don't pass it we're not going to win the next election,' but if you do pass it you're not going to win the next election.

Q:  Can both of you comment on whether you view last night's election as a rejection of President Trump?

Leader Schumer.  I think it's pretty obvious that people in Virginia were upset with how President Trump has tried to govern in Virginia, has been unable to get anything done, has resorted to tweeting instead of leading that – yes I believe that this was a rejection not only of President Trump, but of the policies that he and the Republican party seem to be adopting.

Get rid of health care, give tax cuts to the rich, cut the kinds of things like transportation and scientific research that people need.  It was a rejection of both the President and his policies that his colleagues in the House and Senate are blindly following.

Congressman Neal.   One of the best messages from last night at Caucus, with the Democrats at the Ways and Means Committee bright and early this morning in anticipation of the mark up, for those of you who really follow this – is that Governor Northam probably couldn't get nominated in New Jersey.  And Governor Murphy probably couldn't get nominated in Virginia.  But last night, they both heralded a big Democratic victory as did the Senators from both states talked about what a big Democratic victory meant last night.  I think that's the path that we're on.

Leader Pelosi. And that was based on Democratic values and principles as we go forward.

Q: Yesterday, about 12 Senate Democrats met with the Trump Administration on tax reform and they gave them two bills that Sherrod Brown has proposed called the Patriot Employers Act.  Trump, who's on the phone with them, said he liked the bills and Senator Brown and others were saying that if he would accept these into the plan, it would go a long way with getting Democratic votes.  I'm just wondering if you agree with that.

Leader Schumer. Well the sentiment, and I'll turn this over to Ron who was at the meeting, but the sentiment that was expressed by Senator Brown is a sentiment of all of us.  If they work with us, we can come up with good proposals.  They would focus on the middle class, they would focus on helping working people get better wages, one of them is soft of similar to what we're talking about today.  That corporations, Sherrod has worked very hard on this along with Senator Durbin, that corporations shouldn't get tax breaks unless they actually put the money to help middle class and working people.  Not their shareholders and not corporate CEOs. So, that sentiment was clear.  I'll say another thing here and Ron can elaborate.  My colleagues were sort of shocked at what President Trump said, and how far away from reality it was.  He said there are no tax breaks for wealthy people in this bill.  That's why he had to put the estate tax in.  He said a bunch of other things that defied credulity.  He's not a very persuasive salesman when he doesn't even know what's in the bills, Ron.

Senator Wyden. The point of yesterday and it's in line with the other meeting that we had at the White House was, Senator Brown and Senate Democrats keep coming to the key point.  We believe you grow the economy around the middle class and red, white, and blue jobs which is what his legislation is about, is keeping jobs in America.  The President, when asked, always says, ‘that's what I'm for.'  No tax cuts for people like me.  Get them to the middle class, jobs in America and what we have said is there sure is a big difference between the President's words and the Republican bills that actually get written down.

So the question, and I think an appropriate way for me last least to wrap up is after last, A, and B, after the conciliatory way in which Senate Democrats reacted to the Administration and the President because we kept saying you could get a huge bipartisan vote in the Senate if you did what you said you were going to do and what Sherrod Brown's bills are all about.  But so far, there's been a big disconnect between the words the President uses and the legislation that Richie is dealing with in the House, and that I may, and Senate Democrats may be dealing with next week.  We believe that we will be in markup in the Senate next week.

So what we're talking about is a bill that could remake the American economy, and as of now, we have not been involved in any of the specifics in terms of getting ready for this legislation, and it seems to me when Sherrod Brown called the question again yesterday, the next step will be does the President want to do what he says he wants to do and actually put it down on paper that we're going to get a middle class bill and support for growing red, white, and blue jobs in America.

Leader Schumer. Leader Pelosi –

Leader Pelosi. Thank you Mr. Leader.  I just want to add this to all that has been said because you started by asking a political question.  This election is not – the Democrats in Congress are running to win the majority in Congress.  We're running against the policies of the Republicans in Congress.  In terms of policy, we're not talking about personality of the President, we're talking about subjects like trickle-down economics, tax breaks for the wealthy at the expense of working families in our country, walking away from the Paris deal, things like that.  Gun safety, women's right to choose and the rest.  These are issues that the Republicans in Congress have been on for a very long time.  In some cases, worse than President Trump.

So the debate for the next election will be: who do you want to represent you in Congress?  Do you want checks and balances on the policies of President Trump?  I think most Americans do.  Democrats offer that alternative.  But it's also for better policy because what is happening in that room, these are not messengers of Donald Trump, these are people representing the views held a long time by Republicans in Congress.  That is what we need to change.  Thank you all very much.