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Transcript of Pelosi Press Conference Today

February 27, 2015

Contact: Drew Hammill, 202-226-7616

Washington, D.C. – Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi held her weekly press conference today. Below is a transcript of the press conference.

Leader Pelosi. Good morning. This morning, as we gather here, the United States Senate is passing a clean longtime Department of Homeland Security funding bill that, if passed by the House this morning, could be sent to the President and signed into law today, well before the midnight deadline.

Instead, in the House this morning, House Republicans have a plan that is a staggering failure of leadership that will prolong this manufactured crisis of theirs and endanger the security of the American people – endanger the security of the American people.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson warned Congress about the severe consequences of a shutdown and a short term CR in an urgent letter sent last night. In the letter he said, "As I have noted many times, mere extension of a continuing resolution has many of the same negative impacts," referencing all the negative impacts of a shutdown. "A short term continuing resolution exacerbates the uncertainties of my workforce and puts us back in the same position, on the brink of a shutdown, just days from now."

In addition to this, in terms of going to conference, Democrats will not dignify House Republicans' toxic anti-immigrant riders by supporting going to conference. House Republicans' ineptitude in legislating is endangering our entire country.

I thank the Senate for their bipartisan action in passing a clean, long-term Department of Homeland Security [funding] bill. A clean, long-term Department of Homeland Security bill is clearly the only way to avert this crisis. We should be voting to pass a clean, long-term Department of Homeland Security bill that the Senate is sending us today. They have done their work. We should do ours. With every House Democrat supporting long-term DHS funding legislation, it's clear this crisis exists only because Republicans prioritize anti-immigrant extremism over the safety of the American people.

It's important to note, if you are out there at home, what this means to you, a short-term Continuing Resolution. What is a Continuing resolution? It's a failure, just a stopgap measure – in this case, a failure to come to terms. It's a short-term stopgap measure which delays critical state and local grants. Without a full-year funding, DHS cannot award $2.5 billion in grant funding that includes the safety of your neighborhood, your community, and your city, and our country.

For example, $600 million in Urban Area Security Initiative grants. This is really very important in terms of our homeland security. Mostly urban areas, 40 urban areas that are the prime targets of terrorism. $350 million in emergency management preparation grants, that's from FEMA. They won't be able to give those grants for preparedness. $340 million in staffing for Adequate Fire and Emergency Response grants, SAFER. Staffing for Adequate Fire and Emergency Response grants. These SAFER grants are very, very important to communities. They rely on them for the safety of their communities. $340 million in firefighter assistance grants. $120 million for emergency food and shelter grants. And $100 million for food related grants.

That's what the short-term delay holds up. It delays the critical state and local grants. The CR continues to delay that funding from going out. It's dangerous and it undermines the security of the American people. It's irresponsible, and we should be taking up this today. The Senate has given the House – in a bipartisan way – the Senate Republicans have given the House Republicans a path, which they apparently are refusing to take, but I am ever hopeful.

Any questions? Yes, sir.

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Q: You talked about your frustrations with the Republicans holding this funding hostage.

Leader Pelosi. Yes.

Q: Yesterday, Speaker Boehner held a news conference, and he said, "I just think it's outrageous that Senate Democrats are using Homeland Security funding for blackmail to protect the actions of the President where the President himself has said that he did not have the authority to do this." What was your reaction when you heard that at his news conference?

Leader Pelosi. I didn't hear it. But I really have pretty much lumped together the irresponsible statements that are made by many of the Republicans on this subject because some of it is just not true. I have heard some other things that some of their colleagues have said, that the Republicans in the House are acting like "crazy people." That, I thought, is something I could identify with.

But the fact is that what the Senate Democrats are doing is what the Senate Republicans are doing, sending over a clean, long-term Department of Homeland Security funding bill. Is he painting the Senate Republicans with that same brush? And if you're talking – well, that's fine, we don't need to come back on how they're characterizing the President's actions.

Q: Madam Leader, if this is such bad policy, and you made a strong case that it is, can you think of a plausible political advantage by Republicans to do this, to stretch this out for 3 weeks?

Leader Pelosi. Well, one is that they could have Benjamin Netanyahu's speech to Congress when government is open instead of closed. I think they'd look bad doing that, don't you? And I think that is one reason they're kicking the can down the road, so that they can accommodate their invitation to Prime Minister Netanyahu. I don't know, is that a political advantage? I don't know.

But, you know, when we are talking about homeland security we are talking about something that is so beyond politics. It's about the safety of the American people. I keep using that word, the security of the American people. And there is bipartisan support for an approach to get this done, get this done now. It doesn't mean that you put every other difference aside. It means you take them up in other pieces of legislation.

And so, far be it from me to psych out what goes on in the House Republican Caucus, but it's not responsible, it's not legislating – and that's our responsibility, to legislate and to protect and defend the American people.

Can you think of any political advantage? I don't even think it's a political motivation with them. I think that's who they are. They don't believe in government. They're against anything the President proposes. And this is a comfortable place for them to be.

Yes, sir.

Q: You just had your Democrat Caucus meeting. Are you united in opposition to this?

Leader Pelosi. Yeah, I think so.

Q: Any concerns that Democrats would help pass the CR?

Leader Pelosi. I don't think so. I think the Republicans probably have the votes for this. And so if any Democrats join them, that's not the point. I don't want Democrats to give them the victory, but if they feel – the people are very concerned about shutting down government and they weigh the equities of one proposal or another. I do believe that if this were to fail, they would have no choice but to take up the Senate bill. But instead, they want to go to conference. This is really, really amateur hour to the nth degree as to what the Republicans are doing.

I told my conference this morning, did you ever hear the story about somebody goes to heaven and he was really disappointed that he had died in a disaster, and he said to the Lord, "Lord, I prayed to you all my life, and I prayed to you when I was in danger, and here I am." And the Lord says to him, "Well, you remember when you were on the top of the roof of your house and that canoe came along and you said, 'I'm not going in that canoe.' And then you remember the helicopter came and you said, 'I'm afraid of helicopters.' And then somebody swam up to you, and you said, 'I don't even know who you are, I'm staying where I am.' And here you are not among the living anymore."

Well, this is what the Republicans have done. In December, they decided that they would be irresponsible. The Speaker made it clear to all of us when they were passing the omnibus, with the Cromnibus on it, the CR on it, "Oh, don't worry about it. We'll take it up in January. We'll get it done." We all read into that that he wanted to get voted in as Speaker first and then he could act as Speaker of the House and take up the bill.

So, okay, along comes Paris, Je suis Charlie, perfect excuse for them to bring up the bill tout de suite. Okay? Then they don't do that. Then along comes a court case, [that] says, "Okay, here is a face saver for you, here is a path out for you." They ignore that. And now we have three people arrested in Brooklyn with very, very dangerous intentions regarding elected officials, police officers, et cetera, another reason for them to say, "Let's just get this done and out. The court has put on hold our major concern, which was the President's actions on immigration, so let's just use these other outs for the benefit of the American people."

But I think there is an element of them that wants to shut down government, so no out will do. Immigration, for some, is a reason; for others, it's an excuse. For all of them, it's a sad state of affairs for the American people.

Yes, sir.

Q: Madam Leader, you're the only other person in the building who can really answer the question what would you do if you were John Boehner because you have been in his position. And maybe nothing exactly analogous to his position, but on votes for reauthorizing the Iraq war when you were Leader, they weren't exactly analogous to this, but you resorted to some pretty tricky – my words – rules, and people, you know, deeming and passing and people voting against things without having to vote against them. What would you do if you were him?

Leader Pelosi. But I told him, I told him right from the start when he became Speaker. First of all, let me just say that this is nothing compared to the Iraq war. So do you want to compare notes? Put several hundred thousand people in the street against the Iraq war. As one who was vehemently opposed to it, I was opposed to it from the start, I said the intelligence did not support the threat. I believe that the Bush Administration took us into war on a misrepresentation – some people would call that a lie. So my record on that war is very strong. Nonetheless, our troops are there, and we needed to fund the troops.

And so what I said to him is do what we did and you can do it every time and it works every time. Put legislation on the floor. Let people vote the way they want to vote. And then put another bill on the floor where enough bipartisan support is there that it can move on to the Senate, or if it came from the Senate, move on to the White House. Let them vote their hearts out. They are not asking to vote for anything. You are just giving them a chance to state their attitude, opinion, legislative priority, whatever it is, and that's what you should do.

Look what they did with VAWA, a ridiculous bill they put on the floor. "Yes, we're against violence against women unless you're a Native American, unless you're an immigrant woman, or unless you're an LGBT woman." That's the bill they liked. Put it on the floor, let them vote for it, but put the real bill on the floor, the bipartisan bill that came from the Senate, and let that happen. And that eventually is how we got VAWA passed over 550 days after its authorization has expired, but they finally came around to that.

So that's what he could do today, put whatever it is on the floor, but put the good bill on the floor, too, and let them both go forward, and that's what he could do today. He can put his three-weeks and he can put his full-term and send them over and see what happens. One of them can go directly to the President, and others will have their chance to say, "I never voted for the full funding bill."

It's so elementary. It doesn't take much to know how to legislate. But we're the Legislative Branch, and we have a responsibility to respect the opinions of everyone in our Congress, the regional, every kind of disagreement, see how we can get the job done for the American people. And when that job is to protect and defend, which is the oath we take and our first responsibility, we even have a heightened, heightened need for the Speaker to get the job done.

But this is silliness. We're going to kick the can down the road three weeks, get past the Netanyahu speech. We're going to then go to conference. The Senate has said they're not going to conference. The Senate has come up with a solution. Get it over with. You have some other issues, you want to talk about [like] immigration, bring them up in a separate bill.

And since I mentioned immigration, I just want to say, once again, and every opportunity I have I will take to say what they are saying is unconstitutional and unlawful on the part of President Obama, it's exactly what President Ronald Reagan, President George Herbert Walker Bush, President Bill Clinton, President George W. Bush all did to protect immigrants in our country. In fact, President Reagan and President George Herbert Walker Bush did it to a higher percentage, not a higher number of people, but a higher percentage than President Obama. But for them it was okay. For President Obama it's unconstitutional.

So understand what is going on here. They have their trifecta going. They're anti-governance. There is an element of them that wants to shut down government. They're anti-Obama, so anything he suggests they're against. And as you've heard me say, not applying exactly here, they're anti-science, so they don't want to know what the facts are and what's real in a situation. So they have a trifecta going where they have a comfort level to be against anything that the President puts forth.

The President has the legal authority under the written law, he has the precedent set by previous Presidents, and he has the prosecutorial discretion to act in the manner in which he did. And they are saying, "No, and we disagree so much that we are going to jeopardize the security of the American people to make our point."

If you have a better idea on immigration, put it forth. Pass a law. That's what the President has said to them. Ronald Reagan, even when Congress passed a law, said, "You didn't do enough to protect immigrants in our country," and he put forth his own executive action to do more, which he did, and President George Herbert Walker Bush carried out.

Thank you all very much.

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