Pelosi Remarks at Bicameral Democratic Leadership Press Conference

Contact: Drew Hammill/Evangeline George, 202-226-7616

Washington, D.C. – House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi, Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid and House and Senate Democratic leaders held a press conference today following a bicameral Democratic leadership meeting discussing a path forward towards a budget deal this fall. Below are the Leader's remarks followed by a question and answer session:

"Thank you very much, Leader Reid. I join with you in expressing sympathy and our prayers and thoughts are with the families of those affected at the tragedy at Umpqua Community College in Oregon. We extend our sympathy directly to those families and to our colleagues in the House and in the Senate.

"As the Minority Leader said, as the Democratic Leader of the Senate said: last night, yesterday 151 Republicans voted against opening up government based on their ideology to hold women's health hostage in our country. This is disappointing but also a signal that we have to observe. The next 10 weeks, as we prepare to write a budget, can be a timetable of progress, which we hope it will be, or a calendar of chaos. What we need to do is to pass a budget that grows our economy, that creates jobs, that defends our country, that takes us into the future as we reduce the deficit.

"In addition to writing that budget, we have to pass a transportation bill that is robust and worthy of the aspirations of the American people in terms of job creation, cleaning the air, all kinds of things that a transportation bill does – improving the quality of life as it creates jobs and promotes commerce. We have to honor the full faith and credit of the American people – that will probably happen in November – and we must reauthorize the Ex-Im Bank. In addition to that, we want to pass the 9/11 health bill.

"So we have a large number of immediate concerns that have timetables on them that must be addressed. We want to extend the hand of friendship to do this in a bipartisan way, respectful of other views, but also respecting the needs of the American people. So will this 10 weeks be a timetable of progress or a calendar of chaos? It's up to our Republican colleagues.

"151 Republicans. Only 91 Republicans voted to open up government. 151 voted to keep government shut down. That's not responsible. That does not heed the message of Pope Francis who told us to be respectful of each other's views, to have openness and pragmatism in our decision-making and to go forward for the good of all people. So hopefully we're in the spirit that is still with us of Francis and honoring our responsibilities to the American people, we'll work together as quickly, not hastily, but as soon as possible to remove all doubt that government will be open, that we will honor the full faith and credit, that we will create jobs, that our exports will be well-served – and that is job creating as well. And that we will honor the people of 9/11 as we did on 9/11 by passing that important legislation. Thank you."

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Senator Reid. We'll take a couple questions.

Q: If the budget negotiations extend to November and December, do you expect they will continue when McCarthy becomes Speaker, and how would that change the tenor of the talks?

Senator Reid. That's a question I think you should direct to someone over in the House. Right now, you would need a ouija board to try to figure that one out.

I'm glad you mentioned indirectly what's going on there. One of the things that we did earlier today, very early this morning, wrote a letter to Speaker Boehner saying this Benghazi Committee is a rip-off of the American taxpayer. Almost five million dollars they spent already and that doesn't include the money spent on six other committees who held hearings. I don't know if he meant to speak the truth, but McCarthy did. It is a political witch hunt, and it really gives a negative smell that goes on back here and that's too bad because all over on the other side of the Capitol with the huddles the Republicans have been holding…

Leader Pelosi. If I might add, I'm so pleased that the Democratic Leadership and others in the Senate have written to the Speaker to say: disband the Benghazi Committee. The Republicans should disband it. Democrats in the House, we're not in favor of supporting it. But as long as they're having it, some of our Members still believe we should be present to defend the truth. This is not the only Select Committee. This Select Committee is five million dollars, longer than the Watergate Committee. [It] produced nothing. And on top of which our bipartisan, nonpartisan Intelligence Committee has written its report clearing this issue.

So they're wasting time and they're wasting taxpayers' dollar. In addition, now they want to do a Select Committee Against Women's Health. I don't know what their title is for it, but that's what I call it. Another expense and waste of time when we should be focusing on what our responsibilities are directly to the American people. Hopefully as you take this challenge that we all have to the American people, public sentiment will weigh in and the Republicans will stand up to the responsibilities that we all have, and not have this be how they can shut down government but how we can keep it open.

Q: Is there a timeline in place for when you would like to have the framework released to the public?

Senator Reid. Yes.

Q: What kind of offsets are you considering?

Senator Reid. Well, my staff and Leader Pelosi's staff, we've been at the White House two days in a row – yesterday and the day before. Yesterday, the Republican staff members were there. We're working through that. And the push that Leader Pelosi and I really are going to stress more than anything else is speed. We don't want to wait. We want to move this on. Getting the pay-fors, offsets, that's painful work, but the pain is going to be there no matter when we do it. We have to get that done. We are going to try to get the pay-fors, top-line, and then we're going to make sure that we have the riders all resolved and any increases have to be equal between defense and nondefense. Those are our feelings, that's what we're going to stick to and we are going to do it as quickly as possible.

Q: What timeline are you working off of? When can we see something from you guys?

Senator Reid. As quick as we can.

Q: Senator Reid?

Senator Reid. Yes.

Q: There's been a report that Senator McConnell asked President Obama to leave Congressional Democrats out of the budget talks. Has that been relayed to you by President Obama? Does that concern you that those reports are out there?

Senator Reid. Well, Leader Pelosi and I have been to the White House more than once in recent days talking about this. We are party to some of the conversation that's gone on. There is at least one of the leaders in the Congress that wants to cut us out, but it's not going to happen.

Leader Pelosi. And besides, at the end of the day, it has to be a bill that the President will sign and that's not a bill that can hold Republican votes. So, the Republicans know that they have to reach across party lines, as they had to do last night. 186 Democrats, 100% of the Democrats voted for the bill to open up government. 151 Republicans voted no.

Senator Reid. Republicans need our votes.

Leader Pelosi. They need our votes. But I just want to say one thing about the timetable. We want to remove all doubt in the public's mind that the government will be there, that governance will take place, that the investments that we need to be made will be made and some of the other issues that I mentioned will be addressed, like the debt ceiling, because when that wasn't addressed before – even though we ended up lifting the debt ceiling just this thought, the suspicion that it could happen lowered our credit rating.

So the timetable doesn't relate to who's in charge. The timetable relates to meeting the needs of the American people in a very strong way.

Q: Leaders, are you going to be co-equal negotiators with President Obama and the White House in this negotiation?

Senator Reid. Why wouldn't we be? So the answer is yes.

Q: How much harder do you think to get a budget deal with this new Republican Leadership in the House with Kevin McCarthy?

Leader Pelosi. We'll see.

Senator Reid. You have to talk is talk to the Wizard of Oz. Maybe they can tell you.

[Laughter]

Leader Pelosi. It depends on how responsive they are.

Senator Schumer. It is more the man behind the screen.

Senator Reid. Thanks, everybody.

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