GRASSLEY: The House of Representatives is moving forward on a health care legislation with a big tax increase. It's hard to see how proposals to raise taxes to these higher levels and even higher than they were in 1990 makes sense in the middle of a recession, especially the way the surtax proposed in the House would hit small business very hard. And small business tends to be the job-creating engine of our economy.
Data from the Joint Committee on Taxation -- and that's a non- partisan group -- shows that at least 55 percent of the revenue raised by increasing the top two rates in 2011 comes from small business income. So the House surtax is extremely burdensome to small business in Iowa and across the country.
On the campaign trail you may remember our president, then candidate Obama, said that everyone would pay lower taxes than they would unless -- than they would under Bill Clinton, rates that they set in 1990. The small business surtax proposed in the House would violate that pledge. And it is a pledge.
So I'm opposed to it. And I hope that the president's opposed to it as well. And, in fact, I can say that the assistant leader of the Democrats in the Senate didn't speak very highly of it over the last weekend.
So in the Senate I'm continuing to work this week on health care legislation. I'm also participating actively in the Judiciary Committee hearing on the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor as she is a nominee for Supreme Court justice. I anticipate that I'll be asking my second round of questions last this afternoon. And I hope it won't be the last round, but it could be the last round of questioning.
I'm going to start with Tom at the Des Moines Register.
QUESTION: Senator, the president insisted the other day that the Senate come up with a health care bill by the end of the week. Do you think that's realistic?
GRASSLEY: The Health Committee's probably this very minute voting a bill out. But don't forget it took them 14 days to do it. I have meetings later on this afternoon with Senator Baucus. And it's not really set yet, but I pledged with him I'd try to get with him because I don't want to take time away from Sotomayor.
And before I have a meeting with him, I want to have one with Enzi and Snowe. Those are the three of us that have been negotiating for Republicans. So maybe I'll be able to answer your question better.
But I assume if he's getting a lot of pressure from the White House, they may send a message or Reid may send a message to him to just forget this bipartisanship stuff. We need to move ahead.
Now, I hope that they don't do that. And the reason I hope they don't do it and why they shouldn't want to do with it -- I think it's going to make the public very skeptical if we have a partisan health reform bill, not just because it's health reform. But as you've heard me say so many times, it's restructuring one-sixth of our economy because that's what health care dollars are, 16 percent of the U.S. economy.
It's just so sweeping that Senator Baucus and I have thought for two reasons. One, not much gets done in the Senate that's not bipartisan. And secondly, because it is so sweeping, it ought to have a broad base of consensus. You know, we may talk too -- too hopingly about getting 80 votes. But, you know, that'd be 80 votes out of the center of the Senate. It's a big center. But it's the sort of big center you ought to have when you're -- when you're restructuring that much of the economy.
And so, that leaves out some people on the right and some people on the left, some people that maybe don't want to do anything or some people that want to do such -- so much more like, let's say, set up a Canadian system. And that's not a far-fetched thing for me to say because it's my understanding that there were seven or eight votes in the Health Committee the last couple days for Senator Sanders' amendment to set up a Canadian-style health insurance system.
QUESTION: You've called on the president a bunch of times to get more involved. And he's -- he's spoken up a little bit lately. First, do you think he's taken the -- taken the initiative that you've hoped he would take? And second, do you -- do you consider his silence on bipartisanship troubling?
GRASSLEY: Well, it has him in silence in the past. Now, maybe you're referring to something lately that I'm not aware of. But he called me on my cell phone yesterday, and I didn't have a precondition he was calling. I didn't even know who it was. The cell phone said unknown number. And so, I, you know, answered it in front of a couple other senators. It didn't take me long to get out of that environment when they said the president wants to speak to you.
But we had this conversation yesterday. And I suggested, you know -- and I don't want to say he rejected everything I said. I -- I asked for help in a couple areas. I'm not going to tell you about a private conversation with the Senate. But there is one issue where I asked for help. And he said that he -- that he -- he -- that that wasn't an issue with him, that he couldn't do much there because there wasn't support enough for it on the Hill.
I didn't take time to say that -- that, you know, you're coming out for that would really make a big difference and change a lot of people's minds. But he's not willing to do that. And consequently, it's -- you know, it's -- it's -- it's a problem because it's key to a lot of other things, not just -- it's not necessarily the key to bipartisanship. It's just the key to good public policy on that one issue.
Let me go on to James Lynch.
QUESTION: Good morning, Senator.
GRASSLEY: James Lynch, go ahead.
QUESTION: Hi. Could you talk a little bit about the volume of mail and e-mail calls that the health care debate is generating and whether some of these ads that interest groups are running now targeting you are generating more criticism of your position on the issue?
GRASSLEY: Well, what -- what are they running? Because I'm not aware of what they're running. I guess my staff's going to inform me about that so you don't have to.
QUESTION: There's an ad about playing off your remarks about if you want health care, get a job with the federal government and suggesting you're out of touch.
GRASSLEY: Yes. Do you know -- do you know what? Let me explain to you how that's being intellectually dishonestly used. I -- and also there -- some of the letters to the editor are quoting me wrong. I knew -- I know how much I was paying for my portion of the health care, which is 32 percent. Some of the letters to the editor are reporting that I didn't even know that.
There was a question about co-pay that maybe I didn't have an exact figure in my mind. But the issue of premiums -- set it straight that I know what that is.
The other thing was I thought I was just giving a very candid answer. I think some people thought it was funny, so they -- there's -- if you read -- if you listen to the transcript of it on YouTube, you'll find out that people thought it was funny. Even the guy that I said it to was laughing.
But I said, well, you know, if you want exactly what federal employees have, you'll have to become a federal employee. It seems to me like it's the same thing as saying if you want what John Deere has, you know, go get a job with John Deere.
And -- and -- and I didn't know any more way to answer his question. It wasn't that I was flippant and trying to make a joke out of it or saying that -- that -- that that's what -- it was just a fact, you know.
So anyway, let's answer your question. Your question is that...
QUESTION: About how much mail and e-mail you are getting on the health care issue.
GRASSLEY: Yes, yes. And, you know, maybe that -- maybe that -- maybe that ad that you're referring to implies that I don't understand the anxiety about coverage. We're going through that every day. We're getting examples of that every day.
When I go to my town meetings, that's there. But I hope Iowans understand, in response to this ad, that -- that that's why I've been at the negotiating table for four months of trying to come up with a solution so they can get coverage. And I explained at this very meeting that this clip was taken from that it was affordability and accessibility of what we're for -- affordability for the discrimination against preexisting conditions and solving that through community rating of policies. And then the other one was for those that are low income, that we're going to make sure people have health insurance.
So I would -- I would hope people would want somebody for two reasons, one, somebody that's fiscally responsible like I am to be at the table and another one that understands what it is for people to be at the table and get health insurance, and why I work so hard on children's health insurance program, why I work so hard on the Family Opportunity Act with Senator Kennedy about five years ago, and why -- you know, a lot of things I've done on health care -- the award that I got through the American Legion for helping on health care for veterans.
We're not getting the number of calls that you might think for that reason, or for any other reason, because health care is so highlighted. So I don't see a response from the ads. I don't receive -- I don't perceive a response just because it's a big issue. And I really don't know why, because I'm quite surprised that we're not getting more calls, e-mails, and letters on something so significant.
Let's go on to the next person is Mike Glover.
QUESTION: Senator, what's your take on Sotomayor so far?
GRASSLEY: She's doing a very, very good job of overcoming what was her greatest weakness when she was coming into hearing, and that greatest weakness was not necessarily the cases she had decided, although to some extent they are, as my questions have indicated, but more the speeches and the writings that she's done -- you know, the white-Latina thing is one example.
QUESTION: Right.
GRASSLEY: She started out Monday in her speech about her statement -- her only -- her benchmark is fidelity to the law. She's reinforced that very, very well. She's reinforced it by saying it and she hasn't distracted from it by answering our questions very definitively. The most recent one that she didn't answer very definitively was Senator Coburn saying: Does an individual like me, if my life is threatened, do I have a right to defend myself?
And he never got a yes or no answer. He got five minutes of gobbledygook based upon what the state law was; based upon what -- what courts may have said in different places; whether or not there was a -- an imminent danger, all those sorts of things, when all Senator Coburn was saying, a lot of people are watching this.
They're not lawyers. They would just like to know, do they have a right to defend themselves?
And a person going on the Supreme Court didn't seem to be able to answer it. And so that's what we're getting.
But, you know, is she doing anything, so far, that has harmed her chances of approval? And I only "chances of approval" because quantifying that, there's 60 Democrats, you know, so what's the chances of her not being approved?
Plus, who knows how Republicans are going to vote? Who knows how Chuck Grassley's going to vote? I don't, at this point.
So she's -- to answer your question, I think she's covering herself pretty good on her weakest point.
QUESTION: So where are you on it?
GRASSLEY: Well, I'm going to -- just like I would have told you a month ago when she came up, am I going to vote for her or against her, what's the point of the hearing if we know how we're going to vote?
I might as well be working health care this week instead of Sotomayor. So I don't know.
QUESTION: I'm good today, Senator. Thank you.
QUESTION: Hey, I'm here, Senator.
GRASSLEY: Yes, go ahead.
QUESTION: I want to switch gears here a moment. We have 137 families in Mason City that are still waiting for federal buy-out money. And I guess my point in asking you this is that FEMA has already approved the buyouts for them, but since their packages, the total package, is more than $1 million, it has to go through the Office of Management and Budget, and that adds several weeks to the process, as I understand it.
I just wondered if you're concerned. These people waited 57 weeks.
GRASSLEY: Ya'll.
QUESTION: If there's a way of shortening the process, or if you...
GRASSLEY: Well, if you're right, that OMB is the stumbling block, I will make sure that my office contacts OMB today to see what the holdup is.
Now, let me ask you this: Are you sure they're not helped by the $570-some million that we announced about three weeks ago, because that was HUD money, not FEMA money.
QUESTION: Right.
GRASSLEY: And it seems to me that HUD -- HUD money, if -- and I can pledge you this, that if there -- if it takes a phone call to OMB, I can do that yet today. But I'm not sure of where you are in this.
And another factor that weighs in here is -- and I don't think that this would be a problem in Mason City, like it would be with a few other cities that were hurt -- even many more people hurt. For instance, Cedar Rapids...
QUESTION: Cedar Rapids, sure.
GRASSLEY: But there is the responsibility of a local plan. Has the local plan been approved and everything?
QUESTION: Oh, yeah. Yeah. What's happened is that all those funds have been approved. Then they went to Ankeny, I believe, for -- for the -- or the second round of approval.
Then they went to Kansas City for what we understood to be final FEMA approval.
And it's my understanding, though, that, like there were 30 homes. There are 60 or 70 homes in one package and 70 or 80 in another. And because that total was over $1 million, it has to go to OMB for approval.
GRASSLEY: Are these -- are these in the area that I viewed a year ago, along what's a fairly small creek, where it just got -- it just inundated some homes, almost up to their rooftop?
QUESTION: Right. Right. That's certainly a part of it. That's a big share of it, the neighbors up in that area.
GRASSLEY: OK. Well, listen. All I can do is let us look into it. We'll get Sherry on it right away.
QUESTION: Appreciate that.
GRASSLEY: Yes.
QUESTION: Yes.
GRASSLEY: Sherry's from Waterloo, but she's out here with me and she knows this stuff pretty well. And she'll know where FEMA ends and HUD begins. And she'll know whether that $573 million that we put out a couple weeks ago -- because that's out. I don't think...
QUESTION: Yes.
(CROSSTALK)
QUESTION: I don't mean to dominate the conversation, here. I think some -- some people in Mason City have benefited from that, but I think that's separate from what we're talking about here, in terms of the buyouts.
GRASSLEY: OK. Thank you.
QUESTION: But thank you for the -- your time on this.
QUESTION: Has Sotomayor done anything during the hearing to change your view of her fitness to be a Supreme Court justice?
GRASSLEY: Well, every -- all 19 members don't question her fitness from the standpoint of academic background; from the standpoint of her career as a lawyer, her career as a judge.
She's qualified to be on the Supreme Court. The question is that bothers a lot of members, is she going to be legislating from the bench. That's my job, so you can vote me out of office if you don't like it. In her case -- in her case, you know, she's said a lot of things that raise questions about that.
Now, she's trying to -- she's doing a pretty good job of covering that, and so then you kind of get down to the question: Is this a deathbed conversion? Or is it very sincere? And is this the way she's always been, and her statements that she's made publicly that raise all these concerns, if they aren't a factor in her judging, then, you know, she's done a pretty good job and will probably get a lot of broad support.
But the question -- the extent to which she hasn't answer that and the extent to which it hasn't been answered yet for me, because I'm going to wait until the hearing's over, you know, then the jury's still out.
QUESTION: President Obama, when you were talking to him, rejected your appeals for help on some key areas?
GRASSLEY: No, he did not reject appeals.
QUESTION: OK.
GRASSLEY: He did say that one area that I thought was very, very key that -- that there was so much opposition on the Hill that it wouldn't matter where he stood on it. And consequently, he wasn't able to -- willing to help in that area. But my point was that I tried to make to you, that quite frankly I didn't go into depth with him, is that if -- if he would come out in that area, it would change a lot of minds on the Hill.
I was in a recent breakfast with a bipartisan group talking about -- and these are people that don't deal with health care. We were there for the sole purpose of our expertise in health care to talk to him. And I found on this -- and I'm not going to identify this issue, because I don't want to get into a personal conversation with the president.
He won't be calling me if I -- if he knows I'm going to blab to the press all the time.
So here's -- I just know that -- that there's a different view among a bipartisan group of people on this very key issue, that if there was just a push, we could maybe get one of the best things done that's going to bend down the health care inflation curve.
Let me go -- is there anybody else?
OK, thank you all very much.