Verdict with Ted Cruz - What’s Actually In The Senate Relief Bill

00:00:00.000 This is an iHeart Podcast.

00:00:02.580 Guaranteed human.

00:00:04.180 All the people out of jobs the Democrats are using to push,

00:00:07.240 what are they pushing for?

00:00:09.420 Changing the emission standards on airplanes.

00:00:14.580 Mr. President, what the hell do the emission standards on airplanes

00:00:18.560 have to do with thousands of people dying

00:00:22.600 and millions of people out of work in the coronavirus epidemic?

00:00:30.000 Welcome back to Verdict with Ted Cruz.

00:00:34.020 I am Michael Knowles.

00:00:35.160 We have a lot to get to.

00:00:37.200 We have to answer that question.

00:00:38.800 What the hell do emission standards have to do with coronavirus?

00:00:41.820 The Senate has just voted on the coronavirus stimulus package,

00:00:46.880 a $2 trillion package, the largest stimulus in American history.

00:00:51.320 It is after midnight on the East Coast,

00:00:53.140 and I am joined as ever in the middle of the night

00:00:55.360 by one of the senators who voted on that, Senator Cruz.

00:00:59.420 Senator Cruz, what did we just see?

00:01:02.740 Well, Michael, good morning.

00:01:04.120 It is 1227 in the morning, and once again, you know,

00:01:08.160 it feels like deja vu all over again.

00:01:10.220 It's, you know, when we got started on the Verdict podcast,

00:01:13.500 it was during impeachment, and it seemed every night

00:01:17.020 we would be there till midnight, 1, 2 in the morning,

00:01:19.980 and then head straight to the studio.

00:01:21.620 So I just came from voting on the Senate floor.

00:01:24.760 As you noted, the vote was unanimous.

00:01:26.460 It was 96 to nothing.

00:01:28.380 Every single Republican voted yes.

00:01:30.380 Every single Democrat voted yes.

00:01:32.180 And we just passed out a $2 trillion emergency relief package,

00:01:36.980 which hopefully will have significant effects

00:01:41.640 relieving the economic devastation being caused by this corona crisis.

00:01:47.600 Well, I want to get into exactly what is in this package,

00:01:51.140 because obviously there's a lot, and some of it is controversial.

00:01:54.300 But before we get to what is in it,

00:01:56.600 I want to get to why we are sitting here in the middle of the night.

00:01:59.780 You know, this bill was supposed to be voted on,

00:02:02.320 I think, over the weekend.

00:02:03.720 Then it was supposed to maybe be voted on yesterday.

00:02:06.320 Then earlier today.

00:02:07.720 And here we are.

00:02:08.800 It's after midnight.

00:02:10.040 So I want to know why this was so delayed.

00:02:12.960 And I guess more specifically,

00:02:14.040 I want to know who delayed the vote.

00:02:17.420 Well, that's an easy answer.

00:02:19.020 It's two people.

00:02:19.920 It's Nancy Pelosi and it's Chuck Schumer.

00:02:22.380 Everybody thought we were going to vote on this Sunday night.

00:02:25.360 The bill had been negotiated with about a dozen Democrats.

00:02:29.300 We're part of the negotiating teams.

00:02:31.200 They had all been active and engaged.

00:02:33.140 And we thought we're going to take it up Sunday night and get it passed.

00:02:36.520 Nancy Pelosi came in at the last minute,

00:02:38.520 and she threw a hand grenade in. 1.00

00:02:39.820 And she began making all of these completely unrelated partisan demands. 0.51

00:02:45.640 And we showed up Sunday night,

00:02:47.040 and every single Democrat voted to block our getting on the bill,

00:02:51.740 our even starting to consider it.

00:02:52.980 And so they blocked it on Sunday night.

00:02:54.520 They blocked it Monday, all day Tuesday, all day today,

00:02:57.680 until just about 11 o'clock last night when we finally got it passed.

00:03:02.500 So, as you noted in that clip we played at the beginning,

00:03:05.780 which, by the way, I thought was terrific.

00:03:07.960 I was a big fan of you really calling it like it is here

00:03:12.420 and saying, what do emission standards,

00:03:15.220 what does the Green New Deal have to do with coronavirus?

00:03:18.400 So it looks as though the Democrats totally backed down.

00:03:22.140 I mean, I don't know, though.

00:03:23.400 You were there all day.

00:03:24.880 Did the Democrats achieve anything by stalling the vote?

00:03:28.160 What's the good stuff in the bill?

00:03:29.460 What's the bad stuff in the bill?

00:03:30.540 Well, look, it's complicated.

00:03:32.980 Most of the extraneous partisan issues that Pelosi was fighting for,

00:03:38.180 almost all of them have dropped out of the bill.

00:03:40.000 So that's good.

00:03:41.300 What she held everything hostage for Sunday and Monday and Tuesday is mostly gone.

00:03:47.220 So what's passed?

00:03:48.440 Look, $2 trillion is a crap ton of money.

00:03:53.280 I mean, that's 10% of our national debt.

00:03:56.720 Not our deficit, 10% of our national debt.

00:03:59.680 In over two centuries, we just spent 10% of it tonight.

00:04:04.300 And it's worth pausing to think.

00:04:07.140 That was unanimous.

00:04:08.520 That means Bernie Sanders voted for it.

00:04:11.680 I voted for it.

00:04:12.640 And everybody in between voted for it.

00:04:15.000 And what I would say is the reason is these are not normal times.

00:04:19.280 This crisis is extraordinary.

00:04:21.800 The health crisis is extraordinary.

00:04:24.080 People are scared.

00:04:25.960 We've got a global pandemic.

00:04:27.920 But not only the health crisis, but the response to the health crisis has created an economic disaster that is unfolding.

00:04:36.360 There are millions of people losing their jobs.

00:04:38.720 And in response to that devastation, everyone feels an urgency to provide relief.

00:04:45.000 Now, you mentioned at the outset, and this is something a lot of people are saying, they're referring to it as stimulus.

00:04:50.520 I don't call this a stimulus bill.

00:04:52.640 This is a relief bill.

00:04:54.100 It's quite different.

00:04:55.060 It is designed to provide relief to people who are hurting badly and are hurting through no fault of their own.

00:05:01.620 So they didn't do anything to cause this.

00:05:04.300 So what are the different pieces?

00:05:05.680 What's in this monstrous bill?

00:05:08.420 Yeah.

00:05:09.040 So one big piece of it is individual relief.

00:05:13.040 And for every American in the country who makes under $100,000 a year, you're getting a check.

00:05:19.100 You're getting a check in the next couple of weeks.

00:05:22.340 Individual adults are getting $1,200 each.

00:05:25.160 A couple's getting $2,400 each.

00:05:27.900 And if you have kids, you get $500 each for those kids.

00:05:30.660 And those checks are expected to go out.

00:05:32.980 According to the Treasury Department, they're going to get them out in two to three weeks.

00:05:36.320 So sometime probably early to mid-April is when those checks are going to arrive.

00:05:41.280 And correct me if I'm wrong, this is unprecedented, right?

00:05:44.360 I mean, we've never seen the federal government mailing checks to this large a number of Americans for direct relief.

00:05:51.300 The only thing comparable to this was during the 2008 crisis.

00:05:57.780 There was a smaller set of rebate checks that were sent out under the Bush administration.

00:06:02.840 But it wasn't nearly as significant as this.

00:06:04.960 This is much more broad-based.

00:06:06.540 And these are bigger checks.

00:06:07.880 Look, if you look at restaurants that have been shut down all across the country, you look at bars, you look at hardware stores or nail salons, there are a lot of people who are hourly workers who are suddenly finding themselves at home and are scared.

00:06:22.640 How am I going to make the rent check next month?

00:06:25.000 You know, how am I going to pay the basic expenses?

00:06:27.420 How are we going to pay for food?

00:06:29.040 And so these checks are providing relief on a broad-based manner.

00:06:33.800 It's not picking winners and losers.

00:06:35.060 It's providing it across the board.

00:06:37.140 Most economists agree that's not going to be a major stimulus effect.

00:06:41.400 But it is going to help people who are worried and being hurt by this right now.

00:06:46.540 Right.

00:06:46.700 I mean, people, you know, they can't afford to not work for a month or however long this is going to go on.

00:06:52.140 So the idea is that's going to fill the gap.

00:06:54.400 And hopefully you can take $1,200 and put it toward your rent or whatever bill is due.

00:06:59.440 What else is in the bill, you know, especially in terms of I know it was controversial that there's a loan program for businesses to stay afloat.

00:07:06.960 The Democrats were very against that.

00:07:08.740 What does that program look like?

00:07:09.940 Well, let me get to another major part of the bill that I think is really important is there's $377 billion for small businesses.

00:07:20.760 And this is an emergency loan program that is going to go to small businesses, essentially businesses with 500 employees or less.

00:07:28.320 So the hardware stores and barbershops and restaurants that we talked about, all these folks that are shuttered right now and are on the verge of bankruptcy,

00:07:37.800 they can now you can now go if you're a small business owner, you can go and apply for a loan and you can get it.

00:07:45.200 It's a small business administration loan, but you can get it from your local bank.

00:07:48.320 It's from all of the local banks in the community that you can go and apply for it.

00:07:52.380 And it's up to $10 million.

00:07:54.440 So it's small loans, relatively speaking, but they're designed in particular to meet costs like payroll, to meet costs like rent.

00:08:02.500 The basic costs that you have that you don't want to lose your business and the way it's designed, if you spend the money on payroll, if you say to your employees, we're going to keep paying you, we're going to keep your paycheck coming, then those loans are forgivable.

00:08:15.700 So for the small business owner, you can take the loan, and if you actually pay it out to your employees, the loan obligation goes away.

00:08:25.220 And so that's a direct lifeline to these small businesses that are profoundly hurting.

00:08:31.820 And a lot of them are making the decision right now, do I stay open or do I shutter the door?

00:08:36.800 Right. Well, I'm sorry to interrupt.

00:08:39.940 I mean, this is a very important point here because, you know, as we see the unemployment rate ticking up, you had claims last week for unemployment that were comparable, if not higher, than you saw at the peak of the 2009 crisis.

00:08:53.040 I mean, you could have massive unemployment.

00:08:55.260 You could have businesses falling apart.

00:08:56.860 So this would allow the businesses to continue to employ their workers.

00:09:02.520 Right. And that means people keep a connection to their job.

00:09:05.060 It means they keep their health insurance, which is a big challenge for everyone.

00:09:08.820 If you lose your job, you may be losing your health insurance.

00:09:11.320 So we'd rather as many people as possible to stay employed, to stay in a position that when we get past this crisis, hopefully sooner rather than later, that everyone go back to work, that we want to get the economy moving again.

00:09:23.340 And so these small business loans, again, are unprecedented.

00:09:26.840 I mean, to give you a sense, the Small Business Administration's budget, I think, last year was $23 billion.

00:09:32.820 This is $377 billion.

00:09:36.360 So this is more than 10 times the size of the Small Business Administration's entire budget.

00:09:42.080 But all of that money is designed to flow out through the community banks to small businesses and to be used for payroll predominantly and other essential costs like rent and utilities just to keep the businesses open.

00:09:54.900 Well, I know that this brings up another question on employment that was really central to the debate today, and you played a central role in this, which is some Republican senators, I think Lindsey Graham mentioned it, and you spoke out very forcefully against it, identified in the bill a provision that would actually incentivize people not to go back to work.

00:10:18.300 What was that provision, and where does that stand right now?

00:10:21.540 So part of this bill, and one of the things in particular the Democrats demanded as a price of supporting this bill, was increasing unemployment insurance compensation.

00:10:32.040 So when you file for unemployment in your states, the federal government is plussing up those weekly compensation, and plussing it up dramatically is basically adding $600 a week to what you can earn from unemployment.

00:10:47.900 So what does that mean?

00:10:49.340 And listen, most Republicans, I think that is a good thing.

00:10:52.920 We are going to see this week when the job numbers comes out, we're going to see millions of Americans who have lost their jobs in the last two weeks.

00:11:01.260 I mean, it has been – I've spoken to at least a dozen CEOs in the last week who've laid off thousands or tens of thousands of employees.

00:11:09.460 I mean, it's just one after the other after the other, and if you're suddenly laid off, having unemployment and enough to support your family is important.

00:11:20.740 So I think plussing it up made sense.

00:11:23.080 Here's the problem.

00:11:24.560 The way it is designed, the $600 is irrespective of what you were making before, which means – like I'll give you an example in Texas.

00:11:33.660 So right now in Texas, the maximum someone can make on unemployment is $521 a week.

00:11:40.720 That's what the state unemployment will – and that's based on your income.

00:11:46.060 We're now adding $600 a week to that.

00:11:48.160 So instead of $521 a week in Texas, it's now $1,121 a week.

00:11:53.860 That's a nice raise.

00:11:54.940 That is a very nice raise.

00:11:56.340 But here's the problem.

00:11:57.320 There's no constraint on whether it is more than you were making in your job.

00:12:02.680 And so I and a number of other senators, we introduced an amendment today, just a common sense amendment, that said, look, you should not make more on unemployment than you were making working.

00:12:13.740 It's common sense, right?

00:12:14.840 And we had – so we debated it on the Senate floor.

00:12:19.140 It was interesting.

00:12:19.740 Actually, an astonishing thing broke out on the Senate floor, real debate.

00:12:23.660 Dick Durbin, a Democrat from Illinois, was arguing back and forth.

00:12:27.920 And our amendment just was a simple proposition that you shouldn't be paid more in unemployment than you were making in your job.

00:12:33.620 And the reason is you don't want to disincentivize work.

00:12:37.700 I'll use the Texas example.

00:12:40.280 $1,121 a week, that's a little bit over $58,000 a year.

00:12:44.940 Now, it's four months' worth, but annualized, that's $58,000 a year.

00:12:48.580 That works out to over $28 an hour.

00:12:51.020 The problem is if we're paying people that much not to work, it incentivizes people not to work.

00:12:59.760 And it was very interesting.

00:13:00.160 Why would you ever go back to your job?

00:13:01.780 Well, and the back and forth – so Durbin did what a lot of Democrats did, which is he demagogued. 0.63

00:13:06.160 He said, oh, these Republicans are saying anyone unemployed is lazy and rotten.

00:13:10.300 And I said, hold on a second.

00:13:12.300 We're saying exactly the opposite, which is this policy will hurt workers and it will hurt small businesses.

00:13:18.660 Why?

00:13:19.060 Let's say you're a waitress and you've been laid off from your job.

00:13:23.440 You're getting unemployment.

00:13:24.500 But suddenly you're making $25, $26, $28 an hour at home not working.

00:13:31.180 And you face the decision, do I go back to work for $10, $12, $15 an hour?

00:13:36.600 However, we're creating incentives where it would be perfectly rational to say I'm not going to go back to work because I make a lot more money on unemployment.

00:13:47.020 That hurts the workers.

00:13:49.020 It also hurts small businesses.

00:13:50.340 Let's say you're trying to reopen your restaurant.

00:13:52.540 The shutdown has stopped in your city.

00:13:54.480 You want people to come back.

00:13:55.980 You call up your old employees and they say, look, I'd love to come back to work, but I can't afford the pay cut.

00:14:02.540 Yeah.

00:14:03.360 You've got to match my unemployment salary.

00:14:05.240 So that, I think, was an unfortunate mistake.

00:14:09.880 And we ended up the amendment lost.

00:14:11.380 It was basically a party line vote.

00:14:13.000 I think every Democrat voted against it except Joe Manchin.

00:14:15.760 He was the one, yes.

00:14:18.040 But I think that was unfortunate.

00:14:20.920 But nonetheless, there will be significant benefits from the additional unemployment insurance in this time of crisis.

00:14:27.800 Right.

00:14:28.040 Okay.

00:14:28.500 That makes sense.

00:14:29.840 I, I, it's too bad, unfortunately, that that seems to have been left in the bill.

00:14:34.480 But I, I guess, obviously, there's a lot of debate here.

00:14:36.660 And you did come to a unanimous vote.

00:14:39.840 However, I, I have to pick up on what you said.

00:14:42.780 You said the vote was 96 to zero.

00:14:45.820 There's more than 96 senators.

00:14:47.560 Some people were missing.

00:14:48.360 Yeah.

00:14:48.840 Yeah.

00:14:49.260 Now, we've got, got several senators who, who are out, out on quarantine.

00:14:52.860 And, and, and where that started from was, was, was a few days ago.

00:14:58.120 Um, Rand Paul tested positive for the coronavirus.

00:15:02.680 And, um, and, and he had been in, in DC the whole week.

00:15:07.160 And, and, and actually the way we found out about it.

00:15:09.440 So, so we were meeting every day for lunch, the Republican senators.

00:15:13.380 And it was interesting.

00:15:14.480 We shifted.

00:15:15.080 We normally meet in a room in the Capitol called the Bansfield room.

00:15:17.900 And, and, and it's, um, and actually, by the way, the minority meets in the LBJ room, which is a smaller room, but the Bansfield room is bigger.

00:15:26.500 So it's one of the things, it was nice in 2014.

00:15:28.900 We became the majority.

00:15:29.900 We switched our lunch rooms and got to a bigger room.

00:15:32.620 That's a nice, nice perk.

00:15:34.100 But when coronavirus hit, um, we all wanted to social distance.

00:15:39.860 And so the Bansfield room, we decided it was too small.

00:15:42.300 So we were meeting instead in a conference room.

00:15:44.220 And we moved actually to a couple of different conference rooms that were sort of almost like big auditoriums in one of the Senate office buildings.

00:15:50.920 And so we were in one of those big, big auditoriums where the acoustics were terrible.

00:15:55.260 It's hard for everyone to hear because they're not, they're just, it's not good acoustics.

00:15:58.780 But, but Mitch, every, every day we were meeting for lunch and we'd have often a two, three hour lunch because it would be a progress report on the negotiations of the bill.

00:16:09.780 And, and there were different committees that were working on different portions of the bill.

00:16:13.680 So the people would stand up and say, all right, here's what's going on with this.

00:16:16.420 And we'd ask questions and we debate back and forth.

00:16:18.440 Um, and so a few days ago we're there and Mitch is talking and he just kind of matter of fact says, um, and so Rand Paul just tested positive for coronavirus.

00:16:29.880 And we're all sitting there going, what the what?

00:16:32.700 Like, like, like, I mean, it's big news.

00:16:35.180 And Mitch just very matter of fact mentions it and keeps going on and a whole bunch of second.

00:16:40.920 Hold on a second.

00:16:42.480 Can, can you rewind that tape and play it again?

00:16:44.920 And so it was, um, well, and Rand had been at the Senate.

00:16:51.460 He had been that morning at the Senate gym.

00:16:55.000 He'd been swimming in the pool.

00:16:56.460 Oh, wow.

00:16:57.400 I got to say, I don't think I've ever seen my colleagues as pissed off as they were.

00:17:04.100 Like he had just gotten the positive test results and then they were pretty angry, uh, that he hadn't self-quarantined.

00:17:10.700 Now, now Rand said he wasn't sick.

00:17:13.160 He had no symptoms.

00:17:14.320 He hadn't come in direct contact with, with the, the, he was at a gathering with people who were sick, but he didn't come in direct contact with them.

00:17:21.780 I understand his reasoning.

00:17:23.120 I can tell you people were freaked out.

00:17:25.120 And so I remember we're sitting there going, okay, well, what do we do?

00:17:28.400 I mean, I mean, there are 53 Republicans.

00:17:30.060 The immediate question.

00:17:32.080 All right.

00:17:32.620 Are we all quarantined?

00:17:34.020 Like, as you know, I spent 11 days in self-quarantine in Houston.

00:17:37.800 Right.

00:17:38.280 And I'm like, well, all of us have been here with Rand.

00:17:41.600 What does this mean now?

00:17:43.780 Um, and what ended up happening is within an hour or two, two people self-quarantined as a result, Mike Lee and Mitt Romney.

00:17:54.220 Yeah.

00:17:54.620 And the reason is at lunch, they had sat on either side of Rand.

00:17:58.020 They had been at lunch with him.

00:18:00.000 They sat next to him.

00:18:00.920 They'd been there for a couple hours, and so they decided neither of them are feeling sick.

00:18:04.160 I talked to both, uh, both Mike and, and, and Mitt this week after they quarantined, they both said they were feeling great, but they self-quarantined because they'd sat next to Rand and spent a couple of hours.

00:18:16.280 You know, I thought about it, but as it so happened this past week, I just didn't run into Rand.

00:18:21.280 In fact, I didn't even, I didn't know he was around.

00:18:23.360 I'll often sit next to him at lunch.

00:18:25.080 I just didn't happen to this week.

00:18:26.640 So it was a good, good week not to sit next to Rand Paul, but it puts you in a tough position because as you're all sitting there and, uh, leader McConnell tells you, oh, by the way, one of your colleagues has coronavirus, you know, it's a pretty small club there in the U.S. Senate.

00:18:41.960 You're all voting on this very important legislation.

00:18:44.740 If all of the Republicans self-quarantined, what happens to the bill?

00:18:49.420 That is, was a real issue, and I think that's one of the reasons why all of us said let's move forward and get this done quickly and, and get the hell out of here.

00:18:56.720 Everyone's flying home tomorrow morning.

00:18:58.780 Right.

00:18:59.020 And, and, and the Senate is, is not expected to be in session for several weeks, but, you know, look, if you look at the Senate, there are a lot of people in their seventies and eighties.

00:19:06.980 I mean, you want to talk about a potentially vulnerable population.

00:19:10.660 We're trying to stay away from each other.

00:19:12.600 We're trying to like social distance.

00:19:14.300 People are pouring hand sanitizer, uh, like crazy, but you know, Rand and, and, and, and Rand and I traded texts.

00:19:21.980 He said he's feeling good and feeling healthy, but you remember Rand, uh, what was it?

00:19:26.900 A year or two ago, his neighbor tackled him, broke six ribs.

00:19:32.340 The ribs punctured his lungs.

00:19:34.080 He got pneumonia and they did surgery and removed part of his lung.

00:19:37.580 And, and so what's scary, what's scary about this is Rand with, with, with part of his lung removed is, is in a vulnerable position where he's more vulnerable.

00:19:48.580 If he gets COVID-19, if he gets sick, he's potentially more vulnerable.

00:19:52.380 And so that's, he's obviously taking it seriously, but all of us are, are, are, are worried and praying for Rand.

00:19:59.500 Um, of course.

00:20:00.340 Yeah.

00:20:00.680 That, that really does bring it home because some people have even kind of been joking about how the median age of the U S Senate is about 150.

00:20:08.060 And so, you know, that's an at-risk population, but of course, uh, Senator Paul in particular is especially at risk here.

00:20:15.240 So I, I suppose everybody should pray for his speedy recovery.

00:20:19.060 It's, it's, you know, one, one other actual coincidence, I suppose, with Rand Paul being out for this vote is he's been so outspokenly say libertarian, uh, you know, during his political career.

00:20:32.540 Um, and conservatives now are struggling with what to think about this bill because it's so much money, you know, it's the biggest package like this ever in American history, but this is a, a totally novel circumstance.

00:20:45.780 How should conservatives be looking at this?

00:20:48.800 Um, look, I've struggled with it.

00:20:51.040 Every conservative has struggled with it.

00:20:52.720 $2 trillion is a ton of money.

00:20:54.700 Um, I think the magnitude of the challenge we're facing justifies it.

00:20:59.220 Um, and I also think it's very different.

00:21:01.500 I mean, some people are trying to draw the analogy to TARP, to, to what happened with the 2008 financial crisis.

00:21:07.620 I think they're dramatically different.

00:21:09.820 Uh, and the biggest reason their difference is, is the financial meltdown was caused in very significant part by misconduct by the financial services firms who, who, who were taking undue risks, who got all the upside.

00:21:22.980 If they made money, they got rich and, and, and got to enjoy the blessings.

00:21:26.400 But then when it all cratered, the government had to step in and help them.

00:21:29.720 Um, and so it, it, it, it felt very much like a rigged game.

00:21:34.080 Um, this is a very different circumstance because the people that are getting relief here, they didn't do anything to cause the Corona virus.

00:21:41.520 It wasn't their conduct.

00:21:43.240 You know, the, the individual waiter who's been laid off, it's not his fault that, that this started in Wuhan and spread across the world.

00:21:51.280 It's, it's not the fault of, of the guy who owns the local movie theater.

00:21:55.480 Um, and, and, and so I think that's different.

00:21:59.200 I think it's also important that if you look at how this is structured, um, you've got the individual grants, which, which are very important relief.

00:22:08.160 You've got the small business piece, which is very important.

00:22:10.680 If you look at other elements of it, so there is a hundred billion dollars in this directed to hospitals and healthcare providers.

00:22:18.160 Now look, in the Corona virus circumstance, hospitals are panicking.

00:22:22.040 They need to expand their capacity.

00:22:23.840 A hundred billion dollars for hospitals.

00:22:26.000 You know, God forbid you have circumstances where we need to wrap, ramp up quickly.

00:22:30.680 That is almost the very definition of emergency relief for this crisis.

00:22:35.800 You've got 16, 16 billion dollars for protective gear, for ventilators and medical supplies.

00:22:42.260 That again is, is, is crisis appropriation.

00:22:45.720 You've got 150 billion dollars for state and local governments to meet the Corona virus.

00:22:51.080 And it's limited so that it goes to Corona virus spending on the state and local level.

00:22:55.560 Um, all of that.

00:22:56.880 So you're saying that the States and the cities, they can't just spend it on whatever pet

00:23:00.520 project they want.

00:23:01.540 They, there actually will be some checks on how they can use the federal money.

00:23:05.620 I hope so.

00:23:06.820 Or maybe not.

00:23:07.380 But look, let me throw in a caveat.

00:23:09.300 This bill is massive.

00:23:10.660 It was drafted really quickly.

00:23:13.160 Um, we're going to find all sorts of ugly things there as it rolls forward.

00:23:17.900 So when it comes to the constraints on the States, at least as it was relayed to us, as we understood

00:23:23.960 it, it was intended to be just Corona virus spending.

00:23:26.800 Can I promise that there won't be States frittering the money away?

00:23:30.080 No, but they are facing a massive and unprecedented health crisis.

00:23:34.100 So, so, so the intention was give them the funds.

00:23:37.460 And that was one of the big democratic holdouts and demands also, is they wanted money, uh,

00:23:43.380 for, for the state and local governments.

00:23:45.240 And that's one of the big things that, that was added, that was expanded in the last couple

00:23:49.200 of weeks.

00:23:50.700 The part that is deemed the most controversial, uh, is there's $500 billion for what's called

00:23:58.080 the stabilization fund.

00:23:59.860 Now that's what the Democrats have been characterizing as the big corporation bailout.

00:24:04.900 Right.

00:24:05.780 Um, listen, of all the parts of the bill, that's the part I, I have the most concerns about,

00:24:10.740 but I do think there are differences.

00:24:13.960 Even in that part from, from, from, from a bailout, almost all of that is structured as loans.

00:24:21.720 So, so, so what are the components of it?

00:24:24.540 Um, the components of it, you've got $450 billion that basically goes to the fed to make loans

00:24:34.040 across the economy.

00:24:35.040 And, and, and it's designed for the fed to leverage it up.

00:24:39.420 So that $450 billion is expected to result in about $4 trillion in additional capital.

00:24:47.200 So I'm sorry, pardon my economic ignorance.

00:24:50.440 How does that work?

00:24:51.780 So the fed will make loans, will make loans that will go out to businesses, to companies

00:24:58.040 all through the country.

00:24:58.940 And, you know, look, in thinking about how to respond to this crisis, I tried to talk

00:25:04.740 to a lot of experts, to conservatives who, who I know and respect and trust.

00:25:08.040 So one person I called is Art Laffer.

00:25:10.040 Art Laffer is a good friend, was Reagan's chief economist, helped design the Reagan tax

00:25:14.680 cut.

00:25:15.000 The Laffer curve, you may, you may recall, uh, he drew on a napkin that laid out the principle

00:25:19.640 that if you raise taxes too high, tax revenue will go down.

00:25:23.200 And in that circumstance, if you lower the tax rate, you can actually, the federal government

00:25:26.480 collects more taxes because of incentives.

00:25:28.440 Art is a strong conservative, a great friend.

00:25:32.080 I called Art and said, all right, what, what should we be doing?

00:25:34.240 This is, this is an economic catastrophe.

00:25:36.620 What, what, what should a conservative be doing?

00:25:39.600 And Art focused on two things.

00:25:41.700 He said, number one, we should do a payroll tax holiday from now to the end of the year.

00:25:47.440 Payroll tax is about seven and a half percent paid by the employee, about seven and a half

00:25:51.080 percent paid by the employer.

00:25:52.620 We should just say, nobody has to pay it from now to the end of the year.

00:25:56.320 That would create enormous incentives for work.

00:25:59.420 Look, it harkens back to the fight we had over the unemployment compensation, the disincentive

00:26:03.380 for work.

00:26:03.820 I'm very focused on incentives for work.

00:26:07.480 Right.

00:26:07.920 That makes sense.

00:26:08.700 By the way, half of that proposal is in this bill.

00:26:11.860 One of the things that is included in this bill is from now to the end of the year, employers

00:26:16.860 don't have to pay their half of the payroll taxes.

00:26:19.720 They have to repay it in 2021 and 2022, but it defers those tax payments, which means for

00:26:26.020 a, an employer, it lowers the cost of employment.

00:26:28.640 It makes jobs less expensive.

00:26:31.100 That, that is a good supply side step in terms of tax relief.

00:26:36.780 But the other thing Art said, and this was important, he said, listen, the most dangerous

00:26:42.080 thing in a liquidity crisis is you don't want it to become a solvency crisis.

00:26:47.120 Now, what does that mean?

00:26:48.080 That means your customers have dried up because the government is making people stay home and

00:26:53.500 suddenly your revenue is plummeting.

00:26:55.680 Yeah.

00:26:56.200 And you can't meet your basic bills.

00:26:58.400 You can't meet your payroll.

00:26:59.280 You can't meet your mortgage.

00:27:00.120 You can't meet your rent.

00:27:01.480 And so when you face a solvency crisis, you've got to suddenly sell stuff on the cheap.

00:27:06.960 We don't want to see the airlines suddenly have to auction off all their planes for 10

00:27:11.480 cents on the dollar.

00:27:12.320 That, that would take a temporary crisis and turn it into catastrophe.

00:27:16.880 And the, and so what Art said is you want to have liquidity in the system.

00:27:22.540 You want to have people being able to get a line of credit, companies able to get a line

00:27:26.700 of credit so they survive the catastrophe.

00:27:29.300 And so that was his, his principle recommendation, which has been echoed by a lot of conservative

00:27:35.280 economists I've talked to.

00:27:37.140 That 450 billion is designed to do exactly that, to, to, to make it.

00:27:41.100 You don't want to take this acute problem and have it lead to very long-term economic catastrophe

00:27:47.440 because we were too cheap to do what we, what we had to do in the moment.

00:27:50.540 That's exactly right.

00:27:53.160 Now, all of that is, are loans.

00:27:55.900 Those are not grants.

00:27:56.760 So nobody's getting a, a, a special payment that they get to keep.

00:28:00.080 No one's getting bailed out in that sense.

00:28:01.860 All it means is they're able to go and get a loan and they're able to get a loan.

00:28:07.140 Think about it.

00:28:07.600 If you, let's say you're, you run a hotel.

00:28:09.860 Yeah.

00:28:10.340 Um, I talked to several hotel owners who described, like one said their, their occupancy rate

00:28:15.780 was now 6%.

00:28:17.080 Look, 6%, you couldn't go get a loan.

00:28:20.300 I mean, a hotel is not a going concern with 6% occupancy rate.

00:28:24.960 Now it won't always be.

00:28:25.860 It didn't used to be.

00:28:26.820 And when the crisis is over, presumably it won't, but who would want to see every hotel

00:28:33.040 auctioned off at a foreclosure sale.

00:28:35.240 And all that would mean is whoever happened to have capital would suddenly have a, a windfall,

00:28:42.340 be able to acquire, you know, let's go buy the Waldorf Astoria for, for 10 cents on the

00:28:46.600 dollar that actually doesn't help the economy or anything to force every business owner to

00:28:53.300 sell their assets.

00:28:54.180 And, and so the liquidity is basically giving someone the capacity to get out of it.

00:29:00.480 Now, look, there may be some failures.

00:29:02.660 There's some taxpayer exposures.

00:29:04.180 The liquidity is not cost-free, but, but it is not, it's designed to be broad-based enough

00:29:11.340 that hopefully it won't be the government picking winners and losers.

00:29:16.300 Now, well, it does sound very different in that way from the 2009, uh, federal spending

00:29:22.240 that we saw.

00:29:22.700 Now, yes.

00:29:24.040 Now, now there are two exceptions to that.

00:29:26.600 One of which, uh, is more problematic than the other.

00:29:30.140 So there's 17 billion that is carved out, they say for nationally security, important companies

00:29:38.260 that basically everyone knows means Boeing and, and maybe GE.

00:29:42.980 And, and they, they were pretty candid about, we're just writing it to help.

00:29:46.620 And listen, Boeing has all sorts of problems that had nothing to do with the Corona virus.

00:29:50.940 And, and, and, and, and I, I fought hard against that, the Boeing and GE money.

00:29:56.700 I argued against it.

00:29:57.860 I stood up in conference and, and, and I mean, blasted my colleagues and you know what?

00:30:03.680 We couldn't get it out of the bill.

00:30:05.400 The rep, and the sad thing is the Republicans wanted it in and so did the Democrats.

00:30:09.320 Hmm.

00:30:10.320 The second industry specific component is airlines and airlines.

00:30:17.380 It's interesting.

00:30:17.960 You know, the Democrats talking point, which all of them are saying is this is all corporate

00:30:22.800 welfare for Republicans.

00:30:23.780 They want the big corporations.

00:30:25.660 Here's the irony, Mike, the corporate welfare increased because of the Democrats' demands.

00:30:34.260 So the Democrats are entirely posturing.

00:30:36.980 So let's take, for example, the airline portion of it.

00:30:39.600 So there was 58 billion in the Republican bill that we had, actually the bipartisan bill that

00:30:43.660 we had that we're going to vote on on Sunday.

00:30:45.940 There was 58 billion for airlines, but it was all in loans.

00:30:49.260 It was a hundred percent loans that they would have to pay back.

00:30:51.480 So the Democrats in the last three days of their negotiations, they insisted that 50%

00:30:56.820 of it be grants, that it be direct grants rather than loans.

00:31:00.920 So the next time you see, if you listen to any of the Democrats rattling on about, they're

00:31:05.640 the ones that fought for the grants instead of the loans.

00:31:08.320 You know, you, you don't, you don't see that reported in much of the mainstream press.

00:31:12.740 Actually, you don't see much of any of this that we're talking about right now reported

00:31:16.420 in the mainstream press.

00:31:17.300 Senator, we're already over time, but I, just before we go, do you have a sort of 30

00:31:23.300 second takeaway beyond everything we've talked about for the American people while they're

00:31:27.880 looking at this crisis and while they're looking at this relief package?

00:31:31.560 Listen, this crisis is extraordinary, but we're going to make it through this.

00:31:35.140 We're going to make it through the public health side and people are scared.

00:31:37.980 I get it.

00:31:38.440 People are frustrated about being at home.

00:31:40.560 We will make it through this, but we'll also make it through the economic challenges.

00:31:44.060 I mean, people are worried now, you and I have never lived through a great depression.

00:31:48.560 We've never seen 20%, 30% unemployment.

00:31:51.320 I don't know if we will see that or not.

00:31:53.040 I certainly don't want to.

00:31:54.480 I hope that this emergency relief package helps, but, but the way we stop the economic

00:32:00.320 devastation is we solve the pandemic is it is that we contain it is that we develop effective

00:32:06.860 vaccines and treatments.

00:32:08.300 We need to do that and my focus and priority is stopping this pandemic, but also ensuring

00:32:13.880 that we have an economy that can keep going, going forward.

00:32:17.100 We don't want to see every small business in America destroyed in the process of keeping

00:32:21.340 us safe.

00:32:21.860 So, so we got to do both and, and that they're going to be challenging days ahead.

00:32:27.000 Yeah.

00:32:27.480 But, but it's worth remembering, listen, America is a great country and we're great because

00:32:32.440 of the character of the people.

00:32:34.380 We have overcome challenges before we've overcome world wars.

00:32:39.480 We've overcome nine 11 and we will overcome this and, and, and that I'm inspired every

00:32:45.040 day by, by the heroism of the American people.

00:32:47.760 And that's, what's going to take us beyond this challenge as well.

00:32:50.800 I agree.

00:32:51.820 And, and part of the way that we will recover is by staying healthy and Senator, part of

00:32:56.220 the way you stay healthy is by getting enough sleep.

00:32:58.600 So we've got to let you get out of here and go back home and get at least a few hours of

00:33:02.660 sleep.

00:33:03.400 Uh, there's so much more to cover.

00:33:04.680 I guess we'll just have to get to it next time.

00:33:06.660 I'm Michael Knowles.

00:33:07.580 This is verdict with Ted Cruz.

00:33:18.300 This is an I heart podcast.

00:33:20.800 Guaranteed human.

Verdict with Ted Cruz - March 26, 2020

What’s Actually In The Senate Relief Bill

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript