Call Your Senator: Sen. Gillibrand on Impeachment and COVID Relief

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Brian Lehrer: It's the Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning everyone. The second impeachment of Donald Trump will go next to the Senate. With us now is one of the 100 members who will become a juror, New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand. We will talk about the insurrection and impeachment, of course, but also the transition and the urgent business to do for the people like beating back the coronavirus and its economic shocks and getting serious about racial equality. Hey, Senator. Just another day in America. Welcome back to WNYC.

Kirsten Gillibrand: Thanks, Brian. How are you doing?

Brian: I'm doing all right. The question is how are you doing? I wonder would you like to begin with some oral history of your experience during the insurrection? What will you always remember from that day?

Sen. Gillibrand: Well, it certainly was a very anxious day. It was an important day so most of the senators were actually in the chamber at the time to listen to the arguments of both sides. All of a sudden, things started to change. Staff got up, they quickly went to the podium, took the vice-president down from the podium, and then moved Senator Grassley to the podium. No one knew it was happening because normally, you're not on your phones during the Senate, and so we weren't scrolling through the newsfeeds. We started to do so and realized that the riots outside were becoming more and more violent and within moments, we were informed that the Capitol had been breached.

It was just one of those just high anxiety days where you couldn't understand what was happening in the moment. On reflection, looking back, I'm more and more horrified as the days go on with now, there's allegations that there was serious planning, that there may have been inside information. There may have been complicity with not only Capitol police, but other public servants who work in this facility, in these halls.

It's just an important moment that we recognize that our country is under attack. Our democracy is under attack. That pipe bombs were placed at the RNC and the DNC. Five people died. This is something that we need to understand and make sure that we prevent in the future, but begin to address much more holistically.

Brian: Let me ask you about one possible piece of complicity that you've probably heard the theory about New Jersey Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill, a former Navy pilot, says she saw members of Congress giving tours the night before the breach to people, even though Capitol tourists have been suspended during COVID, and she suspects they may have been what she calls reconnaissance tours, showing insurrectionists the lay of the land inside the building to help them prepare and plan. Did you see anything like that or have any information about that?

Sen. Gillibrand: I did not see anything like that nor did I have information, but I know there needs to be a thorough investigation. I believe that this is the kind of information that's deeply troubling and goes to the depth of what President Trump has done to this country. President Trump had been inciting violence for weeks. He had been undermining people's confidence in our US democracy and our elections. He inspired members of Congress and senators to support his views that the Electoral College votes shouldn't be counted and that there had to be some extra judicious review that was more than was called for by law.

He really is at the heart of the far-right extremism that has grown in this country during his presidency. Not only with the most conservative media outlets where facts are irrelevant, but also with the online communities and various platforms that can reach millions of people to spew not only hate divisiveness but lies and anarchy.

Brian: My guest there is New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, and we can take your questions for her on the Senate trial of Donald Trump to come or anything else. 646-435-7280. 646-435-7280. New Yorkers, call your Senator and others may call too. You can tweet a comment or a question as well @BrianLehrer. May I ask, Senator, were you trapped hiding in a room with Republicans who refuse to wear masks because we know that some people wouldn't have gotten the coronavirus?

Sen. Gillibrand: Well, we were evacuated from the Senate chamber really moments before the rioters reached the chamber, and we were evacuated to one of the Senate office buildings to one of the hearing rooms. Now, the blessing I would say for us was that the hearing room was very large, it had very high ceilings, but we were there for four hours. I did not see people not wearing masks in the Senate chamber. There are Republican senators who don't wear masks when they come to the Senate floor, but I did not see people maskless in that locked down room. If I had, I would have approached them and told them to put their masks on because it's not right, it's not fair, and it's incredibly selfish.

Brian: For people who don't know this yet, at least three Democrats who were trapped hiding with Republicans who refuse to wear masks even when asked have now become COVID positive including 75-year-old lung cancer survivor, Bonnie Watson Coleman, Congresswoman from New Jersey. Listeners, Congresswoman Bonnie Watson Coleman will be our guest in this time slot, 10:00 AM tomorrow. Plus there's Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley's husband who was there and also apparently got COVID that way.

The one last thing I want to ask you about this, Senator, is you wrote a New York Times op-ed calling for accountability for anyone involved in the insurrection. What would accountability look like in your opinion for Republican colleagues who caused COVID spread by refusing to wear masks even under those circumstances?

Sen. Gillibrand: Well, I absolutely agree with the Speaker's finding of members of Congress who refuse to wear masks. I believe in the Senate, we should censure those who participated in President Trump's fantasy that the Electoral College vote shouldn't be counted or was somehow wrong. I do support an effort by the Senate to hold our own colleagues accountable for their role in undermining people's confidence in our democracy. I do believe that the Speaker is right to not only create more oversight and ways to keep her colleagues safe. I also agree with her using fines for people who refuse to care about others and refuse to do what doctors are asking and requiring people to do.

Brian: Now, the president has been impeached for incitement to insurrection, and the New York Times says around 20 Republicans have an open mind on conviction, You would need around 17, and that the 20 include Mitch McConnell, who was quoted saying, "I haven't decided yet how I will vote." Do you think you can get a conviction? Since this would happen after Trump is out of office, why do you think it would matter?

Sen. Gillibrand: I think we have to do our constitutional duty. I don't think we get to pick and choose what jobs we like in the US Senate. While we would love to get immediately to President Biden's agenda and pass a robust COVID relief package as well as a infrastructure bill, as well as jobs agenda, as well as a healthcare agenda, we can do that and do our constitutional duty with regard to a trial and a possible conviction. The constitutional mandates it, it's required that as soon as an impeachment is concluded in the house, it must come to the Senate, so we will do both.

I don't know though, Brian, to be honest, if there are sufficient votes to convict him. I would suspect not. I've not seen my Republican colleagues stand up to President Trump when it's been needed and they've had many, many opportunities to do so. I don't think we'll get the 17 votes we need, but I do believe we need to complete our duty and do the process. At the same time, we need to be working immediately on COVID relief, getting money to our cities and our states, money for food, food stamps, money for schools, money for first responders, money for small businesses. The common-sense bipartisan idea is that shouldn't have been delayed under McConnell.

Brian: We'll get to some of your specific COVID relief proposals, your newest ones as we go. What do you think McConnell is up to with this hedge, he might vote yes? Is he just plotting his most effective way to block your policy agenda now that the Democrats will be in the majority?

Sen. Gillibrand: It's an interesting question. I don't know the answer to that question. I always suspect there's a political motive behind pretty much anything Senator McConnell does. I don't know, but regardless of what he does, I do believe that Senator Schumer will meet our constitutional responsibilities. We will do it efficiently, but I'm not holding my breath for real leadership from either Senator McConnell or his colleagues.

Brian: One more question for now about the trial to come. Do you think you would call some of the insurrectionists who were being arrested, the people who actually physically breached the Capitol, to testify if they believe they were being summoned to insurrection by the President as Liz Cheney and others have said? Of course, there's this famous, now famous Liz Cheney quote, a Republican who voted for impeachment, who said, "The President of the United States summoned this mob, assembled the mob, and lit the flame of this attack. Everything that followed was his doing."

She added, "The president could immediately and forcefully have intervened to stop the violence and he did not." Again, my question is, do you think some of the insurrectionists might become witnesses to say they believe they were being called to that duty by the President?

Sen. Gillibrand: Another interesting question. I do believe that Liz Cheney is right. I agree with her quote and I do believe that those witnesses' views is relevant. I do believe it is relevant testimony for senators to hear, but that will be up to the prosecution, the team that Speaker Pelosi puts together for the prosecution to decide what is the most relevant information to present to us.

Brian: How do you see the 10 Republican votes for impeachment yesterday? Of course, there were zero in the Ukraine impeachment of President Trump. It's still just 10 out of like 200 Republicans in the Senate, but it's getting a lot of press like it's a big deal. How do you see it?

Sen. Gillibrand: I think it is a big deal. I think to have a bipartisan impeachment is extremely notable and notable in history. Obviously, President Trump is the only president in our history who's been impeached twice. The fact that it is bipartisan is very, very meaningful in the same way that even when Mitch McConnell, even during our own trial for the first impeachment, the fact that Mitt Romney came out and did vote on one article of impeachment, that was extremely meaningful, and so I do think if the Republicans decide to hold President Trump accountable on any level, I think that will be meaningful.

Brian: Do you think, since there were also those Republicans who voted to block seating the electors even after the insurrection, and those who did not, the Republican caucus was really divided on that one. Is there now a Mitt Romney, Liz Cheney, New York Congressman John Katko, Republican Party, and a Jim Jordan, Ted Cruz, maybe New York Congresswoman, Nicole Malliotakis, Republican Party?

Sen. Gillibrand: Well, we would prefer, I think, as a nation, a sane, moderate Republican Party that wants to get things done and speaks the truth. I found that the acolytes of Trump do not speak the truth and they do not actually meet their constitutional duty to do the work that they are called to do from their constituents. I do have grave concerns about the behavior and views of those who continue to reiterate the lies of President Trump that this election wasn't fair and wasn't counted properly and that Joe Biden is not the duly elected president of the United States, that causes me grave concern.

I would welcome a shift in that party, but the Republican Party does need to reckon with its unfailing support of President Trump over the last four years and the fact that they not only supported him but followed him down several very destructive rabbit holes that we are now left with. I do believe though that Joe Biden can begin to heal this nation. I believe his focus on common-sense solutions and good bipartisan ideas is the way to do it. I've told him many times that I will serve in the Senate in a way to deliver those bipartisan solutions so that he can sign good, meaningful legislation.

It's why we want to get to the business of the recovery from COVID and the growth of our economy and why we need strong ideas, like a Health Force, like postal banking, like a jobs guarantee where anyone who's unemployed can get the training they need to get a better paying job. Those are the big ideas of this moment that we need to be for, and we need to fight for and find bipartisan allies to push across the finish line.

Brian: Kylie in Northern Virginia, you're on WNYC with Senator Kirsten Gillibrand. Hi Kylie.

Kylie: Good morning, thank you for taking my call. I have two questions, and one I just thought about while I was waiting on hold so we'll see about that. The first question is just, what is the alternative that the people in D.C. who did not support the impeachment, how did they recommend we hold Donald Trump accountable and sorry, this has been covered, but I'm just not hearing a clear sense of where senators and congressmen, how they want to hold them accountable, if not impeachment.

Then the second question I have is aside from statehood, which I'm not pushing for D.C., is there any effort to get the district the authority that they would need to call the National Guard unilaterally in such an instance as this, without having to go through the federal government so that like Mayor Bowser could have gotten the troops that she needed because she wanted them, but Donald Trump wouldn't let her have them. Those are the two big questions. The third is who cleaned up the mess in the Capitol building? Was it just the regular people who were supposed to, because that seems also just grossly unjust as well. Those are my three questions,

Brian: Kylie, from the existential democracy question to the on the ground, very practical, who cleans up the mess question, Kylie thank you very much. Senator.

Sen. Gillibrand: Kylie, those were three excellent questions, so thank you for being so bright and thoughtful. Well, I'll start from the last. The public servants who work in the Capitol every day were the ones to clean up the destruction. I was there the next day and I saw glass shattered all through the Capitol. They were dutifully sweeping it up, boarding the windows. There's work in there today, I'm in the Capitol. I was in the Capitol this morning. They're still working on fixing all the things that were destroyed. These are men and women who are dutiful public servants, who are experts in restoration and in making our Capitol represent our democracy and with the brilliance that it has and with order and openness that is always shown.

With regard to the question of D.C. and how do we prevent a delay of four hours of getting the National Guard where they needed to be in advance. The National Guard reports to governors, and so one of the big ideas for the new Congress is to make D.C. a state. D.C. statehood would solve that problem in a moment because she like every other governor if she was elected the governor, would be able to call up the National Guard in advance, have them at the ready, and know that they would be there when needed. I've done a lot of work to assess what the delay was for and why, and why pre-positioning would have been required for them to be where they needed to be when we needed them most.

Then what was your first question? It was the larger one about, oh, alternative to impeachment.

Brian: [crosstalk] That's right, how Republicans not for impeachment think the president can be held accountable.

Sen. Gillibrand: There are three ways to hold President Trump accountable, and each one is valuable and meaningful. The first way is an impeachment trial, which has already been concluded. The impeachment in the house is done so he has been impeached, no matter what, he will be the only president in history until this moment who has been impeached twice and so that's already done.

To convict him, to hold him truly accountable, and the conviction can carry several punishments, that would come in the Senate and that was what we were talking about earlier that we need to have a trial and convict him, but you need 17 Republicans to vote with us to get to the majority that you need for conviction. If he's convicted, there are several things you can do. You could prohibit him, for example, of never holding office again. That would be I think an extremely meaningful result if we were able to get to conviction.

If you can't get to conviction, you have other alternatives such as a censure. We could have a censure motion in the Senate, a resolution to try to speak through just a majority of our views, but you can also have a criminal prosecution. Once he leaves office, he can be prosecuted for federal crimes as well as for state crimes.

Our state Attorney General in New York is actively doing investigations on possible state law violations that President Trump has committed. The Georgia Attorney General could investigate him for trying to interfere with the election there by saying, please find votes and if you don't find votes I might prosecute you, that needs to be fully investigated as well along with federal crimes and so the Attorney General of the United States under President Biden could investigate him or any of the the US attorneys for federal crimes.

The last idea of holding him accountable is one that the cabinet can do which they have declined to do and Vice President Pence has declined to do, which that is to invoke Article 25 which is the 25th Amendment, which would allow for him to be removed from office for cause because he couldn't carry out his duties. That would have been the best thing that could have happened so that the last few days of administration we wouldn't all be on pins and needles, afraid of what more terror President Trump can wrought in our communities, in our country in his final days.

We, as a nation after Trump, we have to confront white supremacists and domestic terrorism, not only in our ranks of military and law enforcement but in society overall. We need not only clarity and transparency, but we do need accountability and justice. that is something I do hope President Biden will focus part of his Department of Justice on. I will certainly focus on that issue as the new Chair of the Personnel Subcommittee in Armed Services. There's enormous racism in the military that we need to not only understand but find ways to root out and find ways to have accountability.

Brian: You're on the Armed Services Committee. How do you investigate that?

Sen. Gillibrand: There was a survey recently of the Armed Services that said a third of the members of the military had heard or witnessed some form of white supremacy or white-supremacist rhetoric, and so that means it's present. I'd like to have a hearing on that issue which I'm allowed to call at least two hearings every year. I hope to have more than two, but I hope that can be one of them.

Brian: We'll continue with Senator Gillibrand in a minute. Brian Lehrer on WNYC.

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Brian Lehrer on WNYC as we continue with our Call Your Senator segment with New York, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand. We'll take another phone call in a minute, but I want to note that more bad unemployment numbers came out this morning, Senator, as COVID related shutdowns proliferate again, and a priority for the new Senate I know will be a better COVID relief package than you were able to get with Republicans in the majority. I see you're introducing some specific proposals, including a Direct Relief for Communities Act and an Emergency Paid Leave. Would you like to explain them?

Sen. Gillibrand: Yes. Thank you. What we've seen around New York State is just extreme loss. People have lost their jobs, They've lost the ability to feed their family, lines for food stamps, lines at soup kitchens and at different pantries and feeding organizations is exponentially higher than it's ever been. We need real solutions, so I'm hoping in this next bill, we can have a couple of things.

First, we need state and local funding and that's the Direct Support for Communities Act. That's billions of dollars that would go straight into counties' budgets, city budgets, and the state budget. There's massive gaps. The state has a $15 billion gap. We need to send real relief immediately.

Paid leave is the most simple and elegant solution for the COVID epidemic that exists. It's shocking that I could not get bipartisan support in the Senate to make paid leave permanent or to make sure it was in the last package. What we want to do is we want to have emergency paid leave in the next COVID relief bill that would allow anyone who has to stay home because their child's school is closed, because they have a sick family member, because they're sick themselves, because they have a dying parent, any family event, they can stay home up to three months and still receive up to 66% of their income.

That bill on an emergency basis would be the basis for a long-term permanent paid leave. We're the only industrialized country in the world that doesn't have access to paid leave. What that means, Brian, is that caregivers, which disproportionately are women, are left behind the workforce because every time there's a family emergency, they may have to quit their job because they have to meet the need or they don't have paid time off and they can't quit their job because they need that income, They then, therefore, cannot meet the family need.

What we saw in the jobs report that you mentioned, in December, 140,000 net jobs were lost net. All of them were female. They were jobs that women held, disproportionately, women of color. Those are the workers who work in the industries that have been crushed during COVID. [crosstalk] It's restaurants, service industry.

Brian: Wait, explain that. You said all the jobs lost in December, the net job loss, all of them are females?

Sen. Gillibrand: Correct. Let's say tens of thousands of people got new jobs and tens of thousands of people lost their jobs. If you net all the gains and all the losses out, it's negative 140 all female. It doesn't mean that men didn't lose their job in December, it doesn't mean that women didn't get jobs in December. It means if you net out all gains with all losses, there's 140,000 lost and they were all female, and disproportionately, women of color.

That is a wake-up call about how severe COVID has hit women and women of color in this country. One of the best solutions therefore is paid leave because they could that hold on to their job, be paid during that family emergency, and then never lose their spot in that company, not lose their seniority, not lose their pay level, but every time a woman gets fired or has to quit her job, she winds up having to get another job at a lower wage and we call that dynamic the sticky floor. It means it's very hard for women to get off the lowest rung, the lowest-paid jobs, the lowest level of employment which is the sticky floor.

Brian: Susan in Manhattan, you're on WNYC with Senator Kirsten Gillibrand. Hi, Susan.

Susan: Hi. I'm going to be very quick. I'm 76. My partner is 65 with stage four cancer. I have been trying now for four days to get an appointment for a vaccine. I've tried in New York City, I've tried New York State, I've tried all my local pharmacies that were listed under the New York State possibility. Either they don't have the vaccine or they have waiting lists of 500 to 1000 people. I'm just talking about the local pharmacies now. This is crazy. This is absolutely crazy. What, as a citizen, can we do to protect ourselves and get the vaccine?

Sen. Gillibrand: Well, I'm so sorry that this has been such a horrible time and that you haven't been able to get the vaccine that you certainly deserve. President Trump has really harmed our ability to use distribution methods that would've made a difference during COVID. He didn't use the Defense Production Act to get testing, contact tracing, and vaccines up and running, and to have a supply chain line that was strong and resilient.

I believe that once Biden is in power, he will create a supply chain line that is more reliable and he will ramp up production and get more shots in arms more quickly because this is his commitment. One of the legislative ideas I have that Mitch McConnell would not let us vote on is a Health Force. I've worked on it with several members of the Senate.

What it would do is train hundreds of thousands of people to be new healthcare workers, to supplement and support the nurses and the pharmacists and the EMTs and frontline workers who don't have the capacity right now to get the vaccines out as quickly as necessary because they're dealing with active COVID cases and dealing with a strain on our healthcare system.

If we were able to fund the Health Force, get a very robust COVID package across the finish line in January, then we could begin to create a supply chain and a process where someone like you could get into a facility immediately to get a vaccine. I'm deeply sorry that you have not been able to do that. It is President Trump's doing because he refused to take the power of the federal government seriously in eradicating COVID.

Brian: Raul in East Elmhurst, you're on WNYC with Senator Gillibrand. Hello, Raul?

Raul: Senator, good morning. Thank you so much for being on the show. Brian, I love your show.

Brian: Thank you.

Raul: Senator, the electoral vote is the problem. A lot of presidents have used it, so they should do away with the electoral vote. Can you help us out? Thank you.

Sen. Gillibrand: Well, I agree with you. I think the Electoral College is a holdover from a time past where we couldn't easily have an election where every vote counted and it was by popular vote. It's undemocratic. It gives weight to smaller states. It gives weight to, frankly, red states right now, given where population centers lie. It's just undemocratic and unfair, so I do support eliminating the Electoral College. It will take a constitutional amendment to do that, which means two congresses have to pass it, and then it has to be ratified by two-thirds of the states, which takes time.

It doesn't mean it can't be done, but you'll need a president who wants to get it done. I certainly will be an ally in the Senate to get it done. I'm hoping that we can begin to debate the Electoral College because it should be one person, one vote.

Brian: Last question, and I know you have to go in a minute. Democrats will have a one-vote majority in the new Senate, but there is still the filibuster, which means 60 votes, not 51 will be needed for many things, right? Do you think the Senate will or should abolish the filibuster?

Sen. Gillibrand: I believe we should ultimately abolish the filibuster. That's my personal view. I don't believe that is the majority view in the Senate right now, but I'm not sure. We do have one procedural tool that we can use if we do maintain the filibuster, and that's reconciliation. What reconciliation is, it usually happens in the beginning of a Congress. It has to relate to financial issues. It has to be about the budget and money. You are allowed, with a 51-vote majority, to pass a reconciliation bill that could include a lot of the COVID relief that we're talking about. It could include a lot of the structural reforms that we're hoping to put in place, that are financial-related.

We are, right now, I believe working on a reconciliation approach for the beginning of the Congress that will meet the needs of COVID relief right now. I don't know for sure, but I think that certainly, many offices are working on that idea. I certainly am hoping to have an emergency version of paid leave included in any reconciliation bill that is being drafted. I also believe we should have the $2,000 checks be going out immediately to every family that needs it.

I do believe we should have some infrastructure investment framework to do immediate infrastructure investment, including health care infrastructure and a way to get vaccines, not only for our caller, but for all the people who need one now, because they are immunocompromised or they are older, or there are a specific risk. Certainly, all frontline workers should have access to vaccines immediately.

Brian: Senator, we always appreciate when you come on. Stay safe because I've seen the stat that there will be more National Guard members in DC between now and the inauguration than there are us troops in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria combined. What a time, and what a time for you to be in our nation's capital. Stay safe and thank you for joining us.

Sen. Gillibrand: God bless you, Brian, and thank you to all your callers. I enjoy being on your show very much. Thank you.

 

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