Friday, January 15, 2010

Waiting On The Senate

By Brian Friel  

Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md.

Chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee

Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chairman Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., says House Democrats have a lot of accomplishments to run on, even with health care, energy and financial regulatory legislation stalled by the Senate. That means House members can spend more time in their districts this year selling what the majority did since President Obama took office. In a Dec. 17 interview with National Journal, Van Hollen -- who is also a liaison to the White House as assistant to the speaker and is a member of the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee -- said Democrats will run on their efforts to shore up the economy, and on Republicans' opposition to those efforts.

NJ: Rep. Baron Hill, D-Ind., said at a recent event that he wants the president to succeed, uniquely because of who he is. Can you talk about the relationship the president has been building with House members?

Van Hollen: Democrats want the president to succeed because we want the country to succeed. We want to work with the president to get us out of the economic ditch that he inherited. And we want his agenda of health care reform, which will finally address the problem of rising health care costs, and his efforts to invest in clean energy jobs at home -- we all want him to be successful because if that agenda is successful, America will be successful. I believe the American people hope the president will succeed. We're working with the president to move his agenda forward.

That being said, obviously members will vote on each issue on its merits as it comes up. That's why you find some members voting in support of the health care reform bill, some voting against, some voting for the new energy strategy, some voting against. Yes, people want the president to be successful. But I want to be very clear that doesn't mean they're going to be voting with the president every time.

NJ: The House has sent a lot up to the Senate that the Senate hasn't acted on yet. Can you talk about the challenge of running on your accomplishments when the laws that you passed haven't been enacted?

Van Hollen: People do have short memories. The first 100 days of the new presidency were very productive, and I'm talking about bills signed. I'm not talking just about bills that passed the House. Some of the highlights were the children's health bill, the Lilly Ledbetter legislation, the Serve America Act -- the Kennedy-Hatch bill -- legislation to finally give the FDA the authority to regulate tobacco products so you don't have thousands of kids getting hooked every day. There was a big public lands protection bill. I want to make that point. There are a number of commentators in this town who said if you just took that first 100 days, at least compared to the last couple Congresses, it was a very productive Congress right there. In terms of the other measures passed by the House, we're going to be pushing the Senate hard to act on them.

NJ: You mentioned at a press conference today not wanting to take up immigration just to throw another big bill to pile up at the Senate. So what does the House do this year?

Van Hollen: First of all, we are going to continue to be focused on the economy. So we will, early on, work with the president on a bill to accelerate job growth. The other item will be a real focus on putting in place measures that will reduce the deficit and debt in a predictable manner. Other things in the House, we will really push to do a transportation reauthorization bill. We're not sure where the Senate will be on that, but we really want to pass not just a one-year or two-year, but we hope to have a five-year transportation bill. But as you know, there are lots of challenges there, especially on the funding piece. So those are some of the things for next year.

But again, because the House has completed so much work, we want to make sure our members also have opportunities to be in their districts, talk to their constituents, answer the questions their constituents may have about the issues we've already worked on and work with their constituents to encourage the Senate to move forward on some of these issues.

NJ: Can you talk about the expiration of the Bush tax cuts and the outlook for tax reform?

Van Hollen: The Bush tax cuts will expire on their own terms. That's the way they were designed by the Republican majority and President Bush. I do think we need to look at the tax code. It's a messy, tangled code. It needs to be simplified. I think there's a lot you can do in the way of tax reform. I want to make it clear that tax reform can be done in a budget-neutral way. The goal of tax reform is not to increase revenue. The goal of tax reform is to look at the tax code, look at the equities of the tax code and simplify the tax code.

NJ: Is tax reform separate from or would it be done together with steps that relate to the expiration of the Bush tax cuts? Is it a 2010 issue, or might it go beyond that?

Van Hollen: I'm not saying that we have a goal of completing tax reform in the House next year. I believe there's room for a good, healthy debate about tax reform. Discussions will begin in the Ways and Means Committee. I'll give you an example, because I want to make it clear that this is not being done in a revenue-raising way. Let's take the corporate tax. We have a higher rate than many countries, but because there are so many loopholes a lot of people are able to do an end-run against what most people would think is their fair share. So you could actually reduce the corporate tax rate and close some of these loopholes in a revenue-neutral way.

NJ: Well --

Van Hollen: I just want to make it clear from this conversation that no one's talking about doing this for the purpose of raising revenues and that our goal is not to complete action on this comprehensive tax reform in this coming year. And that goes a little bit to the Senate issue. We really believe the Senate has got plenty the House has acted on that they can digest.

NJ: If you can project out to November on jobs, what's the message at that point?

Van Hollen: Because in this 24-hour news cycle, we all have such short memories, [people] do need to be reminded that the president inherited a disastrous economic situation and that the economy was falling through the floor, and that in fact there's been remarkable progress over the last 11 months in stemming the bleeding. Until we've actually stopped the bleeding and the patient is recovering, meaning that we see positive job growth, we won't be satisfied, which is why we've been so focused on it.

Fast-forwarding to next November, our Democratic members of Congress are going to be in a position to go to their constituents and say, "I have been fighting every day to try to get the economy turned around, to try and put people back to work." And just compare where we were on the day the president was sworn in to where we are now. Are we fully satisfied? No. I don't think anybody is expecting a big "V-shaped" recovery. No one is expecting that this is going to be a rapid bounce-back. But given where we were on the last day of the Bush administration, the first day of the Obama administration, we have been able to stabilize things and begin to turn the corner on the economy and putting people back to work. That was in part due to the measures that we took, and unfortunately our Republican colleagues fought us at every turn and walked off the playing field when the American people were most in need. That will be their message.

NJ: Looking back at the 2008 election, there seemed to be a hunger for an end to partisan bickering. How do you respond to that desire?

Van Hollen: There's no doubt that the president reached out to the Republicans. He worked very hard from his very first day in office to reach out to Republicans on a whole range of issues. Let's just look at the economic recovery bill. Not a single Republican voted for that. So they set the tone very early on that they were not interested. I say that because we included a number of measures in that bill that had been Republican ideas. There were some of our members that did not want to support some of the provisions we had in those bills. I happen to think they were good Republican ideas. I supported them -- a lot of the business tax credit provisions, and small-business things -- but there were other people who thought the monies could have been spent differently. I thought it was right to include them. The president obviously thought it was right to include them. And to a person, the Republicans said no. The most important thing to the American people at the end of the day is getting something done to improve the economy. It is results that matter -- putting people back to work that matters. I think they understand that if the Republicans were going to walk off the field, that doesn't mean the Democrats should follow them off the field in the name of bipartisanship. Someone had to play. Someone had to stay on the field and do the business of the American people. "Just say no" was not an option.