Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news.
Speaker 2: It's great to be joined again by the Republican Senator
Speaker 2: from Texas, Ted Cruz, who chairs the Commerce Committee. Senator,
Speaker 2: welcome back.
Speaker 3: It's good to see you.
Speaker 2: A busy day when it comes to the reconciliation process
Speaker 2: as we track the parliamentarian in your chamber, a rules
Speaker 2: committee in the House. I'm just wondering, broadly, what's the
Speaker 2: first thing you take out.
Speaker 3: Of this bill.
Speaker 2: Is it the new cap on salt or are you
Speaker 2: more focused on enhancing what is in the bill, like
Speaker 2: making business tax cuts permanent.
Speaker 1: Well, listen, I think the House did a good job
Speaker 1: starting this process.
Speaker 3: We're going to get this bill accomplished.
Speaker 1: We're going to get it passed because it's the main
Speaker 1: vehicle to deliver on the promises we made to the
Speaker 1: American people in November, and so it's the main vehicle
Speaker 1: to deliver the funding to secure the border. It's the
Speaker 1: main vehicle to rebuild our military. It's the main vehicle
Speaker 1: to extend the twenty seventeen tax cuts and make them
Speaker 1: bigger and bolder, and that's critical for economic growth and jobs.
Speaker 1: The process of the back and forth is ongoing, and
Speaker 1: so in the Senate right now, Each committee right is
Speaker 1: releasing its language and the Senate is going to take
Speaker 1: some different approaches than the House did, and ultimately there
Speaker 1: will be a conference and the two will come together,
Speaker 1: and I think through that process the bill will get
Speaker 1: better well.
Speaker 4: And certainly the Commerce Committee has made some changes to
Speaker 4: the House legislation, including in the bill you released last week,
Speaker 4: a tweak to the moratorium on state AI laws, tying
Speaker 4: it to the federal broadband expansion program. Mister Chairman, are
Speaker 4: you confident that can get through the Senate? Frankly, has
Speaker 4: the parliamentarian suggested to you that will pass muster when
Speaker 4: it comes to the.
Speaker 1: Bird rule, Well, we have yet to argue this before
Speaker 1: the Parliamentary and I anticipate that we will do so
Speaker 1: this week, either this week or next week, and it
Speaker 1: certainly will be challenged. That provision will be challenged in
Speaker 1: front of the Parliamentary and I don't know how she'll rule.
Speaker 3: Listen, I think it is very sound policy.
Speaker 1: If you look at just a few weeks ago, I
Speaker 1: chaired a hearing on AI, and I think AI is
Speaker 1: transformational technology that is going to have a massive impact
Speaker 1: on productivity and jobs across the country, and I think
Speaker 1: it is critical that America win the race to AI,
Speaker 1: that we not lose to China. And the hearing I chared,
Speaker 1: we had witnesses from across the industry testifying. Everyone agreed
Speaker 1: there is a real danger of state legislation and in
Speaker 1: particular states like California adopting a heavy handed nanny state approach,
Speaker 1: much like the European Union, which would cripple America's leadership
Speaker 1: at AI. And so I think it is sound policy.
Speaker 1: Whether it gets enacted on reconciliation or not, it is
Speaker 1: a question that's still being argued.
Speaker 2: You've got the FAA, of course in your purview, Senator,
Speaker 2: and it's an agency that we've all, as Americans, talked
Speaker 2: about a lot recently. This is something that touches all
Speaker 2: of our viewers and listeners.
Speaker 3: You've got a little.
Speaker 2: Over twelve billion dollars here for enhancements in improvements. Is
Speaker 2: that enough money to replace the nation's air traffic control system?
Speaker 1: Well, twelve and a half billion dollars is a major
Speaker 1: investment in modernizing air traffic control. There's no doubt we
Speaker 1: need to do so. It's something I've been fighting for
Speaker 1: for over a decade. In the Senate that if you
Speaker 1: look right now at our air traffic control system, it's
Speaker 1: outdated equipment that they use radars from the nineteen fifties.
Speaker 1: They use little slips of paper and computers that have
Speaker 1: floppy discs. My guess is a lot of your viewers
Speaker 1: don't even remember what floppy discs were, and yet that's
Speaker 1: what we rely on to keep our flying public safe.
Speaker 3: That's unacceptable.
Speaker 1: We need to embrace modern day technology and GPS. They're
Speaker 1: enormous upsides, and so twelve and a half billion dollars
Speaker 1: is a major investment. I also think we need to
Speaker 1: need reforms to improve the system. That's something that's going
Speaker 1: to be a real priority for the Commerce Committee.
Speaker 2: I'm saving my floppies in case they become collectors items someday. Senator,
Speaker 2: I wonder if you still feel like starlink is part
Speaker 2: of this solution, and if you've had a chance to
Speaker 2: talk with Elon Musk about it since his apparent breakup
Speaker 2: with the president.
Speaker 1: Oh look, I think starlink is amazing technology. And my
Speaker 1: view is that technology decisions throughout the government ought to
Speaker 1: be based on the merits you look at. For example,
Speaker 1: the bad program, which which Congress authorized forty two billion
Speaker 1: dollars to provide connections to high quality broadband, and the
Speaker 1: entire BIDE administration they didn't connect even a single home
Speaker 1: in America. It was an absolute boondoggle and failure. The
Speaker 1: President President Trump's administration is rightly focused on using that
Speaker 1: money to actually have connectivity. One of the reasons the
Speaker 1: BIDE administration didn't connect anyone is they decided they hated Elon, Musket,
Speaker 1: hated starlink, and so we're not going to consider that
Speaker 1: as an option. And the reality when you're talking about
Speaker 1: broadband is the right technology depends upon the right location.
Speaker 1: So in a dense herbit environment, fiber makes a lot
Speaker 1: of sense. If you're out in the mountains or the
Speaker 1: middle of the wilderness with very sparse population, satellite or
Speaker 1: or less expensive infrastructure solutions make a lot more sense.
Speaker 1: And so I think the government ought to make those
Speaker 1: decisions based on the technology that best meets the need.
Speaker 4: Mister Chairman, I'd like to ask you about words we
Speaker 4: heard from another Senate Chairman, Lindsay Graham of the Budget Committee,
Speaker 4: who suggested in an interview today that this package may
Speaker 4: end up needing to be broken up in different parts
Speaker 4: after all, which of course was the original plan of
Speaker 4: the Majority Leader John Thune. Is it acceptable to you?
Speaker 4: Do you think it would be acceptable for the President
Speaker 4: to not get his entire legislative agenda done in one
Speaker 4: single beautiful bill.
Speaker 3: Listen.
Speaker 1: I think we're going to get it done, and it
Speaker 1: early on I advocated for doing it in two bills.
Speaker 1: I would have been certainly supportive of that. But we're
Speaker 1: going to get this bill accomplished. And the reason is,
Speaker 1: I think the stakes of failure are too high. If
Speaker 1: Congress does not act by December thirty. First, there's an
Speaker 1: automatic four trillion dollar tax increase that will hurt every
Speaker 1: working family in America, that will hurt every small business
Speaker 1: in America. And that's an outcome that the Democrats are
Speaker 1: quite happy with. But there's not a single Republican in
Speaker 1: the House or Senate who wants that to happen.
Speaker 3: So is it going to be complicated?
Speaker 1: Yes, are there a million trade offs, yets, But we're
Speaker 1: going to get it done. And you know, look, I'll
Speaker 1: reflect back to twenty seventeen, the last big tax cut
Speaker 1: we passed under President Trump. I spent hundreds of hours
Speaker 1: in twenty seventeen negotiating provisions in that bill.
Speaker 3: And if you look at how that bill came.
Speaker 1: To pass, the House passed a good bill, it went
Speaker 1: to the Senate, the Senate made it substantially better, and
Speaker 1: then we went to conference committee and it got better
Speaker 1: as well. My hope is the same thing happens this time.
Speaker 1: I'd like to see the Senate be bigger and bolder.
Speaker 1: I'd like to see us have more fiscal responsibility and
Speaker 1: cut unnecessary waste and fraud and abuse. And so that's
Speaker 1: certainly what I'm urging my colleagues in the Senate to do.
Speaker 3: Well.
Speaker 4: And you'd like to see Trump savings accounts for newborn's
Speaker 4: become a reality. That, of course was your brainchild, Senator.
Speaker 4: The law stipulates the baby must be a United States
Speaker 4: citizen at birth, and I wonder what assumptions you are
Speaker 4: making about the status of birthright citizenship here.
Speaker 1: Well, look, this particular provision doesn't resolve that. It just
Speaker 1: relies on US law, and so right now, US law
Speaker 1: confers citizenship on birth. I think birthright citizenship is a
Speaker 1: policy that doesn't make sense because it encourages illegal immigration.
Speaker 1: So I've long advocated for changing that policy. But this
Speaker 1: bill is an economic bill, so it's not purporting to
Speaker 1: resolve immigration questions. What this bill is doing and I'm
Speaker 1: proud to have introduced it and to be fighting for it.
Speaker 1: It's in the bill, it's going to be enacted. This
Speaker 1: will create an investment account for every child in America
Speaker 1: and newborn children.
Speaker 3: Newborn children born.
Speaker 1: This year would receive one thousand dollars to see that account.
Speaker 1: And then each year, parents and family and employers would
Speaker 1: be able to contribute up to five thousand a year
Speaker 1: in a tax advantaged account. That money would grow and
Speaker 1: it would be invested in the stock market in the
Speaker 1: s and P. Five hundred, and if you assume, let's
Speaker 1: assume a little girl little boy born this year has
Speaker 1: one thousand dollars and then has five thousand dollars invested
Speaker 1: each year. If you assume historic rates of growth of
Speaker 1: the s and P. Five hundred, that little baby, by
Speaker 1: the time here she turns eighteen would have one hundred
Speaker 1: and seventy thousand dollars in their account. If they kept
Speaker 1: on investing five thousand a year, by the time they
Speaker 1: turned thirty five, they would have seven hundred thousand dollars
Speaker 1: in that account. And that's for every child in America.
Speaker 1: That is a really powerful way to enable every child
Speaker 1: to have the benefits of compound growth.
Speaker 2: Senator, I want to go to la with you for
Speaker 2: a moment here, because i know you're very sensitive to
Speaker 2: constitutional law, and I'm sure you have very strong feelings
Speaker 2: about some of the things that we've seen on the
Speaker 2: streets of America's second largest city over the past four days.
Speaker 2: We received a statement from the Chief of Police LAPD
Speaker 2: Chief Jim McDonnell responding to the possible deployment of Marines,
Speaker 2: which now, of course, has happened. We've got seven hundred
Speaker 2: deployed from Camp Pendleton. He starts by writing, the LAPD
Speaker 2: has not received any formal notification the Marines will be arriving. However,
Speaker 2: their arrival of federal military forces in Los Angeles, absent
Speaker 2: clear coordination, presents a significant logistical and operational challenge for
Speaker 2: those of us charged with safeguarding this city. Is what
Speaker 2: the President is doing right now fair to the police
Speaker 2: in Los Angeles.
Speaker 1: Well, listen, what is not fair to the police in
Speaker 1: Los Angeles is the actions of Karen Bass, the Democrat mayor,
Speaker 1: and the actions of Gavin Newsom, the Democrat governor. What
Speaker 1: we're seeing in La is horrific. We're seeing violent riots
Speaker 1: that are breaking out and spilling on day after day
Speaker 1: after day.
Speaker 3: We're seeing police cars firebombed.
Speaker 1: We're seeing protesters protesting against the enforcement of federal immigration law.
Speaker 3: And I got to say, it is a bizarre.
Speaker 1: Image to see protesters who say, do not enforce immigration law.
Speaker 1: We want to be here illegally. To see them waving
Speaker 1: Mexican flags for the proposition, don't you dare back dare
Speaker 1: send us back to the country whose flag we're waving.
Speaker 3: That makes no sense.
Speaker 1: And whether the troops are deployed though, well, look, the
Speaker 1: problem we've seen in places like La is the cops.
Speaker 3: And I think I.
Speaker 1: Support law enforcement and the police, but unfortunately today's Democrats
Speaker 1: do not. When they are given a choice between siding
Speaker 1: with illegal immigrants or Venezuelan and gang members or violent criminals,
Speaker 1: or siding with the police, Today's Democrats do what Gavin
Speaker 1: Newsom does, which is he's suing the Trump administration saying
Speaker 1: do not enforce law and order, do not protect our citizens.
Speaker 3: I gotta say that's backwards.
Speaker 1: I think we ought to be keeping our cities safe
Speaker 1: and that should be regardless of the circumstance.
Speaker 3: Answers. We should be against violence, but should.
Speaker 4: We be against states rights? Senator? Is that not something
Speaker 4: you stand for? Does this not risk setting a dangerous
Speaker 4: president of the federal government coming in and overtaking the
Speaker 4: will of an individual state.
Speaker 1: You know what, there's a long tradition when you have
Speaker 1: local politicians who are lawless, who are defying federal law.
Speaker 1: The federal government has the authority and has an obligation
Speaker 1: to enforce federal law. Look, you saw when you had
Speaker 1: Southern Democrat governors in the civil rights movement resist integrating schools,
Speaker 1: saying we are not going to allow African American children
Speaker 1: in our schools. You saw President Dwight D. Eisenhower send
Speaker 1: in the National Guard and say you are going to
Speaker 1: follow federal law and you don't have the right to
Speaker 1: defy federal law.
Speaker 3: Well, the new.
Speaker 1: The new massive resistance Democrats are now fighting against federal
Speaker 1: immigration law. The federal government has a responsibility to keep
Speaker 1: the American people safe. And I got to say, we're
Speaker 1: seeing a replay of what happened during the Black Lives
Speaker 1: Matter and Antifa riots where Democrat politicians prevented the police
Speaker 1: from protecting their citizens and allowed people to be murdered,
Speaker 1: allowed stores to be looted, and allowed police to be assaulted.
Speaker 1: And so I'm glad President Trump is stepping forward saying
Speaker 1: we're going to keep you safe from violence on the streets.
Speaker 4: Well, when we consider what he's keeping Americans sefe from Senator,
Speaker 4: there's a difference between resistance and insurrection. And the President
Speaker 4: today did not rule out invoking the Insurrection Act.
Speaker 2: Should he?
Speaker 1: Well, look, that'll be a question that will depend on
Speaker 1: the circumstances. But I got to tell you the problem
Speaker 1: is made worse when you have Democrat mayors and governors
Speaker 1: that refuse to enforce the law. And that's what we're
Speaker 1: seeing in California. If you break the law, if you
Speaker 1: commit acts of violence, you should be arrested. And these
Speaker 1: are lawless protests in support of further lawlessness.
Speaker 3: Why are they mad?
Speaker 1: They're mad because President Trump is deporting illegal immigrants, because
Speaker 1: he's deporting Venezuelan gang members and murderers and child rapists.
Speaker 1: And I don't get the Democrats calculus when they look
Speaker 1: at that and say, you know what America needs. We
Speaker 1: need more MS thirteen members, we need more human traffickers
Speaker 1: and criminals. I think the vast majority of Americans don't
Speaker 1: agree with that.
Speaker 4: All right, Senator, we appreciate your time. Republican Senator Ted
Speaker 4: Cruz of Texas, of course, the chair of the Senate
Speaker 4: Commerce Committee, here with us on Bloomberg TV and radio