'Special Report' on Build Back Better

close

Video

Senate votes to increase federal debt limit as inflation surges

'Special Report' panel discusses resistance toward Biden's 'Build Back Better' agenda

This is a rush transcript of "Special Report" on December 14, 2021. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

Let's bring in our panel, former education secretary Bill Bennett, Kimberley Strassel, a member of the editorial board at "The Wall Street Journal," and Jeff Mason, White House correspondent for Reuters.

Bill, you look at the PPI chart and the up arrow, and then you add, obviously, the debt clock that keeps on ticking. Republicans, let's be fair, have not focused on the debt and deficit in recent years either. But it seems like nobody is up on Capitol Hill.

BILL BENNETT, FORMER EDUCATION SECRETARY: No. The spending spree over the last 13 years is where I would put it, ready to be corrected on that. It's been outrageous. That we have to raise the debt ceiling is understandable. But where things stand, where the numbers are, is outrageous. Is there no end? And how sharp is that line going to go up?

One more way to punish our children and grandchildren is what we're doing now. And now we get this outrageous notion, excuse my parochialism about forgiving all this student loan debt. Sorry, folks, you signed up for this to get your education, to get your degree, and you got to pay it back. It was an obligation freely accepted.

Now, I will admit a lot of these institutions of higher education are in the rip-off business. But you did this knowingly. This can't happen. We can't add another $1 trillion because of forgiveness of loans and debts that were freely incurred by students for their own benefit.

BAIER: Jeff, from the White House point of view how hard are they pushing that student loan debt forgiveness? And where is the, do you think, the level of concern about long-term debt and deficit at all?

JEFF MASON, WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT, "REUTERS": Well, two things, Bret. In terms of how hard they are pushing it, I think there is more push for it from progressives on Capitol Hill, from Senator Warren and other colleagues of hers. And they have appealed to the White House to go through with it. It was part of President Biden's campaign promises when he was running for office last year.

But, and to your second point, I think that the White House's answer to concern about debt is that it's on their radar, but they would probably come back with a political answer and say that the Republicans weren't concerned about it during the last administration with the tax cuts, and so that shouldn't prevent Democrats now from going through with their policy priorities as well.

BAIER: Yes. You know who is concerned about it, Kimberley, is Joe Manchin. He talks about it all the time, Democrat from West Virginia. And he may be one of the votes that blocks the Build Back Better bill. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JOHN THUNE, (R-SD): All it takes is one Democrat to put the brakes on and stop this thing dead in its tracks.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is the president meeting again with Senator Manchin?

JEN PSAKI, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: We are not quite there yet, hence, the conversations will continue.

SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL, (R-KY) SENATE MINORITY LEADER: Senator Manchin can determine the timing here. If he thinks it's not ready and he is not ready to go, then I assume this will be brought up some other time. The best Christmas present the American people could hear was that this bill was going nowhere.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BAIER: So Kimberley, that's perhaps why Senator Romney called Senator Manchin President Manchin while getting into the elevator recently. He has got a lot of scheduling that he can do.

KIMBERLEY STRASSEL, "WALL STREET JOURNAL": Yes, two enormous things happened this last Friday. One we got those massive new inflation numbers, and as Bill Bennett said, they are going up. They are not getting better. That's been one of Manchin's red lines. And then also that new CBO score that showed the honest accounting of the Build Back Better agenda, which is closer to $5 trillion rather than the $2 trillion that Democrats have been saying. Those have been the two big issues for Joe Manchin all along, and it's hard to see how he walks back some of those comments.

Now, I think he's reluctant to be the guy who says no, I'm calling it off before Christmas. I think he is hoping his colleagues work out that there are too many process things to work through to even hit that deadline. But it's pretty clear he is still in no place ready to say yes to this bill.

BAIER: Average folks, what they're concerned about, what they see as far as prices, take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: My business partner and I see that everything that we need, coffee cups, coffee, sugar, milk, everything is a lot more expensive.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Gas, food, beef, chicken, you name it, everything is up minimum 15 percent.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: To me, with the corona, with the pandemic, with the new thing virus, that goes with inflation.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BAIER: Bill, it translates into a political issue, a political problem. No matter where you put the blame on it going up, it's going to fall to the administration in power, does it not?

BENNETT: Oh, sure. And it's a form of the old argument, tu quoque. Well, you spent a lot of money, well, you did, too. Yes, but not quite as much as you are spending. And if Build Back Better happens, I don't know what happens to that -- what happens to that inflation curve.

But there's is a moral dimension to this, too. Every news show we see shows us the situation in Kentucky, and then we have these people saying forgive these student loan debts which I incurred. Inflation is hitting a lot of people hard. Think of what it's doing for the people who are worse afflicted, and that should raise a moral question about what one is asking for. Sit down and be quiet. You have no business doing this right now.

BAIER: Jeff, has the answer changed about inflation, do you think? Have you seen an evolution from the podium at the White House?

MASON: Yes, the answer has absolutely changed during the course of this year. At the beginning of the spring when it started to be an issue, the White House said that it would be transitory and indicated then, as I recall, that it would be sort of under control by now, by the fall. That, of course, did not happen. They are now arguing, and some economists are arguing, that it will be under control at some point next year.

But you're absolutely right that the voters will hold the people in power, and that is Democrats right now in the White House and in Congress for that. And it is absolutely a concern for the average American, but it's also certainly a political concern for this White House.

BAIER: Senator Manchin just told a small group of reporters up on Capitol Hill he spoke to President Biden today. Not much else on the timeline. Someone asked him is Biden moving closer to what Manchin is asking for? Manchin, according to this, laughed and said, "I wouldn't say that." So we'll see where all of this goes.

Panel, stand by if you would. Up next, mask mandates versus COVID antiviral pills, what all of this means. Stay here.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ALBERT BOURLA, PFIZER CEO: Vaccines are needed. Vaccines is the primary frontier of what we should be using to stall the virus. The waves, they're coming. The hospitals are really overcrowded, and that creates significant issues to health care system. With this pill, we are expecting that instead of 10 people going to the hospital, only one will go, and actually no one is dying. So this is very, very good news.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BAIER: The Pfizer CEO talking about vaccines being necessary, but this new pill, antiviral pill dealing with COVID, seemed to be very effective 89, 90 percent according to Pfizer. We'll see what the FDA says. We are back with the panel.

Kimberley, it seems like a potential game changer. Obviously, vaccines and getting people vaccinated is still the push.

STRASSEL: It ought to be a game changer, because, think about this, if you were to stockpile these drugs, get tens of millions in supply, also figure out a situation in which doctors could get them to patients very efficiently because they're more effective the earlier they are taken so you'd have to deal with testing issues. If you were to do that, you ought to be able to maybe release a little bit on the vaccine mandates and the mask mandates.

The question, though, is whether or not the White House is going to approach this with the level of emergency that it did vaccines and make that a priority. So far it has not indicated that that is at the top of its list.

BAIER: Jeff, we had this grim milestone, the lawmakers up on Capitol Hill marking the 800,000 dead from COVID. Obviously, there is still a concern about unvaccinated, but there is a measure of also concern about these mandates and how they're affecting different aspects, as you take another look at that video of the vigil up on Capitol Hill.

MASON: Yes, Bret, the vaccines, the mandates in particular, as you say, have certainly become controversial and have been very political. I think that you won't see this White House giving up on that stance even though they have been challenged in the courts. I think they are going to continue to go forward with that. The president made his decision to go with vaccine mandates earlier this fall when he decided that he needed to use more of a stick instead of a carrot approach to getting people to get vaccinated. But it has certainly been something that Republicans, in particular, have pushed back on, and it's become a political liability at least to some extent for this president.

BAIER: "Wall Street Journal" on the labor shortages, Bill, quote, "Labor costs in the industry have soared and hospitals struggled to retain enough nurses, technicians, even janitors to handle higher hospitalizations in recent months as the Delta variant raged. Thousands of nurses have left the industry or lost their jobs rather than get vaccinated. As of September, 30 percent of workers at more than 2,000 hospitals across the country surveyed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention were unvaccinated." We saw what Amtrak did, saying you can get tested, not vaccinated, in order to keep labor so the trains could say keep running.

BENNETT: Yes, Amtrak, Joe Biden's former mode of transportation. Yes, that's the price of coercion. This seems to be the default position of this administration and the governors. When things are falling apart, and things really are falling apart for them, more coercion, more forced vaccination, more compulsion. And now we have the children. So five to 11-year-olds.

Its' very sad to see that vigil, 800,000 people, and we got these drugs coming out, fine. The average age last time I looked of someone who died from COVID was 68, not five to 11. Let's stop using these kids in this experimental way when the risks are so small. But that's their default position. When things are going badly, just more coercion, more vaccination mandates, and thus the price that's being paid.

BAIER: Very quickly, Kimberley, natural immunity, do you think it will factor in as opposed to vaccines, natural immunity and how that factors in?

STRASSEL: That's why this pill could also make a difference, because if more people were to get it, this pill would keep them from being hospitalized, but you'd have greater numbers developing some sort of natural immunity.

BAIER: OK, panel, we'll obviously be talking about this for a long time. Thank you very much.

When we come back, Tuesday tweets here on S.R.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BAIER: I love the bird tweeting.

Finally tonight, it is time for Tuesday Tweets. First from Nick. "I'd love for to ask politicians on both sides of the aisle why if we have to balance our finances at home, why can't Congress. We keep borrowing and borrowing. We as families and individuals can't do it."

Nick, I do it all the time. Democrats and Republicans, it's just that lawmakers haven't cared about that for recent years. We will see if they do.

Kristen asks, "Whatever happened to the Border Patrol agents and horsewhip drama?" Great question. We asked. The DHS Inspector General decided not to investigate. It then went to the Office of Professional Responsibility, seemed to die there. We don't know. The Border Patrol, president of the Border Patrol union says horseback agents, all of them in question, are still on duty, and we have seen them on the border with our crews there.

Here is a good one from Dan. "Bret, do you have any ideas for a new book?" Yes, I do, Dan, it's in the works. I just can't tell you right now.

Up next, Ann asks "favorite Christmas song?" That's "White Christmas" by Bing Crosby.

Finally, Mike asks "Good afternoon, Bret. Having worked very closely with former FOX NEWS SUNDAY host Chris Wallace, what was your reaction to Chris's decision this past Sunday to leave FOX News?" Well, I was surprised with everybody else here. I wish Chris the best. I worked with him 18 of my 24-and-a-half years here. Had a great time, and I wish him the best in his next adventure. I am hosting FOX NEWS SUNDAY this weekend, so check your local listings.

Thanks for inviting us into your home tonight. That is it for the SPECIAL REPORT, fair, balanced, and still unafraid. "FOX NEWS PRIMETIME" hosted by Will Cain starts right now early, because I took time yesterday.


Copy: Content and Programming Copyright 2021 Fox News Network, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Copyright 2021 VIQ Media Transcription, Inc. All materials herein are protected by United States copyright law and may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, displayed, published or broadcast without the prior written permission of VIQ Media Transcription, Inc. You may not alter or remove any trademark, copyright or other notice from copies of the content.