CLTV: Quigley on Politics Tonight

The following is a transcription of a report that originally aired on CLTV on September 24, 2013.

Part 1:

Paul Lisnek: Joining me live here in our WGN studio is Democratic representative Mike Quigley, from Illinois’' fifth congressional district. Congressman welcome back to the show.

Rep. Mike Quigley: Good to be here.

Paul Lisnek: Even if this bill passed, or if there was a government shutdown, the bottom line is that doesn't defund Obamacare because much of Obamacare doesn't rely on annual funding, is that right?

Rep. Mike Quigley: That's absolutely right. I mean, much of Obamacare has been put into place already, but October 1st, the program starts in the state of Illinois; people can start signing up on the program.

Paul Lisnek: Now, you have been quoted, lots of people on the Sunday shows over the weekend, pretty much to ever person, no shutdown, we'll get through, we'll make it. Now you've been quoted as don't be so sure about that. You actually anticipate there will be a shutdown, unless you're thinking has changed.

Rep. Mike Quigley: Well, here is the problem. The minority of the majority is controlling Speaker Boehner's policy. It is really, not just the dog's tail wagging about it; it's the tip of the dog's tail. It's the Tea Party folks who have Boehner afraid of Republican primaries against his base. For those reasons, I'm concerned he'll listen to them and drive us off the cliff.

Paul Lisnek: So what you are saying is, it's about politics, and it's about Boehner afraid of losing his own speakership and that's what it's all about.

Rep. Mike Quigley: He's lost control of his caucus. It's not a one headed monster, its three or four heads, and he's lost control of it. And that's why we've voted over 40 times to repeal Obamacare.

Paul Lisnek: So here's what's going to happen. The Senate is going to kick it back to you guys, without that provision in there, and you are going to have to deal with it. It would seem to me, and I’ve said this on the air, the only way this thing can get through, this is Republicans trying to save face in this process, they've got to get something. Is there any piece, anything the Democrats can give Republicans in Congress to go, "here," and we'll buy a few months by doing this.

Rep. Mike Quigley: Well look, what they are asking for, a long delay of the implementation of Obamacare, is not really the compromise we talk about in Congress. Usually we offer, we budget, and we appropriate. We don't do a continuing resolution and a very poor way of governing. There, you can actually give and take. Here, it's my way or the highway. It's Boehner's petulant child that he won't discipline.

Paul Lisnek: Do you expect that there will be some offering to Republicans? We'll give you this so they can go home to their constituents and say, "see I got you this."

Rep. Mike Quigley: I think they already had that. I think that was offered to them by the speaker. They passed a continuing resolution that defunded Obamacare, so now they can say, "see, 42 times I went after this health care law." So that should have been enough.

Paul Lisnek: There is some news today about Obamacare, I mean look, there are some glitches in the system, I think the President would admit to that. One of them today is basically saying if certain employers choose to give health coverage only to their employees and not their families, well their families of course have to get Obamacare, they have to get coverage, this could actual lead to an increased cost for families. So perhaps something nobody had been thinking about, could lead to another glitch. The problem is that I heard the President say, look, I'm willing to work on these problems, but I can't with this Congress.

Rep. Mike Quigley: I think he is absolutely right. Any major piece of legislation, like health care law, requires some tweeking. The problem for him is, we can't pass a bill that would tweek this law because they would be so busy trying to dismantle it, or defund it. It's not a rational creature that we are dealing with here. So I think that's what the President is talking about. But I would remind everyone, just why the health care law was passed. In Illinois, before this law as passed, healthcare premiums for Illinois citizens were increasing three times the rate of wages. You could be kicked off for a preexisting condition. There were lifetime and annual caps for people. The number one reason for bankruptcy was health care catastrophe within a family.

Paul Lisnek: Is the reason this thing is getting attacked right now is because, once Obamacare has been around for five years, ten years, I personally think that people will look back, once things get fixed, and say like social security, like Medicare, and say I thought we always had this. Republicans though complain, this is government inside my home, stay out of my life

Rep. Mike Quigley: Like Medicare. I've heard people say, get the federal government out of Medicare. It makes absolutely no sense. There were problems, even with a much smaller program brought on by the Bush administration, Medicare part D. There were glitch problems there as well, and we didn't attempt to defund that. Now we look at this and can't imagine that program wouldn't be there for people.

Paul Lisnek: So once you get through this closure issue or the budget issue, you are going to be facing the debt ceiling issue. It's around the corner, just a few weeks away. Some have said that's what the Republicans are waiting for. That’s where your challenge will be.

Rep. Mike Quigley: It's possible, and that makes even less sense because one puts our government at risk. Refusing to raise the debt ceiling put our economy at risk. It actually puts the world economy at risk. There isn't a reputable economist in the world that thinks it’s a good idea to not rate the debt ceiling. I would remind my Tea Party friends that Ronald Reagan raised the debt ceiling 18 times. We need to address the debt and the deficit, but this isn't the way to do it.

Paul Lisnek: And of course, the President says that’s true. By the way, very quickly before we go to break, do you foresee any more sequestration, any more, well here's the kind of thing we'll hold up like last time?

Rep. Mike Quigley: I think it's quite possible, it's very unfortunate.

[BREAK]

Part 2:

Paul Lisnek: I'm going to come back to you now and get your reaction to that. Iran, there is some questions as to whether or not the President would actually shake hands with the new president of Iran. Apparently that is not going to happen. What is your sense as a member of Congress, given 30 years of hostility between Iran and the United States, your sense as to whether we should accept what appears to be a hand reaching out to us?

Rep. Mike Quigley: Look, I think there is nothing wrong with talking to your enemies and people that you are worried about. It’s a lot better to try to do diplomacy than engage in warfare. I think it's healthy to have an extraordinary amount of skepticism about anything the Iranian government does. There is not a long history there of trust between our two nations. So I think there is a lot of skepticism there. I also think it makes sense to keep those sanctions in place until there is verification that the process of the centrifuges in creating the weapons that they can create from those centrifuges has stopped.

Paul Lisnek: Is trust by verify sufficient in this kind of situation? In other words, some people think Iran is just playing with us; they don't mean what they are saying

Rep. Mike Quigley: I think we should continue the sanctions, I think we should continue everything we've done working with Israel in the mean time to prevent that from happening. But we should always welcome, at least the appearance of a diplomatic overture.

Paul Lisnek: I want to bring things home now, to the state of Illinois. You obviously represent the fifth congressional district. We've been dealing with violence in a significant way around the city. It's a good day to ask you about this because, tell our viewers where you spent part of your day.

Rep. Mike Quigley: I was in Back of the Yards, at the park where 13 people were shot just last week. I got a ride along with one of the outstanding police sergeants in the city of Chicago and I met with the superintendent earlier before. It's been under the heat for a long time, and it's justified because there is a lot to do. There is about a 15% reduction in crime from last year, 21% reduction in murders. It doesn't seem like that, and there is still a long way to go. I do want to thank our officers for protecting us and trying to improve a very difficult situation.

Paul Lisnek: And four arrests made in that situation so far. But let me ask you, and I presented this question last week to Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle and others; some say when you look at the statistics that you just cited, what Chicago really has is an image problem, a perception problem. This is national news Mike, you know that. When you hear about these shots and killings that occur, it's hard to call it perception.

Rep. Mike Quigley: It's a serious problem. But the number of guns that we confiscated in Chicago, already this year, 200 weapons that have been designed for a theater of war has been confiscated by Chicago police. So there is a lot that has to be done beyond just the perception. The fact of the matter is that people can go to a gun show in nearby Indiana and buy anything they want without a background check. They can buy a weapon like that, that was used in the Back of the Yards last week. You can do that if you are a felon, if you have been adjudicated mentally ill, you can do it if you are on a terrorist watch list you can do it! So there are some sensible measures we can take to reduce this problem

Paul Lisnek: You said you met with Gary McCarthy today, police superintendent. Of course Governor Quinn has offered the state police to help Chicago out. McCarthy was very clear today, going, "no thanks, we're doing just fine." On the Congressional level, you have to wonder about National Guard, that kind of thing. My question is, what is your sense, and you see violence even in your district, it's all around. Do the police have the resources they need or have budget cuts really been impacting the work they can do.

Rep. Mike Quigley: I think they have been doing the best with what they have. We should remind people that the state police do patrol our expressways in the city of Chicago and there are a number of projects they work very closely with the City of Chicago already. I think we need more police. The problem there is obviously a funding program. Yet, at the federal level, we are still funding mid-size nuclear weapons, which most people say are extinct and have no military value. The cost of those weapons are higher than the weight of those weapons in gold. Those are hundreds of billions of dollars protecting us from a cold war that doesn't exist, rather than a hot war that is happening in our city.

Paul Lisnek: Are you suggesting that that funding should be taken and rechanneled to our states for this kind of police use enforcement?

Rep. Mike Quigley: That's what exactly why I proposed the amendment to make that change. The police grant was zeroed out by the House majority. The actual money that helps fund urban areas, higher police was zeroed out. We need to go the opposite way.

Paul Lisnek: Couple minutes left, I know the environment has been one of the key things on your agenda as of late, certainly in some of your touring yesterday. Give the President a grade on his efforts and what hope do you have in a Republican controlled Congress of getting environmental bills passed?

Rep. Mike Quigley: I give the President an A for dong the most he can using executive orders. Unfortunately, statistically, this is the worst House of Representatives in the history of the United States, from an environmental report card point of view.

Paul Lisnek: Also in terms of any accomplishments, number of bills passed. Do you have any hope on any bill to get through?

Rep. Mike Quigley: I had some hope that immigration might. I'm afraid that what is happening right now with sequestration and with the threat of shutting the government down, that we'll lose the chance to pass a critical bill.

Paul Lisnek: So even that won't get through?

Rep. Mike Quigley: I don’t see it happening

Paul Lisnek: Let me take you back home. Elections are around the corner. Of course you're at the Congressional level of the ticket. Federal level, the Democrats had their slating meeting last weekend, and they slated Pat Quinn for governor, of course Dick Durbin for Senate. What is your sense about the accomplishments of Governor Quinn? I know Democrat, you'll support the Democrat, but a lot of people say he hasn't been strong enough about pension issue, which is critical in the state if Democrats hope to win.

Rep. Mike Quigley: Look, the pension issue is a bipartisan failure over the last 20 years. The failure to make payments, promising too much in certain instances, so we have Democratic and Republican houses who have failed to do the job. The governor inherited an extraordinary problem. It's going to take all three levels of government to get this right.

Paul Lisnek: Should he be more involved? Should he be saying, "Look Speaker Madigan, look President Cullerton, this is what I want in a bill." Or should he just be saying, "I’m here to sign things. Figure it out and send it to me."

Rep. Mike Quigley: I think all three are equally responsible. They need to get together and get this done. They need to get it done yesterday.

Paul Lisnek: What is your sense...by the way we checked in with that committee. There is nothing new on the table right now; they are not even getting paid for their work. What is your sense of that as the governor's strategy? Keeping people from getting paid. It's political.

Rep. Mike Quigley: I think it's political. I don't think this should have required that sort of threat. I think it's very dangerous because we do live in a state, in a country, where the Constitution's separation of powers is very important. What happens if in next session the governor doesn't like what the general assembly is doing on any other kind of issue and threatens not to pay them. It's exerting a pressure that’s probably inappropriate, but on an issue that should have been done a long time ago.

Paul Lisnek: Alright, we are out of time, but do the Blackhawks win the Stanley Cup again?

Rep. Mike Quigley: Absolutely