Interview with Senator Jim DeMint
ERIN BURNETT, HOST: Thanks, John. Last night, we brought you a shocking picture of what appeared to be U.S. Marines urinating on the bodies of Taliban. Tonight we have the full video and audio. We're going to play them for you and we're also finding out the identities of the Marines believed to have been involved. And who's responsible for the murder of a top Iranian nuclear scientist? Does the American government know who did it? And the "Bottom Line", on President Obama's request to Congress to increase the debt ceiling by $1.2 trillion, one of the most conservative members of the Senate and the GOP South Carolina kingmaker, Senator Jim DeMint joins us. Let's go OUTFRONT. Well good evening everyone. I'm Erin Burnett and OUTFRONT tonight, this. This is a letter from President Barack Obama. He just sent it to House Speaker John Boehner. It says, quote, "further borrowing is required because the debt is limit to -- is right now close to, well, it's 11 zeros and a one, $100 billion. And that means we need more money. The president's asking Congress to raise the debt ceiling by $1.2 trillion. Now to be fair we all knew this was coming because this is part of the deal Congress and the president signed back in August. OK. That doesn't mean it's going to happen without a lot of noise, fury -- sound and fury. Senator Jim DeMint of South Carolina has led the charge against the nation's debt problem. His new book is called "Now Or Never: Saving America From Economic Collapse" and he is OUTFRONT tonight -- Senator, good to see you.</s>SEN. JIM DEMINT (R), SOUTH CAROLINA: Good to see you and we talk a lot about the debt --</s>BURNETT: Yes, yes, you do. All right, so, this letter comes -- it's a very short letter -- "Dr. Mr. Speaker, pursuant to section</s>DEMINT: Like you said, we knew it was coming. It's strange that the so-called deficit reduction bill last August just increased our debt and unfortunately, I didn't -- I couldn't vote for it because we not only didn't need to raise the debt limit to the degree they were talking about, but we made this a passable with only a third of the votes of House members and a third of the Senate members. Normally, it takes 60 votes to pass this in the Senate, but part of the deal was is we didn't have to vote for it, but it would pass. So I didn't want to be any part of it. We've got to take the debt more seriously than that. We spend all year, Erin, talking about deficit reduction. We just passed a spending bill for this year that spends more than last year.</s>BURNETT: Let me ask you, though, because you know then Senator Barack Obama also voted against increasing the debt ceiling.</s>BURNETT: When he became the president --</s>DEMINT: He called it a failure of leadership.</s>BURNETT: That's right. Then he became the president he realized something, which is true, which is that when you don't deuce (ph) that, you default on the debt. Most people who own U.S. treasuries are Americans. Most people who have promises made to them by the U.S. government in the past are people who get Social Security and wouldn't get paid. He's got a fair point.</s>DEMINT: Not if you cut spending. You don't have to default on the debt. But we're increasing our spending every year and we have through Bush, through Obama. We can't keep spending more than we're bringing in. Erin, we have to borrow over $120 billion every month just to keep the lights on --</s>BURNETT: Are you -- are you inherently against -- talk about the economic cycle for a second, right.</s>DEMINT: Sure.</s>BURNETT: So when things are good --</s>DEMINT: Yes.</s>BURNETT: -- say you didn't spend all your money, then when things are bad, you have a little bit left over. But also when things are bad by definition a government according to many economists, should borrow money. Then when things get better you pay -- are you against borrowing in any case?</s>DEMINT: No, but the scale of borrowing now -- I mean our debt is bigger than our economy. We're projecting another 10 trillion in additional debt over the next 10 years. There's not that much money in the world to borrow. That's what the whole point of the book is. Wait a minute we've had debt before, but we've never had it on this scale and with the type of projections we have. And we still have a president who says balancing the budget is an extreme idea. So the plan is to keep spending more than we're bringing in until the whole house of cards falls down.</s>BURNETT: Let me ask you this -- what happened in August when you voted against the debt ceiling. Stock market fell 634 points in one day. Our debt got downgraded by Standard and Poor's, which over time --</s>DEMINT: This was after it passed.</s>BURNETT: Historically -- that's right.</s>DEMINT: Yes.</s>BURNETT: Historically it means our interest rates are going to go up. And you know from mortgages, all kinds of things where people borrow money, and the reason that Standard and Poor's gave the downgrade was it "reflects our view that the effectiveness, stability and predictability of American policymaking and political institutions have weakened, which makes us pessimistic about the capacity of Congress and the administration."</s>DEMINT: What they're saying --</s>BURNETT: That finger was pointed at you as well as the president.</s>DEMINT: They don't see the will to stop the spending. They see a spending addiction and they don't see any plan or intent to ever stop spending more than we're bringing in. And that not only sends a signal to the rating agencies, but to our creditors like China and markets all over the world. The only reason we're doing well right now as far as our dollar is concerned is the euro is doing worse and the Federal Reserve has been buying our debt or a large part of it the last two years.</s>BURNETT: S&P; was agnostic though in terms of how we got extra money. Cut spending and increased taxes. Is there any tax increase you'd be OK with?</s>DEMINT: It doesn't make sense to have to do the wrong thing in order to do the right thing. American businesses and upper income pay a larger portion of the federal taxes of our national taxes than any country in the world. You've got that top three percent the president keeps talking about already pay over half or all our taxes and you've got half of Americans who don't pay any. We need to get rid of all the loopholes, all the corporate subsidies and handouts, have a flat rate that's border adjusted so we can compete with the world, but everyone needs to participate in the whole tax system.</s>BURNETT: And handouts.</s>DEMINT: Handout.</s>BURNETT: How do you define handouts?</s>DEMINT: Well I mean --</s>BURNETT: Is all welfare a handout to you or no?</s>DEMINT: No, no. I mean I'm not saying throw out the welfare programs, but I did propose to take welfare spending back to 2008 levels. Now this is in the context of we've increased welfare spending 300 percent since we supposedly reformed it in the '90s and we've made poverty worse. We're not curing it. We're not helping to make people self sufficient. We're subsidizing poverty and trapping people in generational poverty --</s>BURNETT: So I wanted to read you a quote from your book.</s>DEMINT: OK.</s>BURNETT: And there's a lot of -- you've got a lot of interesting ideas and a lot of solutions, which I think is fair -- give you credit for. You don't just say there's a problem. You go through a lot of solutions, but there's one thing you say on page 104 that I have to be honest I think kind of makes a lot of Americans cringe. You say "Democrats exist to beat Republicans, period". Now, that's the kind of talk that really frustrates people.</s>DEMINT: I'm sure it does. And you know I introduce that chapter explaining that I did a lot of work in organizations team building, teaching cooperation, compromise. I understand how it works, but what I point out is you've got to have a shared vision and unfortunately the day the constituency for the Democratic Party are made up of people who are dependent on the government and want more power at the federal level like the labor unions.</s>BURNETT: But they want a better country just like you do.</s>DEMINT: They do, but they --</s>BURNETT: And we're getting downgraded because you guys don't compromise.</s>DEMINT: We're not getting downgraded because we don't compromise. We're getting downgraded because we did compromise. Every compromise since I've been in Congress, Erin, has led to more spending and a bigger government. We can't keep doing that and the Democrats will not compromise with us because they have to keep spending. Now, if we could talk about tax increases. We could talk about cutting spending. But as a Congress and as a country, we have to decide we're going to balance our budget. That needs to be the first thing. In the House of Representatives had a bill to balance our budget or to send a balanced budget amendment to the states to ratify. It didn't say how we were going to do it. It was completely open-ended. And just about every Democrat voted against ever balancing our budget. We can't live that way. And so I think we need to have an honest debate that we have to stop spending more than we're bringing in. If I lose the debate on taxes, so be it, but people need to know the facts.</s>BURNETT: And I think it's important you're saying spend more than we're bringing in (ph), although in an economic cycle, you at least left open the door there would be times you would run a deficit. I mean I think that's an important caveat intellectually --</s>BURNETT: But also -- I mean the president said Medicare cuts are on the table. It seemed frustrating every time --</s>DEMINT: He said --</s>DEMINT: Erin, he never put anything in writing that he would cut, never. And there's never been a proposal that we could say, OK, let's take that and work with it. And it's just a lot of talk.</s>BURNETT: Now, but here's my question and one of the big frustrations people have is nobody on either side of the aisle really wants to cut where the big money is, right?</s>BURNETT: -- debate it, but cutting where the big money is --</s>DEMINT: Yes.</s>BURNETT: -- that's Medicare. That's Medicaid. That's Social Security. That's whether you're going to cut or you're going to change how benefits are adjusted, index to inflation. That's where the cuts have to come. Are you willing to say that to people, that you're not going to get what you were promised?</s>DEMINT: We don't need to say that to seniors to fix the problem and no one over 55 should have to change their plans for Social Security or Medicare. They've paid for it. It's not a charity --</s>BURNETT: But somewhere, you've got to draw the line and say hey --</s>BURNETT: -- you've paid in for 30 years, but you're not going to get it.</s>DEMINT: I not only agreed to it, I've put proposals on the table. If we could give younger workers 401(k) style plans and -- that were cheaper for the government and save money, but I make the point in the book, Erin --</s>BURNETT: Yes.</s>DEMINT: -- the Democrats will not give younger workers a chance to get out of Social Security with alternative plans. Like Paul Ryan suggested, why can't you keep your personal health insurance when you retire and let Medicare help you pay for it? A lot of Americans would opt for that, but the whole point of the book is that there's attention in Washington that's not Republican-Democrat. It's those who want central power and those who want decentralized power, which is what made America great.</s>BURNETT: All right. I hear you on your point of view. I know though a lot of Americans are so frustrated about the lack of conversation in Washington, but I want to play a sound bite from you --</s>DEMINT: But let me make one point.</s>BURNETT: OK.</s>DEMINT: You don't get $15 trillion in debt without a lot of compromise and bipartisanship. This idea that there's not --</s>BURNETT: Do you acknowledge that a lot of that came from George W. Bush --</s>DEMINT: Yes -- yes -- yes.</s>BURNETT: OK.</s>DEMINT: And a lot of Republicans are there to bring home the bacon. This is a party with both -- I mean a problem with both parties have been involved with.</s>BURNETT: Yes.</s>DEMINT: So and if you ask anyone, they'll tell you that I've been at war with some of my Republican colleagues.</s>BURNETT: All right. Let me play a sound bite from you just because we're -- back in 2008, January of 2008, here's what you had to say about Mitt Romney.</s>DEMINT: This is a man who knows how to run things and if there's one place in the world that needs to be run right, it's Washington, D.C. We need a president like Mitt Romney who knows how the free enterprise system really works.</s>DEMINT: Yes.</s>BURNETT: You still think it?</s>DEMINT: Yes, he knows how to run things and some of the other candidates do, too.</s>DEMINT: I think we've got a good field. I think he'd be a good president. I think Santorum would, Newt Gingrich would, Ron Paul. Anyone in our field would do better than what we've got now.</s>BURNETT: "National Journal" out today, South Carolina's Jim DeMint, Romney's silent surrogate.</s>DEMINT: Every time I say something nice about one of the candidates, and I've been saying things -- nice about Ron Paul today, I start getting all these tweets and e-mails --</s>BURNETT: You did say some nice things to the "Daily Caller" about Ron Paul.</s>DEMINT: Oh, yes --</s>BURNETT: What's the best thing about Ron Paul?</s>DEMINT: If we -- if we don't listen to Ron Paul's -- there are several things, Erin. The unaccountable out-of-control Federal Reserve is going to destroy our monetary system. The whole concept of individual liberty and limited government, I mean that needs to be not only the core of the Republican Party, but American people need to realize that that's what makes us great. Not this central government collectivism that we've moved towards now, so if Republicans don't listen to Ron Paul, we're going to have a divided party because the other half of the country that wants more from government is united and they're going to elect people who are going to promise more from government.</s>BURNETT: You think there's any way you could eventually have a ticket that had Ron Paul on it even if Romney was at the top of it?</s>DEMINT: We could. I don't know how that's going to end up and I'm not endorsing anyone, so despite what the articles say, I'd feel good about any of them being elected. They all have their good and bad points, but they would all be a lot better than what we've got in the White House right now --</s>BURNETT: Before we go, did you know Mitt Romney was a Mexican?</s>BURNETT: All right.</s>DEMINT: Is this a birth certificate question --</s>DEMINT: OK.</s>BURNETT: But thank you very much for coming on. We appreciate it --</s>DEMINT: Well, Erin, thank you. I enjoyed it a lot.</s>BURNETT: All right. Thank you, sir. Appreciate it. And Mitt Romney does hope to be the first Mormon president ever, but would he also be the first Mexican president? We will explain. And the latest in the Iranian murder mystery, a third nuclear scientist assassinated, Iran says America did it. And outrage at the governor. More than 200 convicts, rapists and murderers granted clemency by Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour, why?