WASHINGTON—United States Senator Bill Hagerty (R-TN) today joined Kudlow to discuss the latest infrastructure negotiations and rising inflation.
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Partial Transcript
Hagerty on the latest infrastructure negotiations: “I concur with what Leader McConnell said today, as well as my other colleagues. You know, Larry, this is starting to feel a lot like Obamacare. You remember, ‘you’ve got to pass it to find out what’s in it.’ They don’t even have language. And Schumer’s talking about moving through the procedural process, starting as early as Wednesday to kick this off without even having language in place. I think it’s folly to do it. We’re talking about trillions of dollars. The size of this package alone is just amazing, and the fact that they want to shove it through again says to me that it’s in deep, deep trouble.”
Hagerty on Democrats’ reckless runaway spending: “One of the big ones, the IRS enforcement that would have really pushed the IRS to harass Americans even more, seeing that off the table I think is a great relief to many Americans. And you’ve heard Senator Manchin say this, he doesn’t want to pass something that’s not going to be paid for. Right now we can’t see a way to pay for certainly the $3.5 trillion that they’re talking about pushing through in this so-called ‘reconciliation’ process, which Larry, it’s not what you and I would call ‘reconciliation’. It’s in fact just a reckless runaway spending bill that the Democrats trying to push through on a partisan basis. You add that to the bipartisan package that we’re talking to, another trillion dollars, how’s that going to be paid for? I think that if you listen to what Joe Manchin saying, I think most Americans would agree. It needs to be paid for it’s going to be passed. And I don’t see a way to get that done right now.”
Hagerty on Democrats’ tax hikes: “Think about the direction that they’re trying to take our nation. We’re already at roughly a $30 trillion debt. We don’t need to see more debt. And so if you’re going to do it, you’re going to have to put a tax hike in place. They’re not going to generate the revenues. You know, they’re aggressive form of these taxes that they’re talking about. They’re talking about putting a tax on job creation. They’re talking about doing away with fossil fuels, as we know it. They’re talking about The Green New Deal disguised. All of this raising debt taxes, trapping capital in place, all of this is going to push jobs over shore, and it’s going to slow economic growth. That’s going to have exactly the counter effect and they think they can tax their way through this. Now what they’re doing is they’re just pushing us toward more and more socialism in this country. We’ve got to stop it.”
Hagerty on rising inflation: “We haven’t even seen the details yet, but what we have heard is deeply, deeply concerning. What we’ve seen is just this push toward more and more social programs that will be devastating to the economy. And we’re looking at this on top of massive inflation. We just saw the CPI last month from, May to June, on an annualized basis, increased 12 percent. You may have seen my commentary with Chairman Jay Powell last week when I was talking with him about the inflation targets. I get it, long-term two percent, you may overshoot a little bit to get there. Twelve percent is far beyond a small overshoot. This is a dramatic tax on hardworking Americans every day. You just go to the pump, see what’s happened to gas prices. Even if gasoline isn’t in the core CPI, everything that people in my home state of Tennessee, every good, has to be transported, to be purchased. Try to buy a home in Nashville right now. Home prices are up 15 percent plus. I mean, we are seeing inflation roll through this economy, and it’s part-and-parcel to the policies of the Biden Administration. I understand the transitory aspects that may eventually work their way through, but this isn’t a pig in the python moment. This is the direct result of policies like the Biden Administration started at the very beginning. Doing away with the Keystone XL pipeline, forbidding drilling on federal property, what does that do? That increases the input factors for energy for every industry here in America. It makes us less competitive. It makes China laugh all the way to the bank.”