WASHINGTON—Today, United States Senator Bill Hagerty (R-TN), a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee and former U.S. Ambassador to Japan, joined Squawk Box on CNBC on set in New Yorkto discuss Senate action on Venezuela, fraud in Biden-era Obamacare subsidies, and enforcement of U.S. immigration law.
Partial Transcript
Hagerty on the Venezuela sanctions vote: “It doesn’t have any teeth. It doesn’t have an immediate impact because it was a procedural vote to actually move to a discussion and debate on this next week, and that’s what’s going to happen. Senator Fetterman, for example, said he was going to support the procedural move, but he will not vote to support it. There are a few Republicans who moved this. This isn’t an unusual situation, particularly coming into midterm elections, where you have senators who are in tough situations. I’m not going to try to judge what my colleagues’ motivations are. This is not a time where it’s unusual to see an elected official break with the president.”
Hagerty on bipartisan votes to extend Obamacare subsidies: “It’s the same situation [as the Venezuela sanctions vote]. That same bill in concept was put forward before Christmas in the Senate. It didn’t make it. We had side-by-side bills—one Republican-sponsored bill, the other Democrat-sponsored bill. We just don’t have a meeting of the minds yet. What we’re [Senate Republicans] trying to do is put the funds in the hands of the people as opposed to directly subsidizing the insurance companies. There’s a significant amount of fraud that we’ve uncovered in 2021 under [former President Joe] Biden. We went to this zero-premium plan that was made available. Since that’s happened, a normal private plan will have about 15 percent of enrollees in a given year not make a claim. It’s up to 40 percent of people who are enrolled here. The brokers are being paid roughly a thousand dollars per enrollee. There’s a lot of anecdotal evidence that people have been signed up and don’t even know they have the insurance. So, this money is going straight to the bottom line of the insurance companies. People are not even aware that they’re insured. It’s a tremendous amount of fraud.”
Hagerty on potential fixes to the program: “It [getting rid of zero-premium plans] certainly is one of the quick fixes that’s been discussed. I don’t know why the Democrats are resistant to this. We’re talking about a minor de minimis payment, but that would at least notify the individual that they’ve got insurance, even if it’s five dollars. And there’s resistance even to that. We’re trying to eliminate the fraud. The program is clearly broken. The rate of escalation of insurance premiums under Obamacare, since it was founded in 2014, is a 260 percent increase. That’s more than two times the average private sector premium in my home state.”
Hagerty on reconciliation and the legislative path forward: “There’s significant discussion about another reconciliation bill. That’s an option that’s open to us right now. Senator [Lindsey] Graham has talked about the same thing on the Senate side. That would be one means to fix it. It could be a wholly Republican product. Right now, there are bipartisan discussions taking place. We’ll see where it lands.”
Hagerty on President Donald Trump’s support among Republicans: “I wouldn’t say that [the President is losing his support] one bit. I think support for President Trump is as strong as you’ve ever seen it. What you’re seeing is the typical process that happens coming into midterm elections, and you’ve got vulnerable candidates that are taking moves that may be helpful to them in their particular constituency. But I don’t think this is a broad swipe against the President.”
Hagerty on economic momentum: “What I see on the horizon is a tremendous amount of capital expenditure coming into play. Go back to the trade negotiations that have taken place. They’re benefiting my home state significantly.”
Hagerty on ICE enforcement and the Minnesota incident: “The situation is tragic. There’s no question about that. But the greater tragedy is when you have elected leaders encouraging non-cooperation with federal authorities. It’s rooted its head in various jurisdictions where you’ve had people attacking ICE agents. The number of threats against ICE agents has gone through the roof, over a thousand percent. It’s time for people to start cooperating.”
Hagerty on immigration enforcement and public safety: “This is an easy answer with my constituents. The violation of our immigration laws under Joe Biden was a top issue for voters in Tennessee, and I think that was the case broadly across the country. What people want is law and order. And the law and order were completely destroyed at our southern border under Joe Biden. There’s been an influx of people pressure on social services. I support whatever it takes to get people who shouldn’t be here out of our country. Period. Full stop.”
Hagerty on the political motive behind the border crisis: “What warrants a real discussion is what was the motive behind all of this flood of people coming into the country? Whether the number is 12 million, though I’ve heard numbers even higher than that. The motivation was very clear, and every one of my Senate colleagues made it clear when I put legislation on the floor that would require the census not to count illegal aliens for the purpose of allocating congressional districts and electoral votes. That’s what’s being done right now. It’s the biggest backfill ever to count these people and give disproportionate voting power to states like California and New York. Blue cities that create a sanctuary are creating magnets to backfill the laws of population.”
Hagerty on protecting ICE agents: “It is an unprecedented situation. This is not something that we’ve seen before. It’s because the left has decided to mount a massive campaign to try to block law enforcement. These agents sadly have to protect their identity because they’re being doxxed. They’re being outed, their families are being threatened. It’s a sad state of affairs, and it needs to come to an end. Leaders on both sides of the aisle should turn down the heat. The last thing we need is for federal leaders or state-level leaders to be encouraging the resistance to ICE.”
Hagerty on the importance of Congressional majority: “It’s interesting we’re talking about how tight Congress is. The votes that are happening in the midterm are extraordinarily close. And so control of Congress is a very key dimension of all of this. The reason the border collapsed, the reason these 12 million people came into the country, had a lot to do with the changing voting dynamic here in America.”
###