>> Now that we have the Republican counter proposal on COVID stimulus where they effectively
want to give you basically nothing. And would be perfectly happy to literally give you nothing,
what's gonna happen, because there's all these calls for unity and
partisanship and all that and there are some Republicans 10.
We're gonna be meeting with Joe Biden and we know what Joe Biden is like.
So is this a time where we should be prioritizing bipartisanship? Here's Bernie Sanders and what
he thinks about this offer. >> We all want bipartisanship
and I think you're gonna see more of it as we move down the pipe.
But right now, this country faces an unprecedented
set of crises. We have families who are watching this program right now,
who cannot feed their kids. We have millions of people who faced eviction. We are in the
midst of the worst pandemic in a hundred years. We have got to act and we have got to act now.
You know what I don't care what anybody says we have got to deal with this pandemic.
We have got to make sure that we are producing the vaccines that we need
and get those vaccines into the arms of people. The question is not bipartisanship.
The question is addressing the unprecedented crises that we face right now.
If Republicans wanna work with us, they have better ideas on how to address those
crises. That's great. But to be honest with you, I have not yet heard that.
>> Okay, that was good. Now look, admittedly I'm not 100% with Bernie because Bernie,
he said in that interview, we got to get them the 14 $100 checks.
He's seemingly okay, with this new number that I understand it's a hill apparently that you
can only die on, but they promise $2,000 checks if the Senate was won by the Democrats. That's
what they promised. Not 1400 more dollars. But even more importantly than that, when we were
talking about that we talked about what the promise was, but what else did we talk about?
We talked about how negotiations work. And if before the Republicans have even said anything,
you're suddenly going lower. Well, then what do you know?
You had promised 2000 but now you're saying 1400 last week,
you said that might even be negotiable. And now the Republicans are saying 1000.
So, did you ever want 2000 total dollars because your strategy seems to indicate
that either you didn't or you don't know how the republicans work or
you don't know how negotiations work. But something fell apart. We're just,
we have to be Sherlock and figure out exactly what the failure point was.
But this is mid failure right now. >> Yeah.
Look, I absolutely think you're right. I think there's no reason we shouldn't have $2,000 checks,
especially if that's what democrats promised. But I also wanna say there are things in this bill
the $1.9 trillion Stimulus bill that will go far beyond an extra $400 real or $600.
Seriously the fact that you were extending unpaid sick leave benefits
for workers. At larger companies who were excluded from the initial bills,
that is huge, that is a big difference. The fact that there is more money to states
look right now we have the vaccine and states have no idea how to roll them out.
Literally not they need funding. We've got states that are running out of unemployment money,
right? States are how a lot of people get their unemployment of course, and they're running out
of that money. So money to states absolutely matters. I just think that It is in this UBI or
bill the social welfare state debate that I think we're gonna see more and more of as we go forward.
I am of the belief that we UBI is really important especially as things become completely automated.
And there just aren't that many jobs in the future that is only necessary, but at the
same time, I don't think we should have UBI over dismantling the private health care system, right?
The people who are gouging us, what good is having a check
if everything else around you is skyrocketing in price. If all these other industries are biting
and chomping at the check that the government gives you, then there is no point of this.
So I just wanna temper I can't a complete cost-benefit analysis right now for you.
But there is one and I just trust that the people were advocating on the progressive
side of the Biden adminstration have done this. >> Yeah, a couple final points that I wanna
make. One, we've been through this whole pandemic
and we now know all of what Trump and the Republicans did and didn't do
to produce the outcome we're at where we just experienced a January where 95,000 Americans died.
We came this close to hitting 100,000 Americans in one single month, and the fact that now
the position is, well, we want to make sure that people get as little as possible. Look,
I value consistency in politics and this is a position that Republicans have consistently had.
But I will remind everyone, we had elections in no small part on this presidential election.
Trump lost Georgia sent two democratic senators, to flip control of the Senate.
People voting in Georgia, knew what they were doing. They could have said,
well, we just had a democratic president, but now we want it to be split government, they said no.
The Republican position blows we're gonna give you democrats.
So one of the Democrats going to deliver and the GOP doesn't care if people continue to go hungry
or get evicted or lose their house. They don't care about that. They've been very clear about
that. They also don't care if the democrats negotiate themselves down to a relief bill
that will technically exist, but won't solve the problem, people will still be suffering.
And they're gonna remember that in the midterms and the Democrats get routed, the Republicans
want that outcome. >> Yes.
>> So we're waiting to see, do the Democrats understand that and do they care about what
is going to happen? Everything is lined up for as big of a stimulus bill as possible.
You said what it was gonna be. And people voted in droves for it. They've already
said they want it. You can check the approval ratings. If you're starting to question it.
It's overwhelmingly positive. So we have to see
is Biden going to do what's right? >> Yes. And guess what else?
You have a majority in the Senate. I know that you think you don't,
but guess what that tie breaking vote that is a very important vote and you bet your ass that
absolutely Republicans would have used that, and would use that if they were in control right now.
So use it. >> 100%. Never hesitant about that.