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Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning everyone and happy first real weekday of 2021. You've been hearing on the news, a few of the same clips I think, over and over of the hour-long phone call that President Trump had on Saturday with Georgia election officials. Republicans in a Republican-run state. Mostly you've probably been hearing the one of Trump asking them point-blank to find 11,000 votes, so they can say that he won, but the tape and transcript of the full phone call exists.

I want to start by playing just a couple of other very short clips than the one or two you've been probably hearing. These are just to give you examples of the way the Georgia election officials gave the president specific answers when the president brought up specific claims of massive voter fraud that they had already debunked. For example, here's a specific claim by Trump, we'll hear Trump first, about a video that he says shows a massive example of voter fraud in the form of ballot stuffing as he addresses George's Republican secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger.

Trump: Let's face it, Brad, they did it in slow motion replay magnified. She stuffed the ballot boxes. They were stuffed like nobody's ever seen him stuffed before. There's a term for it when it's a machine instead of a ballot box, but she stuffed the machine. She stuffed ballot. Each ballot went three times.

Brian Lehrer: That's the claim. Here's Raffensperger's response.

Brad: You're talking about the State Farm video. I think it's extremely unfortunate that Rudy Giuliani or his people, they sliced and diced that video and took it out of context. The next day, we brought in WSB-TV and we let them show, see the full run of tape. What's you'll see, the events that transpired are nowhere near what was projected by-

Brian Lehrer: At that point, Trump cuts him off, but there was that very specific response about Giuliani editing a tape to look like something it wasn't and the secretary of state of Georgia showed the full tape to an Atlanta TV station, which has tape viewing equipment, and the Giuliani edit was debunked. Specific claim, specifically refuted in that exchange with the president. Here's one more, Trump made a claim about thousands of dead people voting in Georgia. Here again, is Brad Raffensperger responding to that.

Brad: I guess there's a person named Mr. Braynard that came to these meetings to present a data. He said that there was dead people, I believe it was upward of 5,000. The actual number were two. Two people that were dead that voted and so that's wrong, it was two.

Brian Lehrer: There are just two examples of how the Georgia election officials, Republicans led by Republican secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger there, had investigated the claims of massive voter fraud and had the answers to them. All the president could do was claim over and over again that he had better evidence that they would present sometime in the future. I thought you'd like to hear those clips as examples of how specific the responses were.

Of course, the spectacle will continue for at least another few days as Congress has scheduled to certify the election results on Wednesday and some Republicans in each House will object on the basis of claims like the president was making. That spectacle, hard as it is to look away from, is only a distraction from the people's actual business that's taking place right now too at the height of the pandemic, including Congress overriding Trump's veto of a defense spending bill and Mitch McConnell refusing to allow a vote on a $2,000 per person stimulus check for Americans making up to $75,000, that would probably pass the Senate, if there was a vote.

Of course, President Trump was for that too and almost didn't sign the coronavirus relief bill as a result, but it was Trump and the Democrats in that case and that conversation is ongoing. On the Democratic side, the House barely reelected Nancy Pelosi speaker yesterday, after the Democrats lost seats in the November election, and they have their internal debates too. With us on all this, and maybe even more is Democratic Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill from Northern New Jersey, one of the House freshmen from the relatively moderate wing of the party who did retain her seat, and as of yesterday, became a House sophomore.

For those of you who don't already know her background, Mikie Sherrill graduated from the United States Naval Academy and flew missions as a pilot around Europe and the Middle East, as well as being a Russia policy expert. She also got a master's in economic history from the London School of Economics and a law degree from Georgetown. Besides serving in the Navy, she was a prosecutor in the US Attorney's office in New Jersey before being elected to Congress. Congresswoman Sherrill, always good to have you on. Welcome back to WNYC and happy new year.

Mikie Sherrill: Happy new year to you and thanks for having me.

Brian Lehrer: Do you want to respond first to the president's phone call in any way?

Mikie Sherrill: Yes. This is I think many of us have been concerned for many months, most of my term, that the president would not accept the free and fair election results. Last spring, we held a hearing in the House Armed Services Committee where I questioned the secretary of defense and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff about their responsibilities in a peaceful transition of power. This is when we had seen the president really misusing the Insurrection Act and trying to put military troops on the streets.

They came to the border, he had called them to the border of the district and I think the SecDef and the chairman talked him down from actually using military troops. There were guardsmen and there were law enforcement, but not federal military troops. I questioned them about their responsibilities under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, under our statutes, and importantly under the constitution, and they both strongly said that there was no place for a military in a political election and deciding who the president was.

This is something we've been seeing and then the president made further remarks about how he wouldn't accept any sort of turnover, and since that time, we've seen him again and again, and again, trying to use any and every way that he can think of to overturn a democratic election. It's really shocking to have a president of the United States trying to undermine our democracy like this and that phone call is chilling. I don't think it's surprising. We've heard reporting of screaming matches in the White House when the president and close advisers talking about using military troops to rerun the election.

We've seen the members and House sign on to amicus briefs trying to bring a case without merit to turnover the election. This is what the president's been doing, but I think what we saw here, which I thought was impressive, was the secretary of state refusing in real-time to adopt any of these kind of conspiracy theories or claims that don't have evidence to back them up. He, as you played those tapes, had done his research, and again and again, refuted the president's claims.

Brian Lehrer: For you as a lawyer and a member of the House, can you explain to our listeners what happens on Wednesday under the constitution and the law?

Mikie Sherrill: Yes. For your listeners, they're probably, as they've heard more and more about January 6th as Congress certifies the election, kind of thinking to themselves, well, what has happened in previous elections? Usually, this is something that is sort of a pro forma session. We meet, the election is certified in about half an hour. What happens is the vice-president as the president of the Senate, oversees the certification, both Houses meet, the House and the Senate meet to certify the election. There is really a roll call of each state in alphabetical order and the electoral college votes are presented and then they are certified.

If anyone wants to challenge them, you have to do so in writing, and in order for that challenge to be debated, you have to have at least one member of the House and one member of the Senate. Then if you have that, a written challenge by at least one member of the House and one member of the Senate, then both Houses will separately debate for no more than two hours, the merits of the challenge, and then come back and vote on whether or not to certify the electoral count. That's why you had heard, I think, Mitch McConnell, really trying to quell the members of the Senate from saying that they would adopt what some of the members of the House had been saying, that they were going to challenge these votes.

Brian Lehrer: Because if there wasn't one member of the Senate to also do it, then there would not be a two-hour floor debate, but now there are 11 senators. We had heard Josh Hawley as one lone individual. Now it's being described as a group of 11 led by Ted Cruz.

Mikie Sherrill: Yes, I think what's so disturbing about this is as we've seen with over 60 court cases and the election and several recounts, there's no merit to the claims that we did not run in the United States of America, a free and fair election, there's no merit to some idea that our democracy is not working. To have this group of senators, all of whom have taken an oath to the constitution to be seated, to have them really, I think have no policy agenda, no ideology, and belief in our democracy, but rather just focused on a personal grab for power. It's really, really disheartening and to see so many in the Republican party doing that, including, I think we have by my count, four new members.

It seems as if this trend in the Republican party, in the Senate, of really just working on individual personal power at quite frankly, the expense of our country and our democracy, is something that is growing in the Senate and I think very concerning.

Brian Lehrer: What do you anticipate in this two-hour floor debate? Do you think it'll be a back and forth making and refuting specific claims of fraud like we heard in the back and forth between the president and the Georgia secretary of state in those clips?

Mikie Sherrill: I think what you'll see are several things. I think each person, each member can speak, but for no more than two hours. I think you'll see members, especially members from the states that are being contested of course. Each member can speak for five minutes and then they'll go back and forth, a Democrat and then a Republican. I think what you'll see is the evidence of why the secretaries of state or whomever in the state certified the elections, why we as the American public can be sure that these elections were run well.

I think you'll also probably see a discussion about how we came to these values, what our democracy is based on and why it's so critical that we support these elections, and that we have Congress certify this election.

Brian Lehrer: We even had Trump's trade advisor, Peter Navarro on TV over the weekend on Fox, claiming vice-president Pence could unilaterally order a 10-day delay in Wednesday certification vote, while they perform an additional audit of the vote in selected states. Keep your lawyer's hat on and tell us, can he do that? Do you have information on whether he will try?

Mikie Sherrill: I don't have information on whether or not he will try to do that. I've not heard that, but there is no reason to delay this. I think that's why you saw quite frankly, all the living former secretaries of defense, come out in an op-ed in the Washington Post saying that it is time now to transition the government, that the time for the election is over, the court cases are over, they have been lost by the Republicans. The recounts are mostly are finished for the president. There's still some ongoing in the House, but it's time for us to transition. It's time for us to do what we have done uninterrupted, except for the Civil War since 1789, and peacefully transition our government,

Brian Lehrer: Do you know what happens? I don't expect you to know, it was so obscure until it entered the conversation in the last few days, I think. What happens if Pence does try? Does the seating of electors get delayed while you would have to go to court to enforce the constitution as you understand it?

Mikie Sherrill: He is simply presiding over this. I think I'm delving into that now because this is a constitutional role of Congress. How can we ensure that we fulfill the constitutional role? A lot of how we do this is based on the Electoral Count Act, but that is not constitutional, that is a statute that Congress passed to help in this process. I think we will be looking in Congress to ensure that on the 6th, we are fulfilling our responsibility and try to ensure that Congress oversees this.

It's quite frankly, there might be some way that it gets to court, but really when you're talking about a constitutional responsibility of Congress and you're talking about separation of powers, this really should not be going to the court system. It might have to if that's what we have to do to decide some issues, but really this is something that Congress should handle. The court would be, I think, hesitant to engage in this process.

Brian Lehrer: My guest, if you're just joining us, is democratic Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill from Northern New Jersey. We're getting some phone calls in what we've been talking about so far. I'm going to take maybe one and then I want to go into the actual people's business like the coronavirus relief bill and where that stands and other things, but people are calling about this.

Obviously, some people are obsessed. That's not a criticism. Certainly, this is what the media has been focusing on mostly over the weekend. It is so outrageous, but I don't want it to be a distraction from the actual business of the government for the people of the United States when this fiction by the president isn't actually going anywhere. We'll take one call anyway. Bill in Rego Park. You're on WNYC with Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill. Hi, Bill.

Bill: Hi, Brian. Good morning. Good morning, Congresswoman. Thank you for your multiple services to our country. I would like to ask you with your lawyer hat on, is what Cruz holy cabal and the president and others are doing rises to the level of sedition.

Mikie Sherrill: I think what we're looking at now, certainly, in so many levels, is simply makes this president unfit to serve as president. There are acts that I think we could consider seditious acts, but I think what we really need to focus on and what I'm focused on is quite frankly, turning over power, is making sure that we utilize every single tool we have to have a peaceful transition. I do think it was important to see all the secretaries of defense unified, coming out to say, that it is time, that the Pentagon needs to turn over power.

I think it's important because the most powerful tool that the president could conceivably look to is our military, to try to stay in power. Making sure that the DOD is not engaged in any refusal to turn over power. I think it's important to see Mitch McConnell, engaging and trying to push the Senate to do the right thing and certify this election. We can certainly talk about in the future, how we want to handle the president's misdeeds and how we feel that is appropriate, but I think right now, the focus should be on turning the power over to a new president, for many reasons, not the least of which is because he was elected in our democracy and that's what we do in this country and that's the basis of the government of this country, but also because I think we have to ensure that President Trump is out of office and out of power as quickly and as smoothly as possible.

Brian Lehrer: Most people, I think it's fair to say, are rolling their eyes at this whole thing and saying, "Please, we have real problems like the pandemic, the disease, how many people are dying, the hospitals filling up, and the economic impact." Congresswoman, did you vote for the compromised coronavirus relief bill? Are you for the $2,000 checks that Senate majority, leader McConnell, is refusing to vote on?

Mikie Sherrill: Yes, to both. I was happy to vote for the compromise bill. I think, what we have to understand in this country is we need to continue to legislate in Congress. Sometimes that means we legislate on bills that I am 100% in agreement and sometimes that means we legislate and vote for bills that I think could be better, but do support concerns I have and support the American people, and that's what this was.

Do I think we need state and local funding? 100%. This is not the time to be cutting teachers and police and firefighters as we're facing this pandemic, as we're trying to get our kids educated during really, really trying times. However, was it critical that we extended the eviction moratorium so we didn't see people being thrown out of their homes right after Christmas? Yes, I believe it was.

I think it was important that we had more PPP loan money because, in my district, we have small businesses who made use of the PPP loan, and yet they've run out of money, and we've got to get them through the winter because it's so critical that if we are going to get through this pandemic and not have severe economic harm at the end of it, we have to have our businesses intact.

We can't have every shop on Main Street shut down. We have to make sure that we're keeping them going as best as possible so that people can return to work as soon as it's safe to do so. As far as the $2,000 stimulus checks, did I think that it was the right way to govern, to kind of sit on the sidelines and refuse to say a number during the whole negotiations? Believe me, Brian, these negotiations have been going on for months. We passed the Heroes Act in May, the House's version of what we thought the second round of relief should be.

These negotiations have been going on for months and it was really not until we were kind of ready to ink the deal that the president suddenly weighed in with this. Just I think to add to the chaos that he seems to crave and to try to upend this however, I think the $2,000 would be very helpful to people right now and would really help spur again the economy because much of this money goes directly into the economy as people spend it to try to keep going during this crisis.

Brian Lehrer: This is likely to come up again after president Biden is inaugurated and especially if the Democrats win control of the Senate, but I want to play you a clip of McConnell and his argument against the checks would go to people with income up to $75,000, receiving the full $2,000 and then phase out gradually to zero once you get to $99,000 of income per person. Nevertheless, here is McConnell from Thursday characterizing those checks as socialism for the rich.

McConnell: Now for several days, we've heard some senators say, "Congress must send more cash to higher-earning Households who haven't seen any income disruption during COVID-19." Our colleagues who purport to be the champions of vulnerable Americans, now say that what struggling people really need is for Congress to stop focusing on targeted relief for them specifically, and to instead, send thousands of dollars to people who don't need the help.

Experts from across the political spectrum agree that our colleague from Vermont is dead wrong on this. Socialism for rich people is a terrible way to help the American families that are actually struggling. Let me say that again, borrowing from our grandkids to do socialism for rich people is a terrible way to get help to families who actually need it.

Brian Lehrer: Of course, reference to his colleague from Vermont was to Bernie Sanders who's been a leader on that question. Congresswoman, you have a degree from the London School of Economics. One, are people in your district who make $75,000 a year rich, as McConnell characterizes them? Can you think of examples of actual socialism for the rich that Mitch McConnell and his caucus support?

Mikie Sherrill: Well, Brian, you're well aware of the area and I don't think anybody in my district who makes between $75,000 and $99,000 a year would regard themselves as rich. I think they would regard themselves as middle-class. I don't think any of those people would regard themselves as rich. Certainly, when we're thinking of who the wealthiest are, those are the people that this administration and McConnell have given tax cuts to and have really supported.

I'll also say that it's frustrating because I know that sometimes there are these phrases repeated over and over and over again, and we've got to delve into what we're actually talking about and saying that experts across the political spectrum disagree with us. I get a sense that if this was put on the floor of the Senate, it would pass. Saying that experts across this political spectrum disagree with this is simply untrue. I've spoken to economic experts across the political spectrum and their assessment, and these are economists left, right, and center, including some people in this administration who have said the worst thing we did under Obama trying to get out from under the last huge recession, we stopped spending too early.

Even though many of us are, of course, always concerned about the amount of spending of the government and want to make sure we're spending the people's money wisely. This is a good investment. This is an investment in our future to ensure that the economy gets through the pandemic and we are able to recover much more quickly than if we allow this economy to go into a depression. Right now, if you look across the world at how countries across the world has handled the economic fallout from this pandemic, you will see that the United States' response to date has kept our economy in better shape than almost anywhere else in the world.

To say that experts agree, that's factually inaccurate, and to suggest that this is socialism for rich people. Again, in my district, people would not say that if you are helping people out between $75,000 and $99,000, and by $99,000 you're getting zero, but at $75,000 a year, those are not people that are categorizing themselves as rich people.

Brian Lehrer: We have a few minutes left with Democratic Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill from Northern New Jersey. You were a Navy pilot. I gather you voted to override the president's veto of the defense spending bill along with most other members of Congress. There are some progressives who say the Democrats didn't fight hard enough for the $2,000 checks because you could have refused to vote for that defense bill, the override, unless Republicans went along with the checks. Did you consider holding that out for the checks?

Mikie Sherrill: I sit on the House Armed Services Committee and we passed the most bipartisan bill I think in the two years I'd been in Congress, out of the committee. It was a unanimous vote out of committee for the National Defense Authorization Act. We negotiated with the Senate, we fought very hard to get rid of the Confederate naming conventions on many of our bases. That was a big fight. We added in there some important environmental proposals because, of course, as we know, unfortunately, traditionally, our military has been one of the greatest [unintelligible 00:28:36]

Looking at new fuels, looking at different battery storage components for green power on some of our bases. We worked incredibly hard on the National Defense Authorization Act. Then we conferenced with the Senate and we're able to get that passed in a very bipartisan manner. Again, at the 11th hour, the president brings up section 230 issues, which are social media issues that have been handled. Numerous hearings have been held on them in the energy and commerce committee, not in the National Defense Authorization Act.

Again, this president inserts himself at the very end of things to just try to create chaos and impede good governance. I thought it was important that we overrode his veto of this because not only did it not make sense, not only was it critically important for some of our authorizations in the military to continue, especially during this pandemic, but also because we're fighting so hard for good governance.

As you mentioned, I entered in 2018 with a class that was really sent to Congress to make Congress work better, to improve upon Congress, to modernize Congress, and to see this president at every turn, trying to upend good governance, trying to simply create chaos, was something that, as a lifelong public servant, as someone who served in the military and then served again at the US Attorney's office, was just so offensive to me. I thought it was very important to override that veto.

Brian Lehrer: Let's take one more call. Douglas in Brooklyn wants to react to the McConnell clip, where he called the check socialism for the rich. Douglas, you're on WNYC. Hi.

Douglas: Hello. I just want to bring up the point that there are many, many government subsidy programs for the wealthy. The one that comes to mind is the mortgage interest deduction. Where if you're paying interest on a mortgage, you get to deduct it from taxes. There's deductions for donating money to charities. There is a raft of subsidy programs. I'm not going to argue that a tax credit or break is a subsidy because it is. There plenty of them for the rich. I don't know why this idea that some people may benefit who "don't need it." It happens all the time of government. I just think specious and ridiculous argument. Thank you.

Brian Lehrer: Douglas, thank you very much. Do you want to respond to that, Congresswoman? Because the ones that he mentioned there, I would tend to bring up subsidies across the board tax cuts for people in high-income brackets and particular subsidies to leaders of certain industries, things like that. He brought up tax deductions for charitable contributions, which would go disproportionately to the rich, but you probably support for other reasons. Deductions for home mortgage interest which renters don't get, that's considered-- even though it's targeted partly at the middle class, is considered a tax cut for the rich.

You're trying to protect that in New Jersey when the Trump tax law that got passed a couple of years ago took away state and local tax deductions over $10,000. As he brings up a complicated issue, there are progressives like Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez, who would say, "Let's not put back that particular provision because anybody who's paying more than $10,000 in state and local income taxes is pretty well off. We should put back other things that help more working-class people."

Mikie Sherrill: Well, certainly, I'm happy to talk about the state and local tax deduction and how important I think getting rid of the SALT deduction cap is for my district and why I think that's important and why I think that leads to having in New Jersey the best schools in the nation and other really important things when we have more control of our state money.

What I think this loses in this discussion we're having here is the fact that this is simply not socialism for rich people. Here, we are almost adopting this idea that "Oh, there's other things." Well, this isn't one of them. This doesn't, to me, meet that definition. Saying that we're giving money to people making $75,000 a year in North Jersey. I don't think anybody in North Jersey would say we're giving money to rich people.

Brian Lehrer: We'll leave that there without going down further rabbit holes. I want to ask you one final thing because you've spoken against the partisanship of this era and about the possibility of more consensus governing. That's certainly a goal of President-Elect Biden. You've spoken about the importance of there being more women in Congress. This year, it was Republican women who saw a growth in the number of seats in the House. Is it possible that Democratic and Republican women will find consensus more than the men have or do you think party overrules that in this environment? The idea that women can compromise more because you're more relationship-oriented and less about winning than men, and more about finding solutions, is that idea itself a gender stereotype?

Mikie Sherrill: That's interesting. In fact, I just had a Republican woman approached me on the floor of the House yesterday to say that the women need to get together. We've certainly seen during the pandemic. It seems to be the countries led by women that have the best response to the pandemic and the crisis. I do think there's probably something a little bit gendered about that because I find that bipartisanship comes in all shapes and sizes, and really, what you have to focus on is where those areas are that you can agree on. I have found that people have said to me over the last couple of years is it even possible to really be bipartisan in these times.

I tell them the story of a gentleman who I sit on the House Armed Services Committee with. Every time he gets ready to speak, I tense up because I know I'm going to disagree. In some cases, especially when it comes to issues and areas of sexual assault and harassment, I'm going to really disagree with him. Yet, I have co-sponsored bills with him because many of the issues in his district, economic issues, are similar to those in my district. We find those pathways to working with people.

I am very concerned because while I think it's incredibly helpful that we have President Biden coming into office, and while I think Mitch McConnell is realizing how dangerous some of the ideology of the president is in his own caucus as we see all of these members parting from him. I think I heard reports that he was supposed to have a conference call with Josh Hawley to talk about this vote on January 6th and Senator Hawley didn't even get on the phone. He didn't even have the respect to get on the phone with McConnell.

I think McConnell's realizing that. I will say despite all that, so those are hopeful signs to me that we can get something done in this next administration. I do worry. I had some concerns just yesterday. As we were getting sworn in with one member in particular, who the Sergeant at Arms had to escort off the floor of the House because she refused to wear a mask. Those kind of weird issue areas, that I wonder what some of our new members in both the House and the Senate, what their focus will be.

If they do have important policy discussions they want to have. If they do want to ensure that we're promoting our democracy, or if it is simply going to be about their personal power and their personal agenda that's going to be at the expense of our country.

Brian Lehrer: Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill, Democrat from Northern New Jersey. Good luck in your second term. We appreciate that you keep coming on with us.

Mikie Sherrill: Well, thank you for continuing to have me on, and have a great new year. Hopefully, we'll talk soon. Thanks again.

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