Live from Virginia Wednesday morning on The John Fredericks Show – weekdays on WNTW AM 820/ FM 92.7 – Richmond, WJFN FM 100.5 – Central Virginia, WMPH AM 1010 / FM 100.1 / FM 96.9 (7-9 PM) Hampton Roads, WBRG AM 1050 / FM 105.1 – Lynchburg/Roanoke and Weekdays 6-10 am and 24/7 Stream – host Fredericks welcomed US Congressman of Virginia’s ninth district to the show to outline why Trump refused to continue negotiations on a second stimulus package with Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
Fredericks: Joining us now the man of the hour. Congressman 9thDistrict, Virginia Southwest Virginia Morgan Griffith. Congressman, welcome.
Griffith: Good morning.
Fredericks: So good to have you on Congressman. Okay, lots of talk about let’s talk about today. Let’s start with the president saying, You know, what we’re done negotiating on a new CARES Act where trillion dollars apart. Nancy’s playing games. We’re done. all of a sudden media melts down and says that everybody’s going to be starving in the streets now. What’s the deal with this?
Griffith: Well in Nancy Pelosi has been playing politics with it since we passed the last update forgetting that one. That was June or July when you know did a little bit of a tweak to it. Everything since then has been politics. It’s absolutely outrageous. She’s holding up people. I wish Trump had been able to get the message out a little bit better than he’s stepping away because she’s playing politics. Because that’s exactly what’s happening.
That’s all they’re doing. They passed this bill last week and it takes us back to the old SALT system, and let me explain that because that’s important in my district is probably important in your listening area over on the eastern part of the state as well. What they want to do is they want to have us pay our federal income taxes. And pay you a little bit more to the federal government then the federal government gives places like New York City and Manhattan and San Francisco a tax cut on local taxes.
So the people of Saltville are paying in part the local taxes for millionaires who live in San Francisco like Nancy Pelosi. The people in Marion are having to pay for people in Manhattan who may have a condo that overlooks Central Park and costs more money than most of the people in Southwest Virginia will ever see in their entire lifetimes. But we don’t give them a tax break by putting the tax on poor people and people of lesser means. That’s what she’s stuck in there because they need the fat cat millionaires. She sticks that into a bill about COVID. Give me a break.
Fredericks: No wonder the president is walking away and he should have talked about things like that. How do you get this out in the fake news media? Because all the fake news media saying well now people just going to suffer. Trump doesn’t care. There’s no negotiation. Nancy wants to give everybody money. She wants to do PPP. He walked away. Of course, the fake news legacy media, which is all a bunch of liars picks up that line and that’s what they run with.
Griffith: Yep. That’s what they run with. And in reality, we had a PPP bill on the floor are that was available to go to the floor. And that’s why she put together a whole new, you know package of whatever the name of the bill was part two or part three is because a number of her members wanted to be able to vote on something before they went home. So she put together something with poison pills in it that she knew was never going to fly with the Republicans or the Senate.
And in fairness, I’m not sure even with Democrats the Senate would have passed that thing. It just doesn’t make sense for America unless you’re a millionaire. It didn’t make any sense. Look we did the numbers back when we pass the Tax Cut and Jobs Act. We did the numbers. In Southwest Virginia in the 9th Congressional District, you would have to have a house in the most expensive taxed area in Southwest Virginia.
You would have to have a house, this is in Southwest Virginia, that cost more than $830-840,000 before you would pay one penny under the Republican version of giving people a little bit of a break on their local taxes. That’s why it’s very clear that this thing is for millionaires. Because you have to have a house worth close to a million dollars in most parts of Virginia. Maybe not Northern Virginia, but in the rest of Virginia, you’d have to have a house well over a value of a million dollars in order to be benefited from what Nancy Pelosi put into a COVID package just last week.
You tell me how that’s dealing with COVID. You tell me how that’s helping average American families. It’s not. She held a bill up for that and a couple of other poison pills she put in there. But she’s holding up help for American families in order to help people who have you know, somewhere between let’s say seven hundred thousand and in some jurisdictions on up houses. If you can afford that kind of a house, you don’t need relief from your local taxes at that level.
You need some, but you don’t need that level. Or maybe you need to go talk to your city council and say, you know, what? Y’all are taxing the heck out of us and you all should do something about that because that’s part of the way that New York City and San Francisco and some of these other places are able to have such high local taxes. They would promise you you’re not going to pay it all because the federal government can give you a tax break.
Well, who is paying it? The people in Saltville are paying it. People in the coalfields of Southwest Virginia are paying it. The people who work in the poultry facilities or in the tomato fields on the Eastern Shore that’s who is paying it. They’re paying it so fat cats in San Francisco and New York City and other rich places don’t have to pay as much federal income tax.
It’s not right. It’s wrong and it really does pull back in my opinion that mask off the Democrat Party that there for the little guy. They’re not for the little guy. There for the fat cat billionaires. Who’s financing them? Fat cat billionaires. Look where the money’s coming from. Show me the money and I’ll show you who they support and who they’re working for in D.C.
Fredericks: So basically it’s a transfer of wealth to get to urban rich people that are the biggest donors to Pelosi’s campaigns, right? So they just take that money they saved and they give part of it to her for her campaign for her caucus or whatever other causes they’re doing also supporting the Dems. so basically that’s what she held up PPP for. Am I having Deja Vu Morgan Griffith or did the Democrats, were they not screaming for years during Obama for a clean bill or something? Remember they kept saying say we want a clean resolution. We want a clean bill to keep the government open. Am I dreaming that?
Griffith: You’re not dreaming that. And look I’m a big proponent no matter who’s in control of what we need. We need smaller bills that do, you know single purpose and are not thousand-page bills or 800-page bills and that get to the point deal with what they’re supposed to do with and move on. And both parties have been guilty of that.
But in this case, they not only are guilty of throwing a bunch of stuff in there claiming it does one thing when it does multiple things including the tax relief. And also, you know cut some money that previously was in that in her earlier version for police. But the bottom line is that they are just doing this for political reasons. and they threw this whole thing in so it’s even worse than just jamming things up because you got a time crunch.
They jam things up intentionally so they could use it politically. And you know, I think it probably would have been better if the president had said we’re willing to negotiate as soon as I take the politics out of this thing, but I don’t think you’re going to do that. Which is why we have to wait till after the election. If she came to the table and said we’re going to have a clean bill, more power to it.
Fredericks: I wish the person said that I wish she said just what you said. Number one. I wanted a clean bill and as soon as we get a clean bill at $1,200 checks and PPP I’m all in. We’re going to sign it. Secondly, why didn’t he say exactly what you just said? He certainly isn’t at a lack for words these days. So I mean all he simply said is I’m done negotiating with her and then everyone immediately jumped on him and said he’s talking everybody to go to hell. The spin on this thing is horrible from a PR standpoint and we all know why. You just outlined in very detailed terms why he walked away from the table. Why has not that message got out in the White House?
Griffith: I can’t answer that one, I’m sorry. I wish I could tell you the answer…
Listen to the full show here:
https://youtu.be/dqm2fQeKRUc
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