Podesta: ‘We Just Can’t Settle’ For Excuses From The Democratic Leadership

When Al Franken became the 60th Democratic senator, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) made clear that it didn’t necessarily mean that progressive legislation would be enacted because he wasn’t planning to twist any arms:

“We have 60 votes on paper,” Senator Harry Reid, the majority leader, said Wednesday in an interview. “But we cannot bulldoze anybody; it doesn’t work that way. My caucus doesn’t allow it. And we have a very diverse group of senators philosophically. I am not this morning suddenly flexing my muscles.”

Peter Laumann from the University of Pennsylvania asked Center for American Progress President and CEO John Podesta about this statement at yesterday’s 2009 Campus Progress National Conference. Podesta said that while he recognizes the extraordinarily tough job congressional leaders have with an unruly, diverse caucus, progressives need to keep pressure on them to round up the votes on important issues:

PODESTA: And I think that — I suppose I have a little bit of sympathy for Sen. Reid, in the sense that I look around at his caucus and understand how hard his job is. But I don’t think you can settle for a statement like that. I think you have to call out the fact that we’re demanding serious change, and indeed, it is the job of the leadership to round up votes, to push legislation through, to try to get the kind of bold initiatives that the President is talking about passed, and to his desk, and signed. [...]

And that, I think, is what we should expect, that’s what we should demand, and that’s what we should put pressure on the members of their caucus to push back on their leadership. You just cannot settle for “What am I supposed to do? I’ve got one outlier who won’t vote for cloture.” We’ve got to both put pressure on the members who are not supporting a progressive agenda, but we’ve also have to put pressure on the leadership to come up with a strategy to find the votes to kind of get these things and move them forward. And we just can’t settle for less than that.

Watch it:

During the discussion, Podesta also said that while he’s generally been pleased with Obama’s agenda to this point, he would like to see him “use his executive authority to stop separating service men and women who are gay or lesbian under the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy.” “He can push hard and sort of get in front, and not wait for a political consensus on Capitol Hill to resolve this question,” he said.

Transcript:

Q: So what are we supposed to do when our own leadership is somewhat apathetic to what we voted for them for?

PODESTA: That’s a great question. (APPLAUSE) It’s a great question. And I think if there was an easy answer, we’d all have it. It seems to me that we can’t settle for that kind of thinking. There’s got to be pressure on the leadership itself. And to some extent, there’s got to be pressure on the White House to put pressure back on the leadership.

And I think that — I suppose I have a little bit of sympathy for Sen. Reid, in the sense that I look around at his caucus and understand how hard his job is. But I don’t think you can settle for a statement like that. I think you have to call out the fact that we’re demanding serious change, and indeed, it is the job of the leadership to round up votes, to push legislation through, to try to get the kind of bold initiatives that the President is talking about passed, and to his desk, and signed.

I have to say, I think that — there will probably be some dispute in the room about how far the bill went — I still think the job that Speaker Pelosi did, that Congressman Waxman and Congressman Markey did getting this energy and climate bill through the House was remarkable. And that took every ounce of leadership from her beginning at the beginning of the year. They had a tough leadership fight in the committee when Sen. Waxman — Congressman Waxman — took over the committee, all the way through to the final 219-212 vote. That is real leadership.

And that, I think, is what we should expect, that’s what we should demand, and that’s what we should put pressure on the members of their caucus to push back on their leadership. You just cannot settle for “What am I supposed to do? I’ve got one outlier who won’t vote for cloture.” We’ve got to both put pressure on the members who are not supporting a progressive agenda, but we’ve also have to put pressure on the leadership to come up with a strategy to find the votes to kind of get these things and move them forward. And we just can’t settle for less than that. [...]

PODESTA: I said there are places where I think he’s fallen short of the mark. We’ve been pushing, at CAP, for him to use his executive authority to stop separating service men and women who are gay or lesbian under the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy. We think he’s got that authority; there’s some question in the White House whether he does or he doesn’t. I won’t make Daniella offer a legal opinion here on that question. But we think he can go further on that. He can push hard and sort of get in front, and not wait for a political consensus on Capitol Hill to resolve this question.

He says in order to do it he needs permanent legislation, but we think that he’s got a lot of executive authority which he can move the ball forward.