00:00I do want to bring in Kevin Hassett, the director of the National Economic Council under President
00:05Trump, joining us now. Thank you so much for taking the time to be here with us today. I know
00:09you've had a busy week and really several months here. Yeah, well, it's great. It's great to be
00:14here. And first off, I did want to ask you overall, again, as I mentioned now, we are in day seven
00:20here. What sort of impacts have we seen already happening and what could we see in the coming
00:26days and weeks? Right. Well, first of all, to give viewers the setting, that we're in a very unusual
00:33circumstance with the government shutdown, that the Constitution and the Federalist Papers designed
00:40the Senate to be a moderating influence in our government. And in fact, under Chuck Schumer and
00:46the Democrats, they're the exact opposite. This is the third time since President Trump took office,
00:52last time plus this time, that they've shut the government down. In fact, one of the years they
00:57didn't do it was the COVID year. And so they're basically, you know, if you like to think about
01:02it, they're batting really, really like way above, you know, Ted Williams in terms of their willingness
01:08to shut the government down. But Republicans have forever and ever recognized their constitutional duty
01:13to keep the government open. And so with Joe Biden, 13 times, they had a continuing resolution
01:19to keep the government open, just as the constitutional framers would have expected
01:24the moderating influence people would do. And those continuing resolutions were supported by the
01:32vast majority of Republicans who understood their duty to be a moderating influence. And in fact,
01:37the votes were in the 80s every single time. And so we're at a very unusual time. And that's the setting.
01:43And so the question is, how do we think about the unusual time? And the Council of Economic Advisors
01:49has done a study about like, what's the cost of the overall economy of shutting the government down?
01:54And they estimate that it costs us about $15 billion in lost GDP every week. And so, you know,
02:01you haven't seen the GDP numbers yet, though, they'll come out in the future. But we've, yeah,
02:04we've lost a significant amount of national income because of the shutdown already. And it's the
02:11position of President Trump and Senator Thune that the senators need to recognize their constitutional
02:17duty, be a moderating influence, and get the government open. And then instead of trying to
02:22get policy concessions, you know, while they're, you know, driving the truck off the cliff,
02:27they open up regular order discussions about their concerns as soon as the government's open.
02:32That's the position of the president and of Senator Thune.
02:35And on that note, what are maybe the red lines, things that Republicans are not willing to give
02:42up as those negotiations continue? Because we heard from President Trump yesterday, he said in
02:47the Oval Office that some good talks are happening and there could be something good in the future.
02:53What is it that Republicans are not going to give up regardless of what happens?
02:59Republicans want the government to be open as all of your listeners want.
03:03They want the people to get the paychecks that they've earned. We want military families to get
03:09their paychecks. We want the children who are getting their baby formula from the WIC program
03:15to get their baby formula. And we want that to happen. And that's a very, very simple thing to
03:21happen. It's not a thing to negotiate. It's a one line thing. Just open the government.
03:25And once the government's open, then President Trump and Republicans on the Hill are willing,
03:29of course, to talk to their colleagues about, well, what's next step for policy. But now is not the
03:35time to do it. I'm not sure if you can provide necessarily some perspective here, but how many
03:41federal employees do you expect are going to be furloughed versus maybe required to work without pay?
03:47And when do those furloughs become potential firings?
03:52Well, right now, our hope is that we get the government open today and that if, you know,
04:00the money doesn't come, then eventually cabinet agencies are going to have to make hard choices
04:05about how they keep the government running, given that Congress hasn't allocated the funds
04:11to those agencies. But again, nobody in the White House, nobody in Capitol Hill that's a Republican
04:17wants people to lose their jobs and to lose their pay. We just want the government open. And then we
04:23want with regular order to talk about the future of our country.
04:27Benefits and different programs, support programs that are there. You touched on this a little bit,
04:31but what is being impacted so far? Because we've heard about military families, things of that nature.
04:37So what has been impacted there as far as those programs go?
04:43Right. Well, well, one of the things that's having an impact is that the there'll still be
04:48some checks going out to government workers, but with the government shutdown, then they won't get
04:52paid for the shutdown days. And so that the checks that they'll receive, a lot of people are getting
04:57their next check on the 15th of October. Those checks will be smaller and that'll be an immediate
05:03impact. You and I already talked about the immediate impact of having the government shut for a week.
05:06The CEA thinking that that's a cost of about $15 billion.
05:10Are there concerns, risks there of losing trained federal staff permanently, people quitting,
05:17putting in their notice when you do have something like this, like an extended shutdown?
05:23The basic point is the Democrats need to open up the government. And if the government is not open,
05:30if they fail to do that, then there can be long run costs where especially valuable government workers
05:38who have a high market value in the private sector say, that's it, I'm done. You know, I'm here taking
05:44this government job because I'm a patriot, but the Democrats won't, you know, support me in my
05:50patriotism. And then there is a risk that people would move on and take private sector jobs. And the risk is a
05:56serious one because the people, the very, very best people are the people that are most valuable in
06:01the private marketplace as well.
06:02The.
06:03The.
06:04The.
06:06The.
06:07The.
06:08The.
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