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Brian Lehrer: It's the Brian Lehrer show on WNYC. Good morning, everyone. Let's get right to Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, New Yorkers you're invited to call your Senator at 646-435-7280. Anyone else may call too from blue states, red states, purple states, and any other color state, 646-435-7280. Just make your calls relevant to things that the US Senate is dealing with.

I'm going to start with voting rights and the filibuster that stands in the way, and you think the COVID relief bill was big, here comes the Biden infrastructure bill we're told, which could be a trillion dollars or more bigger, 6646-435-7280. Hello, Senator Gillibrand. Welcome back to WNYC.

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand: Hello, how are you?

Brian Lehrer: I'm good. Thank you for asking. I'm going to get right to it. Are you ready to vote to abolish the filibuster so that only 51 votes are needed to pass voting rights or civil rights legislation?

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand: I personally am prepared and the reason why is because we have so many urgent areas of crisis that have to be addressed immediately and frankly, all we've seen from Mitch McConnell has been obstruction. I think we will continue to see that obstruction.

I've been working on this voting rights bill with John Lewis before he passed for over five years. What's happening in the states across the country to truly take away people's civil rights and civil liberties and making it much harder to vote is so anti-democratic that we may have to respond in this way.

I would love us to be able to govern effectively with a 60-vote threshold and have bipartisanship in all things, but I've really seen Mitch McConnell close ranks and you saw it in the first COVID relief package that should have been widely bi-partisan and we are likely to see it in the next COVID package, which is probably why we'll do that again through reconciliation.

Brian Lehrer: You mentioned McConnell. Republicans object to a variety of provisions in For the People Voting Rights Act that they don't want the federal government to impose on the states. Here is Senate Minority Leader, Mitch McConnell, with two of them.

Mitch McConnel: "From here in Washington, popular policies like voter ID requirements would be banned unless states neutered them with loopholes. Meanwhile, unpopular and absurd practices like ballot harvesting where paid political operatives can show up carrying stocks of other people's ballots, would not just be allowed, it would be mandatory."

Brian Lehrer: Did Senator McConnell describe those provisions accurately, and how would you defend taking those decisions away from states or things like ballot harvesting as he labeled it, allowing paid operatives to collect ballots at people's homes?

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand: I think what he's talking about is a lot of the reforms we put in place to help with COVID. Be clear, he's also opposed to issues like early voting and vote by mail and making sure Saturday and Sunday voting is allowed. He's against all of it and I think he's trying to demonize accommodations that were made for people that needed help during COVID to get their votes mailed and to get them actually counted.

You can tell by the language he's using the fact that he's saying harvesting ballots, that is charged language that makes it sound like these are created ballots, that these aren't real ballots. It's a dog whistle and I think he's trying to infer or imply rapids voter fraud, and none of these measures have shown to have any impact in undermining voting rights. In fact, they lift up and help make sure people can access their voting rights.

Brian Lehrer: How far would HR 1, Senate Bill 1 go? For example, for people who haven't heard this yet, the Republican governor of Georgia, Brian Kemp, just yesterday signed a new law passed by the Republican legislature that does things like seriously shortening the length of a runoff election period. Of course, that's now the two Democrats won in the Georgia Senate runoff, and reduce the early voting period for runoff elections by two-thirds.

It takes administration of elections away from the Georgia secretary of state, who we know has been a principal non-partisan actor here, though he's a Republican, and gives it to the partisan legislature. It even bans bringing water to people who are standing in line at the polls in any election, I guess that's because the lines tend to be longer in urban read Black and Democratic areas, so bringing water might be more relevant to them. Would your Senate Bill 1 ban everything that Georgia just passed?

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand: I don't think so. I don't think there's anything in For The People Act that relates to having water be delivered. I think this bill is far more about ballot access, preserving the integrity in voting systems, demanding accountability in election administration.

It does modernize the voter registration system, so for example, it would let people register online, which is something that's already law of the land in states like South Carolina, and I tried for many years to get South Carolina senators to co-sponsor even that one provision with me because it's already the law of the land in their states and they declined.

It will ensure ballots are counted from Americans serving in military and overseas, allow same day registration, notifies voters when voting changes are made, assist voters with disabilities, restore rehabilitated citizens' right to vote. These are big sweeping access issues.

Then integrity issues are things like counting all provisional ballots, provide informed and reliable poll workers, protect voters from deceptive practices and intimidation. That's how we would ensure integrity. Then last just accountability, create a national voter hotline to report problems, ensure votes are counted correctly, and reauthorize the election assistance commission.

Again, I think he's trying to create red herrings and trying to imply that what we're trying to do is somehow nefarious. It's part of Donald Trump's effort to create another big lie and to extend the big lie. Again, this is what I'm very concerned about that Mitch McConnell cares more about politics than he cares about our democracy. We've heard from Republican legislators across the country, that their intention is to make sure that they win elections and that Democrats' votes aren't counted. I think they're being very disingenuous and harmful.

Brian Lehrer: One more thing on this then we'll move on to calls and other issues. If you're now going to federalize election law, what is to stop the Republicans the next time they have control of Congress from enacting the voter suppression provisions like we see them pushing through in states like Georgia? We know that many Black churches have what's called souls to the polls voting trips after church on Sundays, they did not get the provision to ban Sunday early voting through in Georgia. We had talked about on the show that they were trying, that's apparently not in the Georgia law, thank goodness, so they can still do early voting on Sundays.

As of now, here's Republican Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith of Mississippi however, speaking in a Senate hearing this week, supporting the idea of banning early voting on Sundays in particular.

Cindy Hyde-Smith: "Remember the Sabbath and keep it Holy, so that is my response to Senator Schumer."

Brian Lehrer: Nevermind the establishment clause of the constitution, but if you're going to federalize election law, imagine the Republicans would say you've given them the basis on which to pass their version of an HR1 Senate 1 next time they control Congress or tell me why not?

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand: No, you're absolutely correct. This is why the debate over the filibuster is so important. We do run grave risks that things we care about will be undermined when we are not in power and I've spent the last six years in the minority. I know what it feels like. It's not fun and I was very angry when Mitch McConnell changed the voting threshold for justices to 51, because I thought a Supreme Court justice should at least be able to garner 60 votes since it's the highest court in the land and since it is an appointment for life.

This does have very significant downsides and everyone needs to be aware of it. It's why not all communities are supporting the filibuster reform. Women's rights will be at grave risk, LGBTQ rights will be at grave risk, clean air and clean water will be at grave risk, and so what we saw under President Trump is what he was able to do just as president through executive order.

If you watch what he did in the first six months of his administration, he banned transgender troops from serving. He harmed LGBT rights across the board. He immediately allowed polluters to pollute in almost an unrestricted way. He immediately put in place a Muslim ban. If you have a Congress or a Senate that's as conservative or extreme as President Trump, they will do those things.

Again, everyone must understand, be careful what you wish for. This is not an easy decision. It is a hard decision, but I believe given how urgent the crisis is right now that we do have to do everything we can to preserve voting rights, which is why the Voter Empowerment Act is so important. It's why we need it for gun reform, since how many gun deaths do we have to see in New York state and around the country?

That includes at least doing three things, the assault weapons ban, the background checks, and the anti-trafficking bill. Because the assault weapons ban and the background checks will prevent large shooter attacks, and the anti-gun trafficking will prevent some of the day-to-day gun crime that destroys Black and Brown communities in our state in New York, because too many guns are sold out of the back of a truck that are trafficked from- in places like Georgia that has less severe gun laws to places that have better restrictions like New York.

Brian Lehrer: In fact, our first caller is asking a gun's question and it's Laura in Manhattan. Laura, you're on WNYC with Senator Kirsten Gillibrand. Hi there.

Laura: Hi there. Hi, Senator. Thank you for picking my call. I was thinking about this in terms of what has happened recently and I do come from gun culture. I have family members who are very responsible gun owners, and whenever we get into this conversation, it gets to be very volatile because of terminology that is used inaccurately. I just noticed that you were using the term again, assault weapons.

When you talk to a gun owner, assault weapon is really not the term to be using because there's really no such real terminology as an assault weapon, all weapons can be used in assault capacity. Often, the style of rifle that is being targeted is an AR-15 style rifle, because they look like military rifles such as M16, but they function like other semiautomatic civilians sporting a firearm. They fire only one round with each pull of the trigger and they're basically a template, if you will, for a kind of rifle.

The main difference between an AR-15 and other semiautomatic rifles is the vertical grip and the versatility of customization, and that's really it. If your conversation starts out with trying to ban AR-15s, when you get somebody who's a gun enthusiast or a law-abiding gun owner, the conversation stops because the terminology is incorrect and the understanding is incorrect.

They will also point out to you that pistols are far more used in gun deaths, so why target specific weapons such as an AR-15 when they are not used in the most gun deaths in this country?

Brian Lehrer: Let me get a response, Senator, what do you say to Laura? She's being very specific there.

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand: Laura, you are well-informed as are your gun enthusiast friends and family members. The reason why we use the general term assault weapons is we want to ban the military-style weapons that are designed to kill large numbers of people very quickly. It's not intended to take away people's ability to buy the hunting rifles that they want, to buy the kind of guns that they would want to have in a home but this is serious issues. AR-15s are designed for the military and are used by the military.

If you are a member of the military, you will be trained on that weapon for years. It is not something that should be able to be bought easily. It's something that requires significant training, and it can easily be changed to be able to emit large numbers of rounds quickly. That's the design of those weapons. That's why it is designed the way you just described.

We're trying to keep the kinds of weapons that a shooter, which we've seen in these gun deaths in the last several years, could easily access. A shooter with grave mental illness, a shooter with terrorism in mind to acquire that weapon easily and be able to use it. That's what the ban's about because we're not trying to undermine law-abiding gun owners. We're not trying to undermine hunting but there are some weapons that really should be reserved for people who are highly trained and that's our military.

That's why we use a simple term. I understand for people who know a lot about guns, that it can be frustrating, but that is the intent of what we're trying to do. We have to stop the number of mass deaths that we've seen and the simplest way to do it is to eliminate the guns that make that so easy.

Brian Lehrer: Laura, thank you for your call. Obviously, this conversation continues around the country. Debra in Harlem, you're on WNYC with Senator Gillibrand. Hi, Debra.

Debra: Hi, good morning. Senator Gillibrand this is a quiz of different topic. I'm a small business owner in East Harlem, and I've questioned whether you can assist with two issues. One is with the PPP, the rules were recently changed finally to allow small business owners to use their gross to base their PPP, gross income, which is how it always should have been.

However, there are many of us that already had received our second PPP loan because we needed it so we applied early. I mean we needed it very much, so we applied as soon as it reopened and they are not talking about making it retroactive, which really would only be fair. That's my first question, whether you can do anything to advocate for that.

The second question is regarding the EIDL targeted grant, which is also another new rule that is going back to the CARES Act to give also mostly to sole proprietors of small business owners, the ability to get the full $10,000 grant that was supposed to be given to every one of us and instead the SBA had changed it to receive $2,000 per employee and that's being corrected as well.

However, that was back in the end of December and the email invitations, which the business has to receive, they started going out at the beginning of February 1st, and the vast majority have not even received the invitations yet. It's just taking so long, and I'm just asking if there's anything that you can do about that?

Brian Lehrer: Senator.

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand: I don't know that specific answer to your question, but my staff does. I would love to offer them to you. All you have to do is email casework@gillibrand.senate.gov, and then Caitlin on my staff will reach out to you and you can give your number to the people who run this call afterwards and she'll call you.

There was a lot in the last package just for listeners on small businesses. We did 28.6 billion just for restaurants which were in dire need and we created that program so it's reflective of what the restaurants asked for. It has another 1.25 billion to save our stages, meaning for Broadway and other places that had not been able to have their venues open.

15 billion for SBA targeted EIDL grants. Now, this is the funding that will provide hard-hit, underserved small businesses with increased flexibility and more grant relief. These grants are particularly helpful for very small businesses and sole proprietors, which include over 90% of minority-owned businesses that have been disproportionately harmed by the crisis.

It also expands PPP for not-for-profits, which is helpful. It creates a community navigator program for underserved businesses, and this might be something you can also access. Caitlin will tell you how to do that. That's $175 million will fund community organizations and community financial institutions with a focus on and experience working in minority immigrant and rural communities to make sure that they get targeted help.

Then there's 10 billion for small businesses opportunity fund. This is funding through the treasury department that's modeled on the state small business credit initiative and that support state and local capital and technical assistance initiatives for small businesses, again, to target these underserved areas.

Then beyond that, there's economic development grants as well. That includes tourism and travel and an extended employee retention tax credit. Again, when you work through your taxes, you can get more tax benefits so you can protect your business over time.

Brian Lehrer: Debra, hang on, we're going to take your contact information off the air as the Senator invited us to do and hopefully, you'll be hearing from them and getting some specific help.

Senator, President Biden, and you mentioned the COVID relief bill. Now, President Biden is going to propose a big infrastructure bill soon. I've read it's $3 trillion worth, and you want that bill to include certain things for Black and Brown communities, such as West Farms in the Bronx, which we've been covering here, which was devastated by past infrastructure policies, like building the Cross Bronx Expressway through it.

What would you like to say about the coming bill overall, including its size and this provision that you're looking at?

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand: I wrote a bill called Build Local, Hire Local. That bill, I wrote probably over the last two years, I worked with the Urban League on it, I worked with lots of advocates and experts, I worked with Labor on it. What that bill would do is create a fund for infrastructure investments in areas that have been historically underserved, but also historically harmed.

For example, we all know the story of Robert Moses and how he built a lot of infrastructure around New York state. Unfortunately in Black and Brown communities, he often built infrastructure in a way that deeply harm those communities. For example, upstate, you have I-81 running straight through a community. That needs to be put underground into a community grid model, which is hopefully what we're going to do.

In the Bronx, there are so many highways that crisscross, and the Bronx, it has the highest asthma rate in the whole country. Not the whole country, in the whole state. It could be the whole country, but certainly in our state. Those are legacy environmental degradation that we have to fix.

What this bill does is say, it will provide more money for lots of infrastructure projects, including all these ones, and then you train and hire the local workers. For all the folks that are unemployed across our state, they would be given opportunities for any infrastructure project in their area to be the first trained and to be the ones who benefit from this massive investment.

I've talked to the head of AFL-CIO in New York and said, "Is this something you guys can work with?" The answer was, "Yes", because they have apprenticeship programs. They can do this really hands-on training that's so effective and has been proven to be effective, and so the training model is already there. I'm excited about that provision.

The bill will also have, hopefully, a national paid leave, something that would have helped people in this pandemic exponentially, because if you've seen any of the jobs' data, women in particular and caregivers have been disproportionately affected by COVID because they are the ones who are staying home when their child's school is closed and have to do remote learning, they're the ones who are caring for loved ones when they get sick, and they've lost a lot of jobs.

Unfortunately when you lose your job, it's hard to get rehired, it's hard to get rehired with the same salary. You move backwards. December was just a very instructive month in that net job losses after you took out all the gains for men and women and all the losses, it was net loss of 40,000 women, mostly women of color.

Brian Lehrer: Lorian in Queens, you're on WNYC with Senator Gillibrand. Hello, Lorian.

Lorian: Hi, how are you? I have a question really-- Well, a comment for Senator Gillibrand, who is calling for Governor Cuomo's--

Brian Lehrer: Resignation?

Lorian: For him to step down. Thank you. I'm nervous. After what she did to Al Franken without due process, how can she go ahead and do that? Now, I will preface the fact that I do totally believe that he's guilty, but let's have due process. That's where we live, that's what we're about. I think it is a real shame as the Democrats to just- and I'm going to use this word loosely, crucify somebody because of what other people said. We do not do that. It's due process, and Senator Gillibrand already ruined Al Franken's life.

Brian Lehrer: Lorian, thank you. Senator.

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand: Thank you, Lorian. I appreciate your question because I have a chance to explain to you and, hopefully, all the listeners why that is not the case. First of all, everyone is entitled to due process, everyone. Al Franken is entitled to due process, Governor Cuomo is entitled to due process. Those are the choices they make.

Al Franken chose, chose not to go to the Ethics Panel. He chose to resign instead. When senators, particularly senators who work with him or senators who work in our state or legislators who work in our state, we're not asked about that question. We're asked whether we believe the women who have come forward, number one, and if we do believe them, whether those mistakes or crimes merit someone to step down.

We're not given the benefit of waiting three months when we're asked that question, we are just asked, "Do you think these allegations are credible? Do you think that if he did do these things, that these are the types of allegations that would mean he would have to resign?"

We are literally just being asked for our opinion. We don't have a luxury of saying, "I'm not going to give you my opinion for the next three months". We don't. We just simply don't because we make judgments all the time based on whether we believe something or not, whether we believe something's true or not.

It would be far easier for me personally, to wait three months, because I wouldn't have to be blamed as you just did for Al Franken's behavior. He's the one who groped eight women. It wasn't just a photo, it was eight women. I waited for several weeks to say, "There's going to be an investigation". When it gets to be eight and it gets to be a repetitive set of allegations, and I then realized that one of the women who has alleged the groping is a member of the armed services. I sit on the armed services committee. Then I find out one of the allegations is from a woman who works in the US Senate.

Then I hear that there's another allegation from somebody at Affair and another allegation, and they're all similar, I'm asked, "Do you believe these women? If you do believe them, is that the type of behavior that should be tolerated?" It's just an opinion, but Senator Franken, he gets to decide what he does with his life. It's his decision. Blaming me for his decision is wrong. It's what we do all the time, we blame women for the actions of men and we blame women for voicing an opinion about it.

I am obligated in so many instances to voice an opinion because of my job. I wish I never had to voice an opinion because it puts me with enormous pressure of massive backlash. Your statement is a perfect example. You're blaming me for Al Franken's eight gropings.

I'm happy to do my job, and if I have to stand in front of a bus for eight women who have been groped, which I did, because I believed them and I didn't want them to have to take that heat. It's part of my job.

Now with the governor. The governor has two investigations going on now. He's got an investigation by Attorney General, Tish James, she will do a thorough, transparent investigation and the facts will come out and whether or not any of these allegations are criminal will be investigated. They will do the work, and at the end of that investigation, they will make recommendations about whether there needs to be a prosecution, whether there needs to be some penalty or some punishment, that's their judgment.

I'm not here to decide on penalty or punishment. I was only here to say, "Do I believe these women, and do I think that conduct is inappropriate?" My answer is "Yes". It's just an opinion. Governor Cuomo--

Brian Lehrer: You called on the governor to resign?

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand: I did, and that's my opinion. I believe the women and I believe these allegations rise to the level that he should resign. Mostly, especially now, we're in the middle of a COVID epidemic. We have just given $1.9 trillion to the states to restore this country and to help people who are suffering. When your job has to be focused on solving these so many problems, I think it's very hard to do that job if you do not have the support of your governing partners, that you do not have the confidence of your assembly members or your state senator members.

In light of that, and in light of the repeated allegations that are very similar in nature, these are credible allegations, in my opinion. That's why I made my statement, which is my view, but it doesn't mean that the governor or Al Franken don't deserve as much due process as they want before they're punished. I'm not punishing them. I'm just telling you my opinion and that's what due process is about.

Due process is a criminal term that's designed to say no one can be convicted of a crime and punished for that crime before they have due process. I'm not convicting anybody of anything, I'm not punishing anybody for anything, I'm just giving my opinion.

Now, the governor has said, "I'm waiting", which is his right, which Al Franken chose not to do. The governor is waiting, he's going to go through that investigation that will probably take two or three months, it's going to take a long time. He's going to wait for the assembly to decide whether or not to impeach him, and he'll go through that process.

All the while, all I want to do in my job in the Senate is just help people. I want to get this COVID relief money out. I want to help the small businesses that we heard about from earlier. I want to help the first responders, and so that's where we are. I'm sorry that you think it's wrong of women to voice opinions or elected leaders to voice opinions.

Brian Lehrer: One quick follow up on this and then I want to close with inviting you to tell our listeners about the news that you're breaking this morning about a bipartisan bill with Marco Rubio and that Jon Stewart also has an involvement in. Talk about strange bedfellows, you, Marco Rubio, and Jon Stewart.

I gather you worked for the law firm Davis Polk at one time, the firm that the Assembly has selected to lead its impeachment investigation, but which is facing scrutiny for its ability to be impartial because of ties that some of its prominent members have to the governor. Some of the accusers say they're so not confident in their impartiality, that they won't cooperate with the Assembly's impeachment investigation, would you call on the Assembly to change law firms, or what's your opinion about that?

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand: My opinion is that this is one of the best law firms in the country. The three named people who are doing the investigation, two are former US attorneys, are prosecutors, former prosecutors. These three that have been named I know and they're among the three most highest integrity lawyers that I know, so I don't have any concerns about it.

I know the people we're talking about and a lot of people don't necessarily. I understand their worry, but my knowledge of the firm and the three individuals, this is an outstanding team who will take this extremely seriously, and will probably take their time to do a thorough investigation, so I don't share those concerns at all.

Brian Lehrer: Lastly, you have an announcement today I see as a member of the Armed--

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand: Yes, about our burn pits legislation.

Brian Lehrer: Because you're on the Armed Services Committee, so people don't even know what a burn pit is, in many cases. Tell us about this.

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand: During the Global War on Terror, the army built Massive Open Air burn pits to dispose of waste. The waste include things like computers, electronics, equipment, chemicals, clothing, and they lit it on fire with jet fuel. They burned those burn pits 24 hours a day. Our service members worked, ate, and slept near those burn pits. They breathed in these horrible toxins and unfortunately, they came home with cancers and respiratory diseases.

This is something I am very familiar with, because the nature of what was burned in those burn pits is the same thing that was burned on 9/11, because when the towers collapsed, it was electronics, it was building materials, it was computers, chemicals, all the same things. The type of diseases that these men and women who served in our military are getting are very similar to the 9/11 diseases.

I believe that there needs to be a presumption that if you served anywhere near a burn pit and you're sick, that you are covered. We know from the 9/11 work that we can, over time, prove the links epidemiologically because we did it for 9/11, but I don't think we should be making our service members and our veterans prove that each time they get sick because that's what they're being forced to do.

We know that 3.5 million people have been exposed to burn pits, that's an estimate from the VA. There's 230,000 that have already registered as part of the burn pits registry, and thousands of service members were exposed at other contaminated bases that are very similar. We know this is a population that needs support and so any veteran who served as part of the Global War on Terror, or the Gulf War would be covered.

Having Marco Rubio as my co-sponsor is very important. The bill is bicameral and bipartisan in both bodies and this is how we get things done. These men and women deserve to be covered. The fact that Jon Stewart is also part of this is very important. We also have another person of equal celebrity to the 9/11 community, John Phil, also advocating for this.

We have a huge group of people, including survivors and spouses of survivors that have advocacy groups. The Burn Pits Advocacy Group is extremely effective and so I believe we will get this done. We're hoping we can get a hearing in the future and we're hoping that we can get a vote on this bill in the next few months.

Brian Lehrer: Senator, thanks. As always, talk to you next time. Stay safe.

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand: Thank you so much. Take care.

 

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