Interview: Chuck Grassley: “The Senate majority is is very eager to process these Trump nominees very quickly”
Sen. Chuck Grassley discusses Trump's cabinet picks, reconciliation, the History Channel, and more with the Washington Reporter.
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R., Iowa), 91, usually shows up to work at 6 a.m. — so, he has little patience for the “absenteeism” of some of his Republican colleagues, who he said are allowing President Joe Biden’s radical nominees to get confirmed during the lame duck Congress.
“Trump's taken the right position, and I'm taking the same position, not just because of Trump, but I'm voting against these nominees,” Grassley told the Washington Reporter in an interview. “And if we had every Republican who’s a member of the Senate present, we would be defeating some of these but because of the absenteeism of some Republicans, these judges are getting confirmed by less than a 50 vote margin because of absenteeism.”
Next year, Grassley will chair the powerful Senate Judiciary Committee, and he plans to start confirmation hearings for Trump’s nominees as soon as possible.
“I think that the Senate majority is very eager to process these Trump nominees very quickly, and I'm hoping to hold a hearing on them, like Pam Bondi and even on the FBI director sometime after that, before Inauguration Day,” Grassley said. “I don't have any fault with any of them that have been proposed…obviously there's some questions among some of my colleagues and probably by all of the Democrats on two or three of them, and I'm going to let that play out.”
Those who Grassley has already met with, including Pam Bondi and Scott Bessent, has impressed him. “I was very impressed with Pam Bondi, and I look forward to leading her confirmation success on the floor of the United States Senate,” he said. Bondi, he added, can undo damage done by the Biden administration’s highly-politicized Department of Justice.
“She is prominent in prosecution, she's going to make sure the laws are enforced,” he said. “And one thing that I think we can be confident in her case is the end of the weaponization of law enforcement, the political weaponization of law enforcement by the present Justice Department.”
During his meeting with Bondi, Grassley showed her a binder filled with “158 letters that we've written to the Harris-Biden Department of Justice that have not been answered or if we’ve gotten an answer, it’s a non-answer. In other words, they aren't cooperating with Congress, and I expect this Republican administration to cooperate with us on our oversight, particularly they ought to be cooperating on our oversight to make sure that we get answers to the things that we thought were done in the Biden administration that were wrong.”
Grassley, who stops every police officer he can to assure them that he opposed to defunding the police, wants to “secure the border,” which he believes “is going to happen before the Justice Department will have a chance to operate in this area, because I think we're going to be securing the border through reconciliation.”
In the next Congress, Grassley also wants to focus on “tackling the drug epidemic and stopping fentanyl from coming into the country; that's still connected with securing the border. Additionally, helping victims of crime has been a goal of mine over the last ten or 15 years. Another goal is protecting kids on big tech, and backing our law enforcement … and in the area of keeping drug prices down, the really big efforts in that area are done by two or three other committees.”
Grassley, however, isn’t letting other committees do all the work to lower drug prices. He has made tackling pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) a priority in recent months. “We've set up a system that's very opaque, and when you don't know what's going on in a system that ought to be the free market working, you don't know what to do about it,” he said. “So most of this approach is to make everything that PBMs do more transparent, and by making it more transparent, we think it's going to drive down the price of drugs. We think the hidden approach, the hidden role of the PBMs, is something that has inordinately increased the price of drugs.”
The longtime senator also has a longtime grudge with the History Channel, which he condemned for focusing too much on fantasy and not enough on history. “You either change the name of the History Channel or have history on it,” he said. “I'm not sure I can pass a law to do that. I could maybe go to the FCC and make sure they are enforcing the truth in advertising legislation, because when you don't see history on the History Channel, then they're lying. They shouldn't be lying to the public.”
However, Grassley does have some recommendations of programs he’s enjoyed from the HIstory Channel over the years for those who need holiday viewing material. “They had all the battles of World War Two. They had all the political history of various presidents. They had a history of the Civil War.”
Not all History Channel programming is created equal, he cautioned. “The X-man is not a history, and they also had something about outer space. Why all the fiction? Why not just the true history?”
Below is a transcript of our interview with Sen. Chuck Grassley, lightly edited for clarity.
Washington Reporter:
Next year, you’ll serve as the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, working closely with President Trump. What are your top priorities?
Sen. Chuck Grassley:
Because about 40 or 50 percent of the work of the Judiciary Committee is judicial nominees, that's at the top of my list to continue to accomplish. I want to do great things for our judicial branch like putting constitutionalists in there; I like to use the word constitutionalist instead of conservative. The opposite is liberal. I like to say those are people who want the Constitution to change daily. So I want to get constitutionalists on it. And it's a very high priority, like it was a very high priority of mine in the first Trump administration. And Trump delivered, and I think I delivered, and conservatives delivered, for the benefit of the Constitution and for the rule of law in the United States.
Washington Reporter:
What do you make of this last minute push from President Biden to get as many judges confirmed by Senate Democrats as possible during the lame duck Congress?
Sen. Chuck Grassley:
Well, my my answer to that is, Trump's taken the right position, and I'm taking the same position, not just because of Trump, but I'm voting against these nominees. And if we had every Republican who’s a member of the Senate present, we would be defeating some of these but because of the absenteeism of some Republicans, these judges are getting confirmed by less than a 50 vote margin because of absenteeism.
Washington Reporter:
So judges are a top priority for you. What do you think of the nominees that President Trump is getting ready to send your way for his cabinet for next year?
Sen. Chuck Grassley:
I don't have any fault with any of them that have been proposed, but obviously there's some questions among some of my colleagues and probably by all of the Democrats on two or three of them, and I'm going to let that play out. But everybody I've met with this week, like the Special Trade Representative, was impressive. just recently, within the last hour, I finished meeting with Secretary of Treasury nominee, Scott Bessent. I was very impressed with Pam Bondi, and I look forward to leading her confirmation success on the floor of the United States Senate. I think she's going to be a great Attorney General. She is prominent in prosecution, she's going to make sure the laws are enforced. And one thing that I think we can be confident in her case is the end of the weaponization of law enforcement, the political weaponization of law enforcement by the present Justice Department. We want law enforcement to be apolitical. And then, of course, another thing I want to accomplish is securing the border. Now, I believe that this is going to happen before the Justice Department will have a chance to operate in this area, because I think we're going to be securing the border through reconciliation and then tackling the drug epidemic and stopping fentanyl from coming into the country; that's still connected with securing the border. Additionally, helping victims of crime has been a goal of mine over the last 10 or 15 years. Another goal is protecting kids on big tech and backing our law enforcement. Every time I see a policeman, I always stop and talk to him, and I have a very short sentence for him. I want him to know that I'm not for defunding the police. And in the area of keeping drug prices down, the really big efforts in that area are done by two or three other committees. But within the Judiciary Committee, we have some minor pieces of legislation that would drive drug prices down, and those are things that I've been working on for the last two congresses. We get them out of committee, but they don't get through the floor.
Washington Reporter:
Is it fair to say between the nominees for Attorney General and also for the FBI Director that you want to move quickly on them once you're in the Senate majority in January?
Sen. Chuck Grassley:
Yes. By the way, I think that the Senate majority is very eager to process these Trump nominees very quickly, and I'm hoping to hold a hearing on them, like Pam Bondi and even on the FBI director sometime after that, before Inauguration Day.
Washington Reporter:
Another priority of yours has been working on accountability with pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs). Can you explain your view on this issue, and about how you've come to see them as contributors to rising costs on working families and on seniors, and what you think the Judiciary Committee can do about that?
Sen. Chuck Grassley:
PBMs fall more in the Health Committee or the Finance Committee or the Commerce Committee, but any of these approaches are satisfactory to me; I'm working with Democratic Sen. Maria Cantwell on Commerce on a bill that got out the first year of this Congress, and that's what I'd hoped to do. But let me answer your question, whether it applies to my bill or the other two bills out of the other two committees. We've set up a system that's very opaque, and when you don't know what's going on in a system that ought to be the free market working, you don't know what to do about it. So most of this approach is to make everything that PBMs do more transparent, and by making it more transparent, we think it's going to drive down the price of drugs. We think the hidden approach, the hidden role of the PBMs, is something that has inordinately increased the price of drugs. Now they claim to save taxpayers money when we buy it through Medicare, they presume to have us believe that they save the consumers money, but they we don't know what they do, and transparency brings accountability, and there's not enough accountability in this system. They decide prices, they decide formulary, and nobody knows what they do. We don't know whether they're helping the pharmaceutical companies, the local pharmacists, which are driving out of business the independent pharmacist, and they're surely helping themselves. Do they help health insurance companies or the consumers? We just don't know, and we need to know that. And you can't know if the marketplace is working if it's always behind closed doors or in a dark room.
Washington Reporter:
You were one of the lead Republicans on a lot of antitrust issues, including the American Innovation and Choice Online Act. Do you think that antitrust reform bills like that or others are something that the Judiciary Committee will be able to do in a bipartisan manner next Congress?
Sen. Chuck Grassley:
I think it's difficult when you're up against big tech, but we've got to try. And I'm saying this in a conservative way. We want the marketplace to work, but if some people are so big that they contravene the workings of the marketplace, then it seems to me that's a legitimate role for legislation. In other words, I don't want the government running the economy, but I want the government to be a fair referee to make sure that the economy does function in a willing buyer, willing seller relationship.
Washington Reporter:
Are there any other priorities of yours on the Judiciary Committee during the lame duck that we haven't touched on?
Sen. Chuck Grassley:
Yes, there's only one more, and it doesn't deal with legislation; it deals with the constitutional responsibility of the Congress to make sure that the executive branch faithfully executes the laws, and those are words from the Constitution. A great deal of my resources are put into oversight, and that is one of the things that I expect Pam Bondi is going to help us do. I showed her a binder that's probably four inches thick of 158 letters that we've written to the Harris-Biden Department of Justice that have not been answered or if we’ve gotten an answer, it’s a non-answer. In other words, they aren't cooperating with Congress, and I expect this Republican administration to cooperate with us on our oversight, particularly they ought to be cooperating on our oversight to make sure that we get answers to the things that we thought were done in the Biden administration that were wrong.
Washington Reporter:
And then, most importantly of all, how do you want to use your role in the new Senate majority to fix the History Channel?
Sen. Chuck Grassley:
Well, I think the name answers for itself. You either change the name of the History Channel or have history on it. I'm not sure I can pass a law to do that. I could maybe go to the FCC and make sure they are enforcing the truth in advertising legislation, because when you don't see history on the History Channel, then they're lying. They shouldn't be lying to the public.
Washington Reporter:
Well, what has your favorite either program on the History Channel or not on the History Channel been that you would recommend people watch during the holiday season?
Sen. Chuck Grassley:
Well, I go back to how I got enticed to being a History Channel fan in the first place. They had all the battles of World War Two. They had all the political history of various presidents. They had a history of the Civil War. They had things like that. Just let me end there, things like that. That's the history. The X-man is not a history, and they also had something about outer space. Why all the fiction? Why not just the true history?
Washington Reporter:
That is a great question that I don’t know the answer to. But I expect that you can get to the bottom of it. Thanks so much for chatting today, Senator Grassley.