WASHINGTON, D.C.— House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) joined Fox News Channel’s Fox & Friends this morning to discuss the Congressional agenda for 2018, starting with the economic growth we are already seeing from the passage of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.
On building off the growth from tax reform:
“There’s a lot that we’re going to be doing in 2018, and it starts where we left off. Tax reform is working incredibly well. We’re seeing our economy take off. The next big thing you’re going to see is a need for workers, and I think the best thing we can do is to go and reform those welfare programs that are trapping people in a failed welfare state. Let’s actually put some work requirements in place so that we can get people back to work [and] rebuild the middle class. Then we’re going to have to work on health care again. Look, I’m for repealing and replacing Obamacare; one of the best things we did was repeal the individual mandate because that really undoes a lot of the stools of Obamacare. Now we need to go and fix the things that are broken in health care that are jacking up costs, so let’s get back to work on some of those things like what we passed in the House that almost passed in the Senate so that we can get our health care system working again, rebuild the private marketplace, and then let’s work to get back to a balanced federal budget. It’s something we can absolutely do with the growth we’re getting out of the tax cuts.
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“When we moved to cut taxes the Democrats just walked away from the table because they didn’t want people to get more of their hard-earned money. But look at how great it’s working. You can go to my website, Majoritywhip.gov/TaxReformWorks and see a list of dozens and dozens of companies that are giving bonuses to workers [and] raising the pay of their workers.”
On funding our defense:
“The next thing we have to do is properly fund defense and whether you’re in the Freedom Caucus, or RSC, or the Tuesday Group within our conference, I think we all acknowledge that we’ve got to get back to properly funding our defense in a way that we can meet all of these growing threats working with President Trump, who is a great Commander-in-Chief. As you talked about earlier, [he is] supporting the unrest in Iran, people who are rising up against their corrupt government, [and] moving to move the United States Embassy to Jerusalem. I think we’re going to have to continue to do what we can to give our men and women in uniform the support they need.”
On immigration:
“I think there is an agreement that can be reached. It’s got to start with border security, though, and putting money in place to start building the wall. As President Trump said, he campaigned on this, and he won the presidency with this being a front and center issue. Let’s go and secure our border. Just by the talk of President Trump saying that we’re going to secure the border and enforce our laws, you’re seeing a dramatic drop in illegal border crossings, but there’s more that needs to be done…We need to end chain migration. We need to end this lottery system that we’ve seen time and time again is a failed and flawed system. Let’s get back to the things that work. We let a million people into our country legally every year, the most generous nation in the world. Let’s strengthen that legal system and border security in place, and I think you can see an agreement that can be reached.”
On last night’s Sugar Bowl in New Orleans and the Saint’s Super Bowl prospects:
“I watched the game but, boy, New Orleans was hopping, and look, the Saints are on path to win the Super Bowl. We’ve got to take care of Carolina in the Superdome this Sunday.”