Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Joining us to chat about it is a senator representing
the state of Nebraska. He was victorious by quite a
margin and his special election, if you will, his name
is Senator Pete Ricketts and Senator Ricketts as always a
true honor. Thanks so much for Rehena on the show today.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
My pleasure. Thanks again for having me on every.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
Okay, so let's let's go ahead and start last. Or
maybe it was two weeks ago. Gosh, my weeks are
all you know running together now? But a right, you know,
the week after Donald Trump wins reelection and we know
pretty much all of the results for most of the
Senate races and all that jazz, Right, we know that
the Senate has to pick a majority leader, and there
(00:40):
were a lot of people with a lot of opinions
about who that should be among the three top candidates.
And obviously we weren't super privy to exactly how the
process was going to go because most senators don't talk
about who they vote for. So with that being said,
I guess my main question is how does that work?
And are like the negotiations of trying to figure out
(01:02):
who will be the new Senate leader for the Republicans?
Speaker 2 (01:06):
Yeah, So when we went through that leadership election, it
actually started fairly early when Mitch McConnell announced that he
was going to step down last February. So the three
candidates that emerged you already talked about. There were three
of them, you know, it was Johnson, John Corny, and
Rick Scott. They had a chance to go around and
talk to each of the senators. I've talked with each
of them multiple times. We also had the opportunity to
(01:28):
have kind of a form of candidate form, if you will,
where they made their pitches and we got a chance
to ask them questions and so forth. And then of
course we all got together to vote on who that
would be, and that was mostly nominating speeches and so forth.
And you know, my process for this was talking to
all the leader candidates about how important was that we
(01:48):
really start working to fix the broken system there that
you know, we need to be working like Americans work,
you know, Monday through Friday, not this whole Tuesday afternoon
through Thursday afternoon stuff that Schumer has had us doing.
That we need to have a rigular appropriations process so
we get our spending under control. That we need to
be able to offer amendments on these bills. That and
some of this problem was not just a Shumer problem, right,
(02:11):
There's been a problem across different you know, all the years.
So all the candidates, frankly, were pretty much on board
with changing the system, changing the way things were being done,
giving the centers more of a say in how things
were being run. So I'm really optimistic about what's going
to happen once we all get sworn in in January.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
And I guess that would lead to my next question, right,
not asking who specifically you voted for, but was there
any sort of you know, obviously, the thing that I'm
reminded of is how the House tried to figure out
who the speaker was going to be in twenty twenty
three leading into the twenty twenty three after the twenty
twenty two election, how contentious that was, and how there
was a sector of the Republican Party that just didn't
(02:54):
want to make sure Kevin McCarthy was the guy, and
of course that came back to bite him later once
he did get the gabble. Is there anything like that
that happened in the Senate with this Was there any
sort of like hardcore negotiating that you felt like there
were some senators that just weren't interested in playing ball.
Speaker 2 (03:09):
No, not really. This was the kind of thing where,
again we went through a couple of rounds of voting
to come to the final you know, person who won,
and there were certainly people who you know, were supporting
their different candidates publicly. I would say it was a
minority for you know, as you point out, most centers
didn't say who they were going to vote publicly. But
(03:29):
you know, it really wasn't like there was this hardcore
group of people who said, you know, no, no, no,
I think we had three good candidates. They all had
their different strengths and weaknesses, and there was really just
a discussion about who we thought was going to do
the best job of leading the conference going forward, especially
as we focus on hey, we got we're all guaranteed
two years to get Trump's agenda done, right, we only
(03:51):
guarantee two years. We got to move fast, we got
to hit the ground running, and we need the leaders
going to do that. And I think everybody at the
end of the day felt like, all three leaders, we're
going to push that Trump agenda as quickly as possible.
Speaker 1 (04:04):
So with that being said, then are you most comfortable
at this point? And you feel like most of the
Republicans in the Senate are on board with John Thune
is the guy.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
Yeah, John, John won the election, and we're going to
get behind him. We're going to work to be able
to make sure that we get those processes fixed and
we get a chance to have amendments. We're I'm going
to I've already been pushing him, I know others of
well about having a more of a working schedule there,
because again, we have a limited window of time to
get Trump's she genda done. We need to be there
(04:35):
in DC getting working and I you know, he hasn't
announced the Senate's schedule yet, but that's what I'm here,
just as kind of the word on the street is
that we're going to be working a lot harder than
we did under Schumer.
Speaker 1 (04:46):
All right, we're seeking with Senator Pete Ricketts. It's interesting
how that works.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
Now.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
Another thing that I think many people are kind of
confused by is how the cabinet confirming process works for
Donald Trump. And he is nominating people to serve in
various jobs for his presidential cabinet, and that's something that
the Senate would theoretically have to confirm. There's a lot
of this talk of recess confirmations. And of course we
saw Matt Gates just kind of withdraw from his nomination.
(05:14):
Whether or not that had something to do with how
the Senate was reacting to his nomination, I'm not sure,
but can you explain kind of just generally how this
process is working for the cabinet members.
Speaker 2 (05:24):
Yeah, So what happens is, you know, the president and
by the way, the President is doing a great job
of getting his cabinet members out early, which is again
a good step and for us hitting the ground running
in January to move fast to start moving on the
president's agenda. Because the Senate's constitutional role is to advise
and consent on these cabinet nominees, that means we take
(05:45):
a vote on them. And so typically what the process
has been is the President nominates somebody. Those nominees then
make their way around to the different Senate offices to
talk to centers individually. They also will come in front
of the committee's of jurisdiction to have a hearing, and
because as the Republicans are in the majority, we will
have a majority of the members on each of those committees,
and then once voted out of committee, they will come
(06:06):
to the Senate floor for a vote as well. And
then once they get voted on the Senate floor, they
become the official cabinet person. So and I will say that,
you know, if you look at my committees right now,
which are Environment, in Public Works, and Foreign Relations, the
President has done an outstanding job of putting up nominees
for that. So for example, Lee's heldon ran for governor
(06:27):
in New York. He's a new EPA administrator pick. I
think he's going to do a fantastic job there. Marco
Rubio has been selected for Secretary of State. Marco is
super smart. You know. Obviously I know him a lot
better at having worked with him the last couple of years.
But he's on Intel, the Intelligence Comittee, Foreign Relations. He
understands very clear, in a very clear eyed way, the
(06:48):
dangerous world we live in. He's going to end this
appeasement first policy the Biden administration has had. So I'm
very excited about the picks. So those cabinet head picks
for the committees that I.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
Said on recots. With that being said, a lot of
talk this cycle, more than I can remember about recess
appointments where there was the ability for the executive brancher
for the president to use kind of a workaround if
there was someone like a Matt Gates that seemed like
may not have the votes to get confirmed, for him
(07:19):
to work around and appoint somebody to do that. Anyway,
Can you explain how that process would then work if
something like that was to be utilized, And have you
heard about this being actually utilized for Donald Trump and
his cabinet right now?
Speaker 2 (07:33):
Recess appointments are part of the Constitution. It's really designed
around when neither the House or when actually both the
House and the Senate are not in session, then where
we're basically the Congress is in recess, then the president
can be able to point a cabinet member that would
and that appointment would only be good for two years,
(07:53):
so it's a limited time. It's really kind of a
temporary sort of thing. And I know that there's been
talk about doing recess appointment. I think that we ought
to go through the regular appointment process, but the recess
appointments are part of the constitution. It should not be
off the table for us to consider that. Depending on
how the Democrats are going to handle this confirmation process.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Speaking of Matt Gates in the controversy around his nomination,
you being, you know, in the Senate. I know that
you haven't worked with him directly because he was in
the House, but I heard, you know, there were reports
of anonymous Republican senators said, this one's not going to
work very well, and this isn't going to happen. What
were you a part of any of those conversations about
Matt Gates in his you know, how that nomination was
(08:38):
coming along in the Senate, if they were going to
actually go through with it that way.
Speaker 2 (08:41):
I had a conversation with Matt Gates right after he
got nominated, and he basically just called and said, hey,
we don't really know each other, I mean a chance
to work together, but I'm planning on coming to see you.
I said, yes, he asked me for some advice on
the confirmation process, so you know, I gave him some advice,
and ultimately, you know, as you point out, he withdrew
so well. You know, I was not a part of
(09:02):
those conversations about how he made that decision. I think
there were some members of Republican members of the Senate
who expressed some skepticism given the House Ethics report out
there that was kind of hanging out over his head
and so forth. But I was not a part of
any of the conversations directly about why he decided to
withdraw his name.
Speaker 1 (09:21):
Okay, well, that's good clarification, especially considering I think there's
a lot of people that are wondering if he might
even be a part of the Senate. By the time
you guys are convening and talking about some of this stuff,
have you heard anything about, you know, who might fill in,
like the Rubio slot down there, because his name's still
being floated around.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
Well, there's a number of there's a number of rumors
about who might take over Marco Rubio. I'm expecting Marco
will sail through the confirmation process and be our next
Secretary of State, and then, of course it'll be up
to Governor Ronda Santas to appoint a replacement for him.
And again, it just like me, if you get appointed
as a replacement, it's a temporary position and depending on
(10:01):
the state law, you won't have to run in an
election to fill out the rest of the term. So
I don't know who governments is thinking about for that,
but I'm sure he'll do a great job. I got
great respect for Ron. He does a fantastic job in Florida.
And I'm sure he'll pick somebody strong to be able
to sell in for Marco, and probably that person will
(10:21):
then run for election on their own center.
Speaker 1 (10:23):
P Rick is joining us before I get you out
of here. Certainly, we talked a lot about national security
and foreign policy, and I know that people in Congress
are pretty alarmed last weekend when Joe Biden gave Ukraine
the authority to fire off American made long range missiles
at Russia. And then you talk about, you know, maybe
(10:45):
a little bit better news that we heard today that
Hesbola in Israel seemed to be ready to along with
Lebanon specifically getting at least that portion of that conflict
kind of into a ceasefire agreement. Can you give us
a status of how you, specifically, and also your colleagues
in Congress are feeling about the way that some of
(11:06):
this stuff is happening in between the election and the inauguration.
Speaker 2 (11:12):
What I think is very important that we do is
change it's the peacement first policy. The Biden administrations have
all they have done is project weakness around the world,
which has encouraged our adversaries to be aggressive. There's nobody
who believed There's nobody believes that if Trump had still
been president, that Putin's invading Ukraine. Nobody believes that if
Trump had been president, Putin would have invade because Trump
(11:34):
is strong, Biden is weak, And if you look at
all these other conflicts we have around the world, I
would say the same thing is true with Israel. The
Biden administration had let's just try to give around a
bunch of money and see if they'll be our friends
that way. That's not the way it works. They don't
think like we do, and there's no amount of money
we'd give them to be our friends. And so when
we just gave a bunch of money, all they did
is turn around use that money to arm their proxies
(11:58):
like Hezbollah, like khama Us, and then Helmas launches that
war on Israel. So all mentioned Biden's appeasement first policy.
So the sooner we can get to a Trump administration
where people are afraid our adversaries are afraid of Trump,
I think you're going to see a lot more stable
world going forward. So I'm excited about the new administration,
and we just got to get through the next several
(12:19):
weeks here to be able to get to that.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
Well, it's going to be something that we're going to
be paying close attention to, and we'll certainly be in
touch with the delegation from the state of Nebraska in Washington,
d C. Which includes Senator Pete Ricketts. Senator Ricketts is
always so thankful for the information today for all of
us here in Omaha and around the state of Nebraska,
and we'll chat with you again very soon.
Speaker 2 (12:41):
All right, great, thanks Hemry, I appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (12:43):
That is Senator Pete Ricketts. We thank you for listening
to our show today as well. We'll have more for
you coming up next on news Radio eleven ten KFAB.
Emery Sunger on news Radio eleven ten Kfab