There’s an old saying in politics: Never answer the question that is asked of you, answer the question that you wish had been asked of you.
Wyoming’s senior U.S. Sen. John Barrasso took it a step further when he appeared on Meet the Press on Sunday by answering the question before anyone had a chance to ask anything.
Host Kristen Welker merely welcomed the senator to show expecting the perfunctory “good to be here” or a similar platitude, but Barrasso had no time for formalities. He came out guns a blazing.
“What you saw was an earthquake election,” Barrasso said. “The biggest comeback politically in the history of the country.”
“They used to call Bill Clinton the comeback kid, Donald Trump is the comeback king,” he added, mentioning the president-elect’s two impeachments, numerous court cases, assassination attempts, and the election night win — both the electoral college and the popular vote.
It was apparent that Welker really wasn’t needed for the interview as Barrasso could surely fill the 10-minute slot on his own — as anyone attending one of his rallies in Wyoming would attest — but he paused long enough for Welker to slip in a question.
She wanted to know what the Senate Republican mandate was, as Barrasso is positioned to hold the second-highest job in the body, the Republican whip.
The economy and the border, is job one, he said. And then reversing so many policies that President Biden had put in place, mentioning energy and the border.
He also hoped Trump could have his cabinet installed and ready to go by inauguration.
“We're going to have hearings and votes so that on Day One, Jan. 20, when the President takes over, he's going to have as much of the cabinet in place as we can get,” he said, mentioning the roadblocks the Democrats put up after the 2016 election.
With the landslide victory that Trump enjoyed, Barrasso reasoned Democrats would offer “a little more cooperation.”
Mass Deportation
Would the president get cooperation from Congress — mainly the money — to carry out his mass deportation plans?
Barrasso explained it’s a safety issue, and of the at least 10 million illegal immigrants in the country many were criminals.
“These are people … who have been murdering, raping and poisoning our citizens,” he said, stating that the president will target those people first for deportation.
What about the estimate that it could cost $88 billion to deport 1 million people? Barrasso didn’t answer, but he did say that Americans were firmly behind immigration reform.
A recent Reuters poll showed 90% of Republican voters were not concerned that Trump could order mass deportations.
Further, 58% of Republicans and 15% of Democrats agreed with a statement immigrants without authorization to be in the country should be "arrested and put in detention camps while awaiting deportation hearings."
President’s Cabinet
Welker pivoted back to the topic of President-elect Trump’s cabinet and wondered as a medical doctor, could Barrasso support the appointment of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. — a skeptic of some vaccines.
Barrasso said he wouldn’t comment on any one person because nominations have yet to be announced.
He did praise the president for his selection of Susie Wiles as chief of staff, the first female in history to have that role.
He also said he wasn’t worried about who Trump selected as attorney general.
“John Kennedy appointed his little brother Bobby as attorney general,” he said. “The president gets to choose who he wants.”
The Budget
Although Elon Musk wasn’t mentioned in the interview, his expected role in the Trump White House will be to slash the bureaucracy and eliminate waste, something he did at Twitter (now X).
At the same time, Trump has promised a massive amount of tax cuts with estimates reaching $9 trillion. Welker asked Barrasso if he supported approve such a measure.
He didn’t seem worried about that, stating that the problem is spending.
“When we cut taxes in 2017, revenue money coming into the treasury actually went up, but we ended up spending more than we brought in,” he said. “So that's the problem. It's not that we're taxed too little, it's we continue to spend too much.
“The government is too big,” he added. “It does too much, and we need to take a look at what we can do to make sure the American people have what they need.”
Jimmy Orr can be reached at jimmy@cowboystatedaily.com.
