The Daily Signal - Battle for Senate GOP Leader: Rick Scott Aims to Shake Up Status Quo

Episode Date: June 3, 2024

For the past 18 years, Senate Republicans have had one leader: Mitch McConnell took the job in 2006 and has retained it ever since. But with his decision to step down from the post after November’s elections, there are three Republicans vying to replace him. One of them is Sen. Rick Scott of Florida. He was first elected to the Senate in 2018 and ran against McConnell two years ago. He’s now competing with Sens. John Cornyn of Texas and John Thune of South Dakota to win the support of his Senate Republican colleagues. The Daily Signal invited all three senators to discuss their plans, and Scott was the first to accept our request. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Let's lead. Let's focus on how do we secure the border? How do we balance the budget? How do we improve our foreign policy and have a positive agenda to solve the problems that the American public has sent us all to D.C. to do. This is the Daily Signal podcast for Monday, June 3rd. I'm your host, Rob Blewey. And that was the voice of Senator Rick Scott of Florida. For the past 18 years, Senate Republicans have had one leader. Mitch McConnell took the job in 2006 and has retained it ever since. But with his decision to step down from the post after November's elections, there are three Republicans vying to replace him. One of them is Rick Scott. He was first elected to the Senate in 2018 and ran against McConnell two years ago. He's now competing with Senators John Cornyn of Texas and John Thune of South Dakota to win the support of his Senate Republican colleagues. The Daily Signal invited all three senators to discuss their plans, and Scott was the first to accept our request. Before we go to his interview, though, I want to thank you for support. the Daily Signal. It was 10 years ago today that the Daily Signal officially launched as an

alternative to the establishment press. We believe then that major newspapers and broadcast networks were leaving a massive audience of conservatives and independent Americans unserved. We set out on June 3, 2014 to inject competition into the market. Well, our hypothesis was correct. To all the patriotic Americans and supporters of our work, thank you for making the past 10 years possible. forward, you can expect the same insightful reporting and thoughtful commentary from the Daily Signal as you've come to rely on for the past decade. Just as our name implies, we will continue to be your signal that cuts through the noise to transmit the news quickly and simply. More importantly, we will always tell you the truth. That is our promise to you. We believe that by

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thank you for making the Daily Signal your trusted source for news. Now, here's our interview with Senator Rick Scott. We're joined on the Daily Signal today by Senator Rick Scott of Florida. He recently announced that he's running for Senate Republican leader, a job that will become vacant for the first time since 2006.

Senator, why did you decide to enter the race for leader? Well, first of all, we've got to have big change. Let's think about just decisions we represent. I mean, they're fed up with, you know, a budget that's not balanced. They're fed up with an open border. They're fed up with all this wasteful spending. They're fed up basically with the federal government that's out of control. And so if you want change, you're going to have to change the way to since run.

and we need to go back to represent our states. We need to be fighting over issues. The bills shouldn't be decided by McConnell and Schumer. Then we should go through a committee process. I mean, there's so many things we've got to do to get this country back where it needs to go. We need to have a Republican leader that has a relationship with President Trump. He's going to win. He's going to have an agenda.

We got to do everything we can to help him get his agenda then. Senator, when you talk about those big changes in some ways, it seems that you're suggesting the Senate is broken right now and needs fixing. What are some of the ways that you would go about making sure those reforms are put into place? Well, number one, I don't think any leader should have a term of more than six years. Number two is the bill shouldn't be done by McConnell and Schumer. They should be done at the committee level where everybody has the opportunity to have input that are on those committees. Then after that, we ought to have a robust amendment process on the Senate floor.

So if I would like an amendment that's going to represent my state better, I ought to be able to do that. If I can't talk people into it, that's my problem. But if I don't even have a chance, because the bill never went through a committee or number one or number two, we never had any amendment boats. I have an opportunity to say yes or no. That's not the way the Senate is supposed to represent and work. I'm supposed to be able to represent my state and fight for the issues that are important to my state. That's not how the Senate works right now.

Can you go a little bit deeper on that? I'm curious, as you've observed, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer's approach to running the Senate, what you see as some of his biggest or most glaring failures. Well, he wants to, you know, and he does a lot of this with McConnell, but they want to write the bills. I mean, it's not a committee. It doesn't come up through a committee. So there's one or two people that have input.

and then they put them on the center floor where you just have an up or down vote. You don't even have a chance to improve it. I think we all have ways we could improve these bills, and we don't even have a shot at trying to improve the bills. So that's not the way the sentence is supposed to work. I'm supposed to be able to fight like hell for my state. Every senator should have the opportunity to fight for their state. But if you don't, if you don't, if you don't build a committee,

you have no input on the bill and you don't have any amendment votes, it's pretty hard to represent your state. Some of the early chatter in Washington seems to revolve around a leader's role in raising money for members of his party. I'm curious to know your thoughts on that and perhaps why that shouldn't be the sole qualification for somebody to get the job as leader. Well, first off, I think any leader is going to be able to raise money. I mean, a lot of the money flows through PACs that the leader is, you know, might be, or is tied to. So anybody is going to be able to raise the money as long as you want to, you're willing to do the job. As you know, I'm from a big state. So, good mind, governance race, I had to raise a lot of money.

I might have been a race. But the real job of the Senate leader is to represent the conference. And so our bylaws, Republican bylaws, require us to have a legislative agenda. We haven't had legislative agenda since I've been up here for five years. We need to come together as a group and say, what do we want to get done the next two years? And then let's say, okay, so now this is what we want to get done. How do we get it done? What's going to be our strategy?

What do we have to do to do these things done? That's what we ought to be doing every day. We shouldn't be sitting here and be reactive to what Chuck Schumer does. And then if we can get the majority of which I'm very optimistic, then let's lead. Let's say this is, you know, let's focus on how do we secure the border? How do we balance the budget? How do we improve our foreign policy and have a positive agenda to solve the problems that the American public has sent us all to D.C. to do.

Conservatives were clamoring for that legislative agenda back in 2022 for the midterm elections. You offered one. Senator McConnell famously rejected your idea instead said he wanted to merely run against President Biden. Looking back, in retrospect, why was McConnell's strategy a mistake? Well, he has the belief that, you know, you shouldn't stand for anything. You should just stand and talk about how bad the Democrats are. The Democrats are bad. There's no question about it.

But my experience is a business guy is I was able to attract talent to work with me on my management teams because I had an agenda to get done. They bought into the agenda. If they didn't like my agenda, they wouldn't come to work with me. The public wants a plan. The public wants a plan. I had a plan when I ran in 2010 to be governor to turn the economics of our state around, get people a job. When I came to D.C., I had a plan to how to make Washington work for you.

So I think the public is clamoring for a plan. The public is clamoring for somebody that's going to fight like hell to defeat, the policies and the ideology of the radical left, which we all know is destroying this country. So that's what the public wants. And that's what we all talk about when we run. Well, we ought to do it when we're here. You've mentioned your role as a successful businessman. You have served as Florida's governor.

You have also worn the hat of being chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee. In all three of those roles that you've had, what is your leadership style? What can people expect from you as somebody who is aspiring for this job? Well, first off, I'm very goal-oriented. I want to accomplish something. I became the governor and I built businesses because I wanted to accomplish something. I ran to the Senate because I wanted to accomplish something. I've been very clear.

With my center role, we've got to change the way Washington works. It's not working for the American public right now. So what they're going to see is somebody that's very focused on getting a result. That's number one. Number two, if you look at my business career, my governor career, this is a team event. You've got to bring people together to find a common goal to get anything done. And you're not going to get it. It's not going to be just your ideas.

It's got to be – you have to have a consensus, and so you've got to figure out what it is. And then you have to work – have a strategy to accomplish it. If you look at any successful business, if you look at successful governors, that's what they do. They have a plan, and they work. their plan. They surround themselves with people that believe in what they're trying to accomplish. That's what they'll see. If I can become the Republican leader and hopefully a majority leader, you'll have a Republican conference that is very results-oriented, and the goals will be very clear. We will solve the problems that the country believes are the most important problems.

Today, I'd say those are securing the border, making sure that we get inflation under control, balancing the budget, making sure we fix our forms. policy so we don't have wars going all around the world. And on that specific note, what are some steps that you would like to take to empower those individual Republican senators to have a greater role in the legislative process? Well, the biggest thing is ask for their opinion, ask for their advice, to get them in the middle of everything. We have very talented Republican senators.

And we are to say, okay, so with your background, you know, would you like to be involved in this? and you get people in the middle of it, of the issues. And guess what? You bring out new ideas, you bring out new energy, and you get a lot of things done. But the biggest thing is you get people in the middle of the problem because what my experience with Republican senators, they want to solve problems. So let them do it. Get them in the middle of it.

You know, specifically as it relates to the appropriations process, I remember years ago, you worked with me and some other folks over here on, a series of videos that you did about spending. I know that that's a particular passion of yours. You made great strides in the state of Florida on this. What is your vision for reducing this reliance that it seems that Washington has year after year for omnibus spending or emergency supplementals? Well, not having a budget to me is foolish. It's unfair to American public. not having a budget, it's just basically having spending bills. What that means is we're going to have more inflation. So that's wrong.

We should do everything we can to help all of our families by getting inflation under control. You can't do it with that balanced budget. So we now have almost $35 trillion for the day. We have interest expense that exceeds our national defense budget. We have a Federal Reserve that balance sheet is out of control. You know, I mean, what's going to happen is in that environment, interest rates can't come down. That means that if you think you're going to get a lower interest rate for a house, you're foolish. Your credit card rate interest rates are not going to come down.

And then on top of that, we're not going to see a reduction in gas prices and food prices in these things. So in spending matters. And so I've always, you know, my business life, I balance the budget. The governor's job, we balance the budget every year. We actually paid off a third of the state debt in my ears of this governor. We can do this at the federal level. The way you do it is you say, this is my anticipated federal revenue. So this is how much money we're going to spend.

You can do it. But if you just always say yourself, no, I don't think I can get that done. And that's going to be reality. You will not get it done. So let me ask you this to put it a little bit more bluntly. Will there be any backroom deals with a leader, Rick Scott, in charge of things? No. No, what you need to do is you need to be, we all are part of this.

You need to be transparent. You need to tell everybody what's happening. If you want people to support what you're doing, you don't do it behind closed doors. You do it by talking to people, by getting their information, by getting them. involved in what you're trying to accomplish. You challenged Mitch McConnell for this job in 2022. What lessons did you learn from that race that you hope to apply this time? Well, unfortunately, in that race, they rushed the vote to the next day,

so we didn't have time to actually go sit down with everybody. What I'm hoping to do is sit down with every Republican senator and say, what do you want to accomplish? And then my role will be, if I can win, is to say, how do I help you accomplish your goals? How do I help you represent your state? Because that's the Republican leader's responsibility is to help each senator be successful. Well, a successful senator is somebody that is successfully representing their individual state. You mentioned this earlier.

Senator McConnell has served 18 years as leader. You have endorsed a position where you, would like to have a six-year term limit for this position. Why is that change important to you? I think what happens when you, I've always believed in term limits. Number one, nobody consolidates power for a long time that way. That's number one. Number two is everybody realizes that you only have six years to get what you want to accomplish, so everybody gets more results focused. And sort of we have term moments for the governor. We have term moments for our legislature. And what what that means is you're going to get new leadership with new energy every few years.

You're going to have people very focused on what they can get done in their time in leadership or their time in office. Now, two of your colleagues, Senators John Thune and John Corden, are also in the mix for Republican leader. What distinguishes you from each of them? Well, first off, they, they, I think they work hard. percent their states. Probably the difference to what I bring to the table is my business background. I built the largest hospital company. I built a variety of manufacturers.

I've been involved in variety of business. My first business was a donut shop, actually, when I was 22 and I got out of the Navy so my mom could have a job. I've had the opportunity to serve in the military. I had the opportunity to be the governor. So those are the types of things I bring to the table. The biggest thing is, and I tell people, I'm a turnaround guy. If you think the country's head in the right direction and you don't think there has to be

dramatic change, no one should vote for me. I believe the country's in trouble. I believe there's so many people in the American public that are struggling. And so I think the only way we're going to make their lives better is if we have dramatic change. And that's what I bring to the table. Have you seen examples of your entry into the race or even just the chat? matter about you potentially entering the race before you formally did, that has moved either

of them in your direction when it comes to some of the reforms that maybe Mitch McConnell has not necessarily endorsed in the past? Well, I think one thing about every race heads are talking about is term limits. You know, most people are elected, don't really believe in term limits, but I think the average person believes in it. I know the public believes in it. And so I think now we're having a real conversation about should there be a six-year term? We have a six-year term for every other leadership position in the Republican Senate.

We ought to have one for the leader. There's no reason that should be different. I think that's number one. Number two, we're starting to have a conversation about. So, you know, how should we be managed? Because the leader's role is not to be a dictator. The leader's role is to be a leader of a group of individuals they get to represent their individual states. I recently had the opportunity to talk to Senator Roger Marshall about the Republican-wide discussion that took place.

And I believe he and you and others were part of that group that instigated the conversation. And it seems that those types of events may occur more frequently in the future should this play out the way you hope. Well, I believe in it. I believe we ought to have real conversations and have real discussions and let everybody bring their ideas to the table without any negative ramifications. It's just like, I don't get why I was kicked off and my gleeward kicked off Commerce Committee just because I ran against McConnell. It doesn't make any sense to me. I think I've run the biggest company of any person ever in the history of the Senate that's served. And then Mike and I got kicked off because Mike nominated the Republican leader. I mean, that stuff is wrong. We ought to say, hey, Rick, you bring this to the table. Mike, you bring this to the table. You know, whoever it is, this is what you bring the table.

You ought to be really active in those ideas. And let's fight over, you know, who's got the best idea. And then let's come together with the goal that we get a result. I know that we got to secure the border. I know that we've got to get inflation under control. These are things that are so simple to me that the public needs and deserves and can happen. Those, of course, are big priorities of President Trump as well. You sound confident that he is going to be victorious in November.

Why are you the one who's best positioned to not only advance his agenda, but also those critical votes on the nominees he puts forward to serve in his administration? Well, I knew President Trump before either of us ran for office. I've known him for a long time. I believe in what he's trying to accomplish. He's in the same position I am that we have to have a dramatic change. We can't nimbled at the edges. There has to be a significant change in how our federal government has run.

The public realizes that. That's why he's going to win. And so what he's going to need is they need a partner in the Senate that wants that to happen. It's just hillbent to make sure that's exactly what happens in the Senate, not just in the White House. And finally, Senator, just curious, what kind of reaction have you received, either from your constituents in Florida or some of your colleagues in the Republican conference since making the announcement? Well, I've had a lot of positive feedback. Number one, for my colleagues that, you know, want to sit down and talk about, you know, where we go. So that's a positive.

number two, in the state of Florida, people are excited that, you know, there's a possibility of a Republican leader and hopefully the majority leader coming from our state. Excellent. Well, Senator, thanks so much for spending time with The Daily Signal. We wish you well in the race and look forward to keeping in touch as things progress. Have a great day. Bye-bye. Thank you. And that'll do it for today's episode. The Daily Signal podcast is made possible because of listeners like you. If you would like to support our work, visitdailysingle.com slash donate. Be sure to check out our evening show right here in this podcast feed. We help you cut through the clutter and bring you the top news at 5 p.m. each day. Also, please subscribe to the Daily Signal wherever you prefer to listen to podcasts

and help us reach more listeners by leaving a five-star rating and review. We appreciate your feedback. Thanks again for listening and have a great day. The Daily Signal podcast is made possible because of listeners like you. You. Executive producers are Rob Blewey and Kate Trinko. Hosts are Virginia Allen, Brian Gottstein, Mary Margaret O'Lehann, and Tyler O'Neill. Sound design by Lauren Evans, Mark Geiney, and John Pop. To learn more or support our work, please visit DailySignal.com.