that are just being cast aside, not only to those who are looking for jobs, and this paralysis is preventing them from being unleashed. but also important to our democracy, suppress the vote and suffocate the debate with unlimited dollars, poison the debate, the victory for the special interest. and unfairness in favor of the special interest at the expense on the thriving middle class. it's a very important week and the last nine days as we go into a celebration of our own independence and it is important for us to understand that you cannot change the policy unless you change the politics, unless, we, as i've issued to you before, unless we dare, by

disclosing. i'm nancy pelosi, and i approve this ad. as we have to do, they should do. amend the constitution to overturn the citizens united, reform the system to remove money as completely as possible from the process and elect reformers who will do that in both parties. we are at a crossroads, but it's important to note that this is nothing accidental, coincidental or just happen to happen. it's a decision to suppress the vote, to validate policies that have increased the deficit and increased unemployment in our country and that is exactly what they have in mind. yes, sir? >> that's a pretty tough bond on george w. bush's attorney general, michael mu casy and

alberto gonzalez before that. what's the difference between what republicans are doing to eric holder right now and what the democratic majority did to michael mukasey and alberto gonzalez? >> well, i -- in the house, our con term. of congress was addressed to josh bolton. i can't speak to the other cases. they never came to a vote on the senate floor. in the house, however, we did take a vote on the floor and the circumstances are quite different. we were talking about political intervention in the hiring of u.s. attorneys or having them retain their positions, the political intervention from the white house & in a very political manner. i think far be it from me to speak about this issue because our elija cummings was so very, very proud of him and the way he

had conducted his role in the hearing yesterday, in a very fair way, in a very fair way, but the particulars of the cases are very different and as you know, we won our case and the court ruled in our favor, and i can only speak to our own experience in the house. >> the ranking member yesterday said that if speaker boehner were to bring up the vote to hold it in contempt in the house that he would become one of the most extreme speakers that has ever watched over the house. do you agree? >> well, i -- i defer to the superior knowledge and mr. cummings on this subject. i just know that my case is different from years ago. >> do you see any problem --

>> yes. >> given the fact that the interest rate increase will only apply to new loans. it won't apply to -- >> suppose you're a student and you're taking out a loan and you sign up for 6.8%, you signed up. now some time down the road you are going to perhaps renegotiate the loan that that's an affirmative action that you have to know how to do. there are costs involved in it that will probably be passed on to the borrower. people have to make decisions based on -- this may or may not be the interest that i pay and you don't een knven know if it be retroactive so why would we

do that except -- except humor -- humor, and the intrance sequence of the house of representatives, why should students have to face that uncertainty if we agree that the interest rate should be 3.4% and not 6.8%. so it hurts these student. i can give you chapter and verse on this and we have the presentation as recently as this morning to be current on what it means to a student and it means a great deal to a student and their family, so much so that their families have to decide with this uncertainty, not knowing if this is going to happen and we may just have to pass up going to school this year. >> it starts earlier and earlier. >> madam leader and just to

follow up on the contempt issue. the attorney general was up here andy said he was willing -- and the president exerted executive privilege and made it a very public clash between the president and the house. are you concerned any time that you and the president warned us to be about jobs versus the big fight between the president and the house? >> i'm trying to enlarge the issue for you. this is part of the scheme that the right wing over the edge and i don't think all republicans subscribe to this, but the over the edge gang which dominates the house of representatives which said this is the best way for us to spend our time, to review a policy that began in the bush administration. a mistake was made. a person was fired. tens of thousands of document his been turned over and so without going into -- i don't know the conversation between

the president and the attorney general is privy to that, but i do know that the administration made every attempt to make every document available to it and i was present as speaker of the house. [ inaudible question ] >> what does it mean to have the interaction between the republicans and mr. norquist when this is such a central them to the republican surplus of this? >> i think they're in touch every day. there is not any different than the influence that he has on that where he's saying a pledge to me is more important to the pledge to uphold the constitution of the united states. if we're going to take any pledges here and it should be a

pledge to uphold our democracy and not to give tax cuts to the richest people in the country which undermine fairness in our country and destabilizes the middle class and does not create jobs and increased the deficit. >> you said there is a gimmick to the attorneys being fired? >> yes. very big difference and the court ruled -- >> and the differences can be to democrats and the republicans agree. someone ended up dying and they sent a letter that they later retracted. i'm curious on the substance, where it's appropriate and not appropriate. >> i think there is a vast difference in the two examples that you pointed out and i'm going to leave it to elija cummings who better than anyone has made us so very proud in doing the right thing on this,

and i take the swinging from where they are to some other place. they're trying to take this to a balanced place about what our responsibility is. contempt of congress -- contempt of congress to frivolously use that really important vehicle to undermine the person who is assigned to stop the voter suppression in our country, i'm telling you, this is connected. it was no accident. it is a decision and it is as clear as can be. it's not only to monopolize his time. it's to undermine his name and undermine his name as he goes forward to protect and defend the constitution of the united states. ydz? >> the story of the supreme court did not rule on health care and it's expected in the next week or so.

earlier this week the democratic whip told reporters that there were democrats that had discussed their contingency plan for a range of options. i'm wondering if you -- i've asked you this question before and you maintained the confidence that it would rule in your favor in an iron clad case, but i'm wondering what the contingency plan for the democrats is in the individual mandate. >> the only meetings that i have been party to have been those that we have heralded the benefits of the plan that tens of millions of people have already benefited from it. millions of young people are now in their parents' plan until they're 26 years old. many more millions of young people cannot be -- on the basis of a pre-existing medicare condition. seniors pay more because of other legislation which poses the doughnut hole, you probably don't know what that is, but it

means something to seniors. the annual check-up without co-pay, very important, wellness initiatives in the legislation. those are just some of of the benefits that are already there that tens of millions and many as many as 80 million people benefit from. that's what we're talking about is what we're trying to defend in this legislation. there have been other meetings about the immremation of the law that have nothing to do with the court case but i believe that the court will rule in favor where iron clad constitutionally, and we're on clad for the constitution and we'll just see what the court does, but as i said before, we believe in judicial review and the republicans have not, up until now, have not believed in the judicial review and all of a sudden they're big proponents of marbury versus madison and they were saying it was wrongly

decided. so with respect for the court and the constitution we wrote the bill and we believe in its constitutionality. if i just may for a second. there's also something that was said that the speaker was going to take the massachusetts case on the supreme court and again, use taxpayers' dollars frivolously to defend this bill. i think it's important to note because i've talked to you about when the republicans have not believed in judicial review and one of those occasions was on a bill and when they were in 2005 and they wrote a bill that said this, this, this and this and the court should not have judicial review over doma and saying no is on very fragile constitutional grounds.

we think it's unconstitutional, but they know, realizing that, wrote a bill, stripping the supreme court of the right to rule in it and it passed the house. it did not pass the senate. thank god. yes? >> last question regarding health care. that was the messaging. on policy, assuming, i know you're going on 3 -- >> you know something i don't know? >> you told us it was going to be 63. >> that's right. on a matter of policy, if the court strikes down the mandate and leaves in place all of the things that you know voters love and all of the things that you like and the foreclosure and all these other things, as a matter of policy can you justify leaving those things in place without the mandate that everybody knows will help premiums and without the

mandate. if you write that down, how can you leave the goodies in place even for a while? >> the supreme court metaphor, you have to eat your vegetables. you have to have the mandate in order for this to work from a financial standpoint, but does it mean, in other words, we want to keep those in place. the biggest difference in the lives of the american people -- well, let me say one of, because in terms of this legislation is that you can -- cannot be deprived of coverage if you have a pre-existing medical condition. this is huge. this is huge and insurance companies even say that they really can't do that unless the premiums skyrocket. so if the american people like the idea that they and their children for a lifetime cannot be deprived of health care,

health insurance because of pre-existing medical condition then that will require some other action in order for that to happen and what could that be? there could be something passed in the congress similar to what we had originally in the house bill which was a surcharge on the wealthy to pay for aspects of that. that was our pay for. the senate had another idea and on a different path. states can take their own actions in california. we have our legislation, as you know, massachusetts, under the governorship of mitt romney passed a mandate that he said was necessary for the health and well-being for the people of massachusetts. so some states already have their prototypes. they can have their own exchanges. they could have a single payer. they could have a public option.

in other words, right now in the world of speculation and i don't usually like to go in that world, but you're asking what are some of the things that could happen, but we cannot say to the american people we're going to throw you at the mercy of the insurance companies who refused coverage to, rescinded policies going into the operating room, raised your rates to a point of having it be prohibitive and we have to also remember that one of the main reasons -- if you had no other reason to pass the health care bill, no other reason. everybody loved their insurer and loved their coverage and the rest of that, the cost of it was unsustainable. unsustainable to individuals, to family, to businesses, to our economy, to our competitiveness, to have this anvil of health care around the neck of our businesses and to the public budgets, whether it's county, state or federal budgets.

it was unsustainable so you had to have legislation which in its oneness and in its integrity had these things connected and was on the path to the decreasing cost to all of the entities that i mentioned including the federal budget. the many things in there that we don't get credit for from the cbo wellness. some things that go along with it like electronic medical -- electronic medical records, that kind of thing. health i.t. which would drive down the cost of health care, as well. that's not figured in the cbo report, but in the think tanks of the hundreds of billions of dollars of savings over the life of the bill. so let's hope and pray that the court will love the constitution more than it loves broccoli and that we will have a decision that is based on merits and the constitution of the united states.

>> what? okay. >> those are all of the things the american people will demand, the broccoli versus the goodies. can congress justify if the broccoli is taken off of the table, can they justify leaving the goodies on the table? >> throughout all of it we had to be sensitive to cost, but let's just say the majority that exists in the house right now has no interest in making these things available. you should see in the budget, they want to do away with medicare. they don't want to strengthen medicare as they do in the health care bill. you see "the wall street journal," and $2, two papers and all of that good news and the rest of the good reporting and the rest of the plays are saying in the editorial page.

does that happen where you work? they're separate, but they love that, right? they'll have fun with that. but the -- they're criticizing some of the republicans and they're perpetuating them, but there has to be a way to pay for it, to reduce the cost, to expand the coverage, to improve the quality and this bill did just that. so hopefully they will see the light that the -- in order to have these things that the american people are taking advantage of already and yet i'm not even to 2014 yet and to have the exchange of the mandate --

but as they say, states can do what they need to do, but that's not going to be the answer and some of these same people -- the insurance companies insurance c getting tens of millions of new clients subsidized by the taxpayer under a federal set of rules. that's a beautiful thing for them. that's a beautiful thing for them. but if that -- if that whole federal structure comes down it makes matters worse for them. i think they're sort of in the crocodile tear place. they want the bill to charge more for premiums. now they'd rather see a formulation that is federal rather than deal with 50 states. anyway, this is a longer conversation that is -- shall we say speculative until we see

what the court will do. it's -- it's a remarkable thing nobody knows. as they say those who speak don't know, those who know don't speak. that's the phrase we've been using in politics farce long time. nowhere does it apply more than the supreme court of the united states. don't forget they're going after eric holder because he's supporting measures to overturn voter suppression initiatives in the state. it is no accident. it is no coincide. it is a plan on the part of republicans. thank you all very much. coming up at 1:40 p.m. eastern. we will take you live to the white house, the president is expected to talk about student loan interest rates, which are set to double, some of them by july 1st. we'll have that live at 1:40

eastern here on c-span. house speaker john boehner also briefed reporters today saying quote, americans deserve the truth of what happened in operation fast and furious. he declined to say if he felt attorney general eric holder should resign. the house voted yesterday to hold the attorney general in contempt of congress for refusing to comply with a s&p in the fast and furious investigation. a full house vote is scheduled for next week. his briefing is just under 15 minutes. >> good morning, everyone. the american people are continuing to ask the question where are the jobs? middle class families and small businesses struggling with high unemployment, rising prices and stagnant wages. republicans have been relentlessly focused on helping small businesses create jobs and we're going to remain focused on that goal. congress also has a

responsibility to the american people to learn the truth about what happened in infrastructure and furious. on february 4th, 2011, the department of justice denied allegations that it allowed guns to be smuggled into the -- into mexico. ten months later, the justice department formally withdrew its denial and acknowledged that it made false claims to congress about this reckless operation. the obama administration however has stonewalled congress's legitimate oversight responsibilities to find out how and why it made these false claims. remember, we're talking about a program that gave mexican drug dealers guns and those guns killed an american border agent. the american people deserve the truth and the administration has an olgs to turn over the relevant documents right now.

the decision to invoke executive privilege is an administration that the white house officials were involved in decisions that misled the and have covered up the truth. what is the obama administration hiding in fast and furious? today the house passed the domestic engineering and jobs act which will help create good paying jobs by expanding american energy production. this is the latest in is series of more than 30 house past jobs bills that have removed government barriers to economic growth and stop policies that are driving up gas price. i also want to be clear about something, house republicans want to get a highway bill done. we want a bill and our colleagues are working toward producing a bill. we just want to make sure it's a bill that includes real reforms to ensure that taxpayer funds are paying for legitimate projects that support economic

activity. not -- not planting more flowers and beautification projects around the country. we continue to support bipartisan job creation initiatives like the keystone pipeline. next month the house will boost to increase economic growth and jobs by providing a massive tax hike and a fairer, simpler tax code that lowers rates and closes special interest loopholes. stopping the tax hikes is critical to our economy, which more and more democrats are acknowledging every day and tax reform will help fuel more economic growth and job creation in our country. house republicans will also vote on several measures to stop harmful regulations that are creating more uncertainty and hurting small businesses. in the coming days i think you all know the supreme court will rule on the president's health care law, which are driving up health care costs and making it harder for small businesses to

hire new workers. unless the court throws out the entire law, the house will vote to repeal whatever is left of obama care. and then we need to enact common sense step by step reforms that protect jobs and protect americans' access to the care they need from the doctor they chose at a lower cost. with that, i'll take questions. >> nancy pelosi just before you came in here said that the contempt citation is about diverting attentions from issues like the transportation bill and undermining an attorney general that's trying to guarantee the right to vote in various states. do you have a response to that? >> i met with the republican conferees today on the highway bill. they've been heavily engaged. and clearly there is some movement that's been underway since the meeting that i had

with senator reid and senator boxer. we're continuing to our work. the american people deserve the truth about what happened in fast and furious. the terry family deserves answers about why their son was killed as a result of an operation run by the united states government. this morning, the terry family put a statement out, i'll read you the last sentence of it. our son lost his life protecting this nation and it's very disappointing that we are now faced with an administration that seems more concerned with protecting themselves rather than revealing the truth behind operation fast and furious. this is a very serious matter. until yesterday it was just the department of justice that we were concerned about.

clearly at the 11th hour and 50th minute of the white house decided to injekt themselves into this. where there have been no indication that the white house had been involved at all. now there have been lots of claims about how many times this white house and that white house in the past have invoked the issue of executive privilege. a privilege that is preserved for the president and its top advisors and their deliberations. why the white house would invoke executive privilege over the department of justice documents raises i think very serious questions. >> knowing what uninow, should attorney general holder resign? >> what we are trying to get to are the tacts and the truth about where this program started. why it continued. and why an american border agent

was killed as a result. what we want is the truth. and we want to get to the bottom of this. the house will vote next week on the contempt resolution unless these documents that we're looking for are in fact turned over. but this is about getting to the truth for the american people and the terry family. it's not -- it's not about personalities here. >> he should not resign? >> are they not look at this credibly? yet there's distension in your conference over this? >> the negotiation that was proposed by the attorney general is that we should accept some documents of his choosing and as a result of him turning over some documents of his choosing that we would never, ever pursue