E-mail a friendRep. Steny Hoyer
airdate January 24, 2007
Rep. Steny Hoyer was elected to represent Maryland's 5th Congressional District in '81. As House Majority Leader, he's the highest-ranking member of Congress in Maryland history. Hoyer was the lead House sponsor of the Help America Vote Act and sponsored the Americans with Disabilities Act. He previously served in the state senate, where he was the youngest president in state history. Hoyer is a respected voice on national and international issues and has been honored for his epilepsy research advocacy.
Rep. Steny Hoyer
Tavis: Congressman Steny Hoyer is the newly-installed House majority leader, and the second-highest ranking member in the House. The Maryland Democrat is serving his fourteenth term in Congress. His days in public service date back to age 27, when he was a member of the Maryland Senate. He joins us tonight from Capitol Hill. Congressman Hoyer, nice to have you on the program, Mr. Majority Leader.
Congressman Steny Hoyer: Thank you very much for inviting me, Tavis.
Tavis: Glad to have you. Let me go back, first of all, to the speech last night that everybody, of course, is talking about today. Is it just my read, or did the president appear to you to be a bit more modest, a bit more humble, and if he was, in fact, what I thought him to be, did he have any choice in that?
Hoyer: Well, it was one of the more sober speeches, and subdued speeches, that I've heard a president give in a State of the Union. And I think you're right. I think your observations are correct. I think most people made those observations. I thought he was very gracious to Speaker Pelosi. It was a very historic event, being the first woman Speaker to preside over a State of the Union.
But clearly, his poll numbers and the lack of support for his administration policies, not only in Iraq but in other places, as well, I think, as I say, made it a very subdued speech, and properly so.
Tavis: Let me go right to this clip of what the president had to say about Iraq. I guess the paragraph that most folk have referenced since last evening, get your thoughts about what the president had to say with regard to Iraq last night in the annual State of the Union speech.
Tavis: So Congressman, to that latter part, can we, at this point, turn events toward victory. Is that possible?
Hoyer: We would hope it is possible, Tavis. He said in another portion of his speech, as you will recall, that when people voted on this resolution, nobody voted for defeat, and that is absolutely correct. We’d all like victory, we’d like success, we’d like a stable, secure Iraq. The problem is the policies that have been put in place to accomplish those objectives have not done so.
The problem is that when asked to make a change by the American public, when suggested changes by the Iraq Study Group, headed up by Baker and Hamilton, Secretary Baker and former Congressman Hamilton, the administration has not moved in a new direction. They’ve tried this so-called surge on at least a couple of occasions in Baghdad, and it has not brought security.
The Malaqi government, presumably, we hear, was not for this proposal. In fact, we have recommended strongly that the way to succeed, and we all wanna succeed, is to let the Iraqis know that they must take responsibility for bringing the sectarian violence to a close, to disarming the militias, to reaching out to the minorities to protect them.
To pass provisions, as the president said last night, for sharing revenues. But that the U.S. military cannot bring this about. And many of the military leaders who have testified, as you’ve heard over the last week, the four committees have said exactly that. It is very doubtful in anybody’s mind that the U.S. military can win this battle. That’s why the president, I think, got a very measured, skeptical response from both Democrats and Republicans last night.
Tavis: He still, to that quote a moment ago, used the word victory. You’ve talked about the way to success. He has used the word victory. So, that raises two questions for me. What does victory in Iraq mean these days for the president, and is his definition of victory the same as the Democrats in the House and Senate?
Hoyer: Well, I don't know, because I don't know exactly what his definition of victory is. If it is an operating Democracy similar to ours and to many western nations and some, Japan and others, I think the answer to that is no. If on the other hand it is stability and security, I hope that it is possible. But it is possible, in our opinion, in my opinion, through the Iraqis, not through the U.S. military.
The U.S. military can participate, can train, can stabilize, can support, but it needs not to be the lead force here, because that has not worked. And our military leaders say that they don't believe it will work. And frankly, the 20,000 are too late and too little, in my opinion. Secretary Rumsfeld wanted a lean and mean machine.
And victory, at that point in time, you’ll recall was removing the Hussein regime from power. We did that. The president, on the aircraft carrier, claimed victory. He said, “Mission accomplished.” But then over the last three years, we’ve seen our continuing to be pursuing an objective that has not been attained.
Tavis: Before I lose you and this satellite feed here in just a couple of minutes, we all know what the president did attempt to do last night, by starting with his domestic agenda even before he got to Iraq, never mind the fact that Iraq is at the forefront of everybody’s mind, and the forefront of this conversation, he started with domestic issues, he talked about immigration, he talked about healthcare, he talked about energy consumption and use.
Is it just me, or did you also notice the president, for two consecutive years now, following the greatest disaster in this country, did not mention New Orleans. He didn’t mention in the State of the Union last year, and didn’t mention it last night. What do you make of that?
Hoyer: I thought it was a very telling omission. Because we have not succeeded in New Orleans or along the Gulf Coast. If you go down to New Orleans now, and I'm sure you know this, or maybe you’ve been there recently, you see a situation very much like that, that existed shortly after Katrina hit New Orleans and the Gulf Coast.
That is a failure of this administration. It’s a failure. We’ve appropriated money, substantial sums, but it has not been applied correctly, efficiently, effectively, in the New Orleans area. And you talk to the mayor, you talk to other elected leaders in and around New Orleans, and they will tell you this administration has not effectively responded to that crisis.
And that’s why he didn’t mention it, because it has been a failure, and he would like us to ignore it. I think that was unfortunate. We have a responsibility. Yes, we have a responsibility to the Iraqis, but we have a much greater responsibility to American citizens savagely attacked by a natural phenomena.
Tavis: He is the new majority leader in the Democratic-controlled house. What a moment that was last night, seeing Nancy Pelosi, the first woman Speaker, sitting behind the president.
Hoyer: That was a very, I thought, moving experience. Historic experience. And I thought the president was very gracious. Nancy, Speaker Pelosi’s dad served in the Congress of the United States, was long-time mayor of Baltimore. And as the president observed, he certainly would have been extraordinarily proud of his daughter.
Tavis: Majority leader Steny Hoyer out of Maryland, nice to have you on. We’ll do it again, I'm sure, pretty soon.
Hoyer: Good. I look forward to it.
Tavis: Thank you, sir.
Hoyer: Thank you.
Tavis: Take care.
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