Newly Elected Lawmakers Want In on Tax Debate

This is a rush transcript from "Hannity," December 10, 2010. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

SEAN HANNITY, HOST: All the controversy over the tax cut compromise explains a lot about why the GOP made historic gains in the midterm elections. On November 2nd, the American people expressed outrage at exactly what they are seeing on display in Washington right now, liberals eager to tax and spend and Republicans all too willing to compromise with them.

Now, the GOP gained 63 seats in Congress in the midterms elections. Yet, not one of these newly elected members have any say on this tax cut deal. Now, ironically, it's the lawmakers who were voted out of office for their behavior who are now finishing up their terms, who are now calling the shots right this minute.

Well, two incoming GOP House members have a thing or two to say about all of that.

South Carolina Congressman-elect Tim Scott and North Carolina Congresswoman-elect Renee Ellmers. Guys, welcome to the programs.

CONGRESSMAN-ELECT TIM SCOTT, R-S.C.: Thank you very much.

CONGRESSWOMAN-ELECT RENEE ELLMERS, R-N.C.: Good to be with you, Sean.

HANNITY: All right. Renee, you are not there. If you were, what would you do?

ELLMERS: Well, I do not like this. I do not like this deal that has been worked out. A couple of days ago, as we all learned about it, it sounded like there was going to be some compromise made. But now, we are finding out that the devils are in the details. And there's a little bit more than we are giving up than what we all ran on. I ran on cutting taxes, cutting spending, repealing the death tax. And these are all of the things that we have got to watch out for, I am not in favor of those.

HANNITY: Would you have gone for the original deal that the president outlined?

ELLMERS: Well, you know, when we were first talking about extending the marginal tax rate for all Americans, so that no one's taxes are going to go up. And there was a discussion about extending the unemployment taxes for another 13 months, with finding a way to pay for it in the federal government. I thought that that was a pretty reasonable compromise and I was in-favor of it.

But now, as time has gone by, yes, we aren't paying for it. We are going to increase spending and we're going to increase taxes.

HANNITY: All right. So, now that they are larding it up with pork, which you know, I mean, why I am not shocked? Let's say the original deal that Joe Biden said, you know, there's no changes, that this is take it or leave it. Tim Scott?

SCOTT: Yes. It is very difficult to look at the hypotheticals to come to a conclusion. But what we do know is what you said earlier today, and that is simply this, the pork that the Democrats are adding to this bill is simply saying this to the American people, business is usual is what we are going to continue to do until we are out of Congress. There's a reason why the American people voted the Republicans into leadership and voted the Democrats out. What we need is a straight up vote on extending or the continuation of the current taxing environment. That is how we get a pro growth environment that leads to more jobs for the American people.

HANNITY: Yes. You know, look, the blame lies with the Democrats. They did not have the courage.

SCOTT: Absolutely.

HANNITY: Before the election which is when they should have done this, so the American people would know where they stand on this. So, here it is in this final hour, you know, we're just days away from this thing expiring, Congressman-elect Scott, are you content with the idea to let these expire? And when you come in on January 5th, then retroactively go back and just pass the tax cuts.

SCOTT: I think it is certainly in the American people's interests for us to continue the Bush tax cuts. But we should do it not just for two more years but we should do it permanently. If these tax cuts are not extended before January the 5th, one of the first things that we should do at the Congress is take it back up and say to the American people, we are listening. We want to extend the entire Bush tax cuts permanently for all classes of folks, income brackets. Because we understand that the top brackets is how you create jobs. We have to have a pro growth environment for this economy to recover. And if we are going to deal with the deficit long term, we're going to have to have growth in the private sector. The government cannot create jobs.

HANNITY: Tim, that's a great point. Renee, and just to add one little bit of emphasis to that. I thought that Jim DeMint on this program last night said it very well, you know, how do businesses make decisions with a temporary economy?

ELLMERS: Exactly. We can't work in a temporary economy. This is the problem. Our small businesses have got to have all of these uncertainties removed. Until we do that, we are not going to see the growth we need to see.

The private sector jobs are created in the private sector. We've got to remove all of the uncertainties, including the possibility of tax increases. We've got to deal with Obamacare, we've got to repeal that.

We've got to take all of those things off the table, including card check and cap-and-trade and then our small businesses will be able to start hiring again.

HANNITY: Guys, we look forward to seeing you on January 5th. Appreciate you being with us.

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