Rep. Jordan: Trump is keeping promises, Congress should too

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Rep. Jordan: Trump is keeping promises, Congress should too

House Freedom Caucus member reacts on 'Your World' to the president's decision on the Iran nuclear deal.

This is a rush transcript from "Your World," October 13, 2017. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

NEIL CAVUTO, "YOUR WORLD" HOST: You know, I'm going to link the Iran deal, the health care thing, even tax cuts back to Congress, back to the president saying, I will unilaterally, on my own, do memoranda, and then decertify deals, because you guys are not doing it. So, I expect you to follow up and come up with something -- that would include DACA, by the way -- because you're not doing it.

Let's get the House Freedom Caucus star Jim Jordan, a Republican of Ohio.

What he's saying is, I think, Congressman, I'm tired of waiting for you guys, so I'm going to take this into my own hands.

Am I reading that right?

REP. JIM JORDAN, R-OHIO: I think you're reading it that he's doing what he told the American people he was going to do.

And, frankly, that's what we all should be doing. I have said this on your show before, Neil. Congress' job is pretty basic. What did you tell the voters you were going to do when they elected you to come here and serve them? Let's make sure we focus on getting that done.

I think that is what the president is doing, whether it's, as you say, not doing something on the DACA issue. That was unconstitutional what President Obama did.

CAVUTO: Right.

JORDAN: Whether it's now on the CSR payments, these insurance bailouts, or, of course, now on the Iran agreement.

CAVUTO: But, I mean, I guess what I'm asking is, will Congress do something? I know there's a very big difference between the House.

JORDAN: We had better.

CAVUTO: The Senate has -- the Senate has far more rules. I know how that goes.

But even on the tax cut thing...

JORDAN: Yes.

CAVUTO: ... I'm beginning to wonder whether the votes are there. What do you think?

JORDAN: I think the votes -- I think the votes are definitely there in the House. The framework that was unveiled a couple of weeks ago is right where we want to be, bringing down the rates.

I mean, we said all along in the Freedom Caucus you show us a tax framework that actually cuts taxes that, that actually simplifies the code and one is that conducive to producing economic growth, and then we will support the budget and we will move this process along, because that's, again, what we told the voters we were going to do. And the framework seemed to do that.

So, I'm confident it will get through the House. But, frankly, with the Senate, I mean, Neil, six Republican senators on the health care issue, six Republicans senators voted against the very legislation they supported 20 months ago, exact same language, same commas, punctuation. Everything was the same. They voted against it, though, after they told the voters they were for it and after they had actually supported it. They then voted against it.

So, your guess is as good as mine in the Senate. I hope they're getting the message from their constituents and will pass it after we do. But we will have to wait and see.

CAVUTO: All right, now, the argument that had been raised against President Obama crafting this deal that was never approved by Congress is that he overstepped his bounds.

The same criticism of the president, this president is getting from Democrats that he overstepped his bounds, didn't consult Congress, et cetera, et cetera.

So, do you see Congress coming up with an enforceable treaty or mechanism to challenge the Iranians and to prove that they are honoring a deal that calls for them to avoid anything nuclear?

JORDAN: Well, we don't want Iran getting nuclear weapons. I think anyone knows that this is the largest state-sponsor of terrorism.

Their relationship with Assad, their relationship with Hezbollah, what they have said about us and our best ally, Israel, we don't want them to get nuclear. So, we start from that premise.

I liked what the president said today. I think it was a whole new tone, compared to the previous administration, which was the previous administration was about appeasement, weakness, and frankly leading from behind. That is not President Trump. And I...

CAVUTO: But did he approve anything or state anything that you think is going to work? Because he didn't reimpose any sanctions, didn't offer new sanctions.

JORDAN: But he followed -- he...

CAVUTO: I guess, Congressman, to your point, the threat is there. But do you think he should?

JORDAN: Yes, well, what he did is follow with the law what sets out.

There's a certification time frame. And he said, I'm not going to follow that certification. That's what the law says. Every so often, you have to recertify. He says, I'm not going to do it. It's time to refocus and look to see how we can make this agreement better or scrap it altogether, which is -- again, I didn't vote for it.

CAVUTO: Yes.

JORDAN: I'm one of the handful in the House who didn't vote for this thing, because I thought it was so bad.

So, I'm for scrapping it altogether. But I think what we should do is start focusing on what sanctions would snap back in place if, in fact, we get rid of this agreement. Think about that as we move forward.

But I think the president did the right move today on this and a host of other things that he's done in the last two days.

CAVUTO: It has obviously prompted a lot of protests in Iran.

But I do wonder whether the genie could be out of the bottle too late. By that, I mean, when this deal was signed, I believe, Congressman, the Iranians got better than $60 billion of assets quickly unfrozen, some of it coming on pallets and private jets as the deal was signed.

JORDAN: Yes. Yes.

(CROSSTALK)

CAVUTO: So, I'm wondering -- and this is my big fear -- do they feel emboldened and just say, well, the hell with Trump and whatever he's threatening, we got our money, we have got the wherewithal to survive whatever he throws at us?

JORDAN: Well, you're showing the problems with the original deal.

But, look, that's in the past. That happened. It's unfortunate that it did. I think the president's moving in the right direction.

And can -- and you -- also, look what our ally said. Look what Israel said today. They said this is the right move. They understand the threat that this -- that this country poses for the greater Middle Eastern area, but also just worldwide.

So, this is the right direction to move. The president, I think, showed a different tone, the right tone, set the right kind of -- sent the right kind of message, set the right kind of tone, I think, with this action.

And Senators Cotton and Senators Corker are already working on the kind of legislation that we may need to look at moving forward. But, right now, let's -- let's figure out what we have to do and let's begin to look at those sanctions that we may need have to -- may have to put back in place.

CAVUTO: Congressman, thank you. Always good catching up.

JORDAN: Thank you.

CAVUTO: All right.

END

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