'Special Report' All-Star panel on Liz Cheney's departure, infrastructure debate on Capitol Hill

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Will progressives agree to a lower cost infrastructure deal?

'Special Report' All-Star panel reacts to Sen. Mitch McConnell's hope for a bipartisan infrastructure plan

This is a rush transcript from "Special Report," May 12, 2021. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

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REP. STEVE SCALISE, (R-LA) HOUSE MINORITY WHIP: President Biden's leadership is nonexistent. The crisis at the border has become very evident. The president still won't acknowledging and go down to the border. Gas prices are through the roof, and people are now waiting in line. There was a major hack by Russia, likely. President Biden doesn't want to confront that. Our country is less secure. Look at what's happening around the world, the Middle East, Iran. Where is the president's leadership on any of these crises?

JEN PSAKI, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: We have to be prepared to juggle multiple challenges, multiple crises at one time, and that's exactly what we're doing at this moment.

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BRET BAIER, HOST: Dealing with a lot, hotspots around the world and here in the U.S. During this hour, the president did sign an executive order aimed at improving the nation's cybersecurity posture, looking to all that that does. Also today, you had the House Republicans voting off their House Conference Chair Liz Cheney, saying that they no longer want her in leadership. They have not filled that spot yet but it's believed Elise Stefanik will fill that spot eventually. The House minority leader was asked about the focus on the 2020 election by the former president.

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SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL, (R-KY) SENATE MINORITY LEADER: I don't think he has changed. I like the president. I liked him when he was in the Senate. We did some deals together. I never thought he was a moderate. And so I wasn't particularly surprised.

REP. KEVIN MCCARTHY, (R-CA), HOUSE MINORITY LEADER: I don't think anybody is questioning the legitimacy of the presidential election. I think that is all over with. We are sitting here with the president today.

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BAIER: Obviously, I asked Senator McConnell about all of that today. Let's bring in our panel, Byron York, chief political correspondent of "The Washington Examiner," Mara Liasson, national political correspondent of National Public Radio, Steve Hayes, editor of "The Dispatch." Steve, your thoughts of the McConnell interview there?

STEVE HAYES, EDITOR, "THE DISPATCH": Yes, I thought it was very interesting interview. You asked him a number of pointed questions about Liz Cheney's departure, her ouster from the House Republicans. He wasn't very interested in answering them directly. He said he had stood by what he said about her before, which was he thought she was a great leader and looked forward to continuing to work with her, but didn't give her much of a boost at this point.

But I think what you saw from Senator McConnell in that interview mirrors what you saw from Kevin McCarthy and his comments from the White House after the meeting today, which is they just don't want to be dealing with this. They would rather be looking at Joe Biden, they would rather be making those arguments. The problem is, as Kevin McCarthy's comments suggest, they are just not leveling with the American people about what's happening. Kevin McCarthy said nobody is claiming that the election was stolen, the election was illegitimate. Donald Trump claimed that two days ago. Elise Stefanik, who Kevin McCarthy is pushing to replace Liz Cheney, made the same accusation, or suggested the same thing in interviews just last week.

So as much as they want to wish that this is going away, this isn't going away. And I thought the speech that Liz Cheney gave last night on the House floor when Republicans walked out, or many Republicans walked out as she began to speak, I thought she told the truth, and it suggests to me that Republicans, or at least some Republicans, didn't want to hear that truth.

BAIER: Byron, there is clearly a split here. And the question is how much it effects the GOP's ability to unify against being the opposition to Biden, and how much it effects 2022.

BYRON YORK, CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT, "THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER": That's right. I think this was inevitable. Remember that on February 3rd, Republicans held a vote on Liz Cheney remaining in her leadership position. She got a strong show of support, got 145 votes to 61 to stay in office. And that was three weeks after she voted to impeach then President Trump. So something had changed.

And you just heard Steve Scalise talking about how there are all of these issues, the border problem, the Middle East, this weird situation with the hacked gas pipeline. There are a lot of things that Republicans need to deal with, want to deal with, opposing the Biden agenda, winning in 2022.

We had a recent report in the "The Washington Post" that Liz Cheney's effort to, quote, name, shame, and banish Trump had become fundamental to her political purpose. The sense among Republican leaders was that she is just not going to move on. She is kind of obsessed with the events of November, 2020, to January, 2021, which was fine for her as an individual member, which she is, but not good for a member of the leadership. So today, you saw a pretty decisive voice vote saying she is out of her position.

BAIER: Yes, and we will ask her about all of that tomorrow. She is coming on SPECIAL REPORT to talk about what happened and the way forward.

Mara, the one thing the Senate minority leader talked about extensively is this meeting at the Oval Office and what potentially comes out of it. It seemed a little bit more optimistic than I've heard. Take a listen.

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SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL, (R-KY) SENATE MINORITY LEADER: I think they want a deal this time. And I think they want a deal with us because I don't think they think they can pass this second effort through a reconciliation package. In other words, I don't think they can get their own ducks in a row. And so they are coming to us. And that's generally how you reach bipartisan agreements. Plus, the subject matter is pretty popular on both sides of the aisle.

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BAIER: Mara, your thoughts?

MARA LIASSON, NATIONAL POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT, NATIONAL PUBLIC RADIO: Yes, look, infrastructure, especially traditional infrastructure, roads, bridges, I think I would add broadband to that, getting lead out of water pipes, that is pretty popular. And it's popular with Republican voters, too.

The problem the pay-fors, and I think Mitch McConnell went on to say, and he said it in many different occasions, that they don't want to touch a hair on the head of the 2017 tax cut bill, and Joe Biden wants to raise taxes on corporations and the wealthy to pay for infrastructure. So that's going to be a big sticking point. But both McConnell and Biden would like to have some part of this be bipartisan if they can get a deal.

BAIER: But, Steve, is there any chance that progressives are going to say oh, OK, do the deal even though it's way less than we want?

HAYES: No, I don't think so. I think they may be persuaded ultimately to go along in a final vote, but, no. Look, I think Senator McConnell is right in sort of a depressing way. I do think both major political parties are eager to spend money. We have seen that now repeatedly. I think there needs to be certainly infrastructure spending. I would point to the hack and some of the infrastructure spending around cybersecurity that needs to take place. But you are talking about a lot of money on top of a lot of money that was just spent on top of a lot of money that the Biden administration has proposed. At some point, this spending is going to catch up to us, and it's probably going to be sooner rather than later.

BAIER: I don't know, you may have been hacked. You were frozen there, but we heard you loud and clear. Thank you very much.

By the way, we're going to dig into what's in this executive order. It's a big deal on cybersecurity. We had Sam Palmisano, former IBM CEO, talking about that earlier this week. Thank you, panel.

When we come back, tomorrow's headlines tonight.

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BAIER: Finally tonight, a look at tomorrow's headlines tonight with the panel, and unfrozen Steve Hayes, you're first.

HAYES: Mine is a fantasy headline. The Biden administration to rethink Iran deal in light of Middle East violence. We know that Iran is the major funder of Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hamas. And in light of violence, we know where the money is likely to go. I would hope they would reconsider.

BAIER: Mara?

LIASSON: Mine is Cheney's ouster unifies GOP for 2022 but exposes long- term problems for Republicans. I think that Kevin McCarthy's goal is to keep Donald Trump inside the big tent. To do that you can't have someone in the leadership who pushes back against Trump's lie that he was, in fact, the real winner of the election and Joe Biden is illegitimate. But I think down the road it's going to be hard for the party to reconcile those two things.

BAIER: Byron?

YORK: Mine is border, gas supply, Middle East -- Biden says everything under control. Kind of the no worries presidency.

BAIER: No worries. Panel, thanks so much.  

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