RCP: Let me start by asking you about the (conceal and carry) amendment yesterday. Was that a surprise, did you think you had the votes?

Senator Thune: Well, they were whipping it hard. I mean, those guys were really breaking arms on it. And they probably - if we had picked off a couple of others - they would have figured out a way to get a couple of other Democrats to vote no. They were trying to give a pass to people who really needed to be for it. But, yeah, it was disappointing not to get 60. But, on the other hand, getting 58 - which is a strong majority in the Senate, and getting 20 Democrats on board - was a pretty good vote. And I think it's a good foundation to build on.
But we just think it makes sense, given the vast number of states with all these different laws out there - my amendment would have made sure that anybody who had a conceal/carry permit from their state of residence when they transfer a firearm to another state abided by the laws of that state - but just so that when they go into another state they are not illegal, just by virtue of the fact that they are there geographically. Because we don't think the 2nd Amendment ends at state lines and that people's right to defend themselves doesn't end at state lines.

It was a good amendment and it was a good debate. There was a lot of hyperbole and exaggerations on their side, but they were trying to play on people's emotions.

RCP: And do you respond to the critics who say, "It is a state's rights issue." It was kind of interesting that Democrats were arguing state's rights...

Senator Thune: Yeah, it was ironic to have Barbara Boxer arguing for state's rights when they're trying to federalize health care and every other aspect of our economy.

RCP: What was your response?

Senator Thune: Well, I think the bill struck the balance. It is a Constitutional right. And this ties into the whole - even the Sotomayor nomination where the 2nd Amendment and the cases that are out there at the Circuit Court level about whether or not the 2nd Amendment should be incorporated into the 14th Amendment. All the other Amendments in the Bill of Rights have been incorporated except for the 2nd Amendment - and basically saying that the states cannot prevent someone from exercising one of their Constitutional rights under the Bill of Rights.
So I thought what the amendment did was allow people to exercise their Constitutional right to keep and bear arms and get a conceal/carry permit and move across state lines still respecting the laws of the state. In some states they prevent people from having conceal/carry permits - Illinois and Wisconsin - so you wouldn't be able to carry a gun in either one of those states. So it was respectful of the laws of the individual states, but it also gave deference to what is clearly a Constitutional right under the 2nd Amendment.

RCP: Critics said this was simply a strategic effort to drive a wedge between the Democratic caucus. What do you say to that?

Senator Thune: Well, I think it's a tough vote for some Democrats but, you know, we get sent here to make tough votes. They were playing games with the defense bill - they put hate crimes amendment on it. It was a non-germane, non-relevant amendment to the defense authorization bill and they forced us to spend over a week on it.

And so my view was, if they're going to do that - and I was going to second degree the hate crimes amendment because I thought what better way to prevent hate crimes, or protect potential victims of hate crimes is to allow them to defend themselves by allowing them the conceal and carry permit.

But Senator Reid "filled the tree," preventing us from offering 2nd degree amendments and so I decided to offer it as a first degree amendment. That's kind of what started us down the path in the Senate. And it was ironic because hate crimes, of course, is something that's a state's issue, too. In most cases it's regulated at the state level. And the hate crimes amendment wanted to create a national statute to deal with hate crimes, and yet here they were arguing state's rights on the 2nd Amendment issue. So there were a lot of inconsistencies there, which shouldn't come as any surprise in the Senate.

But I think it's a legitimate issue to be debated and there were a lot of people who didn't want to vote on it. But like I said, when we come here we should expect to have to make tough votes on occasion.

RCP: What's your sense of the Senate right now? Since you've been here, how has the tone shifted?

Senator Thune: When I came here, of course, we had 55 Republicans and now we have 40. So we're significantly smaller in terms of our conference than we were when I got here four years ago, and we've had to adapt to that. There are three significant numbers in the Senate: 60, 51 and 41; 60 being the filibuster proof majority, 51 being what it takes to control the agenda and organize the Senate, and 41 being the bare minimum necessary to shape legislation or stop it if you want to.

So we have had to adapt our tactics and the way we maneuver in the Senate to try and make sure we are relevant to the process. Therefore you have to be pretty aware and wise to some of the procedural tools that are available to you. On the other hand, the Democrats being in the majority have been very - Senator Reid in the last couple of years files cloture on every bill, tries to cut off Republican amendments, doesn't appoint Republican conferees when they go to conference committee with the House - there's just a lot of fairly partisan moves that have been made by the majority. So I think we've tried as best we can to adapt to that and make sure that we're not being run over.

Sometimes that creates, I suppose from their side, animosity. But we've been elected and represent constituencies all across this country and we have to make sure we're doing everything we can to exercise our rights and make sure that they're not running roughshod over our ability to offer amendments and to have some level of fair play in the Senate.

RCP: On a somewhat related note, the health care bill got put off until after recess. But what do you see are the odds the Democrats will use reconciliation to pass health care?

Senator Thune: I think they could, but if they do it'll mean they want a partisan solution. The President, for all his talk about bipartisanship and wanting to include Republicans really hasn't done that. I always say you have to judge a politician not by what they say but by what they do, and so far there hasn't been any follow through on the issue of involving Republicans.

Their definition of bipartisanship now has moved to, "well, we might let you offer some amendments." It's just completely - to basically shut Republicans out of the process at the committee level to develop a strategy where you would pass a bill with a strictly partisan vote. I think it doesn't serve the country well on an issue of this consequence. We're talking about one sixth of the American economy. It doesn't make any sense to me that you'd try to overhaul one sixth of the American economy and do it on a very partisan basis, which is what reconciliation would do.

Now, reconciliation creates difficulties for them, because there are certain things you can't do under reconciliation, that are subject to the Byrd Rule which would take 60 votes to waive. So if they decide to do it that way we will use every tool at our disposal to try and stop them. But I think it's an option they're retaining and keeping open to them in the event they want to try and jam this thing through without any consultation with Republicans.

RCP: And what do you think the odds are of this bill getting through given the President's push, the way polling has gone, the intraparty fight among Democrats. Do have a sense of where this is headed?

Senator Thune: I think it was a pretty devastating blow last week when CBO came out with those new budget numbers. They had to start backing away a little bit from that proposal because that really took the air out of their sails. On the other hand, they continue to talk about pushing through with this thing and trying to get more favorable scores and all that.

But I think there are 40 Republicans who are united on the point that we don't want a government takeover of health care. So if they insist on this public plan option, and if they insist on an individual mandate and all these things they want in the bill, I think it's going to be very hard to get any kind of Republican support. So they're going to have to pass it with Democrats. Can they do it? Maybe they can. They'll try and do it next week in the House. We'll see if the House Republicans can peel off enough Blue Dog Democrats to stop it.

I just think that logic would dictate that when you are in a recession you don't raise taxes. When you're running trillion dollar deficits as far as the eye can see you don't borrow more money to create new entitlement programs. So I think the Administration should be constrained by a couple of parameters that make it really hard to do this if it's going to be a cost of one to two to three trillion dollars. Who really knows? My guess is that it's going to be much higher than any estimate we've seen so far, and we know the baseline estimate's been a trillion.

And we've got proposals that we believe would address the cost issue and the access issue and do it in a way that actually scores as a net surplus or as budget neutral without having to raise taxes a trillion or two trillion dollars. I mean, it's just ridiculous in this kind of economy to talk about doing this sort of government expansion.

RCP: Do you think Republicans have done a good enough job of getting the message out that they have an alternative plan?

Senator Thune: Well, the President keeps saying that Republicans just want to defend the status quo and doing nothing is not an option - all the useful rhetoric. Maybe we haven't but we've got comprehensive plans and we've got plans that address the more discrete problems with health care today with more discrete solutions. Burr-Coburn is a comprehensive solution to this issue. Burr said yesterday - we haven't been able to get CBO to score it but they had an outside group score it - $70 billion over ten years, in savings. So we've got ideas out there that we think make a lot more sense to make the health care system in this country stronger, more affordable, more accessible for more Americans.

But we're having a hard time getting through the filter of the press. My assumption is that we have not broken through with that - he's got the bully pulpit and he keeps hammering Republicans for not having ideas. We do, but that message is not getting out and that's one part of our message we have to get out there. I think we're getting out the part about the President wanting to tax and spend and borrow for a bill that really doesn't cover that many more Americans. Millions still uncovered with their proposals.

RCP: Stepping back to look at the bigger picture: how do you feel about the state of the GOP right now?

Senator Thune: Well, in the near term we've had our problems and struggles. Of course, coming off a really bad election everybody thought we were sort of in the valley, and we have been in the valley, but I think we're starting to climb out of it. It seems to me, at least, that things are looking up.

I think that the new administration is overreaching. Most political recoveries are triggered by mistakes made by the other side, and I think they're making plenty of them. They're giving us lots of ammunition.

But for the Republican Party to really go through a recovery and to get back our mojo - so to speak - we have to be out there with ideas. If we can win the war of ideas, I think we will win back a lot of those political independents who left us in 2006 and 2008. I think the people who moved away from us are a lot of the Independents and what moves them are economic issues. And I think one of the reasons you see Obama's numbers dropping and the support for his policies dropping is these Independents are evaluating his agenda and saying, "we don't think this makes a lot of sense." And so they're moving away from him.

Now, they're moving away from, but we need to get them to move back to us. And to do that we have to restore credibility on spending, on fiscal responsibility - we've sort of lost that mantle - and we have got to have ideas that are based upon our principles that deal with the issues people care about: health care, energy independence, etc.

RCP: How do you restore credibility on spending?

Senator Thune: Part of it is, we have to practice what we preach. I think putting up a strong fight against the stimulus bill was a good start. On spending bills that come through that overspend we have to put up fights on those things and try and fight a lot of the wasteful spending we see in the budgets.
It's taking on the health care program that spends another $2 trillion, is a good example of where we're starting to get some traction. Taking on the new national energy tax in the cap and trade proposal is a good way to establish our credibility on tax and spend issues.

So I think people will start gravitating back to us if we demonstrate we are trying to get spending under control here and limit the amount of debt that we pile on future generations.

RCP: You talked about cap and trade today, saying "the costs are real but the savings are theoretical." Is it similar to how you see health care?

Senator Thune: It's very similar. They're trying to get us to buy a pike in a poke, I think. Because all the costs are going to be borne by the American people - small businesses - for savings that I think are very illusory. They can't - nobody really knows on cap and trade. It is a very risky proposition that could put us a tremendous disadvantage relative to our competitors around the world to get what could be minimal to no environmental benefit.

We all want to reduce carbon emissions, but there are better ways of doing it. Using incentives as opposed to using big mandates, creating these bureaucracies in Washington and dumping all these new costs on the economy at a time when you're in a recession....as I said, logic would dictate that when you're in a recession you don't raise taxes, and when you have trillion dollar deficits as far as the eye can see you don't keep piling on more debt. Yet that's exactly what they're doing.

The energy tax would be a new tax. These taxes to create the health care program - it's either going to be funded through taxes or borrowing, one or the other - neither of which, in my view, is an option. We have to come up with reforms that create savings and efficiencies rather than just new spending.

RCP: I want to touch on social issues for a minute. There's been a lot of talk about the base of the Republican party and their influence. It seems like social issues, for the most part, faded away as the economy has taken over and consumed everything. What's your sense of where social issues fit into the political landscape right now?

Senator Thune: I think most voters, and Independent voters in particular, are economic voters. Like I said, they're fiscally conservative people who don't believe in more government in Washington. And I do think those are the issues that matter [inaudible]. The reason Republicans are rallying around some of these tax,spend, borrow issues right now is that we know to get back in the groove and get the train back on the tracks, that's the way to bring Republicans together.

The social issues are important to a very important constituency that is part of our coalition, and that doesn't mean we shouldn't be speaking to those issues. And, honestly, I think we will - these appropriation bills are coming through now that are messing with the Hyde language, they're messing with Mexico City.
All these things the Democrats on every bill are trying to incorporate parts of their policy, or doing it by Executive Order. And then you get these Supreme Court openings and they have a huge impact on some of these social and cultural issues.

So I think that people out there who care deeply about those issues, there's still a tremendous intensity for them on these issues, but I do think if you're looking for issues that really unite all Republicans and can help us put a coalition together that can make us a governing majority again, it does have to center around economic issues.

RCP: I know time is short so I have to ask you the obligatory question about your future. There was a piece in the Washington Post this week mentioning you as a possible contender for 2012. Any thoughts?

Senator Thune: Well, my focus right now is trying to prevent them from taking over health care and a lot of these things that are on the agenda. I've got a job to do right now, and of course I'm running for reelection in 2010 for the Senate, so I'm very focused on that I haven't given consideration to anything beyond that.

So I guess at this point that's how I'd characterize my interest: Senate 2010 and trying to do everything I can right now to keep these guys from nationalizing every part of the American economy.

RCP: Thank you very much.