(news music) - [Narrator] Welcome back.

Our guest this week is former Republican congressperson from West Michigan.

Pete Hoekstra, he'd like to be the next Republican Party chair.

Our lead story, the governor on tax cuts.

On the OTR panel, Chuck Stokes, Zoe Clark and David Boucher, sitting with us as we get the inside out, Off the Record.

- [Announcer] Production of Off the Record is made possible in part by Martin Waymire, a full service, strategic communications agency, partnering with clients through public relations, digital marketing and public policy engagement.

Learn more at martinwaymire.com.

And now this edition of Off the Record with Tim Skubick.

(all laughing) - Oh, we're obviously having some holiday cheer here that says straight gin folks, right?

Welcome back to Off the Record Studio in studio C. We are taping on Tuesday so that everybody can get fat on Thursday.

We have a setup piece on the governor talking to us this week about tax cuts.

Let's listen in.

- Tim, I won't rule almost anything out.

I can't think of anything I would.

- [Tim] With that blanket statement.

Governor Gretchen Whitmer has opened wide the tax cut door as she addresses something the Republicans have wanted for years.

Ever since former Democratic Governor Jennifer Granholm left office, Republican leaders like Mike Shirkey and House Speaker Jason Wentworth have called for a rollback in the state income tax rate.

Up until now, the governor has said no, but now, she is clearly ready to discuss the rollback as part of a package, a comprehensive package, of other tax cuts that she wants.

If they want it, you'll give it to them.

- It all depends on what the terms of the agreement are Tim.

- But you could see a grand package out of this that would include an income tax rollback.

You can envision that.

- I could envision a lot of different things.

- [Tim] Adding more fuel to this pre-holiday tax cut fever and chit chat, House Speaker Wentworth said last week he was open to tax cuts too.

The governor seems to be saying, "bring it."

I'll have all those conversations.

I'm eager to have those conversations.

- [Tim] But the tax cut package is not in any form yet to be voted upon and it's certainly not under the state holiday tree either.

Maybe later.

Or maybe not, Zoe, what's your read on this?

Is this opening the door, an invitation to dancing lame duck of all places to do a tax cut package?

- I would be shocked if something like this happens in lame duck.

- [Tim] I'll bet you it does.

- Really?

- [Tim] Yeah.

- Okay, well answer your own question then.

(all laughing) - [Tim] Wait a minute, you wanna switch chairs?

- Okay, so sure, like, it's beneficial.

- [Tim] Don't be funny to me, Clark.

(all laughing) - It's beneficial.

But why would you not wanna wait till you have Democrats running the show so that all the Ds, you know, this new legislature can take credit for?

- If you look at, it's the art of the deal.

If you got a deal, deal.

- So what does she get from it then in lame duck?

- She'll get what she wants.

She'll get her earned income tax credit, she'll get- - [Zoe] Why not wait until next legislature, though?

- You're not buying any of this.

- [David] No, I think that had been the case, they would've done this already, right?

- [Tim] Don't gang up on me already, all right?

(all laughing) - I mean, this is what, don't we think that Republicans in the House and Senate being able to run on a tax cut might have helped them save those chambers?

Like, if they were this close before, like, it feels like they could have done that.

- [Tim] Well, why would Wentworth say it then?

- Well, why didn't the governor commit to anything in part of this package?

I mean, I think she kind of danced around your question a little bit there, right?

I think that everybody's seemingly already on board on the EITC expansion.

- [Zoe] Just to want them out.

- Right.

Everybody's talked to some degree about.

- [Tim] A tax cut for the needy families.

- [David] That's exactly right.

And people talked about some changes to the way the state collects gas taxes, either in the short term or long term.

You can see that being part of a package, but including all that in the lame duck seems ambitious.

- [Tim] Chuck, tell them they're wrong.

(all laughing) - I'm not going to tell them that they're wrong.

I'll say that anything can possibly happen in lame duck.

We've seen some weird stuff throughout the years, but I tend to think it won't happen in lame duck.

I think it will happen when the new legislature takes place because I think she's going to want to throw some kind of bone to the Republicans.

Keep in mind she's.

- [Tim] That's what the income tax rollback is.

That is the bone.

- [Chuck] But I think you wanna do it when the new legislators are in place.

The only argument for doing it in lame duck, is the fact that there might be some Democrats who don't want to have their hands tied to this.

So you get it done in lame duck and you aren't saddling some of the new ones coming in with it.

But I tend to think if it's gonna happen, it's gonna be after the lame duck.

- So going into the new legislature, there's gonna be a really slim majority that Democrats have, right?

Like, we're talking one, two votes.

People can't get sick, you know, right?

- That's almost not a majority.

- Well, hey, you only need plus one.

But I hear what you're saying and so I guess if I'm thinking strategically as the governor's office, why give up a bargaining tool, right now in lame duck, that I could hold to get some Republicans, new Republicans, on board in the new legislative session?

- Towards toward what end?

- Towards all the things that she wants to get done.

To your point, if she wants to try to get some gun control measures or things that maybe, there could be some moderate Republicans who would be willing to vote in favor with Democrats on, but what is she going to offer them?

- [Tim] But she also has the possibility of all these lame duck Republicans who aren't coming back, could pop her a nice New Year's gift with a yes vote.

- [Zoe] Well, and that's why folks are bringing up things like ethics reform, you know?

But those, again, in some respects, you could argue, might stick it to new legislature than anything else.

- Keep in mind, this is a governor who in this next legislature, she has a boatload of cash sitting there that Republicans left her because they didn't think that they were going to lose the majority.

Now she has all the, that's right, so she has a whole lot to play with.

She can pass out a lot of different things.

The art for her is going to be how do you thread that needle down the middle, look like you're a governor for all of the people, and not just bowing to the demands of the Democrats who are whistling in your ear, we've got the majority, don't forget, let's run this railroad train as quick as we can.

- [Tim] But you could also make the argument that you check this off the list and then you begin your new year not looking forward to a knockdown, drag out fight over tax cuts, which you guys all know, this could gobble up a ton of time.

If you can get this thing out of the way, go for it.

- [David] It just seems like, you're doing a good selling it.

(all laughing and chattering) - [Chuck] Let's hope the governor's listening to, Tim.

(all laughing) - [Tim] We're gonna take that pregnant pause out.

(all laughing) - [David] It just feels like people are gonna see that as political.

If it's something that the governor obviously didn't want to do during this time when Republicans in the House and Senate campaigned on it, they brought it out, they, mentioned it all the time in the last six months and then six weeks after an election, suddenly it's time to roll back the income tax.

It just, again, to your point- - [Tim] But it's not an isolated issue.

It's part of the package.

- [Zoe] Which is why you hold it back as something to use for leverage and negotiating next year.

- [Tim] What is she going to do, is she going to say, I'm not going to give it to you, if she's going to give it to them, give it to them.

- It doesn't feel like an easy win, right?

And maybe to your point, she's getting calls, but it doesn't feel like an easy win, especially when there are other things that they could do, like ethics reform, that passed the House unanimously that might be a little bit of a easier lift.

- [Tim] Well, why would that be any easier in the Senate in a lame duck, then.

- [Zoe] Because Shirkey who has been kind of the reason that it hasn't passed is like, I'm outta here.

Sure, go do this for the next session.

You guys all want this.

Go for it.

- [Tim] So you think he has signed off on that?

- [Zoe] Oh, no idea.

- Well, why did you say that then?

- [David] But we've heard repeatedly from people that have supported this, that they have the votes, right now.

- In the Senate, it's just as simply that it can't go forward because of Shirkey.

- [Tim] Well then my question remains on the table.

It's not gonna get done in lame duck if he is still saying no, are we right or wrong?

- [Zoe] If he is still saying no and isn't gonna bring it to the floor, then absolutely, it's not getting done.

What I'm saying is, he is not going to be leading the caucus, he is not going to be in the Senate, next term and one could argue that these ethics reform bills are gonna change and make some things, there's a reason that some lawmakers don't want this to happen, right?

It's gonna have to disclose some things and so it's a little bit like Shirkey being like, out the door and going, here, you guys want this so bad.

- And what's the advantage for Shirkey to do it at this point?

- [Tim] To leave on an upbeat.

- [Chuck] Do you think Shirkey really cares about that now that he's on the way out the door and he's not in the majority.

Well, it's never too late, you know, as long as the door doesn't hit him in the behind on the way out.

- [Chuck] Well, it may play to some future plans that he may have, of which I don't know, but if he's thinking down the line, I'm gonna get back in politics in some sort of way, he might want to have this on his resume.

- [Tim] All right, well what about Mr. Wentworth and this exchange with the state representative over opening up an investigation to, here's an old story, the 2020 election.

- [David] Well, it was right.

We heard from Representative Steve Carra, West Michigan Republican, who sent a letter to the Speaker of the House and the House Republicans, asking to create a commission with subpoena powers, to investigate alleged fraud in the 2022 election.

And the letter seemingly pointed more at the 2018 election and the 2020 election.

- [Tim] Don't forget the one in 1948.

- [David] Sure, well, and the speaker responded noting some historical precedent that there has never been a commission - [Zoe] In 200 years - In 200 years with this sort of power, and asked some very pointed questions that tacitly poked fun, frankly, at the representative's request, and noted that it was just not something that he was going to do.

But that message apparently wasn't received, by the representative and by other people who have been claiming election denial for years.

- [Tim] What did he understand about, show me some proof.

- I think that he took that as a mandate.

That's what it seems like, as opposed to a- - [Tim] Now, that's why we have to have the investigation.

- [David] Sure, and so, because the reason we think that, is that Patrick Colbeck, former state senator, who has been championing election misinformation claims for quite some time, sent out a missive to this network of people that believed these claims and said, we need affidavits of election fraud from the 2022 election in the next 24 hours.

He sent it out over the weekend saying that it was part of discussions with the speaker about investigations.

So it is no surprise that after that sort of ginned up that particular base, that we saw the actual exchange come out between Representative Carra and between the speaker's office, to kind of, pour some cold water and this idea of any investigation from the house.

- [Tim] What'd you make of that letter?

- [Zoe] Oh, I mean, yeah, it was a complete misinterpretation of the speaker, basically going, like, asking these sort of, rhetorical questions.

- [Tim] Yeah, what about no, don't you understand?

- Right, I mean, and it goes back to this bigger picture of where the Republican Party is at, right now.

That there is a small group, but very vocal, that continues to talk about election, whatever election is you're talking about, 1948, I mean, you know, I'm being tongue in cheek here, but seemingly now, you know, going back how many elections and then a speaker trying to just move forward, right?

And being a little tongue in cheek, as well, in his letter and I think it just goes to show this place that Republicans find themselves in and this group, like Steve Carra, going to kind of, even double down after these huge election losses with the grand new party path.

- [Tim] Isn't that the point, Chuck?

Didn't they know what happened on election day?

- Well, you'd like to think they didn't.

That the vote and the fact that they're looking at a trifecta right now would reinforce that.

But I agree with Dave and Zoe on everything that they said, but the bigger picture is clearly this is a case of a small faction of the Republican Party looking back, rather than necessarily looking ahead, and how are you going to get out of the hole that you currently are in if you keep looking back, bringing up things, rather than trying to paint a vision of where you want the Michigan Republican Party to go.

It'd be interesting to see what our guest says about that, because they're lacking direction right now.

Somebodies saying, this is where we are going as a team, not as a very- - [Tim] Nature pours a vacuum.

- [Chuck] Right.

They're all over the place right now and it's hurting the party.

- Well, and it's interesting to see, you know, in 2020 after similar claims came out, both Senate Majority Leader Shirkey and then House Speaker Chatfield didn't say that the election was fraudulent, but they allowed, both House and Senate committees to kind of, pursue some of these claims.

That led to the (indistinct) hearing with Rudy Giuliani in the House that featured Mellissa Carone that was spoofed on SNL- - [Zoe] It was on Saturday Night Live.

- Right, and then it also led in the Senate to the McBroom report that came out and said that none of this was actually accurate and that became a huge sticking point for former President Trump and other people in the party.

You could argue that, politically, that didn't lead to any positives for Republicans running this election cycle.

And so we are seeing a demonstrably different response from the House speaker now, when admittedly, a small portion of the caucus is trying to revive these sort of efforts.

- [Tim] By the way, I think Mr. McBroom won by 62% of the vote up north.

Yeah, there was a whatever.

- [David] Squealer, yeah.

(Zoe laughing) - Let's call in former Congressman Pete Hoekstra.

Mr. Hoekstra, come on in, grab a seat here.

We have one for you.

It's been a long time since we've seen you, sir.

Welcome back to Off the Record.

- Good to be here.

Thank you.

- Yeah, have a seat.

We'll wave the swearing in, fair enough.

- All right.

(all laughing) - You do promise to tell the truth, right?

- We'll see.

(all laughing) - You had your fingers crossed.

Congressman, let's cut to the chase.

Is Donald Trump, in any way, responsible for what happened to your party on election day?

- [Pete] No, there's a whole wide range of things.

that happened on election day.

- Is he included?

- There's a whole, we didn't do very well in the get out the vote here in Michigan.

We didn't have the resources, we weren't unified as a party.

Nationally, it wasn't all a big frown on our face.

- [Tim] This is a Michigan show, okay?

And the question's still on the table.

Does he take some of the or should he take some of the responsibility?

- Like I said, the responsibility is widespread.

We failed on just about every level.

You know, I mean, it was a disappointing day.

We didn't have to have a day like that with the issue set that was out there.

- Ms. Clark.

- So, I think one of the reasons you are here is some possible interest in being the next chair of the Michigan Republican Party, is that accurate?

- [Pete] Yeah, that is, that is accurate.

- Why would you want that job right now?

- [Pete] I've got a passion for this state.

I see us headed down the path of where Illinois is today.

I don't think that's the future that I see for the state.

I think with the Republican Party, can have a set of, we can have a platform that is very positive and can move this state forward and that's what I want to do.

- Mr.

Ambassador, how do you, if you get in that position, how do you tame what many people are looking at right now as saying it's a snake pit of snakes and a lot of venom in there, moving all different directions.

How do you bring everybody into one?

- [Pete] Well, I think I was listening to some of your comments earlier.

We need to put forward an agenda.

In 1992, I ran for Congress, I ran against an incumbent, you know, the expert said, ah, this guy will never win.

I won.

- [Tim] Wait a second, wait a second.

- You didn't even know who I was in 1992, when I ran in that primary.

(laughing and chatter) - [Zoe] You knew about the guy on the bicycle, just not actually his last name.

- In 1994, I worked with Newt Gingrich on the contract with America.

They said, oh, you'll maybe pick up seats in 94, but there is no way that you will win the majority.

The contract with America was an agenda, a positive agenda, we united Republicans and we took the majority for the first time in 40 years.

Like Donald Trump or not, in 2016, he came forward with a compelling message of Make America Great Again.

It brought together Republican, Independents and probably even some Democrats and he won an election.

I chaired that campaign here in Michigan and we won the state of Michigan and delivered Donald Trump with those electoral votes.

We can do it again.

- [Chuck] Will you seek President Trump's endorsement of any type for this job or will you say stay out of this, this is a fight between me and Dixon and DePerno and whoever else.

- [Pete] I don't think Dixon is in.

This is probably, if I get in right now, it'd probably be a contest.

I don't wanna characterize it as a fight.

It'll be a contest between Matt DePerno and myself.

- [Chuck] But will you seek his endorsement of any type?

Will you try to get his influence in this?

- I think what the president has learned in Michigan is, especially on some of these races at this level, you know, Matt's a friend of the president, I'm a friend of the president.

I served as his ambassador for three years.

We know each other well.

This would probably be a race where the president is, you know, is best sitting on the sidelines.

- [David] How do you convince people that have donated to the Republican Party in the past who obviously sat out this race, we saw statewide candidates struggle to raise substantial amounts of money.

How do you convince people to get back in while at the same time, not, you know, appearing like you're selling out to this hardcore base of the party?

- [Pete] No, it's a tough job, okay?

But it is a unified.

You know, we know what happens when Republicans or any political party is divided.

1964, a long time ago, Republicans were divided, Goldwater, Rockefeller.

The end result 140 seats in the House of Representatives and 32 seats in the US Senate.

Here we are in Michigan, we had a divided party.

No one benefits from a divided party.

The people, you know, the hardcore, however you want to describe them, the business class, the donor class, yeah, we're all gonna be looking at the next two years and saying, wow, we can't allow this to happen in 2024.

The stakes are too high.

We want to deliver the electoral votes, the Republican nominee.

We've got a senate race on tap and we need to take back the State House so that we will have some check on the Democrats.

- [David] Do you think that the party needs to examine, potentially changing the apparatus, where party delegates are picking the Secretary of State or the Attorney General to more of a traditional primary vote.

- [Pete] The delegates can take a look at it.

I like the primary process, personally, okay.

I think it actually allows grassroots to have more of an impact on a larger scale.

Go to, you know, potentially go to the primaries, I make them close primaries, where you only have Republicans allowed to vote in the primary, people who are willing to register as a Republican, people are willing to register as a Democrat voting in the Democrat primary.

We saw what mischief the Democrats can sow by having the open primaries, not only in Michigan, but around the country.

- [Tim] Congressman, when you say it would be best for the President to be sitting on the sidelines, can I infer from that, that his endorsement would be a negative?

- No, I don't think so.

- Well, why do you want him on the sidelines.

- [Pete] At what level?

As to would it be negative in terms of, you know, getting and winning the delegate fight at the convention?

Would it be negative later on in those types of things?

- Could he help you get votes at the convention?

- I think there's no doubt that if you had a presidential appointment or you know, endorsement, it would help you get votes at the convention.

- [Tim] So why don't you ask for it?

- [Pete] Because I think you have to go forward, you know, afterwards and you have to build this party, okay?

And I don't want a strong division coming out of a convention.

The divides are deep enough, we don't have to put them any deeper.

This has to be a constructive debate about the future of the party, the two, three, four people who are going to be running for state chair and hopefully it is a constructive debate.

It kind of goes back to, you know, my experience in 2010, okay, I ran for Governor, Rick Snyder won, but you know, we never said a bad word about each other through that campaign.

We were friends when that process started, we were friends and that kind of unity is what we need if we are going to move this party forward.

- [Tim] So respectfully, you are asking Mr. Trump to keep his nose out of this battle or whatever it is.

- When I talk to the president about this, I'd suggest to him, he's got friends on both sides here, it's probably best for him to stay out of this.

Let him focus on his race.

He's announced he's running for president and let the race here move forward as well.

- [Tim] And you told him that personally.

- I've seen him a couple times in the last week.

I haven't had this discussion with him yet, no.

- But when you do, you will.

- Yes.

- Do you think it's good that President Trump has announced his candidacy for the presidency or should he go by the wayside now, let new blood come into the party?

- Well, I mean, you know, far be it for me to tell Donald Trump, I mean, you know, in 2016, everybody laughed at him as he came.

- [Chuck] But what would your preference be?

Because you might soon be in a position where you're demanding tremendous amount of leadership here in the state.

- The tremendous amount of leadership here at the state says for every Republican candidate that is announced for president, they can come in here.

The state party will welcome them into this state to make their case and we are going to present them with a closed primary that enables them, that enables the people of Michigan through a fair and trusted process to select the individual that they want to represent them on the ticket in 2024.

- Well, let's talk about your vision, which you mentioned earlier.

What will your vision be?

You have strong conservative stripes, but what will you be laying out as your platform?

- Well, the platform is very simple.

We want safety in our cities.

We want affordability for our citizens.

Life has gotten to be too expensive for them.

We want fairness and we want a quality education system.

Those are four principles that not only move from the federal level, but move down into the state level.

- [Zoe] Ambassador, I'm curious though, I mean, what we saw, a shellacking here in Michigan, was Republicans running on a few of those issues that you just talked about, but a lot of election denialism and I guess I'm just curious, are Republicans in Michigan out of step with the issues that Michiganders care about?

I mean, you know, Democrats basically wiped the table.

I mean, just fundamentally do Republicans in Michigan need to rethink about issues that you talk about and focus on?

- [Pete] We need to rethink the issues that we talk about and we need to rethink about how we need to rework, about how we talk about these issues.

- [Zoe] But Tudor Dixon talked about education, a lot in fact, on the campaign trail, and it didn't seem to help.

- [Pete] But, we didn't blame the issues.

There was a lot of noise out there - [Zoe] About culture wars, book banning.

- Culture wars, about abortion.

- [Zoe] So, did that hurt Republicans?

- Obviously, I mean, there again, there was a systemic failure at a number of levels.

You don't lose the State House, the State Senate, the governor's race, Attorney General and Secretary of State, God, that's painful to go through that list of places that we lost, right?

But you don't lose all of that and for the first time in what, 40 years, don't have a single place where the Republicans can be a check on the system here in Lansing, you don't go through that and say, yeah, we basically got a lot of this stuff right, just a couple of things wrong.

No, you gotta start, we did a lot of things didn't work the way that we anticipated and we need to rethink them.

- [Zoe] Do Republicans in Michigan in large need to move on from election denialism?

- Yeah, I think so, okay.

I mean, we need to make sure that we're working towards elections that have integrity and those types of things.

It's gonna be very interesting though.

You know, there's going to be an election denier moving into one of the most powerful positions in Washington DC and that is Hakeem Jeffries, who is going to be the minority leader.

You know, you have a good election when you're retiring Nancy Pelosi.

Well, Hakeem Jeffries is an election denier.

He totally denied the election of 2016, not only at the time of the election, but for the next few years pushing the Russian hoax.

I think, what we're gonna find, is you need to address the pocket book issues for taxpayers, okay, for your citizens and for your voters, you know?

They care about going down and paying $4 for gas.

They see inflation each and every day and if you're not putting forward solutions to those kinds of issues, you know, the battle is about the middle.

That's where the middle is and those are the issues that they care about.

- [Zoe] So Republicans have gotten too far right from the middle.

- We didn't address those issues to their satisfaction to earn their votes in the last election.

- [David] Well, we heard Republicans at about the House and the Senate level talk about the price of eggs and about the price of gas for eight to 10 months.

I think we can all argue that perhaps there wasn't a cohesive message about how to fix that.

But we heard that from Republicans at a level and at the same time, we heard them either downplay or try to ignore abortion and voters clearly, to some degree, valued this discussion on abortion over this discussion on economic or pocketbook issues.

- I dunno, were you watching TV about the, you know, the week before the primary or the five weeks after the primary, all you could do is turn on TV and see, you know, a litany of ads on abortion.

- [David] Yeah.

- Okay, the Democrats, governor Whitmer, they framed the election and during that month, five, six weeks, Republicans didn't respond.

- Congressman, stay for overtime?

- [Pete] Sure.

- [Tim] Why not?

- Yeah, why not do.

(all laughing) - [Tim] You have nothing better to do.

- It's a long drive to get here.

Let's make this worthwhile.

- He's game.

We're gonna keep him here.

Go to wkar.org for more of Mr. Hoekstra, right?

- [Pete] That's right.

- See you right there.

- [Narrator] Production of Off the Record is made possible in part by Martin Waymire, a full service strategic communications agency, partnering with clients through public relations, digital marketing, and public policy engagement.

Learn more at martinwaymire.com.

For more Off the Record, visit wkar.org.

Michigan public television stations have contributed to the production costs of Off the Record.