what would jesus take? no, not jesus. reverend norquist. the most powerful man in america who does not sleep in the white house. now, grover norquist is facing a challenge. republican tom coburn said this about tax reform. if taxes end up going up in some capacity, would you not be in violation of that? which pledge is more important, david? is the pledge to uphold your oath to the constitution of the united states or a pledge from a special interest group. grover norquist is accusing republican senator of oklahoma, tom coburn, of violating the pledge. willing to throw grover norquist under the bus. reporter: grover norquist joins us. it really does seem now everything is on the table. republicans who refuse to raise taxes continue to scare bankers and investors with threats to not raise the debt ceiling. i will vote no on raising the debt ceiling. dire warnings. absolutely unbelievable. disastrous for the economy. the alternative would be catastroph
no, that s not true you don t accept the president as a christian based on what you said yesterday on abc? absolutely, i accept that but, no, he has said that to me personally. but you don t accept that? i believe that well, we ve had some conversations with him on some things. it s not that i don t believe him, only god knows those things. i m not his judge, god is his judge. so only god knows who the christians are and saying you re a christian is not good enough for you, right? no, you re trying to put words in my mouth, lawrence. that s not correct. i m just saying, nobody knows a man s heart except god. he knows your heart, he knows my heart, and i m not going to judge whether he s a christian or not a christian. right. so when you look out at your congregation, you re preaching, you see hundreds of people out there, sometimes thousands in big stadiums, you don t know, because you don t know what s in their heart, you don t know if they re thinking about, may
that if senator coburn supports a gang of six plan that raises net tax revenue, he would violate grover norquist s pledge. senator coburn is obviously ready for that fight. well, i think, which pledge is most important, david? is the pledge to uphold your oath to the constitution of the united states or a pledge from a special interest group, who claims to speak for all of american conservatives when, in fact, they really don t. joining me now, the founder and president of americans for tax reform, grover norquist. grover, thanks for joining me tonight. hey, lawrence, good to be with you. i just wanted to get it out there, exactly what republicans are up against in this tax dialogue. i know you and i won t have any areas of agreement here, there isn t much for us to debate. i m for higher taxes and much, much higher brackets at the tax end. the one tax bill i worked on in the senate which you opposed and
so we haven t asked people until they formally run. i expect all of the republican candidates for president will sign the pledge. but let me back up. we have 100,000 donors to americans for tax reform. our position is no net tax increases on the overall tax burden. we do not support or oppose any particularly tax credit. one of the arguments that i ve had with senator coburn is he wants to get rid of the ethanol tax credit, which is a left-wing effort to force people to use higher cost energy that eats up a lot of corn. it s a very stupid incentive or disincentive. we ought to get rid of it. we were opposed to putting it in the first place.
in the senate. neither body is going to be passing a tax increase in the next two years. and after the next presidential and senate elections, when we have a different senate, and one hopes that a pro-taxpayer president, we ll be able to get significant spending and tax relief. and what happens politically to someone who violates their pledge? you can mobilize against them in a republican primary, can t you? well, i think if you d ask george herbert walker bush how his second term went, that was the first president who took the pledge and then broke it two years later and couldn t, after a fairly successful president, george herbert walker bush managed the collapse of the soviet union, he got iraq out of kuwait without getting stuck, occupying the place for a decade, and yet when he raised taxes, he d broken his commitment to the american people and was not able to get re-elected. so the pledges between candidates and the people and the american people have said several times in el