Source: United States Senator for Iowa Chuck Grassley
WASHINGTON – Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) was featured as the inaugural guest in YouTube’s new series, ‘YouTube in Session,’ which brings together members of Congress and YouTube content creators to foster conversation and civic engagement. Grassley sat down with Emily Jashinsky, host of UnHerd’s “Undercurrents” podcast, to reflect on his time in public service and discuss the latest on Iran, government oversight, the One Big Beautiful Bill and more.
Watch the full video HERE and below. Excerpts of Grassley’s remarks follow.
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On President Trump’s efforts to broker peace between Israel and Iran:
“I don’t think Iowans are different than Americans [on this issue]. They prefer peace to war, they prefer diplomacy to war… I think it’s not a war against Iran, it’s [a] war against Iran’s nuclear capability. I haven’t had the briefing on it that we’re going to get Thursday, but we assume that what’s been reported so far that…it’s decimated the Iranian nuclear program.
“I think it proves that the President says he’s a peacemaker. Look it – he had 60 days. He wanted to negotiate. At the end of 60 days, he put on another two weeks that really turned out to be two days. I think he worked very closely with the Israelis, and I think he had plans for the Israelis to accomplish a heck of a lot before we put our efforts in jeopardy. And I think now that this…ceasefire, if it holds – you don’t know what the Ayatollah’s thinking right now – but maybe it’ll bring about peace for another decade or two, or maybe longer than that.”
On what motivates Grassley’s public service:
“…I think [it’s] the responsibilities that we have to leave a better nation than we receive… I think since the pilgrims came here, this is about nine generations. Each generation’s left the country better than the previous generation. That’s a little bit in question now, but it’s my responsibility to continue that as best we can.
“And…being number one in the United States Senate, as far as seniority is concerned, puts me in a position for my number one interest – the state of Iowa, to represent that. But it goes way beyond the state of Iowa… I think it’s just the problems the country confronts, and your ability to help solve those problems.”
On the media’s developing role in political discourse:
“[Podcasts are] something we’ve found out in the 2024 election made a big impact, particularly on people under 50 years of age, or maybe under 40 years of age.
“I was maybe one of the first ones [in the Senate] to get a fax machine, and I did satellite back to Iowa once a month, on a TV interview that I did. But whether it’s that or radio programs I do – there’s three that I do every week, but there’s others I do once a month, maybe 10 or 12… [J]ournalism is a policeman, policing the political system we have. It’s to keep government constitutional, to keep those of us in government abiding by the law [and] being ethical… You expect the freedom of the press, the First Amendment and the people that practice journalism to take that seriously and keep government functioning, and reduce the cynicism that people have towards government or towards politicians. All of that is to build respect – because we may have the best Constitution in the world and the longest living Constitution in the world, but that very good piece of paper is useless if people don’t have respect for it. [Respect] for the institutions of government and for those of us that serve in government.”
On the importance of representative government:
“Whether it’s Twitter, or whether it’s the fax machine, or whether it’s radio programs, or whether it’s on podcasts…representative government is a dialogue with our constituents…
“I try to explain at my town meetings that I’m one-half of the process of representative government. You, my constituents, [are] the other one-half, and this face-to-face meeting we’re having is the best way to do it. But I only see a few thousand people face-to-face as I visit each one of the 99 counties every year for a Q&A. So, I have to depend upon email and postal mail and telephones and any way people want to communicate with me. Because I only see a few thousand people, but I’ve got three and one-tenths million constituents…You’re the other half of representative government, and you’ve got to have dialogue. I’ve got to know what’s on your mind.”
On FBI oversight and whistleblowers:
“There is great respect, maybe in both political parties, for the FBI. But then…what journalists exposed, as well as Chuck Grassley and other people… You find out that [the FBI] can’t be trusted, and that the word ‘political weaponization’ is entirely legitimate. I think I proved that with what I exposed about Special Agent Thibault and lot of other people that aren’t as famous as him. But I mean, they actually [said] within their job in the FBI that ‘we’re going to see how we can get Trump.’
“This all goes back to a pretty basic principle of government. What you learn in eighth grade civics: checks and balances of government. We not only appropriate money, we not only pass laws, and that’s not the end of it – you’ve got a responsibility to make sure that the executive branch faithfully executes those laws. That’s what it’s all about.
“And then these big departments – or even a small department – the people, the head of it, they can’t know what’s going on underneath. They ought to be listening to their whistleblowers… I think I have a reputation for taking most whistleblowing very seriously and some of this stuff has been exposed, and then you find out they’re retaliated against. Now, we’ve got a friendly administration in, and we’re getting some of these whistleblowers back into their job or we’re getting them back their reputation…but you shouldn’t treat whistleblowers that way. And if people like Christopher Wray and, before him, Comey – if they had listened to whistleblowers, this stuff would’ve never happened. Unless they wanted it to happen. And I can’t say they wanted it to happen, but you can’t know what’s going on below. And just patriotic people that I call whistleblowers – they just want the government to do what the government’s supposed to do and spend money the way Congress [and the people of this country] want it spent.
“So it’s just important that Congress do its oversight work, and it’s important that the executive branch listens to whistleblowers. There’s no reason for a whistleblower to come to me if the people that are in management in that department – from low to high – start listening to them.
“Everything that has been covered up in the first Trump administration, without Trump knowing it, and in the Biden administration – we’re getting the cooperation that I need to bring transparency to government, to show what was wrong and to get protection for the whistleblowers, getting them back their job. We’re getting full cooperation on that [from this administration], and we never got it out of Wray.”
On Congress delegating away too much of its authority:
“Just think, the recent trade policies of this administration [are] just a little bit more severe than previous administrations under both Republicans and Democrats. But that’s all because Congress in 1962 and 1974 delegated one of its 18 powers to regulate interstate and foreign commerce to the president. Now, you can take that back, but you can imagine – if you don’t have two-thirds vote to take it back, the president isn’t going to give it up.
“You‘ve got to write legislation [that’s] more specific. And it’s really easy to say, ‘Well, we don’t really know whether we should use this word or that sentence. Let’s just say, let’s give a broad authority and then let the regulators figure it out.’ That’s what the Supreme Court is now turning a corner on… In other words, anything over $100 million I think [in] economic impact – you better show us in the law exactly where Congress gave you the authority to do it. Now, this is going to put a big burden on Congress to write this legislation more specifically. That’s what we should be doing all the time anyway.”
On bipartisanship:
“Let me start with saying something I’m very sincere about saying: I don’t think a single senator dislikes me, and there’s no senator I dislike. And if anybody dislikes me, I don’t want to know who they are.
“And then another thing I think is pretty important is the fact that I try to work in a bipartisan way. So don’t take my word for it – go to the Georgetown University website. Click on Senator Lugar Center, and they do an index every year. And I’m always in the top 12, sometimes in the top five – nobody can beat Senator Collins; it’d be useless to try. But then also remember the Senate, as an institution, drives bipartisanship because [of] the 60-vote requirement to shut off debate to get to finality on a bill.
On Washington then vs. now:
“The biggest way [the Senate’s] changed in the 45 years I’ve been in the Senate is the first 25 or 30 years, we used to start at 10 a.m. on Monday and go to 4 p.m. on Friday. And now… we start the first vote at 5:30 on Monday, we work a full day Tuesday, a full day Wednesday, and usually by two in the afternoon, Thursday, it’s shut down.
“Now I want to make very clear – for an individual senator, there’s enough work between Iowa and here. You can work seven days a week if you want to… There’s plenty of work to do, more than just when the Senate’s in session. But if you’re going to solve this country’s problems, you’ve got to spend more than two and a half days a week doing it.
“…[W]e’ve got to do things more efficiently than we’re doing it. We’re basically nothing but a confirmation body, confirming nominations all the time.
“This Senate, under [Majority Leader] Thune, has passed more legislation than [former Majority Leader] Schumer did in the last two years, but there’s still a lot more we’ve got to do. I keep bringing up [that] we haven’t passed a new five-year Farm Bill. It’s supposed to be done in [20]23 and it hasn’t been done. I think it’ll be done this year. And then there’s 65 or 70 of us [senators] who want to get prescription drug prices down by bringing Pharmaceutical Benefit Managers under control – PBMs, nobody knows what they do, and if we knew what they do, we’d be find[ing] out some way of reducing prescription drug prices. How are you going to get those things [done] if you’re just working two and a half days a week?”
On the One Big Beautiful Bill:
“The [Senate Majority] Leader – and I’m proud of him for saying this – [said] we’re going to stay in session till we get this [bill] done… It’s got to be done.
“If you don’t get this bill passed, you’re going to have the largest tax increase in the history of the country – four and seven-tenths trillion dollars, over a 10-year period of time. It’s going to really hurt the middle class if we don’t do it.
“The Democrats are saying this bill is nothing but [to] cut taxes for billionaires. But there isn’t a rate change from [the] 2017 [tax cuts], so that’s intellectually dishonest to say that. And [the bill] does a lot for working men and women, like through the not taxing tips. And it helps senior citizens with a special credit for them, and it helps overtime pay and the economic benefits that comes from that.
“We’ve got to get this bill passed, because the economy is going to be disrupted very much if we have that big tax increase. And if we do pass it, it’s going to really help the economy grow.”
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