In an interview with cspan, senator harkin reflects on his time in washington. This is 35 minutes. Senator tom harkin of iowa, we are sitting in a room you spent a lot of time in over the years. And done a lot of important pieces of legislation. I am wondering what prompted you to make the decision to retire this year. There is still a lot to do. I guess what prompted me were long discussions with my wife. And thinking about the past and where i am. I came to the decision that 40 years here is long enough for anyone to be here. And, you know this whole concept i haveg to power all these offices and a great committee, all that stuff. I think a lot of people stay around too long. So i just started thinking about it. I thought, i am still relatively young. Healthy. I feel and contrary to what my political opponents say, my mental faculties are still recent. Decent. I just love the senate. I love my work here. Giveandtake. I look to legislate. I love politics. O i will miss the senate it is a long time to be here. I do not think that is reason enough to stay around until they carry me out of here feet first. Is time to let new people come in here with fresh ideas and enthusiasm. I said for me, it is time to move on. What are you planning to do next . At Drake University in des moines, a wellknown college because of the relation everything, Drake University a year and a half ago started the harkin in the duke of Public Policy institute of Public Policy. We have a nonpartisan board of directors. Of the iowahair Republican Party is on the board of the harkin in the two. Institute. For that reason, he will probably never be reelected to the chair of the Republican Party. We have a former chief justice of the iowa supreme court. So i will be spending a lot of my time in iowa. We only live about 12 miles from Drake University. Oh i hope to be doing a lot of work that institute. One of the things you know, as a senator, we have all the stuff on our plate. We have a lot of stuff to deal with. The gooden set one of things about being a senator is you get to deal with a lot on your plate. It has been said of the senate that one of the things about the senate is that you have a lot of things on your plate. So i want to narrow those down and focus mostly on what im probably best known for, and that is disability work during so i will work with the institute and some here in washington. , oni hope internationally what i consider to be one of the making theins of americans with disabilities act really work, and that his Job Opportunities for people with disabilities. Some exciting things are happening out there, by the way, with people with disabilities getting jobs. Really interesting things. And i would like to be a part of that and are to expand that as much as possible. You mentioned consulting with your wife, ruth. Observations suggest that this country has a lot of political spouses. What is her life going to be like after leaving the senate . I hope ok. You have to understand it is not like youre going to still be very busy. My wife has always carved out her own career. ,irst as an attorney prosecuting attorney, then here in washington with a law firm. Then later back in the federal government as the president and ceo of the overseas private investment corporation, which she did an outstanding job at. Then later as a corporate executive. Regents ofboard of iowa. So my wife has always had her own career path. I remember one time when i was first elected, and she was already a prosecuting attorney. You have to understand, my wife and i ran for office in the same year, 1972. I lost and she won. Inh was the only democrat the story county courthouse. Attorney an county attorney in the state of iowa. Interviewed around that time about our relationship and about being a congressional wife. She says, i am not married to congress. Ur coat she said, my life would be very disappointing if all i had to hinge on was i was the wife of a congressman. So my wife has been an advocate of women doing their own thing and seeking their own career path. She has been very busy. And she is still on a couple of boards today. Been one toever just be a senatorial wife or Something Like that. I want to go to your declaration of love for the senate. I wonder if the senate has gotten a little harder to love in the past decade or so. Well, it certainly requires a different approach. Speaking in the linkage of romance. Romance. Ge of the last decade has been very different. I always want to be careful about getting into this area i doi do not want to not want to become one of those old men that constantly say things were better when i was younger. Things were better when i first got here. I heard that from my father, and a her that from people growing up. Different, yes. And i do believe that there are certain things that the senate ought to be doing that i think transcends decades. Build personal relationships. Legislationf good is still personal relationships. Trust. Getting to know one another. That has broken down in the senate. That has got to be pulled back together again. We need a broader base in the Republican Party now. Not sure about the democratic party. Well, up until just recently, the Republican Party had a pretty good broadbased. There were liberal republicans, moderate republicans. Lately, we have had moderate democrats. Some conservative, in the south. In that mix, we were able to get things done. The Republican Party got rid of all are liberals and they became very, very conservative. That engendered a reaction, i think, on the democratic side. More and more democrats are getting more and more liberal. We have to have more of a mix now than what we had in the past. I know it sounds political, but i hope the Republican Party gets back to having more moderates in the Republican Party. So that. Might i also add i think some procedures need to be changed in the senate. I have long advocated we get rid of the filibuster. I think we can say it is a weight around our next that is not in the constitution. It was used primarily for almost 100 years to stop civil rights legislation. That was the basis of the filibuster. But it has no relevance today. It really does not. What has happened in the last individuals that have found they can use the filibuster to absolutely stop disliking. It was legislation. It was never intended that way. It was intended to slow down legislation if you had a sizable minority. But never to be used in a way it is now. So in 1996, i proposed getting rid of the filibuster. I said at that time, it is in the record, what is happening is, when the democrats are in, republicans will use the filibuster. When the republicans get in power, the democrats go, you did this to us. We will do it to you. It is like an arms race. Every time the senate would change hands, the new party would do more filibusters than the last. And i said, it is going to be like an arms race. It is getting to the point we cannot run the senate. That is true today. So two things. Get rid of the filibuster on legislation as well as nominations. On the other hand, i have often said the republicans have a legitimate argument in that they are not being allowed to offer amendments. They are not being allowed to offer amended because of filibuster bills. The best way to get rid of it is to get rid of the filibuster. At the same time, guaranteed to the minority in new rules in the senate that the minority will be able to remain amendments to that legislation with a reasonable time limits for debate. If you do that, then we can move legislation. And the minority will have the right someone said, the minority does not have the right to prevail. Which theyre doing now, because minority can control the luster and stop things filibuster and stop things. It should be the right of the minority to amend, to have full and vigorous debates, and have votes on amendments. If we do that, i think the senate would begin to operate very well. I heard you say that the resulting gridlock upsets the balance of power by giving more power. Would you blame wife . Explain why . I think there is gridlock in the congress because we cannot get things done because of more power to the president. We see it with this president , the last president. It is just like an arms race. More power will devolve to the. President when we cannot get our work done. When and why did it change . There was sort of a gradual thing. Its it started in the 1980s. It accelerated a little in the 1990s. And then it turned off in the 2000s. Im not going to say, the democrats did this. Both sides started it. Both sides started it. I would say it really escalated perhaps in the late 1990s. I would say from the late , to 2012. Rly 2000 every euro got worse in terms of the filibusters and gridlock. So we do not vote on everything around here anymore. The only thing we vote on his unanimous consent. Something like that. We do not even debate any longer. I think the country loses when that happens. Collegialitybout and things important to the legislative process. The senates work week has gotten shorter, more structured. People we talked to suggest that this is one of the roots of the problem, that they are not here on weekends. Why did that change . What is going to change it back . Because people are going home to raise money. Is going to say, why are people leaving here . To go out to raise money. Campaigns have gotten so expensive. If you have been reelected as a senator, you better start raising money right away . You remember what your First Campaign cost . Not that much. Good question. I am sure somebody knows. My first senate campaign, 1984, gosh. It has increased exponentially . Just awful. I would be surprised if my 1984 i know less than 2 million, maybe 1. 5 million. My last campaign probably came in around 12 million or 15 million. That is crazy. Just not. But that is what it has gotten to. That is the other thing. To build relationships, you have to have personal time. It used to be we had a Senate Dining room. There is still a Senate Dining room, but that is where everybody could go. We had a little dining room for only senators to have lunch in. No staff, just senators. We had to bang tables and their there and talkn about this and that. Personal stories, what is happening in your family. Get to know one another. We had great conversation that these lunches. Some were political. We talked about this. You are not on record, so you can really talk openly. Room doesntng even exist anymore. A time when fewer and fewer senators were going there. And finally, it did not exist. Think about that. Something we used to do on a daily basis, we never do. Why is that . Well, we used to come in the senate was monday at noon. And then we would be here until friday at noon. At a minimum. Sometimes friday, later. , we would have monday, tuesday, wednesday, thursday. At least four or five days of lunches. Now, we do not get here until monday evening. Lunch for the caucus both republicans and democrats. They are Party Conferences caucuses. Thursday is the policy lunch for democrats and republicans. We leave thursday night. Everyone leaves wednesday. And what are they doing on wednesday for lunch . They are out raising money. It is not healthy. It is just not healthy at all. And we used to here is another suggestion i make for those new senators. I make it not here in this conversation, but i make it to them. We should have our caucuses like we used to. On an afternoon, tuesday afternoon or wednesday afternoon. We used to take two hours. We go to 5 00 or 6 00 in the afternoon. That was our caucus. Now it is lunch time. Having go back to there isnt anything else here for crying out loud. Of collegiality, i am wondering about your relationship with your longtime counterpart, chuck grassley. The funny ways of the Senate County things counting things. You are still the junior senator. The longestserving junior senator. I am the most senior junior senator in the senate. Used to be fritz onyx when strong thurmond was here strong thurmond was here. Senator grassley and i got sworn in on the same day on 1975. A few hours earlier in his case, senator grassley . We got elected the same day. We were sworn in on january 1975. Same day. Rut he came to the senate fou years before me. In terms of our time here you are in the house for 10 years before you came to the senate. Exactly. That is right. I know people say iowa, he is a conservative. He is a liberal. How do they do that . We have always had a good relationship. We do disagree on some things once in a while, but when we work for iowa, our staffs work closely together. You have to remember, iowa is a very close state. The registration is about what was when i first started 40 years ago. Democrat, one third republican, one third independent. So i have often said there are a lot of conservative islands, iowans, andt of liberal iowaans, the rest are moderates. Out the grassley fills conservative and of the spectrum , but does enough things to reach over to moderates. I represent the liberal spectrum and do enough to reach over to moderates. Liked that balance. I have always said there has been a kind of balance. The most part, it has worked pretty well. 1992, he left to become president. How does that look through your Rearview Mirror . I know bob dole once said famously that there is only one cure for the desire to be president , and that is a wooden stake through the heart or Something Like that. But i look back at it and i think, you know, first of all, i was ill prepared to run for president. I had not really planned on it for a long time. It just was not something i was geared up to do. But after the 1990 election, i became so upset about bushs economic policies, but also the , thatnto iraq, the qb war kind of thing. That i felt we needed a good populist voice running pop ulace voice running. I was not prepared. Iran a terrible campaign. A terriblean campaign. I should have run in just a few states. Ohio, maybe connecticut. Set up operations in those states and nowhere else. But people said you have to campaign in texas. Driving downe time the highway in South Carolina on a rainy day, and i thought, what am i doing in South Carolina . I have no support here. Date riley, who they are became a good friend of mine, he was running clintons campaign. What was i even spending a day aside from having staff and campaign people. If i had just concentrated on a few states, that might have been different. But i also believe my message was wrong also. My message was wrong. Things,ink about those and howeverack, both the country and me and my family and my personal life are probably better off that i never got elected president. I am not just saying that out of fake modesty. I say that because i love legislation. I like legislating. Atmosphere. Ike that the more i thought about it, i am not really the executive type person. I have never been in an executive. I have always been a legislator. I have to tell you this. I love my anonymity. Storely like going into a and no one knows me. I like going into a restaurant and i do not need secret service or Something Like that. Nobody knows who i am. I have enough notoriety through the issues i am involved in that certain elements of society know me and know me well, but broadly speaking, it is a nice feeling to have that. That anonymity. Once you get elected president , it is over with. I think about it, i think my life has been more fulfilling. I think my personal life, my wife and my family, has been much more fulfilling. With my being in the senate than it ever would had been in the white house. , those trying to get bill humphries to run for president in 1988. Onwere really working running. Finally came back and said the three of us it was paul simon, berkeley bedell, and me. We try to get them to run. Said toing around, he me and said, you know, i think, i think i could run a good campaign. I think i could even win the nomination. By gosh, i think i could win the presidency. But you know what . I would never have another happy day in my life. From the time of don adams, right . I went and watched your withdrawal speech. Based at the washingtonbased college for the death. Deaf. Would you tell us about your interest in that . It started with my brother, who was deaf. I saw how he was discriminated against a lifetime. I thought, if i could ever get in a position to do something about it. Well i did. My first work in the house was my thought on disability was on deafness. That is what i was focused on. So i was involved in closed and of setting up the National Captioning Institute in virginia to caption prerecorded tv programs. Jennings randolph and i, the senator from West Virginia and i, set up the first decoder box for jimmy carter in the white house. Way, that led me, by the this was one of the things that not many people know about, but they know about my sponsorship of the americans with disabilities act. But before that, i did Something Else. I got a bill through called the der television , which circuitry act mandated that every Television Set sold in america with a size 13 inch screen or bigger had to have embedded within the tv the chip that decoded that line. I got it through. And that is why you have that mute button you can hit now. All the lines come across the screen. My interest was in deafness. Later on, my nephew got my sisters boy, got injured in the military. Got shot down and broke his neck. Became a quadriplegic. He got out, went through rehabilitation in colorado, and then he wanted to go to college. I will never forget. Call me up one day and said uncle tom, i cannot even go to college. I said, you are at fort collins. What are you talking about . He said, i cannot get around on my wheelchair. I cannot get up the steps to go to school. They have classes on the second and third floor. And i cannot get there because there is no elevator. All of a sudden, my concept of disability started expanding way deafness. Y beyond, also about that time, i met a young man by the name of danny er, who hadhad pip down syndrome. He played football. He acted in school plays. He was a magnificent young man. I had to start thinking about how many people with intellectual disa