Grover Norquist is the founder of Americans for Tax Reform, which issued the influential “Taxpayer Protection Pledge” barring signatories from voting for tax increases. Norquist is also a board member of the National Rifle Association and the American Conservative Union.
Brown Political Review: Reports indicate Simpson-Bowles may be the Senate’s framework for dealing with the Fiscal Cliff. What’s wrong with Simpson-Bowles?
Grover Norquist: Simpson Bowles is an outline, not in legislative form. It’s also a commitment to take federal taxation from its historical average of 18.5% of GDP to 21% of GDP. Over the next decade, that’s a five trillion dollar tax increase. So it’s a non-starter; it’s a unicorn, it’s not there. Remember that Obama said, “Yeah, I like Simpson-Bowles, its really cool,” and a few weeks later, Obama’s budget included nothing from Simpson Bowles. Nothing! Which spending savings from Simpson-Bowles is the President for? None of them. The three Republicans and three Democrats who claim to be for Simpson-Bowles never put it in legislative form, where it would be clear how little spending reduction is actually discussed, and how big the tax increases are. If they thought it was really a good idea, it would have been put it in writing. They never did, and it hasn’t been scored by the CBO.
BPR: The Debt Ceiling negotiations collapsed despite 70 percent of Americans favoring a “balanced” approach to deficit reductions, and commentators say your No-Tax Pledge in Congress was partly to blame. Doesn’t ATR bear responsibility for the parties’ inability to work together?
Norquist: No. Lets go back to the original assertion that 70 percent of the American people want a tax increase. In point of fact, Scott Rasmussen, in his book The Peoples Money, goes through all the various polls. The American people quite explicitly want spending cuts and not tax increases. You can look at different polling data, and if you ask, “Would you like a balanced approach?” then of course people are going to say they want a balanced approach. But, if you ask them “Do you want your taxes raised?” No! “Do you want anyone’s taxes raised?” No. Because when we raised taxes in 1982, as the Democrats talked Reagan into doing, they spent every penny of it. They didn’t use it to bring down the debt.
BPR: As a board member of the NRA, what is your response to increased support for gun control in the wake of recent tragedies? Without some gun regulation, how can we prevent or limit the extent of these types of tragic shootings?
Norquist: I’d say look at the expansion of concealed carry permits in each state that allowed people to have concealed carry permits. Violent crimes, murder, rape, assault, all declined dramatically, more rapidly in states without that. The number one city for gun control is Chicago. It is also murder central. The more you have honest citizens with concealed carry permits, the more violence, murder, assault, and rape goes down. The data is irrefutable and puts the Democrats in a terrible position, which is why you don’t see them talking publicly about gun control.
BPR: Conservative intellectuals like David Frum, Norman Orstein at AEI and President George H.W. Bush suggest the current direction of the GOP is unsustainable. If Romney loses the upcoming election, do you think the GOP needs to move away from the right or more to the right?
Norquist: The modern Republican Party is not just the Presidential election. It includes the House and the Senate. Obviously Republicans have won the House, are continuing to win the House, and for the next decade will hold the House, as the party who will not raise your taxes. So it certainly is both sound politics and sound policy.
The same is true with the US Senate candidates. Norm Ornstein and David Frum are neither intellectual nor Republicans, in my opinion. Orstein is a left wing Democrat and David Frum is a disgruntled former Republican who whines about raising taxes and stuff like that all the time. Neither of them is the model for the modern Republican Party.
BPR: But who do you think is next in line to represent the modern GOP? You don’t think there’s any change needed if Governor Romney loses this election?
Norquist: Well, looking forward I think the Republican Party is in a significantly stronger position than modern Democratic Party. Who then, assuming Romney isn’t the nominee in four years? Throw a dart at the map. Around the country there are a number of Republican governors who have governed competently and governed well, unlike Democrats. Twenty-four states have Republican governors and Republican legislatures. Eleven states have Democratic governors and Democratic legislatures. The twenty-four states are succeeding while those eleven states are failing. The Republican Party’s future is written in the success of governors.