Senator Chuck Schumer

And so the bottom line is I felt an imperative

To do something about this.

When you talk to a mother and she says, my daughter has cancer and she's going to lose her treatment and the research, the groundbreaking research has been cut off because they cut off NIH, something you know better than anybody.

My daughter's going to die.

That's a moral imperative, not a political imperative, a moral imperative to do something about it.

So I felt this was the right thing to do.

And the good news is virtually my whole Democratic caucus from the most liberal to the most conservative feel the same way.

But most important, it's not my caucus.

It's the American people.

I mean, two-thirds of these cuts are going to be in red states and red districts.

I don't care.

And, you know, some people say, don't get this done and it'll be good for us politically.

It's too important to get this done because so many people will suffer and thousands and thousands will die.

He didn't offer it to me.

Nobody that I know, but he's supposed to offer it to me.

But he didn't offer it.

He said he might do it, but he said he first...

He wanted us to just go along and not negotiate, do what they want, you know.

And then second, maybe we'd negotiate when we see what it is.

We need to sit down, the four of us.