The following is the transcript of an interview with Rep. Michael McCaul, Republican of Texas, that aired on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan” on June 29, 2025.
MARGARET BRENNAN: And we’re joined now by Texas Republican Congressman Michael McCaul, good morning to you.
REP. MICHAEL MCCAUL: Good morning. Thanks for having me.
MARGARET BRENNAN: So, your Republican colleagues in the Senate have been working hard on trying to get this bill together, and they’re probably going to eek it past.
REP. MICHAEL MCCAUL: Right
MARGARET BRENNAN: But that’s even with GOP lawmakers like Thom Tillis saying they can’t stomach what this is going to do to Medicaid, an estimated $930 billion in cuts to it. That’s more significant than what you all had voted to do in the House. Are you going to vote again for final passage if it looks like this?
REP. MCCAUL: No, I’m going to vote for it for this reason. I think these numbers, it’s all about waste, fraud and abuse in Medicare, Medicaid. What I’m voting for is a border security measure, $80 billion, $12 billion to reimburse states like mine. I’m voting for $150 billion that will go to our Department of Defense at a time when we saw with Iran, is desperately needed. The world is on fire, Eastern Europe, Indo-Pacific. And then the tax cuts. I mean, if we don’t extend these tax cuts, it’ll be the largest tax increase in American history for those three reasons. I’m a yes. I think everyone in the House, they know the peril they’re in if they vote no on this thing.
MARGARET BRENNAN: What do you mean the peril they’re in?
REP. MCCAUL: I think, first of all, it’s good for the nation. Secondly, they know that their-their jobs are at risk. Not just from the president, but from the voting- the American people. Our base back home will not reelect us to office if we vote no on this.
MARGARET BRENNAN: But is it about reelection, or is it about the policies, right?
REP. MCCAUL: No-no. It’s about- it’s about- it’s great for the country, and I’ve outlined the three top points.
MARGARET BRENNAN: But to help me understand then- you have such narrow margins in the house, and you look at these projections from like the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, they say it violates the House instructions by $500 billion or more, what the Senate just put together here, and that deficits could rise more than $3 trillion. How do you get that through when you have fellow conservatives who are fiscal hawks and saying, I can’t get with this, like Chip Roy?
REP. MCCAUL: Not to get into the weeds on the economics, but the dynamic scoring is not taken into account here by the Congressional Budget Office. That means that when you cut taxes, you actually get increased revenues to the Treasury. And that’s something we saw under President Kennedy, under President Reagan, and under President Bush.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Chip Roy and some of these other fiscal conservatives are going to come along for the ride?
REP. MCCAUL: Well, I think at the end of the day, I think they’re going to vote for it.
MARGARET BRENNAN: You do. Let’s talk about some of the threats that you mentioned there, at home and abroad. You’ve been briefed on the actions against Iran. The IAEA director told us here that Iran has capabilities and could be up and running within a matter of months. Do you think it is an overstatement by the White House or a mistake to declare mission accomplished?
REP. MCCAUL: Well, first of all, I respect the IAEA. Their job is to inspect not to be an intelligence agency, so they don’t really have the clear intelligence analysis that I would attribute to our intelligence community like the CIA. We met with Director Ratcliffe. It was not just his decision. These are career and intelligence officers that have been at the CIA for over 30 years that made this assessment that it was severely damaged and sets a program back a matter of years. In any event, the world and the Middle East is safer today than it was seven days ago, a week ago. That is highlighted by the fact that the proxies didn’t light up. Russia didn’t come to their- to their aid. China basically ran back for cover. Iran is on its own and psychologically, is very damaged. The deterrence is real. The damage is real. This is a masterful military operation, the likes of which I haven’t seen since my father’s war, World War Two.
MARGARET BRENNAN: So, on the homeland front, do you then dismiss these concerns about threats? You have the National Terrorism Advisory System that says there’s a heightened threat environment in the US. After the strikes, there were federal agents that arrested 11 foreign nationals from Iran, including one who had ties to Hezbollah. Have you seen specific evidence of any kind of threat here in the United States, or is it, as you say, just done and over with?
REP. MCCAUL: No, I have. We picked up 11 Iranians, one a sniper, one IRGC, another one, a known suspected terrorist, just within the last couple of days.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Were they planning to do anything, or did they just happen to have those alliances from the past?
REP. MCCAUL: You know, I don’t know all the details, but I will tell you the FBI briefed me in a defensive briefing after Soleimani was killed. I was a part of that–
REP. MCCAUL:– back in 2020–
MARGARET BRENNAN: — that I was under indictment in Iran and that I was on that top target list. So, you know, look- is it imminent? I don’t know. We have to take it seriously that there could be sleeper cells in the United States, that could go after people like Mike Pompeo, John Bolton, you know- you know- myself and others that were involved in that decision making and including the president of the United States. We know he’s been targeted.
MARGARET BRENNAN: When it comes to detention of migrants here in the United States, it’s a high 59,000 detainees, according to ICE. 47% of them, though, lack a criminal record, fewer than 30% have been convicted of crimes. Doesn’t that show that the numbers- these aren’t the worst of the worst.
REP. MCCAUL: Yeah, I was a federal prosecutor for many years. Counterterrorism. You have to prioritize, right? I would prioritize the aggravated felons that my Mayorkas let in, in defiance of federal law. It was shall detain. He said, may detain and let them out into the streets. I would, I would prioritize that first.
MARGARET BRENNAN: So, you would prefer that Homeland Security prioritize them and not run up the numbers the way they are in this–
REP. MCCAUL: I think they’re running the numbers up because 15 to 20 million people came under the- under the Biden administration, and they’re trying to get some sanity involved in the United States. And I think deterrence is the key here. And Margaret, it is working. You know, the apprehension rate at the border, and Texas is the biggest one, has gone down to almost zero. I mean, the border is just about secure, catch and release is over, and the threats are going away.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Mike McCaul, Congressman, thank you very much for your insights today.
REP. MCCAUL: Thanks, Margaret, thanks for having me.
MARGARET BRENNAN: And we’ll be back with more Face the Nation. Stay with us. You.