Transcript: Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., Talks To ABC News’ David Muir

The Democratic senator reflects on her fight to help the middle class.

ByABC News
April 21, 2014, 6:28 PM
ABC News' David Muir interviews Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., at her Massachusetts home, April 17th, 2014.
ABC News' David Muir interviews Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., at her Massachusetts home, April 17th, 2014.
Christine Romo/ABC News

— -- This transcript has been edited for clarity.

DAVID MUIR: We sit here today a few years later. You're now a senator. A lot has changed since the last time we sat down with you. But you're still tryin' to save the middle class.

ELIZABETH WARREN: That's right. For me, that's what it's always been about. I wrote this book out of gratitude. I am the daughter of-- someone who ended up as a maintenance man, a woman who worked a minimum wage job at Sears. And I ended up in the United States Senate because I grew up in an America that was investing in kids, that was building a strong middle class.

We're not doin' that anymore. And Washington isn't working for families. It's working for big corporations. It's working for billionaires, not for families. And so this is just the continuation of my work. I wrote A Fighting Chance because that's what I want every kid to have.

DAVID MUIR: One of the working titles for the book was Rigged. So I'm curious the change.

ELIZABETH WARREN: This book is about how Washington is rigged to work for those who can hire-- armies of lobbyists and lawyers and make sure that everything that they want gets done in Washington. But the things we need for families-- we need to help our kids get a college education. We need to raise the minimum wage.

Nobody should work full time and live in poverty. We need to fix Social Security so it's gonna be out there forever and raise payments for those who depend most on it. We know the things we need to do as a country. But there's no army of lobbyists and no army of lawyers to push for that in Washington.

The game is rigged to work for those who already have money and power. I wrote this book because the way I see it, working families, they're not lookin' for a handout. They're not lookin' for some special deal. They just want a level playing field. They just want a fighting chance.

DAVID MUIR: And there are no lobbyists saying, "We're here for the middle class."

ELIZABETH WARREN: Not enough. You know, there-- look, there are always some good people out there who are fighting on the side of working families. But it's kinda like a football team. You know, one side has 11 players to put on the field and, you know, armies to back them up, to make it all work.

And it's like the other side sends two people out onto the field. It's not a fair fight out there. It's not a government anymore that's working for families. It's a government that's working for those who can hire the lobbyists. And that's just-- that's not a fair game.

DAVID MUIR: The lobbyists who can find the loopholes.

ELIZABETH WARREN: Yep. And that's what lobbyists do. They get out there and they find all the loopholes. So let me just give you an example around this. Right now, our kids whose moms and dads can't afford to pay for college, they borrow money from the federal government. And I'm glad the federal government lends them money.

But the federal government lends at a rate that produces tens of billions of dollars in profits for the government off the backs of college kids who are just tryin' to get an education. That is obscene. That is not what we should be doing. But there's no lobbyist out there saying for all those college kids, you know, knocking on every senator's door, making contributions, push, push, pushing to say, "We gotta bring down the interest rate on student loans."