With just days to go, before a bitterly contested election, we speak with two members of Congress,

one Republican, the other Democrat, despite their party labels. They agree with each other,

more than they disagree, both are reaching across rigid partisan divides.

This is Let's Find Common Ground. I'm Richard Davies.

And I'm Ashley Milntite. Democrat Abigail Spanberger is the US representative for

Virginia's seventh congressional district, and she's serving her first term. In 2018, she defeated

a Republican incumbent to win the district, which includes most of the northern suburbs of Richmond.

Brian Fitzpatrick is a Republican member of Congress, representing Pennsylvania's first

congressional district, which includes all of Bucks County, a mostly suburban area north of

Philadelphia. Our wide-ranging conversation begins with the long deadlock over the COVID

stimulus bill. For months, Congress has been deadlocked over a COVID relief bill, which,

you know, most people would agree is absolutely vital. For a long time, House Democrats and Senate

Republicans were really far apart and couldn't compromise. What does this say about our politics?

Well, I think we find ourselves talking about a number, right? Like the conversation related to

COVID relief, everything that's being talked about in the press by, and on the White House,

the Senate, the House, it's a focus on the dollar amount that we're going to spend.

And with problem solvers caucus, we took a different tact and said, you know, when you're talking

2.4 trillion or 3.2 trillion, these dollar amounts are just incomprehensible numbers. Let's talk

about the programs that people actually need. And so we went about coming up with a framework

based on the programs that matter to the constituents that we represent. And there were elements of

this proposal. I mean, in the conversations to get to our framework, we're tremendous. It was

incredibly informative. And in the end, we got a program, a proposal that had from a Democrat's

...