CNN "State Of The Union With Jake Tapper" - Transcript "Sen. Rand Paul"

Interview

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TAPPER: Welcome back to STATE OF THE UNION. I'm Jake Tapper.

President Trump didn't even take part in perhaps the nastiest political fight on Twitter this week, when Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky criticized the number three House Republican, Congresswoman Liz Cheney of Wyoming, over her support for -- quote -- "endless wars" and accused her of not being supportive enough of President Trump's goal of pulling U.S. troops out of Afghanistan. Cheney tweeted back, calling Paul a -- quote -- "big loser whose motto

is terrorists first." And it went on from there.

Joining me now, Kentucky Republican Senator Rand Paul.

Senator Paul, good to see you.

You're also the author of an upcoming book, we should point out, "The Case Against Socialism," which comes out next month. Congratulations on that. We will have you back to talk about it.

I want to start with this feud between you and Congresswoman Cheney, because I assume you think this is more -- about more and about something more important than just two members of Congress bickering.

SEN. RAND PAUL (R-KY): Yes. No, I think this is a big issue, whether or not we should stay in Afghanistan.

I can't meet a general who can clearly tell me what our national security interest is in Afghanistan. Most of the military, over 60 percent of the military who served in Iraq or Afghanistan now think both of the wars should come to an end.

So I think the president's right to do this, but I think we have to call out the Republicans who are preventing him. This is the Bolton- Cheney wing. Dick Cheney to this day still thinks the Iraq War was a good thing.

The Iraq War, President Trump has said, was the biggest geopolitical blunder of the last generation. It destabilized the Middle East. It increased the strength of Iran. It tipped the balance towards Iran.

So there really was nothing good about the Iraq War. And Dick Cheney, Liz Cheney, John Bolton, they still don't get it. They still are advocating for more regime change in the Middle East.

TAPPER: The back and forth between you and Liz Cheney went even further when you took the fight to her home turf. You called into a Wyoming TV station.

Let me just ask you. There's an open Senate seat in Wyoming next year. People are talking about Cheney running. Would you prefer that a different Republican fill that Senate seat?

PAUL: Well, you know, one of the reasons we called it into Wyoming is, there are two state representatives who wrote an op-ed that we ended up retweeting and sending about.

And in their op-ed, they criticized Liz Cheney for always criticizing the president when he wants people to pay more at NATO, when he wants less troops overseas or when he wants less war. Liz Cheney criticized him every time. That was the main reason for calling in.

But, yes, there is a Senate race. I'm supporting Cynthia Lummis, who is a former congressman (sic), conservative congressman (sic). That's the only person that I know of in the race at this point. TAPPER: Iranian backed Houthi rebels in Yemen took credit for a drone

attack on Saudi Arabian oil facilities yesterday, temporarily wiping out about half of Saudi Arabia's daily oil production, escalating the conflict in the region.

Secretary of State Pompeo blamed Iran. And your fellow Republican Senator Lindsey Graham tweeted -- quote -- "It is now time for the U.S. to put on the table an attack on Iranian oil refineries if they continue their provocation or increased nuclear enrichment."

Your response to Graham and to Pompeo?

PAUL: I think an escalation of the war would be a big mistake.

This all comes from the Yemeni civil war, where Saudi Arabia is heavily involved in another country, indiscriminately bombing civilians, killing children. And the Houthis are supported by the Iranians. So it's back and forth.

But, really, the answer is trying to have a negotiated cease-fire and peace in Yemen. And bombing Iran won't do that.

The other thing I would say is, Iran's military spending is about $17 billion. Saudi Arabia spends about $83 billion. The Gulf sheikdoms around Saudi Arabia that ally with Saudi Arabia spend another 50-some- odd billion.

So, really, the Saudis and their allies dwarf the spending of Iran. And this is a regional conflict, that there's no reason the superpower of the United States needs to be getting into bombing mainland Iran.

It would be a needless escalation of this. And those who loved the Iraq War, the Cheneys, the Boltons, the Kristols, they all are clamoring and champing at the bit for another war in Iran.

But it's not a walk in the park. And you have to tell that to the 4,000 or so soldiers who died in Iraq, that, you know, are we going to send more to their deaths in Iran for something that, in the end, when you topple these regimes, you get more chaos and more terrorism, not less?

[09:20:11]

TAPPER: Let's turn to domestic policy.

Yesterday was -- quote -- "Guns and God Day," a day dedicated to gun rights and Christian principles. The organization opposes any new restrictions on guns.

Their press release touting your endorsement of Guns and God's Day, of their effort, said -- quote -- "We encourage participants to be prayerful about returning our nation to God as the only solution to the hatred and mass murder plaguing our blessed nation" -- unquote.

Do you really believe that returning our nation to God, no change in policy, is the only solution, the only way to stop mass shootings in the U.S.?

PAUL: No, I think that part of the problem is cultural and losing a sense of right and wrong. But that's not the only answer.

I have said, yes, we should do something. And I think we should look at each of these killings and say, what went wrong? And I think the consistent theme here is, typically, not always, but white teenage boys in their middle teenage years to early 20s.

But the other consistency that we're seeing in all these shootings, almost every one of them is sending off signals. Many of them are committing crimes that we slough off and we're not prosecuting.

The boy in Parkland was said to have committed 23 crimes. The sheriff down there is more interested in talking about gun control than doing his job. He should have arrested this boy.

At the school ,he wasn't allowed to bring a backpack in because they already suspected he might bring in weapons to shoot people. He should have been prosecuted for terroristic threatening.

We need to prosecute these boys, primarily boys, or whoever they are, beforehand. And, typically, I think this can be done. We're letting down -- do you remember the Orlando shooting that was so horrific?

TAPPER: Mm-hmm.

PAUL: A gun store owner turned the guy in. The FBI went to the gun store and the FBI never looked at the footage. Had they looked at the footage, you know, the footage in the store, the surveillance camera, they would have found out that this guy had been investigated for 14 months by the FBI.

We might have saved a hundred lives there. So let's look for where the answers are. Let's -- yes, let's try to do something to prevent these shootings.

TAPPER: OK.

So let me ask you. There are people in the Senate right now, Republicans and Democrats, talking about a red flag law, which would encourage states to pass laws that allow judges and others, family members, to take away somebody's guns after an adjudication process of some sort.

Would you support that? Would you support expanding background checks?

PAUL: We don't know yet what's coming forward.

I can tell you that it'll have to be consistent with the Constitution. Almost all crime is adjudicated at the state level, murder, theft, assault. They're all state laws. So, 99 percent of crime is in state courts.

So, really, it's under the purview of the state legislature. We already have some emergency protection orders in about 18 states. I think the states need to look at what's on the book, and they need to enforce it.

The thing we could do at the federal level that we're not doing -- and I think this is a federal crime -- is that, when a felon goes in to buy a gun -- 12,000 felons tried to buy gun, with the last statistics, and they were caught, and they didn't get a gun, but we didn't prosecute them.

It is a felony for a felon to try to buy a gun. And if we know they're trying to buy guns, we -- I think we prosecuted 12 out of 12,000. So there is legislation that's been before the Senate before and will probably come up again that I will support that says, by all means, we should do this.

TAPPER: Mm-hmm.

PAUL: We also should make the background checks work.

At least two of the recent shootings, I think, the Dylann Roof shooting and the shooting in the church in Texas, both of them shouldn't have had guns. One was a domestic abuse. Another was some other felony, but they didn't get in the system.

So I think we can make the current system work better. But the vast majority of these shootings, background checks wouldn't have helped. The vast majority of these mass shootings are purchased legally.

But every one of them -- I can't get it out of my head that the kids in Parkland were immediately saying, it's so and so. They knew his name before they knew he had done it.

TAPPER: Yes.

PAUL: And this is happening throughout. All these kids are troubled. They're sending off signals. And they are committing crimes.

But if you do something like these laws to prevent things in advance, you have to keep the same constitutional burdens that you're innocent until proven guilty. You can't flip it and say to the person, oh, you have to prove that you're not a criminal.

No, the government always has to have the burden.

TAPPER: Yes.

PAUL: There has to be due process. You have to be allowed a lawyer, because the danger is, they could just say, oh, anybody that takes antidepressants can't have a gun, or anybody who's ever been to a psychiatrist can't have a gun.

And so there is a danger of going too far, where we preemptively just are out there taking everyone's guns.

TAPPER: Mm-hmm. PAUL: And I am alarmed and it does alarm a lot of us when we hear

Beto O'Rourke up saying, yes, they're just going to come and knock the door down and take our guns.

That scares the heck out of a lot of Republicans and a lot of gun owners.

TAPPER: Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, thanks so much for your time, sir. Appreciate it.

PAUL: Thank you.

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