CNN "The Lead with Jake Tapper" - Transcript: Interview with South Carolina Congressman Mark Sanford

Interview

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[16:16:13] JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: In politics, moments ago, President Trump tweeted again about South Carolina Congressman Mark Sanford saying, quote, had a great meeting with the House GOP last night at the Capitol. They applauded and laughed loudly when I mentioned my experience with Mark Sanford. I have never been a fan of his, unquote.

This doesn't match at all what others in the room told us, that, in fact, Republicans moaned and groaned and some media accounts said he even was booed. The president seemed to mock Sanford's loss in front of his congressional colleagues, his fellow Republicans.

And it was another tweet from Trump hours before the critical primary that Sanford faced that may have sealed Sanford's loss.

I spoke to Sanford just a few minutes ago.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TAPPER: Joining me now is Congressman Mark Sanford, Republican of South Carolina.

Congressman, good to see you again. Thanks for joining us.

REP. MARK SANFORD (R), SOUTH CAROLINA: My pleasure.

TAPPER: So, yesterday, President Trump mocked you, mocked your loss in front of your peers. He called you a, quote, nasty guy. How do you respond to that?

SANFORD: You don't. You know, I don't quite understand where the president comes from on any number of different things these days. And so, you don't.

But I do think it's humbling, one, that in this case the president is booed by colleagues in the House who basically said we don't go along with what the president is suggesting. And two, I think that there is a bigger message for all of us to take away from what occurred, because well beyond the president's comments, well beyond the election of the first district, and that is the importance and the value of dissent in our political system.

And in this case, I largely supported the president and his agenda. But because I had spoken up on a number of things that were at odds with stands I had long taken or at odds with people I represented, I was singled out. And I think part of what the president did yesterday was to send a very chilling message to my colleagues on, hey, if you speak up against me, there will be consequences. And I think that's the last thing we need in our political system.

TAPPER: Have you heard from any of your former colleagues who were at the event yesterday?

SANFORD: I've been overwhelmed by the number of colleagues who have come up and said awfully kind things.

TAPPER: Our new CNN poll shows a generic Democrat winning over a Republican by eight points. Why do you think the Republicans are behind? Is that a referendum on President Trump, do you think?

SANFORD: Again, you know, I'm not an expert on what's happening in terms of national polls and what might come next in the presidency. I just know what I know. And that is I went to an awfully interesting election cycle that was unlike any other that I've experienced in my entire time in politics wherein the referendum became not where did I stand on policies that were important to people's lives in the first district of South Carolina, but rather, was I for, quote, or against the president.

And when I answered with sort of a nuanced answer, which was overwhelmingly I supported him but on these handful of issues, I've differed, that became the focal point in the election and should tell all of us a lot about this, again, inflexion point that we're at as a civilization. Is it about ideas and representing our district? Or is it simply about blind allegiance to whoever it is that might be at the top?

TAPPER: Do you think the Republican Party right now is about blind allegiance to President Trump?

SANFORD: I don't think that there's enough pushback, and I'm not alone in saying that. I mean, I think there are any number of different folks, whether in media world or in policy world, in business world, who have said there needs to be more vigorous dissent, because that's how ideas get vetted.

I mean, the Founding Fathers were so genius in their design in creating a legislative and executive and judicial branches, each of which were a check upon the other. If they wanted just efficiency, they would have gotten a king. But they didn't want that. They wanted dissent.

[16:20:00] And so, you know, the question and your answer I guess has already been answered by a whole lot of different folks saying there ought to be something different than what see these days. TAPPER: There was some pushback, it seemed, to these images of these

undocumented immigrant children having been separated from their parents. President Trump saying he just signed an executive order on this issue to stop the separations.

How do you think of how the president has handled this policy?

SANFORD: Well, you know, it spun up into the firestorm that it's been, and it puts two I think great American values at odds with each other. One is the principle of law and what does the law mean in our country, what's it mean if you break the law. But the other has been the importance of family as the absolute cornerstone, building block, of our civilization. And so, we had I think a firestone that legitimately arose based on the way in which this policy that had been enacted by the president seemed to put those two things at odds.

TAPPER: Congressman, have you been disappointed by your colleagues? I know that there are a lot of people in that building who believe in conservative principles, who believe in the separation of powers, who believe in free trade, and I have been just as somebody who has covered this town now for more than a generation surprised at how quiet a lot of people have been about certain issues that I thought they cared a great deal about.

SANFORD: I would agree with that. I mean, I think that that's the quandary for all of us. There are a lot of great people in this institution, Republican and Democrat, House and Senate. Spectacular people.

But I think that if you look at the way group dynamics work, if you have a forceful personality, which Trump certainly fits that bill, it becomes sometimes a bit differently, particularly if your job is on the line, to speak up against. And yet, there's never been a more important time to do so as it relates, for instance, to spending.

So I think that we do need to speak up, but, again, that's the take- away from this election I just went through, which is, is there a substantial electoral consequence to speaking up and speaking your mind in this particular age that we find ourselves in.

TAPPER: And obviously, you think there is. Do you have any regrets?

SANFORD: None. I mean, you know, I have my four sons with me and you know those boys. You met them over the campaign trail a number of years that our lives have crossed each other. But they're grown men now and they stood with me.

And to a boy, each one of them came up afterwards and said, dad, you made the right call. We're proud of you.

And I think that that's the test for every one of us in politics, which is there's always some gray zone out there, and nobody gets it perfect. But to stand on the ideas that you believe in, regardless of the consequence, I think becomes particularly important in this time when you've got a dominating personality in the executive branch as we do right now. TAPPER: Republican Congressman Mark Sanford of South Carolina, thanks

so much for your time, sir.

SANFORD: Yes, sir.

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