Fox News "Hannity" - Transcript: Cruz focuses on 'positive' conservative message;

Interview

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HANNITY: All right, here with reaction, 2016 Republican presidential candidate Texas senator Ted Cruz. Are you planning on getting in a fight with Trump? Is that a preview of coming attractions, pay-per-view? What's going to happen?

SEN. TED CRUZ, R-TEXAS, PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: You know, we are focused on what we've been doing from day one of this campaign, which is building a conservative army on the grass roots. And what's so encouraging -- listen, the reason why people are throwing rocks and we're taking shots from all directions is because the energy momentum we've got, Sean, is incredible.

You know, I just got back from a three-day barnstorming tour through Iowa. We went to 16 counties in three days, had standing room only crowds everywhere we went. And so it's understandable that other candidates are getting nervous about that and are wanting to launch attacks.

We're going to keep focused on my positive, optimistic conservative message. And people are tired of campaign conservatives. They want someone who's got a proven record. I think that's why conservatives are uniting behind our campaign.

HANNITY: All right, let's talk a little bit -- you even are now ahead of Hillary Clinton in some head-to-head matchups. That's happening. The media seems very focused on the battle that has emerged between you and Senator Rubio. You have gone after Senator Rubio on the issue of immigration. You talked about his foreign policy as him being a proponent of military adventurism, that you said he has benefited from Islamic militant groups. What did you mean by that?

CRUZ: Well, you know, if you look at Senator Rubio's record -- he's someone who I like personally. He's a friend of mine. He is a very, very charming and effective communicator.

But if you look at his policy record, there's a big difference between his record and mine. You started out asking about amnesty. That may be the simplest and clearest record. As you know, back in 2013 when President Obama and Chuck Schumer joined with establishment Republicans in passing -- in pushing a massive amnesty plan, Senator Rubio led that fight. He stood right there alongside with Barack Obama and Chuck Schumer. Indeed, it was the Rubio/Schumer amnesty plan.

And I made a very different decision. I stood alongside Jeff Sessions and Steve King and fought against amnesty and to secure the border. And we ended up defeating the Rubio/Schumer amnesty plan. Now, that's a real policy difference that I think Republican primary voters are quite interested in.

HANNITY: You know, one of the things that comes up -- especially when you get close to the caucuses, the primaries, things get more heated, naturally. I've watched too many of these cycles. Then Republicans talk about the 11th commandment. Tell us where that balance is.

CRUZ: Well, the balance -- as you know, throughout this campaign, I have declined to respond when other candidates have attacked me personally.  They engage in the food fights. You know, first couple of debates, there were a lot of just nasty ad hominem insults. And I'm not interested in playing that game. If others insult me, I won't respond in kind.

Now, there's a difference between that and a substantive policy disagreement. I do think politics is and should be -- the bread and butter of it should be policy differences. And so it is perfectly appropriate to lay out, as I have over and over again, that on the issue of amnesty, a majority of the candidates on that debate stage have publicly supported amnesty, and that I am the only candidate on that debate stage who has never supported amnesty and who led the fight successfully to defeat amnesty when it was before the Congress.

HANNITY: The two big differences are -- that you're pointing out is on immigration. He's attacking you on the USA Freedom Act reforms. I want to give you a chance to respond.

CRUZ: Well, sure. You know, Marco -- a PAC that is supporting Marco has bought about $200,000 of attack ads in Iowa. And these attack ads are false, and Marco knows they're false. What -- he's trying to suggest somehow that I'm responsible for the terrorist attack in Paris. And it's silly. And it's the natural thing that a campaign does when they're nervous, when they see conservatives uniting behind our campaign.

Now, what I did is I joined with my good friend and strong conservative senator, Mike Lee. I joined with a ton of conservatives in the House in passing the USA Freedom Act. And what the USA Freedom Act did was two things. Number one, it ended the federal government's bulk collection of phone metadata. It ended the federal government having your cellphone information and my cellphone information.

And I think we've got to respect the Bill of Rights and the rights of law-abiding citizens. But number two, the USA Freedom Act strengthened the tools to go after actual terrorists, to target the bad guys, to get their cellphones, their e-mails. That's the way the Bill of Rights works.

And you know, Marco knows that, but at the end of the day, the position that he's advocating is he thinks we'd be safer if the federal government sees your phone records and mine. I don't think that's right.
And at the end of the day, the intelligence agencies told Congress the USA Freedom Act expanded their ability to target the bad guys. And yet, Marco's…

HANNITY: All right, let me ask you this…

CRUZ: The super-PAC supporting Marco doesn't want to acknowledge that.

HANNITY: You know, we see what happened in Paris, and the president actually said that those types of attacks only happen in America. Perhaps he forget what just happened and forgot Charlie Hebdo.

CRUZ: Yes.

HANNITY: But you know, during a joint press conference with President Hollande, he actually said, the president, that this climate change summit will be a rebuke to terrorists. He also said there's no tougher issue that he can think of than climate change. Let me play part of this.

CRUZ: Yes.

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HANNITY: Don't you think radical Islam and mullahs in Iran getting nuclear weapons and the economy and $20 trillion in debt is a bigger problem than climate change, which keeps changing from global cooling and the ice age coming to the planet blowing up with heat, to now just a neutral climate change for everything that they don't like?

CRUZ: Well, Sean, of course, it is. And you know, that statement -- it's gotten to the point now where President Obama -- "Saturday Night Live" can't even make fun of him anymore because he says the most ridiculous things. This is a president who thinks the SUV in your driveway is a greater threat to this country than radical Islamic terrorists. In fact, he's not even willing to utter the words "radical Islamic terrorism."

And we need a president who will stand up and defeat ISIS, utterly destroy ISIS. And you know, there was another exchange that just occurred recently, where President Obama was telling Erdogan in Turkey, You need to secure your border with Syria. And Erdogan responded, Well, why don't you secure your southern border first before you try to lecture me?

And I go to say, maybe for once in the history of all time, I agree with Erdogan on that, that President Obama is allowing an enormous security vulnerability of this country by not securing the southern border. And that's why I've been leading a fight to secure the southern border.

And I'll tell you, Sean, if I am elected president, we will secure our borders. We will keep this country safe from terrorists. We will not be allowing in tens of thousands of Syrian Muslim refugees. Our top priority…

HANNITY: Well, do you…

CRUZ: ... will be the safety and security of American citizens!

HANNITY: Did you hear Marine general Joseph Dunford, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, saying we have not contained ISIS? By the way, even Dianne Feinstein said it. The president said they were contained the day before -- hours before the Paris attacks.

Not only did he say they're not contained, but they're growing. So how could the president be so wrong and Dianne Feinstein and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs saying something totally different?

CRUZ: Because it's out-of-control political correctness. They don't acknowledge that the problem even exists. I mean, when the president stands up and says the Islamic state isn't Islamic -- look, that's just nutty. I mean, that's not even -- school children can figure that out.

They've declared their intention to create an Islamic caliphate and to forcibly convert or murder any infidels that don't adopt their radical Islamism.

HANNITY: Right.

CRUZ: And because the president won't acknowledge it -- as he put it, he doesn't believe in American leadership or America winning. He doesn't have time for that. I got to say, FDR and JFK and Ronald Reagan were spinning in their graves to hear a president say he doesn't believe in American leadership or America winning!

HANNITY: All right, we're going to take a break. We'll have more with Senator Ted Cruz right after the break.
Also tonight, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich -- he'll be here to weigh in on the latest shake-ups in the 2016 GOP field.

Also tonight, Jeb Bush compares Herman Cain's 2012 campaign to Donald Trump's current White House run. Well, Herman Cain will be here to respond. That and more on this busy news night tonight on "Hannity."

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HANNITY: Welcome back to "Hannity." And we continue with 2016 Republican presidential candidate Senator Ted Cruz. You just heard Hillary Clinton basically agree with Barack Obama, who said American leadership isn't just about U.S. ground troops fighting is. Can we defeat ISIS without ground troops, the way they're discussing?

CRUZ: Well, it is abundantly clear that Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton can't defeat ISIS because they have no intention of even trying.  They won't even acknowledge the enemy. I mean, Hillary Clinton at the last Democratic debate went out of her way to refuse to say the words "radical Islamic terrorism."

What we need, Sean -- yes, we can defeat ISIS with a strong commander- in-chief. If I am elected president, I will make unequivocally clear to the world we will destroy ISIS. Now, how can we do so? We should do so, number one, with overwhelming air power.

You know, in the first Persian Gulf war, we launched roughly 1,100 air attacks a day, for 37 days, pulverized the Iraqi army. It then took 36 hours for our troops to mop up what was left of it.

Right now today, Obama is launching between 15 and 30 air attacks a day. It's a pinprick. It's a photo op for political.

And the second thing we ought to be doing is arming the Kurds. The Kurds are fighting ISIS. They are our allies. They are effective fighters. The Kurds are, in a very real sense, our boots on the ground.

And yet the Obama administration -- and Hillary Clinton is sadly in this mix. They refuse to arm the Kurds for political reasons because it would upset Baghdad. That doesn't make any sense!

HANNITY: Well, let me ask you about the establishment. There's been a lot written and talked about in this campaign about insurgent candidacies. Yours obviously now is on the rise. You have great numbers in Iowa, New Hampshire, and your numbers have gone up pretty dramatically nationally, and Donald Trump says you guys are going to be fighting pretty soon.

But more importantly, I hear that establishment talk, and there was a big donor meeting at a big fancy hotel in California. That if an insurgent candidate wins the primary, that they may fund and help Hillary Clinton.  What is your reaction to that?

CRUZ: Well, look, it indicates what is wrong with Washington. People are fed up with what I call the Washington cartel. As you know, this summer, I wrote a book called "A Time for Truth," where I talk a great deal about the Washington cartel, the career politicians in both parties who get in bed with the lobbyists and the special interests and grow and grow and grow government.

And those folks are very dismayed that a president might come in who is actually a conservative who will stop the corporate welfare. Listen, there's a reason, Sean, that the lobbyists are all supporting Hillary Clinton and Marco Rubio. There's a reason the lobbyists are not supporting my campaign…

HANNITY: You know…

CRUZ: ... because they understand in Washington -- yes, go ahead.

HANNITY: Well, listen, Ronald Reagan was viewed as an outsider. He wasn't particularly loved by the establishment, and nor was Newt Gingrich, who's going to join us in a minute.

Let me ask this question. We had this tragedy, Planned Parenthood, shooting -- you weighed in on it in a couple of ways.

CRUZ: Yes.

HANNITY: Negative and hateful speech allowed this to happen, was the headline in The New York Daily News. I want you to react to that.

CRUZ: Well, with regard to the shooting at Planned Parenthood, what happened there was a horrific crime. I mean, it was a deranged killer who murdered three people, murdered a police officer, murdered two innocent civilians, injured others. And our prayers should be with their families.  And it is a terrible crime.

And I have to say, it was really sad to see the media falling all over themselves to try to politicize this, to try to use this as an avenue to attack conservatives. And it really shows the media bias of the mainstream media, where they're so excited to paint anyone who believes in the right to life as somehow being a murderer.

Listen, I am unapologetically pro-life. That means protecting the right of every human being from conception to natural death as a gift from God. That means I'm against murderers like this individual murderer, and that's something the media has a very hard time understanding.

HANNITY: All right, Senator, good to see you, as always. And we look forward to having you on often. Thank you. Appreciate it.

CRUZ: Thank you.

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