Fox News "The Story" - Transcript: Interview with Sen. Tom Cotton

Interview

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MACCALLUM: Trace, thank you. Joining me now Senator Tom Cotton, a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee. He's also in Iraq and Afghanistan war veteran. Senator Cotton, great to see you tonight. Thank you for being here.

Having served in Iraq and Afghanistan and many of these documents were related to that war, some of them had to do with the treatment of detainees, in some quarters he was heralded as a hero for forcing those documents and that information into the open, how do you perceive him?

SEN. TOM COTTON, R-ARK: Well, Julian Assange is frankly kind of a weirdo but he's also a very dangerous man who put the lives of our troops at risk with the assistance of Chelsea Manning. I heard some of those lawyers defending him saying that this would be a blow to press freedom. It's important to know that he wasn't charged with leaking classified information, he was charged with a conspiracy to commit a computer crime which was inducing Chelsea Manning into hacking into those classified systems and providing that information to him.

Now, he's been living for six years in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London. Remember, he didn't go there because of these charges, he went there because he was an accused rapist in Sweden, to give you a sense of the character of the men with which we're dealing. But I guess he's used to dealing and are living in small places so a federal prison cell will be a good place for him to be.

Frankly, I'm glad Chelsea Manning is back behind bars as well. It may just be for refusing to cooperate with their grand jury, but that's where she should have stayed until President Obama commuted her sentence.

MACCALLUM: I want to play some of the reaction from your colleagues on the Hill. This is Joe Manchin and also we're going to hear from Richard Blumenthal here. Watch this.

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SEN. JOE MANCHIN, D-W.V.: Thank God. I think we will get some answers now. I'm glad (INAUDIBLE) coming back to United States.

This is needed. It's very much needed. I'm glad (INAUDIBLE) to death. I'm glad we finally got that. We need some facts and get the truth out, maybe he'll put an end to all this stuff.

SEN. RICHARD BLUMENTHAL, D-CONN.: He should be extradited to face justice here. He should face charges here without presuming what the outcome will be. Justice should come to Julian Assange for his role in Russian meddling in our election and the sooner the better.

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MACCALLUM: So what do you think about that and what do you think we may learn? What do you want to know? What are your questions about his connection to the Russian government? You heard him say to Sean Hannity that he was -- there was no connection to the Russian government or this or a state entity. He was very specific in his answer there.

COTTON: Well, I want to say extradite him promptly. I want to see him face trial here. I'm confident that he will be convicted and he'll be sent to federal prison. I want to commend the President and Secretary of State Pompeo and the Attorney General as well for working with the government of Great Britain and Ecuador to finally in the farce of Julian Assange hanging out in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London for six years rather than facing justice.

There's a lot to answer for and leaking highly classified military material but also into the release of those e-mails that were hacked from the Democratic National Committee and senior Clinton officials as well.

And as far as being separate from the Russian government, look, everyone knows that WikiLeaks is a front for the Russian intelligence services. Sure they may use cutouts that are not officially employed by the Russian government, but that's the way Russia works.

MACCALLUM: I want to try to squeeze in two quick questions for you. This is Ilan Omar talking about the -- about September 11th and what started the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Watch this.

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REP. ILHAN OMAR, D-MINN.: Here was founded after 9/11 because they recognized that some people did something and that all of us were starting to lose access to our civil liberties.

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MACCALLUM: What's your reaction to that, Senator?

COTTON: Well, that something that happened was an attack on the American soil against the American people which 3,000 Americans died and the people who did it were radical Muslim terrorists. Ilan Omar was a refugee from Somalia. He would think of all the people that would be grateful for America and be thankful that we stood up and protected the rights of Muslims in places like Somalia or Afghanistan or Iraq that was going to be oppressed, it would be miss Omar.

It's very disappointing to hear and characterizing 9/11 in such a fashion.

MACCALLUM: I want to bring back and talk about the raise act, but just tell us briefly if you could what your goal is with this immigration act.

COTTON: Of course, Martha. So we've introduced the raise act to change the way we welcome permanent residents and ultimately citizens into our country. Right now we add a million people a year to our country. That's like adding the entire state of Montana every year. Yet only one out 15 of those people are admitted to this country because of their skills or their job training or their job opportunities.

We need to change that. We need to focus on high skilled employees and we need to make sure that we continue the progress we've made and giving pay raises for low-skilled workers in our country.

MACCALLUM: Senator Cotton, thank you very much. We'll have you back soon. Good to see you, sir.

COTTON: Thanks, Martha.

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