MSNBC "The Beat wITH Ari Melber" - Transcript: "House votes to condemn Trump's "racist" remarks."

Interview

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

MELBER: Juanita Tolliver, thank you. Stay with me because obviously, this is an unfolding story on the House floor. But has promised, I turn now to U.S. Senator and 2020 candidate Amy Klobuchar. Thanks for joining me tonight.

SEN. AMY KLOBUCHAR (D-MN), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Thank you. Thanks, Ari.

MELBER: On this breaking story and your colleagues in the House holding this vote, what does it mean to you?

KLOBUCHAR: Well, I think the points that were just made were incredibly right on. This is something the president brought us to because he is deliberately putting out these racial tweets. There is absolutely no doubt about it. He basically is saying now in writing to people who are American citizens who are members of Congress, go back to where you came from. And by the way, what does that mean? I`ll tell you what it means. There`s a little girl in Minnesota who went out to dinner with her parents a year ago or so during the height of the Trump rhetoric. And they were out there, they`re Somali. And a guy walked by, the parents told me this story, and said you four go home. You go home to where you came from. And the little girl look up at her mom and she says mom, I don`t want to go home and eat. You said we could eat out tonight. You think of the words of that innocent child. She only knows one home. That`s my state. She only knows one home, that`s our country. But when he sent that tweet out, that`s what he was saying and that`s what some of the people that listen to him are saying because he`s saying it. And so that`s why I think it`s important that this resolution happen, but at the same time I just want to emphasize these points. He wants us to talk about this. And we have to take a stand but then we have to take a stand on something else, and that there are broken promises all over the carpeting of that Oval Office that he has made to the people of this country. I talked about him today about what I want to do in my first 100 days, pharmaceutical prices shooting up, nothing, nothing. Going on with infrastructure, when people can`t even drink the water in some cities in this country, that`s broken promises and that`s what people are talking about in their everyday lives. As much as he wants to claim he`s going to do raids and send out tweets whenever he wants, we have to make sure we have an optimistic, economic agenda for this country. That`s how we win.

MELBER: Well, you mentioned that and there`s also the battle with you`re -- the guy in charge of your Senate Mitch McConnell which is something we were looking at. We were prepping for this interview and he, of course, today was appearing to really dance around or avoid wanting to take much of a position on the president`s remarks. You and other Democrats have obviously been battling with him. I want to play a little bit of that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When someone were to say to her, she should go back to her country because of the criticism of federal policies, wouldn`t you consider that a racist attack?

SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY): Well, the Secretary of Transportation came here at age eight legally, not speaking a word of English, and has realized the American Dream.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Was it racist to say go back to your country?

MCCONNELL: As I said, illegal immigration has been fulfilling of the American dream.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Would you ever use the words go back to where you came from?

MCCONNELL: Look, I`m obviously a big fan of legal immigration. I`m a big fan of legal immigration. The President is not a racist. The President is not a racist. And I think the tone of all of this is not good for the country. From the President to the Speaker, to the freshman members of the House, all of us have a responsibility to elevate the public discourse across the ideological spectrum in the country, all across them. Everyone ought to tone down their rhetoric.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MELBER: That`s the way Senator McConnell has been talking about it which we`ve been discussing. I also think -- bear with me. I think we do have some of your history battling McConnell which what I mentioned. So I want to play that as well and then I`ll give you all the time to tie it all together.

KLOBUCHAR: Oh, wow, OK.

MELBER: We don`t have -- I`m told we don`t have it. I`m going to -- I`m not going to do an Amy Klobuchar impression because I don`t know how to do that, but for the sake of my viewers, it was some of what you`ve done in the past which is really trying to call Mitch McConnell to account, to criticize him, and to say at times that you don`t think apart from your ideological disagreements, that you don`t think he`s running the Senate in a forthright and fair manner. I give you your time back to speak to any or all of the above.

KLOBUCHAR: Well, thank you. I mean, first of all, I think you have to call out racism when you see it, and he refused to do that and that is very wrong. You had a Republican congressman in the House from Texas who actually said it and he voted that way today. Secondly, I think one of the biggest problems for the American people right now is that we`re not able to get things done. The House has passed things that would help people. They have passed things to keep dark money out of our politics. The House has passed gun safety legislation. It is bills that are just sitting in a graveyard outside of Mitch McConnell`s door. And I think that is one of the major problems in addition to the president that we`re dealing with right now. And we already heard the people speak in 2018. They want to see change and they want to have a president and a Congress that`s actually getting these things done that are going to help them in their everyday lives like pay for college and do something about the price of healthcare. But every time we try to move in the Senate including on immigration reform and allowing the DREAMers to stay, it`s topped by Mitch McConnell and he`s backed up by the President of the United States. So to me this is just part of a bigger problem that`s going to be solved by this election.

MELBER: And then when you say more broadly, when you talk about your 100 days, and we`ve had this conversation that obviously the Democrats are sort of having in public, what do you do about all this and how do you outline your agenda. For Americans who are watching who say OK, I got it, the House is having a war with Trump. Trump said terrible things. He`s being condemned for it. What else do the Democrats stand for and what would you do for people`s daily lives if you win, if you`re the president Klobuchar? Your answer.

KLOBUCHAR: Well, the first thing is we need to bring some decency back here. You`ve got parents that don`t even want to have the kids watch the president on T.V. because of the embarrassing things he says. Secondly, in the first 100 days, it`s unbelievable what you can get done within the parameters of the law. You can do things like bring in less expensive drugs from other countries that are safe, to bring down the price of prescription drugs. That is something that I will do. I will get us back into the international climate change agreement on day one and bring back the clean power rules. One of the points I made today is a lot of people have plans and I`ve got some good ones at AmyKlobuchar.com that people can check out. But I`ve also given myself a deadline. And I`ve cited Franklin Delano Roosevelt who back in 1933 basically understood you need the long haul. You need to have long term plans things to get done, but you also have to completely gain the confidence of the people in the first 100 days. And sadly people have lost confidence in our democracy because we have a present that undermines it every single day. And so that`s a lot of my focus, bringing that back, and getting things done for people, and telling them the truth instead of the over 10,000 lies that have been documented that we`ve heard out of the mouth of this president.

MELBER: Senator Amy Klobuchar on a big and busy night on Capitol Hill, thanks for making time for us.

KLOBUCHAR: Thanks, Ari. It was great to be on.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source