CNN "CNN Newsroom" - Transcript: "Interview with Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand"

Interview

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BALDWIN: So let's start right there. With me now, a 2020 competitor of the former Vice President, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of New York. She would like to be the next President of the United States. She is coming to me live from the campaign trail in Manchester, New Hampshire. So Senator Gillibrand, good to have you back. Welcome.

[14:05:08] SEN. KIRSTEN GILLIBRAND (D-NY), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Thank you.

BALDWIN: So with Dr. Biden's message to that crowd, you know, she is basically sitting there and she is saying, "Listen, you know, my husband may not be your favorite candidate, but you need to vote for him, because he is the only one who can beat Trump," and Senator, my question to you is, well, why can't that be you? Why can't you beat Trump?

GILLIBRAND: I actually can, and it's why I decided to run. I do think electability is the most important issue. It's the first, second and third question out of every early state voters mind. And I'm the only candidate who has run who has actually won in a two to one congressional district to one Republican congressional district twice, last time with a 24-point margin.

And in New York State, I have the highest vote percentage in the history of the state, outperforming Trump, outperforming Hillary Clinton, President Obama, any person who has ever run for senator, governor ever, and it's been because I do so well in the red places, the purple places and the blue places.

And I think it's a false choice. Democrats are struggling with, do we need the best progressive who inspires the base? Or do we need a moderate who could win red and purple? Well, actually, we need both. We need a progressive who is for the big ideas, like repealing don't ask, don't tell, like passing a Green New Deal and healthcare-for-all. But also who can win those red and purple places that are necessary to win the general election that's why I decided to run.

BALDWIN: But here, the "but" is this, you know, and you point out you've crushed it in New York, but in order to beat Donald Trump, you know, you have to register with Democrats. And I'm just wondering why you think your numbers on this national scale here, Why aren't they higher in this current primary race? Why are you not connecting?

GILLIBRAND: Yes. I think the measures today are name recognition, and whether you're a national candidate when you started. I wasn't. I was a senator from New York. And the truth is, I'm still leading the national debate on the issues that count. Issues where we can't afford to lose, I'm leading the charge whether ...

BALDWIN: But you know, you know -- GILLIBRAND: ... it is going to the frontlines of Georgia and

Missouri, I'm doing that to talk about reproductive rights.

BALDWIN: I know but you know that you need those, you need the money, Senator. You need those polls, you need the money. Those are criteria, right, to even just get you to the next presidential debate which you have yet to qualify for. So why do you think that you have not connected?

GILLIBRAND: Exactly, and that's why I'm on your show, so people will go to kirstengillibrand.com and send a dollar so I can jump through this hoop that the DNC has created, that I need 130,000 donors in the next two weeks. So hopefully your viewers will help me get there. Because we do need a candidate who can bring this country together, who can actually inspire voters, because you're for those big ideas, but you have a record of actually getting things done.

I passed 18 bills in the last Congress, all signed into law by President Trump. He has no idea he signed my bills, but he did. And it's because I find common ground, always, but for progressive liberal causes.

Repealing don't ask, don't tell is one of the major pieces of gay rights legislation in a decade, and I led that charge. Same with finally passing the 9/11 Health Bill permanently, just a couple weeks ago.

So I do get things done, and I win in red and purple, which is why I'm running. And I'm leading the national debate on reproductive rights, on gay rights, on a family Bill of Rights with national paid leave.

BALDWIN: On the donor point, because you do need those -- you do need that and I think it's only a couple more days to qualify. You know, I had read that you said in an interview that calling for Al Franken to resign has hurt you with Democratic donors. How do you know that, Senator? Have they told you that?

GILLIBRAND: Yes, it's been widely reported in the press that certain donors are angry, and frankly, that's on them. But the truth is, I did what was right, and it was really hard. There's nothing easy about calling out a colleague.

But the truth about Senator Franken is we had eight credible allegations that were corroborated in real time to since he was elected. And the last one that came forward was a congressional staffer. And I've been working for months on legislation to change how we deal with sexual harassment in Congress, as well as years on working on sexual violence in the military and college campuses.

So I've been leading on those issues for a long time. And, yes, 34 other senators followed me, some within minutes. It may seem like I'm standing here alone, but many of them are running for President.

And my view is this. Listen, it's not easy, but you have to do the right thing. And we should have the courage to do so. BALDWIN: Let's talk about your policies. You are there in New

Hampshire today, you have said that seeing the toll of the opioid epidemic there helped really frame your policy on mental health, which you rolled out today. Tell me more about that.

GILLIBRAND: Yes, so no matter where I've traveled, and here in New Hampshire, specifically, there's such a lack of access to basic mental health. And there's real ideas about how to provide that -- Community based models, school based models, peer based models. These are the things that actually are getting mental health to the places where we need.

[14:10:07] GILLIBRAND: I've served on the Armed Services Committee for over a decade, I can tell you the number of suicides every day from veterans and service members is about 20. It's disgraceful, but it's the lack of access.

And so I've laid out the most comprehensive approach for how we create access for mental health, and the synergy between mental health concerns, trauma, addiction and other conditions is why mental health should be dealt with the same way as any other health condition. It should have 100 percent parity, both for insurance reimbursement and coverage, but also for availability, and we need to drive young healthcare providers and professionals into mental healthcare to ask them to support the needs we have.

BALDWIN: On mental health, this President has called for more mental health institutions to combat gun violence. In fact, today, CNN is reporting that the President is cooling on background checks, sort of behind the scenes, and you know, it has just been a couple of weeks since those mass shootings in Gilroy and in El Paso and in Dayton, so when you know, when everyone goes back to work, you know, are you less hopeful anything gets done in September?

GILLIBRAND: So President Trump has no courage at all. He is unwilling to stand up to the NRA in any circumstances. And there are so many common sense reforms.

We could do universal background checks, making sure we ban assault weapons and large magazines and a Federal anti-gun trafficking law because we shouldn't have to live in a world where kids doing back to school shopping at Walmart are afraid, where kids are doing shelter- in-place drills as opposed to mathematical drills. It's not what we should be aspiring to. And we know the difference. If you're a mental --

BALDWIN: So how can President Trump get it? You get it. How can President Trump get it? How can Senator Mitch McConnell get it?

GILLIBRAND: I think people need to keep raising their voices. We have mental health issues in every country around the globe. But only in America do you have these mass shootings, do you have gun violence on every street corner in big cities.

And the truth is, it is the access to weapons that is so prevalent, so easy for anyone to walk into a store and get a military style weapon. It should be reserved only for our military. They're designed to kill large numbers of people so quickly.

So I think President Trump just has no courage. He will not stand up to the NRA, and that's why as presidential candidate, I laid out a comprehensive approach to getting money out of politics. Go after the greed and corruption at the heart of everything that's wrong at Washington, have publicly funded elections, have clean elections and deal with political corruption. And I have the most comprehensive approach to do that because I know what we're up against.

It's the chokehold that the NRA has over Members of Congress that make it so impossible for them to vote the right way.

BALDWIN: Another piece of the news today, Senator, in Iraq and Syria, ISIS is gaining new strength after the drawdown of American forces. So if you were to become President, what would you do differently? What would you actually send in more troops?

GILLBRAND: So I have served on the Armed Services Committee for a decade, and I've traveled to the Middle East many times, bringing senators and Congress Members with me. And the last time I assessed what was happening in Syria, we went to Jordan and we went to Turkey, as well as Israel.

And I can tell you this, terrorism metastasizes. It can locate anywhere, it doesn't not need to be in Syria or Afghanistan or Iraq. It can be worldwide, and it can recruit online.

So having mass deployments and having permanent bases in places like Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan is the wrong approach to defeat terrorism. We should bring those troops home. We should be doing strategic, targeted anti-terrorism missions where the problems arise, just like we did to take out Osama bin Laden. That's the strength and nimbleness of our military today.

And we should be investing far more in cyber defense and cyber warriors, getting the best and the brightest set of our best schools around America to serve this country and protect our democracy, our voting infrastructure, to protect our infrastructure for energy to make sure that we can't have terrorist attacks around the country. That's the priority to keep America safe, not long-term deployments that frankly, result in more, not less terrorism.

BALDWIN: Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, thank you.

GILLIBRAND: Thank you.

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