CNN "The Situation Room" - Transcript: "Interview with Sen. Mazie Hirono"

Interview

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BLITZER: Lengthy list there indeed. Jim Sciutto, thank you very much.

Joining us now, Democratic Senator Mazie Hirono of Hawaii. She is a member of both the judiciary and armed services committees. Senator, thanks so much for joining us. Let's begin with the president's news conference at the G7 earlier in the day. He says China wants to make a deal to end the trade war. Do you see any sign of that happening?

SEN. MAZIE HIRONO (D-HI): You never know with the president because I think just a few days ago he said that Xi Jinping was an enemy of the people and then now Xi Jinping is a great leader.

So, as your prior commentator said, you have to make a list of all of the misleading and outright lies that the president perpetuates even at the level of a G7 meeting with other world leaders. So, what he does is he continues to diminish U.S. credibility and influence throughout the world by his erratic and unpredictable behavior. As far as the deals with China, we'll have to see.

BLITZER: As you know, there are plenty --

HIRONO: That's what he says. We'll see what happens.

BLITZER: -- there are plenty Democrats -- you're a Democrat -- who agree with the president that China's trade practices, intellectual property being stolen need to be confronted.

HIRONO: Yes.

BLITZER: How should the U.S. do that without hurting the U.S. economy?

HIRONO: By being reasonable and rational about what we want to do and how we want to accomplish things, but not by unilateral tweets. China is playing a long game. You know, they look at a whole of government approach, 50 years. It is a long game. The president plays a tweet game.

So, this is how he conducts foreign policy. And, yes, we acknowledge that there are issues that we have with China in terms of intellectual properties, et cetera. Well, there are rational ways of addressing these concerns. That's not what the president does.

BLITZER: As you heard -- the president also made his case for letting Russia back into the G7 without preconditions, once again becoming the G8. What message would that send to the world?

HIRONO: The message that sends to the world is that a country like Russia -- I would say that President Putin is really happy with the kind of support he gets from President Trump as would two other world leaders, Xi Jinping and Kim Jong-un.

The president has an affinity toward these kind of leaders. So once again he -- the president blames Obama -- President Obama for the so- called annexation or the takeover of Crimea by Russia. Nothing could be further from the truth and yet he continues to push it out.

This man has a major obsession with President Obama and all of President Obama's policies, including, by the way, his inability to face up -- unwillingness to face up to the fact that climate change is here and even to the point of -- what an embarrassment to say he missed a climate change meeting because he was having talks with Angela Merkel and Modi of India and both of them were at the meeting.

[17:15:04] BLITZER: Yes, there is -- we showed --

HIRONO: That's a climate change meeting.

BLITZER: -- a picture of the empty chair at that summit. At that moment there, were G6, not G7 leaders there. Under what circumstances, senator, if any, would you support reinstating Russia into the G7 and making it once again G8?

HIRONO: Maybe they should give Crimea back. But I think for the president to keep going on and on when the other leaders, after all, we don't get to select who should be in the G7 or G8 all by ourselves even if the president wants to do that.

There are other members of G7 and -- G6 members and I don't think they're all eager to welcome Russia back because they are the ones who took the position that Russia should be kicked out of the G8.

BLITZER: In another dramatic moment at that news conference today, the president signaled that he would be willing to meet with the Iranian president, Hassan Rouhani. Do you think a meeting with the Iranian leadership like that could be productive?

HIRONO: I would have major concerns if it's President Trump going into this meeting because, remember, he's the one that blew up the Iranian nuclear deal even if our European allies do not want him to do that. So, I think it is very dangerous for the president to go and meet with any world leader at this point because we don't know what they're going to talk about. And there is usually a massive lack of preparation. And for something as important as meeting with the Iranian leader, I would say that I would have major concerns unless our allies are also involved and engaged.

BLITZER: Senator Hirono, thanks so much for joining us.

HIRONO: Thank you. I just want to do one shout out. I'm in Hawaii. I want to give a shout out to our Hawaii little league teams that are doing really great at the World Series.

BLITZER: Good luck to that little league team. Nice shout out indeed. All right, thanks very much, senator, for that. Appreciate it.

HIRONO: Thank you.

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