MSNBC "All In with Chris Hayes" - Transcript: Interview with Sen. Tim Kaine

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Senator Tim Kaine is Democrat representing Virginia, previously served as governor of Virginia from 2006 to 2010, and he joins me now.

Senator, you know, this states politics as well as just about anyone. Tell me about that governor`s race in 2005. Because I remember that being a big deal. And, again, there were some of those dynamics in effect in terms of who`s in power in the White House and where the energy is in opposition. How much do you think that matter? And how much was it just about Virginia issues?

SEN. TIM KAINE (D-VA): Well, Chris, you`re right, the Virginia governor`s race coming a year after the presidential race. You see a 70 percent turnout in the presidential year. And then the governor`s race the next year, it could be 47, it could be 45, it could be 42 turnout drop, and you always see really, really close races. My race was a single point race up until election night and then I ended up winning by five or six, but everybody thought it was essentially a dead heat.

So, this is sort of a common phenomenon. And it just means that, you know, the party that has won the White House has to not be complacent. The one thing in this Virginia race that I`ll predict will be factor tomorrow night is we have 45 days of early voting in Virginia for the first time ever in a governor`s race, because our democratic Houses decided they wanted to make it convenient for people to vote. And the early vote is coming in very, very strong for Terry McAuliffe, but it`s going to be a close race tomorrow, no doubt about it.

HAYES: This is also going to be a first big election. I mean, there`s a California recall, but that was not very close. But first big election with all sorts of national eyes on it, again, with Donald Trump endorsing this candidate under the kind of specter of the big lie. And you`ve got the former president saying this today, we must win bigger than the margin of fraud by flooding the polls with those who believe in America first.

You know, you`ve got this really, again, unsustainable situation where there`s almost an expectation that if it were, say, a close loss for Glenn Youngkin, that`s not going to be the end of it, as far as Republicans are concerned.

KAINE: Well, no, I think you`re -- I think you`re right -- Youngkin started, you know, preaching the big lie about election fraud and problems with the 2020 election. He`s finishing the campaign with an ad going after of all people Toni Morrison, African-American woman, Nobel laureate for her Pulitzer Prize winning novel, "Beloved." And so, he`s finishing with this weird attack on an African-American woman author, again, coated and dog whistled.

This is a Trumpian campaign. And on the Democratic side, we believe if we win, whether it`s a close winner, even if it`s not a close win, the Youngkin team with the backing of Trump, will try to denigrate the integrity of Virginia election. So that`s why it`s so important that people turn out so that we can deliver a very, very clear mandate tomorrow because we expect the Youngkin-Trump team will try to challenge the integrity of the election.

Just look, they`re already doing it, they brought Steve Bannon in for a big rally. Ten days ago, they pledged allegiance to a flag that we use at the, quote, peaceful protest on January 6, 2021 in D.C. They`re setting it up for an attack on Virginia`s election integrity. Virginians appreciate it.

HAYES: There`s a question here also about what this race is about. I mean, when you -- it`s funny, I spent time on Youngkin`s website, I`ve been reading a local coverage, people talking about education. But you as you saw with that one parent activist in Loudoun County, a lot of this is about what are our kids learning, what are they learning about the history of American racial hierarchy and things like that.

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And again, these are -- those are real issues in the sense that there are parents who are worried about them, and they`re actually like, big normative fights we have in a democracy, what do kids learn. But I can`t really find anything else about what exactly a Glenn Youngkin gubernatorial administration would look like in the state of Virginia, other than this sort of coating on, you know, defund the police or CRT or whatever?

KAINE: Well, I think you`re right, Chris, and Virginia voters are in danger of getting fleeced by this guy, because he isn`t putting up, you know, anything about what he wants to do as governor. He`s using these culture war issues.

You know, I`ll remind you, I`m sure I got a lot of Virginians watching this. Virginia schools are some of the best performing schools in the country, not only pre-K12 schools, but also our higher ed institutions. You know, most governors, if they could do it in a secret ballot would trade their education systems for Virginia, Terry McAuliffe with great education, governor, investing in education, expanding early childhood education, expanding childhood nutrition, better funding for community colleges.

A lot of people move to Virginia because the public schools are very, very high quality. That doesn`t mean we can`t do more or it`s talked about the fact that our teachers aren`t paid at the national average in the way they should be, everyone wants to move it there.

But, you know, Glenn Youngkin is trying to kind of create and then inflate a culture of grievance against schools and school teachers that doesn`t really match up with the lived reality of people in most Virginia cities.

HAYES: All right. Senator Tim Kaine, former governor from the Commonwealth of Virginia. Thanks for making little time for us tonight.

KAINE: Thank you.

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