CNN "American Morning" - Transcripts

Interview

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ROBERTS: Republican Congressman Darrell Issa of California is calling for a congressional hearing to deal with these threats, and he joins us now live from Washington.

CHETRY: Thanks for being with us this morning, Congressman.

REP. DARRELL ISSA (R), CALIFORNIA: Thank you, Kiran.

CHETRY: What is the -- what do you hope to accomplish by holding this hearing? What do you want to get out there? ISSA: What I'm hoping to do is sort of two parts. First of all, make the public more aware that there have been ongoing credible and not so credible threats for years to both parties. And that we divide them into those which members feel are not just insulting and inappropriate but actually could lead to harm to their staff or themselves. And that if we feel that, if it's taken as credible, they're investigated and they're prosecuted and maybe put in perspective that health care is controversial. People have gone over the top. But they went over the top on the war. I remember even on the House floor, two of our members had wet red painted money thrown on them from the stands.

We've lived with this. It's part of our society. Hopefully what the hearing will do is both bring balance that it occurs but also an understanding by the public that they better not cross the line with the state assembly, the state Senate, governor or their congressman because if it's a credible threat, it will be prosecuted.

ROBERTS: Congressman Issa, this is something that you have personal experience with. One of your congressional offices was targeted in a bomb plot. A couple of members of the Jewish Defense League are under arrest because of it. But in terms of what the genesis of this is, is it the rhetoric going on in Congress and where do you draw the line between legitimate criticism and incitement to violence.

ISSA: Well, clearly, controversial votes create a higher level of this kind of angst. But we have it all the time. You'd be amazed how many times people call up just off their meds to every congressional office and we discard most of those.

This has been a year-long battle in which some members of Congress on both sides have used language on the House floor that creates sort of a feeling of injustice in the process. The process was followed. I think it was stretched, but I think it was inappropriate. And I think we're going to regret it both in the House and the Senate in the long run. But having said that, what the hearing is hoping to do is let's bring this back into perspective. Let's get the American people to understand that the ballot box is where you correct flaws on Capitol Hill. The constitution may have been trampled in the language. That's for the court to decide. But on the House floor, the process, the result of the last election was borne out in a predictable way. And I think the American people have to accept that if we don't have enough votes, we lose. If you want to change that this November and the November two years later, that's how we do it in America.

CHETRY: Well, you know, Virginia Congressman Tom Perriello, we had him on the show yesterday, a Democrat. He's been a target as well. Somebody published what they thought was his home address. It ended up being his brother's. And he told me yesterday that he felt that Republican House Minority Leader John Boehner should have come out more strongly against what's happening. He said that the comments that he made saying that we don't condone this but meanwhile, channel that anger into, you know, votes or working for your congressman. He said he should have been much stronger about it and said basically, if you did this, you should go to jail. Do you think your party is doing enough to tamp down the violence?

ISSA: Well, first of all, I think that we're trying to be measured in our response because this is not an amount so much greater than we would have expected. The vote for the gulf war, even the post Afghanistan conflict had similar situations.

What we're trying to do is make it clear. Both sides have experienced this, continue to experience it. Eric Cantor had a bullet put into his campaign office. What we're trying to make clear, though, is that together we want the public to understand the ballot box is the right place, not in fact violence. We want people to continue assembling here in Washington and their homes and peacefully do expressing themselves, because that's how we do it in America.

ROBERTS: Right.

ISSA: Elections make a difference, but protest is peaceful.

ROBERTS: Well, certainly, you know, we've seen a lot of heated election campaigns in the past, Congressman. And you know, one of the things that's out there right now is this graphic that Sarah Palin has put on her Facebook page which shows 20 Democratic districts, you know, being targeted with gun sites. There have been critics who say that's just beyond the pale. But Senator John McCain was asked about that yesterday on the "Today" show. Here's what he said about it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: I have seen the rhetoric of targeted districts as long as I've been in politics. Please. This is any threat of violence is terrible. But to say that there's a targeted district or that we reload or go back into the fight again, please.

ANN CURRY, "TODAY" NEWS ANCHOR: Those are not my words. Those are her words.

MCCAIN: That's just language -- those are fine. They're used all the time.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROBERTS: Do you agree, Congressman, that it's fine?

ISSA: John, no, Senator McCain is absolutely right that whether it's fine or not is a separate question that the public decide. But the Republicans and Democrats have used the term "targeted" and use targeting and reloading in regular dialogue. And of course, Sarah Palin may be a little more so as a rifle moose-hunting Alaskan finds it particularly fits her. But I've heard that -- I was once at the Democratic National Convention -- not convention but their gala dinner and I heard language much more along those lines. And that's in a gun control type crew.

ROBERTS: Right. Right.

ISSA: That language is being pointed out inappropriately.

ROBERTS: And you think that the graphic is appropriate as well?

ISSA: Well, look, if you want to make a point of something that incites a special action, pick something that was different than the rhetoric over the last decade and point it out. In the case of Sarah Palin, I'm not coming to her defense. I'm not a Sarah Palin supporter. But at the same time very, very much she is using what is typically used in politics. There's no special incitement. If we're going to take it out of the dialogue, if we're going to PC (ph) on that, that's fine. But we're going to be after PC (ph) in all the party.

The fact is, this is a great concern to us. Some of these threats are real. Tony Weiner getting powder. If you knew how many millions, tens of millions of dollars have been spent because of the anthrax attempt and continue to be spent, we take that serious. And I would expect that we will have federal law enforcement tracing that back just as we're going to trace back the coffin on the front lawn and all the other over the top real threats.

That is serious. We denounced it. We denounced it immediately. We're going to continue to. What the hearing is intended to show is let the public understand if you cross the line, you will be prosecuted because it cost the American people tens of millions of dollars. And intimidation of your representatives is the best way to destroy a democracy. And on the left and on the right it should not be accepted in any way, shape or form and we do denounce it.

CHETRY: All right. Congressman Darrell Issa, great to talk to you. Thanks for being with us.

ISSA: Thank you.

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