The following is a transcript of an interview with Sen. Tom Cotton, Republican of Arkansas, on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan” that aired on Aug. 4, 2024.
ED O’KEEFE: We turn now to Arkansas Republican Senator Tom Cotton, a good friend of the former president and a big ally of the Trump-Vance campaign. Senator, great to see you. Thanks for being here.
SEN. TOM COTTON: Thank you, Ed.
ED O’KEEFE: I want to start with something that Mr. Trump said last night in Atlanta. He attacked the governor of that state, Brian Kemp, and the Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, both of them Republicans. Take a listen.
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FORMER PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Raffensperger and Brian Kemp, your governor, who I got elected, by the way. Who- wasn’t for me, he would not be your governor. I think everybody knows that. He’s very disloyal person. Yes indeed, very disloyal. Your governor, Kemp, and Raffensperger are doing everything possible to make 2024 difficult for Republicans to win. What are they doing? I don’t know. They want us to lose. That’s actually my opinion. And we can’t let that happen.
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ED O’KEEFE: It’s a must win state for the former president and he also said both Raffensperger and Kemp “don’t want the vote, to be honest.” Why attack a governor and a secretary of state who are popular with Republicans in that key battleground state?
SEN. TOM COTTON: Well Ed, I think it’s obvious that those guys have their differences, and they have had them for a long time. But what they agree on, and what we all agree on, is what a disaster Kamala Harris would be as president. She is a dangerous San Francisco liberal, who wants to do things like take your health insurance away on the job and give it to illegal aliens because she wants to decriminalize illegal immigration into this country. That’s just the small tip of the iceberg of her radical views. So obviously, they have their differences. But we’re all united in the need to stop Kamala Harris. Because if you think the last four years have been bad for your family, the worst is yet to come if Kamala Harris gets elected president.
ED O’KEEFE: And Governor Kemp made that point: I want to defeat her as well, but stop attacking me, focus on the issues. He continues to not do that. Do you think he’s underestimating the potential strength of the Harris campaign now that she’s at least brought the campaign back to even?
SEN. COTTON: No, I think we always knew this campaign was going to be a close race. But remember, she’s only been the nominee for two weeks now. She hasn’t answered a single question, not one single question by the media, Ed. She’s only had one single unscripted moment, Thursday night at Andrews Air Force Base, welcoming those hostages back and she served up the kind of incomprehensible word salad for which she’s become famous. When she has to encounter the media, and I’m sure you’re going to insist that she does, she’s going to have to answer for things like why she wants to eliminate oil and gas production in this country, why she wants to ban gas powered cars, why she wants to confiscate private firearms. So we knew this race was going to be close all along, whoever the Democrats wanted to put up against President Trump. But Kamala Harris has only been the nominee for two weeks and hasn’t answered a single question. When the American people get a better look at her and her radical positions, I think you’re gonna see that they don’t want her to continue the Biden-Harris legacy.
ED O’KEEFE: I appreciate that you’re critical of her not doing more interviews and engaging in more unscripted events. You’ve just done a decent job there of explaining the potential policy differences between the former president and the vice-president. But Trump doesn’t do that himself. He wants–
SEN. COTTON:– Well Ed I dispute that–
ED O’KEEFE: — Well- let’s hold on a second, what earned him the most attention this week? Questioning whether or not the Vice President is black. That became the big focus on him this week, instead of those conversations about policy that you suggest should be the focus of the campaign.
SEN. COTTON: Well Ed, I dispute that. I watched his conversation at the National Association of Black Journalists. I watched last night at his rally in Georgia. The vast majority of that time is spent contrasting his record of peace and prosperity and the Biden-Harris record of high inflation and a wide open border and war and chaos around the world. I know you- you played a clip of him airing differences with other Republicans, but the vast majority of it was what you showed at the beginning of this show, when he talks about Kamala Harris’ record of being a radical trans activist or wanting to ban cows or ban oil and gas production. That’s where President Trump’s focus has been throughout this campaign. And as the American people start getting answers from Kamala Harris–which as you said, I’m sure you’re going to insist upon, you got shamed by the White House last month for having the temerity to ask about Joe Biden’s age and infirmity–they’re not going to like what they hear. So I think it’s incumbent upon the media to hold Kamala Harris to the same standard that every other nominee who earned their nomination has ever been held to. Donald Trump in ’16, Barack Obama in ’08. They all had to go through more than a year of testing at town halls and VFWs and debates because they earned the nomination. Kamala Harris had it given to her. For two weeks she’s dodged the press. She can’t dodge the press for another 13 weeks.
ED O’KEEFE: Are you personally okay with him questioning whether she’s black?
COTTON: Ed, he wasn’t saying- he wasn’t saying that what matters is how she identifies as her race. He explicitly said he didn’t care. One was fine. The other was fine. Both was fine. She identifies as a dangerous San Francisco liberal that’s the danger to the American people.
ED O’KEEFE: Right, well let’s move on to some other things. Last night the former President congratulated Vladimir Putin for the prisoner exchange suggesting that he had extorted the- or he has in recent days suggested- that he extorted the United States by getting this deal. You yourself haven’t actually weighed in on- on what you make of this agreement. Do you agree with the former president that Putin got a better deal here?
SEN. COTTON: Well, of course, we all join in the joy for the family and friends of the American hostages that were released. We’re always welcoming them back. Unfortunately, that joy is tempered by the reality that they’re going to be more hostages in the future, and families are going to have to grieve for their absence in the future, because Vladimir Putin, just like the Ayatollahs, have played Joe Biden and Kamala Harris like a fiddle. I mean, there’s even reports suggesting that Putin specifically took Evan Gershkovich hostage because of previous failed hostage exchanges between the Biden-Harris administration and Russia, because he was a prominent reporter for a prominent global media company. What you see now is there’s a market for this kind of hostage taking. That’s why the Ayatollahs take hostages, because they got $6 billion from Joe Biden. You didn’t have that with Donald Trump. He got more than 50 hostages back to the United States without paying a dime of ransom, or having any high profile prisoner exchange. He also was willing to use our military to conduct hostage rescue missions, another thing that Joe Biden has never done. So of course, we join in rejoicing at the return of the American hostage- American hostages. But we have to realize that if Kamala Harris is elected president, it is once again going to be open season on Americans overseas.
ED O’KEEFE: What would a deal under a Trump administration have looked like?
SEN. COTTON: Well, part of the point is- is that you might have had these hostages taken in the first place. There’s Wall Street Journal reporting that indicates that the Germans went forward with this now because they believe that Vladimir Putin was scared of Donald Trump becoming president again. Again, we don’t have to speculate–
ED O’KEEFE: — Is there no guarantee that no American–
SEN. COTTON:– we don’t have to speculate what it would look like in the future. For the first time in 100 years we have the record of a former president to compare to the Biden-Harris administration. More than 50 hostages returned under Donald Trump, not a dime of ransom, and no high profile prisoners exchanged either.
ED O’KEEFE: All right, Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas, good to see you. Thank you for being here. We appreciate you.
SEN. COTTON: Thank you, Ed.
ED O’KEEFE: “Face the Nation” will be back in a minute. Stay with us.