Buchanan Says His Campaign Will Not Tolerate Racists

Aired February 18, 1996

WOLF BLITZER, Anchor: Last night, I interviewed Pat Buchanan here in Manchester. I asked him about House Speaker Newt Gingrich's warning that there should be no room for racist and anti- Semites in the Buchanan campaign.

PATRICK BUCHANAN (R), Presidential Candidate: Well, Wolf, there's never been any room in my campaign for racists and anti-Semites. Newt knows that. But there's also not any room for something else. When Newt had a young lady named Christina Jeffrey [sp] working for him and she came under savage and brutal attack as an anti-Semite, he cut her and dumped her. And it turned out the woman was innocent and her reputation was damaged badly and ruined in a lot of ways. And she never fully got back, although a lot of people apologized to her later.

So what I'm going to do, a man's asked me to stand by him while he goes out and defends himself against charges he says are malicious and false - every single one of them. So I'm going to give him that opportunity to do that because I'm not someone that turns my back on a friend when he's in trouble and under fire and he tells me that he is innocent of such outrageous charges.

But let me say this - there is no room in the Buchanan campaign for people who are anti-Semitic or anti-Catholic or anti-black or any other of these aversions because our campaign is about bringing this country together and making us one people and one nation under God again.

BLITZER: If there are supporters of yours who, for example, supported David Duke in Louisiana, or if they support the Aryan Nation [sp]. Do you want them out? Will you force them out of your campaign?

BUCHANAN: Look, a boarding party from Mr. Duke tried to get into our campaign and we rebuffed it in Louisiana. We don't have any people like that. This woman down there in Florida looks to me like a classic political dirty trick. What's going on here, Wolf, is we're winning the campaign on ideas and issues and message. Bob Dole doesn't have a message. You saw it the other night. That's why he's got to deal with something called push polls and all this other attack ad nonsense. And we are winning the battle of ideas and that's why the establishment is coming together against an insurgent populist candidacy. It always does, Wolf.

BLITZER: You know the Bob Dole campaign spokesman, Nelson Warfield, has called on you to apologize because some Buchanan supporters in Louisiana were passing around these leaflets, `The Truth at Last,' which attack Wendy Gramm, Phil Gramm's wife, because of her Korean ancestry.

BUCHANAN: No. Let me say something. Nobody in our national office has ever seen that. Nobody in Sandy McDade's operation - she's a wonderful lady, ran Louisiana - has ever seen that. That, again- you think we would really put our face and name on something like that?

BLITZER: Well, there's people who claim to be your supporters.

BUCHANAN: Well, Wolf, I mean people can claim to be that. Nobody in our operation does those sort of things. I would think that a good journalistic organization like CNN would look into who's doing that because if anybody's doing that we would condemn it.

Let me say just about Wendy Gramm- hold it. Wendy Gramm is a great and gracious lady. We have had meetings where she was supposed to speak first or me. She has always stepped back for me. She's the kind of lady I'd love to have in a Buchanan administration. Phil Gramm is right to be proud of her and anyone who put out any garbage on Wendy Gramm doesn't belong in our organization and is not in our organization.

BLITZER: You've made your position very clear.

BUCHANAN: I think so, Wolf.

BLITZER: Let's get to the horse race.

BUCHANAN: Sure.

BLITZER: All right. The latest CNN\USA Today\Gallup poll has Bob Dole at 26 percent, you at 25 percent, Lamar Alexander at 20 percent and Steve Forbes at 12 percent - a slight, slight decline from a few days ago for Bob Dole from 28 to 26 percent.

BUCHANAN: I think he was up over 30, if you look at that poll.

BLITZER: He was up last week over 30.

BUCHANAN: So what he's done is probably lost 20 percent of his support and he's starting to lose it right after the debate. I think Bob Dole's in decline. There's no doubt Lamar is moving and we're continuing to surge, despite these kinds of negative attack ads on us. And I tell you, I think they're hurting Bob Dole here in New Hampshire the way they hurt Steve Forbes in Iowa. People in New Hampshire love this primary process. It's being soiled with these constant attack ads and these anonymous phone calls, in some cases, attacking candidates like me.

BLITZER: You know the accusation against you is that you can't win. You can get a quarter of the Republican vote-

BUCHANAN: Wolf the-

BLITZER: -let me just finish, all right? With all due respect. But you can't really win because you're the spoiler. You spoiled - this is the accusation - George Bush's chances four years ago and now you're going to spoil Bob Dole or Lamar Alexander's chances this time around, that the White House is sitting back enjoying your success. That's the accusation.

BUCHANAN: Let me tell you something. Well look, that's nonsense. Look, I won Alaska clean. I beat Bob Dole 2 to 1, Lamar didn't even come in sixth. We won Louisiana, we beat Phil Gramm in his back yard. I beat Lamar Alexander clean in Iowa and almost beat Bob Dole. I mean we might say they're spoiling my chances for this nomination by staying in this race, Wolf.

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As for the general election, you name me one candidate that could do what I could do, which is bring home the Perot voters who left George Bush and left the establishment Republicans. Wolf, it was the establishment Republicans who ruined the Reagan coalition. They drove 19 percent of the country into the arms of Ross Perot. I've been fighting to bring them back home to the Republican Party and I'm the only Republican leader who can do it. You think Bob Dole can do it? You think Bob Dole can bring back the Perot voters?

BLITZER: You know, the last time you were on Inside Politics Weekend, January 21st, you predicted you would win Alaska- you were on your way to Alaska. You then predicted you'd upset Phil Gramm in Louisiana. You thought you'd come in second in Iowa - it was between you and Bob Dole - and you'd win New Hampshire. Are you still predicting you're going to win New Hampshire on Tuesday?

BUCHANAN: Well, I've got a good track record, Wolf, but we'll keep off any predictions this close to the final vote. But let me say this; this campaign is surging because of ideas and issues. The middle class folks and working class folks out there see in Pat Buchanan a candidate they believe represents their interests and cares about what's happening to them. That's why we're moving.

BLITZER: All right. You make a point of always saying you're for America first. Who, among your Republican rivals, isn't for America first?

BUCHANAN: I think a lot of them are caught up in this globalism. I mean, take GATT, the world trade organization. Bob Dole will put us into a world trade organization where we get one vote out of 120 and they've got command of American trade. He cuts the budget in Washington. He shipped $50 billion down to Mexico. That's not looking out for your own country and your people first.

BLITZER: Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon were for free trade, that would be for America's best national interest to have open markets.

BUCHANAN: Wolf, you tell me a 23,000-page document is about freedom? That is special interest legislation. Ronald Reagan would never have surrendered American sovereignty to a world trade organization. He believed in putting his own country first. He wasn't someone who believed in these global institutions. Ronald Reagan was the one that saved Harley-Davidson with tariffs. He put the quotas on Japanese cars. He put the quotas on steel. Look back at the record, Wolf, and the rhetoric that we're hearing about Ronald Reagan and some of the first great presidents of this country does not comport with the record. These fellows do not know history.

BLITZER: So when you're saying that some of these other candidates are not for America first, it's only because of their trade policies?

BUCHANAN: I'm saying that Pat Buchanan will always put American and Americans first. For example, what are we doing shipping all this money overseas in foreign aid when we can't even balance our own budget? Taking money from hard-working Americans, shipping it over to foreign governments, socialist governments, some of them hostile to the United States, to balance their budgets when we can't even balance our own. Then you cut veteran's benefits in the United States, ship the money to Mexico. That's going to stop World Bank loans to communist China, to communist Vietnam? That is an outrage and it ought to stop now.

BLITZER: All right. Put yourself in the Clinton White House right now. You're director of communications - low inflation, low unemployment, growth is pretty good, mortgage rates are very low - under 7 percent. It's a tough record to- if it's the economy, stupid, it's going to be tough for any Republican to beat Bill Clinton.

BUCHANAN: Yeah, but one Republican can because the economic issue underlying all this, Wolf, is the economic insecurity of the middle class and the declining wages of American workers. They know it in the White House and there's only one Republican who addresses it. Only one Republican can bring home the Perot voters and the Reagan Democrats and put them together with the GOP.

Let me tell you, they would love to run against Bob Dole. They would love it. I think they are nervous about Lamar and I think they would look at me and say, `That's a wild card. We prefer not to deal with that one.'

BLITZER: They may not, but what they tell me - and you know I cover the White House - is they'd love to run against Pat Buchanan because they think you would be too divisive.

BUCHANAN: Then we got something in common because I would love to run against that White House and against Bill Clinton and I think- who do you think would do better in a debate against Bill Clinton - Pat Buchanan or Bob Dole?

BLITZER: Well Bill Clinton's a pretty good debater.

BUCHANAN: He's an excellent debater. Who do you think would do better - Pat Buchanan or Bob Dole?

BLITZER: All right. But you seem pretty casual out here. Are you going to give us your final prediction before you leave this set?

BUCHANAN: We're not making predictions. All I'm saying is we're going on to this nomination. I can see the establishment rallying together in terror and fear that Pat Buchanan's going to be nominated and I'd tell those folks out there, `Come join this campaign and cause because it is going all the way.'

BLITZER: OK, Pat Buchanan-

BUCHANAN: Take it easy, Wolf.

BLITZER: Thanks for joining us on Inside Politics Weekend. I'm sure you will be back. You're not dropping out after New Hampshire, right?

BUCHANAN: No, no, no, no, no, no.

BLITZER: All right.

BUCHANAN: We won't even drop out after San Diego. We're going the whole way.

BLITZER: Thanks again.

BUCHANAN: Right. Take it easy.

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