Transcript: Pete Buttigieg on "Face the Nation," February 9, 2020
The following is a transcript of an interview with Pete Buttigieg that aired Sunday, February 9, 2020, on "Face the Nation."
MARGARET BRENNAN: We now turn to former South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg. He is at his campaign headquarters in Manchester. Good morning to you.
PETE BUTTIGIEG: Good morning. Thanks for having me.
MARGARET BRENNAN: According to our latest figures, you're about four points behind Senator Bernie Sanders. How do you close the gap and make the argument that moderates should vote for you and not Joe Biden?
BUTTIGIEG: Well, New Hampshire is a state that likes to think for itself. And we'll be engaging Democrats as well as a lot of undeclared voters and maybe a handful of Republicans who- who know that they won't agree with me on everything, but are just sick of looking their kids in the eye and trying to defend or explain this presidency. That kind of hard work, we'll be putting in all the way until polls close on Tuesday, and we're confident that it's going to lead to a great night.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, you also have to throw a few elbows here back at Bernie Sanders, who basically is calling you a little inauthentic. He's going after some of your financial base saying you've got at least 40 billionaires with ties to the pharmaceutical industry, other big money interests. He's basically saying you're bought and paid for. How do you respond to that?
BUTTIGIEG: Well, I've never hesitated to stand up to industry. We sued the pharmaceutical industry when opioid- opioid makers ravaged our community and I'm campaigning right now for higher taxes for the wealthy and for corporations to finally have to pay their fair share. And my campaign has been built from the grassroots. We have hundreds of thousands of supporters, most of whom went on PeteForAmerica.com and chipped in a few bucks because they share this vision that we have for the future. You know, being the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, is not an establishment powerhouse. We're here because this message, this vision that I'm offering is connecting with voters of all backgrounds and at a time like this, if somebody is ready to help us put together the campaign that's going to defeat Donald Trump, then I welcome that support. No matter how they voted in the past, no matter if they've got a lot of money or not, I want their help because let me tell you, Donald Trump and his allies right now are doing everything they can to hold onto power.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yeah.
BUTTIGIEG: They just raised 25 million bucks in a day. We need to go into that fight with everything that we've got. And I'm not going to define my campaign by whose help we reject or whose support we turn away. This is a moment to bring everybody that we can into common cause just as we have to unify the country after we do win.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Joe Biden says you're unelectable, inexperienced, and today said you're unable to unify the black community. He also released a digital ad. Let's listen.
(BEGIN CLIP)
Joe Biden helped save the auto industry, which revitalized the economy of the Midwest and led the passage and implementation of the Recovery Act, saving our economy from a depression. Pete Buttigieg revitalized the sidewalks of downtown South Bend by laying out decorative brick. And both Biden and Buttigieg have made hard decisions. Despite pressure from the NRA, Joe Biden passed the assault weapons ban through Congress then he passed the Violence Against Women Act. And even when public pressure mounted against him, former Mayor Pete fired the first African-American police chief of South Bend. And then he forced out the African-American fire chief too.
(END CLIP)
MARGARET BRENNAN: How do you respond to that?
BUTTIGIEG: Well, it's a typical political attack that doesn't tell most of the story. He makes no mention of the work that we did, for example, in my administration, appointing the first African-American top lawyer for the city, helping the first citywide executive African-American woman get elected in South Bend, and really minimizing the experience of my city. And I know that a lot of mayors are speaking up today about the idea that what happens in communities doesn't count.
MARGARET BRENNAN: But what--
BUTTIGIEG: Maybe my community does look good from- does look small from the perspective of Washington. But to us, a lot of times it's the infighting in the Washington establishment--
MARGARET BRENNAN: Right.
BUTTIGIEG: -- that looks small and the work that we're doing on the ground in communities that are tired of being treated as a Washington punchline.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Lastly, how do you instill confidence in the public that the Democratic Party can run this election with integrity? Given the confusion that just happened in Iowa?
BUTTIGIEG: Well, the delay was frustrating. I imagine nobody had more cause to be frustrated than I did. But at the end of the day, this is about voters standing up and talking about and voting for the future that they want. It's voters asking the question: how's my life going to be different depending which president that we get? And for all the- the- the party behind the scenes machinery, what matters most at the end of the day is that the American people are going to send a statement. And the majority that we have right now, not just unified around wanting a different and better president than Donald Trump, but even more importantly, unified around what we're for: having corporations pay their fair share, raising wages, acting on climate change, getting everybody health care, delivering paid family leave, acting on gun violence--
MARGARET BRENNAN: Right.
BUTTIGIEG: These are America's priorities.
MARGARET BRENNAN: But Tom Perez who is--
BUTTIGIEG: They're our priority in our party--
MARGARET BRENNAN: --head of the DNC--
BUTTIGIEG: --and certainly the priority on my campaign.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Tom Perez, who's head of the DNC, is saying that perhaps the National Party should be taking more of a role here. That's not instilling a lot of confidence about these local officials. What do you think?
BUTTIGIEG: I'll- I'll let the party work on what the party does. I'm focused on what we need to do with the powers of the American presidency to change the trajectory of this country before it is too late. And I believe that there is a strong enough majority for what we seek to do, that there will be an unambiguous, decisive result, not just to end the Trump presidency, but to put Trump-ism itself in the history books if, and only if, we have a platform and a- and a campaign based on unity and belonging. It's why I'm concerned about a message that says that either you're for a revolution or you must be for the status quo. Most Americans don't know where they fit in that story. I'm offering a different approach and that's clearly serving us well. And we're gonna be on the ground connecting with as many New Hampshire voters as possible in these remaining hours to make that case and earn that win.
MARGARET BRENNAN: All right. We'll be watching. Thank you, Mayor Pete. And we'll be back in one minute with Republican Senator Lindsey Graham.
