{"id":3945,"date":"2010-09-16T01:43:56","date_gmt":"2010-09-16T06:43:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kevinbryant.com\/?p=3945"},"modified":"2010-09-16T01:43:56","modified_gmt":"2010-09-16T06:43:56","slug":"jmint-on-conservatives-victories","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kevinbryant.com\/kbarchive\/jmint-on-conservatives-victories\/","title":{"rendered":"jMint on conservatives victories"},"content":{"rendered":"

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TRANSCRIPT:<\/p>\n

Jonathan Karl: Republicans, a lot of Republican leaders say you\u2019re crazy for doing this. You\u2019re going to cost them the chance of getting the majority. <\/span>You\u2019re supporting candidates that can\u2019t win general elections.<\/p>\n

Senator Jim DeMint: Yeah, if we had stuck with the candidates like Arlen Specter and Charlie Crist, there would certainly not be a wave behind the Republican party right now.<\/span> <\/span>There\u2019s nothing to get excited about. But when we put candidates out there who are speaking for this awakening going on around the country it gets people excited, and there\u2019s more excitement around the election and we\u2019re drawing in independents and democrats right now. So if we didn\u2019t have people like Marco Rubio on our ticket, we wouldn\u2019t have anywhere near the opportunities that we\u2019re going to have in November.<\/p>\n

Jonathan Karl: Okay, but how upset have you made some of your republican colleagues here with what you\u2019ve done?<\/p>\n

Senator Jim DeMint: Well, according to them we\u2019re okay. <\/span>But the anonymous staff members that speak make me think that there\u2019s a lot of anger out there. <\/span>But it doesn\u2019t matter. I\u2019ve been here 12 years. I don\u2019t want to be here 6 more years with the same people I\u2019ve been with if they\u2019re not going to stand up for Constitutionally limited government and continue to run our country in a ditch with all this debt. I mean, we\u2019ve got to change this. <\/strong>There\u2019s too much a stake. Really, there\u2019s too much a stake to trivialize this debate with meaningless political labels like \u201cliberal,\u201d \u201cmoderate,\u201d and \u201cconservative.\u201d I mean, we\u2019re really at a crossroads of survival versus bankruptcy. <\/span>And I think the more people that get this urgency, the more they realize I\u2019ve got to step outside my comfort zone. <\/span>I can\u2019t just stay with incumbent Senators who keep voting for the Obama\/Pelosi agenda rather than standing on principle with the American people where they really are.<\/p>\n

Jonathan Karl: So you still stand by what you once famously said that about rather than having 30 true conservatives in the Senate than 60 that don\u2019t really have principles. Do you still stand by that?<\/p>\n

Senator Jim DeMint: I do. And I\u2019ve said I\u2019d rather have 40 Marco Rubios than 60 Arlen Specters and the reason for that is if you want 60 republicans, you\u2019ve got to have at least 40 to start with who stand on principle. And if we can show America this election the clear contrast between the Pelosi-Reid-Obama agenda and more of a constitutionally limited government, if our candidates have that clear contrast, I think they\u2019re going to win in every state. We\u2019re going to have an earthquake election if we put the right candidates and I think that\u2019s what we saw in Delaware last night. Christine O\u2019Donnell has been maligned by everyone from the right to the left but people in Delaware love our country and they don\u2019t want it to go bankrupt. They\u2019re going see this contrast because now republicans are offering a contrast with the democrats who are going to continue this radical agenda with the President. I think the people in Delaware are smart and you\u2019re going to see Christine O\u2019Donnell win that election.<\/p>\n

Jonathan Karl: But the chairman of the Republican party in Delaware said that she couldn\u2019t win a race to be dog catcher.<\/p>\n

Senator Jim DeMint: Well, it\u2019s my business to show they are wrong. That in Pennsylvania, Florida, Kentucky, <\/span>all over the country, these candidates I have supported, I was told could not win elections. They\u2019re ahead in the polls and they\u2019re all going to win, not because of me but because they are speaking for Americans.<\/p>\n

Jonathan Karl: Will you have regrets if you wake up on November 3rd, day after the election, and suddenly you could have had the majority and suddenly you didn\u2019t because you lost one or two of these races?<\/p>\n

Senator Jim DeMint: No. I\u2019ve been in the majority with Republicans who didn\u2019t have principles and we embarrassed ourselves and lost credibility in front of the country. Frankly, I\u2019m at a point where I\u2019d rather lose fighting for the right cause then win fighting for the wrong cause. And I think that\u2019s where America wants us to be and why we\u2019ll raise probably 5 million dollars on Senateconservatives.com. <\/span>Average contribution $40 because Americans are not so concerned about winning as they are having a candidate that will speak for them. But the interesting thing is when you get candidates who stand on principles, you win. And we\u2019re going to have 60 if we can get the whole party to come behind candidates who really believe in limited government.<\/p>\n

Jonathan Karl: Has the republican leadership, republican establishment in this town gotten the message?<\/p>\n

Senator Jim DeMint: Some have, some haven\u2019t. I think you see it reflected a lot in the house. I think you\u2019re going to see now a lot in our Republican party. McConnell is a great leader for us. John Cornyn has done a good job. We\u2019ve got a good group of candidates now that they\u2019re going to all get behind. I mean, there\u2019s still a lot of people on K Street, the lobbyist, who are earmark lobbyist. They\u2019re here to take home the bacon and what they know is these candidates I\u2019m supporting are going to shut down the earmark favor factory. <\/span>We cannot be the party of limited government and think it is our job to take home the bacon. America is sick and tired of that kind of thinking. And so, yes there are some people downtown here in Washington who don\u2019t want us to stop earmark factory. Like Trent Lott, he doesn\u2019t want anymore \u201cDeMint Disciples.\u201d I don\u2019t want any more \u201cDeMint Disciples\u201d <\/span>but I do want people who speak for America.<\/p>\n

Jonathan Karl: Any chance you will run for leadership?<\/p>\n

Senator Jim DeMint: I don\u2019t want to run for leadership. I\u2019ve got a pretty good leadership position now as Chairman of Steering Committee and Chairman of Senate Conservative\u2019s fund, which is at senateconservatives.com by the way. So I like what I\u2019m doing and I\u2019m going to try and cooperate with leadership all I can and I think there will be a good leadership team if we put good people around them.<\/p>\n

Jonathan Karl: Okay and one last question: What kind of message has been sent the Republican leadership, leadership of your party, by what we have seen in Delaware and in Alaska, Colorado, Nevada\u2026on and on and on. <\/span>What kind of message is being sent?<\/p>\n

Senator Jim DeMint: The message is pretty clear: Americans are sick and tired of the doubletalk coming out of Washington, of us going home and saying we\u2019re conservative and then coming up here and voting for 10,000 earmarks. We can\u2019t fool America anymore, the media is too good. <\/span>They\u2019re reporting what we\u2019re really doing. So the message for the Republican party is, let\u2019s stand up on our principles and we can win in any state in country. Because in every state where I\u2019ve supported a candidate they\u2019ve said a conservative can\u2019t win. Well, every state they\u2019re ahead.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

TRANSCRIPT: Jonathan Karl: Republicans, a lot of Republican leaders say you\u2019re crazy for doing this. You\u2019re going to cost them the chance of getting the majority. You\u2019re supporting candidates that can\u2019t win general elections. Senator Jim DeMint: Yeah, if we had stuck with the candidates like Arlen Specter and Charlie Crist, there would certainly not […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-3945","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2gEQ0-11D","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kevinbryant.com\/kbarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3945","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kevinbryant.com\/kbarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kevinbryant.com\/kbarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kevinbryant.com\/kbarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kevinbryant.com\/kbarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3945"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.kevinbryant.com\/kbarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3945\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kevinbryant.com\/kbarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3945"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kevinbryant.com\/kbarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3945"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kevinbryant.com\/kbarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3945"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}