The following is a transcript of an interview with Senator Mark Kelly, Democrat of Arizona, on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan,” broadcast October 6, 2024.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Joining us now is Arizona Democratic Senator Mark Kelly. He’s in Detroit this morning campaigning for the Harris campaign. Good morning, Senator.
SEN. MARK KELLY: Good morning, Margaret.
MARGARET BRENNAN: I want to talk to you about Arizona, but let’s start in Michigan, where you are now. And it will be such a key state for a potential win for Harris or Trump. Vice President Harris faces challenges among black and working-class men, as well as Muslim and Arab populations skeptical of the White House’s support for Israel’s wars. What do you hear from voters there?
SEN. KELLY: Well, my wife, Gabby Giffords, and I have been here for a few days. We’ve been campaigning all over the country, Michigan, I’ve also been to North Carolina, Georgia. I’ll be coming back here to Arizona soon. The Vice President spoke to Muslim organizations and the Arab community here about what is at stake in these elections and addressed their concerns. What we hear are issues about the economy, about gun violence, about supporting American families and the difference between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris. You know, Kamala Harris, who has a vision for the future of this country, Donald Trump, who just wants to drag us backwards.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Today in Dearborn, Michigan, there will be a funeral service for an American man killed in Lebanon by an Israeli airstrike. It just underlines how the community that you’re talking about in Michigan is experiencing some of what’s happening to their community in a personal way. Given how close this race is, do you think this war and the expectation that it could escalate could cost Democrats both a Senate seat and possibly the presidency?
SEN. KELLY: Margaret, no one wants to see escalation and it’s tragic when an innocent person, whether American or Palestinian, loses their life in a conflict. Tomorrow marks one year since October 7 when Israel was violently attacked. Israel has the right to defend itself, not only against Hamas, but also against Hezbollah and the Iranians. But you know, me and my wife, you know, we sympathize with the community here that’s been affected by this. And that’s why the Vice President met with that community here earlier, a few days ago.
MARGARET BRENNAN: But it’s a current issue.
SEN. KELLY: Yeah, definitely. I mean, there’s an ongoing conflict in the Middle East. Israel is, you know, now fighting a war, I think it’s fair to say, on two fronts and then also being attacked by the Iranians. And they must defend themselves, and we must support our Israeli ally. At the same time, it is tragic when women and children lose their lives, innocent people in a conflict.
MARGARET BRENNAN: You do sit on the Senate Intelligence Committee and so I know you know the intensity of the efforts by foreign actors to try to manipulate voters in November. Last Friday, Matthew Olsen, the Justice Department’s lead on election threats, told CBS that the Russians are highlighting immigration as a wedge issue. That’s such a big deal in Arizona. Are you currently seeing targeted information operations that are really targeting Arizonans?
SEN. KELLY: Not just in Arizona, but in other battleground states. It’s the Russians, the Chinese, the Iranians, and it’s significant. And we need to do a better job of getting the message out to the American people that there is a tremendous amount of misinformation out there. If you look at things on Twitter, on TikTok, on Facebook, on Instagram, and it’s political in nature, and you might think that the person who commented on that political article or who made up that meme is an American. It could look like an American soldier. There’s a very reasonable chance that I would put it in the 20 to 30% range that the content you’re seeing, the comments you’re seeing, are coming from one of those three countries: Russia, Iran, China. We recently had a hearing with the FBI director, the DNI, and the head of the National Security Agency. And we talked about this. And we talked about getting the word out. And it’s up to us, so thank you for asking me the question, because it’s up to us, the people who serve in Congress and the White House, to get the information out that there was a tremendous amount of wrongdoing in this election information. and it won’t stop on November 5th.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Got it. And we’ll do our best to help analyze that for the viewers. But on the topic of the border, President Biden announced new rules this past week to keep in place the partial asylum ban he put in place in June. That’s what is credited with helping reduce a number of border crossings in recent weeks. It was intended to be a temporary policy depending on the number of people crossing at one time. Do you think this is the right long-term policy, or is this just a gimmick to drive down the numbers in the run-up to the elections?
SEN. KELLY: Well, the right long-term policy is to do this through legislation. And we were still a day or two away from passing tough border security legislation, supported by the Vice President, negotiated by the Vice President, and the President and his Department of Homeland Security, with Democrats and Republicans…
MARGARET BRENNAN: But this is not legislation.
SEN. KELLY: –This is twofold. This is not the case. But the legislation was killed by Donald Trump. We were very close to making it happen. That’s the right way to do this. If you can’t do that, Margaret, if a former president interrupts the legislative process the way he did, which is the most hypocritical thing I’ve ever seen in my three and a half years in the Senate. After that happened, executive action was the only other option. And this has gone from chaos and crisis at our southern border to somewhat manageable. And if you’re the border patrol, you know, this is this, you need this. I mean, otherwise it’s unsafe for Border Patrol agents, for CBP agents, for migrants, for communities in southern Arizona. So it’s a shame that these were the steps that had to be taken.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Okay.
SEN. KELLY: But that’s because the former president wouldn’t allow us to do this through legislation.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Senator, we have to leave it at that. Face the Nation will be back soon.
