'This Week' Transcript 9-29-24: Rep. Tom Emmer, Former Sen. Jeff Flake and John Kirby

A rush transcript of "This Week with George Stephanopoulos" airing on Sunday, September 29, 2024 on ABC News is below. This copy may not be in its final form, may be updated and may contain minor transcription errors. For previous show transcripts, visit the "This Week" transcript archive.

MARTHA RADDATZ, ABC "THIS WEEK" CO-ANCHOR: I'm joined now by a top member of the GOP leadership, House Majority Whip Tom Emmer of Minnesota.

Good morning to you, Congressman. It’s great to have you here this morning.

You have been tapped to play Harris’ running mate, your fellow Minnesotan there, Governor Tim Walz, in Senator J.D. Vance’s debate prep. Can you tell us a little bit about how that’s going and what your approach is?

REP. TOM EMMER, HOUSE MAJORITY WHIP & (R) MINNESOTA: Well, my job – I've – I've known Tim, oh, probably since he was first elected almost a – 20 years ago. And I – I worked with him directly for four years. I spent the last month just going back, all of his old stuff to get his phrases down, his mannerisms, that sort of thing. My job was to be able to play Tim Walz so J.D. Vance know what he’s going to see.

RADDATZ: What’s a little different than how you’re playing right now? A little more folksy? What – what – what is your vibe there?

EMMER: Yes, you – Tim’s been a complete disaster in Minnesota. And what’s happened is he’s so good at being this folksy, nice, kind of down to earth guy until people get to know him and his policies. I don’t know if you notice, but his whole congressional district, where he played this character for several years of being kind of a – a folksy, egg friendly, outdoorsman. He lost it in both of his gubernatorial races. In the last one, almost by 10 points. He’s not well liked because once you get to know the real Tim Walz, he’s like Gavin Newsom in a flannel shirt.

RADDATZ: I know you’ve been – been saying things like that. So, when you play him in a debate, what do you do? Have you had any mock debates yet? Have you actually played him for J.D. Vance?

EMMER: Well, the – the debate is on Tuesday night, so I'll let your – your viewers decide that. I'm not going to get ahead of J.D. and the team. If they want to talk about exactly what we did, when we did it, how many times, they can do that.

For me, I did my job – or have been doing my job in helping J.D. see what it is he’s going to be dealing with on Tuesday night. He’s going to do a great job. I can tell you, he’s got the issues on his side, Martha. He could talk about the economy that Donald Trump fixed and that Harris and Biden broke. He can talk about the border that Trump fix and they broke. He can talk about peace and stability around the world, which they don’t even have a clue. They’ve caused all of this disruption in – once he understands that Tim Walz is just going to try and deflect and go into this folksy whatever, he’ll hold him accountable. I think J.D. will do a great job.

RADDATZ: Well – well, let’s talk about some specifics there. You – you say you think J.D. will do a great job. So far Tim Walz’s favorability ratings are higher than J.D. Vance. In fact, recent national polls found anywhere from four in 10 to six in 10 voters hold unfavorable views of J.D. Vance. So – so, stop for just a moment with the criticism of Tim Walz and tell me what J.D. Vance has to do to change that favorability rating. That’s an important rating.

EMMER: First off, I know he’s going to do a great job on Tuesday. But second, Martha, I – of course they want to focus on the Republicans. Let’s talk about Tim Walz. I just told you, he’s not a popular guy in Minnesota. This guy – actually Kamala Harris, once they – they just pushed Joe off the cliff and installed Kamala Harris, she instantly had a 10-point lead over Donald Trump. And guess what, it dropped by half and then by a little bit more after she added Tim Walz. So, here --

RADDATZ: Let’s – let’s talk – let’s go back to my question about J.D. Vance.

EMMER: People (ph) should get to know Tim Walz.

RADDATZ: Let’s go back to my question about J.D. Vance and those unfavourability ratings. Tim Walz’s are higher than J.D. Vance. So, J.D. Vance clearly wants to do something different to raise those favorability ratings. What does he do?

EMMER: I think J.D. is very likeable and I think he’s well liked. And I don’t buy into these snapshot polls that are being done for a specific reason. If you’re not willing to – to agree that Tim Walz, once people get to know who he is and they know what his policies are, he’s more radical than Kamala Harris.

People do not like him once they get to know him. And J.D. will expose that on Tuesday.

RADDATZ: Vance, of course, has consistently praised Donald Trump, talking about him often. Trump, last night, called Kamala Harris mentally disabled. He said that Joe Biden became that way. She was born that way.

Do you think Kamala Harris is mentally disabled? Do you approve of that kind of language?

EMMER: I think Kamala Harris is the wrong choice for America. I think Kamala Harris is actually as bad or worse as the administration, that we’ve witnessed for the last four years, Martha. You’ve got 20 percent inflation. You’ve got the average family spending $1,200 more a month for the same backet of foods they were buying just before the –

RADDATZ: Congressman, do you approve of that language? Do you approve of that language, Donald Trump calling her mentally disabled, mentally impaired?

EMMER: I think we should stick on the issues.

RADDATZ: So, you don’t approve of that, and you don’t think she is?

EMMER: I think we should stick – I think we should stick to the issues. The issues are, Donald Trump fixed it once. They broke it. He’s going to fix it again. That – those are the issues.

RADDATZ: OK, then – then let’s – let’s talk about one of the issues. And one of the issues is, of course, migrants. I – I can’t believe we’re still talking about this, but the baseless claims elevated by Vance and Trump that Haitian migrants were eating their pets. You know that Mike DeWine even, governor of Ohio, said that is just simply not true.

If the moderators in the debate ask Vance about this, should he finally make clear it is not true?

EMMER: Such a distraction. You – the people in the mainstream media want to put up these shiny objects to distract people from what they see happen every day.

RADDATZ: Congressman, the – Congressman, Vance and Trump have talked about this.

EMMER: The economy is not working for everybody. The border is wide open.

RADDATZ: Vance and Trump have talked about this issue. They brought it up.

EMMER: I'm telling you, they’ve got to focus on the issues.

RADDATZ: They will focus on the issues?

EMMER: I think they’ve got to focus on the issues. And the issues are very clear. The economy works under Donald Trump. It doesn’t work under Kamala Harris. The border is sealed under Donald Trump, and crime is under control. And the border is wide open, and Kamala Harris is going into Minnesota trying to bail out rioters and people who are attacking policeman with a bail fund. It just – the list goes on and on. It will be a very clear contrast between J.D. Vance and Donald Trump’s agenda, versus what Kamala Harris it talking about.

RADDATZ: I – I want to –

EMMER: I don’t know why you guys don’t ask her about her price controls, about – I mean she’s been way to the left.

RADDATZ: We – we – we do ask her about that. But I want to say, Mary Bruce just reported that Harris announced down there on the border several immigration policies she’s pursue as president, barring immigrants who illegally cross the border from reentering the country for five years, enacting stricter criminal penalties for repeat offenders.

Do you oppose those policies?

EMMER: I'm going to tell you, do we believe her now, after she’s had almost four years to solve the border crisis, and all she did was make sure that it was wide open. She never even bothered to go to the border until just this past week. And that’s because this is one of the number one issues in the campaign.

Everyone knows that when Donald Trump was in office, the border was sealed. Everyone knows that since Kamala Harris has been in office, the border has been wide open.

And it’s not just people who are migrants who are trying to come to this country for a better life, it’s criminals, it’s gang members. Everybody knows that. It’s terrorists. People on the terrorist watch list.

Martha, this is too little too late. Nobody can believe her because her actions have said something completely different for four years.

RADDATZ: OK, I can see this is going to be a very lively debate on Tuesday night.

Thanks for joining us this morning, Congressman, I appreciate it.

EMMER: Thank you, Martha.

MARTHA RADDATZ, ABC "THIS WEEK" CO-ANCHOR: And let’s bring in former Republican Senator Jeff Flake of Arizona, who, until just weeks ago, was the U.S. ambassador to Turkey.

Good morning. It’s good to see you, Ambassador.

And you broke some news this morning on X, announcing that you will support and endorse Kamala Harris.

Why now?

JEFF FLAKE, (R) FORMER ARIZONA SENATOR & FORMER U.S. AMBASSADOR TO TURKEY: Well, I couldn’t do it much before. Obviously, as ambassador, you can’t participate in partisan politics. But I'm happy – certainly happy to do so now.

RADDATZ: And – and tell me what you believe her strengths are. We just heard Congressman Emmer really zero in on the border. T hat she’s only been there twice. That she failed. That the border was wide open with the Biden-Harris administration.

You’re on a border state.

FLAKE: Right. Well, I'm happy that she went to the border, and I was pleased to hear what she had to say. If she wants to have a tougher policy than – than the Biden administration has employed. And I think that that’s certainly needed. And she’s been a prosecutor. She’s been a district attorney – I'm sorry, an attorney general. She – she knows what it takes. She knows the problems of the border. So, I was glad to see her go down there.

RADDATZ: But – but you said you – you hope to see something tougher than the Biden administration had. Were you critical of the border issue in the Biden-Harris administration? Do you think it needs much improvement?

FLAKE: Oh, I – I definitely think that we need to change our asylum policies in particular. And I think a lot of that would have been solved with the bill that the Senate worked out. I wish that that had continued forward, just like the bill that we had in 2013. I wish that that had passed. That would have done a lot to solve the problem.

RADDATZ: And you’re joining the ranks of several Republicans endorsing Harris recently. Notably Liz Cheney, Dick Cheney. Do you think it really makes a difference? Can you appeal to Republicans who may be on the fence?

FLAKE: Well, I think Republicans believe in the rule of law in particular. And it’s difficult to support a candidate who, having lost an election, tries to use the powers of the presidency to overturn that election. That is anything but respect for the rule of law. So, I know that a lot of conservative Republicans fell the way I do, that you just can’t support a candidate like that.

And – and with regard to tariffs as well, there are reasons to impose tariffs. But to pretend that we’re going to get a windfall of money from some foreign government because we’re imposing tariffs just doesn’t jive with what – where conservatives have been on free trade.

RADDATZ: I want to talk a little bit about your time as ambassador to Turkey for the Biden administration. Did you ever interact with Kamala Harris? How do you think she is qualified in her – your impression of her readiness to possibly be commander in chief?

FLAKE: I do think she’s ready. We saw her speak at the Munich Security Conference and in other international venues She understands what’s going on. She understands that we have real enemies abroad. But in particular we have indispensable allies as well, and we need to support them and work with them if we’re to defeat Russia, certainly, and the growing threat of China. It was really stark watching the debate the other day and – and hearing the former president not be able to even cheer for Ukraine. And that’s – that’s a big issues for me and – and certainly for all of Europe who have spent a lot of time and blood and sweat and tears trying to help Ukraine, you know, and deal with this Russian threat. We have to support and work with our allies. And she understand that.

RADDATZ: Both the Harris and Trump campaigns have recently been focusing and courting Mormon voters in Arizona. I know you remember the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. They make up about 6 percent of your state’s population. Mitt Romney is not endorsing Harris. Would your vote, would your endorsement with those Mormon voters, make a difference? And could those Mormon voters make a real difference in the presidential election?

FLAKE: Well, I – I – I won’t speak to that. Everyone makes their own decision. I can only speak for myself and – and where I am.

RADDATZ: And you – you don’t think the endorsement has any – do you think they should be courting the Mormon voters, the Democrats?

FLAKE: I think any candidate ought to court any votes that they can get. And – and I do think that – that Vice President Harris can win Arizona. I think she’s gaining here. And so I think she ought to court all voters. And I do believe that that includes moderate Republicans and conservative Republicans who believe in – in the rule of law, in limited government, the economic freedom, individual responsibility. She ought to recourt (ph) everyone. And I think she’ll do well here.

RADDATZ: Well, let’s go back to the border for a minute. You – you say you think she needs to do tougher things, that the Democrats need to have a tougher policy. That is not resonating. You have seen the polls. It is simply not resonating with voters. It is a huge venerability for the Democrats. So, how does she convince people that it will be tougher in time for Election Day?

FLAKE: Well, I think she’s doing that. And she outlined a couple of policies where she would be more – she would be tougher on the border, particularly with asylum policies. We’ve got to have a situation where we have comprehensive reform. One thing that she brings to the table is that she knows how to work on a bipartisan basis. And if we do immigration reform that endures, it’s going to have to be bipartisan.

So, I'm obviously very pleased that she would sign the legislation that was worked up in the Senate. That’s what we need to do. It needs to be bipartisan in order for it to be lasting.

RADDATZ: OK, thanks very much for joining us this morning. Good to see you.

FLAKE: Thank you.

RADDATZ: Thanks, Ambassador.

Up next, after Israel’s assassination of Hezbollah’s leader, will the threat of a wider war get worse. We’ll ask White House National Security Spokesman John Kirby.

We’re back in two minutes.

MARTHA RADDATZ, ABC “THIS WEEK” CO-ANCHOR: Thanks so much, Ian Pannell in Beirut.

I’m joined now by White House national security communications adviser, John Kirby.

Good to see you, Admiral Kirby, this morning.

JOHN KIRBY, WHITE HOUSE NATIONAL SECURITY COMMUNICATIONS ADVISER: Thanks.

RADDATZ: Hezbollah has now basically had its leadership wiped out and hundreds if not thousands of operatives wounded or some dead. So who has the keys to Hezbollah now and what changes?

KIRBY: I don't think that's exactly clear, Martha, exactly how they're going to figure out what the leadership structure looks like. We fully expect that somebody will be anointed and somebody will probably try to take Mr. Nasrallah's place. He's been in command of Hezbollah for some 30 years. So, we'll see who they decide to put in charge and where this goes.

I think to your point, though, the command structure has been nearly decimated, thousands of missiles and drones destroyed by Israel over the last few days. There's no question that the Hezbollah today is not the Hezbollah that was even just a week ago.

RADDATZ: But they still have capability. I mean, do you have any estimate of long range missiles or how much firepower still remains?

KIRBY: I don't think we have a clear picture of exactly how much capability they have but you're absolutely right. You can't just count them out. They still have quite a bit of capability left.

RADDATZ: And you know, the U.S., you, and everyone in the administration has talked about deescalating this conflict, calming it down, tamping it down, but let me ask you this. Why shouldn't Israel at this point when Hezbollah is so vulnerable when they've had so many people wiped out just go full bore after Hezbollah?

KIRBY: Look, I think to a degree, both things can be true, Martha. They have -- Israel has a right and a responsibility to eliminate this threat to their people and to their land, to their sovereignty. It is a terrorist organization. They are still launching missiles and rockets at Israel, and they have a right to be concerned about whatever infrastructure remains of Hezbollah. This is a well-armed, well-resourced group.

At the same time, we believe that we do need to look for ways to deescalate the tensions to prevent this from coming an all-out war, which is why the G7 nations got together the other night and called for a 21-day ceasefire to see if we can't find time and space for diplomacy to work. Both things can be true at the same time.

RADDATZ: Of course, now, all eyes are on Iran. What do you expect Iran to do? First of all, their proxies are vulnerable right now, both of them Hamas and Hezbollah. Will Iran itself respond? What are you seeing there? And the Houthis as well.

KIRBY: Well, the rhetoric certainly suggests they're going to try to do something. I mean, just coming out of Tehran. But we don't really know. We're watching this very, very closely, to see how -- if and how Hezbollah and/or Iran may react, as well as the militia groups in Iraq and Syria.

We have to be prepared for some sort of response. We have to make sure that we are ready and we -- and we are. We believe we have the force capability we need in the region.

But it's not clear right now. Too soon to know how Iran's going to react to this.

RADDATZ: And I know you say you have the force capability in the region. President Biden said yesterday: I directed my secretary of defense to further enhance the defense posture of U.S. military forces in the Middle East to deter aggression, reduce the risk of a broader regional war.

What -- what does that mean exactly? I know you've added some troops. Are they dozens? Are they hundreds? And what will they be doing?

KIRBY: There's a contingency of additional forces in the region right now to help us with any possible contingencies that might come up.

RADDATZ: Dozens more? I mean, I know we have 40,000 troops in the region.

KIRBY: Yeah, I don't want to get into the exact numbers or who these guys are, but -- but we did we -- did deploy some additional forces into the region.

I would tell you that there's other options available as well in terms of adding and enhancing that force posture. I’m not prepared this morning to talk about that in any great detail or make any announcements. That -- that'll be up to the commander-in-chief to do.

I would add, though, that we now have more force capability in the Middle East than we did in April when Iran launched hundreds of missiles and drones. So there is already a very robust military capability to defend ourselves and to help defend Israel if it comes to that.

RADDATZ: What does Israel say when you tell them that there are repercussions for what they're doing? Which means our troops could be harmed.

KIRBY: I believe that the Israelis know very well, and not just from our conversations but they know because they live in a tough neighborhood that -- that the United States could also become and has become in the fact in fact targets of some of these attacks particularly by the (INAUDIBLE) groups. I think they understand that.

And we're having those discussions with them right now about sort of what is the next best step or steps forward. At the same time, as the president said yesterday, we got to make sure we've got the ability to defend our troops and our facilities if it comes to that and we believe we do.

RADDATZ: And if the situation does escalate, we certainly hope it does not. Are you absolutely certain we are prepared to get Americans out of Lebanon or -- or even Israel? Completely prepared?

I know -- I hate to look back on this, but Afghanistan, no preparation. I know it's very different. But are you confident you could do it this time?

KIRBY: We have contingency plans for evacuations in just about every corner of the world, Martha, and we are -- everything that we are doing and everything that Secretary Austin is doing at the Defense Department is to make sure we have the requisite capability and the planning and preparation capability available to us.

So we are working our way through that. I would add that right now, the State Department does not feel a need for that. That -- that there are still commercial operations, commercial air traffic that is getting out of Beirut and are still available to those Americans that want to leave.

We again urge Americans, if you're in Lebanon and you want to go, go now while these options are available to you.

RADDATZ: John, I have a very short period of time here, but should the hostage families still have hope? They are losing hope.

KIRBY: Yes. Yes. We want them to have hope. We have hope. We're not giving up on them.

And we -- absolutely, they need to know that President Biden is doing everything he can to make sure the team is focused on getting them home.

RADDATZ: Okay, thanks so much for joining us, Admiral Kirby.

KIRBY: You bet (ph).

RADDATZ: Coming up, who has more to lose Tuesday night, Tim Walz or J.D. Vance?

Plus, the corruption scandal engulfing New York City's mayor. Could it shape who wins the U.S. House? The roundtable is here for that and more.

We'll be right back.