Transcript for President Trump backs his Supreme Court nominee
Gentlemen, a lot of people have been waiting for this night, so, let’s get going. Our first subject is the supreme court. President trump, you nominated Amy coney Barrett over the weekend to succeed the late Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the court. You say the constitution is clear about your obligation and the senate’s to consider a nominee to the court. Vice president Biden, you say that this is an effort by the president and Republicans to jam through an appointment in what you call an abuse of power. My first question, to both of you tonight, why are you right in the argument you make and your opponent wrong? And where do you think a justice Barrett would take the court? President trump, in this first segment, you go first, two minutes. Thank you very much, Chris. I will tell you very simply, we won the election. Elections have consequences. We have the senate. We have the white house and we have a phenomenal nominee, respected by all, top, top academic, good in every way. Good in every way. In fact, some of her biggest endorsers are very liberal people, from notre dame and other places, so, I think she’s going to be fantastic. We have plenty of time. Even if we did it after the election itself. I have a lot of time after the election, as you know. So, I think that she will be outstanding, she’s going to be as good as anybody that has served on that court, we really feel that. We have a professor at notre dame, highly respected by all, said she’s the single greatest student he’s ever had. He’s been a professor for a long time at a great school and we just — we won the election and therefore, we have the right to choose her and very few people knowingly would say otherwise, and by the way, the Democrats, they wouldn’t even think about not doing it. If they had — the only difference is, they’d try to do it faster. There’s no way they would give it up. They had Merrick Garland but the problem is, they didn’t have the election, so, they were stopped. And probably that would happen in reverse also. Definitely would happen in reverse. So, we won the election and we have the right to do it, Chris. President trump, thank you. Same question to you, vice president Biden, you have two minutes. Well, first of all, thank you for doing this and looking forward to this, Mr. President. Thank you, Joe. The American people have a right to have a say in who the supreme court nominee is. And that say occurs when they vote for a United States senator and when they vote for the president of the United States. They’re not going to get that chance now because we’re in the middle of an election already. The election has already started. Tens of thousands of people have already voted. And so the thing that should happen is, we should wait. We should wait and see what the outcome of this election is, because that’s the only way the American people get to express their view, is by who they elect as president and who they elect as vice president. Now, what’s at stake here, the president’s made it clear he wants to get rid of the aforable care act. He’s been running on that, he ran on that and he has been governing on that. He’s in the supreme court right now trying to get rid of the affordable care act, which will strip 20 million people from having insurance, health insurance, now, if they — if it goes into court. And the justice — and I have nothing — I’m not opposed to the justice, she seems like a very fine person, but she’s written before she went on the bench, which is her right, that she thinks that the affordable care act is not constitutional. The other thing that’s on the court, and if it is struck down, what happens? Women’s rights are fundamentally changed. Once again, a woman could be pay more money because she has a pre-existing condition of pregnancy. They’re able to charge a woman more for the same exact procedure a man gets. And that ended when we, in fact, passed the affordable care act. And there’s 100 million people who have pre-existing conditions. And they’ll be taken away, as well. Those pre-existing conditions, insurance companies are going to love this. And so, it’s just not appropriate to do this before this election. If he wins the election and the senate is Democrat or Republican, then he goes forward, if not, we should wait until February. There aren’t 100 million people with pre-existing conditions. The people already had their say. Okay, justice Ginsburg said very powerfully, very strongly, at some point, ten years agoor so, said a president and the senate is elected for a period of time. But a president’s elected for four years. We’re not elected for three years. I’m not elected for three years. So, we have the senate — He’s elected until the next election. During that period of time, we have — I’m not elected for three years. The election’s already started. The 100 million people is totally wrong. The bigger problem that you have is that you’re going to extinguish 180 million people with their private health care — That’s simply not true. This is — gentlemen, we’re now into open discussion. Yes, I agree, go ahead, vice president. Number one, he knows what I proposed. What I proposed is that we expand Obamacare and we increase it. We do not wipe any — and one of the big debates we had with 23 of my colleagues trying to win the nomination that I won were saying that Biden wanted to allow people to have private insurance still. They can. They do. They will under my proposal. That’s not what you’ve said and not what your party has said. Your party didn’t say that. That is simply a lie. Your party wants to go socialist medicine. The party is me, I am the democratic party. I am the democratic party right now. The platform of the democratic — Not according to Harris. The democratic party is what I approved of. What I approved of. Now here’s the deal. The deal is that it’s going to wipe out pre-existing conditions. By the way. 200,000 people that have died on his watch, how many of those that have survived, well, there’s 7 million people that contracted covid. What does it mean for them going forward if you strike down the affordable care act? Joe, you’ve had 308,000 military people die because you couldn’t provide them proper health care in the military. So, don’t tell me about this. I’m happy to talk about this. If you were here, it would be 2 million people because you were very late on the draw. Late on the draw. China was heavily infected. You didn’t want me to ban — Gentlemen. Mr. President — Mr. President. You’re talking about 2 million people. You’re not going to be able to shut him up. We’re going to talk about covid in the next segment, but go ahead. Let me finish. The point is that, the president also is opposed to roe V. Wade. That’s on the ballot, as well, and in the court. So that is also at stake right now. And so, the election is all — You don’t know what’s on the ballot. Why is it on the ballot? Why is it on the ballot? It’s not on the ballot. It’s on the ballot in the court. In the court. There’s nothing happening there. Donald, would you just be quiet for a minute. You don’t know her view. Well, all right. Let’s talk — we got a lot to unpack here, gentlemen. We got a lot of time. On health care, then we’ll come
This transcript has been automatically generated and may not be 100% accurate.
