Bachmann: Don't Count Me Out of Race, Part 1
GOP presidential candidate hitting Iowa hard in hopes of toppling GOP field
This is a rush transcript from "Hannity," September 30, 2011. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
SEAN HANNITY, HOST: "The Anointed One" is frantically trying to explain his complete and utter failure to turn around the American economy as the Dow today dropped over 240 points, the biggest quarterly drop since the financial crisis in late 2008. But according to the president, the problem lies with you, the American people, not with any of his policy proposals. Now, here's what he told a Florida television station just yesterday.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, WESH/ORLANDO)
PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: The way I think about it is, you know, this is, you know, a great country, great country that had gotten a little soft and, you know, we didn't have that same competitive edge that we needed over the last couple of decades. We need to get back on track.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: You know, "The Anointed One's" starting to sound more and more like Jimmy Carter. He also blamed the American people for his political failures. For example, remember this?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, JULY 15, 1979)
JIMMY CARTER, FORMER PRESIDENT: The threat is nearly invisible in ordinary ways, it is a crisis of confidence. It is a crisis that strikes at the very heart and soul and spirit of our national will. We can see this crisis in the growing doubt about the meaning of our own lives and in the loss of a unity of purpose for our nation.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: Who knows, maybe the president is just trying to make it easy or as easy as possible for one of his Republican challengers to unseat him. On that front, Mitt Romney, Rick Perry seem to be holding their place as frontrunners in this primary. Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann, she has not given up the fight for the GOP nomination. She joins us tonight live with her take on the very latest from the president. Congresswoman, welcome back. Good to see you.
REP. MICHELE BACHMANN, R-MINN.: Thank you. Good to see you, Sean.
HANNITY: You know, we have a crisis in confidence. You know what? Everybody watching this program this Friday night, you're soft. You've given up. You are too soft. 46.2 million Americans in poverty, soft. Eighteen million Americans unemployed. They are soft. Under-employed, they're soft. It has nothing to do with Obama. He's right. It's all our fault. Right?
BACHMANN: Well, he's the master of negativism. But I've got a very positive story to tell. In order to get more competition back into our economy and to get a pro-growth economy, this is actually pretty simple question to solve. We have to repeal Obamacare, a study came just out from UBS last week that said, that's the number one reason why employers aren't hiring. So, that's pretty simple. I've got that bill to repeal Obamacare. The other thing we need to do is clean up the financial services sector because Dodd-Frank does to the financial services sector what Obamacare does to health care, in other words, it destroys competition. Obama only has had only one impulse, and that's to monopolize and centralize more of the economy under himself, under the administration. So, we need to do is have a competitive tax code, get rid of his monopolistic policies. And we will bounce back just fine. The problem is not the American people, Sean. The problem is his policies.
HANNITY: All right. But this is my question. What is it -- I'm trying to understand this. The guy that, him and his wife, they fly on separate planes to and from Martha's Vineyard. More golf outings than any golfer that I know. He plays basketball. They got concerts. They take these fancy vacations. And I'm thinking, you know, it seems a little out of touch here, with maybe, you know, a little bit of spice of arrogance and detachment. Do you see that? What does it tell you about him?
BACHMANN: Well, every day, I'm somewhere else on a plane, meeting people all across this great country. And I just came from North Carolina. I met with a group of business people in North Carolina who are looking for a way out, so we can see the economy grow again. They tell me 90 percent of their problems are coming from the federal government. So, let's go back to the federal government and solve those problems. They're entirely solvable. We could legalize American energy production. We could pass the already negotiated free trade agreements. We could pass a mother of all repeal bills and repeal all the job-killing regulations that are costing us $1.8 trillion a year, or we could stop putting out the billions of dollars from the Department of Energy for all of President Obama's big political donors and stop crony capitalism. There's a lot of places we could start, but the president is so out of touch, he's living in his own parallel universe while the rest of America is waiting to produce again.
HANNITY: All right. Here's the Vice President Joe Biden. They got to this guy a teleprompter. Somebody needs to get him up to speed. I don't blame the people in this country for being mad. We're in charge. Let me play this for and you get your reaction.
BACHMANN: OK.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, WLRN)
VICE PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: There is a lot of people in Florida that have good reason to be upset because they have lost their jobs. Even though 50-some percent of the American people think the economy tanked because of the last administration, that's not relevant. What's relevant is, we're in charge. And right now, we are the ones in charge and it's gotten better, but it hasn't gotten good enough and in states like Florida, it's even been more stagnant because of the real estate market. And so, I don't blame them for being mad. We're in charge.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: I don't blame them for being mad, we're in charge. It's our policies. We got you here.
BACHMANN: You can always count on the vice president to tell the truth. That's what he said about Solyndra as well. He said, that's what the stimulus is for. He always tells the truth. Just like Nancy Pelosi said, we had to pass the bill to know what's in it. They have failed the American people. And I will tell you. Here's the great news, Sean. Again, I am out every day with people across the country. They have made up their mind Sean, Obama will be a one-term president. Now the issue is, are we going to settle for a candidate that is less than a constitutional conservative? That's what we need to have, a strong, bold constitutional conservative who is actually going to do what needs to be done, with repealing these terrible laws and putting into place permanent, private- sector solutions to grow the economy. That's what I aim to do.
HANNITY: All right. You use the words, "We can't settle." You have you a new web ad out that says we can't settle on immigration. Am I interpreting it wrong that this is your position is, that the other candidates in this race, that if they win the nomination, that we would be settling?
BACHMANN: Well, sure, we would be settling if we don't build a fence on the southern border. We have to build that fence on every inch of the southern border. We have a narcoterrorism threat and we also have a threat of potential terrorists coming across that border. And it's also killing our economy with billions of dollars in cost to the economy and it's costing us jobs.
HANNITY: But some of the candidates support your idea for a fence. You're not the only one. I know that this became a big issue for Governor Perry and his position on immigration and in-state tuition. But a lot of the other candidates also support your idea on immigration on the fence. But you seem to be saying no, no, no, I have the strongest position on immigration. How is yours different?
BACHMANN: Well, what I am saying with my position is that I will build the fence. I will make sure that we have the border security that they're full of resourced. I will have their back. I will have the ICE agents' back. And we will end taxpayer subsidy for illegal immigrants in the United States. We will have a wholesale change. And I also believe that English needs to be the official language of the federal government.
HANNITY: All right. Congresswoman, where are you off to next? Are you on the road this weekend? You got any time off?
BACHMANN: I will be in Iowa. I will be with my husband tonight, which I can't wait. And then we will be back to the wonderful state of Iowa.
HANNITY: All right. Congresswoman Bachmann, GOP presidential candidate, thank you for being with us.
BACHMANN: Thanks, Sean.
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