This is a rush transcript from "Your World," August 14, 2012. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
NEIL CAVUTO, HOST OF "YOUR WORLD": Is it me or is Allen West in the news a lot these days? Anyways, fighting in this very tough reelection campaign. His opponents have not been afraid to take shots, some of them pretty petty. One local attack ad going as far as depicting the conservative congressman repeatedly punching two women. It's not true. It's not true. It's all JibJab nonsense, whatever.
The congressman wasting no time fighting back today with this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The ad shows Allen West punching women and stealing cash.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: With a gold foot, hitting two white people.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Punching females, seniors.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And taking money from a family.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They said the ad plays on negative racial stereotypes and they know who to blame.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The ad is mainly funded by the father of Patrick Murphy.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CAVUTO: You've seen all the attack stuff. Or is it me or in the media they generally ignore the guy who's getting attacked? Now we called his opponent, Patrick Murphy, and hoped to have him on soon, but we thought it would be fair game to at least have the guy constantly being attacked on, Congressman Allen West.
Good to have you, sir.
REP. ALLEN WEST, R-FLA.: Always a pleasure to be with you, Neil. How are you?
CAVUTO: Well, I'm OK. You know I was away a little while, and then I'm hearing about all of these attacks on you, and reading them. The first one I heard about, oh, my God, the congressman is beating up women. I would have never assumed that, and then all of a sudden we realize, wait, wait, wait.
And yet there are a lot of people who seriously think, seriously think that that was the case and lo and behold you respond with a campaign. What do you think of the way the media treats you?
WEST: Well, I think that when you look at the way that the media treats overall black conservatives, there's an incredible bit of duplicitous hypocrisy out there, where people believe they can say whatever they wish about us.
And I also look at that as a badge of honor, because I think this level of desperation that you already see shows that the other side, our opponents do not have any ideas. They do not have any plans. And so they have to try to attack your character, which is not going to work. And having spent 22 years in the United States military, I think people need to understand I know a little bit about strategy and tactics, and I can quickly turn and counterattack to any attack that they bring forth.
CAVUTO: What are you doing with this attack? It's one thing to say I'm not beating up older women. I don't know what you have to do to set the record straight here, but a lot of people will see in the ad, even in the attack ads on you, oh, it's just a play on things and all.
But then people start talking about the ad. And they say stuff like this, congressman. Oh, did you see the one where Allen West is hitting the old lady? And that's when it takes on a currency and the life and a disturbing one of its own. So, how do you respond to that?
WEST: Well, the thing is very simple. You define yourself before anyone else has the opportunity to define you.
And so when people see this ad, they are just absolutely disgusted. They saw it as despicable. Many people saw it quite frankly as racist and showing me with a gold tooth and punching white women to include a senior, which everybody knows that is not me.
(CROSSTALK)
CAVUTO: It was blatantly racist. If the shoe were on the other foot, oh, my God, they'd be -- as they should if it were on the other foot, but not so with you.
(CROSSTALK)
WEST: Yes. Well, like I said, when you think about the fair game, when you look at the liberal establishment and of course the mainstream media, if you are someone that does not agree with them, and you are someone that threatens them, Neil, for the life of me I can't understand why would the left want to attack somebody that was brought in the inner city of Atlanta, Georgia, the third of four generations of servicemen, served 22 years in the military?
I've been married for 23 years and I have a wife with an MBA and Ph.D. That's a financial broker. We have two beautiful daughters, one in college and one a sophomore in high school. We're the American dream. Why would they want to attack that? Because they are threatened by that because we're not part of that liberal, let's be very honest, that economic dependency plantation, which they would love to have.
CAVUTO: The ad that you're responding and the way you're trying to get in front of this before anyone frames you is the same thing that is being recommended Paul Ryan do, so that he's not framed as a granny killer and all of this.
What do you think of that? And any recommendations and advice for him on how he handles these attacks?
WEST: Well, as I would say, you have to define yourself early, so that when these types of attacks come you can quickly parry against the attacks and counterattack, because the longer something like that stays out there without a response from you, you are right, it does start to take hold.
I think a lot of people believe that negative attacks do work, and they do work if you don't quickly turn against it and counterattack and get something else out there and put the other person on their heels. So now what we have been able to do is bring forth the local news reports that talked about how this seems racist, how it seemed very misogynist, as well the fact that you have a young man running for congressional office and his father has established a PAC just for him, for himself, and you can't tell me there's no collusion between sonny and daddy on this.
CAVUTO: Well, I always say, no matter where you stand on the issues, let's stick to the issues. The personal stuff, right or left, is just -- it's insulting.
Congressman, thank you very much.
WEST: Well, if you can't talk about the debt and the deficit, this is what you resort to.
CAVUTO: Yes, sad either way. All right.
Content and Programming Copyright 2012 Fox News Network, Inc. Copyright CQ-2012 Roll Call, Inc. All materials herein are protected by United States copyright law and may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, displayed, published or broadcast without the prior written permission of CQ-Roll Call. You may not alter or remove any trademark, copyright or other notice from copies of the content.
Get all the stories you need-to-know from the most powerful name in news delivered first thing every morning to your inbox