Tim Kaine
I deeply believe - and not just as a matter of politics, but even as a matter of morality - that matters about reproduction and intimacy and relationships and contraception are in the personal realm. They're moral decisions for individuals to make for themselves. And the last thing we need is government intruding into those personal decisions.
I will say, nothing in my time in the Senate has more surprised me than senators and House members want to weigh in on everything under the sun, but they do not want to weigh in on a clearly defined constitutional duty to declare war. It just stuns me.
It seemed to me to be entirely un-kosher, if that's a word, to try to put a debate about war right in front of the midterm to try to affect the midterm outcomes.
As soon as something really bad happens, I guarantee you Congress will act. I absolutely guarantee you Congress will act. But the question is, should we wait for that?
McCain is completely against the sequester. It was one thing when we had a Democratic chair who was against it - all the Democrats were against it. But to have a Republican chair who is outspoken and strong against the sequester, who has the credentials in military issues - who is going to challenge him?
A drone isn't any different than a bomb; it's not any different than other weapons that are used, where there is always a capacity for people to be killed who you wished were not. It's just the weapons platform.
Let me let you in on a secret. I do plan to be on the podium with President Clinton when she's inaugurated in January 2017 - but I'm going to be sitting with the senators.
If we are going to be serious about enforcing the law, we have to have a background record check system to make sure that people don't get weapons who shouldn't.
Most evil in the world is only partly because of an evil person. Most of it is because of the complicity of bystanders.Collection: Bystanders
The way you make communities safer and police safer is through community policing.Collection: Community
Donald Trump has broken his first promise [to release taxes]. Second he stood on this stage last week and when Hillary said you haven't been paying taxes, he said, that makes me smart. So it's smart not to pay for our military. It's smart not to pay for veterans, it's smart not to pay for teachers and I guess all of us who do pay for those things I guess we're stupid.Collection: Teacher
Criminal justice is about respecting the law and being respected by the law so there is a fundamental respect issue here.Collection: Law
If you want to have a society where people are respected and respect laws, you can't have somebody at the top who demeans every group that he talks about.Collection: Law
I have lived according to rules that I embrace, but I don't feel like my job is to force others to embrace the rules that I embrace for myself.Collection: Jobs
You [Republicans] are not going to cut taxes. You're going to raise taxes on the middle class.Collection: Cutting
The great presidents are people who watch out for others.Collection: People
America is a nation of immigrants. We have to have a functioning immigration system.Collection: America
I worry that a Trump presidency doesn't show the true face of America to the world, but I think that peaceful protest all around this country, it showed to the world who we really are.Collection: Country
Peace should be our future.Collection: Should
Donald Trump doesn't have a plan. He said, I have a secret plan, and then he said, um, I know more than all the generals about ISIS. And then he said, I'm going to call the generals to help me figure out a plan. And finally he said, I'm going to fire all the generals. He doesn't have a plan. But he does have dangerous ideas.Collection: Fire
Why don't you trust women to make this choice for themselves? We can encourage people to support life. Of course we can. But why don't you trust women? Why doesn't Donald Trump trust women to make this choice for themselves? That's what we ought to be doing in public life. Living our lives of faith or motivation with enthusiasm and excitement, convincing other, dialoguing with each other about important moral issues of the day but on fundamental issues of morality, we should let women make their own decisions.Collection: Motivation
Matters about reproduction and intimacy and relationships and contraception are in the personal realm. They're moral decisions for individuals to make for themselves.Collection: Decision
I think people are very focused on the economic issues. They want an economy that works for everybody.Collection: Thinking
Donald Trump always puts himself first. He built a business career, in the words of one of his own campaign staffers, "off the backs of the little guy." And as a candidate, he started his campaign with a speech where he called Mexicans rapists and criminals, and he has pursued the discredited and really outrageous lie that President Obama wasn't born in the United States. It is so painful to suggest that we go back to think about these days where an African-American could not be a citizen of the United States.Collection: Lying
I don't think that women should be punished as Donald Trump said they should, for making the decision to have an abortion.Collection: Thinking
If you want to know about the character of somebody in public life, look to see if they have a passion that has animated them throughout their life, whether they were in office or out, whether they were winning elections or losing them.Collection: Passion
We spend at least $5 for remedial education right now for every dollar we put in early childhood education. All the studies on early childhood education show this is going to pay for itself.Collection: Childhood
In the wake of Hillary Clinton's tenure as secretary of state, where she was the architect of the Obama administration's foreign policy, we see entire portions of the world, particularly the wider Middle East, literally spinning out of control.Collection: Mean
I think you should live your moral values. But the last thing, the very last thing that government should do is have laws that would punish women who make reproductive choices. And that is the fundamental difference between a Clinton-Kaine ticket and a Trump- Pence ticket that wants to punish women who make that choice.Collection: Thinking
We support the constitutional right of American women to consult their own conscience, their own supportive partner, their own minister, but then make their own decision about pregnancy. That's something we trust American women to do that. And we don't think that women should be punished, as Donald Trump said they should, for making the decision to have an abortion.Collection: Pregnancy
When I was running for governor, I was attacked pretty strongly because of my position on the death penalty. But I looked the voters of Virginia in the eye and said, look, this is my religion. I'm not going to change my religious practice to get one vote, but I know how to take an oath and uphold the law. And if you elect me, I will uphold the law.Collection: Running
It was Hillary Clinton who worked with Russia on the New START Treaty to reduce their nuclear weapons stockpile. It was Hillary Clinton that worked with Russia to get them engaged in a community of nations to stop the Iranian nuclear weapons without firing a shot. She's not going around praising Vladimir Putin as a great guy. But she knows how to sit down at a table and negotiate tough deals. This is a very challenging part of the world, and we ought to have a commander-in-chief who is prepared and done it, rather than somebody who goes around praising Vladimir Putin as a great leader.Collection: Guy
Governor Pence said, inarguably, Vladimir Putin is a better leader than President Obama.Collection: Leader
Vladimir Putin is a dictator. He's not a leader. Anybody who thinks otherwise doesn't know Russian history and they don't know Vladimir Putin. Hillary Clinton knows exactly who this guy is. John McCain said, I look in his eyes and I see KGB. And Hillary kind of has that same feeling.Collection: Eye
In Donald Trump, you have somebody who praises Vladimir Putin all the time. America should really wonder about a President Trump, who had a campaign manager with ties to Putin, pro- Putin elements in the Ukraine, who had to be fired for that reason. They should wonder - when Donald Trump is sitting down with Vladimir Putin, is it going to be America's bottom line or is it going to be Donald Trump's bottom line that he's going to be worried about with all of his business dealings?Collection: President
So get this. On 9/11, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump's hometown was attacked by the worst terrorist attack in the history of the United States. Young men and women - young men and women signed up to serve in the military to fight terrorism. Hillary Clinton went to Washington to get funds to rebuild her city and protect first responders, but Donald Trump was fighting a very different fight. It was a fight to avoid paying taxes so that he wouldn't support the fight against terror.Collection: Military
The Trump campaign management team had to be fired a month or so ago because of those shadowy connections with pro-Putin forces. Governor Pence made the odd claim, he said inarguably Vladimir Putin is a better leader than President Obama. Vladimir Putin has run his economy into the ground. He persecutes LGBT folks and journalists. If you don't know the difference between dictatorship and leadership, then you got to go back to a fifth-grade civics class.Collection: Running
Hillary and I will do immigration enforcement and we'll vet refugees based on whether they're dangerous or not. We won't do it based on discriminating against you from the country you come from or the religion that you practice.Collection: Country
Trump loves dictators. He's got kind of a personal Mount Rushmore, Vladimir Putin, Kim Jong-un, Moammar Gadhafi and Saddam Hussein. And last and most dangerously, Donald Trump believes - Donald Trump believes that the world will be safer if more nations have nuclear weapons.Collection: Believe
We should let women make their own decisions.Collection: Decision
When Donald Trump says women should be punished or Mexicans are rapists and criminals or John McCain's not a hero, he is showing you who he is.Collection: Hero
If you think, what was the last really big, big accomplishment for the nation that came purely out of the legislature? It might be the Americans with Disabilities Act. I mean that really was a legislative creation.Collection: Mean
If you think of big, legislative accomplishments, most of them kind of get initiated with the president putting something out there and Congress working on it.Collection: Thinking
I do think the president's best role is usually as the sort of initiator.Collection: Thinking
It's immoral to ask people to risk their life.Collection: People
Vladimir Putin is a dictator. He's not a leader. Anybody who thinks otherwise doesn't know Russian history and they don't know Vladimir Putin.Collection: Thinking
Richard Nixon released tax returns when he was under audit.Collection: Return
When Congressman [Mike] Pence was in Congress, he was the chief cheerleader for the privatization of Social Security. Even after President [George W.] Bush stopped pushing for it, Congressman Pence kept pushing for it.Collection: President
Donald Trump started this campaign in 2014 he said if I run for president I'll absolutely release my taxes.Collection: Running