Republican 'brand' hurt: Sanford, Ensign

by Mark Silva

The Republican "brand'' has suffered with the admissions of extramarital affairs by two of the party's most promising members, another Republican prospect for national office said today.

The confessions of South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford and Nevada Sen. John Ensign in recent weeks have taken a yet immeasurable toll, Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty said this morning, in an appearance on CNN's State of the Union.

"It's hard to quantify that,'' Pawlenty told CNN's John King. "But, clearly, there's been damage. Any time you have leading figures who are engaged in behavior that is sad and troubling and hypocritical,other people are going to look at that and say,'Hmm, they don't walk the walk.' And so the words and the actions don't ring true.

"But it's a sad and troubling situation with Jenny and Mark Sanford,'' said Pawlenty, who was considered as a potential GOP running mate last year, will not be seeking another term as governor but could be a national contender in the future.

"I'm proud of Jenny for her strength and her commitment to her family and keeping that family together,'' he said. "And, frankly, I was glad to see her not standing at the press conference like many others have, and, kind of, charting her own path, saying, look, I'm willing to forgive him, but I'm not going to stand there and condone this in any way.

"But it certainly hurts the brand. It's hard to quantify it.''

As for his own plans, and any possibility of seeking that GOP presidential nomination down the road, Pawlenty said: "You know, John, I don't know what the future holds for me, but I do know this. I feel strongly about the values and principles for the Republican Party. I believe I have something to say about that.''

Here, courtesy of CNN, is a transcript of the Pawlenty interview:

JOHN KING, CNN ANCHOR: When our next guest recently decided against seeking a third term as governor, the buzz in conservative circles started immediately. Sarah Palin and Mitt Romney already viewed as possible 2012 presidential contenders. And close associated of Tim Pawlenty urged activists and reporters to add the Minnesota governor to that list too.

But his day job remains leading a state with rising unemployment and a budget crisis, because a painful recession means lower revenues. And as he navigates those difficulties, Governor Pawlenty is often critical of the proposals of the Obama White House that the president says are designed to help. Governor Pawlenty joins us now here in D.C.

Welcome to STATE OF THE UNION. And let's start with the big debate. And we'll get to some of the policy specifics, but I want to talk first about the goals. The president says it is urgent that the United States extend accessibility to health care and have universal or near universal coverage. Do you share that goal?

PAWLENTY: Well, there are goals of three parts for health care reform, John. One is extending coverage, called access, but there are other goals, as well, which is cost containment, because it's bankrupting cities, states, businesses, the federal government. And the third is making sure we maintain quality.

So you can obsess just about access, but if you don't also contain costs and preserve quality, you're in big trouble. And the federal proposal is largely modeled so far after what happened in Massachusetts. They succeeded in extending access, but the cost of that program is now double, triple, and some would say soon-to-be quadruple what they originally estimated. That would be a bad development for those of us who are concerned about the uncontrollable rise in health care costs.

KING: Well, that -- let's go through some of the specifics. To pay for this, the president says about $1 trillion over 10 years. Let me start with the threshold question. Can we afford that right now?

PAWLENTY: Well, the president said not long ago in an interview quote-unquote, "we are out of money." With all due respect, Mr. President, if we're out of money, quit spending it.

And so, no, we can't afford it. This is a nation that has got a debt load and a deficit load that is unsustainable. We're going to have, in my view, the federal government debt crisis equivalent of the mortgage crisis within 20 years.

And notwithstanding the rhetoric, the Obama administration does not appear serious to address this out of control spending.

KING: To pay for health care, he says -- and you know the argument, he says we can't afford not to do it. That the economic and the health crisis will only grow if we don't do it now. But one of the ways he says he can pay for this is to squeeze substantially from Medicare and Medicaid.

Those are federal programs. It's about 50 percent of the money in the health care system comes from the federal government. You're a governor, you are on the receiving end, and your state and your hospitals have to pick up the tab when people without insurance come into emergency rooms and the like.

If we squeeze hundreds of billions out of Medicare and Medicaid, what happens to a governor?

PAWLENTY: John, I looked at some of the proposals that were on the table that are in Congress right now. They're actually proposing to expand Medicaid and Medicare eligibility, to expand benefit sets. They're talking about reducing nominally reimbursements of payments to providers.

But I think what they're going to end up doing is running up the costs of those programs under these proposals. We share, as Republicans, the goal of health care reform, to get more access, to control costs, to improve quality. But the way to do that isn't to have the government take over the system.

The way to do that is to give consumers good information about price and quality, and then give them financial incentives to use the system wisely and give financial help directly to those who need it.

We've done that in Minnesota in a variety of ways and that is the way to reform and control health care costs in this country, not to have a new federal bureaucracy.

KING: Well, you say new federal bureaucracy, the president says this public option, that if you -- you can have your private insurance, you can have what you have from your employer, if you like it, keep it. But if you don't have that or if you want to look around in the marketplace, there will be this government plan.

And if you like that, maybe you opt out instead. Maybe it will be a little cheaper. Maybe it will offer a different mix of benefits. What's wrong in a mix, as long as there is a mix, of having a public option?

PAWLENTY: Well, what's wrong with it is, you have a government option in a market that is supposed to be driven by private choices. So if you're disadvantaged, unable to pay, and the government is going to subsidize you, the question becomes, should we give that subsidy to you directly? Should we subsidize and create its own program? That's the tradition.

But now they're talking about something new and different, which is to say, even if you're able to pay, even if you're in the marketplace, the government is going to compete for your business with private entities.

The government is going to come right into the marketplace and compete. So it would be equivalent to say, you know, John, you're a corn farmer and the government is going to put up a row of corn or a farm next to you and compete with you.

We don't do that in the United States, it's a different kind of model with a different kind of culture and society.

KING: Well, let me -- I want to close the circle on health care with, we don't do this in the United States, you just said. How do you take that philosophy and match it up with those who say we have to have universal coverage in the United States of America or else we fail the test?

PAWLENTY: Again, the way to do that, if you want to extend access to people who are in need or in disadvantage, then give them some help directly or in the form of a voucher, in the form of a tax credit, and then give them good information about price and quality, and at least for those who can function in a marketplace, let them go do that. That's how you assist people in need who can't afford health care.

But to have the government come in and say, we're going to compete directly with the private market is another example of the partial, you know, nationalization of an industry, not unlike the mortgage industry, the banking industry, the auto industry, now the health care industry, soon you'll see that in the energy industry.

This is a pattern with this administration of government encroaching into the private market.

KING: Let's move on to the energy debate. The House just passed legislation, the narrowest of margins, two votes to spare, I guess not quite the narrowest of margins, but almost. The cap and trade legislation it is called. It would dramatically change the way -- if it passes the Senate, change our whole energy economy and our whole energy structure is based in this country.

The Congressional Budget Office says it would increase the energy bill of the average family about $175 by 2020. Is that an acceptable price to pay to reduce our dependence on foreign oil?

PAWLENTY: Well, John, the estimates you cite are on the low end. There are some other studies out that show it could be as much as several thousand dollars for an average family by 2020 per year. So depending on which of those estimates is accurate, it could be a very significant burden.

We all share the goal, I think, of reducing pollution and reducing emissions in this country. But we should have a debate about how best to do that. This bill that has just passed the Congress is a nightmarish, mind-boggling, overly bureaucratic, misguided bill.

I've been a strong supporter of renewable, clean and secure energy. I've been a strong supporter of finding ways to reduce emissions. But the way to do that is through conservation, doing things for baseload like nuclear energy, bringing on more fuel- efficient vehicles.

But this bill goes so far as to have the federal government micromanage and prohibit what local homeowner associations can do as it relates to the design features of local homeowner associations.

That's one example of dozens in this bill in terms of its overreach. And it's a cap and trade bill. It's going to cap our job growth and trade our jobs to other countries who provide a more competitive business environment. This is the overly burdensome version that Congress has put forward.

KING: Strong language there. Cap our job growth. You were part of a regional consortium to work on something that did pretty much this. Why is the president's approach so wrong?

PAWLENTY: Well, I think if you're going to have an approach to reducing emissions, let's focus on incentives to reduce emissions, like the ones I just mentioned before. But if Congress is going to consider a cap and trade bill, you've got to have the cap be at a level that's reasonable and practical.

And then the allowances shouldn't be an excuse for the federal government to raise money. If you look at President Obama's budget, the charge that they were going to put for these allowances in the bill was a big part of how they were going to raise money for other stuff.

Now some of that has gone out the window, but this remains an extraordinarily expensive bill. We should do things to reduce emissions and pollutions, but we have to do it in a way that doesn't wreck our economy or put unreasonable burdens on our citizens. And this bill does not meet that test.

KING: The president's senior adviser, David Axelrod, was out on another program this morning, and says this is a phony issue, the way you call it -- the way you just characterized this. He says it's phony and Republicans are using inaction as an excuse here, a political tactic.

PAWLENTY: Well, with all due respect to David Axelrod, why are they so opposed, on the other side of the aisle, of looking, for example, in the baseload energy area of promoting aggressively more nuclear power plants? One of the biggest emitters of pollution and carbon in this country is our base load energy sector.

Nuclear power plants have no such emissions to speak of. There are next generation opportunities to process -- reprocess nuclear fuel. And yet while they kind of tip the cap at the argument, they really don't want to do anything and won't do anything.

Ask them to be accountable for that. That would be a major step forward as it relates to carbon emissions, and they won't take it.

KING: I want to go back in time a little bit. You were the host governor for the Republican National Convention. And in your speech at that convention, in the middle of a heated campaign, you were talking about then-Senator Obama. And it's clear you weren't that impressed. Let's listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PAWLENTY: When John McCain is president, there will be no misunderstanding about where America stands and what we stand for. In this time, when don't need a president who can just read a poll or momentarily thrill a crowd. We don't need rhetoric or empty promises.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: As a guy some think might be running against -- trying to run against President Obama down the road, rate him now.

PAWLENTY: Well, he's only six months into his term, John, and so I think the history books should be a little broader in terms of perspective than just six months. But I'm very concerned on a number of fronts.

One is the out of control, unsustainable, irresponsible level of state -- or, excuse me, federal spending and the debt and the deficit that's growing by the minute. That is something that is not responsible, something that's going to, I think, snap back and bite us in ways that are going to hurt the economy in the intermediate term.

I'm concerned also about this massive government encroachment in autos, in health care, in energy and other sectors. But, you know, President Obama inherited a very tough situation. I think we need to give him more than six months before you can make an ultimate verdict on how he's doing.

KING: One of the things he has done in those six months is pass a federal stimulus plan. This is one of the Sunday newspapers in your home state, The Star Tribune, in Minneapolis. "Stimulus cash isn't the magic bullet yet," saying the jobs have not yet materialized from the stimulus program.

You used some of that money to make less painful the cuts you've had to make at the state level. So is the stimulus plan in some ways helping a Republican governor like you?

PAWLENTY: Well, in Minnesota's case, we pay $1 into the federal government, we get 73 cents back. On that measurement, we're the fifth-highest payer of money into the federal government of any state in the nation. So we're paying our share of the bill.

But here's a stunning statistic, the GAO, the General Accounting Office, said recently of the $800 billion stimulus bill, only about $150 billion of it is really stimulative for the economy. The rest was spent on government programs, government social service programs that are not stimulative.

And so this is a bill that was misdirected, mis-targeted, mis- prioritized, mis-focused. It should have put money into people's pockets through tax cuts and bread and butter projects like roads and bridges. It didn't do that to the extent it should have. And in that regard, the bill I think under serves this country.

KING: Tim Pawlenty is going to stay with us. Up next, the GOP brand took another hit when South Carolina's governor acknowledged a secret trip to visit his mistress. When we come back, Governor Pawlenty's take on what Republicans need to do to turn things around. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KING: Welcome back to STATE OF THE UNION. Let's continue our conversation with Minnesota's Republican governor, Tim Pawlenty.

Governor, I want to move on to what you think ails the national Republican Party. But first, a question that is very personal to you. Your state has only had one United States senator since the election because of the disputed election between Republican Norm Coleman and Democrat Al Franken.

Your state supreme court has a ruling before it, it could come very soon. After that ruling, the next step would be for you to certify the election. Will you certify the election based on your state's supreme court ruling, is that for you?

PAWLENTY: I'm going to follow the direction of the court, John. We expect that ruling any day now. I also expect them to give guidance and direction as to the certificate of election. I'm prepared to sign it as soon as they give the green light.

KING: And so if Norm Coleman loses at the state supreme court and says he's going to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, will you give him that time or will you say, sorry, Senator Coleman, our state supreme court, our highest court in this state, has spoken, and I will follow their lead?

PAWLENTY: Well, a federal court could stay or put a limit on or stop the effect of the state court ruling. If they chose, if they do that, I would certainly follow their direction. But if that doesn't happen promptly or drags out for any period of time, then we need to move ahead with signing this, particularly if I'm ordered to do that by the state court.

KING: And if you're ordered to do it and they say Al Franken has narrowly won the election, you're prepared to sign it, if the court says so.

PAWLENTY: I'm not going to defy an order of the Minnesota Supreme Court. That would be a dereliction of my duty. But a federal court could weigh in and say, don't do that and order a different result.

KING: I want to move on to the drama in the Republican Party right now. President Obama won the election and won it quite handily. Since then and in recent weeks, we've seen two leading Republicans, men like you, who show up on lists of who might run in 2012, Senator Ensign in Nevada, then Governor Sanford in South Carolina acknowledging marital infidelity.

I want to play for you a snippet of a conversation, I want to very careful and tell our viewers, this is from 2007. I went down to South Carolina to spend some time with Governor Sanford, to ask him there about the ongoing Republican competition for the 2008 Republican nomination.

Even then he said the Republican brand was damaged and he also said this...

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. MARK SANFORD (R), SOUTH CAROLINA: It takes time to damage a brand. It takes even longer to rebuild it. You think about Tylenol, or you think about some of the instance over time, you know, a single night you could do destruction to a brand. And it took time to build up trust.

I mean, the value of a brand is, in the chorus of voices out there, people have a trust in a -- in a single group or in a single product. It takes time to build or regain trust.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: How much further damage to the brand of a party that says it's the party of family values, that counts Christian conservatives among its most reliable base -- how much damage has been done nationally by the actions of Governor Sanford and Senator Ensign?

PAWLENTY: It's hard to quantify that, John. But, clearly, there's been damage. Any time you have leading figures who are engaged in behavior that is sad and troubling and hypocritical, other people are going to look at that and say, "Hm, they don't walk the walk." And so the words and the actions don't ring true.

But it's a sad and troubling situation with Jenny and Mark Sanford. I know them. I'm proud of Jenny for her strength and her commitment to her family and keeping that family together. And, frankly, I was glad to see her not standing at the press conference like many others have, and, kind of, charting her own path, saying, look, I'm willing to forgive him, but I'm not going to stand there and condone this in any way.

But it certainly hurts the brand. It's hard to quantify it.

KING: Well, when you say "hard to quantify," what do you hear?

You're an evangelical. When you go to church and you talk to your pastor -- I travel the country quite a bit, and I've spent a lot of time with Christian conservatives. And they, frankly, are fed up.

They think Ronald Reagan didn't always deliver. They think George W. Bush promised to work against same-sex marriage and he did not, in their view, deliver.

How much frustration is there that tars all of you, that the politicians are going to come to us; they're going to tell us, "I'm one of you," and then get elected and not do it?

PAWLENTY: Well, that's a big part of the problem of the Republican Party. It's not the only one. That leads into what your next question was going to be.

It really hasn't mattered that much whether Republicans have gone to Washington or Democrat have gone to Washington, for example; on the issue of spending, the trend line's been about the same.

Now, it's been accelerated pretty dramatically under the Obama administration. But if you're going to be, for example, the party of fiscal discipline and be the person talking who's about fiscal responsibility, then you better do that.

And so hypocrisy doesn't sell, and the Republicans have to be true to their values, be true to their principles and walk the walk.

Now, we live in a world where people aren't perfect. You've made mistakes; I've made mistakes. There's going to be dumb things that happen, sad things that have happened, heartbreaking things that happen. So we can't expect perfection. But we at least have to be headed along the general correct trend lines.

KING: Since Senator McCain's defeat in the last election, many Republicans have said they think the party, especially with younger voters, is viewed as somehow intolerant.

And some, including Senator McCain's campaign manager, have said Republicans need to think again on the issue of gay rights and especially perhaps open their minds to same-sex marriage.

Does Governor Tim Pawlenty think that the Republicans should step aside and drop their opposition to same-sex marriage?

PAWLENTY: Well, no I don't. I think there is a lot of data that shows a lot of younger people feel differently about that issue than older people, and that's something we're going to have to come to terms with down the road, in terms of a country.

But I don't believe, nor does the Republican Party believe, that all domestic relationships are the equivalent. I believe that traditional marriage should be maintained on an elevated status and an elevated form for obvious reasons. It's an important part of our social fabric and a cornerstone of our social fabric.

KING: After the Sanford scandal emerged, there was a little item in The Washington Post saying, well, who else is out there for the Republicans when it comes to 2012?

And they said, "A riveting reality show takes shape," and they mentioned you, with a picture, and they said, "Tim Pawlenty: The Geek. Minnesota earnest with a dash of bland. Is he flying too far under the radar?"

You were in Arkansas just the other night for a fund-raiser. I know your state press back home watches you every time you go out of state. Is Tim Pawlenty running for president?

PAWLENTY: You know, John, I don't know what the future holds for me, but I do know this. I feel strongly about the values and principles for the Republican Party. I believe I have something to say about that.

So, within Minnesota and outside of Minnesota, at least as my time allows, I'm going to go out and speak to that. And I think I can make a contribution, in a positive way, for trying to rebuild this party. And it needs it.

KING: On that point of your travels, I want to circle back a little bit. Because this became an issue and could become an issue in the state of South Carolina.

When you leave your state, what is your responsibility, as the governor, to tell people where you are, how you can be reached, and the whole combination of events that could play out from that?

Because, as you know, one of the questions about Governor Sanford is did he -- was he derelict of duty?

Could he possibly be impeached for lying to his staff about where he was and not telling others in the state he was leaving?

PAWLENTY: Your staff has to be able to reach you and reach you quickly for all the obvious reasons, natural disaster, terrorism, or other events.

And so I'm very careful to make sure that numerous staff people and my security detail always know where I am and can reach me. And any governor should do that.

KING: So Sanford was derelict in his duty?

PAWLENTY: He should not have left the state and not allowed people to know how to contact him in case something happened. That's obvious.

KING: Governor Tim Pawlenty, we thank you for joining us on "State of the Union." We will see you, whether it be in Minnesota or one of those other plenty places in the months and weeks ahead.

Sir, thank you very much.