Meet the Press - March 3, 2024 Fmr. Amb. Nikki Haley (R) Presidential Candidate, Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.), Geoff Bennett, María Teresa Kumar, Marc Short and Ali Vitali
Press Release
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It's great to be here. Thanks for having me.
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So I'm going to answer this very differently which is Michigan is a purple state. And I've been saying that for a long time. We are a state that frequently votes uncommitted. President Obama got a highly – got a significant uncommitted vote in 2012. But it is one issue that needs to be paid attention to. I got a lot of people that are hurting in my district and in the district that I used to represent. The name of their campaign, the one that I believe was effective, was called "Listen to Michigan." They didn't think anybody was hearing the hurt that their families were facing. I have families that have lost 40 members of one family. They are – the case work I'm doing for people that are starving, have no food, they want everybody to hear them. They're going to be an important group in November. But there's a lot of other groups that we have to make sure turn out. It's going to be a turn-out election.
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I have had very different conversations with the president. And I believe those conversations are private. But I think you've seen a change that the White House has been reaching out more to the Arab-American Muslims community, hearing their hurt. I am told that they are doing many things very directly. I pray that we're going to get a temporary cease-fire any minute. I know that they've been hard for that. And that it leads to a permanent cease fire. We need a cease fire. We've lost 12,000-14,000 children. And what Hamas did was a terrorist act. And we want the hostages to come home. I think most Americans are – are – are horrified by what Hamas did. But social media is letting a lot of people see the horrific circumstances in Gaza.
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So I'm just going to say, I meet with everybody and was protested almost every day last week. I've called for a cease-fire. And there are a lot of very strong feelings. I know that the president will meet with this community. I think they're very raw right now. And I think let's get some pieces in place. But you know, I want to tell you something else. I don't hear Donald Trump talk about this at all. And I – I'm not exactly sure how he would be handling it. I have some pretty strong feelings about what would be happening there. Joe Biden is talking about it. Joe Biden is working hard to get that cease-fire.
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I don't know. I – I think the president is pushing very hard. We have to get humanitarian aid in there. 85% of the people have no home. What people don’t – like the – the population of Gaza is 2.2. 1.5 million of them have gone to Rafah. And they have nothing. There's no toilets. There's no showers. There's no food. And that horrific picture we all saw on Thursday was desperation. It was total desperation. And when – when you shoot into crowds that are desperate and they're hungry, and there's a famine, that's what happens. We need to get aid. The president's trying to get it there every means possible. We all need to do it. And quite frankly humanitarian aid needs to be part of any package we do.
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So first of all I'm always the wrong person to talk to about polling. Because I told the world, and many of my Republican friends didn't believe me either, that Donald Trump was going to win Michigan and thus won the election in 2016. If you look at the polling now that we're even looking at, there have been three national polls that have shown Biden up – President Biden up or tied with Donald Trump. The numbers in all these different polls in the last – he's done well. I think – I do believe that President Biden is getting this sense of urgency. I traveled with him two weeks ago. I spent eight hours with him. They're starting to put the resources we need to see into Michigan. I think we are seeing a campaign that post Super Tuesday is going to go all in the ground and knows what we've got to do to get the job done.
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You know what I want to see? I want to see the bipartisan bill that the Senate worked on for several months actually come forward. And I think when you've got a former president who's a candidate for president tell people not to support something because it would give a win to a Democrat, the American people need a win.
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But – and we –
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The president needs to –
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– needs to be looking at executive orders. But he needs more money. It needs to go into custom and border patrols. The Republicans have cut that. We need to appropriate more money for judges, for law enforcement officials, for technology that's going to detect fentanyl. And the Republicans won't give it. So do I think he should look at every possible executive action? Yes. But do I think Congress, yes, Democrats and Republicans, Republicans and Democrats need to put resources in it and give the American people a win now, not wait till another election. This is a hard issue. We're elected to do tough jobs. It's been decades. Nobody's gotten it done. It's time to get the job done together in the Congress.
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