Interview with California Senator Barbara Boxer
BLITZER: The president and Michelle Obama are planning a one-two punch to try to help Senator Barbara Boxer get reelected. They are scheduled to make campaign appearances for the California Democrat this month. Senator Boxer is facing a tough challenge from Republican businesswoman Carly Fiorina. The latest Reuters poll, by the way, shows Senator Boxer leading by only 4 points. I spoke with Carly Fiorina earlier in the week, let's speak to Senator Boxer right now, she is joining us from California. Thanks very much, Senator, for coming in.</s>SEN. BARBARA BOXER (D), CALIFORNIA: Thanks for the invitation, Wolf.</s>BLITZER: Some Democrats don't want the president to come into their states or districts to campaign for them, but you want the president there, right?</s>BOXER: The president and the first lady are very popular in California. Californians understand this president inherited the worst recession since the Great Depression. They are rooting for us all to get this country back on track.</s>BLITZER: Is there any issue that comes to mind that you disagree with the president on right now?</s>BOXER: Yes. In Afghanistan, I am supportive of legislation that would say, let's get an exit strategy in writing so that we know we are really moving to bring those troops home. You know, I do believe in nation-helping, not nation-building. We have to rebuild our own nation. So I think on that, there's a bit of a difference.</s>BLITZER: What about on domestic issues like economic issues, job creation, health care, do you disagree with him on any of those things?</s>BOXER: Well, I did push hard when we did the economic recovery act for some more infrastructure dollars. So, I pushed very hard for that and we did compromise on that. I would have liked to have seen more of that. But I think the president is right when he says, let's stop giving tax breaks to companies who ship jobs overseas, give them to companies that create jobs here at home. So, there's a lot of agreement and a few places of disagreement.</s>BLITZER: Your opponent, and I interviewed her earlier, Carly Fiorina, she says basically this charge about you, you have heard it from her directly, that you're simply a career politician who has no experience in the real world creating jobs. I will play this little clip, what she told me.</s>BOXER: Sure.</s>CARLY FIORINA (R), CALIFORNIA SENATE CANDIDATE: Where has Barbara Boxer been? For the last six years, the last 12 years, the last 18 years, the last 28 years that she has been in Washington, D.C., where has is she been? Where she has been is voting for more taxes, voting for more borrowing and spending.</s>BLITZER: All right. Your chance to respond to her.</s>BOXER: Well, she is just wrong on that. I voted for over $2 trillion of tax cuts, the largest one was in the stimulus bill. But I have to say, she talks about 12 years. Look, I was there in 1992 and I supported Bill Clinton. And we know that in that period of time, those budgets that I voted for and those economic policies created 23 million jobs, the best in modern history. That's the fact. And we not only balanced the budget, we created surpluses. Then you had George W. come in -- Bush, George W. Bush come in, and in about, you know, a few minutes, it felt like, we saw those surpluses disappear. We saw a horrible record of job creation, the worse since the Great Depression, only a million new jobs. And at the end of the Bush term, 700,000 jobs a month bleeding. So she is just wrong. And you know, she acts as if I didn't get --</s>BLITZER: When you say --</s>BOXER: -- elected -- I got elected.</s>BLITZER: Excuse me for interrupting.</s>BOXER: Wolf, I got elected all of those times, and I'm hoping to get elected this time.</s>BLITZER: But when you say you supported $2 trillion in tax cuts during the stimulus --</s>BOXER: Tax cuts. Yes, I have --</s>BLITZER: Tax cuts?</s>BOXER: During my career.</s>BLITZER: Oh, during your career. I thought you just said during the --</s>BOXER: Yes.</s>BLITZER: -- stimulus. When you said you supported $2 trillion --</s>BOXER: No, no, no, 1.2 -- 1.2 trillion with the stimulus.</s>BLITZER: There was $1.2 trillion in tax cuts in the stimulus?</s>BOXER: There was a lot. About -- well, I will put it this way, over time, that's what it will be, when you figure all of the tax cuts over time. And what we did for the -- for the senior citizens, giving them back those refunds. So there was a lot. Actually, a third of the stim was direct tax cuts. That I can tell you.</s>BLITZER: Yes, but that would be maybe $200 million or $300 million. We're not talking about a trillion.</s>BOXER: So let me say this, a third of the stim and over my time -- let me correct it, you are right, thank you -- 2.2 trillion I voted in tax cuts, 1.2 trillion of which became law. A third of the stim was tax cuts and it was considered the biggest tax cut in history over a couple of year period.</s>BLITZER: All right. Let's get into some other issues, including the issue of abortion rights for women. In this same interview I had with Carly Fiorina, she made this point about you. Listen to this.</s>FIORINA: Well, I personally am pro-life. And I know that not all women agree with me, but it is Barbara Boxer who is extreme in her views here. She supports partial-birth abortions. She says that babies don't have rights until they leave hospitals.</s>BLITZER: Is that true?</s>BOXER: No, it is not true. Here's the thing that's so interesting. Wolf, Roe v. Wade, which decriminalized abortion in the early stages of a pregnancy, that passed the Supreme Court in 1973. My opponent wants to overturn Roe V. Wade, making women and doctors criminals. She raised the issue. She already has the right to life group in here sending mailers against me. She has got the Susan B. Anthony group doing that. She has distorted my position. I voted for the Feinstein Amendment, which would say no late-term abortions whatsoever except for the health of the mother. I'm a mother, I'm a grandma. Listen, I have got to say, she has raised the issue by being so extreme that we went back to look at every senator who ever represented the state of California, Republican or Democratic, and for decades everyone has been pro-choice. She would -- she would come in there saying she wants to repeal Roe v. Wade. It's an extraordinary difference between the two of us.</s>BLITZER: On the issue of gay marriage, you support gay marriage, right?</s>BOXER: Yes. I do.</s>BLITZER: She supports civil unions. On the issue of legalizing marijuana, that is a big issue in California right now, it's on the ballot, where do you stand?</s>BOXER: I support California's current law. I do not support legalizing the marijuana, so I'm against that initiative.</s>BLITZER: But you do support the current law in the sense that for medical purposes, people can get prescriptions to use marijuana?</s>BOXER: I do. I do.</s>BLITZER: What's your biggest --</s>BOXER: I do. And that was voted -- and I might say that was voted on by the people.</s>BLITZER: What is your biggest problem with Carly Fiorina? What is the single biggest difference that you have with her on a substantive issue?</s>BOXER: She's running on her record at Hewlett-Packard. She doesn't tell people she was fired from that job. She doesn't tell people she laid off 30,000 workers and she shipped American jobs abroad to China, to India. She was proud to stamp "made in China," Made in India." And I want to see the words "made in America" again.</s>BLITZER: She makes --</s>BOXER: And I think that's really --</s>BLITZER: -- the point -- I'll just -- I'll just --</s>BOXER: I think that's really the biggest difference.</s>BLITZER: I'll just tell you what she told me the other day. She says that the six years she was the head of Hewlett-Packard, when she came in, there was X-number of jobs, there were more jobs that she he created when she left, even though there was a down period during the dot-com bubble and she had to lay off some people. But more people were working there when she left than when she started.</s>BOXER: She created jobs in China instead of Chino and Chico. She created jobs in India instead of Indio, California. She created jobs, but not in America. And she said she would do it all over again. And she said there's no God-given right to a job in America anymore. And she doesn't have the heart for these times we are going through, so I think that is the biggest difference, but there are lots of others too.</s>BLITZER: And this campaign will continue for another two-and-a- half weeks.</s>BOXER: Yes. Senator Boxer, thanks very much for coming in.</s>BOXER: Thanks, Wolf.</s>BLITZER: We are monitoring some other top stories, including a major development in the military's controversial "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy. The federal government has just taken new action. Plus, the drugstore CVS now admitting to illegally selling a chemical used to make methamphetamines, the details coming up.