Sen. Martha McSally (R-AZ) On Buffalo Police Video: “It’s Not OK For Police To Be Pushing Down An Elderly Man”
Arizona Senator Martha McSally Spoke with Fox News Radio’s Guy Benson in a wide-ranging interview. Touching on the state of the race for the Senate in Arizona, Trump restarting his signature rallies and the killing of George Floyd. Benson asked Senator McSally about a now viral video showing two members of the Buffalo New York police force, Shoving a 75 year old man to the ground. Asking her about the video and the President’s tweets linking the elder man to ANTIFA. The Senator Responded,
“All I can say is I’ve seen that video and it’s not OK for police to be pushing down an elderly man. It’s not OK. So there’s just no place that that’s OK. They have a tough job to do. I get it. You know, they’re outnumbered. Things are very volatile. There’s a lot of dynamics going on. They’re being attacked themselves. I understand all that. But that’s not OK. I know it’s under investigation, but it’s not OK.”
Listen To The Full Interview Below:
Full Transcript Below:
Guy Benson: We are back and pleased to welcome back to the program. U.S. Senator Martha McSally, Republican of Arizona, up for reelection this year. She was the first female fighter pilot to fly in combat and the first ever to command a fighter squadron in combat in U.S. history. She is author of a new book, Dare to Fly Simple Life Lessons in Never Giving Up. It’s out now. Senator, welcome back.
Sen. McSally: Thanks for having me back, I guy.
Guy Benson: All right. So let’s start with the book, Dare to Fly. Maybe give us one vignette in one of these lessons that you describe when it comes to never giving up.
Sen. McSally: Sure. Thanks. You know, I’ve had some unique experiences for sure. Not all your listeners are going to be able to go fly fighter jets, but we all have in common. Overcoming fear, though, I bring you with me into the cockpit of the A10 Warthog, the plane I flew and my very first take off. There’s no two seat models. There were no simulators. It was about a 10 year journey through a lot of obstacles and perseverance and derailment and detours to get to that very place. But I don’t think any of us are born with courage or fear. I think we learn it. And so I share how when I was cleared for takeoff the very first time and I felt like I was going to throw up and my heart was beating for us. I had to make a choice. I was either going to taxi back in and say, I can’t do this. There’s no way. I’ve never flown this plane before. I don’t have what it takes. Or I was going to push up the power and take off afraid. And I did take off afraid that day. And that helped build my courage to continue in my training to fly three hundred twenty five hours in combat. I talk about some complex missions that I had as a squadron commander in southern Afghanistan, you know, protecting American troops on the ground when all my systems failed. But the thing we have in common is fear. And I think a lot of your listeners could could relate to this right now. Fear about the future of our country, fear about what might be going on, their lives, their livelihoods and everything, and the uncertainty and the instability. So how do we learn how to overcome our fear? How do we learn to do things afraid? I didn’t just you know, I wasn’t born and I jumped into that cockpit. I had already made some choices in my young life in order to step into my fear and do things afraid and like an athlete built the myth muscle memory in order to build my own courage and get encouragement from others, which means to put courage in you. And so I break it down to have kind of simple things about how to overcome fear. For example, I, you know, share other experiences I had of climbing mountains and running Ironman travel and and taking on the Pentagon for taking our service. Women wear burqas and there’s just little nuggets in there that everybody can relate to in their own lives, wherever they might be.
Guy Benson: And the book is called Dare to Fly. The author is my guest, U.S. Senator Martha McSally. The subhead is Simple Life Lessons in Never Giving Up. And on that subject, I do want to pivot to your Senate race. The last two polls have you down double digits. Some people are saying it’s time to write off Martha McSally in terms of money and in all that, you know, the trials that people do. Your thoughts, your assessment on the race. Are the polls completely wrong here or are you in a hole? How do you plan to to make a comeback if you need one? I’m just curious how you’re feeling about it.
Sen. McSally: Yeah. A guy that’s just absolutely not true. Look, Arizona is ground zero for the Senate majority. As you know, polls can be all over the place. Look, we’ve been under fire, that’s for sure. And they know their past for Chuck Schumer to be in charge goes to Arizona. So, you know, just like the lessons of my book, you know, I’m here to fight for our country. I’ve done it my whole life. They can continue to fight to make sure that this direction of our country is one that we hold onto our freedoms, our way of life and everything I’ve been fighting for but my life on the line. So it is going to be a tight election in Arizona. Our numbers show that right now millions of dollars are pouring into my opponent. We need to make sure that we hold this seat and we keep the Senate majority. It’s so consequential for our country. I’m here to fight. I’m here to save the country and hold this seat. And that’s what we’re gonna do. We need the support, though, to make that happen.
Guy Benson: Yeah, just to drilldown slightly, the FOX News poll that just came out last week showed you down 13 points. Based on your answer, it sounds like maybe some of your internal polling showing it close.
Sen. McSally: No, our data doesn’t show anything like that. Give me a break. No. Absolutely not. So, look, our data shows that this is going to be a very tight race. Arizona is still right of center. I’ve got no less than seven different groups attacking me right now. Right. Why would Chuck Schumer be spending money on me right now is racist. So, you know, we’re in the fight. This is an important race for President Trump to win. And also for the Senate majority. So we are absolutely in the fight. Going to be a tight race, going to be hard, just like many things within my life. And Chuck Schumer is going to have to pry the Senate majority out of my cold, dead hands.
Guy Benson: So I want to follow up. You mentioned the president and this is not a trick question. It’s a tricky question, at least in my view, because the president announced that they’re going to start these rallies back up in about two weeks. And there are a lot of concerns about social distancing, although that’s gotten muddled because a lot of the public officials who are very strict on it are totally fine with the zero distancing protests around George Floyd. I think it’s confusing for a lot of Americans what’s real, what isn’t. There’s some data coming out of your state, Senator, that hospitalizations are creeping back up. Do you support, like if the president wanted to hold a rally in Arizona in two weeks, do you. Do you think that’s a good idea?
Sen. McSally: Well, you know, I was just talking to his team today. We welcome President Trump out to Arizona. Look, in Arizona, we’ve. Governors take an approach of we’ve got to ensure people can safely return to work and put food on the table and provide for their families while we still fight this virus. It’s not going away. Protect the most vulnerable and nursing homes and assisted living and independent living and and the kongregate, you know, vulnerable in hospitals. Make sure our health care heroes have everything they need and personal responsibility for individual Arizonans. This is you know, you’ve seen some of these states where you have these dictates, draconian dictates coming out of the governor and our state. We trust Arizonans to make good decisions that need to be for Inforum. We still need to be safe and how we conduct ourselves. I mean, going out to restaurants. I got a pedicure. You know, I got my haircut. You know, there’s ways to do this safely. If you’re more vulnerable and have an underlying conditions, you have to make different choices. And so I think Arizona has struck the right balance. But this you know, this pandemic is not over. You know, the Coronavirus is not going away, but we know a lot more about it. We have more tools to protect the most vulnerable while allowing people to also safely work.
Guy Benson: Right. I think, you know. Yeah, that’s that’s true on work in a lot of activities, like you just mentioned. My thing is because I I’m sitting here saying I cannot make heads or tails of why these politicians and even some public health officials are not saying a peep or even endorsing these very large gatherings with no distancing. I saw a video out of L.A. where they were packed to the gills by the thousands in the middle of the street. I’m like, I don’t care if you have a mask or not. That is what we were explicitly told could not happen. We’re worried about seeing a bump or a higher spike in these cases. Is there a safe way to have, for example, a Trump rally in an arena? Would you maybe limited to 50 percent capacity? I’m I’m not trying to corner you here, I think we have to be consitant
Sen. McSally: Look, I think the hypocrisy has been on display, of course. Right. You know, arresting people for, you know, being outside of race and nobody around. And, you know, we’re trying to go to church. But then, you know, in fact, somebody sent me a screenshot of a TV, something in California where it said, you know, social gatherings of less than 12 people, but protests of 100 or so. Look, the Trump Campign worked through this, you know, perhaps they’ll be doing some outside at first. I mean, they’ll work through it. And I think it be a combination of guidelines and also a combination of people being smart and safe in their own choices, you know, based on what your personal situation is and, you know, whatever screening and temperature, they’ll have to figure that out. But we could definitely point out the hypocrisy that we see, you know, go in other places and continue to try and make good choices as we work through everything we need to do to include the consequential nature of this election, which is a very important, you know, coming up here and in just five months.
Guy Benson: Senator, there was news breaking about an hour ago that Leader McConnell said that he has announced your colleague, Senator Tim Scott, will lead a group that is working on a proposal to deal with this issue on racial disparities and discrimination in law enforcement. Your your colleague, Senator Scott, who’s a guest on this show somewhat frequently. He tweeted the same thing that he’s looking forward to this. I’m wondering, were you were you part of that meeting? What was the atmos if you were what was the atmosphere in there? What’s the sense of what can be done and what needs to be done among Senate Republicans?
Sen. McSally: Well, we’ve had a lot of conversations about this guy, and I think most Americans can agree that you got to watch as much as you want to look away. Watch the video of the Kalis disgusting murder of George Boyd and and those responsible for the murder and those who are enabling it and the bystanders of it. They all need to be held accountable. Everybody can agree on that. Everybody agree that we need to root out racism culturally in people’s hearts. They can’t all be done by legislation and systematically where it exists. Everybody can agree on that. People should be able to peacefully protest. We should also not tolerate looting and rioting. So what can we do together? And we shouldn’t be defunding the police. Right. These are all things that most Americans Arizona’s going to agree on. So I look forward to having a conversation of what our appropriate federal role is. You know, off the top of my head, we’ve got and I’m very important grants the cops grants and other grants that burned J grants that come out of DOJ. There’s already connections to training, a best practice. But we need to take a look at that and maybe tighten those up. But we certainly might need more funding for police training, not defunding police. Right. Is what the left is for right now, which would be even more dangerous. So I think thoughtful approaches that the appropriate federal level, not everything can be federal. You know, I look at it as a military officer. I talk about this in my book, Dare to Fly. Just like culture and climate and leadership. I’ve not been in law enforcement, but I’ve had similar experiences of how do you have a toxic climate where people, bad apples are allowed to operate and not be held accountable? I know a lot about that. I talk about that in our book. Well, that’s in some of these things have to be at the local level. But with federal, you know, federal support.
Guy Benson: And that’s the point, I think, about culture. And that was my next question, because you fought against and I think we have great reverence. Most Americans, almost all Americans have great reverence for the U.S. military. And yet even within that institution, there can be cultural problems that lead to very serious blindspots that can really hurt people. And. And you fought back against that in your career there. We also see, like the video of the Buffalo police knocking over that elderly gentleman and letting him just bleed there from his head. And and then they’re celebrating the guys after they got charged with assault and, you know, standing there and cheering them as they leave the courthouse. I think to a lot of Americans, they look at that type of situation and say that’s not necessarily race. That’s a culture problem. How do you how do you fight back against culture problems without tarnishing the entire institution, especially such an important one, whether it’s law enforcement or the military?
Sen. McSally: Well, that’s the key. Just like in the military, highest honor of my life to serve in the military, leadership matters. Culture matters. And that leadership is at the lowest level, all the way up to the highest level. Right. In those organizations that you set the tone for what duty and honor and country means and and the respect and the core values. And you uphold those and they’re good order and discipline in the unit. And if somebody is violating that, that culture is not tolerated, that the culture is to hold people accountable. You see, and I have a lot of questions. What the hell is going on in the Minneapolis police department to allow the kind of culture to see what happened in the murderer, George Floyd? in plain daylight with these enablers standing around callously knowing they were filmed and thinking they could just get away with it? That’s a problem, not just the race problem, not just the brutality problem, but also a culture problem. I’ve got experience like this. The military, you got to identify and rout out the bad apples, ensure that they’re not cancers, and then ensure the highest level on the lowest level leadership are spurring each other on to excellence and honor and integrity. That’s why most people put on the uniform to include our police every single day in our communities. But we’ve got to hold those who are bad apples and committed crimes accountable and ensure that the other culture remains with honor.
Guy Benson: Senator, I agree. I think that’s exactly right. I have to say, as I mentioned, the Buffalo example and that video that so many people saw President Trump this morning tweeting about it, this conspiracy theory suggesting that it might have been a setup. And, you know, I look at tweets like that. I’m not an elected Republican like you are, but I hold my hand. I put both hands on my head and say, what is he doing here? How is this constructive to this very already difficult conversation that we’re having? What is your reaction to a tweet like that?
Sen. McSally: All I can say is I’ve seen that video and it’s not OK for police to be pushing down an elderly man. It’s not OK. So there’s just no place that that’s OK. They have a tough job to do. I get it. You know, they’re outnumbered. Things are very volatile. There’s a lot of dynamics going on. They’re being attacked themselves. I understand all that. But that’s not OK. I know it’s under investigation, but it’s not OK.
Guy Benson: Yeah, we saw what we saw. I mean, it’s it’s on video. And I think no matter who it is, trying to pretend like we didn’t see what we saw, I don’t think is helpful. Senator, last question. In the previous segment, we talked about some additional misinformation that has come out from WHO just yesterday. They’d had to walk it back. It just seemed like a totally unforced error. ABC News had a big report that suggests that Coronavirus may have been spreading in 11 months before we realized, based on satellite imagery at hospitals and a few other things. You have been really an advocate on the issue of accountability for China. And I wonder, are there any updates that you might have for us there?
Sen. McSally: Yeah. So I read that article and looked at that study as well, that softening. I mean, the problem is we don’t know who Patient Zero is, right? We don’t know yet still where this virus came from in China. And what we saw was China just continuing with a cover up, destroying samples and silencing doctors and kicking out journalists. And we still don’t know. And then the propaganda campaign continues, blaming the U.S. Army for crying out loud. So we’re not going to expect China to start cooperating anytime soon. We need to do everything we can to try and figure out where it came from. As we continue to try and fight this, we’re learning more about the virus every day. But because of their cover ups and their propaganda, we had to learn, unfortunately, ourselves the the behavior of this virus against the American people when it came here. They need to be held accountable not just for their reckless behavior related to this virus, but also just their past that they have been on in plain sight, malevolent path in their military activity, their economic activities, stealing our technology. And we need to be bringing our manufacturing home. And no longer be relying on an adversary as step one for our PPE, for our pharmaceuticals. That critical memo, everything we need for America, security and health, security, we need to focus on bringing that health care market up the defense bill tomorrow. And we’re going to have some provisions in the defense bill on this very topic.
Guy Benson: We’re out of time, but I just want to say this as an editorial on my part. If you are concerned about China and you are concerned about Senator McSally’s race, do yourself a favor and Google her opponent, Mark Kelly, and his connections to China. There is there is a serious issue there, honestly. I mean, I think that voters need to know about it. And that’s something maybe we can dove into more deeply next time we have you. But for now, we have to break Senator Martha McSally, Republican of Arizona. Her new book, Dare to Fly Simple Life Lessons in Never Giving Up. Senator, thank you.
Sen. McSally: Thank you so much. People can go to their to fly dot USA. Get your book and leave your inspiring story for me. I’ve been inspired over the last few weeks by the communication that happened. God bless you all. Thanks, guy.
Guy Benson: Thank you, Senator. And we’ll be right back.
