Mike DeWine in Ohio 2006 Senate Debate
On Free Trade:
Tariffs against dumping steel, & give fines to US companies
Q: Would you repeal NAFTA? BROWN: I would renegotiate NAFTA, as I would renegotiate PNTR with China. Mike DeWine has supported every time these trade agreements that give incentives to the big corporations.
DeWINE: I’ll give you an example on trade.
Steel. When these steel companies were importing steel, dumping steel in the US from China & other countries, we got the president to put tariffs on. It made a big difference. Another example. Sen. Byrd and I worked together on the Byrd Amendment, which
says is that when a foreign country dumps into the US, instead of putting that money into the US Treasury when we fine them, we give that money to the US companies. That’s brought back $315 million just for Ohio companies. But the bigger issue is,
Sherrod thinks you can build a wall around the state of Ohio. [Yet] when it comes time to protect Ohio industries, he’s not there.
BROWN: All of us were involved in [the steel issue]. Neither of those laws that he talks about are still in effect.
Source: 2006 Ohio Senate Debate on NBC Meet the Press
Oct 1, 2006
On Homeland Security:
Brown voted 10 times to cut intelligence spending
DEWINE: Brown voted 10 separate times to cut our intelligence spending.BROWN: You know better than making charges like that, that are just unsubstantiated.
DEWINE: The roll call was there.
BROWN: I ultimately voted every time for those
intelligence budgets. And he knows that.
DEWINE: The majority of times of those 10 times where Sherrod Brown voted to cut our intelligence spending, he was the minority even of his own party.
Source: 2006 Ohio Senate Debate on NBC Meet the Press
Oct 1, 2006
On Homeland Security:
I don’t have confidence in Rumsfeld
Q: Looking back at the war, should President Bush have replaced the Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld?DeWINE: I’ve already said I don’t have confidence in Rumsfeld.He’s made major mistakes in this war. There’s absolutely no doubt about it.
The decision to put Rumsfeld in was made by the president, and that’s his decision to keep. I was not elected president of the United States, the president was. That’s why we have elections.
Q: Would you urge the president to replace him?
DeWINE: By saying I don’t have confidence, it makes it pretty clear what I think.
Q: That you’re urging the president?
DeWINE: I don’t think that he’s done a good job.
Q: Who would you put in there?
DeWINE: I’m not going to the point of specula
Source: 2006 Ohio Senate Debate on NBC Meet the Press
Oct 1, 2006
On Principles & Values:
Worked in a bi-partisan manner to get things done
For 12 years in the Senate, I’ve gotten things done. And the way I’ve gotten things done is by working with Democrats and Republicans. I worked with Rockefeller, for example, on highway safety issues, on steel, and on other issues as well-adoption,
foster care. I worked with Dodd to get better medicines for kids, on the fire act to get money, $100 million, directly back in Ohio. I worked with Levin in regard to the Great Lakes. I have a long record of working with Democrats and Republicans alike.
Source: 2006 Ohio Senate Debate on NBC Meet the Press
Oct 1, 2006
On Principles & Values:
Brown does not represent the mainstream of Ohio
The difference between me and Brown is, if you look at his record, he has a very slim record in the House of getting anything done. He has been described as a partisan in the Cleveland Plain Dealer.
He has been described as someone who is on the fringe by the National Journal. He’s on the fringe of his own party. Many times his votes have been in the minority even of his own party. He is to the left of his own party and not in the mainstream of Ohio
Source: 2006 Ohio Senate Debate on NBC Meet the Press
Oct 1, 2006
On Tax Reform:
Some ads had mistakes, but say Brown votes against tax cuts
DeWINE: When it came time to help the middle class with tax cuts, a tax cut that has taken five million Americans off the tax rolls, that has given the average Ohioan $2,000 per year, Sherrod Brown voted no time and time again. BROWN: Mike, you know
better than that, too. His whole ad campaign is fabricated on making up stuff about taxes.
DeWINE: My ad campaign is based on votes that you cast. You just want to run from your record.
BROWN: Mike ran an ad of the World Trade Center on fire.
The problem is, he doctored the ad.
DeWINE: Have you ever denied the facts in that ad? I said there was a mistake made in the picture, but there was no mistake in the facts.
BROWN: He didn’t fire the ad agency.
Q: Was there any factual mistake?
BROWN: Well, other than doctoring a photo?
Q: Well, you made that point.
BROWN: That’s a pretty important point.
DeWINE: He won’t answer the question. The facts are correct.
Source: 2006 Ohio Senate Debate on NBC Meet the Press
Oct 1, 2006
On War & Peace:
Cannot set an artificial timetable for withdrawal from Iraq
We cannot leave Iraq with the job undone, and we cannot set an artificial timetable. It will embolden the insurgents; it will tell them when we will be gone. They just sit back and wait. That would be a mistake. If you don’t believe me, look at what the
three military leaders the other day said. They said they were very critical of Bush and Rumsfeld, and the conduct of the war. But when they are asked “Shall we set a date, a date specific, to be out of Iraq?” they all said “No.” And the reasons they
gave were, one, it would bring about chaos in Iraq; two, it would spread; three, the country that would benefit the most would be Iran. And then it was also said that we would have in Iraq a situation like we had in the 1990s in Afghanistan, only it
would be worse. It would become the focal point for the terrorists, a place where they could go, get sanctuary. The colonel who testified said, “Beirut’s on a major, major airline route. They won’t have any trouble getting there, it’s very easy.”
Source: 2006 Ohio Senate Debate on NBC Meet the Press
Oct 1, 2006
On War & Peace:
Iraq has become a cause celebre for the jihadists
Q: Has in fact the Iraq war made us less safe, created more terrorists than we’ve killed? A: The National Intelligence Estimate said it very well. I think it is correct. It said a number of things. One, it said, as you pointed out, there was-it’s become
a cause celebre. That’s the right word. The jihadists, the people who want to kill us, always have a cause. Bin Laden’s cause before 9/11 was that we had troops in the Arabian Peninsula, Saudi Arabia. They have other reasons. They say Israel.
They say that we have troops other places. So it is always something. But the key finding, seems to me in that NIE, is they said, “If the jihadists are successful in Iraq, they will be emboldened and there will be more of them.
If they’re unsuccessful, there will be fewer of them.” That to me is future-looking, and that is very instructive and it goes along with what the three military leaders who testified had the same plot, same plot in mind.
Source: 2006 Ohio Senate Debate on NBC Meet the Press
Oct 1, 2006
On War & Peace:
Would not have voted to go into Iraq with what we now know
Q: Would you have still voted to go into Iraq, knowing what we do now? A: No. I think with the weapons of mass destruction evidence, we would have never even had a vote. It would never have been presented by Bush. But saying that does not mean that our
troops have not done a magnificent job, nor does it mean that the world is not better off for having Saddam Hussein-this man who had developed chemical weapons & biological weapons in the past-the world is better off for him being gone. The Iraqi Survey
Group that went in afterwards said they didn’t have the weapons of mass destruction, but they said two other things that are very interesting. One, he continued to have the capability and the scientists to develop them in the future.
And second, he had the will and inclination to do it. The intelligence committee said, “This man has weapons of mass destruction.” Knowing that, there was no choice at that point but to make that decision. But the intelligence was bad.
Source: 2006 Ohio Senate Debate on NBC Meet the Press
Oct 1, 2006
Page last updated: Feb 20, 2019