I gave a speech at Kentucky's old state capitol in Frankfort yesterday addressing the true intellectual underpinnings of Rand Paul's dangerous ideology in a serious and thoughtful way.
This speech could be a landmark in our race. If we elect someone who wants to dismantle almost every aspect of our modern government, that's just what we'll get.
Thank you ladies and gentlemen for being here. It’s a pleasure to be here to talk to you about where I think this race is headed over the next couple weeks. And about the fundamental choice we have in this election. Judge Palmore I’m going to dedicate this speech to you. Ok. I think you are going to like it. Rand Paul.
Rand Paul and I have many differences. And you know about some of them.
As Kentucky Attorney General, I have fought crime from one end of the state to the other. You know, Rand Paul thinks that non-violent activities shouldn’t be crimes at all.
I’ve seen first hand what the scourge of drugs is doing across our state. Rand Paul says that drugs aren’t a pressing issue in the Commonwealth of Kentucky.
Rand Paul even wants to charge seniors a $2,000 deductible before they get their Medicare benefits. He calls this position courageous. At least when he is not denying it.
I call it callous and just plain wrong.
Yes you know Rand and I have many differences. But I want to talk to you today about just one. Because I think everything else flows from it.
Protecting people will be the mission of my tenure in the United States Senate if you honor me with your vote. But to Rand Paul, protecting people is not the government's business.
Rand Paul is on record as having said that we haven’t followed mine safety, as it should have been done since 1936. He is on record as having said that we need a pre-World War II system of health care. He is on record as saying, and I quote, "since 1937 I don’t think we have obeyed the constitution at all."
Folks Rand Paul is not a lawyer, but he stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night. And these dates are not random. They are not random.
In 1936, in a case called Carter Coal, the United States Supreme Court decided that the Commerce Clause was broad enough the Federal Government could regulate mine safety.
In the 1930’s we were losing 1,500 miners a year to accidents. Last year we lost 34. That’s 34 too many. But you have to understand in Rand Paul’s world his view of the constitution is it's not broad enough to protect our miners.
It's no accident that he says he wants a pre-World War II system of health care. In World War II...during World War II, the system of Blue Cross-Blue Shield came up and we started reimbursing at certain rates for certain procedures. Rand Paul, along with some of his gang of radicals, thinks that doctors and patients should just negotiate directly without health insurance.
And that quote that "since 1937 I don’t think we have obeyed the Constitution at all." That’s not random. Those are Rand Paul’s exact words, and in 1937, after much debate about the New Deal, the Supreme Court of the United States in the case of Helvering v. Davis upheld the Constitutionality -- by a 7-2 vote -- upheld the Constitutionality of Social Security.
The significance of Rand Paul’s statement is clear.
Rand Paul doesn’t think that Social Security is Constitutional. He doesn’t. Rand Paul’s view stem from a radical view of the Constitution. A view that says that the federal government what it does everyday for people is an illegal expansion of federal power. He thinks it’s unconstitutional.
I say we have been protecting people since the 1930’s. And you hear talk all over America these days. You know Rand Paul is a part of a group of folks that make endless references to the Constitution and to the founding fathers. All to provide cover for their view that many of our basic rights and protections and much of the federal government itself should simply not exist.
One of his merry band out in Colorado said he would repeal the 17th amendment and end our right to vote for our own Senators. Others talk about repealing the 19th amendment and ending a woman’s right to vote.
Rand Paul was even quoted in the Washington Post this morning talking about -- in letters from his college days -- that we don’t need certain measures that provide equality for women.
Rand Paul and I share a fundamentally different view of our future.
Here in Kentucky, Rand Paul said he would repeal the 14th amendment. That’s the amendment enshrined forever in our constitution that guarantees Americans due process and equal protection under law.
It took a civil war to get that one in there. Rand Paul would take it out.
And just yesterday Rand Paul said he would repeal the 16th amendment and impose a national sales tax on everything we buy. From transportation to groceries to prescription drugs to everything. How do you think that would go over with seniors on fixed income. A 23% national sales tax on everything.
You hear Rand Paul and his radical friends talking about the interstate commerce clause and talking about the 10th amendment and talking about the enumerated powers. Why? Because most modern protections that people enjoy today are based on the government's power to regulate interstate commerce.
Think about the landmark case that upheld the Civil Rights Act. Think about Katzenburg v McClung. What we said as a nation is that we are an inclusive society. And that because things move throughout interstate commerce an individual's right if they are a person of color to come into a lunch counter and get served supersedes Rand Paul’s views of the constitution and property rights.
And it was right to do that.
Rand Paul seems to hold a view that nothing the federal government does today is truly permitted under the constitution or by our founding fathers. We are talking about things that people now take for granted.
In Rand Paul’s view the federal government has no business inspecting the food we eat because those safety inspections are unconstitutional.
Rand Paul thinks the federal government has no business checking in to whether or not the cribs in which our children sleep are safe. He doesn’t think consumer safety laws are constitutional.
Rand Paul believes we have no federal right to set a minimum wage. Why Rand Paul himself thinks the federal minimum wage is unconstitutional.
You know you may have asked yourself why would Rand Paul ever oppose mine safety regulation. Well now you know why. He doesn’t think federal mine safety laws are constitutional.
You may have wondered why Rand Paul would ever opposed the ADA and say that businesses should be allowed to force disabled veterans to work on the first floor. Well now you know why he doesn’t think that protections for the disabled are constitutional.
Folks we have 12,000 new disabled vets in this Commonwealth since 9/11. That is a callous, callous view to have for our disabled veterans.
There is a story out this morning in the Washington Post where we have some of Rand Paul’s college writings. And in it he says (I believe I have this quote right), "Since when have two people ever been equal?" Ill tell you when two people have been equal.
Two people have been equal since our founding fathers wrote that we hold these truths to be self-evident. That all men are created equal. And you know who endowed us with the equality. I’m not talking about equality of outcome. I’m talking about equality of opportunity. And you know who endowed us with equality of opportunity. Our creator. Our creator.
And I want you to listen carefully. I want you to listen carefully when Rand Paul answers when he is asked about whether he would have voted for things like the minimum wage or Medicare. Roger (Alford), he says things like oh it’s quote unquote a settled matter or oh we have it now, of course we are going to have it.
Rand never says yes. He never says yes because he thinks all of these things are unconstitutional. Rand Paul believes that almost every single major national initiative to protect people since the 1930’s is unconstitutional.
In this campaign, and long before, Rand Paul questioned the existence of Social Security and Medicare. He called Social Security a Ponzi scheme. He told a reporter he wasn’t sure he would have voted for Medicare when it first passed.
Now you know why. He doesn’t think they should exist at all.
To him Medicare and Social Security -- the basic and momentous protections that we have had for our seniors for these last 50 and 75 -- years are unconstitutional.
Rand Paul has questioned the minimum wage. He has questioned the civil rights act. He has questioned the Americans with Disabilities Act. He has even questioned college loans for our kids. He has even questioned the existence of federal drug enforcement. Now you know why. If Rand had his way these things wouldn’t even exist.
He would seek to repeal and take us back and away from the most basic rights and protections that we have fought for as a society since the depression.
Rand Paul is wrong. Rand Paul is fundamentally wrong.
You know elections are a choice. Not necessarily the choice that Rand Paul wants to put out there. But this election is a choice between us and Rand Paul. That’s what we face. And here are the questions we face.
Do we dismantle Social Security and Medicare as Rand Paul would do or do we fight to protect them?
Do we end civil rights and the safeguards and protections for our children and disabled veterans when they come home from war, like Rand Paul wants to do, or do we stand up for them?
Do we get rid of the minimum wage and let people who work for $2 an hour, as Rand Paul would prefer, or do we fight for a living wage for every single Kentuckian?
Do we just let giant oil companies and other companies do whatever they want, as Rand Paul wants to do, or do we hold them accountable?
The Washington Post reports this morning that, in his college writings, Rand Paul said that there is no need for consumer protection laws.
I’m the attorney general of the Commonwealth of Kentucky. I enforce the Kentucky Consumer Protection Act.
I have taken on pharmaceutical companies that have lied to us. I have taken on oil companies that have gouged us at the pump. I have taken on scams and scam artists. And you know what? I will always in the United States Senate stand up for consumer protection laws.
There is also a fundamental issue here. Do we end mine safety laws, and car safety laws, as Rand Paul wants us to do? Or do we fight to keep them? Do we shut down federal law enforcement? Do we legalize drugs? Do we let criminals loose on the streets, because of Rand Paul’s radical theory of the constitution?
Or do we beef up federal law enforcement, do we try to get drugs off our streets, and do we put violent criminals behind bars where they belong?
Ladies and Gentlemen: There is a choice in this election. In the Senate I’ll protect people. I’ll protect Social Security and Medicare. I will work to protect our coal miners. I will work to protect our disabled veterans. I will work to protect us from the rip off artists and scam artists, whether it’s Main Street or Wall Street. And I'll do it just as I have done as Attorney General.
I will stand up for the basic rights of Kentucky and of Kentuckians, and I will fight my heart out. Rand Paul would end them all because he thinks they are unconstitutional.
In this article in the Washington Post which I keep saying it’s remarkable, he refers to Ayn Rand. I guess that’s how you pronounce her name.
And he talks about average people as the mindless mob of mediocrity.
I get this Commonwealth. I have traveled it. I have seen people who are struggling to make ends meet. Who are trying to pay for health care. Who are worried about whether or not they can send their kids to school.
I’m not talking about equality of outcome. I am talking about a government that provides equality of opportunity and that makes certain that we treat working people well and that we give them the basic protections that they deserve.
Rand Paul on Monday night challenged me to step up and be a man. I’m going to step up and protect the Constitution of the United States. Because it’s a roughly 220-year-old, living and breathing document that tries to take us not to a perfect union but to a more perfect union.
It’s a document that allows us to move forward. Forward for women. Forward for people of color. Forward for seniors. Forward for disabled veterans. Forward for people that need looking out for.
That’s what it means to fight for a more perfect union. Not to have a radical view of the constitution that would take us back to a place that we don’t need to go.
Rand Paul, I have stood up to bullies before. I will stand up and be a man. I will see you on the campaign trail. I am looking forward to the next three debates.
Why don’t you stand up and be a man and tell the people of Kentucky what you really think about the Constitution of the United States of America?
I will see you in the morning in Paducah. I will see you Sunday night on WHAS-11 TV in Louisville. I will see you October 25th on KET.
And the people of Kentucky deserve this debate about how we see our future. I will always stand up for the people of Kentucky, and there is a real clear choice in this election.
And I will never, never forget the people who need someone to stand up for them.
Thank you and God Bless you for being here today.