CBS "Face The Nation" - Transcript
Interview
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BOB SCHIEFFER: And on this anniversary weekend of 9/11, we're going to talk a little bit about
that and the state of the country today--Islam, terrorism and all of that. And we're joined by
Congressman Keith Ellison. He is the first Muslim member of Congress--took the oath of office
with his hand on a Koran. He is in Minneapolis. And, we're also going to talk with the cochairman
of the 9/11 Commission Tom Kaine. And, Governor Kaine, I want to start with you
because you headed that commission that looked in to 9/11 and tried to figure out why it
happened and what we should do about it. And, last week, you and your co-chairman Lee
Hamilton issued another report that I must say was pretty much overshadowed by the Koranburning
controversy. So I want to put the spotlight on that for a minute. Basically, you and Mister
Hamilton concluded that we have failed to anticipate the real danger we face now from
homegrown terrorists. You went on to say in the report that terrorists have found our Achilles
heel. Just how serious is this and what do you actually mean by that?
TOM KEAN (Co-chairman, 9/11 Commission): Well, we think it's very serious. And we think it's
a growing threat because the strategy has changed. It's much more difficult for al Qaeda to
maybe have a great big attack like 9/11, so they're plotting smaller attacks. And they're using
non-traditional people to try to do them. So the best non-traditional people they can get frankly
are American citizens--people with passports, people who can travel back and forth. People like
the person who tried to blow up the bomb in Times Square. And they're recruiting these people
every day over the internet. They're taking them to places not necessarily in Afghanistan, but
Somalia or Yemen for training. And they're trying to get them back into this country to do us
harm. And we think that's a real threat that, yeah, we've got to look at more seriously.
BOB SCHIEFFER (overlapping): Well, what-- what should we be doing that we're not doing
here?
TOM KEAN: Well-- well, what we didn't do is a lot of recommendation. We want to alert the
country. We-- we have a lot of things we can do such as making law enforcement at the local
level more consistent, local law enforcement at the federal level, lot-- lot of those things. But
we're going to come out later with some recommendations. What we figured in this report, the
first thing we had to do was really try to alert the country and alert the federal government to
what we consider a new and a very dangerous threat.
BOB SCHIEFFER: Mister Ellison, as first Muslim to be elected to the Congress, what do you--
what do you think about what Governor Kean is saying here? Because a lot of people say, well,
we've got to be very careful when we start trying to deal with American citizens because their--
you know their civil liberty is at stake here. And we have to be careful not to go too far. You're a
Muslim. What about this putting more attention on American citizens?
REPRESENTATIVE KEITH ELLISON (D-Minnesota): Well, I think that Governor Kean is right. I
think that he is correct that al Qaeda and the transnational terrorists are trying to be innovative
in the ways they could hurt our country. I think the-- the question is not whether his analysis is
correct, because I think it is. The real question is what do we do with the information that he has
developed? I think the wrong direction is to sort of target discreet and insular minority groups
like Muslims and sort of focus on that community in a strict law enforcement sense. Because, I
think that could have a-- a negative effect. I think the bright thing to do is, one, reach out to
mosques and list some groups all across the country to have a relationship of trust and open
communication because these good loyal Americans will be among the first to say, you know
what, we found somebody who's-- who's-- we believe is suspicious. Two, we need to make sure
that we stand for civil liberties so that we can deprive people like Anwar al-Awlaki and Osama
bin Laden of the claim that Muslims are poorly treated in America. The United States is not at
war with Islam. The United States is a fair country. We know that there are occasions where
people are not treated fairly but those things are not lawful. So we've got to stand on our
tradition of civil liberties. The third thing that I want to say to Muslim communities across the
country--talk to your kids. Talk-- don't leave people out there and understand that there are
people trying to recruit your kids and so you've got to be engaged with them. You've got to talk
with them and you've got to have open lines of communication with your children and with the
law enforcement community. And there's more things that we can do, but I think that the
information is right. The question is, what do we do with it?
BOB SCHIEFFER: Let me-- let me just ask you, every poll shows that the country seems to
becoming more anti-Islam. We saw these demonstrations in New York about where to put that
mosque. One in five Americans thinks that Barack Obama is a Muslim. Where is this coming
from, Mister Ellison?
REPRESENTATIVE KEITH ELLISON: Well, you know, I think that one factor is technology. You
know, anybody even an obscure little-known pastor like Terry Jones can-- can do something
incredibly inflammatory, get it on YouTube and all of a sudden he's an international celebrity.
That is one element. But then there's another one. I think there is some-- some anxiety and
frustration in the country. There are some politicians who believe that it's to their political
advantage to identify scapegoats and try to turn Americans on Americans for their own political
advantage by pandering to our worst instincts and fears. And then, I also think, you know, you
can't deny that, you know, the-- the-- the-- the criminals and the murderers who did this thing to
our citizens on 911, you know, they did-- they did associate themselves with my faith, Islam.
That's unfortunate. Nothing they did is-- is the Islam I know, or the overwhelming majority of the
Muslims I know. But they click-- they did make that connection. So a lot of Americans are just--
they don't know anything about Islam. I recommend that Americans go out and get with your
churches and your synagogues, reach out to a mosque. Get to know people. And in my loc--
you know, a few years ago when Ramadan was going on and Yom Kippur was going on, we got
our congregations of Jews and Muslims together to break the fast.
BOB SCHIEFFER: All right.
REPRESENTATIVE KEITH ELLISON: I hope people around the country do that.
BOB SCHIEFFER: Let me ask Governor Kean. Do you think because we mentioned the fellow
down there that was wanting to go burn these Korans, he called it off, the secretary of defense
called him, General Petraeus spoke out about this, a lot of people say he was just a fringe
character and maybe they elevated him to another level when they did that. Do you think that
they did the right thing, governor?
TOM KEAN: I think they felt they had to. But he is a fringe character, and he got blown up. But
that's not what this country is about. In fact, Osama bin Laden wants this. I mean that's-- his
strategy is to get this war against Islam, not a war against Islam. The majority of Islam, vast
majority Islam is all with us on this-- on this fight, helping us in this fight. And-- and this is not a
country about hate. Never has been. And-- and we've got to recognize that. And we've got to
frankly deal with the majority of Islam in good faith and show that we're willing to work with them
as they're willing to work with us to get rid of this bad element that did this terrible event on 9/11
and would like to hurt us again if they possibly could.
BOB SCHIEFFER: Well, governor, I just saw Congressman Ellison shaking his head. We have
about twenty seconds in-- in agreement with you-- about twenty seconds left, Congressman,
just a final thought.
REPRESENTATIVE KEITH ELLISON: A final thought the-- we-- is that I'm looking and talking
with my colleagues about how we could perhaps pull together a bill to help study violent
radicalization. We don't know enough about it. And we're operating on anecdotes. I think we
need to move forward with Governor Kean's recom-- analysis and recommendation.
BOB SCHIEFFER: All right.
REPRESENTATIVE KEITH ELLISON: I commend him for his work.
BOB SCHIEFFER: All right. Thank you so much both of you. We'll be back with some final
thoughts.
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