Tim Kaine Quotes

Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump basically share a policy of brute military strength. And both, I think, make a lot of Americans uneasy about our foreign policy going forward, which needs a frank discussion. Likewise on the issue of student debt and the future of our younger generation.

I think if Donald Trump should become commander in chief, we all want that in a leader, somebody who is able to fight back.

I think that Joe Biden is qualified in many respects. But I do point out that he's been wrong on many foreign policy and national security issues, which is supposed to be his strength.

I was a member of the Armed Services Committee for 18 years. I spent a big chunk of my life studying national security issues and our role in the world.

Voters are not great at reading issues. They are great at reading character.

There’s a minimum threshold any man or woman has to cross on national security and foreign policy for the American people to think you’re remotely eligible to be president and these guys have a long way to go.

I've known Don since he came to Washington. When he first came to work for George W. Bush, he was a different Don Rumsfeld. He was jolly, full of life, and ready to go to war, but only if we could win.

We need a Commander-in-Chief, not a Campaigner-in-Chief.

Senator Clinton is very knowledgeable about national security and is probably going to be strong on defense. I have no doubts whatsoever that if she were president in January '09, she would not act irresponsibly and issue orders to conduct an immediate withdrawal from Iraq, regardless of the consequences, and squander the gains that have been made.

During the 2008 campaign, Hillary Clinton ran a blunt television ad asking whether Barack Obama could handle a foreign policy crisis.

It's not our job to choose the best Sunday school teacher, like Jimmy Carter was. It's our job to choose who would defend and protect our nation, who would be the best president.

I just think Trump's character and some of his values makes him unfit to lead. For someone like him to be president and in charge of our troops? It's scary, to be honest.

We need a commander in chief not a professor of law standing at a lectern - the lectern.

Well, the most important thing a president will be is commander-in-chief. And that requires having an understanding of the complex issues on foreign policy. Foreign policy presents us often with hard choices, not black or white choices.

I'm a war president. I make decisions here in the Oval Office in foreign policy matters with war on my mind.

Don Rumsfeld is the finest secretary of defense the nation has ever had.

President [Ronald] Reagan never has tried to become an expert on military matters. He never has endeavored to learn the most important details in that field, which lead to a situation in which his aides played a much greater roles than aides would have played under President Ford or let us say in the whole Nixon-Ford-Kissinger era.

Just listen to what Mr. [Donald] Trump has to say and make your own judgment with respect to how confident you feel about his ability to manage things like our nuclear triad.

We need a president who will lead with a stronger, more consistent foreign policy. We also need our commander in chief to put more faith in military leadership who have all of the combat experience. It’s bad policy to try to micromanage too much operationally and tactically from a desk in the Oval Office.

Donald Trump is temperamentally unfit to be president and commander-in-chief.

As a former secretary of defense, I think Donald Rumsfeld is the best secretary of defense the United States has ever had.

America needs a commander in chief, not a global community organizer.

I think it's critical that we return national security issues to the center of the overall political debate in America.

The judgment that every voter is making of every one of us [running for presidency] who has the experience, who has the vision, who has the judgment to be commander in chief. That is the most important decision for the voters to make. That's a standard I'm held to. And it's a standard everyone else is held to.

Donald Trump says he knows more about ISIS than the generals. No, he doesn't.