Tim Kaine on Foreign Policy Democratic Senate Challenger; previously Governor

Create a humanitarian zone in northern Syria, with UN aid

PENCE: What America ought to do right now is immediately establish safe zones, so that families and vulnerable families with children can move out of those areas, work with our Arab partners, real time, right now, to make that happen. And if Russia chooses to be involved and continue to be involved in this barbaric attack on civilians in Aleppo, the US should be prepared to use military force to strike military targets of the Assad regime to prevent them from this humanitarian crisis that is taking place in Aleppo.

KAINE: Hillary and I also agree that the establishment of humanitarian zones in northern Syria with the provision of international human aid, consistent with the U.N. Security Council resolution that was passed in February 2014, would be a very, very good idea.

On Putin: See difference between leadership & dictatorship

KAINE: Hillary has the ability to stand up to Russia in a way that this ticket does not. Donald Trump, again and again, has praised Vladimir Putin. And it's clear that he has business dealings with Russian oligarchs who are very connected to Putin. The Trump campaign team had to be fired a month or so ago because of those shadowy connections with pro-Putin forces. Gov. Pence made the odd claim, he said "inarguably Vladimir Putin is a better leader than President Obama." Vladimir Putin has run his economy into the ground. He persecutes LGBT folks and journalists. If you don't know the difference between dictatorship and leadership, then you got to go back to a fifth-grade civics class. I'll tell you what offends me...

PENCE: Well, that offended me!

KAINE: Vladimir Putin is a dictator. He's not a leader. Anybody who thinks otherwise doesn't know Russian history and they don't know Vladimir Putin.

The "reset with Russia" failed because Putin is a dictator

Q: Senator Kaine, what went wrong with the Russia reset?

KAINE: Vladimir Putin is a dictator. He's not a leader. Anybody who thinks otherwise doesn't know Russian history and they don't know Vladimir Putin.

Create a humanitarian zone in northern Syria, with UN aid

PENCE: What America ought to do right now is immediately establish safe zones, so that families and vulnerable families with children can move out of those areas, work with our Arab partners, real time, right now, to make that happen. And if Russia chooses to be involved and continue to be involved in this barbaric attack on civilians in Aleppo, the US should be prepared to use military force to strike military targets of the Assad regime to prevent them from this humanitarian crisis that is taking place in Aleppo.

KAINE: Hillary and I also agree that the establishment of humanitarian zones in northern Syria with the provision of international human aid, consistent with the U.N. Security Council resolution that was passed in February 2014, would be a very, very good idea.

On Putin: See difference between leadership & dictatorship

KAINE: Hillary has the ability to stand up to Russia in a way that this ticket does not. Donald Trump, again and again, has praised Vladimir Putin. And it's clear that he has business dealings with Russian oligarchs who are very connected to Putin. The Trump campaign team had to be fired a month or so ago because of those shadowy connections with pro-Putin forces. Gov. Pence made the odd claim, he said "inarguably Vladimir Putin is a better leader than President Obama." Vladimir Putin has run his economy into the ground. He persecutes LGBT folks and journalists. If you don't know the difference between dictatorship and leadership, then you got to go back to a fifth-grade civics class. I'll tell you what offends me...

PENCE: Well, that offended me!

KAINE: Vladimir Putin is a dictator. He's not a leader. Anybody who thinks otherwise doesn't know Russian history and they don't know Vladimir Putin.

The "reset with Russia" failed because Putin is a dictator

Q: Senator Kaine, what went wrong with the Russia reset?

KAINE: Vladimir Putin is a dictator. He's not a leader. Anybody who thinks otherwise doesn't know Russian history and they don't know Vladimir Putin.

Maintain relations with Britain & EU to move beyond Brexit

DONALD TRUMP: People want to see borders. People want to have independence. And you see it all over Europe. You're going to have many other cases; I think it's happening in the United States.

Q: Do you think he's right that there's a parallel?

SEN. TIM KAINE: There's a couple things you've got to understand. Young voters, those under 50, especially millennials, overwhelmingly voted to stay. And it was older voters who voted to leave. And certainly immigration issues are important and a concern about some of the European regulation, et cetera. It's a huge deal. It really is. And the important thing for us is because the relationship with Britain has been so strong, and we're so close to European nations, we have to help them find a path over the next couple years to do this in a way that can keep ties rather than tear ties apart.

Truman Doctrine is the last comprehensive US foreign policy

"Poland has a far right, Putin-style movement, but it's democratic. Should we support all democracies, even ones that are going against what we believe in in terms of dealing with Russia?" Kaine noted, "What if you're in a pure democracy and you're a religious minority, ethnic minority or racial minority, and the majority says `we don't like you?' Democracies are no guarantee that the public will do what we will do, but democracies are preferable to authoritarian nations and so with a nation like Poland."

U.S. leadership in global economy, without blind endorsement

Virginia is a global gateway, and that status is important to me as Congress debates whether to give the president the tools to negotiate more trade deals to cement American leadership in a global economy. My support for TPA is not a blind endorsement of any pending trade negotiation. Once we establish our key principles, I will make sure that the specifics of any final deal are placed before the public and fully debated to see if they meet our standards and help Virginia.

It is time to restore freedom to travel to Cuba

Long pro-Israel tradition allows for some disagreements

KAINE: I don't feel a distancing of Democrats from Israel, but I do feel there has been an effort by some in the Republican Party to push Democrats out of the relationship with Israel. Our party has a long tradition of being pro-Israel, and being pro-Israel doesn't mean we agree on everything, but we're friends, we're allies, we're partners and to the extent we have disagreements we try to work them out productively.

Q: Is there room in the Democratic Party for members who are not pro-Israel?

KAINE: Everyone I know in this party is pro-Israel. This doesn't mean we agree on everything. I have very deep concerns about the path that leadership is following with respect to trying to find an actual implementation to what was agreed upon in Oslo in the early 1990s. We've got some disagreements, but I don't know a single senator who is not pro-Israel, Democrat or Republican.

Congress censured Obama for troops to Libya without asking

If we allow a nuclear Iran, others will follow; but deal ok

Everybody wants Iran not to have nuclear weapons. We have a diplomatic opening. We release $500 million a month to Iran over 6 months. In exchange, they destroy their 20% enriched uranium cap, all their other enrichment and allow daily inspections If we do our part, and if they do their part, then we will build some trust and we can see whether there's a next step.

Open debate spurred Syria to destroy its chemical weapons

Non-state organizations will have an increasing role

Investments in international development is important to US

Strengthen partnerships with Latin America

Let Israel & Palestine negotiate about status of Jerusalem

GOV. KAINE: Well, let me just talk about the Jerusalem issue. He says he believes personally that Jerusalem should be undivided. But this is a matter of negotiation that's ongoing between Israel and Palestinian leaders right now. And he says he respects that process. They're negotiating that. They're going to decide what the right framework is. He expressed a personal preference and a belief. The issue of experience is fundamentally about judgment. Senator Obama said in '02 this war would be a big mistake. It's not about whether we win the war; it's about whether we win the right war. We need to win the war against terrorism.

Two-state solution despite Israeli settlements on West Bank.

Congressional Summary: S.Res.6/H.Res.11 objects to U.N. Security Council Resolution 2334, which characterizes Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem as illegal and demands cessation of settlement activities.

• Calls for such resolution to be repealed or fundamentally altered and allows all final status issues toward a two-state solution to be resolved through direct bilateral negotiations between the parties.
• Notes that granting membership and statehood standing to the Palestinians at the UN, its specialized agencies, and other international institutions outside of the context of a bilateral peace agreement with Israel would cause severe harm to the peace process.
• Urges upholding the U.S. practice of vetoing all Security Council resolutions that recognize unilateral Palestinian actions or dictate terms and a time line for a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
• Reaffirms that it is U.S. policy to seek a sustainable, just, and secure two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Opposing argument: (Cato Institute, Dec. 19, 2003): In principle, separation seems the best answer to stop the killing. For this reason, a security fence makes sense--if it actually separates Jew from Arab. Unfortunately, to protect a number of disparate Israeli settlements erected in the midst of Palestinian communities, Israel currently is mixing Jew and Arab and separating Arab from Arab. Thus are sown the seeds for conflict. After 36 years of occupation, the land remains almost exclusively Arab. The limited Jewish presence is the result of conscious colonization. The settlements require a pervasive Israeli military occupation, imposing a de facto system of apartheid. Separation offers the only hope, but separation requires dismantling Israeli settlements.