Rand Paul says Clinton Foundation details are 'alarming'

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Rand Paul says Clinton Foundation details are 'alarming'

Book questions foreign donations made to the foundation on 'Hannity'

This is a rush transcript from "Hannity," April 20, 2015. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

SEAN HANNITY, HOST: Here with more reaction is the senator who's been a very big critic of Hillary Clinton and her actions as secretary of state, GOP presidential candidate, Kentucky Senator Rand Paul.

Senator, there are two issues here. One, the quid pro quo, and an issue that I know you have been critical of, and that is why accept tens and tens of millions of dollars from countries with atrocious human rights records, especially on gays and lesbians, et cetera, without being critical of those countries?

SEN. RAND PAUL, R-KY., PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Well, we have rules that we specifically have written into the law to try to prevent foreigners from influencing our elections. So it's actually illegal for anybody to take a contribution for your election from anybody from a foreign country.

Now, these aren't contributions to her campaign, but the question is, do they kind of act like the same thing as a contribution? Are they expecting something in return? And yes, I've been very, very loud about the fact that not only should they not take money from Saudi Arabia and these other countries, they should give it back.

I mean, there was a young woman in Saudi Arabia that was raped by seven men, and then she was arrested for being in a car with an unmarried man.  And she was given 90 lashes, six months in prison.

You know, this is the kind of country you should shun or rebuke, but you certainly shouldn't be taking contributions from them.

HANNITY: And I can't find public statements by Hillary Clinton critical of the country, but they then take tens of millions of dollars from Saudi Arabia. I want to get back to that in a minute.

Let me go to The New York Times writing about Peter Schweizer's book, claiming that you have been briefed on it, specifically, and they say that foreign entities made payments to the Clinton Foundation and through Mr. Clinton -- through high-speaking fees -- and they received favors from Mrs. Clinton's State Department in return.

In other words, we see a pattern of financial transactions involving the Clintons that occurred contemporaneous with favorable U.S. policy decisions benefiting those providing the funds.

Your reaction to that? That is -- that is the definition of pay-to-play, quid pro quo, is it not? Buying access?

PAUL: I've been briefed by Peter Schweizer on this book, and the facts are going to be alarming. They're going to be mind-boggling. And I think people are going to read this book they're going to and say, "My goodness, this is happening in America? How can this happen in America?"

And it's detail after detail after detail. I promised not to reveal all the details because it's not my book, but I think people are going to be blown away by the details in this book and how they link the Clintons into this enormous exchange of money from foreign countries, from donors to companies, and then it's all swirling around.

And I don't think it would happen if you didn't have somebody who was a secretary of state and a former president, and they seem to be capitalizing on their service in government. And it sure doesn't remind me of Harry Truman at all. It reminds me of people using the system to enrich themselves, and I think it looks unseemly. And I think a lot of Americans are going to agree with me.

HANNITY: He mentioned -- well, The New York Times mentioned three specific transactions. One, in Colombia, a free trade agreement that benefited a major donor to the foundation. The second case, development of projects in the aftermath of the Haitian earthquake. And the third one is a million dollars in payments to Mr. Clinton by a Canadian bank, major shareholder in the Keystone XL pipeline.

Do you think, as you read these allegations and whatever you've been briefed on, that there's a possibility that laws may have been broken, sir?

PAUL: I think there's going to be some real question, because there are certain transactions that the secretary of state does oversee. And I'm not going to be able to get into the details tonight until the book comes out.  All I can say is that the secretary of state has to oversee some transactions, and the real question is, was there money that influenced these transactions directly or indirectly? Is there the appearance of impropriety, at the very least?

And I think that's what voters are going to have to look at and wonder, can we trust someone to be the president of the United States who's involved with so much money changing hands from foreign countries, foreign entities?  And even now, they say they're not going to take it from foreign countries anymore, but they're still going to take it from wealthy people who live in the foreign countries --

HANNITY: Same thing.

PAUL: It's hard to separate people out in some of these countries.

HANNITY: All right, let me put up on the screen to let people know exactly what we're talking about. This book will go into the quid pro quo aspect of it, but the allegations both -- both of us have been very outspoken about -- you look at the countries and their history here. We have a list of the gender gap rankings in the countries, those seven countries there where she took money from, some of the worst rankings in the entire world.

For example, if you go to Saudi Arabia, she took tens and millions of dollars from a country where women can't drive and women need a male relative to be seen in public. If you look at Kuwait, for example, and women -- women don't have the right to become prosecutors or judges, no laws prohibiting domestic violence.

We go through the UAE and Oman and Qatar and Algeria, Brunei, and all of these countries, and I cannot find a public statement, Senator, where she has condemned any of the treatment of women in these countries, but yet she's running as, you know, "Isn't it a time for a woman to be president?"  Is that hypocritical?

PAUL: Well, I think it's going to destroy her message because I think it's going to be hard for her to go around saying she's going to be a champion of women's rights when she's taking countries -- money from countries that abuse women's rights.

In Brunei, for example, the punishment for adultery is death by stoning...

HANNITY: For women, only.

PAUL: Yes. Women don't get to complain because women are not voters and women don't sit on juries, and it takes two women to equal the testimony of one man in most of these countries.

So yes, I don't know how she's going to explain this in any possible way.  She was making $300,000 an hour giving speeches. All of her husband's speeches seemed to increase in the value. He gave 13 speeches worth a half a million dollars a speech when she became secretary of state.

And apparently, this will be revealed in the book and was in The New York Times today, that before she was secretary of state, apparently, Bill Clinton's speaking fees weren't quite what they were once she became secretary of state.

HANNITY: Well, maybe she can answer a question. I know there's been a lot of commentary about the fact that you did a full hour the day that you announced. I asked you every question I could possibly think of, Senator, from Iran, your position on abortion, how you'd fix the economy, defense.  Maybe she can answer a few questions. That would be a good start.

Senator Paul, thank you for being with us.

PAUL: We'll see. Thanks.

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