Palin: Vice President Is in Charge of the Senate

Created: October 21, 2008 14:30 | Last updated: July 31, 2020 00:00

ANCHORAGE, Alaska — Think Progress has a great catch. At the end of an interview with a local TV station in Colorado, Gov. Sarah Palin said she thinks the vice president’s job is to be “in charge of the U.S. Senate.”

Third-grader Brandon Garcia asked what Palin thinks the vice president’s job entails. Palin replied:

[T]hey’re in charge of the U.S. Senate so if they want to they can really get in there with the senators and make a lot of good policy changes that will make life better for Brandon and his family and his classroom.

Palin first propounded her expansive views of the vice president’s office during the vice presidential debate with Sen. Joe Biden. When moderator Gwen Ifill asked her if she believes, as Dick Cheney does, that the vice president is not solely a member of the executive branch, Palin responded that there is “much flexibility” in the job.

Well, our founding fathers were very wise there in allowing through the Constitution much flexibility there in the office of the vice president. And we will do what is best for the American people in tapping into that position and ushering in an agenda that is supportive and cooperative with the president’s agenda in that position. Yeah, so I do agree with him that we have a lot of flexibility in there, and we’ll do what we have to do to administer very appropriately the plans that are needed for this nation.

The whole Colorado interview is worth watching. Palin talks taxes, energy and her views on funding programs for special-needs children. The comment about the role of the vice president is around the 7-minute mark.