转录：莱·巴科特做客《与玛格丽特·布伦南直面国家》节目，2026年6月7日
2026-06-07T10:30:04-0400 / 哥伦比亚广播公司新闻
以下是与海军陆战队退伍军人、“光荣同行”组织创始人莱·巴科特的完整采访实录，部分内容已于2026年6月7日在《与玛格丽特·布伦南直面国家》节目中播出。
玛格丽特·布伦南： 今天做客我们节目的是莱·巴科特，他是海军陆战队退伍军人，同时也是“光荣同行”组织的创始人。该组织致力于推选曾投身公共服务的退伍军人及其他人士参选。该组织表示，在过去八年里，他们已帮助超过100人成功当选，其中目前有50人在国会任职。他的新书名为《勇气可以拯救我们：十位非凡美国人与我们未来的斗争》，书中介绍了五名民主党人和五名共和党人的事迹，他们都有过军旅生涯，其中一人还有联邦调查局工作经历。莱，很高兴你能来。
莱·巴科特： 谢谢。感谢邀请我上节目。
玛格丽特·布伦南： 那么，我们确实需要被拯救。
莱·巴科特： 是的。
玛格丽特·布伦南： 听起来在你的书中，你介绍了这十个人的故事，其中一些人目前仍在任职，包括做客本期节目的唐·培根众议员，还有两位州长。是什么让你决定撰写这本书？
莱·巴科特： 我一直在领导“光荣同行”组织。八年前左右，我与已故的大卫·格根以及我在伊拉克和阿富汗战争中服役的另一名海军陆战队队员共同创立了该组织。在这段时间里，我们帮助招募、培训并助力退伍军人参选，他们承诺以诚信、文明和勇气服务公众，包括在艰难时期勇于跨越党派界限开展合作。在这个过程中，我结识了他们中的许多人，彼此相当熟悉。因此，我决定挑选十位人士，以五比五的比例平均分配两党成员，他们都在国家面临严峻挑战的时期就任公职。我真正想要深入挖掘的是他们勇气的来源，同时审视他们在军旅生涯以及从政和担任公职期间的勇气时刻。有时这种勇气更为内敛，更多的是道德勇气，而非他们在军旅中可能经历的肉体勇气，但这就是我撰写这本书的思路。这本书主要是为学生们写的。我希望能有更多学生学习勇气的意义。我将勇气定义为一种服务形式，即为了超越自身的事物承担风险。这并非出于私利，而是为了服务于人们常说的公共利益。
玛格丽特·布伦南： 听起来你确实需要激励年轻人，因为从整体民调来看，皮尤研究中心的数据显示，仅有17%的美国人相信华盛顿政府总能或在大多数时候会做正确的事。我们哥伦比亚广播公司的民调也显示，年轻一代情绪低落，对未来感到焦虑。那么，你该如何激励他们加入这个他们认为已经 broken 的体系呢？
莱·巴科特： 是的，我认为很多年轻人都感到孤独。他们缺乏目标感。我在军旅生涯中发现的一大好处是，它能让你拥有一种超越自身的使命感，让你与来自各行各业的美国人拥有共同的目标。因此，这本书的一个关键要点是找到一条通往公共服务的道路，这也是本书的目标之一。书中显然重点关注了退伍军人，“光荣同行”是我领导的非营利组织，本书的所有收益都将捐献给该组织。该组织每年与盖洛普合作，开展对退伍军人信任度的调查。退伍军人是美国少数几个——护士群体是另一个——跨党派信任度特别高的群体。我认为这是因为他们的服务精神，这是一种特殊的品质，也是我们需要守护的东西。
玛格丽特·布伦南： 你是否担心现在需要守护这份信任？我们听到五角大楼很多关于“战士精神”的言论，都是关于战士精神的具象描述，关乎杀伤力。这并不是你在这里所描述的东西。
莱·巴科特： 是的，我认为军队的美好之处在于它是美国的缩影。它涵盖了各行各业、所有社会经济背景、不同种族、性别和族裔，它必须是那个熔炉，那个汇聚各方的地方。这就是我所介绍的十位人物的特点——他们来自不同背景，却在服务中找到了共同的使命。
玛格丽特·布伦南： 你是否担心，在当下，你所描述的那种道德勇气几乎不可能实现？因为我们看到当下的党派对立如此严重，再比如可能会固化这种党派分歧的重新选区划分，削弱了你所说的你想要鼓励的两党合作。各种力量似乎都在与你作对。
莱·巴科特： 各种力量确实都在与我们作对。大多数美国人都渴望勇气，但却觉得几乎看不到，甚至根本看不到。我想要阐明的是，勇气依然存在。它依然存在，这里就有十个例子。这并不容易。我们需要在勇气出现时加以赞扬。是的，我对诸多整体结构性因素感到担忧，这些因素让践行勇气变得更加困难。因为人都是凡人，我们都有缺点。这十个人也并非完美无缺。他们的很多立场都会有人不同意，这很自然，因为他们一半属于这个党派，一半属于那个党派。
玛格丽特·布伦南： 那么，这十个人当中有没有哪个故事特别让你印象深刻？
莱·巴科特： 有的，你马上就要请到唐·培根了，我们昨天刚和他以及布莱恩·菲茨帕特里克众议员合作，他们两人都在书中有所介绍。他们在支持乌克兰问题上立场鲜明。本周他们采取了独特的行动，发起 discharge petition（强制解除法案搁置程序），以期为乌克兰争取更多支持。我们实际上一同前往——
玛格丽特·布伦南： 这迫使共和党领导层不得不考虑他们原本不会考虑的事情。
莱·巴科特： 没错，是的，这需要勇气。你知道，他们的同僚会用异样的眼光看待他们。我今天早上还和他们交流了想法，但他们认为这是正确的事情，而勇气的本质就是在面临风险时做正确的事，认清风险并依然坚持前行。我们实际上和他们两人一同前往了基辅和哈尔科夫，同行的还有两位民主党人，萨尔瓦多·卡尔瓦哈尔，他昨晚也和我们在一起，以及吉米·帕内塔。吉米·帕内塔和唐·培根共同创立了众议院两党退伍军人核心小组，我们的非营利组织“光荣同行”为该核心小组提供支持，目前约有38名众议院议员参与其中。
玛格丽特·布伦南： 他们还支持一些立法议题，比如他们曾试图帮助阿富汗盟友——
莱·巴科特： 是的。
玛格丽特·布伦南： ——还有其他方面。
莱·巴科特： 没错。没错。其中一项最早的立法优先事项是由创始成员之一赛斯·莫尔顿提出的，我在书中也提到了这一点。这又是一个勇气的例子，可能和人们习惯看到的形式不同，那就是设立988全国自杀预防热线。赛斯鼓起勇气公开表示：“嘿，我也曾有过创伤后应激障碍的问题。你可以寻求帮助。”寻求帮助并说出“我需要帮助”本身就需要勇气。于是我们推动设立了这条热线。我们帮助推广并维持了它的运行，我认为这是一个跨党派合作完成的、真正改变了很多人生活的例子。
玛格丽特·布伦南： 你知道，过去的军旅经历并不能保证人生一帆风顺。你的话也暗示了这一点，但我们一直在和参选人士讨论这个问题，比如缅因州的民主党参议院候选人，还有其他议员。你有没有过这样的时刻，看着某位候选人，心想尽管你有服役经历，但我还是无法支持你？
莱·巴科特： 我们确实有过。我们只会——
玛格丽特·布伦南： 你们是如何做出这个决定的？
莱·巴科特： 我们通常只会在所有参选的退伍军人中选拔约10%的人选。今年参选的退伍军人比以往任何一年都多。我们将在周二公布具体数字，也就是本书发布之际，但参选人数跨党派增长了30%以上，这相当令人鼓舞。不过其中很多退伍军人参选的选区并不具备获胜条件，这是我们的一个评判标准。但从根本上来说，我们考察的是品格，候选人必须承诺以诚信、文明和勇气服务公众。我们会观察候选人在竞选活动中的表现，采访那些在危难时刻与他们一同服役的军人。最终只有约10%的退伍军人能通过选拔。一旦他们当选公职，他们也必须坚守承诺。他们必须维持跨党派的信任。这并不意味着他们会在所有议题上都达成一致，大多数议题上他们都有分歧，但他们会维持信任和人际关系。这并不总能成功。在过去八年里，已有一些人退出了核心小组。
玛格丽特·布伦南： 你有没有要求他们退出？
莱·巴科特： 这不是我的核心小组，而是议员们的核心小组。所以核心小组的领导层，比如唐·培根和吉米·帕内塔，会处理这类事情，但确实有过几次这样的情况。因为在这个地方，激励机制并不是让你治理国家，而是让你选择自己的文化战争和议题，在网上攻击他人，变得更加党派化，以此筹集小额资金等等。所以如今，仅仅是跨党派建立关系就需要勇气。说出来似乎很荒唐，但事实确实如此。书中有一个关于托德·杨的例子。托德·杨，来自——
玛格丽特·布伦南： 印第安纳州的那位。
莱·巴科特： 当然，来自印第安纳州。
莱·巴科特： 有人评价他是“你从未听说过的最具影响力的参议员”，我把这句话作为引言收录了。当然，在华盛顿，很多人都听说过托德·杨，因为他实际上是一位实干家，促成了很多法案的通过。他与参议院少数党领袖、当时的多数党领袖查克·舒默合作通过了《芯片与科学法案》，你可以想象这有多不容易。当时他正领导共和党竞选委员会，但他专注于务实行事和推动立法，我认为他是一个典范，是我们应该大力宣扬的人物。
玛格丽特·布伦南： 我之前都没听说过他，尽管我们一直都在邀请他上《直面国家》节目，但他从未来过。不过你刚才提到的承诺，我们查了一下，承诺内容包括在公职中倡导文明、加入跨党派退伍军人核心小组。你们还要求成员承诺每月与一位反对党议员会面，并共同参与重要的两党立法工作。
莱·巴科特： 没错——
玛格丽特·布伦南： 我们可以让你展开讲讲——
莱·巴科特： ——这看起来——
玛格丽特·布伦南： ——但国会现在根本不立法。
莱·巴科特： 是的，没错，没错，没错，我们能不能加大力度，并且——
玛格丽特·布伦南： 没错。
莱·巴科特： ——进一步扩大这种合作？我希望如此。我们一直在持续发展并维持这种凝聚力，但这一直很困难。在过去八年里，有很多时刻，我们的关系都变得紧张。1月6日事件就是一个例子——
玛格丽特·布伦南： 是的。
莱·巴科特： ——还有其他很多情况，这对国家至关重要，但确实不容易。而且，仅仅会面只是一方面，但真正有勇气将自己的名字与他人的名字联系在一起，宣称我们将共同推进这项工作，我们将坚守这个立场，即便我可能会因为与“敌人”合作而遭到攻击。这听起来很荒谬。有一项调查显示，80%的共和党人和民主党人——当然，约40%的美国人无党派倾向，但在有党派倾向的人群中，超过80%的人将对方阵营视为敌人。这就是我们当下的处境，也正是为什么我认为在这本书里，勇气可以拯救我们这个国家。我们的国旗上有一道裂缝。它并没有破碎，但确实有一道裂缝。我们国家正处于一个严峻的时刻。我们即将迎来建国250周年，但归根结底，我相信这是一个乐观的前景。仍有很多人在为超越自身的利益服务。
玛格丽特·布伦南： 目前国会中有98名退伍军人议员。你想把这个数字往上推吗？
莱·巴科特： 是的，虽然这个数字处于历史低位，但相较于人口比例，目前国会中退伍军人议员占比约为20%。在二战和朝鲜战争时期，这一比例曾高达70%，他们为我们树立了榜样。我已故的联合创始人，我非常怀念他，大卫·格根，一位海军退伍军人，经常谈到像丹尼尔·井上和鲍勃·多尔这样的退伍军人之间的友谊。他们在二战中负伤后康复期间结下了友谊，随后互相鼓励参选公职，尽管分属不同党派，并在各自的职业生涯中发挥了重要作用。我们希望回到那种服务精神的时代，这是实现这一目标的一种方式，但它不是万能药。我并不是说——
玛格丽特·布伦南： 是的。
莱·巴科特： ——它是万能药，但它是我们前进的一条建设性道路。
玛格丽特·布伦南： 莱·巴科特。祝你新书顺利——
莱·巴科特： 非常感谢。
玛格丽特·布伦南： ——谢谢你。
莱·巴科特： 谢谢你邀请我。
玛格丽特·布伦南： 我们稍后回来。
备注：“光荣同行”组织并未直接为格雷厄姆·普拉特纳的竞选活动提供资助，但他们通过一个名为“跨党派政治行动委员会”的“民主党附属PAC”为其提供了支持。
Transcript: Rye Barcott on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan,” June 7, 2026
2026-06-07T10:30:04-0400 / CBS News
The following is the full transcript of the interview with Rye Barcott, a Marine veteran and With Honor founder, a portion of which aired on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan” on June 7, 2026.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Joining us now is Rye Barcott, a Marine veteran who is the founder of With Honor, an organization that works to elect military veterans and others who have dedicated themselves to public service. In the last eight years, the organization says they have helped over 100 get elected, currently 50 of them serve in Congress. His new book is “Courage Can Save Us: Ten Extraordinary Americans and the Fight for Our Future,” profiling five Democrats, five Republicans, all of whom have had military service, or in one case, FBI experience. Rye, it’s good to have you here.
RYE BARCOTT: Thank you. Thanks for having me on.
MARGARET BRENNAN: So, we need saving.
RYE BARCOTT: Yes.
MARGARET BRENNAN: It sounds like in your book you profiled these 10 people, some of them currently, including Representative Don Bacon, who’s on the program, and then two governors. What about them made you write?
RYE BARCOTT: So, I’ve been leading With Honor. I co-founded it with the late David Gergen and another marine that I served with during the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, about eight years ago, and through that period of time, we’ve helped recruit and train and help elect veterans that take our pledge to serve with integrity, civility, and courage, including the courage to work across party lines at a difficult time to do so. Through that process, I’ve gotten to know many of them quite well, and so what I decided to do was select 10, an even balance of five and five, all of whom were in office at a very difficult, challenging time for the country, and really unpack where their courage came from, and then look at moments of courage, both in military service as well as in politics and elected office. Sometimes that courage is quieter, it’s more of a moral courage versus a physical courage, which they may have encountered in the military, but that was the- that was my approach to this book, which I’ve written principally for students. I’d like to see more students being able to study courage. I’ve defined courage as a form of service, that it is taking risk in the service of something larger than yourself. It’s not self-interested, it’s serving what’s referred to oftentimes as the common good.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, you do need to inspire younger people, it sounds like, because when we look at the polling overall, 17% of Americans, according to Pew, trust the government in Washington to do what’s right all or most of the time. Our own CBS polling has showed the younger generation is dispirited, they’re anxious about their futures. So, how do you inspire them to join a system that they believe is broken?
RYE BARCOTT: Yeah, I mean, I think a lot of young people are, they’re feeling lonely. There’s a lack of a sense of purpose. One of the great things that I found through military service was that it gives you, it gives you some, a sense of something larger than yourself and a common mission with Americans from- from all different walks of life. So one of the key takeaways for the book is to find a- to find a route into public service, and that’s one of the goals with this. The veterans, and the book obviously focuses on veterans, we have a partnership With Honor, the nonprofit that I lead, of which the proceeds of this book go to, it partners with Gallup every year and vetera- and trust and measures the trust in veterans. And veterans is one of the few groups within the United States, nurses is the other, that has particularly high trust across party lines. Again I think that’s because of the service mentality and that’s a special thing and something that we need to you know safeguard.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Do you worry about needing to safeguard that right now? I mean, a lot of the language we hear from the Pentagon is about the “warrior ethos.” It’s about physical descriptions of what warrior ethos actually looks like. It’s about lethality. That’s not the thing you are characterizing here.
RYE BARCOTT: Yeah, I mean, my- the beauty of the military is that it is a reflection of the United States. I mean, across all walks of life, every socioeconomic background, all different races and genders and ethnicities, and it needs to be that melting pot, in that, that, that, that place. And that’s what- the 10 that I profile come from all different backgrounds and have found a common mission in service.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Do you worry we are at a point where the kind of moral courage you’re describing is nearly impossible to fill? Because when we look at the kind of partisanship out there, and then you look at, for example, the redistricting that may lock in that partisanship and disincentivize the thing you say you want to encourage, bipartisanship. The forces are kind of against you.
RYE BARCOTT: The forces are really going against us, and most Americans want courage, but feel like they see very little of it, or none of it. And what I wanted to shine a light on is to say that this still exists. It still exists, here- here are 10 examples of it. It’s hard. We need to celebrate it when it- when it arises. And yeah, many concerns about the overall sort of structural factors that are making this more difficult, because people are- people are humans, you know. We’re all flawed. These- these 10 are not perfect. There are many things that- that they do that, you know, folks will disagree with by nature, because half of them are on one part side and half are on the other.
MARGARET BRENNAN: So, is there a single story among the 10 that, like, stood out to you?
RYE BARCOTT: Yeah, well, you’re having Don Bacon on in a moment, and we just yesterday teamed up with him and Congressman Brian Fitzpatrick, both of whom are in the book, and they have made a real stance on support for Ukraine. They took the unique position of forcing a discharge petition this week in order to maintain more support there. We actually traveled–
MARGARET BRENNAN: That forced Republican leadership to consider something they wouldn’t have otherwise.
RYE BARCOTT: That’s right, yeah and face- you know, that takes guts, you know, they have peers that- that are looking at them askance. I mean, I was, you know, exchanging notes with them this morning, but they- that is a core thing for them that they believe is right, and that’s what courage comes down to, is doing the right thing in the face of risk, understanding the risks and going forward with it. We actually traveled with both of them to both Kyiv and Kharkiv, along with two Democrats, Salud Carbajal, who was there with us last night, and Jimmy Panetta. Jimmy Panetta and Don Bacon co-founded the bipartisan caucus of veterans in the House, that we- that With Honor, my nonprofit works and supports about 38 members of the House.
MARGARET BRENNAN: And there’s some legislative issues they get behind, they were trying to help the Afghan allies–
RYE BARCOTT: Yes.
MARGARET BRENNAN: –as well.
RYE BARCOTT: That’s right. That’s right. And one of the- one of the first legislative priorities was established by one of the founding members, Seth Moulton, and I write about this in the book. It’s another example that- of courage that maybe takes a different form than people are used to, and that is the establishment of the 988 National Suicide Hotline. Seth had the guts to come out and say, ‘hey, I’ve had some problems with PTSD.’ You can seek help. It takes courage to seek help, and to say that- that I- that ‘I need help.’ And I- and so the- we put that in place. We’ve helped grow and sustain it, and I think it’s an example of something that got done across party lines that really makes a difference in a lot of people’s lives.
MARGARET BRENNAN: You know, past military service doesn’t guarantee a flawless life. I mean, you gestured to that, but we’ve been talking about this with candidates, the Democratic Senate candidate in Maine, for example, other lawmakers. Do you ever look at candidates and say, despite your service, I can’t support you?
RYE BARCOTT: We do. We only–
MARGARET BRENNAN: How do you make that call?
RYE BARCOTT: We usually only do about 10% of the overall vets that run. This co- this year, there is more vets running than any year before. We’ll announce the- let- the total numbers on Tuesday when the- when the book announces, but it’s- it’s an increase of over 30% across party lines, quite encouraging. Many of those vets are not running in races that are winnable, so that’s one criteria, but really fundamentally we look at character, and you have to commit to this pledge to serve with integrity, civility, and courage. We watch how people conduct themselves on the campaign trail, we interview individuals that serve with them in the military under duress, and it’s only about 10% of the veterans that make the cut. Once they serve in office, they really need to be committed to it. They have to- they have to maintain that trust across party lines. That doesn’t mean that they’ll agree on every issue, most issues they don’t, but they’ll maintain trust and relationships. It doesn’t always work. Some have- have decided to leave the caucus over the last eight years.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Have you had to ask them to leave?
RYE BARCOTT: It’s not my caucus, it’s the members’ caucus. So, the leadership of the caucus, people like Don Bacon and Jimmy Panetta, have handled that, but there have been a few occasions. Because the incentives, of course, in this place are not to govern, the incentives are to pick your culture war and issue and, you know, attack online. Just to be more partisan, you raise small dollars, et cetera. So, it takes courage these days just to have relationships across party lines. It’s silly to say that, but it is- it is actually the case. There’s an example in the book of Todd Young. Todd Young, of–
MARGARET BRENNAN: Of Indiana.
RYE BARCOTT:–of course, of Indiana.
RYE BARCOTT: Somebody reflected, and I added it as a quote of the- most impactful senator you’ve never heard of. Of course, in this town, a lot of people have heard of Todd Young, because he’s actually been a workhorse, he’s gotten a lot done. The CHIPS bill that he passed, he partnered with Senate Minority Leader, then Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, so you can imagine how uncomfortable that would be. He was leading the campaign arm for the Republicans at that time, but he focused on content and getting things done, and is, I think, a model example, and somebody that we should shine a light on.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Never heard of him, because he’s never come on “Face the Nation,” even though we ask for him all the time. But right when you talk about the pledge, when we looked it up, the pledge is to bring civility to office, participate in a cross-partisan veterans caucus. You ask members also to pledge just to meet with a member of the opposing party once a month, and then join them in significant bipartisan legislation.
RYE BARCOTT: That’s right–
MARGARET BRENNAN: Could we let you build on that–
RYE BARCOTT: — I mean, it seems–
MARGARET BRENNAN: — Congress isn’t legislating.
RYE BARCOTT: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, can we amp it up and–
MARGARET BRENNAN: Right.
RYE BARCOTT: –and– expand it more? I hope so. We have continued to grow and maintain that- that cohesion, but it has been difficult. I mean, there have been many moments over the last eight years where we’ve- relationships get frayed. I mean, January 6 was one example–
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yeah.
RYE BARCOTT: –you know, many others, and- and this matters for the country, but it is not easy. And- you know, meeting- meeting alone is one thing, but then actually being willing to have the courage to put your name with another and say we’re going to do this, and we’re going to stand for this, even though I might get attacked for working with the enemy. I mean, it’s a crazy thing. There’s a- there’s a survey out that 80% of Republicans and- and Democrats registered Republicans and Democrats, of course, about 40% of the country are non-affiliated, but among the- those that are affiliated, over 80% refer to the other side as the enemy. I mean, that’s what we’re, and that’s why, with this book, I think courage can save us as a country, the us is the flag, it has a crack in it. It’s not broken, but it has a crack in it. We’re in a serious place as a nation. We’re turning 250 years old, but at the end of the day, I believe this is a- this is an optimistic outlook. There are a lot of people that are still, you know, serving for the good of service, something that’s larger than themselves.
MARGARET BRENNAN: There are 98 veterans in Congress right now. You want to drive that number up?
RYE BARCOTT: Yeah, so they’re at historic low. It’s- but it’s, but it’s still larger than the population, so about 20% in Congress now. It used to be as high as 70% back with the World War Two and Korea War generations, and- and they set a model for us. My late co-founder, who I miss dearly, David Gergen, a Navy veteran, often spoke about some of the relationships between veterans like Dan Inouye and Bob Dole, who forged a friendship recovering from wounds in World War Two, and then went on to encourage each other to run for office, different parties, and- and made a difference throughout their careers. We want to get back to that type of ethos of service, and this is one way to do it, it’s not a, it’s not a silver bullet. I’m not claiming–
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yeah.
RYE BARCOTT: –it’s a silver bullet, but it’s- it’s a constructive way forward for us.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Rye Barcott. Good luck with the book–
RYE BARCOTT: Appreciate it.
MARGARET BRENNAN: –thank you.
RYE BARCOTT: Thank you for having me.
MARGARET BRENNAN: We’ll be back.
NOTE: With Honor has not contributed directly to the Graham Platner campaign, but they have supported him through what With Honor has called a “Democratic subsidiary PAC” called Crosspartisan PAC.
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