Rep. Amash lays out case. TRANSCRIPT: 5/23/19, The Last Word w/ Lawrence O’Donnell.
LAWRENCE O`DONNELL, MSNBC HOST: I heard that.
RACHEL MADDOW, MSNBC HOST, “TRMS”: Yes.
O`DONNELL: Good evening, Rachel.
Speaking of breaking news, let`s get to the much more important thing than
the minor reference you made to me where he`s telling us that Robert
Mueller does not want to testify publicly on TV with everyone watching.
He`s willing to testify very old school with no cameras as if it`s a
Supreme Court hearing with transcript to be released later.
MADDOW: Because he is worried about it being too political. I don`t know
whether a camera makes something political that a pen and paper doesn`t. I
can see not wanting to be made a spectacle of. But I can`t see how
testifying behind closed doors as opposed to testifying publicly affects
whether or not your words are interpreted in a political context.
O`DONNELL: Well, what he`s right about, historically, but I`m not sure it
would work in this case is that when you turn the cameras on in Congress,
it is impossible not to get a certain amount of stunting.
MADDOW: Right. Show boating, yes.
O`DONNELL: We know which side will be doing a lot of that. The Republican
side which basically has nothing to throw at Robert Mueller, that`s the
side where the strangest things would come from and that`s the side where
there are certain players who are always playing for the camera.
And every member will tell you when they close the doors, those people
don`t behave the same way. Now, with Mueller, they might be playing for
the transcript which is a little bit harder because it won`t just be fist
pounding. They have to come up with some words to make the transcript come
alive.
But I can see Mueller`s point but there`s something – I mean, it takes us
back to the 1940s to not have this on television.
MADDOW: And it is – I will say that while I`m happy for Chairman Nadler
to have given us that news tonight and we can break that news and have a
better understanding of – I still think there`s got to be some other
variable here that we`re not factoring into the equation because all the
different pieces of this don`t totally add up.
I have been wondering whether or not it`s a question of Mueller testifying
alone versus Mueller testifying with the team that carried out this
investigation. I`ve been worried about whether this might be the justice
department intervening here in terms of what they`re allowing Mueller to do
or suggesting to Mueller might be a good idea for him to do as opposed to
him acting on his own steam here. I still don`t know if any of those
things are at work, but this is provocative news and an open question
whether or not the judiciary committee will proceed on those terms.
O`DONNELL: Yes, I think you got a huge revelation out of the chairman
tonight, but it still leaves us I think me and you and a few million more
people mystified –
MADDOW: Yes.
O`DONNELL: – about where this stands tonight. It is a very peculiar
situation.
MADDOW: It`s like 63 freaking day since he finished in his investigation
and turned into the report. We`ve seen nothing from him. He`s like locked
up in a box somewhere. It`s – this is a weird situation we`re in.
O`DONNELL: Well, thanks for getting what you did get. That was very
important.
MADDOW: Appreciate it. Thanks, my friend.
O`DONNELL: Thank you, Rachel.
Well, Republican Congressman Justin Amash is now making stronger statements
about impeaching President Trump than most Democratic members of the House
of Representatives.
George Will has been watching Congressman Amash for more years than most.
And he will join us tonight with what his view of what Congressman Amash is
up. George Will himself left the Republican Party after Donald Trump won
the Republican presidential nomination. What will happen to Congressman
Amash in a party that now seems to be owned and operated as a Trump
enterprise?
And another anti-Trump Republican will join us, former Republican
Massachusetts Governor Bill Weld who is challenge Donald Trump for the
Republican presidential nomination. Bill Weld does not have to win that
nomination to do very serious damage to the Trump candidacy.
Every incumbent president who has been challenged within his own party in
the primaries beyond the New Hampshire primary has then lost his re-
election in the general election. Bill weld will tell how far he plans to
go beyond account New Hampshire primary.
And it`s worth a reminder that presidents do not publicly attack members of
their cabinet. That may come as news to teenagers who have been paying
their first attention to the presidency during the Trump years. Donald
Trump did it with Attorney General Jeff Sessions while he was still in the
cabinet and he has done it repeatedly with his first secretary of state,
Rex Tillerson. The president called Rex Tillerson dumb as a rock again
today because Rex Tillerson spent seven hours in a closed-door session with
the house foreign affairs committee talking about Donald Trump and Vladimir
Putin and how Putin has outsmarted Donald Trump.
We have so much to cover in breaking news tonight that we will get to that.
Only at the end of this hour you will want to hear exactly what Rex
Tillerson had to say about Donald Trump and Donald Trump`s values.
But first, the breaking news we`re going to begin with tonight is the
statement released by the White House that Rachel was just referring to, a
statement saying today at the request and recommendation of the attorney
general of the United States, President Donald J. Trump directed the
intelligence community to quickly and fully cooperate with the attorney
general`s investigation into surveillance activities during the 2016
presidential election. The attorney general has also been delegated full
and complete authority to declassify information pertaining to this
investigation in accordance with the long established standards for
handling classified information.
That came at the end of a day when another Trump campaign associate was
indicted on bribery charges involving Paul Manafort, and the president of
the United States, once again, described himself as a stable genius. This
time, quote, “an extremely stable genius.” He did that in a typically
Trumpian rant about House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in which everything he said
about Nancy Pelosi was provably untrue.
Speaker Pelosi responded in a tweet saying: When the extremely stable
genius starts acting more presidential I`ll be happy to work with him on
instruct, trade and other issues. Once again today, the president said he
would not work with Congress on anything as long as the House of
Representatives is investigating the president.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: Mr. President, is there anything that you are willing to work
with Democrats on now?
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: No, no, they have to go down
their track. Let them get rid of the nonsense first. When that`s done,
we`ll go very quickly. We`ll go very quickly.
Infrastructure is very easy. For me, that`s very easy. You can`t go down
two tracks at the same time. It doesn`t work that way.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O`DONNELL: Of course, it has always worked that way in the past when other
presidents have been under investigation. Important legislation always
continued to move through Congress with the cooperation of the White House
even when previous president were under investigation by that same
Congress.
During her weekly press conference had morning, Speaker Pelosi once again
described how president Trump told her yesterday that he would not work
with Congress on the infrastructure plan that they were actually scheduled
to discuss. Or work with Congress on anything else.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA): The president again stormed out, I think what
first pound the table, walk out the door. What?
Next time, have a TV cameras in there while I have my say. That didn`t
work for him either. And now this time, another temper tantrum.
Again, I pray for the president of the United States. I wish that his
family or his administration or his staff would have an intervention for
good of the country.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O`DONNELL: Speaker Pelosi said that her experience with the president
including previous meetings with the president leaves her wondering who is
in charge.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PELOSI: This is not behavior that is rises to the dignity of the office of
the president of the United States. But having said that, as I said, I
actually ardently pray for the president because we need – I don`t know.
Sometimes when we`re talking to him, he agrees.
And then, I said one time, who is in charge here because you agree and
then, all of a sudden, something changes? What goes on there? Who is in
charge?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O`DONNELL: And then the president said it`s very clears who in charge at
the White House.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: I haven`t changed very much. Been very consistent. I`m an
extremely stable genius. OK.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O`DONNELL: The president was then asked specifically about Nancy Pelosi`s
comments this morning.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: Speaker Pelosi said today she hoped your family would provide an
intervention with you. What`s your reaction to that?
O`DONNELL: I saw her read it perfectly just the way she said it. It`s
very sort of a nasty type statement. But I will say this: she said I
walked into the room right next door yesterday and walked in and started
screaming and yelling. Just the opposite. Just the opposite.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O`DONNELL: As you saw in the Nancy Pelosi video, she was not reading her
description of what happened in the cabinet room yesterday and she never
said that the president started screaming and yelling.
The president then called on individual members of his staff who were in
the room and got each of them to agree that he was not screaming and
yelling yesterday even though Nancy Pelosi never said that the president
was screaming and yelling.
The president also threw in some nasty name calling of Nancy Pelosi and
Chuck Schumer which Speaker Pelosi in effect predicted he would do in her
comments earlier this morning.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PELOSI: This is not behavior that is – rises to the dignity of the office
of president of the United States.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O`DONNELL: Leading off our discussion tonight is Democratic Congressman
David Cicilline of Rhode Island. He is a member of the House Judiciary
Committee.
And, Congressman, thank you for joining us tonight.
Your chairman, Jerry Nadler, just was on with Rachel Maddow where he
announced that Robert Mueller`s one of his conditions for testifying to the
committee at this stage of negotiations is he wants to do it behind closed
doors, no TV cameras present, no media present, transcript to be released
later.
REP. DAVID CICILLINE (D-RI): Yes, I hope the negotiations will achieve a
different result. I think it`s very important that the American people
hear from Mr. Mueller that he walk the American people and the Judiciary
Committee through his report. To explain his findings, explain the
judgments he made.
This, of course, was a report done on behalf of the American people when
our democracy was attacked by a foreign adversary. He details ten specific
instances where the president obstructed justice, and lots of contacts
between the Trump campaign and Russian operatives. I think people need to
hear that directly from him.
So, I hope we can arrive at a set of conditions that will allow him to give
testimony under oath before the entire committee and before the American
people.
O`DONNELL: Let`s listen to exactly what the chairman told Rachel in what
is now the breaking news of the night.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. JERRY NADLER (D-NY): Mueller, he I think I can say his point that he
wants to testify in private.
MADDOW: Why?
NADLER: I don`t know why. That`s – he wants to testify, he`s willing to
make an opening statement but he wants to testify in private. We`re saying
he ought to – we think it`s important for American people to hear from him
and to hear his answers to questions about the report.
MADDOW: Does he want to testify in private and have it be a closed session
where we the people would not even get to see a transcript of it.
NADLER: No, no, no, we would see a transcript. But I – we`d see a
transcript.
MADDOW: Do you have any sense of, I mean, why would witnesses usually say
something like that or do you have any indication of why he might want
that?
NADLER: He – he envisions himself correctly as a man of great rectitude
and apolitical and he doesn`t want to participate in anything he might
regard as a political spectacle.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O`DONNELL: Congressman, was that news to you tonight?
CICILLINE: No, we understood that those negotiations are under way and
that that was part of the conversation. I think the chairman is going to
continue to try to persuade Mr. Mueller`s team to allow Mr. Mueller to come
before the committee in public again. I think everyone on the committee
thinks it`s very important that the American people hear him testify, but
obviously, those negotiations are ongoing.
O`DONNELL: And I want to get your reaction to this statement from the
White House tonight where the president has put the attorney general not
just in charge of investigating any kind of – any kind of investigation
that occurred during the presidential campaign but also in charge of all of
the classification issues involved with all of the intelligence agencies
who might or might not have picked up anything in that investigation.
CICILLINE: Well, I mean to quote a former high level DOJ official, this is
a grotesque abuse of the intelligence community. And what`s really
disturbing is on the very same day that the president says, I can`t work
with Congress to get anything done for the American people because I can`t
do that and respond to investigations at the same time, he initiates yet
another investigation. So the irony is kind of extraordinary.
We`ve passed over 100 pieces of legislation in the Congress so far while we
are conducting robust oversight. So we can do both things. We ought to do
both things. That happened during the Clinton impeachment, that happened
during the Nixon impeachment, investigations and oversight with normal
congressional work. We do that while passing the for the people agenda.
It`s sort of ironic that on the very day the president stormed out and
said, I can`t do both things, he announces his attorney general is now
directed to assist the intelligence community to conduct a new
investigation about the origins of the inquiry conducted by Mr. Mueller.
It`s kind of funny.
O`DONNELL: Chairman Nadler told Rachel that your subpoenas although are
already being treated very seriously by judges in court. You`re winning at
every stage, that they might be taken even more seriously and moved even
more quickly if they are in service of an impeachment inquiry.
Do you support moving to an impeachment inquiry in your committee?
CICILLINE: Yes. I have expressed that opinion to my chairman and to my
colleagues. I think we are at the point now where not only because of the
contents of the Mueller report but because of the conduct of the president
his administration and their efforts to impede and prevent us from getting
the facts and following the facts wherever they lead us to get the truth
the president has been engaged in a cover-up. He is behaving as if he is
above the law. We have a responsibility to make sure we hold this
administration accountable.
I have argued that the opening of an impeachment inquiry is just a
beginning step. It`s a formal question whether or not impeachment is
appropriate. We would then conduct our hearings, collect evidence and make
a judgment. At the conclusion of that, we would consider articles of
impeachment or not. But this would be the sort of formal process.
There is no question it would raise the level of seriousness of our effort.
It would consolidate some of this work. I think there certainly is court
decisions that say at that moment, when an impeachment inquiry is under
way, Congress`s power is at its zenith.
So, I think it would strengthen our hand. I think the chairman is right.
We have enough authority under our regular oversight to get what we need.
But I think the president`s conduct in attempting to prevent us from
hearing from witnesses, defying subpoenas and telling people not to produce
documents, those acts have by themselves may be a basis of impeachment, but
certainly are enough in my mind to begin an inquiry, to open up a formal
process to consider whether or not an impeachment is appropriate.
O`DONNELL: Before you go, Congressman, let me ask you one more thing about
this because we know there`s been a debate within the Democrats in the
House when to move to impeachment or how to move to impeachment. And you
have been one of the leaders of let`s go to impeachment now.
What is the most persuasive counterargument you have heard from other
Democrats in those private discussions you`re having?
CICILLINE: Well, I`d say two things. I`m not suggesting going to
impeachment now. That`s a different question. What I`m saying is open a
formal inquiry today which is the first step before you decide whether or
not to actually vote articles of impeachment.
So, this is really the formal process by which the committee begins
consideration of this question and then begins the fact finding and
evidence collection process. I think that the principal argument against
it and I think it`s a fair one is it will be very divisive for the country.
And these are hard moments for the country. We`re in a very grave moment.
I happen to believe we have a responsibility to bring the Mueller report to
life, to hold this administration accountable. I think we can`t weigh
political considerations that are good for us politically or not. That`s
irrelevant.
What matters is what are the facts, what is the truth here and to be sure
we`re acting in a way that upholds the rule of law and honors the
Constitution and the world is watching us. I think the behavior of this
president and his administration and the contents of the Mueller report and
his subsequent conduct necessitate the opening of this inquiry in a formal
way.
I take my colleagues at their word when they`re concerned about kind
confident divisions it would have on country. I think that`s real.
But the other concern I think folks have and I think we disproved this is
somehow this would consume us. The truth is, the Democratic Caucus is
unified on two points. One, we have to continue to deliver on our for the
people agenda. We`ve passed 100 bills there`s relating driving down
prescription drug costs protecting access to the Affordable Care coverage
for pre-existing conditions, universal background checks, equal pay for
equal work, a whole number of bills.
So, we have to keep doing that. And the caucus is unified on doing that.
The caucus is also unified that we need to hold the administration
accountable, make sure no one is above the law, including the president and
find the truth and follow the facts.
Some people have a different sense of the best vehicle. Is it inquiry of
impeachment, is it just a regular oversight? But we`re united on those two
points and we`re going to get to the facts. We`re going to get to the
truths. We`re not going to allow the president to continue in this cover-
up and we`re going to demonstrate once and for all that no one in this
country including the president of the United States is above the law.
O`DONNELL: Congressman Cicilline, your Chairman Jerry Nadler just outlined
a very heavy work schedule for your committee this summer, both legislative
and investigative. We thank you very much for joining us tonight and we
hope you`ll be able to join us again.
CICILLINE: My pleasure.
O`DONNELL: Thank you, Congressman.
And joining us now, Ezra Klein. He`s the editor at large at “Vox” and he
hosts of the podcast, “The Ezra Klein Show”.
Ezra, there`s so much to cover here tonight. One of the developments today
was the president taking time to publicly proclaim he`s not the crazy one
here.
EZRA KLEIN, EDITOR AT LARGE, VOX: So things are going great in American
democracy I guess.
(LAUGHTER)
O`DONNELL: Yes, I didn`t know quite how to put that.
KLEIN: There`s a nice line in the “New York Times” piece about that in the
moments he began going around the room. And if you have not looked at this
video, by the way, you at home, go online and look at this.
“The New York Times” had this side in their piece saying in a ritual rarely
seen in a democracy, it looked like the kind of Potemkin moment you see in
dictatorships. It was a scary moment watching him herd his own staff into
a room to publicly testify to his own state of mind and as you say,
publicly rebut a claim that was not actually made about him. It was
strange and given the fact that the guy has his hands on a nuclear weapon,
it`s troubling.
O`DONNELL: And, Ezra, let me get your reaction to the breaking news in
Rachel`s hour. Chairman Nadler announcing Robert Mueller is negotiating
for a closed door hearing with transcript to be released later.
KLEIN: I think Robert Mueller who has done I think a lot of tremendous
work is so – is a little bit too concerned over the idea that his work
could be interpreted politically. You cannot take quite so much of the
politics out of politics.
He`s a fact finder. He has done again I think a tremendous job trying to
establish a pattern of facts. There are questions left open by the
document he created and while I certainly understand the idea that when you
get put in front of a camera with the Congress the way that it is, a lot of
people are going to be grandstanding and trying to create that the one
viral moment or couple moments that will go viral in different systems of
American politics.
Nevertheless, you either don`t it because you`re worried that it could be
politicize the to the American people, you`re working for the American
people. That doesn`t quite add up to me.
O`DONNELL: And, Ezra, we`re hearing, we heard from Chairman Nadler an
outline I`ve whole new approach to hearings this summer trying to basically
cover the territory of the Mueller report, the challenge he`s having is
exactly what witnesses do you get, the reports are the committee is
surprised at the resistance they`ve been getting from the Trump
administration on getting witnesses. Intelligence Committee also making
plans for a similar approach to hearings that will illuminate what`s in the
Mueller report.
KLEIN: Something that I am struck by and it`s something that the
congressman said in the segment earlier is that Donald Trump since release
of the Mueller report has considerably strengthened the case for
impeachment against him. There is what the Mueller report says and then
there is the way the Trump administration under his command has acted above
the law since. The complete stonewalling of what is functionally
Congress`s constitutional duty to conduct oversight over him.
And added to that, the reversal of the normal approach preys take which is
to say, I`m the one here doing the people`s business while they`re
investigating me and doing a circus. Instead, Donald Trump is saying,
until they stop investigating me, I will not do the people`s business, I
will not do infrastructure, as if governing is a favor he does us when
everybody is nice to him otherwise.
So I think that Donald Trump is doing a pretty nice job strengthening the
case for an impeachment inquiry against him and I think Nancy Pelosi who
has had his psychology pegged perfectly since the beginning is doing a nice
baiting him into it step by step. I`ve always think it`s important to
recognize her position has not been no impeachment, but to continue going
forward and either building support for it or in seeing support dissipate
for it.
And so far, she`s moved into him into a place where I think he is building
support both in her caucus and I suspect over time in the country.
O`DONNELL: Ezra Klein, thank you very much for joining us tonight. Really
appreciate it.
KLEIN: Thank you.
O`DONNELL: And to continue our breaking news coverage, we`re going to
crash right through a commercial break and we`re going to be joined by Bill
Weld. He`s the former Republican governor of Massachusetts. He is running
for the Republican presidential nomination against President Trump. He is
joining us tonight from the campaign trail in New Hampshire.
And, Governor Weld, I want to get your reaction to be what we just learned
from Chairman Nadler about Robert Mueller`s testimony and for the audience
we`re going to play it one more time and for you. Here`s Chairman Nadler
telling Rachel Maddow that Robert Mueller wants to testify in a closed door
hearing, not a publicly watchable hearing.
Let`s listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. JERRY NADLER (D-NY): Mueller, he I think I can say his point that he
wants to testify in private.
RACHEL MADDOW, MSNBC HOST, “TRMS”: Why?
NADLER: I don`t know why. He wants to testify, he`s willing to make an
opening statement but he wants to testify in private. And we`re suggesting
– we`re saying that he ought to, we think it`s important for the American
people to hear from him and to hear his answers to questions about the
report.
MADDOW: Does he want to testify in private and have it be a closed session
where we the people would not even get to see a transcript of it?
NADLER: No, no, no, we`d see a transcript. But I – we`d see a
transcript.
MADDOW: Do you have any sense of – I mean, why would witnesses usually
say something like that or do you have any indication of why he might want
that?
NADLER: He envisions himself correctly as a man of great rectitude and
apolitical and he doesn`t want to participate in anything that he might
regard as a political spectacle.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O`DONNELL: Governor Weld, you`re a former U.S. attorney in Boston. You
are a former – you`re a veteran of a Republican Justice Department. You
know the workings of this sort of thing. And you know the workings of
congressional investigative committees.
I think your first job in public service was working with young Hillary
Clinton, then Hillary Rodham on the congressional committee investigating
President Nixon which eventually led to President Nixon resigning the
presidency.
As you see the special prosecutor making this unprecedented choice
basically unprecedented since television cameras first went into hearing
rooms, what is your reaction tonight to Robert Mueller saying I`m ready to
testify but no cameras?
BILL WELD (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Well, Lawrence, I think that Bob
Mueller is totally up to testifying in public. He was head of the FBI for
12 years. He was grilled by Congress both parties many, many times.
And he was my deputy in the U.S. attorney`s office in Boston. And I
remember I went to a dinner in New York where he was giving a speech 12
years later after he had served so long and ably in the FBI.
He`s a totally different guy. I mean, he`s a very, very consummate,
experienced guy. So, he would be up to it.
I think what`s going on here is Bob is so straight, that he doesn`t
necessarily want to say how the process has been perverted. And my reading
of what happened behind closed doors, Bob Mueller`s report says we decided
not to make a traditional prosecutive judgment because we really couldn`t.
Translation, Bill Barr told me that he was going to squash any indictment I
tried to bring against the president for obstruction.
That`s a dirty story. Bob Mueller doesn`t want to have to tell that on TV.
And I think that`s exactly what`s going on here. He`s such a gentleman.
O`DONNELL: But, Governor, he is saying he`ll testify. The transcript can
then be immediately released.
Knowing Bob Mueller as you do, what do you think he sees – because,
obviously, it won`t change his testimony whether there`s cameras there or
not. What about it do you see in his approach to this that makes him think
the transcript is the way, the written word in the transcript in news
print, in us reciting it on this show, that`s the way he wants his words
delivered instead of him?
WELD: Yes, I would suspect, Lawrence, that he wants to avoid a circus.
But as I say, he`s testified many times in high pressure situations with a
lot of members of both parties from time to time being angry at the
performance of the FBI, and he always stood there and took it. And he can
do that again.
Believe me, he`s a tough guy. I was shoulder to shoulder with him. He can
more than hold his own there. I think it`s just that the picture of the
politicization of the Justice Department around him and putting him down is
so tawdry that he doesn`t like the idea of that being in a circus
atmosphere.
But you`re right, the facts are what they are and they`re pretty bad.
O`DONNELL: Governor, what would do you if you were in Robert Mueller`s
position as a special counsel, which you would be by the way fully
qualified to do with your background and experience in a case like this,
and you were at this point where an now it`s the question of testifying to
Congress about this, would you make that request that it be a closed door
hearing?
WELD: Oh, no, I would testify in public. I think that involves a lot of
the flavor. You never know what`s going to happen when all kinds of
witnesses are testifying in public.
I`ve been a litigator for a long time, as long as Bob Mueller. And you
never know what`s going to come out of witnesses` mouths or interrogators`
mouths, and that might be quite revealing. But I think the back story is
that the president is trying to bait the Democrats into impeaching him
prematurely so that he can cry foul and total exoneration if the Senate
doesn`t vote to remove him.
And that will be his campaign going into the 2020 election. I don`t think
Nancy Pelosi is trying to bait him or baiting him. I think it`s the other
way around.
O`DONNELL: What – if you were in the House of Representatives, what would
you be advocating?
WELD: I would pause, I`d want to – I agree with Jerry Nadler. I think
they should have a full summer of investigations so that by the time the
House finally cuts and cuts cleanly on the question of whether to vote for
impeachment – by the way, and the evidence is already there as a matter of
law if they wanted to. But why not do so with maximum evidence with the
most, you know, finely tissued report about exactly everything that went on
here?
But the president has already gone well beyond what Richard Nixon ever did
he in terms of obstruction of justice and 750 former federal prosecutors,
Republicans and Democrats, and mostly career prosecutors, 20 of them like
myself confirmed by the Senate, have said the president committed
obstruction of justice according to the Mueller report. And it`s not even
a close question.
The only person that doesn`t agree with that is Attorney General Bill Barr
and his theory I think with all respect – and Bill Barr is a very eminent
lawyer and friend of myself and Bob Mueller in years past, I don`t think
his theory holds water as a matter of law.
O`DONNELL: Republican Presidential Candidate Bill Weld, thank you very
much for joining us tonight. I want to talk next time –
WELD: Thank you.
O`DONNELL: Next time when you`re here, I want to hear your plan for how
you take your candidacy all the way to the Republican Convention. We`re
going to find time for that next time.
WELD: Yes, sir.
O`DONNELL: Thank you very much for joining us, Governor.
WELD: Thank you.
O`DONNELL: Really appreciate it. And when we come back, the president
attacked a member of his cabinet today calling him dumb as a rock and that
cabinet member was reported to have called Donald Trump a moron. So this
kind of sounds like a case of the pot calling the kettle a rock.
And next, no member of the House of Representatives is more forceful in
calling for the impeachment of President Trump than Republican Congressman
Justin Amash. Who is Justin Amash? Why is he doing this and why is he the
only Republican doing this? That`s next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O`DONNELL: The Republican leader of the House of Representatives Kevin
McCarthy said during the last presidential campaign, “There`s two people I
think Putin pays, Rohrabacher and Trump.” He said that he thought in
private, of course, the comment was leaked later.
Dana Rohrabacher was a Republican member of the House of Representatives
who was defeated in his re-election campaign last year. That same
Republican leader Kevin McCarthy who once said he believes Putin pays Trump
is now attacking Republican member of the House of Representatives
Congressman Justin Amash because Congressman Amash is the first and only
Republican member of Congress who has come out in support of the
impeachment of President Trump.
Congressman Amash did that last weekend in a series of carefully composed
tweets and he added to that body of tweets today saying, “Mueller`s report
describes a consistent effort by the president to use his office to
obstruct or otherwise corruptly impede the Russian election interference
investigation because it put his interests at risk.
It also reveals criminal activity, some of which were committed by people
in Trump`s orbit and in the case of Michael Cohen`s campaign finance
violation on Trump`s behalf. Trump asked the FBI director to stop
investigating Michael Flynn who had been his campaign adviser and national
security adviser and who had already committed a crime by lying to the FBI.
After Attorney General Sessions recused himself from the Russia
investigation on the advice of Department of Justice ethics lawyers, Trump
directly asked Sessions to reverse his recusal so that he could retain
control over the investigation and help the president. Trump directed the
White House Counsel Don McGahn to have special counsel Robert Mueller
removed on the basis of pre-textual conflicts of interest that Trump`s
advisers had already told him were ridiculous and could not justify
removing the special counsel.
When that event was publicly reported, Trump asked that McGahn make a
public statement and create a false internal record stating that Trump had
not asked him to fire the special counsel and suggested that McGahn would
be fired if he did not comply. Trump asked Corey Lewandowski, his former
campaign manager to tell Attorney General Sessions to limit the special
counsel`s investigation only to future election interference.
Trump said Lewandowski should tell Sessions he was fired if he would not
meet with him. Trump used his pardon power to influence his associates
including Paul Manafort and Michael Cohen not to fully cooperate with the
investigation. Trump through his own statements such as complaining about
people who flip and talk to investigators and through communications
between his personal counsel and Manafort, Cohen, gave an impression that
they would be pardoned if they did not fully cooperate with investigators.
Manafort ultimately breached an agreement to cooperate with investigators
and Cohen offered false testimony to Congress including denying that the
Trump Tower Moscow project had extended to June 2016 and that he and Trump
had discussed traveling to Russia during the campaign.
Both men have been convicted for offering false information and Manafort`s
lack of cooperation left open some significant questions such as why
exactly he provided an associate in Ukraine with campaign polling data
which he expected to be shared with a Russian oligarch.
Some of the president`s actions were inherently corrupt, other actions were
corrupt, and therefore, impeachable because the president took them to
serve his own interests. The president has authority to fire federal
officials, direct his subordinates, and grant pardons but he cannot do so
for corrupt purposes. Otherwise, he would always be allowed to shut down
any investigation into himself or his associates which would put him above
the law.”
I was somewhere between surprised and shocked when I read Congressman
Amash`s tweets this weekend supporting impeachment but I think Conservative
Columnist George Will was probably much less surprised. He has been
watching Congressman Amash much more closely than I have for years.
And six years ago, George Will wrote that Justin Amash was one of those
Republicans who had to deal with the challenge of how to balance “being
interesting and being electable.” George Will who gave up his membership
in the Republican Party when Donald Trump won the Republican presidential
nomination will join us next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O`DONNELL: Here is the Republican Minority Leader of the House of
Representatives Kevin McCarthy attacking Republican Congressman Justin
Amash for supporting the impeachment of President Trump.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. KEVIN MCCARTHY: It`s very disturbing. This is exactly what you would
suspect from Justin. He never supported the president. And I think he`s
just looking for attention.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O`DONNELL: Joining us now is George F. Will, Pulitzer Prize-Winning
Columnist for the “Washington Post” and an MSNBC political analyst. And
George, to Kevin McCarthy`s point that Justin Amash is just looking for
attention, let me officially enter into the recorded that this television
program has been begging the congressman to come on as has every political
television program and news program and he has not done one second of
attention-getting television for his position.
How surprised were you this weekend when Justin Amash became the first
Republican to come out in support of impeachment?
GEORGE WILL, PULITZER PRIZE-WINNING COLUMNIST, THE WASHINGTON POST: Not at
all. Let`s give you a little thumbnail sketch of Mr. Amash. He represents
the Grand Rapids, Western Michigan District once represented by Gerald
Ford, the epitome of Vanilla Republicanism.
There is nothing vanilla about Justin Amash. He`s the son of a Palestinian
father and a Syrian mother. Magna cum laude graduate in Economics from the
University of Michigan and then from the University of Michigan Law School.
Student of Friedrich Hayek in the Austrian School of Economics. That is to
say, he`s a real libertarian Republican limited government conservative.
When he was in his first term in the Michigan legislature on something like
70 bills, he was the only no vote, the only one to vote against them
because he thought government had no warrant to be doing what the
government was doing. He got to the House of Representatives and he said
he would not vote for any legislation that was submitted to the House
before people had a chance to read it. Talk about eccentric.
Now, if someone who believes as he does that this is a government of
limited delegate and enumerated powers is immune to the normal controlling
structure of incentives in Washington, by which someone says if you support
my expansion of government, I`ll support your expansion of government.
He`s not interested in that which means he`s a free agent which makes him
dangerous and a little bit frightening to Washington.
O`DONNELL: He told you – you quoted him six years ago in your column
saying that – he said, “I am a moderate because the point of the
Constitution is to moderate the government.” He seems to be trying to
moderate the presidency now.
WILL: Well, I think that`s right. I mean most libertarians and all, it
seems to me, Americans are alarmed by the growth of executive power and not
just under this president but the eclipse of Congress over decades now and
the freewheeling unilateral activity of the president in foreign as well as
domestic. So this is a piece with someone who came to Washington sensitive
to the basic problem of the disequilibrium in our constitutional structure
caused by the swollen presidency.
O`DONNELL: Do we have a reason to suspect that many or some House
Republicans watched this with admiration, with secret admiration?
WILL: I don`t know. I wish we could suspect that but I don`t think there
are very many people whose admiration is secret for anyone else other than
their public admiration for Donald Trump.
O`DONNELL: And how about his congressional district which you know well?
Can he get re-elected in his congressional district having taken this
position?
WILL: Well, I won`t say it`s a matter of indifference to him but it`s not
the most important thing in his life. His convictions are he is what
Margaret Thatcher called herself, a conviction politician. And it was said
of Margaret Thatcher that she couldn`t see an institution without swatting
it with her handbag.
That`s the spirit in which I think Justin Amash operates. He`s been
challenged before in his district. He no doubt will be challenged again,
this time from the right. He`s been challenged from a more Moderate
Republican. I don`t know how it will turn out, but as I say, I think he
would like to win, but he can live without it.
O`DONNELL: George F. Will, thank you very much for joining us tonight.
Appreciate it.
WILL: Thank you.
O`DONNELL: Today, the Trump Justice Department released a 17-count
indictment under the Espionage Act and we`re just getting to that now.
That`s going to be next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O`DONNELL: Today, the Trump Justice Department charged WikiLeaks` founder
Julian Assange with 17 crimes under the Espionage Act. The charges include
conspiring with ex-army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning to disseminate
national defense and classified documents including the identities of human
sources on WikiLeaks in 2010.
Chelsea Manning served seven years in prison after being convicted by
court-martial of espionage. Chelsea Manning is currently in jail for
refusing to testify to a grand jury investigating Julian Assange. “The New
York Times” reports today the Justice Department`s decision to pursue
Espionage Act charges signals a dramatic escalation under President Trump
to crack down on leaks of classified information and names squarely at
first amendment protections for journalists.
Though he is not a conventional journalist, much of what Mr. Assange does
at WikiLeaks is difficult to distinguish in a legally meaningful way from
what traditional news organizations like “The New York Times” do, seek and
publish information that officials want to be secret, including classified
national security matters and take steps to protect the confidentiality of
sources.
Tonight, Julian Assange is in a London jail serving a 50-week sentence for
skipping bail in 2012. The United States has June 12 deadline to present
its case for extradition of Julian Assange from the United Kingdom to the
United States.
Coming up, we have seen the Trump cabinet humiliated in congressional
hearings day after day, but no one humiliates the Trump cabinet the way
Donald Trump does. Today, he called a former cabinet member who he
predicted was going to be a star “dumb as a rock.” That`s next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
O`DONNELL: Rex Tillerson lasted as Donald Trump`s first secretary of state
for a little over a year. The president told us that he always hired the
best people and was putting the best people in his cabinet. And when Rex
Tillerson took the oath of office, the president said “Congratulations to
Rex Tillerson on being sworn in as our new secretary of state. He will be
a star”, exclamation point.
Today, the president said Rex Tillerson is dumb as a rock. That`s the
second time the president has said Rex Tillerson is dumb as a rock. In
December of last year, the president said “Rex Tillerson doesn`t have the
mental capacity needed. He was dumb as a rock and I couldn`t get rid of
him fast enough. He was lazy as hell.” The president said that after Rex
Tillerson described Donald Trump in a “CBS” interview in December.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REX TILLERSON: A man who is pretty undisciplined, doesn`t like to read,
doesn`t read briefing reports, doesn`t like to get into the details of a
lot of things but rather just kind of says look, this is what I believe.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O`DONNELL: Donald Trump revived the dumb as a rock accusation today
against Rex Tillerson after the “Washington Post” reported that Rex
Tillerson met in a closed-door session with the House Foreign Affairs
Committee for seven hours.
We spent a lot of time in the conversation talking about how Putin seized
every opportunity to push what he wanted, a committee aide said. There was
a discrepancy in preparation and it created an unequal footing.
Rex Tillerson was describing a meeting he attended with the president and
Vladimir Putin in Hamburg, Germany. Andrew Weiss, a Russia scholar at the
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, told the “Washington Post”,
“Putin is a very nimble adversary who`s been at this for 20 years now. The
Hamburg meeting sounds like it was one of Putin`s wildest dreams. A
freewheeling backroom style conversation with the U.S. president.” The
president has told us how he prepares for meetings like that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: I`m very well prepared. I don`t think I have to prepare very much.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O`DONNELL: In his seven hours with the House Foreign Affairs Committee,
Rex Tillerson said he and President Trump do not share the same “value
system.” The “Washington Post” reports, when asked to describe Trump`s
values, Tillerson said, “I cannot.”
That reporting in the “Washington Post” by John Hudson and Josh Dawsey not
surprisingly got a response from the president today on Twitter, of course.
The president tweeted “Rex Tillerson, a man who is dumb as a rock and
totally ill-prepared and ill-equipped to be secretary of state made up a
story, he got fired, that I was out prepared by Vladimir Putin at a meeting
in Hamburg, Germany. I don`t think Putin would agree. Look at how the
U.S. is doing”, exclamation point.
We have no response yet to that tweet from Rex Tillerson but we have every
right to imagine that his private reaction is something along the lines of
what he said while he was serving as Donald Trump`s secretary of state
after Donald Trump left a meeting one day at the Pentagon. Rex Tillerson
was reported on this network at that time and then later in Bob Woodward`s
book to have offered what for him was a complete description of Donald
Trump in only two words.
Here is the scene as described in Bob Woodward`s book “Fear.” Just after
President Trump walked out of a Pentagon meeting about North Korea.
Trump got up and walked out. All the air seemed to have come out of
Tillerson. He could not abide by Trump`s attack on the generals. The
president was speaking as if the U.S. military was a mercenary force for
hire.
If a country wouldn`t pay us to be there, then we didn`t want to be there.
As if there were no American interests in forging and keeping a peaceful
world order. As if the American organizing was money.
“Are you OK?”, Gary Cohn asked him. He`s an f-ing moron Tillerson said so
everyone heard. And now everyone has heard it again. Rex Tillerson gets
tonight`s last word.
“THE 11TH HOUR WITH BRIAN WILLIAMS starts now.
END
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