Pod Save America - “Mueller: The Season Finale.”

Episode Date: July 25, 2019

Special Counsel Robert Mueller testifies for six hours before the House Judiciary and Intelligence Committees, Democratic leaders remain hesitant on impeachment, and Joe Biden gets scrappy with his opponents over health care and criminal justice reform. Then House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff talks to Jon F. about the Mueller hearing and impeachment.

Welcome to Pod Save America, I'm Jon Favreau. I'm Jon Lovett, in for Dan Feinfer. That's right, Dan's on vacation. So you're here. It's great to have you here on the Thursday Pod. I'm going to bring all my seriousness to bear today. We'll see about that. Later in the pod, my interview with House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff about his committee's hearing with Robert Mueller.

Before that, we'll talk all about the special counsel's big day on the Hill and what it might mean for impeachment. We're also going to talk about how Joe Biden is getting feistier with his opponents ahead of the next debate over issues like health care and criminal justice. On this week's episode of Pod Save the World, Tommy and Ben talk about how the hell Boris Johnson became prime minister of the United Kingdom, why Trump mused about killing 10 million people in Afghanistan during a recent Oval Office press conference, and how he's trying to get ASAP Rocky out of jail. a range of topics on that pod save the world check it out sounds like a good one uh finally the last installment of july's crooked minis on patriotism

came out on wednesday hosted by ken harbaugh and featuring an interview with pete budaj subscribe to crooked minis wherever you get your podcasts and check out the whole series also we're having a merch sale of it i've been told we are so there's some great stuff in the store check it out at cricket.com there's a lot more in this copy that made me seem like a salesman i'm not gonna read it oh yeah 20 off this act now get 50 off your order here i think we it's time we face that given the amount of advertising we do that That I am selling underwear and home security systems. I think this is a nuance that is lost on most listeners. Cool, cool, cool. Anyway, there's a sale.

Go get some t-shirts. Also, the next episode of our Presidential Candidate Interview Series will be out tomorrow, Friday. I'll be interviewing Bernie Sanders. We'll be right here in Cricket Headquarters, and we will release that pod late Friday afternoon. So be on the lookout for that. Very excited to finally sit down with Bernie.

Okay, let's get to the news. In six hours of testimony before the House Judiciary and Intelligence Committees, Special Counsel Robert Mueller limited himself largely to confirming the already explosive findings of his investigation, that the president and his campaign encouraged Russia to commit crimes to help him win the presidency, eagerly accepted and then benefited from those crimes, lied about it, and then obstructed the investigation into those crimes and other crimes. Mueller did not, however, break a lot of new ground. He refused to answer a lot of questions, and he seemed a little hesitant and a little rattled at times.

He refused to answer a lot of questions, and he seemed a little hesitant and a little rattled at times. But it was a day of hearings where I think anyone who watched heard a pretty damning story about the president's corruption. And as Adam Schiff said, his disloyalty to the country. Before we get into it, I believe we have a clip of Jerry Nadler, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, opening up the first hearing of the day. So the report did not conclude that he did not commit obstruction of justice. Is that correct? That is correct. And what about total exoneration? Did you actually totally exonerate the president? No. Now, in fact, your reports expressly states that it does not exonerate the president. It does. And your investigation actually found, quote, the president. It does. And your investigation actually found, quote, multiple acts by the president that were capable of exerting undue influence over law enforcement investigations,

including the Russian interference and obstruction investigations. Is that correct? Correct. So, Lovett, it's been now a full day since the hearing. Of everything we learned, or at least everything we heard yesterday, what has stuck with you? It's a great question. What has stuck with me? I think overall, it is the moments where Mueller talked about the Russia interference was probably to me the place where he showed the most emotion. And where I think for him is where he believes we have a real moral obligation that we're not fulfilling. It was one of the few places where I think for him is where he believes we have a real moral obligation that we're not fulfilling. It was one of the few places where I think he didn't exactly go beyond the report, but expressed some real outrage and fear for the country because of Russia's continuing efforts to interfere with the election. to refer to some of the conduct around Russian interference and the collaboration between the Trump campaign and Russia, which he didn't call a crime, but did have strong words of criticism for

and was willing to, I think, express some moral language about. I mean, those to me were the two moments and types of things Mueller said that I think will have the most lasting impression for me. types of things Mueller said that I think will have the most the lasting impression for me. Yeah. I mean, he said of Trump's praise for WikiLeaks, quote, problematic is an understatement and that such comments give, quote, hope or some boost to illegal activity and that it certainly calls for an investigation. He also, as you referred to, use the terms unpatriotic to talk about it. That was about the past. He also said that Russia and potentially other countries are trying to meddle in our election again, as we speak, as we sit at that hearing, which I thought was rather alarming.

Yeah. What else, what else did we learn that is new, that sort of surprised you from yesterday that wasn't in the report? Anything? Yeah, I mean, the one, the one big piece of information that we learned towards the very end of the intelligence hearing was Robert Mueller saying that there were portions of the president's statements that were in some way untruthful, the exact language he used. Well, he was asked the question. He was responding to leading questions from Democrats. but he agreed generally that the president did not tell the whole truth in his written answers to the special counsel. Yeah, I thought that was

pretty fascinating. And I was also a little surprised that that didn't make it into the report itself. If there were untruthful answers, though, it may be hard to actually prove perjury. report itself. If there were untruthful answers, though, it may be hard to actually prove perjury. There's a couple other things, you know, that he emphasized that I thought are not exactly new, but definitely confirmed the fact that, you know, there is substantial evidence that the president did commit a crime, that he obstructed justice. Mueller agreed that lies by the Trump campaign and the White House impeded his investigation. He said that because Justice Department guidelines prevented him from indicting a sitting president, he did not make a decision either way on whether to indict the president for obstruction of justice, though this was a walk back to an original answer he gave to Congressman Ted Lieu that

seemed a little more forward leaning. I believe we have that exchange. I'd like to ask you, the reason, again, that you did not indict Donald Trump is because of OLC opinion stating that you cannot indict a sitting president, correct? That is correct. So I don't know if that was a mistake so much as it was a Freudian slip. Yeah, so that's a really good point. Yeah, so first of all, it was a stunning moment. It was an important moment because it did go further than what was in the Mueller report, right? The Mueller report doesn't say that. It specifically doesn't say that. And actually, this has been one of the most central parts of the narrative around the Mueller report because it's actually what Barr hung a lot of his argument on in his four-page summary of the Mueller report. So

the OLC memo says you cannot indict a sitting president. That memo was something that Robert Mueller was going to respect. That meant that Robert Mueller could not indict the president. And based on that logic, it meant he couldn't say in his report, this is what you glean. It's sometimes it vacillates between something he's saying explicitly and less explicitly. But what that meant is not only could he not not indict a sitting president, he did not feel it was appropriate to say that he would indict a sitting president. a sitting president, but for the OLC memo, because that is basically saying, I would like to indict the president, which achieves the same end without actually being able to put someone on trial and having them an opportunity to defend themselves. Yeah. And what we just heard in that clip, that is an effective accusation against the president, even if it's not technically an

accusation, because it's saying, I believe as a prosecutor, he committed obstruction of justice, but because of this rule, I couldn't charge him. Now, it's interesting, I believe as a prosecutor, he committed obstruction of justice, but because of this rule, I couldn't charge him. Now, it's interesting, like not everyone agrees with Mueller's conclusion there. One notable person who did not agree with Mueller's contention that he did not have the power to say he would have charged him, but for the memo is William Barr and Neil Katyal, who was the Solicitor General in the Obama administration and also wrote the special counsel regulations, he brought this up yesterday in an interview. He reminded us that Barr said in an interview

after the report was out that Mueller could have reached a conclusion on obstruction if he wanted. Why didn't he? I mean, I sort of took it as, OK, well, that Mueller was doing the right thing here. But I sort of wonder if we'll look back and wonder, why didn't Mueller say, yeah, I did reach a conclusion. I investigated this president. Here's all the evidence. I reached a conclusion on obstruction. But, you know, there's the OLC memo.

I can't charge a sitting president. So take this as an impeachment referral. that goes so far beyond what was necessary to uphold, I think, a sincere conviction around the rule of law and the limitations of the special counsel rules. I take the author of those rules at his word. And I understand Robert Mueller's general principle of, I would like the facts to speak for themselves. I do not want to be part of an ad. I do not want to be part of a partisan campaign one way or the other. I'm going to trust the system, protect the Department of Justice, provide all the evidence I see fit as a kind of statement of what the law should be, how the law should work. I understand

all of that. I do believe that those are principles worthy of being upheld and could have been upheld by being more explicit. I think he's a bit twisted around the axle in these moments because there's this logical argument that ends in, I can't really say very much at all. Yeah. And another moment where it seemed like he had sort of twisted himself in knots around this question is when Ted Lieu is questioning him on, you know, he's basically saying there are three elements to obstruction of justice. You have evidence that it met this element that you have. And he basically gets Mueller to admit that all three elements of obstruction of justice have been met,

the legal elements to make obstruction of justice. And then Mueller basically stops at the end of that, realizing that he had sort of just walked into this trap and said, yes, but I didn't, I didn't formally reach that conclusion. And it's like, well, what other conclusion could you have reached? Because you just agreed that all the elements to obstruction of justice were there? Right. It's like he's singing happy birthday and just not playing the last note. You know, it's like we all know what you think. The Republicans know what you think.

The Democrats know what you think. You know what you think. The lawyers sitting behind you know what you think. You know what you think. The lawyers sitting behind you know what you think. The reporters watching this and scoring this, you know, to make sure this, you know, to see who's triple axles landed and, you know, who got the quad. Everyone knows what you think. You laid it out in your report. There are 10 instances of obstruction of justice. It's as clear as day. He did it on television. He did it on Twitter. He did it to you and to Jim Comey, someone you know well, you know, a member of the, a leader of the FBI, someone you respect, someone you admire. You know, the the the the challenge in all of this is we are having an incredibly important and large debate where no one really underneath it all disagrees on what happened here.

Right. The subtext is not subtext. No. And I think it's confusing for some people because the media treated his correction of his statement as some giant walkback, as if you can put that back in the box, but you can't. We know what he knows. What he believes is what he originally said to Ted Lieu. And by the way, that's also what's in the report.

There is nothing in the report. There is no evidence that there are other reasons why he did not bring a charge against the president for obstruction of justice. It was not for lack of evidence. No. And the part of the report where Mueller says, you know, there were other issues that prevented this conclusion from being reached. It's what Barr hangs his hat on. It's what a lot of this debate hangs its hat on. That's actually why the walkback isn't as significant. The walkback isn't Robert Mueller denies that but for the OLC memo, he would have charged Donald Trump. The walkback is Robert Mueller won't say that but for the OLC memo, he wouldn't have charged Donald Trump. It is a semantic walkback, ultimately.

In fact, it actually argues for saying that him saying it isn't ultimately as important as we made it out to be even in the moment that, yes, hearing him say it, I was taken aback by it. I thought it was a big statement. But then you you walk. I also thought, oh, obviously, that's obviously true. Well, that's why I thought it was like, I'm glad he's finally saying, but I wasn't I wasn't blown away by it. It was like it was like when the, you he's finally saying, but I wasn't I wasn't blown away by it. It was like it was like when the, you know, the gayest kid in the theater troupe says finally says he's gay. It's like, yeah, OK, great. We're going to talk about it. Me, too.

You know, so Robert Mueller came out of the closet on obstruction and then immediately went back in. Yeah, that seems like what happened. So that's so that's some of what we learned or heard confirmed out loud by Mueller. Now, before the hearing, House Democrats were telling reporters that their goal for these hearings was to bring the Mueller report to life. How well do you think they did on that front and what could have gone better? Do you think the Democrats were effective? And then I guess we should talk about do we think Mueller was effective? Well, it wasn't exactly Shakespeare in the park. You know, I'm of two minds on this.

You know, we were watching this. We saw, you know, we criticized pundits for saying that, you know, the optics were a disaster. It wasn't exciting. It wasn't dramatic. There wasn't a big reveal. And yet at the same time, it's also true that given the expectation that Mueller wasn't going to say very much beyond the two before the hearings, Mueller's people said to Democrats, oh, he's not even going to read parts of the report out loud so that you have that soundbite, which I thought is a bizarre decision and in no way warranted or necessary.

Yes, I guess I understand it because in terms of from his perspective right as use of time and actual value reading out loud words that have already been released to the public is pure politics you know it it's well it is again in line with the democrats goal of a lot of people in this country didn't read the report we want we believe that robert muller should stand by the words that he wrote that he does stand by the words that he wrote so if he does stand by the words that he wrote. So if he stands by them and believes in them, why not say them to people who may not have read the report? You know, I think it's a very fair request. Yeah, I think, right.

I think it's, I see, I see both sides of it. I don't actually ultimately think him reading from the document would have been that. It wasn't magic beans. No, it wasn't magic beans, as we say. It wasn't magic beans, but classic magic beans. As we say in politics, it wasn't magic beans, but classic magic beans. As we say in politics, it wasn't magic beans. But, you know, there were a lot of big moments that came out of the hearing. Nadler asking about exoneration and getting some of those answers on the record.

The moment about Trump being dishonest, the moments about a lack of patriotism, about things deserving to be investigated, about Russian interference. I thought Schiff's questioning was really effective. There were other moments of questioning that were very effective. And I think those moments were played pretty often on television. I presume many of them were played on the local news and were part of the coverage. But also part of the coverage was the general critical response and the Republican response that Mueller was, you know, he fumpered a bit. He had to search his pages. He asked for questions to be repeated. He wasn't very dynamic. Some of the lines of questioning didn't lead to very much. Donald Trump went out to the

helipad and started shouting over the sound of propellers about how it was fake news and saying both, I didn't watch the coverage, but what you did was wrong and what you did was wrong and what you did was wrong. So all of that is infused in how this is received. Is there a version of it where we got more out of it? Yes. Did we still get a good amount of coverage of Mueller's underlying claims in the report in a way that hadn't happened at any point previously? Yes. Yeah, this is, you know, I thought it would be reversed when before the hearing in that I thought we would be critical of Democrats for not getting the right questions or blowing it and then be like, oh, thank God for Mueller. I actually think for as much as we've criticized

Democrats on impeachment and other things, I think that the Democrats on the committees handled themselves quite well. I think especially Chairman Nadler and especially Chairman Schiff, I thought was outstanding. And within the context of interviewing a witness who had said at the outset that he would not read parts of the report and would not go beyond, as he said, the four corners of the report at all. Within that context, I think they got a lot out of it. And I think the Mueller thing did surprise me. You know, I don't think he was as sharp. I don't know why. You know, there's one theory I had was, you know, he didn't really want to prepare for this hearing that much because he didn't want to do the hearing in the first place.

And he knew he wasn't going to go beyond the report. So it's not like he prepped himself like crazy because he knew he was going to keep saying, I refer you to the report, I refer you to the report, and I'm not going to answer that question, which he did. But even if he was going to take that strategy, he still seemed a little lost at times. And I do wonder what's going on there. Yeah, I think that's right. I also think it's a matter of mindset and going into something like this. I think it was pretty clear that he went into this hearing with a whole set of places he didn't want to go. Yeah. And very few places he did want to go. Right. You know, I was prepping Robert Mueller and obviously I'm a partisan, but, you know,

if I were prepping Robert Mueller and I was I'm a partisan, but, you know, if I were prepping Robert Mueller and I was thinking about someone purely from the perspective of caring about making sure that the report has its best airing in a nonpartisan way and that we defend the prerogatives of the rule of law in the United States, I might have pushed to say, all right, here are some of the areas I think it's worth making an important point about, whether it's the integrity of the Department of Justice, the importance of the protection of investigations at the Department of Justice from interfering on Russian interference, from interference from the White House. On Russian interference, I do think he was a bit more expansive in part because whether he prepped around that or not, whether he was worried about

it or not, it was a place where he felt comfortable expounding a bit more. I do. And in his defense, too. I mean, we just said that the Democrats overall did quite well. But I do think some of the questions, because they couldn't get Mueller to read the report, they read, you know, a paragraph at a time very quickly. And, you know, if I was sitting where Robert Mueller is, right, we could all hear the sound very well on our televisions. But in that hearing room, a lot of reporters who were in there said it's sometimes hard to hear the questions. And they were speaking really fast. And you have to think to yourself, do I want to answer the question quickly and strongly?

Or do I want to make sure I don't lie under oath and get something wrong? Like, I better look into the report, you know. So who knows what was going on there. But I think the important thing is, like, I get that the main goal for the Democrats was to bring the report to life. I don't necessarily think that Robert Mueller giving a shaky performance detracted from getting facts out into the public sphere that people needed to know that much. Like it might have at the margins, but, you know, we just you reference sort of the pundits on this. There were a few pundits and reporters who decided early on that Mueller was a little off. Our friend David Axelrod tweeted that, quote, he does not appear as sharp as he was in the past. Chris Wallace then said he was uncertain that the hearing was a, quote, disaster for Mueller and Democrats.

Chuck Todd tweeted, quote, on substance, the Democrats got what they wanted. But on optics, this was a disaster, another word disaster. And there were plenty of others like that. And of course, then the White House picked up on all of those talking points. And basically, thanks to all the pundits who said it was a disaster, it gave the press secretary at the White House and Donald Trump the ability to say it was a disaster as well. So the argument that I heard from some reporters on this was, you know, Democrats said that their goal was to bring this to life. And that's all about optics. So why shouldn't we judge optics? Yeah, I mean, fair enough. It is not that the Democrats didn't get what they wanted out of the hearing. And it's, I think, why the conversation on optics is so frustrating.

get what they wanted out of the hearing. And it's, I think, why the conversation around optics is so frustrating. The issue is what we learned in the hearing, given that Mueller wasn't doing a, you know, dramatic reading of the testimony. It was not a few good men. It was not a few good men. It was not. You know, Mueller didn't finally admit to the code red. It's a little bit what we learned is that Democrats made a mistake weeks ago. Yeah, that that even in Democrats saying they wanted to bring the report to life, what they were what they were in some sense saying was, I need Robert Mueller to do something I'm either unable or unwilling to do, which is take this report and all the information in it, none of which will be new by the time we get to Mueller's testimony, delayed and delayed and delayed until now, which is bring it to life for the American people and hold it up and say, this is enough.

This should be enough. Slouching toward reasonableness and this effort to create the illusion of some coming information that finally makes the case worthy of being made on impeachment, elevated the Mueller hearing into something that, even if he had been one of the great dramaturgists of our age, would not have been possible because we already had the information. We have the information. The president is guilty of crimes. We all know it. We all know it. And maybe Barr's memo was too effective in slowing us down. Maybe it took the wind out of our sails. But Mueller wasn't going to be able to put the wind back in. And so I was frustrated with the focus on optics. But maybe part of that is frustrated with what led the Democrats

in Congress to believe that the optics of this were what was going to matter. Yeah, I mean, look, I very much understand that, unfortunately, optics are important in politics. I get that. I get that, you know, we watch these debates and a lot of the debates are judged by performance, right? I also think that this should be treated as something different. Obviously, there are partisan interests at stake in the outcome of the Mueller hearings and this investigation as a whole. We all understand that. But we also had an independent special counsel, a registered Republican, conducted a two-year investigation into a serious attack on our democracy and the connection to the president of the United States in that investigation as well. And to treat that as

just, to treat the presentation of that report in public as, you know, the most important thing is to judge it via optics, whether, you know, Bob Mueller was shaken or not. You know, a lot of people are going to only watch news coverage of that hearing. They're not going to watch the whole hearing. People did not have time to watch the whole hearing. So they're going to get whatever the media filter is going to be incredibly important to how people judge that. And if someone turns on their news and they've been busy all day, don't they deserve to hear what exactly happened in the hearing and not a bunch of talking heads saying it was a disaster for Democrats because Bob Mueller was unprepared? Don't they deserve don't the American people deserve to hear the substance of what Robert Mueller told them about a foreign power attacking our election?

Yes, this yes this is this is in this one instance we're just asking for one fucking instance in in you know what i'm not i'm asking for more than one i mean too i've just set my sights low and i know i know that to the reporters that hear this criticism there's like a bit of a rolling of the eyes like yeah no i know like what world do you live in well they say you know oh you're yeah you blame you blame the media for trump it's like no i i don't blame the media for trump i don't think that if uh you know maggie called it alive that uh again the magic beans would uh yeah we're not we're not making that we're not making that case i just think it's worth reflecting collectively

not pinning it on any journalist but like some of the hardest things for us to talk about it are the larger kind of contours of the way we talk about politics that have been developing and growing for decades, not born of this election, not born of 2016, but that are a culmination of a lot of changes in how we talk about politics. There is an assumption inside of the political coverage that says the optics were a disaster for Democrats, which is that I'm saying that for you, the pundit, the observer, the person watching politics from the outside. But it assumes that you are not the only mediator. It assumes that there is some other form of coverage that is covering the substance and revealing the substance to people. And you're watching that coverage and saying, here's how I think it's working. The problem is there isn't

that other kind of coverage. This is the way we talk about politics. This is the way politics is mediated for people. The way you say it seems is how it seems. And so it's a vicious circle. I sometimes think that reporters and pundits don't understand the power they wield to actually shape the public narrative. Exactly. That's partly because no one reporter or pundit has the power to do it themselves. And so they often say, oh, well, it's just my tweet. What are you getting upset for? But collectively, and there is a hive mind approach here to this, right? Like one person on Twitter says it's a disaster,

and then the other person says, and then all the folks who are stuck in D.C. start thinking the same way, and suddenly that's the narrative. And those people all know. They know how damning the report is. They know how damning Robert Mueller's testimony was. They know that. And so when you say, you know, the optics are a disaster,

that is the optics are a disaster, that is the optics being a disaster. It is the description of the optics that becomes the optics. It is a self-fulfilling prophecy and it is naive and it is a fantasy. But it ought to be at least part of how we talk about this, where what if the instinct was in cases, for some people to see what Robert Mueller is saying, to see how this is a culmination of weeks to get Mueller to testify about the content of his report. And the response was, wow, this is important substance. It's really important and necessary information. It was conveyed in an undramatic and halting way. is now our job to bridge that gap to help people understand what it is to overcome the optics oh no the optics are are preventing people from seeing

why this is important i better overcome those optics and make it my job to show people what really happened yeah and look you can you can do both you know we didn't we didn't start this whole thing by being like no no robert mull Mueller was perfect yesterday and he was amazing. And he won that. Like, no, you can admit that he was stumbly, but also let people know the relative importance of that in relation to the overall testimony and what we learned. It's not that hard. hard. Yeah. So let's talk about what happened after the hearing. The president very predictably declared the day a victory for himself and pointed out all the pundits and reporters who agreed with him that it was a disaster for the Democrats. Democratic leaders responded in a press conference where Nancy Pelosi said this of impeachment, quote, My position has always been whatever decision we made in that regard would have to be done with our strongest possible hand. And we still have some outstanding matters in the courts. She's referring to the lawsuit to force former White House counsel and Mueller star witness Don McGahn to testify,

and for DOJ to hand over all the underlying evidence from the Mueller report. But according to Politico, Judiciary Chairman Jerry Nadler tried to push Pelosi to launch an impeachment inquiry in a private caucus meeting Wednesday after the hearing, and the speaker basically said, not just yet. Lovett, what's it going to take here? Does impeachment get easier from here, harder from here? What do you think? I do not believe impeachment got easier.

Let's face it, it just didn't. Where we are now is, in many ways, where we were before the Mueller testimony, which is Mueller was never going to provide you the perfect recipe for impeachment. He's not going to do your homework for him. He wasn't going to do it. He's not going to take the test. It's a hard decision you're going to have to make for yourself, and no one's going to make it easier for you, as Democrats.

Yes, and a lot of the coverage has been around how much Mueller did or didn't reveal. But one other facet of what we saw unfold was actually the Republicans on the hearing just throwing their conspiracy theory punches and trying to drum up, you know, insults to the special counsel, to the partisan witch hunt of the investigation, all the usual fare. Some of it, you know, a new gloss on sort of a classic, a remix. Some of it, you know, a new gloss on sort of a classic, a remix. But it didn't land very hard either. It actually sort of, I think, didn't change the conversation in the other direction at all. Because where we are is where we were before.

We have basically the same amount of information, a little bit more nuance, a little bit more insight. From what Mueller said, Mueller built on his statement in response to Barr in some of his answers. We've got a bit more context for this report. It might not have provided the great TV fodder and dramatic moment that would have galvanized impeachment more quickly, but we're where we are. We have the information. If what your claim is, is that we need something more damning, more clear cut than the many, many public and private crimes outlined by Mueller, not to mention the ways in which he is unfit and unsuited for the office, his racist outbursts and all the rest. If what you're saying is that's not enough, I'm not sure whatever would be. Yeah. Look, I get how hard this vote is.

I get that it's not popular. And I also understand that the Senate's, you know, going to acquit him. I get all of that. I also understand that it is a legitimate strategy to say I want to tie up all the loose ends before we have this vote. I want to, you know, compel McGahn to testify. I want to compel the DOJ to get us all the documents that we need. I get all that. But we are running out of time. You know that in an election year in 2020, it's going to seem foolish to have an impeachment hearing while this presidential campaign is going on. And so, and you've said this before, L it like that leaves that leaves the fall. And I think, look, Jerry Nadler clearly wants to do this.

Like Nancy Pelosi sort of standing in the way here. And she's trying to cover for a lot of Democrats who were just not there yet. And I think it's I'm sorry to interrupt, but it's like she's in some sense covering for those Democrats, but also in her standing up, standing in the way she helps make it less likely in some way. So it's both. That's all. Yeah. And I also look watching that unfold yesterday. I, for the first time, started seeing the risks in impeachment in terms of, all right, we're going to hold a bunch of televised hearings on impeachment. hold a bunch of televised hearings on impeachment we better lock our shit down and make sure those hearings go well if the reason that we are impeaching him is not just for um the moral case but to build a political case against trump that can help um defeat him in 2020 and if we're going to build that political case uh all of these hearings better sound like adam schiff's opening

testimony and his questioning and jerry nadler's questioning yeah and it better not sound like a whole bunch of other shit that we heard you know look we're not going to be able to prevent republicans from like throwing out their conspiracy theories during the impeachment hearings if we have them but gotta lock that fucking case down but i still believe and you know i i sat there we're gonna talk to schiff in a bit but i watched his his, because I only caught parts of it, I watched his opening statement last night. And it is this sort of clarifying moment when you hear the story put together in that way. And I started thinking to myself, you know, this is seven minutes here, but imagine this message over and over for months during impeachment hearings. I mean, Tommy brought this up yesterday. You know, the one thing you can say about Trump is he's on message.

He's been on message, the same concise, consistent message on this whole investigation for years now. No collusion, no obstruction, witch hunt, total exoneration. You hear it over and over again. And Democrats don't have a message. And sometimes when you're all struggling to come up with a message, this happens in campaigns too, you need a forcing mechanism, right? And obviously the 2020 campaign is a forcing mechanism for whoever the nominee may be. But I think that for the House Democrats who have been,

by all accounts, sort of flailing for the last couple months, inter-party feuding, the investigation strategy hasn't been going that well by any standard. Yes, that's right. An impeachment proceeding would be a focusing mechanism to get them all on the same page and to figure out what their story is about Donald Trump and why he's unfit to lead this country, which is a very important story to have for beating him in 2020. Yes, I totally agree. And by the way, I say that as somebody who doesn't view impeachment as some silver bullet. No, at all. I think there's a good

I mean, I actually think the most likely outcome of impeachment, well, there's two most likely outcomes. One, it helps us a little bit. And right behind it helps us a little bit is it's a complete wash and doesn't matter in the election whatsoever. Absolutely. And then I think it hurts us is below that for me. I really, I think it could be nothing.

Yes, I do. But one thing that it would do is it would change the current dynamic. It would get us out of this this kind of feckless, dull ache of a oversight period that we've been in that I think has been a source of a lot of the internal strife amongst Democrats, because, you know, when you step back from the from from from Mueller, from from from Pelosi blocking for the moderates, from the from from some of the from some of the bickering and legitimate differences we've seen, there's a lot of pain for Democratic voters. There's a lot of anger and frustration among Democratic members. Here we are, a majority we fought so hard for against a president we all recognize is unfit, corrupt, and must be removed from office as soon as humanly possible, who we all believe. Every member who supports impeachment, every member who opposes impeachment believes that Donald Trump is guilty of impeachable offenses.

And we have now spent months watching this president prevent subpoenas from being fulfilled and Democrats debating amongst themselves as to whether or not impeachment is worth it. Maybe a 2020 campaign can change that dynamic on its own. I'm not so sure. And he's continuing to abuse his power as we wait because he knows he can get away with it right like we saw him yesterday yesterday he was distracted by this hearing and he was angry yes and i would rather him distracted and angry and tweeting about impeachment hearings than i would doing all kinds of other bad shit which he is i mean there he is he is out of control his presidency is out of

control we haven't even talked about the fact that, you know, Customs and Border Patrol, you know, detained an American citizen, an 18-year-old American citizen for three weeks, no showers, lost 26 pounds because they didn't give him a food, put him in a cage with a whole bunch of other migrants, which, you know, we also don't talk about nearly enough. But we are now, we detained an American citizen, a child, a teenager, because he has brown skin. That's that's the country we are right now. That's the president we have right now. And we are just going to say we can wait until 2020 to render a judgment against that man. Because because we have concerns about the politics, not the merits, not the not the

facts, not the law, not the morality, because we have vague concerns about the politics we cannot fully articulate and we cannot know for sure. This is our chance to go on record, to use the powers of the house to say we do not find this conduct acceptable. we do not find this conduct acceptable. In fact, we find it so egregious, reprehensible, and illegal that we are going to say on the record, this man has no business being president of the United States. And if it were up to us, we would remove him. We don't have the power because we hand it over to the Senate, but let them go on record and say the opposite. And if this president is reelected and the House returns to Republican control, the statute of limitation runs out on a lot of the crimes that Donald Trump committed, and he will never be held accountable. And if and this might be so what the House,

the House making a decision to impeach may be our best last chance to hold this man accountable for the crimes he's committed. And and and And imagine Donald Trump being reelected and Democrats losing power, having for quotidian political concerns, which turned out to have not been correct and not been borne out by what took place after, failed to use their power to say what they believed, which is that this man had no business being president, to forgo an opportunity to say for history and for the world that we weren't this, that we weren't behind this, that we were going to use our power to stop this. That is a grand mistake that is not worth making based on political concerns that no one really knows for sure are accurate. Nobody knows.

Look, and they are real, right? Like the I am eyes wide open that the flip side of this is we vote to impeach. We drag the country through impeachment proceedings and it is very unpopular. And we regret that, too. It's very. But there are there are two really tough choices. I don't think either choice is easy. And I think when both choices in front of you in politics are very difficult, you go with the choice that you believe in. You do what you believe in when both are difficult. Especially when I don't think there is anyone who is part of this debate who would argue that where we're at right now feels politically satisfying. His approval rating is at its highest it's been right now.

So the fall is the moment. It is the opportunity to have this, to have these hearings, to concentrate the focus. And by the way, after that, we'll be off to 2020. We will have come together and Democrats in the House will have come together to to to hold the president accountable and make a case. It may not have a huge impact at all, but it will have been done. And that will free up Democrats running for president to make their case for why they are a positive response to Donald Trump as well. OK, let's talk about 2020. Joe Biden is getting scrappy ahead of next week's Democratic primary debates. He's getting into it with Cory Booker over criminal justice reform. He's getting into it with Bernie Sanders and Kamala Harris over health care.

On the first issue, Biden released a criminal justice reform plan last week that would decriminalize marijuana, expunge prior convictions, eliminate mandatory minimums for nonviolent crimes and the death penalty, abolish private prisons, get rid of cash bail and discourage the incarceration of children. First, before we get into the politics, what do we think of Biden's plan? I think it's good. I mean, I think it's where the Democratic consensus now is, which is undoing some of the harsh sentencing laws. They came from the 94 crime bill. They came from the 94 crime bill. Biden famously supported it. Yes. Getting rid of cash bail, I think it's good how quickly it became a kind of mainstream position.

It went from being something that I don't think was talked about at the national level at all and has sort of quickly become something people. It's an interesting case of people quickly realizing, like, oh, wait a second. There's a there's an injustice here that's incredibly common that we aren't talking about enough. I think it's also another example of, you know, Biden's criminal justice reform plan may not be the most ambitious or most progressive in the field, but relative to anything we've seen in the past and past campaigns, it is very progressive. And I think that is a testament to the left, to activists, to organizers who have really pushed the field on this. I mean, Biden is seen, and we've said this too, as the centrist candidate in the field. There's nothing centrist about a criminal justice reform plan like that. That is a very progressive plan that would do a lot of good.

So Cory Booker, who helped pass a criminal justice reform bill in Congress this year and has been critical of Biden's involvement in the 1994 crime bill, tweeted the following in response, quote, it's not enough to tell us what you're going to do for our communities. Show us what you've done for the last 40 years. You created the system. We'll dismantle it. Biden defended himself and his plan and called into question Booker's record on criminal justice and public safety when he was the mayor of New York, telling reporters this, quote, His police department was stopping and frisking people, mostly African-American men, he said, leading the Obama administration to intercede. Quote, We took action against them.

The Justice Department took action against them, held the police accountable. He objected to federal interference. If he wants to go back and talk about records, I'm happy to do that. That got that got heated fast really fast a couple people put out some good criminal justice reform plans and suddenly we are fucking off to the races i'm old enough to remember where biden wasn't going to get in the fray and cory booker talked about love it was two weeks ago so what what do you think's going on here? Why did Booker take the shot and why did Biden respond and respond so quickly? I think that, look, Joe Biden, he's been the archer and he's been the prey.

I think he's been the prey mostly. This is the first instance of him being an archer. Yeah, that's right. I think he was sick of being the prey and decided it was time that he might have to be the archer because he couldn't. I wonder if there's a whole bunch of people who just don't understand that reference at all. Probably, hopefully. Mostly straight people. Yeah, I mean, look, I don't think it's that complicated.

Biden is about to head into a debate in which he is probably going to face criticism from Booker, Harris. He'll be flanked by the two of them. Yeah. And it's if Biden had more debates like the last debate, he would very quickly have no chance of being the Democratic nominee. There's just no way that that could continue again and again. It's not possible, not at it, not when so much of this debate is about who will stand up against Donald Trump. So they're making a change. They're not going to take punches. They're going to punch back. And they're going to.

The thing that was most interesting about what Biden said is it was a signal to everyone at the debate that Biden's going to punch back. And the thing that the campaign said was if Booker wants to talk about the past, we can do that. That's an argument. We'll win, but we want to talk about the future. And I think one of the lessons that one thing we said about the previous debate, one thing that was obvious probably to his campaign as well, was that Biden needs to talk about what he's going to do. He needs to talk about the future because if they're talking about the past, it's unhelpful to their campaign. So I think this is a way of trying to signal that you can try to mix it up, but I'm going to try to push towards the future. And if you come at my record, I'll

come at yours. So let's have a different kind of debate. I think that last point is very important because all of these top candidates, none of them just appeared yesterday, right? Like there's some people who've been in Washington much longer than others like Joe Biden. But Cory Booker has a long record as mayor of Newark before he was in the Senate. Kamala Harris has a long record as a prosecutor, as attorney general, as a DA before she was in the Senate. We found out that Pete Buttigieg has a long record or not a long record, but a record as mayor in South Bend. And, you know, all of these records have elements that the candidates can be very proud of and want to talk about. But there are also sort of weaknesses in the record, or at least controversies in all of their records. And I think you're right that

Biden wants to let people know, you can come at my record if you want. And there's a lot of votes you can pick. And there's a lot of issues that I've evolved on and that I wasn't so great on back then. But by the way, I'm going to come after your record, too. And I wouldn't be surprised if he does that with Booker, if he does that with Kamala Harris on stage. Like, I think you're right that he is sort of putting them on notice. Yeah, he is. And look, Booker's response to Biden is a very hard hit. It's also an ad hominem attack. And I don't say, you know, ad hominem is what, that's an ad hominem attack, and therefore it is unacceptable. That's not what I mean. I mean, it is not a criticism of the policy. It is a suggestion that while this policy may have

elements I agree with, and actually I'm not going to be critical of what you've laid out at all, I am going to say that basically you are not the person to actually execute this policy because in some way your heart is not fully in it because your record reveals the kind of president you would be. And I think sometimes that argument is valuable and I think sometimes it's not. I'm not sure yet here. I think this is a totally worthy debate that they're about to have about their records. But it's worth keeping in mind that this is a conversation outside of the policy and trying to basically say, I don't you should you should be skeptical that he'll actually be the kind of president that would that would that would fight for these policies. And I think it can be a very effective argument against Biden, by the way. I think Booker said something that makes it more effective, which is, you know, I'm glad that Vice President Biden has come along

on these issues. But where Booker's setting up, and I'm sure Kamala Harris is setting this up too, is, okay, who do you trust to change the system? Do you trust someone who has changed over time and evolved to a good place, or someone who's always been there? That's the argument that ultimately they want to all make against Biden, right? That it's great that he served as Obama's vice president and was progressive and supported Obama's agenda. It's great that he has progressive policies now, but who do you really trust when they're president to stick by you? And I think that could be a good argument, but there is the danger that you overdo it and that you expose yourself to your own problems in doing that.

So the other issue where there was some Biden feistiness this week is health care. Biden continued his criticism of Bernie Sanders' Medicare for All plan, saying that during the four year transition, some people might be stranded without health insurance plans because during the transition, what might happen is private insurance companies, knowing that they're about to be extinct, could pull out of a lot of markets and do price gouging like they do now, but maybe worse. But then the vice president said that at least Bernie's being honest about how he'd pay for Medicare for all by raising taxes on the middle class, whereas candidates who insist you can pay for Medicare for all by just raising taxes on the wealthy are living in, quote, fantasy world. It seems very clear there. He was talking about Kamala Harris because he'd just been talking about her. Love it. What's happening here? And how do you think this the public option versus single payer debate is playing out so far? So, you know, we've reached the part of Cocoon where Don Amici is dancing again. I saw that. I i saw that i saw your wheels turning on that one as i talked about biden's feistiness

specifically there's something about saying a man in his 70s is feisty or spry and it's like wow avoid the typical media really real spring in his step joe biden slammed bernie sanders this week i know i know it's just so but know. So the line about at least Bernie is being honest about raising taxes. It is interesting hit on Kamala. It's a funny it's a funny shot. Yeah, it is. It is a bank shot. You know, I want to live for a moment in a fantasy world where we have a debate about a public option or Medicare for all who want it versus Medicare for all. about a public option or Medicare for all who want it versus Medicare for all. That is not just based on substance and policy, based on substance and policy, but even more than based on substance and policy is where both sides speak about the pros and cons of their own plans and each other's.

Yeah, I really is a fantasy. It is a fantasy. I'm with you. I know. And I guess it's just sort of just take a moment to imagine what that would be like. It would be someone like Joe Biden saying, I see the value of a transition to Medicare for all the efficiencies that will be gained from the system, a simple system in which everyone knows they can rely on Medicare and they will never again have to worry about falling through the cracks of a broken system in which insurance companies and pharmaceutical companies and hospital companies prey on people because you will know that you have the most reliable insurance that there could be, which is Medicare provided for the government. However, there's a downside to a plan like that, which is that we'd have to raise taxes on the middle class. And while ultimately a lot of middle class families would pay less, there are people that are happy with their private insurance who might not be up for that bargain. And actually, because Medicare for all is less popular, it might make us harder to just improve the system because we won't be able to get to Medicare for all. That kind of a criticism. And I also think Pete Buttigieg actually has one of the best arguments here where he says we should provide Medicare for anyone who wants it. Anyone who

wants to enroll should be able to enroll in Medicare. And hopefully, if people really like that plan so good and if people like that plan, it will strangle all the different private insurance plans because it will be the plan that everyone wants. And then we will have Medicare for all that Bernie wants. But I think that people should have the choice to go there and not have the government make the decision for them. I think it's a very effective argument. I do too. And I actually think, you know, Gillibrand, who is someone who signed on to the Bernie bill and it talks a lot about how much she worked on the transition, elides this debate by kind of making the Mayor Pete argument while supporting Medicare for all. Basically saying it's a step, the public option or Medicare for America or whatever plan is a stepping stone to where we're going to get to, which is single payer. Right. But that's the argument I think some of the single payer

supporters are making by simply saying the public option will become Medicare for all. So the transition will be more smooth than you're anticipating. On the other side, you know, some of the broadsides against a public option, I think, have also been unfair. There are legitimate critiques of Medicare for all. But I think sometimes the kind of attacks like this is a tool of the insurance industry. This is a tool of the pharmaceutical industry. This is allowing these companies to have too much power. I think some of that is quite legitimate. But it actually means you're avoiding making the most important case for Medicare for all versus a public option that has to be made, which is why everyone's switching is

better for everybody. And I think that argument... The hold hands and jump together argument, right? Right. If we're going to do this, we should all do this at once, one single network. Everyone can keep their doctor and pick the doctor they want because all the doctors will be in the same network. We have all these efficiencies. And if we're going to do it, we can't do another piecemeal transition. We have to do it all at once. And how it helps you control costs and helps make sure insurance, make sure everyone has quality insurance and that the system as a whole provides better care for everybody without some of the massive overhead and administrative costs that that that that that weigh down the system and without cracks in the system that a lot of people fall through to this day, despite the passage of Obamacare. cracks in the system that a lot of people fall through to this day, despite the passage of Obamacare. You know, because part of the reason I think it's important is if you support Medicare for all, you need to reckon with the fact that there are polls right now that show Medicare for

all who want it polls 70 percent. 70 percent support Medicare for all who want it defined as, quote, allowing all Americans to choose between a national health insurance program and their own private health insurance. Even 46% of Republicans said they support such a program. This is the NPR PBS Marist poll from this week. 41% support Medicare for all defined as a national health insurance program for all Americans that replaces private health insurance. And I do think Medicare for all supporters have to reckon with these polls, particularly because they have been the ones who have been citing so often polls that say, oh, Medicare for all the American people wanted.

It's very popular. Yes. But the way that the poll is asking that question is, do you believe, you know, do you like Medicare for all right? Which people are assuming to mean Medicare for anyone who wants it, but they assume that choice baked in. And I've seen, and there are people who criticize that and say, actually, you know, it's actually hard to get at this information. There are people who- I'm sure it is.

And of course, and there are people who claim they like their private insurance, but the next follow-up question has to be, have you used it? How good is your insurance? How do you know your insurance is good, right? There are complications in this, but all that's a way of saying, except all those complications, if you believe Medicare for All is the right policy, I really, rather than attack the polling result, I would like to hear arguments to close that gap. And by the way, getting to 41% on Medicare for All is an achievement.

It is an achievement. It speaks to the current failures of the healthcare system and the incredible work and activism and organizing that's gotten this issue so quickly into the mainstream. Yeah. And I will say on the financing point, because Biden did make the point about middle class taxes, about Kamala Harris. We haven't even started a debate about that yet. Right. Most of the debate so far has been about a single government plan versus keeping your private insurance. I don't necessarily think that is going to be the most important thing in the end here. Like the financing is very difficult for a full Medicare for all system. Medicare for America, which Center for American Progress and

sort of like Pete Buttigieg, Beto O'Rourke, they've sort of hovered around that. You know, they just released a plan. You can finance that purely with tax increases on the wealthy. Biden is correct and Biden is correct, and Bernie is correct and honest about it, that you do have to raise middle class taxes. Now, Bernie says that by raising the taxes, you still end up saving money because you're not paying any premiums anymore, which eventually is true. But I do think that Kamala Harris does need to answer, you know, how she's going to fund Medicare for all or at least some funding options, particularly because her first piece of legislation that she wants to pass is a middle class tax cut.

So she wants to pass a middle class tax cut, but also is signed on to Bernie's Medicare for all bill, which is trillions and trillions of dollars. I think that this is this is why we have seen a lot of Kamala raising her hand and then explaining the hand raise and signing on for Bernie's bill and then avoiding this part of the question. I don't know if Kamala Harris is going to actually try to answer and solve this problem or try to try to hide from it like like whack-a-mole. You mean what she has said in the past when confronted on plans to pay for things is Democrats too often worry about how we can afford it. And my question is, how can we not afford it, right? And I think she's speaking to sort of this feeling

that's in the Democratic Party, at least among the activist base, that in the Obama presidency, we worried far too much about deficits and debt. And that is a very valid critique. But I think there is worrying too much about deficit and debt. And then there is not caring at all about how you pay for things. And I think there's a big gap between those two things. It's not even honestly, to me, it's even the policy question is actually a projection of the moral and personal question, which is what are you going to fight for? You know, you've signed on to Medicare for all.

That's are you do you believe in Medicare for all so much in your bones that you're going to go out on the campaign trail and start making a case for even though middle class taxes will have to go up? Ultimately, middle class families will save money and everybody will be safer. My honest view is I don't believe that that's her position. I think she signed on for this bill. I think she really loves her middle class tax cut. I think she likes her middle class tax cut. And I think probably, you know, she's seeing polls like this and thinking, I need to find a way to go from signing on to Bernie's bill to ultimately being for a Medicare for all who want it type plan. Right. I mean, that is, I think, where the Democratic consensus is likely to end up. Yeah, well, certainly in the polls, that's where the party is now.

Yeah. You know. OK, so when we come back, my conversation with Chairman Adam Schiff. with Chairman Adam Schiff. Joining us today, the Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Congressman for California's 28th Congressional District, and good friend of the pod, Adam Schiff. Welcome back, Congressman. Thank you. Great to be with you. So one of the things that struck me about the President's response to yesterday's hearings was how concise and consistent his message has been throughout the investigation. No collusion, no obstruction, total witch hunt.

He's lying, but you know, he's telling a story. I think Democrats have had a harder time settling on a story about the president, possibly because there are so many targets. But I thought that through your line of questioning, and especially your opening statement yesterday, you told the most compelling story about Trump that I've heard. You said it was a story about greed, lies and disloyalty. What was the one thing you wanted people at home to remember from yesterday? And how do we get the whole whole party on board with that message? Well, what I wanted the takeaway to be is the Russians massively intervened in our election. The Trump campaign knew about it. They welcomed it. They

made use of it. And then they lied about it. And those acts are unethical, unpatriotic. They're at times criminal. And I think Mueller really drove that home. And I think perhaps most powerful message of all is just the disloyalty to country. So I think it was really an important hearing. I know people went into it, some with expectations that it was going to have a dramatic impact in terms of impeachment. But my expectations were much more modest, that this would be the first time the American people would get to hear from Mueller about his own work. And even though it wouldn't be new facts, it would be

a new messenger. And that work wouldn't be filtered by the president, who, as you say, keeps lying about it, or the attorney general who's been doing the same, but from the man who did the work himself. There was a moment during Mueller's testimony where he seemed to confirm the existence of a current counterintelligence investigation by the FBI. A senior Democrat on the committee said they were surprised by this. Did it surprise you? And what are the most important things that we still don't know in terms of counterintel? You know, I think it's still unclear, and we're following up on Director Mueller's testimony, and I was inquiring about just those issues today. He may have been referring to, if it was Mike Flynn you're talking about, a case that Flynn is a witness in, was also, I think, a co-defendant in, in which his co-defendant was convicted, I think, either during the hearing or just shortly before that.

Or it might have been something else, and we're trying to find out. Did the Intel Committee get its classified briefing after yesterday's public hearing as originally planned? Not by the staff member who appeared with Director Mueller. We have been briefed by another member of Mueller's team, and we are continuing. In fact, I got yet another briefing today on the counterintelligence issues, which are of such concern to our committee. issues which are of such concern to our committee. But as we are learning more, there are still a great many unanswered questions, and we still have only the broad outlines and some specifics of the counterintelligence information that came out of the investigation. So that work is ongoing, and we're making progress, but we still have a lot more to do.

What did you make of Mueller's statement that Trump's written answers were generally incomplete and untruthful? I mean, if he lied in written testimony, why doesn't that constitute an additional obstruction of justice offense? And why do you think it wasn't in Mueller's report? Because I think that when someone answers as Trump did, that I can't recall. It's very hard to make a perjury case. you know, having looked at different fact patterns over the year and having had, as a foreign prosecutor, a lot of witnesses who were dissembling, you know, the easiest dodge of all is not to say something that is directly false in the sense of controverting facts that can be proven, but to say you have a failure of recollection, which is harder to prove or disprove. So I think it's a problem of proof for Mueller. But he also wanted

to make clear that he thought the president's answers were, you know, deeply unsatisfactory and that they were real credibility problems. I mean, the fact that he couldn't evaluate the credibility or couldn't make a positive statement about the president's credibility. And in fact, when he was confronted with several statements by the president, you know, the witch hunt stuff, the hoax stuff, he was willing to say those are false statements. The I have no business dealings in Russia while he's pursuing a Moscow Trump Tower. You know, the president made it all too clear what he thinks about that when he was confronted with those lies about Moscow Trump Tower. And his answer was, well, I just said that to the public. It's not like I said that to some magistrate. He feels it's just part of his job to deceive the public. And, you know, again,

this is somebody who does nothing but project onto others his own lack of morality. You know, his attitude is everybody does it. And so do I. Yeah. So at the press conference after the hearing, you described launching an impeachment inquiry as a decision that will be made after you get more information from the courts in various hearings. But wouldn't opening an inquiry now help you get that information? Like, isn't the point of an impeachment inquiry to get more information? Well, you know, there is one area where it may be helpful to get information, and that is there's litigation by the Judiciary Committee, which I think is fairly imminent, to get the grand jury material underlying the Mueller report. And there's a, you know, there's an exception to grand jury rules for a judicial proceeding,

and impeachment is a judicial proceeding, but that section also says, or preliminary to a judicial proceeding, which is where we are now. So we should be able to get that anyway. What I do think people need to understand, though, is there's a perception that if we announce the kickoff and impeachment proceeding tomorrow, that suddenly Don McCann says, okay, tell me when to show up, and Corey Lewandowski says, can I come in and testify now, and the Justice Department says, we're ready to open our files and come take a look at anything you want. None of that happens with the beginning of an impeachment. In fact, if anything, they just dig in further.

We still have to fight this out in court. And I just want to make sure that if we go down that road, that if we can't win a conviction in the Senate, given Mitch McConnell and the Senate cult of personality around the president, can we win this case among the jury of the American people? And I don't think we're there yet. but one thing that would get me there is when we do finish the litigation and the court orders them to comply, if the president still refuses, then we do have that constitutional crisis. Then I do think that we need to use whatever remedy we can, and I may get there before that point, but before we go down a road that is going to be as wrenching to the country

as a year-long impeachment. I want to make sure that it's the right thing to do. I mean, setting aside for a minute whether beginning impeachment proceedings is the right way to go, do you believe that Donald Trump deserves to be impeached? Because I don't know how anyone can read your opening statement yesterday and come to a different conclusion. Well, look, I think that he has committed offenses against the law that would certainly qualify as impeachable offenses. I think he committed obstruction of justice. I think that he is individual one in the indictment in New York, and if Michael Cohen should go to jail for a campaign finance fraud scheme, then the guy that

the indictment identifies as directing and coordinating that scheme should also go to jail, but would also certainly qualify as committing a crime. The Constitution makes clear, though, that the Congress isn't compelled to do an impeachment, even though they're impeachable offenses. And here, where we know what the result is going to be, which would be acquittal and claims of vindication by the president, I think we need to make a decision, is this the best thing for the country? Do we want an adjudication that this conduct is not considered impeachable? And for those that would like to see the president prosecuted, I also think that the Justice Department, when he leaves office, is going to have to consider that question. And one factor they may consider is whether he's already been tried. And if he's already been tried and acquitted by the Senate, that won't be determinative, but it may be a factor that the Justice Department considers in deciding whether to prosecute him.

What do you think about Elizabeth Warren's argument here? I mean, she just said the other day, you know, I don't expect the Senate to convict Donald Trump. You know, obviously, 2020 is the chance for him to be removed from office. But shouldn't all of us, every senator, every member of Congress be on record as saying, yes, I believe that when when this moment in history came and we saw this kind of behavior and these kind of offenses, I said that this president deserves to be impeached, that we should all be on record. And that way, you know, if Susan Collins and Cory Gardner and all the rest of them in the Senate want to defend Donald Trump, they're happy to, they can go defend Donald Trump and then we can all go to the ballot box in 2020 and see what happens. Well, you know, history will judge this moment one way or another. Well, you know, history will judge this moment one way or another. They'll either judge it by saying the House should have impeached and they didn't,

or they'll judge it by saying the House impeached knowing there would be an acquittal and that was a mistake. And now we have this record for all of history that these are not impeachable offenses. And when some other president commits like conduct, it'll be held up as an illustration of how you can't impeach for this. So, you know, we will be judged by history on this. I think before we pull the trigger on this, and I'll be frank, I think once you begin an impeachment inquiry, the laws of political gravity kick in and you're going to, you really have to be prepared to have that vote in the House. So those who are advocating the use of an impeachment proceeding as just a means of getting information and documents, the reality is you start down that road, you better plan on continuing down that road. Yeah. I mean, one thing that sort of has been sticking with me is, you know, there's a pretty

good chance if Trump's reelected and Republicans take the House, the statute of limitations runs out on the crimes that he may have committed. And in that case, impeachment now may be the only way to ever hold him accountable and prove to the American people, as all of you on the committee said yesterday, that no one is above the law. Are you comfortable taking that chance? Are you comfortable taking that chance? Well, look, I'm not comfortable with any of this. And I think it's why we're all wrestling with this. I wrestle with this question every day.

The most attractive thing to me about impeaching this president is it's the strongest form of censure that we have. Even if he's acquitted in the Senate. It puts a stain on his name in history. But as I mentioned, you know, the flip side is also tragically, terribly true, which is an acquittal will be trumpeted as a vindication. And that sends its own message to history. So, you know, I may get there. And I have an open mind on this, and I have a lot of, I think, very thoughtful people that are weighing in with me on this. And it's a decision, I think, that needs to be made by our caucus together, because we're making this on behalf of the American people. Okay, one last question, I'll let you go. So, what do we need to do, and what can we do in this political environment to protect the 2020 elections? Well, I think we can be prepared is one thing. We can put pressure on the states to

make sure that they have paper trails, that we can make sure that our agencies are doing what they are, that the intelligence community has the resources focused on divining Russian plans and intentions, that the Defense Department is taking actions to deter the Russians from action, that the State Department is communicating to its Russian counterparts the kind of vast economic sanctions that will be levied if they mess with us again. I mean, we can bring to this a whole-of-government approach, which is really what we need to do. I'm particularly concerned about deepfake technology that the Russians can now deploy where they could tomorrow issue a video of Joe Biden or Kamala Harris or anyone else saying

something that they never said, and it would be utterly convincing. We can prepare ourselves for those kind of disinformation campaigns. But at the end of the day, the best preparation is not so much directed against the Russians or our foreign adversaries, but making sure that we're ready to forswear the use of this foreign help. And of course, the biggest impediment to that is the President of the United States. Right. Chairman Schiff, thank you so much for joining us. If you do make up your mind on impeachment, you know where to come to. Well, I will come on and make my announcement on your show. I appreciate that. All right, Congressman, take care.

Okay, take care. Thanks to Chairman Schiff for joining us today. And, you know, we'll see you next week Have a good weekend How'd I do, Danheads? Where are my Danheads at? I tried, I did my best Pfeiffer What do you think?

Did you do what Paul Ryan ran for us? That motherfucker you