MSNBC "The Beat with Ari Melber" -

Interview

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MELBER: That was Donald Trump`s argument. There may be the wakeup call,  Democrats roaring back into power, consider they need 24 seats to retake  control of the House and that would deliver with its subpoena power, the  oversight committees would start doing a whole lot more aggressive  oversight of this executive branch.

Now one of the Democrats who would likely be in-charge is my special guest  here in studio in Washington, Congressman Adam Schiff.

Welcome to THE BEAT. And that you join us on a week where the House says  they are closing down the probe, the Republicans there. You spoke out last  night. Many of our viewers saw that presentation. Where do you go from  here?

REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D), CALIFORNIA: Well, we are going to be compiling  report on what we know to date, all the facts that we have been able to  find on key issues, going to collusion, to obstruction, going to the  Russian hacking and dumping operation of emails, their social media  campaign. But importantly, that report will necessarily be incomplete and  we will be setting out just why it`s incomplete. The witnesses that we  were not allowed to bring up and the leads we couldn`t follow and what  would need to be done to do this credibly and really get to the truth a lot  of key, still unanswered questions.

MELBER: You talk about leads, I read your investigative update. It seems  carefully written. But it had some clues, one of which was you saying the  White House was unresponsive on key questions like not addressing whether  recordings, memoranda or any documents at any time have existed and the  White House would have memorialize conversations between Trump and Comey.  And then you go on to say that you have quote "a good faith reason to  believe the White House does have such documentation memorializing Trump`s  conversations with director Comey.

So lordy or not, as Mr. Comey would say, what are you referring to?

SCHIFF: Well, I`m not referring to tapes. We haven`t seen any evidence part from the President`s own suggestion for whatever reason he made it that there were recordings. But there are indications that there were, at least some memorialization and discussion between the President and Comey 
that would shed light on the issue of obstruction of justice, enough for both myself and Mr. Conaway on a bipartisan basis, to then write (ph) to the White House and demand of those, if not recordings then memoranda.

MELBER: And sir, can you say whether you are referring specifically to the  reported letter that Steven Miller helped draft about removing Comey?

SCHIFF: Certainly, if those drafts included a discussion or sheds light on  meetings between the President to Comey, then yes. They would be included.

MELBER: So you would want to subpoena Steven Miller`s letter?

SCHIFF: Yes.

MELBER: Let me show him talking about this. Because this has come up in  the public forum quite a bit. Here with Stephen Miller on that question.

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MELBER: What more do you want to know about that letter? Is there  anything problematic there?

SCHIFF: Well, certainly, we have no idea what was in the draft, that after  the lawyers looked at it and they may have concluded, OK, this is  problematic. Because it suggests that the President may have had an elicit  motive for getting rid of Comey. We ought to see what was in the original,  what was omitted.

MELBER: Can I run a theory by you?

SCHIFF: Absolutely.

MELBER: And I know you are careful so you will comment as you see fit.

SCHIFF: OK.

MELBER: But from what we have learned it almost sounds like Stephen Miller  worked with people there around Donald Trump and put an element of  obstruction in the original draft of the letter, an illicit reason for  removing Comey and then under better advice it was later removed, is that  possible?

SCHIFF: Well, it is certainly possible. We just don`t know. But we see a  pattern within the White House and you can see it reflected in that  concoction of that false statement about the Trump tower meeting, where  there was a debate going on about what to include and what to exclude and  who misleading they could get away with. We asked several of the witnesses  that came for our committee about those conversations of those drafts.  They refused to answer the questions and tragically for us and for the  public, my GOP colleagues were more than content to take no for an answer  and we were not able to compel them to answer those questions.

MELBER: Right. And it would seem that scenario where the Congress has a  greater interest because you are checking the executive branch`s  functioning, right, which might be different than some of the national  security issues where they feel you may have no business there. But if  there is obstructive activity, you want one branch to oversee the other on  that, which makes sense.

Well I wonder -- I also want to ask you about some of these news on Roger  Stone and WikiLeaks and some of those issues, if you will stay with me for  a moment.

SCHIFF: Absolutely.

MELBER: We are going to fit in this break.

Now, coming up, two key Trump associates respond to reporting done right  here on THE BEAT. We are going to fact check the reactions. And dramatic  video from across the nation, students protest gun violence, to talk to  Republican lawmakers define the NRA who says the students helped change his 
mind.

And later tonight, Stormy Daniels` lawyer on more women who may have come  forward with more claims about President Trump.

And the shocking poison attack that raises questions about why Donald Trump  is not tougher on Russia.
I`m Ari Melber. You are watching THE BEAT on MSNBC.

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MELBER: We are back with more from the top Democrat in the House  intelligence committee. He made news this week confronting his Republican  counterparts for ending the Russia probe at a time when new questions are  surfacing about Julian Assange and longtime Trump advisor, Roger Stone.

Congressman Schiff back at the table.

Roger Stone is someone who is I think a difficult witness whether you like  or dislike him as people have political opinions about him. Because he is  known to exaggerate. He is known to insert himself. And yet there is news  this week as you well know, the "Washington Post" and on THE BEAT last  night, about people saying he was trying to reach Assange.

Your view of the significance of that.

SCHIFF: Well, we know that he was in communication with Guccifer 2.0. We  also know he was in communication with WikiLeaks. What we ought to do if  we are doing a credible investigation is subpoena twitter for direct  messages that went to these particular handles or that came from Roger  Stone so that we don`t have to accept and rely upon the word of Roger  Stone, which I think is a hazardous thing to do.
You know, one thing that Roger Stone and the President have in common is a  philosophy that you deny everything. That only suckers and losers admit to  anything. And so the President of course denies collusion, but the  President denies anything to do with Stormy Daniels, denies or points with  Roy Moore that well, you know, you got to pay attention to the fact that  Roy Moore deny ties the allegations and therefore it`s OK. If you deny it  didn`t happen.

MELBER: Right.

SCHIFF: That`s also the Roger Stone philosophy. And where the witness  like that, you don`t rely on what they have to say, you test what they have  to say and hear what the public reports of other witnesses who are saying  in fact Roger Stone was in communication about stolen emails before their  release. We need to bring those other witnesses before the committee.

MELBER: And Bob Mueller has not according to Stone and our reporting  called in Roger Stone yet. Roger Stone has a very long running  relationship with the President, which he has described a little  differently over the course of the campaign. And so for context, I want to  show there were times where he said we are cordial. This is all just a big  adventure. We speak now and then. But as time goes on, he said he had  access to all the right people. His former partner Paul Manafort. And  then said he was sending quote "long memos to the Donald once or twice a  week by October."

That raises the question of whether with all of that claimed communication,  if he did have inside track information about WikiLeaks, which Donald Trump  was mentioning over and over in the campaign, is it a credible line of inquiry as to whether Roger Stone told then candidate Trump about that?

SCHIFF: Well, it is certainly a credible line of inquiry and you know, a  very similar and credible line of inquiry is would Don Jr. really go into  this meeting with the Russians under the promise of getting dirt on Hillary  Clinton and feel the meeting was so important that he needed to bring in  the campaign manager and the President`s son-in-law at a time when they  were still contesting the nomination, would he withhold that information  from his father?

We endeavor to find out. There are phone records that should shed light or  may shed light on that but we were not allowed to pursue them. We weren`t  allowed to pursue whether in fact they were calls that were taken place  around that time, whether there were meetings within Trump tower. We know  that there were visitor logs. We know there are ways to try to confirm or  refute some of the testimony we have heard.

But similarly with Roger Stone, there are a lot of, I think, very telling  circumstances in terms of what Roger Stone appears to be predicting. John  Podesta`s time in the barrel was coming, he says, shortly before the dump  of Podesta emails, it would be, I think, innocent for us not to look into  these things.

MELBER: Final question. Your status update that you released last night,  mentioned several things that the Republicans refused to subpoena that you  think would get to the bottom of some of this. If the Democrats win the  house back, will you be subpoenaing all of these things?

SCHIFF: What we will do is see what the status of the investigation is at  that point? How much has the Senate been able to do? How much has Bob  Mueller been able to do? And has that work been done or is that work still  outstanding?

Certain issues right now and no one is looking at in the Congress. I`m  particularly concerned about the issue of money laundering. Were the  Russian laundering money to the Trump organizations? Is this a lever they  can hold over the President of the United States?

It would be derelict in our responsibilities not to find out. All of these  meetings were just allegations before the investigations, and they proved  to have taken place.

MELBER: Right.

SCHIFF: And so, we will look at all these issues and figure out, OK, have  these been investigated and what remains can be done.

MELBER: OK. Congressman Adam Schiff, thank you for coming on THE BEAT.

SCHIFF: Thank you.

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