MSNBC "All in with Chris Hayes" - Transcript: Interview with Rep. Hakeem Jeffries
Interview
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HAYES: If we do not keep the majority, all of this goes away. MSNBC reached out to the Congressman`s office for comment, have not received a response but Nunes has a point. The President in some of his closest associates face a grave threat from the Mueller investigation which has already ensnared senior campaign officials and the President`s first National Security Advisor. And Nunes made it crystal clear all along that his priority is not to find out what the truth about what happened in 2016 or whether the President or his aides broke the law but rather to shield the President from any consequences. The same could be said for the better part of Republicans in Congress. It applies not to the Russia probe but expanding number of corruption scandals that demand investigation and accountability.
Consider the new developments in just the last few days. We just learned thanks to tremendous reporting from ProPublica that the Trump Administration has secretly farmed out leadership of the V.A. to three members of the President`s private club Mar-a-Lago and none of whom has any relevant experience. We learned that President`s Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross stands accused of misappropriating or outright stealing as much as a $120 million from former investors and business partners. That`s according to a new investigation from Forbes. And then just yesterday we learned that the first member of Congress to endorse the President`s campaign, New York Republican Chris Collins allegedly carried out an insider trading scheme last year from the South Lawn of the White House. Collins was arrested yesterday pleaded not guilty to the charges.
Meanwhile, the President has been spending his entire week at his Golf Club in New Jersey one of many properties from which he continues to profit while in office opening him up to bribery and all manner of conflicts of interest. In theory, it should not be that hard to find out whose interest the President is serving if only congressional leaders would say subpoena his tax returns. Now, polling suggests voters want Congress to exercise its oversight powers responding by 25 percent margin they`re more likely to support a candidate who promises to be a check on the President. And fresh off another round of encouraging election results on Tuesday, Democrats have a message of their own about the high stakes of the midterms that they are in the words of Nancy Pelosi committed to cleaning up corruption to make Washington work for the people.
I`m joined now by Democratic members of Congress Representative Hakeem Jeffries in New York who serves on the House Judiciary Committee. What does that mean cleaning up corruption? How do you do it?
REP. HAKEEM JEFFRIES (D), NEW YORK: well I think we`ve got to make sure that we can get big money out of politics in the aftermath of the terrible Citizens United decision, what we`ve seen is dark money flow into Washington D.C. fueled by lobbyists and mega-corporations who are buying off influence and essentially shaping legislation that this Congress has been pushing forward. The biggest example of it was the corrupt GOP tax scam where 83 percent of the benefits went to the wealthiest one percent. This was not done for the people. That`s what we stand for as Democrats. It was done for the lobbyists, for the mega-corporations, for the wealthy, the well-off, the millionaires, the billionaire`s to subsidize the lifestyles of the rich and shameless. This is corruption happening in plain sight.
HAYES: But that`s -- OK, but that is -- I would not disagree that`s corrupt but that`s everyday corruption, OK. That`s a system that is shot through with corruption. I don`t want to minimize that because I think the entire system, but we`re talking about very specific corruption which is this President has a whole host of distinctly corrupt you know relationships to his business and things like that that my question is what would Democrats -- what could Democrats do if they got the majority?
JEFFRIES: Well, you`re correct. They are lying, they are cheating, they are stealing and they are doing it with impunity and the reason is that this Congress has refused to do its constitutional oversight responsibilities.
We are an independent branch of government, a separate and co-equal branch of government. The House of Representatives doesn`t work for Donald Trump, we work for the American people. But these guys on the other side of the aisle apparently have not gotten the memo and so basically they`re acting as co-conspirators, refusing to do oversight, refusing to subpoena documents, refusing to expose corrupt scandals to the American people and doing their constitutional duty, Democrats will do that.
HAYES: So every day I think to myself, well there should be a hearing on that. One example, this insane story about these -- the three Mar-a-Lago members, a Baltimore lawyer, a Palm Beach doctor, and the guy who runs Marvel Entertainment who are basically running the V.A. like should there be hearings on that?
JEFFRIES: Absolutely. And you know the Oversight and Government Reform Committee basically for years wasted millions of dollars on Hillary Clinton`s e-mails which was a fake scandal designed to undermine her presidency but refuses to do anything as it relates to you know, sort of the corrupt, after corrupt, after corrupt instance that has arisen as it relates to Trump`s cabinet secretaries. It`s shameful and you`re not going to get them to act like a constitutional check in balance as Devin Nunes disclosed to his donor.
HAYES: Yes -- no he`s very clear in that tape about what he views is his roles. I want to play one more bit of tape because he`s there with Cathy McMorris Rodgers, the number for in-house leadership. Before you guys went on recess, they file articles of impeachment against Rod Rosenstein and Paul Ryan said this is not going anywhere. Devin Nunes has a different take on this. This is a little like bait and switch maybe. I want you to take a listen and respond. Listen what he had to say.
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HAYES: It`s a matter of timing. That sounds awful like what he is saying and what the number four we`re hoping the House is saying is they all support impeaching Rosenstein they just not going to do it now.
JEFFRIES: Absolutely. It`s very cynical but he exposed essentially what appears to be the GOP plot which is to go after Rod Rosenstein but to allow the Senate to jam the Supreme Court justice down the throats of the American people. Do that work and then return after the midterm elections to try to jam Rod Rosenstein. Most people can probably remember that the Clinton impeachment actually took place in the aftermath of a midterm election during what was essentially a lame-duck session. It appears that they want to go out and do the same thing.
HAYES: You know, I had forgotten that but -- and that was 1998 midterms breaking with history. There have been a sort of stunning rebukes the Republicans who`d actually lost seats in Congress and they continued in that lame-duck session with the impeachment. Do you really think that`s what they would do?
JEFFRIES: It wouldn`t shock me because nothing would shock me at this particular point in time.
HAYES: So you think it would not shock you if they`ve lose the House and they`re like well we got a few months left let`s impeach Rosenstein.
JEFFRIES: Of course, because this is what they do. In other words --
HAYES: I mean, that`s like sounds like what Nunes is proposing.
JEFFRIES: Yes. And at the end of the day -- listen, the so-called Chairman of the Intelligence Committee is a complete embarrassment but what`s worse is that you have the number four person in the House Republican Conference apparently signing off on this and we can`t necessarily believe what the leadership is saying when we know what Donald Trump wants to do is get rid of Rod Rosenstein because he wants to get rid of this investigation into the Trump campaigns collusion with Russian spies.
HAYES: Final question. Nunes is a special case in terms of the extraordinary lengths he`s gone to.
JEFFRIES: Very special.
HAYES: But is it your sense from being on the Judiciary Committee and your colleagues that that`s basically actually the way that most of your Republican colleagues feel about this?
JEFFRIES: Well, a significant number of House Republicans are part of what I refer to as the cover-up caucus. Their sole objective in life in terms of their current membership is to deny the fact that we have a criminal conspiracy that appears to have taken place to sell out our democracy to artificially place Donald Trump in the Oval Office, an ongoing serious investigation they want to turn a blind eye to that and distract the American people in part by doing things like going after Rod Rosenstein.
HAYES: It`s not. You know, they`re spending a lot of time doing that. They`re not spending a ton of time legislating which is also notable. I mean, since they passed the tax bills it`s like OK.
JEFFRIES: Totally. And we want to lower prescription drug prices, we want to raise pay, and we want to clean up corruption in Washington D.C.
HAYES: All right, you got that in there. Congressman Hakeem Jefferies, thank you for your time tonight.
JEFFRIES: Thank you, Chris.
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