MSNBC "The Rachel Maddow Show" - Transcript: Interview with Sen. Chris Murphy

Interview

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MADDOW: Joining us now live is Senator Chris Murphy, Democrat of  Connecticut. He`s a member of the Foreign Relations Committee.

Senator Murphy, I really appreciate your time being here tonight. Thanks  for being here.

SEN. CHRIS MURPHY (D), CONNECTICUT: Thanks a lot.

MADDOW: So, a lot of people have described this moment we`re in as a  national security crisis or even a national emergency. And we`re certainly  seeing signs of the country being shaken. We`re seeing a national freak- out, for lack of a better term in response to the president`s behavior with  the Russian president yesterday.

I think of you as the bright light of Democrats, Democratic foreign policy  thinking in Congress, and certainly in the Senate. And I also think of you  as a pretty sober observer of these things.

Are people being too alarmist? Are you -- are people overstating the  gravity of the situation that we`re in right now?

MURPHY: No. People aren`t overstating the gravity of the situation.  Indeed, it`s not a national emergency. It`s really a global emergency  because the post World War II world order is built upon the undergirding of  the transatlantic alliance and that alliance is falling apart before our  eyes. I would argue to you, Rachel, today that President Trump has made  NATO, the primary security apparatus by which we defend the United States  and our allies in Europe obsolete, at least temporarily.

He has basically told the world that he does not believe his own  intelligence services about a Russian attack on the United States. And so,  if he were to receive evidence of a Russian attack on Europe that Russia  denied, why would he believe his intelligence or security services then?  Why would he come to Europe`s defense?

Europe knows that and so I think you also have to doubt whether they would  come to our defense. And so, this is a moment where all of the assumptions  that we have about how we would order the defense of this nation are coming  apart. And 24 hours later, I think we can safely say that Congress is not  taking this emergency seriously.

And that we really are going to have to bring this question of whether  there is an effective national security check on the power and the defense  of the United States that the president is giving away to the electorate.

MADDOW: In terms of what can be done here, I`ve been sort of saying for  the last -- well, I guess since the summit happened that it strikes me when  we have a national security crisis as a country and we`ve had lots of them  for different magnitudes for different reasons over the decades and the  centuries, it tends to empower the president politically because the  country is inclined to look to leadership, particularly executive  leadership at a time of national security crisis.

The presidency is what we look to particularly in the modern era when we  feel as a country we need to be kept safe. When the national security  crisis is the president or is at least about the president, I`m not sure  we`ve got any sort of American reflexes that kick in in terms of where else  we look for security, where else we look for leadership, where else we look  for a way out.

It seems to me like Congress might rise to the occasion. I want to -- I want to believe that`s possible because I don`t know where else Americans can look besides to our other elected leaders. If we`re going to be a 
democracy and we believe in saving democracy, we have to look to democracy to save our problems. I want to be optimistic as I possibly can that Congress will rise, but it sounds like you don`t share that even aspiration 
to optimism.

MURPHY: Well, listen, I wake up every day with an aspiration to optimism.  But it is -- it is tough to get threw these days.

Listen, I think that it is good news that we are only four months away from  an election, because I feel like the Democrats are, you know, Charlie Brown  to the Republicans` Lucy on the issue of Russia. We have been so hopeful.  We`ve been so optimistic that at some point, they will notice the watershed  moment that we have passed.

And yet, moment after moment, when the president gets more reckless, gets  his behavior becomes more indefensible, they continue to refuse to step up  to the plate. And so, of course, there are things that Congress could do.  We could levy another round of sanctions. We could provide complete  protection to Mueller`s investigation. We could tie the hands of the  president`s ability to pull out of NATO.

But I think Republicans have telegraphed to us that they are not prepared  to do that. And so, I think we have to find consolation in the fact that  we are four months away from an election, which the American people can  stand up and say that Congress does need to be a national security check on  this president and it can`t happen with the current leadership that`s here.

MADDOW: Senator Chris Murphy, Democrat of Connecticut, thank you for being  here tonight, sir. I really appreciate you being here.

MURPHY: Thanks.

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