CNN "State of the Union" - Transcript: Interview With California Congressman Adam Schiff

Interview

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TAPPER: Joining me now is Congressman Adam Schiff. He's the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee and has been outspoken about rising anti-Semitism around the world. He's a Democrat from California.

Congressman, thanks for joining us.

So, you're the top Democrat on House Intel. Have you been briefed on this attack on the Tree of Life Synagogue? And is there any information you can give us on motive, beyond the obvious anti-Semitic hatred that this man was filled with, as evidenced by his social media posts?

REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D), CALIFORNIA: I have received preliminary briefings, and very much in line with what we heard at the conference, that the full belief is that this is the lone shooter.

They're obviously going to chase everything down to make sure there's no continuing threat to anyone in the community or in the country. And it certainly appears that anti-Semitism was the dominant motivation.

As is often the case, social media provides the best window, but, apparently, he was also shouting anti-Semitic slurs during the attack. So, his motive seems pretty clear.

TAPPER: The president condemned the shooting and anti-Semitism in very stark terms at an event in Indianapolis yesterday and on Twitter.

Are you satisfied with how President Trump has responded to this tragedy?

SCHIFF: I'm not satisfied in a couple respects.

First of all, I don't think you blame the synagogue for not having an armed guard there. That's not the answer. Are we going to have armed guards in every church, every synagogue, every movie theater, every concert venue? We can't have armed guards everywhere. That's not the answer.

But, more than that, what's fundamentally unsatisfying about what the president has to say is, you cannot preach division 365 days a year, you can't stoke people's animus towards the other, you can't vilify people coming to the country as murderers and rapists, and then, on the day tragedy strikes, sound a different note.

It just rings hollow. And that, to me, is the problem. It's not what he said yesterday. It's what he says every other day.

TAPPER: It's -- I want to get to that in a second.

But let me just drill down for one second on the armed guards part of this, because it -- I heard from a friend of mine Saturday who was at a bar mitzvah, and texted me in the middle of a bar mitzvah in Los Angeles, your hometown, saying that LAPD came in. And the synagogue, I believe, has armed guards regularly anyway.

This is not to blame the victims, but are we not in a world now where synagogues, mosques, other places need to have armed guards?

SCHIFF: Well, it certainly feels like that today.

But can that really be the answer? Is every house of worship now going to have to be armed? And, of course, it's not just our houses of worship.

You saw this man, after going into a church unsuccessfully, or trying to get to into a church, shoot two African-Americans in a store because he couldn't get into the church. Are we going to have armed security at every store, every concert, every other venue?

It just can't be done. That's not the answer. The answer isn't to spread more firepower around. We have got plenty of firepower.

I think part of the answer, certainly, is responsible gun safety legislation. But part of it is also changing the climate that we're all living in. We all have a major role to play in that.

But the person with the biggest bully pulpit right now is the president of the United States, for better or worse. And it's mostly for worse. And the way that he continues to divide us, the way that really his whole political strategy is about division, creates a toxic climate, a climate that is just sulfurous.

And that has got to change. And he's not going to change. That's a part of his constitution. We're going to have to change it, all of us. We're going to have to take on this project without his help.

And he just doesn't -- doesn't fundamentally understand that the job a commander in chief is to make us a more perfect union. So, we're going to have to take that on.

And I think we will.

I always come back at times like this to something Bill Clinton once said. There's nothing wrong in America that can't be cured by what's right in America.

TAPPER: Defenders of the president point out, A, he's a strong supporter of Israel; B, he had -- Ivanka converted to marry Jared, and he has three Jewish grandchildren.

And, C, they point out that this shooter, this deranged anti-Semite in Pittsburgh, had several social media posts in which he blamed President Trump for being too cozy with Jews, controlled by kikes, as he put it. Apologies for the language, but it's important people know what this guy said.

How do you see this incident in that light?

SCHIFF: Well, first of all, having Jewish children or grandchildren or support for the government of Israel isn't a license to traffic with people who are anti-Semitic. It just didn't give you carte blanche.

And more than that, once you -- once you put this bile into the bloodstream, you can't control it.

Yes, this shooter thought Trump didn't go far enough to keep Jews out of the country, to stop Jews from infiltrating the invaders. But he also believed -- this shooter also apparently believed that Jews were funding this caravan.

And so when the president and supporters of his or people around him attack George Soros and say Soros is funding this caravan, they are trafficking in a well-known and historic anti-Semitic trope.

TAPPER: You think that those who attack Soros are being anti-Semitic?

SCHIFF: I do. I do, not all of them, but there's a reason why he's being singled out.

He's not the -- he's a major donor of the Democratic Party. He's not the biggest donor. He's not the only donor. He's not being singled out because of his height or his eye color.

He's being singled out because he's a symbol. And for those who are in the world of white nationalism, he's a profound symbol of -- of the Jewish conspiracy, the well-funded Jewish cabal of bankers and others that are controlling the country, that are polluting the purity of the American bloodstream.

TAPPER: Congressman Adam Schiff, thanks so much for being here on such a horrible day. We appreciate it.

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