CNN "Erin Burnett Outfront" - Transcript: Interview with Rep. Jerry Nadler (D), New York

Interview

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BURNETT: All right, thank you very much, Jim Sciutto.

All right, so in this context, let's bring in the Chairman of House Judiciary Committee, Democratic Congressman from New York, Jerry Nadler. Chairman, look, you've got a lot going on here tonight. And now the Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein is leaving, right?

[19:30:01] He's overseeing the Mueller investigation. You know, people inside the White House now say, oh, Mueller's going to be done. Does the departure of Rod Rosenstein concern you or not?

REP. JERRY NADLER (D-NY), CHAIRMAN, HOUSE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE: Well, it certainly does concern me, because he has shown himself to be an honest man. And he has, by all accounts, defended the Mueller investigation against all kinds of attacks by Trump and by his minions, who have tried to sabotage the investigation in various ways.

So, yes, that disturbs me, especially in view of the fact that the new attorney general or that the acting attorney general, Mr. Whitaker, has expressed great hostility and pre-judged the outcome of the investigation. And the nominee for attorney general, Mr. Barr, has said that the very idea that the investigation was wrong.

So that makes me very nervous that Mr. Whitaker or more likely Mr. Barr, depending how long Rosenstein stays, will be supervising the investigation.

BURNETT: Now, you know, President Trump has submitted written answers to questions from Bob Mueller, as you know, right? That was in November. Now, "Reuters" tonight says that Giuliani, Rudy Giuliani, the president's attorney, says Trump will not answer any additional questions and the quote was, as far as we're concerned, everything is over. They could try to subpoena him if they want, but they know we could fight that like hell. They say they haven't asked anymore questions. If they haven't asked

anymore questions and Rod Rosenstein says he's leaving, do you think Mueller's done?

NADLER: I don't know. But the -- all I do know is that whether he's almost finished or not, the indications are that he may be, but whether he's almost finished or not, we must protect his investigation, make sure he can do what he thinks proper and report it to the attorney general and make sure that the report then goes to the Congress and to the American people, which is the whole purpose of it, to start with.

BURNETT: Now --

NADLER: And that may be a battle.

BURNETT: So you sent the Acting Attorney General, Matt Whitaker, you brought him up a moment ago, sent him a letter and you sent it today and it demands that he comes before your committee, doesn't use the shutdown as an excuse, you're threatening to subpoena him if he does not do so voluntarily. The top Republican in the committee, Doug Collins, saw your letter, says he's dumbfounded by your request.

What's your response?

NADLER: Well, I don't know why Doug would be dumbfounded.

Chairman Cummings of the Oversight Investigation Committee and I had a phone conversation with Mr. Whitaker back on November 30th in which he agreed to come before the committee in January. I wrote him a letter on December 21st, and we started the -- on the staff level negotiating the time and they started dragging their feet. On December 21st, I wrote a letter to Mr. Whitaker, saying -- reinforcing that he should come before the committee in January, and listing various topics that we would want to discuss, including various aspects of the Mueller investigation and separation of children at the border and various other -- and the administration's -- the Department of Justice's decision to switch from supporting to opposing the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act in court, which is a very unusual decision for a Justice Department to make. We listed those.

And we've continued negotiating for a date and a place in January. He sent a letter to me a few days ago saying that he would -- offering himself only in February, and only two weeks after the government shutdown. Now, the government shutdown has no bearing on this whatsoever.

BURNETT: So it's just excuses, as far as you're concerned?

NADLER: And so we went the letter saying, no, no, we wanted you in January, January 29th. You'll be in town, it's the State of the Union Address, you'll be here. There's no reason you shouldn't appear on before January 29th. And if necessary, we will issue a subpoena in the next couple of days.

And I don't know why anybody would be surprised at the fact that after his ducking his promise for the last, since November 30th, we would be ready to issue a subpoena.

BURNETT: Right, and as you said, in the next couple of days.

Now, I want to ask you one more thing, Congressman, because you've spoken out about this. Freshman Democratic Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib last week used the expletive to describe the president and vowed to impeach him in the same sentence. You said of what she said, I don't really like that language, but more to the point, I disagree with what she said, it is too early to talk about that intelligently, referring to impeachment.

Last night, she was on this show and I asked her about the president and the language she used. Here's what she said.

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BURNETT: She's talking about things, something like impeachment. Is it possible that she's right and you're wrong? I mean, she has the pulse of America.

NADLER: I don't think either one of us is wrong. I think she is right to feel the way she does.

[19:35:01] I think she is right -- well, the fact of the matter is, I don't like that kind of language, but the president opened up that language, the president has used worse language, far worse language on occasion, so he has coarsened the discourse.

BURNETT: Well, when you said it's too early to intelligently talk about impeachment, she's saying no.

NADLER: Well, I think people can have different opinions on impeachment at the moment. Certainly, the more we learn, the worse it looks for the president. And especially when you look at the Manafort -- what we learned about Manafort offering private polling information from the Trump campaign to the Russians, and what use would they have, except to target their social media, more effectively, in interfering in our election. I think the walls are closing in and the noose is drawing tighter.

BURNETT: All right. Thank you very much, Congressman Nadler, chairman of the Judiciary Committee. I appreciate your time.

NADLER: You're quite welcome.

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