CNN "The Situation Room" - Transcript: Interview with Rep. Adam Schiff (D) California

Interview

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BLITZER: Roger Stone for decades has been a close associate of the president of the United States.

All right. Thanks very much, Evan, for that report.

Let's get some more on all of this. Democratic Congressman Adam Schiff is joining us. He's the ranking member of the Intelligence Committee, soon -- about to become the chairman of the Intelligence Committee.

Senate -- Congressman, thanks so much for joining us, and let's get to that last issue we were just discussing. Your committee has now handed over the transcript, the official transcript of Roger Stone's interview before the House Intelligence Committee to the special counsel's team. Is this leading toward an indictment?

REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D-CA), RANKING MEMBER, INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE: Wolf, I can't comment on any request, either to confirm or deny it. So that's not an issue I'm going to be able to discuss with you today.

BLITZER: Can you tell us whether or not you think Roger Stone lied before your committee? Yesterday, one of your colleagues, Jim Himes, says he personally believes that Stone did lie during his Q&A with the committee under oath.

SCHIFF: I've said for quite some time now there are a number of witnesses, Mr. Stone among them, where I've had deep concerns about whether they testified truthfully before our committee, and it's one of the reasons why I thought we ought to provide all of the transcripts to the special counsel, so that the special counsel can assess, with the benefit of the information that he has, who may have told the truth and who may have lied to our committee.

Those transcripts, I think, also may be useful to the special counsel in terms of what evidence they show on the issues that he's investigating.

So I do believe that there are witnesses that I have serious questions about, and we saw with Michael Cohen's plea the flaw in what our majority did throughout the year, which was simply assume that everyone who came before our committee was telling us the full truth and nothing but the truth.

BLITZER: You want to tell us who the other witnesses who came before your committee that perhaps you have some concerns about what they said?

SCHIFF: Well, you know, one thing I do want to comment on or I can comment on is our desire to have Mr. Cohen come back. We certainly know, because he has admitted to it and pled guilty and accepted responsibility, that what he told us about the Moscow Trump Tower deal and how much progress they made and when that took place and whether they heard back from the Kremlin, that he testified falsely about that.

We'd like to know are there other matters that we asked him about in which he also did not tell us the full truth or other matters that perhaps we neglected to ask him about that could shed light on the core issues of our investigation as, indeed, Mueller made clear in his filing that Cohen has information at his core. And I assume core to the issue of collusion or conspiracy.

BLITZER: Would you want Michael Flynn, the president's former national security adviser, who's now awaiting sentencing -- he won't be sentenced until March at the earliest. Do you want him to come before your committee?

SCHIFF: Absolutely, and, you know, with we're reaching out to these witnesses that have entered cooperation agreements to seek our testimony before our committee.

As you know, Wolf, in the special counsel's filing there were three areas where the counsel identified that Flynn had been cooperative. One of those areas was completely redacted. If that goes to an issue that is a counterintelligence risk, that's something our committee needs to know about.

But also we have deep interest in what he can tell us about those on the transition team, including a very senior transition official which he has evidently told Mueller was knowing that what he had said and want vice president later represented to the country about his communications with the Russian ambassador was, in fact, false.

[17:15:06] BLITZER: The acting attorney general, Matt Whitaker, he has decided that he won't recuse himself from overseeing the Mueller investigation. Are you comfortable with the process that led him to make that decision?

SCHIFF: Not at all. And particularly now as more is coming out about what the ethics lawyers of justice said, if it is true that the ethics lawyers recommended that he recuse himself, and he is nonetheless refusing, it means the top justice official in the country is ignoring the advice of the ethics lawyers. That is a pretty intolerable situation, particularly when it involves an issue that was the very reason why he got the job.

And that is he had been auditioning with comments about how he could silently and out of the public view, cripple the Mueller investigation. So the first thing that we need to do is get ahold of that ethics decision, and that needs to be provided to Congress.

I think the country ought to know what the ethics lawyers have to say about this, but more than that, it underscores just how essential it's going to be that every action that he takes that has any bearing on the Russia investigation, is going to be exposed to the public.

BLITZER: If necessary, would you as the incoming chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, subpoena that ethics -- what the ethics lawyers over at the Justice Department wrote?

SCHIFF: Well, I think that the primary committee that will be looking at this issue is the Judiciary Committee. They have already indicated that Whitaker is going to be one of the first witnesses to come in. They will undoubtedly ask him questions about that ethics opinion. I think we should have that in advance of his testimony.

Frankly, I think we should have that today, given that he's ignoring it and given that he may very well start to play a role in this investigation.

BLITZER: Now that the acting attorney general, Whitaker, has made his decision not to recuse, presumably, he'll be getting some serious briefings on the Mueller investigation. Do you have concerns about that?

SCHIFF: I certainly do because, of course, we'd like to know is this something that he is going to use to inform the president or inform the president's legal team? Certainly, the ethics lawyers would advise him against that.

But if he's willing to ignore the ethics lawyers who tell him, "You should recuse yourself, the public cannot have confidence in you and that is a key criteria for an attorney general," then he may very well ignore the ethics advice about whether he can communicate about this case to the president or others on his team, given that the president himself may be implicated in this case.

BLITZER: The president now says his position is clear. He won't sign any measure to continue to fund the government -- and the funding goes out at midnight tomorrow night -- without securing funding for border security, including a wall or at least a steel fence.

Is there any compromise you'd be willing to make with him on those issues?

SCHIFF: Sure. If the president will deliver on his campaign promise and get Mexico to pay for it, then we may be able to work something out.

He committed to the country that taxpayers would not fund this wall, and he is trying to renege on that commitment. He's trying to force taxpayers to pay for something he promised they wouldn't have to pay for.

First of all, it doesn't make any sense from a security point of view to have a concrete wall or whatever latest iteration, but he promised that Mexico would pay for it. He needs to deliver on that promise if he wants to build this thing, because we're not going to vote to spend taxpayer money on it.

I think what's really going on here, Wolf, is he needs to shut down the government to show his base that he's serious about this and to do this as a sop to his base. That is not a reason to furlough tens or hundreds of thousands of people around the holidays. That is not a reason to impact all those who do business with the government, which is many hundreds or millions more, merely as a sop to his base.

So he needs to do his job, and part of that means keeping the government open. They've had two years where they controlled everything and didn't do it. They don't have the votes for it. They know it, and just to do this as a gesture to his base, I think, is unconscionable.

BLITZER: Let's not forget, more than 900,000 federal workers would immediately stop getting paid. Many of them would have to continue working on sensitive law-enforcement-related injuries, but their paychecks would dry up if, in fact, there is a partial government shutdown at midnight could. Could gave enormous ramifications, as you correctly point out. Let's see what happens between now and midnight tomorrow night.

Congressman Schiff, thanks so much for joining us.

SCHIFF: Thank you, Wolf.

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