CNN "State of the Union" - Transcript: Interview With Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson

Interview

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TAPPER: Welcome back to STATE OF THE UNION. I'm Jake Tapper.

President Trump facing more questions this morning, after a series of revelations about his dealings with Russia.

That is as the president is, at least temporarily, backing down from this threat to declare a national emergency over his border wall, saying Congress should come together to figure out wall funding and reopen the government.

Joining me now, Republican Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin. He's the chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee.

Senator, thanks so much for joining us.

"The Washington Post" is reporting that President Trump has tried to keep secret what was said in private meetings he had with Vladimir Putin, going so far as, in one instance, to take away his interpreter's notes.

The story says -- quote -- "As a result, U.S. officials said there's no detailed record, even in classified files, of Trump's face-to-face interactions with the Russian leader at five locations over the past two years."

This comes as we learn that the FBI investigated whether the president was working on behalf of Russia, against American interests.

Does any of this concern you? Let's start with the idea that there are no detailed records of those conversations with an adversary like Russia.

SEN. RON JOHNSON (R), WISCONSIN: Well, good morning, Jake.

I have no firsthand knowledge of what the facts are here. I do know that President Trump was burned earlier by leaks of other private conversations, so I can certainly understand his frustration from that standpoint.

But you said earlier this is not a traditional president. He has unorthodox means. But he is president of the United States. It's pretty much up to him in terms of who he wants to read into his conversations with world leaders. That's just the basic fact.

TAPPER: Do you think -- well, why do you think President Trump is trying to keep these meetings off the books?

"The Washington Post" story made it clear it that even the national security adviser at the time couldn't find out what was said at one of these meetings.

[09:20:05] JOHNSON: Well, again, I don't want to go speculate, beyond the fact that I know he was burned by leaks in other areas.

And he was pretty frustrated by it. So, that might be -- that might be one explanation.

But, otherwise I can't really comment further.

TAPPER: Are you OK with the fact that the Kremlin knows more about these meetings than U.S. intelligence and the National Security Committee?

JOHNSON: In the end, I'm going to judge this president based on his actions.

As you said earlier, we have increased sanctions. We did -- we have begun providing lethal defensive weaponry, as well as training, to Ukrainians, so they can defend their territorial integrity.

The jury will be out on other actions this president will or will not take.

TAPPER: But...

JOHNSON: So, in the end, you just have to basically judge him on his actions. We defeated, basically ISIS. We have taken away that caliphate.

We were all concerned about a precipitous pullout. Now that's going to be conditions-based. We can certainly attack ISIS and continue to attack them from positions in Iraq.

So, again, we will -- I will wait to see. But I have seen pretty strong actions on the part of this administration against Russia. They realize Russia's a threat. And I think we have been, by and large, responding to that threat strength and resolve, which is what we need to do.

TAPPER: But you also mentioned the U.S. withdrawal from Syria, which is something that I think that Russia applauded. They don't want the U.S. in Syria.

But let's move on to the other big story. You just heard your colleague Senator Mark Warner talking about the FBI counterintelligence investigation into whether President Trump worked on behalf of Russia, against the interests of the United States.

Warner said the president at one point was almost parroting Putin's policy priorities.

Do you have any concerns President Trump may have unwittingly been doing things that would help Russia and hurt the United States?

JOHNSON: Yes, I heard an awful lot of innuendo from Senator Warner, who is the Intelligence Committee, and has a lot more knowledge about this than I do. And that's part of my frustration. I wish the Mueller investigation would come to conclusion and he could

issue his report. I, quite honestly, wish the Senate Intelligence Committee would -- would move more expeditiously and provide us information in terms of what they've found.

This -- this is -- we're almost two years into this investigation. I have not seen any evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia. I have seen evidence of collusion between Democrats and Russia with the Steele dossier. We still don't have the information on that.

So there are a host of questions outstanding of this on all sides of the issue.

TAPPER: What evidence...

JOHNSON: What we need, the American people need -- need -- we need the information on this, so we can get past the innuendo, we can actually deal with facts, because we have serious issues facing this nation.

And it's not good that we have this cloud hanging over any administration, whether it's this one or previous -- previous administrations or next administrations. We need the information. And it's been too long being developed. We need the reports. We need these things concluded.

TAPPER: Well, we know for a fact there was an offer by the Russians to provide dirt on Hillary Clinton, and Trump campaign officials met with that lawyer.

And we know for a fact that Paul Manafort provided campaign data to Konstantin Kilimnik, who has ties to Russian military intelligence. So there's that.

In terms of the collusion between the Democrats and Russians...

JOHNSON: Well, we also know for a fact that -- we also know Democrats paid for the Steele dossier.

TAPPER: Right.

JOHNSON: And we have seen all kinds of corruption within the FBI. Andrew McCabe took over the FBI after that. He's now been fired because he lied to the FBI's own investigators. So, no, we have seen all kinds of...

TAPPER: But that lie...

JOHNSON: ... nefarious activity here...

TAPPER: McCabe...

JOHNSON: ... that I want to get to the bottom of, but we're -- we can't as long as the Mueller investigation continues to rumble on without a conclusion. So we need the information. We need these investigations concluded, so that the American people

understand exactly what happened, so we can move on and start addressing the serious nations facing this -- or serious issues facing this nation.

TAPPER: Just in point of fact, McCabe was fired...

JOHNSON: In other words, Jake, I don't want -- I don't want to deal in speculation. I want to deal in facts.

TAPPER: Right.

JOHNSON: And we don't have them yet.

TAPPER: And McCabe was fired -- McCabe was fired for not being honest about a leak he had authorized. And the leak was one that was damaging to Hillary Clinton. It wasn't a pro-Clinton leak. It was an anti...

JOHNSON: He lied -- he lied to the FBI.

TAPPER: Yes. And good riddance. I don't care, but...

JOHNSON: The acting director of the FBI lied to the FBI. That's pretty serious.

Other people are going to jail for lying to the FBI.

TAPPER: I don't disagree.

JOHNSON: Here's the acting director of the FBI...

TAPPER: Right.

JOHNSON: ... lying to the FBI.

That's some real corruption in the FBI. I have serious questions about that.

TAPPER: I don't disagree. But my only point with inserting the fact there was that it was a lie about a leak that was damaging to Hillary Clinton. It was not pro-Hillary Clinton.

But let's turn to the government shutdown I know you're eager to talk about.

JOHNSON: OK.

TAPPER: It's now the longest shutdown in American history.

The Senate has gone home. You're home. Warner is home. Hundreds of thousands of Americans are not getting their paycheck.

Republicans did have unified control of the federal government for the past few years and did not pass any major immigration reform or wall funding. Our new CNN poll out this morning shows that most Americans are

putting the blame for the shutdown on President Trump.

If this is so important and so needed, why didn't Republicans in the House and Senate pass wall funding at any point in the last two years?

[09:25:05]

JOHNSON: Because we have a majority in the Senate, but we don't control it. We need Democrats to work with us.

And there's a real easy solution. Have Democrats stop being hypocritical and put their money where their mouth is and fund better barriers. They work.

They were -- they supported and vote for about $8 billion of better barrier funding in the 2013 immigration reform, $40 billion in total in terms of border security.

This is a growing problem. In 2012, a little over 11,000 people came into this country as family units. Last year, it was 107,000 people coming in as a family unit. In the first three months of this fiscal year, it's been 75,000 people.

This was all sparked by DACA. Even the Obama administration realized that we had to deter this. It's a growing problem. It's not going away. It's getting bigger and bigger. And Democrats continue to minimize this. We need barriers as just the first step, but we also have to fix all kinds of bad law and loopholes and legal precedent that's incentivizing and rewarding people who come to this country either as unaccompanied children from Central America or as members of family units.

And, again, that is a growing problem. That is the problem at the border, and it's a crisis at the border.

TAPPER: So...

JOHNSON: It was viewed as a crisis in 2014, when a total of 120,000 people came in as family units and unaccompanied children.

Last year, 145,000 people came in under that same category. It's a growing problem. It needs to be addressed. And the easiest solution to the shutdown, just give President Trump the money for his -- the mandate he received from the American public.

Let's face it. As a candidate, this is what he talked about. If there was a mandate he can claim from his election, it is better border security, keeping this nation safe. Democrats have voted for this in the past. They're being total hypocrites. It's easy. This could be solved in 15 minutes, as the president has said. Just fund the barriers, which we need.

TAPPER: We're out of time, but I just want to get you on the record.

If no compromise is able to be reached, would you support President Trump declaring a national emergency to be able to fund his border wall?

JOHNSON: A better solution would be to pass our Shutdown Fairness Act, which is going to pay those individuals that are being forced to work because they are essential.

So I have got a piece of legislation. I have got about five co- sponsors already. We will introduce it tomorrow. But it will actually pay those workers that Senator Warner is concerned about. So, hopefully, Mitch McConnell will bring that up.

Hopefully, Democrats will support it. Hopefully, President Trump can sign it, so at least those individuals get paid.

TAPPER: OK.

But, beyond that, assuming that the shutdown still continues, would you support President Trump, yes or no, declaring a national emergency?

JOHNSON: I would hate to see it.

Using that act, it would be -- in this instance would be a far larger act than has ever occurred in the past. So, I would prefer not, primarily because, if we do that, it's going to go to court, and the wall won't get built.

So, I actually want to see this wall get built. And so I want to keep pressure on Democrats to actually come to the negotiating table in good faith and fund what they have supported in the past.

TAPPER: All right, Senator Ron Johnson, Republican of Wisconsin, chairman of the Homeland Security Committee, thanks so much for joining us this snowy morning.

We appreciate it.

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