Fox News "The Story" - Transcript: Interview with Sen. Josh Hawley

Interview

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MACCALLUM: William Barr on deck to be the United States Attorney General for the second time. First time was under Bush 41. He stayed in his case today before the Senate Judiciary Committee. His hearing comes just days after a stunning piece in The New York Times that said that the FBI launched an investigation because they feared that Mr. Trump was a Russian agent.

The Times admitted that they had no evidence to publicly back that up. Still, it has some wondering if the FBI at that time was overreaching in its role.

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SEN. JOSH HAWLEY, R-MO.: In your experience with the FBI, is it strange to have a counterintelligence investigation begun because members of that Bureau disagree with the foreign policy stances of a candidate for president or a president of the United States?

BARR: Yes.

HAWLEY: Would it concerned you as Attorney General if FBI agents were making decisions about when and how to launch an investigation of an elected official if it was in order to avoid being supervised or directed by their agency leadership?

BARR: Yes.

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MACCALLUM: Joining me now exclusively is the Senator that you just heard from, brand-new senator from Missouri Josh Hawley, the youngest member of the United States Senate and today was his first day on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Congratulations on your new post, Senator, and welcome to THE STORY. It's good to have you here tonight. Do you want to elaborate a little bit on what you were drilling down on there?

HAWLEY: Well, listen. I mean, the report about that the New York Times ran over the weekend is very disturbing and to have the FBI launching a counterintelligence investigation usually reserved for suspected spies by the way, because they disagree with the President's foreign policy views. I mean, this is what the Times reported that the FBI was concerned about -- or some agents were concerned about the President's statements on Russia, on Ukraine, on other matters, I mean foreign policy matters. This is -- this is unprecedented.

It's also potentially unconstitutional because the Constitution gives the President foreign policy authority. The Constitution says the President is the one who determines national security interests in the foreign policy context. So we need to figure out what's going on here.

MACCALLUM: Well, they -- I mean, they -- these agents clearly thought that the President was in cahoots with the Russian government more than just disagreeing with perhaps what he might do as President. I want to play this exchange between chairman of the Judiciary Committee Lindsey Graham and Mr. Barr today. Watch this.

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SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM, R-S.C.: This is a message August 8th, 2016, a text message. Trump is not ever going to become president, right? Strzok responded no, no, he's not. We'll stop him. March 4th, 2016. Page to Strzok. God, Trump is a loathsome human being. October the 20th, 2016. Trump is an effing idiot as unable to provide a coherent answer. How do these statements sit with you?

BARR: I was shocked when I saw them.

GRAHAM: OK, please get to the bottom of it. I promise you we will protect the investigations but we're lying upon you to clean this place up.

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MACCALLUM: He said we're relying on you to clean this place up. Was there any indication in the testimony today that William Barr would be proactive about that?

HOWLEY: Well, he responded to that line of questioning from Senator Graham by saying that he was very concerned. He told me the same thing. He was very concerned by the FBI's behavior here and that he was going to get to the bottom of it and he was going to figure out what in the world is going on. Because listen, the other the other part of The Times report is you have agents who are trying to launch an investigation while they have a friendly supervisor Andy McCabe who since been booted out of the department.

So this is very unusual behavior. Again it raises serious constitutional concerns and I hope that the new Attorney General will get to the bottom of it and I for one intend to hold him accountable.

MACCALLUM: Yes. You mentioned that in your second question and it was the whole issue of Strzok and Page saying that they had to really get moving on the case that they were working on while Andy is acting, meaning Andy McCabe is the acting attorney general -- I mean the acting FBI director at that point which clearly raises a lot of questions. Let me get your thoughts on this. This is Mr. Barr on the subject of Vladimir Putin. Watch this.

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BARR: I think the Russians are a potent rival of our country and his foreign policy objectives are usually at directly contrary to our goals.

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MACCALLUM: What you think of that answer? He also pointed out China as the country that he thought was more concerning. Is that relevant to the job that he will be doing? He was asked about it obviously.

HAWLEY: Yes, he was asked about it in the counterintelligence context and clearly China and Russia are two countries that we need to be very concerned with and these countries are attempting to interfere with the United States to counter us to exert control in many ways over our economy, over our elections. We know that. So we've got to be vigilant and standing up to them and I think that this Attorney General gets that. He understands the role of his department. He understands the role of the FBI and he wants to get back to actually following the rule of law at the Justice Department, the FBI, and that is important.

MACCALLUM: Senator, before I let you go, I would ask you one question about the two rulings by federal judges because you were part of the case that was brought by 20-some states against ObamaCare, and now two federal judges have ruled that there should be no exemption for companies who do not want to provide because of their religious beliefs, birth control under their health plans. What's your reaction to those two decisions.

HAWLEY: Well, I think that these are wrong decisions. I mean, I think that the rule that was put forward by the administration that would allow religious and moral exemptions for folks from the contraceptive mandate, let's not forget, I mean, I was one of the attorneys who went to the Supreme Court to challenge the contraceptive mandate is unconstitutional or at least as against statutory law and the court ruled in favor in the Hobby Lobby case.

So now the -- this administration is trying to comply with that and you've got these two courts, Liberal courts who have thrown out the religious and world exemptions. What's worse, Martha, is they've issued nationwide injunctions. They purported to tell the whole country of what they can and cannot do. And I raised this with attorney general Barr. I think it's a big problem.

MACCALLUM: Senator Josh Hawley, thank you very much. Good to have you with us tonight. I look forward to talking with you more.

HAWLEY: Thank you.

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