MSNBC "All in with Chris Hayes" - Transcript: Interview with Sen. Mark Warner

Interview

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HAYES: For more on what to do about the President, I`m joined by  Democratic Senator Mark Warner of Virginia, vice chairman of the Senate  Intelligence Committee. I`ll start I think with the question I has just  asked you on Brennan which is how you understand the recourse if in fact  there is this sense now, it`s made explicit I think in the last 48 hours  because of the reporting, the suspicion fundamentally of the loyalties of  the commander-in-chief of the head of state.

SEN. MARK WARNER (D), VIRGINIA: Listen, Chris, I`m not going to jump to  any conclusions but I do think we can recap what we know factually. We  know factually in a bipartisan way. Our Senate investigation showed that  Russians massively interfered in 2016 in our campaign to help Trump and  hurt Clinton.

We know that Mr. Trump`s behavior during that campaign while he was willing  to criticize virtually every other world leader, he was not willing to  criticize Vladimir Putin. We saw the candidly embarrassing kowtowing of  Mr. Trump to Vladimir Putin on the world stage in Helsinki.

Now we have these reports and I`m not sure if they`re true or not of  whether Mr. Trump is trying to take America out of NATO. We saw the kind  of strange announcement Mr. Trump made about taking America out of the  Syrian conflict without any forewarning that frankly benefits Bashar Assad  and again benefits Putin.

And we`ve seen as well that those figures inside the Trump administration  like Secretary of Defense Mattis who were that forced to kind of say hey,  American tradition, American role in the world is to stand up for human  rights, for press rights, for a strong United West against oligarchs and  dictators like Putin. He`s been pushed out of the administration.

And we even have today the administration didn`t get a lot of attention but  there was a broad bipartisan coalition standing up against the Trump effort  to try to remove the sanctions on one of Trumps cronies Oleg Deripaska.  Luckily there were 57 senators that rejected the Trump administration`s  approach. But there is a pattern here.

I`m not going to reach a conclusion until we finish our investigation or  until the Mueller investigation is finished, but I do agree with John  Brennan. I frankly think the vast majority actually my Republican  colleagues also agree that Mueller is got to be able to finish his job and  that report then needs to be made public to the American public.

HAYES: There are a bunch of outstanding factual matters that that are now  at issue. And you`re the ranking member of the Intelligence Committee in  the Senate. First I want to ask, what is the status of the Senate  investigation which is not as far as I know wrapped up or issued some kind  of final report unlike those in the House?

WARNER: We have seen over 200 witnesses. We have a number of witnesses  that are still on the docket and we`ve got major figures like Michael Cohen  and some of the other principals that we want to bring back as well as our  desire that we need to hear from folks like General Flynn and Paul  Manafort, people that have already gone at least partially through the  Justice Department proceedings.

We need to have that information before we can conclude. We`ve got a lot  of unanswered questions. I want this report. I want our investigation to be finished as soon as possible but we`ve got to get access to some of 
these individuals. Frankly, some who have been reluctant to testify and some frankly that Mueller needs to give agreement that we can see as well.

HAYES: Rex Tillerson was a Secretary of State who was in that meeting that  The Washington Post has reported the President confiscated the notes from  the interpreter. In an e-mail, Tillerson said he was present the entirety  of the two President`s official bilateral meeting in Homburg but he  declined to discuss the meaning, did not respond the questions about  whether Trump had instructed for the notes to be taken. Do you think --  would you like to talk to Mr. Tillerson under oath about that?

WARNER: Listen, I would love to hear from the former secretary the state.  Clearly, the President of the United States can meet one-on-one with other  foreign leaders but anytime you meet with someone particularly that has  been you know, traditionally viewed as an adversary as the case of Vladimir  Putin, even if you want to meet one-on-one, you want to give your team a  full readout of what happened. That has -- there`s lots of do outs that  come out of the meeting of that nature.

And it is more than a little bizarre if the reporting is accurate and we  don`t know this for a fact, that the President took in effect the  interpreters notes, wouldn`t share him with anyone. And I still have not  heard from anyone in the administration what actually transpired between  Putin and Trump in Helsinki. And I don`t know any one of the  administration that is even represented that they know what transpired.

HAYES: All right, Senator Mark Warner, thanks for your time tonight.

WARNER: Thank you, Chris

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