NBC "Meet the Press" - Transcript: Interview with Rep. Jerry Nadler
Interview
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CHUCK TODD:
And joining me now from New York is the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Democrat Jerrold Nadler. Congressman Nadler, welcome back to Meet the Press, sir.
REP. JERROLD NADLER:
Good morning.
CHUCK TODD:
Well, we anticipate getting something from the attorney general today about the principal conclusions of the Mueller report. What do you believe is the definition of "principal conclusion"?
REP. JERROLD NADLER:
Well, I don't know. I don't know what's in the Mueller report. And we'll just have to wait and see. But here's what I do know. What I know is that it's critical that everything in that report and the underlying evidence be public, be open to the American people, that transparency is key. America needs answers as to what's been going on. And I hope that the Department of Justice will not leave things hanging by seeking to keep things secret. I also know that the Department of Justice believes that it cannot under any circumstances indict a sitting president, no matter what the evidence, for anything. And that means that they believe that they cannot hold a sitting president accountable. And accordingly, the only other institution that can is Congress. And Congress must get all the information and the evidence that they may -- that the Department of Justice may have in order to exercise our function of being able to hold the --
CHUCK TODD:
Well.
REP. JERROLD NADLER:
-- president accountable. If we don't do that, if we can't do that, then the president, effectively, is above the law.
CHUCK TODD:
All right. Well, that brings us to this ambiguous phrase, right? "Executive privilege." And I'm just curious. Who gets to decide -- who gets to arbitrate this? Is this up to the attorney general?
REP. JERROLD NADLER:
Well, no. The president must personally assert executive privilege. And I do not believe it exists here at all because, as we learned from the Nixon tapes case, executive privilege cannot hide -- cannot be used to hide wrongdoing. And in that case, the Supreme Court nine to nothing ordered that all the claims of executive privilege be overridden and the tapes be public. So I don't think that executive -- I mean, the president may try to assert it, may try to hide things behind it. But I don't think that's right or be successful. I want to say that we know a few other things which are very relevant here. We know that the president pressured the FBI director to go easy, to drop the investigation on Mike Flynn and some others. We know that he fired the FBI director for not giving him the personal loyalty that he demanded and for not dropping those investigations. We know that many of the president's closest associates, his national security advisor, campaign manager, et cetera, have been convicted of various crimes. And we know that he's waged a relentless two-year campaign to attack the law enforcement institutions, the FBI, the special prosecutor, all to demean the power --
CHUCK TODD:
So don't you have enough evidence --
REP. JERROLD NADLER:
-- of those people to --
CHUCK TODD:
So is his --
REP. JERROLD NADLER:
-- of those people to hold him accountable.
CHUCK TODD:
Do you already have enough evidence? Do you need to see the Mueller report at this -- you have these -- you have the indictments that Mueller has issued. You have the narratives in those indictments. So you have pieces. You know exactly, a lot probably, of what's going to be in this report. Sounds like you already believe there's enough evidence out there to prove obstruction, for instance.
REP. JERROLD NADLER:
I think we have to see all the evidence. And there may be evidence that goes the other way. There might be evidence that tends to be exonerating. We need to see all the evidence. And we don't -- we shouldn't have to waste our time and the public's time and money recreating the same information by interviewing all the same witnesses. There's no need for that duplication at all.
CHUCK TODD:
What did you make of -- how did you interpret the no new indictments decision by the special counsel?
REP. JERROLD NADLER:
Well, I don't know how to interpret that at this point. First of all, the special counsel, we know there are lots of investigations going on by other agencies. The Southern District of New York, the Eastern District of Virginia, et cetera. And there may be indictments from them. So the story is not over. We don't know. And beyond that, we don't know the reasons. Again, that's one of the reasons we need and the public needs to see the report.
CHUCK TODD:
Will you accept Bob Mueller's conclusions in the report once you read the whole thing?
REP. JERROLD NADLER:
I assume Bob Mueller, being a very good and thorough professional, that he -- that there will be good and adequate documentation and reasoning in the report to support his conclusions, in which case we'll certainly accept them. If I'm surprised and there isn't adequate documentation or reasoning, then we'll have to look at it.
CHUCK TODD:
If he concludes though that just couldn't -- he didn't find evidence of collusion here, does that make you temper some of your investigations?
REP. JERROLD NADLER:
I don't think it tempers the investigation. We have to look at what, whatever loose ends there are, and we have to look at whatever we don't know.
CHUCK TODD:
Do you plan on calling Bob Mueller to testify before your committee?
REP. JERROLD NADLER:
If necessary. But that's a very big if.
CHUCK TODD:
Why do you say you wouldn't want to hear from him? I'll be honest. As an American citizen, as a taxpayer who helped pay for this report, part of me would like to hear from him directly.
REP. JERROLD NADLER:
Well, yeah, that would be -- that would be very pleasant. But the fact is that he's got a -- he gave us a report. He speaks through that report. If that report answers all our questions, there will be no need to call him. And if that report is all public. If that report is not public, if large parts of it are not made public, or if it leaves a lot of questions, then we have a necessity to call him. You don't call witnesses unnecessarily.
CHUCK TODD:
You're only going to call him if you feel as if the Justice Department isn't giving you the report?
REP. JERROLD NADLER:
Or if we think there are questions we have after reading the report.
CHUCK TODD:
How closely are you working with your Senate committee colleague on the judiciary side of things, Lindsey Graham? I ask that because it is judiciary that is dealing with this. Is there any way you two can work together? Or is the politics too hard?
REP. JERROLD NADLER:
Well, I don't know. We're going to be trying that. We haven't really worked together very much yet. But we'll see.
CHUCK TODD:
Senator Graham believes there needs to be an investigation into how the FBI handled the Clinton investigation as well as the Trump investigation. Would you ever be open to something like that?
REP. JERROLD NADLER:
No, I think it's totally unnecessary. When the Republicans controlled the Judiciary Committee and the Oversight Committee in the House in other words last year, they did an extensive investigation of that and found nothing. Just a lot of innuendo. The -- as far as we can tell, the Hillary investigation was done professionally and properly. And the Mueller report had its genesis in information about Russian interference in our elections.
CHUCK TODD:
Final question. You had put out document requests to some 81 entities and individuals. I feel like at the beginning of the week you said you were starting to get some cooperation and then it was clear the White House isn't cooperating. Is a subpoena coming? Are subpoenas next?
REP. JERROLD NADLER:
If necessary. Right now, we're getting a lot of good cooperation from a lot of different people. But not from the White House. And not just our committee and not just those 81 requests. The White House is simply treating Congress in -- generally in contempt. They are not bothering to respond to letters, even with a -- even with a perfunctory, "We've received your letter. We'll review it." They're simply ignoring --
CHUCK TODD:
Well, do you have a deadline --
CHUCK TODD:
-- how much time you plan on giving them before you then consider subpoenas?
REP. JERROLD NADLER:
Not off -- not off the top of my head, but we'll act when we have to.
CHUCK TODD:
Chairman Nadler, it's the beginning of what could be an extraordinarily long year for you and a lot of us. Anyway, Chairman Nadler, Democrat from New York, thanks very much.
REP. JERROLD NADLER:
Thank you.
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