MSNBC "The Rachel Maddow Show" - Transcript: Interview with Sen. Chris Murphy

Interview

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MADDOW:  It`s leaders view nuclear weapons as critical to regime survival.  Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats speaking January 29th. 
 
One more Donald Trump/Kim Jong-un summit later, we now know that Dan Coats and the intelligence community were apparently on to something there.  NBC News reporting tonight within two days of the president leaving his failed denuclearization summit with Kim Jong-un last week, the North Koreans appear to have started preparations for a new missile launched at a previously dormant testing site. 
 
Joining us now is Senator Chris Murphy.  He`s a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
 
Senator, thanks very much for joining us tonight.  Nice having you here. 
 
SEN. CHRIS MURPHY (D-CT), SENATE FOREIGN RELATIONS COMMITTEE:  Sure.  Thanks for having me. 
 
MADDOW:  So have members of Congress, have senators been briefed on these developments?  If so, is there anything you can share? 
 
MURPHY:  No, we haven`t.  In fact, today we had an off the record conversation with the president`s primary negotiator with the North Koreans.  And this did not come up.  I`ve seen the reports you have.
 
It`s certainly very worrying that they`re back working on a test site that was supposedly closed.  You know, there was an assumption that when the president at the end of this summit announced that notwithstanding the fact they didn`t get any agreement, he was going to permanently shut down these joint exercises with the South Koreans that maybe that had come in exchange for a promise from the North Koreans to permanently stop these tests as well.  That may not be the case, given the fact that they look to be restarting one of these facilities. 
 
And if we have unilaterally decided to stop not military exercises without any behavior given an exchange from the North Koreans, that`s even worse than coming out of the summit without a deal. 
 
MADDOW:  On this point of the president giving up the military exercises, there`s a -- I mean, as far as I understand this, this is one of North Korea`s major priorities in terms of dealing with the United States, sort of one of their major international demands.  I have been slightly unnerved about the president being so willing to trade away those joint military exercises, not only because our military says they`re important, but also because the president himself apparently told people that he got this idea by speaking to Russian President Vladimir Putin, who suggested this to him as something he ought to give away to the North Koreans. 
 
That was reported in "The Wall Street Journal" a very long time ago.  That`s very much stuck in my craw.  I don`t know if you have any take on that aspect of this. 
 
MURPHY:  Yes.  So much for "The Art of the Deal".  There were, you know, a small number of things other than the sanctions that really stuck with the North Koreans.  There were a small number of things that we could give away in part of a confidence-building deal if we didn`t want to start loosening the sanctions.  And those exercises were one of the few chips we had. 
 
Trump went into the negotiations thinking the, you know, these Danielle Steele love letters that he exchanged with Kim Jong-un was going to lead to a big comprehensive agreement.  That was never going to happen and he walked away with nothing.  What he should have been doing was trying to work on some small preliminary deal that would lead to a bigger deal later on.  And we`re now seeing that the stakes of failure were pretty high if the consequence is the North Koreans are going to start again. 
 
One last thing I`d mention, we have not gotten confirmation on this, but there were reports that Sergey Lavrov was in Hanoi during the time of the summit, which makes you even more worried about what he was doing there. 
 
MADDOW:  In terms of what happens next here, I know you are a dedicated student and leader on foreign policy issues, and I think that you have strong ideas about negotiating even with people whom you disagree in order to get America`s way in the world.  With this president and the way he has approached this, though, do you think there is a course correction that is available here in terms of how he is handling this matter?  Obviously, this is a -- this is a huge deal for not only the Korean peninsula, but for the world in terms of national security. 
 
MURPHY:  Yes, you are running out of time and, of course, it may be that this has all been simply a delay play by Kim Jong-un.  That he has been assiduously working behind the scenes underground on developing nuclear weapons capacity while he`s been sitting across the table from us.  In a six-month period of time, it will be too late. 
 
The problem, though, is we could have used this last year to continue to build up crippling sanctions.  Instead, because Trump was so eager to get this deal, he set aside the sanctions work and went right for the comprehensive agreement without having done any of the prep work ahead of time. 
 
So, we`ve lost critical time to build up sanctions pressure.  We now are at ground zero.  We don`t have even a preliminarily agreement that could have been worked on in Hanoi.  And it may be that we`re going to find out as this nuclear site continues to be developed that it`s all too late. 
 
MADDOW:  Senator Chris Murphy of Foreign Relations Committee -- really appreciate your time tonight, sir.  Thanks for being here. 
 
MURPHY:  Thanks. 
 
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