CNN "The Situation Room" - Transcript: Interview with Rep. Steve Cohen

Interview

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BLITZER: Not too long away, starting very soon, as well. Thanks very much for that, Laura Jarrett, reporting.

Joining me now, Steve Cohen of Tennessee, he's a member of the Judiciary Committee. Congressman thanks so much for joining us. You just heard that John Dowd, the president's lead lawyer at that time, you heard what his reaction is. Do you view this voice mail, and we got the transcript of it now, as possibly an effort to obstruct the Russia investigation?

REP. STEVE COHEN (D-TN), JUDICIARY COMMITTEE: Indeed, I do, Wolf. And I think there have been so much. Most of it was in the Mueller report. And Robert Mueller made it clear that there were ten instances of obstruction of justice and but for the legal counsel's policy of not being able to not indicting a president during his term, but the possibility, as Mueller said, to preserve evidence when people's memories were good for possible prosecution after he left office, and the fact that Congress is the proper body to look into misdeeds -- criminal misdeeds by the president through impeachment. It's obvious, there was lots of obstruction. And that's all that Trump and his team were doing. They were trying to get Sessions fired, get Mueller fired. They fired Comey. They've now gone further and tried to stop people from giving over documents requested by the Judiciary Committee, testifying before the Judiciary Committee. This is an assault, really, on the American political system and the rule of law.

BLITZER: As you also just heard, the Justice Department has decided not to hand over the transcripts of Michael Flynn's phone calls with the Russian ambassador at the time, Sergey Kislyak, even though the federal judge asked for those transcripts. Is there a legal justification to do that?

[17:15:08] COHEN: Not that I can foresee. I was shocked to hear that. And I'm sure Judge Sullivan will be shocked. The federal district court judge should be honored -- his request at all times. And for him to cavalierly say they're not going to give it to him or there's no need for it is just amazing. They put themselves above the law and the law is the federal judge. You could appeal some rulings and it goes all the way to the Supreme Court. But they didn't do that at all. They just basically thumbed their nose at him. And this is a serious breach of the rule of law, of our values, of our Constitution. And that's why impeachment's on the table.

You know, I don't know what -- some people think there's a method to Trump's madness. I think it's just madness. And I think people give him too much credit to think that he has somehow come up with some type of a way to entice Nancy Pelosi and/or the rest of the Democrats to impeach him and that he want that. He doesn't want that. That would hurt his ego. He's a narcissist. He wants to go down in history as the greatest thing -- well, he thinks he is the greatest thing, but the greatest president ever. And he doesn't want to be thought of in the same terms as Andrew Johnson and Richard Nixon and he's right now in my opinion a little bit underneath them. He might be right there with Buchanan. But he doesn't want that, I don't think he wants that to be next to his name and he's concerned about history. He's also concerned about what would come out in an investigation.

BLITZER: Congressman, you've also heard these new details about how the president is reacting to seeing Robert Mueller on TV and hearing what the Attorney General Bill Barr is saying. He's very enthusiastic we're told about what Bill Barr, the attorney general is saying.

COHEN: Bill Barr is apparently gone to some -- something's happened to him. He had a good reputation. His reputation is gone. And I don't understand it at all. He's got some kind of an agenda that has required him to become, basically, Donald Trump's Roy Cohen, Donald Trump's lackey, Donald Trump's consigliere. And everything -- all of that collusion talk on the day that he made his -- released the report, that's not legal terminology. His refusal to accept the conditions that Jerry Nadler set up for him to testify before the Judiciary Committee was ridiculous. The attorney general does not set the guidelines. He accepts and attends and testifies. And all of this, it's just amazing what Barr's saying. And he's attacking. He's hurting the Justice Department that he's in charge of and the FBI. And these are institutions that have played great parts in the rule of law and Democracy.

BLITZER: The attorney general also says he analyzed Mueller's conclusions on obstruction, he determined that -- and I'm quoting him now, that many of the instances would not amount to obstruction. How do you interpret that comment from the attorney general?

COHEN: Well, I think, you know, he has an opinion that there has to be an underlying crime to have obstruction. And that's a very minority opinion. And he may be sticking to that. That may be the basis of it. But it's a very minority opinion off the wall and most people don't ascribe to it. There were almost 1,000 former United States attorneys that signed a letter and said there was obstruction of justice. I would take a 1,000-1 rule as a pretty good margin about what the reality is about the legal elements present that can constitute obstruction of justice. And I think Robert Mueller was saying that in his report.

I mean, he said, no man should be above the law. The closing part of the report is about no person being above the law, not even the president of the United States. And the closing of his press conference last week about the American people need to be concerned about foreign interference in our elections. Bill Barr doesn't seem to be interested nor does Trump about foreign interference in our elections. They seem to be concerned with some thought that the origins of this investigation, in thinking there was some political activity. There wasn't.

I mean, there were some people on the team, Peter Strzok and somebody else there, that thought that Trump was a bad guy. But you get most people that work for FBI or the Justice Department, they've got college degrees and if most people with college degrees thought that about Trump. I don't think it was any abhorrent conduct and certainly not reflective of the Justice Department or the FBI in general, but it was two people and they had discussions and their discussions were typical of people of their educational background.

BLITZER: Congressman Steve King, thanks so much for joining us.

COHEN: Please, not King! Cohen!

BLITZER: Did I say Steve King? Steve Cohen thanks very much. Thanks for the correction. Appreciate very different two guys.

[17:20:00] Thanks very much for joining us.

COHEN: Very different.

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