MSNBC "All In with Chris Hayes" - Transcript: "Mueller testifies Trump misled probe."

Interview

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HAYES: Special Counsel Mueller`s marathon day of testimony in the Hill started with the House Judiciary Committee this morning where members were largely focused on volume two of the report and the ten instances that Mueller lays out of possible obstruction of justice by the president. I`m joined now by two members of the House Judiciary Committee who questioned Robert Mueller this morning as you just heard, Congressman Jamie Raskin of Maryland and Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal of Washington. Congresswoman, how did you view your goal today going into this?

JAYAPAL: I think the goal, Chris, really was for us to lay out all the different -- the most compelling pieces of obstruction of justice, to get Mueller to actually testify to them, that is what was in his report, and in many ways re-educate the public about what was actually in the report. And I think what came out was overwhelming evidence of obstruction of justice committed by the president, acts that if any other person in the United States did those acts they would be criminally prosecuted.

HAYES: Congressman Raskin, I`m going to give you an argument that I`ve seen some make both sort of mainstream pundits and conservatives as well at the White House that this was not you know, a sort of showstopper in terms of the performance of Mueller himself. Obviously, he was sort of reticent, at times seemed not to have full command of the report. And as such, if the whole point was a kind of illustrative show that it didn`t do what you wanted it to do. What do you think of that argument?

RASKIN: I disagree with that. You know, maybe it wasn`t a showstopper by the witness but I think it was an absolutely breakthrough a moment for the Judiciary Committee and for Congress and for public sentiments which Abraham Lincoln said was everything. You know, what we did was we took this abstraction of obstruction and we made it real in the case of tampering with particular witnesses like Manafort, like Stone, like you know, the Flynn case. In my case, I was talking about Michael Cohen, we talked about the president trying to get people to lie, trying to get people to cover up evidence, trying to fire the prosecutors. We really brought it down to the level of factual detail. And I think we did break through the sound barrier and we dispelled the fog of propaganda that Attorney General Barr and Donald Trump had been laying down over the country ever since the report came out.

HAYES: If there`s evidence of obstruction of justice that congresswoman as you just said, which I think both of you agree with and I think many of the -- in the caucus and certainly on the committee, congresswoman, isn`t that on its face, just that, meets the facial threshold for opening and impeachment inquiry if there is sufficient evidence the President himself obstructed justice?

JAYAPAL: Absolutely. And I think Jamie and I both came out along with several of our other colleagues on judiciary months ago for an impeachment inquiry. I will tell you that what we are doing right now in many ways is the heart of what we need to continue to do. And what we -- what we hope to be able to do soon is be able to use all the tools in our toolbox because there is still a little bit of information that we need like the grand jury information in order to continue. And remember that the Mueller report is not the only thing that constitutes impeachable crimes, high crimes and misdemeanors. There are other things including financial issues, Emoluments Clause that need to be a part of our investigation and that`s what I think we hope we can get to. But this was obviously a ground-breaking moment for us with the Mueller report.

RASKIN: Can I add one thing to that, Chris.

HAYES: Yes, please.

RASKIN: Just -- it`s not only grounds for launching the impeachment inquiry. the reality is that obstruction of justice was the heart of the Nixon impeachment and it was the heart of the Bill Clinton impeachment. Congress has established through history and through its own precedents that obstruction of justice is right up there with bribery and treason as a betrayal of the basic oath of office and that`s what Trump did. His duty is to take care that the laws are faithfully executed but he tried to sabotage the laws, he tried to tamper with witnesses, and he tried to obstruct justice. And we saw it in case after case that we laid out in painstaking detail today.

JAYAPAL: And, Chris, you might have noticed that after almost every one of our testimonies, we ended with if anybody else had committed these same crimes, they would be prosecuted, nobody should be above the law and I think that was a theme throughout the hearing.

HAYES: So two questions. One I guess is -- I`m hearing you and I`m nodding along. I mean, you know, this seems generally persuasive to me. But it just seems like OK, so then I watched Democratic leadership come out and say we`re going to go to court, we`re going to keep trying to track down this information. I guess for you Congressman Raskin, and then I`ll come to you Congresswoman, you know there`s a really remarkable moment in the second hearing when Robert Mueller basically said look, we wanted the president to sit down for an interview but we had to weigh the fact that it would drag things out verse the probative value of actually getting an interview. They`re trying to do the same thing with the subpoenas and everything with you here. Like don`t you run the same risk that Donald Trump has spent 40 years tying things up in the courts and he`s going to try to do that again?

RASKIN: Absolutely. And contempt of Congress is itself an impeachable offense. That was also in the Nixon case. But look there`s a material that we`re going to go and fight for that we have every right as the Article One branch to get. The grand jury material under 6E, we`re going to be fighting for. We want to see that Tom McGahn comes in to testify. He`s a critical witness since he was told to go out and sack the special counsel. We`ve got a right to all these people`s testimony. We`ve got a right to all the documents we`re asking for. If they don`t give it that in itself escalates the constitutional confrontation with Congress.

HAYES: So then do you understand your role, Congresswoman, as being part of a project now that is engaged in building evidence sufficient enough for impeachment?

JAYAPAL: Well, what I would say to you, Chris, is I think that today was ground-breaking and imminently I think you will see a number of actions that will reflect the seriousness of where we are and the inevitability of the path that we are on. And I think you know, probably it feels like a long time to wait but certainly, it feels that way for us too, but we do have to follow a couple of steps. But I would just say imminently I think we`ll see some steps that will reflect the seriousness of the path that we`re on.

HAYES: The inevitability. That`s a very interesting word in a bunch of different directions. Congressman Jamie Raskin, Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal, thank you both for joining me.

JAYAPAL: Thank you, Chris.

RASKIN: Thanks for having us.

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