CNN "Erin Burnett Out Front" - Transcript: "Interview with Rep. Jamie Raskin"

Interview

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BURNETT: All right. Thank you very much, Abby. Yes, I mean, it was sort of jarring, how many times he said the same thing today.

OUTFRONT now, Democratic Congressman Jamie Raskin who's on the Oversight and Judiciary Committees. And I appreciate your time tonight, sir. So the judge obviously handing you all a victory ruling you can go ahead with a formal impeachment inquiry. You don't need that formal vote in the House.

Of course, even though it was done in the prior to impeachment. It's rejecting that ruling arguments by the Trump --

REP. JAMIE RASKIN (D-MD): Actually the court corrects that --

BURNETT: Go ahead.

RASKIN: The court corrected that misimpression, which was circulated by the Republicans. I mean, the whole opinion is a devastating refutation of everything that the Republicans have been saying over the last few weeks.

First of all, the question of whether or not it's an impeachment inquiry is not up to the courts, it's up to the House of Representatives.

BURNETT: Yes.

RASKIN: Under our rules. We set the rules for impeachment and we set the rules of the House. And so we've declared this an impeachment inquiry and we are proceeding on that, so it's not up to the Republicans to second guess it in court. It has a legal proceeding.

BURNETT: So it's completely off the table then? I mean, in terms of there's no way there is going to be a vote, now that you have this, you're just not going to do it.

RASKIN: We may or we may not. The point is it's up to the House of Representatives because of Article One which provides that we get to define the rules of our own proceedings and we have the sole power of impeachment. It's not up to the Senate, it's not up to the minority, it's not up to the courts, it's up to the House of Representatives.

And so the House of Representatives is conducting an impeachment inquiry. So look, but we know that all of these process complaints are a massive distraction from what America has learned, which is that the President undertook a campaign with the President of Ukraine to try to shake him down for cooperation in his campaign, giving him dirt on the Bidens and going back and reviving a discredited conspiracy theory about what happened in the 2016 campaign.

The courts are now overwhelmingly turning against all of these arguments that are being made by the Republicans and I think the whole country can now see the republicans are just trying to obstruct the progress of justice. One of the things that Chief Judge Beryl Howell was --

BURNETT: I just want to ask you one thing about that though, because obviously, yes, we know what the facts pointed to in the testimony that we've gotten thus far and Republicans have been going after the process and trying to avoid talking about those facts. That's fair.

But you have the legal court and you have the court of public opinion. And Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, as you know, was trying to go ahead with his resolution, condemning your whole process. He's got 50 co-sponsors in the Senate, which means a lot of people are supporting what he's doing who really think what the President did was wrong.

President Trump bragged about it today. Here he is, Congressman.

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TRUMP: I haven't even made a phone call, 50 out of 53. And they said, you get the 40, that's pretty good. You haven't done anything. But we're up to 50.

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BURNETT: And I mentioned, Congressman, that even Republicans who have slammed the President over Ukraine aren't supportive of that. Even Mitt Romney says he would quote like to see a vote in the House and a more open process.

So in the court of public opinion, would you do better to have this be more in the light of day than you are?

RASKIN: Well, as long as everyone is conceding that it's perfectly lawful and constitutional what we're doing, undoubtedly there will be votes on the House floor. That's the only way that you get a resolution of impeachment. It's the only way that you can articles of impeachment moving forward.

But remember that it was the Department of Justice that made the decision that there was nothing there to see in the whistleblower's complaint, which is why there was no factual investigation done by the Department of Justice. That investigation was done in the Watergate case by Archibald Cox. It was done in the Clinton case by Kenneth Starr.

BURNETT: By Ken Starr, yes.

RASKIN: And so all of those materials were turned over, so we're doing the frontline factual investigation and all they're doing is throwing pizza parties in trying to obstruct and blockade the process. But I think that this case along with several others makes clear that we're doing precisely what we should be doing in order to pursue the impeachment of the President for very likely high crimes and misdemeanors.

So we hope that the Republicans will live up to their constitutional oaths and participate in the process rather than trying to shut it down. There are dozens of Republicans who have the right to be in that room and many of them were in that room trying to ask questions when these guys barged in and had their little fake civil disobedience, which by the way compromise National Security likely.

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BURNETT: So let me ask you about John Bolton, because he's very important and I know you all are having Saturday depositions and you're trying to, it seems, certainly from the schedule, it's moving quickly and it's accelerating. We know that John Bolton's lawyers have spoken with House Committees about a possible deposition. Can you update us on that, Congress Raskin, on when this might happen? Will he testify?

RASKIN: I'm sorry, Erin, I cannot update you on that. But I just wanted to finish answering your question about the about what Senator Lindsey Graham did in terms of getting a statement by 50 of the republicans and the President bragged that 50 of 53. You think he'd be measuring it 50 of a hundred because that's the jury that operates not just the Republican members.

But in any event, the fascinating thing to me now is that rather than hurrying to get it over in the Senate, so they can act, the Republicans seem to be very nervous about what might happen in the Senate and they're trying to slow everything down in the House and put the pressure on us, I think, to slow our proceedings down.

We're moving at a very rapid, deliberate pace to get all of the evidence and to keep them from sandbagging us, but it seems as if there are a lot of those Republican senators who are getting extremely nervous precisely about the dramatic shifts in public opinion, where even Fox News are showing that a majority of Americans want to see the president impeached and removed or at least the inquiry go forward.

BURNETT: Thank you very much, Congressman Raskin. I appreciate your time on this Friday night.

RASKIN: You bet.

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