Fox News "Hannity" - Transcript: Interview with Rep. Lee Zeldin and Michael Waltz

Interview

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HANNITY: All right and joining us now are two House GOP members, who are directly involved in the storming of the Democratic closed-door Soviet- style impeachment coup attempt. Florida Congressman Michael Waltz is with us and New York Congressman Lee Zeldin. Thank you both.

Congressman Zeldin, let me go to you first here. OK, this never happened in history. This is unprecedented. No due process, frankly no legitimacy. I hope you guys do this every day. Why won't they afford President Trump, Congressman Zeldin, everything they afforded Bill Clinton in 1998?

REP. LEE ZELDIN, R-N.Y.: Yes, I know all the rights that they would demand if the roles were reversed, they're doing it because they're trying to take down the sitting President, not based off of actual charges built on actual facts, actual evidence.

What Adam Schiff is trying to do right now in his bunker in the Capitol basement, is to try to write the world's greatest parody. And in that, he can't bring in the witnesses that the minority party will want. He can't allow the President to have his Counsel present to cross-examine witnesses and present evidence.

He says it's analogous to a grand jury. In this grand jury, he's the prosecutor, the judge, and the jury. None of this is right on the process and the substance where we seen it all fall apart, but that's why he doesn't provide all the transcripts to the public.

HANNITY: And I go to you, Congressman Waltz, and ask you the same question. I mean you guys going to do this every day? I want you guys every day to pound the pavement. I hope you - are you planning on it?

REP. MICHAEL WALTZ, R-FLA.: Look Sean, I'm a Green Beret, I've been in combat from Afghanistan to Africa and third world countries, all over the Middle East, and they treat their officials more fairly than what we're seeing here. At least the defense can call their own witnesses and the accused can have their own counsel present.

But not in this case, and I'll remind folks, every single hearing has started in Schiff's in this court that he's running with, with a statement that what they're talking about is unclassified. Unclassified, there is no reason to be down in that bunker, except that he wants to control it, selectively leak it, drive the narrative and then get the moderates in his party comfortable with voting for what he has always wanted in the first place, which is to drive for impeachment, if not Russia then Ukraine or something else.

So I simply - look, they are over-playing this. We sat down politely and asked, it was Assistant Secretary of Defense, I'm on the Armed Services Committee, and asked to hear and see. I've been asking for three weeks for Kurt Volker's transcript, and as a sitting member of Congress, I'm not allowed by Schiff to at least read what the man said.

HANNITY: The guy, Congressman Zeldin, he's conflicted, he's a material witness in this case. Now he's hiding the transcripts, he won't even let Republicans go unless one of his minions a minder walks you over. You can't have the transcripts. Do we even know why they want to impeach him, what is the exact article or reason or scope of the impeachment inquiry, do we know?

ZELDIN: They are going to make new stuff up, because this thing started on this whistleblower complaint, but the whistleblower complaint has totally fallen apart. So now what they need to do is scramble to figure out the new shiny object or objects, and again they don't care what the charges are.

This impeachment started when the President was first elected. I remember being there when the President was getting sworn in. Pennsylvania Avenue was lined up, while the President's hand was on the Bible, with signs that said impeach him now. They won the House by pledging to resist, oppose, impeach and obstruct everything and anything.

It's about an enraged liberal activist base that they want to appease. They're going to lose their majority because of it. Ironically, the President's going to get reelected because of it. But you know what, it's not right despite the fact that it might help the President politically or Republicans regain the House.

It's just not the right thing to do. The President doesn't deserve to be impeached. He said they should be working with him.

HANNITY: All right, so when they finally vote - so they got their closed smoke-filled rooms, all these antics, no due process, totally illegitimate, no constitutional anything, then the question is OK, are they - did they jump out of the plane now Congressman Waltz, they can't get back in, they are now 5,000 feet below the plane. Is there any - they can't pull it back, so they're going to impeach him. President won't be convicted, but the American people then get to reelect him, don't they?

WALTZ: That's right. And that's what they're trying to do this as fast - as quick as possible, because we're within a year of the election and they don't want to show in no uncertain terms that we could just go to the election. And can I just say, Sean, this is the Intelligence Committee, we have China, Russia, Iran, North Korea.

And instead of dealing with those real intelligence issues, this is what they're doing with their time, and we also don't have a defense bill right now for our military members that are all over the world waiting on that funding. So a lot of things not getting done, while Schiff is leading a very important Committee down this ridiculous path.

HANNITY: Keep it up, great job today. This is a big change.

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