Fox News "Hannity" - Transcript: Interview with Rep. Steve Scalise and Rep. Andy Biggs

Interview

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Joining us now is Freedom Caucus chairman, Congressman Andy Biggs, and House Minority Whip Steve Scalise.

Gentlemen, thank you for joining us. I had a pleasure of serving with both of you previously in Congress.

I want to go to Whip Scalise here first, because I got to tell you, to hear Schiff and Nadler already pooh-poohing a criminal investigation without any facts, without any knowledge, just saying, oh, well, that must be political, jumping to conclusions, when you hear and see that, Steve Scalise, how do you react?

REP. STEVE SCALISE, R-LA: That's a bit rich, Jason, coming from those. I think what you saw today, this was big news, by the way. This is a really bad sign for all the people who are politicizing and trying to interfere with the 2016 election, including people at the Department of Justice and the FBI who were trying to undermine the Trump campaign. And, of course, we've already seen a lot of information about that.

But today, you saw both Schiff and Nadler hit the panic button. They really understand that this is bad for them and their case. They are trying to impeach a president based on false information and innuendo in secret behind closed doors.

And in fact, what you look at, both what Horowitz is doing and what Durham is doing, they've actually been looking at facts, talking to real people, giving things that they've risen to the level of criminal probe.

It's a really big deal, bad news for those people who try to undermine the Trump campaign illegally using their positions in the FBI and other agencies.

CHAFFETZ: Andy Biggs, when you see Chairman Nadler, Chairman Schiff use their chairmanships to belittle, badger, and call politics on Attorney General Barr, Mr. Horowitz -- who is, you know, by the way, unanimously confirmed as an Obama appointee by the United States Senate, when you see these people's apology is names disparaged and they try to take them down and put a political spin on it, how do you react to that?

REP. ANDY BIGGS, R-ARIZ.: Well, Jason, good to be with you and Steve too. But my first thought is, you know what, that's consistent with everything that they are doing in the impeachment probe, that's consistent with the way they approach the Mueller report and it's consistent with their partisan -- I mean, I mean, we are all partisan there, as you know, as both of you know really well. But this is just beyond normal partisanship. They don't care about what justice is, they don't care about what the facts are.

And when I see those statements that those guys both signed on to today, I thought, you know what? How interesting that they are more concerned with saying this is a political witch hunt and immediately going to spin when that's exactly what they've been doing for two and a half years. It's just remarkable to me.

CHAFFETZ: Now, Whip Scalise, I've got to ask you this question. It runs in parallel because you've heard earlier, Mr. Clapper trying to say, oh, well, there's all this heat on these people in the Trump administration because of impeachment.

Now, what I don't understand, I wrote an op-ed for FOX News, what I don't understand is three times, the Democrats tried to bring up impeachment to the floor in the House and three times it was defeated including July of 2019.

So, how is it that anybody can actually call it an impeachment proceeding when the last floor action that happened was a defeat -- over 137 Democrats that voted against proceeding with impeachment. That's the last action on the floor the House.

SCALISE: It is, Jason. And, in fact, if you look at Nancy Pelosi's actions, she is scared to death having a full book on the House floor or even starting an impeachment inquiry, which, by the way, is how every other impeachment inquiry, the other three intent previous presidents have been done in the history of our country. And so, she is trying to shield her vulnerable members because they can't go back home right now, and talk about what they've done. They are the party of impeachment and that's all they have to show.

In fact, they have more subpoenas that this House has issued under Pelosi then bills that have gotten signed into law under Pelosi's. I mean, you think about that. More subpoenas than bill signed into law by Pelosi's House -- such a failure of leadership. And so, all they want to do is badger the president.

They've investigated him for over two years with the Mueller investigation. They thought that was going to be their ticket. And I turned out there was nothing that was charged. Mueller had full authority whether it was for collusion, for obstruction, none of that happen. And, in fact, it was Schiff leading the charge saying that he had more than substantial evidence of collusion, or, you know, of any kind of collusion with Russia and it never existed.

And so, instead of moving on, they're going behind closed doors trying to fabricate a story when, in fact, you look at what Durham and Horowitz are doing, they've actually found some real alarming things that broke the law, and so, it rose to the level of actually convening a grand jury. That's why you are seeing them panic right now because they know there's real stuff behind what happened in the 2016 election and they are afraid it's going to get uncovered.

And President Trump has been seeking the truth, by the way.

CHAFFETZ: Yes.

SCALISE: The American people want the truth and deserve the truth. And that's ultimately what we need to get.

CHAFFETZ: Now, Congressman Biggs, I pat you on the back and applaud you for actually playing a little bit of offense by the resolution to censure Adam Schiff, and also trying to be able to see what's going on in these proceedings there, in a transcribed interview or disposition in the Intel Committee because there is no formal impeachment proceedings. But I've got to tell you, what you've heard from others, Nancy Pelosi changed the rules in January of 2019 on how this actually works. She changed several of the rules, the rules package voted on January of 2019, one of them had to do with the rights of the minority and the ability to actually be present and have members present when somebody is going to the transcribed interview.

So, how does this get resolved because they've got a lot of attention to it, but I don't see any movement by Nancy Pelosi and Adam Schiff in opening this up to the public and to even members of Congress?

BIGGS: Now, you are right, Jason. I mean, so Matt Gaetz and Steve really helped us get through there, try to force the issue. We want to make it known to the American people. But the rules are normally put in place to protect the minority, because the majority doesn't need the rules, they can change the rules anytime they want to do whatever they want.

Nancy Pelosi is not going to budge here because they don't want the truth to come out. This is absolutely a coup d'etat and it's being done as Steve says behind closed doors with selective leaks coming out. And also, this is really interesting to me too. Mr. Schiff has actually threatened Republicans that if they leak, he's going to bring an ethics complaint against them. He threatened an ethics complaint against us the other day.

He does not want openness and transparency. And he's got to be just really queasy when he sees this Durham thing going over to the criminal side now.

CHAFFETZ: I applaud the two of you. You are fighters there in the House. For the life of me, I don't know how Adam Schiff continues to have a security clearance. It makes no sense to me. That should be revoked somehow someway. You all got to figure that out.

But thank you for joining us tonight, Congressmen Biggs and Steve Scalise.

BIGGS: Thanks, Jason.

SCALISE: Thanks very much, Jason.

CHAFFETZ: Thank you.

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