CNN "CNN Newsroom" - Transcript: Interview With Rep. Brad Sherman (D-CA) Regarding The Impeachment Inquiry
Interview
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HARLOW: Well, this morning, the impeachment inquiry moves into a new different stage. Democratic House Intelligence Committee members now say they could hand it off to the Judiciary Committee pretty soon after the Thanksgiving break.
Democratic Congressman Brad Sherman of California, who serves in the Foreign Affairs and Financial Services Committee, joins me. Thank you.
I know it's such a busy week, so thank you for being here, sir.
REP. BRAD SHERMAN (D-CA): Good to be with you, Poppy.
HARLOW: Let's just first take a moment to listen to your Republican colleague in the House, Congressman Mike Turner.
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REP. MIKE TURNER (R-OH): You guys want to be the laughingstock of history to impeach a president of the United States because he didn't take a meeting? Oh, please, dear God, please undertake that.
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HARLOW: All right. So you've got zero Republicans so far, at least publicly, in the House or in the Senate on board with you guys. So what now?
SHERMAN: Well, the key thing is we've drawn a line. We've made this president feel that he's not invulnerable, he's not invincible. That process started 2 1/2 years ago, when we began talking about impeachment.
And you'll notice the big change. In his first six months in office, when the president wanted to commit a crime, he just did it on T.V. Now that he wants to abuse our relationship with the Ukraine, he at least has the good sense to do it secretly. So he knows he's not invulnerable.
The old President Trump would have just tweeted, Zelensky, get me good dirt on Biden or you'll never see your aid. This president sent Rudy Giuliani instead (ph), sent this message, made that call, all trying to keep it secret from the American people. He tried to keep it secret, because he knew it was wrong.
HARLOW: I'm confused though. I mean, A, is that any better to do it in a roundabout way with Giuliani, and B, if the accomplishment you're saying the Democrats have made is to draw a line in the sand, but you're not saying this is going to mean the president is removed from the office, to what end for the American people if it hasn't fundamentally changed the behavior? SHERMAN: We have -- the question is how many crimes would the president have committed beyond what he's done, if he thought he was invulnerable and invincible, if he thought no one would talk about impeachment back in July of 2017 --
HARLOW: Well, respectfully, it was just a few weeks ago that he said in public on television, China should investigate the Bidens in the middle of trade negotiations with China.
SHERMAN: That was pretty blatant. But imagine the crimes -- what we don't have is him tweeting Zelensky, I need those gold bars or you're not going to get your aid. There are worst things that the president has thought of doing that he has not done, and that is because we have that oversight.
HARLOW: How do you know that? Is that based on fact? I'm just -- I'm confused as to the evidence behind that and to what end for the American people.
SHERMAN: Well, we know what's he's done. When you have someone who -- when you have a professional burglar, and you know they have committed three or four burglaries over a period of several years, you figure they would commit more burglaries if there was no burglar alarm and no police department. So --
HARLOW: So then is it a win for Democrats, you're saying, even if you don't succeed in getting a single Republican vote to impeach the president in the House or the Senate, because you think you have changed his behavior?
SHERMAN: It's a necessary protection for this country that we do everything possible to restrain a president with clear criminal tendencies. And if we can - if we did nothing, if there were no burglar alarms, if there was no police department, how many more burglaries would there be? This is a -
HARLOW: It sounds -
SHERMAN: Yes, go ahead.
HARLOW: It sounds to me like you're saying -- and please correct me if I'm hearing you wrong, but it sounds like you're saying you don't think that you're going to get Republicans on board, and you certainly don't think the president is going to be removed from office, but this is the best you can do.
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Is that your feeling right now, Congressman?
SHERMAN: No one is coming on CNN and predicting that there will be 20 Republican senators who join the Democratic senators and vote to remove this president. But no one should come on this and say that impeachment is therefore meaningless.
The impeachment process is the check that we do have. And if the president felt completely invulnerable, God knows what he would have done.
HARLOW: It's an interesting argument and an interesting point, and one I haven't heard much.
SHERMAN: That's why I came on.
HARLOW: We always appreciate that.
So to that point, listen to this from Democrat Andrew Yang, who is running for president. Here is the argument he made to my colleague, Wolf Blitzer, last night.
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ANDREW YANG (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: The fact is Donald Trump thrives on attention, even negative attention. And so the concentration on the impeachment proceedings, I don't think is going to work for the Democrats, particularly because not a single Republican has crossed party lines.
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HARLOW: Do you think he has a point? He is saying this could backfire for the party.
SHERMAN: Well, we're not doing this for the party. We're doing it for the country. We're not doing it because it's a clever political poll-tested device. We're doing it because the Constitution demands it.
That being said, support for impeachment and removal is right about positive 2 percent. It stayed there consistently over the last month. But if the party turns its back on the Constitution, ignores its responsibility to do everything it can to control this president, then what would happen to our support in the polls? This party has got to stand up for the country.
HARLOW: We do know, at least from "The Washington Post" reporting, that the language shift among Democrats on the Intelligence Committee and elsewhere from quid pro quo to bribery may not have been poll- tested but it was focus group-tested. But I hear your point.
So to your final point --
SHERMAN: I -- well, long before there was any focus group, I was on saying, don't speak Latin. Bribery is the English.
HARLOW: I think Sciutto -- Jim Scuitto -- is, I believe, fluent in Latin. So he can school us all on that.
SHERMAN: Let's put it like this. I know enough about politics to know that the Latin-speaking quadrant is not what you're really aiming for (ph).
HARLOW: Yes. Well, there you go. Final point, you say this is not about party, this is about country. If that's the case, would it be prudent for the Democratic Party led by Nancy Pelosi on the House side of this right now to wait? She says, we're not at the mercy of the courts. We're going to get a McGahn ruling possibly on Monday. That could inform Bolton, et cetera, through the courts on whether they can be compelled to testify and the limits potentially of executive privilege.
If it's about the country and the process and not the party and not 2020, then should the Democrats move more slowly on this, wait to try to get documents, wait to hear from more people?
SHERMAN: If we wait until we get all the evidence of all the crimes committed by this president, it's going to be well into the next decade. The fact is when we have --
HARLOW: Come on, Congressman.
SHERMAN: Look --
HARLOW: Like how long are you willing to wait?
SHERMAN: No. The point I'm making is we shouldn't wait until we have all the evidence of all the crimes, because new crimes come up every few months.
What we should do is move forward when we have the proof that he committed a particular high crime and misdemeanor.
I think we have reached that point, but it wouldn't hurt for us to get a bit more information. That's why we'll have hearings in the Judiciary Committee that will add on to what we've done in the Intelligence Committee.
But I think there's no doubt in the minds of the American people, this president was trying to get dirt on Biden for his own political purposes, and he held up American aid to an ally to do that. The only question before us now is, is that reason enough to impeach the president, or should we say no harm, no foul?
HARLOW: I really appreciate the conversation and you coming on. Thank you, Congressman Brad Sherman.
SHERMAN: Thank you.
HARLOW: Have a nice holiday. Jim?
SHERMAN: Thank you.
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