CNN "CNN Newsroom" - Transcript: Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) is Interviewed about Impeachment; Mitch McConnell's Power

Interview

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SCIUTTO: Let's speak now with one of the trial's jurors. He is Senator Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island.

Sheldon, we -- Senator, we appreciate you taking the time this morning.

SEN. SHELDON WHITEHOUSE (D-RI): Good to be with you, and good morning.

SCIUTTO: So as you watched the series of amendments fall by a party line vote, only one Republican going on one of the lesser votes later in the evening. Does this tell you that Democrats really just don't have any leverage in the Senate on these key issues, especially with still an open question now as to whether witnesses will be called?

WHITEHOUSE: Well, the Senate in this matter operates by a majority. And the Republicans have the majority. And that's a fact we have to live with.

The problem for the Republicans is that the American public is the ultimate judge over whether they're using or abusing their majority power. And I think last night what we saw was an abuse of their majority power. It is a very distinct aberration in the long tradition of American law to keep out evidence that is not excludable under any legal theory and that you know is sitting there. In fact, it's actually in boxes in some of these agencies awaiting delivery but for the president's desire that it be blocked.

So the peculiarity of what they did, I hope, is something that the American public is paying attention to. This isn't the way the system is supposed to work.

HARLOW: Senator, we saw Susan Collins late last night in one -- at one time, one out of 11 different moves here, vote with the Democrats on one of the 11 amendments put forward by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer. And then her office put out a statement that seemed pretty typical until the last line. And here's what they wrote. Quote, she says, it is likely that I would support a motion to subpoena witnesses at that point in the trial just as I did in '99. The language is different than she's used. Now she's saying it is likely. Do you sense a shift here?

WHITEHOUSE: Well, Mitch McConnell is a master of Senate tactics.

[09:50:01]

And one of his Senate tactics is what we call the hall pass, which is when he gives a few of his Republicans permission to vote against him, but never in sufficient numbers to make any difference.

HARLOW: So she got a hall pass?

WHITEHOUSE: So, on balance, there's still a phalanx of centurions marching in lock-step under Mitch's command.

SCIUTTO: It's CNN's reporting, speaking to that, that McConnell is arguing behind the scenes that to call witnesses would be a constitutional issue, that it would somehow break the separation of responsibilities between the House and the Senate.

I'm curious what your response is to that argument, but also what would Democrats do if that holds, right, and that this is just a hall pass for Collins, but you don't get the four Republicans you would need to call a witness?

WHITEHOUSE: Well, you've got to remember, the president's goal here is to have as little evidence as possible before the Senate and to block as much evidence as possible from the Senate and from the American people, and they're accomplishing on that goal very, very well. But to say that there's anything peculiar about having witnesses in

the Senate ignores both the history of virtually every impeachment that's ever been held and of the basic principle of American law that trials are where you consider evidence and witnesses.

SCIUTTO: Right. I'm just curious what you thought if that happens?

WHITEHOUSE: So it's very hard to make that stand up.

Huh?

SCIUTTO: I'm just curious what Democrats do if they don't have the votes? They just wave the white flag and say that's all we've got?

WHITEHOUSE: No, I think at that point the reversion is to the ultimate jury, which is the American public, to hold the Republicans to account for basically having fixed a legal proceeding in a manner that is unprecedented in American legal history.

HARLOW: Senator, do you think that it is worth it for Democrats politically but also for the American public to hear from witnesses like John Bolton and Mick Mulvaney and Duffey if it means that the White House calls Joe Biden and Hunter Biden, maybe tries to call Adam Schiff, is that worthwhile?

WHITEHOUSE: Remains to be seen. I think that if that were to transpire, it would become quickly evident that Bolton and Mulvaney and others were direct, percipient witnesses to the gravamen of this charge against the president and that Hunter Biden and/or Joe Biden would be mere sideshows whose testimony would properly be stricken as neither relevant nor material in any regular proceeding.

So if the Republicans wanted to dress this up that way, I think that it would be a mistake on their part. But, again, they're in the majority. And if they wish to do that, they can do that. I just don't think it ends well for them to have clearly irrelevant witnesses dragged in for political purposes.

SCIUTTO: Right.

As we speak even, new evidence is coming out as this happened a number of times now since the end of the House impeachment inquiry. This particular new evidence, new e-mails showing that the White House Budget Office laid the groundwork for freezing this Ukraine military assistance the day before the Trump/Zelensky phone call here, but also crucially shows a direct tie to the White House here, that the direction was coming from the White House.

I'm curious if this evidence, like the rest of evidence, gets blocked in the Senate, what do Democrats do with that after the fact? Do they proceed? Does the investigation proceed?

WHITEHOUSE: You see that's the -- that's the -- that's the peril here for our Republican friends. That's what is so strange about preventing the Senate from seeing known evidence. We know it's there and we know where it is and we know how to go get it. What the Republicans also know is that that is likely to come out sooner or later. Indeed much of it is coming out now.

And so they're not going to be in a position to say, oh, gosh, we never knew that evidence was there. What a pity that we didn't have the chance to consider this.

So, obviously, investigation and oversight of this will continue. Obviously people like Bolton will write their books. Obviously press interest will bring more things to light. And very obviously this will all be ultimately in history's eye. So any Republican senator looking at history's eye is going to be in a very awkward position voting against hearing evidence that they know is there and that, as your question suggests, they know is going to come out sooner or later.

HARLOW: Senator, given Alan Dershowitz' 180 here and arguing on behalf of the president, the constitutional issues, and he now believes that, you know, you need a crime, a spelled-out crime under the criminal code to impeach, he didn't think that in '98-'99, but given that, looking back, would it have been prudent for your fellow Democrats in the House to include bribery, for example, as an article of impeachment?

WHITEHOUSE: I don't want to second guess them on that.

[09:55:00]

I think what everybody in the Senate knows is that if you look at the conduct that is charged in the abuse of power article, the conduct is solicitation of a bribe as that term is defined under federal criminal law. The fake investigation is a thing of value. It was solicited by the president. It is embedded in that article.

Ditto the abuse of the obstruction of Congress count. Actually obstruction of justice has a special specific law for the obstruction of congressional proceedings. So embedded very clearly within both of the articles of impeachment is a clear criminal law violation.

HARLOW: Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, clearly you have a busy, big, long day ahead, so thanks for spending some of your morning --

WHITEHOUSE: Another long day. Thanks for having me.

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