CNN "The Lead with Jake Tapper" - Transcript: Interview with Congressman Adam Schiff

Interview

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[16:17:32]

TAPPER: In our politics lead today: a sharp divide widening in the Republican Party this week.

President Trump's most ardent supporters planning to try to overturn president-elect Joe Biden's victory during Wednesday's formal Electoral College campaign Congress. Many top Republicans, however, are warning their colleagues to skip the stunt.

House Republican Conference Chair Liz Cheney saying their effort is -- quote -- "directly at odds with the Constitution's clear text and our core beliefs as Republicans" -- unquote.

Joining me now, Democratic Congressman Adam Schiff of California, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee.

Chairman Schiff, thanks so much for joining us.

Probably not every day you agree with Liz Cheney. Have you talked much with your Republican colleagues in the House? What are you hearing from them?

REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D-CA): Well, it's been very difficult, actually, with the pandemic to have many conversations the way we usually would on the House floor.

But, look, I think there are a great many Republicans like Liz Cheney who understand that what they're doing is anti-constitutional, anti- democratic, repugnant to their conservative beliefs.

But, nonetheless, you have well over 100 House Republicans, about a dozen Senate Republicans who, for reasons of fear or ambition, are ready to shred their oaths.

And it's a real low point for our democracy in a four years of low points. But it's not like we didn't see this coming. This is what the president has wrought for years now.

TAPPER: Well, I -- it's not that we didn't see this coming from the president, although I don't know that we saw it going to this lengths.

But I have -- I confess I am surprised to see Kevin McCarthy and Steve Scalise and the House Republican leadership other than Cheney signing up to this nonsense. They signed on to that crazy lawsuit from the Texas attorney general that the Supreme Court threw out the window. And now they're going forward with this effort.

If Kevin McCarthy were speaker right now, and thus able to actually block electoral votes from being counted in the House, I don't know the law. Would that keep Joe Biden from being president, if McCarthy were in the majority?

SCHIFF: Well, it could if Mitch McConnell or Senate Republicans had a majority there that was also willing to do the president's dirty work. Now, I don't know that that's the case in the Senate.

But you may have had a higher estimation of Kevin McCarthy than I did. Sadly, he's proven to be exactly who I think he is, which is driven by politics and power alone, with little regard for the Constitution or his obligations of office.

[16:20:10]

So, I have had for years, sadly, to acclimate to that kind of GOP leadership. But, look, even though it's going to fail, it is doing real damage to our democracy, because it's establishing a precedent.

And should the party majorities differ in the future, as you point out, it could lead to catastrophe. It could lead to a Congress deciding, the people have spoken, but we don't like what they have had to say, and we're simply going to overturn the election.

That's not what the Constitution says.

TAPPER: Just a short time ago, we watched Georgia election official Gabriel Sterling rattling off a long list of fact-checks of these wild, deranged conspiracy theories that he heard from President Trump on that tape when he tried to pressure the secretary of state of Georgia.

Sterling is a Republican. He's clearly exasperated. Do you think he changed any minds? Or is this just far beyond the convincing stage at this point when it comes to the millions of Republicans who are being told these lies and are believing them?

SCHIFF: I think it's enormously important that Republicans of principle speak out.

And you do see many of them doing that. And you see some in elected office, like Mitt Romney, Liz Cheney. It's enormously important. It can't be just the Democrats defending the Constitution. It requires all people of good principle to do the same.

Does it matter, when there there's a powerful conservative media echo chamber that's going to repeat the president's lies and falsehoods? It still matters. It may not sway the majority of GOP voters out there, but it does reach people. And it's our duty. So, I applaud them for what they're doing. We all are in this together.

TAPPER: Yes. SCHIFF: And this is a real stress test for our democracy.

TAPPER: Your colleague Republican Congressman Chip Roy of Texas did something interesting last night. He challenged the seating of the delegations of members of the House from Arizona, Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Georgia, and Nevada.

He wanted his colleagues on record, saying, if the vote counts in those states for Joe Biden were wrong, then so were the counts for you.

Do you think any of the Republicans in the House got the point?

(LAUGHTER)

SCHIFF: They all get the point, Jake. It's not that they're living in some fantasyland, that they don't understand what they're doing, that they drank the Kool-Aid.

They know exactly what they're doing, which, really, in a way makes it worse, because they understand they are perpetuating a falsehood, and they're willing to do it. They know what their oaths require, and they cannot uphold it.

But they have no -- no misunderstanding about just how fallacious these claims of fraud are. They're doing it because of naked ambition. Some want to run for president in the Senate. Others don't want to antagonize the president's base, and it's motivated by fear.

But you would hope that devotion to country would be greater than either one of those other attributes, but apparently not.

TAPPER: House Democrats have begun drafting a resolution seeking to censure President Trump because of this phone call with the Georgia secretary of state. Is that going to happen?

And was what the president did there illegal, in your view?

SCHIFF: It's very possibly illegal.

And Georgia may investigate. The subsequent -- the Justice Department in the new administration may have to look into it as well. I think that phone call, like that corrupt phone call the president had with the president of Ukraine, needs to be viewed in the surrounding circumstances.

This call didn't happen in isolation. It's part of a pattern with the president of trying to overturn the election. So, it's very possibly a violation of criminal and other laws.

In terms of what the House can do, right now, Jake, we are focused on Wednesday, and that is making sure that we get past that critical date in the history of our democracy. And then I think we will turn to figuring out, OK, what step, if any, should the House take in these waning days of this administration?

TAPPER: Democratic Congressman Adam Schiff of California, thank you so much. Appreciate you being here.

SCHIFF: Thank you.

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