MSNBC "The Beat with Ari Melber" - Transcript: Interview with Adam Schiff

Interview

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MELBER: That`s the pressure on those committee members.

Meanwhile, America seems far less divided than part of the Republican Party; 72 percent of the nation includes people saying there is at least something more to learn about this riot and many unanswered questions.

Joining me now is someone at the center of all of this, including prior investigations of Donald Trump`s misconduct, Congressman Adam Schiff, Democrat of California. He chairs the Intelligence Committee and oversaw that first Trump impeachment. He also will serve on this pivotal January 6 committee.

Thank you for being here, sir.

REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D-CA): Good to be with you.

MELBER: Let`s start with the framework of your membership here on the committee. You have got a lot of experience. I think viewers have come to know some of the role you have played in investigations.

How will you be working with the two Republicans the speaker put on the committee? And why is it important, do you think, to the speaker -- you`re part of her leadership team as a chair -- to make sure there are Republicans on the committee, but ones who are, in her view, committed to the integrity of the probe?

SCHIFF: Well, so far, we have really been working seamlessly.

Ideally, this investigation should be nonpartisan. And that`s very much how we`re approaching it. I think Adam Kinzinger and Liz Cheney approaching it in very much the same fashion. We all want to get to the truth. We want to provide a thorough, objective report to the American people about what went into that terrible day, why we didn`t get reinforcements when the attack was under way, what the knowledge was before that day, and, most importantly, what do we do to protect the country going forward?

Those aren`t partisan questions. And we`re all determined to bring a serious approach to this. And I think those two Republicans are every bit as adamant about getting to the truth as we are.

MELBER: I appreciate your point on doing it without partisanship. And a lot of this is about facts and evidence, which shouldn`t be partisan at all.

We have seen more videos. We have learned more from some of these opened DOJ probes, as you know. But there`s also the aspect of, what did the president know and when did he know it, which speaks to the role that he and others may have had, not only in bringing all those people to Washington, but then in what to do about what became the insurrection.

Congressman McCarthy has sort of started to migrate on whether he would provide testimony to you or to your committee. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

QUESTION: Would you be willing to testify about your conversation with Donald Trump on January 6 if you were asked by an outside commission?

REP. KEVIN MCCARTHY (R-CA): Sure.

QUESTION: Do you still stand by that? Are you still prepared to testify about your conversation?

MCCARTHY: Well, my phone call is out there.

The question is, do you make a phone call after people are in the Capitol to advise the president of what`s going on? Doesn`t get to the answer of, why were we ill-prepared?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MELBER: He has evidence, being a part of one of those pivotal conversations with then President Trump.

Do you think that his testimony is necessary in this investigation. And, if he refuses, would you seek ways to try to compel it?

[18:40:09]

SCHIFF: Well, I`m not surprised to hear him hedging now.

I think he was willing to make those statements when he didn`t think there would be an investigation, when he thought they had successfully killed the commission that was first proposed and was the product of negotiations between Democrat Chair Bennie Thompson and Republican John Katko. Now he seems to be singing a different tune.

But, look, that conversation might very well have had to do with why the Capitol was so ill-prepared and protected. We don`t know what the administration knew in advance about these white nationalist groups that were going to be participating in that rally that had preplanned this attack on the Capitol. And we don`t know why it took so long to bring in the National Guard and other reinforcements.

So, if that call is relevant, if his testimony is relevant, then I`m sure we will seek it.

MELBER: How are you going to distinguish between what might be called protected speech, however fanciful or obnoxious it may be, around January 6, for example, some of the Republicans who spoke at the rally and talked about not certifying the result?

But of course, they technically have that choice to make. They have that ability to decide whether to certify or not. How do you distinguish between that and what we saw in some of the militia organizing, the Proud Boys, the efforts to actually use violence to, however sloppily, try to have some sort of citizen coup?

Where`s that line for you, as an investigator?

SCHIFF: Well, our role is going to be to fully uncover the facts.

What is it that people did at that rally to instigate violence? How many of them went to that rally fully planning to do violence even before it began? Where was the financing for it? What role did the administration play in it?

The decision about whether it`s First Amendment-protected activity or its violence directed at the Capitol and directed at people in the Capitol, those decisions are really ultimately made by the Justice Department in deciding who to prosecute. That won`t be our role in this committee.

But it will be our role to lay out, in a very objective fashion, what role each of those components played in what ended up being that bloody attack on the Capitol.

MELBER: Is there in writing or anywhere a clear sort of framework for where your work begins and ends?

For example, we were covering the horrific plan to bomb political headquarters of one of the major parties, the Democratic Party, in California. That comes out of a context of right-wing hate speech and other things, but it comes far after January 6.

Now that this committee is really going, and you have got your experience with investigations, how will you define those boundaries? And will the public know in real time sort of where your inquiry starts and ends?

SCHIFF: Well, we begin with the organizing documents.

So, the legislation establishing the January 6 select committee will be the paramount guide. But then, now that we`re constituted, we will sit down with our staff, and we will map out, OK, what`s the scope of what we`re going to look at within what`s defined by the statute?

Now, as we learn more, that scope may expand because there are things related to January 6. But the focus is January 6. The focus also is in preventing this from happening again. And to the degree that other things are relevant to that, they will be relevant.

But there is plenty to uncover about what took place that day. And so we will have more than our plate full with that. But we intend to follow the evidence where it leads and be guided by the language of the statute.

MELBER: And final question, Congressman.

I know it`s early yet, but we always want to ask these questions because it`s important and interesting to some degree. The 9/11 Commission was seen as a high watermark of some of this. As you mentioned earlier, parts of it were quite nonpartisan in getting through the evidence.

And, ultimately, it provided a framework for some policy changes. There are older examples. The Church Committee came out of allegations of government misconduct and led to reforms to surveillance.

Given your experience here, do you see any avenues where you might hope that not only do you find facts, but you could provide some nonpartisan framework for things that might be better improved?

Because, when you put some of this -- some of the Republican lies to the side, I would at least help the most Americans look at this and say, anything reasonable that can be done to prevent anything like this ever getting near the Capitol or near security targets again would be worth considering.

SCHIFF: Well, absolutely.

And that`s really the goal, is to write a report that has credibility with the American people and recommendations that we can get buy-in for and implement like the 9/11 Commission.

[18:45:03]

Now, I don`t need to tell you we`re at a different place in our country`s history right now than we were a 9/11 and we were when the Church Committee was established. It`s a much more polarized country. Our information is more balkanized.

So, in that respect, the job of our committee is going to be more difficult than it has in the past. But we`re just going to have to work harder at it, because, at the end of the day, protecting the country going forward is what this is all about.

One final note, and that is, this was ultimately an attack on the Capitol motivated by people who could not accept losing an election, and made the decision that they would use violence to achieve a political object that they can`t at the ballot box.

And that danger to our democracy is one we`re going to have to address. And it will be part of the scope of what we look at. But that`s a big, important question for the whole country that we`re going to have to wrestle this.

MELBER: A member of this new commission, as well as Intelligence chairman, Adam Schiff.

Thank you, sir.

SCHIFF: Thank you.

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