MSNBC "All In with Chris Hayes" - Transcript: Interview with Rep. Joe Neguse

Interview

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Congressman Joe Neguse is a Democrat representing Colorado`s second congressional district. He previously served as an impeachment manager in the second impeachment of Donald Trump over the ex-President`s role in inciting the insurrection, and he joins me now.

It`s good to have you, Congressman, what`s your reaction to this development?

REP. JOE NEGUSE (D-CO): Well, good to be with you, Chris. I think it`s an incredibly important day for our republic, certainly for the separation of powers and congressional authority, and for the rule of law. I think that the line prosecutors at DOJ and the grand jury made the right call.

Clearly, the subpoena that was issued to Mr. Bannon, both the documentary subpoena and the testimonial subpoena, were lawful. They were duly issued, and Mr. Bannon chose to willfully disobey and defy that subpoena.

And I think that today`s decision, the decision by the Department of Justice and the grand jury to proceed with the indictment certainly sends a compelling message to each and every witness out there that witnesses can no longer ignore Congress with impunity, which of course, is you know, really became the norm during the course of the Trump administration, when you had the executive branch and a wide variety of individuals taking steps to obstruct Congressional investigations every turn. So, the fact that this indictment is now moving forward, I think is really important step.

It`s also, you know, I don`t -- as you said, important for us not to understate just the gravity of the decision. The last time that a decision of this nature was pursued by a grand jury in the context of a criminal contempt citation by Congress was before I was born in 1983. So, clearly, this is a big deal. And I`m hopeful that it will have a persuasive impact on witnesses to come who are subpoenaed by the committee.

HAYES: I want to read just what the committee statement put out by the chair and vice chair. "Steve Bannon`s indictment should send a clear message to anyone who thinks they could ignore the Select Committee or try to stonewall our investigation. No one is above law. We will not hesitate to use the tools at our disposal to get the information we need."

I think, you know, this idea of no one being above a law which is -- which is what Dan Goldman said in that previous block. I mean, what we saw during the Trump years was these kind of, you know, these sort of gray spaces between law and norm and custom that tend to guide the kind of constitutional structure of inter branch accommodation just completely fall apart.

And in some ways, a contemporary for all is an example of that and falling apart. But it`s sort of the least bad option it seems to me.

NEGUSE: That`s precisely right. I mean, look, during the course of the Trump administration, you had norm after norm really eviscerated. And perhaps the most salient example of that was this notion that witnesses could essentially avoid subpoenas entirely and willfully disobeyed them engage in total defiance with impunity and with no consequence.

And I think the fact that this indictment is now been filed, we`ll disabuse people of that notion moving forward. Obviously, the decision also underscores a topic that you and I have discussed previously, which is that the Congress shouldn`t have to rely on the executive branch to enforce its prerogatives, right?

At the end of the day, Article One provides for the Congress, right? It`s the first branch of government and the notion that it has to rely on the Department of Justice to execute a contempt citation, to me, underscores the need for reform.

On the congressional side, of course, inherent contempt is something that myself, Ted Lieu, other members of the Judiciary Committee have proposed in the past and I think, notwithstanding today`s decision is something we should pursue into the future.

HAYES: Well, there`s a broader question and implication here, right? Which is that both parties will be in different situations in terms of which offices they occupy, whether that`s the White House with an opposition Congress. You know, there`s sort of -- there`s institutional branch of equities to protect here. And then there`s, you know, the sort of partisan possibilities.

And I saw Jim Jordan who said today threatening, hey, look, we`re going to come after Ron Klain, the Chief of Staff and Jake Sullivan, the National Security Adviser. We want to hear testimony from them.

Now, under longstanding executive privilege jurisprudence, they would be exempted from that, that`s squarely in the executive privilege, sort of, basket. But I guess if you -- I wonder what you think about that threat and what it means, sort of, going forward.

[20:25:04]

NEGUSE: Yes. I would say, Chris, I don`t take that particularly seriously. Look, at the end of the day, the purported invocations of privilege that we`re talking about here by someone like Steve Bannon, who, as you said, was a private citizen, who had not worked at the White House, literally, for years, who decided to completely disregard the subpoena, not just, you know, come and testify and ultimately invoke privileges and attempt to avoid discussing certain subjects, but just decided not to show up at all.

That`s the kind of defiance akin to sort of the absolute privileges that were invoked by various officials during the Trump administration that I don`t think our constitutional order can stand. And so that -- that`s really the distinction here. You have very extreme examples, of course, in the case of Mr. Bannon, and I think in the case of some other witnesses that have been subpoenaed by the January 6 committee.

And look, at the end of the day, I`m always going to fall on the side of congressional oversight and the idea that separation of powers has to be maintained. And to do that, it means that the Congress has a constitutional duty to engage in oversight, and that we ought to protect it.

HAYES: Yes. I mean, you are overlooking the podcaster privilege, the James Madison put into the constitution. That`s an important protection for people talking to microphones.

Congressman Joe Neguse, thank you for joining us tonight.

NEGUSE: Good to see you, Chris.

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