This is a rush transcript from "Hannity," August 1, 2017. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
HANNITY: Many thanks to our friends on The Five. This is a Fox News alert. Welcome to Hannity. A massive breaking story tonight from circanews.com. Sara Carter, former Obama national security advisor, Ben Rhodes is now tonight a person of interest in the House Intel Committee's unmasking investigation.
We'll get all the details coming up in mere moments. First, the five forces working to destroy President Trump are now kicking their efforts into overdrive. They want to bring down, delegitimizing this commander-in- chief. Laura Ingraham will weigh in on that in our breaking news.
The Washington, D.C., swamp, they are waging an all-out war against the president. How is it possible for the president to govern when his own party is just pathetic? Tonight's important breaking news and opening monologue.
All right, a reminder, as we've been telling you now four months, five forces aligning to take down President Trump but what we're now seeing in this day and age unfold is far worse than ever before. Let's start with the deep state, they are the most dangerous.
Selectively leaking information meant to damage and hurt the president. Now, the perfect example, it happened again last night. 'Washington Post' citing an anonymous source, shocking anonymous, reporting the present was personally involved in the statement about his son Don, Jr.'s meeting with the Russian lawyer.
I guess we live in a day and age where a father can't even help his son when false, phony allegations are being made. This, of course, is nothing new. It's part of the deep state playbook. They want to inflict the maximum amount of damage to the Trump administration.
And, that's the only beginning of this massive problem. We have leaks from the intelligence community. They have reached out of control's levels. They want to hurt the president, stop his agenda, 125 leaks in 126 days? Seven times greater than what we saw from the previous two administrations.
It's why now the Trump administration finally is taking action. The Attorney General Jeff Sessions, he is expected to now hold a press conference later this week on this very issue, finally. I have been arguing people need to be held accountable. People broke the law. They belong in jail.
It couldn't come at a better time because as we've been telling you, Circa.com, Sarah Carter has reported the FBI general counsel, now, is also under investigation for leaking national security information again to the media.
The general counsel of the FBI? We know that James Comey wrote memos on government computers, some of it classified and removed it from the FBI, had a friend leak it to 'The New York Times'. He wanted a special counsel and he got it.
The Department of Justice needs to find out who are these leakers, prosecute them to the fullest extent of the law. And, on top of that, the second big force, the destroy Trump media. Their so called reporting on this administration is so completely abusively biased, it has now reached unparalleled levels.
They are now completely out of touch and unhinged. Look at this, a recent Harvard study found more than 90 percent of NBC, CNN, CBS coverage about the president is negative. And, that's why the president continues to call out the fake news media.
Earlier today he tweeted, 'Only the fake news media and Trump enemies want me to stop using social media, 110 million people. Only way for me to get out the truth.' Well, that's an understatement. And, of course the establishment destroyed Trump press. They refuse to let up on the attacks on the president. Want some examples? These are the most recent ones, take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEOCLIP)
CHRIS MATTHEWS, MSNBC: I think all this going around and purging people, just like Kim Jong Un. What is he doing? Knocks off all his relatives when he gets scared. When you get scared of your position you start killing people around you. We don't do this in this country. We fire them.
JAKE TAPPER, CNN: The White House resembling the red wedding from 'Game of Thrones'.
(END VIDEOCLIP)
HANNITY: Kim Jong Un, that's who are going to compare the president to? We'll have a lot more on the destroy Trump media later in the show tonight with more examples you need to see. The next group, the Democrats, they've made it very clear. They will obstruct, as they say resist the president in every turn no matter what the issue is.
If they really cared about the forgotten men and women, 50 million in poverty, food stamps, lowest labor participation rate, although we have almost 1 million new jobs now, wouldn't they offer some solution to help the American people out?
Then reestablish Republicans. We already saw them fail and fail miserably. They couldn't even repeal and replace ObamaCare. Breaking a major promise they've been making for seven years. And, what John McCain and others like Lisa Murkowski did last week it was inexcusable.
Instead of working to keep their word, well some of these Republicans they appear ready to throw in the towel move on to the next issue. Which proves as we have been saying that Republicans have no spine, you have no backbone, no vision, no willingness to fight for the American people.
You don't have any identity. What are you people stand for now? And then the Never Trumpers, all right forget them. The so called Republicans, they want the president to fail just so they can say I told you say. One example, look at Arizona Senator Jeff Flake. He's releasing a new book. He goes after President Trump and Republicans have supported him.
Take a look at him selling his book.
(BEGIN VIDEO)
FLAKE: The party has lost its way. We've given in to nativism and protectionism. There are times when you have to stand up and say, I'm sorry this is wrong. I'm very concerned about where the party is going and kind of the anti-immigration fervor. Somehow conservative - conservatism has become being mean or loud.
(END VIDEO)
HANNITY: No, senator, you've lost your way. Instead of trying to sell your books, maybe, Senator, you should be focusing on lowering ObamaCare premiums. Let's look at your home state of Arizona. Let's see, in the last year alone, they went up 116 percent, the highest in the nation. So the Never Trumpers, like Senator Flake, they don't seem to understand that by blocking the president's agenda and you see the reaction he gets around the country, they're only harming you, the American people.
The President's son, Eric Trump, who was on the show last night, he summed it up perfectly. Watch this.
(BEGIN VIDEO)
TRUMP: I mean I want somebody to start fighting for him, you know he's the best fighter in the world, he will do a better job fighting for himself than all of them will do fighting for him, but I mean how much weight does he have to carry by himself?
The DNC is in debt, the Republicans are raising seven times on a monthly basis, what the DNC - - look why wouldn't they embrace that? Why wouldn't they carry out - - my father has the voice of this country. The people of this country love him, why wouldn't they get in line?
It doesn't make sense - -
(END VIDEO)
HANNITY: And he represents Conservative principles, Eric is right about that. So how is it possible for the president to govern on principles Republicans say they support when even Republicans don't have his back?
And they're undermining him, now Republicans you need to either start working to help the American people, pass the agenda you say you support or get out of the way.
Or better yet, you're going to be fired and nothing is going to be able to stop that. Now that we've given you the background information about exactly what's going on, exactly what the president and his administration are up against, I want to point out a massive double standard when it comes to media coverage in this country.
Earlier today, the White House Press Secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, called out the press - - the establishment press for ignoring - - you've heard it on this program, not many other places, massive Democratic scandals, good for her. Watch this.
(BEGIN VIDEO)
SANDERS: You guys are focused on a meeting that Don, Jr. had no consequence when the Democrats actually colluded with a foreign government, like Ukraine, the Democrat-linked firm, Fusion GPS, actually took money from the Russian government while it created the phony dossier that's been the basis for all of the Russia scandal fake news.
And if you want to talk further about a relationship with Russia, look no further than the Clintons as we've said time and time again, Bill Clinton was paid $500,000 to give a speech to a Russian bank and was personally thanked by Putin for it. Hillary Clinton allowed one-fifth of America's uranium to reserve to be sold to a Russian firm whose investors were Clinton Foundation donors.
And the Clinton Campaign Chairman's brother lobbied against sanctions on Russia's largest bank and failed to report it. If you guys want to talk about having relations, which you seemed obsessed with doing, look no further than there.
(END VIDEO)
HANNITY: Checkmate, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, great job today. That's exactly what the media should be covering, but they don't because they are completely, abusively biased. They're leftwing, ideological hacks; they only care about advancing their anti-Trump narrative. And they're obsessed 24/7.
I decided tonight I want to turn the tables on the establishment destroy Trump meeting just for a minute. Think about all these examples. How would the media react if a Republican member of Congress kept an IT guy on the payroll under investigation for double billing the government and reportedly smashed his hard drives, even though his lawyer denies it, and seemingly there were people unqualified for IT work, being paid a fortune.
People who worked at a car dealership and at a McDonald's, the press would go insane if that involved a Republican, if that involved President Trump or his Campaign and not Debbie Wasserman Schultz. And here's another example, how would the media react if President Trump deleted 33,000 emails and then used acid wash BleachBit to get rid of them totally?
Then mishandled secret - - top secret - - and special access classified information on a private server and smashed mobile phones with hammers; and what if Donald Trump's lawyers turned over BlackBerrys to the FBI that didn't have any SIM cards? What good are they?
How would the media react if Politico reported, like back in January, that it was a Republican, an RNC operative who met with the Ukrainian ambassador at the Ukrainian embassy? How would they react if the Republican Attorney General met with Melania on a tarmac - - airport tarmac for 40 minutes, just before that person was about to make a decision involving possible crimes they committed. How would the media react if Donald Trump himself -- want to talk about Russia -- if he gave up to 20 percent of America's uranium to Vladimir Putin and the Russians and he got kicked back to some Trump charity or the Trump organization over $145 million.
Turn the tables on him, there's no doubt the media would be in a breathless all-out frenzy. But since those scandals don't involve Democrats they don't care. It's why Congress -- not only are they not legislating, they need to take the lead. We gave them power, the power of subpoena, the power to investigate issues like this.
In the House Judiciary Committee, they're finally now calling on a second special council to appoint an investigation into Hillary Clinton, James Comey, Lorretta Lynch. I shouldn't end there. Congress has subpoena powers, you gave it to them.
They have committees who need to start calling people involved in all of those scandals we have been talking about. Put them under oath, make them testify about what they know. That means Hillary Clinton, top members of her campaign. That means Debbie Wasserman Schultz, that means Loretta Lynch, James Comey, all of them.
Here with a reaction, Editor-in-Chief of LifeZette, Fox News contributor, nationally syndicated radio host and sometimes friend, not all the time friend, Laura Ingraham. How are you?
LAURA INGRAHAM; FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: I'm just enjoying -- I was enjoying the last several minutes. We got that viral on YouTube. I'm putting that on my Facebook page, featuring it on LifeZette, that's everywhere. But Sean, you are totally right. But double standard is so glaring.
It's actually laughable if weren't so serious. But if any of the facts that you just laid out, which apply to the Democrats, apply to Loretta Lynch, apply to the Justice Department of the Obama Administration were applicable to Donald Trump, they would be calling for him. They would be demanding multiple special prosecutors, special investigation and this is where the responsibility now lies.
It lies with Congress and people like Devin Nunes who are trying to do the right thing shouldn't be given -- throw little bones to him, Congressman Nunes, who they tried to sideline on the other investigation.
But this should be a serious inquiry into government wrong doing and the use of our criminal justice to -- our criminal justice laws to settle political differences. That also has to be examined because we know going all the way back to the IRS scandal with Lois Lerner and that total fiasco, that the Obama's were serious about intimidating the right, preventing them from speaking on key issues and fighting back in every way that they know how.
And, the Republicans, they're always playing this genteel game of politics and the Democrats are -- they're out for blood. I mean they're out for political blood and they mean business.
HANNITY: Well, they're Republicans. This is the thing.
INGRAHAM: I think you pointed out, a lot of them don't want Donald Trump to succeed, a lot of them don't like his policies. You heard from Jeff Flake, he represents not just himself and maybe John McCain, he represents a significant Chamber of Commerce wing of the Republican party on immigration, trade and going onto the intervention reform policy of George W. Bush, which some people might disagree with as well.
HANNITY: Hey Laura, what do -- how do they get away with smashing to smithereens, hard-drives, how do they get away with deleting subpoenaed emails, 33,000. How do they get away with acid washed bleach pit, how do they get away with hammers?
Did you every take a hammer to a Blackberry on an iPhone? How do you get away with sending the FBI devices without SIM cards? Why do I think I would spend eternity in jail and you would have to bring me cake with a file?
INGRAHAM: Well, they don't have officials at their Justice Department who will rush to recues themselves, number one. Everyone knows I love Jess Sessions, but that -- I understand why Donald Trump is not happy about that because that did set off a chain of reaction that really ended up creating this whole special council nightmare for Trump in the first place.
But, Republicans play the safe, gentlemanly game of politics and I keep saying this, they agree with the Democrats on a lot of these key issues and they don't agree with Donald Trump on a lot of key issues.
HANNITY: That's not what they told us though.
INGRAHAM: But they're not willing to fight for him, they're not willing to fight for the policies that he's in favor of.
HANNITY: They lied to us Laura.
INGRAHAM: What's that?
HANNITY: They lied to voters in 2010, 2014 and 2016.
INGRAHAM: Oh yes. Well, yes. And they don't like the fact that Donald Trump called them out for doing that in 2016. Remember Sean, you pointed this out numerous times, Donald Trump won without the consultants that all of these candidates hire election after election.
People who are now talking about talk radio and Fox News is the problem. They're all consultants who Trump never needed. He went on his own political instinct which is a 95 percent excellence. His own wit, wisdom and pragmatism. And tweeting and social media, he used all of it to battle them basically by himself with a few us who supported him.
HANNITY: He crushed them.
INGRAHAM: And he won.
HANNITY: He crushed them. He won.
INGRAHAM: He crushed them and they never got over it. The day after the election they began plotting what they hoped would be his demise.
HANNITY: Right. Stay with us. When we come back, we'll devote an entire segment to the breaking major news story from Sarah Carter, Ben Rhodes, Obama aid now a person of interest in the Congress, unmasking investigation. We have all those details and a big Hannity surprise tonight. We'll tell you about it straight ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HANNITY: Welcome back to "Hannity" a Fox News alert. Circa News' Sara Carter, she'll be on tomorrow night. A major breaking story tonight.
Former Obama White House National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes is in fact now a person of interest in the House Intel Committee's investigation into unmasking.
We continue now with Laura Ingraham. I wanted to hold this for its own unique segment because it's Susan Rice now. Now, we have the article about James Clapper, then we have the article about Ben Rhodes and more leaks.
Seven times the amount of leaks than the previous two administrations.
Unless people go to jail for the felonies they're committing we're never going to see an end to this are we? And, I'm not saying anyone's guilty but it's got to be gotten to the bottom of.
INGRAHAM, CONSERVATIVE POLITICAL COMMENTATOR, FOX NEWS: Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act looks like, according to Sara Carter's reporting could have been the backdoor that was used for this unmasking. And if this unmasking was done in any way for political motives or without going through the proper channels, then this is a felony.
You can't do this for political purposes. That happens in a police state. That doesn't happen in the United States of America. And last time I checked, we weren't a police state and you're not supposed to be able to spy on your political enemies, you're supposed to defeat them at the ballot box.
And Ben Rhodes at the national security -- the national security advisor and others are going to have to answer these questions. I know we met with the Senate Intelligence Committee last week. That was on the Russian probe. We don't know if the issue of unmasking was probed in depth, then, Sean.
But I certainly hope that Susan Rice is finally going to be willing to speak to these committees because as we know, she has refused to testify. She will not testify. Why?
HANNITY: As Pete Hoekstra -- well, she's going to have to testify. I want to -- you said something that is so very important. And Pete Hoekstra actually used the term he's deeply concerned. I want to explain to people why this is important and I want to get your response.
We give our intelligence community -- and these are brave men and women that are protecting us from ISIS, Al-Qaeda, China, Russia, Iran, all our enemies. We give them these powerful tools and then 99 percent of intel people risk their lives for us and deserve credit. We don't know their names, they work so hard.
But here's the problem. If those powerful tools are turned on the American people.
INGRAHAM: Yes.
HANNITY: And then the intel is leaked, like General Flynn, we have a police state, Laura by that one tenth of one percent. This is a real clear danger for Americans.
INGRAHAM: I agree. And this is why people like Rand Paul and others have long since argued against the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. And I understand there are all these conservatives, neo-conservatives and others who say no, we need this or we can't stop attacks.
The problem is that we have bad actors inside our own government, Sean.
And if you have bad actors inside our own government who are willing to spy on innocent Americans and then unmask their names for political purposes, then we're not using it for terrorists, we're using it to overturn an election or to prevent an electoral victory that they feared there was some possibility of happening.
That's what seems to have happened is they were trolling for information -- if I was a betting person, I would bet that one of these characters -- maybe it was Rhodes, maybe it was Rice -- thought you know, let's just see what they're doing. Let's see what these characters are up to.
We have a sense about Russia. Let's see what they're up to. And they went on some type of fishing expedition here, then someone should be going to jail. And the Justice Department under Jeff Sessions ought to take this very seriously and Congress ought to take this very seriously because this is becoming a deep state dictatorship if we don't curb these abuses and show people that the rule of law will be enforced.
HANNITY: I hope people are hearing us. This is really important.
INGRAHAM: It's scary.
HANNITY: And I'm going to make a prediction. It's scary and my prediction is other top Obama people will also be found involved. Top, not the intelligence community, the top people. Laura Ingraham, thank you. Great analysis.
INGRAHAM: Good to see you. Thanks.
HANNITY: You won't believe what vile things are being spewed by the mainstream media about the president. We have that and a big announcement tonight. Straight ahead.
(COMMERICAL BREAK)
JACKIE IBANEZ; FOX ANCHOR: Good evening and live from America's News Headquarters I'm Jackie Ibanez in New York. Christopher Wray is the new director of the FBI. President Trump's nominee was confirmed by the Senate today by a vote of 92 to 5. All five no votes coming from Democrats.
A former high ranking Justice Department official under George W. Bush, Wray fills the position left vacant since the former director James Comey was fired by President Trump over his investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.
And the U.S. Navy scouring the South China Sea for a missing sailor that may have gone overboard. Japanese ships and aircraft are assisting in that search. A lieutenant was reported missing from the USS Stethem, seen right here, around 9 o'clock in the morning, local time. The ship was searched multiple times to no avail. The sailor's identity is being withheld until his family has been notified.
I'm Jackie Ibanez, now back Hannity. For all your headlines, log on to foxnews.com.
SEAN HANNITY, HANNITY: Welcome back to Hannity. So as I discussed in my opening monologue, the destroy Trump establishment of the media is one of the five big forces that have tried to delegitimize and take down this president and stop his agenda.
But don't take my word for it, he is yet a small, tiny, itsy-bitsy sampling of this week’s media coverage of the administration. Remember, we're not even half way through the week. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MATT LAUER, ANCHOR, TODAY: Do you think today, in the last six months, he has damaged the credibility of the Office of the Presidency?
FRED ROGGIN, MSNBC ANCHOR: With the regularity of the nightly news, President Trump is throwing bodies out of the White House at a rate that matches the Russian Revolution. I think all this going around and purging people just like Kim Jong Un.
What's he doing, he knocks off all his relatives when he gets scared. When you get scared of your position you start killing people around you. We don't do that in this country, we fire them. Trump seems to know how to fire.
JAKE TAPPER, CNN: The White House now resembling the red wedding from the "Game of Thrones."
BRIAN STELTER, CNN: It's August now and the story of the Trump presidency every month has been his dishonesty.
FAREED ZAKARIA, CNN: He knew that election of a black president had stirred a kind of ugly racial animus among some people, probably a small subset. But he knew a way to get directly to them.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SEAN HANNITY, FOX NEWS HOST: Here with reaction, The Hill's Joe Concha, Fox News contributor Mercedes Schlapp. Joe, let me start with you. So we have got Ukraine. We've got real collusion. We've got real deletions, real acid washing, real hammers breaking devices, no SIM cards, Debbie Wasserman Schultz's case, Uranium One, James Comey, then the general counsel of the FBI, now unmasking with Ben Rhodes, our big story tonight, and that's all they still talk about. Go ahead.
JOE CONCHA, THE HILL: I was about to say, after the election we heard about a lot about soul-searching that many media members said they were going to do because basically everybody got the election wrong. The reason why they did was because they stayed in their ivory towers, media towers in Washington and New York, and didn't go out and get a true pulse of the country which focused on the economy, trade, immigration, foreign policy, those sort of topics that people in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan voted on.
So now we continue to see after the fact, after the soul-searching was supposed to be done, the same kind of coverage around palace intrigue and, more importantly, the provocative, negative personal attacks on the president like you just showed in that montage. And it's all part of this I really want to say something provocative so I get re-tweeted, I get some stories afterwards, and maybe, hopefully, if everything goes well I get a guest spot on Colbert. That's not journalism anymore, Sean. That is the stuff that soapboxes are made of.
HANNITY: Guest spot on Colbert, that's how low? But there's a really serious issue here. All of those scandals I just mentioned, it takes me too long to name them, Mercedes, but now Ben Rhodes, now unmasking on top of Susan Rice, on top of the Clapper story last week, wow. This is huge.
MERCEDES SCHLAPP, WASHINGTON TIMES: Right. And I think it's obviously the mainstream media is not necessarily wanting to focus on these very big issues associated with the Obama administration as we know with the unmasking of Trump campaign officials, whether it be Samantha Power or Susan Rice.
But I think that there's something that's happening here. It's a bit of a phenomenon. We can call it celebrity media apprentice if you want to talk about that way, which is the fact that you have these individuals out there in the media who it's not about fairness or objectivity. It's about just doing what they can to continue to beat that drum on the president and on this idea of impeaching the president, of the president being dishonest, of everything that's negative associated to the president.
But can I tell you, the American people are becoming normal. They get the joke. They understand that there is just too much negative media coverage against this president. And I think at the end they look at this and say you guys are spinning yourselves in circles here while what we need to be talking about are the kitchen table issues that matter, for example like unemployment is the lowest that we've seen in 15 years. Our GDP is at 2.6 percent this past quarter. These are things -- our stock market is at an all-time high. Sean, those are the stories that should be covered.
HANNITY: They're never going to talk about those. Joe Concha, does this ever end, or is it going to be one way from now on and they are all going to be sheep in the media?
CONCHA: One way from now on, Sean. I think there's no question about that.
I just want to compliment Tom Brokaw who said today, Tom Brokaw of all people, 77 years old, he's retired he still does some reporting. He went to Powell, Wyoming, where President Trump won with 70 percent of the vote, and he said that they blame us in the media. Quote "They don't feel any connection between what we do and how they live their lives, and they're not entirely wrong because they look at these shows doing analysis and commentary and they don't see anyone who looks like them or lives their lives that they do." It took a 77-year-old retired journalist to show journalists how they should be doing their jobs.
SCHLAPP: Sean, real quick, the media talks about the White House chaos. I think there's a media chaos that's happening.
HANNITY: Well said. That's so well said.
SCHLAPP: They are completely focused on themselves and on trying to figure out a way to destroy this president.
HANNITY: Guys, well said, both of you.
Coming up, a Republican congressman is now saying Mueller needs to go, and I have a special announcement. I'll tell you about that straight ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HANNITY: Welcome back to HANNITY. The House Judiciary Committee member Congressman Trent Franks is now calling for Robert Mueller to resign as a special counsel because of his friendship with former FBI director James Comey. In a press release, Franks said, quote, "Bob Mueller is in clear violation of federal code and must resign to maintain the integrity of the investigation into alleged Russian ties. Those who work under them have been attested he and Jim Comey possess a close friendship and they have delivered on the record statement effusing praise on one another."
Joining us now with reaction, Fox News anchor, attorney Gregg Jarrett, former White House press secretary, Fox News contributor Ari Fleischer, from Judicial Watch, Tom Fitton.
Let me, Gregg, start with you because I don't even think this is the most egregious side of this. And by that I mean I don't like that he hired Hillary Clinton's attorney that worked under the Clinton Foundation. We put up all the donors, for example, political donations from Mueller's team that went to Democrats, as we put that up on the screen. And you have been able to identify very specific statutes and laws, as you explain them, for example 28-CFR-45.2 disqualification statute. Why don't we put them up on the screen and you can explain them in what they mean?
GREGG JARRETT, FOX NEWS ANCHOR AND ATTORNEY: Yes. It essentially means that if you have a personal relationship with somebody substantially involved in the case, you shall not serve as special counsel. It goes on to explain what a personal relationship is. It's a friendship that normally is viewed as likely to induce partiality. Sean, you might as well put a picture of Mueller and Comey together next to the statute. They are at the definition of a disqualifying conflict of interest.
And Congressman Franks on the Judiciary Committee is calling for Mueller to resign. I spoke to him a short time ago, Congressman Franks, and he said there are other members of the Judiciary Committee who feel the same way, and the congressman is vowing now an official lobbying effort to convince others to come out and call for the resignation of Robert Mueller.
HANNITY: Ari Fleischer, I think this is only one of a small part, but there's a bigger part here. It is when you look at we're told now classified information leaked by James Comey to cause the appointment of a special counsel. It ends up being his close friend. There's talk that they coordinated before he testified before the Senate Intel Committee. And that relationship goes further and further. What is your reaction to all this? Should he recuse himself and get out of the way?
ARI FLEISCHER, FORMER WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: I don't think we know what the extent of the friendship is between James Comey and Robert Mueller. If there is a statute involved and they are in violation of the statute, then the deputy attorney general who has jurisdiction has got to look at that. But I don't accept that I know the definition because some people in the press have speculated that their friends. There are varying degrees of friendship. And maybe they knew each other professionally.
But Sean, for Republicans on the bigger picture here, I still think the best thing they could happen to Donald Trump is that Bob Mueller look at all the facts and exonerate Donald Trump. You can replace the person of the top but the investigation won't go away. And so nothing makes this investigation go away. I'm for getting it behind us, resolved, and I see no example or evidence of collusion. I would like Robert Mueller to be the one who says that.
HANNITY: OK, but you can't be comfortable, Ari, and I know you're a fair minded individual, you can't be comfortable with the people he's putting around him because you can't have a Clinton lawyer, Clinton donors, Obama donors, Democratic donors. Where are the Republicans on this? Is there any Republicans there? And one person with ethical problems in terms of intimidation tactics the way I interpret it in his handling of past cases.
FLEISCHER: Sean, I've said this before and I tweeted it today that they were donors, Democratic donors. That's a problem. I think Bob Mueller made a mistake in bringing them on board. He should've brought neutral people on board. And if this investigation goes anywhere beyond the investigation into collusion, meaning Donald Trump or his campaign worked with Russia to hack the DNC, Podesta, and disseminate the emails, I would be the first one to cry foul if they start going after Jared's taxes or some ancillary issues, and I will come hard on those people. But if the investigation is only on collusion, I do have faith that Bob Mueller will lead an independent investigation even with those people.
HANNITY: Ari, you saw this in the Bush years. You saw what they did to Scooter Libby. You saw how close they got to Karl Rove. You saw the investigative creep. This is a real problem with all special counsels. Let's get Tom Fitton's case, thoughts on this.
TOM FITTON, JUDICIAL WATCH: I think the problem for Mueller isn't so much his analysis of the conflicts of interest. It's did he go to the process of the Department of Justice? He could have these conflicts but they could be potentially waived under the regulations, and that would have been up to Rod Rosenstein.
So what did Rod Rosenstein do when asked about and did he go through the process of evaluating whether Mr. Comey is conflicted, or Mr. Mueller is conflicted? I think the big problem for Robert Mueller is his appointment is subject to scrutiny or skepticism as a result of Comey's misconduct and leaking those documents to get a special counsel appointed.
And so he's got to be asking questions about how he was put in there, and asking questions presumably of the witness that he's using, Mr. Comey, about whether he did anything wrong. So it's not so much about investigating President Trump and collusion. It's investigating Comey and the circumstances, frankly, of Mr. Mueller's appointment. I don't see how he can do it.
And, again, it's about time for the Justice Department to get this investigation back under control. You can have a special counsel, but not a rogue prosecutor like Mueller seems to be.
JARRETT: You can't get another control because it's not just Mueller that has a conflict of interest, it's Rod Rosenstein, Mueller's boss. He is both prosecutor and witness in this particular case. He authored the memo telling the president to fire Jim Comey. So how can he be fair and impartial here on his own and in evaluating the impartiality of Robert Mueller? He cannot. Both men should step aside.
HANNITY: We've got to break, but when we come back, I want to talk about why are Republicans -- they're not only not getting things done legislatively, they're not using their subpoena powers. And do we have equal justice under the law? Our panel continues.
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HANNITY: Welcome back to HANNITY. Former DNC chair, Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz is now under increasing pressure to answer questions about her former IT aide who was arrested for bank fraud while trying to leave the country last week. Now a watchdog group, the Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust, has now filed a complaint with the Office of Congressional Ethics questioning why Wasserman Shultz kept paying at the aide after he was barred from the House computer system. Remember the double billing issue?
We continue with Gregg Jarrett, Ari Fleischer, and Tom Fitton. Ari, as I look at that and I'm thinking the media ignores this, a, and, b, wow, she kept this guy after she knew he was double billing? Why would she possibly do that?
FLEISCHER: It's worse than the media ignoring it, Sean. Many of the leading newspapers have actually mocked those who are looking into it. It is fishy, it is odd, and generally if you're indicted for bank fraud and you leave the country members of Congress don't want you on their staff.
Debbie Wasserman Schultz just kind of did the opposite. So I do want this to be looked into, I think it will be looked into. And we need to find out. What more is there to this, and how far to the tentacles reach?
HANNITY: Gregg Jarrett, you're an attorney, and I know if I smashed hard drives and I deleted subpoenaed emails and I BleachBit the server and the computers, all the things they have done, and her i.t. guy and she keeps him on, why do I think I'd be in jail and I'd need to hire you and pay you a lot of money?
JARRETT: Her behavior is inherently suspicious. What did she know? Why in the world would she use taxpayer money to keep this guy on the payroll after he was banned from using congressional computer equipment and accessing apparently without members' permission sensitive government information on the Intelligence Committee and the Judiciary Committee? She needs to be very careful here that she isn't looking at aiding and abetting criminal behavior. Not only that, but she was caught on tape appearing to threaten a law enforcement official who seized her computer. And she was demanding it be returned or there will be consequences. That could be obstruction.
HANNITY: Wow. And Tom, to me, these run so deep. Where's the Republican Party? Where is the party that has the power of subpoena? I say Russia is a nonissue, there's been no evidence, and that's all the media talks about.
Hillary, Uranium One, Ukrainians trying to influence our election, meeting with the DNC operatives, information passed on to the DNC, Hillary's campaign. You've got Comey, Loretta Lynch and all these instances. The Republicans seem impotent. They can't get legislation done and they don't use their investigative powers.
FITTON: It's not, but it's a decision not to pursue these inquiries. It's a decision, a political decision. In the case of the Awan brothers, they don't need to worry about the administration is or isn't giving them. This is an administrative inquiry they can conduct through the House administrative committee or other committees on the Hill to figure out what is going on with these taxpayer-funded employees at Congress who are evidently committing crimes while on the government dime and who continue to work there despite strong suspicion of criminal activity.
Why aren't there hearings into what the conduct of Debbie Wasserman Schultz was? I don't understand why Republicans are refusing to ask questions of their colleagues on the Hill here. And they're relying on the media to do investigations like "The Daily Caller." We did FOIAs to the agencies. They don't want to give us anything. And it's outrageous that independent people outside of government that are doing the hardcore investigations here.
HANNITY: Last quick question, and I'll throw this to Gregg Jarrett. Gregg, there's a mountain of evidence on these issues. No evidence on Russia, and that's all we hear about is Russia. Thoughts?
JARRETT: There's something fundamentally unfair and imbalanced when you investigate the winner of a presidential election but not the loser. Hillary Clinton doesn't get a get out of jail free card simply because she lost a presidential election. And so now you've got the House Judiciary Committee asking for a special counsel to investigate Hillary Clinton, James Comey, Loretta Lynch, Samantha Power, Susan Rice. There may be a lot more there than meets the eye at first blush.
HANNITY: Guys, thank you all for being with us, appreciate it.
When we come back, I have a big announcement that I want to share with you. That's straight ahead, really big. Big, big, big.
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HANNITY: Welcome back to HANNITY. Time for our "Question of the Day." Do you agree with Congressman Trent Franks? Should Robert Mueller resign as the special counsel? Facebook.com, or Facebook, and @SeanHannity on Twitter, let us know what you think.
OK, big announcement tonight about the movie I am executive producing. I've been working on it for a number of years now. It's called "Let There Be Light." The trailer is officially out. The movie will be out October the 27th. Very proud of this project to be a small part of it with Kevin and Sam Sorbo.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, I am coming. Keep your pants on. What do we have a doorman around here for anyway?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You are drunk.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Can't pull the wool over your eyes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The basic tenet of Christianity.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Don't you dare tell me about the love and the compassion of your so-called God because if he felt like sacrificing his only begotten son, that's his business. He should have bloody well kept his hands off of mine.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What do you think it does to the boys to take the death of their brother and use it as part of your carnival act?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It pays the bills.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Daddy.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Clinically dead in the ambulance for four minutes.
It's a miracle.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I saw Davey. All I wanted to put my arms around him.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You have the best scientific explanation. It hasn't brought you any comfort. Would you consider consulting a different source?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He is your God, and he is holding out his hand. All you've got to do now is take it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Jesus gets whacked, right?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I've never exactly heard it put that way, but yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Follow me. It ain't brain surgery.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you believe that God hears us?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: God always answers prayers. Sometimes we just don't understand the answers.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don't want to lose you.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So my first question is, are you ready for the amount of heat that will be coming your way with this?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: Don't worry. I don't have a big role in the movie, but I'm very proud of the project. Kevin and Sam and others were phenomenal. As we get closer to October 27th, I will let you know more.
As always, thank you for being with us. Our promise, our pledge to you, we are not the establishment media, always fair and balanced. See you back here tomorrow night.
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