Mueller investigation criticized as being 'one-sided'

Name: Mueller investigation criticized as being 'one-sided'
Uploaded: 2018-08-24T22:13:21-04:00
Duration: 13 min 54 s
Description: Trump hammers Sessions over handling of the DOJ and the Mueller probe; reaction from Pam Bondi, Gregg Jarrett and Mark Penn on 'Hannity.'

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Mueller investigation criticized as being 'one-sided'

Trump hammers Sessions over handling of the DOJ and the Mueller probe; reaction from Pam Bondi, Gregg Jarrett and Mark Penn on 'Hannity.'

This is a rush transcript from "Hannity," August 24, 2018. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

JEANINE PIRRO, FOX NEWS HOST: Welcome to this special edition of "Hannity: The Left's Agenda."

I'm Jeanine Pirro, in tonight for Sean.

For the hour, we'll show you how Democrats, the deep state and the media are all working together against President Donald Trump. First, we'll address the special counsel's partisan probe into Russian collusion. While this administration pushes a sound conservative agenda, Mueller's witch- hunt is dividing the country and wreaking political havoc day after day.

Meanwhile, Attorney General Jeff Sessions is nowhere to be found. He's recused himself from all things Russia almost immediately after taking office and now, the relationship between President Trump and his absence the attorney general is at an all-time low.

Today, the president mocked Sessions on Twitter writing, quote, Department of Justice will not be improperly influenced by political considerations. Jeff, this is great. What everyone wants. So look into all of the corruption on the other side, including deleted emails, Comey lies and leaks, Mueller conflicts, McCabe, Strzok, Page, Ohr, FISA abuse, Christopher Steele and his phony and corrupt dossier, the Clinton Foundation, illegal surveillance of Trump campaign, Russian collusion by Dems, and so much more. Open up the papers and documents without redaction. Come on, Jeff. You can do it. The country is waiting.

Former House Oversight Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz is slamming Sessions for perpetuating our two-tiered system of justice. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JASON CHAFFETZ, FORMER HOUSE OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE CHAIRMAN: Donald Trump is right and Jeff Sessions is wrong. Jeff Sessions, to say he hasn't had done any political considerations is totally false. He hasn't done nothing to go after what Congress has been asking for and giving the documents up he. Has done nothing to pursue what is known to be false statements to Congress.

I was the chairman of the Oversight Committee and Bob Goodlatte, the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, we sent a letter the department of justice asked him to look if Hillary lied under oath, never gave a response. That's because of politics, not because he's not do -- he's just not doing his job.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PIRRO: Even Senator Lindsey Graham, a longtime Sessions ally, is questioning his ongoing tenure as attorney general. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM, R-SOUTH CAROLINA: Every president deserves an attorney general they have confidence in. As to Jeff Sessions, I've never met a finer man. He was a great senator. He's great lawyer. I think he's been a good attorney general.

But this is not working. So I hope the relationship gets better, if it doesn't, I would imagine the president is going to look for a new attorney general because what's going on is unsustainable. I'm not blaming anybody. I love Jeff Sessions.

But from my point of view, the country is not being well-served with as much friction.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PIRRO: Meanwhile, with Sessions MIA, Mueller's partisan team of Democratic donors have aggressively targeted Trump and everyone around him.

Clinton pollster Mark Penn is writing the Cohen's plea deal is merely an attempt to set up Trump and "The Wall Street Journal's" Kimberly Strassel highlighted the FBI's one-sided investigation in a brand new report writing, quote: The country has watched the FBI treat one presidential campaign with kid gloves the other with informants, warrants and eavesdropping.

Joining us now to break all of this down is Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi, the author of the New York Times bestseller "The Russia Hoax: The Illicit Scheme to Clear Hillary Clinton and Frame Donald Trump", Fox News legal analyst Gregg Jarrett, and former Clinton pollster and advisor Mark Penn.

All right. Good evening to all of you.

I'm going to start with what Jason Chaffetz said that we just heard on that sound where he talked about sending a letter to Jeff Sessions and saying he never got a response with respect to his investigation of all of the wrongdoings or apparent wrongdoings of the Clinton campaign.

And I'll go to you, Attorney General Pam Bondi. Is Mueller's probe a one- sided probe?

PAM BONDI, R-FLORIDA ATTORNEY GENERAL: Well, of course, it is. Because they're only looking at the president of the United States and that's -- that is their target. And anyone who gets in the way is collateral damage. That's what they're doing.

But all of these other issues have to be examined. I mean, we live in a nation of laws and we have got to look at the Clinton emails, everything that you listed in your opening monologue. Everything President Trump said. We've got to look at Strzok, Page, everything, the FISA warrant, everything.

But especially these FBI agents who either, like Lisa Page, got to resign or even the ones who are fired. I'm sorry. They don't get off that easy. They have to be investigated as well.

PIRRO: Well, they have to be investigated and -- but, Gregg, you and I both know that there is no attorney general who's interested in investigating him.

GREGG JARRETT, FOX NEWS LEGAL ANALYST: Jeff Sessions is either an unwitting dupe or he's incompetent. It's got to be one of the two. One of the fundamental principles of democracy is equal justice under the law. It's on the pediment of the U.S. Supreme Court. That's how important it is.

But under Jeff Sessions and the previous Department of Justice, it is nothing more than a charade. The president rightly named more than a dozen things Sessions should be investigated for especially, Hillary Clinton and her conduct. James Comey twisted the facts, contorted the law to clear her. Both of them should be in front of a grand jury.

PIRRO: You said something interesting. You gave me two options you said Jeff Sessions as either an unwitting dupe or incompetence.

JARRETT: Yes.

PIRRO: Or could it be possible that there are people who have convinced him that it's not in his interest to look at potential problems on the Democratic side?

JARRETT: That would go to incompetence because it was so --

PIRRO: That would be sold out. There's a difference between that and --

JARRETT: That would be corrupt.

PIRRO: Right.

JARRETT: For political purposes, you are making decisions about law and justice, which are two polar opposites.

PIRRO: OK, Mark Penn, I'll go to you on this. You know, you your article that we'll get to in a little bit is excellent, I read it. But in terms of, you know, your being someone to work with the Clintons, you know how they work, you know now that it appears or that there is a deep state here that is protecting them.

Am I right in that assumption?

MARK PENN, FORMER CLINTON POLLSTER AND ADVISER: Well, I don't know whether there's a question of whether they're protecting Hillary Clinton or not, but they sure -- they sure are going after President Trump.

PIRRO: No, no, let's back up.

PENN: That's clear, right?

PIRRO: That's not the answer. What I'm looking for, is it the woman at a foundation that was not investigated no one has had there is no kind of forensic accountant -- counting (ph) other than my people who are connected to the Clinton Foundation, that along with money going to the Fusion and that's campaign funds being paid for a dossier that's totally fake. Shouldn't she be looked at?

PENN: Well, look, every schoolchild knows when you look at this that the most cursory tools and investigations were done on the allegations against the Clinton and the Clinton cache, and you're seeing the absolute entire state machinery of prosecutors FBI, CIA, all combined, going after Trump. So, there's no question that there's an unequal scale here that almost everybody in America sees.

PIRRO: So then what do we do about it, Pam? I mean, you're an attorney general. How do you resolve this kind of thing?

BONDI: Well, and again, we know we're not in a perfect world. But given all of our backgrounds, in a perfect world, what should be happening right now, Hillary Clinton should be in receipt of a target letter, Huma Abedin should be in receipt of a target letter, all of these people, and frankly, the American public shouldn't really know what's going on in a clean honest investigation.

So, that's what should be going on. They should be under active investigation right now.

PIRRO: Yes, but they're not.

Go ahead, Gregg.

JARRETT: The only way to do that is to replace Jeff Sessions. Look, when you have lost the confidence of your boss, the president United States, when you've breached that trust, the good and honorable and right thing to do is to submit your letter of resignation, and that's what Jeff Sessions should have done a long time ago. He apparently did it a year ago but the president at the time felt it was unwise to accept it.

PIRRO: Well, that's President Trump. I mean, he gives everyone a chance. I mean, yes, no, you didn't even look at the one who just wrote the book. He gave her a chance and it -- you know, he believes in people, he believes in raising people up.

But you know what? I'm going to go to you, Mark, on your -- on your article where you write about Cohen's plea deal is an attempt to set up Trump.

All right. So, we now know that Michael Cohen has pled guilty and at the end of the plea or one of the last pleas had to do with the reference to campaign finances. What was your take on that? How does that set up the president?

PENN: Look, I think, given what the -- it seems the prosecutors found, for a -- probably Cohen would have pled guilty to the Lindbergh kidnapping had they asked him to. I think at the end of the day, they said, look, plead guilty to this, we'll reduce your sentence, we won't go after your wife. I think that was even now I understand on the table.

And those things that he pled guilty to are not crimes. So, by getting him to plead guilty, they can now create an unindicted co-conspirator conspiracy kind of theory for impeachment on something that's not a crime.
This was established with Clinton. It was established with Edwards very clearly when even the FEC ruled that these payments were not campaign contributions.

And frankly, had they paid them out of the campaign, they'd probably be indicted for misuse of campaign funds for personal purposes.

PIRRO: Well, there's no question about what Mark is saying, Pam, and that is that you know if you paid for it for personal purposes out of your own money -- I mean, there's no campaign violation. They want to interpret it as meaning who's trying to meddle with the 2016 election. I find that stunning as a prosecutor.

BONDI: And we see it. We see CEOs. We see corporate executives all the time who women want to -- women, men want to extort money from them, and they have -- always my advice is go to the police. But they never want to go to the police because they have families or it could affect their stocks.

PIRRO: Right.

BONDI: So what they do is they hire a private attorney, and with that attorney, they do a lock solid non-disclosure. And that's a good attorney.

This is a bad attorney who represented his client poorly.

JARRETT: We had all the members of Congress who paid money to accusers sexual harassment and in exchange for NDAs. Now, obviously, it would benefit them in their reelection, but no prosecutor ever accused them of a campaign crime.

PIRRO: That's very interesting. Yes, for all those people who paid off, but you know, the young interns are move never they sexually arrest with our taxpayers money, I would remind you --

JARRETT: I talked to a career lawyer at the Department of Justice who has since left. He spent half of this time on campaign violations. He said this isn't a crime. It's not a campaign violation.

PIRRO: Of course not.

JARRETT: And it's outrageous that Jeff Sessions and Rod Rosenstein would have authorized a plea guilty for a non-crime.

PIRRO: And the truth is, Mark, that there is no civil or criminal precedent to bring charges on something like this. Is that not correct?

PENN: There is -- look, the precedent was Edwards and he both got off, and the FEC ruled that these payments were not properly campaign payments, and so, all the donors were off the hook.

Look, just think about it for a minute. One of them he's accused of coordinating, not actually even making the payment. And imagine if Michael Avenatti coordinated a payment to Stormy Daniels with CBS to air it to help Hillary, then that would have to be a campaign contribution just as a payment not to air it would be a campaign contribution.

PIRRO: Exactly, exactly..

PENN: All of this, which is why the whole thing's absurd.

PIRRO: The whole thing is absurd and in the end, you know, is lady justice, did she have it in for Donald Trump? And are there are two systems of justice in this country?

I'll ask both of you, 30 seconds.

BONDI: That's what we're seeing. That's clearly what we're seeing we're seeing a vendetta against the president in the United States because he won an election fair and square.

PIRRO: You know what's interesting, Pam, and you and I both been prosecutors. I mean, you know, you we have to be believers. If we weren't believers, we wouldn't be doing the jobs that you're doing that I did.

BONDI: Right.

PIRRO: It's, you know, and it is so frustrating because this is not the white justice is supposed to work.

BONDI: No, and especially when you see a guy like Michael Cohen. We all know, he is a zero as a witness. He's useless.

That guy --

PIRRO: He was a witness and a lawyer.

BONDI: Right. He's told so many different stories, so many stories.

PIRRO: Yes, go ahead, Gregg.

JARRETT: Partisans have ripped the blindfold off of Lady Justice.

PIRRO: Or she's looking through the bandages.

JARRETT: And they have jumped on the scales of justice and they have tipped it in their favor for political purposes, that is anathema to our rule of law in the system of justice.

PIRRO: So, given that, don't you think that if we get no justice in our justice system? Will we get justice in the 2018 elections, quick yes or no, Mark?

PENN: Well, look, I fought strongly for President Clinton.

PIRRO: That's not a yes or no. That's not a yes or no.

PENN: Right. Look, we all get justice every time people vote, instead of having our politicians locked with prosecutors.

(CROSSTALK)

JARRETT: No way to know.

PIRRO: Good answer.

Anyway, great panel. Thanks for being with me tonight.

And coming up on this special edition of "Hannity", the liberal media and Democrats have been calling for President Trump to be impeached. We have the tape, next.

And don't forget to by copy of my book "Liars, Leakers and Liberals: The Case Against the Anti-Trump Conspiracy".

We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PIRRO: Welcome back to special edition of "Hannity": The Left's Agenda.

All week, Democrats and the liberal media been hysterically calling for President Trump to be impeached. Last night, one MSNBC guest even argued that the Founding Fathers would support Trump's impeachment. Take a look at this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What did the Democrats trying to do? Should they be talking impeachment now finally after all this action of this week?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: If you had asked me that a few months back, Chris, I would have said no, that Democrats should hold off on talking about impeachment because we need to see all of the facts. And I still think that we need to see all of the facts, but I think Tuesday changed things fundamentally in this country.

I think that Democrats can start talking about impeachment not saying that we should just remove the president without going through the full two-step process, right? But I think that if now is when we can't talk about impeachment, when can we talk about impeachment? The president was implicated in a crime and I can't imagine a scenario that is -- could be any more ripe for a serious discussion by responsible adults. It's exactly what the framers would have wanted.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PIRRO: And over on CNN, one host claimed it was President Trump who was playing the politics of fear by mentioning impeachment. Take a look at this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I first just want to get your take on what we heard from Giuliani and President Trump, talking about impeachment. The president forced to address his own impeachment.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I mean, it sounds like they're playing politics of fear right out of that playbook.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They are.

Rudy Giuliani, remember, is not playing legal counsel per se to the president. He's playing political advisor. And in -- for stoking these fears among the electorate, that if Democrats win the House, they'll try to impeach the president, that's for turnout. That's a good message. That's a good fear for Rudy Giuliani and Trump to convey to Republicans.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PIRRO: What they failed to mention is that it is the left and the media that's been obsessed with impeaching President Trump. They mentioned the word "impeachment" hundreds of times, just over the past few days.

Here are just some examples.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIPS)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Given the events of today, the likelihood of impeachment, I'm not saying it's high necessarily, but it certainly went up.