Sen. Graham: Pelosi 'taking a wrecking ball' to the Constitution
Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham accuses House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of denying the president his day in court in the Senate on impeachment and reacts to the latest on the FISA report fallout on 'Sunday Morning Futures.'
This is a rush transcript from "Sunday Morning Futures," December 21, 2019. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
Maria Bartiromo, anchor: Welcome and good Sunday morning, everybody. Thanks so much for joining us. I'm Maria Bartiromo, this is "Sunday Morning Futures."
We have breaking news right now. Senator Lindsey Graham coming up live, straight ahead, reacting to the impeachment trial and Nancy Pelosi's plans for the Senate, sending articles or not. The Senate Judiciary Committee chairman also reacting to the abuse at the FISA court. Who will Graham call to testify now that the IG report is out? And what will John Brennan tell investigators? All coming up. Plus, right here, Senator Ted Cruz is with me this morning on what he knows about the altering of documents at the FBI, why he says John Durham's investigation is now criminal. And House GOP leader Kevin McCarthy on his record fundraising in the face of last week's impeachment vote, which was sandwiched between the budget spending bill and a trade deal with Canada and Mexico. Also, breaking news this morning, the first interview with New Jersey Congressman Jeff Van Drew on his stunning switch from the Democratic Party to the Republican Party amidst no vote to impeach. He will join me exclusively as he does something that has never been done before, moving from the majority party to the minority party.
All of that and a lot more right here, right now on "Sunday Morning Futures."
[BEGIN VIDEO CLIP]
President Donald Trump: Our opponents have spent every waking minute of the last three years trying to overthrow the election of 2016 and, at a minimum, to sabotage the election of 2020. That's not going to happen. We're not going to let it happen. And if it did happen and if they were successful, they will destroy this country.
[END VIDEO CLIP]
Maria Bartiromo: President Trump blasting the Democrats' impeachment battle while speaking to young conservatives this weekend. House lawmakers voting along party lines impeaching President Trump for two articles, abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. The next move sending those two articles of impeachment to the Senate, but Speaker Pelosi says now she may wait due to concerns of how the Senate may handle the impeachment trial. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham joins us right now in an exclusive. Good to see you, Senator. Thanks very much for being here.
Sen. Lindsey Graham: Thank you.
Maria Bartiromo: Your reaction to what Nancy Pelosi --
Lindsey Graham: Thank you.
Maria Bartiromo: Have you heard from Nancy Pelosi? Are you getting the articles of impeachment in the Senate?
Lindsey Graham: Well, my reaction is that she's taking a wrecking ball to the Constitution. This is the latest in a series of constitutional train wrecks orchestrated by Nancy Pelosi. During the impeachment process, the president was not allowed to have counsel present during the Intel Committee. He could not call witnesses on his behalf. He could not confront his accuser and now that he's been charged with two articles of impeachment, Nancy Pelosi is denying the president his day in the court in the Senate and she's actually trying to tell Mitch McConnell how to run the Senate. She's trampling on the separation of powers. It's the Senate's job to dispose of impeachment articles once passed by the House. It's not Nancy Pelosi's job. When it comes to Trump, the rules don't matter to Democrats and that's dangerous and sad.
Maria Bartiromo: I mean, how is this going to play out? We spoke yesterday. You said this was like extortion. Explain that.
Lindsey Graham: It is. Well, what she's trying to do is to get Mitch McConnell to bend to her will to shape the trial. Can you imagine if the roles were reversed? You had a Democratic president impeached by a Republican House and the Republican speaker was telling a Democratic majority leader how to run the trial? You know the media is so in the tank when it comes to Trump. Democrats hate him so much; they don't love anything Constitutional anymore. All the rules have been thrown in a ditch to get Trump from the way they impeached him to now denying his day in court. Here's how it's going to end. She'll eventually send the articles because public opinion will crush the Democrats. You got the minority leader Chuck Schumer conspiring with the Speaker of the House basically to insist upon calling witnesses that deny -- the president is invoking executive privilege around Mulvaney and John Bolton and others. They impeached this president because he chose to go to court. The second article of impeachment is obstruction of Congress. The president has claimed executive privilege and instead of allowing the president to exercise his legal rights, they've impeached him because he wanted to go to court. Can you imagine what would've happened if we'd done this to a Democrat? That we impeach a Democrat because they wanted to go to court?
Maria Bartiromo: Yeah. It's pretty extraordinary. So, do you expect that there will be witnesses in a Senate trial? Can you walk us through how the Senate trial --
Lindsey Graham: No, I don't.
Maria Bartiromo: Yeah.
Lindsey Graham: Okay. To any senator who votes to compel the testimony of John Bolton or Mick Mulvaney before the president can have his day in court exercising executive privilege before the courts -- the court's available to every American, including Donald Trump -- so, if you call these witnesses who work for the president after he's invoked executive privilege, if you deny him his day in court, then you're abusing the constitutional rights of Donald Trump as president and you're putting the entire presidency at risk. I can't imagine any senator doing this to the presidency.
Maria Bartiromo: Yeah.
Lindsey Graham: What did they impeach him for, Maria? They impeached him because he wanted to go to court. Instead of allowing the president to go to court to exercise executive privilege, they put an artificial time limit and said “if you don't allow these witnesses to come to the House at a time certain we're going to impeach you.” They impeached him for exercising his legal rights. I hope senators will not do the same thing. Hope the senators will not vote to compel witnesses before the court determines whether or not there's executive privilege.
Maria Bartiromo: All right. I want to move on to FISA, but real quick, how long would you expect a Senate trial to go? When you go back to Clinton, what was it, two weeks?
Lindsey Graham: Yeah, I think what's going to happen it's going to be exactly like the Clinton trial. The House managers will argue the case to the Senate based on the record established at the House and one of the reasons she's not sending these impeachment articles over is because her case is so weak and shaky. But what happened in Clinton, they argued the facts accumulated by the House, witnesses were requested, they were denied along party lines. There were no witnesses. Then we voted. That's what's going to happen here.
Maria Bartiromo: And you were a House manager back then.
Lindsey Graham: Yeah. So, I made the case based on what we did in the House. Then we requested witnesses. The Senate refused to allow witnesses. Then they voted on the articles of impeachment. Schumer says he wants a process like Clinton. That's exactly what he wants to get, but when it comes to Senator Schumer and his colleagues, they could care less if they're trampling on the rights of Donald Trump. This president is wanting to invoke executive privilege. The question, will the Senate deny President Trump the ability to invoke executive privilege? Or will they run over his right to invoke executive privilege and force the witnesses to come anyway? The House just impeached him because he wanted to go to court. This is the first time a president's ever impeached because he insisted to going -- insisted on going to court. This is dangerous.
Maria Bartiromo: Senator, do you know who the House managers are this time around?
Lindsey Graham: No. I'm sure it will be the, you know, Schiff/Nadler show.
Maria Bartiromo: Okay.
Lindsey Graham: You know, I supported Mueller's investigation because I took it seriously. This stuff from the beginning has been partisan.
Maria Bartiromo: I'm glad you mentioned Mueller because I have an op-ed here from the Journal this weekend and it's called, "Robert Mueller's Dossier Dodge," and you know, it's asking the question -- the same question that I asked throughout the Mueller trial. I'm sorry, the Mueller hearing, and it was basically how is it even possible that Robert Mueller can sit there and testify to what took place in 2016 in terms of Russian meddling without looking at the dossier. But over and over again, he said that the dossier was not in his purview, that it wasn't his mandate. Now we know from the IG report that, in fact, the dossier was a, quote, “essential part” of the wiretap warrant that they got, the warrant to wiretap an innocent American citizen, and that is Carter Page. What is your reaction to that, that Mueller refused to talk about the dossier, even though now we know it was essential for them getting that wiretap? He was the former FBI director; he spent $40-plus million on this Mueller probe. Shouldn't he have known that?
Lindsey Graham: Yeah, I don't see how you can investigate the 2016 Trump-Russian allegations without looking at the dossier. I don't know how you can move forward once the dossier collapsed regarding Carter Page. So, the Horowitz report is the first step in a long journey regarding FISA abuse. The FISA court rebuked the FBI; that is a great start. They came down hard on the FBI. If they had failed to do that, I would have lost all confidence in the court. Comey said last week he was sorry, it was sloppy. No, Comey, it wasn't sloppy; it was criminal. I'm going to call every person who signed the warrant application; I'm going to find out why Brennan went to Harry Reid in September of 2016 to talk about the investigation. I'm going to find out why it took two years for Mueller to realize there was no “there” there. We're going to look long and hard at FISA abuse; we're going to pass laws to make sure this never happens again. Accountability will only be successful if somebody gets fired, and I'm looking at Christopher Wray to fire somebody at the FBI. And somebody needs to go to jail, and I'm looking Durham to hold people criminally accountable for the laws they broke.
Maria Bartiromo: Well, you make a good point, and we've got a graphic here that shows everybody who signed those warrants, and you're saying each of these people, you're going to call down to testify. That includes -- obviously, James Comey signed the warrant three times; Sally Yates signed it once. You had Andrew McCabe -- his deputy signing it. Do we have that graphic? Sally Yates, as well. All of those people, you say, you are going to call to testify as you continue to do this deep dive into what took place in 2016.
Lindsey Graham: Yeah, there's two questions I want to ask these people. When you signed the warrant application, how much time did you spend trying to figure out if it was actually true, and how far up the chain did this go? Did President Obama know about the counterintelligence surveillance of the Trump campaign? Did Vice President Biden know? How much information was provided to Susan Rice? I want to know how far up the chain the investigation went. I want to know why so many people could sign a warrant application so flawed. So, there's a lot of questions. I want to make sure this never happens again. To the American people, you deserve better than this. Every American should be worried about FISA. And to this impeachment debacle, to my Democratic colleagues --
Maria Bartiromo: Yeah, I want to --
Lindsey Graham: -- impeachment is a dead cat.
Maria Bartiromo: I want to --
Lindsey Graham: Stop playing with it.
Maria Bartiromo: Say it again, Senator.
Lindsey Graham: Impeachment is a dead cat. Stop playing with it. Bury it. It's going nowhere. Quit violating the Constitution. Give the president his day in court, and let's get this behind us so we can talk about things that people really care about in this country.
Maria Bartiromo: Senator, I want to take a short break, but what you just said was really important. How high up the chain does it go? A lot of people keep telling me that the mastermind was at the CIA of putting Trump into this whole Russia meddling hoax over the last three years. I want to talk about John Brennan when we come right back. Stay with us, Senator Lindsey Graham. We'll be right back.
[COMMERCIAL BREAK]
Maria Bartiromo: Welcome back. I continue the conversation now with Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Lindsey Graham. And, Senator, a moment ago we were talking about the FISA abuse and this whole idea to insert Donald Trump's name into Russia meddling back in 2016. You said, “How high up the chain does it go?” I want to take your attention back to May of 2017 when Trey Gowdy was questioning former CIA director John Brennan. Listen to what he said. Watch.
[BEGIN VIDEO CLIP]
Trey Gowdy: Do you know if the Bureau ever relied on the Steele dossier as any -- as part of any court filings, applications, petitions, pleadings?
John Brennan: I have no awareness.
Trey Gowdy: Did the CIA rely on it?
John Brennan: No.
Trey Gowdy: Why not?
John Brennan: Because we didn't. It wasn't part of the corpus of intelligence information that we had.
[END VIDEO CLIP]
Maria Bartiromo: Senator, you just heard it. That was May of '17. He said, “It wasn't part of the corpus of information we had.” In fact, we know now from Michael Horowitz's IG report, which came out last week, that it was an essential -- quote unquote, “essential” -- part of the application for a wiretap on Carter Page. Your reaction?
Lindsey Graham: Well, number one, it was a part of the intelligence assessment provided to President Trump in January of 2017. This is when Comey met privately with the president and said, “I want you to know about this dossier. We can't verify it, but I want you to know about it.” I want to know, was the CIA part of an effort to get to the media the fact that Trump was investigation? There was a lot of frustration by people at the FBI and other places that the storyline was not getting out. Christopher Steele went to every media outlet in the country to shop the dossier, to try to get it out before the election. Brennan meets privately, I think, in September with Harry Reid -- John Brennan, the CIA director. I want to know what role, if any, did the FBI and the CIA play in trying to get out the dossier, market the story that Trump was under investigation for colluding with the Russians?
Maria Bartiromo: It looks like John Durham wants to know the same thing. John Durham has now requested -- we understand from the New York Times that John Durham has asked for John Brennan's phone records and emails, and they want to know what exactly he was telling CIA staff in terms of this dossier. Was that perjury there? Did he just commit perjury in that May hearing?
Lindsey Graham: We'll let John Durham decide that, but it's pretty odd to me for the CIA director to tell publicly, under oath, the public that the dossier had no part in the corpus of the intelligence being gathered when it was the central reason they got the FISA warrant against Carter Page. There's a disconnect there. Somebody is either really ignorant of what happened, or they're trying to shade what happened. I think they never believed that there would be a Horowitz investigation. I think these people believe they would get away with it and along comes Horowitz. What Horowitz told the American people is very damning. He told a story of manipulating evidence to continue to get a warrant against an American citizen. He told a story of hiding exculpatory information from the court to keep the investigation going. Why did they want to keep it going when it should've stopped? Because they hated Trump and they were out to get him. There's no other conclusion. Now, I want to know how far up did this go. I want to know did President Obama, was he aware of the counterintelligence investigation of the Trump campaign? And I'd be shocked if he was not.
Maria Bartiromo: Yeah, and real quick, are you going to get back to looking at what you were talking about as priorities and that was you wanted to know everything about the Bidens? You say that we're not going to see witnesses likely not in this upcoming impeachment trial. If you get through this quickly what's your -- what is your next priority aside from obviously the FISA abuse?
Lindsey Graham: I'm working with -- thank you. Here's the question. You know, the Washington Post and New York Times and major media outlets in this country, all the news organizations, haven't spent 15 minutes or $15 looking at whether or not Hunter Biden, who received $50,000 a month from one of the most corrupt companies in the Ukraine, tried to stop the investigation once it was opened. Working with Senator Johnson and Grassley, I'm going to ask questions about the role Hunter Biden played after Bergsma came under investigation, after they raided the president of Burisma's home. He picks up the phone. He calls the State Department. If this had been Mike Pence's son, it'd be the most damning story in the history of America. They'd be challenging whether Mike Pence should even have Christmas Day with his son. So, the double standard here is unbelievable. We will continue to look at the Hunter Biden conflict of interest, whether or not he did anything appropriate, what did Joe Biden do and when did he do it? Because the American media will not. But we're not going to do it during impeachment. As I said before, impeachment is a dead cat. It needs to be buried and what they're doing to President Trump by denying him his day in court in the Senate is unconscionable. They're shredding the Constitution. I know you don't like Trump, but enough is enough.
Maria Bartiromo: And I know that there's also an issue around China with Hunter Biden. He traveled on Air Force Two with his then -- you know, his father, then-Vice President Joe Biden, to China and then received money later.
Lindsey Graham: Yeah. You know, I've known Joe Biden for a long time. I admire him. I like him. He's had a tragic life. But we're not going to let this go.
Maria Bartiromo: Okay.
Lindsey Graham: Did Hunter Biden monetize the vice presidency? I don't know. Somebody needs to look. I can assure you if a Republican did this, they would be looking at us.
Maria Bartiromo: Senator, it's good to see you this morning. Thanks very much. A lot of news there with Senator Lindsey Graham. We've got a breaking news interview up next. A moderate Democrat turns Republican. Something nobody has done before going from the majority to the minority. Jeff Van Drew voted against impeaching President Trump. He will join me live next, Jeff Van Drew from New Jersey in an exclusive right after the break.
[COMMERCIAL BREAK]
Maria Bartiromo: Congressman Jeff Van Drew joins me right now in an exclusive interview. Congressman, it is a pleasure to see you. Thanks very much for joining me this morning.
Rep. Jeff Van Drew: It is a pleasure to be with you and as I was saying before, I am so proud to be associated with you. You truly represent what news media should be about and just how to conduct a show like this. I'm very, very proud of you and the work that you do and the objectivity that you have. So, thank you.
Maria Bartiromo: I really appreciate that.
Jeff Van Drew: And you were the first one to give me a shot, too.
Maria Bartiromo: Congressman, that means the world to me in this environment of media today. I -- so I'm grateful and I so appreciate your comments. Let me ask you. We spoke on the phone the other day and you said, "You know, Maria, I always look for signs." There was a sign, something in you that said I'm not comfortable here. Tell me how you came to this decision to leave the majority, the Democrats, and become a Republican congressman.
Jeff Van Drew: Well, the final point and the final sign. So, there has been all along, you know, where the party is moving further and further to the left where there's discussions of it being a socialist party and I am a proud capitalist. I believe in hard work. I believe that we can give people opportunity, but that they also when they get that opportunity have to work hard to achieve success. You can't give them success and many other things that I'm sure we'll talk as we go along here. But the final sign for me was oddly enough, actually in my home county, when one of the county chairmen, and I have eight counties, one of the county chairmen came to me and said, "I have to speak with you." And I said sure and sat down. He said, "I just want to let you know that you have to vote for impeachment." And I said, "What do you mean?" And he said, "You've got to vote for impeachment. If you don't you're not going to be able to run in my county." Well, first of all it's not his county, it's our county. "And you're not going to be able to move forward. You're not going to get the line," which is a big deal in New Jersey. "And you're not going to be successful." And I first of all I still could've run and I still could've gotten the line and I could've fought it out. I fought a lot of things in my life and I fought hard to be where I am. But it made me think, for all the years that I've worked so hard and tried to give so much, not only to the party but to everybody, the things that we've done and I won't go into them, but many, many infrastructure projects and helping people and all the services that we try to give people in our offices and it all boils down to one vote that I may have my own individual opinion on one vote and that's not going to be allowed? I'm going to be punished for that? And that's when I knew. I had been thinking about it for a while and I said, and you know, I was speaking to my chief of staff about this and I said to her, I said, "You know, there's always been in my career and over time, something that happens that lets you know that it is time to make a change." And this was it.
Maria Bartiromo: You know, that's really interesting.
Jeff Van Drew: It told me it was time to make a change.
Maria Bartiromo: So, you were uncomfortable with the shaming and you know, the pushback that you couldn't do what you thought was right, that you had to go along with the herd. Look, we talked about this before that, you know, Congress is going to have to go back to its districts, and we've got a map here of the 31 districts of what -- the districts that President Trump won, but these people will have to get reelected, and they also have to follow their conscience. And yet this impeachment vote last week -- you were among the few -- you and Colin Peterson were the only two that voted “no” on both articles, and then one other voted “no” on just one article. So, post-impeachment vote, what are you feeling today? What struck you about the impeachment? You were a “no” going into it. You told us that a month ago.
Jeff Van Drew: Exactly, and how I feel today is I feel good. I feel that I did the honorable thing. I feel that I did what was right for me and right for the country. And I heard Lindsey a little while before; this impeachment is a weak, thin impeachment that just doesn't really mean anything much to most of the American people. And it has been a long dark shadow on our country, and folks are tired. I really believe folks are tired of it. They're tired of the hours and hours and hours of time that has been spent on it, they're tired of the millions of dollars that have been spent on it, and they want to move forward. And, Maria, we have so many important issues, and, yes, we've done a few. No doubt, we're doing a few, but there are so many more, whether it's election security, whether it's better care for our veterans, whether it's a host of other issues -- and I could go through one after another. Medicare; Medicaid. We can talk about all of them that we should be concentrating 100 percent of our time on. We are there to work for the American people and not to have constant political bickering and to come up with a weak impeachment. And, you know, most importantly, we must understand what impeachment is. It almost never happens for a reason. Other than declaring war, it is the most serious issue that America -- and action -- that America could ever, ever take, and it harms our country. It fractions us apart; it makes us more -- literally creates more civil unrest. It creates more unhurt. I want to bring people together. Let's bring Americans together.
Maria Bartiromo: Congressman, you know, throughout this week after you made the switch a lot of people were saying, “Look, he left the Democrats. Now he's a Republican. How can we trust him as a Republican?” So, we have your voting record here, and you have followed your principles in your voting record. I mean, we've got that you voted to override President Trump's veto of a bill that overturned his emergency declaration of border wall funding. You voted to block President Trump from withdrawing from the Paris Climate Change Accord. When you look at your voting record, and you hear some of the skeptics who say, “Look, Jeff Van Drew just left his own party. Now he's with us. We don't know if we can trust him,” what do you want to say about that in terms of how you are going to push for the Republican Party now?
Jeff Van Drew: I'm going to -- I always pushed for what I believed was right and what I believed was best. And so, for example -- we talked about the environment a little bit -- I believe that we can have a good environment and that we can do what's right for the environment, and at the same time, not hurt our business atmosphere in the state and in the country, and I think that's very, very important. And I think the biggest reason I can say that people know that -- I've had many, many Republicans vote for me for years, and many Democrats. I try to do, again, what is the best. So, I've won in areas, and as we've talked about before, where I was, you know, one of the -- literally, I think, only the first or the second state senator in history to ever win in my state in my district. I was only one of a handful of freeholders that ever won since the Civil War, which are county commissioners. To make a long story short, people voted for me not only because of my political party, but most importantly, because they knew my word was my bond, they knew that I love this country more than anything in the world --
Maria Bartiromo: Well, the other thing is --
Jeff Van Drew: -- and that we can do better.
Maria Bartiromo: -- I heard you quote Reagan the other day, and you said, “Look, I didn't leave” -- he said, “I didn't leave the Dem Party; the Democratic Party left me,” and I love what you said the other day when I spoke with you. You said, “Look, I want Americans to know that we're exceptional. I believe in America exceptionalism.” So -- and you're a capitalist. Tell me what went wrong in terms of the Democratic Party that it doesn't see -- feel like they see it the way you do. Really quickly, sir.
Jeff Van Drew: Well -- and that's where you hit it on the head. So, you know, I speak about America exceptionalism a lot. For those that are not really familiar with it, it means that America is a truly unique nation, that it is the greatest nation in the world, that we have so much potential, and we are the leaders of the free world, and that we are leaders in general. And I have Democrats come to me that say, “That's wrong. We're the same as any other country in the world.” They're wrong. That's not true.
Maria Bartiromo: Congressman, thank you. I'm so proud to have you this morning, sir. Thank you. Congratulations to you.
Jeff Van Drew: Thank you.
Maria Bartiromo: Congressman Jeff Van Drew. Back in a minute.
[COMMERCIAL BREAK]
Maria Bartiromo: Welcome back. Uncertainty hanging over the impeachment of President Trump during Washington's holiday recess. Speaker Nancy Pelosi says she's not sure when she will send the articles to the Senate, while the president is demanding an immediate trial. So, what now? I spoke with Senator Ted Cruz right after the impeachment vote. So, Nancy Pelosi said after the impeachment that maybe she'll sit on the articles of impeachment before sending it over to you and your colleagues in the Senate. Can she do that?
Sen. Ted Cruz: You know, you can't make this up. Listen, I think this is a sign of weakness, that this is a sign she understands just how weak these articles are. And these articles of impeachment that they actually voted on were really an admission of failure. For months, they had been promising all of this evidence of criminal activity. For months, they've been talking about bribery, they've been talking about quid pro quo, but then they heard all the evidence, and they've got no evidence of it. And these articles don't allege any crime. This is the first time in the history of our country that a president has been impeached without a single article alleging any criminal conduct. They don't allege any crime; they don't even allege any federal law that was violated. This was, at the end of the day, a political response because Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats hate the president.
Maria Bartiromo: Let me move on to really what was a blockbuster IG report. What struck you most?
Ted Cruz: Well, the Inspector General report is a stunning indictment of the politicization of the Obama Department of Justice and the FBI. The inspector general report details 17 specific serious misrepresentations DOJ and the FBI made to the FISA court. By the way, the inspector general, Michael Horowitz, was appointed by Barack Obama and I'll give you the most stunning example the inspector general uncovered. A senior lawyer at the FBI fabricated evidence, and here's what happened, so Carter Page is an outside advisor to the Trump campaign. He also is periodically talking to Russians, including some sketchy Russians. And so the FBI wants to get a wiretap on him. Now, an obvious question if you have someone talking to sketchy Russians is well, are they working for the CIA? Because that's a very different inference if someone's working for the CIA then talking to sketchy Russians isn't that surprising. CIA --
Maria Bartiromo: Well, he's doing work for the CIA.
Ted Cruz: He's doing his job. So, the FBI sends an email to the CIA. Says hey, is this guy a source for you? The CIA emails back and they say “yes, he's a source.” The FBI assistant general counsel takes that email and he alters it. He types in the word -- so, CIA said “yes he's a source.” The FBI lawyer types in “no, he is not a source.”
Maria Bartiromo: Unbelievable.
Ted Cruz: A hundred eighty degrees exactly opposite. He then sends that email on to the Department of Justice that uses that as the basis for a sworn statement to the FISA court to get a wiretap. By the way, the inspector general report also talks about it -- so, let me just say --
Maria Bartiromo: That's unbelievable.
Ted Cruz: For the IG to have found this, you want to talk about good investigating, I mean, they dug through the original documents that someone on the IG team noticed the original email from CIA, the forwarded email, and compared, said “wait a second, these words aren't in the first one.” I'll tell you what the IG report says. When they questioned this assistant general counsel at the FBI they said hey, how did this email change? He initially denied it. He said, "Oh, I don't know how it changed. No idea." And then they pressed him and he's like, "Yeah, okay, I changed it." That is on its face criminal conduct. If you or I did it in a car wreck case. If you got in a car wreck and you were in court and you doctored fraudulent documents and submitted it to the court, you or I would serve jail time for that. That senior leadership at the FBI, that's how badly they wanted to spy on Donald Trump and get Donald Trump. It is a horrifying abuse of power.
Maria Bartiromo: It's horrifying. Do you think people will go to jail?
Ted Cruz: Yes. I very much hope so. In this instance, this individual has been referred for criminal prosecution. I was encouraged by the statements that both attorney general Bill Barr and U.S. Attorney John Durham put out that they're continuing to investigate that there's substantially more here. This was spying on the Republican nominee to be president. They sent in multiple confidential human sources wearing wires.
Maria Bartiromo: All before July 16, when they claim the FBI counterintelligence investigation began.
Ted Cruz: And, you know, I used to be -- under George W. Bush I was an associate deputy attorney general. I spent five and a half years as solicitor general of Texas. I've spent a lot of time in law enforcement. I got to say, in any ordinary law enforcement, any responsible leadership, if someone had come in and said “hey, let's wiretap and spy on Hillary Clinton, or Bill Clinton or John Kerry.” It's possible if there was a mountain of evidence and serious criminality that you would end up approving that but you'd better believe you would cross every T and dot every I and you would press and say “all right, what's the evidence for it, what's the basis because you'd know it would get checked.” One of the things that's so offensive, it's clear these guys assumed Hillary would win which would mean there'd be no accountability at all.
Maria Bartiromo: That's right.
Ted Cruz: They could get away with this because no one would check.
Maria Bartiromo: While the Trump investigation was going on, there was another investigation going on into Hillary Clinton's emails, 33,000 emails gone. She was bleach bit and a hammer to get rid of her devices. I mean, if that's not obstruction I don't know what is and it was the same person, Peter Strzok, who was running the FBI investigation into Trump and running the investigation into Hillary Clinton. We haven't heard anything about HRC.
Ted Cruz: One of the worst legacies of the Obama administration is the corruption of law enforcement and the intelligence community and by the way, the big unanswered question is how high up the chain did this go? We know that the deputy director of the FBI McCabe was read in and authorized this. We know the director of the FBI, James Comey, was read in and authorized this. Did the attorney general, did Loretta Lynch sign off on spying on the Trump campaign in the middle of the election? Did the national security advisor at the White House, did Barack Obama, did Joe Biden? I got to tell you in most administrations if you're launching an investigation on a major political figure like the Republican nominee for president, your opponent, they would be read in. Nobody's asking those questions about whether Barack Obama and Joe Biden personally signed off on spying on and surveilling their political opponents. Not a single Democrat in the House cares about the answer to any of this. It's beyond crickets. You cannot ask about abuse of power or investigation. That's wrong.
Maria Bartiromo: And yet here we are with the impeachment of Donald Trump. Senator, it's good to see you.
Ted Cruz: It's always a pleasure.
Maria Bartiromo: Thank you so much, Senator Ted Cruz. We will be right back. [COMMERCIAL BREAK]
Maria Bartiromo: Welcome back. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi holding on to the articles of impeachment against President Trump, drawing criticism from the president and Republicans who want her to take the next step, send them on to the Senate. Joining us right now is the leader of the GOP. He is House Minority leader Kevin McCarthy. Congressman, it's always a pleasure to see you. Thanks very much for being here.
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy: Thanks for having me back.
Maria Bartiromo: So, you just heard Senator Cruz. You heard Lindsey Graham, as well, talking about what is taking place and what has taken place in terms of the IG report. First, react to that. Set the stage for us.
Kevin McCarthy: Well, if you pause for one moment and you read this IG report by Horowitz, here's the FBI. They broke into President Trump at the time candidate Trump's campaign spied on him and then they covered it up. It is a modern day Watergate. And you've got Democrats who aren't willing to even look into that. That is the area that we should be looking in. It's a modern day coup. The closest this country's ever came to but the only way you can compare this to is Watergate. They broke into his campaign by bringing people into it. They have been trying to cover it up for the whole time. Now the question rises just like Watergate. Who knew? When did they know it? And how high did this go up?
Maria Bartiromo: It's quite extraordinary, actually, Congressman, that the Democrats are able to change the narrative on you and your colleagues over and over again. You had exposed what took place in the 2016 election. You exposed how Donald Trump was framed, the informants, the leaks, et cetera, and yet here we are talking about impeachment. What are you going to do about, that they keep changing the narrative and the conversation on you?
Kevin McCarthy: Well, they've changed everything. They used Adam Schiff as being the chairman of Intel to go out and write a FISA report that now, we saw from that report, is totally false. Devin is vindicated. We now watch the House of Representatives change standards of the House on how we dealt with impeachment so they could try to move one forward. They withheld witnesses from the minority; they withheld even how we could question inside our own committees. They run this impeachment through, and remember what the Constitution says. Impeachment is a process when you're trying to impeach a duly elected president. It's not merely one vote. What Nancy Pelosi is doing today is unacceptable and unconstitutional, and she will not be able to sustain this position. She will eventually have to name managers and send this to the Senate.
Maria Bartiromo: Yeah, let's talk about that, because I know that there are going to be House managers named. Who do you think that is on the Democrat side, and who will be on the president's side? Who would you recommend to the president to help represent his side once the trial does start in the Senate?
Kevin McCarthy: Well, on the Democrat side, I imagine they name quite a few. They'll start with Adam Schiff; they think they'll go to Raskin. But remember, most of these people they named had already voted for impeachment, before that phone call ever took place. Almost half of the entire Democratic conference that sits there today voted for impeachment before the Ukraine call ever took place. Now, you don't get managers on the Republican side, but the president could have representation, that he's probably going to hire an attorney to represent him. Maybe he uses the White House, but I believe he should have help from the House, these individuals that have worked through this that could give advice, and others. I would go to John Ratcliffe, former U.S. attorney, that has done an amazing job. I'd go to Jim Jordan. I'd go to Doug Collins. These are individuals that I would actually pull in if I was in the White House, because we have been at this. Remember, the Democrats have been trying to impeach the president for two and a half years, changing the -- changing whatever they could find every step of the way, from the Mueller report to trying to quid pro quo to extortion to bribery to what they came up today with articles that reach nowhere, no facts. But through all those battles, you want people that have been through this, understand it, and have been in those hearings even when they were in the basement -- that testimony; who's been in those rooms. And those three individuals are ones that I would actually recommend to the president.
Maria Bartiromo: And, of course, Congressman Ratcliffe has been a friend to this program, been on many times. He knows cold what took place. He saw all the redacted documents; he knows what took place in 2016 in terms of the so-called coup, as you put it. Congressman, stay with us. I want to hear about the victories that you've had going into 2020, your priorities. Stay with us. Back in a minute with the Minority Leader.
Kevin McCarthy: Thank you.
[COMMERCIAL BREAK]
Maria Bartiromo: Welcome back. I am back with House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, and Congressman, you had a huge week this week. Of course, you had the impeachment vote, but that was sandwiched by two very important bills. You had the spending vote, and then USMCA. Congratulations on that. I know you've been working on USMCA for over a year, as has the president. Big victory. Tell us the impact.
Kevin McCarthy: This is a very big victory for the president and for the Republicans in the House. Here is the United States, Mexico, and Canada, our number one and number two strongest traders. We just passed it. I think the only way we were able to do it: putting the pressure on the Speaker of the House, because she has the power to call this bill up, and you showed when this bill was called up, it passed overwhelmingly. This makes America stronger. The Democrats did not want to do this and give the president and Republicans any type of support and success, but we probably had one of the most successful portions of any Congress at the same time they're trying to impeach a president from a Republican side.
Maria Bartiromo: Yeah, and you've been raising money, I know, and you've been meeting with donors who have voiced optimism about your agenda. Tell me about that and what your priorities will be in 2020? What do you hope to get done even as your colleagues try to drag the impeachment trial out as long as possible?
Kevin McCarthy: Well, remember what this Congress started out with. Today, after all the Democrats have ever done -- issued more subpoenas than created laws -- that their conference is actually smaller, and ours is stronger. We have welcomed a new member, so now we only need 18 seats to win the majority, a fewer number than the Democrats had two years ago to be able to win the majority. We're going out across the country; we have more than 30 seats that we can play in that Democrats currently sit in that President Trump carried. There are eight and a half million Americans who voted for President Trump in 2016 who did not in 2018 because the president was not on the ticket. He'll be on the ticket this time. We know who those individuals are. If they turn out, that's 28 new seats. But the difference will be that you'll get a Congress that will work for America, that can actually work with the president instead of investigating, and put America first. Just as we made this economy strong, we've got further to go. We need to lower prescription drugs, but we need more cures. We're less than a few weeks away from the end of this decade. What does the next decade look like? I think it looks like American could be first and stronger.
Maria Bartiromo: A lot of optimism there. Congressman, it's great to see you. Thanks so much.
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