TF 40 Politicon - Is the Dam Breaking? Part 1 Live from Politicon - RUSH TRANSCRIPT
Harry Litman [00:00:07] Politicon in Nashville, Tennessee, and we are live! And the Talking Feds fans are the best fans because we're only two minutes away from the opening pitch in Game 4. Nobody leave. And you guys are here with us. Welcome to Talking Feds, a prosecutors roundtable that brings together prominent former federal officials for a dynamic discussion of the most important legal topics of the day. I'm Harry Litman. I'm a former United States attorney and deputy assistant attorney general and a current Washington Post columnist. We're looking forward to doing two panels this weekend, both on the ultra timely theme. Is the dam finally breaking?
Harry Litman [00:01:02] One short months ago, the president and Republicans seem to have beaten back all efforts to shine a serious light on presidential misconduct, much less have any real, tangible possibility of a removal. But it was a month ago today that we learned of the whistleblower complaint that set out allegations of broad abuse of the president's power that have now brought trumped to the moment of greatest crisis in his presidency. And to discuss, I'm thrilled to welcome three first timers to Talking Feds.
Harry Litman [00:01:42] Maya Wiley. [APPLAUSE] Who everyone already knows. But nevertheless, I'll tell you, as a University Professor at the New School, a nationally renowned civil rights attorney, a legal analyst for NBC News and MSNBC, previously an assistant U.S. attorney in the Southern District of New York and counsel to New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio. Welcome, Maya. What took you so long?
Maya Wiley [00:02:11] Harry you didn't ask!
Harry Litman [00:02:15] Next, Joe Lockhart joins us on Talking Feds. [Applause] Joe, as you all probably know, was press secretary under President Clinton from 1998 to 2000. Tumultuous time that gives him much personal experience as almost anyone with the political or political turmoil that we are about to experience. He previously was press secretary to a number of prominent officials, including Walter Mondale, Michael Dukakis, and easier than the man to call when you're in an existential crisis or he's a professional glutton for punishment because his communications consulting firm, Glover Park Group, worked for Facebook from 2011 to 2012. And the NFL. So he and I actually met on the Kerry campaign when I was general counsel in Pennsylvania, though he was too high up to remember. Welcome Joe. Thank you very much for being here.
Harry Litman [00:03:16] Finally, Jill Wine-Banks, as many of you know. [APPLAUSE] All right. Number one. Number two and number three is an MSNBC legal analyst, but that ain't all.
Harry Litman [00:03:27] She was the first woman to serve as an organized crime prosecutor at the DOJ in Washington. One of the three assistant Watergate special prosecutors. Again, the only woman. Appointed as general counsel of the U.S. Army. That would be a whole nother podcast. That's a tricky position. By President Carter, served as Illinois's first solicitor general and also has had a long career in private practice. And she is generally considered, I'd say, to be the grand dame of the MSNBC commentator world. Welcome, Jill.
Harry Litman [00:04:05] All right. Let's dive in. The White House finds itself having to fight now on many fronts. They're mostly on the defense. They're mostly losing ground to capitalize on Joe's experience in particular. Let's start with a tighter focus on the White House and the president himself. It's really not clear that anybody is actually at the helm. There seems to be no war room, nobody in charge. And to the extent Trump is in charge of his own defense, he seems characteristically angry and erratic. So to all of us. But, Joe, let me start with you. What's the White House doing right now, if anything? And what are they doing wrong?
Joe Lockhart [00:04:47] Well, I think you're right about there not being a war room or an organized effort. They are they are held hostage to the whims of the president. He's running all of this. They don't have any of the normal channels to use to get a message out. There is no White House briefing. They don't seem to have a surrogate operation. And, you know, I think the focus of this as a communications problems are a little misplaced. It's it's not a communication and it's a Trump problem. He has created it. He makes it worse. You know, our strategy in 1998.
Harry Litman [00:05:23] What was it like how did it contrast?
Joe Lockhart [00:05:25] It couldn't be further from what they are doing now. You know, I can count on one finger the number of times the president went out and talked about the impeachment process and the investigation and Ken Starr,.
Harry Litman [00:05:37] That wasn't such a great–
Joe Lockhart [00:05:38] And it was a disaster. But that was one time in nine months. And trust me, the president wanted to talk about it and he had strong feelings about it. And some of us privately heard a lot about it. But the whole strategy was to make sure that he focused on the people's business, on governing, and was a full time president, not someone distracted and obsessed and self-pitying and self-indulgent.
Harry Litman [00:06:01] Who is enforcing that? Who was reining him in?
Joe Lockhart [00:06:06] Umm...We did it in shifts. No fewer than three people were allowed. I'm a shift because one person would get killed. No, no. Listen, the president, you know, staff can enforce long term strategy on a principle that doesn't agree with the strategy. And it took great self-restraint on the president's behalf to keep his mouth shut. And for Bill Clinton, that was a hard thing to do. But he did. And it worked. As you know, his approval rating went up 10 points between the impeachment hearings opening and the impeachment hearings om the House. Being impeached in the House. So. And I what you know, it went from 63 to 73. This isn't, these aren't Trump numbers. So and then Trump has done just the opposite. He has sent the message to the country that the single most important thing going on in the country right now is the attack on him. And that whether you don't have health care or whether you don't have a job or whether your kid's school is falling apart. None of that matters until he gets taken care of. And as a political strategy, it's a terrible strategy.
Harry Litman [00:07:14] Jill, do you actually remember how it was and say, you know, I and others who are old enough, remember Ron Ziegler out there trying to manage communications from the Nixon White House in 74? I know you weren't inside it. Very much the opposite. But were they? What was their sort of strategy and more structure? If you to the extent you glean it?
Jill Wine-Banks [00:07:35] The structure and the strategy was pretty much the same as Donald Trump attack the prosecutor. They used the words witch hunt and hoax the same way during Watergate.
Harry Litman [00:07:48] And was it Nixon himself out front or who was in charge? Nixon?
Jill Wine-Banks [00:07:52] Well, Nixon did say all that. Nixon had, of course, his enemies list. And he went ahead and implemented it with, let's get the IRS to investigate all the people on my enemies list, which were mostly Democratic donors and journalists. Mary McGrory is the only woman who is on that list. She was a journalist and it was a horrible situation back then. But we in the prosecutor's office pretty much ignored it. We just went about our business and did our job. And that's what I think has to happen now. Is Congress has to keep about its business, not only the business of the people by passing legislation. And by the way, Congress was able during Watergate to pass a lot of good legislation. And actually, Richard Nixon actually was in charge of a lot of good things that happened. The EPA was created under him. Title 9 was passed under him. China was opened by him. I don't see any accomplishments right now of any equivalent nature in this White House that benefit all the people in this room. Maybe they benefit him for sure. They benefit him and his most close colleagues. But they aren't helping with education. They are. With voter suppression, they aren't helping to protect us from the Russians right now who are doing the same thing for this upcoming election that they did in the last year.
Harry Litman [00:09:13] And they're not helping with civil rights, says Nixon. I mean, Nixon's never looked as good as he has these last two years. But but you know something I remember that was of a piece was the attack on the press, which I thought was very vicious at the time. You know, Katie Graham, etc. I won't finish that sentence, but that's a big feature, Maya, of the Trump, not just the Trump, but the Trump surrogate attacks on Fox. The whole notion of the conduit of the information, the press being in on the scheme to bring him down.
Jill Wine-Banks [00:09:54] Wait a second Harry, you have to finish that sentence.
Harry Litman [00:09:56] Katie Graham's going to get her tit caught in a ringer, said Hal-, said Nixon himself.
Jill Wine-Banks [00:10:01] It's almost as bad as grabbing pussy.
Harry Litman [00:10:11] Should we vote on that?.
Maya Wiley [00:10:11] See, I wouldn't have been to say a word. Jill!
Joe Lockhart [00:10:14] I yield my time.
Harry Litman [00:10:15] Yeah. But but but but Maya what?
Harry Litman [00:10:17] So, I mean, look, in so many ways, we from critics have been flummoxed over the last many months and things we thought were were ineffective, if not buffoonish have been effective. What about this broadside against the press? Is it generally continue to be an effective sort of arrow in his quiver or is that going to abate now that the sort of facts of the matter seem to be coming established?
Maya Wiley [00:10:51] Well, let me answer that by saying yes and yes and no and no. By which I mean, first of all, Fox News, one of the important things that's happening is there are actually a few people on Fox News challenging the Trump narrative. Right. Chris Wallace has not given folks a pass. And I think that is important because one of the problems we have with this discussion about what are facts? What do we know? What is speculation? What is opinion is that we're not all consuming news from the same sources. So and you and I have we had this conversation a while back, which is, you know, during the time of Nixon, folks were getting their facts. Generally, they were getting the same facts. Right, no matter what network you made.
Harry Litman [00:11:38] Huntely-Brinkley?
Maya Wiley [00:11:39] Yeah.
Maya Wiley [00:11:40] But now you really, unfortunately, have people who are in media markets who if they're only watching Fox News and not watching Fox News and maybe some other stations are not reading or listening to radio stations that have a broader, more diverse set of discussions about what we're learning. You might not necessarily know all that's really happening in this. So I think it's so it's complicated by that factor. There are some folks who are not going to necessarily see or get the facts in the way that we are.
Harry Litman [00:12:12] I want to do a shout out, by the way, to Chris Wallace, is interview of Mulvaney that was the best moment in journalism
Maya Wiley [00:12:18] Absolutely. Absolutely. But I but I do think the the this this goes back in part to what is the strategy for impeachment hearings and trials and the trial moving forward, because I think on one hand, we have a lot of very clear public information widely available that in and of itself, I would argue, is sufficient evidence to vote articles of impeachment. Right. Put aside perhaps a trial. Certainly sufficient to vote articles of impeachment. I think the issue becomes how much consumption, how much opportunity do people get to hear from the actual witnesses? Because remember, now we have a situation where those witnesses are part of the Trump administration. So unlike the attacks on the news saying fake news, they're lying to you, it becomes a lot harder to say that his own appointees are lying. That becomes more challenging. And I just wanted to lift up an additional point that, you know, Joe was making. I mean, the other thing that we have happening, though, that is not that is that is, I think, somewhat directly related to what may happen in the impeachment process or all the other unforced errors of lawlessness of the Trump administration. So the G7 summit, I mean, it's real. It's not only not focusing on issue bread and butter issues for the American people, which is a big mistake. He's making other large mistakes that make him look corrupt,.
Jill Wine-Banks [00:13:55] Look corrupt?
[00:13:57] You see, this is why I sit next to Jill.
Harry Litman [00:14:01] You know but it is really true this tremendous record of accomplishment. It's puzzling. You know, we just found out today, for instance, we've had where we're looking at a trillion dollar deficit. And, you know, even if you channel it, I want to get back to how I got a 17 percent increase in 12 months. But I I want to ask Joe. I want we go. We're trying.
[00:14:20] I want to follow up on something Joe said and [unclear] OK. You got it a second. I want to ask Joe, because I assume when you're press secretary, you might have thought it sometimes with the last thing you would have wanted to do was malign the fourth estate. And it actually seemed like an article of faith, not just of Trump and but the press, the various press secretaries. How have you reacted seeing in the last year, the press secretary get up there when when she does every eight months or whatever and just call the people assembled, you know, a bunch of corrupt morons. And it's kind of the kind of work anyway.
Joe Lockhart [00:15:02] Well, I mean, he has a strategy. You know, it is it is a reasonable strategy, given how weak a hand they have. They don't want to be playing this hand. They'd rather have a hand to play where they had a strong economy, good government, peace in the world and a president who was thoughtful and reasonable. They don't have that. They have, you know, an insane human being as president driving us off the cliff. So the only strategy they have available to them is to create chaos. Attack the process. Attack the media and try to create the sense that everyone is corrupt and it all get lost in.
Joe Lockhart [00:15:41] And, you know, going back to the earlier point, the difference between now and then, whether it be Clinton or whether it be Nixon, is you know, Roger Ailes famously said his idea for Fox News came out of Nixon, which he said if Nixon had had something like Fox News, he wouldn't have had to resign. We live in a completely different world. We live in a world where people only listen to people they agree with. They only watch people they agree with. They only read people they agree with. The problem for Trump is he needs more people than are watching him and watching his Twitter feed to get reelected than he has. And every president up until Trump always worked on the, you know, the sort of strategy that I have my base, I keep them happy, but I spend every day trying to broaden my coalition. My 40 percent needs to be 51 percent. And you often find like my my boss was criticized by progressives as being too conservative. The idea was, though, he wanted to make sure, among other things, that he had a second term. So he was reaching out to Republicans. And that's the way it always worked. Until the media fractured and we had over everything fractured. And now you have a president who only thinks he's governing for the people who voted for you.
Jill Wine-Banks [00:16:58] Jill, you're being very patient and I'm coming to you in five seconds. But I just have one quick follow up. Your old friends in the press, are they thin skinned about it or are they mad? Does it bother them or do you think it's water off their back?
Joe Lockhart [00:17:11] Let me correct you, my old friend. That isn't plural.
Harry Litman [00:17:14] How she's doing.
Joe Lockhart [00:17:15] Just just great. It's funny because tomorrow when I'm moderating a panel with four White House correspondents and boy, I've been waiting 20 years to turn the tables so that I you know, it's funny because I did ask, you know, someone who is a fairly prominent White House correspondent that everyone would know. I won't tell you who it is, you know, six months in. I said, this must be fun. You have access to the president of the United States more than you normally would. You get on the front page almost every day. And I was very surprised when they said, no, it's miserable. And I it's I'm not even sure it's them being the story. It's the constant lying and it's the constant having to deal with people you don't trust. But you've got to talk to them because who you're going to ask someone on the street or your cab driver what the president's policy on Syria is. And I think it's a you know, the president talked about draining the swamp. He just moved it into Pennsylvania. Sixteen hundred Pennsylvania Avenue. And I by and large, I think most of the people there are discouraged and miserable.
Harry Litman [00:18:17] OK. So, Jill, you had a point both to Maya and to Joe, right.
Jill Wine-Banks [00:18:20] And some of it's been covered already. But that one is going back to Ziegler, who called the break in at the Democratic National Committee a third rate burglary. And now the president's calling a third rate. Chief SCHIEFFER, secretary of energy, the speaker of the House, third rate speaker of the House. So there's, you know, another similarity. Going back to this difference between then and now where we had three networks and all of them had the same facts and trusted people that we believed. We argued about what they meant, what. But we didn't argue about there being facts. And if there is, as Joe just said, if there had not been or the kind of media we hadn't, if there had been a Fox, I do believe that Richard Nixon could have survived.
Jill Wine-Banks [00:19:05] I probably would have been the one who erased the 18 minutes because they would have accused me instead of. Exactly. Good, good demonstration. And that makes a difference. Facts matter and we have to pay attention.
Jill Wine-Banks [00:19:18] Everyone should be reading not just the news coverage, but when you read online and it says the indictment is here, read the indictment, read Taylor's 15 pages. It's dramatic. It's amazing. Read the decision that says this is a legitimate impeachment inquiry. And you have a right to get the 60 material. Those are things that we all need to be informed about and to be able to argue. And I think, you know, we've lost a certain percentage of Americans who are gone for at least right now and maybe for a long time to come. They've been unleashed in a horrible way to think that they are empowered to talk badly and think badly and what they think is OK. But facts do matter. And so pay attention and also make sure that. You're not using the language that Donald Trump uses, and I don't mean just his dirty words. I'm talking about how he creates, you know, fake news and how he says they're just trying to do something and don't call it digging up dirt. It's making it up. There is no dirt to be dug up.
Jill Wine-Banks [00:20:24] So let's not let them set the glossary for this investigation. Let's call things what they really are. And let's call lies lies.
Harry Litman [00:20:34] Now. OK. And Maya, you were shaking your head on a number of things. Let me zero in on this point about the court. So Judge Howell's opinion now says they can have the grand jury material.
Harry Litman [00:20:45] It is true and pretty interesting that when they first started this stonewalling strategy, they just wanted to buy time to get past the Mueller stuff, which they bought. But now that the decisions are coming due, just as this new scandal has broken. But but you you seemed especially enthusiastic about that opinion. Do you think besides the good, it just.
Maya Wiley [00:21:08] I Happened to get excited about upholding the United States Constitution.
Harry Litman [00:21:13] Exactl.
Maya Wiley [00:21:14] That does excite me.
Harry Litman [00:21:16] And does it excite others? And I mean, my question to you is, do you think not simply the legal holdings with the actual impact on the over all kind of opinions about Trump and the administration, the fact that the courts are weighing in? Does that does that strike a big blow against the White House or do you think people ignore it?
Maya Wiley [00:21:40] Well, look, so one. Let's let's talk about what we mean by blow. So one is this administration has been a body blow to the U.S. Constitution. So any judge that stands up and says and if you a lot of people aren't going to read 75 pages of that opinion. But what that opinion says essentially is you all just body slam the constitution and we're done now. Yes. That's not it. Impeachment inquiry is legitimate, by the way. You don't ask. I that's right. I said I haven't actually to. And I'm gonna say this, even though those outside the scope of your question in in the judge's summary of the facts. She specifically cites the Mueller report, the fact that both the Department of Justice, which has launched this ludicrous argument and the attorneys for the House Judiciary Committee, agree about the central city of the Muller report in shedding light on Congress's impeachment process inquiry.
[00:22:51] And she specifically enumerates sections of the report where Paul Manafort convicted Paul Manafort doing business on behalf of the pro Russian Ukrainian government, briefed Donald Trump redaction right after the July 22nd release from from WikiLeaks. So I say that because she is specifically saying and I don't know if you noticed it today, but Donald Trump had a tweet saying there was no finding of Russia collusion. Right. This is on the heels of a judge who specifically pointed to questions and facts that may shed light on what Robert Mueller himself said he couldn't get sufficient evidence of because of the obstructive behavior of many different people. So I think that is relevant not just for the holding of the constitutional opinion, which was critically important, which gives a lot of wind in the sails of the Democrats and certainly should give the Republicans pause as they trash as they help support the trashing of the Constitution. But she also really goes and points directly to what is at issue in this impeachment inquiry.
Harry Litman [00:24:12] It's so true. I mean, we up here have been saying for many months how bankrupt some of these not just bankrupt, but brazen, knowingly bankrupt they were. But the court process takes some time and we say it and it's not really in an empty chamber because there are people on Fox saying the opposite. And after months and months, her opinion wasn't simply definitive on the law. The tone of it really struck a blow. This argument by the by the White House borders on farce, not a not a thing that you'll see and many opinions. And she really blamed, as she should have, the the obstructive attitude of the White House for why she now needed to say, you get all this material.
Joe Lockhart [00:24:57] You know, I'm the one non-lawyer on the panel and goes to the forever disappointment of my mother. But there you go.
Maya Wiley [00:25:04] We'll give you an honorary degree. I didn't.
Harry Litman [00:25:06] Everyone's honorary.
Joe Lockhart [00:25:07] I did in my mid 30s, I got a job working for the president of the United States and her reaction was it would look good on my law school application. But having said that, and, you know, I read these things a little bit different way, but it seemed to me that part of that opinion was it was almost like she was trying to do a public service to say these talking points are bullshit, such talking points or so. And, you know, the the eight page letter that went from the White House counselor. They are. Yeah. The eight page letter that, you know, I read someone's analysis this morning, which I think is right. Which is she made Cippilone eat his letter.
Maya Wiley [00:25:44] Oh, yes.
Joe Lockhart [00:25:44] And and it seems like there were there was almost a conscious effort on her part to say enough. But I think they've had they've had a fair, fair fight. That shouldn't have been a fair fight.
Joe Lockhart [00:25:58] And I'm gonna come down on the side of what's right versus what's left or what she laid out a very clear set of facts.
Jill Wine-Banks [00:26:05] She laid out not just obstruction and collusion. She did. Even though you've heard me say a million times, there is no such crime as collusion and there isn't that we shouldn't let again Donald Trump set the words for the crimes that are being investigated. But she did it in a really rational way. Point by point going, that's a ridiculous argument. This has no basis. There is a legitimate inquiry. You don't need a vote of the House. You don't need a resolution. And she pointed out that in Watergate, there wasn't one. There is no need for it under the Constitution or under the practice. She really went through step by step and kept saying that argument falls flat. That argument is wrong. If you remember, she also said, wow, that's quite an argument during the argument. I mean, you knew sort of where she was leading. But she did a really good job.
Maya Wiley [00:26:57] And it was this it was the second time, not the first, because we have the New York federal court right on the issue of Trump's tax returns in the Manhattan district attorney's case, which basically said, yeah, you can't ever investigate me while I'm sitting in office no matter what I do. So that was also an astounding argument.
Maya Wiley [00:27:18] But I fight a very similar opinion, both in the sense of its tone and it and its in its public service to really lay out how detrimental, destructive and lacking in any legal analysis that could be supported by the Constitution. So I think in totality it does matter that there's been a cadence. But the one thing I do want to say this is a this is an administration now that is not only put on more federal judges than previous administrations. We he has thrown out the playbook on only nominating lawyers who have been deemed qualified by the American Bar Association. And we just had someone confirmed deemed not qualified to be a federal judge by the American Bar Association. So there are some things that will be lasting no matter what happens with impeachment. And no matter what happens with the election, because the judges that we are hearing from right now are judges who were qualified to sit on the bench.
Joe Lockhart [00:28:29] Well, let's say let's not forget we have a president who's not qualified. So.
Harry Litman [00:28:34] But he doesn't get. He doesn't get it. But no, look, it's true. Judges and justices, you could. Now, there it is true that the Howell's opinion is going to go up on appeal. And D.C. Circuit is a little hard to predict. But I think you can expect expect the same kind of emphatic opinion. The Second Circuit opinion, I think, will issue any day by Judge Katzman, and I think it will be also emphatic. But but these are sifting their way up to the court. All right.
Harry Litman [00:29:03] Let's switch gears from the White House and the court to now our third branch focus on the contours, the point Maya brought up of an impeachment trial in the House.
[00:29:16] I mean, an impeachment article in the House and a potential trial in the Senate. Let's start with the House. So we're hearing these screams from the Republicans that the Democrats approach of closed door depositions constitutes an egregious violation of due process and everything Western society holds dear. Jill, as a prosecutor. Is there anything to that or not? Are also a political sort of observer. Anything to the charge and whether or not there is. Is it hitting home?
Jill Wine-Banks [00:29:49] Short answer. There's nothing to it. No is the answer. It's ridiculous. Is it hitting home? It is. Well, for the people who are lost forever to our democracy, it is hitting home. And this goes back to something that Joe said earlier, which is the one thing that they're doing right, is they are keeping their. Yes, they are holding the base. They are convincing them because they only have information from Fox News and from him, and they he's convinced them that if he says it, it's true. And they should pay no attention to anybody else. Don't believe what you see. Don't believe what you read. Believe only me. So that's the first thing. Historically, this is a totally fine way. An inquiry must be done in secret for a number of reasons. Number one, you don't want witnesses getting together and knowing what the other one has said, which apparently has happened here. Yes. Representative Swalwell. Exactly. So you need to make sure that that doesn't happen by keeping the information quiet. Secondly, the Republicans are in the room. And every time that they say that this is being done without any Republicans were being kept out of this. That is just nonsense. I was gonna say something else. I say a lie. It's a lie. OK. I was going to use a worse word. But we have to keep in mind that we need to know that that is true, that this is how it's always done and how it should be. This is an investigation. All the process that is due to the president is being accorded to him right now. And then when there is a Senate trial, if the Senate has a trial, because remember, Mitch McConnell can pull any tricks he wants, he didn't let us have a vote when Obama had a Supreme Court nominee. Maybe he'll decide there should be no trial, although he's indicated that he will have a trial. Doesn't mean that it won't be opening statements and they vote to acquit without having a defense. I'm just saying it's possible. And so we need to be careful and paying attention to what's happening.
Harry Litman [00:31:51] All right. So let's stick with it chronologically. So what say now with the investigation and and there there is a articles of impeachment presented a big topic now that I think including in Congress, they're really thinking about it strategically is how broad gaged or narrow gage. Do they go?
[00:32:09] And Maya I wonder if you ever thought about how narrow they should stay. You know what? We've had we've got two years of grist for the mill, including the mower stuff that's just come out. On the other hand, we have this pristine example that's corrupt on so many levels with the Ukraine scenario. What do you think it will be? And what do you think should be the kind of structure of articles of impeachment if they issue?
Maya Wiley [00:32:39] You know, I admit that I go back and forth on this myself because it's genuine judgment. It's a genuine judgment call. It's actually purely a political judgment call, because legally, I would say there are a whole bunch of articles of impeachment that need to be listed in the articles. I have a I. But let me say what I feel what I feel is that OP's obviously articles of impeachment on abuse of power as it relates to Ukraine. I would call I would have an article called Bribery. And Ari Melber has written about this and made this point very powerfully. I would call it bribery as well. I would have an article and articles of impeachment, I must say. Well, you mean one count. Yeah, I'm going to count. Remember, you can have abuse of authority or abuse of power. It can be a separate count from bribery. OK. So talking to. Yes, I'm talking two counts. I would name them both as counts, the obviously obstruction of Congress. I do not believe any of given the behavior of this administration, Congress can afford not to have an article or probably more than one right count of obstruction of Congress because it'll just be devastating to the country if we allow this as a precedent that doesn't result in an article of impeachment. But I have a hard time leaving his obstruction of justice off the table, because in that one, the Mueller report named in several instance instances with a thoughtful legal analysis, the facts and the law that provided substantial evidence of obstruction of justice. So I don't know that you need to it necessarily needs to prolong greatly the process to pull that forward, particularly now. You know, if they're able to get it. But I think even in what what has been what has not been redacted, there is sufficient evidence. And I would, I think, add that the other reason just from a political standpoint is some of the polling shows that Republicans get much more concerned about whether or not Trump should be impeached when they see those facts. So I think the more that that can be pulled back into the public light. Trump did us a favor. In fact, by the day after Mueller's testimony and Congress deciding he had a free hand to go violate the law.
Maya Wiley [00:35:08] That and then started obstructing again.
Harry Litman [00:35:10] The very day,.
Maya Wiley [00:35:11] The very next day that it's actually, I think that a coherent narrative.
Harry Litman [00:35:15] All right. So we'll keep plowing through chronologically, except I do, Joe or Joe. Either you have a substantially different view from Maya's. On actually what the article should look like.
Jill Wine-Banks [00:35:27] I agree with Maya completely. There were three articles of impeachment against Richard Nixon, and they were the three that Maya just named. There was abuse of power. There was obstruction of justice. There was contempt of Congress. All of those apply equally to Trump. And whatever you specify under them, those are the three broad categories. Now, there were attempts to, for example, pass for the bombing of Cambodia, and that did not gain a bipartisan support. So if we go to Syria and our abandonment of the Kurds, which is clearly was, again, it all goes back to Russia. I see. Jennifer Rubin here. And that's what she just said earlier. It's true. It all goes back to Putin. And that's one of the things that goes back to Putin. But the other three, there are many examples under each of those categories of how he has abused his power. And we can't stick to just one, even though the Ukrainian phone call is such a great example. It's it's actually probably extortion under the Hobbs Act, which says that you don't need physical violence if you are under color of law. And clearly being president and making a threat like that is color of law. And it's nonsense to think that the Ukrainians did not know that the money was being withheld because they didn't have it and they knew that Congress had passed it. So how did they not anecdotal.
Maya Wiley [00:36:48] And there's evidence. Now, I read that these leaks in news reporting, there's evidence that they it was early.
Harry Litman [00:36:52] You guys are kind of passionate about this.
Harry Litman [00:36:55] All right. So I detect a general consensus for a more full body. Can't predict. I'm going to.
Joe Lockhart [00:37:00] Yeah. Can I make just a point on this? Because I agree that this right now is wholly a political decision, has nothing to do. I would I would just on the Constitution, again, as a non lawyer, the reason that you wouldn't put Syria and because there's nothing in the constitution, says the constitution that says the president can't do stupid things, he can't do corrupt things, he can't do abusive things. But this is and I think what the Democrats on the Hill have to look at is not what the Republicans are arguing today. They have to anticipate what the Republicans will argue when it comes to the floor. And it's I can tell you with almost certainty what their argument is going to be. There are arguments going to be we're very disappointed in the president. He made a mistake here. He shouldn't have done that. But this doesn't rise to the level of impeachment. That's where they're going to be. And if it's too narrowly focused on just Ukraine, then we will not have established that this is not a single mistake.
Joe Lockhart [00:37:58] This is a pattern of abuse. So I think it has to be broad enough. And I know the you know, I've learned things like kitchen sink versus thin to win in green rooms, you know, from lawyers. So I think it has to be at least a small kitchen sink to establish that. And the one point I want to make, just, because I don't get to make a case this is the thing that makes me crazy, is the rank hypocrisy in the arguments. I mean, I lived through 1998 and I lived through Lindsey Graham playing in my head talking about we should do this in secret because that's how you do it.
Joe Lockhart [00:38:34] And I lived through Lindsey Graham talking about this is just an indictment. You know, this is I lived through them saying, you know, the Republicans have argued in the last month or two that everything is hearsay here. Without hearsay, there never would have been on Monica Lewinsky investigation because Linda Tripp is who told the investigators. That's hearsay. That's classic. You don't have to go to law school to know that that's hearsay.
Joe Lockhart [00:39:00] So every now and then,.
Maya Wiley [00:39:01] And if you do go to law school, you'll learn there are exceptions. Yes. Yes.
Joe Lockhart [00:39:04] But every investigator, every argument they've made is based on this standard that they argued the exact opposite of in 1998, which just tells you that they don't have any principles and that they only believe in holding on to power, grabbing power and desperately trying to keep it. So that's you know what?
Harry Litman [00:39:25] I think the indictment is true broadly, but it really has been remarkable. If you're on Twitter, people say there's always a tweet and it really is. Lindsey Graham comes out and says something. You go back and find it and it's the exact opposite. All right. I detect, by the way, a consensus for a full bodied approach, articles of impeachment. I won't. I'll just note that I've taken the counter view and have an op ed out this week presenting it. And but it really is, as Maya says, a genuine judgment call that they are currently struggling with on the Hill.
Harry Litman [00:40:00] All right. So now moving forward and Joe, you kind of preface this. Look, if they if they vote, we know it will pass the House. So I just want to think for one question about the House Republicans versus Senate Republicans. They're a very different breed, right? They're ones a little more uncouth. I think you could say the if you could imagine a united strategy that just says we'll hold our fire till the Senate.
Harry Litman [00:40:26] Or you can imagine the House Republicans going, you know, almost kind of gonzo and trying to make a joke of the process. What do you see that if they see it as a foregone conclusion, how do that what what's the specific strategy? If you have any thoughts of the House Republicans knowing that probably they're just, you know, paving the way for the trial?
Joe Lockhart [00:40:50] Yeah, listen, I don't. That's not even a dilemma for House Republicans. We know what they're going to do. They're going to try to light the House on fire and hope they burn the Senate down in the process. And somehow the president will be left standing. And there is a big difference between now as well. Yeah, there's a big difference between the House and the Senate.
Joe Lockhart [00:41:07] Anyone in the House as a Republican who is a moderate or in a swing district right now, we call them a lobbyist because they lost in 2018. They're not there anymore. So it's you know, and with gerrymandering of districts, you've got I think they have one hundred and ninety eight seats. I think probably one hundred and eighty of them are absolute safe seats. They could join Donald Trump and shoot people on Fifth Avenue in their town and still get reelected.
Joe Lockhart [00:41:35] I mean, for God's sake, to Republicans in 2018 under indictment, Chris Collins and Cunningham went ran in San Diego and they won. So that tells you something about their districts. So they are going to light the bonfire and we expect that the Senate is in a different place.
Harry Litman [00:41:55] We're about to got here. OK. So I want to give that these guys a shot first. I'll just say, you know, when we saw that mob on on Wednesday, I thought these guys are buffoons. They're crazy, or at least they're try they're willing to make themselves look crazy in order to just change the narrative any way at all. But David Jolly made a really good point on David Gura this morning.
Harry Litman [00:42:15] He said, no, no, no, no, no. You've got to understand, each of them is playing to their home crowd and to the people who will reelect them. They're not crazy. They're gladiators. Knight in shining armor going down and, you know, acting and acting out their civil disobedience. All right. Moving to the Senate, where I at least, you know, almost whatever happens, you got to think that that the trial begins with the with the likelihood that Trump is acquitted. But but maybe it's up in the air. The Senate is supposed to be decorous. Finally, take it seriously. There have been all these senators who have just dodged this for years where what do you have any sense?
Harry Litman [00:43:02] And, you know, it's just it's just speculation. And our point at this point of how the Senate approaches it when when they actually get this bill of particulars from from presumably Chairman Schiff.
Jill Wine-Banks [00:43:17] So I think we've seen McConnell and we can predict what will happen. I want to just add on the House side. I wore a clown pin yesterday because that's what I think of what happened. And it's not funny, though, because this is a serious part of our democracy that they are just flipping. And it is a question of gerrymandering has led to. There is no common ground anymore. There's no bipartisanship. They are secure and they will do whatever it takes. And that's a danger to democracy. I think the Senate could act in a reasonable way. I I just want to say I still remain some of my Pollyanna views, which is how many people remember Paula Duncan, anybody. She was a juror in the Manafort trial who was a loyal Trump supporter, who said this whole thing is a witch hunt. It's a hoax. But I was a juror and I heard the evidence and I voted to convict him on all 18 counts. I'm hoping that there are maybe 20 senators who will see the facts and we'll go. This is a danger to democracy. He's threatening our national security. He's threatening the international order, not just us. And we have to protect America. And that they will come to the fore and take action. So I still remains somewhat hopeful that the trial won't be a hoax and that it will be legitimate that the evidence will be presented. I look forward to the public hearings because it made a huge difference in Watergate as the facts came out. You could watch Nixon won 49 out of 50 states. He won a landslide in the popular vote, unlike the current incumbent and his support. Went from the 60s to 20. His numbers on impeachment went from 20 to over 51. In the same exact pattern as facts came out, and that's what I'm still sort of hoping that even in this day of Fox News and social media and the Russians posting on social media and on Bright Barton info wars and whatever else there is, that there will come a time when all of us will be informed of the facts and that the vote in the Senate will reflect those facts. [APPLAUSE]
Maya Wiley [00:45:53] I'm gonna be a little more negative, not because I don't absolutely hold out the hope that Jill has, but the end of the day. McConnell is the presiding officer, while Justice Roberts will sit up there and it is the person who will be making the decisions about how the trial proceeds. What evidence and how the evidence is presented means exactly where I think Jill started. I think that what they will do is try to cut short the presentation of evidence, because whatever they're going to vote, it just doesn't matter what the evidence is. So they're going to want it to be as brief and short as possible. You'll see the Democrats fighting that. But at the end of the day, it is under their rules. It is Mitch McConnell's call. And Justice Roberts is not going to sit up there and get involved in the politics of that. Right. So but but but having said that, I think that that is why it becomes so critical for the house for the house to get as many facts out there as possible in the house process, because it'll still be out there in the public when the Senate starts its trial.
Harry Litman [00:47:09] So there is an end. I think I'm going to ask Joe for for a very quick just name or two.
[00:47:15] Do you have an opinion as to who's Goldwater here? We don't see McConnell ever deserting him. You know, Mitt Romney isn't dramatic enough. Is there a name or two that if you're Trump and that senator starts to prevaricate, you're really getting nervous?
Joe Lockhart [00:47:33] I don't think it'll happen. But if there's gonna be a Goldwater, his name is Mitch McConnell. And here's why there. I mean, you can be Pollyanna ish. You can be constitutional based. This is about none of those things. He will never consider the Constitution. It's not clear he's ever read it. He, more than anything in 2021, wants to still be majority leader, not the minority leader. That is a disaster for him to become. And he's on the ballot this year and he's got approval rating of somewhere between 18 and 20 percent in Kentucky. He is in Kentucky. Yes. So and that's not unusual for a majority leader, because he has to do things, you know, and make deals.
Joe Lockhart [00:48:12] And the point is, there go. He is going to look at what's best for his caucus, not what's best for Trump. The current dynamic for a Republican is if you do not side with Trump, you can't get elected. But dynamics change. And if that if that through facts coming out and everything that could happen in public hearings and court cases and you know, all of the information coming out, McConnell will abandon Trump as quickly as he has to. He has to. He doesn't like him. He doesn't respect him. He but at this point, he will stick with him because it's in the interest of his caucus. And one one other point, which is a lot of Democrats, including me, we debated whether we should go forward with impeachment. And one of the things that turned me because I thought we shouldn't I thought we should do this at the ballot box, was the idea that Trump was emboldened by what happened with with Mauer. And there's a very significant thing that I think has changed in the last couple of weeks, which is up until two weeks ago, Trump had all of the leverage on the Senate and the Senate had no leverage with Trump. I think that has shifted and I think the leverage now is with the center. Trump ultimately knows that these are the jurors. And, you know, he's not that smart. But I think he understands you can piss them off, but not too much. And I think you see in very subtle ways that balance of power changing. And I think you're seeing a little bit of the beginnings of a check and balance coming from the Republicans in the Senate and not necessarily the Democrats. So as a broad point, this will all be decided based on them, the electoral map of 2020, not on the Constitution. And already I think it's had an effect of putting some, you know, a I don't know what you call it, a baby guard rail on Trump. And, you know, that is a very good fact.
Harry Litman [00:50:11] All right. It's time for our final segment that if any you from heard Talking Feds before no five words or fewer, where we take a question from a listener and each of the feds has to answer in five words or fewer. Our question today comes from Terri Marr. Terri asks, Trump has exposed weaknesses in our democracy. What specific laws should be passed, norms codified or structural changes made so that a bad actor cannot have so much power in the future?
Harry Litman [00:50:47] Five words fed starting with Maya.
Maya Wiley [00:50:51] OK. This is like the hardest part of this show, so I make it real simple. Impeach Donald Trump. [APPLAUSE]
Harry Litman [00:51:00] Are you giving your extra two to Jill?
Maya Wiley [00:51:04] Oh, I will.
Jill Wine-Banks [00:51:06] I'll agree with what I'm taking her extra words, but I agree with everything she said. Criminalize presidential public lies.
Jill Wine-Banks [00:51:17] It's a lie. Every time he speaks, let's criminalize it.
[00:51:21] The other is reenact Watergate special prosecutor rules and regulation.
Joe Lockhart [00:51:30] Slash regulations. Right. All right. Normally I have I take the prerogative going last, but I'll leave that to Joe.
Harry Litman [00:51:39] Eliminate Electoral College.
Jill Wine-Banks [00:51:40] Yes.
Maya Wiley [00:51:40] Yes.
Harry Litman [00:51:42] Restore filibuster.
Joe Lockhart [00:51:47] Mine is more forward looking and has nothing to do with codifying anything. It's very simple. Get out and vote.
Maya Wiley [00:51:55] Yes.
[00:51:56] All right. Thank you very much to Maya Wiley, Jill Wine-Banks and Joe Lockhart. Thank you very much, listeners. Thank you very much. Audience for tuning in to Talking Feds. If you like what you heard, please tell a friend to subscribe to us on Apple podcast or wherever they get their podcast.
[00:52:17] And please take a moment to rate and review this podcast. You can follow us on Twitter at Talking Feds Pod to find out about future episodes and other fads or related content. And check us out on the web at Talking Feds dot com. Submit your questions to questions at Talking Feds dot com. Either five words or fewer or sidebars. Thank you to the staff and hardworking staff at Politico. Thanks, listeners, for tuning in.
[00:52:46] And don't worry, as long as you need answers, the feds will keep talking. Thank you.
