DPCC Co-Chair Lieu: The President Is Not Above The Law
WASHINGTON, DC – Congressman Ted Lieu, Co-Chair of the House Democratic Policy and Communications Committee (DPCC), appeared on All in with Chris Hayes on MSNBCto discuss the Mueller investigation and President Trump's ongoing attacks on the Justice Department and law enforcement personnel. Below are excerpts from the interview. Click to here to watch the video
"Andrew McCabe gave a number of very disturbing statements about the behavior of Donald Trump to me — one of the most alarming was that Donald Trump believed Putin over our intelligence officials. No President of the United States should ever believe a former KGB operative over career U.S. intelligence officials. It makes you wonder what does Putin have on Trump that would make him behave this way. And it's consistent with Trump's behavior over the last two years with his bizarre relationship with Russia."
"I'm a former prosecutor. These are law enforcement personnel. They are looking at facts trying to determine if crimes are committed. Rosenstein is a Republican. He is looking at the same thing we all saw which is the President fired the FBI Director and then went on national TV a couple of days later and said ‘I did it because of the Russia investigation' that looks like textbook obstruction of justice. It makes you really wonder what is this President doing which is why it's not surprising that they may have had these discussions about the 25th amendment."
"This President raises all sorts of different constitutional issues that we have never encountered because no one has ever broken this many norms from the fake national emergency to the actions he has taken to really attack the Justice Department, attack law enforcement. When you look at the Constitution, nothing in there says you can't indict a sitting President and the whole lesson of Watergate to me is that the American people said no one is above the law and the DOJ is charged with enforcing the law and prosecuting people who commit crimes."
"Absolutely. Because if you say you don't, essentially the President is above the law because what you are saying none of the laws in America can be enforced against the President and there is no way the American people would accept that. It is not in our Constitution. And I am proud of what the FBI and DOJ have done so far as well as their prosecutors in the Southern District of New York as well as state attorneys general – everyone is taking the oath to the Constitution seriously."
"It is very interesting what Barr said later which is basically he didn't have all the facts when he wrote the memo. It is also very interesting to look at his actual testimony before the U.S. Senate. He does concede there are lots of different cases where the President can obstruct justice. And just because Trump does this in public in full view and brazenly, it doesn't mean it's not a crime and that's something the House Judiciary Committee is going to investigate. We are going to hold hearings and look at obstruction of justice, abuse of power as well as witness tampering."
"None of this is okay. It's not okay that you have career FBI officials struggling with what do you do with a President who looks like he is violating the law. It's not okay for the President to routinely attack law enforcement. But I have more hope than I think some of my colleagues because even before the midterm elections last November, we still had a Republican-led investigation of a Republican President from the Department of Justice. That's very impressive and that investigation is still going on. I'm not sure ta lot of other countries would have allowed that to happen. The fact that Robert Mueller still has his job I think is a testament to how strong our institutions still are."