Representatives Jeffries and Rice on the Insurrection

Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. With me now, Congressman Hakeem Jeffries, chairman of the House Democratic Caucus under Speaker Pelosi. He represents parts of Brooklyn and Queens and is a member of the House Judiciary Committee, and remember, he was also one of the House impeachment managers. Congressman Jeffries, welcome back to WNYC, just another Thursday morning.

Hakeem Jeffries: Just another Thursday morning in Trump's America. Good morning, Brian, great to be back with you even under these circumstances.

Brian: Before I ask if another impeachment process is underway or should be underway, as some people are calling for, can you describe your experience of yesterday? Where were you when the Capitol was breached, and what was your experience of the rest of the day like?

Hakeem: Well, I was on the floor of the House of Representatives at the time. We were engaged in debate with respect to the seating of the electors connected to Arizona and/or its certification because that's early in the alphabet as we were going through the different states and that was the first state that the Republicans objected to. The debate was ongoing, and there seemed to be some growing tension and movement by some of the Capitol police officers who were in the chamber. The next thing that we saw was that Speaker Pelosi was expeditiously removed, and then, the majority leader and the majority whip, Jim Clyburn and Steny Hoyer, who were in close proximity to where I was seated, were expeditiously removed.

At that point, we knew something serious was taking place. Jim McGovern, who's the chair of the Rules Committee, replaced Nancy Pelosi in the chair and the proceedings were ongoing. Then, he was interrupted by, I believe, the sergeant at arms who said, "There's a disturbance, protestors are trying to breach the Capitol. We think we have it on the control and we'll continue to update you with respect to any additional information."

Shortly, thereafter, we started to hear noise indicating that they clearly were closer than perhaps initially communicated to us. Sergeant at arms, I believe, or another security official got up again and said that the protestors had breached the Capitol, we're on the second floor, which is where the house chamber was located, ordered that the doors be barred, indicated to members that we needed to secure our gas masks that were underneath the seat and be prepared to thereafter follow any directions with respect to an anticipated conflict. It was at that point that I think I realized, Brian, this is a serious situation that is unfolding.

Brian: When you returned last night, what did you find? Was there vandalism? Was there graffiti? Was there theft? Where there written threats? What did the rioters leave behind?

Hakeem: There was clear vandalism, broken windows. Some of the debris had been removed and cleaned up, but there was urine. There was clear desecration. My office in the Capitol was located in close proximity to Steny Hoyer's office, which I understand was in part trashed. Steny Hoyer, since the passing of John Lewis has had a memorial poster board tribute to John Lewis, that was missing. I'm not sure whether it was desecrated but it was missing, and it was in an area where the protestors had clearly penetrated. I would think that would be a target for them.

Brian: Can I interrupt to ask if you take that as a sign of the racial nature of this riot?

Hakeem: Well, there's some complex issues connected to race that are clearly involved in what took place. This was a Trump-inspired insurrection, directed by an out-of-control president who has incited violence from the moment that he arrived in the Capitol all the way through this moment that we're in right now. This was a logical consequence of his behavior.

Now, with respect to the racial aspects of what took place, we know right-wing extremists were involved. Trump has played footsie with them over and over and over again and embraced their ideology in a wide variety of ways. They were clearly white supremacists who were in the building. The big question that many of us are concerned with, Brian, is, why were some of these domestic terrorists apparently escorted into the building and escorted out without any consequence? There's no circumstance where had those protestors, so-called, been of a different complexion, they would have been treated in that fashion.

Brian: Do you think that's a racial blind spot on the part of some Capitol police officers, or do you think that is, as John Heilemann put it on MSNBC, evidence of a fifth column of some of them who actually were with the insurrectionists?

Hakeem: I think we're going to need to do a comprehensive investigation to determine how this all unfolded in terms of the insurrection that took place, how it was organized, who was involved. There clearly was an intention to storm the Capitol. We need to hold every single person involved accountable. We've got video footage of many of these individuals.

I have to tell you, Brian, I was very disturbed in conversation with several members who are still in the capital area, who live in close proximity to the Hill, and there are many hotels close to us, and there were Trump supporters, MAGA supporters, who were checking out in full Trump regalia, drinking coffee, without masks, smiling as if nothing happened. It seems to me some of these people are probably the very same insurrectionists, which is why the whole situation is outrageous and why we need a complete and total investigation into the entire affair, internal and external.

Brian: Roman in the Bronx, you're on WNYC with Congressman Hakeem Jeffries. Hello, Roman.

Roman: Hey, Brian. Hey, Hakeem, glad to hear that you're safe.

Hakeem: Thank you, Roman.

Roman: Yes, just wanted to continue on this thread of the racism. I was in DC for the anniversary of Martin Luther King's March this summer and all throughout the city for protests for Black Lives Matter. This morning, it was pretty frustrating. I googled how many people were arrested from last night's riots. The first few articles were saying that it was reported around 13 or so people were arrested. That was just extremely infuriating to see the lack of arrest and accountability compared to the scene when I was down there for peaceful protests and seeing how the number of police officers that were down there. I guess my question is, what are your thoughts on the Capitol police's response to primarily white crowd versus a primarily Black or brown crowd?

Hakeem: Thank you. It's a very important narrative. I think we have to follow this thread to wherever the facts may lead us and that has to be part of the investigation, but let's take a step back. This was an assault on our democracy, an assault on the seat of government, an assault on the peaceful transition of power. We were executing our constitutional responsibilities to certify the election of Joe Biden as the 46th President of the United States pursuant to the Constitution. That is why the assault took place on this particular day. That is why it's been referred to by people across the ideological spectrum, including George W. Bush, as an insurrection.

We also know that it was an insurrection that was inspired and perhaps directed by Donald J. Trump. We have to track his words, including what he may have said at the rally, which I haven't been able to review at this particular point in time, but we know things intensified after he spoke. I believe he told people, "Go to the Capitol." That is an extraordinary breach of who we are as Americans.

In fact, the only other time that the Capitol has been breached in a manner as violent and aggressive is in the early 1800s by the British, when they were still mortal enemies. This time, it was domestic enemies. We have to follow-- We have to deal with that attack on who we are as Americans. Now, we also know that America is a country where systemic racism has been in the soil for the last 401 years. Whenever there's an American story, race is generally involved. We saw that yesterday and that has to be part of what we deal with as well.

Brian: What, in your view as a lawyer and a member of the Judiciary Committee, would constitute the crime on the part of the president of incitement to riot? I mean, in theory, one could say, "Go to the Capitol," and it means, "Go and hold a peaceful protest outside, down the Capitol steps," or it could mean, "Go and do what these rioters did." Where's the legal line for incitement to riot?

Hakeem: I'd have to take a look at the statute, Brian, and then, overlay the president's words. We do know what his actions have embodied over the last four years. This is a culmination of the recklessness of the president's behavior for the last four years. As a matter of fact, even prior to that, for five years, he perpetrated the racist lie that Barack Obama was not born in the United States of America. That was part of an effort to delegitimize Barack Obama's election. However, it also delegitimizes government.

When you deal with delegitimize government, you provoke some to take violent action to overthrow the government that has been delegitimized. Trump bears responsibility for that. That's clear. That's an open and shut case. With respect to criminal liability, we've got to take a look at the statute. I hope that there are investigators at both the Department of Justice, the FBI, as well as local authorities, who will do just that.

Brian: Willie in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC with Congressman Hakeem Jeffries. Hi, Willie, thank you for calling in.

Willie: Brian, good morning. Good morning, Hakeem. Can you hear me?

Hakeem: Yes, I can, good morning.

Brian: We can.

Willie: Good morning. Now, listen, Donald Trump is behind all of this. He's always been transparent. He's always told us who he was, what he was going to do, and the other night, everybody seems to be surprised at what happened. I was born and raised in Selma, Alabama. I'm 68 years old. Those people that sat behind that desk are despicable, deplorable, and dirty. He went and got the people that he knew that could carry out this terrorism. You can coat it with anything you want to, it is against our society. They urinated up there, call it like it is. They did everything that they could to talk to us the way they would talk to us if we were Black and standing in front of them.

How are we going to go after that? How are we going to fix this? How are we going to arrest these people? Somebody died last night or yesterday. That young girl died over there in the Carolinas as well, and now you got a woman climbing over into the Capitol. What are these people doing up in there? There were Black people up in there too. What are they doing up in there? Who let them in? President Trump let them in. How do you all fix this? They were on their knees in their chambers. They were not praying. They were hiding from bomb. Timothy McVeigh was locked up, and then, executed. Mr. Clinton was not playing. Something has to be done right now. Donald Trump has not-- He has not followed any rules. What he does is his rule. We've got to wipe this thing clean. How do you do it?

Hakeem: Thank you, Willie, for laying out those facts in a very compelling fashion. There's a lot to unpack there as there should be because there's a lot that was involved in what took place yesterday in the context of a violent attack on America and on our democracy. Let me start with just this response, one, I believe that every single person who breached the capital has got to be held accountable, treated like enemy combatants where appropriate, and charged with domestic terrorism.

The consequences of that will have to be decided by the courts, but this has to be treated with the greatest degree of seriousness because of what it was. This wasn't a peaceful protest. This was an intentional effort to halt the peaceful transition of power and to overthrow the government. We've got to be clear and intentional in making sure that we state that and that there are consequences.

The other interesting thing about what took place and, Brian, you know this, is that the president cannot just show up at the Capitol. That is part of our democratic tradition. He has to be invited. The reason why the president cannot just show up without an invitation is because of the concept of separate and co-equal branches of government as part of checks and balances. There was an assault on that yesterday. It's an assault by the presidency on the legislative branch to try to artificially hold on to power.

There's a lot that needs to be unpacked, which is why we need a complete and full congressional investigation. We probably need a 9/11 style commission, and we definitely need criminal investigations at the local and federal level. I'm so thankful that if this was going to occur, it would occur right now where we will have a Biden justice department that will follow the facts, apply the law, be guided by the constitution, and hold the treacherous seditionists accountable.

Brian: Teresa in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC with Congressman Hakeem Jeffries. Hello, Teresa.

Teresa: Hi, Brian. Hi, Hakeem. Thanks, both, so much for your work. My heart's beating so fast. I'm a really big fan of the show. Anyway, I listened to your show yesterday and I was watching all the live coverage. What I'm curious about is the media and public's surprise and response to yesterday's insurrection, referring to it as something that could only happen in a "third world country" or developing country, when coups are something that our military and government have historically played a part in abroad and all over the world.

What is this refusal to look at what's going on now in the US holistically, critically, and with like historical precedent? Is this American exceptionalism not what might've gotten us here to having this president in the first place? We always talk about how he's a symptom of the larger flawed system, but by refusing to acknowledge that our wars abroad are also our wars at home, our history is completely intertwined with the present. As a public and the media, we're putting ourselves in these situations where we're always surprised and unprepared to deal with deep-rooted issues in the country and continue to let things develop as-is and culminating in these horrendous points and continuing to let slow violence continue as well.

Hakeem: Teresa, thank you so much for your kind words and for your thoughts and for laying that out in a very compelling way and in a factual-based way. You are correct that we have to take a look at our own history and involvement. That involves in Guatemala in the 1950s, that includes the Dominican Republic, I believe, that was in 1965, I think Chile and Pinochet in 1973, on and on and on.

We have a long history of getting involved in the affairs of others in the so-called banana republics that were, in fact, made that way, in part, based on the financial and economic interests of the wealthy, well-off, and well-connected in our own country, working in partnership with the CIA and others. It's not a wild conspiracy theory, that's historical record. I appreciate you pointing out that dynamic, and I think we should all be sensitive in how we discuss our own history and its application to what took place yesterday.

Brian: You managed one impeachment of President Trump earlier last year. Now, some people, including some members of your caucus, are calling for another one even though there are just 13 days left before Biden is inaugurated. Is the Judiciary Committee taking any steps?

Hakeem: I'm going to try and convene a conversation tomorrow with the entire House Democratic Caucus, at some point, to both discuss what took place yesterday, perhaps hear from the sergeant at arms and the Capitol police chief, but then, also to have a discussion amongst ourselves about holding this president accountable and what that might look like over the next 13 or 14 days.

In my view, all options should be on the table, including impeachment, conviction, and removal. It's got to be a caucus-wide decision to go into that direction. We've got to at least figure out where the Senate is at in terms of holding this particular president accountable. The 25th Amendment is another option, but that, of course, is a process that is initiated by the cabinet in coordination with the vice president, remains to be seen whether that will take place or not.

I'm under no delusion that someone like Betsy DeVos will have the moral fortitude or courage to be part of that particular effort. There are some who are discussing censure, and then, there are others who want to make sure that there's a full and complete criminal investigation into every single person, no matter what office they hold, who may have been involved in inciting that insurrection, and that's certainly something I support as well.

Brian: Congressman Hakeem Jeffries, chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, member of the Judiciary Committee, representative from parts of Brooklyn and Queens. We have another of your colleagues with prosecutorial experience, Kathleen Rice, standing by. As you may know, she had already called before yesterday for a criminal investigation of the president for appearing to threaten the Georgia secretary of state in that phone call over the weekend if he didn't flip the election results. We'll talk to your colleague, Kathleen Rice, in just a second. Congressman Jeffries, thank you very much.

Hakeem: Thank you so much, Brian, and please give my best to Kathleen. She's a tremendous member of the New York delegation.

Brian: Brian Lehrer on WNYC, Congresswoman Rice after this.

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Brian Lehrer on WNYC, and with me now, Democratic Congresswoman Kathleen Rice of Nassau County, formerly the Nassau County DA. Even before yesterday, she was calling for the president to be held accountable for a possible criminal act in connection with his weekend phone call to the Georgia Republican secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger. Seems like so long ago, right? Seems like innocent times last Saturday, which included telling Raffensperger that he could be charged with a crime if he doesn't reverse Georgia's election result. Congresswoman Rice, welcome back to WNYC.

Kathleen Rice: Thanks for having me, Brian

Brian: Can you remind everybody of that background? We haven't had you on in the last few days. What was it that you were calling for with respect to that phone call by the president on Saturday to the Georgia secretary of state?

Kathleen: Sure, Brian. It was very clear to anyone who listened to that just over an hour-long tape of the president having a conversation with the secretary of state of Georgia, during which he tried to solicit votes that simply do not exist from an election official, the secretary of state. We all heard it. It was clear as day. As a former prosecutor, I know that this is a clear violation of not only federal election law but other laws that should be investigated as well. That's why my colleague, Ted Lieu from California, and I sent this referral to the FBI.

There was an actual threat to Raffensperger to "find 11,780 votes" and further asked him to recalculate the results in his favor, which clearly are violations of both federal and Georgia state election laws, in that, they would deprive George's voters of an actual accurate count of their vote. Mark Meadows was on that phone call, the chief of staff. Now, he used much more careful language, but he was aiding and abetting the president by even being on that phone call.

This is just outrageous. We have a president who simply cannot accept the fact that he lost fair and square, and he has been putting out all of these inciteful messages on social media. He's been calling for people, his supporters, to come to Washington on January 6th for months since the Election Day. Why was anyone surprised at what happened yesterday? I mean, it was just an unbelievable assault on our democracy by the person sitting in the Oval Office.

Brian: You were a DA, a prosecutor, I'll ask you the same question I asked Congressman Jeffries, where is the legal line between asking people to come to a peaceful protest, which is okay, and incitement to riot?

Kathleen: I think that that is something that is going to have to be determined. My hope is that now that President-elect Biden who-- Now, the election has been certified, he will be inaugurated on January 20th, thank God. He has named Merrick Garland to be the attorney general, and I'm looking forward to Judge Garland restoring a level of dignity to the Department of Justice that we haven't seen under the leadership of AG Barr.

My hope is that he would set up a DOJ-led task force to look into all of this. I mean, the evidence is replete with references that are not-- People say, "Oh, it's dog whistle," or what language he's using. He clearly uses language and they're in the tweets and all over social media. When he tells people to come to Washington and, "Stop the steal," or, "This election was stolen from us," he was with this crowd hours, just about an hour before they marched down to the Capitol and breached the security of that great building that belongs to everyone here in this country, and then, kept tweeting about it as they were running through the Capitol, breaking things, and assaulting people.

I mean, it was just an outrageous display by a president, who really has shown over and over again that he has no respect for the democratic process. Even with 13 days left, his increasingly erratic and authoritarian behavior cannot be discounted anymore. I am just disgusted by my Republican colleagues who tried to blame yesterday on Antifa. I just don't even know-- There were no words. We need more Republicans in the House, in the Senate to stand up to Trump, and say, enough is enough.

Brian: In fact, it shouldn't go ignored that even after the insurrection, more than a hundred of your house Republican colleagues voted to reject Biden electors, continuing to promote the lie that the election was unconstitutional even after more than 50 court rulings to the contrary. How do you even comprehend them doing that?

Kathleen: There is no way to comprehend it. I was sheltering with every member of the Senate yesterday for hours, and it was during that time that I think, to some of their very little credit, most of them, other than Senator Hawley, agreed to not object anymore, but we still had House members, members of the New York delegation, stand up and continue to call out these false and knowingly fraudulent claims that this election was stolen.

It's just outrageous that after what we went through that any of my colleagues could stand up and continue to perpetuate what we know to be a lie and the rantings of an increasingly unhinged president. They're going to be held to account when they have to stand up and say, "Where were you at this time in our nation's history? What were you saying after this unbelievable attack on the Capitol where one woman was shot in the Capitol? Where were you, and what were you saying at that time? Were you defending democracy in this great country of ours, or were you continuing to suck up to a president who was increasingly unhinged?"

Brian: Heather in Freeport, you're on WNYC with congresswoman, I think your congresswoman, Kathleen Rice.

Heather: She is indeed my congresswoman. Happy new year, everyone. Yes, I'm from Freeport, and I am sitting here watching this unfold yesterday and thinking to myself, "I knew this was coming." I knew this was coming. I told people, friends, I said from watching his rhetoric, from seeing what he's saying, from seeing what the confederates say when they respond to his tweets, "These people are going to show up and they're going to try to overthrow the government and they will not stop because he will not stop."

There is this kind of ideal, I think, by the elite echelon of especially the Democratic Party, which is really intellectual, that this could never happen. This is out of the norm. There is nothing that this man has not done [unintelligible 00:30:58] norm through everything that he has done. There's no norm he won't break. I've said it before, this man will come out of that White House in handcuffs or without a pulse. I think everybody needs to be braced for what is coming in the next two weeks.

How did those confederate people go through that Capitol building so easily? Why after weeks of him saying, "Come to Washington. Come and it's going to get wild," were there no national guardsmen, were no federal cop force like they had one Black Lives Matter was on Pennsylvania Avenue? Why was there nothing done as I'm sitting here trying to claim to my children, "It's going to be okay," when I don't think it's going to be okay? I really respect you, Ms. Rice. I need to know how come the Democrats don't take this man as seriously as he needs to be taken. He is a weapon against the people of the United States. I'm going to hang up now because-- Thank you.

Brian: Heather, thank you very much. Your call is very important. Congresswoman.

Kathleen: Heather, I share your concern. I will say this though, we, as Democrats, have known from day one how dangerous this man is. We actually impeached him, and it was the Republicans in the Senate who refused to remove him from office. The thing that is so concerning to me, and I am someone who tries to be bipartisan, I have a lot of friends on the other side of the aisle, I actually don't know how I'm ever going to be able to have a conversation with any of them given what some of them said yesterday about trying to implicate Antifa when we know that they had nothing to do with the assault yesterday. I have been calling out to my Republican colleagues to have a backbone, to stand up to this tyrannical person in the White House, and say, enough is enough.

We have done our part, we impeached him, and yet, when you have someone like Senator Collins say, "I believe that now that he's been impeached, I believe that he learned his lesson. The only lesson that Donald Trump learned from that is that he was going to be able to act with complete impunity because he has the cover from every single one of his Republican colleagues in the Senate and the House. That is what they are going to have to answer to, how they allowed this president to, as you said, shatter norms, democratic norms, all in the name of empowering himself and allowing him to be increasingly more autocratic and despotic in his behavior.

Look, Democrats, as I said, have stood up. I have been calling for the cabinet to invoke the 25th Amendment because, at this point, I think that is the most efficient way to get him out of the White House. Even for the 13 or so days that remain, we know how much damage he can do. We saw what he did yesterday, and that was all at his direction. He cannot blame anyone else for what happened yesterday. It's clear in the tweets that he has been putting out endlessly, to say nothing of what Giuliani and Don Jr. were doing too to incite this violence.

My hope is that there will be a 9/11 style task force or commission to look at what happened here, the security breaches, why they happened so seemingly easily, and why there haven't been more arrests. To be honest with you, 52 people were arrested. There were tens of thousands of people there. We need to get to the bottom of this.

Brian: Most of those 52 arrests, all but about 13 were for curfew violations after six o'clock after the insurrection had been cleared from the Capitol. A lot of people who did something really illegal were allowed to walk away. You mentioned that even some-

Kathleen: Yes.

Brian: -of your New York colleagues engaged in this rejection of Biden's electors. I think since we're in a New York radio station, we should call out these names. There were four of them. They were the upstate representatives, Chris Jacobs and Elise Stefanik, but also, Nicole Malliotakis, newly-elected from Staten Island and Brooklyn, and your Long Island colleague, Republican Lee Zeldin. Were you surprised?

Kathleen: Unfortunately, no, I wasn't because they have been increasingly jumping on this stop the steal bandwagon, which is just based in nothing but what comes out of Trump's mind. I thought it was a really shameful moment, I have to say. Tom Reed, to his credit, is a Republican from upstate, at least, stood up on the democratic side of the aisle and said, "This is enough. We have to stop this. We have to work together. This is not about politics anymore. This is an assault on our democracy." He at least had the backbone to say that.

I was very disappointed in my other Republican colleagues. They know what they're saying is not true and to perpetuate that at a time when our democratic process, when we're trying to do nothing more than our ministerial duty to certify an election of a president was undertaken and stopped by a gang of seditionists. I don't know-- There are no words. They are going to have to explain to the constituents that they serve why they stood up and continued that false rhetoric after this deadly assault on the Capitol.

Brian: Before you go, at the same time as what you were just saying, Mitch McConnell, Lindsey Graham, and others, and even Mike Pence have now broken with the president in some meaningful ways. The president denounced Pence yesterday for lack of courage because Pence wouldn't assert the falsehood that he, as vice-president, had the unilateral power to delay the seating of the electors. It's come to even that kind of a rift.

I'm curious if you find any hope in that, that there would be this reckoning now or a division, at least within the Republican Party, which might be healthy and start to move the country forward to some reality after these four years of unreality, but then again, maybe not, after 100-plus Republicans were willing to vote not to seat the electors even after the insurrection was ended last night. I'm not sure what to think about that, but there is, all of a sudden, Mitch McConnell, Lindsey Graham saying, "I'm done."

Kathleen: Brian, I mean, you know me, I try to be optimistic. I'm one of 10 kids. My mother, you'd say, she, out of necessity, had to be optimistic. For them to change what they were saying at the eleventh hour is really of no moment. If you want to say they should get some credit for yesterday, I don't know, I think it was a little too late. Let's see if that conciliatory tone carries into the 117th Congress. Let's see. Now that the Democrats control the Senate, let's see where Mitch McConnell is. Does he really want to try to heal this country and bridge the divide that is so palpable between people in this country?

I mean, it's just so disheartening to see the majority of Republicans still maintain the falsehood that this election was rigged and stolen and fraudulent. I don't know. Lindsey Graham plays golf with the president all the time, do you think maybe he could have been whispering in Donald Trump's ear a little before January 6th of 2021? He had the ability to do it. He didn't want to because they all want to just suck up to the president because of all the supporters that he has. They don't want to be on the other end of an angry tweet like Mike Pence was yesterday for doing his job.

There shouldn't be anything courageous about doing your job. There was no way that he had any ability as vice-president to replace electors in various states. That is written in the Constitution. It was not an act of bravery for him to stand up and say it. We all knew that he had no ability to do it and it wasn't until right before he took the chair on the House floor when he put a letter out saying, "I really can't do what the president wants me to do." That's not a profile in courage. Again, they were all-- Let's see how they feel on January 21st, what rhetoric is coming out of Mitch McConnell's mouth and Lindsey Graham's mouth then.

Brian: Congresswoman Kathleen Rice from Nassau County, thank you so much.

Kathleen: Thank you, Brian.

 

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