MSNBC "The Rachel Maddow Show" - Transcript: Interview with Sen. Chris Coons

Interview

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MELBER: I turn now to Senator Chris Coons who is on the Senate Judiciary  Committee and was rebutting Rudy Giuliani`s assertion today that collusion  is not a crime. He read aloud from the U.S. Code the actual statues that  the senator notes would be broken if there was collusion with Russia and  election interference, which certainly adds to the public records, Senator.

I want to start with your view of whether what Donald Trump wrote on the  Internet today is evidence of potential obstruction.

SEN. CHRIS COONS (D-DE), JUDICIARY COMMITTEE: Well, it`s certainly  evidence of his state of mind how he views the ongoing Mueller  investigation and of what he thinks should happen. He`s saying this  morning that Jeff Sessions should shut down the Mueller investigation which  he calls a rigged witch hunt as a number of commentators have said so far  this evening could be entered into evidence as something that suggests what  his state of mind has been.

I`ll remind you this goes all the way back to his Lester Holt interview  following his firing of FBI director James Comey. Whether he said that he  had the Russia investigation in mind when he fired Jim Comey, the former  FBI director. So I think there`s abundant evidence that obstruction and  intent to interfere with the ongoing investigation into whether or not  Russia committed some conspiracy with Trump campaign in order to violate  our federal election laws.

That`s something that`s been out there in plain view now for months.  Frankly, my answer as to why President Trump did in this morning is a  combination of appealing to his base, delegitimizing the Mueller  investigation and he frankly partly just can`t help himself.

MELBER: Can`t help himself, right, because as we`ve reported, his lawyer`s  reaction shows that this was coming from the top and that they wanted to  say it didn`t do what it did.

Getting to your other piece, you know, sometimes it feels like we`re all  going through a type of law school together in this era. And you would be  one of our voluntary professors I suppose. Collusion, conspiracy, criminal  hacking and thief, fraud against the United States, foreign campaign  contributions, those are all felonies that relate to what has been alleged  in 2016.

Walk us through your point about what crimes constitute collusion.

COONS: Well, first, the term collusion here is being used casually. What  it`s really referring to I`ll remind you is a conspiracy to break federal  election laws.

The federal election law and I think it is Title 52 of the U.S. Code,  Section 30121, says that it is a crime to solicit or accept a thing of  value from a foreign national in order to influence a federal election.  I`m summarizing what is a much longer paragraph.

But essentially, that`s what it says is that a foreign national can`t  contribute either money or a thing of value and an American can`t solicit  or receive a thing of value from a foreign national in connection with a  federal election. And that`s really the crux of what`s being investigated  here is whether or not the Russian well-documented wide scale Russian  effort by dozens of military intelligence officers to influence the  American election and to offer hacked e-mails was in some way either solicited or accepted by the Trump campaign team.

That`s why I think the developments in recent days that Michael Cohen may  well be willing to testify that President Trump knew about the June 9th  Trump Tower meeting with Russians offering dirt on Hillary Clinton could be  a key turning point here. There`s lots of public evidence of an enthusiasm  by the highest levels of the Trump campaign to accept information  derogatory to Hillary Clinton and his campaign. There`s now lots of  evidence that Robert Mueller`s investigation has made public through  indictments of Russian efforts to influence the outcome of the campaign.

What`s been missing so far is something that connects point A to point B  and makes it into a conspiracy. That may well it be the evidence that  Robert Mueller is preparing to present. I`ll also, just, Ari, in closing  remind you that lying to federal investigators is also a federal offense  and sometimes things that are said on Twitter, whether it`s by Donald Trump  Jr. or by Paul Manafort or others, what really ends up being the thing that  hangs them up is having testified in front of a committee or to an FBI  investigator one way and it being proven that the facts are the opposite.

So, I think those are the three core issues here. Filing federal election  law, working in partnership to break the American laws which is conspiracy  and then lying to investigators most of the indictments that have so far  come out from the Mueller investigation move along one of those three  tracks. I expect we`ll be seeing more indictments in the near future.

MELBER: So, Senator, to paraphrase it, sounds like they were right to say  collusion is not a crime because collusion is like four crimes.

COONS: That`s right. What we are commonly referring to as collusion is a  complex series of violations of federal election law, of truthfulness to  investigators, and the commonly known crime of conspiracy which is I think  18 USC 371. That`s just working with more than one other foreign break  federal law. That`s simple conspiracy.

MELBER: Right.

Senator Chris Coons, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, an expert  on many of these issues, I really do appreciate your time tonight.

COONS: Thank you, Ari.

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