MSNBC "All in with Chris Hayes" - Transcript: Interview with Rep. Denny Heck
Interview
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HAYES: All right, Joyce Vance and Glenn Kirschner, thanks to you both. Let`s turn to Congressman Denny Heck of Washington, a Member of the House Intelligence Committee. I`ll start with you Congressman on this. Are you confident that Michael Cohen told you the truth when he was before your committee?
REP. DENNY HECK (D), WASHINGTON: No, not at all. He was not in his candid face when he came before us, I don`t think. I think he is now. It would be instructive and fascinating to have him back and I would like to think that we would be able to do that at some point.
HAYES: The president gave an interview in which he said many things one. Of the things he talked about was impeachment. I think it`s the first time I`ve heard him speculate about that eventuality. I want to play what he said and get a reaction. Take a listen.
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HAYES: What do you think of that?
HECK: Well, I`m going to take offense on Vice-President Pence`s behalf, Chris. He would ascend to the presidency and I have more confidence in him evidently than his own president does.
HAYES: That`s well played, Congressman.
HECK: Thank you. There are way more Republicans talking about impeachment than there are Democrats and the reason is they lack a policy agenda. So they want they want to have this conversation out there because I`ve yet to hear their plan for lowering prescription drug prices or protecting people at pre-existing conditions or increasing our investment in infrastructure or getting Americans a real wage increase which non-salary and employees are not getting so they would rather talk about impeachment.
Most of us believe that we ought to allow Director Mueller to conclude his work before that even becomes a serious conversation. But I`ll tell you this, Chris, I think the walls are closing in on President Trump and as of Tuesday, August 21st, I think we can officially market is the most corrupt administration in modern history. I think that`s a matter of fact. I don`t think that`s a subjective evaluation or interpretation of the number of criminal indictments and convictions at the felony level. I actually think the President ought to start having a conversation with his god and his family and himself about resigning.
HAYES: Do you think there are other people who think that way?
HECK: In this country, other people think that he ought to be having
conversations.
HAYES: There are millions, tens of millions who think that way but is there anyone on Capitol Hill not -- who`s not a Democrat who thinks that privately?
HECK: So a year ago, April, I said on this network that I believe that there were people going to go to jail and there were a lot of people that looked askance at me and they aren`t anymore. And I actually first made this statement on this network in April of this year that he ought to start having that conversation. And the truth is if you compare where we`re then with where we are now, we are doing nothing but heading in that direction.
So as of today, probably not, as of two, three, four, six months from now, yes, I think there`ll be a lot of people having that conversation.
HAYES: Final question. You sit on the House Intelligence Committee chaired by Devin Nunez, what are you guys going to be getting up to counter-program what`s happening in the news once you`re back in session after Labor Day.
HECK: I don`t understand the question, Chris, you mean as it relates to the continuing Russian investigation?
HAYES: What I mean is that Devin Nunez has very sort of expertly guided a kind of counter investigation via your committee often as a means of essentially counter-programming the news that`s coming out of the Russia investigation. I just wonder what you think about what is going to be on the slate for you in that committee when you`re back in September?
HECK: Well, we have continued our investigation where we have been able to. You can find open sources for example that we have interviewed several people notably George Papadopoulos` wife and others. We had Christopher Wylie back, the gentleman who was at Cambridge Analytica. But the truth of the matter is what I think Congress ought to be focused on when we get back is passing a budget and not closing down the federal government as the President has now threatened to do over a failure for Congress to appropriate the funds to build the border wall which he campaigned on in 2016 would be 100 percent paid for by the government of Mexico.
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