Fox News "Hannity" - Transcript: Interview with Sen. Lindsey Graham
Interview
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HANNITY: All right. Big news tonight out of Capitol Hill. Senate Judiciary Chairman Lindsey Graham of South Carolina demanding answers from the FBI on the now what, third infamous raid, in this case, Roger Stone's home in Tampa, Florida. Why did the FBI send, what, 27 agents armed with rifles, body armor to arrest Stone for lying to Congress? He's not El Chapo.
The senator wants to know if CNN, fake news, was tipped off by the Mueller team to get their exclusive footage, of course, of this raid. Oh, they picked the perfect day.
Joining us now with reaction to all this breaking news tonight, Senator Lindsey Graham.
Well, you're in New York. Good to see you.
SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM, R-S.C.: I am. Thank you. Thank you very much.
HANNITY: I won't spend -- I don't think that was about abortion in the commonwealth of Virginia.
GRAHAM: Right.
HANNITY: You once sponsored a bill that I agree with.
GRAHAM: Well, I have it right now. How many nations in the world allow abortion on demand after 20 weeks, which is the fifth month? Seven. Seven nations in the entire world allow abortion on demand after 20 weeks. They're talking about abortion during the actual birthing.
So, my bill says, unless there's life of the mother is at stake, as a result of rape or incest, you can't have abortion on demand in the fifth month. I think most Americans --
HANNITY: So, you would have four months to decide.
GRAHAM: Most Americans would be fine with that.
HANNITY: Let me go to this letter, Director Wray.
GRAHAM: Yes.
HANNITY: And I'll be honest. I kind of expect and have expected more out of Director Wray, because under James Comey we have two criminal investigations ongoing, the general counsel and its deputy director. I think there should be far more.
We hopefully will get to that. You have said you will get into this.
Talk about what should he do? Why are we doing this to people for process crimes? Why doesn't it ever happen to all the liberals like Clapper, Brennan, Mills, Abedin, all these people that have lied to Congress? Why not the predawn raid
GRAHAM: So, let me tell you my job. My job is to provide oversight to the Department of Justice as a judiciary chairman. Love the FBI, respect them.
HANNITY: So do I.
GRAHAM: But somebody needs to watch those who watch us. I'm going to tell you all I can about the FISA warrant and how used to unverified dossier paid for by a political party without any verification how that--
HANNITY: Russian lies.
GRAHAM: Yes.
HANNITY: How ironic.
GRAHAM: But I want to know why to execute a search warrant with somebody who had a lawyer - the best way to get Roger Stone is to tell him CNN wants to talk to you. He'll show up wherever you want him to show up.
So the bottom-line is, this seems to me over the top, and I don't know what the message was being sent. But I personally didn't like it. I've been a prosecutor, a defense attorney it seemed to be sending the wrong message. That if you cross Mueller, look what's going to happen to you. Mueller do your job, but these tactics are unacceptable given the level of threat here.
HANNITY: I look at his team. He has a Clinton Foundation attorney, only Democratic donors, no Republican donors. And the man who was excoriated for withholding exculpatory evidence, put four innocent people in jail, overturned Fifth Circuit. Tens of thousands Enron employees - Enron accounting lost their jobs. He lost 9-0 in the Supreme Court. He's the lead guy.
GRAHAM: Well, if they're sending a message, I'm sending a message to them. You're accountable to the Congress and we're going to find out--
HANNITY: You will get to this.
GRAHAM: --what - well, they better answer my letter.
HANNITY: OK.
GRAHAM: If I were them, I would.
HANNITY: And we'll get to the bottom of FISA. Somebody signed off on something they didn't verify--
GRAHAM: Yes.
HANNITY: --and didn't corroborate.
GRAHAM: Just put it this way. What if the roles were reversed? What if the Republican Party hired a former British agent to go to Russia to dig up dirt on Hillary Clinton and everything in the dossier was a bunch of BS, do you think that might be front-page news everywhere all the time?
HANNITY: Your - the Grassley-Graham Memo, infamous memo--
GRAHAM: Yes.
HANNITY: --bulk of information. That means they committed a fraud on the court and they never told the court which they knew according to Bruce Ohr's testimony that they paid for. All right, I got to get it--
GRAHAM: OK.
HANNITY: Lot of conservatives looked at Donald Trump, New York businessman, had donated to Republican and Democrats. At one point was actually pro- choice. He's pro-life now. He kept his promises on judges, taxes, regulations, energy. Now he's trying to fight for the wall. I'm telling people - I told people that he's going to govern as a conservative.
GRAHAM: Right.
HANNITY: Some doubted me. I think, I've been proven right. And I would say now, I'm 99 percent certain either the Defense Department budget or emergency money is going to be used and he's relentless and tenacious, and changing strategy is not losing.
GRAHAM: So to everybody who's wondering how this movie ends. It ends this way. We're going to build a wall one way or the other. I just talked to the President 10 minutes before I came on your show.
HANNITY: By the way, I know for the fact that he was in the green room.
GRAHAM: So here is the point we're trying to make. The $5.7 billion represents 10 locations according in the Department of Homeland Security that a barrier would make the most difference. It's a professionally designed plan. If you look at the 10 locations on the border where the professionals say, we need a barrier, it adds up to $5.7 billion.
Every Democrat virtually has voted for 634 miles of fencing. When you ask people where are the 10 locations of the 634 miles we need something up now? They gave us the location and the price tag is 5.7 billion. The President's not doing anything crazy. What's crazy is that they're fighting him after having voted the way they did in the past.
HANNITY: Just in the Obama, a few years ago - just a few. And the President, to his credit, offered--
GRAHAM: February of 2018.
HANNITY: --everything - offered things Democrats dreamed about, DACA, Dreamers, but not Amnesty.
GRAHAM: So let me just - let me tell you what - here's the conversation. The President wants to work with Democrats. He doesn't - the shutdown is not the way to get a result. He did it because he had nobody to work with. Democrats are overplaying their hand. If you want TPS reform and DACA reform, you'll get it--
HANNITY: You'll get it now. But you won't get it after the 15th.
GRAHAM: But you won't get it if he does it by himself.
HANNITY: I'm worried. I only have 10 seconds about your Republican colleagues.
GRAHAM: I'm worried too. If you don't stand by this President--
HANNITY: They don't stand by--
GRAHAM: Every President, Bush, Obama and Trump sent troops to the border, what's unusual about that? Nothing. What's the difference between sending a troop to secure the border and build a barrier, while they're there? He has all the power in the world to do this, to my Republican colleagues, stand behind him.
HANNITY: Exactly. It's good for the country. Stop heroin trafficking and human trafficking.
GRAHAM: And if you don't, you're going to pay a price.
HANNITY: Good to see you. Thank you for stopping by.
GRAHAM: Thank you.
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