CNN "Newsroom" - Transcript: Interview with Adam Schiff

Interview

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Joining me now is Democratic Congressman Adam Schiff. He's chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, a member of the Select Committee.

Congressman, thanks so much for taking the time this morning.

REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D-CA): Jim, good to be with you.

SCIUTTO: So what led you, if you could explain, to send out this latest batch? Why the focus on this particular group? SCHIFF: Well, this group was very involved in planning that Stop the

Steal rally that resulted in the insurrection against the Capitol as well as other events, but part of our mission in writing a comprehensive analysis of what went wrong and how to protect the country going forward is to understand what was the planning for this, what was the financing for this, what were the expectations? Was there knowledge that this was going to turn violent? Was that part of the plan from the beginning? So these witnesses will have important information relevant to those questions. The documents we're seeking likewise will shed light on it. We know there was strong participation of these white nationalist groups, the Proud Boys, the Three Percenters, Boogaloo and others. We want to know what knowledge there was in advance that these groups with the propensity for violence were going to be participating.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: OK. A big question of course is the involvement, the knowledge of the White House, right up to the president as well as senior Republican leaders. Are you going to subpoena the Republican minority leader Kevin McCarthy, Trump, the vice president, the former vice president?

SCHIFF: Well, we are contemporaneously seeking records from the White House, from the relevant agencies, the Defense Department and others to fill in exactly that side of the equation as well. We want to know what was going on with the private planning, hence the 11 subpoenas that went out yesterday. We want to know what was the president's involvement, what about people around him? That's why we have depositions coming up in a couple of weeks of some top Trump administration officials. So --

SCIUTTO: But will you ask him directly to address those questions directly?

SCHIFF: We haven't made specific decisions about members of Congress yet. But anyone frankly that has pertinent information that was in communication with the president and we know Kevin McCarthy was, you know, I have to say, certainly appeared to be a pretty pertinent witness to me.

SCIUTTO: OK. I want to talk to you about infrastructure because there's an important vote possible today on infrastructure, though deep questions about whether Democrats have the votes. Will the House vote today on the bipartisan infrastructure plan?

SCHIFF: The short answer is I don't know whether we'll take up a bill, whether we'll the votes if we do, and if we don't have the votes, whether we'll make the decision to put that aside for another day. But I am confident of this, whether it's done today or it's done a week from now or a month from now, God forbid, hope it's sooner than that, we're going to get this done. We're going to pass a physical infrastructure bill. We're going to pass the reconciliation or Build Back Better bill.

The country desperately needs it and I view whatever happens today as merely act one in -- I don't know if it's going to be a two-part play or three-part play, but I'm very confident we're going to get it done.

SCIUTTO: Why should folks watching right now share that confidence, though? This is Democrat versus Democrat here and the gap is wide between, for instance, Sinema and Manchin in the Senate and what progressives in the House want. How do you bridge that gap?

SCHIFF: Well, we have, I think, the most skilled leadership in Nancy Pelosi that the Congress has ever had. And if there's a pathway and I believe there is, the speaker will find it. The reality is, you know, 98 percent of our Democratic delegation in the House and Senate is on the same page here in what they want. But we have 50-50 split in the Senate and we have the (INAUDIBLE) majority in the House ever, so even with 98 percent party unity, that 2 percent can cause a real headache, and we're trying to get to yes because we're going to need pretty much 100 percent.

SCIUTTO: While you, while the president have been focused on infrastructure and the budget plans, Republican-led state legislatures have been passing a whole host of measures, not just to restrict voting, but also to give partisans including state legislatures greater ability to overturn or interfere with the results of elections going forward.

And I wonder have Democrats made a mistake by prioritizing budget and infrastructure over something that could have, you know, immediate and severe impact on elections as soon as 2022 and also 2024. Is that a mistake?

SCHIFF: Well, I think both are really integral to our democracy. In terms of the infrastructure and the human infrastructure, the Build Back Better, one of the reasons why our democracy is at risk is that it needs to deliver and a lot of the American people have lost faith that the government can deliver.

But, Jim, I think you're absolutely right. The issue of these voting restrictions, the effort by Republicans to give partisan boards and legislatures the power to overturn an election, a legitimate election, is probably the greatest danger to our democracy. And that must be given an absolute top priority. And I would hope that the administration is working to find the pathway around the filibuster or carve out because this is how democracies die. I mean, there may be --

SCIUTTO: But even the president doesn't support breaking the filibuster. I mean, if it is the most severe threat what are you doing about it and when?

SCHIFF: Well, I think the president is going to need the support to carve around the filibuster because we're not going to get 10 Republicans in the Senate to do this. [09:35:03]

They think their ideas now are so unpopular and backward the only way they can win power is by cheating, by effectively overturning the popular will or disenfranchising people of color. That's where the Senate majority is right now. It's a cult around the former president and an anti-democratic cult. So that's just going to have to be overcome.

SCIUTTO: OK.

SCHIFF: And you know what I was going to say, Jim, is there may be another attack on the Capitol. I can't rule that out. But I can tell you this, it will be unsuccessful just like the last one. If our democracy comes to an end, it will be because of these quasi-legal means that they're employing around the country to overturn free and fair elections. That, to me, is the biggest dagger at the heart of our democracy.

SCIUTTO: Final question on Afghanistan, there's new reporting from Axios that during a classified briefing with senators on Tuesday, General Milley directly blamed the State Department for the botched evacuation from Afghanistan.

I wonder, who do you hold responsible for the chaos, the delays, the many thousands, for instance, of Afghans left behind who worked for the U.S.? Who do you hold responsible and do you believe someone should resign, offer their resignation as a result?

SCHIFF: Well, you know, looking at it from an intel perspective, I think the intelligence was pretty good. Now that's not to say that the intelligence agency predicted the Afghan government would fall in a matter of days, but over the last six to nine months, and really over the last couple of years, the intelligence community produced increasingly pessimistic assessments of whether the Afghan government would maintain itself and eventually how quickly it would fall.

And so I think there are profound questions that the military needs to answer as well as the State Department about why the military didn't have plans for this contingency when it was a foreseeable one, even if it wasn't the most probable one, and why the State Department didn't move with greater alacrity to process the special immigrant visas, and understand exactly where Americans were. And I think that oversight is going on. It's going to be really important, and yes, I do think people should be held accountable.

SCIUTTO: Congressman Adam Schiff, thanks so much for joining us this morning.

SCHIFF: Thank you, Jim.

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