MSNBC "Hardball with Chris Matthews" - Transcript: Bowe Bergdahl

Interview

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

MATTHEWS: Welcome back to HARDBALL. That`s, of course, Senate Majority
Leader Harry Reid today on the Senate floor criticizing what he calls the
political games being launched over Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl`s release.
While there are legitimate questions, I believe, to ask about the
president`s handling of the prisoner swap, we want to stick to the main
issue here. Was the Obama administration right to release five Taliban
prisoners in exchange for an American soldier, who it appears walked off
his post?

Joining me right now is U.S. Congresswoman Marsha Blackburn from Tennessee.
She`s a Republican. And Michael Tomasky`s a special correspondent for the
DailyBeast.

Let me start with the congresswoman. Your views about how you would have
handled it differently, what -- what your main critique is here of the
president`s decision. He made it. What`s your critique?

REP. MARSHA BLACKBURN (R), TENNESSEE: He did make it. And I think that
this is like so many decisions that they make. You know, they seem to make
mistakes in their information. It leads to illogical conclusions. The 30
days -- why they didn`t come back to Congress and provide that information
-- this is something that Congress has put in place because there had been
questions about detainees. And Chris, why he did not do that is causing
great concern.

And then also, as you said, the five masterminds that were sent back to
Qatar that you don`t know if they`re going to be active in planning actions
against our troops, our men and women in the field. I have a major
military post in my district.

MATTHEWS: I understand.

BLACKBURN: This has caused great concern.

MATTHEWS: Well, let`s get back to those two questions. Was the 30-day
requirement -- the president signed it, he agreed to as part of the law of
the land -- he broke the law. He may even admit so. He`ll also go back to
Article II of the Constitution, which makes him commander-in-chief of the
armed forces.

MICHAEL TOMASKY, DAILYBEAST: That`s right.

MATTHEWS: The second question -- do you think it`s reasonable to assume
that these five characters -- we`ve seen pictures of them, Taliban guys --
are not going back to fight the war?

TOMASKY: First question, that`s troubling, the question about the law.
There`s no doubt about that. Now, you might say that the spirit of that
law is so that he wouldn`t empty Guantanamo. That`s really why they passed
that law, so he wouldn`t empty Guantanamo in one or two fell swoops. And
he`s not doing that. This is just five guys.

MATTHEWS: OK --

TOMASKY: There`s still 100-something guys there. So -- and then there`s
the constitutional questions you address. So --

MATTHEWS: What about going back to fight the war again?

TOMASKY: -- now these five guys -- we have some statistics about this,
Chris. People have studied the recidivism rates of people who`ve gone back
there.

MATTHEWS: But they fought to get these guys back! They asked for this
five!

TOMASKY: I know that, but --

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: -- in the fighting. They were -- they negotiated to get --
look at them hugging! They got these five -- this is the former chief of
staff of the army, the former deputy --

TOMASKY: I understand that. Look, they`re --

MATTHEWS: Former interior secretary.

TOMASKY: -- dangerous guys. They`re dangerous guys. There`s always --

MATTHEWS: OK --

TOMASKY: -- a risk. But look, the Bush administration sent back more
than 500 guys. Obama has only sent back about 80. So the Bush
administration sent back far more guys and with far looser standards. Now,
you know, I don`t know what these guys are going to do. Nobody knows what
these guys are going to do. But recidivism rates are actually --

MATTHEWS: OK, let me go back to --

(CROSSTALK)

BLACKBURN: Well, let me -- yes --

MATTHEWS: Let me -- let me ask you this --

BLACKBURN: Let me --

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: Look, I have to go back and forth here in a reasonable way, or
we`re going to get into one of those stupid cable fights. I`m not doing
that tonight.

BLACKBURN: Right.

MATTHEWS: Let me ask you another question. If you could have gotten a
better deal to get Bergdahl back, what would it have been? I mean, you got
to think, five, four, three, none? What would you have given the Taliban
to get the American serviceman back, or would you give them nothing?

BLACKBURN: Well, that is a question, a hypothetical, that you really can`t
answer. What you --

MATTHEWS: No, it`s the question the president had to answer himself! He
was --

BLACKBURN: You`re right, but --

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: What price would you pay?

BLACKBURN: The deal that he took -- the deal that he took, you had Panetta
and Clinton --

MATTHEWS: I know.

BLACKBURN: -- and others --

MATTHEWS: I said that.

BLACKBURN: -- that already said, do not do this. And --

MATTHEWS: We said that on the show.

BLACKBURN: -- it was not a good deal.

MATTHEWS: Well, what would you do?

BLACKBURN: I don`t know. You never know what you`re going to do in a
given situation. You do know that five for one and what we have learned
causes tremendous concern. What we also --

MATTHEWS: Well, what about --

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: You got to help me here.

BLACKBURN: Chris, no --

MATTHEWS: There has to be a counter-position here.

BLACKBURN: Now, listen just a second --

MATTHEWS: What`s your position that we should have done?

BLACKBURN: What we should do is be more judicious in how we`re looking at
these detainees. Last week, I had a bill on the floor that would have
closed the Thompson (ph) facility in Illinois --

MATTHEWS: Yes.

BLACKBURN: -- to keep those detainees from coming to the U.S.

MATTHEWS: How would you --

BLACKBURN: The president --

MATTHEWS: OK --

BLACKBURN: -- has decided he is going to empty Guantanamo Bay --

MATTHEWS: I know. I want to talk about Bergdahl.

BLACKBURN: -- sending these individuals to the fight.

MATTHEWS: What price would you have paid -- you`ve got to help me on this,
Congresswoman. You`ve always been a good guest. It`s a tough, but nasty
question.

What price would you, as a member of Congress, pay if someone had asked you
beforehand, how far are you willing to go to get this American back? How
far would you have gone? That`s the question the president had to answer.

BLACKBURN: What I will do is look at the classified file and the
information that we will have access to now and then be able to make that
decision.

See, what you have to realize, the president broke the law. Congress was
not informed.

MATTHEWS: OK.

BLACKBURN: We are not privy to what is in that classified file on Sergeant
Bergdahl. That is something that our committees, our intel committees have
returned to D.C.

MATTHEWS: OK.

BLACKBURN: There are going to be hearings on this. What we need to do is
approach this in a very thoughtful and thorough manner. And that`s a
different manner than the president has done.

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: OK. Let me give you a little backdrop. I`m a bit older than
you, Congresswoman, and I have lived in this city a long time, for good or
evil. I have been here.

And every year, they have the MIA guys come to town with the ponytails and
the motorbikes.

BLACKBURN: Right. Right.

MATTHEWS: And they are still talking about MIAs. They`re talking about
people we left behind.

Let me just try this by you, Michael, first.

Suppose we had left this guy behind. We said, no deal, this deal sucks,
that guy sits over there and rots over there. He looks really skinny in
these pictures, but he`s going to rot because we ain`t going to give any of
these guys away.

TOMASKY: Right.

MATTHEWS: What would have been the attitude of the far right -- and I`m
talking about not just the far right, the really angry right in this
country -- if we had deliberately turned down a deal and left that guy over
there?

TOMASKY: You and I both know --

MATTHEWS: I`m just asking.

TOMASKY: You and I both know what they would have done.

MATTHEWS: These guys are still mad about MIAs in Vietnam.

TOMASKY: Yes, of course.

But they would have exploded. The far right would have exploded on Obama
if that guy was left over there. If he died over there, God forbid, the
far right would have exploded on Obama for that, weak president,
unconscionable, this, that. You know that they would have done all of
those things.

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: Well, let`s ask the congresswoman.

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: What would have been the reaction if the president had said,
kibosh this deal, it`s too dirty, I`m not giving away five bad guys to get
one American of questionable loyalty even, certainly questionable service?
What would you have said to that? Would you have said that was a smart
move on his part, if he`d said no to this deal?

BLACKBURN: I -- you never leave a man behind. That`s why we`re all so
concerned about what happened in Benghazi --

MATTHEWS: Well, then he --

TOMASKY: Here we go.

BLACKBURN: And what you have to do is have consistency.

MATTHEWS: OK. No, you`re changing --

(CROSSTALK)

BLACKBURN: And this administration has no consistency. Now you`re asking
for a specific, what would you have done?

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: You said you wouldn`t have left him behind then.

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: Go back to the question of what price you would have paid.

(CROSSTALK)

BLACKBURN: You don`t know until you look at the file.

MATTHEWS: But you just told me you wouldn`t have left him behind.
So, the president, in the first instance, was doing the right thing,
getting him back. So the price was wrong. What was wrong about the price?
If you said the deal was good from our end, we got the guy back, the other
end of the deal you don`t like. How would you have changed the other end
of the deal? That`s all you have to know, the other end of the deal,
because you already know about Bergdahl. You said we want him back.
Irrespective of the paperwork, you said you don`t have to look at the
paperwork. You said we got to get the guy back. OK. What`s the second
half of the deal look like to you?

BLACKBURN: That`s not what I said.

MATTHEWS: You said we have to bring him back.

BLACKBURN: I said you never leave a man behind.

MATTHEWS: Right.

BLACKBURN: You never leave a man behind.

MATTHEWS: Go ahead.

BLACKBURN: And that is what has people upset about Benghazi. We all know
that.

MATTHEWS: No, wait a minute. You left him behind.

BLACKBURN: And they want to get to the answer for why you left people
behind in Benghazi.

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: I know you want to change the subject to Benghazi. I know you
do. I know you do. I know. You know, I`m not going to do this. I will
have you back to talk about Benghazi. We talk about it all the time around
here, but not right now.

We want to talk about Bergdahl.

BLACKBURN: Yes.

MATTHEWS: You said it was important not to leave that man behind. What
would you have done to keep him, to get him back to the States?

BLACKBURN: These are the questions that you don`t know because you don`t
have the classified information. And we will look at it.

MATTHEWS: But you said you knew you were going to do it. You said there
was a principle involved. We have to bring him back.

(CROSSTALK)

BLACKBURN: To go in here and let go of five people that is their dream
team that they personally asked for.

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: OK. I agree. I have these questions, too.

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: But I`m not elected. You are.

TOMASKY: She`s not going to answer.

(CROSSTALK)

BLACKBURN: Why say it has to be done immediately and why say is that you
can`t wait until this is fully vetted and Congress is informed? Why --
they have to do it in this time frame? We know the president broke the
law? Why did he choose to break it?

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: Can we stop for a second? I`m sorry, Congresswoman.

BLACKBURN: Sure.

MATTHEWS: I just want to -- I want to get back to Mike here.
It seems that there`s a lot of agreement. I think the congresswoman speaks
for a lot of people. The important -- and you hear this from right, left,
center, if there is a center left.

BLACKBURN: Yes.

MATTHEWS: We got to get the guy home.

TOMASKY: Yes.

MATTHEWS: Find some way to do it.

And the questions is over the terms of the trade. It will was get him
home. Nobody`s saying leave the guy over there to rot. In fact, when we
saw those earlier pictures, he looked like he was in really bad shape. The
information they had was, you know, get him home fast. There is a quick
window here.

The question is over the deal on the other side. What`s going to be the
thing we`re arguing about three months from now? I think it`s the other
side. I think we`re not going to be arguing about Bergdahl. Everybody`s
going to say we should have got him back, but that`s easy to say if you
don`t say what the price is. Everybody wants a new Cadillac. If it`s $5,
we will take it. If it`s $50,000, I don`t know.

(CROSSTALK)

BLACKBURN: No.

TOMASKY: Bergdahl`s going to go through a process. Bergdahl`s going to
come back. He`s going to speak his piece. He`s going to apparently go
through the military court system. And they are going to determine whether
he was a deserter or not a deserter. And that`s going to happen. That may
take three months.

MATTHEWS: Will that help us understand this deal better?

TOMASKY: It probably will.

BLACKBURN: That is correct.

TOMASKY: We will see his side.

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: Do you think that information is important to know,
Congresswoman, whether he was a good soldier or not?

BLACKBURN: Yes, I do. I do.

MATTHEWS: Why was it important to know?

BLACKBURN: I think that that is very important to know, and I think the
fact that the people that served with him, his unit, are now coming out and
speaking, that all of this is beginning to cause so many questions.

MATTHEWS: I know.

BLACKBURN: It is causing the White House some problems, and those are the
things --

MATTHEWS: What would you have done? What would you do? Would you say
this was a worse deal if he turned out not to be a good soldier? Or
doesn`t it matter? We still have to bring him back?

(CROSSTALK)

BLACKBURN: The inconsistency is one of the things that`s troubling to
everybody.

You don`t leave people behind. We all know that.

MATTHEWS: OK.

BLACKBURN: He should go through the appropriate system. And if --

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: No, but I`m asking you a question. Does it matter whether he`s
a bad -- you raised the issue.

(CROSSTALK)

BLACKBURN: -- military courts, he will -- they will do that. They will
do that.

MATTHEWS: Suppose it turns out that he was a deserter. Was it right to
bring him back at the price we paid, if he was a deserter? Should we have
left him there?

BLACKBURN: This is -- once all of the due diligence --

(CROSSTALK)

TOMASKY: I will actually answer that.

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: No, no.

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: -- elected official.

(CROSSTALK)

BLACKBURN: We will know the answer to that.

MATTHEWS: No, no, but should we have let him go sit there if he was a
deserter?

BLACKBURN: We will know the answers to that once we go through the
appropriate process.

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: No, the question. I just want to ask you the question. Should
we leave him there -- should we have left him there if he was -- because
you said it matters what his fellow platoon members thought of him.

Why does it matter?

BLACKBURN: I think that what we want to --

MATTHEWS: Why does it matter? Why does it matter? You said you want to
know what his fellow platoon members -- you want an investigation. Why
does it matter whether he`s a bad guy or good guy if he`s an American and
we got to bring him back?

BLACKBURN: If he needs to face the justice in the appropriate system, he
will do that.

MATTHEWS: OK.

BLACKBURN: I think that it`s important to note that you do bring people
home.

Our military men and women are -- you know, they are so upset about this,
because you look at the five that were released. And, Chris, you have to
ask, how many people lost their lives or their loved ones in -- fighting in
battles that were instigated by these five?

MATTHEWS: Yes, I know.

BLACKBURN: How many lives did we lose there?

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: So, you`re raising a question I hope you can answer.

BLACKBURN: And all of this -- we hope for those answers, too, and then I
will be able once we have those and have been able to see those files and
have been properly informed, then I will be able to answer some of the
questions that you have about this. I appreciate your attention to it.

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: Thank you. There`s so much conflict here.

BLACKBURN: Yes.

MATTHEWS: I want to end with this.

People say there`s a principle involved, we have got to bring it back. But
then we want to know whether he`s a good soldier or not. We want
investigations.

You don`t need an investigation if you have decided we`re going to bring
him home.

TOMASKY: You absolutely bring him back.

MATTHEWS: Anyway, we`re talking about the president of the United States`
decision.

Anyway, thank you, U.S. Congresswoman Marsha Blackburn.

BLACKBURN: Thank you.

MATTHEWS: By the way, the U.S. military has going to decide on this guy`s
fate. They got to decide.

MATTHEWS: Michael Tomasky.

BLACKBURN: Right.

Source