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Cuomo Prime Time

Trump Impeached; Rep. David Cicilline (D-RI)is Interviewed. Aired 12-1a ET

Aired December 19, 2019 - 12:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[00:00:00]

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST: It's been quite a day. It's going to be quite a night. The news continues. We're going to turn it over to Chris for "CUOMO PRIME TIME."

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN HOST: Thank you, Coop.

I am Chris Cuomo. Welcome to a special midnight edition of PRIME TIME.

The president of the United States has been impeached. It's only the third time we've ever had this happen but we've never had one like this. History has been made and it's still being written.

The Speaker of the House dropped a big cliff-hanger after the votes. She isn't committing to when she will send the two articles of impeachment to the Senate.

Now first of all, can she delay it?

Why would she delay it?

What does it mean?

All we know for sure is it's time to get after it.

(MUSIC PLAYING)

CUOMO: You know, part of the task, especially on an historic occasion like this, is to figure out what matters. The absolute here is that the 45th President of the United States, Donald J. Trump, has been impeached. That word will follow his legacy no matter what else it involves, just like it does with Bill Clinton. That's for certain.

What happens next?

Now we're in the world of uncertainty. The road ahead, we know there's supposed to be a Senate trial.

But when?

The two articles of impeachment passed in the House, Speaker Pelosi says she won't send them over to the Republican-controlled Senate until she gets a sense of what the plans are for their trial. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA), HOUSE SPEAKER: We have legislation approved by the Rules Committee that will enable us to decide how we will send over the articles of impeachment. So far we haven't seen anything that looks fair to us, so hopefully it will be fair and, when we see what that is, we'll send our managers (ph).

QUESTION: Could you withhold the articles for weeks until you get what you consider a fair trial?

PELOSI: Well, again, we'll decide what that dynamic is but we hope that the resolution of that process will be soon in the Senate.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: Now this is not something we have done very often. There's not a lot of precedent. They have rules on either side but they kind of get rewritten each time and the Constitution is very light on what has to happen and, more importantly, on how it has to happen.

Now we're going to talk about this and it's going to be debated over the next couple of days. I know, I know. You thought it was over. It's not over.

But what is for certain is that this president has the tightest grip on his party that I have ever seen in my lifetime. Clinton had 31 go against him for the inquiry, five go against him on impeachment and that was about lying about sex.

This was serious allegations and you had zero defections. Yes, Justin Amash but he's an independent now. He's not really in the Republican Party. That is historic and this president knows it. Listen to some of his reaction.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I'm the first person to ever get impeached and there's no crime. I don't know about you but I'm having a good time. It's crazy. I'm not worried. I'm not worried because it's always good when you don't do anything wrong, you get impeached. That may be a record that will last forever. But you know what they have done?

They've cheapened the impeachment process.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: Even when something bad happens to him, it's the best of its kind that's ever happened. But you know what?

He's right about the galvanizing of the party and as much as we can look at some polls that we'll talk about and in the House. In the Senate it could be a different story. We'll get into that as well.

Without any, any measure of reserve, it has been an extraordinary day and it calls for extraordinary minds to help us process what it means in some of these questions I outlined. We have Elaina Plott, Asha Rangappa, Wajahat Ali.

Thank you very much; not that early on the East Coast but history never sleeps. So let's leave some of this denser what ifs, what ifs, what ifs for a moment. In terms of first journalistically, history is being written right now.

What is it saying thus far?

ELAINA PLOTT, "THE NEW YORK TIMES": I think what it's saying thus far is that, as you said, Chris, not only was there not a single Republican to break against the president, there wasn't a single Republican to even concede that Donald Trump had acted inappropriately in his calls with President Zelensky.

I find that quite astounding in terms of measuring the level of partisanship, tribalization in this country right now. What that says about the 2020 election, I don't think we know yet.

It is, of course, the first impeachment to take place during -- well, I guess Andrew Johnson was also his first term, correct?

(CROSSTALK)

CUOMO: Not even a term, right?

He came in after an assassination.

[00:05:00]

CUOMO: They decided not to nominate him again.

PLOTT: So how this plays out with Trump actively deciding to run for re-election, how his party treats him accordingly, remains to be seen.

CUOMO: Strong point. He is the first president we'll watch run for office with the impeachment on their head. Good point.

The polls, though, Asha -- I'm leaving the toughest stuff for you. We're going deep into the weeds of what the Constitution says. The idea of what we know, the last couple of rounds of polls we've seen softening in the numbers on impeachment.

However, to take one of your own points, we have seen more people say he did something wrong and I want to hear from some other witnesses.

But should he be impeached and removed under 50 percent now for sure?

The president's rating up from high 30s to low to mid-40s now.

Is your read on that a reflection of how people feel about this?

WAJAHAT ALI, "THE NEW YORKER": No. I think what we learned today is that democracy still works and what those numbers -- I want to say this. If you look at Nixon's Watergate hearings, at the beginning of the hearings, the approval for impeachment was 19 percent. Fast forward 13 months after the secret evidence came out, the highest

level was 57 percent without FOX News. Roger Ailes said, if Nixon had a FOX News, he'd never be impeached.

Now fast forward, it's 2019. I think we can safely say that Donald Trump has a right wing ecosystem that sometimes operates like state TV. All the polls consistently, about 50 percent, about half this country wants this president impeached and removed. If you look at the cross tabs, 61 percent of women.

Look at that number, women. Also look at the numbers of 71 percent of Americans think that the aides should testify. That's about 65-plus percent. And 70 percent of Americans think that what he did was wrong.

So you add it all up, I think this is bad for President Trump because democracy works. There was accountability. There was rule of law. And if you read the Constitution, the framers intended such a serious remedy for a president like this who would abuse his power to bribe or try to bribe an ally to interfere in the elections.

And no matter what happens moving forward, and I would love to get in the weeds, he's only the third president in this country with an asterisk next to him, impeached.

CUOMO: I think we all have to agree, it's never good to be impeached, any way you slice it.

Asha, we'll go easy first and then we'll all get into the weeds because we've got to figure out what Pelosi's play is here, how long she can play it and whether she should play it at all. Those are the big questions going forward.

How strong politically -- I know you're not a politician -- is the, he did this, he had this coming, argument versus the, I'm not sure that this was supposed to be done. Those are going to be the dueling narratives. They had to impeach. He checked every box versus I'm not sure they made the case.

Which wins?

ASHA RANGAPPA, CNN LEGAL AND NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: I think they had to do this and I think the fact that there is -- at least the way things stand right now -- very little chance that he's going to be convicted and removed, shows you the conviction that they had, that this had to be memorialized as conduct that cannot be acceptable for anyone occupying the office of the presidency, whether it's Democrat or Republican, in order for us to sustain our democracy moving forward precisely because, as Wajahat says, this implicates our core democratic process, the pillar of our democracy, our elections.

CUOMO: All right. So that's the political. Now we have to get to what matters here.

The president is in high dudgeon. It's not about him. This is all about the people he cares about being victimized. That's his play. Pelosi says, I don't know when we're going to hand over these. I got

to see what the Senate says.

Now first on the political side, how does that play?

PLOTT: My sense is not great, Chris.

CUOMO: Because?

PLOTT: I have spoken to a lot of Republicans today who feel that this is, if anything, a gift to Mitch McConnell. This is something that they are in no rush on the Senate side to proceed with.

But also the argument that you're going to see Republicans use to really animate the case for Trump is they're going to say, Pelosi is making the case, as are House Democrats, that Donald Trump is a national emergency.

And yet she is holding off on the process that ostensibly could end with his removal from power. The logic doesn't really seem to cohere. Whether it's effective, I'm not sure.

But Democrats are saying that this leaves more time for perhaps more evidence to be uncovered, for the court cases to play out with regard to subpoenas for key witnesses. Republicans are telling me that they're ready to fire back and say, you already impeached him. You clearly think your case is good enough.

What else do you need to wait for?

CUOMO: The pushback on the second point is, we were just supposed to give you the accusations.

PLOTT: Yes.

[00:10:00]

CUOMO: You're supposed to vet them and try them in the Senate but that's been somewhat lost in the dialogue. That's a good mindset to be coming into it.

From your political perspective --

(CROSSTALK)

ALI: I disagree.

CUOMO: Of course.

But why would this be a decent play for them?

ALI: It's a smart long-term strategic move for the Democrats because, like James Bond villains, McConnell and Graham have openly said, hey, this is the plot. We're going to be impartial. They have to take a second oath before this trial and say we're going to be impartial jurors. What's going to happen is the jury foreman and the judge is working

with the defense counsel of Donald Trump. Go back to that first number we discussed: 71 percent of Americans, including a majority of Republicans, believe that the aides should testify.

McConnell says, I want no witnesses, right?

Most Americans realize, in a trial, you need witnesses. So what Pelosi is going to do, she could hold on to this. He already has the asterisk of impeachment. She says, we've done our job. You do your job. You conduct a fair trial. I'm going to drag this. I have some leverage. Maybe a week, maybe two weeks.

What I'm also going to do, if I'm the Democrats, long term. Play for 2020. Go after the vulnerable Republican senators who are running. Hang McConnell and Trump on them because they're going all in supporting this, right?

Well, guess what?

If you got 50 percent of this country saying they didn't want this guy impeached and removed, I would say Gardner, Tillis, Ernst, who else?

Collins and a few others, hey, guys, vulnerable senators, they went all in. They defied the Constitution. They defied their oath. They didn't go for the rule of law. We know that half the country wants this guy removed; 71 percent want witnesses.

Why didn't you do your job?

Why did you go with McConnell?

It's a win.

CUOMO: All right, Asha, you're saved by the Waj there. We're going to go to break. But when we come back, these are the competing arguments. Pelosi can do this because this process is still in the House. And transmittal of the articles of impeachment will therefore be up to them. The other one is, no, it isn't.

Once impeachment is over, now it is the Senate's procedure and they can do whatever they want whenever they want. We will take you through which of those is stronger -- next.

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CUOMO: All right. The Speaker causing a bit of stir on this momentous occasion with some questions about when she will transmit the articles of impeachment. Let's bring in Phil Mattingly. Not quite a curve ball because Pelosi will say, I didn't bring this

up. You asked me about it and I have to see what they're doing there and then we'll figure it out.

Does that wash in terms of procedure?

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN U.S. CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: In terms of can they actually do that?

CUOMO: Yes.

MATTINGLY: The short answer there is yes. I think you kind of hit on it last block. There's ambiguity in terms of what the actual rules are going forward. At least there's certainly ambiguity in the Constitution as to whether or not the House has to immediately transmit the articles of impeachment over.

The short answer is, no, they don't. There's nothing that says the Speaker has to immediately transmit them over. They haven't appointed managers yet. They haven't informed the Senate officially that they passed these articles of impeachment. With that in mind, the Speaker can technically hold on to them as long as she wants.

CUOMO: She has the cover of another vote, right?

Phil was explaining this to me before we got on air tonight.

They do have to have another vote, so you can't smack her on the wrist yet and say you're not supposed to do this, right?

There is still one more step?

MATTINGLY: That's exactly right. This he have to have a vote to appoint the managers that would present the case in the United States Senate. Usually that's the trigger. The articles get sent over physically to the United States Senate floor and that's what historically has triggered the Senate trial.

Until that happens, the House can say, look, we haven't done it yet and therefore we can hold onto them.

I think the big question now is, one, how long is the Speaker willing to actually do this?

Two, what will she actually get out of it?

There's a lot of talk maybe this will give leverage to Democratic leader Chuck Schumer in the Senate and his negotiations to get a trial that includes witnesses.

Maybe this will, perhaps most importantly for Democrats, give the opportunity to hammer home the message that, based on what Mitch McConnell has said about his relationship to the White House, about the fact that he's not, quote, "impartial" when it comes to this trial, that this isn't going to be a fair process, a process that you and I and everybody up here in the Senate knows is going to eventually lead to the acquittal of the president.

I think the big question now is we're in uncharted territory.

CUOMO: Look, the one weird thing that's absolutely going to happen is when McConnell has to raise his right hand and take an oath before God and on about the Constitution that he will be impartial when he just said he isn't. That's going to be a little weird piece of double speak even for Washington.

What do you know about the appetite of the Senate to act immediately?

You know, is this something that they're going to necessarily be pissed off about?

MATTINGLY: The most interesting thing over here, look, there have been a lot of questions about what a Senate trial would look like, the timeline, the procedure, the process.

Would there be witnesses?

There is one thing everybody in the United States Senate agrees on, Democrat or Republican. And that was everybody was going to get the holidays. No matter when the impeachment articles came over, they were going to get agreement to break until sometime the first week of January.

I will say this, when you talk to Democrats, they have been so keyed on the idea that it only takes four Republican senators to come their way to essentially guarantee the trial procedures they want. That would include administration witnesses, people like Mick Mulvaney.

CUOMO: Because it's a simple majority.

MATTINGLY: And the idea that withholding those articles helps them get those four Republicans or more to come over to their side, I think, is tenuous at best. The Republicans you talk to, who are maybe somewhat on the fence about this, not necessarily removing the president but at least on the process, want this to move in a traditional historically precedented fashion right now.

Tomorrow Mitch McConnell speaks on the Senate floor at 9:30 am. He's supposed to lay out his view of what comes next.

[00:20:00]

MATTINGLY: At 10:45, Speaker Pelosi will have her press conference. Shortly after that, Pelosi and Schumer, I'm told, are expected to meet behind closed doors to kind of plot their process.

And throughout all of this, we are going to be talking to every member of the United States Senate and try and get a sense of, is this something you're OK with?

Is this something you want to see changed?

Is this something the House really needs to send something over now? Tomorrow is going to be a huge day in terms of what comes next. But right now we don't have a simple answer. You said it's kind of a curve ball, not necessarily a curve ball. This was a remarkable moment, that the Speaker would not commit to sending not just tomorrow but on any timeline.

CUOMO: It would have been a real, what we call in the business, bombshell if she said, we're not going to or she had a hard position. As always, it's not just the latest. It's also the greatest understanding we could have. Thank you very much.

So very interesting.

What do we know?

Pelosi can buy some time because she has to have another vote, OK?

Pelosi can buy some time because the Senate is in no rush to start this. OK.

But if the Democrats' objective is to shift the onus and to put pressure on them about how they're doing their job, they can't do that until they actually start doing their job. Then there is the other biggest factor -- the president.

How does he handle it?

How does he use it?

Let's talk to the panel next.

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[00:25:00]

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CUOMO: Our president's been impeached. That is history. The way it happened is also historic. Republicans are not just standing in lockstep with President Trump. They are arguing he has it worse than Jesus did and comparing his impeachment to Pearl Harbor.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. BARRY LOUDERMILK (R-GA): When Jesus was falsely accused of treason, Pontius Pilate gave Jesus the opportunity to face his accusers. During that sham trial, Pontius Pilate afforded more rights to Jesus than the Democrats have afforded this president.

REP. MIKE KELLY (R-PA): On December 7, 1941, a horrific act happened in the United States and President Roosevelt said this is a date that will live in infamy. Today is another date that will live in infamy.

(END VIDEO CLIP) CUOMO: I'm joined by Elaina, Asha and Wajahat.

Look, Waj, let's do this the right way. The best reckoning of how upset they must be to make references to the second deadliest attack on American ground ever and the crucifixion of Jesus right before Christmas, what does that tell you about their disposition?

ALI: It tells me they've made a Faustian bargain with a would-be authoritarian, a man who has been coddled his whole life by privilege, born into wealth, protected by celebrity and now nurtured by the cocoon of the presidency, who, for the first time in his life, is being held accountable and is rage tweeting and rage shouting, victimhood.

Instead of saying you know what?

Maybe we shouldn't compare President Trump to, I don't know, Jesus or maybe the impeachment to crucifixion, or being staked or being burned or having literally boulders put on you for being an innocent young woman in Salem and being accused of being a witch.

Nothing is going to happen to Trump. He walked out perfectly fine. He held a rally. He felt better about himself. The victimhood and the whining and the conspiratorial madness emanates from Trump and now has infected the Republican Party.

And I will say this, Elaina and I were talking about this beforehand. The best gift for Democrats is Trump. He's going to self-destruct just like he self-impeached.

You saw today at that rally, what is it going to be like leading up to 2020?

There is no bottom. It's going to get bottomer.

(CROSSTALK)

CUOMO: Why do you believe that what he's doing now is perceptible of his weakness and not his strength?

This is what galvanizes people the way he was talking to them today. Don't underestimate the power of a demagogue. You know, they exist for a reason. There is no opposite word for them.

ALI: It galvanizes his base, right?

However, I will say this. This is my bold prediction and, if I'm wrong, I will come back on your show. I will eat crow. Make it halal.

(CROSSTALK)

ALI: Women, people, this country has underestimated women. The Republican Party and Trump has underestimated and undermined women.

Women will be the force that will be so disgusted by him -- I'm talking about suburban white women, some religious white women, some Republican independent women, who probably voted for him. The last three or four years, especially as he attacks Greta Thunberg, as he attacked the widow of Congressman Dingell, especially Nancy Pelosi and her teeth, his worst impulses will come out, more authoritarian, more racist --

(CROSSTALK)

CUOMO: I hear you and I get your prediction.

Asha, just in the basket of argument, OK?

You're a professor of how the law applies to facts, what works in terms of cogency. And to add to Waj's disposition on this, Congresswoman Dingell, who obviously replaced her departed husband, she responded to the president. She put a tweet out. We can put it up there. I'll read it once they do.

This hurt her. The president knew it would hurt her. He wanted it to hurt her. He's OK saying, maybe your husband is in hell. He doesn't mean it as a joke. He didn't laugh. He doesn't care.

However, for the Republicans to compare him to Jesus and compare this to Pearl Harbor and nobody steps out and says, whoa, that's too much, nobody says that.

Nobody says to him, whoa, don't say that about the 16-year old with Asperger's.

Nobody says don't talk about the dead man that way.

Isn't that proof of his strength, not his undoing?

[00:30:09]

ASHA RANGAPPA, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Chris, I cannot get into his crazy. Honestly, like --

CUOMO: I'm talking about everybody else. You can leave him out of it.

RANGAPPA: I think that what it -- what it demonstrates is a cowardice on the part of the people who believe that they either have to get in line or they're going to be thrown out of the tribe. And right now, membership means everything when it comes to politics.

I do think that what they are essentially trying to do with these analogies is continue to politicize this impeachment and -- and say that this is a tribal thing, as Elaina mentioned. And I think it's for that reason that, going back to this procedure issue on whether Pelosi should move these impeachment articles over --

CUOMO: You think she can?

RANGAPPA: I think she can hold for a little while, but this idea --

CUOMO: She's got the resolution vote.

RANGAPPA: I think this idea that they can hold it like a sword of Damocles in order to obtain, you know -- as leverage to get the Senate to change its rules, I don't think is -- is -- she can do that indefinitely. And I don't think it is the right thing to do Democratically.

I mean, if we look at the criminal justice analog, when someone is charged, they do have a right to a speedy trial. So you can't --

CUOMO: Larry Tribe argues, the professor, that --

RANGAPPA: And Professor Tribe, you know, he --

CUOMO: What would you do if you had an indictment, and as you were delivering it over, you had solid information that the judge and/or jury were not going to do their job? Would you continue with the indictment?

RANGAPPA: Well, in that case, what you'd be able to do is get the jurors kicked off, if you have evidence that someone is not an impartial juror or somehow compromised.

CUOMO: Can't do that here.

RANGAPPA: You cannot do that here. But what I think the -- because the Republicans have been so brazen in their willingness to say that they're not going to be impartial, let them own the shame of, you know, not holding a fair trial. You know, being impeached and then acquitted by a rigged jury is nothing to brag about for the president.

CUOMO: So shift the onus and put the spotlight on them.

RANGAPPA: It will make him the presidential equivalent of O.J. Simpson, and he can hang out with that for the rest of his term.

CUOMO: Elaina, one of my loose rules is if something happens three times in rapid succession, it's probably something to pay attention to.

Today on the show, you heard crucifixion done. There wasn't a smack of irony anywhere. The president, in his letter to Pelosi, said, you are insulting people of faith by saying that you pray for me, which shows one of the most fundamental misunderstandings of prayer I've ever heard of any adult in my life.

But earlier, we heard members of the GOP side of Congress saying, from a religious -- you know, this religious bent, that the president was being treated as badly as Jesus in his final days. It's the third time we've heard them go to that. That means that it's not a mistake anymore.

ELAINA PLOTT, CNN ANALYST: I just want to be clear in case any of your viewers, if there's any ambiguity about this point. House Democrats launching impeachment proceedings against Donald Trump is nothing like the crucifixion of Jesus Christ for our sense of this entire world. So I just want to make that really clear.

The second thing is that, I think, from a historical standpoint, it's interesting to me, because during Johnson's impeachment, you had Democratic representatives argue, essentially, the same thing, that Pontius Pilate afforded Jesus more rights that his trial than were given to Andrew Johnson. So that, along with Pearl Harbor, shows that we kind of need to refresh our historical analogies a bit, that not everything rises to those levels.

CUOMO: But it shows they're all-in.

PLOTT: At this point, it shows --

CUOMO: It shows it means everything to them.

PLOTT: It shows they're all-in. But when it happened in Johnson's trial, that ended up making the 11th article of impeachment levied against him. It just shows how much norms have broken down that, you know, for Republicans that wasn't even something to tweet a disavowal of on behalf of any member. It was just, you know, another day in Trump's America.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Because he's the chosen one.

CUOMO: They've said that also. And that this is what God wanted, was for him to be president.

PLOTT: Which to me, I mean, the messianic language that they would denounce, you know, vis-a-vis Barack Obama. I mean, Christian conservatives all of the time would just, you know, harangue Democrats for speaking in messianic overtones at times about Barack Obama. This is no longer overtones. I mean, it's quite explicit comparisons --

CUOMO: It's just the tone.

PLOTT: -- to Jesus Chris.

CUOMO: And why am I bringing it up? To be inflammatory? No. To be instructive of where we're going. There you go. This is the talk.

Thank you very much, each and all, for making us better on such an important night. Appreciate it. All right?

So next guest has just gone down in history with his vote to impeach. Congressman Cicilline has been at the forefront of this fight. How does he feel? What does you think about the holdup? What does it mean about what comes next? Next.

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[00:39:00]

CUOMO: It is done, and things have changed. Our president is living a new reality, and so are we all. Our 45th president is now also the No. 3, with a giant mark of impeachment that will be an asterisk next to it forever. Let's get to one of the people behind that vote.

Congressman Cicilline, thank you for joining us.

REP. DAVID CICILLINE (D-RI): My pleasure.

CUOMO: How do you feel?

CICILLINE: It was a very sad day for the country. I think we -- we demonstrated throughout the course of the day that we had no choice but to move forward with articles of impeachment. The president of the United States abused the enormous powers of his office to cheat in the 2020 election by dragging a foreign power to corrupt our elections.

And we heard a lot about, you know, America is based on free and fair elections. We promote that all over the world. We need to protect it here at home. And the president of the United States undermined the national security of our country. He betrayed his oath of office. And he tried to cover up his conduct. And we were left with no choice but to move forward with impeachment today.

Nobody celebrates that. Nobody came to Congress to impeach a president, but we did take an oath when we began our service to protect and defend the Constitution; and that's what we did today.

[00:40:11]

CUOMO: If it's so clear, why not a single Republican vote, unless you count Justin Amash, onto your side? In '98 with Clinton, five Democrats voted to impeach him. He was actually saved in the Senate by Republicans.

Here, no crossovers. What does it mean?

CICILLINE: Yes. I think you have to ask the Republicans that. You know, I asked that question during the hearing during the markup. Do they think it's OK for a president to invite a foreign power, coerce a foreign power to interfere in an American presidential election? Would they do it? I asked, raise your hand if you would ask a foreign power to help you in your reelection. And of course, no one raised their hand.

The question is why are they more loyal to their party than they are to their country? Why are they defending this president and betraying the national interest of our country by protecting our democracy?

I think everyone was disappointed Republicans did not join us in this effort. When Justin Amash did join, they kicked him out of the Republican Party, and he became an independent. But this shouldn't be a Republican or a Democratic issue. We're all Americans. We all have a responsibility to protect this extraordinary democracy that is the shining city on the hill, that's the envy of the world, that people look up to because of our respect for human rights and human dignity and freedom and fair elections.

And it's never OK for any president to -- who faces a tough reelection to pick up the phone and try to get a foreign power to intervene.

And we should remember, this is a pattern for this president. This is a president who welcomed foreign interference in the 2016 campaign. It was a systematic and sweeping interference by the Russians. He welcomed it.

And then the day after Robert Mueller testified, when President Trump thought he was free and clear of that first offense, he gets on the phone and tries to coerce the new president of the Ukraine to launch a phony investigation of his chief political rival.

This is -- this is shocking -- shocking activity. This is undermining our right to elect our own leaders and to decide our own futures. It should have had broad bipartisan support, and I'm very disappointed our Republican colleagues didn't join us in that.

CUOMO: In terms of the support for the move, on the most recent polling, there's been a softening of Americans believing in impeachment. The number is down. And the president's job approval is up. Does that give you any misgivings about whether or not you did the right thing?

CICILLINE: None at all. Look, this is not about politics. This is not about polls. This is about honoring the oath we take to protect and defend the Constitution, whatever the political implications are.

And what I was so struck by was the extraordinary courage of so many of my colleagues who ran in districts where Donald Trump won, and they run as Democratic candidates for Congress, and in districts where Donald Trump is still popular. That's irrelevant. This is about whether or not we are going to hold the president of the United States accountable, whether the president can abuse the power of his office.

This is exactly what our framers spoke about when they developed the mechanism for impeachment. They understood that one day, a president might advance his own personal, political, or financial interests at the expense of our financial interest and not advancing the public good, but his own personal good. And that's why they developed articles of impeachment. This is the only remedy in the Constitution. We have no other choice but to do what we did. We took an oath. We need to honor that oath. And whatever the politics are, they'll work itself out.

We will have to be able to look at our children and grandchildren and the next generation in the eye and say, We did everything we could to protect our democracy and to hold this kind of president accountable for his misconduct.

CUOMO: If the polls in the beginning had been, if you impeach this president, 90 percent of the country is against you, do you think your party would've gone along with it?

CICILLINE: Absolutely. Look --

CUOMO: Really? CICILLINE: -- I think the speaker has been very clear throughout this

process. We have to do what the Constitution -- what the evidence requires and what the Constitution demands.

This is -- there is overwhelming evidence of the president's abuse of power and an effort to obstruct Congress as we investigated that abuses of power. The evidence was really uncontested, which is why our Republican colleagues talked today about process --

CUOMO: Right.

CICILLINE: -- and about a bunch of other things. They never once tried to justify the president's corrupt behavior.

CUOMO: Well --

CICILLINE: And so we had no choice. And I think, the politics aside, we have a responsibility to go back to our districts and explain to our constituents why this was necessary.

CUOMO: Correct.

CICILLINE: Why we had to take this action. This is a moment for leadership.

CUOMO: Let me ask you one more question here about choice and process.

The leader -- the speaker of the House said, we're going to give them the articles of impeachment. We'll figure out when. We want to see what shape that takes.

There's nothing in the Constitution about this, but there's a clear suggestion that, once you impeach, it's now the Senate's time to exercise its constitutional duty. How much of a delay is OK in delivering the impeachments, and what would justify it?

CICILLINE: Well, I think what the speaker said was that, before she transmits the articles of impeachment, she wants to have a sense of what the procedures will be like, because that will inform her decision of who to appoint as an impeachment manager.

[00:45:06]

So, for example, if it's a full-blown trial with witnesses, that may require a manager with a certain skill set. If, instead, it's merely arguments based on the evidence already collected, that may require different skills.

CUOMO: Where does she get the power to hold back the process until she is satisfied with where it goes from here?

CICILLINE: Well, she has the responsibility under the article of impeachment to transmit it at her discretion. So she'll transmit it when she thinks the time is appropriate. I think it's perfectly reasonable to want to insist that we have some

understanding that this process will be fair and will be deliberative. When you have the Senate majority leader who's saying, I'm not going to be impartial and is saying, I'm coordinating directly with the defense counsel for the president.

I mean, I was a criminal defense lawyer. If the foreperson of the jury ever announced, look, I'm coordinating directly with the defense lawyer, the judge would have thrown them both in jail.

CUOMO: Yes, I get your concern. But you guys are also arguing that this is an ongoing crime and the president is a continuing threat.

CICILLINE: Absolutely.

CUOMO: How can you justify any delay, then?

CICILLINE: Well, I think, look, I don't think anyone is suggesting that there is going to be any unnecessary delay. Again, I am only basing this on what the speaker said at her press conference, that she wants to see what the process is so she can make an informed judgment about who will best manage that. I think that's perfectly sensible and reasonable; and whatever time that takes, it will take. I don't think she's indicated any particular timetable.

But look, let's focus on the important thing here. This is a serious action by the House. We have accused the president of two very serious crimes. The Senate has a responsibility to try the president, and the American people have a right to expect that that will be done in a thoughtful, deliberative, fair process. And that's not only something the speaker cares about. It's something the American people care about.

CUOMO: It's a very important point you make there about what this says, this impeachment. This is an accusation. These are two charges. The political argument that you didn't make a good enough case, your case only needed to be strong enough to sustain the charges. The vetting of those charges happens now in the Senate to the extent that they want to do that job.

Congressman, thank you very much for joining us on such an historic evening.

CICILLINE: My pleasure.

CUOMO: All right, so let's get a deeper look at the merit of this potential Pelosi delay. What is the right play? It's not an easy one. So let's get after every part of it. Next.

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[00:51:30]

CUOMO: Donald John Trump, 45th president of the United States, impeached. That is now permanent. There's no denying it. There's no erasing it. And yet, we're not done. There's a Senate trial to come. But when?

In a surprise move, Speaker Pelosi suggested she wanted to see what the Senate trial looked like before sending the articles over. Her reasoning for this is to allow her to pick the right managers, the representatives who will make the case in the Senate. Can she? Should she?

Now I'm not sure which question is harder to answer. There's no hard rule or procedure for the timing of transmission of articles of impeachment from House to Senate. Supposedly, the House managers bring them to the Senate. So technically, if you don't have managers, you can't deliver them. That sounds silly, but the House does have the power over impeachment, so for at least one more vote, picking managers, arguably, they have leverage. Which means time here.

But if the Senate starts to complain, they could argue that, once impeached, and you just said you impeached him, they get the ball automatically. At a minimum, any disputed delay will fight the Democrats' notion that this is an ongoing crime and the president is a threat to do this again if not stopped. The urgency argument.

So, assuming you could probably delay a little, at least, the question is why delay? These people all want to go home for Christmas. That's the word in the House and in the Senate. And McConnell has not figured out how to please his people, nor his patrons, the president. So there's wood to chop and water to carry, as the book is called, and no reason to rush.

So let's go back to the previous point. Pelosi would have to justify going so fast up until now only to hold up the horses. Here's the most provocative argument to keep control by the House. What is Pelosi's duty in the event that she has reason to know the next phase won't honor the Constitution? How could she know that? Like this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY): I'm not impartial about this at all.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I wasn't in any doubt.

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R-SC): I'm not trying to pretend to be a fair juror here.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: McConnell, Graham, it's all (laughs). They're both supposed to take an oath, raise their hand to their god and swear to be impartial. Can they do that and be telling the truth? Would they be lying then, or are they lying now?

Professor Larry Tribe, who's helping the Democrats call here with their strategy, calls the Senate out for offering a Potemkin trial. This is a clever reference at a minimum.

It means a trial that looks fair only on the outside. It refers to a prince from Crimea -- yes, as in Ukraine -- named Potemkin. He built a fake village to try to impress Catherine the Great, his former lover, who was then part of the Russian ruling family.

Trump is -- Tribe is pretty clever to incorporate all those connections into one construction. The Crimea thing with Potemkin even happened in 1787, the year our Constitution was written. So it is all very clever. But is it too clever?

So if Pelosi suspects the trial on the charges that she's going to hand over won't be fair, can she wait until they make the rules to see? Can the Senate make the rules before they get the articles?

The easier question is whether this is worth the risk. Does Pelosi stretch on this and test the patience of people who are moving pulls away from watching impeachment? Or does Pelosi pounce on principle and say, the GOP is out to defend Trump at all costs and in violation of the Constitution?

[00:55:10]

You know, there is clever, and then there's too cute by half. There's having a strong hand, and then there's overplaying a hand. The country has been through a lot. This impeachment has just made a crash in a turbulent sea, and it is sure to make waves that will ultimately wash up onto the shores of our collective sanity. We want to avoid a Trump tsunami of constant agitation, rage, revolt, revenge and ripping our already fragile situation apart.

The Democrats say their oaths to the Constitution left and bound to impeach by duty. Well, they did their duty. And there is no clear value in extending this national nightmare, and that's what it is. A nightmare. A president is impeached. He will make his pain felt by all.

The constitutional imperative now is to get away from the politics of left and right as fast as we can and get back to the words that matter most, I argue, in the Constitution. The first three. We, the people.

All right. That is all for us tonight. Thanks for watching. The news continues on CNN.

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