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Trump Nominates Matt Gaetz For U.S. Attorney General; Interview With Rep. Madeleine Dean (D-PA). Aired 11-11:30a ET

Aired November 14, 2024 - 11:00   ET

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

[11:00:19]

PAMELA BROWN, CNN HOST: Good morning to you. You are live in the CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Pamela Brown in Washington.

And we begin this hour with my new reporting on what may be the most shocking presidential Cabinet nomination in decades. It is sending ripple effects through Washington. Of course, that's exactly what Donald Trump wants, picking Matt Gaetz for his attorney general.

A source familiar with Donald Trump's thinking tells me the president- elect met with at least two other candidates in person, but didn't -- wasn't happy with him. They didn't check the boxes. So he quickly pivoted to settle on the MAGA loyalist Matt Gaetz because -- quote -- "Gaetz will do all the things Trump will want him to do."

The same source tells me that Trump believes Gaetz is -- quote -- "going to want to go after career employees disloyal, as deep state, and ensure the retribution stuff" -- end quote.

Joining us now is Pennsylvania Congresswoman Madeleine Dean. She is a Democrat on the Judiciary Committee.

Thank you for coming on.

The attorney general, of course, is the nation's top law enforcement officer. Based on what my source tells me, is president-elect Trump putting his enemies on notice?

REP. MADELEINE DEAN (D-PA): Well, it's good to be with you, Pamela, from a very busy week here this week in Washington, D.C., as we came back to session and welcomed 30 new members to our caucus.

What this tells me, this appointment tells me, is that the president is rewarding loyalty. Does it put others on notice? Probably. He's talked openly about a hit list, an enemies list.

But what I would like to say is, the job is on the Senate to actually take a look at this nomination, to do the investigation, to see if he has the two characteristics that I think an attorney general needs, which is integrity and independence.

From my work near Mr. Gaetz these last six years, I would say he fails on both fronts. He has not shown independence from Trump's lies. He has not shown the understanding that the attorney general must be independent. It is not the law firm of the president-elect.

And, on integrity, I have sat with him on the Judiciary Committee where he, whether it's on committee, in hearings, in markups, or on television, spews misstatement, lie, conspiracy theory after conspiracy theory.

So I would suggest the Senate take a very close look. I don't have a say in it. But we will also see whether they recognize he lacks those two qualities. It's very important to the top law enforcement official.

BROWN: You say the onus is on the Senate. Of course, that is where he would need to be confirmed. But you have Trump allies in the Senate, Josh Hawley, Senator Tuberville coming out and saying, look, there was a mandate for Donald Trump by the American people with his election win,and we should do everything we can to get his nominees through.

There is a line of thinking, even in the House among his allies, including from Speaker Johnson, that this is who Donald Trump wants. Someone like Matt Gaetz can reform a DOJ they see as weaponized. What do you say to that?

DEAN: Well, there are going to beat Donald Trump loyalists in the Senate, in the House. We absolutely know that.

All the more reason why a strong Democratic Caucus will provide the checks that we possibly can. It looks like it's going to be a very, very close majority. But I do want to say something else. There's a backdrop that you know of, which is you notice that at the time that he got the nod from President Trump, he immediately resigned from the House.

Strange timing of that, because, as we know, the Ethics report was due to come out shortly. So Mr. Gaetz tried to cut off the results of the Ethics investigation into him on many different corrupt charges, including trafficking of a minor, sex trafficking of a minor, misappropriation of funds, bad behavior on the floor of the House, frankly.

So I call it the Texas two-step, except he's from Florida. But he resigned immediately, hoping to forestall the Ethics Committee. I hope the Ethics Committee releases its report, so that we know exactly what they found in terms of that sitting congressman's behavior.

BROWN: And, as you know, Gaetz has denied any wrongdoing.

Speaker Johnson claims that his resignation did not have to do with this Ethics report. But there are certainly many in the House, including yourself, who really just aren't buying that.

What do you know in terms of the discussions about releasing that Ethics report? Because there are these growing calls for that to be out there, especially if he's going to be potentially the attorney general.

[11:05:10] DEAN: I don't know, but I think you're exactly right. If he's being considered and will be questioned by the Senate for attorney general, I think they have a right to ask for that report, to say, what did you find? What did you know? What do you know? It's relevant.

I think the FBI will have to be doing a background check. So it's relevant. I don't know what the Ethics Committee will do. They're an extraordinary committee. You know they are equal in numbers, Democrats and Republicans. So they may be well-persuaded that, because of the integrity of this institution, because of us upholding our oaths, that they might need to release their work.

They have worked on this for many, many months. So I'm hoping they will come forward and transparently show us what they found and then let the chips fall where they may.

The takeaway from these appointments is that Mr. Trump, president- elect Trump, is rewarding loyalty. It is open corruption. We saw in the first administration of Mr. Trump he tried to surround himself and he did surround himself with very credible Republicans to work with him, most of whom got fired, dismissed or quit.

This time around, he's just going with loyalists.

BROWN: So we know that the FBI investigated Gaetz as well. DOJ decided not to press charges. Both the FBI and the Justice Department have been vilified by Gaetz. He has railed against them for years. He's even called for them to be dismantled. Let's listen to that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FMR. REP. MATT GAETZ (R-FL): We either get this government back on our side or we defund and get rid of, abolish the FBI, CDC, ATF, DOJ, every last one of them if they do not come to heel!

(CHEERING)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: And, of course, there's a question, Congresswoman, if the senators will ask DOJ for the file on him from the investigation, arguing that they need to see that in order to make a judgment on whether he should be confirmed.

Sources I'm talking to on the Hill say it is an uphill battle, if not insurmountable, for him to get confirmed, although there are allies in the Senate. The question then becomes, what about recess appointments, something that Donald Trump himself basically seemed to preeminently push, saying that that's important and that whoever the Senate leader is should do that.

DEAN: Well, I'm hoping the new majority leader soon will not do that.

I think it would be undermining of his own authority, of his own claim to the power that he should wield as the leader. I also think that, with recess appointments, I fear that what will happen is a bunch of acting leads of different agencies and all loyalists.

I think about Mr. Gaetz in the clip you just played. That is what we have seen here year after year, railing at our institutions, trying to tear down Americans' faith in institutions. And he's had friends like the speaker doing the exact same thing, so, now -- in order to shake our faith in our institutions and so that people will become more loyal to the power that Mr. Trump is wielding.

I hope the American people see through it, most importantly. I count on the Senate to do its job and to make sure that people who are disqualified, unqualified, lack the integrity and independence are not confirmed.

BROWN: Congresswoman Madeleine Dean, thank you so much.

DEAN: Thank you very much.

BROWN: And let's bring in CNN senior justice correspondent Evan Perez.

Evan, you heard there the congresswoman say the file on Matt Gaetz from the House Ethics Committee should be released. Is there a chance those findings will ever be made public?

EVAN PEREZ, CNN SENIOR JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: That's the big question I think we have this morning from the Ethics Committee. For instance, we know that the report is done and it was going to be released as soon as tomorrow.

And that's what he did. He resigned before that could happen. So the question is, does this mean that the investigation is over and that file, that report is dead and it doesn't get released? That's the huge question I think for the members of that committee.

The other question is, obviously, as the congresswoman raised, is the investigative file from the Justice Department. Let's go over again -- I think we have on screen the allegations that were investigated, sexual misconduct, illegal drug use, accepting improper gifts, obstructing the investigation.

That was looked at by Justice Department. They in the end decided not to bring charges against the congressman, but the Ethics Committee then took that up and that's what they're focusing on. The question is, does the Senate require a background check from the FBI?

I'm sorry -- yes, from the FBI, because that is what typically is done. Do they require that? Do they require the Justice Department to send over the report? We don't know whether the Senate Republicans will do that or whether they will take the route that you just mentioned, which is to avoid the embarrassment for the congressman and do a recess appointment in some way.

[11:10:08]

BROWN: That is the big question. So obviously Trump got what he wanted in terms of the attention surrounding Matt Gaetz and his pick for attorney general.

PEREZ: Yes.

BROWN: I was just talking to a Trump ally this morning who said, look, he's reveling in this.

PEREZ: Yes.

BROWN: In talking to sources, I'm also told that he has been talking to Kash Patel in the last few days. And Kash Patel, I'm told, is being considered to replace Christopher Wray. Of course, Donald Trump has openly said he wanted to fire Wray. That has been implicit in these conversations.

But Kash Patel is a real, a fierce MAGA loyalist, right?

PEREZ: MAGA loyalist, and he has been extremely critical of the FBI. He -- remember, he was -- he did serve any administration at the -- at the end of the administration, there was a period where Trump -- where he wanted Trump to install him as deputy FBI director.

What he doesn't seem to understand or didn't know is under federal law, the deputy FBI director is required to be a career official. It can't be a political appointee. And then he also wanted to get sent over to CIA, which also got blocked. And so he is ready to come in and essentially burn the place down metaphorically, I guess we should say.

But here's the thing. I mean, I think the way for this to happen first is that Christopher Wray has to either be fired or he has to resign because he does have to just over two years left on his 10-year term. Is Trump going to be the first person to fire two FBI directors? Remember, he fired James Comey early in 2017.

And so we anticipate that this is going to be a big decision for Chris Wray. Does he stay and make Trump fire him or does he leave before the incoming president takes office? I think those are the big questions. And the other thing, Pamela, you and I have been talking about this in our reporting over the last few days.

There seemed to be this behind-the-scenes battle between what we -- what people call team crazy versus team normal. And the normies thought that they were -- they had the upper hand because Marco Rubio and some of the initial picks. And then, of course, it's been blown up in the last couple of days.

The question is, does this important job, does this go to team crazy or does it go to team normie? And we will find out because the -- that's where this is now headed.

BROWN: Yes, the normies feel like they're losing an edge, right?

PEREZ: I think they have definitely -- they have been taken by surprise.

BROWN: Yes, they have. And, again, that's exactly what Donald Trump wants. PEREZ: Right.

BROWN: And I think he's -- from talking to sources, he wants to kind of put a stake in the ground that this time is going to be different.

PEREZ: Right.

BROWN: Round two is going to be different. Nothing is holding him back. There's no restraint like perhaps there was the first time around.

All right, Evan Perez, thank you so much.

Well, Matt Gaetz is not the only controversial pick for Trump's Cabinet. My next guest is a national security expert who says putting Tulsi Gabbard in charge of national intelligence is a threat to national security. But we're going to dive into this and hear some different perspectives.

We will be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[11:17:45]

BROWN: A stunning new warning about one of Donald Trump's key Cabinet picks, a national security expert calling Tulsi Gabbard, who's Trump's choice to lead the U.S. intelligence community, a security risk herself.

Tom Nichols writes in "The Atlantic": "Gabbard is stunningly unqualified for almost any Cabinet post, but especially for ODNI. To make Tulsi Gabbard the director of national intelligence, however, is not merely handing a bouquet to a political gadfly. Her appointment would be a threat to the security of the United States."

Tom Nichols joins us now. He is a staff writer for "The Atlantic" and professor emeritus of national security affairs at the U.S. Naval War College. Also joining us for perspective as Republican strategist Shermichael Singleton.

Tom, let's start with you. You also write in this article: "She has no qualifications as an intelligence professional, literally none. She has no significant experience directing or managing much of anything."

If this moves forward, in your view, what would the impact be?

TOM NICHOLS, "THE ATLANTIC": Well, the impact would be both domestic and international.

First, I don't think Tulsi Gabbard, given her political leanings, which is to say that she's an admirer both of Bashar Assad of Syria and an apologist for Vladimir Putin of Russia and has a long record of statements about that -- is not someone that you would want to trust with America's secrets. And the problem is that our allies certainly wouldn't want to work

with her as someone they would trust sharing their secrets with us. These are positions of immense trust in the international community, and you can't just hand them out as a kind of trolling of your domestic opponents.

The other problem is that the DNI, which was created after 9/11, sits on top of all of the other intelligence agencies in the United States. And this would probably slow the flow of information within the intelligence community, first because she wouldn't know what she's doing, and, second, because I think there would be people at agencies throughout the intelligence community that would wonder how much intelligence they're supposed to push up the chain to someone they think might be an unreliable DNI.

[11:20:04]

And I think that could end up being a problem as well. She legally, as the DNI, would be able to order anything she wanted from the intelligence community. But this makes no sense, other than as one of three appointments that Trump is making to punish communities within the American government that he thinks opposed to him.

He's putting Pete Hegseth at Defense, also a disastrously ridiculous appointment, because he's mad at the military and has been for years. He's trying to punish the intelligence community by saddling them with Tulsi Gabbard. And, of course, at the Justice Department, we have all talked about Matt Gaetz more than enough. And I think that one speaks for itself.

But this is really a risk. This is not a game, and this would have serious consequences for American national security and for our safety as a country.

BROWN: And I do want to add we heard about it on the campaign show, Trump wanting to go after his enemies.

And speaking to several sources close to Trump and knowing his thinking, that is exactly what he's trying to implement now, Shermichael, with some of these picks, not only with Matt Gaetz, but also Hegseth. I was told just by a source last night that there is an effort under way to come up with a list in the Pentagon, for example, of people who were against Trump, someone that they could potentially -- people that could potentially be targeted.

Same with Gaetz as potentially the A.G. Of course, he's got to get confirmed and all of that. But, Shermichael, what is your take on someone like Gabbard potentially being the director of national intelligence?

SHERMICHAEL SINGLETON, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Look, first of all, everyone has to go through a Federal Bureau of Investigations background check, a pretty extensive one. I was a presidential appointee. They go back for a very long time.

Let's go over Tulsi Gabbard's record. She graduated top of her class from the Alabama Military Academy, the first woman to do so. She did a tour in Iraq, a tour in Kuwait. She was deployed to the Horn of Africa, supporting special operations mission. So she certainly has some level of military pedigree as a lieutenant colonel that I don't think many people would necessarily dismiss.

Now, she has been very skeptical of wanting to involve U.S. troops in foreign wars. And there's a ton of data that would suggest the vast majority of the American people in both political parties actually would agree with that. And so I can certainly see how the president- elected his team would make a concerted effort to not only support her selection, nomination, and ultimately confirmation, but would say these are the things that we would point to suggest that she is a pretty good pick.

BROWN: Just to follow up with you, and then, Tom, I will get to you, but what do you say to what Tom laid out about Tulsi Gabbard being an apologist or sympathizer for murderous dictators like Assad, like Vladimir Putin?

SINGLETON: Everyone's going to have different perspectives on someone like a Tulsi Gabbard.

I have seen a lot of opinions about some of her previous statements. I think the focus here needs to be, if she's confirmed by the United States Senate, how does her background as a military officer prepare her to do the job and do the job well?

One of the things that I found, Pamela, spending a lot of time with people in the military owning a firearms company, when you serve and you have seen men and women and your friends die around you, you are very, very skeptical to get involved in conflicts that may send troops to various parts of the world.

And so I would argue that her background and her experience was certainly potentially bold well and her ability to do the job. Will there be a learning curve? To Tom's point, she doesn't have experience in the intelligence community. Sure. But I think she's smart enough to be able to learn what's necessary to do the job well.

BROWN: Tom, I want to get your take on what we heard from Shermichael and also point out in your article, you imply that Gabbard may be a pawn of sorts, that you anticipate her denial to the post -- or he anticipates it, and then he will nominate someone else.

But our reporting indicates that these are his picks. He's wanting -- Trump wants these. These are not shadow picks. And there's a reason why he pushed the idea of recess appointments if they can't get confirmed the regular way. That's what he wants.

What do you say to that?

NICHOLS: Well, first, to Shermichael, I will say, you know better than this.

I'm glad you're on to firearm company. I spent 25 years teaching senior military officers at our Senior Military Academy at the Naval War College. This is ridiculous. She spent time in the reserves doing civil affairs and other support missions. She had no background in intelligence.

This idea that anybody who served can do any job at any senior level, the same ridiculous argument that's being applied to Hegseth...

(CROSSTALK)

SINGLETON: No, no, Tom, that's not my argument. That's not my argument.

My point is...

(CROSSTALK)

NICHOLS: I didn't interrupt you, Shermichael.

(CROSSTALK)

BROWN: Hold on. Let's let Tom finish, and I will give you time, Shermichael, right after he finishes.

SINGLETON: Sure. Sure.

NICHOLS: She has no experience with this.

[11:25:00]

And the idea that while these are just different opinions and that she will be investigated by the FBI, first of all, different opinions are not the same thing as putting somebody at the head of the intelligence community who thinks that Vladimir Putin is in the right about Ukraine.

Second, the administration has already said it wants to dispense with FBI background checks, precisely so that they can do things like this. The idea that the FBI is going to come to Donald Trump and say, no, can't have her, she's got some problems in her background is laughable.

You know exactly what's going on here. This is meant to put a loyalist at the top of the intelligence community who's going to do exactly what Donald Trump says. There is no learning curve. She will have no idea what she's doing. This is a gigantic bureaucracy that she will be taking over.

She will destroy trust among American intelligence professionals and among our allies. You don't have to support every single one of these picks. And as far as the recess appointments go, he signaled this -- Trump signaled this early on by saying, I want recess appointments, because he knows how difficult this would be.

And what he really wants with recess appointments is for John Thune and the Republican Party to say that we no longer care about our constitutional duty of advise and consent. The president won. He can do anything he wants. He's a king. He gets anybody. The Senate's not here to get in his way and to obey Article 1, 2 or -- Article 1 or 2 of the Constitution. That's ridiculous.

BROWN: OK. Really quickly, Shermichael, I'm going let you in weigh in.

(CROSSTALK)

SINGLETON: I want to go over a couple of things.

I don't think there's an interest with Republicans in the Senate to do recess appointments. The skepticism that we have heard thus far as it pertains to some of the nominees has really only singly pertained to Matthew Gaetz for a whole litany of reasons that we have covered on this network.

I'm also not going to diminish Tulsi Gabbard's military service record. I do think if the woman could be the first woman to graduate at the top of her class for officer candidate school at the Alabama Military Academy, I damn surely believe she can learn what's necessary to run DNI.

And so I think we need to be very careful with diminishing someone's record merely because we may have ideological or political differences there. She is going to be vetted like everyone else. Republicans in the Senate and Democrats will have an opportunity to ask her very tough and challenging questions.

And if she gets through those questions well, which I believe she has the capability of doing so, then she will be confirmed. I respect Tom's ability for teaching, but teaching and wearing a uniform are two very disparate things.

BROWN: All right, thank you all for that conversation. I think it was an important conversation to have.

SINGLETON: Thanks, Pamela.

BROWN: Tom Nichols, Shermichael Singleton, thank you both.

We will be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)