NBCNews " The Rachel Maddow Show" - Transcript: Wildstein Court Case

Interview

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JOHN WISNIEWSKI (D), NEW JERSEY STATE ASSEMBLYMAN: Rachel, good to
be with you again.

MADDOW: The plea agreement was apparently agreed to by David
Wildstein in January. He actually entered his plea, pled guilty and we got
the unsealing of other indictments yesterday.

Do you understand why the timing has gone this way?

WISNIEWSKI: No, that`s certainly a mystery to us because the U.S.
attorney`s office has been very diligent in keeping a lid on what they`re
doing. So, clearly, they had discussions with him before January, probably
in November, December to come to that ingredient that he signed in January.
But for some reason, they had to wait until now to have the actual plea
entered in court. That`s something we`ll learn as the process goes
forward. But right now, we don`t have an answer why it took that long.

MADDOW: We have a guilty plea from Wildstein. We have not guilty
pleas from Mr. Baroni and from Bridget Kelly.

WISNIEWSKI: Right.

MADDOW: If there is a trial, if July 7th does end up being a trial
date, do you expect that we will actually learn more about the factual
basis of these claims at the trial?

WISNIEWSKI: Well, I hope so. I mean, so far, each time we think
we`re going to get closure, we seem to have more questions. So, we were
all wondering exactly why this happened.

It turned out in the plea that Mr. Wildstein entered that it was for
political payback. We all kind of doubted that because it seemed like the
consequence of not endorsing was so out of proportion to what they hoped to
gain. But it turned at least from Mr. Wildstein`s perspective to be true.

But we also have competing narratives now of Bridge Kelly saying on
the day that the indictment was announced, that she`s going to talk about
other people in the governor`s office that knew about this. Mr.
Wildstein`s attorney saying the governor knew contemporaneously and, of
course, Bill Baroni is now still sticking to the story that it was a
traffic study.

So, we have four at different versions of what happened. Hopefully,
a trial or trials will help resolve that.

MADDOW: In the indictments that were unsealed on Friday, in the sort
of narrative that they told, key to that narrative was Bill Baroni lying to
you.

Again, we don`t -- it`s not been adjudicated. Bill Baroni says he
didn`t lie and innocent of all charges. If it is proven he did knowingly
lie to your committee about what was going on, will there be some sort of
consequence for that, the prosecutor says it`s not a federal matter?

WISNIEWSKI: Well, it`s not a federal matter. When he testified in
front of the committee, the tradition in New Jersey has long been when you
testify in front of a committee, you`re not automatically put under oath.
That`s being re-examined now because clearly this has shown us maybe
there`s a value in having people under oath. But when he testify, he did
not swear to tell the truth. He just started testifying.

And that`s been the tradition in the New Jersey legislature. But his
story was unbelievable when he told it and then literally two weeks later,
Pat Foye, the executive director of the agency, testified and said there
was no traffic study.

MADDOW: Will you keep investigating and what happens with the course
of the case versus the course of your inquiry in the legislature?

WISNIEWSKI: Well, we have to be very careful. We don`t want to
impact whatever proceedings will happen in court on both indictments.

But there are unanswered questions. Remember, what we`re trying to
do is very different than what the U.S. attorney is trying to do. They`re
prosecuting violations of law. We`re trying to get the facts so we can fix
the rules and the Port Authority and the governor`s office so this kind of
abuse can`t happen again.

We have different missions. The facts overlap with one another. But
we need to make sure we don`t unfairly hurt the trial and the ability of
the defendants to present their defense and Mr. Fishman to present his
prosecution. But we still have a job to do to learn the truth and to make
sure we change the rules so it can`t happen again.

MADDOW: Right, especially if the basic narrative of what happened is
still contested by people who are literally on trial for those.

WISNIEWSKI: The facts are still up in the air.

MADDOW: Yes, John Wisniewski, New Jersey state assemblyman, New
Jersey legislative investigation co-chair -- thank you, sir. This is both
exciting and perplexing time in this case. Thanks for being here.

WISNIEWSKI: You`re welcome. Thank you.

MADDOW: All right. We got lots still ahead including that story on
gun news that I never expected to be able to break on this show.

Stay with us.

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