CNN "CNN Newsroom" - Transcript: Interview with Sen. Ed Markey (D)

Interview

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

[10:42:54] HARLOW: Welcome back. The Trump administration seeming to lower expectations ahead of the summit between President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un next week. A source tells our Michelle Kosinski it will be more of a, quote, "meet and greet" rather than any historic action. The president made that pretty clear on Friday as well, saying this would be a meet and greet.

Let's talk to Democratic Senator Ed Markey about this and more. He serves on the Foreign Relations Committee.

Nice to have you. And thank you for waiting through that breaking news of the Supreme Court decision. We appreciate it.

SEN. ED MARKEY (D), MASSACHUSSETTS: Thank you. Historic decision. No problem.

HARLOW: A historic decision indeed. You warn against a -- what you call a made for TV summit. And now that we know that the president thinks and the source tells our Michelle Kosinski that this will be more of a meet and greet than any realization of historic action.

Should the president still go to Singapore? Should the president still sit down with Kim Jong-un?

MARKEY: Without question, the president should begin diplomacy with Kim and do so on a personal basis. But he also has to understand that we're not going to extract concessions by made-for-TV diplomacy, by the photo-op that Kim wants, and I think that Trump wants as well. Ultimately there is a historic Kim family playbook where they negotiate with the United States, they extract concessions, they make actually none on their side as well, that we can ultimately identify as meaningful, and then the problem just continues unabated.

And so the president has to be aware that there could very well be a whole series of false promises that the North Koreans make at this summit, that ultimately will be meaningless if they're not accompanied by real action.

HARLOW: You called it an unforced diplomatic error in your words when the president canceled the summit and pulled out. But given the North's language and rhetoric about the vice president, threatening nuclear war in that statement overnight, that caused the president to withdraw from the summit initially.

[10:45:11] Why do you think that was a diplomatic error?

MARKEY: No, I think it actually, in that sequence, it began, which on Bolton saying that what the United States was going to expect is that North Koreans would accept the Libyan model, that the Gadhafi model which of course leads to the death of Kim, if that's the model we would be using, then they did not go to the table within three or four days after that, and then the vice president, once again, raised the Gadhafi model, the Libyan model, which, of course, once again leads inevitably, inexorably to the death of Kim, and then we were then once again criticized by the North Koreans for engaging in that language, and then the president pulled out of the negotiations.

So it was an unforced error. We should have been more diplomatic in the two weeks before that period of time. We were not. Now we're back on track, at least to begin the negotiations, but we have to be realists. We can't Panglossian. We can't be wearing rose-colored glasses going in here. These are dangerous people with a dangerous nuclear program that not only threatens their region but could potentially threaten the United States as well.

HARLOW: I'd like you to weigh in on two significant things that the president wrote this morning. And I'm not going to read the full tweets. You've probably read them. But he said, quote, "I have an absolute right to pardon myself," in one. And in the other, he said that the special counsel is, quote, "totally unconstitutional."

What do you think the president is trying to do here? He's wrong on the facts. He's wrong. The special counsel's appointment is completely in line with the Constitution. But what do you believe the president is doing here?

MARKEY: I think what the president continues to do is to try to delegitimize the special counsel. But it's not a rule of Trump, it's a rule of law that we live under in the United States of America. Even back in 1974, Richard Nixon's Justice Department made it quite clear that Nixon could not pardon himself. The same thing is true here.

It is a rule of law. Nixon just made very clear that under our Constitution, no one is allowed to be the judge of a case and then simultaneously be able to pardon themselves from any consequences of their own illegal activities. So it's just a continuation of an attempt to delegitimize the special counsel, which is clearly constitutional.

HARLOW: However, it seems to be working in the court of public opinion among Republicans at least and among his base. And that is that our most recent polling shows that these consistent attacks from the president seem to be working and that fewer and fewer people are supportive of and view the Mueller probe favorably when you look at the president's base and Republicans. Does that concern you?

MARKEY: Well, I think that may be true for the most conservative of Donald Trump's Republican supporters. But in the wide swath of independent swing voters in our country, I do not think they subscribe to the idea that our president is in fact a monarch that president can engage in illegal activities and actually face no consequences whatsoever. And I think if he attempts to take that path, he's going to pay a huge political price at the polls this November.

HARLOW: As you know, Republicans in the House and in the Senate have joined with Democrats in proposing legislation that would protect the special counsel. At this point, is that necessary? Is it time for that? Do you believe that these statements today from the president are a bridge too far, they make you fear that he would fire even though he said he won't and it seems that he won't but fire the special counsel?

MARKEY: I think it would be better if we did pass legislation to make sure that we were in fact protecting the special counsel. I think Mueller is doing a very good job in keeping this from appearing to be partisan. But at the same time, if he attempts, if the president attempts to act in a way that allows him to arbitrarily end this investigation, I think that it will trigger the beginning of the impeachment process in the United States Congress.

I think that there will be an uproar across this country and many Republicans will feel that pressure and not be able to resist it in a year where every single House member is on the ballot. That's what happened in 1974. Ultimately Nixon was forced to resign in August of 1974, just three months before an election, with Republicans demanding that Nixon do so.

[10:50:08] I think the same kind of phenomenon will be invoked in 2018 as in 1974 if the president tries to act like a monarch.

HARLOW: Senator Ed Markey, appreciate your time today, thank you very much. And thanks for waiting around.

MARKEY: No problem. You bet.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source