MSNBC "The Rachel Maddow Show - Transcript: "Trump downplays cost of July 4th event."

Interview

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MADDOW: Yesterday, "The Washington Post" got a scoop about the president`s planned Fourth of July event. The headline was, Park Service diverts $2.5 million in fees for Trump`s Fourth of July extravaganza. Fees that the National Park Service were supposed to go for improving the national parks, but instead, they are diverting them to give them to this Trump event. That news was not well received in many corners. Here, for example, Senator Tom Udall`s reaction. Quote: This is beyond the pale. The American people pay fees to make improvements at the National Parks and not to boost President Trump`s campaign. The National Mall is not the place to hold a de facto political rally. And joining us now is Senator Udall of New Mexico. He has a key role on the appropriations committee in oversees things like the National Parks Service and the Department of the Interior. Senator, sir, thanks very much for being here. I really appreciate your time.

SEN. TOM UDALL (D-NM): Thank you. Thank you, Rachel. Great to be with you this evening.

MADDOW: So, the president talked about having military equipment, for example, be part of his inaugural parade. Last year, he wanted the big extravaganza involving military equipment and lots of troops for the Fourth of July or maybe Veterans Day or maybe Memorial Day celebration. But when he was told it came with a price tag of over $90 million, he backed off. This year, I`m struck by the fact that as he is getting this thing he`s asked for for so long, we`ve seen no estimates at all of how much it will cost. Has your committee been able to get any clear view how many taxpayer dollars this will entail?

UDALL: We haven`t at all. And actually what has happened here, the top Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, Senator Leahy, myself, the top Democrat on the Interior Subcommittee of Appropriations, several weeks ago asked for all the details, a very extensive letter on where the money was coming from, how much was going to be spent. Very detailed letter. We have been absolutely stonewalled. We haven`t gotten any information from Secretary Bernhardt, from the Department of Defense, from the White House. It`s really disturbing and an extraordinary situation, really.

MADDOW: Presumably those numbers will eventually come out. I can understand why the White House might be interested in keeping those numbers from you and from the public ahead of this event happening. I can even understand them pressuring the military or pressuring other elements of the administration to slow down any of those responses, but ultimately, given the oversight responsibilities of your committee, you will, in the end, be able to guess those numbers, won`t you?

UDALL: Yes, we will be able to get those numbers. I mean, we have a good idea of roughly what was in the budget to be spent. And so, when the final numbers come in, we`ll have an idea as to where they`ve got that money from. As you suggested earlier, they are going to take money from the National Parks infrastructure in order to put on what looks like a political rally. We`re going to have to see how that turns out. But I am going to ask for a GAO investigation into if there were laws broken and we`ll find out how much money will be spent. And believe me, officials that appear before the appropriations committee in both the House and the Senate will be asked about these numbers and we will get those numbers.

MADDOW: You mentioned that there are appearances of what is planned makes the crossover to political rally territory, and you`re expressing some concern about that. Obviously, it`s illegal for public funds, for any taxpayer money to be spent on the president`s re-election campaign, any partisan political activity whatsoever. We have seen reports that the White House has given tickets to this event to the Republican National Committee to distribute to their donors. The president`s campaign has hyped this event, and talked about it essentially as a campaign event. How does that sort of thing get policed? Who enforces that as a matter of law or policy if, in fact, taxpayer money is being spent on something that effectively is designed to boost the president?

UDALL: Well, after you have a GAO investigation and there has been a determination that there is a violation of the law and money shouldn`t be spent, then it will have to come from the political sector of his campaign or the Republican committee, which it basically have been merged together at this point, but they`ll have to pay that money back. As you know, there`s a real tradition on presidential trips, if it`s an official trip and he`s doing something political on the trip, then there`s an allocation as to what the taxpayers pay and there`s an allocation of what you pay politically. That`s the tradition, that`s the way it`s been followed. We expect the law to be followed here.

MADDOW: Senator Tom Udall of New Mexico, thanks for joining us, sir. I know it`s a busy time. I really appreciate you being here.

UDALL: Thank you.

MADDOW: Thanks.

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