MSNBC "All in with Chris Hayes" - Transcript: "Remembering Rep. Elijah Cummings."

Interview

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HAYES: President Trump gave Turkish strongman President Erdogan a green light to invade Northern Syria over a week ago. And then as reporting continued to bolster the case that his personal attorney Rudy Giuliani has been working on behalf of Turkish interest, the president followed up that decision with an impossible to summarize set of wildly contradictory,. often racist, pronouncements about the situation in northeastern Syria, that as the U.S. was forced to evacuate its troops and bomb its own bases while Kurdish civilians were fleeing, civilians were being killed, and the Turks, and Syria`s President Assad, basically carved up that strip of earth. That was the reality when Vice President Mike Pence and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo arrived in Turkey to meet with Erdogan and emerged today with a deal quote-unquote that gives Turkey everything they want. President Trump said Turkey has been trying to get this deal for years, and in a way he`s right, for years Erdogan has wanted to ethnically cleanse northeastern Syria of Kurds. That`s what he wanted, and that was the ultimate point of this mission. The deal struck today is that for five days, Turkey will pause to allow the Kurds to leave the area, thereby ethnically cleansing themselves so that Turkey can go and get the rest of that territory. And in exchange the U.S. agreed to remove economic sanctions imposed earlier this week as well as the threat of other sanctions, meaning the sum total of this is that Turkey has gotten what it wanted, the Kurdish allies who lost 11,000 of their own people fighting side by side with American soldiers to defeat ISIS, have now been repaid with U.S. approved removal from the land. Joining me now, Senator Tammy Duckworth, an Iraq war veteran, Purple Heart recipient, who is a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee. Senator, the vice president, the president, and Mike Pompeo, saying this is a whole deal struck in Turkey today, but the facts appear to essentially to allow the Turks to kind of campaign of ethnically cleansing the area of Kurds and the U.S. withdrawal of sanctions, how do you see the deal?

SEN. TAMMY DUCKWORTH, (D) ILLINOIS: How is this a huge deal to have essentially 120-hour pause on a situation created by the White House? We are absolutely far worse off today than we were roughly 10 days ago with they started this whole process, so I`m not quite sure they might be congratulated, or they should be patting themselves on the back, for getting a pause to a situation that they initiated themselves.

HAYES: You obviously fought in Iraq, and I know a lot of U.S. service members have been expressing their feelings about Kurdish folks that they had fought with or talked to. Obviously Kurds in Iraq are different than those in Syria, although they occupy a large part in that part of the world. Do you have reflections or feelings as you watch this unfold based on that experience?

DUCKWORTH: The Kurdish fighters have stood shoulder to shoulder with American troops in this fight against ISIS. They have lost 11,000 of their fighters in order to help us defeat ISIS. They did everything we asked them to do to go after and get rid of ISIS and to take the remnants of ISIS to put them into the prisoner camps that they were in. And what have we done? We`ve abandoned our allies. And all that Trump has done with this move is allow us to basically put our allies in a position where they`re being slaughtered by the Turks. And now we`re sending a message to the rest of the world don`t work with the United States, you can`t trust us to stand by you.

HAYES: There are concerns I`ve seen from certain quarters about the president`s temperament, behavior and actions in the last few weeks, particularly. There are always concerns about that, but particularly the last few weeks. Do you have particular acute concerns over the last few weeks, do you feel like his conduct is appreciably different in a concerning way?

DUCKWORTH: Well, he`s managed to create much more damage than I ever thought that he would possibly be able to commit. This situation with the Kurds, and with the president, what concerns me is less the president than the people around him. You know, he`s got General Milley, he`s got Secretary Esper, he`s got military leaders around him who, what, they don`t have a say in this? Because he moved forward with this decision without talking to them, and now they`re not stepping up. You saw that picture that the president tweeted and Speaker Pelosi made her cover photo. Those men are hanging their heads through the presidents left and right, because they know that he`s wrong and that he has no strategy for defeating ISIS, he has no strategy for Syria. And it`s taking Speaker Pelosi to confront him on it. And what are they doing? Nothing. That`s my concern is that the advisers around him and my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are enabling this man to do the kind of damage that he`s done to our national security.

HAYES: There was a House vote yesterday with an overwhelming bipartisan majority to condemn the president`s policy in this area. Chuck Schumer, the Democratic leader in the Senate, has called for Mitch McConnell to bring up the same piece of legislation, or resolution, in the Senate. Would you like to see that as well?

DUCKWORTH: I would love to see that. I`d like to see that vote come down, because I think the message would be clear to the White House that there`s bipartisan opposition to this decision the president has made.

HAYES: The president also through his chief of staff today announced that the United States government will be hosting a global summit at the president`s own personal property, which is essentially awarding a contract to himself. It will force the federal government to spend money that will go into the president`s pocket. It will force foreign governments to spend money that will go into the president`s pocket. Do you think that`s appropriate? Do you think that`s lawful?

DUCKWORTH: It`s not at all appropriate, and it`s not at all lawful. I`m actually part of the emoluments lawsuit that has its basis in this very same thing happening with foreign governments booking stays in the Trump hotel in Washington, D.C. and in various places to try to curry favor with this president. Time and again this president has shown he`s consist on a couple of things. One, he`s consist when it comes to lining his own pockets and his family`s pockets with whatever he needs to do in order to further Trump properties. And the other is that -- boy, does he sure love his dictators, as he has cozied up to North Korea and now to Erdogan in Turkey.

HAYES: All right, Senator Duckworth, of Illinois, always good to talk to you. Thank you very much.

DUCKWORTH: Thanks for having me on.

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