CNN "Erin Burnett Out Front" - Transcript: "Interview with Rep. Gerry Connolly"
Interview
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BURNETT: All right. Manu, thank you very much. And I want to go out front now to Democratic Congressman Gerry Connolly. He's on the Foreign Affairs and Oversight Committees. He attended Kurt Volker's deposition today. Nine and a half hour marathon, Congressman. What did you learn?
REP. GERRY CONNOLLY (D-VA): Well, I wasn't there for the whole nine and a half hours.
[19:09:59]
Unfortunately, for Mr. Ambassador Volker was - well, let me start by saying, I think, what I learned was this Ambassador who was very forthcoming essentially corroborated the essential facts of the whistleblower complaint and that was a very important piece of testimony to hear.
BURNETT: And when you say corroborated the facts, were you able to ascertain that the President had explicitly linked aid to Biden investigation and perhaps that had even happened before the phone call in the summer, obviously.
CONNOLLY: I would say that the Ambassador was careful with his words, but he admitted that he was never provided, that he had the title special envoy to Ukraine, he was never provided with any explanation for this sudden mysterious suspension of as much as $400 million worth of military aid that Ukraine desperately needed to be able to defend itself against Russian incursion that's occurring as we speak.
BURNETT: And - yes, go ahead.
CONNOLLY: And so I think that was very important corroboration that clearly something was afoot and then he also added particularly that had been a planned trip and an invitation to the new President of the Ukraine to come to Washington and meet with Trump. That also was put as Manu just said on ice until and unless the Ukrainian government cooperated in digging up dirt on a political opponent of Trump.
BURNETT: And so this text, which he provided, which started with the other top U.S. diplomat in Ukraine. I think it's crazy to withhold security assistance for help with a political campaign. Let me be clear that text was sent before any of this became public, so this was set before anybody knew.
CONNOLLY: That's right.
BURNETT: This was the discussion and I think that's important to note.
CONNOLLY: That's right.
BURNETT: Did he give you any color on that, his opinion on that?
CONNOLLY: He confirmed that text and I think also confirmed that this was a point of friction with the new Ukrainian government, which you got to remember was sort of an unknown quantity and quality. We didn't really know what Zelensky was going to be like or what his policies were, because he had never been in public life before.
And so it was in our interest to want to establish early on positive relationships. And instead we suspend military aid, we suspend the invitation to come early to Washington to meet with the President and we basically put a demand on him that they call crazy. I call that extortion, which is not only wrong and an abuse of office. It's a crime.
BURNETT: So you're saying, envoy Volker confirmed that the aid was suspended, that he knew it was suspended but you're saying he never explicitly withhold, why?
CONNOLLY: He told us he was in the dark, no one ever explained to him why we did it and as a result he was at a loss to try to explain it to his Ukrainian counterparts.
BURNETT: All right. So you're saying that you learned a lot from this, obviously he provided that crucial text, he's confirming all of these things were suspended and there was a reason for that although he did not know what it was, you're clear on that.
CONNOLLY: That's right.
BURNETT: Republicans are now saying this about Volker's deposition, note that they said this, obviously, long before he had actually concluded but here is a Jim Jordan and Lee Zeldin.
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REP. JIM JORDAN (R-OH): Not one thing he has said comports with any of the Democrats' impeachment narrative, not one thing.
REP. LEE ZELDIN (R-NY): The administration is in an even stronger place today than they were this morning as a product of Ambassador Volker coming to testify.
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BURNETT: Did you hear anything? Did you hear what they heard? I mean, you guys were all in the same room.
CONNOLLY: I can only say the power of rationalization and the power delusion continue to hold sway here in Washington in certain quarters. I don't think any rational person listening to that testimony today could remotely come to the conclusion those two gentlemen came to.
BURNETT: Before we go, Congressman. I have one question, as you know Trump publicly asked the Chinese President with whom he has engaged in a massive trade war to investigate Joe Biden today. We have now learned that in a phone call in June with President Xi, the president raised Joe Biden although we do not understand with a direct request for an investigation that call was also housed on the same top secret server that we now know the Ukraine call was housed on. What do you make of that?
CONNOLLY: Well, I think this is further evidence that gives the lie to what you just heard from those two gentlemen, my colleagues, and from the President himself. So when he says there was no quid pro quo, what he really means by projection is there was a quid pro quo.
[19:15:04]
When he says there's no collusion, he means there's collusion and now we have the evidence. In addition, remember we were debating not long ago was there collusion with Russia, well, now we know there was not only collusion with Russia, there was attempted collusion with Ukraine and attempted collusion with China and this is what we know about.
And this is deeply, deeply troubling that the President would use the apparatus of our foreign diplomacy for narrow partisan political ends, where does that end. That is not something we should tolerate in a democracy.
BURNETT: All right. Thank you very much, Congressman Connolly.
CONNOLLY: My pleasure.
BURNETT: I appreciate your time tonight.
CONNOLLY: My pleasure.
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