MSNBC "All In With Chris Hayes" - Transcript: Interview with Jim Himes

Interview

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REP. JIM HIMES (D-CT): Yes, that`s right. And I mean, the -- thanks for having me on, Zerlina. It`s -- it is beyond the pale, right? You didn`t mention the fact that, you know, a number of I think it was almost two dozen Republicans voted against giving a gold medal, a Congressional Gold Medal to the people who saved their lives.

And I think what we`re talking about here, and I think this probably explains the congressman you were just talking about is, you know, just a complete inability to accept the reality, because it is the reality is so damaging to the religion that they follow.

And the religion that they follow, of course, is that Donald Trump is the be all end all. And it is therefore inconceivable that thousands of people who in the name of Donald Trump, at the urging of Donald Trump carrying Trump signs would do what we all know they did. Brutalized police officers, you know, attack the very symbol of our democracy. That is -- I think the term is cognitive dissonance.

And because they can`t accept that, they act in an inhuman way, not shaking the hands of Officer Fanone or voting against the gold medal for these officers or making up fantastical things like maybe this riot was actually started by the FBI.

You know, and -- you know, to the credit of the broader party, most Republicans I think are not that far off the deep end. And this is a -- this is I guess damning with faint praise. Most Republicans are just wishing this would go away, because they know it was just an insane thing that happened. They know that Donald Trump did, and they know that they were complicit by raising all of this uncertainty about the outcome of the presidential election. But it`s -- it results in a lot of very sick behavior.

MAXWELL: There is a lot of chronic cognitive dissonance because all of the Republicans in Congress, I think I`ve said this at least a hundred times on television, they won elections in 2020. Then they showed up, they got sworn in, in Congress, and are there because of the same results they`re calling fraudulent, it makes absolutely no sense.

Do you think there`s any discomfort in the Republican caucus that some of the most extreme elements of their party have taken over? And really, essentially, this point, now that we`ve been through the insurrection already, they`re an ongoing threat to your own safety there on Capitol Hill?

HIMES: Yes, they are. Or I mean, you know, I`m not sure I worry too much about, you know, Lauren Boebert or Marjorie Taylor Greene being a personal threat to me, but the fact that there are millions of people out there in America who are encouraging this behavior, that`s what really worries me.

You know, they`re not -- members of Congress are pretty sensitive to their political interests. And you know, these people, you know, the 20 or 30 of them that are just really inexplicable are doing it because they are actually getting support at home for this. And that`s what really worries me. And I wonder how long will it take?

I mean, how long will it take before Americans realize that a world in which they so hate the other side that they would rather see the constitution shredded in our country turned into an autocracy, then actually hand power over to the other side?

How long does that take to go away? Because if it doesn`t go away, and it hasn`t gone away, we still have a clear and present threat to our democracy.

MAXWELL: Speaking of autocracy, the DOJ politicize during the Trump administration, we just learned in recent reporting that they overreached and started looking at phone data for members of your committee, the Intelligence Committee. Are you at all concerned that some of the same career people that spied on your colleagues will continue to do so or they`re just still in their jobs?

HIMES: I`m certainly concerned that many of them are still in their jobs. I`m fascinated by the fact that everybody who was attorney general at the time, and I guess there were two of them, maybe three of them Sessions, Barr and Rosenstein, all of them say, gosh, I didn`t know what was going on.

Well, you know, either they`re -- either they`re lying, or they`re telling the truth. And there are people still at DOJ who thought that this was an OK thing to do. And this is an OK thing to do if you`re in the worst of the worst of the Banana Republic, but it is not an OK thing to do.

The other thing I worry about quite frankly is, you know, we have not had a commission or any comprehensive look at other elements of the federal government that Donald Trump might have abused for his personal -- his personal advancement.

We know that he was willing to hold up a foreign aid to Ukraine while they were under attack by Russia, he got impeached for that. We know that he wanted to fire Bob Mueller. We know that he suggested or ordered the DOJ to spy on members of Congress, what else? Did he -- did he compromise the IRS? Did he somehow try to compromise the military?

We we need to understand the full extent because if we don`t learn from this, I promise you there are people including some who are running for president who are watching this and say, hey, that`s a pretty cool tool. I wonder what I might do with it.

MAXWELL: It`s a good point about all of the potential abuses of power and certainly the co-equal branch of government. Congress may want to look into that.

Congressman Jim Himes, thank you so much for being here tonight. Please stay safe.

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