Transcript for May 28

REP. SENSENBRENNER: I hope so. I think the American public wants us to have a bill, but it’s important to do it right. Twenty years ago we did it wrong, and we’re paying the price. I don’t think either Senator Hagel or I want our name on a bill that ends up blowing up in the face of the United States 20 years from now like Simpson-Mazzoli did.

MR. RUSSERT: Let me turn to another subject. You issued a press release saying that you’re going to have a hearing entitled “Reckless Justice: Did the Saturday Night Raid of Congress Trample the Constitution?” The FBI raiding the office of Congressman William Jefferson, a Democrat, with a court-approved search warrant, in their investigation of potential bribery. Why are you so upset?

REP. SENSENBRENNER: The Constitution has given Congress immunity for certain transactions, but the court has very clearly said that no corrupt member of Congress can hide behind the speech or debate clause of the US Constitution to shield criminal activity. The FBI has been able to convict corrupt congresspeople in the ABSCAM and in the House bank scandal without this kind of a raid. The executive branch has got immunity under executive privilege as well. And I don’t think that it would be right for a House committee to issue a subpoena to the president’s office and send the Capitol Police rummaging through files, taking everything, and then deciding what wasn’t relevant by themselves and returning it to the president. And that’s what the Capitol—or what the FBI did in Congressman Jefferson’s office two weeks ago.

Separation of powers and checks and balances is very important, but I want to emphasize and reemphasize that this debate is not over whether Congressman Jefferson is guilty of a criminal offense. He cannot use the constitutional immunity of Congress to shield himself from that or any evidence of that. But it is about the ability of the Congress to be able to do its job free of coercion from the executive branch, and this is something that’s worked very well for 219 years, and I think if it’s done right, it will continue to work very well for the next 219 years.

MR. RUSSERT: When Speaker Hastert spoke out like you have against this raid, he said information was leaked about him and being involved in his own investigation against him in order to intimidate him. What do you know about that?

REP. SENSENBRENNER: Well, the Justice Department twice denied that Speaker Hastert is under investigation. One of your competiting—competing news channels after that denial by the Justice Department republished the fact that the Justice Department allegedly was investigating Speaker Hastert. There was a second denial. I think that news media people have a justifiable cynicism of those of us who serve in public office, but believe me, after the department denied that the speaker is under investigation, for them to turn around and put it up on the air again kind of makes those of us who are in the cross hairs because we happen to be elected a little cynical of what some people in the news media do. Fortunately, that’s not you, Tim.

MR. RUSSERT: Senator Hagel, are you upset at the fact that the FBI raided the office of a congressman with a subpoena, court-ordered, because he is the subject of a criminal investigation?

SEN. HAGEL: Well, first, we all need to reaffirm that no individual is above the law. Whether it’s a congressman, a senator, certainly a president. But some of the points that Jim Sensenbrenner brings out are important. I don’t know the facts here, so I’m a little out of my depth. But what I do know, I think this was handled a little awkwardly. I think the president is right in pulling this back a little bit. He is, as you know, put a freeze on this and they will not make a decision for 45 days. We can work our way through this, but you’ve got a number of factors involved. Not only the ones that the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee mentioned, but you’ve got also atmospherics here and, and a very testy relationship that’s going beyond just what, what this issue is about. So we need to just work it through.

MR. RUSSERT: You mean Republicans are fed up with the Bush White House?

SEN. HAGEL: Well, there, there are lot of issues here. And I would go back more specifically not to political issues, but NSA for example, using new technologies to monitor and inventory calls. This is, this is the point I’m making. It’s a universe of bigger issues than, than just this. And this environment, now, is widened and deepened by this one last issue and, and yes there is.

MR. RUSSERT: Is there anger amongst Congressional Republicans with the White House?

SEN. HAGEL: Well, I think there’s an issue of—and there’s always a tension usually.

MR. RUSSERT: Frustration?

SEN. HAGEL: There’s some frustration. Sure, there is. And I think that you’re seeing that played out on both sides.

MR. RUSSERT: You said last week the president should negotiate directly with Iran. Why?

SEN. HAGEL: I said he should engage directly with Iran. I don’t see, first of all, how you’re going to get to the core, to the central issues on the differences, significant differences, between Iran and the United States without that direct engagement. How are things getting better? Are things getting better at the United Nations? Are we enlisting more support for our cause? Are things getting better in the Middle East? I think you could make a pretty strong case that things are worse off in the Middle East today than they were three years ago, by measurement of Iraq, by Iran, by the Palestinian/Israeli issue, what’s going on in Egypt.

And I think the United States must use its force of diplomacy to engage Iran. Eventually you’re going to have to do that. It is bigger than just the nuclear issue. We’re talking about Israel, Iraq, oil, economy. Iran is a large country. It’s a powerful country. It’s a country of a 5,000 year history. That’s diplomacy, that’s the hard work of diplomacy. Eventually, we’re going to have to do it, we should do it, we should take the leadership.

MR. RUSSERT: Senator Chuck Hagel, Congressman James Sensenbrenner, we thank you both very much for your views.

REP. SENSENBRENNER: Thank you.

SEN. HAGEL: Thank you.

MR. RUSSERT: And we’ll be watching this conference committee discussion about immigration.

REP. SENSENBRENNER: Thank you.

MR. RUSSERT: Coming next, our political roundtable. Immigration and the Iraq war, how will they affect the midterm elections November 2006? Our political roundtable is next right here on MEET THE PRESS.

(Announcements)

MR. RUSSERT: Our political roundtable—David Broder, David Ignatius, Kate O’Beirne, and the one and the great Mr. Robinson of The Washington Post—after this station break.

(Announcements)

MR. RUSSERT: Welcome, all.

David Broder, here’s the front page of your paper today. “Republican House members facing the toughest races this fall are overwhelmingly opposed to any deal that provides illegal immigrants a path to citizenship—an election-year dynamic that significantly dims the prospects that President Bush will win the immigration compromise he is seeking ... The opposition spreads across the geographical and ideological boundaries that often divide House Republicans. ... Moderates such as Christopher Shays in suburban Connecticut and Steve Chabot in Cincinnati [and] conservative J.D. Hayworth in Arizona said they are adamant that Congress not take any action that might be perceived as rewarding illegal behavior.” Where are we?

MR. DAVID BRODER: The House is convinced—the Republicans in the House are convinced that the public is with them, as you heard Mr. Sensenbrenner say. I think it’s going to be a very difficult negotiation, and I think, for many of those Republicans, they’d rather have no bill than a bill that they can’t justify to their constituents.

MR. RUSSERT: Kate O’Beirne, the speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert, has said, “I will not put forward any legislation that does not have the support of the majority of the Republicans.” Even if he has every Democrat and 49 percent of the Republicans, a majority in the House, he won’t move the legislation. Is that right?

MS. KATE O’BEIRNE: Right. That, that’s been a long-standing pledge of his, not too much unlike the Democrats who were running Congress before the Republicans took over. Let’s not forget, most of the items on the Contract with America were items that Republicans in the House couldn’t get a vote on on the floor. So it, it is a difference between the House and Senate.

Senator Frist, of course, didn’t get a majority of his Republicans for the bill the Senate just passed out. He had no alternative, because his option was no bill, because he needs 60 votes to get something out of the Senate. But a majority of the Senate Republicans wind—wound up seeming to agree with the majority of the House Republicans, so it sort of puts George Bush with congressional Democrats on the issue of immigration.

MR. RUSSERT: Gene Robinson, how about this? You see George Bush closer to John McCain and Ted Kennedy than he is to House Republicans. What happens politically if a Republican president, Republican House, Republican Senate cannot agree on an immigration bill?

MORE FROM MEET THE PRESS

Meet the Press Section Front

Sunday's Meet the Press guest list Nov. 22: Senate roundtable, Brinker, Snyderman Nov. 15: Clinton, Duncan, Gingrich, Sharpton Nov. 8: Casey, Barbour, Rendell, roundtable, Brokaw Nov. 1: Tim Geithner, David Plouffe, roundtable Oct. 25: Cornyn, Schumer, Burnett, Sorkin, roundtable Oct. 18: Jarrett, Dodd, Kyl, Shriver, Podesta Oct. 11: Levin, Graham, McCaffrey, Myers, roundtable Oct. 4: Ambassador Susan Rice, roundtable Sept. 27: Bill Clinton, Paterson, Kyl, Webb Meet the Press Section Front   Add Meet the Press headlines to your news reader: