TRANSCRIPT 🔗
WEBVTT
1
00:00:00.800 --> 00:00:04.809
Well, today is the day. Republican Congressman Thomas Massey says
2
00:00:04.870 --> 00:00:08.109
he is planning to trigger an impeachment vote against one
3
00:00:08.130 --> 00:00:12.369
of Trump's most controversial cabinet officials, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.
4
00:00:12.789 --> 00:00:15.789
And moments ago, Hegseth told reporters he'll hold a press
5
00:00:15.830 --> 00:00:19.539
conference on the issue tomorrow morning at the Pentagon. Hegseth
6
00:00:19.559 --> 00:00:22.440
has faced bipartisan outrage over his handling of the Iran
7
00:00:22.460 --> 00:00:25.379
war and the military at large, from the firing of
8
00:00:25.440 --> 00:00:28.899
top generals to block promotions for female and black officers.
9
00:00:29.660 --> 00:00:32.460
The controversy top of mind, not just for current members
10
00:00:32.500 --> 00:00:37.509
of Congress, but incoming lawmakers who've arrived in Washington for orientation.
11
00:00:39.490 --> 00:00:43.030
We have soldiers at war. We have Navy sailors at war.
12
00:00:43.530 --> 00:00:45.490
And the secretary of defense is more worried about his
13
00:00:45.530 --> 00:00:46.310
political future.
14
00:00:46.329 --> 00:00:49.149
I think everything needs to be on the table, including
15
00:00:49.189 --> 00:00:53.850
Pete Hegseth, including, you know, some of these other other
16
00:00:53.890 --> 00:00:56.609
agency heads like.
17
00:00:55.710 --> 00:00:58.869
Pete Hegseth is the most unqualified secretary that this nation
18
00:00:58.909 --> 00:01:02.310
has seen. He has caused significant damage to us as
19
00:01:02.350 --> 00:01:05.159
a country and put us at risk and really damaged
20
00:01:05.189 --> 00:01:07.280
the readiness of our entire military force.
21
00:01:08.120 --> 00:01:11.379
Let's bring in MSNL Pentagon reporter Priya Sridhar, MSNL Capitol
22
00:01:11.400 --> 00:01:14.120
Hill reporter Michael Schnell, and MSNL contributor and staff writer
23
00:01:14.140 --> 00:01:16.670
for The Atlantic, McKay Coppins. Michael, what do you know
24
00:01:16.700 --> 00:01:18.530
about the support for Massey's impeachment push?
25
00:01:19.549 --> 00:01:21.150
Yeah, well, Lisa, you had the news at the top
26
00:01:21.189 --> 00:01:24.180
right there that Thomas Massey plans to finally trigger this
27
00:01:24.239 --> 00:01:27.799
impeachment resolution today. I was texting him with him earlier today.
28
00:01:28.060 --> 00:01:29.599
He said today is the day that he will start
29
00:01:29.620 --> 00:01:32.219
this process. It's important to note that that doesn't mean
30
00:01:32.239 --> 00:01:34.760
we're going to see an impeachment vote today. It's just
31
00:01:34.799 --> 00:01:37.390
going to start the process. GOP leadership will have two
32
00:01:37.450 --> 00:01:40.609
legislative days to then set a vote on this matter.
33
00:01:40.650 --> 00:01:43.510
So expect it to come up imminently this week. But
34
00:01:43.549 --> 00:01:45.769
what I'm hearing from sources is that there is a
35
00:01:45.810 --> 00:01:49.260
real possibility that this impeachment resolution can pass. I was
36
00:01:49.299 --> 00:01:51.780
talking to House Republicans last week. who told me for
37
00:01:51.819 --> 00:01:54.980
a while now there has been deep frustration with Pete Hegseth,
38
00:01:55.019 --> 00:01:58.019
how he's been handling the department. Also some consternation with
39
00:01:58.060 --> 00:02:01.420
his performance before committees during various hearings, saying that he
40
00:02:01.469 --> 00:02:05.069
hadn't really answered the questions that lawmakers were asking of him.
41
00:02:05.370 --> 00:02:05.989
So there is a.
42
00:02:05.969 --> 00:02:08.669
Real possibility that this could happen this week. But the
43
00:02:08.729 --> 00:02:12.509
discrepancy is that when you ask lawmakers publicly on the record,
44
00:02:12.750 --> 00:02:14.009
they kind of have a different answer.
45
00:02:14.069 --> 00:02:16.430
It's not a total no, but the door is open.
46
00:02:16.469 --> 00:02:21.849
Take a listen to what they're saying. Should Hegseth be impeached?
47
00:02:24.550 --> 00:02:26.729
Well, the question is for the president, should he continue
48
00:02:26.750 --> 00:02:27.289
to serve as.
49
00:02:27.250 --> 00:02:28.659
The secretary of war? You're going to be asked to
50
00:02:28.680 --> 00:02:30.979
answer this, though, by Representative Masson.
51
00:02:31.000 --> 00:02:32.080
Yeah, that's right.
52
00:02:33.039 --> 00:02:35.110
Well, you know, I want to hear the debate on
53
00:02:35.169 --> 00:02:39.370
it to see if it merits impeachment. I think there's
54
00:02:39.409 --> 00:02:43.960
a lot of discomfort with the effort in Iran. I
55
00:02:44.099 --> 00:02:46.639
think that if the Secretary of Defense will come out
56
00:02:46.819 --> 00:02:50.520
quickly and address those, I think that every Republican should
57
00:02:50.580 --> 00:02:53.080
be solid in that. Now, having said that, that doesn't
58
00:02:53.099 --> 00:02:56.710
mean we want to continue down the same path in Iran.
59
00:02:58.520 --> 00:03:01.599
Now, Paula, those, of course, are not resounding yeses, but
60
00:03:01.620 --> 00:03:04.409
it's also significant that they're not firm no's. And as
61
00:03:04.449 --> 00:03:06.590
I mentioned, there's a difference between folks talking on the
62
00:03:06.629 --> 00:03:08.909
record publicly and behind the scenes. To me, I'm going
63
00:03:08.930 --> 00:03:10.930
to read you a quote that a House Republican told
64
00:03:10.949 --> 00:03:13.169
me last week. They went a step further and said
65
00:03:13.210 --> 00:03:16.379
that Pete Hegseth should resign, telling me, quote, he needs
66
00:03:16.400 --> 00:03:18.539
to have the honor and the integrity of knowing that
67
00:03:18.580 --> 00:03:20.740
he's done a bad job in service to the country.
68
00:03:21.120 --> 00:03:24.740
in this particular position. So certainly not mincing words there. Now,
69
00:03:24.819 --> 00:03:26.819
to get
Load full transcript
an eye into what the Hegseth camp is
70
00:03:26.840 --> 00:03:29.599
thinking right now, are Paula Reid reporting this morning that
71
00:03:29.659 --> 00:03:32.180
him and his advisors feel that they have a solid
72
00:03:32.300 --> 00:03:34.930
defense as they head into this? But again, we could
73
00:03:35.039 --> 00:03:37.810
see a significant moment this week with the House potentially
74
00:03:37.840 --> 00:03:39.889
voting to impeach the defense secretary.
75
00:03:40.110 --> 00:03:42.449
It was remarkable that first clip, McKay. I mean, you
76
00:03:42.490 --> 00:03:45.569
basically have Republicans on Capitol Hill begging the president to
77
00:03:45.650 --> 00:03:48.389
spare them having to take this impeachment vote. Here, though,
78
00:03:48.949 --> 00:03:50.810
is the president, what he had to say about Hegseth.
79
00:03:53.210 --> 00:03:56.090
We saw Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth in the hall.
80
00:03:56.150 --> 00:03:58.030
He was meeting with you just before now. His name
81
00:03:58.610 --> 00:04:01.590
has come up a few times as someone people have
82
00:04:01.900 --> 00:04:04.319
called for his resignation. Do you have confidence in him?
83
00:04:04.439 --> 00:04:04.719
I do.
84
00:04:05.180 --> 00:04:08.580
Look, we've won two wars.
85
00:04:10.060 --> 00:04:13.639
We've won Venezuela. We won that war in less than
86
00:04:13.759 --> 00:04:15.939
one hour. And you credit Hegseth. And nobody was killed.
87
00:04:15.979 --> 00:04:17.439
You credit Pete Hegseth for that?
88
00:04:17.459 --> 00:04:20.310
No, but he was a part of it. So many
89
00:04:20.350 --> 00:04:23.750
things wrong there. There wasn't a war in Venezuela. Nothing
90
00:04:23.870 --> 00:04:27.740
was won. Let's put aside the facts for a minor second, McKay.
91
00:04:28.439 --> 00:04:32.620
I get that loyalty is important to this president. Why
92
00:04:32.699 --> 00:04:37.459
has Pete Hegsath remained so sticky? Why is it that
93
00:04:37.500 --> 00:04:41.490
the president is unwilling to throw him under the bus
94
00:04:41.529 --> 00:04:44.189
and say, listen, this whole Iran thing was a terrible idea.
95
00:04:44.209 --> 00:04:46.339
I blame Pete Hegsath. Let's move on.
96
00:04:48.379 --> 00:04:51.790
Great question. I mean, this whole thing reminds me of
97
00:04:52.129 --> 00:04:55.949
Pete Hegseth's confirmation hearings. If you'll recall, he made it
98
00:04:56.050 --> 00:04:58.689
through those hearings by the skin of his teeth. There
99
00:04:58.709 --> 00:05:02.730
was a moment there where it looked very likely that
100
00:05:02.949 --> 00:05:06.600
he was going to sink there. There was, you know,
101
00:05:06.649 --> 00:05:11.980
extensive reporting about his personal behavior, his drinking. There were
102
00:05:12.180 --> 00:05:14.540
a number of Republican senators who said they weren't sure
103
00:05:14.600 --> 00:05:18.540
that He should get confirmed. Trump stuck by him and
104
00:05:18.839 --> 00:05:21.750
he wrote it out. You know, one way
to think
105
00:05:21.790 --> 00:05:25.649
about this is that Pete Hegseth, before he became secretary
106
00:05:25.689 --> 00:05:30.410
of defense, was one of Donald Trump's favorite cable news anchors.
107
00:05:30.670 --> 00:05:33.560
You know, this was a guy that Donald Trump watched
108
00:05:33.779 --> 00:05:38.040
on TV all the time. He really I mean, I
109
00:05:38.600 --> 00:05:41.180
don't want to be oversimplistic here or glib, but like
110
00:05:42.089 --> 00:05:44.610
Trump is a fan of Pete Hegseth. You know, he
111
00:05:44.629 --> 00:05:47.350
got to bring one of his favorite TV guys into
112
00:05:47.389 --> 00:05:51.129
his cabinet. He is somebody who embodies the ethos of
113
00:05:51.189 --> 00:05:55.910
Trumpism in many ways. He is incredibly confrontational, combative. He
114
00:05:56.050 --> 00:05:59.319
says the things Trump would want his secretary of defense
115
00:05:59.339 --> 00:06:05.160
to say on TV, on social media. I don't know whether, though,
116
00:06:05.259 --> 00:06:08.639
what the president is saying in public right now will
117
00:06:08.819 --> 00:06:13.199
actually translate to sticking to him, because the reality is,
118
00:06:13.899 --> 00:06:17.180
as far as everybody is concerned in Trump's orbit, the
119
00:06:17.279 --> 00:06:19.990
war in Iran is the reason that Trump lost office.
120
00:06:20.050 --> 00:06:21.490
I think there are a lot of reasons that the
121
00:06:21.529 --> 00:06:24.610
Republicans lost in the midterms. But the war in Iran
122
00:06:24.670 --> 00:06:27.569
was a huge one. And they're going to want a scapegoat.
123
00:06:27.709 --> 00:06:30.009
Trump isn't going to resign. He's not going to get impeached,
124
00:06:30.069 --> 00:06:33.110
most likely. I think there are going to be a
125
00:06:33.329 --> 00:06:36.060
number of people in the president's orbit pushing him to
126
00:06:36.100 --> 00:06:39.019
throw Pete Hegseth under the bus. And I could see
127
00:06:39.060 --> 00:06:42.540
them prevailing. I don't know how that will ultimately play out.
128
00:06:42.600 --> 00:06:48.069
But you're absolutely right, Alicia, that Republicans in Congress do
129
00:06:48.149 --> 00:06:50.350
not want to have to make this decision. They want
130
00:06:50.730 --> 00:06:53.399
Trump to take it out of their hands. And we'll
131
00:06:53.420 --> 00:06:54.019
see if he does.
132
00:06:54.569 --> 00:06:55.949
I mean, I think part of the reason that we're
133
00:06:55.970 --> 00:06:57.670
talking about the Iran war is because I do think
134
00:06:57.730 --> 00:07:01.129
it is where you see the greatest bipartisan agreement. Republicans
135
00:07:01.189 --> 00:07:02.810
understand it was a big part of the reason that
136
00:07:02.829 --> 00:07:06.329
they had significant losses on Tuesday. Democrats have been sounding
137
00:07:06.379 --> 00:07:09.420
the alarm on this for months now. But that's not
138
00:07:09.439 --> 00:07:11.899
the entirety of it. You have some brand new reporting
139
00:07:12.000 --> 00:07:14.800
about what is happening inside the Pentagon. Talk me through it.
140
00:07:15.500 --> 00:07:17.790
Yeah, that's right, Alicia. For the very first time, we're
141
00:07:17.819 --> 00:07:21.110
actually getting a glimpse of the mechanics of how Secretary
142
00:07:21.170 --> 00:07:24.449
Hegseth was able to carry out what many people call
143
00:07:24.509 --> 00:07:28.550
his Pentagon Purge. So that's either firing top senior military
144
00:07:28.649 --> 00:07:31.740
officers or withholding their promotions. And we know that many
145
00:07:31.779 --> 00:07:34.899
of those people have actually been women and people of color.
146
00:07:34.959 --> 00:07:38.000
So I spoke to a source who's a very senior
147
00:07:38.079 --> 00:07:41.610
official inside of the Pentagon who told me that workers
148
00:07:41.829 --> 00:07:46.189
inside of the Pentagon were asked to conduct Internet searches
149
00:07:46.670 --> 00:07:50.740
for senior officers who were selected for the rank of
150
00:07:50.959 --> 00:07:54.379
one or two stars by a merit based board. And
151
00:07:54.420 --> 00:07:58.139
they were told to look for one of four things,
152
00:07:59.139 --> 00:08:03.160
any relation or connection to encouraging troops to take the
153
00:08:03.199 --> 00:08:06.990
COVID-19 vaccine, which, by the way, was mandatory at the time,
154
00:08:07.430 --> 00:08:11.410
any connection to the withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan,
155
00:08:11.829 --> 00:08:14.889
any connection to General Mark Milley, who was the chairman
156
00:08:14.930 --> 00:08:18.790
of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under President Trump during
157
00:08:18.850 --> 00:08:21.889
his first term. But when he retired, he spoke out
158
00:08:22.209 --> 00:08:25.029
publicly against him. And most importantly, and the one that
159
00:08:25.129 --> 00:08:27.850
most of these officers sort of fell into this category,
160
00:08:28.110 --> 00:08:32.950
was any connection to any diversity, equity and inclusion initiative.
161
00:08:32.990 --> 00:08:35.970
And so what ended up playing out was, at least
162
00:08:36.070 --> 00:08:40.370
in one service branch's one- and two-star boards, 15 senior
163
00:08:40.409 --> 00:08:44.519
military officers who were selected, their promotions were withheld. And
164
00:08:44.559 --> 00:08:47.940
that meant that every single woman or person of color
165
00:08:48.580 --> 00:08:52.139
except for one, didn't end up getting promoted. And so
166
00:08:52.220 --> 00:08:54.659
what does that mean? That means people with decades of
167
00:08:54.740 --> 00:08:58.940
experience who were in charge of commanding carrier strike groups,
168
00:08:59.000 --> 00:09:03.419
they were highly decorated, had multiple degrees from schools like
169
00:09:03.460 --> 00:09:08.269
Johns Hopkins and MIT, and had served in different war zones,
170
00:09:08.529 --> 00:09:11.889
were now being removed for things like attending a pride
171
00:09:11.950 --> 00:09:16.129
event that had rainbow flags or being photographed after people
172
00:09:16.250 --> 00:09:19.610
They took their COVID-19 vaccine. And I asked the Pentagon
173
00:09:19.629 --> 00:09:24.269
about it. And they insisted, Chief Spokesperson Sean Parnell, that, no,
174
00:09:24.649 --> 00:09:27.950
this is a meritocracy. My source told me that this
175
00:09:28.029 --> 00:09:31.379
is anything but a meritocracy. And last thing, Alicia, is
176
00:09:31.649 --> 00:09:35.519
there's actually very intense questions right now about the legality
177
00:09:35.559 --> 00:09:37.700
of all of this, just like so many other things
178
00:09:38.000 --> 00:09:40.580
that Secretary Hexup is now under the microscope for.
179
00:09:40.879 --> 00:09:41.019
Yeah.
180
00:09:41.220 --> 00:09:44.500
An impeachment, unlike a resignation, would bring all of this
181
00:09:44.580 --> 00:09:46.379
to light. Priya Sridhar, Michael Schnell, I know it is
182
00:09:46.419 --> 00:09:48.120
a busy day on Capitol Hill, so thank you so
183
00:09:48.159 --> 00:09:49.500
much for taking the time to be with us.
184
00:09:49.559 --> 00:09:50.899
McKay. Hey, it's Rachel.
185
00:09:51.179 --> 00:09:52.549
I am so glad to see you at the end
186
00:09:52.570 --> 00:09:54.049
of that clip because this is where I get to
187
00:09:54.090 --> 00:09:56.529
tell you about a new way to watch all our
188
00:09:56.590 --> 00:09:59.870
clips and all of our shows and everything on MSNBC.
189
00:10:00.669 --> 00:10:03.460
on your phone or your tablet or your laptop. You
190
00:10:03.500 --> 00:10:06.120
can watch things live or recorded. Plus, you can ask
191
00:10:06.200 --> 00:10:08.740
me and all the other hosts and reporters questions in
192
00:10:08.779 --> 00:10:13.139
our weekly live chats. You can go to ms.now slash
193
00:10:13.580 --> 00:10:16.179
membership or just click below.
194
00:10:17.000 --> 00:10:17.240
Thanks.