FOX News contributors Mollie Hemingway and former Rep. Trey Gowdy tussle over President-Elect Donald Trump's selection of Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) for Attorney General.
"People are sick and tired of people in Washington, D.C., doing nothing as these people tried to destroy the country and getting upset at someone who actually might root out the corruption there. We don't have a Department of Justice. We have a Department of Injustice, and that's why you get Matt Gaetz as a nominee," Hemingway said on Friday's broadcast of 'Special Report.'
BRET BAIER: With that, let's bring in our panel, Trey Gowdy, former congressman from South Carolina, Mollie Hemingway, editor-in-chief at The Federalist, and Democratic campaign consultant Kevin Wally. Mollie, what do you think, the reaction and kind of these picks as they're rolled out here and traditional Washington gasping?
MOLLIE HEMINGWAY, FEDERALIST: Well, Donald Trump campaigned with a pledge that he would root out corruption at the Department of Justice and throughout the intelligence agencies, that he would secure our borders, return us to being a nation with borders, and to fix the failed foreign policy of the Biden administration. His picks are showing that he is very serious about that.
But even more than that, I think they show what a transformational president he's setting out to be here. It's not – you know, there are four years to go. We'll see how much he's able to accomplish with a frequently hostile, entrenched, sclerotic, permanent Washington, D.C. But he has big goals and big vision and a feeling that there's something that's just been wrong with our country for a while, and we need to return to that glory of self-governance where we don't have really corrupt agencies hurting the country, putting – stopping people from being able to produce. And that is what you're seeing in these picks.
BAIER: Trey, you know, I had Senator Thune on, the incoming Senate majority leader, yesterday. And he basically said, listen, it's not going to be easy. Some of these picks are not going to be easy to get through. But there is this mandate just by the vote that there is a feeling that Republican senators in particular, most of them, want to give the president what he wants. Some of them will be tough.
FMR. REP. TREY GOWDY: Yeah, the overwhelming majority of his picks will sail through because they were grand slam picks. But to Molly's point, you don't root out corruption at the Department of Justice by picking a corrupt person to lead it. So, Matt Gaetz, either the report comes out and he's not going to be the attorney general, or the report doesn't come out and he's not going to be the attorney general.
I mean, the problem, Brett, is all the good picks, John Lee Radcliffe, Elise Stefanik, Lee Zeldin, Mike Walsh, all the good picks, nobody's talking about those right now. They're talking about this wild card pick of someone who had to get out of the House to avoid being sanctioned by the House Ethics Committee. That dumbfounding pick is just sucking the oxygen out of all the good ones he made.
BAIER: You are referring to the situation with the report in the House Ethics Committee. Johnson puts the kibosh on the Gaetz report. This is politico. Trump announced his AG intentions. Gaetz promptly resigned his seat, which in the normal course of affairs would end the ethics probe. But keep this in mind, the report exists.
Senators examining the nomination want to see it, and it will remain a proverbial sword dangling over Gaetz's head so long as he's up for confirmation or serving as the nation's top law enforcement officer. Here's the back and forth on that.
SPEAKER MIKE JOHNSON: I have only expressed my opinion. I wish to stick to the tradition and not release a report on a former member of the House because it would open a dangerous Pandora's box.
REP. GLENN IVEY (D-MD): There's precedent for that. I can't really get into what's going on now, but the fact that someone has left the Congress does not mean that the report can't be released... You got the Senate seeking the information so that they can meet their constitutional obligations.
BAIER: Mollie, let me just go back to you. I saw you shaking your head about this particular nomination and where it stands with that report.
HEMINGWAY: Right. Matt Gaetz was nominated for this position because we have a problem with the Department of Justice. For the last eight years, they have run roughshod over rule of law in this country. They have prosecuted political opponents. They ran the Russia collusion hoax. And too many people in Washington, D.C. did not stand up against what was happening there, and many Americans are upset about it.
Matt Gaetz is one of the most effective people at fighting that Russia collusion hoax and other information operations, whether it was the Brett Kavanaugh information operation, the Donald Trump Russia collusion hoax information operation, or the one that is referenced here, which is something that the FBI and Department of Justice, which hate Matt Gaetz, looked into and cleared him of any wrongdoing. The idea that we're that this is about the issue is corruption. It's the Department of Justice's corruption.
And people are sick and tired of people in Washington, D.C., doing nothing as these people tried to destroy the country and getting upset at someone who actually might root out the corruption there. We don't have a Department of Justice. We have a Department of Injustice, and that's why you get Matt Gaetz as a nominee.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.