Feinman todd on q a. We are four weeks into the Trump Administration. What have we learned about president trump, and what did you learn about what role democrats need to play in the trunk era . You mentioned four weeks. It feels like four years. One thing we are learning is we thought he was erratic. We are learning just how erratic he really is. If this last weeks press conference is any indication of how he is going to conduct himself, i actually think its not just about House Democrats but also my house republican. Olleagues when do they show any sign of resistance to this administration . There is some indication that the Intel Committee may take up the flynn issue. There has been tremendous resistance so far. We have to focus many of us never thought he could be elected in the first place. The exit polls indicated nothing. People actually thought he was unfit for office. It spoke loudly to us as to where do we go wrong . People felt compelled to vote for someone who was unfit to vote for the president of the united states. So a lot of soulsearching. A week ago we had the caucus retreat. A good bit of soulsearching going on. Even a few months after the election, we are still finding our way. It was good for us to do that. When i get from you and a lot of the democrats is that this is a sense that this isnt just another republican president. This is something new and particularly dangerous in your mind. Do you agree with that . Can you explain what you find to be so different and alarming about trump . And how you send that message in a really partisan environment . Where everything is dismissed as being partisan . Rep. Crowley i think you have to look at, he didnt just defeat the democratic party. He defeated the republican party. They also dont not a deal with this. And that is a scary thing. My colleagues, when i look at them and i talk to them, they shrug their shoulders. I think that democrats are in the minority in both the house and the senate. Theres no leverage and term of the democrats with the 60 vote rule. In the house we have less leverage. Over time, we have known, whether it was the tea party or the freedom caucus, from time to time, republicans need democrats to pass legislation to go to president obama. Talk about obstruction, there was tremendous obstruction with the obama agenda so this isnt something new to congress. But for us in the minority, is it our responsibility to reach out to the president . Or is it their responsibility as they control everything . The first indication are the executive orders that have been issued but have done nothing to unify our country at all. If anything, it is a further divide and in my opinion and my caucus opinion, if that is an indication of where we are going, it will be a rocky four years. We talked to a lot while you were there but a week out, we are just wondering if there been any new conclusions based on now, that we have had this press conference and you are saying that the eu erratic nature will be hard to push back against, coming at a machine gun pace. He mentioned 25 different issues yesterday. How do you come up with a cogent issue a cogent message . You had a cogent message. You didnt encounter that in 2016 but trump did with making america great. Jobs first. How do you come up with a link that can counter that to protect obamas legacy . Rep. Crowley it is a work in progress. We do have a method, it but it is about making it concise to connect with the loss from the last election. And that continues to be the case. What i will tell you is that given the erratic nature of the president , he makes it difficult for us and his own party to get anything done. Were not talking above the Affordable Care act anymore. Or taxes. We are talking about Michael Flynn. The inability to get his puns or nomination through. The other executive orders. The issue of russia. This is something that i have been disturbed by since august, in a big way. And yesterday, it was a continuance to not allow any questions to be asked at the press conference. He cut people off left and right. He just floundered out there. So i think this is a big issue for the safety and soundness of our nation. That is why you saw this last week in the ways and means committee, the move by democrats to have a procedure to get the president s tax returns to the committee. To take a vote as to whether or not to release them to the public. We will continue that. We think they deserve to know and they need to know what the powers are of the president , economically. To Deutsche Bank and to russia. They are linked to the whole affair, as well as putin. You said earlier that you didnt think he would win. And you hinge a lot of your message in 2016 of ties to trap and it didnt work based on the extent that you thought. Now you say you want to tie everything to trump. Is there a sense that you can exploit trump and you just didnt do well . Rep. Crowley this is not just about trump. This is about the republican colleagues. When will they speak up against what he is doing . He comes he is you shopping he is usurping their authority. They decried when obama did that. When there was no working majority. The republicans wouldnt work with him. And comparatively, from what we have seen so far, we have 20 something odd executive orders issued and it is phenomenal and exhausting. So it isnt just about running against the president. That is obviously part of it. That is Holding Accountable our republican colleagues. When the president omits the mentioning of the jewish people at the holocaust remembrance and there isnt ap out of the republican members of the house . That is disturbing. We gave him an opportunity procedurally to call upon the white house to include a statement, the mention of a final solution and the obliteration of the jewish people as a major part of the holocaust and they refused to take that up. Obliteration of the jewish people as a major part of the holocaust and they refused to take that up. They dismissed it. The president continues to dismiss it. Are they scared of him . Rep. Crowley i think they are tremendously scared of him. They are one tweet away from being dismissed and being given a new nickname, im sure. It seems like from what you are saying that the democrats are in a catch 22, which is that if republicans stand up to trump, it you are saying it undermines their argument and do you think there is a realistic chance that democrats are pushing a republicans to do this, you read a letter yesterday asking for the attorney general Jeff Sessions to recuse himself on this. The first republican to sign onto their bill, creating a bipartisan commission. Can you talk about whether there will be a Snowball Effect . Where more republicans rep. Crowley they have to separate the politics from the policies themselves and the issues we are dealing with. If the republicans come around and start questioning this president and that is good for the country, i am for that. Regardless of where the politics and up, i think our country is in grave danger right now. To watch mr. Miller last week on the talk shows, i dont want to compare it to other historical events but some of it without right outrageous. Almost feral. So it shall be written and so it shall be done. It will not be questioned what this administration is doing. Everything will be questioned by the legislative branch. Hopefully by my republican colleagues. Everything will be questioned. If in the end the republicans come about to actually take up this cause, that is good for america. And that is what we are driving towards. On that issue, initially it was the Senate Republican leadership that said yes, we will expand the Committee Investigation into Michael Flynn. To include that element of it. Paul ryan said no. Initially. Then your team met with muniz on wednesday and he came out of that meeting saying that he has had a change of heart and now he will expand this to include Michael Flynn. Is that at least encouraging to democrats that they are moving in that direction and they want to expand it . And do you have faith in him to actually do that . Rep. Crowley there seem to be a bit of a dam breaking. And that was indicated with the expansion of look, quite frankly, the issue of leaks. Thats fine. That is a legitimate issue. The to solely focus on the weeks and not on what the content of the conversation and how it jeopardized our standing in terms of our relationship with russia, undermining president obama, it is incredibly damaging to lie to the Vice President and there is a lot of lying going on, frankly. He wasnt fired because he lied. He was fired because he didnt lie well enough and he got caught. Even the president last week in the press conference said, i didnt order him to do this but he is doing his job. I would have told him to do this if he wasnt doing it. The verbiage going on and the language being used by the president , like nothing we have ever seen before. And i take no comfort i am from queens. I am from the other side of the tracks but i take no comfort in being so critical of the president. President bush i had tremendous differences of opinion on in a lot of ways, but i never questioned his character. I never questioned the fact that he was the president. Not the legitimacy but the steps he is taking so far have really left a grave concern to his inability to lead. Back to Michael Flynn, the post has been crushing the story. Reporting yesterday that he told the fbi that he had not talked sanctions when he was interviewed by the agent, which brings up questions of criminality. Our democrats going to push that issue and urge the doj to charge him criminally . Rep. Crowley we dont know what we dont know at this point. It is conjecture. It is an important aspect of it. As to whether or not Michael Flynn gave himself enough ambiguity to the evidence that he gave, it may not be a prosecution answer but we need to know what he said and whether he lied to the fbi and whether there was a coverup for that. The most important question is not necessarily about Michael Flynn but, what did the president know and when did he know it . He lied to the fbi and whether there was a coverup for that. The most important question is going back to the line it is as relevant as it was in the 1970s. Because there is a lot of communication going on about when mike pence new and when the president knew. Why didnt the president tell mike pence earlier . On his airplane when he said he didnt know anything about it. The doj had reached out to him. We suspect the Intelligence Community reach out to him even earlier. You know, it is outright lying. Lying to the American People over and over again. Mike pence lost his job sorry, not mike pence. Michael flynn. Mike pence is a former colleague, i respect him. Let me ask, how confident are you that the russian issue, everything resonating with the american public, because these issues and comments, we have heard a lot of handwringing over whether democrats were focusing on the right things in 2016, with trumps personal foibles versus the more breadandbutter issues of rigs economic systems and whether america is working, whether the economy is working for working families, a lot of people saw that. Are you at risk, of forgetting about that by focusing on the russian stuff . Or is this an issue that really is going to break through . Rep. Crowley the promises that for made by canada trump and his fulfillment of the promise leaves everything to be left for. He is appointed generals to his cabinet, as well as billionaires. As i said before, i grew up in queens, new york. I went to law school at night. My mother was uneducated. She didnt have a college degree. But my mom is one of the most brilliant people ive ever met. She didnt have a college degree. I know she is watching the show. And there was no commonality between trump and the world that i grew up in. Queens has more can with akron, ohio than it does with manhattan. So he authority not fulfilling those promises. Everything is done so far has made it more difficult to purchase a home for the first time. Everything is doing in terms of the executive orders, and disrupting our nation without any cause to do that but having said that, the issue of our democracy is at stake. The russians attempted to influence the outcome of this election. The president said they were involved in the selection to see that donald trump was elected. And to further understand, after he is elected i noticed in his press conference this week that he criticized the press and democrats and Hillary Clinton how many times in that conference . Not once has he ever, ever criticize putin. Or challenged putin knowing what he knows of his involvement in the election. And it isnt about whether he won or lost, he won. Put that aside, mr. President. Vocus of the democracy. Why is he so cozy . Why will you not criticize . And given the opportunity to stay in crimea or to violate treaties of 30 years, the russians right now are working all over this president because he is in sconce in this scandal. Just to put a finer point on that. You are in the minority. You dont have the power to bring things to the floor but you can force things in the rules committee and force people to recommit. So given everything that is happening coming out of the white house, what are you going to prioritize . Do you think it is politically better to focus on the tax returns . Obama care . Immigration reform . What is the winning issue given the tools that you have . Rep. Crowley i think the russian issue itself, this is not created by democrats. This isnt something that we have done, and the media has been doing its job by digging into this but we do have to respond to this and call it a question republican colleagues in terms of the lack of voice here. This is not about democrats or republicans. It is about america. It is about democracy and everything we have stood for. Everything they have stood for. They represent the antirussia party. They pride themselves on being the patriotic party. And here we have a real incursion by a foreign space, russia, into our National Election and silence. We dont know what our president s financial ties are. We need to release taxes, that is an issue. My republican colleagues are also finding how difficult it is to dismantle the Affordable Care act. You cant simply repeal it without replacing it or take away health care for millions of people who now have it, many working poor who are now able to afford it for the first time. So i do think the ability to move on the Affordable Care act or tax reform has been scuttled to a degree because of the russian issue but also the whole notion of a 20 tax on imports. You know, selling that to the senate and their own colleagues has been incredibly difficult. I think tax reform may be dead right now. What is another issue, another issue a know that is aboard into a member of your caucus, the entire caucus, immigration. Yesterday, there was a meeting with the acting director of immigration customs enforcement. There are a lot more democrats who wanted to get into that meeting and were not allowed. But the once you went said they were troubled by the potential scope of the deprecations. Today, the Associated Press reported there is a draft order out to bring in the national guard. Can you talk about that issue . Rep. Crowley this is what led to world war ii in europe. Frankly. But a little education in terms of the meeting that took place. Initially the meeting, which i was supposed to be a part of along with the hispanic caucus was supposed to take place on tuesday of last week. But at short notice was canceled an hour before the meeting. We were told it would be moved to thursday and it would be a bipartisan meeting which we didnt have a problem with. Because we would still be involved. We were notified on wednesday evening that it would be the top three leaders of the Republican Caucus and Democratic Caucus which excludes me. Thats fine. It would be the key members on the committee of jurisdictions on both sides of the aisle. The hispanic caucus was not invited. It was the hispanic caucus initiative and they were no longer invited. The chair of the caucus, no one else who has deep concerns about this. And we see them in the communities in our districts, the concern over how people conduct their lives, innocent people, who are afraid of being swept up and having their lives and their children and their families separated because of what this president needs to do to demonstrate to the American People just how tough he is. But how out of keeping with the traditions of our country. Can i ask you a followup . This is reminiscent of what we saw with world war ii. This is where the comparisons get thrown about. And some people react strongly when you make those. Bringing in the national guard, the army, to come into our communities, to police our communities, to disrupt and gather people up for been a purpose of deporting them is a very scary thing. Its not a country that im familiar with called the united states. Thats not how we conduct ourselves. We see that happen in other countries that are not as free and open as we are to welcoming immigrants. We welcome immigrants. We want the best, brightest and greatest. Migrants came to this country and left everything behind. Churches, homes, synagogues. You come here to make a better life for your family. And now, they are under fear that armed men with m16 rifles can come to your door and break it down and leave your children who are american citizens there but take you and report you . Do you believe it is appropriate to make a comparison to nazi germany . Rep. Crowley look at the past. Look at the history of the world. Find the context of where we are today. Im not saying that this is like germany per se or a comparison to nazis or anything else. But what i am saying is that we as a people have to be concerned about the use of our military to usurp the authority of our police departments. When anyone suggests that, that is something we need to be very concerned about. We are over time but i will give you a minute for the final question. You spoke yesterday with philip miller. Can you tell us a little bit more about that conversation . What are the marching orders that he is getting . They understand with the new president of there is more leeway and what they can and cant do. I do have grave concerns about folks who are right now and the potential of what the Administration May do to them. Individuals who gave information to the federal government in the hopes that we would have a comprehensive Immigration Reform done but that is not happening and it doesnt look like it will be done. He didnt go as far as to say that but i have concerns about it. I dont want to talk to much because it was a personal conversation but it was disconcerting, some of the conversation that we were having, it didnt leave the with a warm and fuzzy feeling. If we have you back in 34 months, what do you expect it to be like . Rep. Crowley it is hard to say. Hard to say. I was hoping that given the president not necessarily being a republican that maybe there would be an all of branch reaching out. Initially you talked about health care to all or negotiating the price of prescription drugs with companies those are things that democrats kind of like. The opportunity for working together. But as of yet he has not demonstrated that. And it is hard to believe that only a month and, it is hard to say. We would like to have you back at that point to see where you are. Thank you. Newsmakers is back after our conversation with the chairman of the Democratic Caucus, congressman joe crowley. Two major themes in that conversation. One was the concern about the overall direction of the Trump Administration and the democrats. Lets start with the second one. You have covered the caucus meeting offsite last week. How are the democrats lining up in the face of many issues coming out of the Trump Administration . They are not sure what to do and that was evident in baltimore last week. They got everyone together and the attendance was the highest it has been in years. A lot of guys alike to go to that kind of thing. But they did come out of this really not knowing what to do with this guy. And i think the reason is that they didnt think he was going to win. And that is because of a couple reasons. They go back to their districts and their hearing the same thing. They speak to the chorus and the chorus speaks back to them. Everyone says that this guy is a gift and hillary is in and now theyre trying to figure out theyre going back and hearing the same thing at he probably watches the press conference and says, i cant believe the sky. I can believe anyone would think this guy is qualified. So theyre coming to grips with yes, we need leading issues. And ripping down the bureaucrats in washington and every thing else he is attacking. That is resonating in district were these guys dont live. And doesnt alienate those liberals that is their base, they have to give them around. But they also have to speak to conservatives who trump is speaking to, and thats on an easy message to come up with , especially to put on a bumper sticker. Mr. Lillis you saw on essential question that was being asked and the retreat in baltimore which is really reflected in the way crowley was talking, which is you focus on trumps personality, and his personal foibles are controversies, whatever you want to call them. Or do you keep it about economic fundamentals, making america work in for the traditional base of the democratic party, which are the middle and working class. I think you can tell in some of his answers, he wanted to talk about russia and the outrageous that he has seen from the Trump Administration so far, but he also knows that there is a realization that that alone does not get you the majority back. Thats a question that still hasnt been answered, and that is something theyre going to work out over the course of months, if not longer, as this continues. The thing is, trump is going to be thrown even more vols, even more controversy. We are just waiting to see whether they can focus. Host he talked a lot about things he is hearing from republicans in the house on you capitol hill. You both met republican members. Are they as concerned or agitated . Mr. Lillis depends on who you talk to. There are certainly more moderate, establishment type republicans who are horrified on a daily basis. This is a guy whos going to sign some conservative bills and you to work with him at the end of the day. Mr. Debonis there are republican members who are more in tune with trunk and the way he sees the world and dont feel conflicted at all. Generally that bargain of we are willing to put up with a lot as long as he signs obamacare repeal, tax reform, thats the dominant move. Host his concern about trumps fitness to serve in the russia thing good partisan politics or , something larger . Mr. Lillis they hope this becomes a scandal that takes on the white house. They do think he is not fit to be the presidency and they already cant believe there is more outrage across the country that this thing is happening just based on what we already know. And the fact that that hasnt been enough to topple him just yet they are obviously hoping that some things going to come up. They are trying to figure out whether to focus on that, is that the thing thats going to resonate, or do they go back to the breadandbutter economic things of health care and Immigration Reform . All the things. Thats a decision they want to make and 2018 will depend on how successful they are. Host we are just four weeks into this and this administration. Thank you both for coming back to newsmakers, we appreciate it. Cspan, where history unfold stealing. Daily. 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