black letter decision, or is that an arguable thing in terms of jurisdiction for the ethics committee. i think it falls into the category of arguable. again, i think it gets to the point where you have a body called the senate ethics committee, and i think when we all hear that term, we instinctively assume there are a series of hard and fast time-honored, tested principles, rules, standards that a company, how it conducts itself, the sorts of cases it looks at. and really, there aren t. and i think it s a situation where, look, if the senate the senate chose, for instance, in this case, if they did, to look into franken and conduct before he was elected to the u.s. senate, or for that matter, if roy moore were to get elected and republicans were to convene the ethics committee, as mitch mcconnell has suggested they might and they were to look into his conduct years ago before he was elected, i think that s something that would have to be tested in the courts. if a roy moore or if
so, all this news, all happening at once today. it does raise some interesting, i think, answerable questions. when was the last time a senator asked for an ethics investigation of himself? has that ever happened before? does it matter if this is going to be handled by the ethics committee investigating franken, does it matter in terms of the jurisdiction here that the behavior involved happened before al franken became a senator? i remember when david vitter was the subject of a sex-realitied scandal and the ethics committee said they couldn t look into it because it was from when he was only in the house, and wasn t in the senate. will that factor in here given that franken wasn t a senator yet? and what about menendez? even if bob menendez wins in court, if he s not retried, or if he gets retried and he s acquitted. could he still face getting booted out of the senate now? now that they ve restarted their ethics inquiry into him? and then, of course, there s candidate roy moore. mit
for a photo where he s groping her as she s sleeping. here is what two senators had to say in response to the news. very disappointed. i support an ethics investigation. this kind of conduct should not be tolerated by anyone in any public official. should he resign? you know, that s something i think we re going to have to wait to see how it plays out on the ethics investigation, which i support. and i think that should move forward. serious allegations. they need to be investigated. is it fitting of behavior of a u.s. senator? no, it s not fitting behavior for anyone. should he resign? it needs to be looked into. interesting. both the republican and the democrat not saying that he should resign. gloria, the ethics committee, scott jennings suggested that the reason that mitch mcconnell is pushing for the ethics committee for al franken is so if roy moore wins, he can say there is precedent for us to investigate and expel someone for something they did before
there s nothing funny about it and there s no excuse for it. senator dick durbin of illinois, from the democratic leadership. quote, there s never an excuse for this behavior, ever. what senator franken did was wrong. it should be referred to the ethics committee for review. senator tammy duckworth, also of illinois. quote, these types of actions are simply unacceptable and should be reviewed by the ethics committee. women across america should be able to feel safe in their workplace. senator chuck schumer, the democratic leader, quote, sexual harassment is never acceptable and must not be tolerated. i hope and expect that the ethics committee will fully investigate this trouble incident as they should with any credible allegation of sexual harassment. so these statements went on and on and on today. democrats lining up to say what al franken did was wrong and he should be investigated for it and there s no excuse for it honestly, the only evolution we saw in the response to this story
way to handle it. it s going to be referred to the ethics committee. we ll see what happens. as the vice chair of the ethics committee, [ inaudible ] that may or may not [ inaudible ]. could be expelled from the senate, do you think? i think the right place to address it is the ethics committee. he s asking for an investigation on himself. and the ethics committee is very, very, very, very competent and very good. look, bipartisanship! democrats and republicans agreeing on something, down to the letter. all it took to pribring them together was a lewd photo, some breathtaking sexual harassment allegations and an apology by the democratic senator in question. joining us now is the great steve kornacki, msnbc political correspondent, steve, great to have you with us again on this. really appreciate you being here. thank you for having me. so i don t i don t know i guess this is knowable. i guess we keep records of these sort of things. do we know if anybody has ever