equal outrage when hillary clinton and the dnc paid a foreign spy to gather information from russia. obviously, there are foreign countries that are interested in influencing our elections. we saw that in the clinton example. i hope my democrat colleagues will be equally offended by the fact this did happen in 2016 where a foreign agent was paid for by a political party that gather opposition research. yes, we are through the looking glass, folks. in other instances we saw gop leadership tell us we didn t hear the president say what he said last night or do what he did last election. i think the president has been very clear. the president does not want foreign governments to interfere in our elections. he said he would welcome that. he did not say. he said he would look at the information, listen to it and if there were a problem, he would go to fbi. i ve watched the president.
then you have a group of senators who would have been in a different place a year ago. what kind of hold does the president have? donald trump s hold on the republican party is stronger than ever. you look at justin amash and his fortunes in michigan where he has a strong constituency. he served his constituents well. he has a great reputation but he s likely to get primaried. you see the wrath coming down on him. you look at what happened to mark samford. that was the cautionary tale. now every one has given in and they will be out if they re not the party of trump. it s not the gop. it s the party of trump. as you saw us going back and forth with mark warner because at some point, he is a traditionalist. you can hear it in his voice. he wants this to work. he s in the one committee there seems to be some decent
come around. these are the same republican colleagues that didn t give merrit garland a hearing. what will i also hope is democrats take control in 2020 so we can set the agenda. why can t you what is why do you think mitch mcconnell won t bring this bill to the floor? same reason he wouldn t bring election security legislation to the floor because i think they pass overwhelmingly. he just doesn t want the president put put the president in a position to veto? the fear people seem to have of this president amongst my republican friends is pretty wild. when the fact that the president s secretary of homeland security wanted to hold a cabinet meeting on election security which is part of her job and she was told not to do this because it might offend the sensibilities of donald trump,
however, what we want to do is have a methodical approach to the path that we are on and this will be included in that. if you re a republican, what do can you do? we saw some republicans criticize what the president said. if a foreign agent approached me with anything, including but not limited to dirt on my opponent, i d call the fbi. i think most people would. the first phone call i d make after that occurred to me would be fbi. the appropriate action to take is to call the fbi. i would send it to authorities, yes. so for most of those predictable preresponresponses e senators. we saw some of the gop offer up unhealthy dose of what aboutism. i m astonished a t the outrage because i didn t hear
it s important to give credit where credit is due. understanding the head winds could be very strong in terms of whether, although you taught us different. it s a different sort i think he s insulated and he knows this. i want to go back the you since you one time worked for rand paul. is this a penalty for mitch mcconnell if he passes this election security bill? what s the downside? is there really a penalty to pay unless he thinks trump will veto it? is that the concern? he s up in 2020. mitch mcconnell is up in 2020. i cannot imagine this is a political liability for him unless he thinks the president will veto it. i have no idea what mitch mcconnell believes in his heart of hearts when it comes to being a public servant other than continuing his own grasp on power. you look at how he started as a moderate republican and landed