more than a thousand witness interviews including those with leaders from the proud boys from the doj s letter in part, read this, it is now readily apparent that the interviews the select committee conducted are not just potentially relevant to our overall criminal investigations, but are likely relevant to specific prosecutions that have already commenced. well, the news that we alluded to this afternoon, a spokesman confirmed an earlier new york times scoop to our team on the hill that the committee will cooperate with the doj. what that could mean and how that partnership could play out, we will have more on that in just a few moments, but first, one of this week s central questions was whether or not the committee would eventually vote on referring trump to the department of justice for a potential criminal case. watching yesterday s explosive hearing, politico suggests this, the committee is making that referral in its own way presenting evidence in a clear chronology t
lies and the rhetoric that culminated in the deadly attack on our capitol. as frank rooney writes in the new york times, don t let bill barr and ivanka trump visit the reputation laundry mat. he says about the hearings, they are a trip to the reputation laundromat or perhaps the reputation dry cleaner. donald trump s one-time acolytes are trying to expunge the stain of their sycophantsy and they re betting that in a country of feeble attention spans and feeble memories they ll have more luck with that spot than lady mcbeth did with hers but ivanka s former stepien says the words don t amount to moral reckonings. as bill barr departed from the trump administration back in december of 2020, his resignation letter was filled with glowing compliments of his former boss. in fact, he wrote, i appreciate
privilege has to yield when there s evidence of a possible crime. mark meadows was the former president s fourth chief of staff. that s right. but he is said to be the chief of staff that trump always wanted. no question about it. he took sycophantsy, and he made it an art form. dwight hieisenhower had a chieff staff of staff named sherman adams. he called him the abominable no-man. in my mind, mark meadows is the abominable yes-man. there was never a scheme that meadows wasn t happy to take for the commander in chief or even become implicit in. rather than being the gatekeeper, he was the guy who flung the gate open to this star wars bar cast of conspiracy theorists and crack pots like
insane reality show stunt he tried to pull with grieving parents whose child was killed. you re getting the withdrawal. i thought the news conference was extraordinary with the vice president. it was like he was meat loaf from an% apprentice episode trying to please mr. trump on the charity candy sale. [ applause ] and the sycophantsy around him has led us, i think, to a dangerous place. but now what we re seeing, i think, is a level of corruption that is so obvious, so deep with ukraine. there is more nervousness on the republican seed than there has been heretofore. steve schmidt, it s great to have you back as a political analyst. thank you for coming here tonight. don t go anywhere. rachel maddow is coming up next. [ cheers and applause ]
who would praise someone every 12 seconds. sycophant. do you agree with that, bill? yes. especially when that person s your boss. i mean, what s ironic, of course, is the vice president pence is uniquely positioned not to have to do that. trump can t fire him. he could, i suppose, not ask him to be on the ticket again in three years, but pence in a way, if he had any, i don t know, something, would not have to bend over backwards as much as you can understand staffpeople who want to stay good with trump, good for the country by saying his good graces, it s still difficult. pence, the degree of sycophantsy by vice president pence and the clips you just played are really shocking. i mean, he could just say something like we, you know, mr. president, under your leadership, we ve accomplished this, we, the cabinet, around this table. instead, it s you, you, you, personal will ye personal. yeah. why s he doing it? why s he doing it?