michael barbaro

How are you?

sydney harper

Good, how are you? Good morning.

michael barbaro

It’s not too cold out.

sydney harper

I know it’s —

michael barbaro

So it’s a little before 9 a.m. We’re just outside the U.S. Capitol.

sydney harper

We’re here.

michael barbaro

To meet with staff of Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and to talk to him about this moment in impeachment. And what it’s like to be the leader of the party out of power in the middle of the Senate trial of Donald Trump.

chuck schumer

Hi.

michael barbaro

Senator.

chuck schumer

How are you?

michael barbaro

I’m good. Good morning.

chuck schumer

Pleasure. Thanks for coming down. How do you want to do this?

michael barbaro

Do you mind if we just like —

chuck schumer

Whatever you want to do.

michael barbaro

Do you want to do this? We’ll do across from each other?

chuck schumer

That’s fine. Whatever you want. And if you don’t mind, I put my feet up. For my old basketball knees.

michael barbaro

So Senator, it is Tuesday morning.

chuck schumer

Yes.

michael barbaro

Over the weekend, as I’m sure you know, my colleagues reported that John Bolton, former national security adviser, is about to publish a book in which he directly corroborates the central accusation in the impeachment inquiry. That President Trump conditioned the military aid to Ukraine on the country’s willingness to furnish information on his political rivals —

chuck schumer

Right.

michael barbaro

— including Joe Biden. Meantime, you’re heading into day three of listening to the president’s defense lawyers make their case to the Senate in this trial. So in an impeachment trial, where it is more or less seen 100% clear that Republican colleagues of yours in the Senate would acquit the president, this seems like a pretty unexpected and damning development. Maybe even the most unexpected and damning development today. So does this change anything?

chuck schumer

I think it does some. Look, we have been saying all along, what we want is the truth. And that means, as Americans realize in any trial, you have facts. And the facts are determined by witnesses and documents.

michael barbaro

Mm-hm.

chuck schumer

So our goal, we thought originally we would be able to negotiate with Mitch McConnell to have witnesses and documents. It seemed so logical. And what happened was, he went on Sean Hannity about a month ago and said he’s taking his total cues from Donald Trump.

michael barbaro

Mm-hm.

chuck schumer

Donald Trump is not interested in the truth. He’s not interested in facts. And so we figured, how do we get at the truth? We looked at the four witnesses, who had the eyewitness view of the actual charge. Why was the aid withheld and who did it?

michael barbaro

Mm-hm.

chuck schumer

We asked for them and the contemporaneous four sets of documents surrounding them.

michael barbaro

One of them was John Bolton.

chuck schumer

One of them was John Bolton. And for a month, we have been sort of relentless, focusing on getting witnesses and getting documents.

michael barbaro

Mm-hm.

chuck schumer

Because we believe the American people — they may be very polarized when it comes to whether to acquit or convict — but how could people resist witnesses and documents? Now, the American people, after we pushed and pushed and pushed this message just about every day —

michael barbaro

Witnesses, witnesses, witnesses.

chuck schumer

— witnesses, witnesses, witnesses, documents, documents, documents — are on our side. That’s rare.

michael barbaro

But only two senators have publicly said —

chuck schumer

That’s rare.

michael barbaro

— that they are on your side.

chuck schumer

Right, but the Republican senators know that their constituencies want witnesses and documents. Now on the other side, of course, is Trump. He will strong arm them. He will be nasty. He will be vindictive. And that’s, I think, one of the things that’s held them back. That’s what makes it so hard. But Bolton is far and away the most major revelation.

michael barbaro

Well let’s circle back to Bolton.

chuck schumer

O.K.

michael barbaro

What does that development with Bolton mean for you? Because I’m guessing that you’re getting at the fact that the power of the voters, that that might start to change the balance.

chuck schumer

And we saw yesterday, because the Bolton revelation was so devastating. And let me tell you the contrast. When Sekulow got up yesterday morning —

michael barbaro

One of the president’s lawyers.

chuck schumer

— after the revelation about Bolton was published in The New York Times, he said there are four mainstays to our case. And the third is there are no eyewitnesses to the account that the House managers had put forward. And there obviously is at least a newspaper report that there is one. It cries out, so why don’t you bring him forward and testify? And a number of Republicans, who had been silent until then, said maybe we need witnesses and documents.

michael barbaro

Mm-hm.

chuck schumer

So do I think this is a done deal? Far from it. But do I think we have a chance now to get witnesses and documents? Yes.

michael barbaro

Senator, how are you talking to these Republican senators, these colleagues of yours?

chuck schumer

Yes.

michael barbaro

I’m starting to imagine the conversations. Maybe you’re poking your head into the gym. Maybe it’s —

chuck schumer

How did you know that? That is where we do a lot of discussing.

michael barbaro

I know you have a morning routine.

chuck schumer

Yes.

michael barbaro

So help me understand. You’re standing next to the elliptical. Mitt Romney’s on it.

chuck schumer

Well I’m not going to any individual. I have conversations with Republicans, but I don’t talk about them publicly. But I would say this. For maybe a good chunk of the Republicans, appealing to their higher instincts — their better angels as Abraham Lincoln used to call it — is meaningless. Because there aren’t too many better angels around, there. But for a good number of Republicans, certainly more than four — considerably more than four — the idea that this is historic, the idea that this is so important to the nation, and the idea that we are a nation founded on truth. That the founding fathers believed that the truth would prevail and right would prevail, and history is upon them, and they’ll be remembered for this vote long after they’ve left the Senate, has some effect.

michael barbaro

So wait, are you making a moral case?

chuck schumer

Yeah, I’m making a case —

michael barbaro

Or not?

chuck schumer

— that truth should matter. This does not apply to every Republican, this “better angels” argument. But it applies to some. And those are the ones I try to talk to.

michael barbaro

And to the others do you make a more pragmatic, practical case?

chuck schumer

To the others? Look, we only need four. And we know there are about 25 we’ll never get. So you’ve got to focus on the people you can possibly get.

michael barbaro

And that leaves you a pool of roughly?

chuck schumer

Well look, there are about 12 Republicans who have never said we shouldn’t have witnesses and documents. They make other arguments. They’re mad about this, Jerry Nadler said that. But they have not made an argument that there shouldn’t be witnesses and documents. But look, is it an uphill fight? Yes. Are we making progress? Yes.

michael barbaro

So without naming names — I understand why you don’t want to do that — can you give me a little bit of a sense of how this conversation tends to go with the people who seem open to this? And what do they say to you?

chuck schumer

Well, they listen. And I think they know — you know, when Adam Schiff said on the floor in that closing argument —

michael barbaro

Mm-hm.

chuck schumer

— Republicans’ eyes were riveted on Schiff. You know, when you hear the argument that you don’t like to hear, you’ll put your head down, you’ll look this way, you’ll chat with your neighbor. But in Schiff’s both closing moments, their eyes were riveted on him.

michael barbaro

Sounds like you were watching their eyes, their heads and their eyes.

chuck schumer

Oh yes, I do. I do. I watch that. And he said, “You know we’re right.” I think many of them know we’re right, but are afraid of the consequences. And our best recourse are two things. Truth and the public’s on our side — for witnesses and documents. If we had started out at the beginning and simply tried to get Republicans to vote to convict, we wouldn’t have gotten anywhere. But the strategy that we used — which I think is the right strategy ethically, morally, but also substantively — is witnesses and documents are much harder to resist. And then we’ll let the chips fall where they may, as I’ve said. And I said that to my Republican colleagues. That’s one thing I tell them all the time. I don’t know what these witnesses will say. I don’t know what these documents will reveal.

michael barbaro

It could go against you.

chuck schumer

Yes, it could be exculpatory of Trump. But we have an obligation to the Constitution, to the country, to what America has always stood for, to get the facts, get the truth.

michael barbaro

Do you accept the possibility that for many of the Republicans who are off the table, who cannot be convinced, that the reason they can’t be convinced is because they think they are going with their better angels, because they just don’t think this is an impeachable offense?

chuck schumer

Look, they’ve made that argument. And Dershowitz tried to make it last night.

michael barbaro

You’re referring to one of the president’s lawyers.

chuck schumer

Yes. To me, it’s hard to say this should not be something where removal is justified, that Trump wanted to cut off the aid to get investigations of Biden and of the 2016 elections. But some of them may think that, yes.

michael barbaro

So let’s say for a moment that you get this scenario that you’re pursuing. You get four Republicans to vote to hear witnesses, including John Bolton.

chuck schumer

Yes.

michael barbaro

Which would mean that his testimony would be given in the Senate. It would be admissible in the trial.

chuck schumer

Under oath.

michael barbaro

And this would be testimony not heard in the House. It would be brand new evidence. As you said, Dershowitz is making this argument that the president’s behavior, the central charge in this trial, is not behavior that rises to the level of impeachment.

chuck schumer

Mm-hm. Mm-hm.

michael barbaro

If the president’s lawyers don’t really dispute the basic facts of the case, and then Bolton comes and bolsters those facts, what’s to be gained from his testimony?

chuck schumer

We shall see. There may be some Republicans who feel that this is serious enough to merit removal from office. But if everyone agrees with these facts, right, an acquittal isn’t gonna mean much. Because most Americans would feel, I think, that cutting off aid, threatening a foreign country — where our national security is at stake — if our elections are subject to foreign interference, that’s a — When I was in high school, you read the Constitution and all that. And one of the things the founding fathers were most afraid of was foreign interference in our elections. It’s in the Federalist Papers and elsewhere. And when I read it then, back in the ‘60s, I said, “What! That’s not gonna happen.” Well as usual, the founding fathers were a lot smarter than all of us. It’s serious stuff.

michael barbaro

So even if you get these four senators to come along with you —

chuck schumer

Yes.

michael barbaro

— it sounds like what you’re saying is this is still about American sentiment, voter sentiment. It’s not that you think that if you hear from Bolton, suddenly that might lead 20 senators to vote —

chuck schumer

Look.

michael barbaro

— to convict the president. It’s that if Bolton testifies, you think it will only strengthen Americans’ belief that something bad and wrong has occurred here.

chuck schumer

Yes. Yes, I agree with that. But I’d make another point. Things keep coming out. New revelations keep coming out. And you never know what’s gonna happen. Is it an uphill fight when you have the power of Trump and the fear of Trump among the Republican senators and the fear of the Trump hard-core constituency? Absolutely. But do we have a moral obligation to make the fight as strong as we can? Yes. That’s what motivates me. Getting at the truth. And somehow, in ways that go beyond my knowledge, it usually ends up creating the right result. But who knows when and who knows how?

michael barbaro

I still struggle to see the political incentive for these Republicans to allow for a witness. Because —

chuck schumer

They’re gonna have to.

michael barbaro

— they’re in the political bind that you have described very well here.

chuck schumer

Yes.

michael barbaro

And allowing witnesses only seems to make the public case against the president worse.

chuck schumer

— except —

michael barbaro

But they won’t vote him out of office, so shouldn’t they just not allow Bolton to testify?

chuck schumer

Well they may. That’s why this is a difficult argument. But when they don’t allow witnesses, their constituencies know they stood with Trump to go against fairness and with a cover-up.

michael barbaro

But it’s a little bit of a snarl, because he has told —

chuck schumer