House report questions legality of Bowe Bergdahl transfer

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• GWEN IFILL:

  Now, for more on the continuing debate surrounding Bowe Bergdahl, we get two views from members of the House Armed Services Committee.

  Representative Vicky Hartzler is a Republican from Missouri. She's also the chairwomen of the Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, which co-authored the report we just reported on. And Representative Loretta Sanchez is a Democrat from California who also serves on the Homeland Security Commission — Committee.

  Representative Hartzler, was Bowe Bergdahl worth rescuing, in your opinion?

  REP. VICKY HARTZLER (R), Missouri: Well, that's not to be determined by our report.

  What we were looking at is actually the circumstances relating to his transfer, and if it endangered Americans, and if the law was violated. And, clearly, we determined that this administration violated the law which says they need to notify Congress at least 30 days before any transfer from Guantanamo Bay.

  And in addition to that, we found much evidence how this administration misled Congress at every step of the way. In fact, the Taliban five notified they were going to be transferred two days before Congress was even notified. And this is very, very concerning.

• GWEN IFILL:

  But it sounds like your conclusion then is that the Taliban five were not a worthwhile exchange for this American soldier.

• REP. VICKY HARTZLER:

  Well, what's more important is whether this administration followed the law or not.

  Certainly, as a representatives of the people, we should know if the five most dangerous Taliban leaders that we were holding should be released and the circumstances of those released. And we're talking about the deputy minister of defense, the deputy minister of intelligence, military commanders, friends of Osama bin Laden.

  These are five of the most dangerous individuals that we had in Guantanamo Bay, and yet they were released, going around Congress, without us even being notified of the nature of their release, of if it posed a security threat to our nation, and whether the country who would be accepting them would be able to detain them and keep them from reengaging in the fight.

  And that is a clear violation of the law. And it's very concerning, because we know through media reports that at least three of these individuals have tried to reengage again. And we have soldiers still in Afghanistan, and we — we fought hard to capture these individuals, to take them off the battlefield. And now, potentially, they were being released without Congress being involved in that decision.

• GWEN IFILL:

  Let me ask the same question then of Representative Sanchez.

  Given what we know the exchange — nature to have the exchange was, was Bowe Bergdahl worth rescuing?

  REP. LORETTA SANCHEZ (D), California: Well, I believe that there is one thing all Americans can agree on, and that is we never leave a man or a woman behind that is in uniform for our armed forces.

  And I think we can agree on that. So, the president, in his role as commander in chief, did what many have done before, negotiated to get our POW back. Now, we, as the Congress, passed a resolution a few months ago that already said, hey, you didn't give us a 30-day notice.

  So, I do not understand why we had to spend precious resources that we have on our Armed Services Committee to basically do what came out, a political report, a politically-minded report, something with a predetermined end to it.

• GWEN IFILL:

  But is it possible there is a connection to be made between the circumstances of that exchange and the unsettled state we now find Afghanistan in?

• REP. LORETTA SANCHEZ:

  Look, these — actually, these five that were released were not the worst of the worst. We — and we didn't choose these in.

  And in the report, the Republicans indicated that somehow we had chosen these because we wanted to get them out of Gitmo. And the reality is that we were negotiating for the life of a fellow American. That's what the president was doing.

  Now, could he have talked to Congress in some way? Well, the administration said, look, this was so important to keep under wraps, because his health was deteriorating, and we were trying to get him out, and we didn't know whether the deal was going to go, and we were afraid that it was going to leak.

  I believe that there could have been a way for the president and his administration to talk to some of the ranking members of the different committees of jurisdiction, those that, you know, deal with this, but he chose not to. And I think we have already passed a resolution that said that.

• GWEN IFILL:

  Let me ask Representative Hartzler about the Guantanamo Bay connection that Representative Sanchez just raised, this idea that there is a goal behind all of this, to be able to resettle Guantanamo Bay detainees elsewhere, close the base down, close the detention facility down.

  Do you see a connection?

• REP. VICKY HARTZLER:

  Well, I'm not sure about that, but do I know that the president promised in his campaign that he was going to release people from Guantanamo Bay, that it was his goal to close it, and he has continued in that path.

  He — his goal is to continue to close the facility. And so here he — he released five individuals, and we were not able to determine if we in the negotiations ever authored one for one or two for one. All of that information was hidden from us, and it still is hidden from us. They refuse to give us that information.

  It took over a year-and-a-half to carry out this investigation, primarily because the administration continued to stonewall in providing us with e-mails and documentation. When we did get the documentations, they were redacted out.

  It was very difficult to determine what we have determined. But it is clear — and I think the American people once they read this report will be as concerned as I am — that the president violated the law. Plus, he misled Congress over and over again, even to the extent that Secretary Hagel came over to the Armed Services Committee and denied that they were negotiating with the Taliban, when, in fact, we know that he was.

• GWEN IFILL:

  Let me let Representative Sanchez respond to that.

  What do we know and what don't we at this stage, in your opinion, about this whole episode?

• REP. LORETTA SANCHEZ:

  Well, what I do know is that what a shame that we spent a year-and-a-half of resources and time on a report that was in essence pre-written, being, yes, the Democrats on the task force for this did sit in the interviews, they did sit in the hearings, but they received the first draft of the report, and they had no input into it, right before Thanksgiving.

  And then they received it yesterday, the final draft of the report, with — yesterday at 11:00 a.m. in the morning, and then it was released today. So, we have what we call a minority report, the Democrats' side of what we think is wrong with the report. And, again, we believe that it was politically motivated, that it's a pre-written report, if you will, that it doesn't talk about the real issues that we might raise, that it makes a lot of assumptions that are just not true, and that it goes after the president unnecessarily.

• GWEN IFILL:

  Representative Sanchez, why we have you, I want to ask you about one other report that we see today, reported that you said on "Larry King" in the context of the whole conversation that we have been having this week about Muslims in America and whether they should be here or not, and what their role is in terrorism, you're quoted as saying, "It can be anywhere from 5 and 20 percent, from the people that I speak to, that Islam is their religion and also have a desire for a caliphate, and to institute that in any way possible."

  And you linked that to terrorism. Where do you get that number, 5 to 20 percent of Muslims interested in caliphate?

• REP. LORETTA SANCHEZ:

  Well, actually, it's in a book that I read published by the Harvard Press.

  But think about this. What I'm talking is about Muslims around the world. And I think that that is a high number. And if you see the rest of the interview that I have, I say that. I think that's a very big number, between 5 and 20 percent of Muslims who have this idea to build a caliphate.

  And, yes, a few Muslims are willing to use violence. We see it, whether it's in Afghanistan, whether it's ISIS, whether it's in Iraq, whether it's in the Philippines, in other areas around the world, with this whole idea of pushing forward their idea — their ideas.

• GWEN IFILL:

  OK. We will…

• REP. LORETTA SANCHEZ:

  So, I think we need to take that into context and say, you know, how is this that we will fight these terrorists, these extremists?

• GWEN IFILL:

  OK.

  Representative Loretta Sanchez of California, Representative Vicky Hartzler of Missouri, thank you both very much.

• REP. LORETTA SANCHEZ:

  Thank you. REP. VICKY HARTZLER: Thank you.