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Adam Kinzinger
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Adam Kinzinger
U.S. Representative (R-Ill.)
Adam Kinzinger is a U.S. representative from Illinois and one of two Republicans to serve on the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol. Prior to his election to Congress, Kinzinger served in the Air Force and continues to serve as a pilot in the Air National Guard.
The following interview was conducted by the Kirk Documentary Group’s Mike Wiser for FRONTLINE on May 18, 2022. It has been edited for clarity and length.
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The Early Trump Presidency
As I said, I want to talk to you mostly about what happens after the election, but let me ask you a question about a little bit before 2020.Was there a point when you were watching the presidency of Donald Trump that you first were becoming concerned about American democracy, about his role?
Yeah, like early in 2017.I didn’t vote for Trump in 2016.You know, I gave him a chance in 2017.And I think, at the beginning, what we could see is, he put some good people around him, hoping maybe 2016 was election rhetoric.And you just saw kind of as 2017 went on, when you look at Afghanistan, you look at the Kurdish issue, foreign policy in general, you saw that he was just kind of shooting from the hip.And while I wasn’t concerned necessarily about domestic democracy at that moment, you started to see, frankly, a president that was more about himself than he was about the future of people, about the future of the country.And so that’s, I think, when real concern started creeping in.And of course it got much stronger later.
And what about Charlottesville?Was that a moment of warning, especially we look back now, and you see some of those individuals that looked very similar to the ones that were there on Jan. 6?
Yeah, I think Charlottesville was a big warning.You know, I think what it showed is, first off, the president didn’t know how to denounce white nationalism.He considered these white nationalists a part of his base.And as you noticed, he always tried to put these disparate parts of his base together to be a majority, and he didn’t want to offend anybody in white nationalism.And we would stand up and say, “I mean, come on.”For us, it was—and for me, particularly, I had to imagine that maybe there was just some miscommunication, because there’s no way that he is, in essence, openly embracing this.
But as time went on, we saw that he was.And Charlottesville was a big eye-opener.And it’s a recognition of what happens when, even if you don’t outright denounce white nationalism, for instance, if you’re silent on it, they often take that as an approval, because they know you can’t endorse them.So if you’re silent, that’s as close to an approval as you can get.
Partisanship and Polarization
those first years are very tumultuous, very divided, between the two parties.And one of the things we’re trying to understand and I’ll ask you about briefly is leading up to that first impeachment vote and the role that polarization plays.And let me ask you first, what were you seeing from the Democrats?Republicans describe a Trump Derangement Syndrome, and talk about “Russiagate” and the dossier and all of that.What were you seeing from the Democrats?Were they involved in driving up polarization in that period?Or how did you understand that moment?
I mean, I certainly think there was—the Democrats had a role in polarization.I mean, I think if you look at the Democratic Party even today, it goes further left.It has its own fights, not really similar to the nature of what the Republican Party has, but it’s always a fight against moderates and progressives.And the tone is just rotten on both sides of the aisle here.But when it came to impeachment, I think one of my criticisms of how the Democrats handled that was they rushed it.You know, they had this report that came out, and then there was this decision where we had to vote to impeach, I think it was prior to Christmas or something like that.And it seemed like they really rushed it instead of, you know, calling certain witnesses.
And I remember it gave us—frankly, it gave me an excuse to vote against impeachment.That’s one of my greatest regrets is not voting for the first impeachment.But it gave me a reason to vote against it.And of course, you know, when you’re stuck in that kind of a polarized moment, you’re always looking for kind of a way out.And that’s to my shame that that happened.But certainly I think looking back, what we know now, looking at the situation frankly between Russia and Ukraine, it’s quite obvious that the president violated his oath, using American taxpayer dollars as political leverage.
We’ve talked to experts who study democracies, and one of the things that they’ve said is that when you have a highly polarized system that some of those checks and balances don’t seem to work.When you look at that acquittal, is that an example of a strain on our constitutional system?
I think the acquittal is a strain.I think it shows polarization.It shows that people are putting party loyalty, frankly, and you know, loyalty to one man above the Constitution.But it’s just— kind of the nature of that moment we’re in right now.And that’s why I think it’s so important for people to stand up from the grassroots up and say, “We demand different.”But yeah, that’s the moment we’re in.
And I think, I’ve come to believe that people less fear death than they do being kicked out of their social circle.And what you’ve seen now in kind of these monolithic views, whether it’s Republicans or Democrats or a gun control group or an anti-gun group, is people are afraid to go outside of the lines and have a little bit of a different belief, because they’ll be kicked out of their social circle.And that, to humanity, is probably one of the most frightening things.
And I think you see that at work, particularly in the Republican Party, where leaders, members of Congress are afraid to tell the truth to their constituents, because they might get text messages from their friends like I’ve been getting for years, and they might lose their election.And that, to them, is a greater, I guess, problem than even possibly dying someday.
The 2020 Election
As you were watching the run-up to the 2020 election, how concerned were you about what you were seeing?
I was very concerned watching the run-up to 2020.It started, really, with the pandemic and the misinformation.I was always aware of and always kind of engaged in this idea of having to fight misinformation.And misinformation is a cancer of democracy.Basically, with democracy, you have to agree on just one thing—that’s it—is that we’ve got a common set of rules, and your vote counts.Everything outside of that you can argue, but if you have that basic understanding, you’re good to go.That was being eroded.That was being eroded through the conspiracies of QAnon, that had a much larger following than people realized until it was too late.It was being eroded by the president’s rhetoric, where he was talking about the election was going to be stolen, or mail-in ballots are just a way for the Democrats to steal the election.Those were all targeted at eroding faith in democracy.And so I would say I was getting really, really concerned even prior to the election.
And were other members of your party concerned?Did you see the response that you were seeing from the leadership as adequate?
Certainly the response by leadership was not adequate.It really has never been to any of these issues.You know, behind closed doors, I could talk to members of Congress who, you know, would express some version of concern.But I think the thing I’m still dumbfounded by is that so many of them didn’t understand the damage this was doing, or if they did, they didn’t care.
And in fact, one of the most eye-opening things is, I think it was just after the election, when I’m sitting in the cloakroom.And to that point, I had never heard a member of Congress actually repeat any of these conspiracies about the CIA or Italian satellites or whatever the latest one was.And I heard a member of Congress express a conspiracy theory to an audience of other congressmen that were like, “Yeah, yeah, that seems reasonable.”And that was a little eye-opening for me, that now this kind of bulwark of “Maybe we’ll tolerate some of the conspiracies, but we know better” has been broken.And now even those in leadership and in kind of the echelon of governance are buying into these.
So let’s go to that moment, where the president walks out in the early hours after the election and says, “Frankly, I did win the election.”How important a moment is that in everything that would follow?
—When the president came out on election night and basically said, “I won; you know, stop counting the votes,” that—for me, that was it.You know, I had condemned a lot of the president’s words leading up to that, about undermining democracy, but the second he tweeted something along the lines of “Stop counting the votes” or something, I knew it was going to be a huge problem.1And I knew this could be a president that’s not, for the first time, at least in modern history, willing to accept election results.
And the problem is, when you have a base, people that are so faithful to you, that have put their trust in you, and now you don’t have a counter to that, you don’t have a Kevin McCarthy out there saying otherwise—instead you have him being silent in the beginning and then ultimately supporting those conspiracy theories—it’s not hard to think that people wouldn’t buy into it.And by the way, every American, if you truly believe the election was stolen or there is some secret society running government, I mean, it’s really in our nature for a revolution.So Jan. 6 should have been no surprise to anybody.
Immediate Aftermath of the Election
36, 48 hours?There’s a period there where it’s the president, there’s Don Jr., there’s Alex Jones, there’s people very close to the president pushing the conspiracy theories.And by the end of the week,, more prominent figures in the party, senators, are going on to Fox News and at least raising questions about the election.How important was the choice that members of the party faced in that moment right after the election in those first few hours?
So right after the election, I mean, every member of Congress, Senate, any party leader, they faced a choice on what position they were going to take.Too many of them took the position of, we’re going to at least tolerate these conspiracy theories, and then we’ll go through to, when all the lawsuits are exhausted, and then the president will accept the outcome.And at every moment, even in this kind of post-election period, there was always something over the horizon that people convinced themselves would stop the insanity.And it never did, I mean, even after Jan. 6.
Those were very defining moments right after the election.And another defining decision was, frankly, Mitch McConnell making the decision to not go after the president’s conspiracies, because Mitch McConnell needed him on board to win the two Georgia Senate seats that he ultimately lost anyway.I heard from a specific senator who said, “Mitch has told us to stay quiet against the president in this period, because we need him for Georgia.”2And I think that led to a lot of what otherwise would be kind of influential senators, at least countering the voice of Donald Trump, being silent.And silence is complicity.
You’ve talked about this a little bit, but I want to ask you directly.When you had talked to other members, especially in that period, those first few weeks, did they believe that there were legitimate questions about the results of the election?
So right after that election period, I talked to people, and I never once talked to anybody that believed any of this garbage.In fact, they would shake their head and say, “Yeah, we’ve got to let him get it out of his system,” or, you know, “I’m going to confront this.”They never would.The few that did, you know, would confront it ultimately ended up kind of, in the end, going quiet again, because they couldn’t take the beatings, I guess.
But I still believe that even today, maybe a couple, but the 99.9%, almost of congressmen and -women in the Republican Party know that the election wasn’t stolen.They’re just too cowardly to say it.And frankly, in a republic, that’s frightening.
And what were you saying at the time?What were you tweeting at the time?And what was the response you were getting, both from constituents and from other members of Congress?
During all that period, I started going on kind of an active countering-misinformation-tweet thing.So if I’d hear something about, you know, what was the latest, “DoD attacked the CIA in Germany, because they were stealing votes,” I would put up how ludicrous that was, and go after all these little conspiracies that most people didn’t know existed, but existed in the Twitter underworld.
And what did that lead to?Well, a lot of constituents that would be kind of what I would call base Republican voters being upset, because I wasn’t showing faithfulness to Donald Trump.And there was a period slightly after that when I started to realize that a lot of these folks truly believed these conspiracy theories.These are college-educated folks.These are business owners, in many cases millionaires, that would buy into this stuff.
My colleagues, on the other hand, actually were all thanking me, because they didn’t have the courage to do it, and somebody needed to.That changed, of course, later on, when it became more and more uncomfortable for them.But yeah, it was certainly a unique period of time.
The Response from Leadership
And Leader McCarthy, what is he doing?What is he saying in this period?We’re not at January yet or the end of December, but in those first few weeks, what’s his approach, and what is he saying he’s doing?
So, you know, in the first kind of month or few weeks or whatever after the election, Kevin McCarthy was really silent, and there were a lot of us trying to kind of get a position of where Kevin sits on this.He was our leader.We looked to him to say, “What’s the tone?”You know, when is it—OK, we’re—you know, kind of the party position is, hey, we’ll see how these court challenges go, and then we’ll accept the winner.He was very silent.
And that was surprising to me, too.I had started to really kind of have a falling-out with Kevin a few months prior when I noticed that he was more interested in defending Donald Trump than his own members, when Donald Trump, for instance, would go after Republican members.But in that post-election period, it was really disappointing, eye-opening for me, to see a leader that really could have, as a leader should, been the one standing up, taking the initial arrows, calling the election fair and allowing, in essence, breathing room for his members to do the same.And he never did it.
One of the things that we’ve seen in a lot of the books that have been written was that there was things going on behind the scenes; that McConnell is silent, but he’s trying to get Bill Barr to get involved with the president, that he’s sort of working behind the scenes.Was that response adequate from Mitch McConnell—working behind the scenes and not saying something publicly for the first six weeks?3
Well, I mean, I’m glad Mitch McConnell worked behind the scenes, but he needed to say something publicly.I mean, if you think about kind of party leadership, o Donald Trump, yeah, let’s call him the party leader, even in that moment after he lost.The next two are Kevin McCarthy, Mitch McConnell, and then there was another echelon under that.You would expect they would speak up.
And the thing is, is Mitch McConnell, you can work behind the scenes to have somebody like Bill Barr say something, that’s great.But everybody is watching him to say something, and not just him.His actions, similar to what Kevin McCarthy could do, which would give freedom to Republican members of the House, if Mitch McConnell would have spoken up, that would give leverage to dozens of other senators to say the same thing.
Ultimately, when people start hearing folks they trust tell the truth, they may actually start believing the truth.But if they don’t hear anybody say it, and it’s just quote-unquote “the media,” all that does is feed into the narrative that there’s a conspiracy out there.
By the time he does say, “Biden won the election,” what had happened in the interim?
So by the time Mitch McConnell finally outright said it, you had this race in Georgia; you’ve had election lawsuits; you’ve had, you know, these briefings on some Texas court decision that would be coming.By that time, it’s like, too late.It’s like, with a conspiracy, there used to be this idea that, don’t address a conspiracy because you give it oxygen.And I’ve come to believe, in the age of the internet, Twitter and information, you have to address conspiracies early, because they are going to get oxygen regardless.
And I think when Mitch kind of spoke out finally—and I want to say that, you know, since he’s been, in Mitch McConnell terms, I guess, somewhat aggressive in calling it out, but that whole period of silence creates a conspiracy narrative that sinks in, soaks in and takes hold.And that’s, I think, largely why we are where we are today.
One of the key warnings, looking back, it seems to us, is that moment with [Republican Georgia elections official] Gabriel Sterling, where he talks about, you know, there will be violence.Did you see a threat of violence?Did you believe things were getting out of hand in that period?
Yeah, I saw a real threat of violence coming.If you just take what I would see out there on Twitter about, you know, I don’t know, various QAnon conspiracies, or, you know, you’d see what was posted on Telegram or any of these other things, and you see people talking about revolution or talking about, you know, this cabal that runs government, and it’s time for 1776, these are all like, kind of echoes of things you’d pick up watching.
You know, threats against me—I remember a specific post, and somebody posted a hangman’s noose under it.Those kinds of things, you’re like, yeah, this is pretty serious.And, you know, the rioter or protester showing up at people’s homes may be technically legal, but you know how quickly that can spiral out of control.I really sensed it.In fact, I predicted violence on Jan. 6, not based on any FBI briefing but based on just what I knew was going to happen, if you just paid mild attention, and you know how people think, and that’s unfortunately what we got.
Why didn’t others see it?Why didn’t other Republican leaders see it?
I don’t know if other Republican leaders didn’t see it or didn’t want to see it.But I also think it’s—you know, when you invest yourself in becoming a leader in somewhat of a cultish moment for a party, you have to suspend any kind of morality.You have to suspend any “I’m doing this for the right reason,” because your end objective isn’t to attain power to achieve good; it’s do whatever you have to do to achieve power, and that becomes the ultimate end state.
So you can easily write out of your mind any concern about violence.You can easily, you know, convince yourself that everything you’re doing is for the ultimate good.When I warned on Jan. 1 or the 2nd—we had a call, and I warned Kevin there would be violence, he just dismissed it.“Operator, next caller.”Didn’t listen to it.He should have.
The Attempt to Overturn the Election
How serious was the attempt to overturn the election?I mean, at the time we saw Four Seasons Total Landscaping and a crazy press conference with hair dye running down.I mean, was it a serious attempt to overturn the election?
I would characterize that whole period and attempt to overturn the election as kind of unserious people seriously attempting to change the outcome.And initially, it appeared like kind of an amusing clown show, a funny point in history.But then you realize, it doesn’t matter how much hair dye somebody wears; eventually, if they can convince people, that’s what matters in a democracy, in a republic.And so while, you know, the lawsuits that, you know, Trump lost all of them, you know, those are all within his right to challenge, it was in the period after the lawsuits were exhausted when it became what at the time felt like unserious, which ultimately you realize is very damaging and was very serious to our democracy and has convinced people that that election was stolen.Even if we survived 2020, and thankfully we did, or the beginning of 2021, it’s not like those concerns go away, and I think they’ve grown ever since.
There was tremendous pressure put on local officials—you know, a single individual on a board in Michigan or a secretary of state or a governor.What did that period reveal about the fragility of our democratic process?What did you see when you look back, and what’s the warning, maybe, that you take from those attempts and how close or not close they came?
I think what we see in that period is that democracy—and it’s maybe something we always should have known—democracy is as strong as people are willing to commit to their oath.So if you think about it, we all take an oath in whatever capacity, if you work for the government, or you’re in a position of leadership, that you will support and defend the Constitution.And that commitment to that oath is the only thing that holds you honorable in that position.
You know, why is it that we respect what the Supreme Court says?Because we respect what the Supreme Court says.Why is it that the president executes the laws of Congress?Because that’s what the president does.If the president decided not to, it’s not like the Capitol can send the police force and do it.It’s because we all kind of agree on this real basic social contract.And what that period showed is there were spots in government, and not really in the federal government, in local and state government, where people held to their oath, and the system worked.If they don’t hold to that oath, we go into real constitutional crisis.We go into a real kind of death of trust.And I think it goes to show that democracy is both strong, but also could be very fragile if people don’t respect their oath that they take.
Can you bring me into that conference call that you mentioned at the beginning of the year, and what you’re saying, what Liz Cheney is saying, what Kevin McCarthy is saying, and what the stakes were at that moment?
Yeah.So that conference call was really, I think it was probably the first opportunity we were hearing what Kevin McCarthy was going to do on the Jan. 6 challenge.To that point, again, notoriously, he had been very quiet.We didn’t know.That’s when he announced, in essence, that he would be voting with the objectors.That was surprising to me.And, you know, Liz had given a really compelling narrative about why we have to certify the election.Kevin came on and said, “Liz only speaks for herself, not the conference.”
Anyway, at that point, you go through the whole thing, and then we all get a chance to ask questions, and I was the first in.And I just said, “Kevin, you need to understand, you have convinced a significant amount of American people that an election was stolen.And if you look at the history of how we were founded, what we believe in, there is no doubt this will lead to violence.I have seen violent threats.I’ve had threats against me.There will be violence on Jan. 6.”And he just said, “OK, Adam.Operator, next caller.”That was it.
And, you know, I mean, it was fortuitous.And I’m not—I don’t have a crystal ball; I didn’t know anything magical.I just paid attention.If you pay attention, you’d notice it.If you didn’t want to notice it, it’s easy to miss.
There’s a report in some of the books where there’s a question about, “How are you going to tell the caucus to vote?,” and he says, you know, “I’m not going to take their voting card.”Was that that same call?
I believe it was that same call.It was definitely that same time period.But yeah, you know, which is funny, because we always get told by leadership how they want us to vote, and at that moment, he said, “Well, if you want to give me your voting card, do it.But otherwise, I’m not going to tell you how I’m going to vote or how you should vote.”And then eventually, he of course did.Too much pressure.
I mean, same thing.So there was a lawsuit for Texas that they tried to get Republican members to sign onto as part of an amicus brief.I didn’t sign, of course.And even Kevin didn’t sign onto that until the next day the list of people that signed onto that came out.Kevin wasn’t on it, and there was Twitter chatter about Kevin, and he put out a press release and said he was accidentally left off.That’s courage for you right there.
It’s sort of a lonely group, and it will eventually become primarily you and Liz Cheney who are speaking a lot about this.What was her position at that time, and why did she make a different decision than Kevin McCarthy?You know, why did you make a different decision?
So Liz’s position had always been a commitment to the Constitution.I mean, if you look at Liz’s whole career, it’s about defense of democracy; it’s about promotion of democracy.I guess we never expected it would have to be here at home.And so I’ve always had that respect.I always knew she’d do the right thing.Obviously, she, like me, we have moments where we’ve made political calculations.It’s naive to think that never happens.But then there is a moment you look and say, "This is really an existential issue."
And why did we make a different decision?You know, I don’t know.I guess that’s one you’d have to ask Kevin McCarthy, because he is the one that has to figure out why he decided that his power or his party or his, you know, guy that he’s sworn some allegiance to was more important than his oath.I can’t answer that.I just know for me, and I would argue probably the same for Liz, we knew the oath we took, and we knew the answers we had to do.It still baffles me that more people haven’t, but I’m comfortable in what I’ve done.
Do you think the result would have been different if he did say, “This is how you should vote.You know, you shouldn’t support this”?
Listen, if Kevin McCarthy had, from the beginning, taken the leadership position of “We respect the election.You know, we lost.Now it’s time to reorganize, take back the House and win the presidency in four years,” we’d be in a much different position.I personally think—I mean, we could talk for hours about the period after Jan. 6, until really, just after impeachment, there was silence in the Republican Caucus.The vast majority of people thought Trump should go.It was really a matter of time of seeing how he was going to end up out.Would he end up in jail?Would he end up impeached?
And then there was a day when Kevin McCarthy went down and met with Trump in Mar-a-Lago.And those of us, for instance, that voted for impeachment were pretty upset about that, and Kevin told somebody in our group—I don’t remember who—he said, “Oh, I just happened to be in Mar-a-Lago, and the president invited me, and so of course I’m going to meet with him.”He also had some website called Trump’s Majority.And Kevin’s like, “Oh, I have 100 websites.That‘s not”—Kevin McCarthy, in that visit to Mar-a-Lago, was like a—when somebody’s in cardiac arrest, and you take the paddles and you bring them back to life, Trump’s political career was in cardiac arrest, and Kevin McCarthy brought the paddles and resurrected him.
January 6
… On Jan. 6, though, a majority of the caucus, it seems like, is going to vote not to certify.Then the attack on the Capitol happens.What is the feeling inside the House, inside the caucus, for you?Does it feel like things are changing?What’s the response of people?Do they think it’s gone too far?
I mean, while Jan. 6 went down, you couldn’t have found a single defender of Donald Trump in the moment.It really seemed like everybody recognized, you know, this thing has gone way too far.I for sure thought that this would be the end of the objections.I personally was angry, right?I think most people were fearful.I was mad because I knew why this was happening, and I knew it didn’t have to happen.And I also knew, as somebody that is a student of foreign policy and frankly gets very involved in democracy development around the world, I knew that this was going to harm our image.So this has an effect not just here, but in other places.
When that attack was going down, and then at one point, I think, in a text group, I had heard that there were people still planning to object to the elections, I think that’s when my anger went from a 10 out of 10 to a 15 out of 10, and to recognize that, even in that moment, the craven politics of that moment outweighed the gravity of what was happening.You know, look, the House has a lot of passion.That’s what the Founders intended.It also has a lot of stupidity, and I learned that that day.
I mean, Trump riles up the crowd.It goes to the Capitol.It’s not, in the end, as we know, successful in keeping him in office.But there is political violence on the Capitol.I mean, in some way, was it successful in the extent that he wanted to send a message to the Republicans in the House about what his supporters were capable of?Was it successful, Jan. 6, in that sense?
So Jan. 6, in terms of, you know, the instruments of government and overthrowing him, was a failure.In terms of the psychological damage, in terms of the kind of, you know, from Donald Trump’s perspective, “I’m the man.I’m in charge.I know how to do this,” probably a bit of a success for him, especially given that he ultimately survived and thrived, to show what was capable in people you lied to, in people that you abuse.
You know, it was a bad day.And I think, ultimately, as I look at democracies, I say we’re not defined by bad days; we’re defined by how we come back from them.So I think it’s a question that’s still out there.I still have no doubt, even a percent, that Donald Trump will go down in history as one of the most dangerous, foolish presidents of the United States of America.But in the short moment, you know, he’s still very dangerous.
We’ve heard that there were some members who were afraid of violence and that that might have affected how they responded to Jan. 6, how they voted.Is that something that you have heard or seen?
I—I don’t want to say I don’t have fear, you know.I’ve been to war.You know, my fear—I probably have a much higher fear tolerance than other people.I think there were folks that were afraid, and I think there were folks that took that fear and used it to find a reason.And this is the thing.If you put them on a lie detector test today, they probably believe they voted against, for instance, the second impeachment of Donald Trump because of some reason that they convinced themselves, but the thing that led to finding that reason is that fear.
I think there were a handful of people like that.And look, my reaction is this.All you have to do is look in Ukraine, look in Iraq, look at people that face violence every time they go into a parliament.And you look at that and go, “How can we sit here and not do the right thing because we fear some violence in the U.S.?”You’re in the wrong job.I’ve got to tell you, you can go be a cuddle coach somewhere if you want.But if you’re going to be a member of Congress, you’re going to have to face sometimes pretty tough positions.
One of the things people have told us is that one of the things that they get by not criticizing Trump is a level of access, ability to talk to the president.And on Jan. 6, Kevin McCarthy does, and says, you know, “You need to speak out against this; you need to stop this.”What does he get in that moment, and what does it reveal about that relationship?
So, you know, some things I have to kind of hold back on with that, in terms of Jan. 6, and what I know.I’ll just say, Kevin McCarthy always made it very clear to us how close he was to Donald Trump.Now he could pick up the phone; he could get him on the phone.And I think he had an opportunity, on Jan. 6, to—and I think he did, to his credit on that day, I think he aggressively talked to Donald Trump and told him to stop and told him what the stakes were.
Kevin McCarthy had access, because look, if you do the bidding of Donald Trump, you’ll get a cell phone number.It’s like the first time ever that a president has been so accessible to those that love him so much.And I guarantee you, that is why you have seen so many people come to Congress as Trump critics and leave as Trump sycophants, because all you’ve got to do is what he wants, and he’s your best buddy.Now, you’ll always get thrown under the bus.But I think that goes to show some of what Kevin McCarthy dealt with, too.He learned that if you stay silent, you allow Trump to do what he wants and you feed his ego, you’ll have access.And in Kevin’s world, access has been the one thing he’s always wanted to fame and power.
The Response to Attack on the Capitol
So in that period after Jan. 6 and in the run-up to that impeachment vote, does it feel like things are changing?… You know, Lindsey Graham gives that speech.We now know about some of the phone calls that Kevin McCarthy had with leadership around that time.Did it feel like things were changing?
So right after Jan. 6, there was really a sense that, you know, we didn’t know how it would change, but there’s no way it can go on, and so we knew something was going to change.I did a video which actually ended up launching a movement, where I was basically calling out, the GOP has gone off the rails.And I didn’t get pushback from all the base Republicans.It was kind of like, “Yeah, that’s a good point.”So there was some optimism.
And in fact, I even remember, during that inter-kind of period, thinking, hey, we should actually do a vote of no confidence against Kevin McCarthy, because he had tolerated everything to this point.And we got close to launching that and then made the decision—I didn’t make the decision, but I was outnumbered by a certain group, like, “No, in the interest of healing, since we’re probably going to get past Trump anyway, let’s not do that.”
I think had we launched the vote of no confidence against Kevin, we’d have had a shot.It goes to show how much that changed, when you could have had a shot there to like, today, where he’s on top.
As you get towards that impeachment vote, were you expecting more than 10?I mean, historically, that’s a large number, but it’s certainly not a majority of the caucus.What happened in that period?
Well, I mean, I talked to a lot of people that were right on the edge.And a couple days before the impeachment vote, I thought we could get as many as 20 or 25 to vote for impeachment.I started to see them kind of fall off that courage train, if you will, and so I was pleased on the day that we actually did get 10.But I look back at it, OK, what’s the difference between the 10 that voted for impeachment and the 15 that knew they should have and didn’t?And it all came down to reelection.
I talked to most of them, and, you know, the ones that ultimately didn’t vote for impeachment were the ones that, as we talked, expressed real concern for whether or not they’d be reelected.Look, if your end state is to stay in this job, you can do it.I mean, there is no way you’ll lose an election if you just can take your morals out and do whatever you have to do to win.Some people do that out here, by the way.Shocking.And I think that’s what people realized.But there were some people, there were 10 that made the decision that, regardless of the cost, we’ve got to vote to impeach; it’s the right thing to do.
And what were the consequences?Did that 10 know what the consequences might be politically, for threats of violence?
I think the consequences have been—from a political perspective, it’s intense.You know, anybody that would have a primary, or normally wouldn’t have a primary, now has an intense primary.I made the decision not to run again, which I think I very likely would have made anyway.But obviously, given that tough thing, and I’ve been in this job 12 years, and I want to focus on broader stuff in this political fight, that’s the decision.So there’s a cost.
But I’ve got to tell you, I can sleep at night.And I know that in five or 10 years, looking in the mirror, I’m not going to be ashamed of what I did in this period.There’s a lot of people I can’t say that I’m confident they won’t be ashamed either.
Did Kevin McCarthy, did Mitch McConnell, did they have a chance at that moment, if they made different decisions, to not revive Trump, as you say, with the paddles, to keep him out of the party, to say Jan. 6 was wrong and election fraud didn’t happen?Did they face a moment of choice at that moment?
I think had Kevin McCarthy and Mitch McConnell and frankly every leader, but starting with them, joined hands and said, “Look, we lost.You know, congratulations, Joe Biden.We’re going to beat you in four years.But what Donald Trump is saying isn’t true,” I think it would be a very different party today.You still may have a fringe part of the party that’s, you know, Donald Trump cultists, but it wouldn’t be the majority of the party, because there would be a counternarrative from people they trust, to what they’re hearing.Up to this point, there was no counternarrative to what Donald Trump was spewing or the internet was spewing from people they trust.
You know, you can watch the news, but if you think the liberal news media is out to get you, you’re not going to believe what they say anyway.But if the leaders you trust are saying, “Yeah, maybe the election was stolen,” you believe it.They personally could have made the decision and changed this around.I’m convinced of that.
And do you know why?I mean, obviously, especially in the case of Mitch McConnell, who’s not a fan of President Trump, but McCarthy sees access in him, and maybe he’s a fan or maybe not, but why didn’t they make that decision?
It’s power.I mean, it’s a tough decision to make, because it could—you know, as Kevin McCarthy is sitting there, looking, realizing he’s got to run for speaker in two years, and he needs every vote to become speaker, because you have to have 218 votes, he knew that all of a sudden, the small minority of people that may be still Trump cultists have the ability to deny him the speakership.So in his mind I think he made the decision to embrace that, assuming that everybody else, even if they have to hold their nose, would come along and vote for Kevin.I’m not convinced that’s going to happen now, but that was his calculation.
He doesn’t believe any of the stuff he says.He doesn’t believe it at all.But he just somehow believes that him being speaker will achieve his life goal and somehow change the world, and it’s not.
And there seems to be a period, an initial period, right after there, where Kevin McCarthy seems to believe that there could be a big tent inside the party and that Liz Cheney can be on the leadership.What happens?Why does that start to fall apart?
Well, so there were people that started to get uncomfortable when Liz kept speaking out.They somehow believed we needed to put Jan. 6 behind us.I would have agreed, had we taken full accountability of Jan. 6 and determined we’ll never do that again.You know, that’s a stain on our party.I think we could have moved on, but we never did that, and you had election deniers.And I think Kevin started to feel the pressure from not the majority of the Republican Caucus but from the 10 or 20 crazy members, like Marjorie Taylor Greene.And he decided, they want to oust Liz, I’ll oust Liz.
And we didn’t even take a recorded vote.By the time we realized they were in the caucus kind of passing something without even taking a vote, it was too late.And, you know, it’s fine.I think Liz is better off because, you know, to be the conference chair with, you know, 30 or 40 people that are constantly trying to undermine you, she’s way more heroic now, and history will judge her better now than had she been a conference chair.
I mean, it does seem like another moment of decision, which is, you’ve supported impeachment, and do you keep talking about it, or do you not keep talking about it?And why do you make the decision to keep talking about it?Some of the 10, haven’t.
It is a moment of decision.For those that haven’t like kept speaking out about it, I don’t hold any grudge against them, as long as, you know, they don’t—and they haven’t—as long as they don’t backtrack on the vote, right?You know, it’s like, “Hey, I took a tough vote.I did my tough duty.I’m moving on.”I understand that.For me, I just realize how threatened democracy is.Look, I’ve been a Republican since I’ve been a kid, which is weird.I get that.But I fell in love with a party that believes in optimism, that believes in having a government that plays a smaller role in people’s life and believes in a strong national defense that can, you know, help people kind of live the American dream in their own world.
And that party doesn’t exist right now.Nobody is fighting for it, and I made the decision that I’ll keep fighting for it.If it fails, it fails, but it deserves a battle.
And how far has McCarthy gone?And how far has the caucus gone?I mean, you and Liz Cheney have been attacked as Pelosi Republicans.There was an effort to cut off her fundraising, you know, people working for her for fundraising.How much has the caucus changed, has Kevin McCarthy changed in that period since Jan. 6?
For me the Republican Caucus is unrecognizable.You know, there was a fundraiser for the opponent to Liz Cheney, and I saw 100 of my colleagues on it, you know, 50 of which blew me away that they would do it.4And as I talked to most of them, they just said, “Well, Kevin asked me to do it, and in essence, he threatened my committee position if I didn’t.”Yeah, that’s not a caucus or a party I recognize anymore.
It’s sad.But again, you know, I choose to remain optimistic that someday—I hope it’s sooner than later, but it may be later—this generation of people that are still kind of mired in their political battles of 50 years, when they move on and pass that torch to the next generation that’s a little more optimistic and is kind of sick of politics as usual, America will be back in, full bore.
So, in that moment, where the Republican National Committee censures you and Liz Cheney and the reference to Jan. 6 as “legitimate political discourse,” what does that say about where we are?
It says that there’s a lot of dumbasses running the RNC.No, that moment says to me—you know, look, I didn’t care if I was censured by the RNC.It was the last thing in the world I really did care about.But it was so like, kind of delicious, when you had the “legitimate political discourse,” because it’s like, even when you’re censuring Adam Kinzinger and Liz Cheney, you still can’t help yourself from looking completely out of touch and insane.And that’s exactly what happened.
I’m glad, frankly, that happened, because I think it exposed the mindset.And I think the most important thing is that, of all those members there, that resolution passed unanimously.Of all those members there, they didn’t all believe it, but there were people that probably supported Liz Cheney and I that were too scared to speak out.And that to me is a microcosm of exactly what’s happened in the party for the last decade.
Some people, with reasonable beliefs, are too scared to speak out, because they’ll be overcome by the mob, which is why Liz Cheney and I are pretty lonely out here, with not a lot of colleagues, that are internally cheering what we’re doing, but too scared to speak out.
And when you look at everything that has changed since then, efforts on voting, who is running for secretary of state or governor, how concerned are you about how things are changing, about the integrity of the next election and whether it will be honored?
You know, I’m really concerned about the future, because I think once—you know, when we hold kind of standards as sacred, you know, the standard that, if you’re a Republican or a Democratic local elected official, you’re going to put party away and you’re going to count votes, right?When that gets violated once, it’s gone.We always say out here, when you throw out a norm, that norm never comes back.And I fear that when you start kind of making it a litmus test to say, "I would have overthrown the election for Donald Trump," and you win, that becomes now what you have to do, you know?And it won’t be long until the Democrats are doing the same thing.Trust me: That’s how it always works.So yeah, I’m very concerned about the future.
The January 6 Hearings
The last thing I’m going to ask you about is the commission and then the committee.What role did you hope that the commission, and then eventually it becomes the select committee, would play, and what did you think of Republican opposition from McConnell, from McCarthy, to an investigation, a bipartisan investigation?
Well, I think the opposition was insane.I think we could have had, you know, a complete accountability of what happened outside of politics, which is what we all wanted.And so in essence, to support and then oppose the commission was silly, and I don’t understand it.My hope is, through all this investigation, though, and how it’s become a select committee, is that we can just give a historical record to the American people.
Look.I don’t know if we’re going to convince anybody to change their mind in the near term.I think some, but you know, I don’t expect that it’s going to be some eureka moment, except I know that, in five or 10 years, when my kid’s in school, he’s going to learn the truth about Jan. 6, and he’s going to learn it because of the work we’ve done.Conspiracies always die out eventually.And so that’s what’s important to me, is the legacy we’re leaving for the truth.
… Can you just describe what it is at risk—if this moment goes wrong, what is on the line?
Look, if this moment goes wrong, we’re going to be fighting a politics that just is about power and not about principle.Look at a lot of failed democracies or struggling democracies, and that’s what you see.You see politics that’s about vindictiveness or about power or about violating the law.That’s what’s at stake.We need truth; we need to get back to the basic commitment to democratic norms.That’s what’s at stake at this moment.
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