Firing Line

>> Is the rule of law at risk?

This week on "Firing Line."

>> If they are guilty or if they should be judged, they should be judged.

And we have to do it now.

>> After President Trump's public demand, the Justice Department indicted former FBI director James Comey.

>> We are going to trial in this case, and this is just the beginning.

>> I have great confidence in the federal judicial system, and I'm innocent.

>> The president is remaking the Department of Justice.

Our predecessors turned this Department of Justice into the Department of Injustice.

He is firing career prosecutors.

This is one of the most dangerous moments America has ever faced.

We are quickly turning into a banana republic.

And he is appointing loyalists without prosecutorial experience.

Alberto Gonzalez was Attorney General under President George W. Bush.

Like many former federal officials, he is concerned about the direction of the Department of Justice.

>> Without the rule of law, we have no democracy.

We have no America.

>> Is this more about justice, or is it about revenge?

>> It's about justice, not revenge.

>> What does former Attorney General Alberto Gonzlez say now?

>> "Firing Line with Margaret Hoover" is made possible in part by... Robert Grineery, the Tepper Foundation, Vanessa and Henry Cornell, the Fairweather Foundation, Pritzker Military Foundation, Cliff and Laurel Asness, and by the following.

>> Attorney General Alberto Gonzlez, welcome to "Firing Line."

>> I'm delighted to be here.

Thank you.

>> You served as White House counsel and attorney general under President George W. Bush.

Now, you're still a Republican, but you endorsed Kamala Harris for president last fall, writing, "I can't sit quietly as Donald Trump, perhaps the most serious threat to the rule of law in a generation, eyes a return to the White House."

Eight months into his term, how would you describe the threat Trump poses to the rule of law?

>> Oh, you know, I made those comments during the campaign, and I think many of the decisions by this current administration confirm my concerns.

And the American people, of course, spoke during the election and said they wanted to go with the current president's vision for America.

But nonetheless, you know, in a democracy, everyone has the right and I would say the obligation to speak out and to criticize their government if they feel it's warranted.

And so there are concerns.

And not just Democrats, but I think some Republicans are concerned about some of the things that we see going on in this administration.

Again, I understand that the president was elected by the people, and I support the president in that we need the president as a country to be successful, and so for America to be successful, I'm always hopeful that the president of the United States is successful.

Last week, the former FBI director Jim Comey was indicted by a federal grand jury, charged with making false statements to Congress and obstructing a congressional proceeding, charges that carry, you know, if the maximum penalty were pursued, potentially 10 years in prison.

That indictment followed the resignation of the U.S.

attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia, who declined to prosecute because he didn't see probable cause to support charges against Comey.

President Trump then appointed his former personal attorney, who had no prosecutorial experience, and he publicly demanded that the attorney general file charges.

What do you make of the indictment against Jim Comey?

>> Listen, it's fairly easy to get an indictment.

I think what's more telling is the fact that no line prosecutor, no career prosecutor from that office was willing to to present the case or to sign off on the indictment.

It did require a recent appointee with no really prosecutorial experience to present the indictment.

I think also what complicates this are the public comments from the President of the United States.

I think it is contrary, certainly contrary to norms.

It's not contrary to the law.

Trump v. United States, the president can have direct contacts with the attorney general and people at the Department of Justice on ongoing investigations and cases.

So it's not unlawful for the president to comment, to direct with respect to investigations or prosecutions, but it's certainly contrary to norm.

I think it's certainly contrary to expectations.

And I worry that ignoring those kinds of norms undercuts the confidence of the American people in the integrity of our judicial system, in the integrity of the Department of Justice, in the integrity of the actions and decisions made by all of our elected officials in Washington.

As an American citizen who's concerned about the erosion of confidence in the Department of Justice, what would you advise citizens to do about it?

First of all, I tell people, pay attention.

Pay attention to what's going on in our country.

Even though you may not be able to do that much about it, pay attention, be informed.

Not just be informed, but also curious and ask questions about what your government is doing.

I have been most disappointed, quite frankly, in the most powerful branch of our government, which is the Congress.

They are Article One.

Meaning, from my perspective, our framers envisioned that Congress be the most powerful.

Not the executive branch and certainly not the judiciary.

And it just seems to me that politics has played more of an influence on the decisions that are being made in Congress than what is good for the American people.

We are currently in the midst of a government shutdown.

And what we see are we seeing both parties just pointing at each other.

They ought to be pointing at themselves.

>> You have unique insight into managing the relationship between the White House and the Department of Justice from both sides as White House counsel and attorney general.

In your experience, what has been the standard for the proper relationship between the Department of Justice and the president?

>> Well, my experience, of course, is based upon post-Watergate and the mentality of post-Watergate, which is that the President of the United States would not comment on, would not interfere with investigations or prosecutions at the Department of Justice.

And there were instances, certainly when I was the Attorney General and as White House counsel, when I would tell President Bush, "You should not be involved in this.

The President should not be commenting or in any way putting his thumb on the scales of what the Department of Justice should do."

And I think that's very important.

It instills confidence in the American people that the Department of Justice is not going to engage in investigations or prosecutions based on politics.

One of the things I always respected about President Bush was his understanding that there had to be a clear line.

And for that reason, we had things like the contacts policy that most administrations after Watergate put in place, limiting the kinds of contacts and communications between the White House and the Department of Justice.

That contacts policy is extremely important, and my understanding now is that it's being ignored today.

And I think that just hurts the Department of Justice and hurts or undermines confidence in the work of the Department of Justice.

Does it undermine people's confidence in the American justice system and potentially even the rule of law?

No question about it.

They no longer have confidence in the investigation itself, which is very harmful to most individuals.

I just don't think that's healthy and again undermines confidence of the American people in our justice system, which I think is dangerous because without the rule of law, we have no democracy.

We have no America.

It is what makes us unique, the rule of law.

And the Department of Justice is a central player in building it up.

You just said, you know, that there has to be a very clear line.

And actually, what we've seen in the last few weeks is the president directly communicating with the attorney general about whom he should prosecute.

He has mentioned Adam Schiff and John Bolton and James Comey to the attorney general in Truth Social Posts directly saying justice must be served.

Is that, in your view, crossing the line?

Well, again, I spoke about the case of Trump v. United States where the court made it clear that the president has the right, the power, the authority to speak directly to the Department of Justice, every employee within the executive branch, about an ongoing investigation, a prosecution.

But as I said earlier, the question is, is it the right thing to do?

The Department of Justice is not the department or the lawyer for Donald Trump.

The Department of Justice, from my perspective, that's the lawyer for the United States of America, and they represent the United States' interest in our court system.

Is it your sense that the attorney general is currently applying that frame of reference to her job?

I would say, you know, when the president of the United States asks you to do something, you try to find a way to do it.

And that's just true.

It's been posed to me this hypothetical.

If the president wanted you to indict a political enemy, directs you to do that, would you do that?

And my response was, what I would do is have a very candid conversation with the president and say that this is very dangerous.

It could blow up.

It could hurt you.

It would be viewed as political.

Are you sure you want me to do this?

And if he said, well, you need to-I want you to do it, then I have to say I would-I have to resign, Mr.

President, because I cannot carry out that order.

I don't think it's the right thing to do.

So, from my perspective, I would have to resign.

>> It's not a law that the Justice Department must be free from political influence.

It's a norm, as you have stated.

It dates back most recently to Watergate, and in 1973, President Nixon wanted to fire the Watergate special prosecutor, and then a series of attorneys refused and were replaced during the so-called, quote, "Saturday Night Massacre."

William Ruckelshaus was one of those.

He appeared on "Firing Line" a month later, and Buckley asked him if Nixon had the right to fire the special prosecutor.

Here's what he said.

- I think there's some question about his right to fire him.

There is no question about his power to do so.

- Would you elaborate on the distinction?

- Yes, I think right implies some correctness of action, which I thought was questionable, and that was why I refused to execute the order.

- Would you say the same issue applies today?

Federal prosecutors declined to indict Comey, and Trump then replaced those prosecutors.

Trump certainly has the power to fire anyone he wants, but are we forgetting the lessons of Watergate?

I think we are.

I believe it's wrong, quite frankly, to fire someone, to remove someone, for failing to do something that's based upon purely political reasons.

I had a situation where involving the removal of U.S.

attorneys myself, and U.S.

attorneys serve at the pleasure of the president by statute, and sometimes the pleasure is exercised for reasons that you may believe is not right, is not good, maybe reasons that you don't agree with, but nonetheless the president would have the authority to do that.

Now that an indictment has been secured against James Comey, what do you think that indictment portends for other individuals that the president has singled out, like John Bolton or Adam Schiff or Lisa Cook?

If you were John Bolton, would you be concerned that you're about to be indicted?

- Would I be concerned?

I think it would be silly not to be a little concerned, given the history, quite honestly, and given public statements made.

But that doesn't mean that it's a certainty it's going to happen and hopefully it won't happen.

But yeah, I would be a little bit concerned.

I've heard you describe publicly the Department of Justice like as a castle, that the job of the Attorney General was to act as a moat protecting the castle.

Explain that metaphor and why that was so important to you.

That is because there are over a hundred thousand people that work at the Department of Justice.

Less than 1% are political appointees.

The rest are career individuals.

They go to work day in and day out doing their job and they want to be protected.

And it is the responsibility from my perspective of the Attorney General to protect the Department of Justice generally but also its employees.

Oftentimes AGs fall short.

I'll admit that perhaps I fell short at times, but nonetheless I understood the importance of stepping up and speaking on behalf of the Department of Justice employees.

It pains me to see people fired at the Department of Justice simply because they were successful in doing their job in prosecuting wrongdoing.

I've said before, I consider that a betrayal.

They were hired to do a job.

They did their job well.

They protected America.

And now and then they were fired for it.

And it's a very sad thing to see.

>> You know, after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, you played a key role in the Bush administration's response to those attacks.

And it included very serious oversight of legal opinions that laid the groundwork for some programs that became controversial, like the enhanced interrogation techniques of prisoners and of the National Security Agency's surveillance programs of terrorists.

These are all legal tools that you and many others have testified helped prevent another attack against our nation.

Now your experience with an emergency situation is extensive.

Do you think that Trump's claims that his policies in response to national emergencies are different from the Bush administration's rationale?

I don't view the -- listen, we have serious immigration challenges.

I think most people would admit that.

And we've done -- we haven't done a very good job dealing with it.

But the notion that the level of our immigration -- unlawful immigration in this country rises to the level of anything that we saw on 9/11, to me, I think -- >> You're laughing.

>> I am laughing.

>> You clearly think it's laughable.

>> Well, it's crazy.

It really is.

This is not a foreign terrorist armed, coming into this country, killing us.

It's totally different.

But you're right.

President Bush made decisions based upon the about what he could do to protect America from foreign terrorists, from people carrying weapons in Afghanistan against our troops, and we would capture them.

Guantanamo was another thing that was somewhat controversial, and that continues still today, surprisingly.

I think we have to deal with immigration.

In a post 9/11 world, we as a country need to know who is in this country and why.

And no one should be in this country unless they're in some kind of lawful status.

And so in that sense, I support beefing up immigration enforcement.

But to say that it's an invasion by a foreign power, I think most Americans would say, "You got to be kidding."

In less than one year, President Trump has declared nine national emergencies, plus a crime emergency in Washington, D.C.

Is there a risk, Mr.

Attorney General, of misusing "emergency powers"?

Of course there's a risk.

What is the risk?

People will grow numb when the president says, "Okay, we have an emergency here.

I think that's dangerous.

And of course, the president of the United States has more information than I do.

And so you begin with a level of trust, because I don't know what I don't know.

And it's always very important for critics to appreciate that.

And so before I go out and publicly criticize or being too tough on a decision by the attorney general or by the president of the United States, I remind myself, I don't know what I don't know.

And it may be that there may be something there that would motivate the president, this administration, to take the kinds of actions we're taking with respect to issues like immigration.

I just don't know.

But it certainly looks different than what we experienced after 9/11.

Recently President Trump has ordered military strikes on boats in international waters that the administration claims belong to cartels.

And there are legal experts who have said that these strikes are illegal.

The FBI director has likened them to the Bush administration targeting terrorists after 9/11.

What do you make of that comparison?

There are numerous things, or statements, that I disagree with the FBI director, and this would be one of them.

Under international law, you cannot use force unless you do so in immediate self-defense or in connection with a U.N.

resolution.

I don't think those two conditions exist here, so I think one would make the argument at the international level that those strikes are unlawful.

You know, if you're talking about boats in international waters, we're a long way from a direct threat against the United States, and so the legality of those strikes, they may be easy, they certainly make for great headlines, and you know, at the end of the day, I guess you get rid of threats against our citizens, but you want to do so in a way that's lawful.

You want to be careful about the use of force.

If those strikes are illegal, is there anything that can be done about it?

Well, there are UN, you know, I mean, there are international tribunals that people could try to bring charges, but that's not going to happen.

And domestically, nothing's going to happen.

So then what is the consequence of this?

Well, there are no consequences other than perhaps political, discussed by the electorate and maybe discontinue of support for Republican candidates.

But beyond that, I don't know that this administration is concerned about how they're going to be viewed in history.

I'm not sure they're concerned about the precedent that they're setting.

That's the other thing that I sometimes wonder about.

You know, you do know Republicans are not going to be in power forever, and Democrats are going to be in power.

And you're giving them a great playbook in terms of how to punish Republicans.

I'm hopeful that they'll be better than you are, and do the right thing, and not be vindictive.

But who knows?

Do you think that the way that Congress will eventually check this executive branch is if Democrats take back the House or the Senate?

I think it'll be a step.

The House controls appropriations.

to check the presidency is to is to limit appropriations and not fund certain programs, not fund certain actions.

And both houses of Congress have the authority to initiate hearings, oversight hearings, investigations.

And when you're not in the majority, you certainly have a lot less power to those, or a lot less access to those kinds of tools.

- Even though you're a Republican, are you hopeful that Democrats take back one of the two chambers?

- I look at it this way.

I'm hopeful Congress, writ large, becomes responsible and does its job.

I'm not, you know, getting, I'm not gonna say I'm hopeful Democrats.

I'm just hopeful, however it happens, I'm hopeful Congress starts to care more about the next generation than about the next election.

You wrote in your memoir that nominating John Roberts and Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court was "President Bush's greatest contribution to America."

But more recently, you've expressed concern about the court expanding executive power since Trump has been in office.

Are the court's recent decisions consistent with what you expected?

My views about the court.

You know, the court's popularity, as I understand it, it's at an all-time low.

And I think part of that has to do with some major decisions that people viewed as political.

Part of it has to do with the current way the court is resolving certain questions through their shadow or expedited docket, as opposed to their merits docket.

And so oftentimes those rulings are accompanied by one page, one paragraph, unsigned ruling.

And people are left to wonder, "What the heck?

Why?"

And it gives people the opportunity, a window, to simply jump through and say, "Well, it must be political."

So I worry the court is hurting itself that way.

But, on the other hand, they're bombarded by cases.

And I think they're trying to resolve it as fast as they can.

And this is one way to do it.

It's hard for me to criticize the court.

And knowing certain members of the court pretty well, I give them the benefit of the doubt.

But I do acknowledge, and I think they know, there's a loss of confidence in their work.

And they need to pay attention.

>> Since returning to office, President Trump and his family appear to have profited off of cryptocurrency ventures, real-estate deals, merchandise, and more.

Is it proper or appropriate for the President of the United States to use the power of the presidency to his or her personal financial benefit?

>> I think that what we're seeing today is unprecedented.

You know, is it proper?

Personally, I don't think it's proper.

What I worry about is when any president focuses on money for himself, for family, for friends, for potential allies or allies, then he's not focusing on the American people and their lives.

And that's what I worry about.

It's not a good look for the administration.

I don't see how it's a good look at all.

And I guess people are making so much money, they don't care.

- You mean that people in the administration are making so much money, they don't care.

- That's correct, yes.

- You know, President Trump has made clear that by word and deed, he intends to seek retribution against those he regards as critics.

Does that give you pause as you share your observations about his administration?

Well, of course it gives me pause.

I try to be measured and hopefully balanced in some of the things that I say, knowing that there may be some kind of reaction.

I give the benefit of the doubt to the President and the Administration, as I said earlier.

I don't know what I don't know.

But from which is, I think, and my comments, I think, are consistent with many in my position.

And so hopefully that people will act reasonably and listening to what I have to say and having the appropriate responses, which is, well, Gonzales is entitled to his opinion.

And he doesn't know everything that's going on.

And this is a different administration.

We were elected by the people to do these things.

But this is America, and you still have the right to speak out.

And I think those of us who have some experience in making some of these tough decisions, you know, I think it can be helpful for the American public to hear what we have to say.

And so I'm hopeful that everyone will listen and learn something.

Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez, thank you for joining me.

Thank you for having me.

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