Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that the FBI raiding former President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago property was “beyond politics.”
Partial transcript as follows:
ANDREA MITCHELL: What is your reaction to what was found in Mar-a-Lago, the search warrant, and of course, the boxes of material, including classified material?
KLOBUCHAR: This is very serious, Andrea, and my first reaction is to stand with the men and women of the FBI who are simply doing their jobs. What was found in that – in Mar-a-Lago – we don’t know exactly what’s in those documents. But what we do know is it rose to the level of a search warrant that a federal judge approved. And we do know that they were searching for classified material, things that fell under one of the statutes they used in that search warrant was the Espionage Act. Another one was that you can’t destroy federal documents or you can’t take federal documents out of secure locations. As a senator, I know when I look at the classified documents, I’ve got to go in a special room, Andrea. I can’t even wear my Fitbit. You can’t bring staff with you. And that’s because these documents not only contain our nation’s top secrets but because our countries that will do us harm, do harm to our own citizens, we don’t want them to get a hold of them in any way, take photos of them, anything, because they can actually reverse engineer them and figure out who the sources are, what the confidential information is. That’s why it is so important that these documents remain in safe locations. And Mar-a-Lago, where you can check out croquet sets and tennis rackets and golf clubs, that’s not one of them.
MITCHELL: Well, do you think that they could’ve done this cooperatively? That they could’ve just used a subpoena? Why take the unprecedented step of going in with FBI agents on a surprise search?
KLOBUCHAR: As Attorney General Garland has explained, someone of just utmost credibility and integrity, the Justice Department tried to negotiate this. We now know this from multiple sources. It’s been reported for months. They tried to negotiate with Trump’s lawyers about what was going on. And in fact, now we’re learning from reporting from The New York Times that they actually had been told there were no classified documents in his home. And now we learn another story. And there must be people that are giving the Justice Department information that they knew that those documents were still there. That is why it rose to the level of a search. Now remember, this isn’t a criminal prosecution, no charges have been filed. But what really happened here was a judge looked at this and said, “Yeah, there’s evidence, enough evidence to warrant a search warrant to go in there and retrieve those documents that are of high national security classification.” These are the nation’s secrets.
MITCHELL: And this has all been unprecedented. Do you believe that if the attorney general decides that crimes have been committed, that he should take the incredible step of indicting a former president of the United States?
KLOBUCHAR: Andrea, it’s not my place to– I don’t have all the evidence. This is going to be up to the Justice Department to make a decision about what happened here, why it happened, and if it rises to the level of a crime. I will say in America, we know as a great man once said, the law is king. The president isn’t king. And I would add to that the former president isn’t king. Everyone has to follow the laws.
MITCHELL: Let me ask you about some of the outrage from elected Republicans. Some have called for civil war. Some have said, “Attack the FBI.” Some of your own colleagues have had very strong rhetoric. What do you think?
KLOBUCHAR: This concerns me so much, Andrea. We already saw from the insurrection the effect that Donald Trump’s language – that he has so many people out there that will just follow him, and he feeds on that, and he sends out messages to them. Look at what just happened in Cincinnati. One of his followers who had taken part in the insurrection tried to kill people, FBI agents. And then there was a major security problem. He ends up getting killed. The whole thing goes down. This is the kind of things that result when you’ve got a president that attacks law enforcement and attacks the law. I thought in the old days the Republican Party used to stand with law enforcement. And I hope some of them do today because this kind of rhetoric is very dangerous to our country. These are career men and women that are simply doing their job. Their boss was actually Christopher Wray, was appointed by Donald Trump. And that’s why we have the FBI director, oftentimes their terms go between Republican and Democratic administrations. Because it is a career appointment. And that piece of it is so important for people to understand. That this is beyond politics. They’re simply doing their jobs. And we have to let them do their jobs.
Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN