Anna Paulina Luna: Why Attorney General Merrick Garland Must Be Held In Contempt Of Congress

3 months ago

Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL) joins Brittany Lewis on "Forbes Newsroom" to discuss why she supports holding Attorney Garland in contempt of Congress for not releasing the audio recordings of President Joe Biden's interview with Special Counsel Robert Hur.

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00:00Hi, everybody. I'm Brittany Lewis with Forbes Breaking News. Joining me now is Congresswoman

00:07Ana Paulina Luna. Congresswoman, thank you for joining me once again.

00:11Thanks for having me back.

00:12Congresswoman, I appreciate you joining me, and we have a wide-ranging conversation today.

00:16Let's start with Attorney General Merrick Garland. The House is voting on whether to

00:20hold Merrick Garland in contempt of Congress after he did not release the audio tapes between

00:25the interview with President Biden and Special Counsel Robert Hurt. You're supporting holding

00:30him in contempt. Can you explain why?

00:32Yeah, so actually there's two types of contempt of Congress, and I think that Garland ultimately

00:38has and should be held in contempt of both. So the first one that we're doing is what

00:43you're hearing a lot of chatter on, and that would be a referral to the Department of Justice.

00:47That's called criminal contempt. And ultimately, because not just one, but two subpoenas were

00:52sent by two different chairmen. One, Chairman Jordan of House Judiciary, and then also to

00:57Chairman Comer of House Oversight, which is the committee that I sit on that leads some

01:01of these investigations. And Garland basically refused to respond to either of those and

01:05also kept the Hurt tapes. And so really, if you're talking about the leader of one of

01:11the most powerful countries the world has ever known, that's the United States of America,

01:14in this case, Joe Biden, in all seriousness and all jokes aside, there are some serious

01:18concerns with members on both sides of the aisle that believe that he has some cognitive

01:22issues. And so when we are talking about what happened with that transcript, they're saying

01:28that we don't, as Congress, don't need to actually hear the audio recordings because

01:32they released a transcript. Well, how do we know that those aren't actually doctored?

01:35And as you saw, the reason why the Biden administration really wanted to glaze over that and really,

01:41I think, cover it up is because they had pointed out that there were some cognitive issues

01:46in that transcription. So we're talking about moving forward if this person can essentially

01:50control the country, be our ambassador to the world, and also to make some very important

01:54decisions. And it's become clear and evident to me that that might not be the case, which

01:59is exactly why we need those transcripts, audio, actual recordings to hear. And ultimately,

02:05Garland is not above the law. If it was any other American, that person would probably

02:09be in jail right now. But because he's the attorney general, he seems to think that he

02:13does not have to answer to Congress. And that's exactly why, one, I support the current

02:18leadership's attempt to hold him in contempt of Congress, of which I do think will pass.

02:22But in the event that the Department of Justice does not do their job, I have filed something

02:27called inherent contempt of Congress. And what that is, is that something that is actually

02:31reserved. You could think of it kind of like a old form of magic that exists in the House

02:35of Representatives. This was commonly done up into the early 1900s. And what this allows

02:40is for Congress to be that punitive authority, even on other departments that might think

02:47that they are above the law. And so what that would do is allow Congress to hold Garland

02:53in contempt of Congress in the event that the Department of Justice does not do their

02:57job. And that may involve sending the sergeant in arms to go get him and order him to the

03:03well of the House of Representatives and demand answers, which he should be if he's going

03:07to ignore us.

03:08I want to talk about the inherent contempt in just a little bit. But Attorney General

03:12Garland did push back on the idea that he would redact or doctor this in any way. He

03:17said this to journalists reportedly, quote, The idea that an attorney general would edit

03:22or redact or censor the special counsel's explanation for why the special counsel reached

03:27the decision, the special counsel did. That's absurd. What do you make of his response?

03:33You know, I would like to have faith in him. However, as you've seen play out over the

03:38last couple of years with President Trump, his family and his allies, I don't have faith

03:44in the Department of Justice and neither do the American people. In fact, if you look

03:48at polling, you're seeing that a lot of people believe that there is a two tier justice system.

03:53And so if he has nothing to hide, then give us the recordings. I don't understand why

03:58there has been such a back and forth. But that's not his decision to make. Congress

04:03has asked for something by committees that are running investigations, and he is not

04:07given the authority to interfere with those investigations. And I would also give further

04:12pushback and say that he recently penned a letter to The Washington Post trying to argue

04:16his case in a public format. However, I find it very interesting that The Washington Post

04:21on a number of occasions has put out hit pieces on Republicans, to include myself, and that

04:26they also try to reach out to our office to try to antagonize us shortly after he

04:29wrote that letter. So what you are seeing is you're seeing kind of a messy game of politics

04:34play out before the November elections. And I don't really care who you are. You're not

04:37above the law and we'll hold you accountable. I want to remind our viewers what was in special

04:42counsel's her report. He found that President Biden, quote, willfully retained classified

04:47materials after his presidency, but he also believed that there wasn't enough evidence

04:52to convict him. He also described President Biden as a, quote, well-meaning elderly man

04:57with a poor memory. The White House counsel said this about Republicans attempts to get

05:02the tapes released, quote, The absence of a legitimate need for the audio recordings

05:06lays bare your likely goal to chop them up, distort them and use them for partisan political

05:12purposes. What's your response to that? Is this political? Is this partisan? Is the only

05:18reason Republicans want them to chop them up, use them in ads from now till November?

05:23No, in fact, I would even push back and say this in the event that those recordings come

05:27out and that they are not redacted and that they are as they seem to be. I would be the

05:34first person to say that I was wrong. However, I believe that the American people deserve

05:38to hear those recordings. And I think that that is just like I have privilege to see

05:43what they are. I think that that's the American people's privilege as well. And so I think

05:46that that's obviously an effort to try to protect the president, which is exactly why

05:50they also tried to exercise executive privilege. But that's also too late because they had

05:55already, quote, unquote, released transcripts. So we should be able to hear what those recordings

05:59are. Reports indicate that Merrick Garland won't receive any punishment if this contempt

06:05vote passes because President Biden really or asserted executive privilege on these tapes.

06:12So knowing that, what is the point of the vote?

06:16So I believe the point of the vote is to show the American people and we'll see if the Department

06:22of Justice is indeed blind and will hold the attorney general in in some form of punitive

06:30action. However, I do believe that there is a check and balance and that would be the

06:35inherent contempt motion. So remember those two types of contempt. There's criminal contempt,

06:38which goes to the Department of Justice, which is exactly what you're saying. It's not

06:41likely that Merrick Garland will be in trouble for what he's done. And then there's inherent

06:46contempt of Congress, which allows us as a legislative body to hold him criminally accountable.

06:53And so that's exactly what we're trying to do, is bring that back, that accountability.

06:56You know, there seems to be a lot of people who have forgotten that Congress has this

07:01toolkit. This is not something that we just made up and pulled out of thin air. This has

07:05been something that has been in our our legislative toolkit really since Jefferson wrote that

07:11Jefferson's manual. So since the founding of our country. And unfortunately, I think

07:16that what has happened is even over the last, you know, maybe 60, 70 years, no one could

07:22really anticipate that the partisan bureaucrats would weaponize the justice system the way

07:27that they have. But that's exactly why I think some of the genius goes back to who actually

07:32founded our country and the check and balance that they put on these different factions

07:36that currently exist within our government. And so we actually have the ability to bring

07:40back accountability. And that's why so many people are starting to talk about what inherent

07:44contempt of Congress is and really hasn't been done. Will it be successful? I think

07:48either which way, though, the American people deserve to know what's happening up here.

07:52And I think that this will be a pretty transparent vote.

07:54So essentially, let's say the inherent contempt resolution passes. That means that the House

07:59sergeant at arms would arrest Garland, correct? It means that the House sergeant at arms has

08:06the authority to arrest him. However, likely what will happen is he will go get him and

08:12bring him and ask them to bring the tapes. And ultimately, also, Congress reserves the

08:16right to hold him, you know, probably at the speaker's office until he does so. So I think

08:21a lot of people are trying to say that this is some crazy, radical, you know, extremist

08:26viewpoint perspective. But actually, if you look at the cases that exist, even up into

08:30the early 1900s, this was done commonly for people that thought that they were above the

08:33law. So my message is to Garland, you are not above the law. My message is to Joe Biden.

08:38You have no authority over Congress. This was a check and balance that our founding

08:41fathers put in place for good reason. And unfortunately, we're having to use it today.

08:45However, you will be held accountable. The criminal contempt resolution. I mean, Speaker

08:51Johnson's whipping up votes, I believe, right now, because there is such a slim majority.

08:55Do you think that the inherent the inherent contempt resolution will pass because the

09:01criminal one's having a little bit of trouble right now?

09:03Well, we're going to see. In fact, we have a letter that we're explaining everything

09:08going into detail, the court cases, the legality of it, it being held up in the Supreme Court.

09:13That's going to be going out to our colleagues after this vote hits the floor. So we'll see

09:17what happens. But either which way, when someone violates a subpoena, you're seeing that right

09:23now, many of Trump, Trump's allies are actually in hot water because of that, because of stuff

09:29that was sent out by the J6 committee. And so if you have someone that's violating a

09:33subpoena, not one, but two, and thinks that they're above the law trying to essentially

09:38protect the president, i.e. Biden, who very much so may have a cognitive issue that can't

09:46be tolerated. And so I think that our argument is very valid and we are going to be actively

09:52talking to members that might be on the fence answering questions. And I do think that this

09:58will likely pass, especially if the DOJ does not do their job.

10:02As you know, critics and Democrats have called this political performative. I want to read

10:08what Jerry Nadler said and then just get your response on it before we change subjects.

10:13He said this. This isn't really about a policy disagreement with the DOJ. This is about feeding

10:17the MAGA base after 18 months of investigations that have produced failure after failure.

10:23What's your response to him?

10:25You know, Nadler is actually also failing to point out that, to my understanding, Raskin

10:31wanted to hold members of the Trump administration in inherent contempt of Congress. And it's

10:36interesting when you do the studying and work, you can actually see that I think that they're

10:40just angry that they didn't do this first. But also, too, from a messaging perspective,

10:45you know, individuals like Nadler, who have been here for a very long time, are largely

10:49part of the reason why we're having issues with border security. And he actually made

10:53some pretty crazy racially charged comments about people coming here illegally. Obviously,

10:58I don't support illegal immigration, but I'm not also willing to import people to work

11:02in the fields, as he had stated that they're here for. So I don't really take anything

11:06he says seriously.

11:08I do not want to do a total 180 here and switch topics. You and I have talked about reproductive

11:12issues before proxy voting for new moms in Congress, as well as the right to try IVF

11:17Act of 2024. Senators Katie Britt and Ted Cruz introduced the IVF Protection Act, which

11:23would strip states of Medicaid funding if they restricted access to IVF. What are your

11:28thoughts on the legislation?

11:30I mean, I think our legislation is better. But what I will say is and what I found is

11:34that you would think that these issues, especially whether it's voting by proxy for new moms

11:40or IVF, should be bipartisan. And what I found is because of the fact that we are in election

11:46year, a lot of Democrats to include, you know, Hakeem Jeffries, who I thought was

11:51supposed to be the champion of women's rights based on his branding and constant attack

11:55on Republicans. He actually told Democrats not to get on my bill, my proxy bill for voting

12:00and then also my IVF bill. And I think that that's because we're going into an election

12:05cycle and you're seeing that they're losing the issues on the economy. They're losing

12:09the issues on border security. And so they're trying to make this about reproductive rights.

12:13And I think it's pretty evident that they're not even for women. So I think the Democrats

12:17are in for a big loss this November.

12:20It's interesting you say that because IVF, when I have talked about it before, up until

12:25the controversial Alabama ruling a few months ago, hasn't been a controversial issue. It's

12:30just been a thing that everyone or if you have trouble getting pregnant, you can use

12:36that that's at your disposal. It currently is legal in 50 all 50 states. So why not just

12:41set a law codifying IVF and then take the politics out of it?

12:46I think that that would probably be too common sense for Washington. And unfortunately, you

12:51know, I never thought that I would see a male male leaders of a party that claims to be

12:58the party of women. The Democrat Party tell members not to get on my bill, whether it's

13:03for maternity voting or IVF for that reason. And it's unfortunate, right, because right

13:07after I actually was trying to fix this and I actually was one of the only members in

13:13Congress to actually come up with legislation. The Democrats refused to sign on to it.

13:18And what was their reasoning publicly and privately?

13:22They were saying that it was too narrow, but I don't believe it was that we actually heard

13:27that it was Hakeem that was telling people not to sign on to it. And same with my vote

13:30by proxy.

13:31So do you think we're going to be seeing any IVF legislation soon from what you were saying

13:36earlier? Probably not, because it is an election year.

13:39I think that we will see IVF legislation, if not via executive order after Trump's elected.

13:45I know that based on what we're seeing, and obviously you saw Donald Trump Jr. actually

13:49did a really great interview on this recently. But President Trump, who, as you know, I've

13:54supported and endorsed, is a massive advocate for that. I think that people that are trying

13:59to say that IVF is somehow selective abortion or will create this, you know, 1984 world,

14:05I think that they're just not informed.

14:06A lot of people, if you do know someone who's done IVF, have to do multiple rounds. It doesn't

14:11necessarily mean it's going to be effective. It's extremely expensive. And I don't think

14:14that anyone would go through that process unless they really want to have children.

14:18And as you know, as a new mom, kids are a blessing. I encourage everyone to have kids.

14:22I think that they're amazing, but it really does change your life. And I think for people

14:26to try to use this as a political tool just shows how out of touch they are.

14:30Congresswoman, I need to end it there. But thank you so much for joining me. I hope to

14:33have you back soon.

14:35Perfect. Thanks, guys.

Anna Paulina Luna: Why Attorney General Merrick Garland Must Be Held In Contempt Of Congress

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