During a Congressional Democrats briefing prior to the congressional recess, Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) accused Republicans of 'acting like subjects.'
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00:00Thank you, Senator Schiff. And I just want to correct the record, Representative Raskin, we don't speak for 15 minutes, we speak for 25 hours here in the United States Senate.
00:09So thank you both for holding this hearing and thank you also for shining light on the simple idea that the president is not king, we are not a kingdom.
00:20And it is many of our colleagues, sadly, on the Republican side of the aisle are acting like subjects to the king instead of being independently elected officials to the point where we're holding this shadow hearing because they won't hold such a hearing.
00:36So I'll start with you, Mr. Crosswell. And I, as a former prosecutor, I just, I was so in awe of what you and others did after you were forced to drop bribery or asked to drop bribery charges against Mayor Adams and wouldn't do it.
00:53The words of the lead prosecutor on the case, Hagan Skotin, forever I will remember.
00:59He said, I expect you will eventually find someone who is enough of a fool or enough of a coward to file your motion, but it was never going to be me.
01:09And I'm sure you felt the same way. Could you talk about why you made this decision?
01:17Thank you, Senator.
01:17Senator, as I think I mentioned earlier, I would probably still be at public integrity.
01:24As deeply concerning as what happened with Eric Adams was, for me, the straw that broke the camel's back was what happened to my colleagues.
01:35These were individuals I cared about, and they had to resign because they weren't going to sign a motion that should not have been signed.
01:45And for me, and I think also just the fact that then we were ordered to do the same thing, for me it almost felt like an abuse of power against me, myself.
01:57And so I just, I mean, I didn't have a job lined up or insurance lined up, but I'd rather be unemployed and not be insured than work for someone that would do something like that to my colleagues and to me.
02:13Okay. Okay. Thank you.
02:15Ms. Young, coming off that, how does firing career prosecutors or trying to make them to do something that they consider illegal,
02:25how does that weaken public safety send the wrong message to law enforcement in general?
02:32Of course, this includes people who just happened to work on the January 6th cases,
02:37who were just called in to play various roles in it.
02:41It might have been someone who'd been in the office for a year or someone who'd been there longer.
02:45Just talk generally about how it weakens the rule of law and law enforcement.
02:50Sure.
02:51Prosecutors at the Justice Department are some of the best lawyers in the country.
02:56So when you fire them, you necessarily make American communities more vulnerable.
03:05When you fire national security lawyers, you make our nation's security less tight.
03:15These terminations are due to career employees doing their jobs, accepting cases that they were assigned,
03:24not prosecuting these cases, would be insubordination.
03:30It's just, it's antithetical to the nature of career service.
03:34And people are resigning preemptively.
03:39And it's also going to prevent really great lawyers from wanting to go to the Justice Department.
03:45And lots of really great lawyers have always wanted to go to the Justice Department.
03:48So the more of these terminations we see, the more intimidation we see, the less safe we're going to be,
03:55and the less strong and seasoned a DOJ will be.
04:03And without a strong, robust DOJ, the rule of law will suffer.
04:07Exactly.
04:09Quickly, Ms. Oyer, Justice Department's taken oath to the Constitution.
04:14Could you, in 30 seconds, the difference between representing the people of the U.S.
04:19and representing the President?
04:21As we know, the line has been completely crossed here, as you know, from your own experience.
04:27It's very concerning that the Department is currently being run by people,
04:31all of whom represented the President personally.
04:33There are certain decision-making authorities of the Department that have been delegated to people
04:39who personally represent the President, including oversight of matters of ethics and professional responsibility.
04:45That's evidenced in the letter that was sent to me,
04:48which was sent to me by someone who was one of President Trump's personal defense attorneys.
04:53This is a way of stripping away any of the safeguards against the tremendous powers of the Department of Justice.
04:59The administration is currently attacking the safeguards within the Department,
05:03as well as the safeguards external to the Department, like the defense bar,
05:07that play a vital role in pushing back.
05:09Which Ms. Cullen is well aware of.
05:10Yes.
05:11Yes.
05:11So it's sort of a multi-pronged attack on the rule of law,
05:15and that has real consequences for real people,
05:17including things like individuals being deported mistakenly
05:21or individuals being swept up in immigration raids who happen to actually be U.S. citizens.
05:26It's very, very concerning.
05:29I recognize the gentlelady from Pennsylvania, Mary Gay Scanlon,
05:37who is the ranking member on the Constitution subcommittee.
05:41Thank you for convening us today, and thank you so much to our witnesses.
05:46I really am in awe of your courage and your dedication.