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Interview

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And joining us now to discuss, Kentucky congressman, Republican Congressman James Comer, chair of the House Oversight Committee.

Welcome back to the show, Congressman. So you just heard Arlette lay it out. The president says raising the debt ceiling is an obligation, not a negotiation. McCarthy clearly sees it differently. He's going to meet with him on Wednesday.

Do you see any scenario, though, where the U.S. actually defaults on its debt? Because the White House is saying we're not going to negotiate.

REP. JAMES COMER (R-KY): No. We will never default on our debt. That's the most important thing. But we have to get serious about spending cuts. I mean, every American realizes that the federal government does not live within its means. Every American realizes that's our federal debt continues to grow out of control.

If the economy is as strong as President Biden continues to say it is, then now is the time to get serious about spending cuts. And when we say spending cuts we're talking about every single thing except Social Security and Medicare.

[20:05:08]

BROWN: OK. So what I hear from you is that no, that's not going to happen. But of course Republicans will continue to push for those spending cuts.

I want to turn to the killing of Tyre Nichols and that brutal video of his beating by police released on Friday. What was your reaction to that video and what more can be done on a federal level to prevent that kind of behavior from police moving forward?

COMER: Well, it's just terrible. I think everyone that watched it is just sick at their stomach. This was senseless. It should never happen. Those police officers should be held accountable. Unfortunately, every profession has bad actors. There are bad politicians. There are bad pastors, bad journalists, and unfortunately bad police officers.

I think we do need to have a national conversation. We need to make sure that we have a national data base because we have -- at least in my area we have a high turnover among police officers and they go -- they're in high demand, obviously there's a shortage of police officers in America. So we need to know that if one police officer's leaving one police force going to another city whether or not they were written up for excessive force and things like that. So we need to be able to share data. But certainly it's something that should never have happened.

BROWN: Right. And you know, that is something that is a common sentiment among Republicans, that, you know, look, there are bad apples everywhere. But what I think also the questions that have been raised with the Tyre Nichols video is whether there is a culture of aggression, whether there's a larger problem there in police departments.

Look, it's true, cops, police officers put their lives in harm's way every day. There are really good police officers out there. But also we see this time and time again. What more can be done, do you think, in terms of legislation? Is there any appetite from Republicans to do something on police reform to prevent this kind of behavior?

COMER: I think Republicans are always open to reforms that will improve our lives, improve our public safety. Unfortunately, you can't pass a bill to legislate against evil. And that's a conversation that we always have anytime there's an act of senseless violence. So this is another act of senseless violence. We need to hold those police officers accountable. And certainly we need to make sure that we're communicating and have accurate records and public records anytime a police officer is convicted or certainly written up because of excessive force.

BROWN: And I know legislating against evil, you hear that as well after mass shootings, in this case police brutality. But I actually -- Jim Jordan, head of Judiciary Committee, said the same thing, and I posed that to two former police officers and they said no, it's not about evil, it's about these officers needing more training, about more being done to reform the police department. So it's interesting to hear their perspective, too.

But I want to also ask you about the latest news, this past week when it comes to classified information. In the wake of classified documents being found in former Vice President Pence's possession, what do you think the next step should be for investigating how pervasive this is?

COMER: Well, hopefully the next step will be Tuesday. We're having the general counsel for the National Archives come in for a transcribed interview. That will be equal participation among Republicans and Democrats on the House Oversight Committee. This will be our first official transcribed interview for this Congress since the Republicans have been in the majority.

This is very serious and this is something that my counterpart, the top Democrat on the committee, Jamie Raskin, and I have both pledged on just about every major network that we're going to work together in a bipartisan way to come up with a solution because we have to reform the way documents leave the office of the president and vice president, and follow them into the private sector.

I said when Mar-a-Lago was raided that this had been a problem in previous administrations. There had been accusations that presidents and vice presidents had mistakenly taken documents that were deemed classified with them. This has always been a problem. I don't understand why we can't have a system where someone, and if that someone is from the National Archives, is there overseeing the boxing up of documents because every president and vice president has a right to take that -- take personal documents with them.

They have a right to go in the private sector. They have a right to write a book and things like that. But we need to make sure that they're not accidentally taking classified information that could jeopardize our national security.

BROWN: No. Absolutely. I think it raises important questions.

[20:10:00]

But, you know, at the same time I asked you about the Mar-a-Lago investigation when we sat down in your office back in November. So let's listen to what you said then.

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COMER: It's not something that we've requested information just to see what was going on because I don't know what documents were at Mar-a- Lago. So, you know, that's something we're just waiting to see what comes out on that.

BROWN: But is it fair to say that investigation will be a priority?

COMER: That will not be a priority.

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BROWN: But let me just ask you, I'm wondering, after Biden and now after Pence, have your views on this issue evolved? Because I think it really puts it under the spotlight what a big issue this is. I mean, Lindsey Graham, for his part, he said that the Pence revelations may have upended GOP efforts to tarnish Biden. You know, so, I mean, you're even hearing from Republicans saying, yes, this is clearly a bigger issue.

COMER: No. Nothing's changed. I mean, we've got to reform the way, as I said earlier, that documents leave the president and vice president's offices and follow them to the private sector. Now what's different with Joe Biden is we're investigating the Biden family for influence peddling. We have a strong suspicion that people around Joe Biden, mainly in his family, have been peddling access to the Biden family with our adversaries around the world.

And when we find out that they have multiple classified documents scattered throughout multiple residences and office buildings across the East Coast, then this raises a huge red flag for us. We want to make sure that those documents in the possession of Joe Biden weren't somehow sent to our adversaries and didn't somehow compromise our national security.

BROWN: But you've also talked about how you're worried about the same situation with the Trump family. Trump had 300-plus documents at Mar- a-Lago. Why don't you have that same concern? I mean, there are visitors going in and out of Mar-a-Lago from different countries including China. There's been a Chinese spy who was arrested at Mar-a- Lago. And it was in an unsecure location at Mar-a-Lago. So would you apply that same concern evenly across the board?

COMER: If someone can show me evidence that there was influence peddling with those classified documents that were in the possession of President Trump, then we would certainly expand it.

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BROWN: But do you have evidence --

COMER: That Chinese file was in Mar-a-Lago --

BROWN: But do you have evidence --

COMER: -- which is a public-private place.

BROWN: Do you have evidence of influence peddling with the classified documents?

COMER: The relationships that the Bidens have with --

BROWN: From Biden?

COMER: I'm sorry, Pam.

BROWN: Do you have evidence -- but do you have evidence of the classified document influence peddling from Biden? It sounds like you don't, you're looking into it. But why wouldn't you look into it in the same way with Trump?

COMER: Not only looking into it. But we have evidence that the Biden family has been very cozy with people from the Chinese Communist Party. We have evidence that Hunter Biden was receiving payments that were linked directly to the Chinese Communist Party through those Chinese energy companies. We're very concerned about all the money that Hunter Biden received from Burisma in Ukraine.

BROWN: But how is that connected to classified documents?

COMER: Well, we don't know. We want to look. We see there's one e-mail that's been identified that is suspicious that we want to look into. We want to make sure that there's one e-mail that was on Hunter Biden's laptop wasn't one of the classified documents. So I think there's ample reason to be concerned among the House Oversight Committee with respect to what types of documents were in the possession of the Biden family.

BROWN: Right. And I'm just trying to follow you here and apply the logic evenly across the board. You know. You don't know, you want to look, so I'm asking why not in the other case why wouldn't you want to look there.

But I do want to ask you before we let you go about Elon Musk because you actually met with him on Capitol Hill. And we're wondering, what did he discuss, what was he like? Can you bring us into the room a little bit, if you would?

COMER: Well, it was -- you know, I don't want to advertise too much about what we talked about. I'll just say this. He's the most interesting person I've ever had a conversation with. Obviously, he's well aware of the Biden family influence peddling investigation that I'm leading. We have obviously some information that he's made public with respect to what role the government was playing in suppressing the Hunter Biden laptop story from the "New York Post."

We have some former Twitter employees who are going to come before the committee for public testimony. And we just needed to, you know, make sure that we were on the same page with details like attorney-client privileges and things like that before the hearing. So I feel like we had a very productive meeting with Elon Musk and I think he's very concerned about transparency. And he's very concerned about the media to make sure that we have freedom of speech and freedom of the press.

And that's what -- one of the things that the Republicans are going to be investigating with what role has the government played in censoring free speech.

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BROWN: Which is interesting. And we don't have time to get into this but I do want to ask you about what's going on in Florida, too, with banning books.

But so much to talk about, Congressman Comer. This is my final show on CNN weekends, and it's nice to have you on for a wide-ranging discussion. Thank you for your time tonight.

COMER: Well, thank you, Pam. You make Kentucky proud.

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