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Bob Corker

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Bob Corker

Former U.S. Senator (R-TN)

Bob Corker served as a United States senator from Tennessee from 2007 to 2019 and as chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee from 2015 to 2019. Corker has been a vocal critic of President Trump and announced in 2017 that he would not seek reelection.

The following interview was conducted by FRONTLINE's Gabrielle Schonder on Jan. 18, 2021. It has been edited for clarity and length.

This interview appears in:

Trump’s American Carnage

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Restoring Faith in Democracy

So, Sen. Corker, I first want to just thank you for doing this, and doing it in these kind of unusual circumstances and being so open to talking to us about some events that we’re going to kind of walk through, if that’s OK, over the last four years.So you can hopefully provide a bit more insight than we have and understanding about some pretty key moments.But I wonder, before we get going, if I could ask you.You know, we’re talking at a pretty historical moment, and I’m curious if there’s anything you wanted to say just about the period of time that we’re in, that we’re having this conversation in.

Yeah, I mean, I think the observation I would make is that we take our democracy for granted, and yet I think recently we’ve realized how fragile that might be.And, you know, it takes people with—our country was created this way, and thankfully, and our Founding Fathers knew that it possibly could be fragile and therefore conducted themselves in a manner that hopefully would not lead to its demise.

But at the end of the day, in a democracy, you also cannot take on the win-at-all-costs type of attitude.I mean, you undermine democracy, which we’ve seen recently; you undermine people’s faith.We’re also at a period of time when, you know—I’m sorry; maybe PBS is a little bit different, but people don’t trust the media.They hear their leaders saying things, and these are hardworking people all across our country.It’s just such a shock to me, the conspiracy theories that people buy into.It's obviously easier to do that than, than to—I mean, let me say this: They succumb—many people succumb to that more than they do the truth.

And so I just think all of us have got to step our game up.We’ve got to be more, way more vigilant in what we do and say.And certainly in the public arena, much has to change to cause our country to rise to the next level.

The 2016 Campaign

I appreciate that.… So I’m going to ask you to go back into history for a moment, and if we can go into 2016 and the campaign and candidate Trump for a moment.You know, do you remember being concerned about the support that he seemed to be getting from some of these fringe groups, the groups that, you know, that would sort of later come into the party that appeared to be a bit more dangerous?

I, you know, did not notice that.You know, I met the president in May of 2016, I think it was, and was with him again later, later that summer.But as far as the fringe groups that were buying in, that didn’t really occur to me until Charlottesville.When that occurred, obviously it became very evident to me what was occurring.

Let me ask you just generally about—were you at the convention?

I was at the convention, yes.

I mean, just the atmosphere of that convention and the establishment’s sort of view of this insurgent candidate, and everything they’d seen during the campaign, you know, they coalesce around him.And I’m just curious what that atmosphere was like.Do you remember sort of that tension between the two forces within the party?

Yes, all those—you know, I wasn’t like hugely involved.I did some—I did an event at a museum there in town, really talking to diplomats who had come in around the world because I was chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee.You really couldn’t feel the tension, if I remember correctly.Sen. Cruz had not yet endorsed the president, so there was a little tension around that.… Obviously it was surprising that all along the way that President Trump had gained as much momentum as he had, but there really wasn’t a feeling—I don’t remember there being a feeling of anything other than observing this unusual candidate and, you know, an unusual convention, if you will.But again, I wasn’t—I wasn’t really hugely involved. …

Trump and the Senate

Let me ask you about, jumping way ahead for a moment, to the health care vote in the Senate.This is much, much later, certainly post-election now.You know, after that fails, the president attacks Mitch McConnell on Twitter, sort of in many ways for the first time in really stark terms.And I’m curious to know your take and if you could speak to what Republicans were sort of understanding at that moment when Trump directly targeted critics with kind of the full support of the base.

… Look, the president’s expectations about the way the Senate operates, the way the House operates were—and his expectations just about how government operates were many times just not based in reality, OK?I think the general sense during that time was look, he’s the president; he obviously does have significant support in the base; we have to—we have to deal with the way that he conducts himself in order to move ahead.

And so, you know, you could see the frustrations throughout the caucus with just the way things were, you know.An agreement would be made, and then it would be changed three times that day.It was just—the whole thing was chaotic.You know, you were dealing with different people within the White House that were talking about their frustrations with just the chaotic nature of all that was happening.So I think people had a really good sense of that, and, you know, I mean, Mitch McConnell obviously is the leader of the Senate, but each senator does, you know, what they feel like is the right thing to do.And in that particular case, obviously John McCain was the deciding vote, and so, you know, it was hard to understand how Mitch McConnell would be the blame of it.But, you know, that’s the president’s nature, as we all know.I mean, he has to, you know—there’s a lashing out when things don’t go his way, and, you know, the closest people, the closest person in the vicinity is typically the one that is recipient of that, and obviously he had been dealing closely with Mitch on the whole health care ordeal.

Was it a warning to other Republicans at that time?

… So I, you know, I think not long thereafter or not long before, the whole Charlottesville episode also had occurred.And I think people pretty well had identified and understood the nature of the president, and I don’t think that that was a shock.I mean, there were obviously people—you know, you have people there that are there on a missional aspect, and they want to do their job and leave.You have people there who are there for life.You’ve got people there that are in between.Depending on what your posture is as it relates to your service, those kinds of things affect you in different ways.And so you can imagine on the spectrum of people serving the Senate, some of those senators would be incredibly fearful of an attack by the president; some people would be somewhat fearful of an attack by the president; and then there would be some that, “Hey, look, I’m going to do my job, and whatever happens, you know, I’m going to do my job; I’m going to do what’s best for our country and for my state.”

Criticizing Trump

And let me ask you, where did you fall in those lessons?I’m curious what you learned from directly criticizing the president.

Look, you know, I was there, you know.I felt like I was there on a mission.I’m a businessperson.I served as mayor of a city, which I love so much, and commissioner of finance for our state, both, one four years, one a year and a half.And, you know, I was there as a public service.I had told my constituents back home that I never planned to serve more than two [terms].It was difficult to leave.I mean, people are putting pressure on you to stay and all of that.But I figured I was there to do a job, and certainly the president and I had a rocky relationship.And I don’t say any of this to be haughty, but it was just—it went with the territory.And, you know, again, our first breach, our first real public breach—we’ve had some private discussions where, you know, there was disagreement, but our first public breach was in August of 2017, when he made the comments he did about the Charlottesville episode.And look, I’ve been the mayor of a city, I’ve worked with people of all backgrounds and races, and to me, that was a step too far.

And then, you know, I was very close to Secretary of State [Rex] Tillerson, and so I had, you know, breakfast, coffee with him often, talked to him a good deal, was aware of what was happening in our foreign policy arena and how things were being undermined.Of course, the public could see how diplomacy was being undermined.I had some conversations with Secretary [of Defense Jim] Mattis.I had people calling me from the White House every single week, you know, about what was happening.They knew that I would never share, you know, their individual input.And so I was very aware of the chaotic nature of the White House and the fact that the president was coming to the White House in the mornings or into the actual executive side of the White House in the mornings spun up over some conversation he’d had the night before, late at night, with somebody who was unvetted.

So I was aware of all that was happening and over time continued to have concerns about other parts of our government.

And you voiced them.And the response was what from him?

Oh, it was, you know, a tweetstorm.… I mean, back home, it is amazing the strength that the president has with, quote—you know, I’ll use the word everybody uses—”the base,” by the way, which grew over time.I mean, I’ve been out—I’ve been on sabbatical for two years up until a few weeks ago.I left the Senate.I didn’t want to be a pseudo-senator, commenting on everything that was happening in the Senate.I just didn’t want to be one of those people.I wanted to make a healthy transition back to private life.And over the last few weeks, over the last month, with all that’s been going on with this election, my time, my sabbatical ended, self-imposed, and I began to speak out.

And you can just—the strength has grown over time, the attachment.I mean, the things that—the things that, you know, as we were talking earlier, you know, conspiracy theories are for some reason easier to believe than the truth.And so the attachment to the base has just really strengthened.Now, obviously the events of Jan. 6 eroded that to a degree.

But when the president criticizes you, to get to your question, sure, I mean, people back home are upset.They think—I don’t want to overstate this—it’s almost like, he’s not a godlike figure, but he’s the Supreme It, if you will, in the Republican Party, and therefore if you’re—if y’all are at odds or you’re disagreeing, then it’s not good for your health.

Now, again, I don’t mean this to in any way be, you know, haughty or big, you know.That part of the job, you know, just wasn’t that important to me.What was important to me is that I expressed myself fully, that I am who I am, that I say and do what is best for the people that I represent and for our nation, and let the chips fall.And so—and there were others who did the same thing.

But, you know, if you’re going to run for reelection, you know, or if you want to be there for 30 years, like some do, obviously you can understand their timidity, their desire to just stay out of the fray, their desire to actually—and this is somewhat unfortunate, too—to actually parrot what the president is saying.And that’s what’s happened, unfortunately.I mean, those House members and senators who said that they were going to object to the electoral count were—if you think about it, all the distrust that exists out there, the conspiracy theories that are easy to grab hold to, and then you have House members and Senate members who are out there saying, “And yes, we’re going to support—we’re going to object to the Electoral College,” all of a sudden people were saying, “Yes”—I think many people already believed it—that “Yes, this election was a fraud,” and we end up seeing the tremendous fractures that took—have taken place in our democracy that have to be healed.

… I wonder if I can ask you if you have some regrets about not speaking out more.

Well, I mean, if you go back and look, I mean, it would be pretty hard to—you know, there is—I really don’t.I mean, I think I spoke out plenty.I mean, there were, you know, very direct about concerns that were had.You know, I had significant concerns about the president just on a willy-nilly way taking advantage of the 1974 Trade Act and using national security reasons to put tariffs on Mexico and Canada and the European Union.To me, it was an absolute abuse of that authority, and I spoke out strongly.Tried to lead a charge within the Senate to overturn that. …

There are things that all of us, I know, think we could have done better.But at the time, you just do the best you can.I can’t look back and say, “Well, I wish I would have done this,” or, “I wish I would have done that.”I think I spoke about as strongly as anyone could speak out on the Charlottesville event, and that just led to issues all along the way.

Trump and Charlottesville

Let me go to Charlottesville now.Why was the “good people” line so concerning?What alarms did it ring for you?

Yeah, I mean, it was very evident that, you know, it was a dog whistle to the groups who had come in and done what they did, not unlike, by the way, the first video that was sent out after the Jan. 6 event at the House.I mean, “We love you,” you know.And so, you know, the president evidently, I mean, you know, did not want to discourage that type of activity.As a matter of fact, wanted to encourage it.And as we’ve seen over the course of his four years of service, the strength among those organizations, their place in what has been happening around the country has continued to increase.

And as you’ve read with some of the interviews, I mean, people thought they were being encouraged to undertake the activity that was undertaken at the Capitol on January the 6th.

I don’t know if you can speak to this, but Mike Pence was in a pretty difficult situation in Charlottesville, which is how to clean up the president’s statement but also not cross him, but also decry the comments.Do you kind of remember watching that maneuver a little bit?

No, but I—I really don’t.I mean, Mike was—Vice President Pence was in our lunch meetings every week on Tuesdays, unless something unusual was happening, and was an incredibly loyal person to the president.Actually, I never saw, ever, you know, even the slightest distance between the vice president and the president in those lunch meetings.And of course, in those lunch meetings, you know, people—for your audience, the vice president is the president of the Senate, and so typically that person would come to the caucus meetings of the party that they’re a part of.And so he would be there on Tuesdays.Of course, the president had staff there, too, you know, taking notes of everything that was happening.So I never saw a shred of difference between the two as it related to differences or anything else.And I don’t remember paying any attention; I didn’t pay any attention to his comments on Charlottesville.

A Rift in the GOP

That's OK. Let me ask you: Around the time period we’re in, about 40 different members of the party decide to leave Washington, including the speaker [Paul Ryan].What had fundamentally changed within the Republican Party, post-Charlottesville?

OK, so if I could, you’re saying that 40 members left service.They decided not to serve anymore.Yeah, so, you know, when I ran for the Senate back in 2006 and starting serving in 2007, you know, the Republican Party cared about its leadership role in the world and felt like that as we, through our leadership with others, fledging democracies, other countries that shared our values, that—in allying with people like that and making the world more stable by sharing those Western values, that we were actually making the world safer for our own people.I believe that to this day.

But obviously, under the current regime, under President Trump, that whole notion of United States’ leadership, not—and that doesn’t, you know, I’m not talking about, you know, entering wars unnecessarily; I’m talking about our leadership on things like human rights, on modern slavery, on, you know, institutions of democracy, NATO, those types of things.Obviously, with this president, with President Trump, that in essence went out the window.We cared about spending, you know, fiscal—fiscal issues.And I’ve never seen anything go so far out the window.It’s like, you know, the two parties now are bidding against each other to see how much money can be spent, and if you look at what we’re doing each year, just in congressional spending, it’s really is what—the reason we pass so many bills is both sides get everything they want, right?There’s no constraint.And so it’s pretty easy in that kind of environment for a lot of things to happen.And again, that just had not been the Republican Party.

And obviously, trade, you know.I look at the willy-nilly throwing around of tariffs on people, waking up one day and, you know, you have a personality dispute with someone, and so you put tariffs on their country and you affect American businesses.The president always seemed to think that the other countries were paying the tariffs, but, you know, as we all know, our own citizens and our own companies were paying those tariffs, not other people.

And so, you know, the whole issue of trade, obviously it needs to be fair, but we had opportunities to counter what China was doing and Southeast Asia and other places by working together on those types of things and obviously that kind of thing is out the window.

And let me say, you know, Republicans generally have been pro-democracy, you know?And, you know, we saw so many Republicans unfortunately over the last 45 days indicate that, “Well, wait a minute”—and we’ve always felt, by the way, the Electoral College was the way for us to have elections, creating fairness across the board.And so, I mean, there’s so many norms.And if I could, I’ve always looked at Republicans—I know the other side of the aisle will discredit what I’m saying, I’m sure—I’ve always looked at Republicans as adults, as people who had to make tough decisions, unpopular decisions.You know, keeping spending down is unpopular.Some other decisions made us unpopular.But it’s just all of that seems to have gone out the window.

Now, that’s not to—you know, there are many members that still care about those kind of things, but the party as a whole.Grievances—I mean, to me, I mean, you know, we’re the party of Lincoln, you know?You know, to—to be race-baiting, to be demeaning people because of their color or their background, I mean, that’s—I’m sorry, that’s just not the Republican Party that I grew up in.I’m in East Tennessee, you know.We’ve always been the part of our state that was more moderate in its thinking.… And I don’t consider myself a moderate, but I’m talking about moderate in its thinking as it relates to those kinds of issues.

And then I’ll just close with this.I mean, I look at the Republican presidents, generally speaking, that we’ve all admired.They had a vision for our country, right, a vision as to where to go.Many Democrat presidents have had the same.But instead, ours became the party of grievances, right?There was no vision.Matter of fact, I can’t think of a vision speech that this president gave, not one.I can’t think of a “This is where we’re going.”It was all about grievances.It was all about, you know, getting back at people that had done us wrong, individuals that did us wrong; if they were disabled or whatever, getting back at them.

So it just isn’t—the party doesn’t have the tone.And yet I’ll be the first to say that there were certain policy gains that Republicans should cherish.But as far as ever, ever electing a person that becomes anywhere close to the characteristics of President Trump, I hope that never, ever happens again, never repeats itself. …

Chaos in the Trump White House

I wonder—I can’t help but have that visual of you on the phone with all of these seasoned veterans of foreign policy, the military, American businesses, Tillerson, Mattis, I’m thinking of those folks, calling you at times in which there is this incredible chaos, there is this incredible shift happening in the way Washington works and the White House works.How difficult was that to witness?

Well, I mean, you know, you just were aware of what was happening.And by the way, most of those calls came from within the White House itself.I remember getting calls, you know, and again, I would never mention names, but I remember getting a call one morning, “Look, Corker, you’ve got to call over here at 9:45.The president’s getting ready to make a decision at 10:00, and he’s really heading into a bad place.Would you please call at 9:45?”Because, you know, he had a tendency to, the last person that called him ended up having the biggest effect.Now, I don’t know if that was still the case in the last two years, but early on, I mean, everything was new to the president, you know.He’d never done it before.And actually—I don’t mean this even to be critical—I was honored to be able to be called upon to make those calls and the people inside the White House thought that it might make a difference.

But the point is, there wasn’t a real sort of vetted process towards decision-making.The president on one hand was the most accessible president ever.I’ve served with three: President Bush, President Obama, President Trump.By far the most accessible president.I mean, if you knew how to—if you knew how and when to reach him, you could do it instantaneously.I cherished that, OK?It was outstanding.I mean, you know, there wasn’t a single day—that if I wanted to talk to him, I could.And of course as time went on, we talked much less, especially after Charlottesville.And then after October, we had another disagreement publicly.And it began to diminish over time, although we still talked some up until the end.

The flip side of all that is that everybody had access to him.So, I mean, there might be some fringe—not might be, there would be some fringe character that would call at 11:00 at night with this conspiracy-type thinking, and, you know, the president would come in the next morning and upend all the discussions that had been taking place around a particular topic.So it cut both ways.

I will say, he was at it all of his waking hours.You know, he was, you know, talking to people.But again, never did they—never did he allow, and no one was ever to put in place, any kind of structured situation where you’re at least vetting the people that were talking to him.My staff in the Senate spent the whole week, every week, figuring out who I was going to meet with, and were they vetted?Were they real?Did they have points that were intelligent?And, you know, unfortunately, that was difficult for chiefs of staff at the White House.

Let me ask you about a moment, which is the celebration of the tax cuts at the White House.These are allies and colleagues of yours who are heaping praise on the president in that moment.You know, but this is also after Charlottesville, and I’m just wondering if you can help us kind of make sense of those two things: that this is, in Orrin Hatch’s words, potentially the greatest president ever, but this is also a president, you know, that we’ve just seen dog whistling.

Yeah. So, look, I think, again, it was a juxtaposing, if you will, of policies that, you know—and Orrin Hatch, I mean, this is something that he was head of the Finance Committee and wanted to do for—a very decent human being, Orrin Hatch.And so I think what you saw was constantly that juxtaposing between, you know, accomplishing policies, realizing the president was unusual in nature, certainly I would say even in—obviously I’ve said many times—in character.But I think, you know, people tried to—and especially people in leadership positions.I remember Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell, I mean, they obviously, they had to lead a caucus or they had to lead the House.They had to move it to a place while obviously still dealing with someone who was volatile, was, you know, was all over the board, would do things that were obviously reprehensible.

And so I was not in those positions.I was able to—I mean, I was chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee and hopefully was able to accomplish a good deal.But because they had—you know, when you look at leadership, and I don’t mean this to be pejorative, but leadership is followership, right?I mean, you’re basically, if you’re going to be in those leadership positions, you’re following your caucus; you know, you’re kind of—you know, get a sense of where things are going.

And so they had multiple forces.The base was strongly behind the president.They knew that.That meant that the elected officials that they basically were leading were very aware of that, very cognizant of that.And so they had to really—not to give excuses, but they were in—they were in a complex situation, a very complicated arrangement, and again, trying to do, from their perspective, what they thought was best for the country.

The First Impeachment

We could be talking about the polling today, to be honest.I mean, there are these same concerns about, you know, how to respond to the base.Let me ask you about the first impeachment just for a moment, and specifically Adam Schiff’s closing statements, where he makes the case about guardrails, that this president needs guardrails because he’s going to do this again.And around the time Susan Collins says something to the effect of, you know, “He’s going to learn his lesson; this is going to be a warning.”What did you think of that discussion and that debate and the way, again, the political divisions were sort of battling it out?

I—first of all, I don’t want to speak to any particular individual.You know, I have respect for Susan, and, you know, I don’t really know Adam Schiff.Obviously I know who he was and dealt with him, if you will, somewhat from afar, across the building, across the Capitol building when I was there.But I—look, the president—let me just go back to the White House.The president does need guardrails, and that’s why you saw some of the most outstanding people that have ever offered public service in our country stay for a while, to offer guardrails.I mean, if you listen to interviews or talk to Gen. Kelly, why did he stay there, you know?Guardrails.What did he say to the person coming in?“Don’t get a bootlicker or you’re going to end up being impeached.” And?

So the president, you know, I can remember calls that he made to me, and, you know—you know, most of the calls that I get are on a cell phone, and I won’t mention particular countries, but you figure that other countries are listening in; it’s just a fact of nature.They drive around Washington, you know, collecting surveillance, right?I mean, that’s what happens on a daily basis.And so just the kind of things the president would call you and ask you to do, you’re realizing somebody in some other country is probably listening to some of that and recording that.And I mean, he just—he knows no bounds.I mean, they’re just—he doesn’t have an understanding of any type of boundary.It’s, I think, you know, likely he conducted his business that way for years.

He comes to Washington.In the beginning, you know, he was somewhat of a, you know, like anybody coming in who hadn’t been in government, somewhat, somewhat of a novice in the beginning as to—but as time went on, he obviously understood the game well, had no bounds, no boundaries, but understood the game well, and in my opinion, over the course of this period of time became darker and darker and darker, to the point—and part of that was that the connection that the, quote, “base” of Republicans who supported him had.

And I mean, it’s really good for people like me who served in the Senate to come back home for a while, right?I’ve been back for two years, and, you know, you’re coming home on the weekends when you’re not in the Middle East or some other place, but to be back home, I mean, to be home, I mean, people that I respect, that I’ve known all my life, the things that they believe, because this president has said them, is unbelievable to me.I mean, I just—I can’t even—you know, I can’t even carry on a conversation anymore about it. Because he said it, they believe it; they don’t trust the media.

And by the way, they hate the other side of the aisle so much that even if he does say things that may be sketchy, they—you know, we’ve gotten into a shirts-and-skins game, right?You’re either on one team or the other.And so it’s just been amazing to me.

And so I know the president—the president was obviously very aware of that attachment that people had to him, right, and how tight it was.And he could feel it.I mean, he goes to these rallies, he can feel it.And so here he perpeturates this total untruth about the election.And intelligent, hardworking Americans, you know, follow him lock, stock and barrel, and believe all the things—even though there were 60 court cases that failed, even though that was happening in Republican states, it was happening with Republican-appointed judges, still.I mean, we had a neighbor come over to our home just the other day, again, I—but it’s solid.And as the president, I think, felt that attachment, knew that the comment he had made during the campaign, where he could fire a gun down whatever street it was, and it wouldn’t matter; it became real.

And again, it demonstrated to me the tremendous fragility of our democracy, where you can have a leader like this perpetrating untruths, not just on the election, but at least half the time when he was speaking, perpetrating untruths.And yet, people believe it. …

So that’s scary.To me, that is a scary thing for our country to, first of all, have a leader who constantly is spewing untruths out there, but then to have that connection.And by the way, to his credit on that, he knew how to speak to people in a way that, you know, he kind of went from this pro-wrestling-esque figure in the beginning to someone who really had learned the system, you know, and had people following him in a way, following him after untruths that came close—came close to—we had terrible things happen on the 6th, but it could have been so much worse.

When you saw some of that language increasing on the campaign trail, you know, in the lead-up to the election—this is “Free Michigan”/”Liberate” the states movement; this is also a Proud Boys moment during the debates—did that concern you?Did that bring up memories of Charlottesville to you?

Well, to me, of course—you know, Charlottesville spoke to his leanings, his character on those issues.But to me, that was just the beginning point.You know, you mentioned something earlier in our discussion and, you know, honestly, before that, other than making sort of racial-oriented, racially oriented comments, demeaning people of other countries, coming from other places, I mean, other than—but to me, Charlottesville was the beginning realization of the true character of this person, as it relates to those kinds of things.

But it didn’t bring back memories of Charlottesville, because to me, where it’s gone is so much more unfortunately powerful and worse.So that was just sort of a foundational moment from my perspective.But to see where he’s been able to take that, to see these—you know, again, I want to say it one more time.Most of the people who support President Trump are hardworking Americans who are patriotic.But it has, the movement, with his encouragement, has attracted fringe groups that have the ability to do great damage to our country.

Sowing Doubt on the Election

Let me ask you about election night and the fraud language ramping up.And, you know, that we can almost expect; we’ve had a lot of warnings about that.But on the Hill, you know, you see a couple of things happening.You see folks like Kevin McCarthy back this language up, and you see folks like Sen. Graham, you know, go on cable and do something similar.You also see a lot of figures that are totally silent.And there at least seemed to be this decision that no one was going to say the words, “President-elect Biden.”That was like the one thing you couldn’t say.Tell me about the damage of the silence and the cost of all of these words.

Yeah, I mean, it was just—I couldn’t believe that it was—if you called President-elect Biden “President-elect Biden,” you were off the team.You were—and that’s not even the appropriate word.You were, you know—it was unbelievable to me, unbelievable that people—and then, “Well, no harm’s being done; we’ve got to let the process play out.”That—that—what that was doing—and I’m sure the people who did it, and again, I don’t want to point to any particular individual.They know who they are, and I’m sure many of them realize what has happened.I mean, they aided and abetted, in essence, this myth that’s been perpetrated—put forth around the country.And by the way, it’s going to hang there for a while.I mean, it’s not going away.That feeling of this election having been won fraudulently is going to hang out there for a while. …

And then—and I’m sure they feel—they wish they hadn’t done it, and, you know, I’m sure that it was done—I mean, again, these are tough positions these people are in.They’ve got two Senate races down in Georgia.They understand the president likely could take his football and go home or undermine it, which he ended up doing anyway.So, you know, they’re trying to—they’re trying to, you know, live with their own situation but also, you know, keep him on the team, if you will, through the election.And then he blows it anyway.

And I think that’s why you’re seeing some of the backlash, some of the anger that you’re seeing take place.I don’t want to say anger.You’re seeing some of the comments that are being made by certain senators.But—and some of them just strongly believe that the president, you know, demagogued this—and my guess is, I’d be surprised if the majority of them did not—but led us to a place that demonstrated how fragile our democracy is.

But again, then you had a group of senators and House members that took it to a different level.They were going to object to the Electoral College.Unbelievable. En masse.I know that individuals have done it in the past over an issue, and, you know, they shouldn’t have done it either, OK?But en masse. So then you’re perpetrating this myth even more fully.And then the president gets out there and says that, you know, Vice President Pence can overdo this.And you know, I respect what Vice President Pence did on the floor, but I would have liked it a whole lot more if two weeks before that, when the first—when the president first starting saying that, you know, Vice President Pence can overdo the election, if he said, “Whoa, wait a minute!First of all, I don’t have that power, but even if I had that power, that is never going to happen.”And he would have ended up in the same place with the president, right, and certainly people wouldn’t have been coming up there that day with thinking that that was a possibility, thinking that senators and House members were the first level of defense; the second level of defense was the fact that Pence could overturn it.

So I think that the lesson in all of this is if you accommodate a demagogue, if you accommodate a demagogue, if you accommodate someone who is telling untruths and leading hardworking Americans to a place, if you accommodate that, it can grow into something way beyond—way beyond what you ever fathomed.I don’t think people expected that people would actually, you know, break into the Capitol, that five people would die.But I think it does demonstrate, you know, the fragility of a democracy and how what you say matters.And hopefully the whole country has learned a great deal from this episode.

The Mob at the Capitol

… I wonder if I could just ask you about who those people were running through the Capitol and where do they fit in in the story that we’re talking about with the Republican Party.

Yeah, so look, you know, obviously, you know, I—I don’t know those people.I’m reading accounts in publications, you know, about who—some of the backgrounds.I think, you know, obviously you had some—my guess is—this is me not knowing the people who were in the building, but my guess is you had some people there who are militant-type people who planned to do really bad things.That would be a subset of what was there.

I think you had people who were—who got caught up in it, I mean, hearing the president, “Go up; if we—unless you fight, we lose.”And by the way, you’ve got these—I would say a lot of these people were reading these conspiracy things, you know, on the internet, on social media.And to them, what the president was saying, to some, it was just fact: “Go fight.”To others, it was a sort of a dog whistle to fight, right?You know, “You know what I’m saying, wink, wink, wink.” …

But believe me, there are people all across our country—it’s amazing—that truly believe the election was stolen, truly believe the election was stolen, will always believe the election was stolen.And while they might not rise to do something like that, they might, too, be someplace throughout our country where a group like this instigates—I’m talking about the fringe groups—instigates something, and they themselves get caught up in it, OK?

And so it’s a dangerous, to me, a very dangerous situation that this climate exists that was created by the president, the leader of the free world, you know, for months speaking untruths, and then being aided and abetted by others who didn’t want to speak out against that; some of them, by the way, some who actually agreed and thought that was true themselves, I’m sure, but many of them probably just aiding and abetting because the base felt so strongly about this president and supporting him.

But from where I sit, I’m not a doomsday sayer.I’m just saying, though, that as a nation, we have to be vigilant to ensure that this type of language, this type of untruth-speaking, we’ve got to be aware and push back—push back against it instantly, or we’re going to have other kinds of issues like this occur in our country, unfortunately.

… I think about Mitch McConnell’s speech right before the mob, you know, takes over the Capitol in which he sort of says, “Today is a new day, and we’re breaking with the president.”I think about Pence’s actions that day, and I think about the previous four years, and I think about the amount of senators that said to reporters, you know, “I didn’t see the tweet; I didn’t see the footage; I didn’t see the …; I didn’t see the …,” and the challenge now of trying to repair that damage to the democratic process that you reference.Is it—do they understand some of their culpability, maybe, in this over the years?

I mean, look. … First of all, every single person who walks into the Senate chambers or to the House chambers over a career of years, you know, can think of instances where we all could do better.I mean, it’s just a fast—it’s—it’s—you know, and the speed of things accelerated the entire 12 years I was there.And all of the public discourse accelerated the 12 years I was there.You know, when—and your questions accelerated, the media, right?I mean, it’s like, you know, God, you know, I mean, you had to—when I was going to go walk to go vote on the Senate floor, I had to, you know, I had to talk to my media person about, did anything happen in the last 20 minutes that I’m not aware of?And—and as soon as President Trump was elected, you know, something new was introduced there, and that is, there were cameras.It used to be just written reporters, right, taking notes.There might have been a camera or two.All of a sudden it became a reality show.I mean, truly, every day in my office—I was chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee—the committee, Foreign Relations meeting room was right down the hallway from my office.But every single day there were cameramen and women posted outside my door.Every day. That had never happened.

And so, you know, when you get back to the “I don’t want to comment about the Twitter,” I mean, you could spend your entire life responding to things that President Trump was doing on Twitter.I don’t want to make excuses, but you could.And sometimes I chose to; sometimes I chose not to.

But my point is, everything is—is different in the hallways of Congress than it was when I arrived January of ’07.Could people have conducted themselves better? Yes.Could—always. All of us can.Can you get wrapped up in the moment? Yes.Can you, you know, understand the dilemma between, you know, the base, which strongly supported the president and every single thing that he said?Maybe.And many of them would say, “Well, I don’t really like the way he said it, but I—but what he said is true,” versus where you are.And I think many senators and House members chose to—as I mentioned earlier, you pick your battles.Many of them didn’t engage in any battles.Now that’s not—that’s not a good thing, OK?Many of them just let it go and continued to heap praises on the president.

But I don’t know.I don’t want to—I think for all of us, this should be not so much a “Oh, gosh, why didn’t you do this in 2016, and why didn’t you do this in 2018?”I think that what our nation has seen is what can happen if you let those things go.I mean, what we saw happening with the, you know, “We’re going to object to the Electoral College; we’re going to have a vice president overturn”—that obviously didn’t happen.People coming in—that is the kind of thing that happens in Venezuela or happens in some other country, you know, not the United States of America.

And it could happen again. It could happen again.It really could.And so I think that as a nation, we should learn that having a leader who has the following of such a mass of people telling untruths, him telling untruths, them believing it, you could topple a democracy.You could get into a place where this country doesn’t exist the way that we know it today.

And so I would just say to everyone, look, we’ve learned a lot from this, and we should never, ever, ever go down this path again.And if we see a person coming down the pike that conducts themselves—we might like some of the policy things, but if they conduct themselves like this president has conducted himself, especially here towards the end, we need to make sure we do everything we can to make sure someone else is elected.

Now, again, you get back to the [shirts] and skins.I mean, what unfortunately is happening is, as much as people may look at what—the way he says things in disgust, they hate the other party so much, hate it so much, and I don’t know how we got here, OK, but how do you hate—you hate them so much that you’re willing to support someone who stands up to them, who makes fun of them, but at the same time demeans so much, demeans our nation, undermines our democracy in the process?

Biden Inherits a Divided Nation

What country does the new president inherit?

So, look, I—obviously a divided country.And I went on the Foreign Relations Committee as—to be a better senator.I’d been a business guy, knew nothing about foreign relations in 2007.Joe Biden was the chairman of the committee.Got to know him during that time.I spent a good deal of time with him while he was vice president.He’s a good human being. He is a good human being.I did not vote for Joe Biden.I’m sorry.I ended up writing in the name of someone who I thought had best demonstrated the way a president ought to—or the kinds of things a president ought to demonstrate.I didn’t vote for Trump; I didn’t vote for Biden.

But he’s inheriting a country that, I think—you know, he’s at a 65% approval rating right now based on the transition numbers.You know, polls, as we know, not necessarily right, but it looks like he’s gotten off to a good start.I look at the things that he says he’s going to do in the first period of time, and I don’t know.I would really focus on doing those things that unified our country, and I really would.I—I hope that he’ll do that.He’s—I know the Democratic—you know, we’re talking about the Republican Party, I know, in this.The Democratic Party has changed a great deal, too, OK?Let’s face it.I mean, we could have spent this entire length of time talking—talking about the changes in the Democratic Party, too.

And so you’ve got these parties that have really moved apart, really moved apart.And he’s going to be under extreme pressure.I’m speaking the same thing everyone else speaks all the time, I know, but he’s going to be under extreme pressure to deal with some of the push and the—what I would call the left ditch, which is not a place he would normally occupy and, of course, we have the right ditch on our side of the aisle, too.

But he’s inheriting a country—look, if you’re going to come into office—this is my opinion anyway.If you’re going to come in and serve in an elected position, you want to come at a time of crisis, right?I mean, you want to—you want to have an effect.He’s certainly coming into a country that just, with the way things are, we are in crisis as a nation as it relates to the lack of trust, lack of trust in people, in institutions, in media, in government, in companies.I mean, it’s just a tremendous lack of trust.And if I were him, I’d say, God, what a wonderful time to come in as president, to really try to mend that, to bring that together, do as much as I can to try to bring Americans back together and to demonstrate that I’m not a Democratic Party president; I’m a president of the United States.I know he’s said things like that, but obviously it’s what you do, not what you say.And I hope he begins this process in a manner that actually demonstrates that’s who he’s really going to be.

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