Joe Lieberman - US Senator for Connecticut, 1989-2013 HARDtalk

It is his first visit as Chinese leader, and more

Welcome to HARDtalk, I'm Stephen Sackur.

A generation ago, the first President Bush proclaimed a new

world order which America would lead a example. 25 years on, and Donald

Trump is in the White House. So what kind of example is America setting

now? My guest is Joe Lieberman, former US Senator, Al Gore's vice

presidential running mate in 2000, and recently touted as a contender

for FBI director under the current president. Is Donald Trump

fundamentally changing America's global role?

Let's begin maybe have to begin, with an assessment of Donald Trump.

Are you alarmed or reassured by what you have seen?

Obviously President Trump ran a campaign unlike any we have

As a former officeholder, during the year I would run

into other officeholders or current elected officials, and we would go

through the latest thing that candidate Trump had said,

which he would have agreed would have ended our campaign.

Part of it was that the public wanted a change, wanted an outsider.

Because he was a successful businessman, they thought

he may be able to make the government work again.

He has brought the same style, spirit and unpredictability

I wonder whether you think that is appropriate?

The right thing for America at this time.

He really has to be more disciplined.

We're talking about foreign policy exclusively?

Part of why I think people elected him is for change.

He has implemented some change by executive order.

Pulling out of the climate change pact.

Withdrawing us from the TPP trade agreement.

Personally they are steps I don't agree with and are disappointed by.

The next most important thing, and has not happened yet,

to prove that his capacity as a leader, and experience

as negotiator, enables him to do something that has not been done

very much in recent years in Washington.

Bring Republicans and Democrats together.

Each to compromise to agree something.

Right now, the obvious place where that is necessary is on health care.

The atmosphere seems as toxic, poisonous as ever before.

We need to clarify what your party is.

You famously quipped the Democratic party more than ten years ago.

Ran against them won your Connecticut seat as an independent.

You infuriated save many in your party by actually backing

John McCain for president against Barack Obama in 2008.

I have to ask you did you vote for Trump?

I strongly voted for Hillary Clinton.

Many Democrats regard you as an traitor.

In 2006, because I stuck with the Iraq war longer than others.

This is part of the toxic atmosphere.

Even though my voting record was good on domestic issues.

I was challenged in the Democratic primary and lost.

The old Ronald Reagan line, not so much I left the Democratic party,

On the other hand I didn't become republican.

That perspective depends on the size of your ego.

What I'm saying is Democratic rejected may rejected my

One of my consultant said, you should run as an independent.

I am afraid the Iraq war will do you win.

They will have to push me out of they don't think

Of course they did, I was lucky enough to get elected.

I want to come back to the extent America may still be open

to a different brand of politics, getting away from the binary

What intrigues me now, within the last month or two,

you seriously toyed with the proposition of joining

the Trump team, in a sense, by taking seriously deep thought

you might become Trump's new director of the FBI.

If you say, it at the beginning of the interview, have serious

Who are a lot of people used to be in American politics.

But not so many anymore unfortunately.

I was raised to believe if the President of United States

calls to service, of the country, you have a profound obligation

to take that seriously, probably do it unless there

He has fired his FBI chief, because, and we now know

from the testimony of James Comey, he feels that Donald Trump

was telling him to close down an investigation into his first

National Security adviser, General Mike Flynn.

We'll know James Comey said, I hope you will know

A direct quote from James Comey, his direct recollection,

that Trump said I hope you can see your way to letting this go.

He's a good guy, I hope you can let this go.

Here is the point, I suppose there is a possibility that

a president I have such a profound difference in foreign

and domestic policy, that I would not seriously consider

what I would normally do, in a call to serve.

I don't think he has crossed that line.

I agree with a lot of what he has done foreign policy.

Of course I had the confidence and ego to think perhaps

I could make a difference as director of the FBI.

Take me into that conversation you had with Donald Trump.

In the end you refuse yourself because you believed

there was a conflict-of-interest, because of activities

When you Trump discuss the possibility of you becoming his

new FBI chief, did he at any point sake, if you take this

job you have to go easy on this Russia thing,

I don't like to talk about conversations I had

He said I would never ask you to do something or not do something that

You are the director of the FBI, you have to do what the law

And he added, I did not ask James Comey to do anything, either.

I don't know President Trump very well, met him over

I am aware for some of the things he said during the campaign,

If it comes down to this, Senator, if I may.

If you were to consider being his FBI chief,

you would have too believed he was a truth teller,

I don't think he has gone over the line on either of those.

His presidency is a work in progress.

The director of the FBI is an important role.

This is part of the problem in Washington.

I don't like that Democrats, my party, had gone into

what they have called themselves, the resistance.

Anything that Trump recommends, forget it, we are opposed to it.

What happens in that case, the country does not solve

any of its problems, take any opportunities.

There is no compromise to get things done.

We will not deal with immigration reform.

Any of the rest that we need to deal with.

Not look at people in the other party as the enemy.

He knows I was a strong supporter of Secretary Clinton last year.

That did not stop him from asking me to do this.

The fact I did not support him, disagreed with some of the things

he has done as president should not stop me considering taking

In the last few days Trump has publicly reflected on the friendship

between James Comey, he fired, and Robert Mueller,

now the special counsel in charge of investigating

Trump says he finds it very bothersome that they are friends.

De think he has a right to say that, and say it in public?

One thing we have to accept is that president Trump will say a lot

of things in public that other elected leaders have

I understand particularly because he feels he is unfairly

targeted, while he will worry as result of learning

about what I think is a professional friendship and relationship

I don't know Comey, I do know Bob Mueller.

There is at least as high likelihood that Bob Mueller will look

at the facts and decide the president has done nothing

wrong or actionable, as he will find wrongdoing.

You lived through the impeachment of a Democratic

Do you think, now you look at how this is unfolding,

we may see the impeachment of Donald Trump?

In other words, based on what we have heard so far,

including Comey saying in his testimony before the Senate

there was no evidence he has seen the president being involved

in collusion with the Russians, meddling in the US election.

The case, the president needs to do something criminal, probably not.

To try to protect General Flynn from prosecution.

My guess is, they will be a lot of sound and fury coming

In the end Bob Mueller, the special counsel has the power

I would be very surprised if this ends up impeachment.

Let me ask you about the Democrat party, I'm intrigued in this

interview keep calling it your party.

Bernie Sanders says the lessons of the last election

The American people are fed up with the elites that

have run their lives and neglected their

He says the Democratic party has been a part of that problem.

The system is rigged against ordinary people, rigged

in favour of the billionaires, the Democrats must find a leadership

prepared to express that the basis for fighting a political battle

Which is to say there are some people in the US who feel that way.

In my opinion, there are a lot more who want Republicans

and Democrats to come together and get something done.

I think Bernie Sanders did as well as he did

in the primaries only in part because of what I would call

You say the Democrats have to get over this idea they have the present

Sanders is saying absolutely on the country.

-- Sanders is saying absolutely on the contrary.

The only way we can build a movement to take back the White House

Perhaps this is a way to clarify what I'm saying.

I think Democrats have a responsibility to oppose Trump

when they have a policy reason to do so.

And they should do it with real vigour.

At some point they have to decide, for instance, on health

care and tax reform, whether they want to negotiate

to get something done, whether this will be two years

It is a difference between what seems to be a times

Anything Trump and the Republicans want, we are against.

Really principled and aggressive promotion

You have spent much of your life either in New York or Washington.

You are an elite Democrat, precisely the reason the Democrats

are not getting traction, in the rust belt states,

where Donald Trump actually found his path to victory?

I spent most of my life in Connecticut.

Always did very well in Connecticut amongst

working-class Democrats, independents, and

Sometimes they knew it was because I was not a captive

I was really fighting for them, trying to get things done for them.

Medicaid Tip at ultimately you walked out of your party precisely

because of your differences with the mainstream of your party on a host

of foreign policies, in particular Iraq. It seems to me that you have

not learned the lesson of what America has done, in the least, over

the last two decades. Endless interventions, endless commitment

and belief that America could change the rules of the game and sow the

seeds of democracy in a host of countries where they do not have a

history of democracy and it has failed time and again. Yet you seem

to remain a hawkish liberal interventionist. Why? I think that

is the right place for us to be. In the face of evidence? Let me say

again that I did not walk away from the Democrats. This is important.

The Democratic Party rejected my candidacy for re-election based on

one issue, Iraq. It was classic of what politics is in America. I

believed... I knew that if I supported the war I knew that the

Bush administration had made a serious mistake after the war was

won in trying to reconstruct Iraq. But I thought that if we withdrew it

would be a cataclysm are not only for Iraq for the credibility of

America in the world and our lot depends on our credibility in the

world. My record beyond that was a strong pro- democratic, that is pro-

Democratic Party record. Leaving Iraq for a moment and talking about

Iran. Barack Obama pulled together a nuclear deal with the Iranians, with

the P5 plus one. He got that deal in the deal is intact.

Rex Tillerson testified to say the Iranians are meeting

Yet, you continue to say, one time you called it shameful.

You continue to call for new sanctions to

Iran is still by our own State Department determination,

the number-1 state-sponsored terrorism.

Iran has tens of thousands of its own forces in Syria,

Iran represses its own people in a way, the regime does come in a way

This is all way more complicated than you have just outlined.

In Syria, Iran is backing Bashar Al-Assad, to even some

in Washington now represents some sort of stability in the face

of the threat of Islamic State and other jihadists organisations.

Equally in Iraq, Iran's role in Iraq has been, over the years,

essentially buttressed by the war America started.

Right now we are doing better in our relations

Quite successful in Mosul, in rolling back Isis.

I don't know where to begin to respond first time

here in London, part of a group called United against Nuclear Iran.

We are focused on businesses in 2008.

To observe the economic sanctions, not doing business in Iran.

Since the Iran nuclear agreement, we have been saying to businesses

It is a high risk situation for any business.

A lot of the other sanctions are still there.

It remains a place where there is not really rule of law.

A dominant influence by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps,

which as been designated a terrorist organisation.

Any business doing business with it may subject itself

Quickfire thoughts on the role America in the world

Trump said he would rip up the deal with the Iranians.

He also came to office saying he would move the Israeli

Something you very actively supported.

Now seems he would not do that either.

Do you think Donald Trump, in reality, is rather different

from the Donald Trump of Twitter promises and outrageous comments?

The foreign policy of the Trump organisation is a work of progress.

Some of the changes you describe should be encouraging

to people who are in a panic about what they Trump

Not necessarily to you, in a sense you are more hawkish

I don't like breaking of the trade agreements.

I don't like pulling out of the climate change pact, etc.

There is a steadiness, leaning towards change on most

The big area of changing the Trump foreign policy,

from President Obama is in the Middle East.

I think Trump has said very clearly, we have two

enemies in the Middle East, and I think he's

The friends in the Arab world, and Israel.

We will support our friends, and oppose our enemies

until they prove to us, Iran, that they are

That is significant, already having effects on the ground.

Both in terms of the unprecedented diplomatic and military activity

in the Gulf Arab nations, and this remarkable coming together

A final thought, when you talk about his change of policy

from Obama in the Middle East, you are focused on one

Perhaps not taking account of what Trump means,

and the impact he's having on America's partners

Let me quote you Angela Merkel, ending his interview, she says this.

She says time for Germany and Europe to take their fate

The time we can rely on others, and clearly referring

Do you worry, as someone who has was wanted America to play very

Under Trump, America's most staunch partners and allies have fundamental

doubts about whether America is still the world's leading power?

Of course, because I believe in a foreign policy that

I would urge people like Chancellor Merkel

and others who have doubts about President Trump's foreign

Acknowledge that although he has said Nato was obsolete,

and when he came to Europe he did not say he supported article

I think he will prove himself to be a better ally than people think.

Look, the world, our allies, they need us

You are remarkably kind of Donald Trump.

The cynic in me wonders whether you still want him

No, when he offered me the job, it was a time of real

When he first called me, I said to him, Mr President,

I am honoured, I will think about it because you are the president.

I must tell you I love my life since I left the Senate.

Joe Lieberman, thank you very much for being on HARDtalk.