Rep. Laurel Lee Joins Dan Abrams: We Must Get Answers for the American People

joing us now Republican congresswoman Laurel Lee of Florida she's on the bipartisan task force to investigate the attempted assassination of Donald Trump she's also a former judge and federal prosecutor she serves on the house Judiciary Committee as well congresswoman thanks so much for coming on the show appreciate it all right do you think that my monologue here is being unfair in my concern about these conspiracy theories well I think what you're hearing is a tremendous amount of distrust and I will say you know some of that is predicated in fact uh we had just a few months ago Democrats in Congress calling for an end to any Secret Service protection for president Trump and the rhetoric is so harsh against him so so I absolutely agree that I think it's constructive at this point what we need to do is exactly what this task force has been has been given the responsibility of doing we need to get to the facts we need to talk to all of the witnesses the local law enforcement the people who were at the rally the Secret Service agents who were involved and get the information because when there is a lack of transparency that's when everyone that's when Americans are left to try to draw their own conclusions and that's what we're seeing here is a lack of information it's impossible to understand how a failure this critical could have happened and so what we need to do is as quickly as possible and as fairly as possible get Americans the answers that they need I think you're right about the the lack of transparency it does lead to things like this but but you know do you think it's Poss possible that the Secret Service or Christopher Ray orchestrated an assassination plot on President Trump well one thing I'll say as you know from my years as a federal prosecutor is that uh sometimes people will surprise you and and the whole purpose of an investigation is that you don't reach a conclusion before you start you go the opposite direction you let the facts and the evidence show you what happened what're that's what we'll be doing and this and this group this group of members of the task force we have former law enforcement we have former prosecutors we have former members of the military so this is a group that is very well equipped to start from the ground up figure out what happened I know last week I had the opportunity to go to Butler Pennsylvania and seeing the site itself was incredibly impactful uh anyone who's been there will tell you it's a very small location there were not very many buildings that needed to be secured so the the depth of this failure is very clear and it is important that we get to the bottom because they're still out there president Trump is having a rally uh today the vice president will be having rallies in coming days as well we need to be sure that when they are out there continuing to campaign that secret service understands what went wrong here and can keep them protected but I think you'd agree as a former judge and a former Federal prosecutor that making accusations against people or entities without any evidence to support it is not where you want to start right well sure that's not what we do you know we what what we are going to do is start with the evidence and see where that takes us um but I think the concern you know the level of fear and concern uh is is really coming from a place of of it being just so hard to understand how something like this could have happened and how grave this experience was and how important it is that we ensure that it never happens again so I know our task force we come in uh where where the evidence will take us that is our that is our job uh to make sure that we get those answers and get them to the American people and I think we are uniquely equipped to do that because of the resources and the ability that we have to bring all of the interested parties together yeah we're look we're counting on your task force right we're counting on you guys because this is important I don't care where you stand on the political landscape it is critical for all the reasons that you've laid out for us to get these answers I think maybe you're a little more forgiving than I am of those who are already pointing fingers without having evidence to back it up I would rather them speak the way you're speaking which is let's see where this takes us the lack of transparency is getting us into trouble than saying oh yeah you know putting up a big picture of Christopher Ray or suggesting that the Secret Service were behind it when they have no evidence to support it but well certainly we we we want to have faith in our institutions of government and our federal law enforcement officers we need them in our country to be uh to be following the Oaths they take and keeping our country safe uh so you know certainly as we go through this investigation um we will be expecting accountability we will be expecting answers uh but absolutely we are we are going to follow the facts follow the law as as we as as we go forward