ACU Chairman Matt Schlapp on MSNBC: 10/28/2016

you for the next 11 days of this race as Trump still trails Clinton nationally in most recent polls. I want to bring in Matt Schlapp, who is a surrogate for Donald Trump, American Conservative Union as well. Matt, we have a lot to talk about, and I want to be clear here, one of the things we heard Donald Trump say was that the FBI is reopening the case into the Hillary Clinton private email server. The FBI did not actually use those words. They are reviewing some new information that the FBI Director James Comey was briefed on apparently just yesterday, according to this letter. Let me start with getting your overall reaction to this. I think you've been listening to the show, so you've heard what Donald Trump had to say. You've heard some of the news that has come out. Give me your take, sort of, from a big picture view. Well, the first thing is the FBI has just suffered a horrible reputation loss over the course of the last several months, and with all these emails that have been spewing out, there is so much wrongdoing in them that I think the FBI has to review them, and I think this is a better day for the FBI and for Jim Comey, because they could not continue to look the other way without just destroying the reputation of the FBI, which, as Americans, none of us want. Is this more about the FBI, Matt? Just to note, obviously, that Comey was a Republican for many years, sir. No, that's not true, by the way. Let me talk to you a little bit here about where you see this going, though, because is this about the FBI, or is this more about where this goes over the next 11 days and what it means to the Clinton campaign? Yeah, no, I just want to very quickly correct the record. James Comey served as our deputy AG in the Bush administration, and I was there when he was picked, and I talked to him personally about the fact that he had a Democratic past, so I just want to clear that up. Well, let me bring in Ari Melber, who has followed Director James Comey for a while. Ari, quick fact check here? Yeah, I mean, Jim Comey spoke previously, including in that testimony under oath, about having a Republican history. I mean, that's both a matter of public record, because he was a political employee. I'm going to finish speaking, and then you speak after other people are done talking. I'm just going to put out some facts first, though. He served as a political appointee in a Republican administration, that is a matter of the public record in the Bush administration, but under oath in his testimony and comments surrounding it, he talked about the fact that he, I believe, was registered in Virginia, where they may not have party registration, but he has previously voted as a Republican, now he's in a nonpartisan office. Those are all just matters of public record. As FBI director... May I go ahead and talk? Yes, I'll just finish. Okay, sir. As FBI director, his partisanship, though, isn't an issue. He's on a 10-year term and no longer is in a partisan role. You can go ahead. Yeah, all I'm telling you is I was the person at the White House he met with when he was picked. His Republican background is only the fact that he served as the deputy AG for President George W. Bush, and in that process, I talked to him about the fact that he has a Democratic background, but that we were happy to have Democrats in our administration, and other people did as well, and he was picked because he was a competent prosecutor, and I think today he has done something that helps his reputation, because whether he is a Democrat or a Republican, he has an obligation as the head of the FBI to root out criminal wrongdoing, and I think that's what he's attempting to do. Matt, I want to talk about what Donald Trump said just moments ago in New Hampshire as we take a look here in our split screen of the FBI director. Trump saying that he believes that this investigation, the news that he talked about at the top of this rally, means perhaps the system is not as rigged as he thought. Do you agree with him? I think a lot of Americans have looked at the FBI and they said, why is it that this General Cartwright, who Donald Trump just talked about, or other people who have mishandled classified information, have actually gone to prison? And why is it that the Secretary of State, who signed all these documents that said she understood what the chain of command needed to be on these documents, somehow got off? And why is it that she had a homebrew server and had these BlackBerries? How did all of these communications occur in a way that put our national security potentially at risk? And so I think a lot of people look at that and say, do the Clintons get a second or special set of rules because of the Clintons? And I think the FBI made the right and responsible decision today to say, you know what, it's got to be one set of rules for all Americans. Matt, as you were speaking, I want to pull up a live shot here of Hillary Clinton's plane as she has landed in Cedar Rapids. As we know, her running mate, Tim Kaine, just now at an early voting site in Tallahassee was asked about this news. All he said was, got to read a little bit more. Clearly, when coupled with what we heard from a Clinton campaign spokesperson earlier in this hour, quote, no idea, when asked about a response to this. This has caught not just members of Congress off board, not just off guard, rather, not just the Trump campaign off guard, but also the Clinton campaign and her running mate as well. I will note that our MBED, our campaign reporter who travels with Hillary Clinton, notes that she is taking a rather long time to deplane. We expect to see her any moment emerging from that door as she heads to her rally in Battle Ground, Iowa, where she may respond to this news publicly. Her campaign may respond to this as well. I am told now from our colleague, Kristen Welker, who was on that plane who you just heard from, that the campaign is not commenting just yet. So we will monitor that. I want to kind of continue the conversation with you here. We heard from some Republicans, including Paul Ryan, and if we can pull his statement on the screen just to refresh our memories here, talking about this being essentially a benefit, a positive. He is renewing his call for Hillary Clinton to not receive classified intelligence briefings from the Director of National Intelligence. How do you see this playing out now over these next 11 days? Do you see this becoming a political football, if you will, as we have seen evidence of already at Donald Trump's rally in Manchester? Unfortunately, I think it probably does. I would hope that something like this would not be, because when an investigation is going on there is something about it that should be separate and aside from politics. But because all of this is now central to this question of Hillary Clinton's campaign is saying Donald Trump does not have the moral integrity to be the President of the United States. That's what all of her ads say. That's her number one theme. The problem for Hillary Clinton is she stands on very precarious ground. With all of these emails that are coming out, even the campaign, the Hillary Clinton campaign itself is starting to respond to them, because it's an avalanche of facts about how they were able to put $60 million in Bill Clinton's pocket through working with the foundation and with this lobbying firm called Teneo. The fact that the Clintons went from dead broke to being worth hundreds of millions of dollars, these are questions that really kind of get to the heart of this question of character. And of course we've been down this road with the Clintons before, so unfortunately I think we'll be talking about this front and center for the next 11 days, and I'll be honest with you, I think we have a barn burner of an election here.