Gingrich: Investigators need to be questioned under oath

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Gingrich: Investigators need to be questioned under oath

Former House speaker shares his perspective on 'Hannity.'

This is a rush transcript from "Hannity," December 7, 2017. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

SEAN HANNITY, HOST: Welcome to "Hannity."

We have major breaking news about the rampant political, bias that is now infecting your justice system like a cancer. It is threatening the very foundation of the rule of law in America. Fox News reporting tonight, a DOJ official has been demoted for highly suspicious meetings with Christopher Steele, now the creator of the Clinton bought and paid for fake news, Russia propaganda, anti-Trump dossier and for a meeting with Fusion GPS co-founder Glenn Simpson.

We have all of the details. Also FBI Director Christopher Wray is grilled by lawmakers. Wait until you see this epic showdown on Capitol Hill over the Trump hating FBI agent Peter Strzok over the rampant political bias in the Special Counsel's office and of course, the corrupt Clinton email investigation. This was incredible today.

Plus, we have the very classless Barack Obama continuing to attack President Trump. This time he is actually warning that America could turn into Hitler's Nazi Germany. And of course the tinfoil hat crackpot over a conspiracy TV. MSNBC somehow managed to hit a new low, if that is even possible. We'll tell you about that. We'll get to all of that and so much more into nights breaking news "opening monologue."

It gets deeper and deeper every day. We start with breaking news. Another glaring example of political bias at your Department of Justice. Our very own James Rosen, he joins us tonight with an exclusive report. James, it gets bigger every minute.

JAMES ROSEN, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Sean, good evening. When Fox News first queried the Justice Department about associate deputy Attorney General Bruce Ohr, a top officials, just four doors down from Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein, we were told that Ohr had been stripped of his title and his office a few hours before our inquiry. Later DOJ told us that Ohr had lost that job because he is also and remains director of DOJ's organized crime drug enforcement task force. And that his wearing of two hats was, quote, "unusual."

Finally this afternoon, DOJ officials acknowledged the real reason for Ohr's stunning demotion yesterday. Namely that he withheld from superiors his meetings last year with two controversial figures. Investigators for the House Intelligence Committee had uncovered that Ohr met with Christopher Steele, the former British spy who authored the infamous anti-Trump dossier with input from Russian forces. And he also met with Glenn Simpson, the founder of Fusion GPS, the opposition research firm that pays deal with funding from the Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee.

The dossier was given to the FBI in July 2016 around the same time that Donald Trump accepted the GOP nomination. Former FBI Director James Comey has described the dossier as a collection of salacious and unverified material about Mr. Trump and his associates.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, JULY 8)

SEN. RICHARD BURR, R-N.C.: I'm not sure when the FBI first took possession of it, but the media had it before you had it and we had it. At the time of your departure from the FBI, was the FBI able to confirm any criminal allegations contained in the Steele document?

JAMES COMEY, FORMER FBI DIRECTOR: Mr. Chairman, I don't think that that is an question I can answer in the open setting because it goes into the details of the investigation.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROSEN: Republican investigators from the House Intelligence Committee issued a fresh subpoena on DOJ today for information on Bruce Ohr. They are looking to determine whether the Democratic funded dossier was used to obtain FISA surveillance on a Trump campaign advisor named Carter Page -- Sean.

HANNITY: Big question. James Rosen, thank you tonight from Washington.

Now this whole thing, I tell you was a house of cards, it is beginning to crash down. I promise you there is a lot more information that is still not come out as of yet. Tick tock to all of our friends out there on Twitter, because we are only scratching the surface here.

For example, Sara Carter reporting tonight, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes will issue a subpoena to Bruce Ohr for information about his meetings regarding this anti-Trump dossier. And also tonight, House lawmakers grilling the FBI Director Christopher Wray on Capitol Hill about new information regarding the Trump hating FBI agent Peter Strzok after Strzok was fired from Robert Mueller's investigation. Why? For bashing Trump in text messages to his FBI official girlfriend, also part of the team.

Now, before we show you the video, remember Strzok signed the document that started the entire Russian investigation. And Strzok's team was assigned to handle the dossier when it was first given to the FBI. And Strzok oversaw the interview a former National Security Adviser Lieutenant General Michael Flynn. Andy played a key role in the Clinton email investigation -- this guy never slept -- including, by the way, attending Hillary's FBI interview that was not under oath. He was also there at the interviews of Clinton's top aides, Huma Abedin, Cheryl Mills, who we know lied and Strzok is responsible for changing the key language in James Comey's statement that exonerated Hillary Clinton before the investigation from grossly negligent, which is the legal standard, to extremely careless.

Now they have all of this information, take a look at this show down, it is epic from today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIPS)

REP. JOHN RATCLIFFE, R-TEXAS: What we have learned about FBI agent Strzok is that it is the one FBI agent that is literally at the epicenter of every virtually every major decision that the FBI has been involved in an action and inaction about the candidate Trump, about President Trump, and about candidate Clinton. And if that one agent at the center or source is decidedly anti-Trump and decidedly pro-Clinton, that raises real questions.

REP. BOB GOODLATTE, R-VA.: I am sure that you are aware of the recent media reports indicating that Peter Strzok who was a special agent at the FBI change the words "grossly negligent" to "extremely careless" in former Director Comey statement closing the Clinton investigation.

CHRISTOPHER WRAY, FBI DIRECTOR: Gross negligence is the language in the statute I believe. But I believe also that almost anybody who grabbed a thesaurus would say that gross negligence and extremely careless are pretty darn close to each other.

REP. TREY GOWDY, R-S.C. : You are right. They are synonyms. Extremely careless is a synonym for gross negligence which begs the question, why change it?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This guy gets on your supposedly unbiased team in the first place?

(END VIDEO CLIPS)

HANNITY: You watch today, you saw something that we have been telling you now for a long time that other networks that say that they are fair, and balanced, objective and they consider themselves to be real journalists, never talk about. Pretty amazing.

Peter Strzok, that is the Trump hating, Clinton loving FBI agent, he is tied to everything. Including the fake news dossier. Watch very closely, an amazing moment, Congressman Jim Jordan connecting all of the dots. You know, kind of like we have been doing on the show. Why? Because it is the truth. Something missing in today's world of so-called journalism, which I said was dead back in '08. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. JIM JORDAN, R-OHIO: Peter Strzok, the guy who ran the Clinton investigation, interviewed Mills, Abedein, interviews Secretary Clinton, changed gross negligence, a crime, to the term extreme carelessness, ran the Russian investigation, who interviewed Mike Flynn, gets put on Mueller's team and then he gets kicked off for a text message that is anti-Trump. If you kicked everybody off Mueller's team that was anti-Trump, I don't think there would be anybody left. So there has got to be something more here.

My hunch is that it has something to do with the dossier. Director, did Peter Strzok helped produce and present the application to the FISA court to secure a warrant to spy on Americans associated with the Trump campaign?

WRAY: Congressman, I am not prepared to discuss anything about the FISA process in this --

JORDAN: Did Peter Strzok, was he involved and taken out to the court?

WRAY: I'm not going to discuss in this setting anything to do with the FISA court applications.

JORDAN: It is been reported that this dossier was all dressed up by the FBI, taken to the FISA court and presented as a legitimate intelligence document -- that it became the basis for granting a warrant to spy on Americans. I am wondering if that actually took place. It sure looks like it did.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: Now, what Congressman Jordan is talking about, and what we have now been getting at for months is that this is critical to the entire so-called Russian investigation. You have everybody in the liberal, mainstream, destroy-Trump-media trying to make this all about nonexistent Trump-Russia collusion. It has been a year, no evidence. But they have all been missing the point and frankly deliberately misleading and lying to you, the American people. They are lazy and they are overpaid. It is pathetic.

The big story and all of this is the growing possibility, yes, it is emerging, that the FBI used the Clinton bought and paid for Russian dossier to obtain a FISA warrant to spy on American citizens that were connected to candidate and then-President-elect Trump. Now, that would be weaponizing the very powerful tools and using them against an opposition party in an election year.

Now, let's be clear here. It is not a smoking gun quite yet, but it is coming. But that is all where the signs now are pointing to. We will follow this every single step of the way, we are ahead of the curve. Please stay with us.

And one more very important point. Can anyone explain to me, anybody at all, how Robert Mueller's investigation can be described as fair, impartial, not bias? Let's imagine for just a second that it is you, it is your family member or somebody that you love and care about, your friends. Would you really want Robert Mueller and his team a partisan political hacks investigating you? Would you want a group of people who donated over $50,000 to the Democrats and filled with unethical officials and attorneys coming after you, that hate one candidate, love the other candidate? Would you really trust them to be fair? Do you think that this is how the justice system is supposed to work? Because I don't think so.

And also tonight, yes, no class Barack Obama back again. What is he doing? Launching a new far left attack against President Trump, warning that America could turn into Nazi Germany. Now he is speaking at the Economic Club of Chicago, and Obama said that the danger today is, quote, "Growing complacent, we have to tend to this garden of democracy, or else things could fall apart quickly. That's what happened in Germany in the 1930s which despite the democracy of the Weimar Republic and centuries of high-level cultural scientific achievements, Adolf Hitler rose to dominate. Sixty million people died. So, you've got to pay attention and you have to vote."

All right. Very cute, very clever comparing the president in a subtle way to Adolf Hitler and Nazis. Obama, by the way, how are your unrepentant domestic terrorist buddies Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn doing? Oh, and by the way, please send our best wishes to the Church of G-d America and the Reverend Jeremiah Wright.

Now, the former president is obviously sick, pathetic, and twisted in this obsession with President Trump. It was kind of like everybody in the media. And every single chance that Obama gets, whether it would be here, home, overseas, does not matter, he is trashing and trying to undermine the president. Maybe he cannot get over the fact that his record was atrocious. Maybe he needs to take his own advice and accept the results of the election. OK, President Obama, Hillary lost. A time for you, too, to get over it. And by the way, I know this is probably impossible, but maybe tried taking some notes from George W. Bush. Because George W. Bush never criticized you, not one time after he left office, because he actually respected the office more and thought it was more important.

Finally, tonight, over a conspiracy TV MSNBC, crazy liberal Joe and his cohorts over at that network, well, they are at it again, now stooping to a new low of attacking and trying to discredit the president in a segment only Chicken Little could be proud of. Liberal Joe and his panel of never-Trump hating sycophants had a collective meltdown during some deranged and reckless speculation about the president's health. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, MSNBC)

STEVE SCHMIDT, FORMER MCCAIN SENIOR CAMPAIGN STRATEGIST: He is clearly slurring his words, I don't know what the cause of it is.

The question of his fitness -- of his stability is in the air.

JOE SCARBOROUGH, CO-HOST: At the beginning of the speech before the slurring started, I said, Mika, look at him. This is not the person that we knew even three years ago.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He does not look in great physical shape. And he has not for some time.

JOE SCARBOROUGH: Now it's Republicans that are coming to us and saying, the president of the United States is not mentally fit.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: You are not mentally fit to host the TV show.

There you have it. Arm chair conspiracy psychology from America's most unhinged liberal morning show host and his band of merry Trump haters. It makes you wonder why liberal Joe has so much rage and contempt for this president. Joe, you are kind of scaring us. I will pay for therapy if you need it.

Joining us now with reaction, counsel to the President, Kellyanne Conway is with us. All right. Forget about those people, because it is a joke. At this point, they are caricature of themselves, but the more important issue is this. Is this a fair investigation? Could you imagine if this was against the Democratic president, only donors to the Republican Party, people that were texting back and forth involved in the investigation that hate one side and love the other side. At some point, Kellyanne, you have to say, don't we need a justice system that is fair and balanced?

KELLYANNE CONWAY, COUNSELOR TO PRESIDENT TRUMP: The president has always said that, he respects the rank-and-file at the Department of Justice and the 35,000 or so who works for the FBI, but we cannot have politicizations of any investigation. It should be transparent, it should be independent. And what you and James Rosen and other reporters who care to know all of the facts have uncovered is very troubling to any American who is paying attention.

This Peter Strzok, boy, he has the busiest guy in Washington, D.C. I don't know if I've ever seen 10,000 texts to my life let alone to one person. He is carrying on this relationship, he is sending 10,000 texts, he is putting energy into being systematically against Donald Trump which is not his job. He is really at the eye of the hurricane of so much. He is changing the language to protect Hillary Clinton. It sounds like he is present when her top confidantes are being interviewed.

He is present when she is being interviewed. This is the entire problem that Americans have with Washington, D.C., and had with Hillary Clinton. The idea that she is always above the law. There is a double standard, and Sean, anybody, and this includes everybody who has wasted all of 2017 talking about Russia, Russia, Russia in this investigation. They are duty- bound to cover this aspect of the investigation.

This guy and the Department of Justice is four doors down from his boss, the deputy Attorney General. He is in main justice, he is on the main floor there. And he is meeting after Donald Trump along which they did not expect and they did not want. He is meeting with the guy who put together a dossier using DNC and Clinton campaign money and trying to figure out a way to discredit the new democratically elected president. It stinks to high heaven.

And look, I think there is so much going on so quickly with all of this information that it is very easy for Americans to just tune it out or feel confused or it does not affect me. What are we doing for Christmas? What is going on for New Year's? They will pay attention. And part of it is that the media had set a trap for themselves. They have been so obsessed for a year plus, with what they consider to be an important investigation. They would be talking about Russia and not America.

But it also shows something else. I want to say one more thing. Hillary Clinton -- she has every advantage possible. All of the kings horses and all the kings men, so much more money and so much more personnel. She has all of the mainstream media. She has all of the Democrats, she has so many people behind her. Two presidents, her husband and her predecessor who is by the way, whose record did not get a third term to her candidacy, Barack Obama's. She had all of these advantages, and then after she loses, she still has advantages.

She still has people going for her. Donald Trump won on the issues. He was a much better brilliant communicator and messenger. His ideas prevailed, hers failed. And this idea on his health is offensive. I will not even dignify except to say, remember when Hillary Clinton folded like an accordion in front of the whole world on 9/11? We said nothing about it the whole day at the campaign. Zero.

She pulled in front of everyone. And apparently she has had pneumonia two days earlier. You know what she did that night? She was at -- with her high class donors. Calling the rest of us, irredeemable and deplorable with pneumonia. And then she takes five days off before the debate, Donald Trump doing seven rallies a day and showing up to the debate to beat her. She is taking time off of the rest and we will talk about his health as a joke. And he is the most energetic person I know.

HANNITY: I do remember her collapse and a bunch of other issues that came up during that campaign. Kellyanne, good to see you. We appreciate it.

CONWAY: Thank you.

HANNITY: And thank you so much, by the way, those images that you are seeing, Ventura County, San Diego, California. You have these wildfires now raging out of control. You have the high blowing Santa Ana winds coming in. It has really, really -- these are chilling photos. We will keep an eye on it all throughout the night tonight.

Here with more reaction first though is Salem radio nationally syndicated host Larry Elder, former secret service agent Dan Bongino, and look, we have to be careful.

I respect rank and file secret service, FBI, intelligence people. That is not what we are talking about. We are talking about the highest level within these agencies, clearly covering up for Hillary Clinton before they ever investigate. And literally applying one double standard after another using pro-Hillary, anti-Trump prosecutors to do it. This literally is a threat to our entire legal system. If this holds up, your thoughts?

DAN BONGINO, FORMER SECRET SERVICE AGENT: You know, Sean, I'm really terrified right now, and you know, I know that that sounds hyperbolic to some of the Democrats listening, but I mean it as a formal federal agent who has been inside both the White House and inside the federal government, do you realize the awesome power the federal government has? It is so powerful that a sitting president, the most powerful man in the world has been targeted by it, by a clearly political process, this is not a criminal process, this is a political process, and there is nothing he can do.

Sean, I get it, there are people in the government that have political opinions, everybody understands that. But I am asking the audience, what are the chances that everybody with a strong political opinion, which is both anti-Trump and pro-Hillary managed to wiggle their way into the Justice Department and influential positions in the FBI and had decision- making power over both the special counsel investigation and the Hillary investigation. Listen to me, this is a scam. And if this is allowed to proceed, Americans faith in the constitutional Republic is going to be shaken. I promise you.

HANNITY: Larry Elder, let's put on your legal hat for just a second, maybe some people -- most people know that you are a lawyer.

LARRY ELDER, SALEM RADIO NATIONALLY SYNDICATED HOST: Right.

HANNITY: Look at this from a legal perspective. You know, we are talking about illegal surveillance unmasking, leaking of raw intelligence, perhaps, and then we have got of course a Hillary Clinton bought and paid for dossier. Questions about, oh, the dossier that she bought and paid for -- wasn't use to get a warrant? To literally surveil an opposition candidate in an election year and then surveil a president-elect. These questions are chilling enough, and then you have the anti-Trump bias pro-Hillary, you know, appointee in Mueller. How do you untangle this web?

ELDER: You know, I remember when Mitch McConnell said that the best thing I can do for the country is to make Obama a one term president. He got hammered. He was called racist by Morgan Freeman among other people. Can you imagine what they will be saying if President Obama was being investigated for reasons this week this thin, this lame? The Republican Party would be accused of being racist, and the accusers will be right. This is a joke.

Can you imagine if Obama was being investigated by people who made contributions to John McCain or to Mitt Romney? And he sent text messages slamming him?

HANNITY: Yes, agree. No.

ELDER: It is insane. It is insane. And to pay for this dossier in the dossier apparently was the trigger to go to the FISA court to get a warrant to surveil members of the Trump team, it is incredible to me that this is going on in this country. And again, if the shoe were on the other foot with the same path pattern, and they were going after Obama, the country would be on fire. You would have people screaming bloody murder.

HANNITY: Yes. You know, I have friends of mine retired currently, FBI -- and I know that you do, Dan Bongino, and they are apoplectic over what is going on here. They see clearly. They feel like the President feels that this agency, these agencies that they love and have devoted their lives to is rightly come under criticism from those at the top with what they are doing and how they are doing it. When have you ever heard of an exoneration by the FBI changing language? The exoneration before the investigation.

BONGINO: Right.

HANNITY: How could anybody by any definition say that that is fundamentally just in any way?

BONGINO: You can't, Sean. The Justice Department failed us. I'm sorry. It let us down. I agree with you. I know the rank and file of the men and women. They are great. It is not their fault. But Sean, this single most important question right now I believe in the American political process, special counsel, everything going on. The single most important question was asked by Jim Jordan today.

Was the dossier a political opposition research documents used to get an affidavit to spy on what would have been under any other circumstance, a law-abiding American and Mike Flynn? If that is the case, Sean, mark my words on this, you saw the first hijacking of the FBI by the Democratic National Committee and a major political party candidate in the Hillary Clinton campaign.

HANNITY: All right. Thank you both for being with us.

ELDER: And Sean, look at the double standard here, Hillary skates the servers in the basement, the emails are deleted, and she skates, and all of the sudden --

HANNITY: They covered for her, Larry.

ELDER: It's outrageous! Pardon.

HANNITY: The fix was in. They covered for Hillary Clinton. It was all a cover up. The whole thing. It is provable now.

All right, thank you both. We have a lot more to cover tonight.

Powerful edition of "Hannity." Sara Carter, brand new report along with Gregg Jarrett, John Solomon, also Newt Gingrich is here. As you can see on your screen. Ventura County, San Diego raging wildfires leaving a trail of destruction as we speak in Southern California. We will have a report on that and more.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HANNITY: Fox News alert, wildfires continue to devastate California tonight according to a fire official. Now, 439 homes and buildings are destroyed by these wildfires north of Los Angeles. A live report coming up later in the program, back to our top story.

We have a senior Justice Department official, his name is Bruce Ohr, he was demoted because of his ties with Fusion GPS. That of course the firm responsible for the dirty Russian anti-Trump dossier bought and paid for by Hillary and the DNC. And Sara Carter reporting tonight that the House Intel Committee Chairman Devin Nunes is going to issue a subpoena for this demoted Justice Department official.

Joining us now with more on this developing story. From The Hill John Solomon, investigative journalist Sara Carter, FOX News legal analyst Gregg Jarrett. We have to Sara, start where we are here. And it is not just him. Rumors tonight running rampant of a major shake-up coming to the FBI. Possibly as early as tomorrow.

SARA CARTER, INVESTIGATIVE REPORTER: Yes. Certainly, that is right, Sean. That is what I have been hearing as well for my sources. We know now that Bruce Ohr as reported by James Rosen, he was demoted from deputy Attorney General, and now he is facing a subpoena by the House Intelligence Committee. And that should be issued in the next couple of days. They are issuing that subpoena, it has not happened today yet.

It is going through the process right now. So, within the next day, possibly even soon as tomorrow, they should have that subpoena issued. And now we are also looking at other developments. I mean, we know that Bruce Ohr had met with Christopher Steele prior to the election and then after the election he met with Glenn Simpson who is the owner of Fusion GPS, who by the way, paid Christopher Steele with the money from the DNC and Hillary Clinton to fund the rest of the dossier, the salacious, unverified dossier.

So right now what the Intelligence Committee chairman wants to know is, why did he meet with him? What did they discuss? And why did he meet with Glenn Simpson and what did they discuss after the election? This is really big news. They say, this is big, big news. Maybe even bigger than Peter Strzok.

HANNITY: All right. These are all great points you are making. And by the way, all -- also the talk of what about Rod Rosenstein knew? I would like to know what he knew. I would like to know what Comey knew. I would like to know what Mueller knew ahead of all of this. You know, a lot of these questions John being raised about, okay, this team that literally has covered for Hillary Clinton and put all of these biased people going after Donald Trump. You know, what would it take to get rid of a special counsel?

JOHN SOLOMON, THE HILL: That is a great question. It is a high legal standard. You have to have 1 of 3 things usually. Misconduct, you have to have done something wrong in the investigation. A clear conflict of interest and that can be very interesting in the next few weeks or an abuse of power. It is not just because people do not like the people that he picked or the political sentiments of the people to remove some worthy of that stature. There has to be a very serious conflict, abuse of power or misconduct. And today I don't think that anything has emerged yet. There is a lot of concerns about --

(CROSSTALK)

HANNITY: It is getting very close so.

SOLOMON: Well I think the conflict of interest is the thing that we should watch. I think we will learn some things in the next two weeks Sean that is going to raise questions on that front.

GREGG JARRETT, FOX NEWS LEAGL ANALYST: There are two conflicts of interest that could get Mueller fired. Of the first one is Mueller interviewed with the President for James Comey's job.

HANNITY: The day before.

JARRETT: That is right and the next day he takes the job of special counsel. Think about that. Sitting across from the man who is opposing questions, and Mueller is not telling the President. He is being dishonest and deceptive. And he is involved in the aftermath of the James Comey firing which is the subject of the special counsel investigation. That disqualifies him. It is mandatory under the law, the other is his close friendship, also a mandatory disqualification. His close friendship with James Comey. Mueller has refused to resign or step aside, it is time that the Attorney General un-recuse himself, replace Mueller and clean up the staff that is right with political bias and corrupt motives.

HANNITY: Where are we, Sara, on the issue of reports that James Comey wanted to hire Christopher Steele? Did they pay Christopher Steele? And when you get to the whole dossier issue, the fact that Bruce Ohr knew all of that and he is four doors down from Rod Rosenstein?

SARA CARTER, CIRCA NEWS: It is incredible, Sean. And right now, we know one thing, that Nunes has been cleared by the ethics committee. So for eight months, they sidelined the chair of the intelligence committee on one question. I've talked to sources up in congress that said that this was incredible. This would have never happened in the past. Those are the questions that they want answered and that is what they are seeking. Or they will subpoena Bruce Ohr, they will ask this question, they have already presented those questions to the DOJ, we know that the inspector general is investigating this, and these are the questions that the American public wants answered as well as me, as well as John, everybody else, you. So there has to be some answer coming from the FBI especially from FBI Director Ray.

HANNITY: Are the house of cards going to blow down?

JARRETT: I think so. And it is a shame, because there are so many highly qualified experience lawyers who do not have a political ax to grind that Robert Mueller could have selected. He did not do it. It was deliberate and by design, instead he stacked it with people with egregious political biases. People who in one case defending the Hillary Clinton foundation. In another defending her top I.T. Aid. These are people who should be nowhere near this investigation of Clinton's opponent Trump.

HANNITY: John knowing all you know and what is likely coming, how bad is this good for Mueller?

SOLOMON: I think there is a very important question that has not been focused on for Peter Strzok. He was an encounter intelligence position on two of the most important investigations over the past year. Trump and Clinton, counter intelligence agents are the focus of foreign power. He engaged in an affair if the reports are true, what is a one-way foreign power compromises someone. Who sacks in affairs? And it was revealed that he had an affair with a fellow FBI agent, and the FBI department talking about integrity, where do they put him, they put him in human resources like he has some expertise on following the rules. It is amazing to me. There are more questions about whether he was in a compromise position.

HANNITY: It was epic at the hearing today. I mean -- seriously what the Republican state is everything we have all been talking about is getting interesting. Thank you all. When we come back, Tomi Lahren, Jessica Tarlov weigh in with a Senator LINSKEY: Franken should have resign today also Newt Gingrich reacts to Mueller's partisan witch hunt. As we continue.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HANNITY: Today amid mounting pressure, Democrats Senator Al Franken announced that he will resign in the next few weeks. Of course the disgraced Senator could not help himself. Had to take a final parting shot at Republicans. And also tonight, Republican congressmen Franks announced that he will resign from office at the end of January. This after former staffers complaining about discussions that the Congressman had with them about surrogacy issues. Joining us now, Fox News contributor's Tomi Lahren and Jessica Tarlov. Tomi, where do in the case of Al Franken you had the pictures, you had a Leanne tweet, you have creepy pictures with Arianna and Joy Behar although they gave him a pass. In my opinion, just looking at the picture. What do you do in these cases when you do not know?

TOMI LAHREN, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: Here is what Franken did today. He pulled a Hillary Clinton, I'm sorry, but I'm not really sorry. I'm not going to take responsibility. Let's be honest here, he is a sacrificial lamb of the Democratic Party. The Democratic Party does not need him. They throw them away, under the bus. They hope that this will better their case, their moral high ground against Roy Moore. Not sure it will work.

HANNITY: They are not losing the seat, the Democratic governor.

JESSICA TARLOV, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: Made the decision easier. I would like to go to the question --

HANNITY: There has been 30 years now up to and including all through last year defending the predator Bill Clinton. That is a fact. That is the record. I do not believe that this is principle. I believe that this is politics and political expediency.

TARLOV: There is certainly politics and political expediency. I do not think that the Clintons are relevant to the conversation.

HANNITY: You know what? Wait a minute. What is -- Jessica, with all due respect, what is relevant is they defended a guy who was accused of rape, groping, grabbing, fondling, touching, and kissing against a woman's will. And a team that evolved out of the Clintons that smeared to these women for 30 years. You cannot tell us this is not relevant.

TARLOV: I can tell you, because today the Clintons are history. They came out and stated --

(CROSSTALK)

HANNITY: The people that defended this are not history.

TARLOV: You want to spell every Democrat over the age of 60?

HANNITY: No I want honesty.

TARLOV: This country elected a man who has 16 allegations of sexual harassment.

HANNITY: Here we go. Is that what is all about? Now it is all about Donald Trump?

TARLOV: No, it is not all about him. It is about Al Franken and Harvey Weinstein.

HANNITY: Do you believe, what do you think should happen in cases -- I was consistent about John Conyers. He is denying it, needs to be investigated, it is serious. But we need to get the facts and we need to get to the truth. Is that the right position to take?

TARLOV: I think that we do need to do that. Step number one is we believe women. We have decided as a society that we take women's word and then we investigated move from there.

LAHREN: Jessica, I want to ask you, you and I are both women. Do you think that that is fair to every case to take a woman's story as gospel and not ask any questions? The Democrats do not believe in due process, because I can sit here as a women and say, I don't think it is right that every woman is just believed. Her truth is taken as the truth without investigation. Think about how powerful that it is. Trial by social media, let's get over this.

TARLOV: I understand that completely. I actually wrote a column for Fox News last week, I do not think that Franken had to go. I think the first step is to take women seriously. There are stories coming out that have hit every single industry.

HANNITY: Al Franken -- wait a minute. I agree taken seriously, but how do you know? How do we know?

TARLOV: I think that you look at things, and the Roy Moore case, you look at the notes that he has written.

HANNITY: Why have we not done the forensics in that case?

TARLOV: I don't know. I think that you can do the yearbook --

(CROSSTALK)

HANNITY: We have to go. I am sorry.

TARLOV: All right.

HANNITY: Newt Gingrich is next, straight ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HANNITY: As we continue tonight on "Hannity," joining us now, the author of the best-selling book "Vengeance" Fox News contributor former speaker of the house Newt Gingrich. Mr. Speaker, is this a political prosecution you see unfolding before you? In other words, you have all of Mueller's appointees for Hillary Clinton, we are discovering, all of them with questionable ethical -- the use of ethics or lack of ethics. And persecuting all Trump associates. Do you see something that is dangerous to you?

NEWT GINGRICH, R-FORMER SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: Well, it is very dangerous. And very parallel to what they have just exposed in Wisconsin. An effort to use the legal system to destroy Governor Walker. An amazing series of stories in Wisconsin now. A group of lawyers who ran amok and were just trying to destroy people's lives. I see the same thing happening here. And I raise a single question. How could they possibly go after General Flynn after 35 years of serving in uniform and skip Hillary Clinton's aides who clearly lied under oath? How can they possibly defend that?

HANNITY: But now we know that the fixed is in, they were writing her exoneration, they did not even do the investigation, sir.

GINGRICH: So I think the correct answer under our constitutional system is for the house and senate judiciary committees to start subpoenaing these guys, bring them in under oath, and I want to see 10,000 of the tweets that the one FBI agent apparently sent to his girlfriend that has all sorts of anti-Trump stuff in nature. But more than that, I think they need to bring James Comey in under oath and say, tell us again why you did not swear in Hillary Clinton. Why was she not put at risk of perjury the way that you did -- the way that General Michael Flynn was? I think that they need to bring in the entire team that was involved in the Hillary Clinton investigation.

This thing stinks so badly that we really need to be protected and under our constitution, one of the protections is the power of congress to investigate and the house and senate judiciary committees are -- one thing they should ask is the deputy FBI Director whose wife as s Democratic candidate got I think $900,000 in donations, why did he not recuse himself? How can he possibly be neutral? These are the kind of questions that congress should be asking right now.

HANNITY: When -- what do we do if they never really investigated Hillary Clinton? Because we know that the fix was in. We know that they wrote the exoneration beforehand. And why do I think that that is obstruction of justice by James Comey? This guy Peter Strzok, and other people that are involved? Why do we have equal justice of the law if we do not do that?

GINGRICH: Clearly the Attorney General has to appoint a special counsel. I think that they need two special councils. Want to go back and look at the entire Clinton experience. The uranium one, the Clinton foundation, et cetera. But second, we need a special counsel or some type of appropriate appointment to review the FBI and the Justice Department's own role. I mean this is so sick, it is so one-sided, it is so clearly not the rule of law. Sometimes you have to take somebody who protects you from the protectors. When the protectors are warned that power tends to corrupt. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.

We are living through that experience right now. We are seeing power in the Justice Department. Power in the FBI that clearly lead to corruption. That means that you need to take some very severe steps. It may involve, frankly, developing some panels of special outside lawyers who have the full power to subpoena everything and go in and to route the stuff out. This is really a serious, serious problem.

HANNITY: It is also a serious problem if you have a group of people that want to undo an election. Do you believe at the heart of this, that there is a deep state, may be including former intelligence officials or people that use a weaponry of intelligence that are criminalizing perhaps the FBI? Deep state leaking that have as their goal that they think the American people made a mistake and they want to undo the results of the election? And they are using every devious tactic that they possibly can?

GINGRICH: A good friend of mine who has been through this said to me today, you have to understand that in 2016, the idea of Donald Trump as President was so horrifying to the left that any action was seen as acceptable no matter how illegal -- as long as it was for the purpose of stopping Trump. And I think that they all frankly expected Hillary to win and that they would cover up all of their crimes. The great shock to them is that Trump did win. And slowly, painfully, step-by-step we are beginning to unmask how sick the system is, how deep the corruption is and a lot of people now are at risk. I think Mueller is at risk. James Comey is at risk. A whole range of people at risk for having basically violated the law and abused power in remarkable ways. I don't know if any experience in American history where you have the scale of abuse of power that we are seeing right now.

HANNITY: The boomerang effect is in full play here, because we now know that Hillary Clinton through her campaign, through the DNC which Donna Brazile is saying that she controlled, the money that they are in. That they paid fusion GPS and they hired Christopher Steel. Christopher Steele goes forward and in fact uses and pays Russians for lies about Donald Trump all to infiltrate the election and there is a possibility as I came up in the hearing today with Jim Jordan that that phony Russian propaganda lying dossier was used as the basis to get a FISA warrant against either candidate and/or candidate Trump and President-Elect Trump and his team. If that is the case, which it appears it may be a possibility after the hearings today, what does that mean?

GINGRICH: What it means is that the Obama administration did everything that it could first to block Trump from winning and second, to undermine and weaken and cripple Trump as he took power. And this is ultimately going to go all the way to the entire administration. It is the national security advisor. It is the ambassador to the United Nations. It is a whole range of people. It is the Attorney General. And I think that people need to recognize this. It is an extraordinarily wide-ranging pattern of corruption. I mean corruption, not in the sense of money swapping hands, but in the old fashion sense that the founding fathers would have understood.

That these are people who were abusing the law for their special interest and the special interest of their faction. And they were prepared to hurt the innocent. They were prepared to frame people, whatever they had to do, because they believe that the cause that they were for was so self- righteous, because of the defeating Trump. Even more than the cause of electing Hillary, it was the specter of Trump that terrified them. And anything was legitimate. It was not. It was in fact, illegal.

HANNITY: All right. We have to leave it there, Mr. Speaker. Always good to see you. Thank you for being with us. Up next, we have a live report. Look at that, southern California on fire tonight. Wildfires destroying the region. That report is straight ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HANNITY: Sadly tonight, wild fires continue to sweep all across southern California for another day. Joining us now on the ground in Ventura County, California, Fox news senior correspondent Adam Housley. By the way, I don't know if the audience knows, you went through this in northern California. I live 30 minutes north of Ventura County. I know the area well. Also in San Diego tonight, it's so sad to watch this.

ADAM HOUSLEY, FOX NEWS SENIOR CORRESPONDENT: Yeah. Fires starting at least one big one a day. This is one of the many parts -- many fronts to this fire. The Thomas fire that we talked about last night. We're outside of Ventura County. You can see these flames are pretty significant. This is one of five or six major parts of the fire still burning like this. The good news, there's no wind. The bad news it's still burning very strong and threatening homes in a number of places. We show you this live here. We want to show a quick view of San Diego. Two fires started there today. This one in San Diego is the biggest. More than 2,000 acres already. 18,000 people have been evacuated. Sean, the firefight continues here in southern California and a red flag alerts remains until Saturday.

HANNITY: All right Adam, thoughts and prayer. We hope they stay safe. Very dangerous with the Santa Ana winds when they come kicking in. Very dangerous. That is all the time we have left. We will always fair and balanced. We're not ever promised the destroy Trump media. We're different. We will prove it in the hearing today. We'll stay on the case. I promise you that. Let not your heart be troubled. The news continues.

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