Conservative retired judge says Trump 'corroded and corrupted American democracy' (2024)

Geoff Bennett:

An influential group of Republican legal voices today endorsed the January 2024 trial date proposed by special counsel Jack Smith in his 2020 election interference case against former President Donald Trump.

The group included former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales appointed by George W. Bush, and J. Michael Luttig, a retired federal appellate judge and one of the nation's leading conservative legal minds.

Judy Woodruff recently visited Judge Luttig at his home in Colorado as part of her ongoing series America at a Crossroads.

J. Michael Luttig, Former Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals Judge: I understood the gravity of this matter. And I understood from my lifetime of experience in and around those offices and those institutions that this was catastrophic for America and for American democracy.

Judy Woodruff:

Retired Judge Michael Luttig is one of the most influential conservatives to have served in the federal judiciary. He clerked for Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia while he was on the appellate circuit, served as assistant counsel to President Ronald Reagan, and was the assistant attorney general under President George H.W. Bush, who later appointed him to the United States Court of Appeals.

He was twice considered for nomination himself to the Supreme Court.

J. Michael Luttig:

I felt that I had a profound obligation to the country to speak and to explain all of what had happened.

Judy Woodruff:

Well-known in Republican legal circles, Luttig burst into public view when, on January 5, 2021, he advised then-Vice President Mike Pence to defy former President Trump's plea not to certify the 2020 election results.

Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY):

Judge Luttig, thank you as well for being here with us today.

Judy Woodruff:

Luttig spoke about it in dramatic testimony more than a year later before the House January 6 Committee that was investigating the insurrection.

J. Michael Luttig:

Donald Trump and his allies and supporters are a clear and present danger to American democracy.

Judy Woodruff:

Challenging Trump so publicly thrust him into the hot lights of American politics, where he's been ever since.

We sat down with Judge Luttig at his home in Vail, Colorado, to talk about where the country is in the aftermath of the past two-and-a-half tumultuous years.

You have been saying for months that Americans have lost their moral compass and that, with this loss of direction, Americans have lost all perspective.

What brought you to that conclusion?

J. Michael Luttig:

For almost 250 years, Judy, there was all but a consensus among the American public on the fundamental values and principles on which America was founded.

And then, all of a sudden, it seems we don't agree on anything at all. We have not talked to each other as friends and fellow citizens, Americans who share the same destiny and have the same hopes and dreams for America for six or eight years now.

Judy Woodruff:

And that being the case, you're — you're still confident that there's more that we have to agree carry on?

J. Michael Luttig:

I am. I know that there's more that we agree on than that we disagree on.

Our officials and our elected leaders have talked to the nation and talked to we Americans as if we were enemies of each other. And we have never been enemies of each other. Over the timeline of the past 10, 15, 20 years, leaders on both sides of the aisle have failed us.

But, as of today, and for the past two-and-a-half years, since January 6, 2021, it has been the Republicans who have reprehensibly failed us as Americans. On January 6, the former president and the Republican allies, his allies and supporters, declared war on American democracy.

Judy Woodruff:

How much responsibility does former President Trump himself bear for all this?

J. Michael Luttig:

He bears a disproportionate share of responsibility, if not the entire responsibility.

The former president sought to overturn an American election which he had lost fair and square. For four years, these claims by the former president and his Republican allies have corroded and corrupted American democracy and American elections. Vast, vast numbers of Americans, into the millions, today no longer believe in the elections in the United States of America.

They no longer believe in the institutions of law and democracy in America, the very pillars of our foundation. And many of those people have begun even to question the Constitution of the United States.

Judy Woodruff:

But you're saying the damage done has been far, far greater than former President Trump, January 6, and the immediate actions that were taken in that time period?

J. Michael Luttig:

Yes, there's no question.

Never again will the world be inspired to — by America and America's democracy in the way that it has been for — since our founding almost 250 years ago.

But the indictment and prosecution of the president doesn't end or even begin to resolve this matter.

Judy Woodruff:

How much does it matter what the verdict of that trial is?

J. Michael Luttig:

All that matters is that the president will be tried for these grave offenses.

Had he not, he would have made a mockery out of the Constitution and the rule of law.

Judy Woodruff:

But do you worry that whether there's an acquittal or a conviction, what the effect could be?

J. Michael Luttig:

We can expect that if the president were to be acquitted, that he and all of his supporters would claim that that was vindication that he was right that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from him.

Were that to be the case, I don't believe that American democracy could be saved, at least in the near future.

Judy Woodruff:

That's a — that's a terrible statement to hear from you.

J. Michael Luttig:

I understand. I understand.

Judy Woodruff:

Former President Trump, as you know, is already saying he's not guilty. He believes he's being treated unfairly in all this, especially in contrast to President Biden's son Hunter Biden.

He has said that he's being treated much worse by the judicial system.

J. Michael Luttig:

The issue with Hunter Biden and the issue with the former president, they are not similar in any way at all, let alone in gravity or consequence.

It's the incumbent president's son and the personal conduct that he's being charged — accused of is of a pedestrian nature by comparison to what the former president has now been indicted for.

Judy Woodruff:

Returning to something that you have spoken about in this interview, a big part of today's problems with what we're facing as a country has to do with political leaders, elected officials.

What about individuals like the Senate minority leader, Mitch McConnell, like Senator Lindsey Graham, who are leaders in the party, but have not so far spoken out clearly against former President Trump?

J. Michael Luttig:

Any leader, Republican or Democrat, who has not spoken against January 6 and the former president's role in it has betrayed their oath.

January 6 and what the former president did is not politics. And it certainly is not partisan politics. This is far above and beyond politics.

And, as we now know, it's literally crimes against the United States of America. But all of our politicians, and especially the Republicans, have regarded it as nothing more than politics. In that respect, they have failed Americans. It's critical to American democracy that you have two very strong political parties who are competing against each other on the issues, the public policy issues before the nation.

We can't have one party who is supporting and defending what occurred on January 6, together with the president of the United States who caused January 6. We can't have that. We cannot function until the Republican Party comes to its senses.

And, in my view, I don't consider the Republican Party a political party in the United States at the moment.

Judy Woodruff:

Luttig added that he believes the country can't be set on course again unless a number of those elected officials lose their jobs.

J. Michael Luttig:

What we need to do is remove our power from our elected officials who have betrayed us as Americans and send to Washington others who better understand than today's officials that their power is our power.

Judy Woodruff:

When you think about what the country does to heal this moment of extreme polarization, what comes to mind as solutions? What needs to be done?

J. Michael Luttig:

Someone who has the moral wherewithal to speak and be heard by the nation has to speak.

Judy Woodruff:

Is there anyone on the scene right now that can fill that?

J. Michael Luttig:

There is not, not one single leader in America today, Judy.

Judy Woodruff:

So what does that portend?

J. Michael Luttig:

That alone portends hopelessness, right?

But we have to be eternally hopeful.

Judy Woodruff:

For the "PBS NewsHour," I'm Judy Woodruff in Vail, Colorado.