The following is the transcript of an interview with Sen. Mark Warner, Democrat of Virginia, on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan” that aired on Feb. 2, 2025.
MARGARET BRENNAN: We go now to Virginia Democratic Senator Mark Warner. He is the vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, and joins us from Palm Beach, Florida. Good morning to you, Senator.
SEN. MARK WARNER: Good morning, Margaret.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Do you have any sense yet what the cost of these tariffs could be for Virginia, which does have a wine industry, for example?
SEN. WARNER: Yeah. Well, first of all, Margaret, I think we might want to call this the Donald Trump Super Bowl tax, with the big game coming next week. If you- you know, avocados, tomatoes, beer from Mexico, price is going to go up. The question around cars- I’ve read already about $3,000 of additional price on cars, up to 10,000 on trucks, because we’ve actually integrated very well our auto production with Canada and Mexico. I think it’s well about the fact that for years, we’ve been encouraging businesses to leave China and near shore to a place like Mexico. Now that is going to end up costing consumers more. And for industries like ours- like the wine industry, where we are growing rapidly in Virginia, those folks are going to get socked as well. So this is- remember Donald Trump got hired trying to lower grocery- saying he was going to lower grocery prices–
MARGARET BRENNAN: –Right.
SEN. WARNER: Two weeks in, he’s doing something that’s going to do the absolute opposite.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, we will track the impact of this trade war. Senator, I want to switch topics. You are, as we said, the Vice Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, we watched that hearing this week for Tulsi Gabbard, she had two particular exchanges with Republican senators, Todd Young and James Lankford, who pressed her to say that Edward Snowden was a traitor. Lankford said it was a softball. But listen to what happened.
[SEN. TODD YOUNG SOT]
SEN. TODD YOUNG: Did he betray a duty? Did he- did he betray the trust of the American people, which is according to Merriam-Webster, that’s the definition of a traitor.
TULSI GABBARD: Edward Snowden broke the law and he released this information in a way that he should not have. He also acknowledged and exposed information that was unconstitutional.
[SEN. JAMES LANKFORD SOT]
SEN. JAMES LANKFORD: Was he a traitor at the time when he took America’s secrets, released him in public and then ran to China and became a Russian citizen?
TULSI GABBARD: Senator, I’m focused on the future and how we can prevent something like this from happening again.
[END SOT]
MARGARET BRENNAN: You’ve worked closely with these senators. I know they’re Republicans and you’re from a different party, but when you speak to them privately, do you think they can get over that- her refusal to call him a traitor and actually vote to confirm her or even move her out of committee?
SEN. WARNER: Listen, Margaret, Edward Snowden released more information- probably did as much damage to our intelligence community as anyone in history. And the fact that Ms. Gabbard- who actually had legislation to pardon Edward Snowden, she called him a brave whistleblower, couldn’t bring herself to call him a traitor, I think is disqualifying just on plain judgment. What would that- what signal if she got in, would that send to the IC workers or contractors? Is she going to suddenly enforce the law if she called Snowden a brave whistleblower? And what I’m particularly concerned about, Margaret, is our sharing of information with our allies, that’s not written into law that’s based on trust. Will they really trust to share their intelligence with us if she can’t call out one of the worst traders in recent American history as- as such, as a traitor.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Do you think she can even make it out of committee and make it to a full vote on the floor of the Senate?
SEN. WARNER: I know there are a number- our committee is the- historically the most bipartisan. We check our partisan hats at the door. There is enormous MAGA pressure that, as we’ve seen, put on senators who are willing to stand up. We’ll know this coming week, but it’s not just Snowden, it was- America’s most powerful intelligence tool is a law called- something we call Section 702, she left us totally confused on her views on that. And as well, her lack of judgment, whether it’s going to visit Assad when he was head of Syria, whether it was taking trips paid for by sketchy groups or echoing Putin’s comments somehow NATO started the war in Ukraine, that is not the judgment of somebody that would run 18 intelligence communities- agencies
MARGARET BRENNAN: We will watch to see those Republican senators. I want to ask you as well about what’s happening at the FBI and the Justice Department. President Trump- he campaigned on this promise to restructure the government. Seems like he’s implementing that this week. So far between the FBI and Justice Department, we’ve seen at least 20 terminations. Some are calling this a purge. But is it overstating it if we’re seeing 20 people lose their jobs?
SEN. WARNER: Well, if you are suddenly taking out the most experienced folks at justice or at the FBI, how does that make us stronger? And what he’s saying is, every FBI agent that somehow touched the January 6 investigation- that was a comprehensive investigation. I’ve been told there were almost half of all the FBI agents at least had some involvement. Remember, this was a case that was taken up against these rioters all across the country. If you’re suddenly going to get rid of all of those- that could be thousands–
MARGARET BRENN: Yeah–
SEN. WARNER: –what does that mean for our cyber security? What does it mean for our trafficking and stop against fentanyl and other drugs? What does it mean in terms of, you know, serious crime investigations? This would be devastating.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, that’s- our reporting is that the order was for a list to be drawn up of those 1500 or so people who worked on those cases. We’re going to try to get to the bottom of whether they’re actually going to be fired or not–
SEN. WARNER: –But, Margaret. Margaret–
MARGARET BRENNAN: –That’s not clear.
SEN. WARNER: We’ve seen- but we’ve seen you get your name on these lists. It’s like- it’s like, Trump’s potentially illegal offer to buy out all the federal employees, where we have no money in the budget for but we had a great tragedy this week in DC with the air- the crash. We are already short air traffic controllers. If suddenly 2 or 3000 air traffic controllers were to say, hey, I’m going to take this buyout, our airspace couldn’t operate. And yet he’s doing this so recklessly, frankly again, without legal authority–
MARGARET BRENNAN: –Is it being offered to them?
SEN. WARNER: Pardon me?
MARGARET BRENNAN: Is that open to–
SEN. WARNER: –Say again.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Is it being offered to air traffic controllers?
SEN. WARNER: All federal employees- my understanding it went out to two million federal employees. This offer- which, again, OPM does not have that authority to start with. That was who it came from, but it is- I can tell you, with lots of federal employees, we got chaos on steroids going on, and we had heard from Trump’s supporters, the OMB director, for example, that he wanted to traumatize federal workers. Well, that is happening, and these workers are the folks that inspect our- our fruit, our milk, our eggs. You know, what happens if they all quit?
MARGARET BRENNAN: I want to ask you- and I know many of those people live in the state of Virginia, they are your constituents. I want to ask you about your former partner on the Intelligence Committee, Marco Rubio, now Secretary of State. He told a podcaster this week, the president made the decision to cancel security protection for Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, who served during the first term, because he looked through a “threat versus cost risk assessment.” I know you’re briefed on intelligence. Did the threat from Iran to assassinate former US officials go away?
SEN. WARNER: No. I’ve seen no intelligence that would indicate that that threat has been diminished. I think this is payback and it’s not just Pompeo–
MARGARET BRENNAN: –But Secretary Rubio endorsed this.
SEN. WARNER: Listen I have not seen any intelligence- and here I agree with my partner Tom Cotton, the now chair of the intel committee- we’ve seen nothing to indicate less threat. And also taking out, for example, down the security detail for former General Chief of Staff, Mark Milley. This is all about retribution. And he’s putting people’s lives in danger, which is just unbelievable and I wish more people would stand up.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Senator, thank you for your time this morning.
SEN. WARNER: Thank you, Margaret.
MARGARET BRENNAN: “Face the Nation” will be back in a minute. Stay with us.
