The Lessons of Watergate
The Political Scene | The New Yorker
The New Yorker
4.3 • 3.9K Ratings
🗓️ 2 March 2017
⏱️ 23 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This week, the Trump Administration was again besieged by allegations of inappropriate contact with Russian officials during their Presidential campaign. Thomas Mallon, the author of the best-selling novel “Watergate,” joins Dorothy Wickenden to discuss what Trump could learn from Nixon’s attempted cover-up of the 1972 break-in at the offices of the Democratic National Committee.
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| 1:12.0 | This is the political scene, a weekly conversation with New Yorker writers and editors |
| 1:16.4 | about politics. It's Thursday, March 2nd. I'm Dorothy Wickenden, executive editor of |
| 1:21.5 | The New Yorker. Yesterday, the Justice Department confirmed that Attorney General Jeff |
| 1:26.3 | Sessions twice had contact |
| 1:28.3 | with the Russian ambassador during the course of the campaign, despite an apparent claim |
| 1:32.8 | to the contrary while giving sworn testimony during his Senate confirmation hearings. |
| 1:38.2 | Here's part of an exchange with Senator Al Franken of Minnesota. |
| 1:41.9 | If there is any evidence that anyone affiliated with the Trump campaign communicated with |
| 1:48.5 | the Russian government in the course of this campaign, what will you do? |
| 1:54.0 | Senator Franken, I'm not aware of any of those activities. |
| 1:59.0 | I have been called a surrogate at a time or two in that campaign, |
| 2:03.6 | and I didn't have not have communications with the Russians, and I'm unable to comment. |
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