>> Democratic congressman

Hakeem Jeffries is speaking out

about how he will be carrying

the party's agenda moving

forward now that the speaker

Nancy Pelosi is stepping back

from her state of the union.

One challenge is the likely new

minority leader, dealing with a

Republican-controlled house.

>> There is going to be,

because of the narrow former CIA director, Leon Panetta discusses former President Trump's reaction to the Department of Justice naming a special counsel to oversee the criminal investigations of former President Donald Trump. majority

that house Republicans are

going to have, the far right

wing, the Maga caucus is going

to be empowered and emboldened,

it's going to make it tougher

for Mccarthy to govern as

speaker if he does in fact

become speaker.

If Kevin Mccarthy needs votes

to pass essential legislation,

just keeping the government

open or raising the debt limit,

will Democrats be willing to

help him if the freedom caucus

votes, the Marjorie Taylor

Greene's of the world refused

to participate.

>> It seems to me that that is

a case-by-case basis.

Democrats have always been

willing to lean on make sure

that we fully fund the

government and Democrats have

always been willing to lean in

and make sure that we meet our

nations' obligations, and do not

default on our debt for the

first time in American history.

I think it's also important to

point out, Jake, that we have

consistently fought against

extremism on the Republican

side, including when it

manifested itself during the

former president's tenure.

All at the same time, being

able to find common ground to

make progress for the American

people.

>> Joining me now is a man who

has held many titles in his

career, including secretary of

defense, white house chief of

staff, and also served 16 years

in the house.

Leon Panetta, thank you for

being with us.

Let's start with the president

Biden and what the Democrats

are facing.

Gop-controlled house where

Kevin Mccarthy, because of the

slim Jordi is facing pressure

from far-right members who want

to investigate everything from

the Biden family business

dealings to Afghanistan

withdrawal, to the FBI search

of mar-a-logo.

If your claims at the white

house, what are you thinking

down Pennsylvania avenue right

now?

>> The most important question

to answer whether or not the

Republicans are interested in

governing, or if they're

interesting in raising.

I think that the message coming

out of these midterms is that

the American people are tired

of extremism, they are tired of

undermining our democracy, and

do want both parties to

work together to

govern.

And so I think it's very

important for the white house

to try to reach out to the

Republicans, obviously to the

democratic leadership, and see

whether or not there is a

willingness to work together on

major issues facing that

country.

That will be the test, not only

for the congress, but for the

white house.

>> And if not, could this be a

a godsend to Joe Biden?

If he's thinking about running

for reelection?

>> I was chief of staff when

the congress went Republican

after the first two years of

the Clinton administration.

Although the president was

despondent at the

time, he also recognized that

it might be an opportunity to

be able to work together with

Republicans, and try to get

some things are done.

That's exactly what happened.

It led to the presidents

reelection.

And so I think that the president

Biden understands that message.

I think that in his guts, he

wants to be able to see if he

can try to work with both sides

to get things done.

He knows that the purpose of

being president, the purpose of

being elected is to try to

solve the problems in the

country.

I think that president Biden is

going to try to explore

opportunities for trying to see

if there can be a compromise.

>> In a single week, we learned

the president Donald Trump or

his warning to the president

again, and the special counsel

had been investigated his

actions around the January 6th

attack about his mishandling of

classified documents are taken to

mar-a-logo.

Trump had this response, let's

listen.

>> This horrendous abuse of

power is the latest in a long

series of witch hunts.

They want to do bad things to

the greatest movement in the

history of our country.

In particular, bad things to

me.

>> Adding to that, his tweets

leading up to January 6th are

visible again, because his

Twitter account was restored by

Elon Musk.

What do you think?

Is this --

are we seeing the potential for

Trump to wreak more havoc over

the next couple of years?

>> I don't think there are any

the question, that's the way the

trump operates.

It's through the chaos and threw

havoc.

As you heard in his remarks,

there is absolutely no kind of

argument about his

innocence, about the

charges that are being

investigated.

He's accusing whoever

is investigating him for being

political.

I think that the reality is

that this president, president

Trump has to be held

accountable for the things that

he did.

He has spent a lifetime

avoiding accountability.

He's going to try to do that

again, by trying to just raise

chaos in the political world.

I think that that game is being

overplayed by president trump.

I think the American people

recognize that, and I don't

think it's going to play the

the same way that it has played in

the past.

>> Do you think the attorney

the general was being a tad too

cautious in naming a special

counsel?

>> He was in a difficult

position no matter what he did.

If he went ahead with the

prosecution on his own, I'm

sure that president trump would

make the same accusations

against the attorney general.

On the other hand, I think that

frankly, to be fair

and objective in this

the investigation, the special

counsel, I believe it's

warranted.

It's going to take some

additional time, I recognize

that.

I do think that the

better course here would be to

have a special counsel handled

the prosecution of both

mar-a-logo, as well as January

6th.

>> I'll move to another story.

The U.S. Has determined that

the Saudi crown prince, should

be granted immunity in a case

brought against him by the

fiancée of Jamal Khashoggi, the

Washington Post journalist who

was murdered at the princes

direction.

The argument is that MBS is the

sitting government, and the

the reaction has been fierce,

international's saying that the

The U.S. Should quote, hang its

head in shame, this is nothing

more than a sickening deep

betrayal.

What is your take on this?

>> I think that what the

the administration did with the

the white house was to basically

follow precedent.

In this situation, with regards

to the world leader.

It doesn't mean that they have

to give up in terms of putting

pressure on the head of the Saudi

Arabia.

Particularly about

Khashoggi.

I do think that there are other

ways to approach this in terms

of making sure that the full

the story comes out as to what

happened.

I understand that the precedent

is the issue, when you start

deciding to prosecute the head

of a nation, it can backfire on

a lot of countries, including

the United States.

I understand the reasoning for

why they took the position that

they did, but it's not an

excuse for letting up on the

the pressure that has to be brought

on prince Salman for what

happened with Khashoggi.