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Obama to talk Russian Hacking; Russia Tells U.S. to Show Proof; Stains Between Trump Transition and Obama White House; Michelle Obama Talks Hope. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired December 16, 2016 - 14:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:00:08] ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, I'm Wolf Blitzer in Washington. I want to welcome our viewers here in the United States and around the world. This is CNN's special live coverage of President Obama's final news conference of his final full year in the White House. And it comes just hours after the president promised retaliation against Russia for its interference in the U.S. presidential election.

Russia, by the way, is telling the U.S., prove we were involved in the hacks of the Democratic Party and Hillary Clinton's campaign or stop talking. And in the middle of all of this, President Obama's successor, Donald Trump. We will have full team coverage of all of this. Our correspondents and analysts are standing by to cover this presidential event, covering it the way only CNN can.

Let's start with our White House correspondent, Michelle Kosinski. She's in the Briefing Room right now.

Michelle, it's likely the Russian hacking response will certainly be a main issue that the president will have to address.

MICHELLE KOSINSKI, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes. I mean he knows these questions are coming. He can pretty much predict them beforehand. What we've been hearing in conversations we've been having is that we can expect to hear him speak more bluntly, more forcefully on this subject. Very similar to what we heard him say in an interview this morning about, you know, the potential response to Russia.

But he's going to be possibly less reassuring. You know, along the lines of, democracy has its ebbs and flows. He still wants to convey optimism moving forward. But because this intense debate has been roiling in America, we expect him to want to get to the heart of that.

Remember, this is the last time, the last chance he has before he leaves for vacation for two weeks to respond directly to these questions. And for reporters, you know, we feel like this is our last chance possibly in his time that he has left in office to ask the questions we've been wanting to ask him for a long time. So this is likely to be far reaching, blunt questions, blunt answers, but certainly focused around the Russian hacking. Here's what he most recently said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I think there's no doubt that when any foreign government tries to impact the integrity of our elections, that we need to take action, and we will, at a time and place of our own choosing. Some of it may be explicit and publicized. Some of it may not be. But Mr. Putin is well aware of my feelings about this because I spoke to him directly about it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KOSINSKI: So that's like a preview of what we're going to hear today. But we know that he is going to want to hit those points that he feels are important. He wants to convey strength in the face of the latest information on the Russian hacking. We know that there's a sensitivity there in the administration to the criticism over the timing of naming Russia as the culprit here. He's going to want to respond to that.

And also we know that when we've seen this back-and-forth that seem to get away from the initial very smooth transition that let's give the next administration a chance and we saw early on, now there's outright criticism. We know that that was precipitated by the administration's anger over Donald Trump's and others questions and even denials that Russia played a role in this. So we're going to hear the president want to be more aligned with his press secretary, what's been coming out daily in these briefings that have surprised so many people to hear those words. He's going to want to defend his press secretary and probably hit those same points once again in his own words, Wolf.

BLITZER: All right, Michelle, stand by. We're going to get back to you. Michelle's over at the White House.

CNN is also learning that Russian cyber hacking has been ongoing since the U.S. presidential election. Sources tell CNN, the intelligence community has concluded that Russian leader Vladimir Putin personally signed off on the hacking of the U.S. presidential election using sophisticated hacking tools like the ones used by the National Security Agency, the NSA here in the United States. Meanwhile, the Kremlin is dismissing these accusations.

Joining us now from Moscow is our senior international correspondent Clarissa Ward.

Clarissa, what more are you hearing right now from the Kremlin?

CLARISSA WARD, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, what we're hearing from the Kremlin, Wolf, is essentially, prove it or stop making these accusations. The Kremlin spokesman, Dimitry Peskov (ph), said essentially these accusations were becoming indecent. And this is very much the line that we have heard from the Kremlin repeatedly since the allegations first surfaced back in October. They have routinely dismissed them as ludicrous nonsense and they have said that there is no physical, tangible evidence to prove any connection between the Kremlin and Russian involvement with the U.S. election. [14:05:01] And it's interesting, if you talk to people here in Russia

who are watching state TV, which is essentially an arm of propaganda for the Kremlin, they're very much buying into the state narrative here, essentially, that Russia had nothing to do with this. They say that basically this is an attempt to distract Americans from all the deep problems that exist in the U.S. They say it's an attempt really also to poison the well as Donald Trump gets ready to assume the presidency and the assumption being that there would be an improvement in Russian/U.S. relations.

So at the same time, what's interesting, though, Wolf, on the one hand people here dismiss it and say this is ridiculous, this is U.S. accusations, these are unfounded, the evidence is circumstantial. At the same time, one also does get the sense talking to people that Russians do sort of enjoy the idea that President Putin and the Kremlin could pull off such an audacious move as actually managing to swing the U.S. election. But officially, Wolf, the party line here, still very much, this is outrageous, it's ludicrous nonsense and stop these indecent accusations.

Wolf.

BLITZER: Clarissa Ward joining us live from Moscow. We'll check back with you after the news conference.

Joining us now, Jake Tapper, our chief Washington correspondent, the anchor of "The Lead," and "State of the Union."

So, Jake, what will you be watching for as the president gets ready to go up to that lectern?

JAKE TAPPER, CNN CHIEF WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Well, we're hearing a lot of sound and fury from both sides and I'm not - I don't want to suggest a false equivalence, but I'm hearing things that are not accurate. First of all, from the Trump side, we are hearing that there was no cyber espionage and they don't believe this and this is all partisan, and that's just not true. The U.S. intelligence agencies are saying very clearly that Russians conducted these hacks of the DNC and John Podesta, Hillary Clinton's campaign chair, and some of these e- mails ended up in the public domain through WikiLeaks and that may have had an influence over the election one way or the other. Motive is still up in the air and the intelligence agencies are debating. But that's just a fact. And this was discussed throughout the election. This is not only post-Hillary Clinton. So that's one.

Then I'm also hearing on the other side this idea - and we're hearing this from comments Hillary Clinton made last night and also President Obama suggesting in his interview with National Public Radio with Steve Inskeep, quote, "there's no doubt that it contributed," the Russian hacks, "to an atmosphere in which the only focus for weeks at a time, months at a time were Hillary's e-mails, the Clinton Foundation, political gossip surrounding the DNC." That didn't happen. There was no time during the election when the only thing we heard about were Hillary's e-mails, the Clinton Foundation, political gossip surrounding the DNC. You can argue we heard about it too much, but I certainly recall a lot of negative coverage about Donald Trump. So I think what is needed right now is President Obama underling the

fact that these hacks are serious and that the intelligence community and Congress and the next administration need to get together and talk about this, but no blaming the Russians for this one thing, this incident, as if this threw the election. For, first of all, the Clinton campaign still blaming everything on James Comey and the FBI, which is completely unrelated to the hack. So I think a measure of non-partisan emphasis of what the serious problem is here without trying to blame the results of the presidential election on the Russians because there is no evidence for that.

BLITZER: The relationship between the outgoing president and the incoming president since the election win by Donald Trump has been good, but there potentially could be some strains right now.

TAPPER: Well, there are a lot of strains right now, especially if you look at Josh Earnest, the White House press secretary, as a conduit for what President Obama is thinking. And he has been out there very forcefully all week talking about how things that Donald Trump has been saying about the hacks are not true. Donald Trump has been saying nobody brought this up before the election, why didn't they say this? Obviously it was brought up any number of times. We can go back to the clips. It came up in - during one of the presidential debates you might - you might remember Donald Trump saying, "you're a puppet." That was all about Vladimir Putin.

And some very pointed comments from Josh Earnest saying it's just a fact, you all have it on tape, the Republican nominee for president was encouraging Russia to hack his opponent because he believed that would help his campaign. There was that last press conference that President-elect Trump gave in July, I believe it was July 7th, saying, where are the 30,000 e-mails that Hillary Clinton hasn't turned over. Maybe the Russians can get them. He says it was a joke. Josh Earnest says, "nobody thought it was funny and there was plenty of evidence to indicate that he knew what he was talking about."

So, Josh Earnest has basically been out there as the lightning rod for the administration taking the heat from Donald Trump who attacked him last night, but also just saying like, these are the facts and nobody should be joking about this and President-elect Trump is saying things that are demonstrably false.

BLITZER: Josh Earnest would not be doing this unless he had authorization from the president.

TAPPER: Absolutely not.

BLITZER: OK.

TAPPER: That's just not - that's just not how press secretary's operate.

BLITZER: Right. That's what I - I just want to make that point.

[14:10:02] Nia-Malika Henderson is with us. Jim Sciutto is with us as well. Nia, what are you looking for?

NIA-MALIKA HENDERSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: No, I think the tone. And, you're right, I mean, what we've seen from the president-elect in terms of how he talks about this president, he has almost seen him as a friend. He said pretty complimentary things about him so far. He was harsh in terms of his comments about Josh Earnest in this last rally he gave. But he hadn't yet criticized the president. And it's unclear whether the president thinks he can still keep some distance between what Josh Earnest said in this press conference yesterday and what he has been saying, because so far Obama has almost seen himself as a sort of tutor to Donald Trump, somebody who can change Donald Trump's mind on certain things.

TAPPER: The Trump whisperer. He's trying to be the Trump whisperer.

HENDERSON: Yes, the Trump - exactly. Exactly. Saying that he's going to, you know, take his time and talk to him about, you know, he talked to him about Obamacare, for instance. Seemed to maybe change his mind in terms of how he thinks about that. So you wonder, what is the message that he has for Trump in terms of Russia? We know how Obama feels. And they're doing this, obviously, because they think that Donald Trump might not do anything because of his views of Putin. But what is his message for Trump in this press conference?

BLITZER: Jim, listen to Hillary Clinton last night speaking to donors about Russian hacking.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HILLARY CLINTON (D), FORMER PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: We're also learning more everyday about the unprecedented Russian plot to swing this election. And this is something every American should be worried about. You know, we have to recognize that as the latest reports made clear, Vladimir Putin himself directed the covert cyberattacks against our electoral system, against our democracy, apparently because he has a personal beef against me. And why is that? Because when he came back into power - was when I became secretary of state he was serving as prime minister to Medvedev, who was president. And I want you to know this because you'll go home and people will ask you. And so he decided, you know, that's the way their system works, he decided he would be president again. So in the fall of 2011, they had, quote, "parliamentary elections," which were so flawed, so illegitimate that it was embarrassing. I was your secretary of state. At least in those years, we stood up for democracy and human rights. And one of the things that was clear was that this was a phony attempt for him to appear as though he had a parliamentary victory. And so I issued a statement, that's what secretaries of state do, and I basically said, based on independent observations and analysis this was unfair, not free, illegitimate election.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: So you heard her directly blame Putin for the hacking.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, she's not alone. I mean the U.S. intelligence community believes that they have the goods. I mean a month before the election, they identified Russia for this and they said that senior-most Russian officials would have had to approve this. In Russia that means Putin. Now they have more intelligence to support that conclusion.

I really think that we're headed towards crisis territory here because you have an outgoing president who accepts the intelligence communities' judgment that Russia was behind this hack and has now said publically he's going to order a response of some kind before January 20th when he leaves office. You have an income president-elect of the United States who denies that premise that Russia, at least in public, I don't know what's inside his head, but at least in public and calls into question the credibility of U.S. intelligence agencies making that judgment.

He's - as you know in tweet, he's attacked the CIA to the point where the Republican Senate Intelligence Committee chairman today felt the need in a statement announcing a bipartisan probe of this hacking to make a statement of support for the intelligence community, saying that, listen, these are hard-working people, they set their politics - they leave their politics at the door. That's Senator Richard Burr, a Republican, who, in effect, is contradicting the Republican president- elect of the United States. So you have an outgoing president, believes the premise, will order some sort of response, an incoming president who either he will reverse that response or stop it or not do it or maybe make friends, you know, with Russia over this attack.

We knew this was a big election with a lot of differences on a lot of fronts. That's a pretty big national security disagreement to have between the outgoing administration and the incoming administration. I expect to hear more about that today.

TAPPER: One thing we know that Russia wants, right, and we see this - they do this all over the world, especially in Europe, they want the American people to lose confidence in its institutions.

[14:15:07] SCIUTTO: Yes.

TAPPER: They want the American people to no longer trust its intelligence agencies. They no longer - they want the American people to no longer trust the media. They want the American people to no longer trust its own government.

Whoever talks about this among these world leaders, among these national leaders, whether it's President Obama, President-elect Trump, Kellyanne Conway, whomever, needs to keep that in mind. It is important that we do not do Russia's work for them.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

TAPPER: It's important that we do not - it's fine to question intelligence agencies and it's our responsibility to question the government, but based on substance. And just to undermine intelligence agencies because you don't like their conclusions or to undermine - the incoming Trump administration. Look, the Kremlin did not tell Hillary Clinton, "don't go to Wisconsin" you know. I mean there are reasons - and you can say well there are any number of reasons that could have changed votes one way or the other.

We don't know what tipped the balance one way or the other in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Michigan, but there's no proof and we'll never be able to say it was James Comey and we'll never be able to say it was Vladimir Putin. So Democrats also need to keep in mind, if you present this instead of as a security crisis but as a partisan issue, then you are doing the bidding of Russia because half the country is going to just tune you out, no longer listen to you, and the other half is going to say, the incoming administration is not legitimate.

SCIUTTO: And that's exactly Russia's goals, to undermine America's confidence in their own system, but also on the world stage, right, because this is a soft power battle. You know, the U.S. and - has advertised its democracy to the world as a better way. So Putin is also thinking about his own people, but he's thinking about people in Europe and Asia. Look at that mess in America. Do you really want that for yourselves? So this has enormous domestic but also international implications.

BLITZER: All right, everybody, stand by. There's a lot more coming up. Moments away right now from President Obama, he'll address all of these issues and more, including the growing rift between Donald Trump and the White House. Stand by. This is CNN's special live coverage of the president's final news conference of this year.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:20:27] ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

BLITZER: Once again, we want to welcome our viewers in the United States and around the world. I'm Wolf Blitzer in Washington.

Moments from now the president of the United States will go up to the lectern there in the White House Briefing Room, make a statement, then answer reporters' questions, probably for at least one hour, this before he heads off with his family to Hawaii for the holiday time off. He'll be back in Washington after the New Year.

Jake Tapper, the first lady of the United States gave an interview to Oprah Winfrey. She said some words that were seen as rather controversial. I want to play the clip and then we'll discuss.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OPRAH WINFREY: Your husband's administration, everything, the election, was all about hope. Do you think that this administration achieved that?

MICHELLE OBAMA, FIRST LADY: Yes, I do, because we feel the difference now.

WINFREY: Yes.

OBAMA: See, now we're feeling what not having hope feels like, you know? Hope is necessary.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: All right, weigh in on that, Jake, because the controversy -

TAPPER: I thought it's kind of -

BLITZER: The controversy is that she's saying that there's no hope now in effect.

TAPPER: I'm not sure that's what she was saying. But if that's what she was saying, I'm sure that's how a lot of Obama supporters feel and it's a lot - it's about how, you know, a plurality of the country who voted for Hillary Clinton feels. It's not how people who voted for Donald Trump feel. There are people who voted for Barack Obama twice and then pulled the lever for Donald Trump. There are 200 counties that Obama won twice that went for Donald Trump. I think a lot of those people voted for Donald Trump because they felt like he would finally pay attention to them and their needs, especially in the small manufacturing towns.

So I certainly know a lot of people who feel that way and I certainly hear from a lot of people who feel that way, they don't have hope. They're scared of this administration, the incoming administration. There's also a lot of people I know who feel the exact opposite and this is, again, maybe - maybe we're misreading her - her - her - what she said. Maybe there's a larger context if you play, you know, five minutes of the clip. But it's important for leaders to be uniting the country right now and not dividing the country right now.

HENDERSON: Yes.

BLITZER: And, Nia, led me just read to you what she said again, "we are feeling what not having hope feels like."

HENDERSON: Yes. I mean I think she probably is speaking for the Obama coalition and, of course, some of those people stayed home or peeled off and voted for Donald Trump. She had, I think, for much of her tenure - she's got very high approval ratings, 66 percent, I think, it might be 72 percent now - had been a very non-partisan first lady in many ways in the way that a lot of first ladies tend to be. But she was very partisan during this campaign, right? Remember that big speech that she gave in New Hampshire where she really called Donald Trump out in terms of some of the things that he said on that "Access Hollywood" tape. So this seems to be a continuation of that.

It was a very partisan statement. She does seem to be forgetting, as Jake said, the 60 - you know, 60 million people who do have hope in Donald Trump and believe in his slogan, this idea that he can make America great again and that currently America is in a tough position and on the decline. They feel like Donald Trump is going to turn that around. So, you know, I do wonder what figure can be, you know, sort of a uniting figure at this point to heal this rift, this very big rift between the two sides, the folks that voted for Clinton, the folks that voted for Trump, whether or not that person even exists. You saw - you saw Obama -

TAPPER: Wolf. HENDERSON: Yes, maybe it's Wolf. Maybe it's Jake. Maybe. Who knows.

We saw Obama try to do that in those initial words in that press conference, but it's a tough road in terms of uniting those two sides.

TAPPER: I mean the thing is, Michelle Obama is the first lady of the United States of America -

HENDERSON: Right.

TAPPER: Not the first lady of the blue states of America.

HENDERSON: Yes.

TAPPER: And more importantly, because she's the first lady not the president and she is on her way out, Donald Trump needs to remember he will be the president of the United States of America. That means he's going to be the president of tens of millions of people who did not vote for him, including his critics. And it just feels like, at this point in the nation and our history, people are just losing sight of that, that you're the first lady for everyone. You are going to be the president for everyone. And especially for President-elect Trump, that's something he really needs to take to heart.

SCIUTTO: You know, it's interesting, we talk so much about loss of faith in institutions, right? I mean we've felt that - people have said that about Congress. Congress isn't working. You talk about law enforcement in the context of Black Lives Matter.

The presidential election now, right, you have a big portion of the country and you're hearing that expressed by a Clinton or Michelle Obama losing faith in the institution of the presidential election, right? In effect saying, it wasn't legitimate.

[14:25:12] And to your point earlier, Jake, you get into dangerous territory from both sides if you call that into question because then you're - you may be upset, right, and maybe rightfully so in your head, but, you know, this election system has served us pretty well for a couple hundred years, right, and there have been divisive elections in the past and if you - if you don't accept the results, you know, of that election - and let's be honest, that happened with Barack Obama as well for a big portion of the country, but if you don't accept the results of that, that sets you up for some really dangerous divisions going forward.

TAPPER: And we should point out that some Democrats are really treading on some very thin ice here because whatever you think about FBI Director James Comey and whatever you think about the decisions he made, and I know a lot of people who know him and disagree with the decisions he made. I don't know one person who knows him who thinks he did it to change the outcome of the election.

The worst interpretation is that he's so infatuated with his own sense of integrity that he put that ahead of the American electoral system. But I don't know anybody who thinks he's a partisan Republican and he was trying to help Donald Trump. Except for the Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid, who this week said that Comey is a partisan hack and should resign and should become chairman of the Republican National Committee.

HENDERSON: (INAUDIBLE). Yes. Yes.

TAPPER: Except for, in a way, John Podesta -

SCIUTTO: Yes.

TAPPER: Hillary Clinton's campaign chairman, who has an op-ed in the paper today saying that something stinks at the FBI.

SCIUTTO: It's broken.

HENDERSON: Yes. yes.

TAPPER: Something - something is afoul at the FBI.

HENDERSON: Right.

TAPPER: This is dangerous territory talking about undermining institutions.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

HENDERSON: Yes. Yes.

TAPPER: And, again, criticism of institutions, totally legitimate -

SCIUTTO: Yes.

TAPPER: But what we're hearing is a real casting of illegitimacy by Democrat leaders, as well as Republican leaders.

BLITZER: Especially at something like the FBI, which has not been partisan, which has gone - maybe J. Edgar Hoover there was a lot of controversy in those days, but that was decades ago.

HENDERSON: Right.

BLITZER: And all of a sudden to hear these kinds of words, you're absolutely right, being uttered involving James Comey and the FBI, it's pretty - it's pretty significant and very worrisome, I must say.

Everybody stay with us. We're waiting for the president of the United States. We're told momentarily he will go into the Briefing Room, make a statement, answer reporters' questions. Our live coverage continues right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

BLITZER: Welcome back. We're standing by to hear from President Obama, his last news conference of the year, maybe his last news conference in his administration. He's getting ready to go into the Briefing Room, make a statement, an opening statement, and then answer reporters' questions, probably for at least one hour. We'll have live coverage of that every step of the way.

Michelle Kosinski is in the Briefing Room getting ready.

Michelle, set the scene for us. You're getting some new information about what we might hear.

[14:30:02] KOSINSKI: Yes, I mean, there are going to be a lot of questions, obviously. Most of them focused on the matter at hand that's really the issue that's been roiling in America right now, this Russian hack. But, you know, obviously, this isn't just for the benefit of