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Deadline for Flynn; Kushner Meeting Part of Probe; Russian Ambassador Contacts; Manafort Turns over Documents. Aired 1-1:30p ET

Aired May 30, 2017 - 13:00   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, I'm Wolf Blitzer. It's 1:00 p.m. here in Washington, 8:00 p.m. in Moscow. Wherever you're joining us from around the world, thanks very much.

We begin with exclusive CNN reporting on the investigation into Russia's interference in the 2016 presidential election, including another member of President Trump's personal circle now being asked to provide information to the U.S. Congress.

Plus, increased scrutiny of the president's son-in-law and his ties to a Russian-banking (ph) executive. And some perspective on the president's mood in the midst of the Russia investigation with one source telling CNN's Gloria Borger, and I'm quoting now, "He now lives within himself which is a dangerous place for Donald Trump to be. He doesn't have anybody whom he trusts." End quote.

All this adds up to some very tough questions for the White House press secretary, Sean Spicer. He'll be going to the lectern on -- not that far from now, within an hour or so. Less than an hour, I should say. His first on-camera briefing since President Trump returned from his overseas trip. We will, of course, have live coverage right here on CNN.

But first, let's bring in CNN's Chief National Security Correspondent Jim Sciutto and Our Senior White House Correspondent Jim Acosta.

Jim's over at the White House. So, Jim, I understand you have some breaking news. You've got some new reporting on the president's personal attorneys now being asked to provide sensitive information to the U.S. Congress. What can you tell us?

JIM ACOSTA, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Oh, that's right, Wolf. Another person connected to President Trump being drawn into the Russia investigation. This time, it is President Trump's personal attorney, Michael Cohen, who was a fixture, of course, throughout the campaign cycle, frequently appearing on CNN and other networks as a surrogate to Donald Trump.

He has been requested by the House and Senate Intelligence Committees to provide information and testimony. I just got off the phone with Michael Cohen a few moments ago. He says he has respectfully declined to cooperate, Wolf. And he also offered some pretty scathing quotes about how he feels about this investigation. He called the inquiry a, quote, "total fishing expedition." He also said, quote, "They have yet to produce one single piece of credible evidence that would corroborate the Russian narrative." He also referred to the investigation as a rush to judgment.

And so, that, basically, sums up where Michael Cohen is in all of this, Wolf. But, obviously, when investigators up on Capitol Hill want to talk to the personal attorney of President Trump, bring that person in, talk to him, see what kind of information that he has, this is an investigation that is getting closer and closer to the president of the United States -- Wolf.

BLITZER: Yes, it's a sensitive new development. We're going to follow-up on that.

I want to bring in Jim Sciutto as well. You've got some exclusive reporting you and the team have been doing on Russian officials discussing what was described as potentially derogatory information about President Trump and his associates. Update our viewers. What are you learning?

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: That's right. Intelligence sources as well as a congressional source tell myself, Pamela Brown and Dana Bash that intercepted communications show that Russians were speaking to each other in these conversations, claiming to have derogatory information not just on President Trump but on his aides. And describing how, because of having this derogatory information, they believe that they might have leverage over the Trump administration going forward.

Now, to be clear, as a caveat here, U.S. intelligence officials, as well as Congressional source, tell us it is possible that they were exaggerating the information they have or even possibly making up that information.

But fact is, U.S. intelligence intercepted these communications and they claimed to have this information of a financial nature both on the president and on some of his top aides.

BLITZER: Do we know the specifics of what the alleged derogatory information was?

SCIUTTO: We don't know, except that it would be of a financial a -- financial in nature. That is one thing. We also don't know the specifics of what particular Trump aides were involved. We know that they spoke about having this information about the president, himself, as well as senior Trump aides.

The reason for that is that the identities of these individuals were masked in the intelligence, as they would when you have a U.S. person captured in intercepted communications, that is, by law, masked. So, we know the president. We know some of the senior advisors.

BLITZER: Let me go back to Jim Acosta. What's been the reaction from the White House from this exclusive report from CNN, Jim?

ACOSTA: Well, so far, the reaction, Wolf, is basically what it's been all along. The White House continues to say there's no evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia during the election cycle.

And one thing that we have been reporting and it should be -- we should also say, once again, is that this White House is in the process of putting together a war room-like operation to do rapid response and respond to all of these stories.

Just yesterday, the former campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, who was known for his sharp elbows, the former campaign -- or deputy campaign manager, David Bossie, were both seen leaving the West Wing yesterday. They were inside talking to people inside the West Wing about all of this. And they are some of the names surfacing as part of this war room operation that's being set up over here at the White House.

[13:05:10] The question, Wolf, is whether or not Corey Lewandowski, in fact, takes a position at the White House. That would, obviously, be something that would need to be, I guess, passed by the president's family. You'll recall, during the campaign, Corey Lewandowski was fired by the campaign.

And first among the people inside the president's inner circle who were concerned about Corey Lewandowski were the president's it daughter, Ivanka Trump, and the president's son-in-law, Jared Kushner.

Of course, Jared Kushner is keeping his head down is the way sources close to him describe it because of the Russia news that cropped up with respect to him last week. But he's certainly still a very influential adviser to the president.

BLITZER: Lots of questions coming up for Sean Spicer. His briefing is scheduled to begin with less than an or so from now. We'll, of course, have live coverage.

Jim Acosta, thanks very much for that. Jim Sciutto, stay with us. I want to broaden our conversation. Also joining us, our Chief Political Analyst Gloria Borger and our Chief Political Correspondent Dana Bash.

Gloria, the news about Michael Cohen. All of a sudden, the president's long-time personal attorney from the Trump Organization now being requested to do an interview to answer questions from members of Congress. He politely declines.

GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, and, again, Michael Cohen did not go into the White House. Michael Cohen has been with the president for more than -- more than a decade and has been his personal lawyer, apparently involved in helping him figure out who should be on his legal team as he goes forward. His personal -- his personal legal team.

So, it really is no surprise, in a way, that the Congressional committee would be asking to talk to Michael Cohen. I think that it may occur that the committee decides to narrow the scope of what they are asking Michael Cohen and make it a little bit more difficult for him to not cooperate. I wouldn't be surprised if that occurs.

BLITZER: I wonder if he, Dana, is going to cite attorney-client privilege. Because he has been the president's lawyer.

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, he absolutely could. There's no question about it. You know, it -- a lot of it depends on what they're asking for specifically and why he is so resistant to talking to them or to giving over the information that they've requested.

But it's entirely possible that he could claim that.

BLITZER: You were part of the team with Jim Sciutto and Pamela Brown that did this reporting on this alleged Russian collection of what's described as derogatory information about the president and his associates.

There is some suspicion, as you know, that maybe the Russians were just having some fun, disinformation, putting it out there, knowing that U.S. intelligence, law enforcement was listening. So, they decided to talk about that.

BASH: Look, it is entirely possible. And if we've all been doing reporting on this, the one thing that we run into over and over again is growing concern about the Russian disinformation campaign. Not only during the election year, but also even now as they're doing their probe to try to throw off investigators and, frankly, journalists. So, that is entirely possible.

But the one thing we should say is the reporting by people at this table, Gloria and Jim, certainly is that there have been financial entanglements of some people associated with the Trump world that the FBI and investigators are looking into. So, there is a connection there.

SCIUTTO: Director Clapper was on our air this morning --

BLITZER: In fact, I have a clip of what he said. Let me play the clip and then we'll talk. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAMES CLAPPER, FORMER DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: I will just say that there were a series of communications and dialogues that we grew -- I say we, members of the intelligence community, that were aware of this were very concerned about. We didn't know the intent. We didn't know -- and certainly didn't know the substance of these conversations and dialogues.

And so, what this merits, what it requires, I think, is an airing, a transparency and play-out this investigation. This is something that the country badly needs to clear up, this cloud that's hanging over us right now. (END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: I should -- put this into context.

SCIUTTO: Well, here's the thing. You often hear, and you heard Michael Cohen there in response to this request from the Hill and you hear this from Trump and you hear this from other Trump supporters, there's no evidence, not a shred of evidence that has been released. That's not true.

The fact is, you have former officials, like Director Clapper, and current ones, for instance Director Comey when he was still FBI director during his testimony, referenced communications between Trump advisers and Russians that were intercepted during the campaign that caught their attention. They have not publicized all the contents of those or, really, any of the contents of those communications because that is truly classified material.

And they haven't advertised what their conclusions are. But they have made public reference to information, evidence, clues that folks like Jim Clapper and others have said is, listen, we don't know what the conclusion is, but this merits investigation going forward.

[13:10:07] And that is a consistent message that you hear from Democrats and Republicans who -- on the Congressional Committee, Senate and House Intelligence. Current intelligence officials serving this administration. We don't have the final answer yet, but there's stuff here that we've got to look at and check out.

BLITZER: Gloria, you've been doing some really excellent reporting on what's going on inside the White House right now, especially in the aftermath of the allegations against the president's son-in-law and senior adviser, Jared Kushner. And you've written an excellent column on this.

Update our viewers on what you're hearing.

BORGER: Well, I'm hearing that before the president went on his foreign trip, he was in, kind of, a glum mood. And I think that when he came back, it didn't -- it didn't get any better. And in talking to people who talk with the president, I heard that he, kind of -- and here's a quote, that he lives within himself which is a dangerous Trump -- place for Donald Trump to be." That "He doesn't really trust anyone inside the White House anymore. And I think that's a problem, when you're president of the United States.

There are also people who are outside the White House who have his ear, who are, quite frankly, critical of the way the White House is being run. They believe that it should never -- this Russia investigation should never have gotten to a special counsel.

You may then ask the question, well then, why did Donald Trump reportedly ask three people to shut down the investigation, because that's what led to a -- to a special counsel. And they believe that people in the White House, as one said it to me, these people play checkers, not chess. And that they -- there is more complex political thought that ought to go into what the president is doing, including the firing of Comey which some of them said was completely ill-timed.

BASH: Well, and, you know, checkers, not chess. But then, the question is, even if the president had, you know, the Jim Baker that everybody is looking for, even if it is Jim baker, himself, who went into the White House, would that make a difference? Because it is -- you know, by lots of accounts, by your reporting and, you know, people I talked to, that it is -- much of this is the president's impulses. He wanted Comey to go.

Now, certainly, there could be people around him he respects to say no, this is a bad idea Mr. President and game out what is happening now real time to make him understand. But I don't know if that's even possible.

BORGER: Yes, I think this is a president who wants to be his own Jim Baker. He believes he can be his own chief of staff. He believes he can be his own spokesman, as we've seen throughout his career. So, I think that, you know, he may not trust anyone, at this point, but I don't think that's necessarily new, when it comes to Donald Trump.

BLITZER: Should we be surprised that the communications director, Dana, at the White House, all of a sudden announces, you know what, I'm leaving?

BASH: Absolutely not. He was brought in somewhat late in the game. Jason Miller, who's now a CNN Contributor, was going to be the communications director. He pulled out around Christmas. And then, they added him pretty late in the game. They say they lived for a long time without a communications director.

Let's be clear. The communications director at the White House is Donald J. Trump. He is -- he is the calms (ph) strategist. And, lot of times, it works out really well for them. But other times, it doesn't.

So, it was -- it's a hard position for anybody. And, you know, maybe they can get somebody in there who can be more in sync with (INAUDIBLE.)

BLITZER: All right, everybody stand by. We're standing by for Sean Spicer, the White House Press Secretary. He's going to be having his on-camera briefing that's coming up.

Also coming up, it's deadline day for the president's former national security adviser, Michael Flynn. How will he answer the Senate Intelligence Committee's latest rounds of subpoenas which requested business documents related to their Russia probe?

We'll be right back.

[13:13:52]

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[13:17:40] WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: We're following the breaking news. One of President Trump's long time personal attorneys, Michael Cohen, he's declining an invitation to provide information and testimony to House and Senate Intelligence Committee members conducting the Russian investigation. Cohen says their request was overly broad and impossible to answer.

Meanwhile, an important deadline has arrived for former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn. Today is the day Flynn is due to respond to two subpoenas from the Senate Intelligence Committee involving his businesses. He invoked the Fifth Amendment to an earlier request the committee made for his personal records.

CNN's congressional correspondent Phil Mattingly is joining us right now.

Phil, what do we know about these subpoenas and how do they differ from the earlier request?

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, they're more tailored. They're more narrow. They're - and that was intentional, Wolf. One of the reasons that Michael Flynn said he was going to decline to provide any documents in that initial subpoena, at least according to people close to him, is it was overly broad. And there are a lot of concerns, given the special counsel investigation, given the fact there are subpoenas that have been issued by - via a grand jury on a federal investigation, about getting involved in a Senate panel investigation as well, Wolf.

What these two subpoenas that Michael Flynn is supposed to respond to today - I'm told he still hasn't responded up to this point - would essentially do is go after documents from two business entities owned by Michael Flynn. And thee rational is this, according to Senate Intelligence Committee members. The idea that Michael Flynn has decided to invoke his Fifth Amendment privilege would not extend to business documents. So, if he were to decline, as he did initially, they would seek any option that's on the table. That was according to Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr, and that includes contempt of Congress.

Now, when you talk to these members behind the scenes, they say they want to figure out some way forward for Michael Flynn to help out in this investigation. Obviously immunity is something that has been broached by Michael Flynn's lawyer. Lawmakers continuing to say that's not on the table.

But if you look, Wolf, at what you guys - what you've been reporting regarding Michael Cohen, Donald Trump's personal lawyer, and what's going on with Michael Flynn right now, there's a recognition that even as the special counsel, Robert Mueller, staffs up and kind of ratchets up his investigation, you're seeing a posture change from the Senate Intelligence Committee and also the House Intelligence Committee. They are ramping up their investigations. There are witness lists that have been agreed upon. There are documents that have been requested. You're going to see a lot more things like this over the course of the coming days and weeks as these committees continue to work forward.

[13:20:03] Now, it's worth noting, members are home. They are in their recess period this week. But I'm told staff still very hard at work at this investigation. The big question now, is there any way to get any type of cooperation, either via testimony or via documents from Michael Flynn. Up to this point, his lawyers have said no. still an open question with those two subpoenas that were issued last week, Wolf.

BLITZER: Let's see what happens during the course of this day.

Phil, Mattingly, thanks very much.

Michael Flynn is just one person from the president's orbit currently under investigation by the FBI or various congressional committees. In the spotlight right now, the president son-in-law and close adviser Jared Kushner. In December he met a Russian banker with close ties to Vladimir Putin. "The New York Times" reports investigators are examining that meeting to determine what the two discussed.

Our justice producer, Shimon Prokupecz is joining us right now to talk about all of this. Putin's allies, key figures close to the president, to the probe of the Russian investigation.

Let's talk first of all, Shimon, about this banker, Sergey Gorkov. What do we know about him?

SHIMON PROKUPECZ, CNN JUSTICE PRODUCER: So Gorkov first surfaced in March when we reported that he meet with Kushner. We're now learning more about what that meeting was, intercepts, U.S. government intercepts. There was discussions on those intercepts about what the communications were.

What's interesting about Gorkov is that he's a close friend of Vladimir Putin, the Russian president. He was appointed to his current position, which is, he runs a major bank, a major Russian bank, and he has ties to the Russian government. He went to their spy school. So he has this craft in knowing how to sort of lure people in, talk to them about different spy techniques that he has from the different spy techniques that he's learned to try and get information.

Jared Kushner, initially we were told they met to discuss diplomatic stuff as it related to his position during the transition. The bank interestingly, that Gorkov works for, runs, they said that, well, the meeting back in December was a business meeting, was a personal business meeting. So conflicting views on what the actual meeting was about back in December.

BLITZER: But the bank is sanctioned by the U.S. government, so you can't do business if you're an American with that bank.

PROKUPECZ: That's correct. That's right. That's right.

BLITZER: And that's interesting that they say there was some business involved. I'm sure they want to investigate that. White House has a different explanation on that point.

PROKUPECZ: That's right.

BLITZER: Let's talk about another Sergey, Sergey Kislyak, the Russian - long-time Russian ambassador here in the United States.

PROKUPECZ: So he's at the center of everything. He is the ultimate spy here. Lives in Washington. Is on the FBI's radar. Has been monitored probably since he became ambassador. He is someone who has met with Trump officials, people tied to the transition, people tied to the White House. He himself went to the White House. Remember there was all that controversy surrounding his appearance, his visit into the Oval Office.

He has met with almost like everyone who's at the center of the FBI investigation now, Michael Flynn, Carter Page, we now know Kushner. And he was the one, we're told, who introduced Gorkov to Kushner as a way to possibly communicate about Russia and what the president, President Trump, going forward, sort of maybe perhaps build some sort of back channel way to communicate.

BLITZER: And now Paul Manafort, who had been the campaign chairman for the - campaign manager for the president's campaign, all of a sudden his name has resurfaced.

PROKUPECZ: Well, that's right. The thing about Manafort is, is he has a long history of business ties to the Ukraine, has done business there. He is cooperating. He basically - he has turned over a bunch of documents, financial documents, to the Senate Intelligence Committee, which is investigating the Russian meddling in the election.

So, you know, and then there's - also we have Carter Page, who we all now know he's the one who's kind of - he's outspoken. He's been on TV. He's been talking about - he has denied any kind of relationship with the Trump campaign. He did do some work for them. He's denied any kind of relationship with the Russians. He too is the subject of an FBI - the FBI investigation and they also have been monitoring his communication. And the Russians, interestingly enough, just lastly on Carter Page, talked about using him. There were intercepts that the U.S. government communications intercepted where the Russians were saying, oh, we can possibly use Carter Page to influence Donald Trump.

BLITZER: You know, it's interesting because the new special counsel, the former FBI director, Robert Mueller, he is only just beginning his investigation and I'm told that investigation, who knows how long it's going to last and where it's going to wind un.

PROKUPECZ: That's right.

BLITZER: Shimon, thanks very much for that.

PROKUPECZ: Sure.

BLITZER: Shimon Prokupecz doing very good reporting for us, as always.

[13:24:59] Coming up, the president not backing away from a fight with one of America's closest allies. Is the president's America's first policy creating a rift with Germany and other friends abroad?

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

Take a look at this. Some live pictures coming in from inside the White House Briefing Room. The press secretary, Sean Spicer, expected to come out within the next half hour or so for his first on camera briefing since the president returned from his international trip. We're going to have live coverage of that coming up. Stick around. It will be interesting.

[13:30:01] President Trump earlier today not backing down from criticism he's receiving from various quarters and he's leveling some criticism at Germany, taking a swipe at that country, saying Germany is bad on trade and not