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FBI Report on Kavanaugh Delivered to Senate. Aired 7-7:30a ET

Aired October 04, 2018 - 07:00   ET

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

[07:00:06] UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A team of FBI agents can do more in a week than most can do in a year.

JAMIE ROCHE, YALE FRESHMAN ROOMMATE OF BRETT KAVANAUGH: I knew he was lying because he was my roommate.

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: "Upstairs, downstairs. Where was it?"

"I don't know. But I had one beer. That's the one thing I remember."

SEN. JEFF FLAKE (R), ARIZONA: Obviously, insensitive and appalling, frankly.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's a lot of legitimate reasons to question the veracity of Dr. Ford's testimony.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're on the verge of a vote that's going to tear this country apart.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right. Good morning. Welcome to your NEW DAY. And there is breaking news, big breaking news this morning.

We just learned that the FBI's report on Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, it has been delivered to the Senate Judiciary Committee in a sealed box. And as we speak, it's being held in a vault. In just one hour, senators, they will start reading it.

Now, White House officials, they have already seen the report, and they claim to CNN there is no corroboration of Christine Blasey Ford's allegations of sexual assault against Brett Kavanaugh. That is the White House version. They provide no specifics.

And again, Democrats have yet to see it and tell us what they think. And there are new questions about just how thorough this probe actually was. "The Washington Post" reports the scope was significantly curtailed by the White House, despite claims to the contrary by the president. FBI agents were reportedly prevented from looking into Kavanaugh's past alcohol use and whether he lied to Congress.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Now before the report even arrived on Capitol Hill, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell started the clock on a confirmation vote. A procedural vote is set for Friday, a final vote set for Saturday.

But stories continue to come out about Kavanaugh from people who say they have relevant information and cannot get in touch with the FBI. Among them, Kavanaugh's college roommate at Yale. Jamie Roche tells CNN that Kavanaugh lied under oath to the Senate Judiciary Committee.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ROCHE: When Brett started saying things about his drinking and his use of certain words, sexually-oriented words, you know, I knew he was -- he was lying, because he was my roommate. You know, we were in a room together. Our beds were ten feet apart for a couple of months.

And what struck me and made me more interested in speaking out about it is -- is not only did I know that he wasn't telling, you know, the truth. I knew that he knew that he wasn't telling the truth.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Let's discuss this with CNN senior political commentator and former U.S. senator, Rick Santorum; and Linda Chavez, former Reagan White House official and chair for the Center for Equal Opportunity. Great to have both of you with us on this very important morning.

Rick, I'll start with you. When you hear that there is information left on the table, when Jamie Roche, for instance, and other people say, "I have information that I think is relevant for the FBI, to take the full measure of the man." But they haven't been contacted, are you comfortable with having a vote tomorrow?

RICK SANTORUM, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes, this is -- yes, I am. Because this isn't about drinking in college. I mean, if the story is about did someone get drunk in college or drink too much in college, then, you know, we probably wouldn't have anybody on the Supreme Court.

CAMEROTA: No, fair enough. It's about credibility and whether or not he told the truth.

SANTORUM: He said he drank. He said he drank to excess. He said he didn't black out. Jimmy Roche doesn't know whether Brett Kavanaugh blacked out. No one knows.

CAMEROTA: He said he had memory lapses.

SANTORUM: No one. Well --

CAMEROTA: If your roommate is -- hold on. Hold on, Rick. If you are roommates with somebody --

SANTORUM: No, I just don't buy that.

CAMEROTA: -- and you say, "Hey, so last night, where'd you park the car?" And your roommate says, "I don't remember. I was too drunk." You know if your roommate has memory lapses.

SANTORUM: If you remember that from 35 years ago, sorry, bullshit. I mean, I'm just saying it's just ridiculous.

CAMEROTA: Rick, you think that you don't remember that your friends had memory lapses?

SANTORUM: No, I don't. Absolutely not. And I don't -- I don't believe the fact that someone is coming forward who obviously has -- has an agenda.

Brett Kavanaugh addressed this guy at the hearing and said, you know, there's things about this guy that, you know, you need to look at. And obviously, there's -- you know, we aren't looking at that. We aren't looking at that redacted thing.

All I'm saying is we've now gone from serious accusations of sexual assault. And now we're talking about whether he drank too much at college. That's just ridiculous.

CAMEROTA: They're part and parcel of the same thing. They're part and parcel of the same thing.

SANTORUM: No, they are not. That's the other accusation. Just because you got drunk --

CAMEROTA: He got so drunk he can't remember.

SANTORUM: OK, and so therefore you sexually assaulted people? There's no evidence out there. No one is saying that he was aggressive sexually when he was drunk. In fact, they say just the opposite.

CAMEROTA: They say that he was aggressive.

SANTORUM: You're trying to tie these together and they are not -- you can't tie them together.

BERMAN: Senator -- Senator -- Senator, you know who is saying he was sexually aggressive when he was drunk?

SANTORUM: Sorry.

BERMAN: Professor Christine Blasey Ford says he was sexually aggressive when drunk. And Debbie Ramirez --

SANTORUM: And those are --

BERMAN: Hang on, hang on. Can I finish? An I finish?

Deborah Ramirez says he was sexually aggressive when he was drunk. There is this additional witness "The New Yorker" reports about. Kenneth Appold who says that he saw or heard at the time, contemporaneously, one day later, the Debbie Ramirez allegations. He was not spoken by the FBI -- hang on one second, Senator.

And let me just put this to Linda, who is going to be part of this conversation.

[07:05:02] Senator Santorum says that lying, or allegations of lying under oath to the Senate about drinking and words that were used doesn't matter. I'm old enough to remember when allegations of lying about sex were an impeachable offense, Linda, so is there a difference here?

LINDA CHAVEZ, CHAIR, CENTER FOR EQUAL OPPORTUNITY: Well, I guess it depends on what the meaning of lying is.

And in this instance, I have to tell you, I think that this has become so poisoned, so toxic that the idea of getting to the truth has been abandoned long ago. And I do think that not much has changed.

What has changed is we've heard testimony. We've had the FBI go back. I had hoped that they would have had a somewhat broader investigation, but I also think it should have been done before the testimony.

I would have liked Dr. Ford to be questioned by the FBI, but apparently, I mean, we don't know, but apparently, there is no corroborating evidence for Dr. Ford's claims or Ms. Ramirez' claims, and if that is the case, I think you're not going to see any changes in anyone's vote.

And much of the voting is going to come down on ideological grounds that has very little to do with the hearing that took place.

CAMEROTA: But Linda, when you say there's no corroborating information, and you're just getting that from press reports, as are we in the moment, but we'll be speaking to the White House, that's because they're not talking to the people who could corroborate it?

CHAVEZ: Well, at what point do you say anyone can come forward and make an allegation? I man, they had the chance to do that weeks ago. They had the chance to do it at the time of the testimony. And now people are coming out of the woodworks?

I mean, I think this has become so poisoned. The Supreme Court is being damaged in this process, our political process as being damaged. Do you want to talk about the Russians doing damage which I think they did to our democracy. This has done enormous damage, this whole mess. And the Democrats are not blameless here. I think they have been part of the problems in what's going on.

CAMEROTA: And just one last question, Linda, before I turn it back to John. Because you think it's been so damaged, do you think, then, that Brett Kavanaugh should be seated on the Supreme Court?

CHAVEZ: Well I have to tell you, if I were in Brett Kavanaugh's shoes, I would say, "A pox on both your houses." And I would not actually assume the job.

CAMEROTA: You'd bow out?

CHAVEZ: I would have bowed out, and I might bow out after the vote, by the way, because I think this -- this is going to be a terrible cloud on him. I think Brett Kavanaugh would make a terrific Supreme Court justice. I am for his nomination. But what this process is doing to the court really, really saddens me.

BERMAN: So Senator, back to you. Do you feel that, if someone who wants to sit on the Supreme Court lied under oath before the Senate, that that should be enough to keep him off the Supreme Court?

SANTORUM: Yes, I would say that Brett Kavanaugh did not lie under oath, OK. Kavanaugh admitted that he drank. He admitted that he drank to excess. Did he have to go into the gory details of every time he drank to excess or how much he drank to excess? He didn't, and I don't think he should have.

That's not the issue here. The issue is whether he sexually assaulted somebody, and obviously, that claim is going nowhere. Why? Because they have not found anyone present at the scene who said that they can corroborate that.

Someone said, well, they may have heard something. That's not corroborating. That's just hearsay. You can't go -- you can't use that as real evidence. You couldn't use it as a court. And you can't use it in this case either.

So the reality is the sexual assault claims have fallen flat, and now they're trying to find some -- some way of getting to him, because he didn't lay it all on the table of how much he drank. That's just not real.

BERMAN: It isn't just the drinking, Senator. It's also these terms that were used. He flat-out said they didn't mean something his college roommate says they did.

He also says he didn't black out. His college roommate says he did. The reason the credibility matters here, in addition to the fact this guy could sit on the supreme Court for 40 years, and pass judgement on all sorts of things, is you have to wonder if he's going to lie about those things. Is he lying --

SANTORUM: This man has a 30-year public career of -- excuse me, a 20- year public career of impeccable integrity. And you're going to focus in on one little bit of testimony where he's being grilled, because there's a nexus between did you drink too much and could you have blacked out and, therefore, done this, as Alisyn made the connection.

CAMEROTA: Well, they also said that he was aggressive when he drank too much and that he had memory lapses.

SANTORUM: Look, the reality is Brett Kavanaugh walked a very fine -- I'll agree, he walked a very fine line on this, but he walked a very fine line, because the Democrats were trying to entrap him on this.

And this is -- and look, I'm not saying that he maybe should have been a little bit more forthcoming, but I -- but to say that's the reason you're going to ignore 20 years of distinguished service to this country, impeccable integrity and you're going to throw that away, sorry, that's just not going to wash. CAMEROTA: Senator, did you find Christine Blasey Ford credible?

[07:10:03] SANTORUM: I thought she gave a very compelling testimony. I said it at the time. She gave very compelling testimony.

CAMEROTA: Did you believe her?

SANTORUM: I think she gave -- I believe that she -- that she thinks that happened. I'm not -- but I don't believe that the -- that the -- that you can look at all of the evidence and say that Judge Kavanaugh should not be confirmed based upon it, because there's no corroboration of what she said. And there were ample opportunities to corroborate.

CAMEROTA: How could you corroborate it? There were only people were in the room. One of them is Brett Kavanaugh, who says no. One of them is her who says yes. And one of them is a famous -- is a man with a famous drinking problem who wrote a memoir about it that he can't remember much of the '80s.

SANTORUM: But there were other people that she identified, and they say that it didn't happen.

CAMEROTA: It happened upstairs in one room. Nobody downstairs would have known.

SANTORUM: But a friend who said that she has never met Brett Kavanaugh. There were only five or six people at this party. The idea that -- that someone who is a friend of hers said she's -- and was very definitive about it, she's never met the man. It's not like she wouldn't know. I mean, this is a very small circle.

Those are very compelling things that say that maybe she just got it wrong. I mean, maybe something happened to her or maybe something didn't and maybe this is the narrative she's told herself. Whatever it is, the reality is I think she believes this. I'm not sure that you can -- you can disqualify a man for the court because of that.

CAMEROTA: You're talking about Leland Keyser.

SANTORUM: Right.

CAMEROTA: And we don't know what she said to the FBI. Maybe we'll find out in a leak today.

SANTORUM: We know what she said to the Judiciary Committee, and she reiterated it afterwards, well before the FBI investigation.

BERMAN: One thing she did reiterate is that she believes her friend, Christine Blasey Ford, though she says she did not recall being at such a party.

SANTORUM: And she doesn't know Brett Kavanaugh.

BERMAN: She says she doesn't recall meeting Brett Kavanaugh. That is what she said in that statement. CAMEROTA: Well, I just wanted to get to Linda for a second. So

Linda, I think it's really interesting that you say that perhaps Brett Kavanaugh would or should bow out, because this has become so toxic and poisoned. There is time.

I mean, if he is too damaged at this point because of all of this, whether it's the Democrats' fault, the Republicans, they all share blame. A pox on both their houses. There is still time to nominate someone else.

CHAVEZ: Well --

CAMEROTA: I mean, obviously, Amy Coney Barrett was somebody who was at the top of the list. This could all still go the way of the president and the way conservatives want.

CHAVEZ: I don't think that I said he should bow out. I said I would under those circumstances.

CAMEROTA: OK, fair.

CHAVEZ: And that is somewhat different. And I do believe that he feels that he has to clear his name.

This is a terrible allegation. Two terrible, three terrible, several terrible allegations against this man. And in that position, he feels that he needs to be vindicated.

But I also believe that, you know, depending on what happens, I think he probably is likely to be confirmed. I think this is going to hang over his head. And it is, to me, a tragedy that has happened on the court.

Now, Clarence Thomas survived, although he has always been looked out critically. I hate to see the same thing happening to Brett Kavanaugh.

SANTORUM: Can I address -- I want to address this issue of a pox on both your houses. Let's just be clear about this, folks. The Democrats are the ones who held this letter up until the last minute.

BERMAN: Hang on! Hang on one second! No, no, no. Christine Blasey Ford --

SANTORUM: Let me finish.

BERMAN: Christine Blasey Ford says she was sexually assaulted by Brett Kavanaugh. She went to the Senate, she went to Dianne Feinstein and said, "Don't tell anyone." Dianne Feinstein didn't tell anyone. I don't understand --

SANTORUM: John, stop right there!

BERMAN: Hang on. What I don't understand is why the fight, what we're fighting about this month, a woman says she was sexually assaulted by Brett Kavanaugh. Why is that something that is a pox on Democrats?

SANTORUM: The pox on Democrats is the proper way to handle this is to go to the committee, get the FBI to investigate it confidentially. The FBI keeps secrets, believe it or not, in this town. I know they leak secrets, but they can also keep secrets.

And they can actually do an investigation confidentially to find out whether there's validity to this without publishing it at the last minute in the most scandalous way possible, and betraying the trust of Dr. Ford. I mean, it was horrendous what they did to her. It's horrendous what they did to Judge Kavanaugh, and that's not the Republican's fault.

Look, the Republicans may be at fault on other things. This is 100 percent on the Democrats and the way they played this, to delay and to destroy the credibility. Why? To get to Linda's point. So he is so discredited when he gets on the court that he is -- that his decisions are invalid.

Whether he gets -- whether he gets approved or not, they have tried to undermine his credibility as a justice. This is horrendous what they did, and to say that this is a pox on both their houses is simply wrong.

CAMEROTA: Well, for you to say the Republicans are blameless in this entire controversy, I think also has -- is somewhat of a narrow --

SANTORUM: Explain.

CAMEROTA: -- perspective on this.

SANTORUM: Explain. Why are they blameless in waiting till the last minute and disclosing her name and then -- and causing scandal to Judge Kavanaugh, when he had no chance to defend himself and there was no investigation prior to the disclosure? That is not the Republicans' fault. It's 100 percent the Democrats.

You want to know why Republicans are mad? That is exactly why, because they see this as just vicious and dishonest and a pure power grab on the part of the Democrats.

[07:15:07] BERMAN: Look, we've got to run. But I will say this. It seems to me, Senator, what you're saying is -- is that the only solution that you would see as just is if Christine Blasey Ford was never able to tell her story to the American people, that what was so criminal here in your mind --

SANTORUM: I just said the opposite.

BERMAN: -- is that Christine Blasey Ford could not tell all the American people what she believes to be her truth of sexual assault? That is what happened.

SANTORUM: Excuse me, John. Christine Blasey Ford didn't want to tell her story. She wanted this to be investigated --

BERMAN: But she chose to testify

SANTORUM: -- the committee to consider it.

BERMAN: She chose to do it ultimately.

SANTORUM: Yes, because her name was exposed by the Democrats. John, just be honest about this stuff. You're just -- you're just glossing over just ridiculous -- ridiculous claims that somehow the Republicans were complicit in this. They were not.

The reality is, she wanted to keep it private. She could have kept it private, had the Democrats handled this the way it should have been handled and was handled on most other allegations.

BERMAN: Never go public. For it never to go public, right?

SANTORUM: The only people that had the information were Democrats. Let's just be -- they asked that question. She said those were the only people that had it.

BERMAN: To be clear, what they're suggesting is -- Linda and Rick, thank you very much for having -- we have a lot of other issues we've got to get to on the show.

CAMEROTA: No, just this one.

BERMAN: Yes.

CAMEROTA: We extend them. Look, I have a million more questions for them.

BERMAN: Yes.

CAMEROTA: Including what they thought about what -- how Donald Trump went after Christine Blasey Ford, but we'll get to that with other people.

BERMAN: Look, but what I don't know and I still don't understand is are they saying that the vote on Brett Kavanaugh should have happened without everyone knowing that this accusation was out there?

CAMEROTA: No, I think that he's saying that they could have done it quietly with the FBI investigating.

BERMAN: So that the American people would never know. That the FBI would have done this background check, and who knows what it comes up with? But that you would have an outcome where the American people don't know?

CAMEROTA: I think that's what he was saying.

BERMAN: OK. There you go.

As we said, we've got a big couple of hours. Coming up we're going to speak to Raj Shah from the White House, who's been handling this matter. What does he know about what's in the FBI report? Also this morning, Brett Kavanaugh's freshman year roommate, Jamie

Roche, is going to join us live with why he thinks that Brett Kavanaugh is not being honest.

We will also speak to two senators who will read this report in just a couple of hours. That's Chris Coons. He led the effort for the FBI investigation. And the Democratic whip, Dick Durbin.

BERMAN: Big show.

So he had heard the boos and the laughter while interviewing some of the biggest names in politics over the last few days. So what did the editor in chief of "The Atlantic," what has he learned about Brett Kavanaugh's nomination process? Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:21:30] BERMAN: All right. Breaking news. The Senate Judiciary Committee now has the FBI report on Brett Kavanaugh. It arrived overnight. It's sitting in a vault as we speak, but in just minutes, senators will be able to go through it.

Joining me now is the editor in chief of "The Atlantic," Jeffrey Goldberg. He's interviewed several senators at the heart of this confirmation process this week, including notably -- and this got a ton of press -- Lindsey Graham as part of "The Atlantic" Festival.

Jeffrey, thank you so much for being with us right now.

That interview with Lindsey Graham that you did -- and of course, Lindsey Graham is a central player here -- was fascinating. Because people have been looking at Lindsey Graham, saying what happened to him? Why does he feel so strongly about this?

Let's start on the issue, because this was all breaking as you were speaking to him, the president's new attack mocking Christine Blasey Ford. I want to play what Lindsey Graham said to you.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R), SOUTH CAROLINA: Everything he said was factual. He's frustrated his nominee has been treated so badly --

JEFFREY GOLDBERG, EDITOR IN CHIEF, "THE ATLANTIC:; Factual is personal, degrading attack on someone who is a private citizen.

GRAHAM: You know, here's what's personally degrading. This is what you get when you go through a trailer park with a $100 bill. For every woman that comes forward, God knows how many never say a word and take it to their grave. Sometimes people are accused of something they didn't do.

So President Trump went through a factual rendition that I didn't particularly like, and I would tell him knock it off. You're not helping. But it can be worse.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: Let's just clear up the $100 bill reference to James Carville. That was confusing to a lot of people yesterday. But the point there is he's defending the substance of the president's attack on Professor Ford.

GOLDBERG: Yes, he is. And one of my questions, and I've known Lindsey Graham for long time. I knew John McCain for a very long time. And one of my questions for Lindsey Graham is, you know, this -- that's the sort of behavior on the part of the president, President Trump, that John McCain, Lindsey Graham's mentor, would never have countenanced. And so I was very curious about Lindsey Graham's defense of this.

But what we're seeing, you know, in this whole process is an intense tribalization in American politics. And, you know, if you're a Republican you now, because of -- in part because of the Kavanaugh nomination and the fight around it, you are lined up with your tribe. And if you're not in that tribe, you're in the other tribe.

And so Lindsey Graham, who had a reputation, obviously, as being somewhat iconoclastic, somewhat an independent thinker, now is -- is firmly and enthusiastically aligned with this president. It's fascinating to watch this process.

BERMAN: He knows people are saying this about him. He knows this is being discussed. Does he have an explanation for this?

GOLDBERG: Well, I mean, I think -- you know, I'm not going to -- I can't -- can't peer into his soul. I take him at his word that this is what he honestly feels. He feels that this process has gone off the rails, feels that Brett Kavanaugh is being treated unfairly.

But, you know, so he was booed yesterday at certain moments when he was defending the president. And -- and what people in the audience didn't understand is that every time he's booed, that's 1,000 more Republicans in South Carolina who had their questions about Lindsey Graham, his centrism, his willingness to work with Hillary Clinton, that's 1,000 more that come lining up right behind him now.

And, you know, I just -- I just feel that he looks at the scenario and -- and seems to genuinely believe that the Democrats are railroading the process. Obviously, we brought up Merrick Garland and how Merrick Garland was treated by the Senate.

BERMAN: Yes.

[07:25:03] GOLDBERG: And I mean, you know, I've lived in Washington a long time. The main industry in Washington is hypocrisy. And so, you know, these things are sort of par for the course in politics here.

But still, there have been some fairly breathtaking moments in this -- in this drama over the last couple of weeks, and I think that's one of them.

BERMAN: I don't want to let it pass, because I saw it as news when he said to you that, if there's a Supreme Court vacancy in the final year of President Trump's term --

GOLDBERG: yes.

BERMAN: -- assuming the primaries have already started, he will move to keep that seat open.

GOLDBERG: Yes, no, that was definitely news. And to be fair to Lindsey Graham, that was a statement that a lot of senators who are not as straight talking as Lindsey Graham, that was a sign -- that was sort of the old Lindsey Graham maybe, a little bit.

And I said to him -- I was sort of surprised by it. And I said, you know, we're sitting in front of 1,000 people at "The Atlantic" Festival. It's not exactly off the record, being beamed live everywhere. I said, "You know you're on the record."

And he said, you know, "Save the tape." He's going to be held to that. And believe me, he will be held to that if this situation arises. But that was an interesting moment.

BERMAN: It really was. The papers are up in the Senate right now in a vault. Senators will begin examining them at 8 p.m. It really seems to me now, and we've heard from a number on both sides. I don't know how many minds are going to be changed by what's in here.

It does seem particularly Republicans are perfectly willing to compartmentalize -- compartmentalize and not even ask questions about whether Kavanaugh was honest during the hearing or not. They just want rock-solid proof. They basically want an admission from Brett Kavanaugh, which will never happen, that he sexually assaulted Professor Ford.

GOLDBERG: Right.

BERMAN: He says it didn't happen. But it seems to me this is pretty baked.

GOLDBERG: Right. I'll tell you this. We had Senator Flake at "The Atlantic" Festival the day before. And he, as you well know, is -- is somewhat tortured by all of this and tortured by this tribalization of politics and partisanship.

But the impression that I got from Senator Flake is that he still will vote for Kavanaugh but mournfully, if you will. I didn't -- that was just a feeling that I got, that -- that he believes in the conservative principles of Brett Kavanaugh and will hold his nose, barring dramatic new evidence and go forward. And I think that's probably true for the other, allegedly wavering Republican senators.

BERMAN: Jeffrey Goldberg with "The Atlantic" Festival, which has been going on. It's been fascinating to see. Congratulations on these terrific interviews and thanks for joining us.

GOLDBERG: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: The White House is fighting back against a "New York times" report about President Trump's personal fortune that appears to destroy his claims of being a self-made man.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)