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Democrats Prepare to Take Control of House of Representatives; Government Shutdown Continues over Border Wall Funding. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired January 03, 2019 - 8:00   ET

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

[08:00:00] ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: All of it begins in just a few hours. But the 116th Congress will be sworn in with Democrats taking control of the House of Representatives, ending one party rule. You can see one of their class photos. A lot of jewel tones. Because there are now 102 women, you will be seeing, John, a lot of royal blue and jewel tones, I predict.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Men can be royal blue.

CAMEROTA: Sure, sure. But I'm just seeing it here. I think that that's one of the things that looks different.

President Trump's administration will face oversight for the first time, another thing that's different. And Nancy Pelosi is expected to make history yet again, reprising her role as House speaker. In a new interview, Pelosi is not ruling out that a sitting president can be indicted. What does that even mean? The new Congress also makes history with, as you said, a record number of women serving in office. It will be the most racially and ethnically diverse in American history.

BERMAN: So this new Congress begins today facing a major challenge as day 13 of the government shutdown, no deal in sight. President Trump and Congressional leaders, they met at the White House. We're learning new details about how that meeting went -- not well. Sources tell CNN the president said he would look, quote, foolish if he accepted the Democrats proposal to end the shutdown. Nancy Pelosi in that same interview we were talking about before says the Democrats will give nothing for the president's border wall.

Let's begin with CNN's Lauren Fox live on Capitol Hill with much more on this historic day. Lauren?

LARUEN FOX, CNN POLITICS CONGRESSIONAL REPORTER: Good morning, John. Up here on Capitol Hill, there is this back to school feeling as we prepare for Democrats to take back the House of Representatives for the first time in nearly a decade. And today there is going to be a lot of pomp and circumstance.

First, a vote for the next speaker. We expect that to be Nancy Pelosi. Then Nancy Pelosi will swear in a new class in the 116th Congress. As you mentioned, it is a very diverse, with a historic number of women, including the first Native American women and the first Muslim woman ever elected to the House of Representatives. It's a huge day on Capitol Hill.

And then Nancy Pelosi will turn to reopen the government. They are going to try to end that government shutdown. They're going to put a bill on the floor that would include six spending bills that the Senate already passed, including a continuing resolution to keep the Department of Homeland Security open through the beginning of February. Of course, that isn't expected to go anywhere in the Senate. That's because we are still operating under a divided government. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has said he will not bring a bill to the floor that the president won't sign. That bill the House will pass today doesn't have enough border security money in it, so McConnell won't bring it to the floor.

Now, we should also note, that's just what we can see on the House of Representatives floor today. We will also be preparing for investigations in the House of Representatives. Democrats are ready to ask questions from the House Ways and Means Committee to the Judiciary Committee. There is going to be a lot happening behind the scenes. Back to you.

CAMEROTA: Thank you very much for setting the table for us. Joining us now is Jess McIntosh, former director of communications outreach for Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign, Scott Jennings, former special assistant to President George W. Bush, and Toluse Olorunnipa, White House for "Bloomberg News." Great to have all of you.

So there's a lot of firsts happening today. This is, as we've said, the most diverse Congress. And let me just put it up on the screen for people. There are 40 new women, there are 20 new veterans, on both sides, Republican and Democrat. There are 10 new Hispanic and Latino members, there are nine new black members, there are five new LGBTQ members. There are also the first two Muslim women in Congress, the first two Native-America women in Congress. All fascinating, groundbreaking, makes for a really interesting class photo as we just showed. But beyond that?

JESS MCINTOSH, FORMER DIRECTOR OF COMMUNICATIONS OUTREACH, HILLARY CLINTON CAMPAIGN: There are also the first women in their 20s to serve in Congress. Every Congress since the dawn of the Republican has had men in their 20s, and this is the first time there will be women under 30 as well.

I am over the moon about this class, because it is the kind of change that doesn't stop here. This creates a cycle. Women, girls are going to grow up seeing people who look like them who are congresswomen. And that's going to make them realize that that's something they can achieve. Congress is never going to look the same again. This class is only going to get more diverse. And it's neat that now we can actually see it is Democratic women that are bringing the diversity to Congress. When you involve in more women, you get better policies, you get different experiences in life.

CAMEROTA: And why is that?

MCINTOSH: We're already seeing with the way that they communicate with their constituents, they are bringing a level of being able to relate to their lives that I think we just previously haven't seen. I think the channels of communication are going to be way more open with these new people, and I think it's going to be something for everybody else to emulate.

It's a shame that on the Republican side they don't look any different at all. They seem to be doing absolutely nothing to try and engage new voters. The difference between the two classes is only going to be more stark going forward.

[08:05:08] BERMAN: It's interesting, we have a statistic that actually shows that when Nancy Pelosi was first elected to Congress in 1987, there were 23 women in the House, the split was 12 Democrats, 11 Republicans. Now there are 102, 89 Democrats, explosive growth there. But Republicans, just 13 women. So the growth for thank you women is 11 to 13. It is interesting to see that.

We talk about history. It's also history for the president. The president for the first time, Toluse, faces oversight, frankly, from a Democratic House of Representatives. You were inside that cabinet meeting yesterday. You were one of the four reporters, if I'm not mistaken, during that long, free flowing exchange of ideas there. How do you think the president is taking this new oversight so far?

TOLUSE OLORUNNIPA, WHITE HOUSE REPORTER, BLOOMBERG NEWS: This new oversight is coming at a time when the government is shut down in part because the president is so focused and so obsessed with the idea of getting border money for a border wall which has not happened during his first two years in office and did not happen under a Republican Congress and is looking less and less likely to happen under a new Democratic Congress in the House.

Nancy Pelosi had said yesterday that the president is not going to get any money for his wall, and this new crop of Democratic freshmen is not in the mood to negotiate with the president. These are firebrand new members who are looking to make a splash, who are, a lot of them are on the more progressive side. But they have in common that a lot of them ran because they saw what the president was doing and they were so about the president that say decided to run for office for the first time and won seats in this blue wave that happened in November.

So they're not necessarily going to be in negotiating mood with the president who, as we saw yesterday in the room, is so focused on this wall that he spent the better part of an hour and a half talking just about the border, just about the border wall, and how he's digging in his heels to make sure that he gets money for the border wall, or, as he said, the government could remain closed for as long as it takes. So it doesn't look like the two sides are getting any closer together. The president is not necessarily in deal making mode. He's digging in his heels, and Democrats are now starting to take their power, and it looks like they're going to set for a long battle on this.

CAMEROTA: Scott, as a Republican, what are you predicting for this new Congress?

SCOTT JENNINGS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, oversight certainly is going to be, I think, a big part of the agenda for the House Democrats. And that will be a lot of paralysis for the Trump administration. In the Senate I predict a lot of action on personnel and judge. I don't think a lot of bills, policy are going to be passed. But the Senate can do personnel. They can do judges. They did a big bucket of personnel appointees last night. So that's what we're going to see.

Regarding the shutdown, this will end when one of two things happen, when the Democrats and Donald Trump get together and decide they can each give a little and call it a day, or when someone introduces a new idea. I think these Democrats should throw out DACA here to break the logjam. I think these Democrats who got elected to the House would love to get a permanent fix for the Dreamers. I know a lot of Republicans would love that fix as well. That's a reasonable trade- off. The president has endorsed the trade off on this before. It doesn't seem like it would be out-of-bounds for anybody really in Washington right now to take that deal, a wall for DACA, call it a day, and clear the decks and move on.

BERMAN: Scott, can I ask you, because you know Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority leader, really well, having worked for him. We have talked a lot about the new House with the new House speaker. Mitch McConnell has got a new job also in this divided government. And he's going to have to navigate this going forward. And it is not just difficult navigating with the Democratic House. It is navigating this president who has changed his positions even in the last month on certain issues.

JENNINGS: Yes. The Senate majority leader, frankly, has a united conference, 53 Republicans in the Senate now. And they're ready to run the plays that the president calls. The trouble is when the coach isn't calling the play, or he's changing the play at the huddle or calling audibles when you're at the line of scrimmage and there's three seconds left on the play clock. And so that is the challenge for the majority leader.

In the case of the shutdown, I think they have a very, very united conference on this. And what they said is very simple, we will back the president's move, as soon as he makes the move, we can develop our votes. But now McConnell used to be in the role, John, of negotiating an end to these stand offs when Obama was president. Now Schumer is in that role. So McConnell really doesn't have much to do here on ending the shutdown. It is Schumer who has to go to the president to say here's what I need to deliver the votes to end the shutdown. So the roles are really reversed. All McConnell has to do is what he's been good at lately, and that's keeping the conference united behind a president who sometimes changes his mind midstream.

CAMEROTA: He also changed his mind midsentence yesterday in terms of how long the shutdown, how long he anticipates it lasting. So here was the president yesterday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How long do you think the government is going to stay partially shut down? [08:10:00] DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: It could be a long time or it could be quickly. It could be a long time. It's too important a subject to walk away from.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Jess, it could be a long time, or it could be quickly, or it could be a long time.

MCINTOSH: Either way. It could be any one of those three very different options. I think it's not just about Schumer delivering the votes. We already know that Democrats have the votes to end the shutdown. Republicans have the votes to end the shutdown. We have a bipartisan agreement to end the shutdown. The only person who is keeping the government shut down is Donald Trump. So I think the only thing that could happen at this point is for Republicans to talk to Trump's friends over in rightwing media and tell them to start putting pressure on him, because that seems to be the only voice that he listens to these days.

CAMEROTA: But they don't want to end the shutdown. They want the wall. And the wall has become this crazy symbol where nobody can define it. We just had a Republican on who couldn't explain where the wall would be needed, how many miles, what it would be made of. He did talk about technology and more manpower, not a wall.

MCINTOSH: Technology and more manpower is something that both parties agree on. Also, the agents at the border agree on that. This idea of this wall that's becoming increasingly metaphorical is not something that we can get behind and not something you ought to be spending $5 billion on. I think most Republicans in Congress even understand that, which is why we got a bipartisan deal to keep the government open without funding the wall. So at this point it's just Trump. I don't know how one gets through to him. I know that Republicans ought to be trying.

BERMAN: It's interesting, Hakeem Jeffries, who will be the caucus chair as of noon today, the Democrats yesterday indicated that he's OK with fencing and perhaps there is wiggle room north of $1.3 billion. So it becomes a border fence or a border barrier, and it's $1.6 billion. I think that we could see a way through this eventually once people start using some different language.

Toluse, I want to use your expertise and your presence in that room yesterday to cover one point. That cabinet meeting wasn't a meeting with a bunch of secretaries. It was a meeting with mostly or many acting secretaries filling key positions, including at the Pentagon, the Justice Department, the EPA. The chief of staff is acting, for that matter. I don't think we have ever seen anything close to this before when there are so many merely acting members running these important agency.

OLORUNNIPA: Yes. And this is going to be taking place at the time that Democrats are going to be conducting an immense amount of oversight over these very agencies, in part because some of the secretaries that have left have left under a cloud of scandal, and Democrats were planning to investigate them very thoroughly. So now the president is with a team that is in many ways the b-team or the team that's coming off the bench, and the president has not yet nominated some of their replacements. He's still looking for replacement for several positions. We have Secretary Mattis that resigned in protest over the president's decision on Syria.

So this does look like a cabinet that is facing a number of battles on a number of different fronts. And the fact that Democrats are now in the House conducting oversight, that is going to make it much more challenging for this administration to get anything done and to keep Democrats from feeling behind the curtains to find out the amount of chaos that a lot of us have realized has taken place in the Trump administration. A lot of it has been behind closed doors and the president has been protected by House Republicans. Now Democrats will be able to file subpoenas, they'll be able to ask for records, and they'll be able to find out what has really been happening. And it could be, as Scott says, the type of paralysis that could make it difficult for the Trump administration to move an agenda forward and even to open the government here as we begin the second two years of the first term of President Trump.

BERMAN: Scott, Jess, Toluse, thanks so much for being with us this morning. Happy new year to all of you.

So when Nancy Pelosi becomes speaker of the House for a second time today, she reclaims the gavel with a new challenge, becoming President Trump's chief adversary. So what do we know about this relationship? There is some very interesting dynamics. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:17:07] JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: I want to show you a picture this morning. This is what the House speaker's office looks like. Now --

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Pretty.

BERMAN: Now, the news is what you're not seeing here. Above the doorway, up until we think this morning, it said Paul Ryan's name. Now, Paul Ryan's name has been taken down in preparation to put up a new name which afternoon today when the vote takes place, it will be Nancy Pelosi for the second time.

She takes over as speaker of the House, facing off against President Trump over any number of issues. The most proximate and immediate is the budget showdown. She's managed to avoid along the way many of his insults. The president hasn't gone after her quite the same way.

Joining us now, congressional reporter for "Politico", Rachael Bade, who just wrote an article on this very topic, and former chief of staff to Nancy Pelosi, Nadeam Elshami.

Thank you both for being with us.

Rachael, to you, because your piece goes into this in great length, why hasn't the president given Nancy Pelosi a nickname? Why isn't he attacking her every other hour? RACHAEL BADE, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes, so, it's a little

surprising, right, because Republicans' number one boogeyman, at least for the past campaign cycle and the cycles before has been Nancy Pelosi. They've gone after her. They've attacked her on the trail.

But Trump has taken a really mild approach to the incoming speaker. It is surprising again because he likes to pummel his adversaries. And they give them nicknames and hound them on Twitter.

But it turns out that according to sources on both sides of Pennsylvania Avenue that he actually admires her. And right after he was elected in 2016, Nancy Pelosi called in to say, congratulations, and what he said to her was, you are terrific, you're very effective. Remember, I was a supporter of yours.

He had actually given to her when she showed up to Trump Tower, or rather given to Democrats that she asked him to support. And he admires her just the way he admires strongmen who have strong grips on their party or whoever they lead.

And that's exactly what Marc Short, the former legislative affairs director, told me in a recent interview. Look, Trump thinks she's powerful, he admires it and he wants to work with her.

So, I think the question here is, will the shutdown spoil that relationship before it even has time to bear fruit? And we just don't know at this point.

CAMEROTA: I think this is really interesting because there are lots of people the president had admired once and then called names. I mean, I'm thinking of Rex Tillerson. We could go on and on.

He doesn't spare people who he once admired if he's in a fight with them. And he certainly doesn't spare women. I think back to Carly Fiorina, Megyn Kelly. I have been called a name by the president.

So why do you think Nancy Pelosi is in a different category?

NADEAM ELSHAMI, FORMER CHIEF OF STAFF TO NANCY PELOSI: Because she has the power, and she backs it up. She's gone toe to toe with this president for the past two years on all kinds of budget fights and she's won, right?

[08:20:02] She united her caucus. She was strong and she presented a pointed view of the Democrats and has come on top each time. And the president has seen that.

And, look, over the past couple of months during the election cycle and the post election as Democrats were beginning to take power, she was able to consolidate support and today, she will become speaker of the House for the second time.

Look, her resolve, her ability to understand issues and her willingness to look at the president and say, Mr. President, you are wrong, these are not the facts. And she has done that in private. And, you know, he maybe respects that, but he also doesn't know how to respond to that at times, I'm sure.

BERMAN: And, Rachael, I'm not so sure the feeling is mutual here. I don't think we're going to see Nancy Pelosi and Donald Trump sharing drinks, beside the fact that he doesn't actually drink, like Ronald Reagan and Tip O'Neill, that's not going to happen.

BADE: Yes. She had a fondness -- she developed a fondness for former President George W. Bush, but that same fondness, it doesn't extent to the current president. In fact, in former recent meeting, you know, she came back to the House and was meeting with a bunch of house Democrats recently and compared negotiating to him with negotiating to a skunk, saying you can't get in a tinkle match with a skunk or you get tinkled all over yourself.

So, clearly, she doesn't have that admiration. She doesn't trust him, from what I understand. And she's seen how he has totally gone back on his word with Republican leaders, and so, she's really concerned about how she's going to negotiate with him.

One of the things we know she's going to do going forward in terms of a tragedy with dealing with him is try to get him to recognize facts, basic facts. For instance, when her first meeting with him after he became president, he opened the meeting by saying, look, I won the most votes. I beat Hillary Clinton. I had the most votes.

She was the only person in the room who said, no, Mr. President, that is false. You did not win the popular vote. And these are the sorts of things that she is wanting to do. She said she prefers to do them privately but is going to do them publicly if he, you know, continues to say things that she finds false.

CAMEROTA: Nadeam, you were her chief of staff. And so, where does that leave us?

I mean, when I hear Nancy Pelosi this morning in a news interview, saying, no, nada, not a single cent, you know, we're not going to do any money for the border wall at all -- well, I mean, how is she going to negotiate out of this? The government is shut down. The president is dug in. So what's her next move?

ELSHAMI: Look, first of all, you have to believe her when she says that. That is not going to happen. Democrats are not going to pass a bill that is going to fund the wall. That is number one.

Number two, you watch as Republicans, you know, pass a bill in the Senate that does not fund the wall. There are votes in the House that do the same thing. Look, and Democrats are never been shy about taking steps to protect the border. If you want to have a serious discussion about border protection, about dealing with, you know, undocumented immigration, about dealing with bipartisan immigration reform, then let's have that.

The wall has become a symbol for the president and for this White House. It is a symbol for his re-election campaign, and that has to be put on the table and that has to come to an end. Look, if you are a Republican senator who is running for re-election in 2020 in a blue state, you are beginning to worry about this. The president is becoming a drag on your effort to win re-election.

And it is going to come to a point where Leader McConnell is going to have to tell the president and the White House, look, we cannot sustain this shutdown any longer. It is not helpful. The reason why we're not passing a bill that the House is going to pass today is because -- it's not because we have the votes to pass it. It is because you are saying no.

So this has to come to an end. And Democrats hold the upper hand in this moment.

BERMAN: You know, Rachael, we had Alexandra Pelosi on yesterday, the incoming speaker's daughter, who talked about her style of leadership. And I think one more time, we want to her what her own daughter says.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ALEXANDRA PELOSI, DOCUMENTARY FILMMAKER: She'll cut your head off and you won't even know you're bleeding. That's all you need to know about her. No one ever won betting against Nancy Pelosi.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: What do you think that means for this White House? Whose head is she going to cut off? Who's going to be bleeding without knowing it?

BADE: As Mark Meadows told me, the White House sees her as a worthy adversary. The question I get all the time is does Nancy Pelosi have sort of fire grip that she had on her caucus last time around when she was speaker even though she lost the majority? And there's been a lot more criticism of her with House Democrats in recent years.

And, you know, the answer we heard back universally from people who like her and don't like her is that, yes, she still does. You know, when Ryan Paul announced his retirement early, he lost a lot of power and he lost a lot of respect and people stopped donating to him in terms of fund-raising.

We have not seen the same thing happen yet.

[08:25:01] But again, she's got this new crop of freshmen coming in. We'll just have to see, you know, how she balances, you know, the far left pushing further left, her wanting to deal with the president and wanting to make deals with him.

But as far that grip her daughter was talking about, she's still got it from what we've seen so far.

BERMAN: All right. Friends, thanks so much for being with us. Of course, stay tuned to CNN all day. You will see that new house, the new members sworn in. You will see Nancy Pelosi gaveled in as the once again speaker of the house. Thanks so much.

The most powerful members of Congress, they met with the president inside the Situation Room. The meeting perhaps to find a way out of the shutdown.

We're going to speak with someone who was there to find out what happened and what happens next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: The president met with congressional leaders in the Situation Room in the White House. They discussed the government shutdown, but they did not end the government shutdown, apparently not even close. We are on day 13 now and counting.

Joining us, someone who is inside that room in that picture we just saw there, the Democratic whip, Dick Durbin of Illinois.

Senator, thank you so much for being with us.

We're hoping to get a better understanding of what transpired in there, specifically, CNN is reporting that the president told Chuck Schumer, Senator Schumer, that he felt he would look foolish if he supported --