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New Day

Donald Trump: I Did Not Work With Russia; William Barr Confirmation Hearing. Aired 7-7:30a ET

Aired January 15, 2019 - 07:00   ET

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


[07:00:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The president's legal team rebuff Robert Mueller's request to ask follow-up questions to the president in person.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Why does he refuse to sit down? The answer is increasingly, inescapably, because he's hiding something.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: At the end of the day, what is the evidence to support these suspicions?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's closer to the subpoena possibility. The president is on shaky ground.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN HOST: William Barr will pledge to let Special Counsel Robert Mueller finish his report.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm going ask him, do you trust Mr. Mueller to be fair to the president and the country?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The senators will want assurance that he will allow his report to be made public.

SEN. CHUCK GRASSLEY (R), IOWA: What more assurance can he give? He ought to have smooth sailing considering what Democrats are demanding.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN BERMAN, CNN HOST: Good morning, and welcome to your New Day. And it is a historic day. The president has been under investigation for working on behalf of Russia. And this morning, the man who will oversee that investigation will face questions from the Senate.

The confirmation hearings begin shortly for President Trump's Attorney General Nominee William Barr who will oversee the Special Counsel probe. Barr is expected to say that he will allow the Special Counsel Robert Mueller to complete his work, and to make its findings public. But Barr wrote a controversial memo last year where he concluded that a president cannot obstruct justice, at least in some cases. And we've just learned that Barr shared, and even discussed that memo with the president's own lawyers.

CAMEROTA: Meanwhile, the President of The United States, on the lawn of the White House yesterday, was forced to utter the words, quote, I never worked for Russia. Now, CNN has learned that the Trump legal team rejected a new request by the Special Counsel to question the president in person.

A source tells us, quote, Mueller is not satisfied. Joining us now is James Clapper. He's the former Director of National Intelligence. Good morning, Director Clapper.

JAMES CLAPPER, FORMER DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE, CNN SECURITY ANALYST: Good morning, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: OK. I want to get to those one-on-one meetings that President Trump had with Vladimir Putin in a moment. But first, there's a story in the New York Times this morning that talks about the president, once again, talking to his aids about trying to get out of NATO.

His senior administration officials told the New York Times that several times over the course of 2018, Mr. Trump privately said he wanted to withdraw from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

Current and former officials who support the alliance said they feared Mr. Trump could return to his threat as allied military spending continued to lag behind the goals the president had set, your thoughts on getting out of NATO?

CLAPPER: Well, at risk of putting two and two together and getting five here. If this was, in fact, a topic of discussion in these secret sessions between Putin and President Trump, that's really terrible.

I mean, with - withdrawing from NATO, even discussing - discussion about withdrawing from NATO, I think is - would - it would be disastrous for the security of the United States. This is not about the U.S. just protecting NATO. Because the U.S. derives benefit from being forward deployed. And where we're - our - our first line of defense is our own shore.

And this would play into Putin's hands. This is a - a primary objective of Putin is to drive wedges between and among the European countries, and a wedge between Europe and the United States. So this would be, to me, a - a - a real disaster. NATO has been a bulwark for both, us and Europe for 70 years. And to summarily and casually withdraw from it would be a disaster.

CAMEROTA: And Director, the reason that you're speculating about whether or not this was a talking point between President Trump and Vladimir Putin is because we have no idea - we have idea. There is no official readout. There are no documents. He didn't brief his advisors and other officials in his

administration. And so, how concerned should Americans be that we have no idea, on five separate occasions, what President Trump spoke about with Vladimir Putin?

[07:05:00] CLAPPER: Well, I think Americans should be very concerned about it. Here, we're having these one-on-one meetings, several of them. And we have no idea what went on. And - and this with, you know, the arch - the leader of the arch adversary of the United States. And I think the - the rationale that this is to prevent leaks really - to use the phrase, stretches credulity.

CAMEROTA: After a 2017 meeting with Vladimir Putin in Hamburg, Germany, President Trump reportedly took the interpreter's notes, and swore him to secrecy. Have you ever heard of that happening before with any President?

CLAPPER: I have not. I have not. I can't conceive of why there'd be a necessity for doing that. You know, the translators are doing a linguistic thing. And that's why it's so important that you have other people there to take substantive notes about discussions, and particularly commitments that are made, and requests that are made in - in a course of a dialogue like that. And I just think it's really disturbing that we have apparently no real record of any of this dialogue.

CAMEROTA: So now Democrats on the House Intel Committee and Foreign Affairs Committee are considering subpoenaing the interpreter's notes. Good idea or bad precedent?

CLAPPER: Well, it's both. It's a good idea. And of course, it does set a - it would set a precedent for future exchanges between heads of state. And that's - that's not good either. So we're - we're - we're, kind of, in a bad place here.

CAMEROTA: You were the Director of National Intelligence. The current director, Dan Coats, do you think that he is attempting, today, to find out what the substance of those meetings were, and how could he do that?

CLAPPER: Well, I had no idea. But the - and I have to be careful here. But I'll just say that you can glean snippets of insight into what transpired at meeting by virtue of gleaning some intelligence from - it's never comprehensive, at least in - in my memory. It rarely is.

But you can have - gain some insight into what was discussed through intelligence sources by virtue of just, you know, discussions by the other party. I don't know if that occurred here. But if it did, certainly, that DNI Coats would - would be aware of it.

CAMEROTA: Sorry, Director. Somebody was talking in my ear. Were you saying that you think that DNI Coats can get it from Russia since the only people in the room, at least in one of the meetings in Hamburg, was Vladimir Putin, President Trump, and Vladimir Putin's interpreter? CLAPPER: Yes. I'll just say, as a general observation, that sometimes - not always, but sometimes you can glean through intelligence sources, what transpired, at least in part - rarely comprehensively, but at least in part, what transpired at such meetings with another head of state. And that's probably all - all I ought to say about it. But - and if that were the case, and I don't know that it is, then certainly our intelligence community would have access and insight.

CAMEROTA: Director, give us the big picture here. In the last 72 hours there have been so many, as usual, stunning headlines, though some of them seem to have risen to a different category for many people, including national security experts. In the past, say, 72 hours, what - what headline, or what development - reporting has gotten you most concerned?

CLAPPER: Well, again, putting two and two together and maybe even getting five. But if there was discussion at these meetings about withdrawing from NATO, I would - I would find that very disturbing. I - I would - I thought the 22nd or so comedy bit that Seth Meyers did was a very good succinct portrayal of the history here.

And what is - I find bothersome is when these revelations come out, as they continuously do, more and more, I think, the public gets jaded to this. And if you can imagine that just - you know, what we've just heard in the last few days came out with no previous background, what a bombshell that these would be.

But because of behavior and statements going back to the campaign, we seem to be, somewhat, callused to this. And that, from a big picture standpoint, I find very disturbing.

CAMEROTA: It's such a great point, Director Clapper. Luckily we have Seth Meyers keeping track of it all for us because, as you know, the news deluge is overwhelming to ...

CLAPPER: It is.

CAMEROTA: ... so many people. Director Clapper, thank you, always great to get your perspective on all of this.

CLAPPER: Thanks, Alisyn.

BERMAN: All right. Joining us now is CNN Chief Legal Analyst Jeffrey Toobin, and CNN Political Analyst David Gregory. Jeffrey, all of what we just heard is the backdrop for what takes place today in Washington where both of you gentlemen are, which is the confirmation hearing for William Barr to be the next Attorney General of the United States.

We learned within the last 24 hours, not only did Barr write this controversial memo saying that he did not think the president could be investigated for obstruction of justice under certain circumstances. But he shared that memo with the president's lawyers, and discussed it with the president's lawyers.

[07:10:00] Is this like can amount to a discussion of legal strategy with a

defense team when you're about to get a job overseeing the prosecution?

TOOBIN: Well, it's similar. In fairness, I think we should point out that people who become cabinet members have political views and legal views on all sort so f subjects. I mean John Ashcroft was attorney and he was a senator before that.

What makes this unusual is that he was taking a position going to really extraordinary lengths. I mean, who sends a 19 page memo just out of the blue to people in the administration about an issue that he will have at least some supervision over and taking the opposite position that Mueller has taken.

So, it is not disqualifying but it certainly suggests that one of the reasons that Barr was chosen taken from essentially out of long-term retirement in to this job is because he has at least some hostility to the Mueller investigation.

CAMEROTA: And so David, when William Barr today says to the law makers as he's expected to from his prepared remarks no, I won't get in the way of the Mueller investigation. It must to his logical conclusion.

I won't stand in the way of it. It is legitimate after he had said that the obstruction of justice annunciation was not legitimate in some many words. Who are they to believe, William Barr?

DAVID GREGORY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, yes. That's a tough question. I think there a consensus among republican leaders that the leadership of the senate and minority leaders of the house that Mueller ought to complete his work.

But all you have to hang your hat on is the idea that is somehow the administration interferes or a cautious part of that work or tries to keep the report. And this is important, whether that report ultimately gets to congress and the public. And Barr has said he feels it should.

That'll be a major area of questioning today. But all you've got to hang your hat on is his word that he's going to let it go forward. And as Jeffrey says there is reasons to be suspicious about this. Look, Donald Trump wants a loyal attorney general. That's what he has said he wants. He wants loyalty and that's not how it's supposed to work.

Now, Jeff Sessions to his credit actually understood that the job was bigger than him and his own political loyalty. William Barr has got to pass that hurdle. I mean, he's someone with background in previous administration and in Washington.

But this kind of memo taking this kind of position to this degree is going to raise a lot of suspicion. And I don't know that they're going to get to the bottom of this in a hearing to everyone's satisfaction. BERMAN: What will they get to the bottom of today, Jeffrey? This hearing we should note, it'll be lead by the new Senate Judiciary Chair Lindsey Graham who has all of a sudden over the last year become one of the president's chief defenders. And it includes some democrats who are running for president, we think.

Kamala Harris, Cory Booker, Amy Klobuchar, do you expect any sunshine at the end of this day to e shown on this investigation or William Barr?

JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Barr has one big advantage is that he has been attorney general and he was generally regarded as a good attorney general under George Herbert Walker Bush. So, it is not -- he comes with the opposite of baggage. He comes with a good deal of credibility.

But I think at least the democratic senators are going to be looking for something close to a complete guarantee that not withstanding this memo, he is going to let Mueller complete his work and release the report. I think that is -- the firing of Mueller I think really is pretty much off the table at this point.

But the status of the report is really interesting and really important. And the attorney general will have really almost complete discursion to release or not release some or all of the Mueller report. So, that's something I'm going to be watching.

GREGORY: And by the way, the important constituencies are still senate republicans, right?

If this thing goes all the way, if there's a damning report about obstruction of justice and whatever the ties are if they exist between the president or his campaign and Russia, it will be for the house to draw up articles of impeachment and for him to be tried in the senate.

So, that's the bottom-line. And whether republican leaders actually lose their patience with Trump or worse is what the critical question is. And let me say one other thing, the history when it comes to law and order and this president is that he hasn't gotten what he's wanted, his guys at the FBI.

His guy, I mean no bigger than Jeff Sessions, his first supporter was a (inaudible). And those guys have stood up for their institutions despite the hammering from this president. I think that says something about how the president wants stuff that he doesn't always get.

CAMEROTA: Right, or that when he does get what he wants, he then no longer wants it.

GREGORY: Well, right. There's that.

CAMEROTA: I mean--

(LAUGHTER) CAMEROTA: So Jeffrey, is there such a thing as a guarantee? I mean if Bill Barr today promised yes, of course I will make the report public or I'll give it to congress. Is that a guarantee?

[07:15:00]

TOOBIN: Well, you have to trust his good faith on that. Once someone is confirmed in the cabinet, there's really no remedy except impeachment of the cabinet member which effectively never happens.

Again, I think David makes a point about the senate republicans. There is no sign currently that any senate republicans are on the fence or against Barr. So, Barr is going to get confirmed.

GREGORY: Right, right.

TOOBIN: The question is, what kind of concessions he will make to democrats and how much the senate and the rest of us believe the commitments he's making. How he expresses himself will matter. And that's why I think it'll be interesting to watch.

GREGORY: And Lindsey Graham as the chairman has said it would be a disaster for Trump to try to fire Mueller, which again I think as Jeffrey says, that is -- we're kind of past that issue.

He's going -- he said publically he wants to make sure that Mueller's fair to Trump. And that's the concession that he wants from Barr. I'm interested to watch that exchange--

BERMAN: Right.

GREGORY: -- and sort of what are those guardrails to make sure that he's fair.

BERMAN: Does that include a subpoena to have Trump come answer questions, Jeffrey, because we learned overnight that the Robert Mueller team wants to question the president again have rebuffed.

TOOBIN: That is an issue that has been outstanding for a long time. It's unclear to me whether Mueller will have to go to his supervisor in the justice department. Now Rod Rosenstein soon to be Barr to ask permission to -- for a subpoena. I mean day to day he doesn't have to ask permission for subpoenas.

But a subpoena to the president, he might have to. The issue with the subpoena I think for Mueller is he knows that there would be a court fight. He knows that the president's lawyers would move to (inaudible). There would months of litigation probably going all the way to the Supreme Court.

Does Mueller want to put his investigation on hold while that fight plays out or wrap up his investigation without the subpoena? I think that's the question Mueller is asking. I don't know the answer, but I think that's the question.

BERMAN: And look, that's why I think it's interesting they even went back to the Trump team and said we want to talk to the president in person knowing all that. David Gregory, Jeffrey Toobin, thanks so much for being with us.

GREGORY: Thanks.

BERMAN: What do we need to learn about attorney general nominee Bill Barr? One of the senators who will be asking him questions today joins us next.

[07:20:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: In just a couple of hours President Trump's Attorney General Nominee William Barr will face questions from the Senate Judiciary Committee at his confirmation hearing, presumably tough questions. Joining us now is Democratic Senator Mazie Hirono. She is on that committee. She will be among those asking questions. Senator, thank you so much for ...

SEN. MAZIE HIRONO (D), HAWAII: Good morning.

BERMAN: ... being with us. In regards to the Russia investigation, what will you ask the nominee?

HIRONO: Regarding the Russia investigation? Of course, that's part and parcel of the Mueller investigation. I would want to get a very firm commitment from Mr. Barr that he will not interfere with the Mueller investigation in any way, shape, or form.

And considering that Mr. Barr wrote a 19 page memo, outlining how Mueller's checking into whether or not the president had engaged in an obstruction of justice. That kind of investigation by Mueller had no basis.

I want to make sure that he will not interfere with Mueller's continuing investigation as to whether or not the president has engaged in obstruction of justice ...

BERMAN: The.

HIRONO: ... because that is totally contrary to what Mr. Barr wrote in his 19 page memo. So these are the kinds of very specific commitments that I would want from Mr. Barr.

BERMAN: So when the nominee says, and he said, that he wants the Mueller investigation to reach its conclusion. He will not interfere. And when he says he wants the report or the results of the investigation to go public do you believe him?

HIRONO: Well, that's what he's saying. So I'm going to probe that a little bit more, as to what constitutes - he didn't say that he would make the report public. He said something about within the - within the law. Yes, I would want that report to be made public.

I would not want him to summarize it. I'd want to get a very clear commitment from him that that report will be made completely public. So there are - he's a lawyer. So he's framed his opening in certain ways that could be subject to - it sounds good.

But let's face it, all of the president's nominees who come before us, many of whom - of course, the judicial nominees. Many of whom have taken very strong positions on all kinds of issues such as voting rights, a woman's right to choose, all of that.

They've written and taken positions, and some of them have even made decisions based on their ideological perspectives. And they all come before the Judiciary Committee and say whatever we wrote did said (ph) - opined upon, set that aside. I'm here to tell you I'm going to do the right thing. So of course we're all going to have a lot of very specific questions to him.

BERMAN: Is - is there any reason that Mr. Barr has given you to not believe him when he has given you the assurance he - he has over the last few days?

HIRONO: Well, then why did he audition for this job recently?

BERMAN: Yes.

HIRONO: I think it's kind of unusual to have someone who just decides, well, I'm going to send a 19 page memo, and I'm going to meet with some of the DOJ people, as to my thoughts. He's going to share his thoughts.

I think that's not terribly normal. But then, we are not living in normal times. So people ...

BERMAN: Let me.

HIRONO: ... do all kinds of things.

BERMAN: I should know. He also met with ...

(LAUGHTER)

... some of the president's own personal lawyers, Jay Sekulow ...

HIRONO: Yes.

BERMAN: ... and the Raskins as well. Let me ask you about the report overnight. You're on the Armed Services Committee where the president, over the last year, has been telling advisers he wants to withdraw from NATO.

HIRONO: Yes.

BERMAN: Do you believe that he would go through with that?

HIRONO: He's made it pretty plain that he's not too happy with NATO. And when you piece together all of the different statements he's made, and - you know, where we - we ask, why is he doing this?

[07:25:00] And then, this is why it is so not normal to have to ask well, whose side is the president on, on Russia's side on our - or our side? It is the accumulation of these, what seems like, unusual, head- scratching, disparate kinds of utterances from him. But when you start to see a pattern where he basically spouts Putin's lies, then we have to ask the most unusual and freighting question about our own president.

BERMAN: The government shutdown is now on its 25th day, the longest in U.S. history. The president, we understand, in inviting some House Democrats, considered to be moderate Democrats, to come over to the White House to talk about ways to end the shutdown. Do you feel that these House members should go?

HIRONO: Well, they'll probably go. But we can end the shutdown right now if Mitch McConnell will bring the House passed bills to the floor because those bills represent a compromise already, bills that the Senate also passed last year.

And so, we could end the shutdown right now if Mitch McConnell would do the job as a - the leader of an independent branch of government. Pass those bills, and end this shutdown. It is Mitch McConnell who I'm looking to because the president is so ...

BERMAN: Yes.

HIRONO: ... locked into his position. And as I said, he's a hostage taker. He's taken over 800,000 people hostage. And he basically - his word is not good because he, you know, was supposed to be OKing the ...

BERMAN: Yes.

HIRONO: ... don't shut the government down bills that the Senate passed, and which the House, we thought, was going to pass. And at the last minute, watching Fox News apparently, I don't know who's running this country. But all of a sudden he changed his mind.

So any kind of meeting with the president, he can say one thing, and then hours later - you know, I call it the Tuesday - Thursday Trump. On Tuesday he'll tell you everything that's great. And by Thursday it's all off the table.

BERMAN: Just very quickly. You - you blame Mitch McConnell. Mitch McConnell says the Democrats could end this shutdown immediately if they were to come back and say, well, $1.3 billion - $1.6 billion. Some of that could go to some new border barrier.

HIRONO: The Democrats said, level (ph) all of us. The continuing assertion that the Democrats don't care about border security is so far off the mark that we have voted on various kinds of border security.

And really, the bottom line is that Mitch McConnell has the power. He has the power to bring these bills to the floor so we can end the shutdown. And we should be debating and discussing the border security as a separate matter.

But we should not be taking 800,000 people hostage. And of the ripple effects of that hostage taking is coming to the floor now, people having to go to food banks, scientific research being stymied. I mean the mortgage bankers have to get a special dispensation so that they could continue to do their mortgages.

BERMAN: Senator.

HIRONO: So it's just crazy that we are not ending this shutdown. And Mitch McConnell has that power to do it. And I'm calling on him. I have continued to call on him to do that very thing.

BERMAN: Senator Mazie Hirono of Hawaii. We'll be watching you and your colleagues today in this confirmation hearing for William Barr to be the next Attorney General. Thank you so much for being with us

HIRONO: Morning (ph).

BERMAN: Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: John, how would the controversial memo sent by Attorney General Nominee Bill Barr affect the Mueller probe? Ken Starr joins us to answer this, and so much more next.

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