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Iowa Voters on Democratic Hopefuls; Subpoenas for Mueller Report; Claims Saudi Arabia Obtained Bezos' Private Information; Rep. Katherine Clark (D) Massachusetts is Interviewed about a Subpoena for the Mueller Report. Aired 8:30-9a ET
Aired April 01, 2019 - 08:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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[08:31:58] JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, breaking this morning, Democratic hopeful Pete Buttigieg announced that his campaign has raised $7 million in the first quarter of 2019. That's a lot of money for an exploratory committee for a guy who is mayor of a relatively medium sized city, South Bend, Indiana.
CNN's Miguel Marquez, he is live in Sioux City, Iowa, where voters are buzzing. Really voters there just buzzing period about all the candidates from what we can tell, Miguel.
MIGUEL MARQUEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: They are buzzing and it's going to -- and they're going to need a lot of buzz. We are still 308 days away from the caucuses here in Iowa. There is huge energy, but a lot of pressure on voters here to pick the right candidate for the 2020 race.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It will be a great year (ph).
MARQUEZ (voice over): Iowa Democrats taking their first-in-the-nation responsibility to new heights.
TROY PRICE, CHAIR, IOWA DEMOCRATIC PARTY: We understand the important role that we have in this process and we know -- and we take it very seriously.
MARQUEZ: With 300 days plus until Democrats here caucus the first bite at the presidential primary sweepstakes, the big goal, avoiding the infighting the party saw in 2016.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I feel like we're just working together doing the work, getting the job done.
MARQUEZ: One huge focus, avoiding 2016's low Democratic turnout in the general election. Clinton got 170,000 fewer votes than Obama in 2012. Trump got 70,000 more than Romney. Clinton lost Iowa by nearly 150,000 votes.
In towns like Ft. Dodge, in Iowa's conservative fourth district, fundraising the old-fashioned way and organizing like never before. MARQUEZ (on camera): How engaged are Democrats right now?
TRACEY FREESE, IOWA DEMOCRATIC ORGANIZER: Very. Very engaged.
MARQUEZ: How do you measure that? How do you know?
FREESE: I know because in very rural Iowa on Thursday night, I had ten RSVPs for a social gathering of Democrats and 22 people showed up. A bunch of new faces I'd never even met before.
MARQUEZ (voice over): With more than a dozen candidates officially in the race and still more to come, Democrats here want one thing above all.
MARQUEZ (on camera): What is the hope for you on November 3, 2020?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, the hope is to defeat President Trump, put a new Democrat in office. And, you know, the best way to do that is to flip Midwest states like Iowa.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: One common goal.
MARQUEZ: Which is what?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: To get rid of 45. And I won't say his name. That's the main goal is to win the White House.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What specifically will you do to address it? Thank you.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thank you. That's a great question.
MARQUEZ (voice over): In Storm Lake, Iowa, the Heartland Forum focusing on rural and farming issues, candidates laid out their visions, voters sized up their options.
MARQUEZ (on camera): What did you make of today's forum?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I -- I thought we had very good candidates. All -- I liked pretty much what they all had to say.
[08:35:01] MARQUEZ (voice over): For some farmers who say they've taken a hit from tariffs, climate change and ultra-low commodity prices, enough is enough.
LAVON GRIFFIEON, DEMOCRATIC IOWA VOTER: It's very hard. Our cost of our input is almost as great as the price for being paid. There's -- we're probably making maybe a -- a nickel a bushel on -- on corn.
MARQUEZ: The Griffieons farm cows, chickens, land, corn and soybeans in fast-growing Ankeny, Iowa. Six generations of farmers worried there won't be a seventh.
MARQUEZ (on camera): How important is this next election?
GRIFFIEON: Very important. Very important. I don't think we can do this twice in a row and still come out as America that other countries look to for leadership.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
MARQUEZ: Now, to try to help avoid the rift in the -- that the party had in 2016, Democrats here are going to add one thing, a virtual caucus basically. When they caucus, they all have to come together physically. They'll do that on a virtual basis now so that if you can't make it to your caucus location on caucus day here in Iowa, you'd be able to do it online. That is expected to increase turnout significantly and help those who can't get to polls here express their opinions for the very many number of Democratic candidates who will be on the ballot by that time.
Alisyn.
ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Very interesting and futuristic.
Thank you so much, Miguel.
All right, did a foreign power hack into Amazon founder Jeff Bezos' phone? What his security head says in an eye-opening op-ed, next.
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[08:40:31] BERMAN: We have breaking news.
The House Judiciary Committee, we just learned, they just announced that it will vote on Wednesday to authorize subpoenas to get the full Mueller report.
CNN's Lauren Fox live in Washington with the breaking details here.
Lauren.
LAUREN FOX, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, John, that's right, the House Judiciary Committee will meet on Wednesday to mark up a subpoena. But this is a preemptive step for Chairman Jerry Nadler. It's unclear when or if he would issue the subpoena.
But, of course, this comes after last week when Bill Barr, the attorney general, told Jerry Nadler that he would not meet the committee's April 2nd deadline to reveal that full Mueller report. Instead, he said he would have a redacted version ready in a matter of weeks, not months, potentially at the end of this month. The committee will also meet on Wednesday to markup subpoenas for five former White House staffers, including Don McGahn, Steve Bannon, Hope Hicks, Reince Priebus and Ann Donaldson. According to Nadler, he believes they may, quote, have received documents from the White House relevant to the special counsel investigation, waiving applicable privileges under the law.
But, of course, this sets up just another showdown between the executive branch and House Democrats as they try to advance their investigations on Capitol Hill.
Alisyn. CAMEROTA: OK, Lauren, thank you very much for all of that breaking news.
Now to this. A starting claim from an investigator working for Jeff Bezos. The investigator wanted to find out how evidence of Bezos' extramarital affair was provided to "The National Enquirer." In a new op-ed piece in "The Daily Beast," that investigator, Gavin de Becker, claims that Saudi Arabia was behind the hack.
Joining us now is Noah Shachtman. He's the editor-in-chief of "The Daily Beast."
Noah, great to have you here in studio.
NOAH SHACHTMAN, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF, "THE DAILY BEAST": Thanks for having me.
CAMEROTA: Explain what the nexus is between "The National Enquirer," Jeff Bezos and Saudi Arabia.
SHACHTMAN: Right. So the -- Jeff Bezos and the Saudis actually did business together for a while. They started a website called shook.com. And Bezos and Mohammed bin Salman, the leader of Saudi Arabia, met earlier this year.
But things turned sour when -- over the killing of Jamal Khashoggi, "The Washington Post" columnist and --
CAMEROTA: Which Jeff Bezos owns "The Washington Post."
SHACHTMAN: Exactly. And the Saudi regime pretty quickly turned on Jeff Bezos. You saw official Twitter accounts and semi-official Twitter accounts going after him, calling him every name in the book. And now there's this, you know, as you say, rather startling claim from his investigator.
CAMEROTA: We have a portion of that. So this is in the op-ed with Gavin de Becker, the investigator, the head of his security team, I guess, says, our investigators and several experts concluded with high confidence that the Saudis had access to Bezos' phone and gained private information. As of today, it is unclear to what degree, if any, AMI was aware of the details.
OK, here is AMI's response. They own "The National Enquirer." The fact of the matter is, it was Michael Sanchez who tipped "The National Enquirer" off to the affair on September 10, 2018, and over the course of four months provided all of the materials for our investigation. There was no involvement by any third party whatsoever.
So Michael Sanchez is the brother --
SHACHTMAN: Right.
CAMEROTA: And now estranged, as you can imagine --
SHACHTMAN: Yes. CAMEROTA: Of Lauren Sanchez, the girlfriend of Jeff Bezos.
So, in other words, "The National Enquirer" is saying the Saudis had nothing to do with it. Gavin de Becker says they did.
He goes on further. My office quickly identified the person whom "The Enquirer" had paid as a source, a man named Michael Sanchez, the now- estranged brother of Lauren Sanchez, whom Bezos was dating. What was unusual, very unusual, was how hard AMI people worked to publically reveal their source's identity.
In order words, he's suggesting that the Saudis had a hand in this but that "The National Enquirer" was pinning it on Michael Sanchez.
SHACHTMAN: Well, I think more than pinning it. I mean we also reported, long before it was made public, that Sanchez was the guy who supplied the texts. What de Becker is implying is that the Saudis may have tipped "The Enquirer" off and then they went to Sanchez.
And, indeed, Sanchez has said that "The Enquirer" came to him, not the other way around. So although Michael Sanchez is a long-time source of "The National Enquirer," he may have actually been tipped off -- "The Enquirer" may have tipped him off, not the other way around.
CAMEROTA: Look, this is also tawdry.
SHACHTMAN: So tawdry.
CAMEROTA: I mean, frankly, except that if the Saudis were involved, it's bigger than tawdry.
[08:45:00] SHACHTMAN: Yes. Yes. Then it's -- then it's a major geopolitical issue. And so we'll see.
De Becker says he's turned his -- the results of his investigation over to federal authorities at the Southern District of New York. We'll see what happens from there.
CAMEROTA: So, in other words, he says that he has evidence that the Saudis did hack -- or that were involved or did release things, and now that will be prosecuted if it -- I mean if they -- if the investigators agree?
SHACHTMAN: I think it will be further investigated, let's say.
CAMEROTA: Are Sanchez and Jeff Bezos -- are Lauren Sanchez and Jeff Bezos still together through all of this?
SHACHTMAN: Look, I know a lot of things about this case. I do not know their relationship status.
CAMEROTA: The reason that I was wondering is because he says who -- who Jeff Bezos was dating, as though it were in the past, Gavin de Becker said.
SHACHTMAN: I don't -- I don't have any information on that. I -- like I said, I know a lot about this case. We've looked at the tipster. We've looked at the Saudi angle. But I don't know anything about whether they're dating.
CAMEROTA: All right, Noah, get back to me on that.
SHACHTMAN: All right, I will.
CAMEROTA: Because that's the part that I'm really interested in.
SHACHTMAN: Yes, ma'am.
CAMEROTA: All right, thank you very much. Noah Shachtman, great to have you here.
John.
BERMAN: All right, President Trump says aid will be cut off to three Central American countries. Will that do anything to stop migrants from coming to the U.S.? Might it actually do the reverse? We'll ask a lawmaker, next.
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[08:50:22] BERMAN: Breaking news, the House Judiciary Committee has just announced that it will vote on Wednesday to authorize subpoenas to get the full Mueller report.
Joining us now is Congresswoman Katherine Clark. She is the vice chair of the House Democratic Caucus. She joins us now.
Thank you very much for being with us.
Why is it necessary to authorize subpoenas at this point, before William Barr, the attorney general, turns over the Mueller report?
REP. KATHERINE CLARK (D), VICE CHAIR, HOUSE DEMOCRATIC CAUCUS: Yes, because we need to see this full report. And a way to do it is to be very clear with Attorney General Barr that we are not going to just rely on the Barr report, but we need to see the underlying evidence and the full report from Mr. Mueller.
And I think the clear message that the Judiciary Committee is sending is that we're serious about an April 2nd deadline. Of course we are open to negotiating. But the time is of the essence, and that we want to keep the pressure on, that if they will not give us the report, then we're going to bring them in front of Congress --
BERMAN: Does that mean --
CLARK: And have them explain the report to the American people.
BERMAN: Does that mean no redactions, not even for grand jury material?
CLARK: I think we have a history and a practice that grand jury material has been waived in the past, allowing Judiciary members to see it. We are able to negotiate keeping classified information, grand jury information, you know, if necessary out of the public realm. But we have a lot of prior process. We know that this report can be almost entirely put out into the public sphere. And that's what the American people demand.
BERMAN: Well, you just said almost --
CLARK: They paid for this report and they need it. If there -- if there are things that classified material --
BERMAN: You just said almost entirely. I just want to be clear. I just want to be clear. So -- so you're saying to Congress, not one word blacked out or subpoenas?
CLARK: That's right. But obviously if there's classified information in there that we can't share with the public, we're going to negotiate that with Attorney General Barr.
BERMAN: OK.
CLARK: But what we've seen with prior reports from special prosecutors, that it was released almost contemporaneously. And that's what we need to do, to understand what Bob Mueller found, what evidence he relied on and the conclusions that he drew.
BERMAN: Let me ask you, the president --
CLARK: It's what the American people are demanding.
BERMAN: The president has threatened this week, as soon as this week, to shut the U.S. border with Mexico. That's his threat. Do you think he'll actually do it?
CLARK: I would never want to predict what this president will do. But I can tell you this, this is another example of a failed policy and failed priorities for our national security. This entire presidency is built on the lie that migrant families are the greatest threat to our national security and that Mexico will pay for a wall to keep them out and that will protect American families and our economy. That's the fundamental misrepresentation of this presidency.
And today, to hear that he thinks we should close an entire border and at the same time take away humanitarian aid to Central American countries where this crisis is beginning, it is the violence, it is the lack of economic opportunity that are driving -- that are driving migrants to our borders. We need to do what Democrats have been saying for years. We need to invest in our immigration system. Let's get the judges there. Let's get the personnel there to be able to handle and process these migrants and make fair judgments about their claims for asylum.
This president wants to go back whenever there's something he wants us not to look at, he wants us to focus on the southern border. This is another dangerous extension of his failed policy around immigration and the wall. BERMAN: Just yes or no, you do agree, though, that the number of
migrants presenting for asylum has gone up substantially in the last couple months, yes?
CLARK: Yes. And that is being driven by many factors. But I can tell you the exact wrong approach to take is to say, we'll cut the aid, humanitarian aid, to three countries. We know what many of these migrants are coming from, to escape violence, to try and give their children some sort of life, to let them live into adulthood.
[08:55:19] And so, yes, we are seeing an influx of migrants. But this is, again, if we want to point to failed policies --
BERMAN: Right.
CLARK: The cruel policy of separating children and families to somehow turn them back failed on many levels.
BERMAN: Congresswoman, I'm running out of time --
CLARK: It failed morally --
BERMAN: I'm sorry, I'm running out of time and I wanted to ask one question here because I know this is very important to you.
CLARK: Sure.
BERMAN: You were calling for the resignation of Education Secretary Betsy DeVos because of a hearing last week that you had with her. Explain why.
CLARK: Betsy DeVos has failed in her basic job of keeping kids safe and making sure that everyone can access a quality public education. And what she did was she wanted to rescind civil rights protection for children who experience high rates of discipline because of the color of their skin. And she did that by cherry-picking racist data and research to support it. That is outrageous, even for this administration, even for Betsy DeVos, who has a rocky history with protecting civil rights. She has -- it's -- it is shocking just when you think you can't be shocked by her actions. And she needs to resign if she is unwilling to protect our students and ensure that there's fundamental fairness that is free of racism.
BERMAN: Congresswoman Katherine Clark from Massachusetts, thanks for being with us. The study you were citing is from John Paul Wright from the University of Cincinnati if people want to go check that out for themselves.
Thank you very much for being with us this morning.
CLARK: Thank you.
BERMAN: Alisyn.
CAMEROTA: OK, John, the breaking news that we've had this morning, there's this technical glitch causing flight delays across the country. So "NEWSROOM" is going to pick up that story, next.
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