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Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) is Interviewed on Health Care; Assange Arrested on Behalf of U.S.; Theresa May Comments on Assange Arrest. Aired 8:30-9a ET

Aired April 11, 2019 - 08:30   ET

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

[08:30:00] SEN. JOE MANCHIN (D-WV): Because he loved the bill, he voted because there was a process they weren't letting basically take place so we could fix things, work in a bipartisan way. That's what John McCain did for the American people and the patriot that he was. So I'm asking, Mr. Barr, please, please, this is ridiculous. We have got to have health care so our people have access to it.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: I'd be remiss if I didn't ask you before I let you go, are you thinking about returning for governor of West Virginia again?

MANCHIN: You know, there's the -- I'm thinking about, where can I best help my state and my country. And I look at it from all different angles. But this will be a decision me and my family would make. We're considering putting ourselves in the best place to help. And right now, you know, this is a challenging place to get a lot done. I've worked for eight years now bringing people together, John. It doesn't matter whether it's a Democrat or a Republican. And I don't take sides. The facts are what they are. I've said this, you're entitled to your own facts, John, you're just not -- I mean you're entitled to your own opinion, you're just not entitled to produce your own facts to support your opinion. And that's what I see happening on both sides of the aisle.

BERMAN: Senator Joe Manchin -- Senator Joe Manchin, for now at least.

MANCHIN: Yes. Yes.

BERMAN: Keep us posted on that and on other things.

MANCHIN: I will, John.

BERMAN: Appreciate it, sir.

MANCHIN: Oh, Thank you.

BERMAN: Alisyn.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: All right, back to our breaking news.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has just arrived at a London courthouse. You see the media scrum trying to get pictures inside that van that he is traveling in. He was arrested on behalf of the United States this morning. We have much more of our breaking news coverage, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:35:15] ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

BERMAN: All right, the breaking news, you're looking at pictures from London from just moments ago. WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has been arrested. Just arrived in court. He was arrested on behalf of the United States. An extradition order from the United States. And we learned just moments ago that very shortly the U.S. government will unseal its charges. We will learn what the charges are against the WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.

CNN's Evan Perez live in Washington with much more on that.

Evan.

EVAN PEREZ, CNN SENIOR JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: That's right, John.

We are expecting that the Justice Department is going to announce what exactly these charges are against Julian Assange, perhaps in the next hour or two. We expect that, again, these are the charges that are behind the U.S. extradition request that the U.K. police were able to arrest Julian Assange today at the Ecuadorian embassy.

Now, we've seen some movement on this case recently. You heard earlier today from Julian Assange's lawyer in London that her understanding was that these charges relate to the 2010 WikiLeaks dump of documents that were stolen by Chelsea Manning. Just in the last few weeks, Chelsea Manning was brought before the grand jury in Alexandria, Virginia. She refused to testify as part of this case. And we now know -- and we now know that she is --

CAMEROTA: Hold that thought for one second because Prime Minister Theresa May -- that's Prime Minister Theresa May. She has just taken the podium to speak about this.

THERESA MAY, BRITISH PRIME MINISTER: Thank the Metropolitan Police for carrying out their duties with great professionalism and to welcome the cooperation of the Ecuadorian government in bringing this matter to a resolution.

Mr. Speaker, this goes to show that in the United Kingdom no one is above the law.

Turning to the counsel, my priority is to deliver Brexit and to do so in an orderly way that does not disrupt people's lives. So I continue to believe we need to leave the European Union with a deal as soon as possible. And, of course, this house has voted --

CAMEROTA: Let's go back to Evan Perez, who is getting some fresh reporting on everything that has happened with Julian Assange and his arrest at the Ecuadorian embassy in London.

Sorry to unceremoniously cut you off for the prime minister there, but, Evan, you were just telling us about what we're expecting in the next few minutes.

PEREZ: Right, it is question time, so I think it's -- it's perfectly appropriate.

But Theresa May was just referring to the fact that the arrest was carried out and obviously the British had to arrest him under -- under U.S. -- under British law. But there was a U.S. extradition request as well, Alisyn.

And part of this -- we've seen some of the movement on this case. We knew that Julian Assange had been charged back in November. The prosecutors in Alexandria, Virginia, accidentally posted publicly a document that said that there were those charges.

We've heard now from one of the lawyers for Julian Assange in London who said that part of the charges relate to the 2010 dump of WikiLeaks documents. These are diplomatic documents that were stolen by Chelsea Manning.

We saw recently also Chelsea Manning was brought before the grand jury in Alexandria, Virginia. She refused to testify and has remained detained because she refused to testify.

So all of that it -- it shows us exactly what has been going on behind the scenes. We know that the Justice Department, lawyers and State Department lawyers have been working with the Ecuadorians and the British to try to get this done. And finally, today, you saw the arrest of Julian Assange.

CAMEROTA: Evan, thank you very much for all of that reporting. Obviously we'll come back to you as soon as those charges are listed and we can hear them.

PEREZ: Sure.

CAMEROTA: But joining us know is James Clapper. He served as the director of National Intelligence for seven years under President Obama and is now a CNN national security analyst.

Director Clapper, it is so good to have you here during this breaking news because Julian Assange and WikiLeaks, some of their most active years were 2010 through 2017, when you were director of National Intelligence.

What do you think as you watch the arrest today at the behest of the United States?

JAMES CLAPPER, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Well, I was, of course, recalling the 2010 era, which was right as I had started as DNI and had to deal with the impact of the Chelsea Manning revelation, which were quite damaging and caused us all kinds of grief in the intelligence community.

I do think that Jeffrey Toobin, I think, as always, articulated the complexities of this case. And there is the, you know, freedom of the press aspect. I personally -- and this is a legal -- a personal opinion, not a legal opinion, think -- I'm in the Mike Pompeo school that WikiLeaks is really a non-nation state hostile intelligence service. But I'm saying that as an intel guy and having lived through the grief that those revelations caused.

[08:40:10] There is the comparison between WikiLeaks and the likes of, say, "The New York Times" or "The Washington Post."

CAMEROTA: That's what WikiLeaks is making. I mean they -- they want to make that comparison.

CLAPPER: Well -- I -- I recognize that. I will just point out one subtle difference from a practical standpoint is that when "The New York Times" -- the likes of "The New York Times" or "The Washington Post" or any responsible media came into possession of classified material, typically, not always, but typically they would at least give us, the intelligence community, an opportunity to comment and make the case for not publishing something.

Now, I will say also, though, that their definition of what is harmful to national security and my definition of what's harmful to national security --

CAMEROTA: Yes.

CLAPPER: Were not exactly congruent. But the difference is --

CAMEROTA: Look, these are conversations --

CLAPPER: The important difference here --

CAMEROTA: Yes.

CLAPPER: Alisyn, is that at least we have the opportunity to make our case. And if someone's life was potentially at risk, responsible media would not publish that.

CAMEROTA: Yes, these are conversations -- hard conversations that are had in newsrooms around the country and the world all the time. But I'm curious -- obviously all of us are curious to see what -- when this is unsealed, and we expect it to happen moments from now, what the charges are against Julian Assange. And it sounds like, if you believe his editor, we spoke to the WikiLeaks editor a few minutes ago, that it's about the 2010 publication and revelations, that it's not about 2016.

CLAPPER: Right.

CAMEROTA: But, of course, so much has changed since 2010 here in this country and you will remember that President Trump said, I love WikiLeaks. He encouraged WikiLeaks. He hoped that WikiLeaks would publish more from the DNC hack. He was quite sympathetic to WikiLeaks and a fan of WikiLeaks.

And so what does that mean now for the court case back here at home now that President Trump is sympathetic to them? CLAPPER: Well, you're right to point out what's changed since 2010.

And I don't know. And, in fact, it makes the arrest at our behest apparently even more curious. And, obviously, if there's a court proceeding here undoubtedly Assange's attorneys are going to point that out, that, you know, the president of the United States, as a candidate, he praised on WikiLeaks.

So I -- again, I'm not an attorney, I don't know how that's going to complicate the legal case that the United States government would now make against Assange.

CAMEROTA: All right, we need you on standby because obviously we are waiting for those charges to be unsealed. We believe at any moment now. And so, obviously, I'll go back to that when that happens.

In the meantime, I wanted to ask you about what we saw yesterday from the attorney general, Bill Barr, in front of the Senate. You called it stunning and scary, those are your words, that Barr would raise -- would use the word "spying."

So can you tell me what was scary about that to you?

CLAPPER: Well, spying has -- a term I have never. I never liked that term being applied to me, even though I spent 50 years in the intelligence business. It has a bad connotation. It's a pejorative term. It smacks of illegality, a lack of oversight, all those kind of things. And that wasn't the case here.

I -- my concern in all of this, as it was when I served as DNI, was the Russians and what the Russians were doing. And to the extent that there was surveillance of anyone, it had -- it was occasioned by contacts with Russians who were targets, validated foreign intelligence targets. And we sort of lost sight of that. And the threat that the Russians pose, because that's how this all started, is the Russian meddling. So when the attorney general -- and I believe he used that term deliberately. You know, he's been the attorney general before, so he's not unfamiliar with all this, I thought it was quite stunning.

CAMEROTA: Yes.

CLAPPER: And apparently he's -- his concern is more broadly to the intelligence community at large, not just the FBI. So I'm very interested in what it is that gives him concern.

CAMEROTA: Yes, he was unclear. He did not expound on what gave him concern. It sounded like he was open to being concerned and he was going to wait to hear what the inspector general had to say.

But I want to talk about how the -- what you hear Republicans saying and the president is that they should have alerted -- if there was an investigation, a counterintelligence investigation that involved the Trump campaign, they should have alerted the Trump campaign. Now, you were the person who, in January of 2017, one of the people, went to tell the then president-elect that all of this was swirling around and he had already been alerted that Russians were trying to interfere in the campaign. And so should the campaign have known before that date that you went over there that there was an investigation -- possibly a counterintelligence investigation involving some people connected to the campaign?

[08:45:40] CLAPPER: Well, the -- I can't speak specifically, Alisyn, to what the FBI did. I believe, but I don't know for sure, but I believe they did give kind of standard defensive briefings after the candidates were designated after their respective conventions. When the two candidates emerged, we started, as is customary, intelligence briefings for both candidates. And those -- those intelligence briefings include --

CAMEROTA: But should it have gone -- I mean should it have gone deeper?

CLAPPER: Those intelligence briefings included reporting on the Russian meddling that was ongoing.

CAMEROTA: Yes. So when you hear different Republican lawmakers say, how dare they not alert the campaign that there was this counterintelligence investigation, are they right or wrong?

CLAPPER: Well, I don't know what the decision calculus here was by the FBI contemporaneously. But I do know, as a general rule, with -- particularly with respect to a counterintelligence investigation, that when you start it, you want to be sure your -- who is potentially complicit and who isn't. and there is a -- as a general rule of thumb, you try to be as cloistered and compartmented about such investigations for all kinds of good reasons.

So, again, I don't know what the decision calculus was at the time, contemporaneously the FBI used. It's my understanding they did give general counterintelligence briefings specifically focused, I believe, on the Russians.

CAMEROTA: Yes. It's good to get that context.

Director James Clapper, keep your phone handy. We'll have you on speed dial as all of this unfolds.

Thank you very much.

CLAPPER: Thanks, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: John.

BERMAN: All right, CNN has learned that the Justice Department will announce the charges against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange very shortly. This, of course, after his arrest in the United Kingdom. Our breaking news coverage continues right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:51:34] ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

BERMAN: The breaking news, British Prime Minister Theresa May, just moments ago, addressed the arrest of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange on an extradition warrant on behalf of the United States. This is what she said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

THERESA MAY, BRITISH PRIME MINISTER: I am sure that the whole House will welcome the news this morning that the Metropolitan Police have arrested Julian Assange. Arrested for breach of bail after nearly seven years in the Ecuadorian embassy. He has also been arrested in relation to an extradition request from the United States authorities. This is now a legal matter before the courts. My right honorable friend, the home secretary, will make a statement on this later, but I would like to thank the Metropolitan Police for carrying out their duties with great professionalism and to welcome the cooperation of the Ecuadorian government in bringing this matter to a resolution.

Mr. Speaker, this goes to show that in the United Kingdom no one is above the law.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: Not easy for Theresa May to get applause these days in the House of Commons, so that was a extraordinary moment.

CAMEROTA: Was that -- was that groaning applause? Is that what passes for applause in the House --

BERMAN: That's how they do it. That's how they do it there. And they drive on the left-hand side of the road.

CNN has learned that the Justice Department will announce charges any minute against Assange. The U.S. Justice Department. This is such an interesting development.

Back with us, Evan Perez, Susan Glasser and Jeffrey Toobin.

Evan, I want to start with you on these charges which we will hear any minute from the Justice Department.

PEREZ: Well, that's right, John. Look, his lawyer -- Assange's lawyer in London has now said that to her understanding some of the charges relate to the 2010 hack -- the 2010 stolen documents that Chelsea Manning leaked to WikiLeaks. And so that's a case -- that's a case - that's where this investigation actually began.

But there has been a lot that has happened since then. Obviously the Obama administration looked at and tried to bring charges against Julian Assange. They ended up deciding that they could not bring charges simply because, how do you bring charges against Julian Assange when you don't bring charges against "The New York Times" and other news organizations that published those very same documents, documents that were stolen and that were published by WikiLeaks. So that's where the Obama administration ended.

The Trump administration took over and took a new look and they arrived at a different conclusion. They decided that Julian Assange could be charged under U.S. charges. And so that's what we're expecting to see in the coming hour or so from the Justice Department, an official announcement, as well as a description of what they're seeking to do with regard to extradition from the United Kingdom.

One last thing I want to mention. The U.K. has a law, obviously, they do not extradite people to countries who might subject those people to the death penalty. So one of the things that's been brought up in this case is whether or not Julian Assange could face charges under the espionage act. And so we're told that part of the negotiation behind the scenes has been exactly that, that the U.S. would have to promise not to use the death penalty, not to bring any charges that would bring the death penalty, as well as they've been trying to give assurances to the Ecuadorians about the same issue.

So, again, there's a lot -- a lot of moving parts, a lot of things that have been going on behind the scenes, a lot of negotiations between the U.S., Ecuador where he had citizenship until just the past hour and the United Kingdom, where obviously he's now under arrest.

CAMEROTA: Jeffrey, if this case -- if this court case ends up being about the publication of classified military documents from 2010, can the hack of the Democratic National Committee also -- the 2016 activities by Julian Assange and WikiLeaks, the publication of whatever was hacked, can that come up in that court case?

[08:55:20] JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN CHIEF LEGAL ANALYST: It certainly could, and there could be additional charges related to the 2016 hack.

You know, we've been talking all morning about the constitutional difficulty of prosecuting Julian Assange. Is he a publisher like a newspaper or like CNN, or is he a participant in a crime? And the point I want to make about that is that, yes, it's a difficult question, but the facts matter. And we'll start to learn some of the facts the government is purporting to prove when the charges are released.

You know, it's one thing for a journalist to accept information and then publish it. It's another thing if that journalist participates in the hacking or encourages or somehow aids and abets the underlying illegal activity. And what will be particularly interesting to see in how the United States frames the charges is, will they charge him just with receiving these stolen documents, or will they charge him in some way with participating in the underlying theft? If they do and if they can prove it, of course, that would make the constitutional issue a lot easier for the government than if he's simply acting as a journalistic conduit.

BERMAN: Susan, put Julian Assange in historical perspective for us because he's at the crossroads of such key events, the 2010 release of information about the U.S. war in Iraq and Afghanistan and, of course, the Russian attack on the U.S. election in 2016.

SUSAN GLASSER, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: Well, that's right. I think he represents, it seems to me, a key stage in the -- not just the distribution of information in a new digital moment, but the weaponization of information. And he suggested perhaps he crossed over the line and that may well be part of the court case that ultimately is waged against him. At some point did he change from essentially a publisher of information into a partner of Russian intelligence? He certainly showed the way to governments around the world the new uses to which secret information could be put. And I do think that now we're living in a permanently weaponized era. You saw the president cheerleading. That's a clip that's going to be played over and over and over again of Donald Trump cheerleading for WikiLeaks. He saw him as an extension in a fact of a key campaign goal in 2016.

Now, there's a narrower question, of course, about the legality of those actions and the extent to which WikiLeaks was operating as a partner of Russian intelligence. But I think, you know, in addition to the criminal proceedings, you know, we are going to remember this as a key moment when we saw the extent to which the digital era had upended the ability of even non-state actors to play in global politics.

Remember, in 2010, this was a key trigger, the release of the WikiLeaks State Department cables. It was a key trigger in revolutions around the world. The toppling of Tunisia's long-time leader took place at least in part because of the WikiLeaks documents exposing corruption inside that society. We haven't had a chance to talk much about it today, but the long-time leader of Sudan is being toppled today in a way that suggests that global politics have been permanently disrupted in part by the mobilization of people that's possible and in part by the uses to which information can be deployed to good purposes and to not so good purposes. And I think that's what really we'll be talking about in regards to the 2016 U.S. campaign for a long time to come.

CAMEROTA: Evan, will the Department of Justices' case against Julian Assange be affected by resident Trump's cheerleading for WikiLeaks?

PEREZ: Look, I think it's going to make things a little uncomfortable. I think it's very, very clear that, you know, what a candidate says ends up having an effect. You saw this during the Obama administration where the president was applauding -- as a candidate was applauding certain things and then where the Justice Department had to essentially change course once he took office. So it does sometimes have an effect.

But in this case I think -- I think not, simply because the analysis that they've done, they believe shows that WikiLeaks -- they showed, they believe, that Julian Assange was more than just a publisher, to Jeffrey's point, that they had become more of a participant, more of a conspirator. And, again, that's their allegation and we don't know what evidence they have to prove it. That's where this comes in. That's where the courts in the U.K. will come in and the courts here. It's not a slam dunk case, I don't think. And I think it does raise, to Susan's point, some very uncomfortable questions for journalists as well.

BERMAN: Again, the president says I love WikiLeaks. His government just arrested its founder.

[09:00:03] Evan, Jeffrey, Susan, thank you very much.

CAMEROTA: All right, CNN's breaking news coverage on Julian Assange continues right now.