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Trump Opposed to White House Aides Going Before Congress to Testify; NYT: Top Official Warned Don't Tell Trump About Russian Efforts to Interfere in 2020 Election; Biden to Officially Announce Presidential Run Tomorrow. Aired 7-7:30a ET

Aired April 24, 2019 - 07:00   ET

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

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: For you, "CNN TALK" is next. For our U.S. viewers, the Trump White House stonewalling Congress giving them nothing. This is a new strategy. NEW DAY continues right now.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

[07:00:13] UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The White House is testing the power of Congress.

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA): The administration is engaged in stonewalling of the facts.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The president who has undergone a two-year investigation.

It's easy to see why he might not be eager to hand over more information.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Former Vice President Joe Biden set to join the 2020 presidential race tomorrow.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Each of the candidates is going to have to figure out how to handle him as a competitor.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're going to see him fade over the year. His best day will be his first day.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Alisyn Camerota and John Berman.

BERMAN: Good morning. And welcome to your NEW DAY.

In the immortal words of Willy Wonka, "You get nothing." The White House is making it clear that it will not cooperate with congressional investigations. President Trump flat-out tells "The Washington Post" it is unnecessary for White House aides to testify to Congress.

He says, quote, "There is no reason to go any further, and especially in Congress where it's very partisan -- obviously very partisan."

CNN has learned that he may try to block former White House counsel Don McGahn from complying with a subpoena from the House Judiciary Committee to testify.

CAMEROTA: And in yet another sign of the deepening power struggle with Congress, the IRS has missed a second deadline to turn over six years of President Trump's tax returns. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin says he will make a final decision on whether to do so by May 6.

Joining us now, Julie Pace, Washington bureau chief for the Associated Press and CNN political analyst; David Chalian, CNN political director; and Abby Phillip, CNN White House correspondent.

David, it was interesting to hear the president on the record in his own words telling us what his and the White House strategy is clearly now going to be on these congressional investigations which is we will give you nothing. We are going to fight every step of the way.

DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: Right. Remember back in November when the Democrats won control of the House of Representatives. There was this big question of is this White House prepared? How are they going to deal with Democrats now in charge and having gavels in these committees?

Now we're seeing exactly what the plan is. And it is to not give an inch. And it is a plan that echoes how Donald Trump handled some of his business career. This is to delay, use lawsuits as a tactic to try and dissipate the immediate tension that something may cause him.

And this is the one problem I think here, John, for the president is when it comes to somebody like Don McGahn he already waived Don McGahn's right to tell his story and sing like a bird -- bird to Robert Mueller.

So it is a little odd for him to say, no, no, no, he doesn't have that right anymore. I don't know how that will get sorted out. But I do know that the White House is fully committed to a complete stonewall strategy.

CAMEROTA: But David, that's the president's point. I mean, that's what the president is using as his justification. He's saying, "I already cooperated. I already had Don McGahn sit down for 30 hours. What more do you need?" He's making the point that it seems gratuitous for lawmakers to just keep going, retreading that same path. And --

CHALIAN: Right.

CAMEROTA: I mean, who knows.

CHALIAN: I'm not a lawyer. I don't know if that will be a winning argument in court. I understand the P.R. argument he's making there.

CAMEROTA: Yes. I am not a lawyer either, but I do play one on TV. And so Abby, what I think happens next is, obviously, Congress is issuing subpoenas for these things to happen.

The president is saying, no, he's using executive privilege, saying, no, Congress will then hold these different witnesses in contempt of court. And then what I don't know is if the courts will fast track this so that they can make a decision before 18 months. And what the White House's plan is when the series of events plays out.

ABBY PHILLIP, CNN WHITE HOUSES CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I mean, I think for now the strategy is just delay it as long as possible. And I think David is right. There is a real legal question about whether or not the president has the ability to exert privilege over something that is already in the public sphere. That he's already allowed McGahn to say this in a context that has been now made public.

And then to say that, just because he doesn't like McGahn going toward Congress and saying it again, that may not win out in court. But it may not matter.

I think the point here is just to have a series of events that pushes this further and further and further into the future, making it more difficult for Democrats to get momentum on their oversight inquiries. This is a strategy that is across the board on his tax returns, on McGahn, on all of these various inquiries. The idea is to delay and deny momentum to Democrats as they try to build a public case against President Trump.

BERMAN: And Julie that pace -- point, last point that Abby was making there, I think, is important. It's not just on Don McGahn here. It's on the tax returns. It's on the security clearances. The White House has now decided to fight on everything.

[07:05:10] Rudy Giuliani was bragging about this overnight, that this is now a choice.

JULIE PACE, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: This isn't some kind of secret strategy. This is a very overt and public strategy. And it applies broadly, not just to the political debate that will follow coming out of the Mueller investigation but to this whole swath of investigations that the new Democratic majority in the House have opened. The Democrats really plan to delve into every aspect not only of Trump's administration but also his personal finances, his businesses.

And we all know, having watched the last two years and in the campaign prior to that, that when you start getting close to Trump's finances and his businesses, that's when he gets particularly agitated. That's when he really gets his -- gets his back up.

So they plan to fight, again, not just -- not just the subpoenas that will come following the Mueller investigation but any attempt by Democrats to investigate any aspect of his presidency or his personal life.

CAMEROTA: All right, David Chalian, hot off the presses. We have a new "New York Times" story that has just crossed from our friends David Sanger, Maggie Haberman, Eric Schmidt.

And it talks about how often Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen was shut down when she tried to have the administration deal with what Russia was doing, what they will be doing in 2020. Here is the paragraph.

"In the months before Kirstjen Nielsen was forced to resign, she tried to focus the White House on one of her highest priorities as homeland security secretary: preparing for new and different Russian forms of interference in the 2020 election. But in a meeting this year, Mick Mulvaney, the White House chief of staff, made it clear that Mr. Trump still equated any public discussion of malign Russian election activity with questions about the legitimacy of his victory. According to one senior administration official, Mr. -- Mr. Mulvaney said, quote, 'It wasn't a great subject and should be kept below his level.'"

In other words, they wouldn't -- the president wouldn't talk about it, so his chief of staff wouldn't allow the people who could help fix it to bring it up.

CHALIAN: Alisyn, let's be clear what we're talking about here. This is a threat to the very function and the core of American democracy. Imagine a scenario where we learned that a foreign entity who is not friendly with us has decided that they are going to send a missile somewhere, and they tell us the date and the time, and the location in the United States that's going to hit and that the White House chief of staff says something like that: "That kind of attack, well, that's below the president's level. Let's keep that off the president's desk."

What more could be on the president's level than an attack on the very functioning of America's democracy? This is so outrageous. And -- and I understand that the president has shown us time and again that he can only equate this issue with somehow questioning the legitimacy of his election. But this is about protecting America's democracy. And I can't think of something that is more on the president's level, at his level, than that.

BERMAN: I -- go ahead, Abby.

PHILLIP: What I also think is extraordinary about the story is that, based on, you know, my reporting over the last several months, this has been a frustration with people at the Department of Homeland Security. That the president doesn't understand that Secretary Nielsen, when she was secretary, had to deal with all of these other issues.

Her job wasn't just to deal with the issue on the border, which the president wanted her almost singularly focused on. She also was responsible for being the first line of defense against the sort of Russian interference in the 2018 election and in the upcoming election.

But clearly, the president is not interested in that. That has been made clear, both publicly and privately. He does not want to talk about it. He thinks that any talk about Russian interference is an effort to undermine his legitimacy.

And it was a source of frustration for people in this administration who want to take it seriously but have been sort of cut off from the top levels of the attention of the president of the United States, which does matter. That's why he is the president, because he is supposed to really take a leadership role in these kinds of decisions when it comes to an attack like this on the very bedrock of democracy.

BERMAN: I have to remind people that -- that page one, paragraph two of the Mueller report, like 25 words into the entire report, it says, "The Russian government interfered in the 2016 presidential election in sweeping and systematic fashion." That is a serious statement from the Mueller team.

And to have this story come out the week after -- the week after that report to show the president, Julie, doesn't care, doesn't want to hear that the Russians are interfering or -- I have to put this out there -- look, if you read the Mueller report, the Trump campaign, Robert Mueller says, was eager to get the Russians' help or eager to benefit from the Russian efforts.

Do we just -- is it fair to ask whether or not the White House maybe wants to benefit from the Russian efforts here?

[07:10:03] PACE: It's a fair question to ask. The Mueller report makes very clear that, while there was no criminal conspiracy, the Trump campaign was aware of some of what the Russians were doing, and they knew that they would be the ones that benefitted from that.

And you can understand why. One of the things that the Russians were trying to do is just sow chaos. And Trump actually likes to do the exactly same thing. He feels like he benefits from chaos.

I think the real problem here, though, is it's not just the Russians that we're talking about now. There are other foreign actors that are also going to be attempting to interfere in the next presidential election. And we don't know which way that their efforts will cut.

And that has been one of the deep frustrations at the Department of Homeland Security with career officials who work on these type of issues.

You know, this isn't just a situation where you will have foreign actors trying to help Donald Trump. This can cut so many different ways. We could have a foreign actor that will try to hurt the next Republican president and the -- the political actors in Washington haven't really been able to get their -- their hands around this. And that is, in large part, because there simply isn't leadership from the very top, from President Trump on this issue.

CAMEROTA: David, the article goes on, "Ms. Nielsen grew so frustrated with White House reluctance to convene top-level officials to come up with a government-wide strategy that she twice pulled together her own meetings of cabinet secretaries and agency heads."

Remember, David, they also -- John Bolton got rid of the cyber security director position at the White House. So the very person who could be coordinating and watching out for and combatting whatever was going to happen in 2020, why would they get rid of that position? CHALIAN: Right. And this argues again for -- it proves why it needs

to be at the president's level. Right? Because in that article, as you're saying, Nielsen tried to work around it, convene cabinet officials. But it amounted to nothing.

And she sort of gave up on it when she realized that that was the case. That's because, you know, Mick Mulvaney and others were trying to keep it away from the president to not upset the president, because he doesn't like this topic.

I'm trying to think, as I'm sitting here listening to us discuss this -- and maybe Abby or Julie can come up with a better example -- but I can't think of a bigger example of sort of a real abdication of responsibility from President Trump throughout his tenure than -- than this topic. It is just mindboggling to me when we -- when we have such clear information about this threat to our democracy that he just does not seem willing to engage on it.

BERMAN: Guys, anything come to mind?

PHILLIP: Nothing comes to my mind. I mean, this has been the consistent theme of his presidency. Standing next to Vladimir Putin in Helsinki, saying that he believed Putin over the U.S. intelligence community.

In spite of all the evidence that is out there, in spite of his own administration officials pointing out how important this is. The president doesn't want to hear it.

And aides like Nielsen have taken to simply dealing with it without him. But that can't continue forever. And I think that that's kind of what this story speaks to, is that there is a frustration, that it cannot be the case that the president does not want to engage in a top national security threat for the United States government that has to be rectified.

But there are some questions about that. The president put in at DHS someone who is from Customs and Border Protection to replace Kirstjen Nielsen. So he's focused on the border. He still doesn't really want to focus on this issue at this very moment.

CAMEROTA: All right. We have David Sanger joining us in a little while to give us more on this new reporting that has just come out. Julie, Abby, David, thank you very much.

BERMAN: I think this story is a big deal.

CAMEROTA: I do, too, and we're going to ask our guests about it. We have Congressman -- former Congressman Charlie Dent coming up next.

BERMAN: I think it also tells us that Kirstjen Nielsen is not going quietly.

CAMEROTA: I think that is right. I think we can determine that she has not gone quietly from the White House. All right. So there is this new reporting from "The New York Times"

that adds to the revisionist history that Jared Kushner seems to have about Russian interference. We're going to talk to a longtime Republican congressman about all this next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:18:02] CAMEROTA: "The New York Times" reports that acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney warned former Homeland Security Chief Kirstjen Nielsen not to bring up Russian efforts to interfere in the 2020 election.

"The Times" reports that Mulvaney made it clear that this was not a great subject for the president. So it should be kept below his level.

Joining us now to talk about this and more we have former Republican congressman Charlie Dent. He's a CNN political commentator.

Congressman, great to have you here. Look, we knew before this that the president is not a fan of dealing with Russia and their attempts to influence the upcoming election. He doesn't like talking about what happened in the last election, and he certainly doesn't like dealing with what they're about to do in the upcoming election.

But we didn't have all of the finer points. We didn't know how much the chief of staff Mick Mulvaney was shutting down Secretary Nielsen. When she -- she was tasked with how to fix this; and we didn't know just how bad it was that she was being shut down.

Here, let me just read you a portion of it. "In the months before Kirstjen Nielsen was forced to resign, she tried to focus the White House on one of her highest priorities as Homeland Security secretary, preparing for new and different Russian forms of interference in the 2020 election. But in a meeting this year, Mick Mulvaney, the White House chief of staff, made it clear that Mr. Trump still equated any public discussion of malign Russian election activity with questions about the legitimacy of his victory. According to one senior administration official, Mr. Mulvaney said, quote, 'It wasn't a great subject and should be kept below his level.'"

What does this mean when you hear it?

CHARLIE DENT, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: It's incomprehensible to me that the chief of staff would keep this type of information away from the president.

If -- if election interference by a hostile foreign power does not warrant the attention of the president, I don't know what does. And clearly, Kirstjen Nielsen, as someone said earlier, is not going quietly. She spent a lot of her time working on cyber issues.

[07:20:03] I am completely flummoxed as to why this administration -- why it would want to dismiss or minimize Russian interventions. The president should be standing up right now, talking about what we're going to do to prevent this and sending a signal to the Russians that there will be retribution and retaliation.

You know, we're better at this stuff than they are. These guys over at Fort Meade, at the NSA, they go flicker the lights in Russia. They can do all sorts of things to back these guys off. And I don't know what they're -- I don't know what they're so afraid of.

CAMEROTA: Well, I can tell you. Because we know from the reporting that the president thinks any suggestion that he had help from the Russians and that the Russians preferred him, though Vladimir Putin said it in front of him, threatens the legitimacy of his win.

So he just -- it's just a subject that is a third rail for him. He just won't touch it. He won't deal with it. I mean, we've heard this time and again. What we didn't know was the people around him were trying to do things but have been stymied.

DENT: I think it just speaks to, you know, maybe a culture of fear in the White House. It seems to me that they're afraid to confront the president with this type of information.

They know they should do it. They're just simply afraid. I mean, you're back to the title of Bob Woodward's book "Fear." I mean, the place is operating on fear.

You know, again, in a functional White House, I think the president of the United States ordinarily would want to know what the major threats are to the country and then develop a plan, you know, to counter them. So I mean, again, it just speaks to the chaos, the dysfunction and, in this case, you know, fear to do what needs to be done.

CAMEROTA: And so Congressman, I mean, further on that point, yesterday, when you hear the president's top adviser, Jared Kushner, saying -- I mean, basically omitting the most significant crimes that Russia perpetrated against us in 2016 -- here, let me play for you how he's trying to rewrite history.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JARED KUSHNER, TRUMP'S SON-IN-LAW AND SENIOR ADVISOR: Quite frankly, the whole thing is just a big distraction for the country. And you look at, you know, what Russia did -- you know, buying some Facebook ads to try to sow dissent and do it, and it's a terrible thing.

But I think the investigations and all of the speculation that's happened for the last two years has had a much harsher impact on our democracy than a couple of Facebook ads.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: So if the White House thinks that it was just a couple of Facebook ads, what does that mean for the rest of us for 2020 as we go into this race?

DENT: Well, again, Alisyn, we're back to dismissing and dismissing a very serious and real threat. I mean, again, it's incomprehensible why anybody in this White House would try to do this, particularly after the Mueller report.

And the Mueller report actually said that, you know, the campaign, the Trump campaign did not coordinate with the Russians. So that extent there was an exoneration. Not on the obstruction, obviously, but on -- at least on the coordination piece.

And so again, I mean, you think the White House would be smart enough to pivot and say that, you know, "We're never going to let anything like happen -- like that happen again."

Again, I think the president is just so sensitive to any -- any conversation about his legitimacy. And truthfully, with all the Russian interventions, there was no evidence, as far as I can tell, that the Russians actually manipulated tallies, you know, which would have certainly undermined the legitimacy of the president's election. But he's just too defensive about the whole thing.

CAMEROTA: Well, while all that's happening, as you know, Congress is trying to do investigations to go further than the Mueller report, to see really what Don McGahn has to say, et cetera.

And here are the stonewalling efforts from the White House on this. They are telling all White House officials, do not comply with any subpoena from Congress. They are filing lawsuits to prevent records from being released to Congress, even if there's a subpoena. And they're declining any requests to release President Trump's tax returns.

So you were in Congress. What does Congress do now about this?

DENT: Well, I'm sure Congress is going to enforce these subpoenas. They're going to start holding people in contempt.

CAMEROTA: And then what? People go to jail? If you don't -- if you don't comply with a subpoena -- let's say they hold the guy who as in charge of security clearances in contempt. Then what? You risk jail time?

DENT: I'm not sure if there's a jail sentence, but there will be -- there will be -- I'm sure there will be resolutions on the floor of the House, you know, to hold these folks in contempt. That's what will happen.

I suspect this could -- you know, this is going to play out in the legal system. I suspect this could result, you know, in jail time. I'm not the attorney, but I wouldn't want to be on the receiving end of what Congress can do to enforce the subpoena.

CAMEROTA: Congressman Charlie Dent, thank you very much for being here with your perspective on all of this.

DENT: Thanks, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: John.

BERMAN: So the front runner in the Democratic race for president, former vice president Joe Biden, he will join the crowded field tomorrow. How will this change the race, shake things up, perhaps immediately? David Axelrod joins us next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:28:42] BERMAN: The wait is almost over. CNN has learned that former Vice President Joe Biden will announce that he is running for president, and he will do it tomorrow.

CAMEROTA: Maybe.

BERMAN: So this will be the third time he has run for president. And if elected he would be the oldest person ever to take that office.

Joining us now, CNN senior political commentator David Axelrod, host of "THE AXE FILES."

And David, I'm just fascinated by the fact that the person who is leading in the polls, the front runner --

DAVID AXELROD, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes.

BERMAN: -- will get in the race officially tomorrow.

AXELROD: Yes.

BERMAN: How does this change the dynamic of the race immediately?

AXELROD: Well, I mean, obviously, if he weren't to run it would have change the race dramatically. There are several people who are considering running. Mayor Bloomberg, for one, who didn't run in anticipation that Biden would get in the race, because he fills a lane in this race, more moderate, sort of center left lane. The working- class, that wasn't Bloomberg's lane, but the working-class, middle- class Joe lane. And so on --

BERMAN: Sherrod Brown a little bit.

AXELROD: Yes. You know, Mitch Landrieu, the former mayor of -- of New Orleans was -- was thought to be a potential candidate. Said Biden had dibs on that lane and so on.

So I think it is big. You know, and he has consistently led in polls. He is -- he's a solid frontrunner. That's giving him the luxury to wait until now to get in the race. So he has to raise money, which is going to be a big question about him.

[07:30:00]