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Trump Tweets about Russia Probe; Barr Testifies to Congress; Jerry Nadler Speaks about Mueller and Barr; Letter from Mueller to Barr is Released. Aired 9:30-10a ET

Aired May 01, 2019 - 09:30   ET

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

[09:31:40] WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Once again we want to welcome our viewers here in the United States and around the world. I'm Wolf Blitzer in Washington.

We're only minutes away from the attorney general of the United States, Bill Barr, arriving up on Capitol Hill to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

And this morning the president has been very, very active on Twitter. So far he's not commenting on this very high stakes hearing specifically, but he is commenting on the Russia probe. It's very much on his mind.

Let's go to our White House correspondent, Kaitlan Collins.

So, Kaitlan, what are we hearing from the president?

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Wolf, no word yet specifically on this hearing, but the president did tweet just a few minutes ago referencing the Russia investigation, once again calling it what he believes is the biggest political con job in history.

Now, we are also hearing pushback from the president's allies and White House officials who say they're exasperated by this latest report about Bill Barr because they had thought that the Russia investigation was finally going to be behind them and now there's a fresh level of scrutiny on how the attorney general has conducted himself.

Now, the president's attorney general -- or, excuse me, not attorney general, his attorney is also commenting on the news last night about Bill Barr, saying in a statement to CNN, and I'm quoting him now, Mueller should have made a decision and shouldn't be complaining or whining now that he didn't get described correctly.

Now, Wolf, we should note that Mueller did not make a decision in part because of a Justice Department guideline that you cannot indict a sitting president. That is something that Bill Barr did not initially describe when talking about the report when he just said that Mueller hadn't made a conclusion about whether or not the president obstructed justice. And, of course, we later saw that Mueller didn't make the conclusion, not regardless of evidence, but in part because of that Justice Department guideline about indicting a sitting president.

So now there are going to be questions about whether or not Bill Barr conducted himself appropriately. And, Wolf, we should note that the president does not have anything on his public schedule until 2:15 today. So plenty of time to watch his attorney general testify in front of lawmakers.

BLITZER: All right, Kaitlan, we'll see what other reaction we get from the White House. I expect we'll be seeing plenty of that.

Kaitlan is over at the White House.

Joining us now, CNN legal analyst Renato Mariotti, he's a former federal prosecutor, and Elliot Williams, a former deputy assistant attorney general at the Justice Department, former counsel to the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Renato, we know that Barr will have to answer lots of questions about this letter he received from Robert Mueller. Barr will have to explain why he put out what clearly was a misleading summary of the report. So what does this letter do to Barr's overall credibility?

RENATO MARIOTTI, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: I think it takes credibility that was already at an all-time low and I think it makes it even lower, Wolf.

You know, before this news broke, there was certainly a lot of discussion, myself included. I had written some columns kind of walking through how I thought the letter was misleading, how I thought the press conference was misleading. But now we know that Mueller himself had a similar view and Barr has to know that eventually Robert Mueller is going to come forward and give his side of the story, give his explanation. I think that Barr is going to be very defensive today. He's going to be trying to provide an explanation and put his view out there to try to blunt the criticism that's going to come, not just for the, you know, months to come, but also for his own legacy.

[09:35:01] BLITZER: Barr had testified, Elliot, under oath that he, quote, didn't know if Mueller supported his summary conclusions in that four-page letter. We now know that wasn't true. Did Barr -- do you believe that Barr actually lied under oath?

ELLIOT WILLIAMS, FORMER DEPUTY ASSISTANT ATTORNEY GENERAL, JUSTICE DEPARTMENT: I don't know if I'm -- I don't know if I'm willing to make that legal finding here. He's got some explaining to do today and tomorrow. And I know a number of members of Congress are going to specifically want to hone in on that precise question.

Look, there are people now going to be calling -- people are certainly calling for resignation and impeachment and all that. But on a much lower level, and for bar disciplinary -- b-a-r, not B-a-r-r -- bar disciplinary actions for an individual who has lied about a proceeding with the intent to mislead. So even, you know, if he didn't -- even if -- even if it doesn't rise to the level of perjury, it rises to the level of a certainly inaccurate and troubling statement. You know I want to just piggyback on a point that Laura Coates had

made earlier in the last segment, it just bears mentioning how Robert Mueller made the choice to put this in writing, knowing full well that this letter is going to be released. You know, it's -- it's -- there's nothing that Barr's public disclosure of this letter, it's not -- it's not deliberative information. It's not going to be grand jury material or so on. So he's creating a record of his public dispute with William Barr and, frankly, this testimony, this contradictory testimony, is also part of that record, as is the press conference, as is the letter.

So he's -- you know, as Renato had said, he sort of started with some credibility problems and it's only gotten worse and he's got a lot of explaining to do over these next two days.

BLITZER: Yes, that's all the more extraordinary given the very close relationship, the friendship that has existed between Mueller and Barr over many, many years and their wives happen to be very, very good friends as well.

Renato, how significant is it when the United States attorney general misrepresents what Mueller calls the context, nature and substance of such a critical investigation?

MARIOTTI: I think it's so serious, Wolf, that it not only impacts Barr's credibility, but I think it impacts the credibility of the entire Justice Department.

I know when I worked at the Justice Department, I'm sure Elliot has a similar view, we were always instructed that a lawyer for the Justice Department was above -- was held to a standard above the standards of an ordinary attorney. Any attorney at the Justice Department was trying to comport themselves as if they're representing the United States of America and its people, holding themselves to the highest ideals of that office.

Obviously, the attorney general of the United States has an even greater responsibility. He is the lawyer for all of us, or he's supposed to be. Here, you know, he's operating below the standards that I would expect from the young lawyers who work for me at my law firm.

You know, the reality is, any lawyer who misrepresented to a judge in the way that Mr. Barr is misrepresenting to Congress and the American people would be -- would be censured by the judge, would be called out. If I acted this way at the Justice Department, I would expect to be reprimanded or disciplined. And I think it's -- it's a problem for -- for Mr. Barr.

WILLIAMS: And on top of that --

BLITZER: Go ahead, Elliot.

WILLIAMS: No, on top of that, based on what we've -- you know, and, again, we've seen reporting on it, but based on what we understand Mueller put in his letter, a big concern of his was protecting the integrity of the investigation. And, frankly, you know, the public perception plays into the integrity. It appeared to him, and he sort of seems to have said this and we'll see this when we read the letter, but it seemed to him that the statements that were out there, even if not inaccurate or even if not untruthful, were actually confusing the public and leading -- you know, hurting the public's integrity and their faith in investigations.

This is exactly the kind of thing Renato was talking about, you want to not just have everything -- have the i's dotted and t's crossed, but have the public at least have faith that the investigation has been carried out in a neutral manner, but also is being -- the findings are conveyed accurately to the public. And so that seemed to have been Mueller's goal and Barr has, at numerous instances, undermined that. So, again, we're just seeing a very public -- I don't want to call it a fight, but a very public dispute and disagreement playing out in front of all of us as to how we should characterize these findings.

BLITZER: Elliot Williams, Renato Mariotti, guys, thanks very much. We'll get back to you later.

Of course, our special coverage continues.

A crucial moment up on Capitol Hill now only a few moments away as we await the attorney general, Bill Barr's, testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee. House Democrats expected to vote in just minutes, by the way, on whether to allow staff attorneys to grill Barr on the Mueller report tomorrow morning. Will that push Barr to skip tomorrow's hearing?

[09:39:45] Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: There you're looking at Jerry Nadler, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee.

Let's listen in.

REP. JERRY NADLER (D-NY): The introduction and summaries of the report because the special counsel felt that the attorney general's public statements were misleading. And he said so. He said they're misleading as to the contents of the report and he says release the summaries and the -- and the introduction, which accurately reflect the report and they're properly redacted, et cetera.

The attorney general's failure to do so is just another step in trying to mislead the public to shield for the president but to mislead the public into what the report was all about and completely misrepresented it for another month.

This makes it even more important that Barr come in and testify before our committee tomorrow and that Mueller testify, which they have agreed to do subject to setting a date, and we will see if this he do that, sometime in May.

[09:45:03] QUESTION: Has your committee reached an agreement with the Justice Department for Barr to come in?

NADLER: No, we have not. We are going to today -- we're having a -- we're marking up the Equality Act today, but before we do that today, we're going to amend the committee rules to permit the counsel to question witnesses after the members do. This is not unprecedented. There's precedent for it. And we think it's particularly important that, especially in light of this letter now, that we have the ability to have follow-up questions beyond what the five-minute rule permits. So that's why we're doing that.

QUESTION: (INAUDIBLE).

NADLER: No. No. They simply -- they -- no. I'll take a charitable view and assume that it's just the question of setting a date, and hopefully that's true. And we'll find that out in the next couple days.

QUESTION: (INAUDIBLE).

NADLER: No. No. No.

QUESTION: (INAUDIBLE)

NADLER: I'm sorry?

QUESTION: Do you think the attorney general should step down (INAUDIBLE) confidence (INAUDIBLE)?

NADLER: I think there are great difficulties with the attorney general at this point. He seems -- besides the fact that he clearly misled the American people, he seems to have testified non-truthfully to the Senate and to the House, which raises major questions.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Last question.

QUESTION: (INAUDIBLE).

NADLER: Well, the more important request is the fact that, remember, we issued a subpoena for the un-redacted report and the underlying evidence. That is due today. If he doesn't supply that today, we will take steps to enforce the subpoena.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK. Thank you very much.

NADLER: That's it. Thank you.

BLITZER: All right, so there's Jerry Nadler, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, with some very, very strong words of warning to the attorney general of the United States, Bill Barr.

You know, Elie Honig, you're a former assistant U.S. attorney in the Southern District of New York. All of a sudden they're raising questions about whether the attorney general of the United States lied in his sworn testimony before Congress.

ELIE HONIG, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Yes, Wolf, it's remarkable. And I'm looking at this through a prosecutor's perspective. And this is going to be all about credibility. And not just the credibility of any person, any witness, the credibility of the attorney general of the United States.

Now, I think Bill Barr has already done serious damage to his credibility. We've now seen the report. Every time Bill Barr has talked already, nobody who was questioning him had seen the report. This is going to change the game. And on top of that, we now know that Robert Mueller has serious questions about this report.

What we're not going to see today is some dramatic moment of recantation. We're not going to see a Jack Nicholson moment from "A Few Good Men" where Bill Barr admits, you're darn right I misrepresented what's in here. And so what the strategy is, what I would recommend is, chip away at the credibility because ultimately you're setting the stage for Robert Mueller. This is going to be a death match to the legacies of Robert Mueller versus Bill Barr. And if you can chip away at Bill Barr's legacy, then you have left the man who actually did all this work have his say and I think ultimately his credibility will win out.

BLITZER: Let's go to Manu back up on Capitol Hill.

Manu, you're there. Set the scene for us. What are we about to see before the Senate Judiciary Committee? You heard and you just saw Bill Barr, the attorney general, arrive, walk through the corridors and go into that room.

MANU RAJU, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Extremely contentious hearing expected right off the bat. Democrats going to assail the credibility of the attorney general and push him about exactly what the special counsel said to him, why he decided to put out the four-page letter the way he did, why he had the press conference and characterized it as essentially the president being cleared, despite the concerns that had been raised by the special counsel. That's going to be the theme throughout this hearing. Expect the Democratic presidential candidates, too, to use this as a forum of sorts to go after Bill Barr.

Republicans coming to his defense. Lindsey Graham already has told our colleague Lauren Fox that he had a conversation with the Justice Department last night in which Barr had said that Mueller's complaint was mainly about how the media had reported about his four-page letter, not necessarily anything else.

Here's Senator Dick Durbin.

Senator Durbin, what do you -- how much does what you learned yesterday impact what you plan to question -- how you plan to question Bill Barr about the -- about the Mueller report? What did you -- how does that change your approach and your questioning?

SEN. DICK DURBIN (D-IL): On two separate occasions, both the House and Senate committees, Attorney General Barr was asked whether or not he had any feedback from Mueller about his March 24th summary of the findings and he said no. Well, it turns out there was a letter that was delivered weeks before by Mueller to Attorney General Barr saying that what he had said didn't properly characterize the findings of that report. That's a pretty significant disclosure.

RAJU: Do you think he should resign?

[09:50:00] DURBIN: Well, I would -- I'd just say this, he needs to be held accountable for what he said at two different under oath. He also needs to be accountable for his role in the future criminal referrals. There are 14 criminal referrals still (INAUDIBLE) at this point. He has the power as attorney general to have a direct impact on them. We need to know whether he'll recuse himself.

RAJU: OK. Thank you, senator.

So you hear from one senator there. Expect that line of questioning through the course of the day, Wolf.

And also we are learning now, just moments ago, that the Mueller letter has, in fact, been delivered to Capitol Hill. Jerry Nadler's office, the House Judiciary chairman, says that he has received it. And you heard Nadler, just moments ago, raised questions about Barr's credibility. Of course there's also a 10:00 a.m. deadline where they are expecting, on the House side, their subpoena says the full Mueller report should be turned over to Capitol Hill un-redacted. We don't expect the Justice Department to meet that deadline. So a lot of fireworks on the House and Senate sides of the Capitol that are going to happen in just a matter of minutes.

Wolf.

BLITZER: All right, stand by, Manu.

Laura Jarrett, our justice correspondent, is with us.

You have the letter. This is the sensitive letter that the special counsel, Robert Mueller, wrote to Bill Barr a few days after Bill Barr's principle conclusions were released. Go ahead and read the letter.

LAURA JARRETT, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: And it's a short letter, so I'm going to read it in full for the benefit of everybody. It's only a little over a page. And here is what they say, Wolf.

I previously sent you -- it's addressed to Bill Barr. I previously sent you a letter dated March 25, 2019, that enclosed the introduction and executive summary for each volume of the special counsel's report, marked with redactions to remove any information that potentially could be protected by federal rule of criminal procedure 60, that's on grand jury materials that concerned declamation (ph) decisions or the related to a charge case. We had also marked an additional two sentences for review and have now confirmed that these sentences can be released publicly.

Accordingly, the enclosed documents are in a form that can be released to the public, consistent with legal requirements and department policies. I am requesting that you provide these materials to Congress and authorize their public release at this time.

As we stated in our meeting of March 5th and reiterated to the department early in the afternoon of March 24th, the introductions and executive summaries of our two volume report accurately summarize this office's work and conclusions. The summary letter the department sent to Congress and released to the public late in the afternoon of March 24th did not fully capture the context, nature and substance of this office's work and conclusions. We communicated that concern to the department on the morning of March 25th.

There is now public confusion about critical aspects of the results of our investigation. This threatens to undermine a central purpose for which the department appointed the special counsel, to ensure -- to assure full public confidence in the outcome of the investigation. See the department press release.

While we understand that the department is reviewing the full report to determine what is appropriate for public release, a process that our office is working with you to complete, that process need not delay the release of the enclosed materials. Again, the redacted materials. Release at this time would alleviate misunderstandings that have arisen and would answer congressional and public questions about the nature and outcome of our investigation. It would also accord with the standard for public release of notifications to Congress cited in your letter.

And then he cites the provision of the federal code there.

So clearly --

BLITZER: And then he signs it, right?

JARRETT: Then he signs it, Robert S. Mueller III.

BLITZER: Yes.

JARRETT: So I think clearly what you see here are -- is two main thrusts. He wanted those public summaries out.

Now, it's interesting, he didn't attach them to his original submission when he provided the full report to the Justice Department, but he did it a few days later and he's adamant, if you release those, they'll have more of the context because, as we remember from those summaries, it laid out chapter and verse everything that we then see in the 448 pages to come. It lays out his theory on why he didn't think a sitting president could be indicted. It lays out that 11 different instances of potential obstructive conduct and so he clearly thought, if you put those out, the public will have a better understanding of my work because right now with your four-page letter, the public is not understanding what the full (INAUDIBLE) of it.

BLITZER: Because he makes it clear -- he makes it clear in this letter that he feels that Barr distorted the bottom line conclusions. He also makes it clear, you know what, you had summaries that we had provided, that were already redacted. Everything was ready to go. Why not release those. And, Mark Mazzetti, I know you want to weigh in on this as well.

MARK MAZZETTI, WASHINGTON INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT, "THE NEW YORK TIMES": And it's clear now from this letter that there is more than one letter.

JARRETT: Yes.

MAZZETTI: That there was a communication, March 25th, which is the day after Barr's letter comes out.

JARRETT: Right.

MAZZETTI: So this 27th letter is actually a follow-up.

BLITZER: Yes.

[09:55:00] MAZZETTI: And it also is quite extraordinary in this letter that you see that there was back and forth over that weekend between Mueller's office and Barr's office about what to put in. And Barr, if I remember correctly, kind of characterized this was -- we looked at it. We made our own judgments. Sort of in a vacuum outside of input from Mueller. But, clearly, this shows that this was -- they -- the Mueller team, over that weekend, wanted to get more into that original letter (ph).

JARRET: Right, and --

BLITZER: Hold on for a minute.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: (INAUDIBLE) on Barr.

BLITZER: Yes.

SCIUTTO: It does not say it was media confusion. It says that Barr --

GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: Right.

SCIUTTO: Misled on the findings of the report. So it belies the Lindsey Graham claims that this was about the press coverage. He said Barr misinterpreted it. Very clear.

BORGER: And, you know, Barr did not want to put out something piecemeal, right? He was like, OK, we're going to wait. We're going to give you this whole thing all at once and we're going to do the redactions and Mueller is working with me.

Well, as we all presumed beforehand, Mueller wasn't born yesterday. And when he wrote his report and he had these summaries, we knew -- we knew that they were probably ready to go and had been scrubbed in advance. And that was, in fact, the case.

And what Mueller is saying in this letter is, you're not only undermining us, but you're undermining the special counsel. And that's a larger problem. BLITZER: Right.

Jeffrey Toobin, I'm anxious to get your thoughts.

JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN CHIEF LEGAL ANALYST: Well, you know, if I can translate some legalese in the letter that Laura just read, that is a scathing, outraged letter.

BORGER: Right.

TOOBIN: Accusing the attorney general of completely distorting and lying to the public about what Mueller spent two years on. I mean, that is not a polite letter among old friends. That is an accusation of political interference in Mueller's work. That is not a routine letter in any sense of the word. And I just think, you know, we'll have the opportunity to read it and -- but -- but let's be clear about what Mueller is saying is that the fix was in and he is saying that Barr deliberately distorted his -- his conclusions for the political gain of the president. That's what that letter says in plain English.

BLITZER: And it's very significant, you know, Susan Hennessey, because the four-page summary by Barr was released on March 24th. In this letter, we now have confirmed, he says this, Mueller, we communicated that concern to the department on the morning of March 25th. So even before he drafted this letter a few days later, he already called them and said, you know what, we've got a problem and it's a significant one.

SUSAN HENNESSEY, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Right. So I do think that this letter shows Barr's conduct in the intervening period between the initial summary to the actual release of the report is fundamentally indefensible. There's going to need to be a serious conversation about whether or not he has the credibility to lead the department moving forward.

Gloria mentioned that Barr has said he didn't want to release things piecemeal. But he did release things piecemeal.

BORGER: Of course. Yes.

HENNESSEY: He just did it. And instead of releasing a version that had been cleared that was the special counsel speaking in his own voice, he offered sort of his own quite distorted take.

And it's important to keep in mind the reason we have special counsel investigations at all. And that's to have public confidence and integrity in these kinds of findings, to understand that they are free from political interference. What Bill Barr has done, what Robert Mueller is fairly clearly accusing him of having done, is essentially undermining the central purpose of having a special counsel. One of the most -- this is the most critical example, an investigation of the president into the circumstances of his election, potential crimes committed while in office. That really is just indefensible.

BLITZER: You know, Laura, Barr has got some explaining to do right now. LAURA COATES, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Oh, like I got -- "I Love Lucy" he

does. Yes. He's got explaining to do. I may actually start calling him Attorney General Lucy after this because I have to say he's fast and loose with the truth and now he has a lot of explaining he has to do, precisely because, number one, this reminds me of a contemporaneous memo that was drafted by James Comey and everyone who's had interactions with Donald Trump throughout the early parts of the administration trying to codify what conversation they have. They do so because there's a fundamental lack of trust.

Here we have a formal congenial relationship or collegiate relationship with two friends. Now I've got to write down the conversations we have to remind you that I essentially am not this inept person.

Number two, you really have this -- this overwhelming idea here that I feel as though the attorney general, according to Mueller, must misconstrue that phrase of, you serve at the pleasure of the president. It seems as though Mueller was trying to be very clear that you do not serve the president, nor do you serve to please the president. This report, the facts stated as they were, they should have been released, and I have repeatedly asked you to do so.

[10:00:04] And more than three weeks later went by before you had Barr give a -- give a.

END