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Rudy Giuliani Cancels Trip To Ukraine, Blaming Democratic Spin; CNN Reality Check: Impeachment As The Founders Intended It; Washington Post: Trump Takes Over July 4th Celebration. Aired 7:30-8a ET

Aired May 13, 2019 - 07:30   ET

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

[07:30:00] MICHAEL SMERCONISH, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR, HOST, "SMERCONISH": It's above my pay grade.

But standing back and looking from the sidelines, it seemed like we had this situation quelled for at least a decade, giving Iran the opportunity to reenter the world community. I think that's what Sec. Kerry and President Obama had in mind when negotiating that agreement.

But the president made it clear from the get-go that he was going to tear it up. He did, and this is what has resulted.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: You know, and it's not just Iran now where the United States has taken another step out on the limb -- more or less, unilaterally here.

But it's North Korea also, where the North Koreans are testing missiles over the last two weeks.

And it's also China, where you have these trade negotiations that broke down on Friday. The president, this morning, is very critical of China. We don't know how China will respond.

And, Michael, you have a take here on where this might be headed.

SMERCONISH: Yes. I mean, it's surprising on one hand that there has not yet been a Chinese response to the tariff escalation because the president said he was going to do this and then come Friday, he did do it. So they were not caught off guard.

You can only imagine that the Chinese perspective is one of trying to decide what can we do to cause some vulnerability, politically speaking, of President Trump? In other words, they're now coming up against the 'I can shoot somebody on Fifth Avenue and get away with it' conundrum.

Because as you've been pointing out all morning long with your coverage, it's American farmers who are on the front line of this battle, thus far. Yet, I've not seen any sign, thus far, that they're abandoning the president. They were a very critical support group for him.

So put yourself in the place of the Chinese. What can you do to throw President Trump off balance? If there's a way that the stock market -- and we'll find out in short

order -- if the market does tank today the way the futures suggest, well, that is his Achilles heel. But you can understand they're flummoxed.

BERMAN: Down 321 points right now -- the Dow futures are in free market trading.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Yes.

SMERCONISH: Right.

CAMEROTA: All right. So, Michael, help us understand what this whole Giuliani going to Ukraine thing was.

So last week, Rudy Giuliani, the president's friend and attorney, unabashedly basically said that he was going to go Ukraine to get their help before the 2020 election because of some investigation that he wanted them to help with into Joe Biden. This came out of left field for many people and also just sounded like a bad echo of what had happened with getting the Russian's help in 2016.

You know, there are laws against taking a thing of value from a foreign country during an election, but Rudy Giuliani was headed off. And then, he changed his mind, I guess, over the weekend.

Here is Rudy Giuliani trying to explain what he was doing or not doing.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RUDY GIULIANI, ATTORNEY FOR PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: And the reality is this has nothing to do with the election of 2020. The election of 2020 is a long time from now. And if I wanted to meddle in that election, which I don't, I could have held this for a year and dropped it right before the convention.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: How do you see what he was doing last week?

SMERCONISH: I don't think he was ever going to the Ukraine so as to ask the Ukrainians to investigate Joe and Hunter Biden. He may have been going to the Ukraine for a paid speech, as I know is a part of his business. That's fine.

I think he threw this out there and achieved his objective, which was to get all of us talking about an issue that was not on anybody's radar screen and to sort of resuscitate that issue that Peter Schweizer had written about in one of his books about Joe Biden allegedly doing a favor that benefitted his son.

So we're having the conversation. We've had the conversation Friday and all through the weekend --

BERMAN: Yes. SMERCONISH: -- and he probably decided -- Rudy -- that he could just stop the charade of saying he was going for that reason.

Really, did he want the Ukrainian investigation to yield something? I doubt it. He wanted this to be a liability for Joe Biden.

BERMAN: I think you're onto something there, Michael, for sure. But one thing I want to make clear to people so that they understand is that Giuliani just didn't invent this last week. He's been pitching this hard to anyone who will listen to him for some time.

This is a cause for him and so, I don't expect him to back off. He may not make the pitch to Ukrainian lawmakers because I'm with you -- it's unclear to me exactly what he expected to get out of that. But this is something that he is pitching hard right now.

And by suggesting -- even suggesting that he wanted the new Ukrainian leader to start this investigation right now, it does seem a little bit like meddling, yes?

SMERCONISH: Yes, it does. And again, ask yourself -- if Joe Biden had opted not to run, would we be having this conversation? Would Mayor Giuliani have been proposing going to the Ukraine to ask for an investigation?

It's all, I think, evidence of the concern by the Trump White House about the Biden strength that he's exhibited out of the gate.

BERMAN: Were you OK after the Sixers lost last night. That game seven was just heartbreaking.

SMERCONISH: No, I'm not. Thank you -- thank you for asking. And, John, here's the worst part about it.

[07:35:00] BERMAN: It was concern -- a genuine concern.

SMERCONISH: I was running from one T.V. to another in my house for reasons I will not bore you. I missed the shot because the clicker wouldn't operate. And by the time I got there, it was all over.

CAMEROTA: Well, we will replay it for you at some point if you continue to watch --

SMERCONISH: Oh, thanks.

CAMEROTA: -- because it was really -- it was really a good shot.

SMERCONISH: Brutal.

CAMEROTA: I know it didn't work out the way you wanted it to.

BERMAN: We're with you, Michael. We care.

Thank you very much. Thanks for being with us.

CAMEROTA: Thanks, Michael. SMERCONISH: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: Be sure to watch "SMERCONISH" on Saturday at 9:00 a.m. Eastern on CNN. And you can hear him weekdays on Sirius XM, also at 9:00 a.m. Eastern.

BERMAN: Michael's a big Sixers fan. He's from Philadelphia.

CAMEROTA: Yes, I was gathering that.

BERMAN: He won't get to watch them now until the beginning of next season because they're out, in case no one knew.

All right, impeachment talked about a lot, understood a very little. We take a look at the origin of this most serious of parliamentary power plays. It is still what the founders intended it to be? A CNN reality check is next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:40:08] CAMEROTA: We hear a lot about impeachment these days and why it should or should not be used, but what did the founders really intend when they wrote it into the Constitution? You might be surprised as we so often are by John Avlon and his reality check. Hi, John.

JOHN AVLON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Oh, Ali, this is going to get really nerdtastic. You ready?

OK, so impeachment is a heavy word that's getting thrown around lightly.

It's, of course, the mechanism our founders set up to remove a president from office for treason, bribery or other high crimes and misdemeanors. Now, treason and bribery are clear enough, but other high crimes and misdemeanors is intentionally and, to some, infuriatingly broad. It's designed to ensure that things like corruption, abuse of power, and selling out to foreign governments were covered.

Alexander Hamilton described these offenses as being political, writing the word in all caps in the Federalist papers "as they relate chiefly to injuries done immediately to the society itself."

Or as Gerald Ford blithely put it in 1970, "An impeachable offense is whatever a majority of the House of Representatives considers it to be at a given moment in history." But that speaks more to the way impeachment has been misused as a partisan weapon rather than the clear but high bar the founders intended.

So, put on your history nerd goggles because we're going to go on a deep dive into notes from the constitutional convention to get a sense of the founding father's real vision of impeachment.

Now, James Madison argued in 1787 that a broad standard for impeachment was "...indispensable to defend the community against the incapacity, negligence or perfidy" of the president. Incapacity got addressed in the 25th Amendment in 1967.

But take a look at Madison's examples of negligence of perfidy. Quote, "He might pervert his administration into a scheme of peculation or oppression." Well, translated, that's about corruption, self-enrichment, and the abuse of power.

And then there's the danger the president, quote, "...might betray his trust to foreign powers." This was a particular obsession of the founding fathers.

They studied examples that bring down ancient Greek republics and report that British King Charles II had been bribed by French King Louis XIV with money and a mistress to back a war with the Dutch. That's why Gouverneur Morris argued that "No one would say we ought to expose ourselves to the danger of seeing the first magistrate in foreign pay without being to guard against it by displacing him."

Founders like the first Attorney General Edmund Randolph believed this was already covered by the emoluments clause of the Constitution and wasn't an impeachable offense. Incidentally, there are two emoluments lawsuits working their way through the courts regarding President Trump and his business interests.

Other impeachment scenarios include concerns the president might gain his office through corrupt means, like bribing members of the Electoral College. Madison also addressed concerns that a president might abuse his pardoning power to stop investigations into his own administration, stating that was an impeachable offense.

Now, none of this is to suggest the founders intended impeachment to be used promiscuously or for partisan purposes. It was, instead, seem as an 'in case of emergency, break glass' form of checks and balances.

A fatal flaw in its applicability today lays in the fact the founders did not anticipate the hyperpartisan polarization in divided government. They apparently assumed we'd be able to reason together when it came to gross violations of presidential ethics that undermine the oath of office. But that failsafe is not evidently in place.

But the principle still stands. As George Mason said during the constitutional convention, "Shall any man be above justice? Above all, shall that man be above it who can commit the most extensive injustice?"

And that's your reality check.

BERMAN: I think it's such an important discussion, John, and I think it's fascinating, right? I think that the founding fathers set a high bar, but not an impossible bar because it's essential to the democracy.

It's what differentiates us with Britain or the countries of the time. It's what made America different -- the ability to remove leaders in a democratic way.

AVLON: One might say it's what made America great. That's exactly right, and the fact that it's not available in the way they anticipated it, I think says a lot about who we are as a nation right now.

CAMEROTA: Because they thought we would be reasonable with each other.

AVLON: Yes.

CAMEROTA: What rookies those founders --

AVLON: Crazy.

CAMEROTA: I know. John, that was --

AVLON: I'm crying beneath the laughing.

CAMEROTA: That was really wonky. Your brain, like, lit up.

BERMAN: I think because if you read the quotes from the founding fathers, I think it really illuminates the discussion in a much different way.

CAMEROTA: John Avlon, thank you very much.

"SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE" delivering lots of jabs this weekend. Here are your "Late-Night Laughs."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KYLE MOONEY, CAST MEMBER, NBC "SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE" (portraying Chuck Todd): I'll give you guys some hypothetical scenarios and you tell me if any of them would be enough for the president to lose your support.

CECILY STRONG, CAST MEMBER, NBC "SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE" (portraying Sen. Susan Collins): Well, you just bring it on, Chuck, because if you think Susan Collins is a pushover -- well, then, you (mumbling).

MOONEY: Robert Mueller testifies before Congress and says he believes Trump committed obstruction of justice. Do you still support him?

BECK BENNETT, CAST MEMBER, NBC "SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE" (portraying Sen. Mitch McConnell): Well, we need a leader that's willing to do what he's got to do to win.

[07:45:00] KATE MCKINNON, CAST MEMBER, NBC "SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE" (portraying Sen. Lindsey Graham): That's absolutely right. See, the best way to uphold the law is to be above it, Chuck.

COLIN JOST, CAST MEMBER, NBC "SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE": And, President Trump held a rally in the Florida Panhandle this week and it was exactly what you're imagining.

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: -- who's coming to the United States. So these countries put people in a basket, like little -- who is it? Who is it?

So always keep your eyes open, be careful, and let law enforcement know when you see a kook.

JOST (on telephone): Hello, kook squad?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: They were not manipulating that video. Those were real words that were uttered.

BERMAN: No, that rally ended up on the late-night shows all week.

CAMEROTA: All right, you're welcome.

This year's Fourth of July celebration in the nation's capital will reportedly break with tradition and be Trumpified. The changes the president wants to make to the Fourth of July, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:50:14] BERMAN: It is time for "CNN Business Now." A big morning, and not a good one, necessarily. Dow futures down triple- digits as President Trump is warning China not to retaliate to the U.S. tariffs.

Our chief business correspondent Christine Romans here with more -- Romans.

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT, ANCHOR, "EARLY START": And the president is tweeting this morning about the big story, right -- the sell-off around the world.

Let me show you where we are here. The only reason Hong Kong is up there is because it was closed for a holiday. Everything down here.

And when you look at what the U.S. indication, it's looking at a 300 and some decline here for -- point decline for the Dow, and for the S&P, almost more than 1 1/2 percent. And when you're talking 1 1/2, two, 2 1/2 percent, then it starts to be really kind of troubling and shows you that there is some fear in the market. Futures here, again, down pretty sharply here.

So what happened? Well, you've got all of these items that are now going to have tariffs. It's going to cost more.

We know -- the president's chief economic adviser, Larry Kudlow, admitted this weekend -- oh, yeah, American consumers -- American importers do pay for this, not necessarily the government of China writing a check to the U.S. Treasury.

So these are all of the items here and there are more items that could be coming. We're told that they're preparing a list of other things that could be -- that could get some big tariffs here -- iPhones, Nikes, all kinds of tennis shoes, toys, sporting goods, and clothes.

These are things that have been left off the tariffs for a lot of different reasons -- left off of the tariffs because these are the things consumers would feel right away. You would notice if you go to Target and suddenly, your bill is 25 percent higher. So they're trying to keep that away from consumers from noticing it.

OK, let's talk about what the president is talking about this morning. He's speaking directly to President Xi, saying that China will do very badly if they don't make a deal. And then he blames them for backing out of a deal. They had a good deal and they backed out.

He's also making this claim which a lot of folks are saying is just not true here. He says, "The good first-quarter GDP of 3.2 percent was helped by tariffs from China. Some people just don't get it."

Well, you saw a big inventory build. Why -- at the end of last year and the beginning of this year -- because companies are trying to get ahead of tariffs.

You also saw a little bit of soybean purchases there, which helped this end of the trade balance. Those soybeans purchases because China was stepping in and buying soybeans again as an act of good faith in this negotiating, guys.

So, the president is cherry-picking stuff out of economic data to say that his tariffs are going to be helpful to Americans and the American economy, when almost all analysts say otherwise, guys.

CAMEROTA: All right, Christine. Thank you very much for explaining all of that to us. Bring us updates as needed.

Meanwhile, is the Fourth of July celebration in Washington about to become Trumpified? "The Washington Post" reports that President Trump is taking charge of Independence Day. He hopes to address the nation from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.

And joining us now is one of the journalists who broke that story, Josh Dawsey. He's a White House reporter at "The Washington Post" and a CNN political analyst. OK, Josh, great to have you here.

This article got our attention. You say that President Trump wants to Trumpify the Fourth of July. What will that look like?

JOSH DAWSEY, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST, WHITE HOUSE REPORTER, THE WASHINGTON POST: Well, the president's been delving into the minutia with his team for the last few months.

He wants to have a speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. He has moved the fireworks show from a usual location to a different place. They're trying to get different entertainment for the venue. And it's going to be, in his mind, a July Fourth celebration that he's always wanted to throw.

As you also saw, he's having fireworks being shot over Mount Rushmore now. That's never been done before.

So the president is taking a keen interest in July Fourth and putting together this ceremony more in his likeness than in previous years.

CAMEROTA: You say the development has surprised and worried some city and federal officials. Why? DAWSEY: Well, city officials are bit concerned about the president and his motorcade coming to the Lincoln Memorial -- to the location of the fireworks. You know, that's a time when hundreds of thousands of people are moving about Washington trying to get to the fireworks, trying to get to the National Mall.

And a presidential motorcade takes some pretty onerous steps to get the president there safely and there's some concern about logistical challenges of moving the president on the same time as hundreds of thousands of people are out and about.

CAMEROTA: The president very much wants to give this speech, it sounds like, from the Lincoln Memorial. And you write, "The president's starring role has the potential to turn what has long been a nonpartisan celebration of the nation's founding into another version of a Trump campaign rally."

And I'm just wondering, Josh -- I mean, what kind of speech would he give? Would he give a presidential speech or would he give one of these sort of 'foaming at the mouth' speech that we sometimes see at the rallies where they clamor -- you know, we hear -- we heard it just last week where people in the crowd clamor for violence.

[07:55:00] DAWSEY: Well, I think his advisers, themselves, don't know what he's going to say before he gets up there. The speech would supposedly be about America, and patriotism, and the economy, and his administration's accomplishments. And, you know, kind of a rah-rah speech.

But the president often goes off teleprompter, as we've seen time and time again. So what he would actually say from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial with these symbol throngs out there is really hard to know.

CAMEROTA: How much will these changes cost?

DAWSEY: Well, the celebration costs hundreds of thousands of dollars, at the least. And what the president has done is obviously adding some different entertainment. You know, adding the logistics of putting together his visit, security.

So it's hard to know exactly what the price tag will be. But everyone that we talked to in reporting this out said it would be more expensive for the things that he wants done.

CAMEROTA: You write that the genesis of this idea was his visit to France. And you say, "The president's idea for the Trump-influenced Fourth of July began within hours of attending a lavish Bastille Day parade in Paris in 2017, former aides say."

And we have some video where we all remember how impressed he was with this sort of show of grandeur, basically.

DAWSEY: Right.

CAMEROTA: And so what was it about this that so got his attention? DAWSEY: The president was totally dazzled by it, as you said. He loved the tanks, he loved the aircraft flying over. When he got back on Air Force One, a couple of his former aides said to me before the plane even took off he had started mapping out what he wanted a celebration to look like in the United States and it was similar to that.

And if you remember, there was a -- there was a military parade that he was thinking of having that was eventually scuttled after the city of D.C. said it would be nearly impossible. That the price tag would be upwards of almost $100 million, and the president had to scuttle that.

But this has been a long-founded dream of his to put together kind of a celebration of patriotism that he runs.

I mean, when he was in Paris for that celebration, one of the things he said on the way back is, "Why don't we do this in America? Why don't we have something like this?" And now, he's getting his version of it.

CAMEROTA: And it's so interesting Josh to hear how engaged and interested he can be when it's a topic --

DAWSEY: Right.

CAMEROTA: -- that he likes or that he's interested in.

DAWSEY: Right.

CAMEROTA: So you said that he's sort of aggressively involved --

DAWSEY: Right.

CAMEROTA: -- in the planning of this as opposed to obviously, some of the policies --

DAWSEY: Right.

CAMEROTA: -- that we've seen in the past where -- for instance, family separation where they could connect children who had been taken --

DAWSEY: Right.

CAMEROTA: -- from their parents. They lost the connection and kids couldn't be sent back to the right addresses.

But this type of thing, you say the minutia is actually very interesting to him.

DAWSEY: Well, the president's kind of a showman and he's a -- he's a builder, as you know. So he often gets involved in things that are going to be public projections or in the design of projects.

I mean, in reporting this out we learned that in the course of renovations of the FBI building, he even wanted carpet samples and specs brought to him.

In this fireworks display, he's been asking in unrelated meetings about different parts of the celebration that he really has gotten involved in the details here. And what he decides to get involved in and what he doesn't is, obviously, particularly interesting. But this is something that he sees as a show of grandeur, a show of force, a show of patriotism, and he wants himself at the center of it all.

CAMEROTA: Josh Dawsey, thanks so much for explaining all of your reporting with us --

DAWSEY: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: -- here on NEW DAY.

All right, we're following a lot of news. Let's get right to it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D-CA): They want to draw this out as long as possible. We're going to fight it.

REP. MICHAEL WALTZ (D-FL): Democrats have a real choice. Do they want to look back at accomplishments or continue to tear the president down?

CAMEROTA: The man who was watching missing 4-year-old Maleah Davis will be charged with murder.

SGT. MARK HOLBROOK, HOUSTON POLICE DEPARTMENT: There's a lot of blanks in his story. We're hoping the public can fill in the blanks.

BRITTANY BOWERS, MOTHER OF MISSING 4-YEAR-OLD MALEAH DAVIS: I just want to find Maleah.

BERMAN: A Utah mother suing the bus driver who closed the door on her 14-year-old son and dragged him down the road.

BRENDA MAYES, MOTHER OF 14-YEAR-OLD DRAGGED BY BUS: Something failed. They have a responsibility to make sure they're safe.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Would you say that you're a racist?

JOHN NAISBITT, FORMER BUS DRIVER, DAVIS SCHOOL DISTRICT, DAVIS COUNTY, UTAH: Not at all. Look at my dog. He's as black as can be (laughs).

(END VIDEO CLIP)

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

CAMEROTA: Good morning, everyone. Welcome to your NEW DAY. It is Monday, May 13th, 8:00 in the East.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was supposed to be in Moscow today but, instead, he is in Brussels meeting with European allies about this growing tension with Iran. This is the second abrupt schedule change in a week for America's top diplomat.

And this comes as CNN learns the U.S. has deployed more Patriot missiles to the Middle East. U.S. intelligence reports suggest Iran and its proxies might be planning to threaten American forces and interests in the region.

Pompeo still plans to travel to Sochi tomorrow to meet with Vladimir Putin.

BERMAN: Meantime, President Trump is warning China's leader not to retaliate against the tariff hike. The president is, once again, falsely claiming that China will pay for tariffs after his top economic adviser conceded that Americans will end up paying for it.

All this as the White House stonewalling reaches new levels. The president and his allies doing all they can to block more than 20 separate congressional investigations of the administration.

Joining me now to talk about that is.

END