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Reporting Indicates President Trump Saying He Expects to be Reinstated as President by August, 2021; Republican Texas State Senator Bryan Hughes Interviewed on Controversial Texas Voting Bill; Ex-Defense Chief Responds to Flynn's Apparent Coup Suggestion. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired June 02, 2021 - 08:00   ET

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

[08:00:00]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Much of that movement is fueled by misinformation and lies, including conspiracy theories from the likes of QAnon about voter fraud. And it's all driven by the big lie pushed by the confirmed leader of the Republican Party, the former president and his supporters. They claim he won the 2020 election. He didn't. Joe Biden did, and it was a convincing Electoral College victory with an overwhelming edge in the popular vote. And overnight new reporting from Maggie Haberman that Trump is telling people that he is expecting to be reinstated as president by August. Seriously. That is madness, and it's dangerous. And you have to work really hard to hear any Republican leaders this morning refuting it.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: And when we see the effects of that disinformation, Republican lawmakers seem to ignore the consequences. Take the response to the January 6th attack on the Capitol. House Democrats are now figuring out their options to investigate the most serious domestic attack on America's government since the Civil War after Senate Republicans blocked the creation of an independent bipartisan commission to examine the origins of that day's violence.

And that block is just another result of the political gridlock that is holding up legislation in Congress on issues like badly needed infrastructure. Republican Senator Shelley Moore Capito heading to the White House again today to try to find a bipartisan path forward, but with a 50-50 balance in the Senate and 60 votes needed to get anything to the floor, compromise really looks hard to find here.

That same gridlock threatens President Biden's push for a voting rights bill to counter Republican efforts in states like Texas where, among other things, drive-through voting and 24-hour voting would be banned. Absentee voting would be limited. And partisan poll watchers would be granted new power.

Joining us now is Republican Texas State Senator Bryan Hughes. He's one of the lead authors of the controversial Texas Senate Bill 7. It's up in the air right now, sir, but I know that you guys are going to press forward with it here in a special session, and we're still waiting to see exactly when that would happen. Thanks for being with us this morning. I want to have you clarify something off the top here, though, about the Sunday voting measure that's in the bill. The bill says 1:00 to 9:00 p.m. Is that right?

STATE SEN. BRYAN HUGHES (R-TX), LEAD SPONSOR OF CONTROVERSIAL VOTING BILL: So the way the final language came out at the end, it says 1:00 to 9:00. It also says hours are expanded to at least six hours. So the attempts to increase Sunday voting. We're going to clear that up and make sure there's no question in the special session.

KEILAR: And I ask because one of the, I think your co-authors, said it's actually supposed to be 11:00 to 9:00. Is that right, 11:00 a.m. to 9:00? Because you have Democrats who say that a lot of times they have Souls to the Polls, very popular with African-American voters. They go church, they go to the polls. Obviously this matters, 11:00 a.m. or 1:00 p.m. Will it be 11:00 a.m.?

HUGHES: Souls to the Polls is popular in east Texas as well. We want to make sure people have the right to do that. If there's any limit at all, it's going to be plenty open to allow Souls to the Polls.

KEILAR: Is that right, though, 11:00 a.m.? Can you back up what the state rep said? I just want to confirm this.

HUGHES: It's 11:00 a.m., if there's any limit at all. We want to make sure people are not limited on what they can do for Souls to the Polls.

KEILAR: OK, so was that an error?

HUGHES: That was added over in the House, and I'll defer to my House colleagues on the details. I will say the bill said --

KEILAR: OK, it came out of conference committee so you actually had the Senate and the House together. So this was the final bill. I know it was put together rather quickly.

HUGHES: That is right. That was added by the House. The House added that provision at the end. They say it was a typo. I'll take their words for it. The intent is to extend Sunday hours, not to make them smaller.

KEILAR: But if it was a typo, why did you defend it? Why did you defend it when you were promoting this bill? You said, quote, "Those election workers want to go to church, too."

HUGHES: Souls to the Polls --

KEILAR: And so that's why it says 1:00 p.m., no later than 9:00 p.m. You can make Sunday service and go after that. And then you admitted actually that you hadn't talked to election workers about this.

HUGHES: As a matter of fact, Souls to the Polls, and in Harris County, are largest county, is normally done starting at 1:00. They've done it from 1:00 on for a long time. This is nothing new. Souls to the Polls where I live, folks go to church, they eat, they then go vote. Senator West reminded us that sometimes folks vote early and then vote Denny. So we're going to clean it up to make sure there's no question about it. KEILAR: OK, voter fraud. They say everything is bigger in Texas, but

actually voter fraud is not. Voter fraud is minuscule in Texas. So why are you OK with suppressing voting by people of color with this bill to combat what's really a nonproblem?

HUGHES: People ask me how about the amount of voter fraud. My question is, how much is OK? In my district I have got a county commissioner, elected official, under criminal indictment for mail ballot fraud. Happens to be a Democrat, and the charges were brought by Democrats. They happen to be African Americans. So African Americans came us to with complaints about cheating. We are responding to that. I know there's a big national debate going on and you want to drag us into that, but this is about Texas elections, problems we've had here, and an attempt to fix them.

[08:05:04]

KEILAR: I'm not dragging you into any debate. You are at the tip of the spear on this. But what I will say, look, you say how much voter fraud is enough? But the truth is, in the way that this bill is written, you are going to have people of color, especially, who are going to not be voting. You're going to see a decrease. And I just ask why is that when you only have 43 pending voter fraud charges in Texas, only one is from 2020. You've previously misquoted that as I think about 400. It's really 43. Only one is from 2020. And there were 16 minor prosecutions for 2020, it was just people putting down addresses that weren't theirs.

HUGHES: There are hundreds of open cases in Texas. As you know the courts have --

KEILAR: No, there's not. There's not. There's not.

HUGHES: The investigation is pending. Oh, there are.

KEILAR: There's 43. There's not hundreds. You may be talking about complaints, which anyone can file. There are not hundreds of open cases. There are 43 pending voter fraud charges in Texas. This is according to your Republican attorney general's office. There are not hundreds, sir.

HUGHES: I'm speaking about the investigations. Courts are pretty slow now because of COVID-19. When someone makes a complaint, we have to investigate it. We take those seriously, no matter what they are about. As far as this goes, this is in response to things we've learned in Texas, in my district, in the valley, in suburban Texas. The provisions of this bill apply across the board to everyone.

As far as turnout goes, about 10 years ago when we were doing voter I.D. we were told you're going to suppress the vote, it's going to depress turnout. What happened? We did voter I.D. and turnout went up, because people know when the election is fair and their votes are counted they're encouraged to vote and to participate. And that's what this is about. When Texans come forth and tell us this is how people are cheating, here are the problems we're having, we want to fix it. That's what this is about. It's an ongoing process in Texas. KEILAR: You bring up your county, Gregg County, I believe, right?

HUGHES: That's the county I represent where the investigations are taking places. That's one of them.

KEILAR: Look, I just want to be clear on where that investigation is. Yes, Shannon Brown, who is the lone black member of -- who is the lone black commissioner on the court is one of four black defendants in this case. This has not been determined, the outcome of this. You also have a county -- your county is one that voted to keep its Confederate monument there. So we have to wait and see where all of this goes. We certainly do.

But if you are going to bring that up as a real concern for something that could happen, you didn't need this bill to find potential wrongdoing there. That is actually proof that the bills, the laws that are on the books -- and this is not just in Texas but really nationally, will catch issues of ballot harvesting that are done as more of a concerted campaign, let's say, instead of a lone actor like that guy in Colorado who submitted his wife's -- dead wife's ballot for Donald Trump who he is actually under suspicion of murdering. Those lone actors really are not a problem.

You bring up 400 -- what I think you said hundreds of -- I disagree with you. I think that's incorrect. But in the scheme of things, we're talking about -- for instance, people should know, more than 11 million people voted in Texas and you're talking about a teeny tiny fraction of that that would not at all affect the outcome of the vote.

HUGHES: I'm glad you brought up the case in Gregg County. You mentioned Commissioner Brown is black. The complainant is also black. The folks who said their votes were stolen are also black. Should we ignore their voices because it's the wrong --

KEILAR: No, and I didn't say we should. I didn't say we should.

HUGHES: Someone says they have a problem, we want to address them.

KEILAR: I didn't say we should. I was saying that this law that you are putting up, obviously -- how would that solve a problem that you say is already being solved? But let me ask you this --

HUGHES: They told us that people were lied to about the definition of disability.

KEILAR: Sure, on disability, which is not in your bill.

HUGHES: So we're clarifying the definition so voters won't be lied to.

KEILAR: No, you're not. You tried to change the disability part in this bill, and you know that. It's not in this bill. You tried to create Department of Veterans Affairs proof and whatnot and it actually got pulled from the bill. So you know that's not actually in your bill. I want to listen to what -- HUGHES: What is in the bill is the definition of disability. So when

voters sign the box they know what it means. It's already against the law to falsely claim a disability. We want voters to know so vote harvesters can't mislead them and make them check a box not knowing what it means. That's all this is about on disability.

KEILAR: I want to listen to the Republican secretary of state in your state and the director of election in her office about how secure the election was in your state.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Despite the challenges presented by COVID-19, this election was a resounding success.

[08:10:02]

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In spite of all the circumstances, Texas had an election that was smooth and secure.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: So why are you pushing a bill that disproportionately targets voters of color?

HUGHES: Nothing in this bill targets any voters. They apply across the board to every voter no matter where they live, no matter how they vote. As far as the elections go, every two years our legislature gathers to address problems. In 2019, I filed Senate Bill 9, many of these same ideas. In 2017, we passed a mail ballot security bill. This is an ongoing process. And when we hear problems we're going to address them. That's our job.

KEILAR: In 2019 you didn't. The 2017 one passed and that actually relaxed, as you were aware, it actually relaxed voter I.D. laws because they were so incredibly stringent you were facing a bunch of court cases. That's nothing at all --

HUGHES: In 2017 -- in 2017 --

KEILAR: That's not at all like this Senate bill. So I just don't want that to distract from the conversation.

HUGHES: Let's be clear. In 2017, a law was passed making it a state jail felony to lie about your disability for a mail ballot. That's what I'm talking about. You should check it out. In 2017, that was passed. In 2019 I filed similar legislation --

KEILAR: You're talking about Senate Bill 5?

HUGHES: -- based on complaints in my district. State jail felony for lying on your application for a mail ballot. That was passed and signed by the governor.

KEILAR: I want to address the crux of what you said was, you said that this -- that the rules apply across the board. And I want to ask you about that, because what your bill does effectively, though, is it stops drive-through voting in Harris County which is the most populous and the most diverse county. It limits the hours. There's no more 24/7 voting. The drive-through voting in particular, that was something that a lot of people of color flocked to. And it helped bring out their votes. And now this bill will shut that down.

So I hear you say it applies across the board, but let me give you an example like this. That's like saying if, let's say there's a gun rights bill that Democrats put up and said, you know what, we're not going to limit -- we don't want to limit pistols, we're just going to limit rifles, and it applies across the board. But let's say that African Americans prefer pistols. African American gun owners prefer pistols and white gun owners prefer rifles, then it doesn't apply across the board. You would argue that it's targeting white gun owners. And this is very much the same thing.

HUGHES: Turnout was up in Texas in all sectors across the board, not just in Harris County. As far as these provisions go, the Harris County elections administrator said this. They said we're going to stop drive-through voting before Election Day because we're concerned they won't count. I think African American voters and all voters want it to count.

KEILAR: They did that because Republicans were challenging it in court in Harris County and actually --

HUGHES: Under the law.

KEILAR: But a district court denied them, and that was reinforced, as you know, by the court of appeals. And what they did just to make sure they counted, because you had Republicans saying 127,000 votes should be thrown out, they wanted to make sure there were no further issues. Of course, because they want to guarantee that people can vote.

I do want to ask you before I let you go --

HUGHES: Those votes need to count.

KEILAR: Donald Trump is telling allies he expects to be reinstated as president in August. That is obviously -- I would say it's absurd. I wonder what you say about that.

HUGHES: That's the first I've heard. We have elections for president every four years. We're going to fight hard and win in 2024. That's how it works.

KEILAR: What does it do for him say that?

HUGHES: I didn't know he said that. I'll take your word for it. I don't know what that's about.

KEILAR: OK. He did say it, so for him to say --

HUGHES: I believe you.

KEILAR: OK, so you don't have any opinion on whether that's problematic?

HUGHES: There's an election in 2024. That's when we're going to choose the next president.

KEILAR: All right. Senator Bryan Hughes, thank you so much for joining us. I know it's early in Austin. Appreciate it.

HUGHES: Thanks for having me.

KEILAR: Have a great day.

BERMAN: Brianna Keilar, you read the law. And it's so striking to me that the explanation for the Souls to the Polls, where you started the whole interview, was, oh, well, maybe we shouldn't have made it 1:00. That's a big part of the bill that they wanted to get through.

KEILAR: Yes. Part of the issue was this actually happened very quickly. They had to abbreviate the debate for what they would normally do. They added, I think, 12 pages of changes after the conference committee and you got the sense that some people didn't really even realize what was in the bill that they were pushing. Of course, they realized what some of it is, but there was a lot of new stuff added, which is also kind of weird. Normally you'd have the House and the Senate get together and they'd hash out what they'd already discussed. This is what you might argue in a court of law had not been brought up, or was not germane prior to that. This was.

BERMAN: The idea they didn't realize something like that makes you think, makes you really think about all the things that were in it.

[08:15:05]

That was a terrific interview. And I have to say, your knowledge of not just Texas law but Texas court cases, pretty impressive.

KEILAR: I married a Texan, so --

(LAUGHTER)

BERMAN: There you -- that's like going to law school. I mean, who needs law school when you do that?

So, we heard a lot of fantasies over the weekend with a pro-Trump lawyer suggesting that Joe Biden should just pack his stuff. A former national security adviser seeming to endorse the idea of a military coup and the former president, we are now told, telling people he'd be reinstated as president by August.

John Avlon with a "Reality Check".

JOHN AVLON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: The godfather of the conservative movement, William F. Buckley Jr. used to say that conservativism was the politics of reality. That was then. This is now.

Because ex-President Trump is telling associates he thinks he'll be reinstated as president in August. Might as well be saying they'll turn into a pumpkin at midnight or win the decathlon in the upcoming Olympics.

It's delusional, totally untethered to reality. And Trump seems to be huffing the fumes of whatever Sidney Powell was smoking at this weekend's QAnon convention when she said this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SIDNEY POWELL, ATTORNEY: Simply be reinstated. That a new inauguration date is set and Biden is told to move out of the White House and president Trump should be moved back in.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

AVLON: Now, remember, this is the same person whose legal defense in a $1.3 billion defamation suit is that no reasonable person would ever believe her claims. So, it's hard to say who she's demeaning more, herself or her audience?

But then this was a conspiracy theorist convention with several of the ex-president's advisers including Michael Flynn attending who seemed to call for a military coup.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

AUDIENCE MEMBER: I want to know why what happened in Myanmar can't happen here?

MIKE FLYNN, FORMER NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: No reason. I mean, it should happen here. No reason but -- that's right.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

AVLON: Now, Flynn tried to deny that he said what he said, which would be challenging enough even if he hadn't been so co-curious in the past.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FLYNN: If he wanted to, he could take military capabilities and he could place them in those states and basically rerun an election in each of those states.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

AVLON: Add to those pathological fantasies, the steady stream of conspiracy theories from Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, including doubling down on comparing mask mandates to the Holocaust, while multiple neo-Nazis were arrested at the pro-Trump Capitol attack. Or the insurrection denialism from congressmen like Paul Gosar, Mo Brooks, Andy Biggs, and Andrew Clyde, or Matt Gaetz, calling for the Second Amendment to be used against Silicon Valley companies.

And you see a sickness in their politics that cannot be wisely denied. All these beliefs echo unhinged comments from the ex-president, lurking around Mar-a-Lago like Norma Desmond in "Sunset Boulevard".

But I'm not reciting these nutburger beliefs to give them more oxygen, but to ask a real question of Republicans who coddle this craziness. Is this really the person you want to build a cult of personality around heading into the next election? Because the idea that you can just harness crazy into something politically constructive is just as naive as the White House staffer who reportedly tried to normalize Trump's post-election rage by asking, what's the downside for humoring him for this little bit of time? I mean, it's not like he's plotting to present Joe Biden from taking power.

Well, we all know what the down side is now. The failure of Republicans to clearly confront and condemn it has led to a self- created hostage situation where they kill a bipartisan commission to try to curry favor while extremists raise the most money from the base and big chunks of the Republican Party simultaneously believe that the January 6th attack was mostly peaceful and led by violent left wing protesters trying to make Trump look bad.

Of course, both things cannot be true. But then truth left the Trump train station a long time ago. It's tempting to look at this festering mess, throw up your hands and quote Obi-Wan Kenobi. Who is the more foolish, the fool or the fool who follows him?

But when one party embraces the politics of unreality, it affects all of us. And when 100 scholars warn that our democracy is in grave danger, we cannot add to the unreality by pretending it's not happening.

And that's your "Reality Check."

BERMAN: A hundred scholars and one Jedi master to be clear.

John Avlon, thank you very much.

Up next, a retired general seen on video appearing to support a military coup in the United States. Reaction from a former defense secretary coming up.

KEILAR: Plus, Americans are done staying home in sweatpants. Really? The proof, though, is in their shopping carts.

And push comes to shove between a California teen and a bear. And she and that little yorkie are going to join us live.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:23:45]

BERMAN: Former national security adviser Michael Flynn is claiming he did not endorse a Myanmar-style coup on Sunday. That's despite the video which shows him appearing to support it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

AUDIENCE MEMBER: I want to know why what happened in Myanmar can't happen here?

FLYNN: No reason. I mean, it should happen here. No reason but -- that's right.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: Flynn posted a statement on his parlor account saying he meant in his answer that he thought there is, quote no, reason whatsoever for any coup.

Adherence to the QAnon movement and fringe Trump supporters have been hoping for a coup in the United States and saying former President Trump can be reinstated into office. The former president apparently telling people he expects to be reinstated by August.

Joining us now is former Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel. Before he was in the cabinet, he was a Republican senator representing Nebraska.

Mr. Secretary, thank you so much for being with us.

Michael Flynn's a retired general. As a former defense secretary, but also as an Army veteran yourself, what's it like to hear a U.S. general sound like he is endorsing the idea of a military coup here in the United States?

CHUCK HAGEL, FORMER DEFENSE SECRETARY, OBAMA ADMINISTRATION: Well, John, it's discouraging, and those comments that he made and, obviously, agreed with at that rally were both dangerous and irresponsible. They incite violence. They further divide our country. They further polarize -- pull apart our country.

Our country is as divided as any time I've seen it since 1968 and I think worse. I think you have to go back to the Civil War to find a time when we were so divided. And comments like that exacerbated, make it worse, deepen it.

Obviously, General Flynn doesn't understand the basis of our freedoms, our democracy. America's freedoms and democracy come from our Constitution. We're a nation of laws.

When we need to change things, we change things peacefully. We self- correct. We have 27 amendments to the Constitution because we didn't get it all right the first time.

We're still working on changes. We still need to work in our country, in our society to make it better. But that's the way we change things in America. Not through bloodbaths. Not through insurrections and coups.

I mean, my goodness. For a general to say that or to not push back on those kind of comments is really regrettable and as I said dangerous and irresponsible.

BERMAN: You said regrettable and dangerous. How much? There are people out there suggesting what he said amounts to sedition. HAGEL: Well, I think that's right. And, obviously, we Americans have

a right to say what we want. But that has to come with responsibility in what you say.

And also I think, the fact is who he is. What his background is. He knows better. He was at the Pentagon when I was at the Pentagon. He's a three-star general. For a brief time, national security adviser to a president of the United States.

This is not just an ordinary citizen making these comments. This is someone who has a lifetime of experience and is informed and is knowledgeable. And for people who hear him say that that, that comes with some credibility and that's why it's so dangerous, because as I said, it incites people.

BERMAN: What would you have done as defense secretary if a retired general had said something like that? I'm not sure what the mechanism would be, but I assume General Flynn is drawing a military pension.

HAGEL: Well, I assume he is.

Well, if I was secretary of defense and an active duty general said something like that, which I -- I mean, I can't believe they would, but if that happens, then I would talk to the chairman of the joint chiefs and I would talk to all of our senior leadership.

We would have to call him in. We would have to take a look at how serious that was. We would have to honestly reprimand him, at the least. Probably remove him from his position. And I don't know what else or what other measures we'd take but those are probably things we'd do.

BERMAN: Shifting gears. You've been outspoken on the need for the bipartisan commission to investigate what happened on January 6th. Obviously, that was blocked in the Senate. Mitch McConnell, the Senate minority leader calling people and telling Republicans as a personal favor to him, vote against it.

And he made some new comments about -- which sort of reframed, I think, what he believes about the insurrection. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY), MINORITY LEADER: Multiple people have been arrested. Many will be prosecuted. Nobody is going to get away with anything who is involved in the incident at the Capitol on January the 6th.

I think we'll know everything we need to know. We were all witnesses. We were right there when it happened. And I simply think the commission is not necessary.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: We know everything we need to know, secretary? HAGEL: Well, I don't think we know everything we need to know. In

fact, I don't think we know near enough or even I think beyond the surface.

That's why you had a commission. Why we had 9/11 Commission, Warren Commission, all these independent of Congress, independent, Republican, Democrats, equal numbers on a commission to find out what drove all of this? What really happened? What was behind this? How deep is this in our society?

You know, we had active duty military involved. National Guard involved. We had active duty policemen involved in this. People lost their lives. Capitol Hill policemen lost their lives, unprecedented in history.

We need to understand the truth. I mean, I don't know why Mitch, the Republicans are so afraid of the truth. That's all we're looking for. We're not looking to blame people. We just need to understand. America does.

This is historic. Never happened before. Our Capitol was attacked and occupied. People died. And how deep is this? How deep in our society is this?

[08:30:00]