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At This Hour

Trump Advisers Drafted Two Orders to Seize Voting Machines; Biden Meets Soon with Senators on SCOTUS Pick; Tom Brady to Retire; Pfizer Asks FDA to Authorize Vaccine for Kids under 5. Aired 11-11:30a ET

Aired February 01, 2022 - 11:00   ET

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

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KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone. I'm Kate Bolduan. Here's what we're watching at this hour.

A threat to democracy: exclusive CNN reporting exposes how Trump advisers had not one but two plans to seize voting machines after he lost the 2020 election.

More shots are coming: Pfizer could soon ask for authorization for its COVID vaccine for children as young as 6 months old.

And a legend calling it quits; Tom Brady walking away from the NFL as one of the greatest of all time.

Thank you for being here. Let's begin with exclusive CNN reporting. For the first time, we learn Donald Trump's advisers drafted not one but two executive orders to seize voting machines in their attempt to overturn the 2020 election results.

The mere fact there was a plan proposed to use the military or federal agents to confiscate voting equipment for political gain is alarming enough. But there's more.

Sources tell CNN exclusively a former top Trump aide to Mike Pence has testified before the House Select Committee investigating the insurrection, as congressional investigators are trying to penetrate the Trump West Wing. Let's start off with CNN's Paula Reid who broke the news on the voting machines.

PAULA REID, CNN SENIOR LEGAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: While neither memo was ever issued, this new report shows the lengths Trump advisers were willing to go to as part of a broader effort to undermine the election results.

We previously reported the existence of a draft order, tasking the Pentagon with seizing voting machines and that document has been handed over to the House Select Committee.

We know from sources, they even asked witnesses about it. But now multiple sources told CNN a second version of that same document also exists but instructs DHS, the Department of Homeland Security, to carry out the same task.

And multiple sources also tell CNN the idea of using the federal government to access voting machines was the brain child of retired colonel Phil Waldron and former Trump national security adviser Mike Flynn.

Both Army veterans were pushing the narrative that the election was stolen from Trump but it's not clear who specifically put pen to paper to draft the EO itself. Trump's former personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, was the one spearheading these efforts to challenge the election results.

And we've learned Giuliani approached Ken Cuccinelli, second in command at Homeland Security at this time, about the idea of seizing voting machines after the election.

And Cuccinelli told him we don't have the authority to do that. Cuccinelli tells CNN his discussions with Giuliani never developed to the point of talking specifically about an executive order. The House Select Committee is looking into this effort to draft an executive order and how it began, including the roles of Giuliani, Flynn, Waldron and others.

BOLDUAN: What more can you tell me about Mike Pence's chief of staff, Marc Short, testifying before the congressional committee, the House committee?

That's getting pretty close to Trump's inner circle.

REID: It's about close as you can get. The House really made one of its most significant witnesses yet here, our colleagues Jamie Gangel and Gloria Borger reporting exclusively yesterday that Marc Short provided lengthy testimony to lawmakers last week.

And this is so significant because he can provide firsthand testimony of what was happening behind the scenes and it shows. Look, the committee has been able to carve out this window through Pence's office into what was happening in the West Wing, especially significant for the committee, as they have had some difficulty getting some top Trump allies to cooperate.

But Kate, of course, this sets up a big question for Pence about whether he will testify.

BOLDUAN: Absolutely. Good to see you, Paula, thank you.

Now to another big story we're watching this morning. President Biden moving quickly in his search for a Supreme Court nominee right now. Later today, the president's going to be meeting with the leaders of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which will, of course, be in charge of holding the confirmation hearings for his eventual pick.

CNN's Manu Raju is live on the Hill with more on this.

Manu, what are they going to be ironing out today when they meet?

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Chuck Grassley is a ranking Republican on the committee, who's attending this meeting, said that he's going to be courteous and listen to the president's discussion; whatever the president wants to say.

When we tried to talk to him about this last night, Grassley said that he has no agenda going in, other than wanting to listen to what the president has to say.

And Dick Durbin is trying to convey a sense of bipartisanship; he will be overseeing this hearing. He said he has reached out to Republicans, a handful of Republicans, who he believes could potentially vote for the eventual nomination.

He wanted to make clear that they'll have time to review this nominee. It's still unclear how many ultimately will come down in favor of the president Biden's pick. But you are hearing some criticism from Republicans about exactly how Biden has come down and said that he would nominate the first Black woman justice ever to serve on the Supreme Court.

A number of Republicans said the president should not have come out and made that clear, even as previous presidents have said, like Donald Trump as well as Ronald Reagan.

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RAJU: That they would nominate a woman justice to serve on the Supreme Court. One of the Republicans is Susan Collins, a key swing vote on this issue. She, over the weekend, said Joe Biden handled this in a very, quote, "clumsy" manner by saying he would nominate the first Black Supreme Court justice while he was campaigning.

And today, she defended that criticism.

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SEN. SUSAN COLLINS (R-ME): I do not think the president handled this as well as he could have by making a pledge to during his campaign. So --

QUESTION: But President Reagan did that as well --

COLLINS: Reagan said one of his Supreme Court justices would be a woman. You're skipping over what exactly he said.

QUESTION: OK.

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RAJU: Susan Collins is viewed, Kate, as one of the handful of Republicans who would potentially break ranks here. At the moment Democrats are still confident, when this nominee comes down, they'll get the votes to have it. They don't have any defections in their ranks.

And the one key Democratic swing vote, Joe Manchin, seems to be on board with the process so far.

BOLDUAN: So far. OK, Manu, thank you so much.

Let's get to this and more. Joining me is chief political analyst Gloria Borger, CNN anchor and CNN political correspondent Abby Phillip.

Let's get to the Supreme Court in a second, because I want to start with this new reporting about Trump and his inner circle, that Trump aides drafted two versions of an executive order to seize these voting machines after he lost. "The New York Times" reporting Trump directed Rudy Giuliani and Trump was the one to direct him to call Homeland Security about seizing voting machines.

Let me play what the former attorney general Alberto Gonzales said about this today.

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JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Do you think perhaps something legally incriminating about this information?

ALBERTO GONZALES, GEORGE W. BUSH ADMINISTRATION ATTORNEY GENERAL: Could be, yes, obviously could be, from as minor as destruction of government records. But obviously, that's minor in comparison to the possibility that he in fact actively participated in trying to overturn the election.

And obviously, that's a very serious matter.

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BOLDUAN: Gloria, what do you think hearing that?

GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: I'll say it's very serious matter when you have somebody who lost an election, president of the United States, directing people to contact the Department of Homeland Security, Pentagon, whatever it is.

And asking the Justice Department about it, whether this would be OK. And it's kind of remarkable. And what you see is the concentric circles sort of closing in on the former president of the United States, who wanted to find any way to overturn the election.

And it's kind of remarkable when, in all of these stories, the ones that were exclusively done by my colleagues, Paula Reid, and "The New York Times," showing Rudy Giuliani in one sense to be the voice of reason, telling the president, apparently, no, no, no, you can't do that, you can't use the Pentagon that way.

It is remarkable and I believe that the more investigating the January 6th committee does, the more the arrows will point at the former president.

BOLDUAN: At the same time, Abby, I also find that when the details continue to roll out, as Gloria says, all of these stories come out, some people, they stop listening to kind of what it really means.

I want to play for you what Harvard legal scholar Laurence Tribe, how he put it about all of Trump's efforts here.

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LAURENCE TRIBE, CONSTITUTIONAL LAW PROFESSOR, HARVARD UNIVERSITY: This is extremely serious. No former president has ever committed so grave a crime against the country right in front of our very eyes, the crime of seditious conspiracy and aiding and comforting an insurrection that he himself fomented.

And he's threatened to do it again. I don't think we can afford to wait. And I'm waiting to see what the attorney general of the United States will do now.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: So the legal point that Tribe is making is that what more does the DOJ need to see?

But from a political standpoint, you can kind of wonder the same thing.

ABBY PHILLIP, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I mean, I do think that there's a sense that the only thing that kind of stood in the way of Trump actually carrying out this attempted coup is just, you know, maybe the dissent among his ranks of co-conspirators, frankly, about what method to use in order to do it.

And the fact that the vice president was not willing to go along with it and so the real question for the country is, going forward, this is a former president, who intends to run again, who has been emboldened even further.

What is to stop him from trying to do the exact same thing again?

And that is the part that I think Professor Tribe is referring to.

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PHILLIP: And I don't know that there's anything standing in the way. Republicans right now are holding his hand and walking right into 2024. And no one seems to be batting an eye at the seriousness of these allegations.

BOLDUAN: Gloria, it was your exclusive reporting, along with Jamie Gangel and Jeremy Herb that Mike Pence's former chief of staff, Marc Short, testified last week before the January 6th committee.

How significant are you hearing this could be?

BOLDUAN: Look, his testimony is crucial because he is the Mike Pence whisperer. And he was with Mike Pence on January 6th, when people were screaming, "Hang Mike Pence," at the U.S. Capitol.

More important, I think or just as important, let me put it that way, he was in the meeting on January 4th inside the White House, when an attorney, Eastman, was trying to convince Mike Pence to overturn the election and trying to tell him, yes, you have the right to do this.

And of course, Mike Pence rejected that but Marc Short was there for that conversation and can recall that conversation.

So the committee has heard from another former Pence aide, general Kellogg, Marc Short.

And the big question is, of course, will they hear from Mike Pence himself or does Mike Pence really want his aides, as we were told, to kind of act as his proxy and to effectively say what he would say anyway to the committee?

Because Mike Pence, politically, would not relish the fact of going before this committee, because he wants to be president and that would clearly alienate the Trump base.

BOLDUAN: Abby, real quick, as Manu was reporting about Biden going to the Hill to talk about his eventual Supreme Court nominee, one of the members on the Judiciary Committee is Ted Cruz.

And Ted Cruz is calling Biden's promise to appoint a Black woman to the court "offensive." He did this on his podcast.

Other than Cruz, I don't know, trying to just get some attention and get his name in the mix here, speaking out about this, what are he and other Republicans doing here with this -- what are they doing?

PHILLIP: Race is an incredibly powerful motivator for the Republican Party base right now. It is very effective to use race to rile up their voters, who believe that they are themselves, the non-white part of the Republican base, being discriminated against.

And that's why you see so many Republicans willing to villainize just the concept of putting a Black woman on the Supreme Court, as if all the men, white men and others who came before them were not the beneficiaries of preferences.

I also just want to note, what Susan Collins said about Ronald Reagan is just not the case. It's exactly the same thing. He promised in a campaign he would put a woman on the Supreme Court. And he did that and that's exactly what Joe Biden is doing here when it comes to Black women.

BOLDUAN: Thank you guys, both, great to see you.

BORGER: Sure.

BOLDUAN: Coming up for us, one of the greatest of all time calling it quits. Tom Brady saying goodbye to football. The new details on his retirement next.

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BOLDUAN: And it is breaking news. It is official. Legendary quarterback Tom Brady is retiring. Brady issuing a statement this morning to share the news. The seven-time Super Bowl champ will undoubtedly go down as one of the greatest to ever play the game.

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BOLDUAN: Coming up for us, is it a light at the end of the tunnel?

Pfizer preparing to seek FDA signoff for its COVID vaccine for kids young as 6 months.

So when can families be able to expect to get shots in the youngest arms?

That's next.

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BOLDUAN: Long awaited and potentially major news on the pandemic this morning. COVID vaccines for children under 5 may finally be on the way. Pfizer's expected to submit a request to the FDA as soon as today to get emergency authorization for its vaccine for babies as young as 6 months.

If given the green light, kids under 5 could get vaccinated by the end of this month but quite a road to that. Joining me now is Dr. Paul Offit, member of the FDA Advisory Committee and the director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.

Couldn't be more happy to have you on a day like this.

What do you think of this news, this reporting coming out?

DR. PAUL OFFIT, U.S. FDA VACCINE ADVISER: Well, we all need to see the data. So my understanding is that the FDA Vaccine Advisory Committee will look at this data on February 15th.

The American public can look at it at the same time because it's an open meeting, not hard to get online and see it. We need to see it. Most importantly, we want to make sure this vaccine is safe, that there's robust data that it's safe, there's robust data that it's effective and consistently immunogenic for all children under 5.

And then it goes to the FDA, to accept or not accept the recommendation and from there, it goes to the Centers for Disease Control and the Advisory Committee for Immunization Practices.

Still a ways to go but most importantly, we need to see the data. Right now, we're all trying to read the tea leaves.

BOLDUAN: That's exactly right. Some of the reporting I've seen is, even if there isn't -- in some of the reporting, is that, even if the data shows there isn't as much of an immune response, it is safe so we should get started on getting shots into kids' arms.

One quote from "The Washington Post" on this.

"'We know two doses isn't enough and we get that,' said one of the people familiar with the situation.