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The Lead with Jake Tapper

Trump Vetoes National Defense Authorization Act; U.S. Makes Deal For Additional Pfizer Vaccine Doses; Trump Sabotaging COVID Relief Bill?. Aired 4-4:30p ET

Aired December 23, 2020 - 16:00   ET

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

[16:00:01]

TOM O'CONNOR, LED FBI RESPONSE TEAM AFTER 2007 MASSACRE: There were very good prosecutors on the -- on the country side, and they also had very good defense attorneys.

So...

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN HOST: Forgive me, Tom O'Connor. I have got to jump in. I'm up against time.

But we know the jury heard it. And now we know the pardons have happened. And I know the details matter to you and so many others.

And I appreciate you sharing them. Thank you so much.

And thank for being with me, everyone.

Thank you.

O'CONNOR: They do. Thank you very much for the opportunity.

BALDWIN: "THE LEAD" starts right now.

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

PAMELA BROWN, CNN HOST: Welcome to THE LEAD. I'm Pamela Brown, in for Jake Tapper.

And we begin with breaking news.

Minutes ago, President Trump took another stunning step, as he upends Washington in his final 28 days in office. President Trump vetoed the National Defense Authorization Act, which passed Congress with wide bipartisan support.

This is a $740 billion defense package. And it includes pay raises for soldiers, equipment modernization and provisions for increased cybersecurity. A version of the bill has become law for 59 years. But in this letter to Congress, President Trump claimed it is a -- quote -- "gift to China and Russia."

And it is just the latest in a series of chaotic moves by President Trump as he approaches the end of his presidency. Plus, any moment, President Trump could leave for Mar-a-Lago, though

the president right now is so unpredictable, that it's still possible the trip could be canceled. We will have to wait and see.

The president specifically mentioned in this letter to Congress that he doesn't like that bill included require -- that the bill included requiring the military to rename bases named after Confederate soldiers, writing: "I have been clear in my opposition to politically motivated attempts like this to wash away history and to dishonor the immense progress our country has fought for in realizing our founding principles."

I want to bring in CNN's Phil Mattingly.

Phil, this was a sweeping defense bill that overwhelmingly passed the Senate and the House.

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes.

BROWN: What happens now?

MATTINGLY: Yes, let's contextualize first what this actually is, Pamela. And you know it quite well, this is the policy-authorizing bill that essentially kind of dictates how U.S. military policy is handled.

It has been passed by the United States Congress almost always with wide bipartisan margins. This was the 60th consecutive year. You have had Republicans over the course of the last several weeks and months begging President Trump not to veto this legislation.

Now, the reason the president has said that he wanted to veto this legislation and since has vetoed this legislation was a couple- pronged. One, it was the issue of online liability, Section 230, something that he's been talking about a lot. It has no application to this bill, which was frustrating for a lot of Republicans, particularly the Senate Republican Armed Services Committee chairman, James Inhofe, in terms of why that was supposed to be in this bill.

It's not in this bill. And that was one of the reasons the president used. Another is, this bill would require the name change of military bases named after Confederate generals, after a period of a panel and then a number of years. The president is opposed to that as well.

And then, Pamela, I think the thing that's most perplexed both Republicans and Democrats is the idea that, as the president said in his veto message, that it is a gift to Russia and China, particularly given the cyberattack that is still somewhat under way with the U.S. government right now.

The cyber provisions, specific China provisions especially, have been things that Republicans have both publicly and privately been trying to push to the president to make clear that this bill is the opposite of what the president thinks it is on the policy side of things.

However, it never made any headway with the president. And now he has veto this bill, setting up a major, major challenge with Congress.

BROWN: All right, so is there enough support to override the president's veto? And what are your sources saying, and particularly your Republican sources, saying on the Hill about what's unfolding in the White House just this past 24 hours?

MATTINGLY: Yes, I will take the latter first.

And I think the amazing thing about what's happened over the course of the last 24 hours -- I know you're going to get into it in-depth in a little bit, but the biggest takeaway right now is how little anybody knows about anything.

Pamela, you know this well covering the White House, covering the Hill, that there are back channels, there are connections. Some individual in one office knows somebody in some office in the White House. They usually have a pretty good sense of what's going on, why and how.

And that has almost been eliminated. There's been no guidance given to congressional offices about what's going on, what the president's thinking might be. Everybody's basically spent the last 24 hours waiting for the president to speak again.

Now, as it pertains to this veto, the House and Senate were prepared for this. They have already set up the process to override the veto starting the week after Christmas. The House will vote on Monday. If the House overrides the veto -- they would need two-thirds support -- the Senate is already teed up to do the same thing on Tuesday.

The big question right now, Pamela, in the House, 335 members voted for this, well above the two-thirds fret threshold. However, House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy said he would not sustain -- or he would work to sustain the president's veto.

So, how many Republicans decide to vote against the bill now is an open question in the House. However, the feeling is, they will be able to override it in the House, override it in the Senate. This would be a major, major brushback to the president in his final weeks -- Pamela.

BROWN: Absolutely.

All right, Phil Mattingly, thank you, as always, for breaking it down so succinctly, so we can understand what is going on behind the scenes there.

[16:05:03]

Now I want to bring in CNN's Boris Sanchez now from the White House.

Boris, this veto is just another stunning move from the president in the last day or so.

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Pam. With fewer than 30 days left in his presidency, Donald Trump is

refusing to go quietly, the president not only vetoing this defense bill. He's also threatening to veto that omnibus spending bill, a huge portion of which is coronavirus relief spending.

Meantime, the president also issuing more than a dozen pardons, many of those pardons controversial, to say the least.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SANCHEZ (voice-over): As President Trump prepares to leave for his holiday vacation in Florida, he's dropping bombshells on his way out the door, first issuing more than a dozen pardons last night, with more expected today, many with personal links to the president himself, including two former Republican congressmen who were early supporters of Trump's presidential campaign, Duncan Hunter, who pled guilty to misusing campaign funds, and Chris Collins, who pled guilty to committing securities fraud and lying to the FBI.

Trump also undoing convictions from the Mueller investigation, pardoning George Papadopoulos, the former campaign aide who pled guilty for lying to the FBI about his contacts with Russian-linked officials, and Alex van der Zwaan, also convicted for lying to investigators.

Also receiving clemency, four Blackwater private security operatives convicted of massacring 14 unarmed Iraqi civilians, including children, while working in Iraq for the security firm in 2007. Notably, Blackwater is owned by Erik Prince, a major Trump donor who also happens to be education Secretary Betsy DeVos' brother.

The second bombshell?

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: It really is a disgrace.

SANCHEZ: Trump threatening to veto much-needed coronavirus aid from Congress.

BRIAN MORGENSTERN, WHITE HOUSE DEPUTY COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR: The president has indicated his intent to sign the bill.

SANCHEZ: Despite his own aides promising he would sign it, Trump blindsiding White House aides and lawmakers in both parties by tweeting a video blasting a long-fought bipartisan bill to fund the government and deliver aid to workers nationwide.

TRUMP: It's called the COVID relief bill, but it has almost nothing to do with COVID.

SANCHEZ: Trump's taped address laced with falsehoods, conflating the coronavirus relief package with a government spending bill that his own negotiators agreed should be rolled into one piece of legislation.

TRUMP: Increase the ridiculously low $600 to $2,000 or $4,000 for a couple. Get rid of the wasteful and unnecessary items from this legislation.

SANCHEZ: Trump deriding the amount of foreign aid in the bill, though the figures closely match what he requested in his own White House budget. And the president's request for more money directly to Americans, strongly opposed by most Republicans, met with support from Democrats.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi tweeting -- quote -- "hat last the president has agreed to $2,000. Let's do it!"

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SANCHEZ: And, Pamela, the president is set to leave the White House for Mar-a-Lago at any moment. We will see if he takes questions from reporters.

Very quickly, I wanted to point out the president has only five days to sign off on this spending bill before the federal government shuts down. But millions of Americans will be feeling the pain of this decision soon before that. Keep in mind, enhanced unemployment benefits tied to the last COVID package expire the day after Christmas -- Pamela.

BROWN: I hope he takes questions, so we can figure out what is going on here, as millions of Americans are concerned they're not going to get the money they need.

Thank you, Boris.

Now I'm going to bring in our panel to discuss all of this.

Abby, first to you.

What is going on here, in your view?

ABBY PHILLIP, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, first of all, this is a president who is in the last gasps of his presidency, and has been in a really unpredictable mood for quite some time.

But he's also facing the real prospect that Republicans on Capitol Hill are not going to do what he wants them to do. They're not going to be successful in stopping the Electoral College vote, which has already happened, from basically becoming official and making Joe Biden the president-elect.

And I do think that he's lashing out at Mitch McConnell and at Republicans on Capitol Hill for that. What's happening here is that he's now thrown uncertainty into this -- particularly the stimulus bill negotiations by giving Nancy Pelosi something that she really wanted and also putting Republicans in the position of objecting to $2,000 in additional money for Americans.

And it's not going to go through, not because Democrats don't want it -- they have been pushing for that all along -- but, rather, because Republicans will object in the House. And it's very unlikely that Mitch McConnell will take something like that up in the Senate. [16:10:04]

So, again, President Trump really lashing out at people who are not toeing the line when it comes to the one thing that seems to matter to him, which is the idea that he might have some success somehow in overturning the results of this election.

BROWN: Yes.

Olivier, as Abby just laid out there, he's really throwing congressional Republicans under the bus by making these moves and putting them in a tough spot here.

OLIVIER KNOX, SIRIUSXM: Yes, you have got to wonder what the two Republican candidates in those Georgia run-off elections are thinking right now.

They toed the line pretty well with what used to be the White House position and what was certainly the Republican Senate Caucus' position. They're now in the position of having to answer to voters there for the infighting up here.

And the divisions where, as Abby pointed out, you have got Nancy Pelosi saying $2,000 checks, sounds great, let's do it. And Democrats have consistently been pushing for more money. So, you have got to wonder what they're thinking.

You have to wonder -- to Phil's point earlier, you have to wonder what they're thinking just generally about what this White House is doing in its final days. The NDAA, the National Defense Authorization Act, for instance, a shocker, and in part a shocker because, even if we sort of understand the argument about renaming military bases currently named for traitors, the Section 230 part is absolutely baffling.

No part of his explanation of that section makes any sense.

BROWN: Yes, so that was what he wanted in exchange.

So we're seeing all of this play out. And when you look at the list of his grievances, Abby, over the stimulus bill, listing off money for foreign countries and other programs, those are part of the larger spending bill, and much of it mirrors what President Trump proposed in his own budget.

Look at this right here on your screen. Trump is complaining of $1.3 billion for Egypt, which is exactly what he proposed, $134 million to Burma. Trump proposed $131 million, and $85 million to Cambodia, compared to the $83 million he requested. The list goes on.

The White House knew what was in this bill. Apparently, President Trump did not, I guess? I mean, does this just underscore to you how uninvolved he has been?

PHILLIP: Yes, it underscores how uninvolved he has been. It also underscores how small the president's circle is becoming within the White House.

He has iced out a lot of people who might be more knowledgeable, but perhaps who he finds to be not loyal enough. And, instead, he's listening to people like his social media director, Dan Scavino, who is on the Internet seeing a lot of this stuff that originated in social media memes.

That's where a lot of this came from. This idea that the stimulus bill was somehow packed with foreign aid was all swimming around in conservative circles online. And then, suddenly, it ends up on President Trump's radar. And he comes to believe that that is what is in the bill, even though he's the president of the United States. He has access to all of the information, any number of aides who could tell him what's going on.

But that is not where his head is at right now. And, instead, he's reacting to what he thinks is going to be a problem for him with his base, which is in large part gauged not only by what's going on cable television, on Newsmax, OANN, and FOX News, but also what's going on in the sort of bowels of the Internet and Twitter.

BROWN: And it looks like we're going to have to continue to guess what is in his head, because he did not stop to take questions just a moment ago as he left the White House to go to Mar-a-Lago.

Carrie, we're also expecting more pardons to be released, to be announced by the White House. As we saw yesterday, he issued a wave of pardons, including two people involved in the Russia investigation, George Papadopoulos and Alex van der Zwaan.

What are the implications of these pardons?

CARRIE CORDERO, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Well, I think we have seen -- it's not really surprising that what he's really trying to do with those particular pardons is, he's unraveling as much as he can of the results of the special counsel's investigation.

And so he had already issued a couple of pardons with respect to Mike Flynn and Roger Stone in that category. These are two more. I think we potentially could see more, in terms of related to the Mueller investigation.

Regarding his pardons yesterday, though, I think the Blackwater guard pardons in particular are ones that we can look at that really are offensive to the proper functioning of the rule of law. This was in -- a terrible event. They were subject to prosecution.

They were -- after an extensive investigation, they were sentenced during the Trump administration in proceedings that were led by the Trump administration Department of Justice and U.S. attorney's office. They were sentenced by Judge Lamberth in the District of Columbia, who has himself extensive experience as a judge handling national security matters, who himself had been a JAG attorney back in Vietnam, and who -- defending soldiers.

And yet he still sentenced these individuals by saying, we in this country hold -- I'm paraphrasing -- but we hold our people accountable.

[16:15:08]

And so those pardons in particular are just so out of the bounds and so offensive. Obviously, the president, in terms of his executive authority, can do it. But they really are shocking.

BROWN: And when you look through the list of, Olivier, of the pardons, the high-profile pardons, you see many links to the president himself or associations, like Erik Prince with Blackwater, and, of course, his GOP allies, early supporters of the president, Chris Collins and Duncan Hunter.

What message does this send?

KNOX: Well, I think to journalists, it sends the message, boy, what's in the next batch, right? Who else is he going to pardon who's close to him?

But, generally speaking, it puts loyalty to him above the functioning of the rule of law. These were not complicated cases. These were not gray area cases. These were actually fairly straightforward. And so he's rewarding two early supporters essentially by wiping their slate clean.

Again, I think what it tells us is that we have to really be watching for what happens in the next batch. I mean, I don't want to speculate irresponsibly on the air here on CNN. But it does mean we have to watch really carefully, because I don't think he's signaling any intention of being hemmed in by any norm or any tradition.

BROWN: Right. I mean, we do know from our reporting that there will be more pardons before the president leaves office. And, normally, you would leave the most controversial in a normal administration at the very end, and we still have a few weeks ago. But we will have to wait and see how this unfolds.

Abby Phillip, Olivier Knox, Carrie Cordero, thank you so much.

Well, as Americans pack planes, look at this, another strain found in the U.K. that could be even more contagious.

Also, Trump keeping his promise -- well, kind of -- a look at border wall construction and why president-elect Biden may not be able to stop it.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:21:25]

BROWN: Turning to our health lead now: Another strain of coronavirus has been detected in the United Kingdom.

That is on top of the other variant found there just this week, earlier this week. Officials say that the second new strain is even more contagious. It's more terrible news before Christmas. Yesterday was the second deadliest day from COVID right here in the

United States since the pandemic began, a CNN's Lucy Kafanov reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

LUCY KAFANOV, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It's a holiday gift no one wanted, the U.K. detecting two cases of yet another variant of COVID-19, this one originally identified in South Africa.

MATT HANCOCK, BRITISH HEALTH SECRETARY: This new variant is highly concerning because it is yet more transmissible and it appears to have mutated further than the new variant that has been discovered in the U.K.

KAFANOV: Experts say the current roster of vaccines should work against it. And across the pond, the Trump administration buying 100 million more doses of Pfizer's vaccine.

DR. WILLIAM SCHAFFNER, DEPARTMENT OF PREVENTIVE MEDICINE CHAIRMAN, VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY: The more vaccine we have, the more quickly we can protect more people.

KAFANOV: Nearly 9.5 million doses distributed so far and just over one million administered.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It may take months for us to get that supply.

KAFANOV: And more concerns about that new variant.

DR. FRANCIS COLLINS, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF HEALTH: It appears to be more transmissible.

KAFANOV: The director of the National Institutes of Health warns that, because the U.S. doesn't have a rigorous enough surveillance system, health experts face greater obstacles when attempting to identify new variants of COVID-19.

COLLINS: It would be surprising if it has not arrived on our shores.

KAFANOV: Despite warnings, nearly a million passengers flew through U.S. airports yesterday, a recipe for a holiday disaster.

DR. ROCHELLE WALENSKY, CDC DIRECTOR NOMINEE: We have been saying loud and clear to the entire American people we need to be limiting our mobility, period.

KAFANOV: Staying home is the safest bet, cases on the rise across nine states, nationwide, more than 195,000 new cases reported yesterday and more than 117,000 hospitalizations, yet another new record, in California, too many coronavirus patients, not enough resources.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Very exhausting. It's really like a never-ending struggle. And it's really tough right now.

KAFANOV: Southern California has run out of ICU beds. NANCY BLAKE, CHIEF NURSING OFFICER, HARBOR-UCLA MEDICAL CENTER: It's

the worst I have ever seen. I have been a nurse for 40 years, and it's the worst I have ever seen. And some of the things these nurses are seeing, where their patients are dying, there's no family member, so they're holding that patient's hand, or they're on the other side of an iPad, where the family's crying.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: And that was Lucy Kafanov reporting there.

And joining me now to discuss all of this is the dean of Brown University School of Public Health.

Dr. Jha, great to see you, as always.

Help us understand what is going on with this newest strain. Officials are saying it's concerning because it has mutated even more than the variant found in the U.K. earlier this week. Walk us through what that means and how worried we should be.

DR. ASHISH JHA, DEAN, BROWN UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH: Yes, so, Pamela, first thing -- well, thank you for having me on.

The reason we're discovering these things in the United Kingdom is because they're actually doing a really good job of sequencing the genomes of the viruses that are infecting people. We're not. So, we don't actually know to what extent these mutations are also showing up on our shores.

We have got to get going on that. And that's sort of point number one.

Whenever you have an outbreak this large happening in the U.S., happening in Western Europe, you're going to start seeing more and more mutations. In terms of these two variants, I think we're still sorting out, how much more contagious? What does it mean?

I think, fundamentally, the things we do to protect ourselves, we have got to keep continue doing, but we have got to learn a lot more before we make any other kind of policy actions.

[16:25:03]

BROWN: It's almost like you look back at the beginning of the pandemic. We were just trying to learn about COVID and we had to exercise some patience.

Now we know a lot about that initial strain. But we're learning about these new mutations as we go along. And, as you point out, in the U.S., the surveillance isn't as good as other countries. So it could be here. Just we don't have the surveillance to detect it like other countries.

Yesterday, you look at the numbers, Dr. Jha. It was the second deadliest day of the pandemic. More than 323,000 Americans have lost their lives from this virus. We are close to hitting in and 1,000 Americans dying from this virus.

What stories do these numbers tell? Do you have any sense of the demographics when you look at the death totals from yesterday, say?

JHA: Yes, I mean, 3,000 -- more than 3,000 Americans dying in a single day is horrific. And it is happening across the entire nation, right? So there isn't one group.

I mean, we do know, obviously, that a lot of people who are dying are older, but there are young people dying as well, more likely to be people of color, but plenty of people of all groups are dying.

And it is really heartbreaking for this to be happening during the holiday season, heartbreaking at any time, of course. And it's devastating. And I'm still stunned that we're just not spending enough time talking about it, certainly from a policy point of view.

We should have our federal and state leaders screaming up and down about how we have got to change things around. And we're not hearing from them.

BROWN: And given the current surge, what warnings does it serve for people traveling to celebrate Christmas? Because we heard these warnings before Thanksgiving, and now we see the numbers.

JHA: Yes. Yes.

A lot of the infections and a lot of the people who are very sick right now and people who will be dying in the days and weeks ahead probably got infected over that Thanksgiving holiday.

And I am very worried, especially since we're so close to widespread vaccine availability, very worried that people have started letting their guard down. Again, I totally understand the value of spending time in the holidays with the family.

What I have been asking people is, if you can avoid it, please do. If you're going to do it, keep it small, wear a mask. This is not the time to let down our guard, not when we're this close to the finish line.

BROWN: And there is hope, as you mentioned, the vaccine. That does give hope.

The Trump administration announced it bought 100 million more doses of the Pfizer vaccine; 70 million doses will be delivered by the end of June. Operation Warp Speed is producing critical materials and supplies to expand vaccine production under the Defense Production Act.

What does all of that mean for when we can get back to a sense of normalcy?

JHA: Yes, we have got to get to 70, 80 percent of Americans getting vaccinated before we really get this virus truly tamed and under control. I think we're going to start making some progress on opening things up

even before then. We're still a long ways away from that. If you think about it, we haven't even vaccinated 1 percent yet, right? It's only about a million people who've gotten the vaccine so far.

So, more vaccine is great. It'll move things along faster. But we have got to keep plugging away at vaccinating as many people as we can to begin to really get this virus under control.

BROWN: So, it's critically important that people get the shot in the arm. But look at these numbers. There were more than 9.5 million vaccine doses delivered across the U.S. But there have just been over a million shots to arms, according to the CDC.

Why are there just vaccines sitting there not being used right now, as we speak, when this is so urgent?

JHA: Yes, so, first of all, it is urgent.

Second is, this is the last mile problem, I think Operation Warp Speed has done a very good job on lots of parts of getting vaccines out there. But there's a lot of steps between getting a vaccine delivered to a state and getting it into the arms of somebody in a nursing home or a health care worker.

A lot of work needs to go into it. A lot of resources need to go into it. Congress is still not producing -- I mean, in the latest bill, they have got money for a vaccine distribution. I think that last mile didn't get as much attention as it needed.

BROWN: All right, Dr. Ashish Jha, always -- as always, thank you so much for sharing your expertise on this.

JHA: Thank you.

BROWN: Well, outrage and disappointment.

Survivors of the massacre in Iraq react to President Trump's pardoning of four guards who slaughtered innocent men, women and children. That's next.

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