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McCarthy Changes Debt Bill Amid Struggle For GOP Votes; Testimony Begins In Battery, Defamation Case Against Trump; Hunter Biden's Lawyers Meet With Justice Department; Leaked Documents Raise Questions About Pentagon's Internal Security; Leaked Pentagon Documents Reveal Concerns On China's Weaponization Of Space, Using Our Space Assets Against Us; Soon, MT House To Vote On "Discipline" Of Transgender Rep. Aired 2:30-3p ET

Aired April 26, 2023 - 14:30   ET

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

[14:30:00]

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REP. KEVIN HERN (R-OK): I would like for it to be more conservative than it is right now. I think it's a happy compromise with our conference.

REP. RALPH NORMAN (R-SC): I want it double what was in there. I agreed to vote for it because this starts the ball, gets us in the arena to solve the debt problem.

Now, I'm not interested in anything coming back, anything but what we voted on. Just said this cannot take up anything from the Senate. We freeze until they get back with us on what we agreed to.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Now, this vote, if it does happen this afternoon, is expected to be very, very close.

We do expect at least one member, Tim Burchett of Tennessee, to vote against it. Others are undecided, like Tim Buck of Colorado and Eli Crane of Arizona, who told me he is undecided on this issue.

They may get this bill through. It will be an enormous amount of work just to get Republicans on board.

Again, Jim, the bigger issue of a bipartisan deal to avert what could be just an economic disaster of a debt default by as early as this June.

There's still no clear way out of that mess as Congress and the White House are not talking about a way out.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN HOST: Yes. We're in the first act of a multi-act play here. See how it all comes together.

Manu Raju, on the Hill, thanks so much.

Boris?

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: Turning now to the civil battery and defamation trial against Donald Trump. Today, jurors heard from the former president's accuser E. Jean Carroll. She told the court, quote, "Donald Trump raped me."

The former magazine columnist alleges that Trump assaulted her in a dressing room at a department store in the mid -990s.

Before she testified, jurors heard from an employee who worked at that store.

We should note, Donald Trump has denied these allegations.

CNN's Kara Scannell is live outside the courthouse in New York for us.

Kara, what did E. Jean Carroll tell the court?

KARA SCANNELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Boris, E. Jean Carroll has been on the stand for a little more than an hour. And this morning, she described to the court and the jury what had happened to the heart of this allegation.

She told them that Donald Trump had raped her. So she set the scene. She told them she was leaving the Bergdorf Department Store, she believed, on a Thursday night and sometime in the spring of 1996.

She said she saw Donald Trump at the door, he put his hand up and said, hey, you are that advice columnist, and she replied, hey, you are that real estate tycoon.

From there, she said they began kind of this flirtatious fun where they were -- he wanted her advice to buy a present for a woman. They looked at handbags. They looked at hats.

He then suggested they go to the sixth floor, the lingerie department. And there, they were teasing each other over a body suit. He suggested that she put it on. She suggested that he put it on.

She testified, though, after that is when things turned violent. She said Trump lured her into the dressing room, he then pushed her up against the wall.

She banged her head, she said, twice from him pushing her against the wall. Then she said that he pulled down her tights and he raped her.

She's testified that, after this, she fled the department store, she called one of her friends and she confided in her and her friend said, you have just been raped.

She then testified she then had a subsequent conversation with a second friend, her friend, Carol Martin, and she said she described what happened to Carol Martin. And she, E. Jean Carroll, testified that Martin told her not to do anything about it because Trump would bury her. And this is what Carroll testified to on the stand. She said, "I was

frightened of Donald Trump, I thought he would retaliate and I was ashamed. I thought it was my fault."

They just came back from an hour-plus long lunch break. Carroll is back on the stand.

And her attorneys are asking her now about what kind of impact this had on her life. Carroll has testified she has not been able to have a romantic relationship since then.

She said, flirting got me into trouble that day. And she said she can't engage in a romantic relationship if she can't look at a man in the eye and smile.

As you said, Trump has denied this. His attorneys will get a chance to cross-examine Carroll and they said she's motivated by finance and by politics -- Boris?

SANCHEZ: Kara Scannell, please keep us posted on that testimony. Live outside the courthouse in Manhattan, thank you.

Brianna?

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Ahead, a CNN exclusive. Lawyers for Hunter Biden meeting with Justice Department officials to discuss the long- running criminal investigation into the president's son. We're going to show you our new reporting on that.

[14:34:13]

Plus, wrong turn, right time. Five men on a work trip are being called heroes after saving drivers from a fiery wreck. See more of their story ahead.

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KEILAR: This just into NEWS CENTRAL. Lawyers for the president's son, Hunter Biden, have met with officials from the Justice Department. Now, it's not clear what was discussed today, but Hunter Biden has been under federal investigation for tax evasion.

Let's bring in CNN legal analyst, Elliot Williams. He was a federal prosecutor who also helped lead the Justice Department as deputy assistant attorney general.

Elliot, what do you make of this? I mean, what are the possibilities of things that they might be discussing?

ELLIOT WILLIAMS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: They might be discussing the nature of the charges. So there's a failure to file taxes. There's a possible false statement about a firearms purchase. There's a tax evasion charge.

And they might be talking about the specifics, what kind of evidence the Justice Department has, what Hunter Biden's explanation might be: I was acting on advice of counsel or I was confused as to what I was doing.

To try to see if they can make it go away. I think really that's what Hunter Biden's team's goal is here, just make this go away.

KEILAR: If they can't make it go away, could they be discussing a plea?

WILLIAMS: Absolutely. It is always in the interest, Brianna, of defendants to plead out to defenses. There's a huge penalty in our system for going to trial. You're going to get a higher sentence if you end up going to trial.

[14:40:07]

The time consumed at trial, either on your own part or the court's part, it's really just to make it go away now.

Or if the Justice Department is saying, we are charging with you a crime next week or next month, yes, it's in his interest to try to plea and get the lowest possible sentence that he can.

KEILAR: What would penalties look like? If you're considering -- and just to be clear, we're talking about tax issues here. We're talking about alleged misstatements when it came to a firearms purchase.

So if you are looking at possible penalties for either a plea deal or going to trial, what are the range of possibilities?

WILLIAMS: None of these carry enormous sentences. I think the highest sentence you would be looking at would be a statutory maximum of five years.

Look, no one is getting the five-year sentence here. You would be looking at months probably, maybe a little more than that in prison.

Now, for the misdemeanor offenses, the sort of not reporting your taxes, it would be less than a year.

In all likelihood, someone who pled guilty would take a much lower sentence than anything like that, but, again, they just want it to go away.

KEILAR: What do you make of how this whole thing has played out with Hunter Biden, his legal exposure?

WILLIAMS: A couple things. It's interesting it has taken this long. If these are really relatively minor offenses, what's taking so long?

I think -- I do note that the Justice Department does have a number of career officials there. Number one, there's a holdover from the Trump administration as the U.S. attorney in Delaware.

Number two, the head of the Tax Division at the Justice Department that's overseeing this is also a career official.

I think they're very careful to make sure clear that this was not politically influenced from the higher ups at Washington or the White House or anything like this.

This is just a by-the-books tax prosecution. We want to talk to this defendant, see what he has to say.

KEILAR: It ends up being political, no matter what.

WILLIAMS: No question.

KEILAR: Of course, right?

Elliot, thank you so much for --

WILLIAMS: Of course.

KEILAR: -- taking us through that.

Jim?

SCIUTTO: Coming up, new details from leaked Pentagon documents reveal growing concerns about China's weaponization of space and the possibility of using our own space assets against us.

And she could be punished for speaking out. Next hour, the Republican- led House is set to consider disciplinary action against Representative Zooey Zephyr. She is transgender, standing up for gender-affirming care in the statehouse there. What's next if that vote goes through?

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[14:46:46]

KEILAR: Now to some of the other headlines that we're watching this hour.

Ukrainian President Zelenskyy said he held a long and meaningful phone call with his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, this morning.

During their conversation, Xi announced that China will send a representative to visit Ukraine and other countries to help conduct in-depth communication. It's not clear when that trip will take place.

This was the first call between the two leaders since Russia invaded Ukraine.

Also FOX News may have settled the Dominion lawsuit, but key information from that case will carry over to an even bigger defamation suit.

Lawyers for Smartmatic wanted documents concerning the Murdochs, Fox Chair Rupert Murdoch, and his son, Lachlan.

Today, FOX agreed to turn over materials, which will include items from the Dominion matter. Smartmatic is suing the network for nearly $3 billion. And five men on a work trip became unlikely heroes in Chicago. They

came upon this fiery crash on the highway and they pulled one of the drivers from the burning car as the flames were closing in.

Get this -- it was a case of really the wrong place at the right time. They were at that scene because they took a wrong turn.

Jim?

SCIUTTO: Lucky they were there.

Well, virtually every day, we're learning new details about what are contained in these leaked documents from the Pentagon, but also how they got out.

And we're learning now more about the military base where a 21-year- old junior airman was apparently able to walk out with troves of top- secret U.S. intelligence documents.

CNN's Alex Marquardt here with new reporting.

This has been a question throughout, how did he gain access to these documents, how did he get them off the base?

ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Yes, so, Jim, we spoke with a number of current and former officials, who worked both at this base, which is called OTIS, and in similar facilities. OTIS has a 24/7 intelligence operation.

The fact is, we are told by these sources, that it is obviously very difficult to get on to the base. It is very difficult to get the kinds of clearances that you need to access this kind of information.

But once you do have that access, once you do have those clearances, we are told, it is actually quite difficult to stop someone who is determined to get this kind of stuff out.

That there are, indeed, vulnerabilities that can be studied by someone who has this kind of access.

So this is Jack Teixeira, the 21-year-old airman first class, who posted documents online. And he likely had access to a system called JWICS, which is the Joint Worldwide Intelligence Communication System.

As you know, Jim, this is a system that the Pentagon uses to disseminate a lot of its intelligence to military officials and military installations all around the world.

He likely worked in what is known as a SCIF, a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility, where you are not allowed to go in with your iPhone, you're not allowed to go in with your watch.

I am told by a former officer, who worked there in the years after 9/11, that this base operated under good hygiene rules. They didn't leave stuff lying around. They -- if stuff was out of place, it would then get put where it needed to be or it would eventually get shredded.

And I'm told that there was repeated training, not just annual, but several times a year, to tell people, to teach people, especially younger enlisted troops, how this information should be managed, what to do, what not to do.

[14:50:09]

SCIUTTO: But training is one thing, but oversight is the other one here. Because the fact is he was quite young, quite a low rank, who still had enormous access. And they clearly didn't have protocols in place to be able to monitor this as it was happening.

MARQUARDT: And we believe now that this was someone who was determined to get this stuff and show it to his buddies online.

I'm told that training was very simple, very easy to understand. But that does speak to how determined he was. And this officer I spoke with summed it up as a "monumental lack of judgment" on Teixeira's part.

SCIUTTO: Which is a consistent message we've heard from the Pentagon, basically put it all on him. But the fact this has happened before raises real questions about oversight to prevent the next one.

(CROSSTALK)

SCIUTTO: You could say the same thing about Snowden, Manning and now Teixeira,

One thing notable about this is -- is what they revealed about China's progress in space. And one of them -- and by the way, the Pentagon has been aware of this for some time, but the numbers keep charting up.

China's building a heck of a lot of satellites and deploying them and getting ahead of the U.S. in some categories.

MARQUARDT: That's absolutely right. Some of the documents that were leaked that "The Washington Post" obtained, which we have not seen or verified, do show how China continues on this march to space dominance.

They do want to be the country that leads the world in space. And at the same time, Russia has been on the decline for quite some time. Russia, of course, historically, a real space power.

The Chinese have some 700 satellites operating in space. And there are some 250. So more than a third of them are for what's called IRS, Intelligence, Reconnaissance and Surveillance.

According to the U.S. assessment that was obtained by "The Washington Post," of course, these capabilities by the Chinese would be used in a future conflict with Taiwan for intercepting communications, for surveillance.

And the Chinese, on the other hand, could prevent the types of satellites and space assets that they are facing.

Jim, as you know well, the Chinese have developed grappling satellites.

(CROSSTALK)

SCIUTTO: They nicknamed them Kidnapper Satellites. They call them maintenance satellites. That's what the Chinese say they're really for.

But what the U.S. is concerned about is that a maintenance satellite, with this little arm here like a robot arm, could also pluck U.S. satellites out of orbit. And it effects blinds, U.S. warships, weapons, airplanes, cruise missiles.

MARQUARDT: And speaking of blinding, lasers that can be used to dazzle U.S. and other allied satellites.

So China very much building up those systems, whereas the U.S. has determined, according to this one assessment at least, that since 2020, for various reasons, Russia's space program has very much been in decline.

SCIUTTO: Listen, what happens with these leaks is every other day, you learn something more. Which is not just stuff that should be kept secret, but it also shows the level of concern about China, Taiwan, Ukraine, you name it.

MARQUARDT: Right. It really does add a lot more to what we already understood about these trajectories.

SCIUTTO: And great reporting about what they learned about how the stuff got out of that base.

Alex Marquardt, thanks so much.

Boris?

SANCHEZ: We want to focus now on the tense political drama playing out in Montana. The Republican-led State House there is set to consider disciplinary action next hour against Democratic member, Zooey Zephyr. She is the state's only transgender lawmaker.

Remember, her Republican colleagues have refused to let her speak until she apologizes for comments she made during a House debate on gender-affirming care.

That standoff led to the video you just saw, heated protests and arrests on Monday as her supporters chanted "let her speak" inside the capitol.

CNN's Lucy Kafanov is in Denver with more on this.

Lucy, this disciplinary action, how far might lawmakers go?

LUCY KAFANOV, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Boris, after those heated protests and arrests on Monday and the abrupt cancellation of Tuesday's session, we are expecting lawmakers to reconvene in less than 10 minutes now to consider, among other things, whether Representative Zooey Zephyr should be disciplined.

This isn't confirmed, but I am hearing from some sources that the motion is likely to block the freshman lawmaker from the floor. So she'd be voting effectively remotely the rest of the session if this motion passes.

Republicans do have a majority there.

She did tweet last night that this could ultimately lead to her being either censured or expelled. She added she was informed she would, in fact, get a chance to speak on the floor today.

The session is closed to the public. Perhaps, to avoid a repeat of the protests we saw in the gallery on Monday, but it will be streamed online.

I'm also hearing from folks in Montana that the rest of the legislative session will remain closed to the public.

[14:55:00]

The Republican House speaker went on -- did a short press conference yesterday where he said the vote will center on whether she violated rules of the body.

The reality, of course, is that the Democrat has not been recognized to speak on the State House floor since she declared on April 18th that legislators who voted in favor of the ban on gender-affirming care there would have, quote, "blood on your hands."

And keep in mind, Boris, that studies have consistently shown alarming rates of suicides among transgendered teens, which was what she was nodding to in her comments -- Boris?

SANCHEZ: Yes, that was the point of her statement.

Lucy Kafanov, from Denver, thank you so much.

Jim?

SCIUTTO: Well, a new development in the feud between Florida's governor and the happiest place on earth. Walt Disney Parks and Resorts is now suing Ron DeSantis in federal court. How the governor's office is responding. All this, next on CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

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