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Trump Aide Walt Nauta's Arraignment Rescheduled for July 6; CNN Obtains Audio of Trump Discussing Classified Documents; Supreme Court Weighs in on Dispute Over Power of State Legislatures in Elections. Aired 10-10:30a ET

Aired June 27, 2023 - 10:00   ET

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

[10:00:03]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: But if that's the case, why haven't we seen it?

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: It is decision day at the Supreme Court. Any moment now, the justices could hand down rulings on several major cases. We're following all of these stories right here on CNN News Central.

SIDNER: This just into CNN, Trump aide Walt Nauta's arraignment in a federal court has been postponed. It had been scheduled to take part today at 9:45. He was set to be arraigned on six felony charges today. CNN saw his lawyer arrive at the court last hour.

Nauta is facing several charges, including conspiracy to obstruct justice and several counts of mishandling classified documents. The case, of course, is connected to former President Donald Trump's handling of classified material.

Nauta is charged alongside Trump, and the Justice Department says it has surveillance video of Nauta moving boxes with those classified documents around Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort.

All of this comes as CNN has obtained exclusive new audio of the former president discussing some of those very documents. We'll have much more on that in just a moment.

But we begin with CNN's Senior Crime and Justice Reporter Katelyn Polantz, who is outside that Miami court. Katelyn, you were there for when both of -- Donald Trump was arraigned. We were expecting this morning for Walt Nauta to be arraigned, but that did not happen. Does that come as a surprise?

KATELYN POLANTZ, CNN SENIOR CRIME AND JUSTICE REPORTER: It is a surprise. It's a twist that makes it a full month following the indictment of Donald Trump and Walt Nauta, where Walt Nauta will not yet be entering his initial pleading of not guilty. That's because he couldn't get a flight to get him into Miami in time.

His attorney told the judge this morning that Walt Nauta wasn't there because he spent eight hours on the airport tarmac and then wasn't able to get a flight in this morning to make it in time for this arraignment so that he could enter that plea.

And so what the judge did is he said, well, we're going to have another hearing on July 6, so next Thursday, that's when his arraignment is set. Nauta actually is not going to have to be here in person for that but there is still this delay for this because he also still doesn't have a lawyer in the state of Florida to help his lawyer, Stanley Woodward, the lawyer that's been representing him throughout this investigation, take on this case. He has to have a lawyer in Florida, and they didn't have one today either, just like they didn't have two weeks ago when Nauta first appeared next to Donald Trump for Donald Trump's own arraignment.

So, a lot of hitches are coming up already putting this a full month out from the date of the indictment for Walt Nauta finally to start the beginning of this case formally by entering that plea.

SIDNER: Yes, it's an interesting wrinkle. One, he does not have a Florida attorney, and, two, he couldn't make it to court today. So, that has been rescheduled. Thank you so much, Katelyn Polantz, for following this story for us. Kate?

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Donald Trump is back on the campaign trail today just after CNN obtains this audio of what he said in his own words during that 2021 meeting in Bedminster, audio that undercuts his claims that he did not keep classified documents after leaving the White House.

On the recording, you can hear Trump discussing highly secret documents and then saying that he knows that he has not declassified them. Listen to just a bit.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: I think we can probably, right?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don't know. We'll have to see. Yes, we'll have to try to figure out a --

TRUMP: Declassify it.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.

TRUMP: See, as president, I could have declassified it. Now, I can't. But this is classified.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: CNN's Paula Reid has more on this from Washington for us. Paula, what are we learning? What do you pick up and what do you hear from this tape?

PAULA REID, CNN SENIOR LEGAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Kate, finally, thanks to the CNN scoop, everyone in the world can hear Trump in his own words, claiming to still be in possession of secret documents. One of the things that really sticks out here are the atmospherics, this is a very casual conversation. People were laughing. Someone can be heard kind of egging him on. The former president calls for sodas at the end of this recording.

But, again, this is one of the most significant pieces of evidence that the special counsel has and I'm going to let folks listen to Trump in his own words, discuss what exactly he's trying to achieve here. Let's take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TRUMP: These are bad sick people.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That was your coup, you know, against you. That --

TRUMP: Well, it started right at the --

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Like when Milley is talking about, oh, you were going to try to do a coup. No, they were trying to do that before you even were sworn in.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That's right.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Trying to overthrow your election.

TRUMP: Well, with Milley, let me see that, I'll show you an example. He said that I wanted to attack Iran.

[10:00:00]

Isn't it amazing? I have a big pile of papers, this thing just came up. Look. This was him. They presented me this, this is off the record, but they presented me this. This was him. This was the Defense Department and him.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Wow.

TRUMP: We looked at some. This was him. This wasn't done by me. This was him. All sorts of stuff, pages long, look. Wait a minute, let's see here.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh my gosh.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.

TRUMP: I just found, isn't that amazing? This totally wins my case, you know. Except it is like, highly confidential, secret --

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.

TRUMP: This is secret information. But look, look at this.

(END VIDEOTAPE) REID: Now, Kate, in recent days, the former president told Fox News's Brett Baier that he didn't actually have any document there, that he just had a pile of articles and papers.

But among the new details in the CNN recording that have not been included in our previous reporting or even the indictment, the fact that the former president said, these are the papers, you can hear him there shuffling papers, trying to get people to look at whatever he has, sort of seeking their affirmation that they agree that this, quote, helps him win his case.

And, Kate, I also want to emphasize he knew he was being recorded. His own aides were recording this conversation because after he left office, he was in the habit of having his staffers record any conversations with journalists or members of the media, the other two people in that meeting working on a book about Mark Meadows.

BOLDUAN: Is it clear what this will mean for this case going forward?

REID: It's so significant when you because it's a reminder that investigators have talked to the other people in that room. So, they likely know what exactly they saw with their own eyes that day in that room. It's unclear if investigators have the document that he alleges to have there, but they are familiar with it. We've also reported that investigators have spoken with Mark Milley.

So, this is definitely the most significant piece of evidence. But, once again, CNN's reporting undercuts the former president's claims that he has done nothing wrong. And it really speaks to the strength of the evidence that prosecutors have in this case. And, again, it's just so astonishing how casual this conversation is about national security secrets when the former president was well aware that he was being recorded.

BOLDUAN: People can hear for themselves, as you say. It's great to see you, Paula. Thank you for that. John?

BERMAN: All right. With us now is CNN Political Director David Chalian and CNN Senior Political Analyst Gloria Borger.

David, just talk to me about the impact of hearing Donald Trump's voice on that tape.

DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: I'm not a lawyer, John, but that doesn't sound very good to my ears for his legal case to make here. It's one thing to read a bit of this transcript in the indictment, and it's another thing to hear the shuffling of papers and hear Donald Trump speaking in this cavalier manner.

I think in terms of what the fallout is, I think you have to look at the legal separate from the political. This may present his legal team with a significant challenge and may be one of the most damning pieces of evidence prosecutors have here.

Politically, you already see in the way Donald Trump is responding. You've already seen several polls come out after the indictment that suggest Americans broadly see politics at play here. You see a significant portion of his base still rallying around him here, and I don't think that's going to change because of this audio.

BERMAN: What about that, Gloria? And to be clear, we're all here, not as lawyers, you two as both political analysts, me as a political junkie. But, politically speaking, you now have this voice on tape saying these things, I imagine Chris Christie night talk about it. I could see an Asa Hutchison talking about it. But as you're looking at the full slate of Republican candidates, why not Mike Pence? Why won't he say, hey, now, I've listened to this?

GLORIA BORGER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: And maybe Nikki Haley will talk about it a little bit because she has talked about the carelessness and the recklessness. And what really comes through, and I think this is what Paula was alluding to, is how reckless he was with these documents, saying, oh, this is cool. Look at what I just discovered. I proved my point.

His point was that he wasn't calling for war in Iran, that it was the Defense Department. And we know that the Defense Department always gives the president a list of options in case of certain circumstances. So, that was all he cared about it. So, it's the recklessness. It's the obsequiousness of the people who were with him laughing about this, him saying, well, this is classified, this is secret, saying that out loud.

[10:10:00]

I think that it sort of changes the wallpaper here in a way.

And I think that some of the other Republican candidates may dip their toes in the water a little bit more about the way a former president of the United States talked about top secret, classified information to people who had absolutely no right to hear it.

BERMAN: Yes, I guess it's that wallpaper where things get the most interesting, that what Gloria is talking about there, the background of this campaign. It's not just people on the campaign trail. It's Republicans in Congress and whatnot, David.

I know there are Republican debates coming up where Donald Trump is not going, at least to the first debate. We don't expect him to. I just am fascinated by the notion of how the other candidates deal with that elephant not in the room there.

CHALIAN: It's such a good question, John. I mean, if indeed Donald Trump is not on the debate stage, that first one coming up in August in Wisconsin, it's going to be an opportunity, of course, for Republican primary voters to take stock of those seeking to be the Trump alternative without the distraction of sort of the Trump antics on the debate stage.

So, that could be a really golden opportunity for those running not named Trump. Because we see in the polling there is an opening here. There is a real opening for a non-Trump candidate. It's not one we've seen any candidate exploit yet, but that opening does exist. I would just note, though, John, as you talk about how they talk about this, our most recent poll asked Republican and Republican leaners whether or not they wanted other candidates and the primary to talk about take a stand against what Trump did in this classified documents case, or do they want them to stay quiet on the matter, or do they just want to hear them rail against the Justice Department. And even if you look at the Republican portion of the electorate not supporting Trump, the majority of them just want the candidates to be quiet on this matter.

BERMAN: It is interesting. I mean, voters generally tell you when you ask them that they want you talking about me, right? I want you to talk about the issues that matter to me and how things affect my life.

Gloria, Ron DeSantis, I mean, he and Donald Trump are both in New Hampshire today, and, obviously, both of them, to a certain extent, are treating this as a two-person race. It is fascinating and will be a challenge for Ron DeSantis on how he continues to talk or not talk about Donald Trump, and this audio tape just adds to that.

BORGER: Ron DeSantis has to start paying a little bit of attention to Donald Trump. I mean, he did say that he would have been court martialed if he had handled documents the way Donald Trump handled documents.

But if you're going to go after somebody in a race, you have to go after somebody. You have to define yourself. You have to define your differences with that person. I think he's done it on a host of issues, but not as directly as I think he probably needs to,because he's way behind in the polls and he needs to give people a reason that they ought to reject Donald Trump, because that's what this is about right now, not only accepting him, but rejecting the frontrunner who is a frontrunner by double-digit.

BERMAN: Gloria, David, I'm going to stop this conversation quickly here because there has been a Supreme Court decision. It actually gets to politics. It has to do with the Moore versus Harper case, which is the independent state legislature theory case.

Who are we going to go to here, guys?

Let's go to Laura Coates, Laura Coates. Laura Coates is in Washington. Laura, why don't you tell me what this case, broadly speaking, is about?

LAURA COATES, CNN CHIEF LEGAL ANALYST: So normally a state is the one that's going to be in control of the manner of its elections, how they're actually going to be performed. But there is going to be the checks and balances we know we need to have in democracy, where you have the approval of, say, just districts or potentially gerrymandered districts as well, ways of looking to figure out whether you can put a check or balance on what a state legislature wants to do with respect to their elections.

The big question here in this phrase you've used, independent state legislature theory, is one that was really a fringe argument not too many years ago, now center stage before the Supreme Court of the United States, it essentially says, listen, we can't be touched. The independent state legislature does not have the checks and balances. We decide and have the buck stop there as to what we'd like to do.

The problem for that, of course, is that it can lead to an unchecked districting map, the inability for a court or other entity to look at what's being done and balance whether it's in fact constitutional.

This theory has been a topic of conversation for a very long time, particularly as our elections begin to be all the more heated in terms of the rhetoric and conversations about the equal access to the polls, how they can draw a district in such a way that gives people the one person, one vote standard.

[10:15:02]

And can there be a court or other entity that looks at it and says, hold on, this is actually passing constitutional muster, or it's not.

This primarily revolves around North Carolina, which I remind people not too long ago, the courts there said that there had been a surgical precision of sorts in trying to use gerrymander districts or try to undermine one's ability under the Voting Rights Act of 1965 to be able to have that equal access to the polls and the one person, one vote, and having opportunity to vote for a candidate of your choosing.

Back at the Supreme Court is even grappling with this issue right now is stunning to many people. As I mentioned, it had been a fringe theory for a very long time because we all accepted the practice that you have a check and balance and we want to be able to have the court view with some level of scrutiny, whether for issues of suspect classifications like race, like gender, lesser issues in terms of partisanship and beyond, about what can actually be done.

And so as we're looking at the Supreme Court's decision, and it's coming in, and we're combing through it to give the full breadth of what they have decided, know that this is going to have an extraordinary consequence going forward for jurisdictions all across the country who are preparing, what, 496 days now away from the 2024 presidential election, the manner in which we have elections, how they're carried out, and who can actually serve as a check and balance.

This also comes, John, on the heels of now more than one case before the Supreme Court where the Supreme Court has surprised many voting rights activists who believe that the court would continue to chip away at the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Section 5, of course, had been gutted several years ago. That was the formula that you would use to decide which jurisdictions in the past, had a history discrimination, and ought to have a preclearance from the government on these issues, then the districting and places like Alabama and beyond. Now, we've got the decision on this theory as well.

BOLDUAN: All right. Stand by for us, Laura Coates. Let's get over to Jessica Schneider. She's been our point in combing through this very lengthy decision. I was trying to scrolling through it myself.

Jessica, what did the justices decide here written by the chief justice?

JESSICA SCHNEIDER, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Yes. The big takeaway here is that the Supreme Court is rejecting this broad independent state legislature theory. This is a theory that was pushed by backers of President Trump in the 2020 election to overturn the 2020 election results. So, the Supreme Court here rejecting that broad interpretation of this theory.

So, to take you back, this was a dispute involving election maps in North Carolina. The North Carolina State Supreme Court several years ago stepped in rejecting the maps, and then challengers to that brought this all the way to the Supreme Court saying, look, per the Constitution, it's only the state legislature that really has say over all things elections, including the drawing of election and voting maps. The state court should have really no say. There's a clause in the Constitution that says that state legislatures should prescribe the time, manner and place of elections. And Trump backers in particular interpreted that to mean that partisan state lawmakers had final say over elections.

But the Supreme Court today rejecting that broad theory. This is a 6-3 decision written by the chief justice, John Roberts. The Supreme Court really wanted to weigh in on this before any future elections coming up in just about a year-and-a-half, because of the real chaos that adopting a theory like this or even letting this theory linger and not having any final say by the Supreme Court could potentially cause.

There was some question as to whether the Supreme Court would actually issue a decision here, because after the Supreme Court heard this case, the North Carolina Supreme Court actually changed its makeup. It became majority Republican. They actually reheard this case. So, the question was, was the U.S. Supreme Court going to weigh in on this? And the fact is that, yes, they have weighted on this today, rejecting that independent state legislature theory in its broad sense, again, a theory that was backed by people who supported President Trump, former President Trump, and supported overthrowing the 2020 election.

So, it remains in place, guys, that it's not just state legislatures who have a say in federal elections. State courts can also weigh in when some of these state legislatures are passing rules when it comes to elections, when they're doing voting maps. So, state legislatures that are partisan can still be checked by state courts. That is the takeaway from today's ruling from the Supreme Court, guys.

SIDNER: All right. Thank you so much, Jessica Schneider, for explaining what the decision is.

Let's go back to Laura Coates now. When it comes to the states going to the Supreme Court, we've seen this now time and again, the states trying to overturn and take control, the legislators trying to take control of things where there's already a Constitution in place.

[10:20:12] What does this say about where the court stands when it comes to things like redistricting and voting rights?

COATES: Well, they're far more perhaps active than people thought that they might be. We want to have these separate branches of government, the judiciary included, and not going into one another's lanes.

Remember, if we go back to the framers of the Constitution, there was an extraordinary amount of distrust for state legislative bodies because they wanted to ensure that they actually had a system of checks and balances going forward. But this if they had accepted the independence legislature theory, it would have meant that there was no real judicial recourse or remedy available to voters, available to the electorate in the immediate sense.

Think about what happens on Election Day. I've monitored a number of elections in my work as a voting rights attorney for the Department of Justice. There is no quick response that can be done for those who feel as though they have been disenfranchised. You must be able to go to the courts, for example, on the day of the election and try to get some type of redress of your grievances.

In other instances, you used to have a preclearance requirement or some way for the DOJ to act as more than a backstop, but actually proactive. But when it comes to federal elections, if they had viewed this as the courts having no role in providing either a reprieve, recourse or a remedy, it would have left voters in that chaotic state that Jessica mentioned and legislatures having come with wide rules now about what to do in place of it.

So, when the Supreme Court took this case, they had recently talked about it or hinted around it as early as 2019, now finally deciding this issue at the core principle, think about where we are in terms of our elections.

The courts are very keenly aware that every step they take with respect to voting will have a very quick impact on how elections are structured going forward. We are 400-plus days away from a presidential election at this point in time, the primary season and beyond. They do not want to interfere with the otherwise normal governance of these different rules. But this would have really subverted all of that. It would have said there is no ability for a court to serve as a check and balance against things that otherwise you could go to the courts to address in a holistic way.

In many respects, this is in line now with what the court has done now several times in the last few weeks, which is to focus on the ability of the districting maps, to serve as a bedrock for our democracy, to serve as an opportunity for people to have representation, to not have a state legislature or otherwise try to draw lines of a map in such a way that it undermines someone's ability to have that equal access to vote for a candidate of their choosing, not necessarily the winner, but opportunity to vote for a candidate of their choosing.

With the independent state legislature theory, it would have essentially said, no matter how much these maps are drawn in a way that runs counter to the Constitution or maybe even the framers of our Constitution, which we know, spoiler alert, did not contemplate a fully equitable system, this would have run counter. This is a way of preserving a status quo that's helpful to navigating our elections.

BERMAN: Yes. In a lot of ways this is about the floodgates that are not opening here in terms of U.S. elections, which, as we all know, actually held in states, state by state with the legislatures and now the state courts also playing a role there.

Just so people know, it was a 6-3 decision with Chief Justice Roberts, Justice Kavanaugh and Justice Barrett siding with the so called liberal judges. So, you have a somewhat broad coalition here of the Supreme Court saying, you know what, we feel like we want to perhaps limit the possible partisanship in elections going forward.

To that end, I want to bring in our political director again, David Chalian, back with us. He was there when the news broke, back again right now.

David, look, all of this matters so much more after what happened in 2020, when there was an effort by Donald Trump to basically overturn the result of an election. And one of the avenues that was explored or discussed was going to the legislatures, going to these legislatures. And we've seen state legislatures around the country split to their partisan ends of the room here. And this decision does not give those legislatures the power that they might have had otherwise. What do you see here?

CHALIAN: Yes, John. You said the floodgates are not opening here, but we all remember how much water pressure was being applied by Donald Trump to those gates in 2020. And real concerns about if he is the nominee in '24, if he does lose that election, what more would he be willing to try to do or allies of his in power, in state governments be trying to do to push those gates open?

[10:25:02]

The Supreme Court ruling here is saying, not so fast with this theory, that independent state legislature theory.

And you're right, this was at the core of the efforts to overturn the election. Remember, we talked a lot about state legislatures sending in alternate slates of electors. You remember what Donald Trump was so angry with his Vice President Mike Pence about that he riled up a crowd that ended up cheering, hang Mike Pence, on the steps of the Capitol on January 6th. It was about Mike Pence not following through with this unconstitutional theory that was being sold to Trump by John Eastman and others that we have learned so much about, because Trump was saying, Mike, just send it back to the states.

Well, what the Supreme Court is saying here is the state legislatures do not have this supreme and total authority. It's sort of like a reminder about how checks and balances work. And while, yes, as we heard from Jessica and Laura, this case may have initially been about the drawing of congressional maps in North Carolina, and you know that the Supreme Court has already sort of said partisan gerrymandering is okay from a federal perspective.

But here, they are saying, but state courts have a judicial review capacity here on the state legislatures as it relates to elections, that the legislature is not some unfettered authority here. And that does perhaps put up a roadblock to future attempts to try and skirt these constitutional norms about how our leaders are elected.

BOLDUAN: You really put it together very well, David, in helping everyone understand, which when you go through this decision, there are so many words in here that I don't even know. It's actually pretty impressive. But the way you put it, David, really brings it home and what the true impact is of this decision.

There were three dissents, Elie Honig --

CHALIAN: One other note, Kate, can I -- sorry.

BOLDUAN: Yes, David, go.

CHALIAN: I just want to mention one other thing here. You noted all the six justices who were in the majority here who joined with the chief. Notice that Justice Thomas, Clarence Thomas, dissents here. Now, he doesn't even think that the court really should have ruled in this case given that the North Carolina Supreme Court readjusted here. But remember his wife's role in supporting some of these theories to overturn the election. His dissent here is going to get political attention as well.

BOLDUAN: That is exactly what I was actually going to lead to, is in the three dissenting voices in this, Elie, are Justices Thomas, Alito, and Gorsuch. And I'm looking at a little bit of what Thomas wrote in the dissent. He writes to say that he would have dismissed the case as improvidently granted in light of the recent state Supreme Court decision, quote, this is a straightforward case of mootness. What are they trying to say there?

ELIE HONIG, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: So, the argument that Justice Thomas is making here is we never should have even considered this, because between the time that the legal challenge was brought to the map in North Carolina and now, the legislature has flipped and it's no longer an issue, it's no longer being challenged. This is sort of an off ramp that Supreme Court justices look for sometimes if they want to avoid --

BOLDUAN: Right, we don't want to deal with it. I don't have an opinion on that.

HONIG: Yes. And I think, but the majority, which included both liberals and conservatives, said, no, we are taking on this issue. And if the outcome had been the opposite of this, it would have been cataclysmic. It would have changed everything about the way we vote. Because, look, the Constitution says it's up to state legislatures to determine time, place and manner of voting. It doesn't actually say courts.

And so the argument, and this started as a sort of fringey law school academic theory a couple of decades ago, well, state legislatures means they can do whatever they want, courts can't do anything about it. If that had been the ruling here, it would have absolutely thrown us into chaos.

And I think it's important to note this is now the second time in two weeks that we've seen at least two conservative justices, Chief Justice Roberts, and in both cases, Kavanaugh, and in this case joined by Amy Coney Barrett, come down in favor of preserving voting rights. So, maybe the court is not quite as partisan as we sometimes say, not on all issues.

BOLDUAN: I keep thinking of the word, guardrails, just showing that they're somewhat, when it comes to voting and elections, this is showing that guardrails are still there.

HONIG: It's a status quo.

SIDNER: Correct? I mean, basically, they have stayed with what we are used to when it comes to --

HONIG: Yes, it's the status quo in such an important way, because the challenge here would have demolished those guardrails. And, really, this is a victory for process, for judicial review, maybe not surprising to hear the U.S. Supreme Court say state Supreme Courts still get their say, too.

SIDNER: I want to go now to Laura Coates. Elie touched on this. This is a six to three opinion. This is not five to four. It is not close. What does that tell us about this decision by the court and how strongly they feel about keeping this as a status quo?

COATES: Well, it sounds like a victory in terms of this issue not being taken up by the Supreme Court yet again.

[10:30:04]

Normally, when you have a decisive ruling like this, obviously, it's not unanimous.