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Georgia Election Probe Continues; President Biden Attends NATO Summit. Aired 11-11:30a ET

Aired July 11, 2023 - 11:00   ET

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

[11:00:02]

SARA SIDNER, CNN HOST: Any moment now, President Biden will sit down with his Turkish counterpart for a critical meeting at the NATO summit, this as the U.S. and its allies score a major international win. We are live in Lithuania with the very latest.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN HOST: All eyes are also on a Georgia courtroom. Today, criminal prosecutors in Atlanta are selecting and seating a grand jury to answer the critical question, will former President Donald Trump be indicted again? The very latest from Georgia.

SIDNER: And floodwaters still rising, causing dangerous conditions in Vermont. At least three radio towers used to dispatch fire and ambulances are down, travel ban now in effect for downtown Montpelier. That has just been extended.

I'm Sara Sidner with Kate Bolduan. This is CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

Happening this hour, President Biden will meet one-on-one with Turkish President Recep Erdogan at the NATO summit in Lithuania. It comes on the heels of a major development for the president and U.S. allies. Just before the start of the summit, Turkey dropped its opposition to Sweden's membership to NATO, meaning very soon there will be 32 members of the NATO alliance.

Also this hour, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy will speak at the summit. He has just arrived in Lithuania this morning. He is expected to appeal to the alliance to make Ukraine's path to NATO membership a key priority now. President Zelenskyy and Biden are also scheduled to meet, but that will happen tomorrow.

CNN national security reporter Natasha Bertrand is following all of this from Vilnius Square in Lithuania.

Natasha, what is the White House hoping to achieve at this moment? You have already seen what happened with Sweden, but Zelenskyy is pushing hard to try and get a pathway to join NATO.

NATASHA BERTRAND, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY REPORTER: Yes, Sara, so the big objective for the White House really was to keep NATO together, right, to show the world that NATO remains united, especially show Vladimir Putin that NATO remains united. But there are some fractures emerging over that question of Ukraine's

membership in NATO, something that President Zelenskyy highlighted this morning in a really scathing tweet, saying that it is his understanding that NATO has been having discussions about Ukraine's membership without actually having representatives of Ukraine as part of those talks.

And so he's very angry that there does not seem to be a concrete timeline as of right now for Ukraine's membership or whether they will even get an automatic invitation to NATO once this war ends. President Biden over the weekend told Fareed Zakaria that it does appear that NATO -- or that Ukraine is not yet ready.

So that raises the question of, will there be other conditions that Ukraine is going to need to fulfill before it can actually become a member of the alliance? Then there's the question, of course, of how is this incentivizing Vladimir Putin? Because if NATO is telling Ukraine that they can only become a member after the war ends, does that not incentivize Putin to maintain the war for as long as possible?

So these are all major questions that the alliance is grappling with. And, of course, there is going to be that meeting between President Biden and President Erdogan today on the separate major topic of Sweden's accession to NATO, a kind of surprise announcement that we got last night from Turkish President Erdogan, who finally agreed to move that accession for Sweden forward.

So, a lot on the agenda, but the big thing that we're expecting is that communique that will be released tomorrow by all of the NATO allies outlining just where Ukraine stands on its path to membership, Sara.

SIDNER: Yes, we're looking at pictures from this morning from Vilnius, Lithuania, and everyone really the belle of the ball after this decision that he reversed on Sweden.

Appreciate you. Thank you so much, Natasha Bertrand, for your reporting there in Vilnius -- Kate.

BOLDUAN: Let's talk more about Turkey's course reversal, real reversal and surprise move overnight, suddenly announcing that it will no longer be standing in the way of Sweden's membership to NATO.

NATO's chief, the secretary-general, praising the development, saying that it will strengthen the alliance, especially in the light -- in light of the war in Ukraine.

CNN's Nic Robertson, he's joining us now from London for more on this.

And, Nic, you and I have talked many times about, well, first, it was Turkeys questions and standing in the way of Finland joining the alliance. And now we're talking about Sweden. What was the -- what was it, a year that they -- that Turkey stood in the way of Sweden's membership and their -- and them joining the alliance?

What do you see in the surprise move overnight, then?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Yes.

And I think, when you said it there, we have talked about this so many times before. Erdogan has got form on this. He comes into a situation where he has leverage, because every NATO nation needs to agree on everything. So he has leverage whether or not Sweden can join. Then he used that leverage, and he used it very overtly.

And it appears as if he got what he wanted, or some of what he wanted, at least, on the F-16 fighter aircraft from the United States, but he got a lot -- he got a lot from Sweden as well. Sweden has had to commit to crack down on groups that Turkey calls terrorist groups. It's changed its Constitution. It's changed its law. It's agreed to crack down on some additional groups that weren't in Turkey's first list -- listing.

[11:05:18]

It's agreed to help Turkey economically, to improve economic relations. It's agreed to help Turkey get into the European Union. That's not going to happen anytime soon. But these are all commitments that Sweden's made that President Erdogan wanted. And, look, it's brinksmanship, isn't it?

He saves it all up right to the last minute. He gets there in the room with Sweden's prime minister and Jens Stoltenberg yesterday. The deal -- then the deals done. I mean, that's just telling you there's a lot of choreography that's gone on in the background. And Erdogan gets the maximum he could possibly get out of it.

BOLDUAN: Absolutely. But it is still a big -- I mean, it is a big moment, though. This will be now 32 members of the alliance with Sweden joining. It's quite a moment to for them all to be marking.

So, we're going to be hearing from the -- from President Biden and from the Turkish president very soon. Thanks so much, Nick -- Sara.

SIDNER: All right, we're going to keep this conversation going.

Joining us now is John Herbst, senior director at The Atlantic Council's Eurasia Center, and, of course, the former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine.

Ambassador, thank you so much for joining us.

I do want to speak quickly to Zelenskyy. He has come out blasting NATO allies, while asking for membership again. And here's what he says.

He says: "It's unprecedented and absurd when time frame is not set, neither for the invitation, nor for Ukraine's membership."

Do you agree with him?

JOHN HERBST, FORMER U.S. AMBASSADOR TO UKRAINE: I think he has a very good point. And, in fact, it's not just me who disagrees with them. That's not

very important. But, probably, the largest majority of our NATO allies think that the communique language on the subject, which is still not published, because they haven't reached agreement yet, is quite weak.

And that's principally because of Washington's position.

SIDNER: I want to ask you. Washington position -- we heard from Biden. Biden has basically said, look, we cannot do this while Ukraine is at war with Russia.

Is that something that makes a lot of sense, because it would draw NATO into this war?

HERBST: It need not draw NATO into this war.

In fact, if we had offered Ukraine admission to NATO, Russia probably would never have attacked Ukraine. And we can make a decision now on what needs to be done, when it needs to be done for Ukraine to have admission when the war is over and now would take account of this.

SIDNER: I want to now ask you about Turkey. There is about to be a meeting coming up between President Biden and Recep Erdogan, the president of Turkey.

What do you think precipitated this about-face? I mean, for a year, there have been battles to try to get him to stop blocking Sweden's entrance into NATO.

HERBST: Erdogan, once he saw Sweden's interest, was taking Sweden to the bazaar. And he was looking to get as many advantages as he could forgiving the agreement he ultimately was going to give.

So he made Sweden sweat. He made Sweden made additional commitments. He may have finally got an agreement for the United States to send those F-16s. And he's come on come back with a nice package of on if Sweden gets in. I think that's what's happened.

You -- I would credit the White House, though, for getting this result in time for the summit.

SIDNER: Russia has responded to this, basically saying, hey, Turkey, you're becoming an unfriendly country.

Does Turkey's about-face really put more pressure on Vladimir Putin as this war rages on?

HERBST: There's no question that Putin's big invasion of Ukraine has been a strategic disaster for Russia and for Putin and his regime.

And Sweden, along with Finland, joining NATO is the biggest example of that, not the only one. But Putin has been courting Turkey for almost 20 years. And he's had some success. So, while Erdogan not only agreed to Sweden joining NATO, but agreed to send back to Ukraine and the Azov fighters who Russia had captured and then released to Turkey, was -- were gifts to Ukraine. At least, the second was a gift to Ukraine. The first was gift to NATO. But, at the same time, Turkey is helping Putin avoid Western sanctions. So, Putin still has reasons to treat Erdogan with kid gloves.

SIDNER: I want to ask you about the summit happening just a few hundred miles from where the fighting is happening in Ukraine.

What does this all mean for the war? Why is it so important that both Sweden and Finland have now joined this alliance or are about to join this alliance?

[11:10:05]

HERBST: It's important for two reasons. These are two countries which have been meticulously neutral for many decades. The fact they want to join NATO demonstrates that Putin's foreign policy is extremely dangerous for all of its neighbors, which is why it's critical, critical for American national security interests that Putin loses in Ukraine.

That's reason one why this is important. Reason two is that these are countries with excellent militaries. They enhance NATO's strength in the north, and they create additional security problems for an aggressive Russian regime. And since Russia is aggressive, it's important they have these additional security concerns.

SIDNER: Ambassador John Herbst, thank you so much for your in-depth analysis of all that's going on.

HERBST: My pleasure. Thank you.

SIDNER: There's so many threads here.

And, again, we are right now waiting for President Biden and President -- Turkish President Erdogan to meet in person at the NATO summit -- Kate.

BOLDUAN: Also coming up for us, a new grand jury to be seated any moment, as the 2020 election interference case against Donald Trump and his allies in Georgia moves closer to the announcement of potential charges.

Plus, severe flooding has shut down downtown -- the downtown area of Vermont's capital city this morning. We have crews on the ground with the latest on this catastrophic and torrential rain and flooding.

And there is a new twist in the Bud Light culture wars, as sales slip for a second month in a row.

We will be back.

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[11:16:14] BOLDUAN: Happening right now in Atlanta, Georgia, a new grand jury is being selected in the investigation into former President Trump's attempts to overturn the 2020 election results in Georgia. The men and women chosen today will ultimately have the power to indict Donald Trump and/or others on charges.

Here's what's key to understand for today and going forward; 23 grand jurors and three alternates are to be selected. To secure charges in this investigation, at least 16 of the 23 voting grand jury members would need to be present, and then at least 12 jurors would need to agree on a charge -- on charges in order to hand over an indictment.

CNN's Sara Murray, she's following all of this for us and has been from the brutal beginning of it all.

Sara, can you walk us through what is going to happen today? I mean, it is a critical day in seating the grand jury. And, also, what is at stake?

SARA MURRAY, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, perhaps an interesting day to report for jury duty, right, in Fulton County?

BOLDUAN: Yes.

MURRAY: I mean, if you are picked to be on one of these two grand juries, the odds are good that, at some point, you're going to hear this Trump case.

And again, these are the grand juries that are going to hear normal cases too in Georgia. They're going to hear murder cases. They're going to hear carjackings. And then one of the days, we expect that the district attorney's team, assuming she does seek indictments, will go in and say, now you're going to hear a different kind of case, and it'll be the Trump case.

And these are the grand juries that can actually hand up indictments. It's different from what we saw from the special grand jury that spent months and months investigating this case. That special grand jury did a lot of the investigative work. They heard from over 75 witnesses. So they heard from Trump advisers. They heard from former Trump attorneys. They heard from officials in Georgia.

And it's been very clear as that investigation progressed that there are a number of people who could face legal jeopardy as part of this probe. Of course, one of them is former President Donald Trump. But there are also people like former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, former Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani who could potentially face charges.

Again, nothing is official. Nothing has been decided. And the district attorney has suggested that August is when we could expect to see her make an announcement about who, if anyone, is going to face charges in this investigation, Kate.

BOLDUAN: All right. We're going to stand by. Stand by for that one.

Sara, thank you so much -- Sara.

SIDNER: All right, thank you, Kate.

The first hearing in the former president's classified documents case has now been rescheduled for next week. While Trump's team has agreed to the hearing's new date, they are pushing back the trial itself, hoping that that won't happen until after the election.

CNN senior legal affairs correspondent Paula Reid is joining us now.

Paula, there is no doubt these are complex issues and complex cases, lots to go over. What is Trump arguing as to why a delay is necessary?

PAULA REID, CNN SENIOR LEGAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: So, what's interesting about this most recent filing is that the legal team is previewing for us all of the challenges that they intend to file in this case.

They laid out a list of big questions, including the -- whether the special counsel has authority to bring charges like this, whether the documents were actually classified. They also raise questions about whether you can get an impartial jury ahead of the 2024 presidential election.

And those are just a few of the questions that they want to put forward. Sara, it's not clear they're going to succeed on the merits of those challenges. But they have every right to raise these questions. And this has the added benefit for them of delaying a potential trial, likely until after the 2024 election.

Now, the special counsel has made it clear, Jack Smith has said publicly he wants a speedy trial. In fact, he wants this to go to trial in December. And that's just a few months away. Given the complexity of this case, that would be speedy, indeed.

[11:20:05]

Another argument that is laid out in this most recent filing by the Trump team is the fact that it's going to take them a while to go through all this discovery. They have only gotten some of the discovery, basically, the evidence that prosecutors have. But they already have nine months of surveillance footage.

SIDNER: OK.

REID: They have hundreds of thousands of documents, including e-mails and...

(CROSSTALK)

SIDNER: All right, Paula Reid, I'm so, so sorry to interrupt you.

We have some breaking news right now. We are going to pictures right now of President Biden and the Turkish president, Recep Erdogan. This is an important meeting. And we're going to listen in now. Biden is speaking. JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: And I want to thank you

for your leadership. Mr. President.

This summit is reaffirming our commitment to NATO defense, close allies in NATO, and hope we can make it even stronger. So, welcome.

RECEP TAYYIP ERDOGAN, TURKISH PRESIDENT (through translator): Mr. President, my dear friend, I would like to, first of all, thank you for congratulating me in the aftermath of my reelection to my current post.

And I'm grateful for the congratulatory messages that you have extended to me. And within the framework of our strategic mechanism, I think it's high time for the heads of states to get together for further consultations. That's why I believe today's meeting with you within the margin of the NATO summit is the first step forward.

Our meetings prior to this were mere warmups, but now we are initiating a new process. This new process is a process of five years, and now you're getting prepared for the forthcoming elections. And with the forthcoming elections, I would like to take this opportunity to also wish you the best of luck.

BIDEN: Thank you very much.

ERDOGAN: Thank you.

BIDEN: I look forward to meeting with you in the next five years.

(LAUGHTER)

(CROSSTALK)

QUESTION: Mr. President, are you worried this proposal does not have the support of President Zelenskyy?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thank you so much, guys.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hey, guys, we're moving out. Come on. It's time to go. It's time to go. Thank you. Thank you.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thank you.

BOLDUAN: All right, so we were listening in to see if the presidents were taking the questions. They did not from the press that was standing around, though valid questions were asked, as we see now this meeting, this bilateral meeting, between President Biden and President Erdogan at this NATO summit.

Let me go -- let's go to Nic Robertson first.

A lot of thank-you and my dear friends, Nic, we have heard from the two leaders, but an important moment to see them together.

ROBERTSON: Yes.

And President Erdogan does seem to be kind of happy with where he is at on this.

I think this idea of the joke at the end where he said, we're -- this is the beginning of a new heads of state relationship, and we should we should continue this every year, and thank you for your congratulations on my election victory and good luck for yours coming up, and this could be five years, I think that kind of a joke kind of sets the tone, from Erdogan's perspective, that he got a lot of what he wanted when he was bargaining to allow Sweden to become a member of NATO.

So -- and I think that tells you a lot of what we have heard about F- 16s, a lot with what we have heard about the commitments that he has got from Sweden. But, for President Erdogan, it is an important moment because I think a lot of people are getting a sense here that Erdogan is in some way pivoting a little bit away from President Putin.

In his analysis of the insurrection in Russia, the mutiny just a couple of weeks ago, he gave back to President Zelenskyy just a couple of days ago highly valued prisoners taken by the Russians in the Azovstal steelworks. This cannot be understated.

Zelenskyy went back to Ukraine with them. These are the biggest heroes in Ukraine for that long holdout that they had last year under siege for almost -- or over a month.

[11:25:00]

So, Erdogan seems to be shading some positivity away from Russia and more towards Ukraine, its allies, the United States, potentially here. Look, he's always played a long game with Russia anyway. And he certainly is still a friend in some ways to Putin.

But this is an interesting moment. And he's sort of saying, hey, and we should make this carry on and be bigger and have these annual meetings.

SIDNER: No secret Erdogan also wants the E.U. to move forward on trying to get Turkey into the E.U.

But I am curious about that relationship between Russia and Turkey, because Russia has responded after some of these things, saying, Turkey is becoming an unfriendly country. How much pressure does this put on Putin to see this play out this way?

ROBERTSON: It's interesting, because parallel to that today, we have heard from Lavrov, the foreign minister in Russia, saying that Sweden and Finland are now sort of giving up their sort of favored nation status in the world's eyes by joining NATO and this statement about the move that Turkey is making.

Now, Russia doesn't tend to hold the looking glass up to itself and see itself reflected and what it's doing and the way that it's positioning itself in the world as an aggressor, propagating an illegal war and all those things. So I think you just have to take that as Russian propaganda, that they desperately would rather that Erdogan is much more on their side.

They bought -- Turkey bought Russian S-400 surface-to-air missiles a few years ago. The relationship was close. But there's a lot of angst between them in what's happening in Syria. Putin looks towards Erdogan at the moment for helping keep his economy going, for sanction -- essentially for sanctions-busting.

So, they're -- Putin -- Putin still needs Erdogan. And the weaker he gets, the more he's going to need him.

SIDNER: He has put himself into this position because of the invasion into Ukraine. That cannot be understated.

BOLDUAN: No, not at all. And that obviously -- and what happens now with the path for Ukraine to join NATO is now becoming a central question.

I'm seeing even more headlines coming out from Jens Stoltenberg even saying that NATO is going to change the pathway and change the requirements needed for Ukraine to join NATO to make the process easier for the country to join the group, so a lot coming out of Lithuania.

Nic Robertson, thank you so much for that.

SIDNER: And we are expecting Biden and Zelenskyy to meet tomorrow, a lot of questions still up in the air, Zelenskyy still very much, as you mentioned, pushing for a very clear pathway and timeline for the entrance into NATO.

Coming up though, we're going to stick here in the United States, the catastrophic flooding that is going on in Vermont. The waters are still rising, and more rain is on the way.

We are live with the very latest there.

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