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Donald Trump Receives Target Letter in January 6 Criminal Probe. Aired 11-11:30a ET

Aired July 18, 2023 - 11:00   ET

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

[11:00:33]

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: The breaking news this morning, CNN has confirmed former President Donald Trump has received a target letter from the special counsel, Jack Smith, this having to do with the investigation into January 6, and efforts to overturn the 2020 election results.

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: That target letter is a major signal that prosecutors could again file criminal charges against the former President.

Trump is already facing 37 charges related to alleged mishandling of classified documents, as well as 30 counts related to business fraud here in New York.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, we have new reporting.

CNN's Kaitlan Collins, anchor of "THE SOURCE," just ran in front of the camera to bring us this new information that you are getting in.

Kaitlan, what have you learned?

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, you're not joking. I literally did run, John.

But, yes, we are learning more about how all of this went down, with Trump's team receiving this target letter. I'm told that the legal team received it on Sunday, including Todd Blanche, who, of course, was one of Trump's attorneys who was in court in Miami when he was indicted the last time and arraigned in the documents case.

Now, in this separate investigation, he has gotten this target letter. Todd Blanche was among several of the attorneys who received this letter. One thing that we're also learning is that Trump's legal team has not formally responded to this so-called target letter yet.

Of course, as we have learned, these target letters offer an invitation to go and testify before the grand jury should the person who receives the target letter wish to do so. It is widely expected that Trump will not go and testify before the grand jury, but they haven't formally said yes or no to Jack Smith's team yet.

So, of course, a lot of the questions here are going to be if this signals that an indictment is coming -- it certainly does -- when that indictment could happen, and, of course, what ultimately the charges could be here.

I will tell you one thing that has happened here is, this has caught the Trump legal team off guard. They, of course, had been wondering if Trump was indeed going to be a target in this investigation. They were not expecting charges to potentially be brought for anyone this month.

Of course, the timing of all of this is really up to Jack Smith and his team. So it's not really something they could know. But, as they were speculating, that was kind of the thinking.

One thing that I do think maybe tipped people off that Jack Smith's team was looking closer at Trump's mind-set here than we previously knew was the fact that they brought in Hope Hicks, someone who was one of his closest confidants formerly, brought her in last month to go and testify before the grand jury that is investigating January 6.

BOLDUAN: Kaitlan, have you heard of any other target letters that have been going to those around Donald Trump?

COLLINS: That was pretty much our number one question when we -- when Trump posted that he had gotten a target letter from Jack Smith, because there are a lot of other names that are being looked at here that we know Jack Smith's team has been focusing on.

This is a very broad investigation. It looks in to the fake electors scheme. We know he's brought in state election officials. A lot of those attorneys who were around Trump in that period before and after his election loss have been essentially the forefront of Jack Smith's pursuits, Sidney Powell, John Eastman, Kenneth Chesebro.

There are -- Patrick Byrne, he was the former overstock CEO who was at that crazy, chaotic Oval Office meeting six weeks after the election. Those are names we know they're also looking at. We have not heard of anyone else who has gotten a target letter so far. But, obviously, that is the next question that everyone is asking if Trump himself has now gotten one.

SIDNER: Kaitlan, you have been talking to a lot of Republicans, a lot of Democrats on your new show, "THE SOURCE."

Can you give me a sense of how you think this is going to play out when it comes to politics? We have not heard real attacks from, for example, DeSantis, who is going to be speaking to our John -- I almost said John Berman -- Jake Tapper.

BERMAN: Very, very similar...

SIDNER: Very similar. No.

BERMAN: ... but older and less handsome. But that's at 4:00 today.

(LAUGHTER)

SIDNER: He's going to be speaking to Jake Tapper -- he's going to get you for that -- in just a few hours.

Do you expect this to change things when it comes to his political rivals?

COLLINS: It remains to be seen.

I mean, they have -- you have heard people like Chris Christie saying the people who don't go out and criticize Trump and aren't questioning these indictments and the charges that he's facing here essentially are avoiding reality.

But then you also hear from the other candidates and their teams of why they don't directly go after Trump for the legal troubles that he's facing, and it's because they're trying to win over Trump voters. So, I mean, it remains to be seen how Ron DeSantis handles it.

[11:05:00]

Obviously, he's at kind of an inflection point in his campaign right now, as we have seen with the fund-raising. The idea that he is doing a mainstream media interview today, that is a notable change, in and of itself.

But, so far, most of the candidates have not directly criticized Trump when it came to the documents investigation, the allegations that he took national security secrets to Mar-a-Lago. This, we don't even know exactly what the charge could be here, if there is a charge, ultimately.

So, I think you will you will maybe wait to see. Asa Hutchinson is one of the first people from the 2024 field to come out and say that these indictments, and potentially another one here, do disqualify Trump from running. But, obviously, it hasn't stopped Trump from running.

And as he told a crowd on Saturday night, he says, when he's indicted, he's essentially arguing to them that he's being indicted for them. Whether or not the voters by that, of course, remains to be seen.

BERMAN: Hey, Kaitlan, you said this caught the Trump team by surprise. I'm curious if that's a form of wishcasting here.

What did they think was going on the last few weeks, as we kept on learning that all these people have testified before the grand jury or spoken to prosecutors here? How did they think this was playing out?

COLLINS: I think the mind-set on this has changed, kind of similar to the documents case, where, initially, they thought they were in the clear when it came to the documents case, especially when the documents situation happened with President Biden, with former Vice President Pence.

And then things clearly changed. And we saw why. It was because of that audiotape that they had. On the January 6 investigation, I think the thinking was, it's such a broad case, there is such a wide-ranging scope here, what charges could they be pursuing? Is it conspiracy to obstruct a proceeding? We know that that is something that they have been asking questions about.

I think, when they started bringing in people like Jared Kushner and Hope Hicks, it seemed to change the calculus for some of the people who are reading the tea leaves here. I mean, only, ultimately, Jack Smith's team knows what they are pursuing here, what these charges could look like.

I think the Trump team thought that the January 6 case would be difficult. And so that was part of their thinking here. What could -- what did prosecutors actually think they could potentially prove here? And so that remains to be seen what that ultimately looks like.

We don't know that he is going to get charged here. Obviously, we believe he will be, if this is based on how the last indictment went. But I think that they kind of had this idea that maybe they would focus on the attorneys here, the Sidney Powells, the Rudy Giulianis, the John Eastmans, those types, and maybe not Trump himself, given the level of difficulty it would be to bring those charges.

But, clearly, they are not. Clearly, they are focusing on Trump directly. That's why he got this target letter on Sunday night.

SIDNER: Yes, I think it's interesting. It was delivered Sunday, according to Donald Trump.

And we haven't heard about it until today. What's happening today? There's the classified documents case that is going to the judge. And, for the first time, we will hear whether or not she decides to put a date on that trial. So we will wait to hear from that.

Kaitlan Collins, thank you so much for all of your reporting and all of your work on the new show "THE SOURCE." We will probably be checking back in with you.

BOLDUAN: And joining us -- thank you, Kaitlan.

Also joining us now is former Trump White House attorney Jim Schultz.

It's good to see you, Jim.

Just your reaction to this news that we have now Donald Trump receiving this target -- Donald Trump's legal team and Trump receiving this target letter regarding the special counsel's investigation into January 6?

JIM SCHULTZ, FORMER TRUMP WHITE HOUSE ATTORNEY: Well, I mean, we saw it wrap -- beginning to wrap up.

As you get closer and closer to the inner circle and more important folks coming into the grand jury, that's a signal that they're coming to a close. So the culmination of that is that they have sent him a target letter. We don't know who else has received or if anyone else has received target letters associated with it.

I expect it has a lot to do with perhaps conspiracy to commit fraud and relating to the overturn the outcome of an election, relating to -- there's a number of factors, the fake electors scheme, perhaps -- perhaps the trying to switch the attorney general out, the pressure on the former vice president.

There's a number of different things that kind of all culminate together to perhaps form their case.

BERMAN: Jim, what's it like to get a target letter? I mean, it's something that...

(CROSSTALK)

SCHULTZ: I don't know. I have never had one.

(LAUGHTER)

BERMAN: But have you represented anyone? When you are working with somebody who gets a target letter, what's that like?

Donald Trump has obviously now had this experience fairly recently. But it's a pretty serious moment. And it causes, from both a legal and, in this case, a political standpoint, I imagine, a certain degree of circling the wagons.

SCHULTZ: Look, it shows that there is some -- there is a degree of legal jeopardy coming in the direction of the former president.

And that's always serious for anybody who receives a target letter. So, I do think it's something that needs to be taken seriously. Perhaps an indictment is on its way. We saw in the last case that that preceded an indictment. I think we're likely to see the same thing here. He's probably not going to go in and testify.

[11:10:03]

And then it's -- then we're back to, OK, this case perhaps is going to be heard in the D.C. District. And who's the judge that gets assigned? And we're kind of off to all the questions that we had on the first round.

SIDNER: Can I quickly ask you? You worked for Donald Trump. And he has this tactic that he uses of attacking whoever goes against him.

Now he's attacking Jack Smith. He said he looked like a crackhead initially. Now he's saying that he's deranged. Why does he do this? And is it problematic? Is it a problematic tactic? It's not going to help him in court.

SCHULTZ: Well, I think the judge is likely to intervene as it relates to that. I think you're going to hear some of that probably at the hearing today, I would imagine, because there's a difference, right, between the political speech associated with these cases and the political strategy associated with these cases and the legal strategy.

That tactic certainly doesn't help the legal strategy.

BOLDUAN: Jim, do you think, if charges do come related to trying to overturn the election, trying to stop the peaceful transfer of power, if criminal charges come to Donald Trump on that, do you think it diminishes the classified documents case that he's already up against?

SCHULTZ: No, I think they are two separate issues, right? And they are separate and distinct issues.

That case is going to stand on its own. And if there's a case that's brought in connection with January 6, that case is going to have to stand on its own. And the case against him in the documents case is incredibly compelling, if all that evidence -- if all those allegations make it into evidence.

SIDNER: Can I ask you what you think Donald Trump will do here with his lawyers, what his defenses may be in this particular case?

SCHULTZ: Look, on the documents case or the potential case coming down the road?

SIDNER: We have seen the documents case. He wants it delayed. He says that there -- that it was prosecutorial misconduct, and he's laid it out.

But in the potential that there is another case, a January 6 case brought, which prosecutors have gotten about 550 or so plea agreements, and they have not lost a case yet, what do you think his defense is going to be if this case is brought forward?

SCHULTZ: I think that there's a difference between those plea agreements in relation to the violence at the Capitol and likely what they're going to bring against Donald Trump, right?

So we don't know what the charges are going to be. We can only speculate as to what the charges are going to be. Therefore, it's kind of premature to start talking about what the defenses might be. But I think it's going to be distinct from that idea of incitement. I do not believe that this will be a case that involves incitement, because of the First Amendment speech issues.

SIDNER: So you're talking about it's not going to be things like seditious conspiracy that's already been charged and adjudicated.

But there's a potential, we were hearing from Elie Honig, obstruction of an official proceeding. I have seen that in court myself over and over and over again. The Justice Department has won those cases. And that's a potential of 20 years in prison. That's at the height of it. It's not always given.

But these are really serious charges, even though they don't sound as serious.

BERMAN: Oh, they can be, for sure.

Listen, Jim, before this stunning news that Donald Trump has received a target letter in the January 6 case came down, we were looking forward to this hearing this afternoon. Judge Aileen Cannon for the first time is hearing directly from the attorneys on both sides of this case, and she's told them -- this is the Mar-a-Lago documents case.

And she's told both sides to come in with arguments about whether or not the trial should be delayed and when the trial should begin. What do you expect to happen today? How do you think she is considering this? And do you see any hints one way or the other of how she might rule?

SCHULTZ: So I think she's going to be under considerable -- considerable pressure, given some of the criticism she's had in the past, to move this case along in an expeditious fashion.

Of course, the Trump side is going to say: Look, we need more time. This is going to interfere with the election. There's a lot of issues associated with this.

But the bottom line is, absent some appellate issue kind of coming in the middle of this, three to four months is probably a reasonable amount of time to get ready for that case. And I do think, though, that I have talked about in the past the Classified Information Procedures Act. You have already seen the Trump team saying: Look, we want to see all these documents. All these documents need to be made public.

If the government opposes that, and the judge rules in favor of Trump, the government has an ability to appeal. And that would be an appeal directly to the 11th Circuit. And that could potentially delay the case for a couple of months, even in an expedited manner, even if it's an expedited appeal. Same thing if they ruled against the Trump team on it. They would have an ability to appeal to the 11th Circuit.

[11:15:01]

And, if that happens, again, you're talking about a couple of months. So, even if she sets this for December, if there are appellate issues that get -- are able to be immediately appealed to the 11th Circuit, that's going to cause some delay. Then she's going to have a decision, OK, now we're looking at February, March, April for A potential trial date.

BOLDUAN: Right.

SCHULTZ: Now it's in the middle of primary season. What happens then?

BERMAN: Right. That's just one of the issues facing Donald Trump...

BOLDUAN: Could be a rocky road ahead.

BERMAN: ... as of today, now that we know he is a target in the January 6 investigation.

Jim Schultz, thank you very much for that, as always.

Again, we're getting new information in about what was in this target letter to Donald Trump, how the Trump team is responding this morning. We're trying to figure out if anyone else has received a target letter, because that is a huge issue. BOLDUAN: Right.

BERMAN: We're also trying to get information the range of possible charges that could be at play here.

Stay with us. Our special live coverage continues.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[11:20:36]

BERMAN: The major breaking news this morning, Donald Trump has been notified he is a target of the special counsel's criminal probe surrounding January 6.

This is the investigation that has been focusing on Trump's alleged efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss.

BOLDUAN: According to Donald Trump's accounting of what has happened, the letter offers him four days to respond and report to the grand jury.

CNN has learned, though, that Trump's team has not yet responded to the letter, and it's widely expected that he will decline to do so.

CNN's Manu Raju is on Capitol Hill.

And you have been hearing some of the initial reaction coming in, especially from Republicans, but also likely Democrats. What are you hearing from folks there?

MANU RAJU, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, a lot of similar pattern that we heard in the previous two Trump indictments, Republicans in the House quick to rush to Donald Trump's defense.

Senate Republicans, for the most part, have been quiet. The Senate does not come in to later this afternoon. And we will see what the leadership has to say at that point.

But we do expect the -- we have already heard from House Republicans leaving a conference meeting earlier this morning, where they initially reacted to the news of this indictment, many of them rushing to Donald Trump's defense, contending that the Justice Department is unfairly skewed against him, even as they have not seen any of the evidence, any of the allegations.

Certainly, there's not been an indictment that has been voted on or unsealed, but, nevertheless, still making the point that they believe that Donald Trump is being unfairly targeted here. That is the point that Speaker McCarthy himself made just moments ago.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. KEVIN MCCARTHY (R-CA): And I think the American public is tired of this. They want to have -- see equal justice.

And the idea that they utilize this to go after those who politically disagree with them is wrong.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Every time they indict him, his numbers go up.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Donald Trump's the leader of our party, and Donald Trump is going to be Joe Biden in 2024 for a second time. Why are they doing everything they can to prevent him from being on the ballot in 2024? I will tell you why. Because Donald Trump will win in 2024.

And the left just -- they're scared (EXPLETIVE DELETED).

(END VIDEO CLIP)

RAJU: So, a number of those members indicating that they still plan to support Donald Trump even as he is facing the prospect of a third criminal indictment, suggesting that perhaps he will not be hurt politically. Now, that is not a necessarily uniform position on Capitol Hill.

There are a number of Republicans who are much more nervous about the prospect of Donald Trump getting the Republican nomination, worried that this -- these legal problems, even if the case is not done yet, or even if he is still -- say he's not guilty if he is, in fact, indicted here, that could have a significant impact, not only on the bid for the White House, but down-ticket, as the Senate Republicans try to get back into the majority and as the House GOP tries to cling on to their narrow majority.

The impact of all of this on them is fresh on the minds of many members of the House and Senate. But, at the moment, you're hearing some of the Trump defenders, like the speaker himself, making clear that they believe that Donald Trump has been the unfair victim of these investigations without any -- seeing any evidence so far -- guys.

BOLDUAN: Manu Raju on Capitol Hill for us.

Manu, thank you so much. I'm sure much more is going to be coming from there, to be sure.

SIDNER: All right, let's bring in CNN's Evan Perez.

This case poses risks not only for Trump, but also Jack Smith? Who's handling other Trump cases. There has to be several attorneys on this.

EVAN PEREZ, CNN SENIOR JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, absolutely, Sara.

We have -- we know that there's separate teams in the special counsel's office that have been -- that have been focused on the -- for instance, the documents case. We have a separate trial team that has been solely focused on that, including lawyers based out of the U.S. -- formerly based out of the U.S. attorney's office down in South Florida in Miami.

And there is a separate team that has been solely going into the grand jury trying to make -- provide -- get evidence from witnesses who have been coming into the grand jury here in Washington focused only on the January 6 case.

And, as you pointed out, this does raise some potential new risks for the Justice Department, for Jack Smith. If you look at the indictment that was handed down in South Florida, that one has to do with it with -- with the classified documents that were being mishandled at Mar-a- Lago, allegedly.

[11:25:04]

You can see that indictment. It's a chapter and verse. It's a speaking indictment, as they call it. This one, we don't know yet what Jack Smith and his team have found. But there's certainly a lot more risk here when you're talking about political speech.

I think the former president is going to claim that a lot of what he was doing was because he believed, he believed that there was fraud, that he believed that it was not being properly investigated, and that he had a right up to until January 20 to continue to make that case, trying to figure out how to make the case that he was being defrauded.

So, that poses a big risk for the Justice Department. We don't know what charges we're expecting to see exactly being brought against the former president, if indeed they do bring them. But we know, for instance, obstruction of a public proceeding or a congressional proceeding, that's been one of the most common charges we have seen in the January 6 investigation.

We have seen defrauding the United States as a potential charge. Those are a couple of charges that, again, raises the question of whether the former president's political speech is being prosecuted. It's going to be incumbent upon Jack Smith and his prosecutors to lay out what evidence they have showing that the former president was the head of this conspiracy -- guys.

BERMAN: All right, Evan Perez, thank you very much for that. Our thanks to Manu as well.

Again, we would love to know the nature and the shape of the possible charges that could be at play here. He is a target in the investigation. A target for what?

BOLDUAN: Right.

BERMAN: For perhaps breaking what laws? That is key.

Also, is anyone else a target here? That is a crucial bit of information. We are digging.

Stick around.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[11:30:00]