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Trump Pressures Michigan Officials; Gaza Destruction Concerns; U.S. Steel Sale Backlash; Biden Reviews U.S. Steel Deal; Exonerated Men's Redemption Plans. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired December 22, 2023 - 14:00   ET

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

[14:00:00]

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JIMACOSTA, CNN ANCHOR AND CHIEF DOMESTIC CORRESPONDENT: All right, welcome back. More apparent evidence has emerged of Donald Trump's sweeping post-2020 pressure campaign. Stop me if you have heard this before, Brianna. Then President Trump calls up a fellow Republican and pushes them to block Joe Biden's victory. We already know he did it with Vice President Mike Pence. We heard the recording of him doing it with Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger. Now the Detroit News says they've heard a recording of him pressuring two Michigan election workers.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: The difference here, though, this time it appeared to work. According to the Detroit News, hours after two Michigan Republicans voted to certify the 2020 results, they got a call from the Democrat Party. He urged them not to sign the certification, and the pair then refused to sign. In the end, though, it didn't matter, at least not to the outcome of the vote. It couldn't matter to these folks here. We have CNN's Katelyn Polantz tracking all of this for us. Caitlin, I do just want to be clear here. CNN hasn't independently heard this recording. The Detroit News, though, is reporting this and has heard it. What are we learning about it?

KATELYN POLANTZ, CNN SENIOR REPORTER, CRIME AND JUSTICE: Correct. And the new thing here, the piece that is so important with this story, out of the Detroit News, is that the audio exists of this call. This is a call that had been known about where Donald Trump in November of 2020, just after the election, did call two Wayne County officials, so that's the county that Detroit is in, in Michigan, and essentially pressured them to not certify the election result, his loss of that state. Two of the things he said on this call that we're learning because of this Detroit News report, the specific wording captured on that audio saying we can't let we can't let these people take our country away from us and everybody knows Detroit is crooked as hell.

So, another instance of pressure here. But the reason that audio is so important is that everyone knows what Donald Trump wanted after the 2020 election, but there are ongoing investigations, including in Michigan, and the federal criminal trial coming up of Donald Trump. And so, there's a big question mark of what the evidence is to show Trump's interest in blocking the election results and the steps he took, the exact words he said. Will this sort of thing come up in some sort of cases in the future? Would it be something that even special counsel Jack Smith could use at trial?

The answer to those questions we just don't know right now, but every time there is specific audio captured of Donald Trump, like that call with Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger out of Georgia and some of the other instances we've heard of calls, every time there's audio, it is the encapsulation of what happened in real time and not just people recreating what they remember. And perhaps even downplaying exactly how forceful Donald Trump was in wanting to pressure people to let him win.

ACOSTA: Yeah, and you have to think it's only a matter of time now before we hear this recording. We haven't heard it yet. You got to think it's coming soon. All right, Katelyn Polantz, thanks as always. We're joined now by former Michigan Director of Elections Chris Thomas. He's now the fellow at the Bipartisan Policy Center's Election Project. Chris, I mean, this is just stunning stuff. Maybe not surprising. You say there was no legal justification for those canvassers to block certification. What can you tell us?

[14:05:09]

CHRIS THOMAS, FELLOW, BIPARTISAN POLICY CENTER'S ELECTION PROJECT: There was not any legal basis for doing that. These positions, there's two Democrats and two Republicans representing their parties. They are required to certify the results of the precinct returns. So, they check the precinct returns during the 14 days after the election and then certify. It is a ministerial, non-discretionary position. They do not have authority to investigate. They do not have authority to do audits. This is one of the steps in the overall statewide certification process. After they certify, it goes to the Board of State canvassers who certify the state, and then candidates can request recounts if they are unsatisfied with the results.

And in this case, Donald Trump did not seek a recount. All the concern expressed about the votes in Detroit, all of which are false, would have been verified had he gone ahead and asked for a recount. He would have seen that everything was above board. But he didn't do that. He did not ask for a recount.

ACOSTA: Right.

KEILAR: And we should just confirm here the signatures weren't necessary in the end. So, in the end, what they've risked here is for not. But on the call, Chris, Trump reportedly tried to persuade these folks by saying, quote, everybody knows Detroit is crooked as hell. Is there any evidence to back that up regarding the 2020 results?

THOMAS: It is just bizarre. It is no history of Detroit being crooked in their elections. It's an unfortunate thing for him to say that. He tends to be somewhat ignorant on Detroit. He made the allegation that there were more votes in Detroit than there were people in the city, which is just patently untrue. We have 500,000 registered voters, and we had about 250,000 turnout to vote. So, this is an ongoing thing. Often, it's Republicans who like to repeat that about Detroit. And it's just patently untrue. The state came in. They audited. They found that the imbalances out of 174,000 mail ballots were 150 ballots. That was the only thing that was somewhat unaccounted for. Hardly anything that's going to turn an election.

ACOSTA: Yeah. And Chris, I mean, it's important to note of the key battleground states Trump lost, Michigan. Michigan was one of his biggest margins of defeat, over 150,000 votes. Why do you think Trump was making these kinds of claims? What do you suspect was going on when he was talking about Detroit being crooked as hell? He was making similar comments about Philadelphia and Atlanta.

THOMAS: That's correct. And it was not a close election. That's three full percentage points. That is not a narrow election. If you recall, he won Michigan in 2016 with 10,700 votes. You can call that a close election. This was not. So, I have to believe that there were plans afoot. As you know, they tried to work the Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader with trips to Washington. Neither of them capitulated to his demands. He has a lot of supporters in Michigan that were willing to show up and protest on Election Day and the day after. But why he thought he could ever turn that around is beyond me. And in fact, he knows he couldn't turn it around. If he could have turned it around, he would have asked for a recount. He did not.

KEILAR: Yeah, that's a good point.

ACOSTA: Very good point.

KEILAR: He could have asked for a recount. Chris Thomas, thank you for being with us.

THOMAS: Thank you. My pleasure.

KEILAR: Let's bring in Susan Page now and Toluse Olorunnipa to talk about this. Tolu is the White House Bureau Chief for The Washington Post, and Susan is the Washington Bureau Chief. For USA Today. The thing is, when you look at this through a political lens, it's not necessarily bad for Donald Trump.

SUSAN PAGE, WASHINGTON BUREAU CHIEF; USA TODAY: Well, it hasn't been so far. I mean, you'd think this is familiar, but shocking to hear the president trying to pressure two county canvassing officials to flip their decision on certifying the vote. And yet these are similar to the charges we've seen before against President Trump that have solidified his position as the leader for the Republican nomination and given him a Teflon shield against the Republican challengers who would very much like to replace him. So yeah, I think that while legally this could be problematic for him, politically so far, these kind of things have been good for him.

[14:10:19]

TOLUSE OLORUNNIPA, WHITE HOUSE BUREAU CHIEF; THE WASHINGTON POST: And all you have to do is look at the campaign statement from the Trump campaign about this. He didn't deny it. They didn't say he was taken out of context. They said, yes, he did it, and he was proud to do it. The president, in the words of his campaign spokesman, was acting in furtherance of his duties as president. They were saying that this is what he was supposed to be doing. And I think that's a big sign that if we find ourselves in this kind of situation in 2024, Donald Trump, the candidate, will try to pressure county canvassers, state election officials, state lawmakers to try to bend the rules in his favor, even if he loses.

ACOSTA: Yes, it's the perfect phone call defense. And Trump was just interviewed on Hugh Hewitt's conservative radio show where he spoke about the Colorado Supreme Court. Keeping him off the ballot. Let's listen to that. Talk about it on the other side.

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DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENTAL CANDIATE (R): If they ever did that, it would be so bad for this country. You have no idea. And you understand it would be it would be a big problem for the country.

HUGH HEWITT, THE HUGH HEWITT SHOW: Oh, I think it will be a 9-0 reversal. I hope it comes today. But I want to make sure you appeal.

TRUMP: I think it's a kind of a reversal. It should not be given any credit, not even the credit of one Supreme Court justice.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: Yeah, Susan, what do you think he's getting out there when he when he says over and over, it's going to be so bad for the country?

PAGE: Well, I actually think he's got a got a point. I mean, there are even conservative legal scholars who say the 14th Amendment might apply. Perhaps he should -- but perhaps he is not eligible to run for the presidency. I think most legal scholars or maybe political scholars, perhaps, or political people see this as a really tough case because, you know, we want voters to decide who the president is. We don't want judges to decide who the president is. We've had that's happened in the past. It happened in 2000. But it's the kind of thing that would fuel the sense of grievance that Donald Trump has counted on through his entire career. And I think it does would risk rending the renting the country in half it.

KEILAR: And it's also interesting. When you listen to where Toluse, Democrats are in this, they have a comfort level with what the special counsel is doing, right. They have a comfort level with the Fulton County case. But when you look at what's happened with the Colorado Supreme Court, little on edge and for good reason.

OLORUNNIPA: Yeah, we heard from President Biden about this when he was asked what he thought about the Colorado Supreme Court's decision. He said, yeah, it's true that Donald Trump engaged in an insurrection, but whether or not he should be taken off the ballot, he was a little reluctant to go that far. And that's in part because of what Susan said. We don't typically in America want judges to be the ones that decide who gets to vote on a certain candidate. And so even Democrats know that some of this could inure to Trump's benefit by having people rally around him, by having people say that you're trying to take away our vote, take away our voice. And that's the message that he's been making as he's been facing these various charges. And this just adds to that same kind of message that we're going to be hearing.

ACOSTA: And Susan, we're just a few weeks away from the Iowa caucuses, and you're starting to get to some of the frustrations from some of the non-Trump candidates that they're having, that the conversation day after day because of Trump's legal problems is almost always about Trump, to their detriment.

PAGE: Well, you see Ron DeSantis, who was once his chief challenger, perhaps normally. Saying he regrets that he's gotten indicted on all these charges. Now, you'd think the best thing that could happen to a challenger is that your opponent has been indicted on 91 felony counts, but that is not the way politics has worked at this moment in this country.

KEILAR: Up is down and down is up when you're talking about Donald Trump, right?

ACOSTA: For sure. All right, guys, thank you very much. Really appreciate it. A new CNN analysis, by the way, is putting the scale of Israel's bombardment of Gaza into stunning context. You want to watch this as the IDF vows not to let up in its fight against Hamas.

KEILAR: And a rare second chance for men released from prison after their wrongful convictions were tossed out, how they plan to pay that blessing forward.

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[14:15:19]

ACOSTA: On the same day, the UN Security Council passed a resolution calling for a suspension of fighting and an increase in aid to Gaza. Israel is signaling it's widening its ground offensive in the Gaza Strip, now ordering residents in central Gaza to move to shelters for safety.

KEILAR: The loss of life so far in this war, it's staggering. According to the Hamas-controlled health... More than 20,000 people have been killed in Gaza since October 7th. And we should say there are some issues with those numbers, yes, but they do grossly represent what we are seeing there in Gaza, and many international organizations use them because of that. CNN is investigating why that death toll is so high. We have CNN chief international investigative correspondent Nima Elbagir who has a closer look. And we do warn you that some of the images in this report are disturbing.

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NIMA ELBAGIR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT: Even at a distance, the devastation wrought on Gaza is unmistakable. We are a few hundred meters here from the boundary with Gaza, but even here you get a sense of the degree of the Israeli bombardment of Gaza, the sheer intensity and scale. This is what that looks like up close. Scenes of destruction have become all too familiar. Here, the aftermath of another Israeli airstrike.

ELBAGIR (voice-over): This time in late October at the Jabalia refugee camp, one of the most densely populated residential areas in Gaza. The bomb that caused this damage is a 2,000-pound bomb, likely made in the USA, dropped by the Israeli Air Force, at least four times as powerful as the vast majority of the bombs used by the U.S. in its fight against ISIS. In densely populated Gaza, the human cost is incomparable. Whole families wiped out in one blow.

[14:20:19]

UNKNOWN (through translator): These are their names. They were blameless. They are all innocent.

ELBAGIR (voice-over): Jabalia refugee camp is one of the epicenters of Israel's bombing campaign. To understand the complete picture and scale of the destruction in Gaza, you need to look from above. In coordination with artificial intelligence company Synthetic, CNN was able to locate over 1,900 craters left behind by bombardment in just the first month of the war. Using AI, we analyzed the diameter of these craters, over 500 of which were greater than 40 feet in diameter, consistent with American-made 2,000-pound bombs used by the Israeli Air Force.

Our analysis covers the one-month period to November 6th, in which a staggering 10,000 people are believed to have died. The U.S.'s most- senior Middle East diplomat testified on November 9th the number of dead could be even higher.

BARBARA LEAF, ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF STATE FOR NEAR EASTERN AFFAIRS: In this period of conflict and conditions of war, it is very difficult for any of us to assess what the rate of casualties are. We think they're very high, frankly, and it could be that they're even higher than are being cited.

ELBAGIR (voice-over): Yet the U.S. continues to back Israel's bombardment. So why is the death toll so staggering? Because it's not just about the point of impact. This is a crater caused by a 2,000- pound bomb. The potential kill zone from that crater can spread up to 365 meters. That's 1,200 feet, an area equivalent to roughly 60 soccer pitches, or around 90 American football fields.

The IDF told CNN, in stark contrast to Hamas's intentional attacks on Israeli men, women, and children, the IDF follows international law. And takes feasible precautions to mitigate civilian harm. But is that true? This is just north of the Shati (ph) refugee camp along the main coastal road. When you go in closer, you can see, in just this small neighborhood, at least nine craters consistent with 2,000-pound bombs. Which means the potential kill zone could encompass this entire area.

CNN and Synthetic's analysis of the devastation of Gaza shows extensive bombardment. In an area this densely populated and using these bombs, it's inherently indiscriminate. And the human cost continues to soar, surpassing 20,000. Many of the dead still unburied, still under the rubble, with no end in sight. Nima Elbagir, CNN, Sderot.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ACOSTA: And our thanks to Nima for that report. In the meantime, an iconic American steel company could soon be under the control of a Japanese corporation. Ahead, why a bipartisan group of lawmakers, and even the White House, are pushing back on that move.

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[14:24:59]

KEILAR: The White House is now weighing in on the proposed sale of U.S. steel to a Japanese company, saying in a statement, President Biden believes the purchase of this iconic American-owned company by a foreign entity, even one from a close ally, appears to "deserve serious scrutiny in terms of its potential impact on national security and supply chain reliability".

ACOSTA: Yeah, U.S. steel was once the most valuable company in the world. This week, it agreed to sell itself to Japan's largest steelmaker in a multi-billion dollar deal that triggered backlash from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle and from steelworkers themselves.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DAVID MCALL, INTERNATIONAL PRESIDENT, UNITED STEELWORKERS: And there's lots of concern for us for our sustainability of our current workforce, their employment security, and obviously, the pensions and retiree health care of our retirees. So, besides the White House's scrutiny on national security and domestic supply chain issues, we're certainly concerned about the whole deal.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: And with us now is CNN economic commentator and Washington Post columnist Catherine Rampell. Catherine, so what are the concerns about? I mean, obviously, this is a foreign company coming in and trying to buy U.S. steel, which obviously comes with a lot of warm fuzzies in the United States. It's existed as a major American institution for so many years. Does it go beyond that? What's the deal?

CATHERINE RAMPELL, CNN ECONOMICS COMMENTATOR: I think this is just rank political pandering at this point that Biden has to show that he has the same nationalistic tendencies that some of the populists, including the United Steelworkers and the union, want him to demonstrate. But look, Japan is a strong ally. A good friend to the United States has proven itself to be as much over and over and over again, including an imposing voluntary export restrictions on its semiconductors at our request, essentially, and mustering the marshalling the forces to get the Indo-Pacific economic framework signed and all of that stuff. So if I were the Japanese government, I'd be pretty insulted right now. KEILAR: You'd be insulted.

RAMPELL: Yes.

KEILAR: And so, he's raising in that statement this issue of needing to scrutinize this for potential national security considerations. What do you think of that?

RAMPELL: Again, I think it's political pandering.

KEILAR: There are no national security considerations.

RAMPELL: There is a committee called CFIUS that's like an interagency committee that does scrutinize any kind of deal that involves or at least certain of a certain threshold, certain deals that involve a foreign company potentially acquiring or merging with a U. S. Company. And I think it's probably likely that they would have looked at this anyway. But the president wouldn't have released a statement about it, suggesting that there were some great threat to national security.