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Rep. Beth Van Duyne (R-TX) Discusses House GOP Resistance To Senate Foreign Aid Bill; Chief Justice Roberts Calls For Written Response From Special Counsel On Trump's Immunity Dispute; Sources: House GOP Seeks Testimony From Special Counsel Robert Hur; TX Deputies Mistake House Guest For Intruder, Shoot Her 5 Times. Aired 2:30-3p ET

Aired February 13, 2024 - 14:30   ET

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

[14:30:00]

REP. BETH VAN DUYNE (R-TX): It's a ridiculous argument.

People should not be here illegally. And when they are, they should be removed. Instead, what we're seeing is crime increasing. We are seeing people who are being raped, people who were being murdered.

We are seeing cartels in charge of our - of our border, at our southern border. As a result, we are seeing tens of thousands of Americans killed as a result.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: That $5,000 number may be unsatisfactory to you, but it is going to be much higher and allowed to be much higher because there is nothing to prevent it.

Congresswoman Beth Van Duyne --

(CROSSTALK)

KEILAR: -- thank you.

DUYNE: There's law,

KEILAR: No, there's not. There's not.

Congresswoman, thank you for being with us.

DUYNE: Thank you very much.

KEILAR: And still ahead, Special Counsel Jack Smith now facing a Supreme Court deadline to respond to former President Trump's request to block a lower court ruling denying him immunity from prosecution.

Plus, we've learned that House Republicans have reached out to another special counsel, Robert Hur, after his report on President Bidens handling of classified documents. Will we see him testify on Capitol Hill? That seems almost certain.

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) JIM SCIUTTO, CNN HOST: Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts is giving Special Counsel Jack Smith one week to respond to Donald Trump's attempt to delay the trial in his federal election interference case.

[14:35:00]

KEILAR: Last night, the former president filed an emergency request asking the high court to temporarily block a lower court decision rejecting his claims of immunity.

We have CNN chief legal affairs correspondent, Paula Reid, with us now.

All right, Paula, so how the Supreme Court acts obviously can have a huge influence on if and when Trumps going to stand trial for criminal allegations. How do you see this playing out?

PAULA REID, CNN CHIEF LEGAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: So I don't expect Jack Smith is going to wait very long before filing his response. I would expect it today or tomorrow.

Because he wants to move this to trial soon as possible. That is his goal, completely opposed to Trumps goal, which is to try to delay, delay, delay until after the 2024 election in the hope that he can get reelected and make all of this ad Jack Smith's appointment of special counsel go away.

So what Trump is asking the Supreme Court to do right now is put on hold that scathing unanimous appeals court decision last week that found that he does not have presidential immunity that can protect him from this case while he exercises all of his other potential appeal options.

Again, it's all a delay strategy. But Smith is likely going to ask the Supreme Court to just weigh in, decide this once and for all, send this back down to the trial court so that we can get going.

But as you said, this is just as much about timing as it is about this constitutional question.

KEILAR: And let's talk about a different special counsel, Robert Hur. Obviously, Biden's handling of classified documents and really a bombshell report, even though he chose not to bring charges.

Do we expect that he'll be testifying before Congress?

REID: Yes. We've learned that he has hired a lawyer and that lawyer is in talks with the GOP to possibly have him come and appear before Congress.

Now this is something we saw with Special Counsel Robert Mueller, the Special Counsel Durham. This is very much expected that he would go before them and answer questions.

But a highly unenviable place to be in, because Rob Hur is really going to be pressed by both sides.

You have Republicans who believe there is a double-standard, don't understand why there were not charges here. And then Democrats and the White House, who are furious with the way that he characterized President Bidens cognitive ability.

So this could be a highly contentious hearing. I'm told from my sources that there's no date set, that they're looking for the end of the month.

KEILAR: Oh, that will come soon.

Paula, thank you so much for that.

Let's discuss all of this with former assistant special Watergate prosecutor, Nick Akerman. He's also the former assistant U.S. attorney for the southern district of New York.

And former Republican Congressman from Illinois, Joe Walsh. He is the director of Mission Democracy and host of the "White Flag" podcast.

SCIUTTO: So, Nick, first to you.

Robert Mueller, other special counsels, they have testified before, as Paula was saying. How would this be different in your view?

NICK AKERMAN, FORMER ASSISTANT U.S. ATTORNEY: Well, I think it would be different because you've got both sides going after this particular special counsel.

You've got the Republicans going after him for recommending that Joe Biden not be charged. And you've got the Democrats going after him for having mischaracterized various aspects in speculating about part his ability to memory -- to remember certain facts.

So I think this is going to be a little bit different in the sense that you're going to have not only Democrats going after him, but also the Republicans.

KEILAR: And, Joe, it appears the GOP, they want to keep questions over Bidens memory in the spotlight.

We should say though it is well within Congresses oversight role, to ask these questions. What do you think about what they're doing here, what is in bounds, what is out of bounds?

JOE WALSH, (R), FORMER U.S. CONGRESSMAN FROM ILLINOIS: Brianna, our only guide is everything that my former colleagues, Republican colleagues have done in the House since they took control of the House is political and has been protecting Trump and trying to exact revenge for Donald Trump.

I mean, that's been their agenda. There's no policy agenda at all. So I would expect that to be the same motivation here.

They want to get this special counsel in and they want to solely focus on what they consider to be the big political damage in this report, which is what the council said about Bidens age and memory.

I expect them to just go hog wild on that in an attempt to again, run interference for Trump. And in essence campaign for Trump.

SCIUTTO: Nick, I wonder, should Merrick Garland have issued a summary, much like we saw Bob Barr do with the Mueller report, to highlight, for instance, the line or there was one line in her report, you'll remember that said "willful retention," which was later undermined in the same report with Hur himself saying there was insufficient evidence of that.

[14:40:00]

Should Merrick Garland, as attorney general, have highlighted that point?

And should the attorney general have piped in at all on a special counsel commenting on a witness' mental competence or memory? Is that a proper thing for the special counsel to have done?

ACKERMAN: I don't think it's a proper thing for the special counsel to have done. I mean, it was a political hit job. No question in my mind about that.

But should Merrick Garland have weighed in on that? No. Anything he would have done would have just politically been disastrous.

If he didn't issue the entire report, it would have looked as if he had started reporting on the report, just like Bill Barr did for Trump in the Russian investigation, that would have looked bad.

I think he did what he only could do, which was to issue the report.

And if you look at the report itself, there's so many contradictions in it that it almost defeats itself. He says he wasn't willful then he says he was willful. On -- and it goes back and forth.

And there's a lot of speculation about what Joe Biden remembered. He faults them for not remembering things in an interview conducted with a ghostwriter in 2017. And then for not remembering the same things, six or seven years later. I mean, that itself is kind of bizarre.

So there's a number of just internal inconsistencies riddled throughout that report.

And if I were on that committee, I'd be cross-examining Mr. Hur on all of those inconsistencies and bringing those out so the public can see that he really didn't do a very good job in terms of writing up a report.

And the odds are the statements that he made about Joe Biden were really motivated by politics?

KEILAR: Joe, what do you think? What questions do you expect would be asked when Hur, we expect -- it kind of looks like he will go before Congress and in not too long. And what kind of questions would you want to ask if you were sitting

there in that position to do so?

WALSH: Well, I'd want to know, because I want to know the distinctions between what Trump did and what Biden did.

And, Brianna, the chasm between Trump and Biden on this issue of classified docs is immense, right? Biden cooperated fully. Trump tried to obstruct justice. He tried to cover up the investigation. He tried to hide the documents.

If I'm the Democrats, I focus on these distinctions.

Look, I know we live in a fact -- almost a fact-free, truth free world right now. But if Hur gets in front of Congress, its incumbent upon the Democrats to show the American people the differences between the way Biden and Trump handled these classified documents.

And on that issue, Hur is very clear about the differences.

SCIUTTO: Nick, the other topic we been discussing in the legal sphere, of course, is the Trump election case. His claims of broad immunity here and now, what the Supreme Court does.

There's something of a broad view among folks, constitutional experts, et cetera, Supreme Court watchers that the Supreme Court won't take this up. They'll let the D.C. court of appeals decision, stand.

I wonder if you share that sense.

ACKERMAN: Yes. I share that 100 percent. I just don't see that the Supreme Court has anything to add to this opinion, on the opinion.

The 57 pages by the D.C. circuit was extremely specific, well- reasoned, very analytical, took head-on all of the issues raised by Donald Trump. Basically obliterated them.

I think the Supreme Court, at this point, is going to sit back and say, were not going to look at this issue until after and if Donald Trump is convicted in this case.

Now at that point, you've got to totally separate situation. You've got --right now, you just have allegations that are set forth in the indictment without evidence put forth, without a jury verdict, without any kind of factual finding.

Once there's a jury verdict and Donald Trump is convicted, the proof will be in, the evidence will be in, and before the Supreme Court. And at that point, it would make sense for them to revisit this issue of presidential immunity.

But at this point, given the juncture of the case, given the fact that they have to also deal with the 2024 election in light of the 14th Amendment, I don't think the Supreme Court wants anything to do with this.

SCIUTTO: That's interesting. They'd have another crack, another bite at the apple as it were.

Nick Akerman, Joe Walsh, thanks so much to both of you.

(CROSSTALK)

KEILAR: Coming up this hour, new body cam video released shows Texas deputies repeatedly shooting at a woman through an apartment window after mistaking her for an intruder. We're going to show you that footage. It's coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:49:25]

KEILAR: Two Houston area deputies are under investigation after they shot a house guest five times thinking that she was an armed intruder.

A warning that we're about to show you some just released edited body cam of the February 3rd shooting. It is disturbing. You should know.

The video begins as the officers respond to a neighbor's report of a break-in and approach the door. The two deputies noticed a window at the home is shattered.

And then this is what happened.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

[14:50:07]

(KNOCKING)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE)

(HONKING)

(GUNFIRE)

(HONKING)

(CROSSTALK)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: I can't keep track of how many shots were fired there in seconds. The house guest, we should note, survived that shooting, amazingly.

Community activists are outraged, pointing out that a child lived in that apartment.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

QUANTELL X, HOUSTON COMMUNITY ACTIVIST: This baby's room has over 20 bullet holes in it, 20 -- over 20 bullet holes exact. Around, 27 bullet holes. (END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: We're joined now by CNN's Whitney Wild and CNN chief law enforcement and intelligence analyst, John Miller.

Whitney, we're hearing from the woman who rents that home, whose friend was shot. I mean, explain how this happened and how police came there thinking it was time to open fire?

WHITNEY WILD, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT CORRESPONDENT: Well, what you explained was that this wasn't an intruder, but actually what happened was they didn't have the keys to the apartment when they came home that night, so they broke open that window and went inside that way.

Here's exactly what she said happened as she was inside as those shots were fired.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LARONDA BARRY, WITNESS, FRIEND OF EBONI POUNCY: So I had to break the window. I go inside. Once I went inside, we were there for about 20 minutes.

The next thing I know I hear loud banging on the door. I was like, what's that noise? Then she grabbed her gun and ran until the door. I didn't hear anything after that. The next thing I know, Eboni came back and she said she was shot.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WILD: So here's what happened. Police got the initial call at 2:15 in the morning from somebody in that apartment complex, who said that there was an intruder in their apartment.

A deputy went there, looked around the apartment, cleared it and found out that there was no intruder at that apartment.

A second deputy arrived to assist, and as those two deputies were leaving, a bystander in that apartment complex said there's another attempted burglary or at least attempted intruder in this other apartment.

So they pointed out the apartment that Eboni Pouncy was in. So police go to that apartment, that second apartment.

Again, as you mentioned, they saw that there was broken glass. They saw that the screen was gone. They saw that the window blinds were up.

They knock on the door and then it -- within just a few moments, you see what happens with this gunfire.

Right now, Eboni Pouncy is in stable condition. Police administered lifesaving efforts as soon as they were able to get inside that apartment. They did find a firearm when they went inside that apartment. Still many more questions to ask. As you point out, this video is edited. So there are many people who are calling for the full release of the video, the full raw release.

At this point, the Harris County district attorney's office is investigating the Harris County Sheriff's Office. Harris County officials are asking anybody with more information to come forward. This information will be presented to a grand jury.

Back to you

KEILAR: John Miller, let's talk about what police are supposed to do in a situation like this.

JOHN MILLER, CNN CHIEF LAW ENFORCEMENT & INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: Well, it's based on their perception. And this is one of the tricky parts of a story like this, which is the way the law will look at this is, what was the officer's perception when she opened fire?

Did she say I saw a gun? I said drop the gun and the gun was suddenly pointed at me instead, and so I opened fire.

Does her partner say, when she opened fire, I couldn't tell whether the gunfire was coming from inside the apartment or from outside?

That is the kind of thing that they're going to be able to establish when they sit these two officers down and conduct those interviews. And perception is going to be important.

But there are obviously clear inherent questions about the shooting itself, which is the sheer number of shots. going through an entire 15 round magazine, dropping that magazine, reloading and emptying another magazine. The curtain is down.

It's not clear from the body camera. And a body camera is not a human eye. It's a one-dimensional view from a different angle. But from the body camera, it's hard to see that they could even see what they were shooting at with the curtain down from the angle they were firing.

So these are all the questions of that investigation. And as we reported earlier today, likely a grand jury will have to sort through in this case.

SCIUTTO: Is there anything, John Miller, in training that would instruct or train a police officer to empty two clips at that pace through a window that has a curtain over it. I mean, again, it comes down to the police's perception of the danger.

[14:55:09]

But in your training, does that look consistent with any training that you're familiar with?

MILLER: You know, in the Los Angeles Police Department, in the New York Police Department, I responded to and reviewed dozens of police- involved shootings. And you see these phenomena, which is one of the things they call it as contagious gunfire.

But something about this case, if we go back to that tape, listen to the time between "drop the gun" and then opening fire. They opened fire during their instruction to drop the gun.

So the question is, did the person who they saw with a gun coming to the door even have the opportunity to obey that command?

KEILAR: Yes.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

(HONKING)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE)

(GUNFIRE)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: And that's -- that's the video.

MILLER: The factors here. You know, there's no -- there's no rule that says you have to give a warning when you're faced with a gun, but when it's feasible and you're able to do that, you know considered with your immediate safety, yes.

So they're going to have to go over this top to bottom and really get from these officers exactly what they thought they saw and how they justify each one of those shots, which is a lot of shots, yes.

KEILAR: Yes. A heck of a lot of shots.

Whitney Wild, John Miller, thank you to both of you.

Still ahead, backlash growing in the wake of former President Trumps controversial comments about NATO. President Biden just piled on.

And we're keeping our eye on the markets. The Dow down more than -- let's take a look. Are we really keeping our eye? All right, right.

(LAUGHTER)

KEILAR: Down more, down almost 750 points there, after a hotter-than- expected inflation report.

Stay with CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)