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Former Trump Attorney Michael Cohen to Testify in Hush Money Criminal Trial of Donald Trump; Engineers to Begin Removing Wreckage of Francis Scott Key in Baltimore; Police: Parishioners Confronted Teen with Gun During Mass. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired May 13, 2024 - 08:00   ET

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

[08:00:00]

CHARLIE DENT, (R) FORMER U.S. REPRESENTATIVE: Biden has put himself in the situation where on the one hand he supports Israel's right to respond to the horrific attacks by Hamas. He supports that. On the other hand, he's trying to restrain Israel's response to protect Gaza civilians. He is pleasing no one. In fact, I think as John Bolton said, the folks, what I would call the axis of aggressors, those folks in Russia, Tehran, and Beijing, are probably delighted with this conundrum that Biden finds himself in.

I get the sense that I think Graham is right that we need to stand by our allies. I don't think finding nuance in this case during war time is a very easy thing to do, particularly when you're a superpower. Sometimes wars like this force you to choose sides. And Israel as our ally. And I can see why a number of Democrats are upset with what Biden has done. Certainly, Republicans are. But Biden is really trying to placate his base in this country, which is, obviously very split on this, and particularly in the state of Michigan. So I think a lot of domestic politics are entering into Biden's thinking on how to manage this war.

SARA SIDNER, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Charlie Dent, Matt Bennett, thank you so much.

A new our have CNN NEWS CENTRAL starts right now.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: The crucial moment in the Trump criminal trial, Michael Cohen takes the stand to testify against his former boss, the same Michael Cohen who once said he would take a bullet for Donald Trump. What is he going to say now?

Secretary of State Tony Blinken warning an Israeli ground invasion in Rafah could leave a vacuum filled by chaos that might be filled also once again by Hamas.

And the long-awaited demolition of the collapsed Key bridge begins today.

I'm Kate Bolduan with Sara Sidner and John Berman. This CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: And the breaking news this morning, we have arrived at the critical moment in the criminal trial against Donald Trump. This is our special coverage as the key witness takes the stand. You could see Michael Cohen as he left for the courthouse just a few minutes ago. Prosecutors will try to use his testimony to make a link between Trump himself and the documents at the center of the case. Trump is charged with falsifying documents to cover up hush money payments to an adult film actress, all to influence the 2016 election.

CNN's Brynn Gingras live outside the court where this testimony takes place today. Brynn, in a way it really has all come down to this.

BRYNN GINGRAS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It really has, John. Listen, it's important to know these two men had been in the same courtroom before, right? Michael Cohen testified in the civil trial last year and was in front of Donald Trump. There was a lot of drama, but arguably the stakes are higher with a criminal conviction possible on the line here. So it is going to be an eventful few days with Michael Cohen on the stand.

And as you just said, for prosecutors, the hope is that Michael Cohen is going to be able to connect the dots, be the narrator for the entire story that they have presented to jurors. They have laid out all the evidence, they have called all the witnesses trying to explain what they believe Donald Trump did to basically pay off these hush money payments. And Michael Cohen is the person that can bring jurors into that room, in the Oval Office in 2017 of February, where prosecutors say the two of them hatched this plan to make the reimbursement payments and disguise them as legal fees on the books.

So we'll see if he can do that for jurors. Of course, they've heard his name a lot. A lot of people had been calling them all different kinds of names. They've said he's aggressive. They said he's a jerk. We'll see how he is in front of jurors.

And of course, when the defense gets their turn to ask the questions, well, they're going to be hammering at his credibility. They have argued that Donald Trump doesn't know what Michael Cohen does. He's kind of a rogue player in his life, in Donald Trump's life. So certainly, like I said before, there's going to be a lot of fireworks, and it all gets started when court resumes today and 9:30.

BERMAN: It all begins today. All right, Brynn Gingras, thank you very much for that. Keep us posted. Kate?

BOLDUAN: Joining us right now is CNN legal analyst and former U.S. attorney, Michael Moore. It's good to see you, Michael. How do you run this line of questioning?

MICHAEL MOORE, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Well, good morning, and I'm glad to be with you. This is going to be an extra day and it's a pivotal day for the state, frankly, as well as the defense. I mean, they've hitched their entire case, they've basically hitched their wagon to Mr. Cohen to bring this together. The question at the end of the day will be whether or not they've hitched their wagon to a lame horse. And I think that's going to be the question that we see going forward. The state has spent essentially several weeks now trying to sort of

pre-rehabilitate and pre-corroborate Cohen's testimony. I mean, they've brought in witnesses to say, well, maybe don't pay attention to what he says. Look at the documents, look at what I saw versus what he saw.

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But the one piece of this case that has remained missing has been whether or not Trump had some specific information and direction and involvement in how the business records were recorded. And so they're going to have to drill into that issue in their direct examination and sort of quit dancing around it, quit talking about the fact that he may have signed a check and that was enough or whether or not he took a long time looking at the bills that came across in a FedEx envelope, whether or not that was enough. They're now going to have to really say, look, tell me what happened, tell me what he said. Tell me what the plan was. Tell me was there some specific decision made by you, Cohen, and Pecker, maybe, to label this in a weird way.

And they're having to overcome some of the witness testimony that has already been out there, and one of those things being from this accounting person who says, look, our system has a drop-down menu, and one of those things says legal expenses, and that's what that's what we put it on.

And we also know the Trump disengaged somewhat from the day-to-day management during about the time of this alleged criminal conduct. So those are the holes they've got to fill it. I'm not saying they can't do it. I'm certainly not here as a defender of the defense. They've got good lawyers. They can do that on their own. But these are real things that they can hang up these jurors. And it only takes one juror to hang a case up and to create a mistrial.

And so they've got to answer questions as if he is the only person. Quit worrying about whether or not somebody else saw Trump with a sharpie and actually drill into what was said and what decision was made as a group on how these business records would be labeled, these expenses would be labeled in those state records.

BOLDUAN: Pre-rehabilitation on someone's reputation is something I am excited to learn more about it. We haven't -- we often don't hear about it, Michael.

You laid out what they need to hit on with him. How explicitly does Michael Cohen need to, like, say the words, connect the dots between the documents and Trump and falsifying the documents and Trump?

MOORE: Yes. I don't -- we won't have as much explicit testimony as we had from another witness in the case, or illicit testimony, but he's going to have to really nail down what this issue was. I mean, he needs to say we discussed this. This was an intentional thing to influence the election. We decided we would list things as business records so that we could essentially mislead the public, so that we could mislead anybody who looked at these state records. This is how we did it. This was -- this was our plan are. Our intention was to violate that another law.

That's what this case is, really, is that they did this with the intention of violating another law, and that being the federal election law. That means that they would have been a campaign contribution limit expenditures and all those things have to be listed accurately. And so he's going to need to talk about decisions around that, not just the fact that the payment was made. That's sort of given at this point, right? I mean, everybody sort of accepts, yes, he paid. And the question is, why did he do it? How did they calculate it or what was the purpose for why they listed it that way on those business records?

BOLDUAN: We're going to see the questioning to begin shortly. We'll watch it play out together, listen to it play out together, read the transcript as it plays out together. It's good to see you -- exactly, good to see you.

Sara.

SIDNER: All right, before we get to that today, crews set to start to demolishing that collapsed Key bridge in Baltimore, but there is an enormous cargo ship trapped, of course, under that wreckage. The difficult task ahead.

And for the second time in less than a week, a church service interrupted by someone armed with a gun. This time it was a group of children were about to get their First Communion. Hear how worshippers jumped into action to try and stop the teenage suspect.

And wildfires raging out of control in Canada. The smoke is affecting the air quality in several states here in the U.S. We will discuss all of this ahead.

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SIDNER: All right, happening today, parts of Baltimore's Francis Scott Key Bridge is set to be demolished finally. Crews will use explosives to break apart a massive chunk of the bridge and remove debris from the Dali cargo ship. Remember, that Dali rammed into the bridge's pillars in March, causing the entire bridge to collapse. It ended up killing six workers who were on the bridge at the time.

And get this, the crew of that ship is still onboard. They've been there since the accident happened.

CNN's Gabe Cohen is joining us now. Gabe, this was supposed to begin on Saturday. It is now happening today. Why the delay?

GABE COHEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Storms, Sara. Bad weather in Baltimore just made it too difficult to end dangerous for crews to do this over the weekend. But they are expecting they're going to have a much better window late this afternoon to finally do this controlled demolition, which the Coast Guard is saying is really the quickest and the safest way to remove that huge piece of the bridge. We are talking thousands of tons of steel still sitting on and really weighing down the bow of the Dali. And once they do that, they can finally tow the ship away. It's been too heavy over these past seven weeks. And that is the next critical step toward finally clearing and reopening the channel.

I do want to show you an animation that we have that really gives you a much clearer sense of how they are going to do this later today. So we know that crews are making these precision cuts only millimeters wide. You can see it right there in the steel in specific spots on the bridge.

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Then, they are going to insert those charges, the explosives and cover them up essentially with a big piece of tape, but adhesive that is going to keep it in there, and the plan is later today, they are going to detonate those charges separating rapidly all of that steel and thrusting it away from the ship.

To be clear, Sara, it is not going to be some sort of big fireball officials -- or at least it shouldn't be -- officials say, this is really going to look like small puffs of smoke like little fireworks going off.

And if all goes well, officials seem hopeful that they can still reopen the channel in the next couple of weeks. But that timeline has been so fluid over the past couple of months as we continue to wait for federal investigators to put out their preliminary report outlining why the ship lost power. We still don't really know what happened that night that caused it to barrel into the bridge.

SIDNER: Speaking of which, the crew still on the ship? Will they remain there as these explosions are going to happen?

COHEN: Yes, that's the plan, Sara. The crew of the Dali, as you mentioned, they have been on board for the past seven weeks and they are going to remain there as this unfolds.

But of course, remember this is a massive container ship, close to a thousand feet long, about the size of the Eiffel Tower just turned on its side and so officials have said, this is going to be perfectly safe. There is space for them to shelter in place where they will be secure as all of this is unfolding.

SIDNER: Yes, Gabe, we can see where the bridge has sort of crushed down on the ship. It is the very, very front. So there is hopefully some safe space for them.

Gabe Cohen, thank you so much for that update -- John.

BERMAN: All right, chaos at a church mass for children. New video shows the moment a teenager walked into a service armed with a gun.

And then Vladimir Putin replaces one of his closest military advisers, just as Russia is making a new alarming advances in Ukrainian territory. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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BERMAN: All right, this morning, a terrifying scene in a Louisiana Church, a service was interrupted when an armed teenager walked in. Police say he opened the back door of the church, then parishioners immediately confronted the 16-year-old when they saw the weapon.

CNN's Isabel Rosales is with us now. What do we know about what happened here?

ISABEL ROSALES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: John, good morning.

This is the last place and occasion where anyone should have to worry about a gunman. This all happening at a mass celebrating children's first communion at St. Mary Magdalene Church in Abbeville, Louisiana.

Police say that a 16-year-old male armed with it the gun was spotted inside of the church at the same time -- we have video here -- a service was being livestreamed online and in it, we can see the priest right here leading the congregation after someone whispered and his ear what was going on leading the congregation into prayer.

But then slowly, you can see folks looking toward the back of the room, that back door where that teenager came from. They are worried, they're starting to panic.

And then we will see the priest here and the deacon actually duck underneath the altar and later on, altar boys running around through the sanctuary. So clearly, they're in a panic. They see something that is worrying them.

And then shortly after these terrifying moments, they hear this PA announcement.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So guys, just get a hold of your child, go slowly. We did apprehend a young man. He is in custody. He is in the police custody.

Calm down and just get next to your child and go slowly.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROSALES: And according to police, parishioners ended up confronting that teen and escorting the teenager outside where police were called and later arrested him.

We know from a police statement that that teenager was transported to a local hospital to be medically evaluated by the Behavioral Unit.

Clearly, terrifying moments here by these parishioners during such an innocent event celebrating again, the first communion of their children. Here is the reaction from one of those parishioners.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

COUNCILMAN BRADY BROUSSARD, JR., PARISHIONER: I'm hurt. I'm angered. I'm disappointed. But this has a society problem, not a local problem.

We have to be aware. We have to be prepared for these events.

We were prepared for this today, and that's why it didn't end terribly.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROSALES: And a very serious situation. That teenager has been charged with terrorizing and two counts of possession of a gun by a juvenile -- John.

BERMAN: Yes, well, certainly glad that everyone got out safely. Isabel, thank you so much for that report -- Kate.

BOLDUAN: Secretary of State Tony Blinken says "A lot of armed Hamas will be left no matter what they do in Rafah." This new warning to Israel against a full ground operation in Southern Gaza.

And a new look at the presidential race with new polling out this morning. The five swing states Trump is leaving right now.

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SIDNER: This morning, calls growing louder from the White House to prevent a major ground invasion of Rafah by Israel. But Israel seems to be pressing ahead despite the warnings from top US officials that a major full-scale invasion could lead to widespread civilian casualties and potentially create a power vacuum.

CNN's Arlette Saenz is joining me now from the White House.

Arlette, the Biden administration has for weeks been putting pressure on Israel, revealing to our Erin Burnett that they're going to -- Biden says he is going to stop sending bombs -- some bombs to Israel if it goes into Rafah.

How is the administration responding now that you're seeing some more movement by Israel towards Rafah.

ARLETTE SAENZ, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Sara, top US officials continue to sound the alarm about a potential Israeli ground invasion into Rafah and chief concern for them is the more than one million people who have a found refuge in that area as this war has continued.

That is why the administration has been pushing Israel to adopt some type of credible plan to evacuate these civilians who are there, and it is also part of the reason why President Biden decided to pause a shipment of some major weapons to Israel including about 3,500 bombs, as well as warning about the potential that they could withhold further weaponry going forward.

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