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New Evidences Unsealed in Jack Smith's Jan 6 Case Against Trump; Harris, Trump in Michigan as Latest Poll Shows Tight Race in State; Hamas Confirms Death of Its Leader; Just Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired October 18, 2024 - 14:00   ET

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

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[14:01:12]

ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN HOST: We begin with breaking news. Brand new documents revealing this moment on January 6th, 2021, that Trump in the White House with a diet soda was watching the violent attack against the Capitol on television. According to a transcript just released by the special counsel, this is what happened when an unnamed White House employee told the President that the networks were airing the riot.

He was like, what do you mean? I said, it's like they're rioting there at the Capitol. And he was like, oh, really? All right, let's go see. I'm taking off his outer coat and I get the TV ready for him and hand him the remote, and he starts watching it. And I stepped out to get him a Diet coke. Come back in, and that's pretty much it for me as he's watching it and seeing it for himself.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: That comes from an interview in a trove of documents just made public as part of prosecutor Jack Smith's case against Trump, alleging that he illegally tried to overturn the election. Trump, of course, has pleaded not guilty. CNN's Katelyn Polantz is here with us. Also with us is CNN Senior Legal Analyst Elie Honig.

And Katelyn, to you first. We know so much or I should say we don't know so much because a lot of these documents are actually redacted. They are blacked out. It's like a sea of black. But I know you're still pouring through these nearly 2,000 pages because there are some bits and pieces. What can you tell us?

KATELYN POLANTZ, CNN SENIOR CRIME AND JUSTICE REPORTER: There are bits and pieces, but it's largely what we have seen before, things like the tweets that the special counsel's office has collected, public speeches, even all of the photocopies of pages of Mike Pence's book that are relevant to this case, and photocopies of what those fake elector certificates looked like.

So if you step back, this is the evidence in the case. So it's four appendices that the Justice Department has submitted into the court. And I got through scrolling basically all 2,000 pages of it because much of it is like this. It's totally blank. These pages -- KEILAR: It's blank not black?

POLANTZ: Well, some of it's black, but much of it really is just blank pages, except for a couple snippets. And those snippets are the things like that piece of a deposition in the House January 6th Committee, the sort of evidence where individuals have already spoken publicly about what their interaction was with Trump, what they noticed him wanting to do as the riot was taking place, the interactions they had, the conversations that they had with him, things like Mike Pence in his book, writing about what his calls with Trump were like after the election, as Trump was telling him that he wanted to overturn this vote. All of this is in the court file because this is what the Justice Department needs to show the court to take this case to trial. They believe all of this is not immune, that Donald Trump should be able to sit for trial because of this. And they want to show the court, this is everything we have. This is what we would ultimately show a jury. And this is what we need to show you now to get this case moving forward.

MARQUARDT: And this is the January 6th case. It's not the classified documents case where there's so much that is so sensitive, so you might understand if a lot of it was redacted. And, you know, we see those redactions, its lines, or its words that have been blacked out. But this is page after page of either blank or blacked out. Do you know why?

POLANTZ: Yeah. And one of the reasons that its blacked out is because it's all of the information the Justice Department did on their own investigation that they have as part of their record that would be put on as the show of the trial before the jury. And so the things that are looking like this, where it's a page that says sealed many, many pages, those are very likely grand jury transcripts, which do remain confidential, interview notes from the FBI when they sat down with a witness, the things that are proprietary to the prosecutors that the defense has been able to see behind closed doors that the court has to look at now, but that we, the public, would only get to see when the trial happens because those people would be very likely called into court and then put under oath and testify in public.

[14:05:12]

KEILAR: Very interesting. Or at least it will be.

POLANTZ: it may be.

KEILAR: At some point.

POLANTZ: At some point.

KEILAR: Possibly.

MARQUARDT: If we ever learned that stuff.

KEILAR: If, if. All right.

MARQUARDT: Thanks, Katelyn. KEILAR: Katelyn, thanks so much. Let's bring in Elie Honig to talk about this. Elie, how are you seeing this filing?

ELIE HONIG, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: Well, I'm not saying much like you guys. But what I'm trying to do is understand why so much of this would be redacted. I think a lot of people are wondering that. Obviously, I can't see through the redactions. But I can tell you this. Here's the kind of thing prosecutors ordinarily would redact. One, anything relating to an ongoing investigation that could jeopardize sources or witnesses. Number two, as Katelyn said, grand jury materials are typically supposed to remain confidential at least until trial. Number three, anything that may reveal personal identifying information about a person, Social Security number, a date of birth, that kind of thing. And finally, prosecutors generally try to avoid putting information out in the public that could reflect poorly on somebody other than a charged defendant. So if there's someone who could suffer collateral damage, you try to limit the disclosure of that to the public.

MARQUARDT: Elie, you called this filing by Jack Smith a cheap shot. Why do you think that is?

HONIG: Well, so it's a little bit different from what we saw today, but I took issue. I believe that Jack Smith, I know that Jack Smith and Judge Chutkan reversed the ordinary course or procedure here in these filings, ordinarily, the way it works under the rules or procedure is that the defense makes the motion first and then the prosecution responds. Jack Smith went into court back in September, said to Judge Chutkan, I want to reverse that. I want to go first. Judge Chutkan said that that request was, quote, "procedurally irregular," and then she granted it.

So that's the reason we're seeing this now. Now, Judge Chutkan is in a little bit of a different position, though. Jack Smith is bound by DOJ's policy against doing things that might influence an election, too close to an election. Judge Chutkan, as she points out in her ruling yesterday, is not. She's a judge. She's not bound by DOJ's policies. And she decided that the public needs to see this. And therefore, I'm going to release some of it, at least.

KEILAR: So what next, Elie?

HONIG: So next Judge Chutkan has to take on the unenviable task of going through all this information, then getting Trump's team response and deciding which of these facts alleged in the indictment are immune, meaning they're official acts and which of them are private acts and therefore not immune. So basically, Judge Chutkan and the parties have to now argue and decide which facts, which allegations get to stay in this indictment and which further facts have to be pulled out of it.

MARQUARDT: Elie, in terms of the election and the proximity to this election, is it unusual to have this kind of release by a court so close to such an important date?

HONIG: Well, sure. I can't think of any precedent where a court has released something this, you know, two weeks and change before a presidential election. Judge Chutkan does take that issue on in her ruling. She essentially says, if I were to pause this, that would be out of the ordinary. And so I'm going to just conduct business in the normal course. It's really just in the eye of the beholder, Alex. I think Donald Trump's team says, why wouldn't you just keep this under seal for 18 or 20 more days, not have to deal with the election? That's actually what happened in the hush money case. The judge over there said, I'm not going to sentence you a couple weeks before the election. We're just going to punt it till the end of November. Trump's team said that Judge Chutkan should do the same. Judge Chutkan disagreed. Judge Chutkan said, if I were to change the ordinary schedule in order to not drop this before the election, she says, that would be election interference. It's very much a Rorschach test.

MARQUARDT: Yes, it is. All right. Elie Honig, thanks so much for the perspective. Really appreciate it. In the race for the White House, both presidential campaigns are targeting battleground Michigan today.

This hour, Vice President Kamala Harris is going to be speaking to voters in Grand Rapids. And then this evening, Trump will be back in Detroit, just a week, you may remember, after criticizing the city while he was there for another event. Now, in terms of the polling, the latest poll that we have out of Michigan shows Trump with a slight edge over Harris. But as you see there, there is no clear leader.

KEILAR: This is about more than just one state, though. Michigan is part of that so called blue wall trio, along with Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. The three states vote together more often than not. And anyone who's studied the electoral map will tell you whoever takes these three states, specifically Pennsylvania, will most likely win the presidency.

Let's talk more about this now with Larry Sabato. He is the Director for the Center of Politics at the University of Virginia. Larry, it's always great to have you. Early voting, of course, underway, 13% of active voters in Michigan have cast ballots as of today. What's the potential for a headline to actually impact someone's vote at this point?

LARRY SABATO, DIRECTOR, CENTER FOR POLITICS AT UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA: Well, there are only a handful of people who actually are going to vote who are truly undecided. There are a fair number of people who won't tell you who they're going to vote for. They know who they're going to vote for, or they may already know they've decided not to vote or not to vote for president.

[14:10:03]

So I'm not a big believer that there are many people out there, or even more than a handful, who can really change their decision at this point. But I'll tell you, it's -- in those three states, Brianna, it is very important to focus on who benefits and who doesn't really.

The odds are this isn't certain. We're still, what, 18 days away, I think somewhere like that from the actual election. But the odds are that Trump's goal is simply to deny Kamala Harris one of those three states because again, the odds are she has to carry all three.

Trump does not have to carry all three. He's got another pathway that's clear, not just a toss-up pathway, but one that right now is being backed up by quite a number of polls being taken in Georgia, North Carolina and Arizona, showing Trump with a small lead in those states. You know, if he gets even two of the three, then he doesn't need all three of those states.

He could lose, say, Wisconsin. So she has the tougher job. I think Kamala Harris has the tougher job and she really has to sweep the blue wall, which gives Trump a clear opportunity to block her in one state.

MARQUARDT: Larry, it's been interesting to watch Harris's media strategy. She went into the Lion's den, if you will, sitting down with Fox News earlier this week in that interview with Bret Baier. And the network actually says that it was the most watched interview of this election season. More than 9 million people tuning in, the highest market, mind you, Pittsburgh, Western Pennsylvania. So Larry, how much do you think that outreach to the conservatives watching Fox News is going to help Harris?

SABATO: To the conservatives? Not very much. Again, the vast majority of people who are going to vote or who have already voted obviously knew for whom they were going to vote or know for whom they were going to vote. People tune in for lots of reasons, curiosity. Maybe they tell themselves at some level of the mind, oh, I can be persuaded. I might switch. Somebody says that to you, 90% chance, they're going to stick with whoever they've already decided on.

But I'll tell you what she did do. She proved she could do it. I mean, that is, for a Democrat, the worst possible for him. And it was very contentious for him. And she held her own. She gave as good as she got. And she got the Fox network and the anchor to admit that they had been wrong about a very serious item, not including the right clip, the right video clip on the key question about whether the military could intervene and potentially arrest or detain citizens for having the temerity, the temerity to oppose Donald Trump. She did actually -- Vice President Harris take a question on the trail in Michigan just a moment ago. Let's play it.

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WOMAN #1: As you were talking about him being exhausted, do you think that's one reason why he chose to go to New York City rather than come out here on the campaign trail?

KAMALA HARRIS, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES (D) AND U.S. PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Well, I'm beyond getting into the head of Donald Trump. But I will say that it should be a concern if he can't handle the rigors of the campaign trail. Is he fit to do the job? I think it's a legitimate question.

WOMAN #1: And then Vice President --

MAN #1: Thank you (INAUDIBLE)

WOMAN #1: And then Vice President --

MAN #1: Thank you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: What do you think about this, Larry, because she's making his energy and an issue at a time when other people are looking at some of his kind of recent erratic behavior, making that an issue. How much of an issue is it right now?

SABATO: It's already an issue. It's been an issue. It was an issue even when he was running against Joe Biden. It was just that Joe Biden was taking most of the spotlight away in terms of what people were claiming was mental deficiency, which may or may not be there or may or may not have been there. But in Trump's case, he keeps providing evidence that there is a problem. It's not just that he won't release his medical records, which is really unprecedented. I mean, you have to go back to the '60s to find a candidate who wouldn't tell the truth about his medical conditions. That was, as we know, John F. Kennedy.

And it matters. It matters a lot. And I think the Democrats and Vice president Harris are absolutely correct to focus on that and to focus on all these building examples, not just of his word salads, but of the strange way he's behaving. You know, those 39 minutes while he was playing D.J. and calling up tunes and dancing in his, you know, Fred Astaire Way. And that's just plain odd. And finally, we have a use for the word weird that makes automatic sense to everybody.

MARQUARDT: Yeah. Not just not releasing his medical records, but going after Harris and hers, which included, frankly, some fairly innocuous stuff.

[14:15:07]

Larry Sabato, we have to leave it there. Thanks very much for joining us today.

SABATO: Thank you very much.

KEILAR: And ahead this hour on CNN News Central, Hamas confirming the death of its leader, Yahya Sinwar, as the Biden administration calls his killing an extraordinary opportunity for a ceasefire. We have a live report from Tel Aviv.

And the murder of two young girls in Rural Indiana made headlines when police revealed they'd actually recorded their killer in their final moments. Seven years after the video went viral, their accused murderer is now on trial. We have the latest from today's opening statements.

MARQUARDT: And she is one of the biggest stars in the WNBA. But Angel Reese says that her salary is not enough to cover her rent. You'll never believe how much or how really how little she says she's being paid.

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MARQUARDT: Hamas has now confirmed the death of its leader, Yahya Sinwar. He, of course, was the architect of the October 7th attacks which killed 1,200 people in Israel and led to the captivity of around 250 hostages. It is believed that 101 of those hostages do remain in Gaza. They are both alive and deceased.

KEILAR: And today, a Hamas senior official said, none of them would be released until these conditions were met. The, quote, "aggression on our people in Gaza stops." Israel fully withdraws from Gaza. And Palestinian prisoners in Israel are released.

Let's go now to CNN's Jeremy Diamond. He is live for us in Tel Aviv. Jeremy, you have some new details on how Sinwar was killed. What can you tell us?

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, that's right, Brianna. Well, up until now, the working assumption has been that Yahya Sinwar was likely killed by tank fire. That is what the Israeli military has suggested, as they said, that this, you know, exchange of gunfire that happened initially with Sinwar and two other Palestinian militants ultimately ended with an Israeli tank, firing a shell into the building where he was wounded. But now, I've actually spoken today with the man who conducted the autopsy on Yahya Sinwar's body, Dr. Chen Kugel, who is the Chief Pathologist at Israel's National Center of Forensic Medicine. And he tells me that he is confident that it was a gunshot wound to the head that killed Sinwar.

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CHEN KUGEL, CHIEF PATHOLOGIST, ISRAEL NATIONAL CENTER OF FORENSIC MEDICINE: The cause of death is gunshot wound in the head. He has a bullet in his head. And there is a severe traumatic brain injury. He has injury from other sources, like a missile injury in his right forearm, a fallen masonry on his left leg or tie, and many sharpeners that entered his body. But only in the chest, they caused severe damage. But the cause of death is the gunshot wound in the head.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DIAMOND: And I asked the Israeli military for comment on that. An Israeli military spokesman telling me that they know that there was an exchange of gunfire, and that the battle ended with a tank shell being fired at the building. But they said they are still working to get more details. But troops involved in the incident are still in combat in the Gaza Strip. Dr. Kugel also told me that the way that they actually confirmed that this was indeed Yahya Sinwar before his body was even brought to his forensic institute, was that a finger was cut off from the Hamas leaders body while he was in the Gaza Strip by Israeli soldiers. That finger was then sent in for DNA analysis. And that is how they confirmed that it was indeed Yahya Sinwar. Some pretty remarkable details from Dr. Kugel. And, of course, he said that he actually was the one who signed this death certificate for Yahya Sinwar. And he said that he was proud to do so. KEILAR: All right. Jeremy Diamond, thank you so much for the report.

We have State Department Spokesperson Matthew Miller with us now. Matthew, thank you for joining us. Is it the Biden administration's position that killing Sinwar should end the war in Gaza?

MATTHEW MILLER, STATE DEPARTMENT SPOKESMAN: So certainly what we want to see come out of this is an opportunity to end the war. Absolutely. I can tell you that over the last few months, the primary obstacle to getting an agreement to stop this war has been Yahya Sinwar. He obviously is the person that made the decision to authorize the terrorist attacks of October 7th. And then in the last few months, has been the person who stood in the way for Hamas in getting a ceasefire.

There have been at times over the course of negotiations where there were other senior officials in Hamas who wanted to move forward with a ceasefire. And Sinwar said no. And we saw him over the last few months consolidate control of both the political wing and the military wing of Hamas, and then in the last month, refused to negotiate at all. So he has been the chief obstacle to moving forward to end the war, return the hostages home, provide relief for the Palestinian people in Gaza and real security in Israel. And now that he has been removed, we certainly want to take the opportunity to try and find a path forward that accomplishes all of those things.

KEILAR: The President striking a similarly hopeful tone yesterday to the idea of this creating a window of opportunity for a hostage and ceasefire deal. But that's not really how Netanyahu appears to see it when you listen to his rhetoric. Why should hostage families, including those of the Americans still being held in Gaza, read this as anything more than lip service?

[14:25:10]

MILLER: So we're going to have those conversations with Prime Minister Netanyahu. As the President said yesterday, Secretary Blinken is going to travel to the region next week, and, of course, we'll be engaging in conversations about how to end this war.

Israel accomplished a very important strategic objective yesterday, one that they have -- has obviously been a high priority for them since October 7th. But bringing home the remaining 101 hostages, including, importantly, seven Americans who are still held hostage in Gaza, is another critically important strategic objective. And we continue to believe the best way to do that is through an agreement that allows them to come home and then sets the conditions for real security for Israel.

That has been the topic of conversation. I think sometimes has been lost in the public debate, that we continue to believe that the kind of endless conflict on the ground in Gaza not only has obviously horrific consequences for the Palestinian people who live there, but it doesn't do anything to establish Israel's long-term security either. And in fact, it continues to add to stability that threatens Israel's long term security. So that's the conversation we look forward to having with the Prime Minister. KEILAR: So notably, the U.S. did not release video or pictures of Osama bin Laden after his killing. Buried him at sea in an undisclosed location so that there was no place for his supporters to honor him. Israel released video of Sinwar's last moments. Do you worry that that gives energy to terrorists?

MILLER: No, I don't. Look, I think that the terrorists and terrorist sympathizers were going to say and what they're going to say about Yahya Sinwar and do what they're going to do no matter what, no matter whether there were images released or not. I just hope that everyone across the region and everyone across the world will remember who Yahya Sinwar actually was and what his legacy actually is. It's not just that he launched this attack that killed 1,200 people, including men and women and little babies, children, elderly and took little babies and children hostages, continue to hold hostages to this day. But it's also that he unleashed the conflict that has killed more than 40,000 people inside Gaza, killed more than 40,000 Palestinians, including many of them civilians. That is Yahya Sinwar legacy. It is a blood soaked legacy that I hope everyone across the world will remember.

KEILAR: The President, President Biden says he has an understanding of how and when Israel is going or will respond to Iran's attack. Is he comfortable with how Israel is going to respond to the attack.

So I know the president gave that answer and then declined to comment on it further. And I think I'll do the same here. We have been in intense conversations with the Government of Israel about the nature of this response, about the scope of this response. Obviously, there are a number of things that you heard the President say publicly we didn't want to see over the course of the last few weeks as we were continuing those discussions. And I think I'll leave it at that, that we know -- we are in the place where we continue to talk to them. But in terms of what they might do, I think I'll keep that private.

KEILAR: All right. Matthew Miller with the State Department, thank you so much

MILLER: Thank you.

KEILAR: We'll be right back.