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New Developments in Kohberger Case; Trump Administration Unfazed by Court Losses; Looking Back at Clarence Thomas' Nomination Controversy. Aired 9:30-10a ET

Aired March 20, 2025 - 09:30   ET

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

[09:30:00]

REP. SEAN CASTEN (D-IL): Who are at odds with other people in the room. And that in - that in turn is creating a public safety issue. We need to be very sensitive about how we do that.

So, you know, on a going forward basis, I think we're going to have to be - we're going to have to be much more deferential to what the local police feel is a safe way to do the town hall. But I think it's important for us to continue to make sure that we have these avenues for - for - for civil discourse and disagreement.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Congressman, I want to ask you about Robert Kennedy Jr. and some comments that he made, the secretary of Health and Human Services, on the bird flu. One of the things that he suggested was possibly - and I'm not - he didn't use these words, but, you know, let it rip in a few places, let the chickens pass it on in certain confined areas to see which ones might be immune so that they can then try to breed the ones that are immune and expand from there. I saw on your Twitter feed you had some criticism over that.

CASTEN: Look, the germ theory of disease is real. Vaccines save lives. And it is hard - it is hard to process the fact that the - the senior health official in the United States is at odds with - with the scientific enlightenment. I mean this is - this is truly stone age thinking. The - we've seen what happens when you allow diseases to run rampant in societies. I mean that was the plague, right?

The, you know, I think I mentioned on my Twitter that the Irish potato famine, if you do nothing when a - when a blight is spreading, it affects, you know, a major feed crop. People starve to death.

RFK Jr. is going to kill Americans. There's no - there's no nicer way to put that. And it - it is the most polite way that I can put this is, I am violently angry at the Republican senators who knew everything about what he thought and confirmed him to that position anyway.

BERMAN: And then one more question, admittedly, based on what I saw in some of your Twitter feed this morning, you commented -- Congressman Darrell Issa of California says he's going to nominate Donald Trump, President Trump, for a Nobel Peace Prize. And you added him to a thread that you actually have that's titled "profiles in sycophancy." What do you mean by that?

CASTEN: Well, I'd - I'd encourage you to check out the thread. It is - it is ridiculous how many of my colleagues have chosen, rather than to defend the Constitution, rather than to defend the - you know, the - the integrity of the Congress, are out there suggesting that they're going to nominate Donald Trump for a peace prize. Claudia Tenney wants to add his face to Mount Rushmore. There's multiple members who want to put his face on - on currency.

I mean, this is - this is a cult. These are not serious people. And, you know, we can have informed policy conversations about why that's stupid, or we can - we can ridicule them. In either case, I think they should be treated with 100 percent of the respect that they've earned. And that's what we're trying to do here.

BERMAN: All right, Congressman Sean Casten, we do appreciate you waking up after the interesting night you had. Thanks for being with us.

CASTEN: Thank you.

BERMAN: All right, new CNN reporting this morning on the Trump administration's Supreme Court strategy. That's ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:37:49]

BERMAN: All right, breaking overnight, new court documents claim the suspect in the stabbing deaths of four college students in Idaho took a selfie allegedly just hours after the killings took place. Bryan Kohberger can be seen smiling and giving a thumbs up in the photo. In their own filing, his defense attorneys challenged prosecutors' timeline of the murders, questioning the surviving roommates text messages and social media posts.

Let's get right to CNN's Jean Casarez, who has been covering this from the very beginning, about this - these new details in court filings.

Jean.

JEAN CASAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: There are so many things that are coming out right now because as the trial is approaching, the judge has to make the decisions, what evidence comes in, what evidence does not come in. So, they're both fighting their case right now of what they believe should be included.

And the state is saying, look at that picture, that selfie. That needs to come in. And why it is so important. This is the one means, the state is alleging, of identifying Bryan Kohberger because the surviving roommate, DM, actually opened her door, according to court documents, and she gave five interviews to police afterwards. And she said, she saw a man standing there all in black, and his face was covered by a mask. His forehead was covered. And she says, as the interviews go on, she has many inconsistencies in her interviews because she said it was very fuzzy to her and she saw something and she was scared. But she said the one thing that she remembered was the bushy eyebrows. She couldn't really remember his eyes. She didn't see anything else. But she remembered the eyebrows. Then she says, I remember an eyebrow, but she said it was bushy. And that is consistent through all of her interviews. And she also says that he was all in black, but looked a little bit taller than her, maybe six feet, and she said that he was very intimidating and walked toward the kitchen area.

So, that is why the defense is saying the bushy eyebrows need to come in. The defense, of course, is fighting it. They don't believe it's relevant because they will look at her story, how she changed - she finally says in the last interview, you know, I really don't remember anything. Everything is fuzzy to me. I'm not sure about anything. That's where the defense is going to hone in on.

[09:40:01]

Now, the next thing that I think is so important is the fact that we know that it was a KA-BAR knife sheath that was next to Maddie Morgan's body when she was found. There was no murder weapon. We have never known of a murder weapon that was found. But what the state did was they executed search warrants for Amazon, for Walmart, for KA-BAR Knife Company. Well, in this motion on Amazon click activity by Bryan Kohberger, they happened to mention in the motion that between March 20th and March 30th of 2022, Bryan Kohberger purchased a KA-BAR knife sheath, a. KA-BAR knife, and a sharpener. And then they go on to say that after the murders happened, that he researched again on Amazon KA-BAR knives and knife sheaths. The defense is saying it could be AI. It could be the way Amazon just pops things up and you just happen to look at it. It's not significant.

Finally, one last thing. The roommates, they were using social media in the hours after the murders for hours until eight hours later, when they finally called 911.

BERMAN: Lot of new information there, Jean. Great to have you on this case, again from the very beginning. Big question now, what's next? Keeps on changing. Thanks so much.

Sara.

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: All right, thank you, John.

New CNN reporting this morning. A source telling CNN the Trump administration is confident they will prevail in the ongoing legal battles over his use of executive power, even though he has lost several cases in court. The ultimate goal is to get these cases to the highest court in the land, the U.S. Supreme Court.

Joining us now is former Manhattan prosecutor Jeremy Saland.

The question is, if it is the ultimate goal to get it to the Supreme Court, is this simply the Trump administration trying to make sure that Donald Trump gets more presidential power? The Supreme Court has already given him the immunity power last year. Is he simply looking for more from this court? JEREMY SALAND, FORMER MANHATTAN PROSECUTOR: I think the evidence, if

you look at it objectively, is an absolute yes. He is pushing and grabbing as much power. And I say pushing. He's trying to pull it in, actually, as much power as he can. And we hear him, whether it's on Truth Social talking about pardons, whether it's challenging birthright, whether there's this privilege doctrine, how far it's gone. Now we have using a wartime doctrine to deport people without rights, where otherwise there would be some form of due process. That does not exist under the - this act now with the Alien Enemies Act.

SIDNER: Let me ask you, the judge James Boasberg, he hasn't even issued a ruling here yet on whether the Trump administration violated his order when they flew deportation flights out of the country, when the judge had ruled that they needed to turn the flights around, where those planes were. There's a lot of questions that the judge has asked for. So, what happened and what are the concerns here?

SALAND: Well, at least initially what happened is, what the judge is trying to figure out is when did they leave American soil, when did they leave the American airspace, when did they land.

SIDNER: Right.

SALAND: Those are the preliminary questions. That's not what tomorrow will be about, the hearing.

But the real concerns are, if the president can enact this law that is not an incursion by a foreign government or a foreign nation at a time of war, but an alleged gang of people, without any due process, who do we know who's being scooped up?

And I would say to you also, we're talking about children, potentially, because the law allows for people 14 and older to be taken without that due process, without any rights.

And then just being deported, not back to their home country, in this case Venezuela, to a third country, someone has nothing to do with it. So, there's a lot of concerns. Who's next? Where are those checks and balances? The executive authority and power is not completely infinite. It's defined by law.

SIDNER: Trump has spent a good deal of time attacking judges throughout his time in his presidency, in both iterations of his presidency. He goes especially hard against those who are appointed by the other party. But he - the ones he focuses on are the people who rule against him. And he said things like, they should be impeached, just recently, they - removed.

I'm curious what this does to the judicial system as a whole. Is there intimidation? And what it means for the safety of these judges.

SALAND: There's absolutely intimidation. And I hate to sound so glib, but he is lifting his leg on the Constitution. He's desecrating all of our rules and all of our laws in that sense. You don't say, I want to impeach a judge because I don't agree with them. And we need a Judge Roberts, from the Supreme Court - SIDNER: Yes.

SALAND: The chief judge to come out and say, no, it's not an impeachment. That's not how we do things. We do things by an appeal. There's a process.

It's frightening because the next question is, what happens if Donald Trump and the administration says, I don't want to follow the judge's order? I'm the law of the land. What's the practical reality? It would be different for you or me. But is that going to happen here?

So, yes, if I'm a judge and I'm a - believe in the rule of law, I am concerned.

SIDNER: You - you talked about the fact that judge - Justice Roberts, not just judge, Justice Roberts -

[09:45:05]

SALAND: Justice, yes.

SIDNER: Who is the chief justice, said, hey, doesn't name Donald Trump, but he was very pointed in his response. Clearly, it was a message to Donald Trump. And Donald Trump did say in his interview that he would not defy the courts.

So, the big question is how rare this moment was for a Supreme Court justice. The case is not before the Supreme Court justice yet. So, speaking on something that was said by a president, I mean, has this ever happened before?

SALAND: You know, this is certainly unique and very rare that - that a Supreme Court justice, in this case, again, the chief justice, has to step up and stand up and say, hey, that's not how we do things. And there's a lot of weight on those justices' shoulders.

SIDNER: Yes.

SALAND: And I even look at, you know, Amy Coney Barrett and say, she stood up - and when I say against, she didn't stand up against Donald Trump, she stood up for the rule of law. And she may not ultimately agree with the particular decision, but she's saying, there's a process that you have to follow. And I'm referencing the sentencing back in state court for Donald Trump.

SIDNER: Right.

SALAND: So, it's incredibly difficult for these judges, whether you're a district court judge or an appellate judge or a Supreme Court judge, to make sure that you give a fair and honest ruling when you're getting all of this noise and all this frightening rhetoric from politicians and the president as well. It's a frightening thing for this nation.

SIDNER: Amy Coney Barrett has faced a huge backlash by conservatives calling her DEI hire and all manner of other things. SALAND: Yes. Yes. Terrific.

SIDNER: So, the president says something and then everyone globs on. And that's why I asked you about whether or not these judges feel safe doing what they are supposed to be doing.

Jeremy Saland, thank you so much.

SALAND: My pleasure. My pleasure.

SIDNER: We really appreciate your analysis.

John.

BERMAN: All right, information about the Holocaust, sexual assault, suicide prevention, all targeted for removal from Pentagon websites in a new effort to eliminate, quote, "diversity content."

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[09:51:11]

SIDNER: A new episode of "UNITED STATES OF SCANDAL WITH JAKE TAPPER" focuses on the Supreme Court nomination of Clarence Thomas in 1991. The nomination sparked controversy when one of his former employees, Anita Hill, accused him of sexual harassment.

Here is a preview.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANITA HILL: It seems to me that the behavior has to be evaluated on its own with regard to the fitness of this individual to act as an associate justice.

LEAH WRIGHT RIGUEUR, CNN POLITICAL HISTORIAN: She's not just calling out Clarence Thomas. She is calling out an entire cottage industry of sexual harassment, of good old boys. It is telling of the reaction of the senators to her testimony.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So, you are not now drawing a conclusion that Judge Thomas sexually harassed you?

HILL: Yes, I am drawing that conclusion. That is my -

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, then I understand.

HILL: Pardon me.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Then I don't understand.

HILL: Well, let me try to explain again.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SIDNER: Those moments were huge. I remember that almost like it was yesterday.

Joining us now, you just saw this wonderful commentator in the clip, CNN political analyst and historian Leah Wright Rigueur.

Can you just - we just got taken back to 1991 when Anita Hill made public her accusation of the sexual harassment against then Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas. Can you explain just how impactful that was in a moment in our history?

LEAH WRIGHT RIGUEUR, CNN POLITICAL HISTORIAN: So, it's huge. It's one of the iconic moments of the 1990s. And it ushers in an entirely different understanding of women, gender, race. But most importantly, perhaps, workplace sexual harassment. It takes something that is discussed in the back rooms, that is just quietly moving into the front of employment and takes it center stage.

And one of the things that comes out of this, right, as we think about, you know, well, workplace sexual harassment and dealing with those kinds of things is commonplace right now. The effect of Anita Hill and Anita Hill testifying in front of Congress, in front of all of these senators, facing the man who sexually harassed her, the effect of this is that it changes corporate and public culture around sexual harassment. The rules that we have in place are in part because of people like Anita Hill. So, it's a major moment in American history, but it's also a major moment in labor and employment history and political history as well.

SIDNER: Clarence Thomas, of course, denying all of that. And he later became a Supreme Court justice, as you see there. Now there is a whole other controversy surrounding him. But we will move on to what is in this documentary.

From your perspective, as a - as a political historian, what was it about these Senate hearings that made them so really shocking to the American public?

RIGUEUR: Well, the first are the optics. When we have - you know, when we look at the Senate hearings, we see a panel full of essentially old white men who are coming down and talking to Anita Hill, who, at the time, is 33, 34 years old. She is a young woman, a professor at the University of Oklahoma Law School. And so initially, you know, the contrast between this - between these things, combative, angry senators who are essentially chastising Anita Hill for coming forward and telling her story is one that is really quite remarkable.

And then on top of that, we do have the - I think the racial - the racial imbalance. So, you have a group of - of white people who are essentially reading Anita Hill on her behavior. They are interrogating her and trying to disparage her character in front of the entire - essentially the entire country, if not the world.

[09:55:04]

And to add to that, you also have Clarence Thomas, who is a black man, and he's only the second black man to be nominated to the Supreme Court at this time. But he's also the second black man who eventually gets appointed to the Supreme Court. So, you have that legacy of Thurgood Marshall, but you also have, and this is something that those senators, particularly the Republican senators who are interviewing and holding the hearing on Anita Hill and Clarence Thomas, one of the things they - that they play up on over and over again, is the idea of a black man being essentially castrated in front of the entire world and accused. And so they bring up this long history, long African American history of black men being falsely accused, while simultaneously ignoring the fact that black women also have a long history of being engaged, being sexually assaulted, being sexually harassed. And this power dynamic and all of that is on display for the world to see.

SIDNER: Yes. I remember him using the high tech lynching as part of his testimony.

Leah Wright Rigueur, thank you so much.

And be sure to tune in. A new episode of "UNITED STATES OF SCANDAL WITH JAKE TAPPER" airs Sunday, 9:00 p.m. Eastern and Pacific on CNN.

BERMAN: Thank you all for being with us this morning. This has been CNN NEWS CENTRAL with Sara Sidner, John Berman and Kate Bolduan, in absentia.

"THE SITUATION ROOM" is up next.

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