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Don Lemon Tonight
President Trump Direct Shot at A.G. Sessions; Russia Probe Irritates Trump. Aired 10-11p ET
Aired August 01, 2018 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[22:00:00] (JOINED IN PROGRESS)
DON LEMON, CNN HOST: -- say, to you, that's who we are right now.
CHRIS CUOMO, CNN HOST: Sometimes, some parts. And if you stay on it and you point out that it's wrong, you'll see change. Stand your ground was on a big run in the early 2000s, not any more, why?
LEMON: Yes.
CUOMO: People are seeing, it's a social instruction that's very dangerous.
LEMON: And people got a big lesson with Trayvon Martin and George Zimmerman.
(CROSSTALK)
CUOMO: Although here we are in the same state, and this time they don't even make an arrest.
LEMON: Here we are. OK. Chris, hey, I got to get to some breaking news, so I'll see you soon. Thank you very much.
This is CNN Tonight. I'm Don Lemon.
We do have breaking news right now, we have new details on what the special counsel has proposed to the Trump legal team about the scope and format of an interview with the president and the team and team Trump's response. We're going to have more on that in just a moment.
So stay right there. We're trying to get the reporter on the line that is being reported by Michael Schmidt and also Maggie Haberman here of the New York Times and of the CNN, as well.
President Trump sending a blunt and very public message to his attorney general today. Here's what he's tweeting. Of course, tweeting. Quote, "This is a terrible situation. Attorney General Jeff Sessions should stop this rigged witch hunt right now."
That seems pretty unambiguous. In fact, it's hard to see it as anything other than a blatant attempt to obstruct justice. That's right, to obstruct justice by telling Sessions he should put an immediate end to Robert Mueller's investigation. Yet, we are told by the president's lawyer and the president's
spokesperson, that is just his opinion. Really? Stop for a minute, I really want you to think about this, about the logic in all of this, OK? You make up your mind whether this is logical or not.
If the president placed a phone call, right, if he placed a phone call to the attorney general and he said, Mr. Attorney General Jeff Sessions, you should stop this rigged witch hunt right now. It's a dirty disgrace, would that be a problem? You bet it would be.
If he had sent Jeff Sessions a memo to that effect or said it in a meeting, would that be important evidence in an inquiry into obstruction of justice? It certainly would. I know that, I'm not an attorney, I'm sure you know that as well.
But because he types it out on Twitter for the whole world to see, including Jeff Sessions, are we supposed to ignore it as just the president blowing off steam? Why? And it's far from the first time that we have been told so treat the president's public statements as something else, something other than what they say. Remember this from July of 2016?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Russia, if you're listening, I hope you're able to find the 30,000 e-mails that are missing.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: This is why this is important. This is how the New York Times reported on that extraordinary statement on that very date. The New York Times has a quote, "If Mr. Trump is serious in his call for Russian hacking or exposing Mrs. Clinton's e-mails, he would be urge -- urging a power often hostile to the United States to violate American law by breaking into a private computer network."
Well, we later learned that the Russians did exactly that. On that very day, the Russians mounted their first spearphishing attempt at a domain used by Hillary Clinton's personal office. And targeted 76 e- mail addresses for the Clinton campaign. That very day.
That revelation coming from Robert Mueller's indictment last month. Charging 12 Russians with election hacking. So again, stop and think. Why is it any better than the president said it out loud? And, of course, there's a president's stunning explanation in his own words on national television for why he fired his FBI director James Comey.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: In fact, when I decided to just do it, I said to myself, you know, this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made up story, it's an excuse by the Democrats for having lost an election that they should have won.
(END VIDEO CLIP) LEMON: So the president admitted publicly on national television that
he fired Comey because of Russia. Openly and clearly stated.
But damming as all that is, Rudy Giuliani, the president's attorney and defender in chief tells the New York Times and I quote. "If you're going to obstruct justice you do it quietly and secretly, not in public" which makes no sense at all. If you say it out loud it doesn't count? If it's not secret, it's not obstruction? Mueller certainly doesn't think so.
We learned last month that his team is reportedly examining more of the president's tweets for evidence of obstruction. And all of this isn't coming in a vacuum, it's not.
CNN has learned the president's tweet today was just hours after his legal team updated him on the possibility of a sit down interview with Robert Mueller, one in which Mueller wants to ask questions about instructions.
[22:05:01] And with his very public tweets and statements the president just might be making Mueller's job easier in putting himself in jeopardy.
So let's get to our panel right now, to our folks here who can discuss all of this. CNN political analyst, Patrick Healy, CNN global affairs analyst, Max Boot, and CNN legal analyst, Laura Coates. Good evening to all of you. It's good to have you on.
So let's discuss this now. And I want to get to what the New York Times is reporting. First to you, Laura. Our reporting that Robert Mueller, Senate proposal about a possible interview last night and agreed to accept some written answers, want the ability to be able to ask follow-up questions in person. What do you think about that proposal?
LAURA COATES, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Well, I think it's really a compromise that's kind of expected. Remember, the reason he would never agree to all written questions is because he would not have had the opportunity to ask the follow-up.
So if he's going to get it in written, and actually have someone's words written down in black and white before them able to lock them in on an answer, and then be able to ask follow-up questions, well, it seems to me Mueller has the best of both worlds.
He doesn't have to have just the simple note taking or the recollection of people who are investigating the matter. He's able to have the combination of the two.
However, it is a bit of a compromise in the sense that being able to respond to questions in writing means you're able to prepare quite fully, and they're not able to have the kind of off-the-cuff statements or have a genuine authentic reaction which is what you're looking for trying to assess credibility. Preparation doesn't always lead to you being able to have an assessment of truth telling. LEMON: All right. You're of legal mind so I want to ask you one more
question. They're also reporting, Laura, that the president's lawyers want to reject it, but the president is pushing them to keep negotiating. At what point does the president just do it against their counsel?
COATES: Well, I think given this presidential administration, any time, remember, the beauty of being able to have the negotiation tactic here is that he can have his lawyers in the room. As long as he's negotiating, he has the ability to say my lawyers can come with me for this actual interview.
If it gets to the point where he has to be compelled or they request him to be compelled under a subpoena in front of a grand jury, that's never going to happen, you cannot have an attorney present.
So he's trying to maintain the upper ground -- upper hand. And I think his lawyers will ultimately say, if the choice is either we cannot be present and we can allow this person to talk in front of a grand jury without us, or we can be present and negotiate a combination we'll take the latter option.
LEMON: Patrick, what do you think about the reporting that President Trump is eager to meet with a special counsel?
PATRICK HEALY, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: No. He's very eager. I mean, he's been calling it a witch hunt for a year and a half. And he's been eager to in his mind sort of clear his name. I mean, he's been frustrated with this, he sees this as the most overt and direct threat to the legitimacy of his presidency. The notions that the Russians helped him.
And he wants to get in the room. The problem, though, for his lawyers in this, is that they know that if the authentic Donald Trump shows up in the room, he's going to start -- he risk -- runs the risk of shooting his mouth off, losing the impulse control that we know he has a lot of trouble, you know, keeping, keeping any kind of mastery.
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: And the truth.
HEALY: And saying things -- and saying things that he really believes, like Jeff Sessions should stop this investigation right now. That is what Donald Trump believes. They can script him, like the White House tries to do for all of his rallies, keep him on the teleprompter, and he loves to just go off. And his lawyers know the biggest danger to Donald Trump in this is himself speaking his mind.
LEMON: Does that, Max, explain why the president was so freaked out on Twitter this morning and really this week. I mean, it's escalating.
MAX BOOT, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: He's got a lot of reasons to be freaked out, Don. I mean, it's kind of ironic if the immediate impetus for his tweet this morning was the fact that Mueller wants to ask him about obstruction of justice, so Trump's response is to obstruct justice.
I mean, that's basically what he was doing on Twitter by saying that the attorney general needs to end this rigged witch hunt, should end this rigged witch hunt right now.
I mean, I love the fact that all these Trump apologists, you have there is one just a few minutes ago on CNN saying all the word should means this doesn't mean anything. Well, I beg to differ.
I mean, if your boss says, you know, I don't like your shirt. That's an opinion. I got that.
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: You change it.
BOOT: But if -- yes. If your boss says, you should go home right now and change your shirt, that's a little more than an opinion and let's remember, Donald Trump is not some blow hard bloviating on the web.
He is the president of the United States and he is Jeff Sessions' boss, and he is saying that he should do something which is completely improper in his part to be patterned with Trump have tried to impeded the investigation into this Russia thing as he explained when he fired Jim Comey more than a year ago.
LEMON: Let -- I want -- let's put up, this is a tweet this morning from the president calling on Attorney General Jeff Sessions to stop the investigation. And I'm wondering if you see it as obstruction of justice in plain sight. Because Max, you write this, you think that the president is flouting the law, right, in plain sight. Is that what you said there?
BOOT: I do, yes.
LEMON: Why do you think then?
[22:09:58] BOOT: Well, I mean, I'm just looking right here at 18 U.S. Code 1503 the section having to do with objection of justice, which says that "Whoever corrupt to you by threats or force or by any threatening letter of communications endeavors to influence, intimidate or impede any officer of a court of the United States."
Isn't that what Trump is doing right here? He is endeavoring to influence, intimidate, or impede. Now typically the difficulty with proving obstruction of justice is proving corrupt intent that he has some ulterior motive for doing that.
But all you have to do to see the corrupt intent is to read his Twitter feed or listen to his interviews.
HEALY: It would be fascinating to get him on the stand and have him say well, do you take Twitter seriously or do you -- you just use it childishly or do you actually say it. I mean, because he sees himself as a master communicator, who has figured out a way to use social media to energize millions and millions of voters. And if he is just out there saying, well, you know, why do you take me seriously? You know, it's crazy.
BOOT: There's a good cause if to take him seriously. I mean, you remember that earlier this year he actually fired the secretary of state by tweet. I mean, if his tweets don't mean anything, how come Rex Tillerson isn't secretary of state any more.
LEMON: Yes. Or, you know, about Comey finding out he'd lost his job on the news.
BOOT: Right.
HEALY: Right.
LEMON: Go on, Laura.
COATES: I was just going to say, you know, this idea that the president of the United States is trying to suggest that somehow the 'should' versus 'shall,' et cetera. I feel like we're back in 1998 when Bill Clinton was saying, well, it depends on what your definition of the word is-is.
LEMON: Is-is, right.
COATES: And people were very critical about this sort of semantics based argument.
LEMON: And it became a meme.
COATES: And it became a meme. And it should have been. It should remain and be revive today on that very notion. But ultimately, you don't have to prove intent by that one smoking gun.
It can be the contextual argument, it can be all of the comprehensive things that over time to show that there is no other conclusion, that somebody could reasonably draw there is some nefarious intent here. And I have to just say--
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: Hey, Laura--
COATES: Yes?
LEMON: Go on, quickly, because I got a quick follow up for you.
COATES: No, go ahead. It's your show. Go.
LEMON: OK, OK. Here is what -- this is what -- I just want to make sure you finish your thought. You're making a very good point there.
I just want -- I just wonder if you look at all of these tweets, should we be looking at them any differently, as I said in my opening statement, because he said them in public rather than -- you know, he didn't pick up a phone, he didn't write it in a memo. I mean, clearly, Jeff Sessions and other people at the Justice Department have access to Twitter.
COATES: You know, absolutely. You should not look at this and say, no, nobody commits crimes in broad daylight. In fact, a great number of crimes are committed in broad daylight. Especially by people who are emboldened to think that justice will not apply to them.
This happened in people who are repeat criminals, serial criminals in a variety of ways. People who can say things like, I could go out on to the street and shoot somebody, and no one would know. And that's more than 18 months ago.
Clearly, the idea of committing a crime in the dark is not the only way to do so. But I just want to caution everybody. Because no prosecutor worth their salt or investigator would ever consider obstruction of justice to be the end game. It is part of the overall inquiry, it would be like giving a speeding ticket to somebody who is fleeing from having just robbed a bank and ignoring the actual bank charge.
The fact that they are looking at obstruction of justice means that the president of the United States has put himself in this position and continues to do so, and prolongs the investigation with every single tweet.
LEMON: OK.
COATES: If he wants it to end, he should stop speaking.
LEMON: All right. I want you guys to stick around because I want to talk to you more. I want to keep you over to the next block.
When we come back, the president's lawyers update him on the Mueller investigation. And just a few hours later the president calls on Jeff Sessions to immediately end the Mueller investigation. Coincidence?
[22:15:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: So the White House trying and mostly failing to mop up the mess tonight after the latest alarming tweet from the president.
Sources telling CNN that President Trump is seething and lashing out on Twitter as his lawyers negotiate for a potential face to face interview with Robert Mueller.
So back with me now, Patrick Healy, Max Boot, and Laura Coates. max, what does the president's Twitter tirade say about his state of mind right now? Is he feeling the heat?
BOOT: What it says to me, Don, is that he is guilty as sin. I mean, this is his outbursts which have been going on for more than a year now, in reaction to the special counsel investigation indicates somebody who is deeply worried about what they will find.
I mean, his mantra of, you know, no collusion, no obstruction and all that stuff is pretty thin. Because he -- if he really thought confidence that they weren't going to find anything why would he be freaking out on Twitter every single time there is a turning point in the investigation which he consistently does.
By the way, I thought that Laura made an excellent point. And I'm by the way, privilege to be on here with a future host of Jeopardy. But I thought she made a -- I thought she made a--
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: Don't whisper the tune I have to pay for it.
BOOT: Yes. I thought she made a terrific point about how there are criminals who commit crimes in plain view. And they are the arrogant ones, the ones who think that they can get away with anything, because they've gotten away with a lot of stuff in the past.
And Donald Trump has been getting away with a lot of stuff his whole life including as president, as a presidential candidate. I mean, just think of the stuff he said in public, you know, attacking John McCain for being a POW, making fun of a disabled reporter, on and on and on.
I think that leads to a sense of impunity that he is bulletproof, as he himself said he could kill somebody on Fifth Avenue and his supporters would still be behind him. And that's why I think he has the chutzpa to be essentially obstructing on Twitter before the entire world.
LEMON: OK. So, can I just -- I just want to stick with you, because I have this last thing and I just want to put this up. This is what you wrote. You said "It doesn't matter," when you're talking about the president and what I said in my opening remarks about if he says it in public.
"It doesn't matter from a legal perspective whether the directive is whispered in secret or shouted for all to hear. It doesn't even matter whether the investigation is actually stopped or not, a crime is still a crime, even if it's not carried out to a successful conclusion. The impeachment proceedings would have already started if congressional Republicans weren't including with Trump to obstruct justice."
I mean, that last statement is pretty bold. What do Republicans think when say stuff like that of your fellow Republicans?
BOOT: Well, my -- I'm an ex-Republican. I'm sure they don't like it.
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: You're an ex now.
BOOT: But that's the reality. I mean, they are protecting Donald Trump as evidence is accumulating of his collusion with Russia, as evidence is accumulating of his obstruction of justice Republicans are basically protecting him.
There is legislation which was passed by the Senate judiciary committee to protect Robert Mueller from being fired. Mitch McConnell, the majority leader refuses to bring it to the floor. Paul Ryan, the house speaker will not bring that legislation to the floor. They will not protect Robert Mueller, and they will not hold Donald Trump accountable.
[22:20:04] Instead, they're allowing members like Jim Jefferson and Devin Nunes to engage in the most reprehensible obstruction on behalf of Donald Trump, maligning people like Rod Rosenstein, maligning the brave and honest men and women of the FBI in order -- tearing them down, in order to save Donald Trump's hides.
So that's where the Republicans are, they are firmly in the obstruction camp, and that's the big difference between now and Watergate, because at the time of Watergate, there were a few honest Republicans who realized they could not let Nixon get away with all of this stuff. And so far, there are almost no Republicans that who willing to stand up to Trump.
HEALY: What's really interesting purely about what Max is saying, it goes to President Trump's mind-set, is that the Republicans have formed this wall of defense around the president.
LEMON: Publicly.
HEALY: Publicly. They are defending him. And it brings him no comfort, it doesn't calm him down. And it goes to his mentality. He's been a command and control person his entire life. He was taught by Roy Cohn and some of the other people who, you now, sort of helped him come up in business that, you know, you get what you want and you do what it takes to get it.
He had a very small family he business, he relight on family members, he relied on people like Michael Cohen to be fixers to sort of deal with problems as they came up.
And now he's president of the United States. And his point of view like a Roy Cohn would say, you should squash this. You are the most powerful person on the planet. You should squash this.
So it doesn't matter to him in some ways that, you know, Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan and others are protecting him so well. He wants to be able to control the situation and it bothers him such a great deal that he can't squelch it, democracy doesn't work that way.
LEMON: As you were sitting there and talking it's very simple when you give a child and continue to give a child what they want, and they sort of -- they keep lashing out, they keep going wanting more and more and more, you never say no. It's just like -- it's just like dealing with a child, right, but they are not good parents.
HEALY: Well, his impulse control from the campaign throughout.
LEMON: You mention Michael Cohen which is a perfect segue the one I want to ask Laura. People inside the White House, Laura, say that the burst of tweets reflect the anger Trump has aired privately for months including about Jeff Sessions.
They say he's been in a dark place since the Cohen story, the Michael Cohen story broke last week. When someone is in a dark place like that, Laura, in your experience are they operating? Does this come from a guilty conscience?
COATES: You know, it's hard to say definitively. You know, with the actions of somebody who's lashing out his petulant. You often wonder are they somebody who should be defiant. Or should they be a defendant.
And you wonder about this, because at the one hand you mentioned Roy Cohn who is the master of witch hunts, frankly speaking, and so you wonder if he is taking a page out of that book and saying, here's the way to become the Johnny apple seed of planting seeds of doubt. You lash out, you make people realize that the court of public opinion links directly to the political process of impeachment.
And as long as you are core of public opinion your favor you will have the strings attached to the congressmen and women who may have to vote in some way on your impeachment.
The other hand, it may suggest that somebody who would simply like everything to be resolved, he doesn't have a guilty conscience who simply is saying let the chips fall as they may. That often tends to see somebody who is silent, who let's everything go on.
So it's always a constant battle trying to reconcile what his intent is, which is why you can't look at any one thing he's saying in isolation. It's about the pattern of behavior, it's about the series of things, and the pattern that you have, and the other contextual clues you have, is not an isolation post to Michael Cohen revelation.
This has been brooding for quite some time, and it makes the pendulum swing closer to, perhaps a guilty conscience, as opposed to somebody who's simply defiant.
LEMON: Max, I have to go. I know you want to say something.
BOOT: Just real fast. I mean, I think what he's engaged is in a very successful campaign to tear down Robert Mueller. You're seeing public opinion shifting against the Mueller investigation. This is how he is defending himself, by attacking the people who are investigating him.
LEMON: Well, the public opinion, will that -- that won't make a difference.
BOOT: It will make a difference, because remember he's not going to be tried in the court of law, because the DOJ position is, you can't indict a sitting president, he has to be impeached, he would have to be tried in Congress. And of course, public opinion matters a lot for Congress.
LEMON: Thank you all. I appreciate it.
When we come back, the White House today defending behavior like this.
(CROWD CHANTING)
LEMON: And you've got to hear the false stories the White House is using in their defense. [22:25:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: Press secretary Sarah Sanders held a press briefing at the White House today finally for only the -- it was only the fourth time in a month. It's no secret that the White House's relationship with the press is terrible and we know why.
It's because this administration is waging a war on journalism and the truth. And Sarah Sanders fights her battles from the podium. Just today, she was asked about our Jim Acosta, our very own Jim Acosta being heckled at a Trump rally Tuesday night.
And instead of actually answering, she makes this baffling and false, by the way, claim and then she dug way back two decades to find it. Watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SARAH HUCKABEE-SANDERS, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: We support a free press, but there also comes a high level of security with that. The media routinely reports on classified information and government secrets that put lives in danger and risks valuable national security tools.
This has happened both in our administration and in past administrations. One of the worst cases was the reporting on the U.S. ability to listen to Osama Bin Laden's satellite phone in the late '90s. Because of that reporting he stopped using that phone and the country lost valuable intelligence.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: So that story is just not true. It was debunked years ago, despite the claim having been made by President George W. Bush and the 9/11 commission. The media reported that Osama Bin laden was known to use - known to use a satellite phone, something that was widely known at the time and had been previously reported.
By the time it was reported the U.S. might be able to monitor that phone, Bin Laden was already scaling back use of those devices. It is quite a stretch to go back two decades to a debunked story to try to defend the behavior we all saw last night.
Are you supporting a free press if you spread falsehood -- excuse me -- if you spread lies from the podium?
[22:30:04] And does the president support a free press, if he also supports the people who try to stop journalists from doing their jobs.
The President retweeted a video of his fans booing Acosta at his rally Tuesday night, sharing an instance of open hostility to the media with his 53 million Twitter followers.
The Trump rally gets ugly, his supporters our reporter doing a job, calling him a traitor and a liar. What does the President do? Well, re-tweet a video in support of the hecklers. That's why when I asked a second time if the White House condemns what happened to Jim Acosta, she's given a second chance to actually support press freedom, Sanders refuses.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I said no one was being violent last night in terms of hitting anybody, and no broadcaster was broadcasting state secrets. They were trying to do stand-ups at a public rally. And you had people yell over them, preventing them from doing their jobs, and yelling that their network sucks on live TV. Do you support that or not?
SARAH SANDERS, PRESS SECRETARY, WHITE HOUSE: Well, we certainly support freedom of the press. We also support freedom of speech, and we think that those things go hand in hand.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: April Ryan is here, CNN political analyst. Boy oh, boy, lowest common denominator. And then to have it defended from the podium, the most esteemed podium in the world. So what do you think? Why would she go back to a story that's been debunked years and years ago about the satellite phone?
(CROSSTALK)
APRIL RYAN, POLITICAL ANALSYST, CNN: Because she's trying to justify, trying to justify the irrational, trying to justify foolishness. There was no cause for that. And she's playing to this base that listens to the President. They need this to rally behind the President because this President is embattled. So when this President is embattled, he either goes to sports or talks about the knee, or he goes to the press, or he goes to some other things that just make his base get into frenzy and forget all the other stuff. That's what it is. It's a big shiny silver ball at the detriment of free press.
LEMON: You have been at the White House 20 years now.
RYAN: Twenty one.
LEMON: Twenty one. For Republican and Democratic administrations
RYAN: Yes.
LEMON: Right? I am sure this is very different. Do you sit in that room -- again as I said, the most esteemed podium in the world. Do you just sit there and say, I cannot believe that someone is standing here lying to the American media and the American people?
RYAN: Yes.
LEMON: Or trying to gaslight them. Do you -- is it surreal to you to sit there every day, because it's surreal...
(CROSSTALK) RYAN: Don, I am going to say this to you. Today, when she said that, I couldn't believe when she was talking about you know how we get leaked information. We don't just -- as the press, we don't just walk into an office and open files and take leaked information and report it. Our sources are giving it to us, giving it to us willingly because they're whistle blowers.
And for her to assume or to say that we are just gathering -- no. She's not -- she's changing the facts. If you want to say she's lying, she's lying. And I agree with that. It was shameful today. That podium is no place to play. You don't play with words. You don't play with moments. Everything comes to the White House from (Inaudible) and everything in between.
That's a serious moment and a serious place. And Jim Acosta's life, in my opinion, was in jeopardy that night. There was a safety issue. And you know she gets run out of a hen house a couple weeks ago, and gets secret service detail.
LEMON: We don't have secret service detail.
RYAN: That's what I'm saying. And this President, this President, President Donald J. Trump has stoked the flames for reporters to feel like they are in jeopardy. Their lives, their safety is in jeopardy. Their lives are in jeopardy at these rallies. And something has got to stop. She gets taxpayer funded. She gets payer funded security for something that she stokes.
LEMON: Yeah.
RYAN: But yet, it's OK. It's freedom of speech for us. It is not right. And I talked to Ari Fleischer, former White House Press Secretary under George W. Bush. And we had our back and forth quite a bit, you know. And I have had back and forths with even Robert Gibbs. It was always a friendly adversarial situation. It was never personal. This has now gone beyond politics. This has gone into life. This has gone into changing lives.
LEMON: But here's the thing that I have to say, a couple things here. Number one, we don't begrudge her security or anyone who has...
(CROSSTALK)
[22:34:55] LEMON: They need it, and many journalists need it now because of what this President and this administration...
(CROSSTALK)
RYAN: I am raising my hand. I am one of those.
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: OK. Yes, so a lot of us are. But you know it started with lock her up. You know build a wall, and all of these unseemly chants. And now it is CNN sucks. It's not about CNN. It's just about the behavior, oh, CNN is whining because they're -- it's not. If they had said it about any other network or any other person in the crowd, any other entity, we would be having this conversation, because this is supposed to be a dignified, respectful place to do the American people's business.
And he says what you're reading and hearing, what you're seeing, or whatever, it's not true. And so further stoking that.
RYAN: But see here's the problem. And people want to listen to the now and listen to this President and be entertained by him. And they talk about patriotism and talk about the constitution in this country. But they forget. Before they talk about you know the guns, second amendment, there's the first amendment that beat out the second amendment, the first amendment.
And within that first amendment is freedom of the press. The founding fathers put into the constitution, this accountability piece. You know if the checks and balances over here between executive -- judicial branches don't work, you still have a press that ask questions, to find out, to give transparency to a situation that -- or...
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: Checks and balances.
(CROSSTALK)
RYAN: Yes, yes.
LEMON: I've got to go. And it's there for a reason, April, that it's the first one. It's in the first one.
RYAN: It's in the first one.
LEMON: Yes. Thank you. I appreciate it.
RYAN: Thank you.
LEMON: Thank you. When we come back, the President spreading lies and stoking divisions on the campaign trail with another rally tomorrow, and more of this weekend, should we expect more angry crowds? We'll discuss.
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[22:40:00] LEMON: The President is set to return to the campaign trail tomorrow night, leading a rally in Pennsylvania. That coming as a worried President is reportedly in a dark mood over Michael Cohen, Paul Manafort, and of course, the Mueller investigation, all of that with the midterms looming. So I want to bring in now CNN Political Commentators Matt Lewis and Dan Pfeiffer, and CNN Contributor Selena Zito, the author of the Great Revolt, a great book.
Welcome one and all. So let's start with the author of the Great Revolt. Selena, you know, the President is heading to Pennsylvania. He's going to have another rally tomorrow. Last night's rally, if that was any indication, he's going to go all out on this strategy of stoking up the base. Are you concerned at all about how these rallies are going, the lies, the aggression toward reporters, and on and on?
SELENA ZITO, CONTRIBUTOR, CNN: Well, I feel as though -- I mean sometimes I feel like we're in Groundhog Day, right? It's just a repeat of sort of what we saw in 2016. I think it's even a little bit more amped up right now, because people have you know -- Trump's looked at some of the results from these special elections. And you know they see that the Democrats are excited and energized to come out.
And they believe that they need to sort of -- they need to be at that pitch as well. And so I think we're just -- I think that it's going to be this way, every day -- not every day, but every rally that we see him host or you know speak at going to be the exact same way. Now, I didn't see the whole rally. I didn't see the whole thing.
I did see some of the parts that Acosta tweeted out. You know honestly, can we all just be nicer to each other. I feel like it's just you know simple and common sense, right? I doubt that that was everyone in the place, but certainly that didn't look very comfortable at all. I have been in those situations. I don't like when I am in those situations. I just wish we would all just like step back and just be a little more polite to each other.
LEMON: I'm looking at both Matt and Dan's faces. I mean Matt, you seem really concerned. Dan, I should say, seemed really concerned. And Matt, you're like -- it's almost like you can't believe this is happening. So first, Dan and the Matt, what do you think?
DAN PFEIFFER, POLITICAL COMMENTATOR, CNN: Sure. Look. I was disturbed by what I saw there. I was (Inaudible) we saw this in 2016. And whenever I see that, I think that too, 10 years ago at a rally that John McCain was having. He was running against President Obama. The crowd got like that. They were screaming things, calling President Obama a terrorist, saying that he was a danger to the country.
And McCain grabbed the microphone and he said, look, we disagree. I disagree with President Obama. But he is a decent man, and you should not be afraid if he becomes President. And so candidates of Presidents (Inaudible) are not accountable for every member in the crowd at the rallies. But they do have a responsibility to try to speak out against that, to try to be a leader.
And that really was one of the last times that a major Republican figure spoke out against this anger, and outrage, and division that have been driving the Republican Party over the last 10 years.
LEMON: I'm glad you mentioned that because I just want to put this up. Matt, this is for you. And I wonder if you know he's following the crows, that's he's sort of (Inaudible) and honing in on their energy. This is what David (Inaudible), he's a former Republican Congressman from Florida. He tweeted today. He said reflecting more on last night's Trump rally, one, it really was as much a cultural event as it was a political one. Two, the majority of the crowd was actually angrier and politically
more extreme than the President. He was simply following them more than they following him. So was he just sort of you know feeding off of their energy, because that's what the crowd wants to hear?
[22:44:56] MATT LEWIS, POLITICAL COMMENTATOR, CNN: Well, I think that's part of it. I mean a leader can take the crowd and channel their energy in a more positive way. But that is not what we have in the Republican Party and the conservative movement right now, sadly. Instead -- again, I mean I don't think Donald Trump caused this problem.
I do think he's a symptom of it. I think he's co-opted it. And I think he is actually taking -- amping it up. But look, John McCain lost. He did the right thing and he lost. And I think a lot of Republicans, a lot of people in that room don't like John McCain any more. They want a guy who's a fighter. And if it tears the country apart, then that's OK, because the country is already -- you know the institutions, the media. The other institutions, they believe have already sold them down the river.
LEMON: All right. I need to get to the break (Inaudible), but I want you guys to stick around, because when we come back, I want to talk about the shadowy group spreading dangerous conspiracy theories and why they showed up at the President's rally last night.
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[22:50:00] LEMON: So the President is using his campaign rallies to fire up his base, but those rallies are also attracting the members of a shadowy conspiracy cult with some pretty shocking beliefs. So let's talk about it. Matt, Dan, and Selena are back. So Dan, as promised, the first question goes to you. So disturbing signs, some disturbing signs popped up at the Trump rally last night.
We have some video. This is from a group called QAnon. Now this group is basically the mother of all conspiracy theories, involving a nonexistent person named Q. Follow along with me. You (Inaudible) notes, a nonexistent person named Q, reported to be a high high-level government official and believe crazy things like this group like President Trump against a global elite seeking to murder him.
He's fighting against that. That's just nuts. So how worried should the White House be about attracting these kinds of supporters? Those are some of the conspiracy theories that are out there.
PFEIFFER: Well, they should be worried. I am positive they're not, because America's most famous conspiracy theorist is Donald Trump, birther conspiracy fame. And this is something that -- it's not just Donald Trump, the entire Republican Party has allowed this to go on for a long time. You take Donald Trump, for example, led the racist birther conspiracy theory crusade.
That gets debunked. He sort of waddles off stage in shame, you know, a few months later, every Republican candidate goes to Trump Tower, bends the knee, and tries to get his endorsement. He stays involved in the Republican Party. There is an opportunity for leaders to stand up, as Matt mentioned, to debunk this stuff, to call it out, to say that that is not welcome within our party, but no one does that.
They want to have their cake and eat it, too. They want to seem serious, yet still get Alex Jones' supporters, QAnon supporters. And I think that is problematic, not just for politics in the moment, just for sort of the state of society in general.
LEMON: The Muslims cheering, that was one, voter fraud, thousands of illegal's voting, that sort of thing. So, but Matt, we have been operating in the strange kind of space where truth is being devalued. All these kinds of groups, I am wondering if there's a consequence of that. There are people who are convinced in these groups that everyone but Trump is lying to them.
LEWIS: Yes. This is a really weird thing, right? You used to be able to disagree about politics, you know. Obama a socialist, this guy -- you could do that. And that's weird. It's fine. It's fair. But right now, what we're doing is actually questioning reality. Like, is -- did Ronald Reagan really even die?
Like, if we can't believe that we watched on TV, and they say there was a school shooting. If we can't believe that that event actually happened, if someone is saying not only did you have the facts wrong, but, like, it didn't even happen, the shooting -- like, if we can't agree on basic reality, like, how -- am I even here right now. Is Donald Trump really the President?
When we start questioning things like that, sanity goes out the window. And that is -- I mean I know it sounds like I am being crazy right now. Watch some of the videos, the explainers on this group. They believe that every President since Reagan -- by the way, they believe that this globalist cabal killed Kennedy and that every President since Reagan, so both Bushes, the Clinton's, the Obama's, are all part of this evil -- you know, conspiracy to take down America.
And Donald Trump somehow has out -- it's really unbelievable. And this is, like -- you know, a lot of people who were in the shots last night at these rallies.
LEMON: Yeah. And a lot of folks have written about it, about that. And we saw -- we witnessed it with our own eyes. Selena, you're shaking your head. My question is should the President -- should he reject this administration's support from groups like QAnon with these sketchy histories and people who believe in conspiracy theories that are just outlandish and completely not true?
Like, like one of the Trump rallies, this guy seen wearing that Black for Trump t-shirt. He once belonged to a violent fringe cult. These are the people who are at the rallies. Not all of them. I would assume. I am not there. But you certainly see a whole lot of them.
ZITO: Well, I mean, I think we should all disavow violent fringe cults and the -- I have never even heard of this Q thing.
LEMON: QAnon.
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[22:49:55] ZITO: QAnon. You know, no of course, you should disavow things like that. I mean it's ridiculous. I was not at this rally. I have never seen this at other rallies. Maybe it's a new thing. But you know, if it becomes growing and it becomes dominant as part of the rally, certainly. It's something you should say, hey, hey, hey, we're not part of that. You know it becomes introduced as part of mainstream.
LEMON: Hey.
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LEMON: A quick answer, if you can, because I am pushing it here. So if -- because I know that Trump supporters hate to be -- you know hate for people to paint them with a broad brush, right, that they're racist or they're conspiracy theorists, on and on and on.
ZITO: Absolutely.
LEMON: So then shouldn't they be upset about these people, who are making them look bad, and shouldn't they speak about it, and shouldn't they be saying something we don't want you at our rallies. You're making us look back, or, hey, it's all great?
ZITO: No, of course not. I mean, of course, they speak out against it. I was just at a rally for Pence the other day in Newark, Ohio, for the special election in Ohio 12th. They -- you know obviously, a much different toned rally, right? But they (Inaudible) half the tweets -- they love the results of his presidency, but they don't like half the tweets of the President does.
And they certainly call out and are unhappy when people make Trump voters look as part of this sort of crazy group of people, right?
LEMON: These people are -- these are Trump voters who are doing it to themselves, but go on.
ZITO: Right. But it's not all Trump voters, and not everyone should be lumped into that same -- see that crazy person? That's what all of them are like. That's when we get in trouble. That's how we missed the election, because we would see these voters -- you know, viewers would see these voters and say, that's what they're all like, there's no way he's going to win.
LEMON: Yeah.
ZITO: And that's not what they're all like.
LEMON: Yeah.
ZITO: And that's our problem. We have a problem with trusting institutions and expertise. And I think that's the larger problem that we have in this country that we need to address. LEMON: I have got to go. I don't want to be rude and cut you off.
Thank you, all, I appreciate it. I have to get to the top of the hour. We'll be right back.
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