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Don Lemon Tonight
Tit-for-Tat Between President Trump and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi; Michael Cohen's Alleged Payout Revealed; President's Lawyer in Clean-up Mode; Michael Cohen Admitting to Paying an I.T. Person to Rig Polls for Donald Trump; The Trump And Kanye West Bromance; Speaker Nancy Pelosi Denied the Use of A Military Plane. Aired 10-11p ET
Aired January 17, 2019 - 22:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(JOINED IN PROGRESS)
[22:00:00] CHRIS CUOMO, CNN HOST: Why would such a savvy smart man do that? As Mike Rogers said and many others, something smells weird. It doesn't have to be a crime to be wrong.
Thank you for watching. "CNN TONIGHT" with D. Lemon starts right now.
DON LEMON, CNN HOST: I were in -- I really want to meet with Chris right now and close the door and I don't want anybody to -- what does that mean? You don't want anybody to know? Something --
CUOMO: It means that you're using your outside voice for your inside thoughts.
LEMON: Right. I mean, seriously there's something I don't want people to know. It's obvious, don't you think? Otherwise, you would memorialize it, you would have your interpreter's notes, you would put the notes into record, I have nothing to hide at all.
CUOMO: I hear you.
LEMON: So, what if it leaks? If you're not saying or doing anything wrong, why does it matter?
CUOMO: I hear you. I hear you. I have to tell you, I am giving every scintilla of benefit of the doubt that I can. People get frustrated, you know what it is. You know what it is. I don't know what it is.
LEMON: You already know. They call you Mr. both sides --
CUOMO: And I don't want to know. Hey, listen, I'm OK with that.
LEMON: Yes.
CUOMO: All right. I'm OK with that because you know what? You cannot be an echo for one side of these kinds of situations. Now, we're not talking about the Mueller probe. People get upset because on the shutdown -- hey, look, I think that the Democrats and Republicans should not be leaving for a recess. They should stay and try to make a deal. And I don't like that they were going to go on a trip for their recess. The shutdown demands more urgency from the left and the right. Pelosi has got high ground on the shutdown. The president says he owns it on national TV.
LEMON: Yes.
CUOMO: But she didn't have to do that thing with the State of the Union. That didn't help her cause. She's better than that. She's playing his game, that's what I was pointing out.
But on this, I don't want to jump to a conclusion that the president is somehow too close to Russia in a way that is compromising this country. It's too ugly a suggestion.
LEMON: I'll say again, I don't -- this is not about both sides. This is about truth, justice and the American way.
(CROSSTALK)
CUOMO: A hundred percent when it comes to the Mueller probe.
LEMON: There is no truth -- there is no truth in this.
CUOMO: In politics there's almost always two sides.
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: There is no justice.
CUOMO: If the two sides were involved in the process there's almost always something going on both sides. But Mueller is about truth.
LEMON: It's not the American way. This is not about -- I don't give a damn about liberal, I don't give a damn about Democrat, I don't give a damn about Republican. Again, as I said, this is about truth, justice in the American way. We're getting no truth.
CUOMO: The Mueller probe.
LEMON: We're getting no -- and all the lies that come out of this administration.
CUOMO: A hundred percent.
LEMON: If I have a deal with you, I got a deal, it's ready to go, we're going to do it.
CUOMO: Yes, but where --
LEMON: And then you say, I'm going home.
CUOMO: Where does that come from?
LEMON: I'm going about my business, I'm going to say to you I'm done.
CUOMO: I know.
LEMON: I've already made my deal with you and if you don't like it that's your problem.
CUOMO: But first of all, politicians -- politicians break deals all the time. But more importantly --
LEMON: Yes.
CUOMO: -- this president is known for breaking deals. He's known for not keeping his word.
LEMON: As a businessman.
CUOMO: He's known -- yes, he's known for not paying people. He's known -- in fact, Kellyanne, his -- I argue -- best defender, she, when she was with Ted Cruz that was one of her main hammer points on the president.
LEMON: Yes.
CUOMO: This guy never pays his debts. Why do you think he was --
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: He built his business off the backs of poor people.
CUOMO: Yes.
LEMON: I want to see his tax returns and then the very next day, she's like, well, listen, you know, he's a good guy and he's the best that we have. Listen, the whole Michael Cohen thing about the polls --
CUOMO: Yes.
LEMON: -- you did an -- you interview Trump, right? So, did I. Every time I went to an interview with him you know what he did? He'd hand me a poll, right? He'd hand me the polls and he'd say, look, take a look at this poll. Look how I'm doing. Look how I'm doing. You know why he did? I have it on good authority. You know why?
CUOMO: He paid good money for them.
LEMON: Well, that -- that and because we're suckers. He realized that if we -- if he got his name out there, if he was doing good in the polls then we would talk about him, we would report on him. If he wasn't doing well in the polls then why would be care because he's not a contender.
CUOMO: True.
LEMON: So, what he did? He strategized.
CUOMO: He's good. He's good.
LEMON: He said, allegedly, right, paid somebody to -- according to Michael Cohen, paid somebody to rig the polls for him so that we could continue to talk about him and amplify his message.
CUOMO: Right. One, I agree with you 100 percent that is part of this particular president's talent. He's good at playing the media.
LEMON: Yeah.
CUOMO: He's good with a gut instinct what will get people upset. He's good at selling.
Now, to Michael Cohen, I wouldn't say allegedly. I'd say more than that. Because the outfit that says they were paid says it and Michael Cohen doesn't deny it.
LEMON: Right.
CUOMO: He says, I did it, but I did it at the direction of the president. Why else would he be fixing stuff like that, you know?
LEMON: They matter. Why would it matter to him?
CUOMO: Right.
LEMON: Right? To do that.
CUOMO: And look, good to him for being honest about this stuff. Now I know people will say he hasn't been honest in the past, but you got to weigh both. You know, the special counsel said he's been helpful, he's been credible -- and you know, you got to take that as well.
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: I believe him.
CUOMO: Why would he lie about this?
LEMON: Any time you are facing prison and your family is in jeopardy and you don't have -- yes.
CUOMO: He's already been sentenced.
LEMON: Yeah.
CUOMO: Why would he lie about this?
LEMON: Why would he lie?
CUOMO: And here's why it matters. One of the main values that people are going to have to weigh with this president because I don't think it's going to come to a crime, all right. I think that's a false standard, I think it's setting too high a bar.
Would he know about these things and let it happen? Would he be OK with this type of dark arts? Would he be OK with this?
[22:05:00] Look at what he did with the women, look at what he did with the poll, look at what he does with Putin. This is man who proves again and again he is comfortable with things that are wrong and he's comfortable lying about the same. It's troubling.
LEMON: Do you know what the test is to figure that out is does it mean that he's going to win? Doesn't even matter what it means politically or ideologically, what does it mean for him winning? That's what the wall is all about.
CUOMO: Think about it. That's what the whole defense is about.
LEMON: That's what everything is about.
CUOMO: Yes. Look, the wall that's so obvious and so frustrating to me because people are paying for it. Now, I would have been OK if the politics kept going. Yes, he keeps walking away from deals. It's not going to help this currency with the other side and it's not going to really embolden his own side who want to work with him and let him take the lead.
But now that all these other people are paying the price now, it means something else. And that's why I say I implore both sides to try to make it stop. Do whatever you can because people are paying the price for your ineffectiveness.
But I'll tell you something. At the end of the day, the lying, the tangled web is going to matter, bot because it's a crime but because it's wrong, and that is going to be the basis upon which he is measured.
LEMON: No, because you can't remember what -- when you lie, you can't remember what he said. Do you know what Bodak Yellow is?
CUOMO: Who?
LEMON: That Bodak, that's Cardi B. song.
CUOMO: I didn't hear you because we're only whispering. We're on television.
LEMON: Bodak Yellow.
(CROSSTALK)
CUOMO: You have microphone, you don't have to yell on television.
LEMON: You know, these things --
CUOMO: I think isn't that he big hit?
LEMON: That's it, Bodak Yellow.
CUOMO: I hear her music in my house all the time. Cha-Cha loves it.
LEMON: Well, I got to go because I got to make some money moves right now.
CUOMO: Did you see my moves before you want to say? You can't move your neck like that. I only have half -- half of my vertebrae are moving.
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: I'm going to tell you what that is. You can't dance.
CUOMO: You think you dance better than I can?
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: You're a terrible dancer.
CUOMO: You think you dance better than I can?
LEMON: We're not going to have a dance off, OK, Chris.
CUOMO: Whenever you want. Whenever you want.
LEMON: Boy, you need a whole bunch of Gillette razors.
CUOMO: Whenever you want.
LEMON: All right.
CUOMO: Whenever you want.
LEMON: Hey, it turns out, guess what, the polls were -- they were rigged.
CUOMO: Shocking.
LEMON: Right.
CUOMO: I'll talk to you later. Have a great show.
LEMON: See you. Have a good one. See you soon.
This is CNN TONIGHT. I'm Don Lemon.
And here we are, another day of government chaos. Another day when the institutions we thought that we could depend on look like they're coming apart at the seams.
This is day 27 now of the shutdown. Day 27, thousands of government workers who have bills to pay, families to feed just like the rest of us, they're forced to go out and work for free, not get paid.
The president and the speaker of the house doing hand to hand combat, I mean, going back and forth. I'm going to tell you about how the day unfolded.
The president's former attorney admitting that he paid thousands to rig polls in favor of candidate Trump. The president's current attorney conceding the Trump campaign may have colluded with Russia while insisting the president did not.
Is anybody feeling good about any of this, about all of this? Well, as I said last night maybe this guy is. There he is -- Putin. So, let's go through it all point by point.
First, there's a story everybody's talking about tonight -- President Trump versus Nancy Pelosi. It's like in this corner, right, and then in this corner.
Trump advisers said it best, this is King Kong versus Godzilla. This is what happens when you play a hardball with Donald Trump, the president denying the speaker a military plane for her military trip to Afghanistan and suggesting that she fly commercial to a war zone. So, a trip that was kept under wraps for security reasons as trips to a war zone usually are is publicly revealed by the president.
All this coming about an hour before Pelosi was supposed to leave, members of the delegation on the bus, their plane sitting on the runway. And predictably, it sparked indignation on that phrase on both sides.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. KEVIN MCCARTHY (R-CA), HOUSE MINORITY LEADER: I'm just shocked she didn't think that she would leave the country. Why would you leave the country with a government shutdown and you're a speaker of the house?
REP. ADAM SCHIFF, (D) CALIFORNIA: I think the president's decision to disclose the trip that the speaker is making to a war zone was completely and utterly irresponsible in every way.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: Why would she leave the country -- speaker of the government. Didn't the president go to a war zone during a government shutdown? Leaving the country? OK. Just checking.
It's absolutely no coincidence this happened the day after Pelosi and what was also a nakedly political move to be honest, suggested the president reschedule the State of the Union blaming the shutdown. And of course, there's her opposition to the president's wall.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NANCY PELOSI, UNITED STATES SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: I'm not for a wall. I'm not for any wall. Not for a wall.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: So many questions about all of this. In his letter, the president called Pelosi's trip to the war zone during the shutdown a public relations event, which is interesting coming from the man who just last month, as I said, took a trip to a war zone during the shutdown.
[22:10:03] And the fact is the speaker of the house is third in line in our government after the president and the vice president. So, exposing her trip to a war zone is pretty questionable even these days and because, of course, the Trump campaign is fund-raising off the clash with Pelosi. Did you know that?
White House official tells CNN the president has been watching the TV coverage and is pleased. So, we can probably expect more of these bareknuckle tactics on both sides -- on both sides.
And speaking of the president watching TV, here's something he apparently wasn't pleased about. Sources telling CNN he was startled when his nominee for attorney general William Barr said this on live TV during his confirmation hearing.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
WILLIAM BARR, ATTORNEY GENERAL NOMINEE: I told him how well I knew Bob Mueller and our -- and how, you know, the Barrs and Muellers were good friends and would be good friends when this is all over.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: The president reportedly complained to his aides that he didn't realize Barr and Mueller were so close, which is odd since Barr says he told the president exactly that. Well, aides have said the best way to get the president's attention is to talk to him via television, to come on one of these shows.
But there's more, much more. "The Wall Street Journal" reporting that the president's nemesis and former keeper of secrets, Michael Cohen, paid thousands of dollars to head -- to the head of a small technology company in 2015 to rig online polls in favor of then candidate Trump, surprise. Now, where have I heard about these rigged polls before?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Watch the polls because this is part of the crooked system. It's part of the rigged system.
You see these phony polls.
They put out these phony polls. You know, the phony polls.
They do these phony polls, right? Some of the polls are great. I only really acknowledge them if I'm winning.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: You cannot make this up. Don't fall for the okidok (ph).
Cohen tells CNN his actions were, quote, "at the direction of and for the sole benefit of Donald J. Trump." This is a quote. "I truly regret my blind loyalty to a man who doesn't deserve it."
Cohen is expected to testify before the House Oversight Committee on February 7th, through a -- though, a source tells CNN he is concerned for the safety of his family after the president publicly suggested, this is over the weekend with no evidence, that he has aware of damaging information about Cohen's family. And then there is the continuing saga of the president's current attorney. You saw much of it play out here on CNN last night with Chris, Rudy Giuliani. Roll it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RUDY GIULIANI, PRESIDENT TRUMP' ATTORNEY: I never said there was no collusion between the campaign or between people in the campaign.
CUOMO: Yes, you have.
GIULIANI: I have no idea if -- I have not. I said the president of the United States.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: Giuliani telling CNN's Dana Bash today, the president has no knowledge of collusion with Russia. The president has no knowledge of collusion with Russia and going on to say, quote, "neither he, nor I can possibly know what everyone on the campaign was doing."
And this, I can't possibly say no one had contact about something or in some way. So now, he is conceding. There could have been collusion by someone on the campaign. That is very different from what the president said way back in May of 2017.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: There's no collusion between me and my campaign and the Russians.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: All of this disruption, all the chaos and, oh yes, the government is still shutdown because of a manufactured crisis, because of the president's refusal to bend on the wall though more and more federal workers are being forced to do their jobs anyway even though they have no idea when they will be paid, no idea. Remember when the president said this?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: I alone can fix it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: Well, guess what? It's really true this time. The president can fix this. The question is, will he? Lots to talk about. Frank Bruni, David Axelrod, Alice Stewart will dig into it, next.
[22:15:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: First, Speaker Pelosi pushes the president to postpone his State of the Union address. Then the president abruptly grounds the speaker's flight to Afghanistan. When will this back and forth end? And when will we ever come together -- or they I should say -- to reopen the government?
Let's discuss now. Frank Bruni is here, David Axelrod, and Alice Stewart. Hello. If we had the answer to that question, right, we wouldn't need to be sitting here on television. How do you read this, Frank, and what's going on in Washington? Is this a both sides thing?
FRANK BRUNI, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Well, what's happened is this has gone from being a policy fight to being an intensely, intensely personal fight. You know, Donald Trump felt humiliated by the letter that Nancy Pelosi send saying maybe he shouldn't do the State of the Union.
And he is now trying to humiliate her back. He hates nothing more than feeling like someone has the upper hand and has shamed him. And so, what he did today was so incredibly personal. It was, I mean, the use of the word excursion in the letter, the use of the word public relations event.
And the way you know this wasn't about winning the public relations war about the wall but it was about just poking at her, it would have been a far smarter thing to let her go on the trip and then say I have no intent to negotiate.
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: She's out of the country.
BRUNI: Yes. How can she leave the country during a shutdown?
LEMON: Yes.
BRUNI: Instead, he does this because this is the kind of thing that makes him feel good.
LEMON: Yeah. And so, there you go. That's what I said. Is it a both sides thing or is it --
BRUNI: Well, I mean, neither side looks good right now but I think you can't -- you can't equate Donald Trump and Nancy Pelosi. She has a long way to fall before she's as low as him.
LEMON: Alice Stewart, CNN is reporting that the president has been watching the coverage and he's, you know, about the letter today and says he is pleased. But he revealed to the world that the second person in line for the presidency was heading to a war zone. She is the second person. The vice president is first, she's second. Is this all a game to him?
ALICE STEWART, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Look, they clearly feel as though they won the day because one thing is for sure about Donald Trump, we can take this to the bank, he is a counter puncher. And when Nancy Pelosi took the step to rescind the invitation to speak on the House floor for the State of the Union he counter punched and pull the plug on her trip.
[22:20:01] And that was something clearly that was expected and she probably expected that to happen. But here's the problem. This has to deal with nearly a million workers
that are not getting paid right now that should get paid. And here we have a tit for tat amongst the leader of our country and the Speaker of the House.
Here's the thing. President Trump when the conditions of his campaign promise to build this wall changed and Mexico was not going to pay for it, he needed to change how he approached this. At the same time, if Nancy Pelosi wants to show that she is willing to make progress and be a Speaker of the House, she also has to be willing to negotiate. This might play well in sanctuary city in San Francisco --
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: But Alice, why would she negotiate now? Whey should she negotiate now when the negotiation was all done before, several deals were on the table that everyone had agreed to, and the president backed out on all of them? Why should she negotiate -- why is it incumbent upon Nancy Pelosi to negotiate? Now, I don't understand that.
STEWART: Well, it's kind of hard for her to look at the American people in the face and say, look, I really want to put these people back to work when she is refusing and not allow --
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: But she's not the one who said -- Alice, she's not the one who said I will gladly shut the government down, I will carry that mantle. I will -- and both of them sat there, Pelosi and Schumer said we don't -- we think that's a wrong move, you shouldn't shut the government down.
STEWART: Right.
LEMON: So why should she negotiate right now? It's not -- she didn't say I'm going to shut the government down, she didn't. The president shut the government down.
STEWART: You're absolutely right. But as I said, why should she negotiate? That's the only way we're going to open the government back up. Look, refusing to fund Trump's big, beautiful wall sits well I'm sure in the sanctuary cities she represents but that doesn't look well --
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: David, I got -- David, I'm going to let -- I'm going to let David in, Alice. I got to -- that's not the only way. The president can open the government back up and still continue to negotiate for a wall. This isn't like the end of the world, doesn't just stop here.
He can say I'm going to do this, I'm going to do it for three weeks, I'm going to do it on the good faith so they know that I'm willing to negotiate with them, but he won't do that. It's not the only way. That's not true to say it's the only way that this is going to happen is if the Democrats start negotiating. There's another way that's actually probably a better way.
And if he wants to bring in some people and gain more confidence with the Democrats, he could say I'm going to open it back up, but I really want you to negotiate with me, and if you don't, then you're going to look bad.
STEWART: Look, I agree 100 percent that we should open up the government first and then negotiate the wall. I think there's a great way to bargain here. The president wants $5 billion, Nancy Pelosi wants zero, let's agree to 2.5 and let's move on.
LEMON: All right.
STEWART: But in the meantime, let's open up the government and then have those conversations --
LEMON: Fair enough.
STEWART: -- because these people now have gone without a paycheck and we need to rectify that.
LEMON: OK. David, sorry. Go on. What do you think about all this back and forth with --
(CROSSTALK)
DAVID AXELROD, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: That's OK. I think the problem with splitting it down the middle is that's the deal that Pence and Mulvaney offered early on and then the president repudiated it. So, he was not willing to accept that deal.
And you know, I mean, Democrats have an upper hand here because they have voted to reopen the government. Republicans and Democrats in the Senate have voted to reopen the government and leave the issue of homeland security and the border wall for further negotiation and the president has refused.
So, when he sends letters to Pelosi saying you shouldn't leave while we have 800,000 people out of work, he has the ability to put them back to work, the Congress has agreed to put them back to work at various times here, and he won't do it.
But I do think the other point, Don, look she played hard ball. She doesn't want to give him the platform of the State of the Union to litigate this issue. He then responded and kind of threw a spitball back. The thing that I thought that was astonishing about it, though, was referring to a trip to Afghanistan to visit the troops --
LEMON: Excursion.
AXELROD -- as a public relation event, especially coming from a president who has yet to visit the troops in Afghanistan, the Commander-in-Chief. Perhaps if he visited the troops in Afghanistan, he would recognize that this isn't a public relations event. It is one of the obligations of the leaders of our government to reassure our troops, to encourage them, to tell them that we appreciate their service. And that's what she was going to do and that's what he pulled the plug on.
LEMON: OK. Everybody, stay with me. I'm going to talk -- we're going to talk much more. A lot more to talk about. Collusion or no collusion? Seems like the president and his lawyers can't get their story straight.
[22:25:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: The president's attorney, Rudy Giuliani, spent the day doing cleanup after saying this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GIULIANI: I never said there was no collusion between the campaign or between people in the campaign.
CUOMO: Yes, you have.
GIULIANI: I have no idea if -- I have not. I said the president of the United States --
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: Of course, Giuliani and Trump have said multiple times that there was no collusion with Russia by the Trump campaign. So today, Giuliani tweeted, "My statements on collusion haven't changed. The misinterpretation has changed." The misinterpretation, did I read that right?
OK. "The point is I represent the president, not the campaign. But from both perspectives there is no involvement and collusion with Russians on the e-mail hack, the only possible crime."
We're all back. Did you get that, Frank?
BRUNI: I seldom get anything that comes from Rudy Giuliani.
LEMON: OK. Let me say this and I said this last night, I've been saying it for a long time, I think with you. Rudy Giuliani goes on television, spins up a tale about something, most of which is not true. We all start chasing our tails, right, or the shiny object, and he comes back the next day and says, no, no, that is not what I meant. What is the point?
BRUNI: And I was going to add and President Trump keeps him in his employee (ph), right?
LEMON: The point is to confuse people. The point is for him to win in the court of public opinion. The point is for him to in the way that he wants to, right, David, to try to keep the president from getting impeached. It's not legal. It has nothing to do with Mueller.
AXELROD: Right
LEMON: This is about public opinion, and he's trying to get your mind off or your eye off the ball. That's exactly what he's doing and we keep falling for it.
BRUNI: Well, we're talking about it right now.
LEMON: Exactly. That's the point.
BRUNI: So you could say he's winning right.
LEMON: He's winning.
BRUNI: If this wasn't something that the Trump administration that Donald Trump wanted, they wouldn't keep putting Rudy Giuliani out.
LEMON: There you go.
BRUNI: But you know, he's doing exactly what his boss does.
LEMON: Yes.
BRUNI: He is the mirror image of his boss. He's throwing out all sorts of words. He's getting us to chase them, he's getting us getting us to doubt our sanity at times.
LEMON: Yes.
BRUNI: You know, and meanwhile, all this other stuff goes unexamined.
[22:30:00] LEMON: David?
AXELROD: I don't doubt my own sanity because of Rudy Giuliani, but he does create a lot confusion (ph) --
LEMON: There are other reasons for that.
(CROSSTALK)
AXELROD: There's no -- exactly. There's no doubt about that. But ultimately, I think what's happening here is that the contours of Mueller's findings are becoming clearer, you know. And now it's becoming more and more difficult to deny that there was, in fact, collusion between elements of the campaign and the Russians.
And now, you know, like -- Rudy's hit the escape hatch and he and the President are parachuting out and leaving the others to fend for themselves because ultimately, his job is to protect the president from the political process of impeachment and his audience is the president's base of supporters.
LEMON: You're the smartest man on this panel.
AXELROD: He's not practicing law here.
LEMON: Yeah.
AXELROD: He is not practicing law. He's practicing politics.
LEMON: Yeah. ALICE STEWART, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: And Don, you're exactly right. We have the lawyers that are representing this president in trying this case with Mueller in the court of law. And then we have Rudy Giuliani who's trying the case in the court of public opinion.
The problem is, is the way this story has transgressed over the last year and a half from no collusion, this is fake news, this is hoax, to we don't believe to the best of our knowledge there is any collusion, to there's nothing illegal about collusion, to now, well, maybe there was collusion but the president didn't know about it.
Last night, for the first time, we had Trump's base sitting at home in the recliners wearing their MAGA hats watching that doing the Cuomo brow, saying what the heck did he just say? That's where we have the problem. And the fact that they're moving the goalposts on this very important key factor in this Mueller investigation, in my view, indicates maybe they know something that's about to come out and they're trying to soften the waters with the base.
LEMON: OK, Alice, so you're a Trump supporter.
STEWART: Right.
LEMON: Does this give you pause or are you going uh-oh?
STEWART: Look. I think the issue here is to find out to what degree the Russians interfered in our election, whether or not they influenced the outcome of the election and certainly --
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: No, no. Alice, I get that. Come on. Come on. Come on. Just be honest with me. You talked about the Trump supporters sitting around in their puffy pants, their PJs, or whatever, and with their MAGA hats and they're watching going, oh, my gosh. Does this give you pause at all?
STEWART: What Rudy Giuliani says to Chris Cuomo gives me no pause, but what Robert Mueller determines in his investigation, that will. I am going to with hold any comments about anything on this until we hear exactly what has come out of this investigation. I am not going to prejudge it. I don't think Rudy should. I don't think the president should. I don't think anyone should. Let's wait till we get the outcome.
LEMON: I have a signed MAGA hat in my office for you, OK?
STEWART: Can I have it?
LEMON: Yeah, you need one. He gave it to me when I did an interview with him. And it's a camouflage and not a lot of people have them.
STEWART: That's cool.
LEMON: David, you interviewed the former Secretary of State John Kerry for this week's Ax Files. AXELROD: I did.
LEMON: Here's a clip.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOHN KERRY, FORMER SECRETARY OF STATE: And so what's happened is people have lost that sense of what's important to our country. Our democracy is threatened today. Our democracy is threatened. We are dysfunctional. I mean let's be honest about it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: Our democracy is threatened. What else did he have to say about this country -- the state of this country?
AXELROD: Well, I mean he's obviously concerned about our relationship with the world. He had quite a bit to say about the president and Russia. Remember he was the secretary of state when this saga began. And he had an interesting cut on the President's view of the military and military service. He was very lively in this interview and very interesting, so I hope people will join.
LEMON: Yeah. I hope so, too. Thank you, all.
STEWART: Thanks, Don.
LEMON: I appreciate it, fascinating. I didn't mean to beat you up, Alice, but, you know, I had to challenge you a little bit on some of the things.
STEWART: That's OK. I am used to it.
AXELROD: Give her the hat, Don.
LEMON: Yeah.
(CROSSTALK)
STEWART: I get a hat for all of that.
LEMON: I was going to say I was going to sell it on eBay. All right, thank you, guys. Don't miss the Ax Files with David Axelrod's special guest, the former Secretary of State, John Kerry. That's Saturday night at 7 Eastern.
Michael Cohen admitting that he paid to rig polls in favor of the president. And he says Trump told him to do it. The reporter who broke the story joins me next.
[22:35:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: President Trump's former attorney Michael Cohen is admitting to paying thousands of dollars to rig polls at the direction of his former boss. The Wall Street Journal reports that before Trump ran for President, Cohen agreed to pay an IT specialist to rig online polls, including a poll of presidential contenders on the Drudge Report and a CNBC poll of top business leaders.
So let's discuss now with Michael Rothfeld, who broke the story for "The Wall Street Journal." We're so happy you're here. Michael D'Antonio is here as well. You know he's the author of the Truth About Trump. Happy to have both of you here, but I am ecstatic to have you here because this story has been fascinating me all day.
During the campaign, you heard, you know, Trump -- he wasn't President Trump -- candidate Trump complaining all the time. The polls are rigged. The polls are rigged. Now, we find out that Cohen is actually trying to rig the polls in his favor. Yes, they are rigged.
MICHAEL ROTHFELD, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL REPORTER: That's right. In 2014, as you mentioned, the CNBC poll, Michael Cohen had a relationship with this IT guy, John Gauger, who also works at Liberty University run by Jerry Falwell Jr. And for several years, they were working together. And then in 2014, he says I want you to make the boss the greatest businessman in the century and tries to write a computer script to manipulate this poll vote many, many times and that fails.
And then a year later, Cohen tries it again with the Drudge Poll when the presidential race is coming up, and says, you know, please make Donald Trump win and he comes in fifth. So it does fail, but they definitely tried to do it.
[22:40:06] LEMON: Yeah. And so, I talked about this earlier with Chris. I've been told on good authority the reason he did it is because they wanted him to show up in the polls just enough for us, suckers in the media, to talk about him, to get his name out there.
MICHAEL D'ANTONIO, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: So Donald Trump believes either you're a sucker or you're taking advantage of the suckers. So, we were the suckers. They took advantage of us. But there's also I think something consistent with Donald Trump's entire life going on here. This is a man who thinks that he cannot win a straight up competition.
He has to somehow rig whatever game he's playing. And you said this also that whatever he accuses others of doing is the thing that he's doing himself -- right. So, who imagines that the polls are rigged? The guy who's rigging the polls.
LEMON: This is what Michael Cohen tweeted, he said, "What I did was at the direction of and for the sole benefit of Donald Trump, the POTUS. I truly regret my blind loyalty to a man who doesn't deserve it."
Rudy Giuliani was on last night and he says the President didn't know it. But once again, you have Michael Cohen who is implicating this president in some very shady dealings.
ROTHFELD: That's right. And then we reported with respect to the hush money deals Michael Cohen did, that Donald Trump was involved in every level of that. So here he is on the side of the campaign operating kind of in the dark on his own. And you know, now, they like -- Trump people would like us to think he's rogue. But, you know, we know that Trump definitely was orchestrating the hush money deals.
And in this case, Michael Cohen says that Donald Trump directed him to do that. And at the time, Trump was tweeting about those polls. And he was very angry, in fact, when he didn't win the CNBC poll and was complaining about it. So I mean that kind of indicates that he was quite aware of what was going on.
LEMON: Every interview I went to, he brought polls. He would hand them to me.
D'ANTONIO: Sure.
LEMON: Yeah.
D'ANTONIO: Sure. And I am sure that he looked for them every morning when he went into the office. Now, he's not a fellow who Googles himself. He has people Google for him, and they bring in these polls, and they circle his standing and he -- it's either a good day or a bad day, depending on how it worked out.
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: You know where you just say, "Google me."
D'ANTONIO: Right.
LEMON: Tell me what they're saying.
(CROSSTALK)
D'ANTONIO: He's going to be Googled. And I also think that what's fascinating about this is, is that this is a president who has employed people all throughout his life to pump him up. And poor Michael Cohen was trained to do it for himself. He winds up creating this fake Twitter account of women who love Cohen.
LEMON: Yeah.
D'ANTONIO: And I mean it's kind of pathetic. And Donald Trump's pathetic in the way that he's promoted himself as a sex symbol. And poor Michael, you know, he's out doing it himself, too.
LEMON: Do you fault a guy for trying? I guess you can.
D'ANTONIO: He didn't know better, but, you know, he has landed on his feet. And he's now going to, I think be the hero of this story.
LEMON: This is where I have to say (ph) -- how do you pronounce of, Gauger (ph), right? Is that what you said? Cohen ended up stiffing Gauger who says he was promised $50,000 in fees but got somewhere between $12,000 to $13,000 thousand in cash in a blue Walmart bag, right?
ROTHFELD: That's right. LEMON: Cohen denies the cash payment. Is this how it works in Trump world? You may Trump world that you get paid in a plastic bag or paper bag full of cash. What does that sound like?
D'ANTONIO: I forgot you bag of cash tonight. I am sorry about that, but I'll catch you tomorrow. I mean --
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: That's it. Thank you, Michael D'Antonio.
(CROSSTALK)
ROTHFELD: But, Don, he forgot to mention he also gave him a boxing glove that belonged to a mixed martial arts fighter from Brazil. So maybe that presumably was maybe some compensation for not getting the full amount.
LEMON: Do we know what if that was supposed to make up for --
ROTHFELD: I don't think so because afterwards Gauger kept pursuing him for the rest of money, and Cohen was telling him, you know, I'll get it to you. You're the only person I owe money in the entire town. I mean I doubt that's the case, but -- so he did expect to get paid.
LEMON: But Michael Cohen requested a $50,000 reimbursement from Trump with a hand written note for tech services and the fees to Gauger in early 2017.
ROTHFELD: Right. When he was getting the Stormy Daniels $130,000, he gave a bank statement to the Trump Organization people. And so, on it, he wrote tech services, and he did get the $50,000 for that and $130,000 for Stormy. And so, that's why Rudy Giuliani is saying, hey, you know, the guy's a thief. He collected $50,000 from us but he only paid the other guy $13,000 in cash. And so, you know, you can't trust him.
LEMON: You mentioned this. But he said women who love and support Michael Cohen, strong, pitbull, sex symbol, no-nonsense, business oriented, and ready to make a difference.
[22:45:07] D'ANTONIO: Come on. Who was he imitating?
LEMON: Yeah.
D'ANTONIO: This is the President of the United States, who back then was all about creating this image of himself as sexy, if you can believe that.
LEMON: Your mom would say birds of a feather or if you lie down with dogs you get fleas.
D'ANTONIO: You're the guy with two dogs.
LEMON: What are you saying, I have fleas? Thank you, Michael. Thank you, both. We appreciate you coming on. And anytime you break the story, you're welcome back or even if you don't break the story. Thank you.
More than a dozen military officials, enlisted personnel, and senior civilians are telling CNN that they are concerned. How is the President politicizing the military and its warring people inside the Pentagon like never before? We'll talk about that coming up.
[22:50:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: President Trump today denying Speaker Nancy Pelosi the use of a military plane for a trip to Afghanistan to visit troops with a congressional delegation. Is this just the latest example of this President politicizing the military? Let's discuss this now. Retired Lieutenant General Mark Hertling is here, and Retired Colonel Cedric Leighton.
Gentlemen, good evening. You are the perfect folks to have on talk about this, so I appreciate you coming on. Colonel Leighton, let's start with you. You once served as a Congressional Liaison. If the Commander-in-Chief decides to plays politics with the military, they really don't have any choice but to go along with it, do they?
COL. CEDRIC LEIGHTON, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Well, that's right, yeah unless you, you know, would resign (ph) on grounds of protests or when you say that, you know, maybe there is a better way to do it and convince your boss and to convince the President that is not the way to go. They generally they have to follow exactly what the President says. And they really do not have a choice in the matter at all.
LEMON: General Hertling, Barbara Starr has a new reporting of the mood in Pentagon. Here are some of them. I'm going to read it.
It says, some of the highest ranking officers say there is a new atmosphere of unease inside the Pentagon, particularly among some of those senior ranks over the President's inclination to use the military to achieve certain partisan policy objectives. The amount of time we have to spend making sure our statements and what we say is a political as astronomically higher than ever before. One senior military official officer told CNN.
What kinds of political pressures does military brass normally operate under?
LT. GENERAL MARK HERTLING, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Well, you think about it, Don, it's like dealing a tough boss that's trying to always make you laugh or do the things he wants you to do and persuade you (ph), but he takes it a step further. Because in the private sector, you're loyal to your boss, you're loyal to the company.
In the military, you are loyal to the Constitution. We take that oath the first day any new military member joins the service. They take an oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, and that's it. And you don't care what political party is in charge. So you have to be very careful about how you relate to politics.
And, you know, you know you can cheer for a president. You can certainly applaud a president as part of your chair of command. You would do the same for our commander. What you can't do is go in that fine line of being part of his inner -- his or her inner circle because you defend the nation as a whole, not as a political party, not something that the president is trying to do, and especially in this case.
LEMON: Colonel Leighton, in his letter to Speaker Pelosi calling off her trip, the president called it a public relations event and an excursion. The president himself was in Iraq just days after the shutdown started. Does that mean he was on a PR excursion?
LEIGHTON: Well, you can certainly make the case that he was. And certainly, with the MAGA showing up and things like that being apart of the press coverage of that event, you can certainly say that. But I think when you look at going into a war zone and you have a congressional delegation that is planning to go into a war zone, that is, you know, definitely not your average excursion out there.
LEMON: The president spoke --
(CROSSTALK)
HERTLING: Don, you know --
LEMON: Go on, General Hertling.
HERTLING: If I can add to that, too, you know, with the Commander-In- Chief, you are the commander. You have the responsibility to visit your forces. What you are talking about with Pelosi visitor or Speaker of the House visit, you are talking about her responsibility for oversight and appropriations and armed services, and the kinds of things that are relegated to Congress in the constitution.
So certainly, as the President has a requirement visit soldiers -- our troops, rather, across the spectrum, the Speaker of the House also has to understand how she's voting for money and how she's voting to support the president in terms of manning and equipping the services.
LEMON: General Hertling, the President spoke at the Pentagon earlier today after acknowledging the death of four American servicemen in Syria yesterday. He said this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: While many Democrats in the House and the Senate would like to make a deal, Speaker Pelosi will not let them negotiate. The party has been hijacked by the open borders fringe within the party. The radical left becoming the radical Democrats.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: General Hertling, according to our team covering it, the room -- this is a quote, "remains silent with no applause." What's your reaction?
HERTLING: Yeah. Exactly what they were supposed to do, Don. And that, today, was a perfect example of using the military to politicize an audience. You can't go in front of a group of military personnel that represent the spectrum of society.
[22:55:01] There are some Democrats in that room, and the president seems to keep forgetting that he now is no longer campaigning. He's representing all Americans.
So by dividing the room and saying Democrats are terrible. Pelosi is bad. They got to give me my wall. That is politicization with a military audience and that's what's wrong. And God bless all of them in that room for standing as still as they could. That's what right looks like. That's what they're supposed to do.
LEMON: Does anything embarrass this President, Colonel Leighton?
LEIGHTON: I am not sure, Don. You know this is something, you know, where General Hertling is spot on in this case because you're looking at the real proper decorum. There are traditions. And I think the real problem that we have is that we are not following certain time- tested traditions, time-tested ways of doing business.
And that is a real problem because they are there for a reason. And we have a military that is apolitical for a reason. We want to make sure it defends all of us, not just a certain few of us.
LEMON: Thank you, gentlemen for coming on. And more importantly, thank you for your service. I appreciate it.
LEIGHTON: Thank you.
HERTLING: Pleasure, Don. Thank you.
LEMON: Yeah. We got breaking news to tell you about. Stay with us. A new report that says Donald Trump directed Michael Cohen to lie to Congress -- lie to Congress about the Trump Tower Moscow, details next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
