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Don Lemon Tonight
Political Disputes Worsen In Washington; Michael Cohen Cancels Hearing Due To Threats; Day 33 Of The Government Shutdown; Interview With Rep. Jamie Raskin (D), Maryland; Democrats Considering To Subpoena Michael Cohen; Michael Cohen Worried About The Safety Of His Family. Aired 10-11p ET
Aired January 23, 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] DON LEMON, CNN HOST: And then, you know, now he's stuck with it.
CHRIS CUOMO, CNN HOST: Sam Nunberg and Roger Stone, the bright lights of the Trump campaign.
LEMON: What are those guys, I saw on TV tonight still defending birtherism. I think it was Corsi. It's like, my gosh. Is this, who are these people?
CUOMO: They play to advantage.
LEMON: Who are -- no.
CUOMO: Fear cells.
LEMON: No, no, no. I think some of those people believe it. I think it's idiocy. You don't think they believe it?
CUOMO: Look, I'm saying this universe of people we're talking about around Trump, no. We know they don't believe it. Even Corsi, I mean, he loves a good conspiracy, but I think he loves them as a method of persuasion. I think he's too smart, he's too educated to buy that B.S.
LEMON: Well, some people are still saying, hey, if you look at the original 1961 birth certificate -- come on.
CUOMO: It's crap.
LEMON: It is, it is crap. Back to the shutdown showdown, you know, it's so frustrating when I look at people on social media and the folks who are out there saying, you got to stick with it. You got to do this. Get Pelosi. She got him. Slam. And they're not thinking about the people who you just mentioned here, the people who aren't getting their medication, may not receive medical procedures.
CUOMO: May not be able to keep a safe in the air.
LEMON: The danger in our skies. I was going to say the same thing. Is no one thinking about that for something, quite honestly, that is a made-up crisis? Yes, there are issues at the border. Yes, things should be addressed at the border. But the wall is not the end all, be all. Plus, you can open the government. You can do that and still negotiate.
CUOMO: Right. Look, I get the leverage play. He's right. The shutdown gives him the greatest leverage --
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: No, no. Let me tell you why he's wrong.
CUOMO: -- to cause all the pain. It's just that it's something he created and it works against him.
LEMON: OK, there you go. Because he had all the leverage for two years, Chris.
CUOMO: It's true.
LEMON: He had a Republican senate. He had a Republican Congress. And he kept -- and, again, as I said before, we're going to show you exactly what's at stake here and how we got here.
CUOMO: Good.
LEMON: He had all of that, and then I said, well, after Nancy Pelosi comes into office, he has no leverage. No leverage. He may as well take the deal that's on the table and then work out a deal to negotiate the wall further, which I think he probably could have gotten some leeway on.
CUOMO: Sure. If he had forgotten the farce and he just flipped his priorities --
LEMON: Right.
CUOMO: -- and said to the Democrats, we need "x," and put whatever big numbers you want that adds up to whatever the biggest number we've ever spent on this stuff that you want, OK?
LEMON: Yes.
CUOMO: He would have gotten it because are you going to say no to more X-rays for drugs? Are you going to say no to more judges and finding ways to keep people? Are you going to say no to figuring out the procedures so we keep kids safe? No. You would have said yes to all of those things. And then he could have said, and look, they said they need a lot more physical barriers. I promised that as a priority. I need money for that. He would have been able to check every box. But that's never what it was about.
LEMON: And easily because it was already money appropriated for building more structures under the Obama administration.
CUOMO: That's right. And look --
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: He could have claimed it as his own.
CUOMO: He's got a couple hundred million sitting there that they can put to work. He would have been able to get more because he wouldn't have made it an existential game because you're asking Democrats to reward you for a lie. And that's hard for any party to do.
You know, this was never going to be made. Mexico was never going to pay for it. It doesn't solve the problems down there. And you're lying about what the crisis is and ignoring the real crisis. And now you want me to give you the most money ever so you can wave it in my face?
LEMON: Yes.
CUOMO: That's a tough thing for them to swallow, and Pelosi is not in that game.
LEMON: Doesn't it gall you though when you get people on and say, wait a minute. Our government is shut down because he's asking us, the American taxpayer, to pay for a wall. He promised that Mexico would pay for it. I never thought Mexico was going to pay for the wall.
CUOMO: But they think that a wall is a panacea and going to make them safer and that nobody will ever die again from somebody who comes into the country illegally. Come on.
LEMON: And I think a lot of people thought who's going to pay for the wall, because what was he referring. Who's is going to pay for the wall and what would they say?
CUOMO: Mexico is going to pay.
LEMON: Mexico is going to pay for the wall. And we would sit here on TV --
(CROSSTALK)
CUOMO: That would have been great.
LEMON: We would sit here on TV and say, Mexico is not going to pay for the wall. That's never going to happen. And the president of Mexico said --
(CROSSTALK)
CUOMO: How do you know? Give him a chance. He's the best deal maker in history. Didn't you read the book?
LEMON: Well, you live in New York. Didn't you grow up in New York?
CUOMO: Yes.
LEMON: OK.
CUOMO: I grew up in Queens. LEMON: OK. Then you grew up in New York. Yes, at one point you lived
in Manhattan, before --
(CROSSTALK)
CUOMO: I live here now.
LEMON: -- no, when you were a kid.
CUOMO: No. I lived in Queens.
LEMON: OK.
CUOMO: And then we moved to Albany and they sent me to military school.
LEMON: OK.
CUOMO: And eventually I worked my way back.
LEMON: OK. So, then, you know this guy.
CUOMO: I do.
LEMON: Is he a deal maker?
CUOMO: You know what? Look, I'll give it to him. He's a good salesman. Has he made great deals? No. He's made great deals for himself.
LEMON: Is he a great businessman?
[22:04:54] CUOMO: I would argue no because he doesn't run businesses well.
LEMON: Yes.
CUOMO: That's the mark. Mark Cuban is a great businessman.
LEMON: Yes.
CUOMO: You know, they're million -- I'm using a big name from another guy that people know. You have to be able to show that you've run a business well. This guy has declared bankruptcy, you know, more times than anybody else I know.
LEMON: Who would -- there was one estimate, I forget who it was, that said he would have made more money --
(CROSSTALK)
CUOMO: He just invested it in the S&P.
LEMON: He just invested it instead of doing all these deals.
CUOMO: Look, I think you have to reward the president for the ambition that he took, him using what he had access to, his father's money, contacts, political contacts. He made a big name for himself. He put his name on lots of big things. He brought back Wollman Rink.
He became an international superstar on television. He has done impressive things to make himself very famous. It doesn't make you a great businessman. It doesn't make you a great deal maker. We know what you show. And this is a mess of his own making.
LEMON: Yes. How much longer do you think this is going to go on because --
(CROSSTALK)
CUOMO: I'll know tomorrow. I'll be able to tell you tomorrow if we're in the same position a week from tomorrow.
LEMON: It's going to get bad when it comes to air traffic control and other issue.
CUOMO: They're going to wind up shutting down flights.
LEMON: Yes.
CUOMO: Fifty-two percent capacity. They're not fixing their radar.
LEMON: And --
CUOMO: Not fix as needed. Fix when the shutdown ends.
LEMON: Eight hundred thousand people not putting money into the economy, which means there's a ripple effect on top of that. And then --
(CROSSTALK)
CUOMO: The DHS secretary is coming out, including John Kelly, saying, hey, man, you've got to fund DHS. We've got to pay for counterterrorism stuff like that. We can't do it this way.
LEMON: And Nancy Pelosi is sitting there saying, looking at the poll numbers going, well --
CUOMO: Well, also, look, you know, I've gotten some heat from this. You love the both sides thing since when is that a crime in journalism. But the idea of Pelosi does not have a responsibility to fix what he refuses to fix.
LEMON: Right.
CUOMO: That's not her job as the speaker of the House. She was put there by her own caucus to do what they think is important.
LEMON: Well, that's not both sides, Chris. That's the truth, right? And then when folks say, well, the Democrats are not negotiating with Trump, and you're like, wait a minute. That is not true. That is a false -- (CROSSTALK)
CUOMO: Right. If we saw proof --
LEMON: That's a red herring. That's not true.
CUOMO: -- that there was a deal to be made, and Democrats are saying, no, no, this is killing him, let's sit back, fine.
LEMON: Yes.
CUOMO: Then I'll come at them. And I do believe that Pelosi will have to be part of a solution here.
LEMON: Yes.
CUOMO: I don't think that this president has the wherewithal to surrender the me to the we in a way that will be necessary. So I think she's going to be really important. That's not me blaming her for the shutdown.
LEMON: Yes.
CUOMO: We all know who's to blame for the shutdown. He told us on national television.
LEMON: And who could open it up right away. Thank you, my friend. If it goes on much longer, though, you think it's ugly now.
CUOMO: It is ugly. It makes us fear for our generation and the next generation of your nephew.
LEMON: See you. Well, see you both sides and Cuomo.
CUOMO: That's journalism.
LEMON: Thank you.
CUOMO: Bye-bye.
LEMON: This is CNN TONIGHT. I'm Don Lemon. And what all of this comes down to, all of this chaos over the State of the Union, the shutdown, Michael Cohen's testimony before Congress -- all of this comes down to the bully pulpit versus the gavel.
President Trump versus Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. This is a president who is used to being able to impose his will on a Congress controlled by his own party, a Congress that will just roll over.
Well, things have changed. Exhibit A, the State of the Union. President Trump will not be giving his speech on the House floor next Tuesday. That's as of today. And that's because the Speaker, Nancy Pelosi, she won't allow it. He dared her to cancel his speech, so she did.
The president tried to strong arm his way into the chamber anyway in a letter to the speaker today, insisting that he'd see her in the House on the 29th and saying it would be his words, so very sad if his speech didn't take place then and there. That failed spectacularly.
The speaker fired back with her own letter saying, quote, "I am writing to inform you that the House of Representatives will not consider a concurrent resolution authorizing the president's State of the Union address in the House chamber until government has reopened -- or has opened."
Nothing remotely like this has ever happened before, ever. And it apparently caught this White House completely off guard.
Here's what sources are telling CNN. Officials weren't expecting the speaker to formally disinvite the president, so they tried to call her bluff by going forward with their plans for the speech. You see how that worked out, right? The president trying to spin what is clearly a humiliation at the hands of the speaker.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We were planning on doing a really very important speech in front of the House and the Senate, the Supreme Court, and everybody else that's there. It's called the State of the Union. It's in the Constitution. We're supposed to be doing it, and now Nancy Pelosi, or Nancy as I call her, she doesn't want to hear the truth, and she doesn't want to hear, more importantly, the American people here the truth.
[22:10:05] So we've just found out that she's canceled it, and I think that's a great blotch on the incredible country that we all love.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: Facts, facts, facts. The fact is the White House tried to call Pelosi's bluff, and they lost. And did you catch what the president said, referring to the speaker of the house as, quote, Nancy as I call her. That sounds a lot like an attempt to demean the speaker for denying him what he wants.
A Republican source telling CNN TONIGHT the president appears to be in no mood to cave on the wall to end the shutdown, despite Speaker Pelosi disinviting him. And she doesn't seem like she's going to cave either.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NANCY PELOSI, UNITED STATES SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: The government is still shut down. I still make the offer. That's what we need to do agree today (ph) as every (Inaudible) mutual agreement so that we can --
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: And did you see this? The president's new slogan, because that's what we're reduced to now, empty slogans. But it does rhyme. Build a wall, crime will fall. Didn't you say Mexico would pay? (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: We are going to build a great border wall. And who's going to pay for the wall?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mexico.
TRUMP: Who's going to pay for the wall?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mexico.
TRUMP: Who?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mexico.
TRUMP: They're going to pay for the wall, and they're going to enjoy it, OK? They're going to enjoy it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: Also speaking of crime, five people were shot dead in a bank today. What are we doing about that? That as we're in day 33 of the shutdown, nearly day 34.
And here is some bad news. The White House may be preparing for an even longer shutdown, one that could have serious consequences for our economy. "The Washington Post" reporting that the Acting Chief of Staff, Mick Mulvaney, is putting together a list of government programs that will be in jeopardy if the shutdown continues into March and April -- March and April. Can you imagine not being paid that long?
Eight hundred thousand government workers going without paychecks, March or April. Without the money they need now, right now, to feed their families, to pay the rent, to pay their bills. Many more government contractors, small business owners might never get back pay at all. Wonder if the president is still proud of this shutdown.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: I am proud to shut down the government for border security, Chuck. I will take the mantle. I will be the one to shut it down. I'm not going to blame you for it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: So much for proud. And then there is this from the president's daughter-in-law and re-election campaign adviser Lara Trump.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LARA TRUMP, PRESIDENT TRUMP'S DAUGHTER-IN-LAW: Listen, this is -- it's not fair to you, and we all get that. But this is so much bigger than any one person. It is a little bit of pain, but it's going to be for the future of our country.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: A little bit of pain. Somebody will say that when the repo man comes. This is a little bit of pain. Can you wait to take my car? A little bit of pain. I wonder how the men and women who protect this president, the Secret Service, how they feel about that.
Take a look at these special challenge coins being distributed to agents and to their families. Pretty clearly expressing their frustration with the words on the flip side. "Don't worry, you'll get back pay."
You know who loves a challenge coin? That's the president. He keeps a bunch of them in the Oval Office. I wonder if he'll add this newest one to that collection.
And then there is the announcement today that Michael Cohen, Donald Trump's former attorney and keeper of secrets, is postponing his public testimony before Congress that was supposed to happen on February 7th. The reason, Cohen says it's because of ongoing threats against his family from President Trump and Mr. Giuliani, the president attempting to brush off those concerns.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Michael Cohen's testimony, he says he's been threatened by you and Mr. Giuliani. He and his family have been threatened.
TRUMP: No. I would say he's been threatened by the truth. He's only been threatened by the truth.
[22:14:54] LEMON: A source telling CNN that Cohen's wife and father- in-law feel threatened by comments the president and Rudy Giuliani, Trump's attorney. So, let's listen to some of those comments, shall we?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Let me tell you the other thing. His father-in-law is a very rich guy, I hear. His father-in-law, I thought, was the guy that was the primary focus. Well, what did he do? Did he make a deal to keep his father-in-law out? Did he make a deal to keep his wife who supposedly, maybe I'm wrong, but you can check it? Did he keep -- make a deal to keep his wife out of trouble?
He should give information maybe on his father-in-law because that's the one that people want to look at. Because where does that money -- that's the money in the family.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RUDY GIULIANI, PRESIDENT TRUMP'S ATTORNEY: His father worth for the Ukrainian. His father-in-law --
(CROSSTALK)
JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: It's not a crime.
GIULIANI: Of course, it's not. I'm telling you he comes from the Ukraine. The reason that's important is he may have ties to something called organized crime.
TAPPER: Because he's Ukrainian?
GIULIANI: Michael Cohen is refusing -- well, there's an organized crime group in Ukraine. Organized crime group in --
(CROSSTALK)
TAPPER: Organized crime everywhere. Organized crime in Brooklyn, organized crime in Bronx. I mean, you know, I think that's making the leap.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: Just do it right in front of everyone. Does that sound like witness intimidation? No? Mueller (ph)? Mueller (ph)? Now there are questions about whether Cohen will testify publicly before he reports to prison for a three-year sentence on March 6th. But oversight committee Chairman Elijah Cummings seems pretty certain.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. ELIJAH CUMMINGS (D), MARYLAND: He felt that he was threatened by the President of the United States of America, and of his lawyer. Let me be clear. That is simply unacceptable in a democracy. We will get the testimony as sure as night becomes day and day becomes night.
MANU RAJU, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: What about when he goes to jail? Can you get him if he goes to jail?
CUMMINGS: Of course, we can.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: Like I said, all of this, Michael Cohen's testimony, the shutdown, State of the Union -- it all comes down to a battle between the House of Representatives and the White House. The president has the bully pulpit. Nancy Pelosi has the gavel. And it's day 33 of the shutdown.
Charlie Dent, April Ryan, Michael D'Antonio. We'll dig into it next.
[22:20:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: So, a senior Republican with knowledge of the White House and Capitol Hill tells CNN tonight that the clash between President Trump and Speaker Pelosi, well, that battle, it's a battle of the titans. That source also saying the president should still do a formal State of the Union address once the impasse ends.
Former Congressman Charlie Dent is here, also April Ryan, the author of "Under Fire: Reporting from the Front Lines of the Trump White House," and Michael D'Antonio, the author of "The Truth About Trump."
Good evening. And here we are, an impasse, a stalemate. Kind of like an old western, right? So, April, first to you. White House officials tell CNN that they were caught off guard --
APRIL RYAN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes.
LEMON: -- when Speaker Pelosi canceled the State of the Union, they try --
(CROSSTALK)
RYAN: No, they weren't.
LEMON: OK. Go on. Why? They say that they were surprise that --
(CROSSTALK)
RYAN: They weren't. They weren't.
LEMON: -- they he called -- she called his bluff, but go on.
RYAN: No. Let me say this. Well, they may have underestimated her womanhood. They probably didn't think that. But they knew it was either one way or the other. Either she would say yes, or she would say no.
They knew that she might have said no, especially when the House canceled or said, we're not going to allow you to come in and do advance on this federal holiday. They said no already once this week. So, they couldn't make the advance to see -- you know, to check out the lay of the land.
But here's the thing with this point, counter point, this back and forth, Don, I would not be surprised if what's in their options bag is that the president might even decide to go on the 29th and still try to do a State of the Union address. But there are several options that they are looking at from what I understand.
One is possibly do a rally as a State of the Union. Two, trying to go to the -- the president cannot deliver an address in the Senate. He has to get both sides of the aisle to agree, and that's not going to happen.
LEMON: OK.
RYAN: And then another venue, the White House.
LEMON: Yes. The White House, or a rally in someplace, you know, some arena or whatever, or the White House. So, then, I want to go to the former member of Congress, then. What are the options? Can the president just storm the Congress and do his State of the Union there?
FORMER REP. CHARLIE DENT (R), PENNSYLVANIA: Well, I guess he could, but I don't think it would go well. Don, in a rational world --
(CROSSTALK)
RYAN: It would be open.
DENT: -- in a rational world, we would reopen the government and then have the State of the Union address. Now, is Nancy Pelosi on solid ground saying that we should postpone this until the government is reopened? Yes. But I don't think it's a fight worth having. I am sure that -- this is like catnip for Donald Trump. He loves these kinds of fights. He lives for this. So, I think it kind of plays into his hands. I don't --
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: Why would he want to have one, though, Charlie, when -- what are you going to say? The State of the Union is shut down? Or is he going to make it a completely -- all the State of the Union is basically touting what your administration has done. But is it going to become more partisan and more political than normal? What's he is going to say?
DENT: Well, that's a good question. I suspect, you know, he'll do the traditional State of the Union. Then he'll lay in -- at some point he'll lay into the Democrats and say they're being obstructionist over the wall and he'll do all that sort of thing.
But I have a -- I think the real story here, Don, is throughout this whole shutdown debacle, look who the president has been listening to Ann Coulter, Mick Mulvaney, and the freedom caucus. All I can say is that in each case, none of these people are going to be endorsing or voting for a bill to reopen the government. They won't.
And so, he's taking advice from people who I don't think are ever going to be part of this solution. At some point, this is going to be resolved by Mitch McConnell and Chuck Schumer coming to an agreement on something they can get 60 votes, and then the House will pass that. That's how these things usually end. But I think it's pointless to have this fight over the State of the Union. I think she's -- Pelosi is right that it should happen after the government is reopened. But I wouldn't go to the mattresses over this.
LEMON: You said in a rational world. That's not what's --
(CROSSTALK)
DENT: That's not what we're dealing with.
LEMON: That is so five years ago.
(CROSSTALK)
RYAN: That is not happening here.
LEMON: Not even five years ago. That was so three years ago.
[22:24:56] So, Michael, let's get back to Nancy Pelosi. I mean I think this president thought that maybe he did or he not, I don't know, that he could just run over Nancy Pelosi, that he was so sure of himself, that you know, no one thought the possibility, you know, he shut the government down, that she would just shut him down like she's doing. How do you think he's taking that?
MICHAEL D'ANTONIO, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Well, I sort of think about the time that my kids complained to my wife about being sent to bed early at 7 o'clock. And the next night they went to bed at 6 o'clock. So, they were really surprised when that happened.
I think the president is really surprised that in this case, Speaker Pelosi is calling his bluff and then he comes back, and he thinks that he's checked her, and she comes back with checkmate. This is a president not familiar with people standing up to him. It never happened to him in his business life.
In fact, he was very proud of his first bankruptcy because the bankers didn't stand up to him. They were in the hole to him for $900 million, and he thought, well, when you owe them $900 million, you own them. They don't own you --
LEMON: Right.
D'ANTONIO: -- because they needed him.
LEMON: Yes.
D'ANTONIO: In this case, I think that we've got a situation where he's way out of his depth. As much as I like to agree with Charlie, I think that in this case, you can't give in to this person. We have been through years and years of this, but it's not normal. We have to keep showing that it's not normal and expressing our outrage.
LEMON: Yes. Two things there. One, I knew I loved your wife ever since I met her. And, number two, can you imagine if someone said, Don, go to bed, or, Michael, go to bed at 7 o'clock. You'd be like, OK. When you were a kid, you're like, no, I don't want to go. All right. I digress. I'll see --
(CROSSTALK)
D'ANTONIO: Well, I tell you, Don, afterwards, my kids did say OK.
LEMON: I'll see you guys on the other side of the break. Don't go anywhere.
[22:30:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: Day 33 of the shutdown and there are signs that both the White House and Democrats are gearing up for a battle that could last for months.
Back with me now Charlie Dent, April Ryan, Michael D'Antonio. So Michael, Lara Trump, the president's daughter-in-law and campaign adviser, said that federal workers were feeling a little bit of pain for the future of our country. How do you think that's going to sit with these 800,000 federal workers going without a paycheck, now twice?
MICHAEL D'ANTONIO, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Well, I can't imagine that it would sit well with anybody. You know, I saw recently that about 40 percent of Americans struggle when hit with an unexpected bill of $400. So for anyone to suggest that these workers need to experience more pain for some gain, that is really illusory.
You know, this is a fantasy idea that a wall is going to be built, and somehow it's going to keep out all bad things. You know, there's not a wall that can't be tunneled over -- tunneled under or scaled or breached in some way. And it didn't work for Hadrian. It didn't work for China. It's not going to work for us.
So for someone to -- someone in her position to speak of federal workers this way is the height of disrespect, and it's sort of typical of this family, but I think it's unacceptable.
LEMON: So Charlie, four former Homeland Security secretaries sent the president and Congress -- five, I should say, sent a letter urging them to fund the DHS. One of those secretaries is John Kelly. When he was the chief of staff, the president threatened to shut down the government over the wall. And now that he is out of the White House, we got a shutdown.
CHARLIE DENT, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, look. I worked with all those Homeland Security secretaries. I was on the Homeland Security Committee for six years. It is outrageous that we are holding these people charged with protecting us, protecting our borders. They're using them as leverage to get this wall.
And so, yes, look. The answer again is to isolate the Homeland Security Appropriations Bill. Just simply kick this into February, and then pass the other six bills and move on. But for some reason, I am just so concerned now that the president is not able to -- he's going to watch these two bills fail in the Senate tomorrow.
What should happen, again, back to the rational world is, McConnell could go to the president and say, look, neither of these passed. Let us now negotiate something. But I am afraid because the president, he does not have fixed policy positions, and his policy positions shift all the time. They can't really negotiate anything.
So I think the president is going to come back at some point and try to declare an emergency again. You know we have that conversation a few weeks ago. I think it's going to come back down to it.
LEMON: But that would take -- Charlie, that would take members of the Senate to stand up, right? That would take members of Congress to stand up, Republican members, I am saying, to stand up to the president and say, listen, we've got to make some sort of deal. This is not good for the country. It's not good for our party. It's not good for any of us. It's not good for your presidency. Do you think that is ever going to happen?
DENT: It's going to -- it must happen. And if -- I believe Congress, they should send a bill to the president with more than a two-thirds vote. And then if he vetoes it, he vetoes it. Override him. That's what they should be doing. Republicans know they're not winning this shutdown. This is what losing looks like. But as I said, Don, on another program earlier.
I said but we're at this Monty Python and the Holy Grail moment. You know we're getting our arms and legs hacked off, and we're pretending that we're winning. Oh, it's just a mere flesh wound, just a little scratch. No, this is -- you're losing. And so I think Republican members of Congress realize that. And at some point, they're going to have enough of it, when an airport closes or who knows what's going to trigger this thing. It's going to force people to reopen the government and in big numbers.
LEMON: April, I want to bring you back in and talk about this Vanity Fair report. Vanity Fair has published another excerpt from former Trump aide Cliff Sims' new book. Team of Vipers, it's called. Now, here he is. He's talking about Kellyanne Conway leaking to the press via text that he was able to see, OK? So here's what he said.
"Over the course of 20 minutes or so, she was having simultaneous conversations with no fewer than a half dozen reporters, most of them from outlets the White House frequently trashed for publishing fake news, journalists from "The New York Times," "The Washington Post," CNN, "Politico," and Bloomberg. She bashed Jared Kushner, Reince Priebus, Steve Bannon, and Sean Spicer, all by name."
[22:35:08] So you work in the White House. Is the leaking like anything you have ever seen before, and what do you make of this report?
APRIL RYAN, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, I will go to what my source told me before we came on the air about this exact story. I said, you know, when it came to Kellyanne, Kellyanne was someone who was not originally in the president's camp. And so, my source is believing it.
This is a White House that just -- they leak like a sieve. If it was really plumbing, I mean we would be in a flood in that White House right now. I believe there are people who are whistle-blowers, and there are people who talk. There are people who don't necessarily like the construct of the inner circle of the White House, to include the children and the son-in-law. There are people who talk.
Is this true? There could be some truth to this. But the question is, you know, will those reporters come up and say, yes, this actually happened. Yes, I was one of the recipients of that text message or e- mail, what have you. There is a lot of leaking there. And if it is Kellyanne, she's got a lot of explaining to do to the president.
LEMON: It could be a setup. It could be a setup, just giving false information to people and then they --
RYAN: Could be.
LEMON: -- run with it. Here's what -- this is what Kellyanne Conway said, "The real leakers, past and present, get much more positive press than I do. While it's rare, I prefer to knife people from the front so they see it coming."
We'll be right back. Thank you.
[22:40:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: Tonight, Democrats who control the House Oversight Committee are considering a subpoena for Michael Cohen, President Trump's former fixer. Earlier today, Cohen announced that he was postponing his testimony before the committee which was set for February 7th. He says his decision is due to what he calls ongoing threats against his family by President Trump and Rudy Giuliani.
So let's talk about this now with Congressman Jamie Raskin, Maryland Democrat, who is member of the House Oversight Committee, so good to have you on.
REP. JAMIE RASKIN (D), MARYLAND: Thanks for having me.
LEMON: What do you think about this? I mean Michael Cohen saying he's worried of death threats to his family from Rudy Giuliani and the president. Number one, do you think he should be worried?
RASKIN: Well, witness-tampering is a crime, and obstruction of justice is a crime, and witness intimidation is a crime. So this is well known, of course, in mafia circles. We know that it's not invented out of thin air at the very least because the president has been tweeting out, insinuating statements about Michael Cohen's father-in-law and about Michael Cohen's wife.
It's a sign of how far we've fallen because of the president's spectacular hatred for the rule of law that we would even think it's a normal thing for a president to be trying to interfere with a federal witness or someone who is coming to testify before Congress. It's extraordinary.
LEMON: Let me get it very clearly here. Do you think it's -- because I asked in my open, is this witness intimidation?
RASKIN: Well, we don't know because we don't know the facts. We don't know exactly what Michael Cohen is referring to. And of course, our committee is determined to see that he testify, and we will take all necessary precautions to protect his safety and security on the way in, on the way out. And we will do whatever we can to see that he does not suffer any reprisals or retaliation.
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: OK. Let me just ask you. And I will let you get to that. You said on the way in or on the way out. I am sure that's probably the least of his concern. He's in Washington, D.C. then when he's coming to testify, right, a lot of security, Secret Service. In his everyday life, I think that's what he's concerned about, because, you know, his family, they're out and about.
They don't have the luxury as the president does and that government workers do, right, our elected officials do to have security provided to them by their jobs or by the government. Can you assure him beyond the Capitol?
RASKIN: Well, it's a great question. And it's one that my staff is researching today. In the ordinary course of things, we protect people through the Capitol Police on their way into the building, on the way out of the building, and so on. And obviously, this presents extraordinary circumstances. But we want his testimony. We need his testimony.
And we cannot allow the president to get away with this acting, you know, as Mr. Comey put it, like a mafia chieftain, like a mafia boss. You know, we're not going to allow him to intimidate our witnesses.
LEMON: I want to play some of what we have heard from President Trump. Here it is.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Did he make a deal to keep his wife, who supposedly -- maybe I am wrong, but you can check it. Did he make a deal to keep his wife out of trouble?
He should give information maybe on his father-in-law, because that's the one that people want to look at, because where does that money -- that's the money in the family.
JEANINE PIRRO, FOX NEWS HOST: What is this father-in-law's name?
TRUMP: I don't know, but you'll find out, and you'll look into it because nobody knows what's going on over there.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So it's OK to go after the father-in-law?
RUDY GIULIANI, PRES. TRUMP'S ATTORNEY: Of course it is. If the father-in-law is a criminal -- he comes from the Ukraine. The reason that's important is he might have ties to something called organized crime. When somebody testifies against your client, you go out, and you look at what's wrong with them.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: Interesting. So should Mueller investigate this, Congressman?
RASKIN: Well, first of all, the major job of the president of the United States is to, quote, "take care that the laws are faithfully executed." If the president knew about mafia activity from anyone, including all those people who are his closest associates, including his lawyer, who have gone to jail or are going to jail or being indicted, he has a responsibility -- he had a responsibility to turn it over, not to use it as part of a campaign to intimidate witnesses.
[22:45:13] I mean think about this. If he really knows about criminal activity, he should have turned it over a long time ago, or he should prepare it, and he should send it to the FBI. But he's just acting like a petty mob chieftain saying, oh, well, if you tell on me, I am going to tell on you. And I know about your brother, and I know about your father-in-law. It's an extraordinary situation when you think about it.
LEMON: But when you think about it, honestly, God forbid something -- you know something odd happens in the Cohen situation. Wouldn't that be confirmation that the -- of what the president is doing or has done or that he is trying to keep Michael Cohen from saying what he has to say?
RASKIN: Well, just from the tweets we've seen, he's obviously trying to derail Michael Cohen's testimony before the United States Congress. And the Republicans in Congress, unfortunately, are going along with that and trying to already undermine his testimony and cast doubt on it and so forth.
Look, this is taking place in the broader context of the shutdown of the government of the United States. So the president, rather than working to reopen the government of the United States, as we are demanding, as we are passing legislation everyday to do, instead, is caught up in this investigation.
And it's starting -- in my mind, it's really starting to corroborate those books and articles, which are saying that this is a president who has a decades-long involvement with the Russian mafia and organized crime figures and the tycoons, the oligarchs in Russia.
And now, all of it is coming back to haunt him. And he doesn't care about the government of the United States and the federal workforce. All of that's out the window. He's just trying to save his own hide.
LEMON: Congressman, thank you very much. We're out of time. I appreciate it. Thank you so much.
RASKIN: Thanks for having me, Don.
LEMON: We're going to take you inside the president's negotiating or not negotiating, art of the deal or no art of the deal, next.
[22:50:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: Right now, we are 33 days into the shutdown. And there's no deal to fund the government and no deal to fund the president's border wall. But the president has been presented with multiple deals for both.
Now, Trump is proposing to reopen the government if he gets $5.7 billion for his wall. Spoiler alert, he's not going to get it. So where is the great negotiator, and where is the art of the deal? Tom Foreman is here to explain, Tom?
TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Don, this wall funding has been the Rubik's Cube of the Trump presidency. Let's go back a couple of years ago when he was fresh in office, just took the oath, had this big promise of a big wall out there. His party held both chambers of Congress. There was a threatened shutdown, and he says here's what I want.
You need to give me $1.4 billion to start on this wall. Well, Democrats and some Republicans, too, weren't too keen on the wall so they said here's a counteroffer. We'll give you about that much for border security for cameras and motion detectors and patrols out there. Trump doesn't really like it very much, but he takes the deal.
And in doing so, kills his first attempt to get the wall funded. So, we jump forward. We move toward the fall. Now, what's in the news? This is what's in the news. The dreamer program, the DACA program, remember this was an Obama era program that would help young people who came here, very young with their parents who really never known life outside the United States to let them stay.
Well, Trump says I don't like that idea. We're going to rid of that. He's phasing that out, and by the way I still want to have my wall. So now he has some leverage here, because Democrats are furious about the DACA program, the dreamers. They say here's a counteroffer again. Let's revive DACA. We'll give you even more border security money, and still you can't spend it on the wall.
And it looks for a while like Trump is going to take this deal, because he kind of gets a little bit of what he wants here. But then gets pushed back from his base. They say you're betraying what you said you were going to do for us, and he said, nope. That deal is dead. I won't do that one either, Don.
LEMON: Wow, so already, Tom, the pattern is being established there that Trump gets close to a deal, then his base protests and he suddenly wants to change major terms or reject it all together, right?
FOREMAN: Yeah. And it keeps going that way. He starts off last year saying I am ready to make some compromises here. If you will come forward with a bipartisan measure that we can all agree on, I will be willing to sign that measure. That's how he starts the year off. And they do. They come up with a proposal to him that says we will respond to you saying you're ready to approve a bipartisan deal by saying here's your first year of wall funding.
You give a path to citizenship for some people out there who are in the country, and in the diversity visa lottery. So this is kind of a grab bag, something for Democrats, something for Republicans, something for liberals, something for conservatives. But once again, what happens is Trump looks like he might take the deal, but he meets with some hardcore conservatives who say you cannot do this.
That's not what you promised. And he backs out and that deal dies. So the possibility of a shutdown is still on the table. And that's when Chuck Schumer comes calling. Remember, this is the Senator, the minority leader from the Senate for the Democrats. And he says I will offer you a different deal altogether. You're still threatening a shutdown. I will give you $20 billion for your wall, $20 billion for the thing you want most.
That's our understanding of the offer here. In exchange, you give me a path to citizenship for many of the people who are in the country without papers.
[22:55:03] And Trump says no. I cannot take that deal either. So that deal dies as well, Don.
LEMON: OK, $20 billion for a wall, though. I mean...
FOREMAN: That's a lot of money.
LEMON: That's a lot of money. And for the wall they said. So he has been offered money for border security, and then money for his wall. And then he's offered bipartisan agreement and then he rejected all of it.
FOREMAN: Yeah. And what it seems to come down to is this, is Donald Trump seems to be taking the position I promised to build the wall. You must approve funding for my wall. Divorced from all other issues, you must simply approve funding for my wall. But look at this. But look at the record here. These are just some of the instances here. But the truth is he was not able to work that out when his party held both chambers of Congress.
So what are the odds of him doing it now with the Democrats in charge of the House? Probably not so good, and especially when you consider this, the nature of this wall, what it's going to be made of, how it's going to function, how tall it's going to be, exactly where it's going to be, and especially how much it's going to cost has been changing and changing and changing and changing, all of which, again, makes it very hard to think that there's going to be any substantial deal on the wall any time soon, Don?
LEMON: Tom Foreman, thank you. Michael Cohen is indefinitely postponing testifying before Congress. Why? Well, we don't know. The president's former lawyer says his family's safety is at risk and what he says Donald Trump and Rudy Giuliani have to do with that.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
