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Don Lemon Tonight

Additional Indictment Added to Trump's Associates; Roger Stone Idolized Richard Nixon; Roger Stone Indicted in Mueller Investigation. Aired 11p-12a ET

Aired January 25, 2019 - 23:00   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[23:00:00] DON LEMON, CNN HOST: This is CNN Tonight. I'm Don Lemon.

It was a bomb shell day in the Russia investigation. We are devoting this entire hour to an in-depth look at all things Russia. It all started with this predawn FBI raid caught on tape by CNN.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: FBI. Open the door.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: Roger Stone, a man President Trump has known for decades, indicted by Robert Mueller. The special counsel says Stone went after e-mails from WikiLeaks that could damage Hillary Clinton's campaign. And he says it was all done in coordination with the Trump campaign with Trump campaign officials. The judge laid out the charges in a federal court in Fort Lauderdale today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: HI. Mr. Stone, you are here for an initial or first appearance on an indictment that has been returned against you. The indictment charges, in count one, obstruction of a proceeding. Counts two through six are false statements to a legislative branch of the government. And count seven is witness tampering.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: Roger Stone is defiant tonight. He says he is not guilty and will defeat the charges in court. But the special counsel's 24-page indictment is damming.

Mueller's team writes in part, "After the July 22nd 2016 release of stolen DNC e-mails by organization one or WikiLeaks a senior Trump official was directed to contact Stone about any additional releases and what other damaging information organization one had regarding the Hillary Clinton campaign."

We don't know who the senior Trump campaign official is who reached out to Roger Stone. But this is the key part. Mueller writes, "The senior campaign officials was directed to reach out to Stone about WikiLeaks had Clinton." So, who is more senior on a campaign than a senior campaign official? You have to wonder how high this goes.

Joining me now, Shimon Prokupecz, John Dean, Phil Mudd. Good evening, gentlemen. Shimon, are you a genie or something?

SHIMON PROKUPECZ, CNN CRIME AND JUSTICE REPORTER: Crystal ball.

LEMON: Yes. It was -- I mean, seriously, I got to hand it to you. It was on this show 24 hours ago, I asked you a question. And you said there were some things going on with a grand jury and it sort of, you know, you guys were thinking that something was going to happen. You predicted an indictment today. So, give me the biggest takeaway of the day.

PROKUPECZ: Yes. I think it was a great team effort of connecting a lot of dots. And it came to be what we expected, that Roger Stone would be indicted. We expected that the FBI would go and take him into custody. They were not going to allow him to surrender, given a lot of the antics that he's pulled in this case. And we believed that they were going to go and get him.

So, in any case, I think what we learned today in this indictment is that we now have a direct link of coordination between the Trump campaign and WikiLeaks. It's very clear when you read this indictment that Roger Stone was that direct link, that Roger Stone was working the campaign. Roger Stone was working WikiLeaks for information.

And most significantly also that senior level people, as you said, Don, knew about this, were asking him to do more. And then who was directing this senior campaign person? We don't know that.

And I think it is a good point that you make, that who would be higher than this senior level person? We don't yet know. You know, there have been a lot of questions whether or not Trump campaign knew about -- had a heads up on these WikiLeaks e-mails, how much did they know? And I think this indictment answers that question quite clearly. They knew things were going on.

LEMON: John, listen, no one wants that knock at any time, especially in the middle of the night or early morning. What do you think is going through Roger Stone's head when that happened?

JOHN DEAN, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: I suspect he was pretty shocked. And I suspect his dogs were pretty shocked too, from what I can pick up from today's news. You know, I -- I don't like to see law enforcement embarrass potential defendants that are charged. And I don't know that that was the reason for this. But it certainly had that impact.

[23:05:02] And you know, what they did is apparently do a full search of the house after they got there. And that's why the team was so large. And I think that Mueller was correct in assuming roger might have made evidence disappear had it not been a surprise arrest. So, I can understand why it happened. But I don't know that you needed automatic weapons for that.

LEMON: So, Phil, what does this say to you? Does it mean the direction came from the president? And does Mueller have evidence of that?

PHILIP MUDD, CNN COUNTERTERRORISM ANALYST: I mean I think one of the things you have to look into this when you are talking about it is an obscure sentence, the sentence. Clearly, Mueller knows something about who offered the direction.

I think Mueller is trying to obscure it because there is going to be an open question if it goes up to the president of the United States about what the Department of Justice does.

The bottom line I come to, Don, is the most fascinating document we are going to see among all the fascinating documents is the final report from Mueller that pulls this all together and I suspect that sentence will get clearer.

The point is that the Mueller team will tell the Congress look, we are not here to investigate the president for some of this, you have got to do this with this final report that includes stuff like that sentence today over to you to determine whether or not you want to proceed. Last comment.

(CROSSTALK)

LEMON: Do you think we will see that report? Before you give the last comment.

MUDD: I think we will. And my last comment point is that puts the attorney general nominee on the hot spot.

LEMON: Got it.

MUDD: He's got to decide as he said during his testimony what to do with that report. I got to believe he's got to hand over at least part of it to the Congress. I also don't think he can distill it. I think he's got to give the real deal.

LEMON: You're already going there before I asked you the question.

MUDD: Yes, yes.

LEMON: Thank you very much.

MUDD: Let me go.

LEMON: Shimon, listen. Stone and Trump have been friends for decades. They apparently were very close. This is, -- take a listen to Paul Manafort.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PAUL MANAFORT, FORMER TRUMP CAMPAIGN MANAGER: Even after Roger stopped being the principle political adviser to Trump, he continued to a very important adviser and is to this day. Roger's relationship with Trump has been so interconnected that it is hard to define what's Roger and what's done. While it will be clearly a Trump presidency, I think it's influenced by Stone philosophy. (END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: Do you think Roger Stone would be reaching out for dirt on Hillary Clinton without the president's blessing?

PROKUPECZ: So, look, what I think could have happened here is that Roger Stone could have been doing it on his own but was keeping the president informed about it and keeping other people informed about it.

I don't know that we are going to see that there is direct evidence tying the president saying go do this, I'm reading about this, go find out. It could have been because of their long-standing relationship that Roger Stone came up with this idea try wanted to help Trump. They have known each other for so many years and that maybe what went on here and that he was keeping Trump apprised of what was going on.

There could have been other people in the campaign. Obviously, that's what this indictment says. Will we ever find out? I think that's going to be a very interesting question going down the line. Because even if it's in this report, you know, that you and Phil were just talking about doesn't necessarily mean that it's going to be made public. That is the big question. Will we ever find out who this is?

LEMON: Yes. John, Roger Stone spoke with Chris tonight. Take a look at this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN HOST: So, there is a 100 percent chance in your mind that nobody can offer any compelling credible proof that Donald Trump knew about your efforts to get to WikiLeaks?

ROGER STONE, FORMER TRUMP ADVISER: Nobody can supply any corroborating truth. People can have their testimony composed, particularly if they are looking for a reduction in their sentence.

But there is no -- there is no proof here, any suggestion that we did discuss it would be conjecture, would be supposition, but there is no evidence to that effect. And first of all, when you talk to Donald Trump on the phone in all honesty, he does most of the talking, you do most of the listening. We just never discussed this topic.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: Do you buy that? No corroborated evidence. Do you buy that, John?

DEAN: I have trouble buying anything from Roger on face value. After I re-read the entire indictment after listening to his interview with Chris. And it doesn't hold up well, his defense.

You know, Chris didn't obviously get down into the weeds with him. And his effort to respond to it just didn't really fit with the charges and the detail that's there. So, I must tell you, my first reaction in reading the indictment and

seeing that senior person in there was probably not Trump, but probably not Manafort or Gates either, because they might have been named since they have already been charged and are either agreed or in jail.

But it could be the sons who I've read many times were considered the deputy campaign managers. And you know, right below the president himself, or the candidate himself. So, that was who I figured it might be.

[23:10:04] LEMON: How worried do you think, Phil, the team Trump should be tonight?

MUDD: I think quite worried. I mean, there is a lot of commentary in Washington that this could be the final shoe to drop. But look at all the information we've seen so far. Roger Stone talked about corroboration, that corroborates the cases against all the other individuals. Which of those was built on a weak case? Every one of those, from Flynn on down was airtight.

My point about the family and why the White House should be concerned is now we know there is direction to the White House, to people who lie. The people in the White House spoke to both the Congress. And I presume at least some of them to the Mueller team. Did they lie as well? That was one of my takeaways from the report.

There is a lot of information here -- or a little bit about who directed Stone. When they spoke to the special counsel, did they do the same thing everybody else did and say I don't really know about it? And if they did, they are in trouble.

LEMON: Shimon is there anything else that stands out in this indictment to you?

PROKUPECZ: I do think it is very interesting in the way that they haven't characterized WikiLeaks, you know. There is nothing to suggest right now from what we are reading in this indictment that even if they were exchanging this information with WikiLeaks, Roger Stone or anyone in the campaign, there is nothing here that says that that was a crime. The crimes that we keep seeing that have been committed in this entire investigation --

LEMON: Lying.

PROKUPECZ: -- is lying. And the question is, what is going on? Why were people consistently lying? And the reason has to be obviously for political reasons.

LEMON: Yes.

PROKUPECZ: They did not want to damage Donald Trump and his chances of winning the election. Certainly, politically they didn't want to damage him. If people -- they knew that this Russia investigation was heating up, they knew there was a lot of information on WikiLeaks and whether or not there was an exchange of information and that's what this indictment says.

And so, they did everything they could because to hide it. They didn't want it getting out publicly. And that's what we are seeing here consistently from Michael Cohen, to now Roger Stone, Michael Flynn, other people -- George Papadopoulos, whatever. We don't know his entire reason. But in the end, it is always about protecting Donald Trump politically.

LEMON: So, this is the interesting thing, because I've heard so many people say well, you know, you get in there -- even in defense of Roger Stone, you get in there and they confuse you and you may have a misstatement, you can't remember something. Law enforcement, they know when you misremembered something and when you are lying. Right, John?

DEAN: I agree with that. And as the Congressman said, when Roger was in front of the committee where he was charged with lying, he was very serious. He was very composed. He was obviously giving his story. When you read the statements that are charged as being false, they are conspicuously false.

And Mueller has heaps of information to prove their falsity and the fact that it's not something he could have easily forgotten.

LEMON: Yes.

DEAN: Sometimes they involved text messages and e-mails the same day he's testifying. So, you know, I don't think Roger can wiggle out from this one.

LEMON: Shimon, Phil, thank you very much. John Dean, I need you to stay with me. We got to talk more.

Roger Stone leaving court today proclaiming his innocence and making an all too familiar hand gesture as he faces several federal charges. Where have you seen that before?

[23:15:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: The indictment against long-time Trump adviser Roger Stone shedding new light on how the Trump campaign allegedly tried to benefit from Russian interference and Roger Stone's apparent love of Richard Nixon.

John Dean is back, and also with me, Mark McKinnon, the executive producer of The Circus on Showtime and the former adviser to John McCain and President George W. Bush, also presidential historian Tim Naftali, author of "Impeachment: An American History." Good evening, gentlemen.

Let's start. Because I want to -- I want to start by taking a look at part of this indictment where Roger Stone is talking to person two, Randy Credico about giving false testimony and pleading the fifth. Stone text Credico "Stonewall it, plead the fifth, anything to save the plan."

OK. That's interesting. But I mean, even what's more interesting is when we play this next clip. OK? This is from Watergate, the Watergate tapes. This is Richard Nixon talking to H.R. Haldeman and John Mitchell. Watch this.

So, Stone was, he literally quoting Richard Nixon when he was talking to people about this. I mean, you can't make this stuff up, can you?

TIMOTHY NAFTALI, CNN PRESIDENTIAL HISTORIAN: No, he admires Richard Nixon. I mean he has spent over 40 years trying to replicate the fun that he had as a 19-year-old working on the re-election campaign. He wasn't that important. He wasn't an adviser, but he was one of those eager guys who was willing to do whatever Jed Magruder or Bart Porter wanted to go to help President Nixon.

So, he ran up an agent in the Humphrey, Musky and McGovern campaigns. He did dirty trick up in New Hampshire. This was a world that he loved. And the thing about Roger Stone that's so interesting is that he kept getting jobs. What is it about the dark side of American politics that people like that are so employable?

LEMON: Yes. You, John, you were actually at the meeting with Nixon. You know these tapes. What did you think when you read that indictment?

DEAN: Well, my first reaction was, it's amazing he literally could recall one of the most pertinent tapes that surfaced in the Watergate saga that was used so effectively in the trial against Mitchell, because here he was conspiring with Nixon to save the plan, plead the fifth, do whatever's necessary. And it was devastating.

[23:20:06] Yes.

DEAN: I've got to also say -- Tim will be interested in this, that the Nixon foundation this afternoon issued a tweet really kind of disowning Roger Stone. Saying he was too young for the '68. He was only 20 for the '72 campaign. And they really were just saying he wasn't -- he wasn't part of our organization.

LEMON: Yes.

DEAN: So, they've not even they want to be connected with him.

LEMON: Yes. I have -- I've got it there. I've got it here. It's been up on the screen so I won't read it. But, Mark, he is known to be obsessed with Nixon. He left, and you saw the court house with that V, right, today that V for victory sign there.

MARK MCKINNON, EXECUTIVE PRODUCER, THE CIRCUS: He has a tattoo of Richard Nixon on his back. And he says I am the only man in America that has a dick on the front and a dick on the back. Can I say that on your show?

NAFTALI: You just did.

MCKINNON: Sorry, Don.

LEMON: Can we go over to camera -- where is this camera. OK. Here's the thing, I have been hearing that joke all night and I said I am not going to say that on TV. I'm not going to say that -- and leave it to Mr. Mark McKinnon. Go on. He's a man from another time.

MCKINNON: Well, what this --

(CROSSTALK)

LEMON: And maybe another planet.

MCKINNON: Yes, indeed. My overall view of what's happening with Stone today is this is exactly where he wants to be. And that he will not flip on the president. And that he will likely go to prison. And he will happily do that, serve a short sentence, be the martyr of all martyrs of for President Trump and be the G. Gordon Liddy of this administration and have a great career afterwards.

LEMON: Yes. He would have been upset if he wasn't indicted.

MCKINNON: Right. Absolutely. I truly believe in that.

(CROSSTALK)

LEMON: He wanted to be -- I was like wow, look at that.

MCKINNON: The only thing that matters to Stone is being the center of attention like his boss.

LEMON: Like his boss.

MCKINNON: Like the president.

LEMON: Donald Trump. So, in the indictment prosecutors also show a text of Stone's. OK? Sent to person number two. Who CNN has confirmed to do a be Frank Pantangeli -- excuse me, that's a character from the "Godfather 2" -- I love that characters, by the way -- who cooperated with the FBI and then denied it while testifying. Here it is right there.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. Pantangeli, were you a member of the Corleone family?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I have no godfather. Look the FBI guys, they promised me a deal. So, I made up a lot of stuff about Michael Corleone because that's what they wanted. But it was all lies, everything.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: So, you get the correlation there, that he wanted, Stone wanted Credico to lie to the House intelligence committee. Does it get any stranger than that?

MCKINNON: No, I mean, this is the truth stranger than fiction, right, or fiction stranger than truth. And I think there's a pretty good chance when Bob Mueller will play that clip before the jury at some point.

LEMON: Do you think so?

MCKINNON: Sure.

LEMON: John, there's so much mobster talk from President Trump and Roger Stone. They call people rats, they call them stoolies and on and on. What does it say about their world view, do you think?

DEAN: Well, it shows very much that Trump is from that world that Roger Stone was in and out of that is very organized crime oriented. And they have adopted -- you know, Roger has taken and learned the worst lessons of Watergate. And he's also adopted all of the tactics of the mob as his mentor, the president, has done.

LEMON: Yes.

NAFTALI: But you know, if you look at his career, this is an intelligence operative (Inaudible). He loves conspiracies, he loves running agents. He is not good at it but he loves that world. So, it's not a surprise when you look at the indictment.

LEMON: Right.

NAFTALI: This is a guy who used cutouts to engage in the kind of game that he always wanted to play.

LEMON: Well, he said he's not a conspiracy theorist. He's a conspiracy realist. I saw a sound bite of.

NAFTALI: Whatever.

LEMON: Yes.

NAFTALI: He says he lives in a world of conspiracy, some of which he's created --

LEMON: Right.

NAFTALI: -- in his own mind.

LEMON: Right.

MCKINNON: But he says the only thing that's worse than talking about him is not talking about him.

LEMON: Is not talking about him.

MCKINNON: Yes.

LEMON: So, there you go. The Circus on Showtime this weekend. I just want to play an interview that you co-hosted with Roger Stone. This is in October of 2016. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are you suggesting that on the basis of what you

know through your mutual friend that in the next three weeks that WikiLeaks will release or could release information that is substantially more damaging to Hillary Clinton than what has released already?

STONE: Yes. I think the race is close enough and the electorate is volatile enough that any major revelation on either side could yet substantially royal and perhaps decide the race.

[23:25:00] Trump may need some breaks, but to say that he is out of it -- over? Did you say over?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right.

STONE: Nothing is over until we say it is.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: He is basically admitting that he knows that more damaging e- mails are going to come out and they are going to help, they want to help with it to help Trump.

MCKINNON: Yes, I think it's clear on its face what he was suggesting there. And, then it came to pass.

LEMON: There is always a tweet or an interview for something when it comes to people who are associated with this.

NAFTALI: One of his flaws, it appears to be this, that he always thinks he is smarter than everybody else. When you read his books about the Nixon era, everybody is stupid, everybody except for Roger. And what's interesting about Roger is that he thought that by denying that he had e-mails that were related to WikiLeaks that somehow the government wouldn't get them.

So, he lies about it before the House intelligence committee, and he doesn't think to imagine that the government could actually go to the servers and get them himself. So, he thinks he is the smartest man in the room but he's not.

LEMON: Yes. John today of all days, the RNC voted unanimously to express their, quote, "undivided support for President Donald J. Trump and his effectively presidency at their annual meeting, effectively a pledge to stand behind Trump in 2020." What do you think?

DEAN: Well, as long as that happens, obviously, he's probably safe, since he's not going to be indicted. It's not likely they will breach the policy of the Department of Justice by an indictment from the special counsel. So, it's impeachment or nothing.

And if the Republicans stay with him, he's safe there. Because he needs -- you need at least 20 members of the Senate to make a guilty plea or a bill of impeachment stick in the Senate, and a removal also.

MCKINNON: But, Don, that's the sort of thing you do as a party from a position of weakness, not strength. I mean, if you are confident about where you are, that's not -- you are not doing purity tests and making demands of -- and having loyalty tests for members of the committee. No.

You go with confidence. But it's when you are really weakened then you are worried about a threat that you establish these kinds of rules.

LEMON: Thank you, gentlemen.

NAFTALI: Yes.

LEMON: Mark McKinnon giving new meaning to business in the front, party in the back. The Circus returns Sunday night on Showtime. We'll be right back.

[23:30:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DON LEMON, CNN HOST: So, today, we learned that long time Donald Trump associate, Roger Stone, allegedly sought stolen e-mails from WikiLeaks that could damage Hillary Clinton's campaign.

The single biggest question stems from this line, a senior Trump campaign senior official was told to contact Stone about additional releases by WikiLeaks. Who would be high ranking enough in Trump world to be directing a senior official to contact Stone? It's got to make you wonder. Who can we identify in the rest of the indictment?

Both WikiLeak's and its founder, Julian Assange, have been identified. Also, in October 2016, a month before the election, the indictment says a senior campaign official reached out to Roger Stone about future WikiLeaks releases. Stone answered there would be a load a week moving forward. According to the New York Times, Steve Bannon, then chief executive chairman of the Trump campaign, had that e-mail exchange with Roger Stone.

And then there are the people Stone communicated with about what WikiLeaks founder, Assange, knew. Person one in the indictment came right out today and said to CNN, "That's me, Stone's associate. Conspiracy theorist, Jerome Corsi.

And one of the things Stone was indicted for was witness tampering. Stone allegedly attempted to sway person 2's testimony to Congress. (Inaudible) alleged that person 2 was a go between with Julian Assange. It turns out that person 2 is Stone associate and radio host, Randy Credico.

E-mails in the indictment show Stone trying to sway Credico's testimony, calling him a rat, and threatening to take away his therapy dog, named Bianca. And someone else's name pops up in the indictment. That's right there, Donald J. Trump. He's mentioned once. But his campaign, 22 times.

So, what does this tell us about the case that Mueller is building and where this is going? Let's discuss, Juliette Kayyem, Michael Moore, and Garrett Graff, the author of the Threat Matrix - Inside Robert Mueller's FBI and The War on Global Terror. Boy, oh, boy, oh, boy. Boy, oh, boy, oh, boy. Here we go. Here we go. I mean just -- Juliette, we were just on last night, right? And here we go.

JULIETTE KAYYEM, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Yes.

LEMON: So -- but Garrett, let's talk Roger Stone's indictment. Does it get us any closer to answering the question of whether the Trump campaign colluded with WikiLeaks or Russia?

GARRETT GRAFF, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: I think it does in that it begins to show us a little bit of what Robert Mueller is thinking. You know, you were right to single out that line about that he was directed -- that the Trump campaign official was directed to contact Roger Stone, which gives some sense of Robert Mueller understands the internal decision making and has evidence of the internal decision making of the Trump campaign during this time window.

And it is really notable that, you know, indictment after indictment, court filing after court filing, Bob Mueller continues to show us the what without necessarily telling us the why. And you have to think that he is withholding the why, the motive, for a reason.

[23:35:02] And as Phil Mudd was sort of saying earlier, that there is a lot more to come when you begin to sort of read between the lines of what Mueller knows and isn't telling us.

LEMON: Juliet, you're shaking your head in agreement and I want to know why.

KAYYEM: Well, absolutely. I mean, first of all, you know, someone is finally going to jail for Hillary's e-mails. I don't think it's who the lock her up crowd thought. But you know, let's begin with the basics that the Democratic candidates' e-mails and her team's e-mails were stolen.

I totally agree with Garrett. I think that the -- and I have been saying this that what we are going to see with the Mueller report is what I have been calling the connective tissue. All of these indictments are pieces. And Mueller is going to give us the connective tissue.

And one way to think about it, I have been thinking about it all day, is that Mueller is very similar -- and you now I come from the world of disaster management -- to a tsunami, right? It has four stages. One is initiation, something starts, something is weird, something looks funky, you know, the water is receding.

Second is called the split stage. You don't know what's going on. Is it actually going to form into something? Because we've spent a lot of months wondering is Mueller going after this or going after that. Then you have amplification, which is that thing is getting stronger and we are starting to see. And then, of course, you have impact or what's called run up.

And we're not even at impact yet. And I think the way to look at today's document is that this is just amplification. It is just getting bigger.

LEMON: Wow.

KAYYEM: And something is going to hit, whether it is Trump or the sons or the son-in-law, whoever that senior official is. It's hit the Trump family. And I have always -- I think we just brace ourselves for that because whether it is Trump or the boys or the son-in-law, who knows.

LEMON: Interesting. Michael, Stone was on Fox News tonight. Here's what he had to say when he was asked about the Trump campaign official that directed Stone to find out more from WikiLeaks. Here it is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TUCKER CARLSON, FOX NEWS HOST: Who was it if it wasn't the president? Who was that official?

ROGER STONE, FORMER TRUMP CAMPAIGN ADVISER: Well, I have to speculate about that. Because since it never happened, it appears to me that they have composed testimony for someone, perhaps Rick Gates, perhaps Steve Bannon, perhaps someone is bearing false witness against me. But knowing what's in my e-mail and my text messages, there is no corroboration whatsoever for this.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: So he's suggesting Gates or Bannon will be named. And we know that Gates is cooperating with Mueller. What is your reaction?

MICHAEL MOORE, PARTNER, POPE MCGLAMRY: Yes. I think it is likely that Gates has given some testimony or some information in the case. But let me throw out another possibility and that is that little Don might be the one that we are talking about in paragraph 12 of the indictment.

You know, we already know he's got an appetite for trying to dig up dirt on Clinton. And we know that because they had this whole secret Trump Tower meeting and it was supposed to be about adoptions. He apparently had (ph) an anonymous telephone number and there's a story cooked up in the press that talks about what the purpose of the meeting was. So, I suggest to you that it might very well be the Achilles heel of the president and that is his family. And I feel like Mueller is telling us that he is getting very, very close to that.

You know, this indictment to me reads like the classic prosecutor sort of hub and spoke conspiracy. And that is that you got all -- you got this centerpiece here in the middle, which is Trump, and you got all these little spokes that go out to the different parts of the wheel and they are all doing their dirty work and their nasty work for him with the common purpose of getting done whatever Trump wants to have done or the people closest to him want to get done.

And that's just a standard prosecution theory that we use in cases -- conspiracy theory we use in cases all the time when we talk about drug cartels, when we talk about organized crime, when we talk about organizations where you don't get direct involvement or direct control or evidence of a direct statement by the person in the middle.

And so, who better than little Don to carry out the wishes of his dad and say, yeah, go on Mr. Stone and get us some more information from WikiLeaks and tell us what's there. That's another one that I would like for you to think about as we go forward.

LEMON: I got it now. Thank you very much. Juliet, we know the indictment mentions an August 2, 2016 e-mail in which Jerome Corsi tells Stone more e-mails are coming. And then he writes -- he says, "Would not hurt to start suggesting HRC old memory bad has stroke."

Now, I want you to listen to what then candidate Trump said in August 15.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: She also lacks the mental and physical stamina to take on ISIS and all of the many adversaries we face.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: Wow. So, that was August 15th, right after that. Lacks the mental and physical stamina. I mean, this became a major refrain in the campaign around that time. Could there be a coordination here?

[23:39:58] KAYYEM: Absolutely. And I think -- I think in some respects the intelligence community may have known it at the time. I heard Jim Clapper on the previous hour say in his book where he says you know the sort of scary thing from the intelligence community was just how the theories against Hillary were the same coming from Russia and coming from Trump, which made them nervous.

Can I add one date to this, which is even -- which makes -- shows how bad the Trump campaign was in terms of taking this seriously. August 15th, Trump says this, right, about her health. August 16th, the Trump campaign and Trump himself get briefed for the first time by the intelligence community that Russia has a campaign against Hillary Clinton, and be wary of any information or contacts.

So, all of this happens in a 24-hour period. That piece is not in the indictment. But just remember that they knew, the Trump people knew that Russia was promoting this. They didn't say anything to the FBI. And you got to wonder, did they not say anything because the day before they already knew where this information was coming from?

LEMON: Stay with me, everyone. The White House is down playing Roger Stone's indictment. Nothing to do with the president, they are saying. But we have seen plenty of denials like this from them before. And a whole lot of them have been proven wrong.

[23:45:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: The White House is denying that today's bombshell indictment of Roger Stone has anything to do with the president. But Sarah Sanders can't say whether the president directed a senior campaign official to contact Roger Stone about what WikiLeaks had on Hillary Clinton.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: You will not answer whether it was the president who directed a senior Trump campaign official to contact Roger Stone. And you may not know. You may not know. All I'm saying is you can't --

SARAH SANDERS, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: I actually have answered the question several times. You just don't like my answer.

BERMAN: No, no, you haven't.

SANDERS: You still think they aren't the same.

BERMAN: Well, did the president do it or not? Was it the president who made that direction or not?

SANDERS: Once again, I haven't read this document.

BERMAN: OK.

SANDERS: I am not an attorney. I'm not going to be able to get into the weeds on those specifics.

BERMAN: OK.

SANDERS: What I can tell you are the charges brought against Mr. Stone have nothing to do with the president, have nothing to do with the White House.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: She does that a lot where she says I have answered the question. She has not answered the question. So, back with you now, Juliet Kayyem, Michael Moore, and Garrett Graff.

Juliet, the press secretary can't say the president directed a campaign official to direct Stone to talk to WikiLeak. Then she insists that the president has done nothing -- has nothing to do with this indictment. Does that hold water? Does that make any sense to you?

KAYYEM: No. She just -- I mean she doesn't have anything left. I am not feeling sorry for her. But I mean, what in fact is she going to say at this stage? She's not an idiot. She's read the indictment or at least she read the news reports before she went on air with CNN. She also has decided to sell her brain and soul to defend the person who she doesn't know what he did.

So, she has no options. She sounds as foolish as it appeared this morning. That was just a crazy interview that John Berman did in the sense that, you know, I didn't read it but I know it is not true is sort of an inconsistent thing to try to keep going for three minutes on air.

LEMON: Garrett, listen how the press secretary described Roger Stone on CNN this morning.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: So there is a connection between Roger Stone and the now president of the United States, you will concede that?

SANDERS: Look, Roger Stone is somebody who has been a consultant for dozens of Republican presidents and candidates and members of Congress.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: So, now, I want you to listen how Roger Stone described his relationship with Trump today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How strong is your allegiance to President Trump?

STONE: I am one of his oldest friends. I am a fervent supporter of the president.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: Not exactly on the same page, right?

GRAFF: No. And this is where I think the president is finding himself painted into a deeper and deeper corner. You and I were talking about this last week that the president is sort of increasingly backed into this question that he is either going to have to admit that he's a fool or admit that he's a criminal.

Because right now what you have is someone who either was criminally involved in some of this or was so clueless a leader and manager of his own presidential campaign that his campaign chairman, his deputy campaign chairman, his national security adviser, his personal lawyer and fixer, and one of his oldest friends were all running separate criminal schemes on their own in the midst of his campaign without his knowledge.

So, you know, sort of neither one of these scenarios is looking very good for the president right now.

LEMON: Michael, the president's attorney, Rudy Giuliani, told the Washington Post today, another false statement case. God almighty. They do have some alleged false statements and I don't want to minimize that. That's not right. You shouldn't do that. But there is no evidence of anything else but false statements. The president is safe here. What do you think? Is the president safe?

MOORE: I don't think he is safe at all, you know, saying that this indictment has nothing to do with the president. It is about like saying that the solar system has nothing to do with the sun. I mean, all of these bad actors are sort of rotating around the president. I mean, we -- I don't know how many people we have gotten now, a dozen or so people that we got charged with various crimes. We have got Russian companies charged with crimes. We have secret meetings in the U.S. Supreme Court or the Court of Appeals. We got all this secret stuff going on. And there's no way he can say that.

[23:50:05] I mean, Giuliani has a history of trying to sort of tamp down and put this off to the side and act like we can't follow the news. I mean -- but the fact of the matter is that you got a serious charge here that maybe a false statement charge, but those are important because that's how we get to the truth of an investigation. That's how the integrity of the witnesses and the process are important.

And here, you have got somebody saying that a high-up person in the campaign was told by somebody, apparently with authority to direct them, to in fact go out and seek additional information, not to mention the information that we heard last week.

So, it's a bad day for the president and a day that I can understand why Giuliani wants to put a spin on it.

LEMON: Thank you all. I appreciate it.

MOORE: Good to be with you.

LEMON: We'll be right back.

[23:55:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: Thanks for watching. Before we leave you tonight, here's a look at CNN Films' "Three Identical Strangers." It airs Sunday night.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When I tell people my story, they don't believe it, but it's true.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I've always thought what would it be like if you turn the corner one day, and you saw yourself.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, my God.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Wow.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The first time the boys met the three together, it was a miracle.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There was nothing that could keep us apart.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That's when things kind of got funky.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Something was just not right.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'd like to know the truth.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was always a question mark.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The parents had never been told. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They're trying to conceal what they did from the people they did it to.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's still so much that we don't know.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How could you not tell us?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Identical Strangers, Sunday at 9:00 p.m. Eastern on CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)