Return to Transcripts main page

Don Lemon Tonight

Regrets Come in the End; President Trump Avoiding Public; Interview with Rep. Eric Swalwell (R-CA); Donald Trump Has A Lot to Say About the Mueller Investigation; A New Book About Donald Trump Before He Became President; The Attack on Empire Actor Jussie Smollett. Aired 10-11p ET

Aired January 30, 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: Well done. I've been saying that for years, not that I'm taking credit for you but you did a much better job.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN HOST: Exactly what you just did.

LEMON: No, no, no. You did a much better job of explaining that because you went beyond and talked about manufacturing.

My whole thing has been about the folks in the rust belt, the folks who are in coal country that during the course of the campaign, he made these false promises.

I've been saying, listen, we want everyone to have jobs. But we also want people to live in reality. Coal, the coal industry is never going to get back to where it was. We are simply -- we have simply moved beyond that. That doesn't have to do with people come across the border and what have you.

It mostly has to do with automation, right, and computers and the way we -- the way we use energy now. Unless you start building these things out of coal, they're never going to return. This is where we are. We're the information technology society. That's where it's all being driven. People have to be retrained for jobs.

It's never going to go -- and why would someone want to go back to a bygone industry that is not going to be helpful to society, and the jobs are going to keep dwindling? That's what he's not being honest with people about.

It is the slogan, as he said in the sound bite you ran there, it's easy because -- it's easy for people to -- if you put a slogan in their head, they believe it if you repeat it. Made in the USA. Made in the USA. Made in the USA. Build the wall. Build the wall. Build the wall. Lock her up. Lock her up. Lock her up. Lock her up. Bring back jobs. Bring back -- that is easy. But the reality of those things are actually as he's finding out and people who are, who believe to have been finding a much harder to do than to say.

CUOMO: Now, Chris Christie, who is a much better intellect than I'll ever be --

LEMON: I just ran -- I just ran into him. He's on his show. I didn't see it. I'm sorry. But go on. I did see -- I was preparing for my show. Sorry.

CUOMO: So, he says this is the president's salesmanship. Now, I think that that is too much of an excuse for the president because I don't care whether you like to do this or not or this is your talent or not. It's what its net effect is.

If you sell people on things that aren't true, you don't know the best people, you can't bring in the best team. You won't have the best people running the government. Then it's not you were just upselling. You were B.S.-ing them. You were lying.

LEMON: Right.

CUOMO: And you wound up having them choose you on a false premise.

LEMON: Right.

CUOMO: Similarly, I'm going to bring back manufacturing. Who does that sound good to? The men and women who haven't been able to find anything better because nobody gave them the means to adjust to the changes in the economy.

LEMON: Exactly.

CUOMO: So, they love the idea, and why wouldn't they?

LEMON: Right.

CUOMO: They should. But it was a false hope that he's giving them of in any real way taking us back to a place that time has forgotten.

LEMON: Right.

CUOMO: And that is unfair to them. And the reason he does it that way is the same way he does it with the wall. The border is complicated. The problem is complex. It's multi-layered. He doesn't want to deal with that. He likes the simple. That's the salesman in him.

LEMON: That's what I said. Build the wall. Made in USA.

CUOMO: Yes.

LEMON: Yes.

CUOMO: Then go sell cheap wine and ties.

LEMON: Or steaks.

CUOMO: Don't be president of the United States.

LEMON: Yes. CUOMO: Because you've got to make hard decisions. You've got to tell people it's hard and find a way forward, not just sell them something that's too simple to be true.

LEMON: Listen, the shutdown, there wasn't anything good that came out of the shutdown except for something I think that was eye-opening for the rest of the country.

Many times, in the media and politically, we tend to portray the working class as a certain demographic, as people who live in the middle of the country, people who are in coal country. Those are the working-class people.

But working-class people are TSA workers, and they're of all ethnicities. Working class people are people who air traffic controllers of all different ethnicity. Working class people are members of the Secret Service who weren't getting paid. Working class people are members of the Coast Guard who are not getting pads. Working class people are from all over the country. They work in all different industries, especially in technology and information now.

And I think it is incumbent upon us and our politicians to realize that and stop playing people against each other and trying to get people to believe that only the working class, the people who matter, are the folks who are so-called forgotten people who are, you know, living and working in the Midwest, who carry a lunch pail to work. Those people are important, but everyone's job is important, and there are lots of different kinds of working-class people.

CUOMO: There's only one person who really needs to apply the wisdom of that, and that's the president. And for him to come out of what we just went through and say, yes, there's a chance we could do it again, that shows that the knocks on him for empathy have some teeth.

As you know, I'm not a big fan of, like, you know, diagnosis and psychology about the president. I don't care what's going on inside his head. I care about what comes out of his mouth and what his deeds are and analyzing those and testing those.

[22:04:57] But if you can come out of something like what we just went and not see how poor it was politically and how damaging it was and suggest you might do it again for the same lame reason --

LEMON: Yes.

CUOMO: -- that is some bad medicine for your base.

LEMON: And we tend to get caught up in the whole -- like we believe if it comes out of Washington, there's a crisis at the border, then people believe there's an actual crisis.

CUOMO: Sure.

LEMON: There's open borders. There's nothing to stop people from coming in. We tend to believe that's true.

CUOMO: Sure.

LEMON: You know what I do every single night when I come up here, whether I get to use it or not, I have this thing. It's a fact sheet. It's a fact sheet. At the top it says, wall, fact-check. And it talks about what administrations in the past have put money and effort towards the wall. It talks about the George W. Bush signing the Secure Fence Act, it talks about how much -- or a barrier on the wall, which is what he's suggesting now.

And as you have said, he's trying to take credit for things that are already there. We already have hundreds of miles of fence along the southern border. Some of it is sufficient. Some areas are not. Some of it needs replacing. Others need to just be rehabbed. Those efforts and the money for that was earmarked for some of it --

CUOMO: Right.

LEMON: -- in prior administrations.

CUOMO: Sure.

LEMON: And all he had to do was say, we need to continue what we're doing but also make it better.

(CROSSTALK)

CUOMO: It's not big enough. It's not big enough.

LEMON: But he's doing the exact same thing that was already in the works.

CUOMO: I know. That's why people hate politics. And people thought he would be better and that he'd be disruptive to that kind of game and be a straight shooter because he's a businessman, not a politician.

LEMON: Yes.

CUOMO: And he's been more of the worst type of rhetoric than we've seen recently.

LEMON: But, Chris, it's all B.S. That's what -- people like, it's all B.S.

CUOMO: I have no problem with that assessment. My problem is this, is the binary nature of this. The Democrats saying, no wall. And the other side saying, why? We want a wall. Look, here's the reality. You've got barriers along that thing all over the place.

LEMON: Yes.

CUOMO: They need more. I believe the men and women who keep us safe and their assessment that barriers help --

(CROSSTALK)

LEMON: But we should -- CUOMO: -- and they need more of it. So, the Democrats should say, fine, more barriers. OK. Let's talk about where, how much and why, not no wall, not a dollar for your damn wall. Don't say that because you don't mean it --

LEMON: Yes.

CUOMO: -- and it puts you in a hole. And on the other side, this idea that we're a wall away from safety, that it's a panacea, is poppycock.

LEMON: Yes.

CUOMO: And they should abandon that. It's disruptive, and it's delusional.

LEMON: But I think people should live in reality and they should know the facts. And when someone says it, say, well, that was already in the works. That is part of deals that were made years and decades ago. That's what we were doing, and we will continue to do that, and we can make it better. But we should not sit here and pretend that there have been no efforts in the past to build a barrier on the southern border.

CUOMO: I agree. But the Democrats put themselves in a hole themselves on a hole when they say no money for the wall.

LEMON: No money for the wall.

CUOMO: They're not giving themselves credit for the money they have put in, for what is really the wall --

LEMON: Yes.

CUOMO: -- for the fencing. So, there's politics at play on both sides. But the president put us in a shutdown. He pushed it too far.

LEMON: Yes.

CUOMO: He sold a farce with this fence, this wall. It was a farcical promise.

LEMON: Yes.

CUOMO: So, you got to put most of the blame on him. The solution and the way forward, that's two sides.

LEMON: Most of the blame on him because there were at least two bipartisan deals ready to go.

CUOMO: Sure.

LEMON: Which would have given him much of what he wanted, and he said no. So, then who do you blame? I got to run. I got to tell you I came in a little bit later than you. I know it was cold. But it is cold out there, Chris. Be careful. We talked about it moments ago --

(CROSSTALK) CUOMO: I'm jogging home, no shirt.

LEMON: Well, that's your problem. No, go ahead and do that. I'd like to see that.

CUOMO: I know you would.

LEMON: Yes. Make sure you Facebook live it because I want to see how tough that is.

CUOMO: I'm going to be live tweeting the whole way. No, we're not allowed to do that here.

LEMON: You take care. Thank you, Chris

CUOMO: You too. I'll be watching.

LEMON: All right. Thanks.

This is CNN TONIGHT. I'm Don Lemon.

Thank you so much for watching.

We do have some breaking news. It is on the Mueller investigation.

The president says he's going to leave decisions on Mueller's report to the Justice Department. But there's also this. It's a pretty ominous quote, and it's from "The Daily Caller", that interview with the president. And here's what it says.

It says, "I could have gotten involved in this. I could have terminated everything. I could have ended everything. I've chosen to stay out of it. But I had the right to, as you know, I had the right if I wanted to end everything. I could have just said that's enough. Many people thought that's what I should do."

Well, if that sounds familiar, it really should because it's clearly something the president had on his mind for quite a while. This is in August. In August he told Reuters that he decided to stay out of the investigation. But he went on to say, quote, "now I don't have to stay out. I can go in, and I could do whatever. I could run it if I want." Remember that?

[22:09:59] And in November, he said this. This was a day after the midterms.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I could fire everybody right now, but I don't want to stop it --

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What about the --

TRUMP: -- because politically I don't like stopping it. (END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: More on all that in just a moment. Trust me, we're going to have more on all that. The president found time to do that interview today right in the middle of being mad at just about everyone, about just about everything.

OK. So, the Democrats, he's mad at them. Mad at the Democrats and members of his own party who are working to figure out how to avoid another government shutdown on February 15th, a little over two weeks away.

The president tweeting this, he said, "If the committee of Republicans and Democrats now meeting on border security is not discussing or contemplating a wall or physical barrier, they are wasting their time."

Speaker Nancy Pelosi's response, asked if the president should stay out of the negotiations, the speaker, without even bothering to break a stride, says he should sign the bill. Play it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Should the president stay out?

NANCY PELOSI, UNITED STATES SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: He should sign the bill.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: Just kept walking. It doesn't look like the speaker is planning to back down anytime soon. But the president tells "The Daily Caller" tonight, quote, "without our involvement, a deal is not going to get done."

The president is also pretty mad over the latest unflattering volumes in what could be called the Trump book club, OK? He called former staff Cliff Sims, the author of the latest White House tell-all, nothing more than a gofer.

He is yet weigh in on the book about Mar-a-Lago. I'm going to talk to the author just a little later on in the show. There it is right there. So, hat tip to the Washington Post's Josh Dawsey, who says sources have told him the president is complaining extensively about that Sims book.

But of course, he's really mad at his own hand-picked intelligence chiefs. If you thought President Trump would rise above that when they dare to publicly contradict him, you don't know Donald Trump.

The president tweeting just today -- as usual tweeting -- that his own intel chiefs, quote, "seem to be extremely passive and naive" and adding "perhaps intelligence should go back to school." Good one.

Sources telling CNN the president was seething and called out DNI Dan Coats by name as he watched TV highlights of yesterday's testimony. So just imagine how the president's intelligence briefing went this morning. Coats usually does that briefing by the way, and it's unclear whether he did today.

A White House official says the president doesn't plan to fire Coats, but seething really isn't good. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer sending a letter to DNI Coats tonight calling the president's criticism extraordinarily inappropriate and saying it will undermine public confidence. What about that tweet? The president calling his intel chiefs naive. You know what's really naive? This.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: We have won against ISIS. We've beaten them, and we've beaten them badly.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: Well, just one month later, four Americans were killed in a suicide bombing in Syria, a bombing believed to have been carried out by ISIS. It's not the first time he's claimed to know more than the experts. And if history is any guide, it won't be the last.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I know more about ISIS than the generals do, believe me.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: While this president is mad at just about everybody, what is he doing? What is he doing? Think about it. Looks like he's having a whole lot of executive time behind closed doors in the White House.

Today was the fifth day in a row without a public appearance by the president. His schedule so far this week, pretty light. Take a look at it. The official schedule released by the White House shows the president has had two meetings this week. Two. Two. One was a lunch meeting with Vice President Mike Pence on Monday. The other was that intelligence briefing this morning.

[22:14:53] In a late addition to his schedule on Monday night, the president attended a fund-raiser at his own Trump international hotel, also with the vice president. That event closed to the press.

We also learned that the president spoke today with the interim president of Venezuela. But there are still hours and hours and hours of time unaccounted for. So, it makes you wonder, what is the president of the United States doing with all that time with so little on his schedule? No official way for anyone to know how this president spends his days.

Unofficially, though, there is Twitter. We know this president tweets from early morning until late night. But I want you to remember, remember during the 2016 campaign, then-candidate Trump said he was going to work really, really hard.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) TRUMP: I will be your champion, and I will work hard to be your champion.

It's going to be a lot of work. It's going to be a lot of time. I wouldn't leave the White House.

Work, work, work. Straighten it out. Get it done. Fix it up. Make it great. If I win, we're going to work really hard.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: Wow. Trump international hotel this week. All those times. You know, Mar-a-Lago, a lot of time at Mar-a-Lago. You've got to wonder with everything going on, with all the storms buffeting this White House, is this president working hard or hardly working?

President Trump saying he'll leave decisions on Robert Mueller's report to the Justice Department, but he also says he could end the investigation if he wanted to. Lots to talk about. Susan Glasser is here, Douglas Brinkley as well. We'll dig in.

[22:20:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: President Trump talking in-depth about Robert Mueller's Russia investigation in a new interview on a day that started with him reportedly seething while watching coverage of his intel chiefs contradicting him on Capitol Hill.

A lot to get to. So, let's discuss it now. Susan Glasser, Douglas Brinkley both here. Good evening to you. I hope you guys are staying warm. It is cold out there for a big part of the country.

Susan, to you first. President Trump talking about Mueller in that new interview tonight to "The Daily Caller". He says he'll leave it to the Justice Department on how to handle the Mueller report. Does that signal anything to you?

SUSAN GLASSER, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: Well, first of all, what it signal is the continued uncertainty after the other day when the acting attorney general, as you know, said publicly, well, first of all, Mueller's almost done. Second of all, suggesting there might be some sort of a review process in the Justice Department before it is sent up to Capitol Hill.

So there remains this incredible cloud and question over whether and in what way we're going to see the full work product of this investigation.

President Trump, as you pointed out, has held out the possibility of just abruptly firing Mueller at any moment. I think most people think that moment has come and done for Trump to be able to do so. But it's fascinating to me that he's still talking about it now.

I think this is part of the overall temper tantrum, it seems to me, that President Trump has been having over the last week. He's just so desperate to assert his power to do things after having been humiliated really by the Democratic Congress.

LEMON: Over the whole wall --

(CROSSTALK)

GLASSER: Over the shutdown, yes.

LEMON: -- and government shutdown thing. Douglas, President Trump says that he could have terminated the investigation if he wanted to. I read the quote there where he says, "I could have gotten involved. I could have terminated everything. I could have ended everything. I've chosen to stay out of it, but I had the right to."

So that was a quote from "The Daily Caller". Even going as far as saying that's what many people thought he should do. Is the president looking for a pat on the back for doing the right thing?

DOUGLAS BRINKLEY, CNN PRESIDENTIAL HISTORIAN: I guess that's what he's looking for. It is like Richard Nixon, I should have burned the tapes. I could have burned them, and I wouldn't have been in the hot water that I'm in.

If Donald Trump wanted to fire Mueller, he should have done it and reaped the consequences. Instead, it's more of this whining wimp factor that people are talking about. He's complaining about his tough, you know, lot in life. He's unfocused, not sure what to do. He's stewing in anger in a White House. He's attacked about everybody of value in his administration.

He's now denouncing Dan Coats, one of the really leading intelligence analysts of our era right now and somebody that everybody agrees tells it to you straight.

I mean imagine having, Don, your intelligence leader tells you -- the public that Donald Trump's wrong about North Korea, wrong about Iran, wrong about Syria, but he's afraid to fire Coats, but maybe he will. Now it's the Justice Department.

This is a president unglued. He's feeling the pressure of the Mueller report, and I think the arrest of Roger Stone, who he's known for decades, not years, is just -- and the power of the FBI the way they apprehended Stone in Fort Lauderdale is spooking him.

LEMON: Yes, threw him for a loop.

BRINKLEY: It's throwing him for a loop, and he may try to recover next week with the State of the Union, and that's probably what he's preparing that speech right now.

LEMON: Susan -- well, and a lot of people are looking forward to that. They want to hear what he has to say. "The Daily Caller", Susan, asked the president if the acting A.G. Whitaker, if he had communicated to the president that the Mueller probe was wrapping up. Trump says they haven't spoken about that, but did they have to because Whitaker went on TV and said as much. GLASSER: Well, that's right. First of all, that was some sort of a

message sending. We don't know. Was that intended to pressure the prosecutors? Was it intended to send a signal to witnesses in the case, it's almost over, just hold out? Or was it sending a message to the president?

Many people seem to think it was very inappropriate for him to have weighed in. It certainly seems highly unusual. Normally the Justice Department would not talk in any such terms about an investigation like this and where it is. So, it was unusual to the point of inappropriate.

[22:24:57] President Trump has been freaking out about the Mueller investigation since the moment it was started. He knows better than we know what it is that it's going to find.

But, you know, again, I just think Doug's point is really important here. You know, this is a president who seems to be casting about, who has neither tactics nor strategy to face a moment in time where he's under challenge like never before by not only Democrats in Congress but increasingly Republicans on Capitol Hill have been pushing back against him on foreign policy.

Dan Coats, by the way, not only the chief national intelligence officer now, a longtime, very conservative Republican senator on Capitol Hill. These are people Donald Trump appointed to run our intelligence agencies.

These aren't, you know, some crazy liberal Democrats that he can caricature for partisan reasons. These are solid conservative officials from his own party that he's now attacking.

And, again, I think the arrest of Roger Stone was very significant. But I go back to the fact on Friday, President Trump, basically the last time he was seen in public was probably the most humiliating moment of his presidency so far.

He held out for more than a month. He put into turmoil the federal government. Huge swaths of the United States, 800,000 people without paychecks. And what happened? He didn't get one dollar from Nancy Pelosi. He was humiliated. And, you know, we can see the president of the United States doesn't take well to being humiliated.

LEMON: Very good point there. Doug, Kaitlan Collins reporting late tonight that the president seethed watching the highlights of his intelligence chiefs testifying on Capitol Hill and then singling out DNI Dan Coats by name during a morning rant. When you hear he's more upset by the coverage - by the coverage than the actual fact-based assessments, what are you thinking?

BRINKLEY: You know, that Donald Trump's not fit to be president of the United States. That we've known that for a while. He goes into these kind of temper tantrums. He doesn't have any real close advisers. You either have to be a sycophant or a person who just does whatever he wants at every moment. He can't stand independent analysis. We've heard this from Rex Tillerson and General Mattis and General

Kelly and now Coats. Anytime somebody tries to tell him the truth, tries to present facts that are going to help our country move forward in the 21st century, he recoils from it because he wants people to just say how wonderful he is, and he wants to pretend that the Mueller report is a witch hunt.

Well, it isn't. Those FBI agents raiding Stone's home in Fort Lauderdale, that was -- they were real people. This is his -- the chickens are coming home to roost for Donald Trump now, and he had drug it around for two years. Every day practically he was tweeting about Mueller, and that's why the wall never got built when he had a Republican Senate in Congress, Don. He had two years to do it, but he's been obsessed about the Russian investigation because he has guilty of some kind written all over him. And he can't get it out of his mind.

Right now, he's worried about it. He might be feeling the end is near for him because Republicans are starting to defect, and he's sinking in the polls.

LEMON: Thank you, Douglas. Thank you, Susan. See you next time. Again, stay warm. I appreciate it. You're in Palm Springs, so you're good, Douglas.

BRINKLEY: Yes.

GLASSER: I'm cold.

LEMON: Don't rub it in. Don't rub it in. See you guys next time.

Robert Mueller says a Russian troll farm used and changed documents from his team that weren't public as part of their disinformation campaign to credit the investigation. Congressman Eric Swalwell reacts. There he is. He's next.

[22:30:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: So President Trump, in a new interview today, has a lot to say about the Mueller investigation. The headline, he says he'll take a hands-off approach and leave everything to the Justice Department. But he also says he could end the investigation if he wanted to.

I want to talk about this with Congressman Eric Swalwell, a California Democrat who sits on both the Intelligence and the Judiciary Committees, very important committees and role there. Thank you, Congressman. Good to see you.

REP. ERIC SWALWELL (D), CALIFORNIA: Good evening, Don, of course.

LEMON: President Trump spoke to "The Daily Caller" tonight, and he says that he's going to leave the decision as to how to handle the Mueller report to the Justice Department. He also says he could have terminated everything if he wanted to, even adding that many people thought that he should do that. He hasn't ended it, but he's certainly tried to undermine it. SWALWELL: Sounds like a guy going through all the stages of grief, right? Like, you know, denial, anger, and now maybe acceptance that it's coming. I mean he's done everything -- he's done everything he can to, you know, undermine it. He's tampered with witnesses. He's obstructed justice. He's tried to dangle pardons out there. He put in place, as the acting attorney general, someone we'll hear from on Friday, next Friday in the Judiciary Committee as a hired assassin essentially who I think was brought in because of his views about taking out the Mueller investigation.

So the best thing the president can do is to just, you know, allow the investigation to continue.

LEMON: You're talking about Whitaker?

SWALWELL: Well, yeah. Whitaker is coming to Congress next week. But the president should just allow the investigation to continue. And then when it's done, make sure that it's fully transparent and released to the American people.

LEMON: The GOP announced their roster to sit on the House Intelligence Committee today. Democrats have been grumbling that they were dragging their feet. How soon could we see a vote to release the panel's witness transcripts to Mueller?

SWALWELL: I hope that's soon. I know that's one of the top priorities of the Chairman, Chairman Schiff, as well as, you know, all the members on the committee. We also have Michael Cohen coming next week before the committee. There's a lot of work that we have to do because we want to be a committee that protects the future because we know the Russians are just as interested in attacking us in 2020 as they were in 2016 and 2018.

So if we're going to protect the ballot box, we've got work to do, Don. And, you know, the focus, you know, should be everything -- all the resources we can devote to securing the ballot box and making the American people aware.

LEMON: We're seeing another disinformation campaign, Congressman, from a pro-Russian Twitter account trying to discredit Mueller, actually using information shared with defense attorneys in a case Mueller is prosecuting. What's your number one concern here?

SWALWELL: Well, my number one concern here is that we have a country that attacked us, that does not want us to succeed, and as we are prosecuting that country, they're trying to make a mockery of the investigation by using information from that investigation to, you know, basically undermine the investigation.

[22:35:09] And yet, we have a president who goes overseas. And every time he goes overseas, he's acting like Tony Soprano going to a dark parking garage and meeting with, you know, another leader from a different mob as he does with Vladimir Putin. Russia is not our friend. They are not worthy because of what they just did in this Mueller investigation of having a president who would give them an audience. And yet, our president meets with them, you know, in darkness and doesn't tell the American people what was agreed upon. And that's a big problem.

LEMON: You were on with my colleague, Wolf, this afternoon. And you say that you're close to making a decision about your 2020 plans. When Wolf asked you about it, you told him to give you just a few more minutes.

SWALWELL: Are you going to give me those minutes?

LEMON: It's been about 311 minutes, give or take. I am not that great with math.

(CROSSTALK)

SWALWELL: He's got the receipts.

LEMON: Any decision?

SWALWELL: I am getting close, Don. And I'll tell you why. It's because I have lived the promise of America as the first of my family to go to college. My parents believed if you work hard, you do better and dream bigger. And I see that that's not being fulfilled everywhere, on every block, or on every floor of every building. And I think that -- I come from a generation that wants to go big, be bold, and do good, and I think that's missing in this field.

Now, I have a wife and two kids under two. So at this point it's just a family decision. My wife has a good job that she's worked hard for. You know, just getting childcare just like most families. It's not easy, especially when you're running for president.

But we're going to sort those things out, and hopefully have, you know, an announcement about the future soon.

LEMON: So you're leaning towards it?

SWALWELL: I see a lot of green lights, Don. But again, there's a lot of pressure, you know, on a young family. And that has to come first.

LEMON: So you're saying there's a chance? No, I am just kidding.

SWALWELL: I am telling you there's a chance, one in a million, hopefully better than that.

LEMON: Congressman, you're a good sport. Thank you.

SWALWELL: Of course, my pleasure.

LEMON: Thank you. My next guest says Donald Trump called himself the King of Palm Beach. Inside information about life at President Trump's private club, Mar-a-Lago, since he has taken office. That's next.

[22:40:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK) LEMON: Before he was president of the United States, Donald Trump called himself the King of Palm Beach. And a new book tells the inside story of his private club there.

Let's bring in now Laurence Leamer, the Author of "Mar-a-Lago: Inside the Gates of Power at Donald Trump's Presidential Palace." Welcome, sir.

LAURENCE LEAMER, AUTHOR AND JOURNALIST: Thank you very much.

LEMON: It's good to have you on.

LEAMER: Thank you.

LEMON: This is fascinating. I have to get -- I haven't read it yet, but I have read some stuff from it. I have been briefed on it. It's seems -- I have been wondering for years what it's like to even go there and be there. But I just want to read something from your book, OK?

LEAMER: Please.

LEMON: And this was right at the beginning of Trump's presidency. You said Trump let the Secret Service know he intended to visit Mar-a- Lago regularly. And with all the people who would be running in and out of the club, they quickly recognized the immense challenges his request would create. Trump didn't seem to care what problems he presented to the Secret Service.

He was used to getting whatever he wanted. He didn't care about the cost or the disruptions. So a lot of his identity is being the King of Palm Beach, correct?

LEAMER: Yeah. He does what he says, and he is the king. He changed this island. It used to be a kind of sedate, conservative place, kind of old money, old wasp money. He came and bowled his way in there. And it's a new elite, a kind of -- it's a gilded age. There are 40 billionaires in Palm Beach. He's one of them. And he's -- they are the people that matter. And they are the people that matter to his presidency in many ways.

LEMON: Talk more about that.

LEAMER: Well, it's wealth. I mean he doesn't care about class. He doesn't care about law. He cares about money. And money is what matters to this guy. And those are the people he wants around him. And those are the people he has -- that's what Palm Beach is about.

LEMON: Yeah, about having a lot of money.

LEAMER: Yes.

LEMON: And extravagance. You said it used to be old money and quiet, now --

LEAMER: Well, if you want to buy -- you want to join Mar-a-Lago? You could join. Anybody can join. It's 200,000 bucks, OK?

LEMON: It went up when he became president.

LEAMER: Yeah, but now it's 200,000. So it's that. It's $14,000 a year. And it's $2,000 minimum food. Of course, you like to drink a few, so you got to pay for your drinks.

LEMON: Right.

LEAMER: So maybe you've been a member for five years. Most of these people you're not going to play tennis. You're not going to swim. So it's basically a dinner club. And it costs -- it figures about $5,000 every time you come for dinner, but what's that?

LEMON: Yeah. Well, that's the common man.

LEAMER: Yeah, exactly.

LEMON: That's the working class.

LEAMER: Exactly.

LEMON: Right? OK, just checking. So, he was last during -- he was last there during Thanksgiving, right, the 20th through the 25th. He wasn't able to go for Christmas because of this government shutdown.

LEAMER: Right.

LEMON: Do you think that really bothered him?

LEAMER: I think that bothered him enormously. This is his spiritual home. He loves being there. He's created this world around him, Don, where people tell him he's great. Wherever he walks, he's got people coming up to him saying, you're great, Donald. He needs to get back. He's coming down there this weekend. It's going to be an extraordinary event this weekend when he's there.

When he's there, everybody comes to the club. People fight to get there, to try to get dinner reservations, because he sits on the veranda outside for his three-hour dinners and everybody is around him. He just loves that.

LEMON: He said because -- he loves the attention. Is he sitting there in the spotlight like, you know, someone --

(CROSSTALK)

LEAMER: I was there this Easter weekend. We were there after 11:00 -- with Toni Holt Cramer and Trump had invited us for dinner there. After 11:00, Don King, the boxing impresario comes in. He's dressed as Uncle Sam. He sits down with Donald, talks to him. Donald gets up, and Don King follows him out, and says the president, the great president, the great president. He screams at him as he goes out.

And I am thinking this is the president. This is -- I can't believe this. But so much of my book is like that. You read it, and you think could this be possibly true, but it is.

[22:45:07] LEMON: Yeah. You said that he president started out being viewed as a lowlife, and a vulgar interloper, but the old society folks in Palm Beach, but soon he became the king. And it's because -- when you talk about how people, they all kiss -- he said, and you quote, "they all kiss my ass."

LEAMER: Yeah. That's his quote, not mine.

LEMON: That's his quote. They all kiss my ass.

LEAMER: Yeah.

LEMON: And he thought that the White House might be the same way as the people at Mar-a-Lago.

LEAMER: No. And now he says that he has no friends in the White House. He doesn't. So he goes down there, and then he has these people that are constantly sucking up to him, and he loves that. He loves Palm Beach. It's his spiritual home.

LEMON: This weekend when it's cold --

LEAMER: He's going to be there.

LEMON: No, this is -- this is going to be my -- until the Super Bowl, this is what I am going to be doing. Laurence, your book is out now. And it's called "Mar-a-Lago: Inside the Gates of Power at Donald Trump's Presidential Palace." Thank you for joining me. It's a pleasure.

LEAMER: Thank you.

LEMON: We'll be right back.

[22:50:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: Tonight, there could be a break in the investigation into the alleged attack of Empire star Jussie Smollett. Chicago Police have photos of two people they want to talk to. The alleged assault is being investigated as a possible hate crime, more now from CNN's Sara Sidner.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SARA SIDNER, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: New details in the alleged homophobic and racist attack against Empire actor and singer, Jussie Smollett. Police reveal that they have images of people they are looking to question regarding the reported assault and battery of the Empire actor.

After combing through hundreds of hours of surveillance video, and expanding their search area for video, police have found something, video that shows what police are calling potential persons of interest, but they need the public's help in identifying them. Actor and singer Jussie Smollett is best known for his role in the television series Empire, where he plays Jamal, a black singer who is gay. Smollett is also black and gay, which may have been the motivation for an alleged attack against him in Chicago. Police say they are investigating a possible hate crime against the actor with the help of the FBI.

Authorities say the Empire actor reported that the crime happened at about 2:00 in the morning Tuesday, when two men got his attention by yelling out racial and homophobic slurs. Smollett told police the men then began hitting him in the face and poured an unknown chemical substance on him, adding that at some point during the incident, one of the offenders wrapped a rope around his neck.

During a follow-up interview, police say Smollett told them something new. That during the attack, the offenders uttered this is MAGA country, Empire Director Lee Daniels taking to social media to voice his support for Smollett.

LEE DANIELS, EMPIRE DIRECTOR AND EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: You didn't deserve nor anybody deserves to have a noose put around your neck, to have bleach thrown on you, to be called die (bleep) or whatever they said to you. We are better than that. America is better than that.

SIDNER: Support for Smollett exploding online from Hollywood A- listers to political heavyweights. Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, tweeting the racist homophobic attack on Jussie Smollett is an affront to humanity. No one should be attacked for who they are or whom they love. Democratic presidential candidate and Senator Kamala Harris also weighing in, calling Smollett one of the kindest, most gentle human beings I know, and calling the attack an attempted modern day lynching.

The show Empire is filmed in Chicago. Crew members have been given extra security. Smollett told CNN he was shaken by the attack. His publicist says he's out of the hospital and recovering. Police are hoping to learn more about who the people on the surveillance video are. So far, more than a dozen investigators are working this case with the assistance of the FBI.

Now, U.S. Congressman from Illinois, Bobby Rush, is calling for an immediate and sweeping civil rights investigation into the racist and homophobic attack on Jussie Smollett.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LEMON: And Sara Sidner joins me now. Sara, these pictures, I mean they are pretty blurry. You can't see much. These are people who the police want to talk to determine whether they know anything about it, correct?

SIDNER: That is right. They say that these two people were in the vicinity of where the alleged battery and assault on Jussie Smollett happened. He reported it. He let them know the area where this happened. And they've been combing throughout as they said hundreds of hours of surveillance video because there are quite a few surveillance cameras in that particular area of Chicago. And they finally found something.

Now, what they want to know is do these people know anything about what happened? Were there potential witnesses? Were they involved? There are a lot of questions they would like to pose to these two people that you see in the photos that were put out. And police have put this out on social media so that anyone can take a look.

But as you mentioned, if you take a good look at these, no matter how close you zoom in, it is terribly freezing there, right? It is -- the polar vortex, so of course their head and face is covered, of course they've got on gloves. It's hard to even tell what their race is. It's hard to tell sort of who these two people may be. But police are hoping, well, maybe if they see it and they know anything, they will also contact police themselves, Don.

LEMON: Sara, we reached out to police, and they said that they're not doing interviews because it's too early in the investigation. What else -- are you hearing anything else from law enforcement?

SIDNER: At this point, it's just they are still looking for more video. They are still trying to comb through more video that they have obtained. And we do know that there are about a dozen investigators on this particular case.

[22:55:07] And you have to remember, like, this is less than 48 hours since the initial crime was reported. And they've already got something to go on. And so they are trying to follow this lead as far as they can. But certainly, this is going to be difficult, judging from the picture, unless of course these two people see themselves, know where they were at the time, and call into police to say, hey, we're the people that you see. What do you want from us? What do you want to know from us?

LEMON: Well, unless they find some more video or photographic evidence, right? Sara Sidner --

SIDNER: Oh, just to quickly mention, Don.

LEMON: Sure.

SIDNER: Just to quickly mention, police are also saying at this point that they're still combing through video, they don't have any video of the alleged attack itself. And so that's something that I am sure they are still trying to find. If that exists in the surveillance video, they are looking to see if they can actually find that, and that's an important piece of evidence.

LEMON: Sara, thank you. The president tonight criticizing the FBI raid on Roger Stone, and saying he could have gotten involved in the Mueller investigation if he wanted.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)