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Ambassador Philip Reeker Testifies To Congress In Impeachment Inquiry; Federal Judge Rules Current House Impeachment Proceeding Constitutional; Judge Orders Redacted Grand Jury Testimony In Mueller Report Be Handed Over By State Department; Democratic Presidential Candidates Campaign In South Carolina; President Trump Gives Speech To Historically Black College In South Carolina; Electricity Cut To Some California Residents Due To Wildfires; Democratic Presidential Candidate Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) Is Interviewed On His Presidential Campaign; Trump Organization Reportedly Considering Selling Hotel In D.C.; Felicity Huffman Released From Prison. Aired 2-3p ET

Aired October 26, 2019 - 14:00   ET

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

[14:00:02]

FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, again, everyone. Thank you so much for being with me. I'm Fredricka Whitfield.

Happening right now, a rare Saturday deposition as Democrats push ahead in the impeachment inquiry. Testifying right now, Philip Reeker, the career foreign service officer in current U.S. policy in Europe and Eurasia, official is speaking with lawmakers on Capitol Hill.

And we're now learning that he was issued a subpoena to testify after the State Department asked him not to appear. Today's testimony happening just hours after a federal judge handed Democrats a key legal victory, ruling the Justice Department must release redacted documents from Robert Mueller's Russia investigation. Congressman Jamie Raskin addressing the decision earlier today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. JAMIE RASKIN, (D-MD) HOUSE OVERSIGHT AND REFORM COMMITTEE: What we have for the people is the House of Representatives. And they've tried to make the argument that there is something illegitimate about the impeachment inquiry. And the United States district court emphatically rejected that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: The judge also ruling that the impeachment inquiry is on solid legal footing, undercutting a key Republican talking point that the probe is invalid. CNN's Jeremy Herb is on Capitol Hill. So Jeremy, Philip Reeker has been testifying now for three hours or so. Are we hearing anything about what's being said?

JEREMY HERB, CNN POLITICS REPORTER: We just heard from Eliot Engel, the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. He came out on his out and briefly told us that Mr. Reeker was just starting to scratch the surface. He predicted this actually could go on for a long time today.

The Democrats want to hear from Reeker because he worked with officials they've already heard from and was part of the effort within the State Department to shield the former ambassador Marie Yovanovitch from the smear campaign that was going on against her, orchestrated by the president's personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani.

This testimony, of course, is happening as you said hours after the Democrats were handed a major legal victory when a judge ruled that they could have access to Robert Mueller's grand jury material. This is a court case that had been going on for a while, and perhaps most importantly to the impeachment inquiry, it was validation that what they are doing is within the bounds of the House, and it undercuts arguments from the White House. Listen here to Jamie Raskin talking about why this is significant for the Democratic impeachment inquiry.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. JAMIE RASKIN, (D-MD) HOUSE OVERSIGHT AND REFORM COMMITTEE: Essentially Chief Judge Beryl Howell wiped out all the arguments that the Republicans have been making this week. And we know that all of it has been a distraction from what America is learning. President Donald Trump has conducted an effort to shake down a besieged foreign ally, resisting Russian aggression, in order to get dirt on a political opponent. It is unprecedented in American history. It's an outrage. It's a scandal. And our Republican colleagues want to talk about anything except for that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HERB: Now, this ruling, of course, comes with the Mueller grand jury material, which is a separate issue in a lot of ways from the impeachment inquiry into Ukraine. But at the same time, it's going to be important for Democrats as witnesses debate whether or not they want to come in in face of the White House saying that this impeachment inquiry is not legitimate, Fred.

WHITFIELD: So Jeremy, former deputy national security advisor Charles Kupperman apparently filed a lawsuit yesterday, asking a federal judge to determine whether he should indeed testify. What are you hearing about that?

HERB: Yes, the timing is interesting for this very reason. Mr. Kupperman asked the judge to rule on whether he had to comply with the House subpoena in the face of the White House calling the impeachment inquiry illegitimate. This ruling on the grand jury material could play into that court case, but it's going to take time for Democrats to work through the courts.

And so it's not clear whether Charles Kupperman will be able to testify within weeks or even months, and that's a problem for Democrats when they're trying to expeditiously conduct this impeachment inquiry. So it is obviously something we're going to have to be watching in the days ahead.

WHITFIELD: All right, Jeremy Herb, thank you so much. Meanwhile, President Trump is lashing out at the impeachment inquiry

again, launching a flurry of tweets this morning deriding the impeachment inquiry as a witch hunt, demanding to know the identity of the whistleblower who triggered the process. CNN's Sarah Westwood is at the White House for us. So Sarah, Republicans want the president to follow the format of former President Bill Clinton when he was being impeached. But the president is saying, you know what, I am the team. I don't really need a team.

SARAH WESTWOOD, CNN WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: That's right, Fred. President Trump still defiant about the seriousness of the impeachment inquiry. As you mentioned, saying yesterday that he is his own team when it comes to the impeachment process. And this comes as Republicans and allies of the White House have expressed increasing frustration with the lack of strategy coming out of the White House to deal with the impeachment inquiry, that the White House has only belatedly realized the seriousness of the political peril that President Trump finds himself in.

[14:05:06]

Now Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy has taken a lead role in distributing talking point to Republican members on Capitol Hill, and sources tell CNN that there have been phone calls between Republican members of Congress, allies of the White House, and White House officials to try to coordinate some kind of strategy. But even this has not been enough. Some allies of the White House saying there has just been insufficient coordination, and members, people who want to defend the president, have been left to come up with their own ways of doing that.

Last night into today, President Trump is continuing to defend his now infamous phone call with the Ukrainian president. That was the subject of the whistleblower complaint that touched off this entire inquiry, even though Democrats have uncovered evidence that go far beyond what was said in that phone call and relate to the administration's dealings with the Ukrainian officials in the months before and after that phone call.

But I want to read you just one of the president's many tweets about impeachment over the past couple of days. "The entire impeachment scam was based on my perfect Ukrainian call and the whistleblower's account of that call, which turned out to be false." Then he goes on to say "Once I released the actual call, their entire case fell apart. The Democrats must end this scam now. Witch hunt!"

And we should just note that the underlying transcript actually does support the whistleblower's complaint, that's the transcript that the White House itself released.

Meanwhile the president has been enduring some fallout from the fact that he chose to compare his political situation to a lynching in a tweet earlier this week. Despite that while he was speaking at the Historically Black Benedict College in South Carolina yesterday, he likened his own experience with the impeachment inquiry to the experience of African-Americans at the hands of the criminal justice system. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We'll never let up on our efforts to ensure that our justice system is fair for every single American. And I have my own experience. You know that. You see what's going on with the witch hunt. It's a terrible thing that's going on in our country. No crimes.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WESTWOOD: Sources tell CNN that the White House legal team for President Trump has decided to focus more on due process arguments about the fact, for example, that White House lawyers have not been permitted so far to accompany witnesses to these congressional hearings. But already, Fred, many of the key witnesses at the heart of this inquiry have already testified, so some allies are viewing that shift in strategy as just too little, too late.

WHITFIELD: Sarah Westwood at the White House, thank you so much.

With me now, Julian Zelizer, historian and professor at Princeton University and a CNN political analyst. Also with me is Anita Kumar, a White House correspondent and associate editor at "Politico." Good to see both of you.

JULIAN ZELIZER, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Thanks for having us.

WHITFIELD: So Julian, you first. This federal judge sending a very strong message and decision that this probe is legit. But you've got a president who campaigned on law and order, but then he's sending, is he not, a very different message in the kind of defiant posturing that we see from him?

ZELIZER: Well, that's why that court ruling is important. Not only does it hand over information, but, at least in the public square, this is more legitimizing that this is a legal process, it's a constitutional process, and the president is actually the one who is defying the law and order by raising questions about the legitimacy of what Congress is doing.

WHITFIELD: So Anita, will this judge's decision hurt the president's approach, his strategy that it's a witch hunt, that all of this is a hoax?

ANITA KUMAR, WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT AND ASSOCIATE EDITOR, "POLITICO": It has really undercut his legal argument that he put out in a letter a few weeks ago. So you have a lot of people in the White House and close to the White House in the campaign saying that he does need to switch it up here, get some other people into the White House or in that orbit that can talk about what strategy he should go after.

The strategy they really have pursued is that people should not, these current officials and former officials, should not testify, that that is clearly not working, as we've seen almost 10 people testify and a whole list of other people coming forward. And many of them just saying, OK, well, I've been subpoenaed, so I'm going to testify. So they really need to switch gears here and try to figure out what they can do that's next, because they're not preventing people from testifying.

WHITFIELD: And Julian, there are lots of sentiments in the Republican and particularly, Lindsey Graham among them, who says, president, you need to have a war room. You need to have a team. The president said just yesterday from the lawn that I am the team when it comes to coming up with a strategy. What does this say to you about this president perhaps not trusting the institution, not trusting the support that inherently comes with that office?

[14:00:01]

ZELIZER: It says that this is a president who likes to do everything on his own. This has been his approach. This is some of what gets him in trouble. And so it's logical that he will keep fighting as a one-man team.

But what it also says to me is that Republicans in the House and Senate are unsettled by the drip, drip, drip of facts that keeps coming out, and they are not on secure ground. And Republicans, Democrats, no one likes surprises in Washington, especially with a major scandal. So I think they're sending a signal not just to the president about how to protect himself, but what they need so that they're protected going into the election.

WHITFIELD: And Anita, right now, Ambassador Philip Reeker is on Capitol Hill, a rare deposition being taken on a Saturday. He's the latest to testify from the State Department. So far there have been nine officials related to this administration, or the State Department, to be interviewed by these three committees. What is the expectation from Reeker's testimony, and how does this set up next week's planned roster of testimony?

KUMAR: Yes, I think what we've seen so far is largely everybody, you've mentioned the nine people, have pretty much done exactly what the whistleblower has said, what the president has said when he released that partial transcript. They are creating this storyline that the president did have Rudy Giuliani, his personal attorney, and others take over the Ukraine foreign policy, and these were things that he was looking for. He was looking for them to crackdown on corruption, yes, but to look into the Bidens.

And so every single person that has testified almost so far we've seen building on that same storyline. I thought it was very significant that we saw the whistleblower through his attorneys, his or her attorneys, saying we don't need to testify, the whistleblower doesn't need to testify because we've already learned more from these people testifying than you can ever hear from me. So I think we're going to continue to see that, and I think the House is going to continue this full next week with five or so more people that will continue to build on that.

WHITFIELD: So Julian, whether it's the White House or the State Department which has urged many of these witnesses not to testify in defiance -- they have done it anyway, particularly those diplomats, et cetera, are you surprised or do you believe in the back pocket will be the White House trying to invoke executive privilege, surprising they haven't already?

ZELIZER: I'm not surprised that they're going to do it. It sounds like they're gearing up to do it. They want to stop the testify. The administration is not doing when the facts come out. So then the strategy is either to stop the facts from coming out or attack the process.

But it won't be easy. A lot of this is already out there. It is now part of the record. And this court ruling suggests that the courts are not going to side with the administration. And remember, back in 1974, the courts did not side with Richard Nixon when he tried to withhold the tapes that ultimately brought him down. So I expect that we might see the same if this is challenged in the courts again.

WHITFIELD: All right, Julian Zelizer, Anita Kumar, thanks to both of you. Appreciate it.

ZELIZER: Thank you.

KUMAR: Thanks.

WHITFIELD: Actually, I'm going to have you back. So don't go away.

Still ahead, on the campaign trail in South Carolina new polls this week show Biden and Warren each edging out the other, depending on which poll you read. We'll talk about how they're honing their messages as we're now just 100 days away from the Iowa caucuses.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:17:17]

WHITFIELD: On the road to 2020 to the nomination, a key stop is South Carolina. The pivotal early voting state is getting some love this weekend from 10 Democratic presidential candidates as they canvas across the state, including all of the top tier candidates. This South Carolina blitz comes as new polling shows Former Vice President Joe Biden with a commanding lead in the state with 33 percent support, 17 points ahead of the next highest candidate. But there is also good news in this poll for Senator Elizabeth Warren who gained seven points since July.

The candidates are also hoping to appeal to a key demographic, African-American voters, by speaking at a criminal justice reform forum held at the Historically Black Benedict College. CNN's Arlette Saenz and Leyla Santiago are out on the campaign trail with the Biden and Warren campaigns. Arlette, you first, Biden is speaking at a town hall right now. What's the message?

ARLETTE SAENZ, CNN POLITICAL REPORTER: Yes, Fred, Joe Biden is here in Florence, South Carolina, as you can see behind me, speaking at this town hall where he's really taking on President Trump, accusing his campaign of engaging in dirty politics, and talking about what he describes as President Trump's erratic behavior. Take a listen to what he had to say just a short while ago.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Just three days ago, the president went on Twitter and referred to members of his own party, the Republican Party who didn't blindly support him, he said, quote, and I hate to even use the phrase in front of everyone. This is his quote. They are human scum. When in God's name has a president ever said something like that?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SAENZ: Now, Biden is here in South Carolina which is a critical component of his 2020 strategy. As you mentioned, he is currently leading here in the state, and that is bolstered by his support among black Democratic voters here. Black voters make up a majority of the Democratic primary electorate, and you have seen Biden and other candidates as well coming here time and time again to try to court that key constituency. Fred?

WHITFIELD: All right, Arlette. And Leyla, as I mentioned at the top, Senator Warren saw a surge in her support in South Carolina, but she is still struggling to gain broad support among black voters. So what are her plans in the state of South Carolina, the palmetto state, this weekend?

LEYLA SANTIAGO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Listen, we are in Florence, South Carolina, and there's a reason why Arlette is just down the road from where we are right now and Senator Warren's team is setting up right behind us. And that is because this is right along the I-95 corridor.

[14:20:00]

This is an area that went to President Trump in 2016. Then the midterms came and it was a really tight race for the gubernatorial race. So this is an area that is very much competitive for the Democrats here. We've heard Senator Warren this week really talk about public education, given that she just recently released a plan.

But there was also another moment that I think was significant not just for Biden but also for Warren. Just a month ago in New Hampshire, we heard Biden say, no super PACs. He didn't want to deal with any money that he didn't know where it was coming from. A change in tone there. Now they are a little bit open to that. And as we have reported, there is a super PAC that is currently being organized.

Now, hours after that happened, I want to show you the tweet that Senator Warren actually put up that same night, responding, not directly mentioning Joe Biden but saying, she says "The Democratic primary should belong to grassroots supporters and grassroots donors, not the rich and the powerful. Every Democratic candidate should agree. Super PACs have no place in our country."

So while she didn't mention him by name, she certainly spoke out about the headlines that he had made over the week. Whether she mentions that here today, we'll have to wait and see. But clearly, she is spending some time in this early voting state, and she's not alone. As we saw, Biden is here. Buttigieg will be here this weekend. Senator Sanders has a canvas launch, and many of them also in Columbia talking about criminal justice reform, Fred.

WHITFIELD: All right, Leyla Santiago, Arlette Saenz, thanks to both of you. Appreciate it.

So 2020 Presidential Candidate, Cory Booker is also among the 10 Democrats who are in South Carolina. He'll be joining me live, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:25:42]

WHITFIELD: Right now more than 50,000 people in northern California are being forced to evacuate their homes as wildfires continue to rage statewide. Officials announced the mandatory evacuation earlier this afternoon. So far, the Kincade fire has torched more than 25,000 acres. And the situation could escalate through tomorrow as winds are supposed to pick up. Utility company PG&E says it will cut off power to nearly 1 million customers across northern California to prevent more fires from breaking out.

CNN Correspondent, Lucy Kafanov is live for us in Sonoma County this afternoon. So Lucy, what are you seeing?

LUCY KAFANOV, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey there, Fredricka. This has been a scene of devastation. A lot of destruction here. You can see behind me, this used to be somebody's home that has now been burnt out. We see the husk of a stove, the kitchen used to be there. In the distance, a car completely burned, completely ravaged. This structure is not coming back. Firefighters are working very hard to prevent more of these kinds of scenes from happening.

But as you point out, we are not in the clear. We just got the latest information from Cal Fire. They are saying that at about 8:00 p.m. local time, that is when dangerous conditions will really begin to kick off. We will see sustained winds of about 40 miles per hour, gusts of nearly 80 miles per hour. Those conditions potentially lasting through into Monday, and that means that firefighters have to be ready to go absolutely anywhere and everywhere.

We've seen throughout the day trucks zooming past. They've been trying to dig containment lines, trying to make sure that more structures are going to be affected. But that mandatory evacuation order that you've now mentioned, 50,000 people, the towns of Windsor and Healdsburg. I can tell you our crews were in Healdsburg yesterday. We went to one of the shelters there.

A lot of folks taking shelter in that town. Some of those folks affected by previous fires. They are now going to have to pack up all of their belongings and move again. This is inconvenient, it is terrifying. There are families that are affected here. So far, thankfully, no loss of life, no loss of livelihood. Well, some loss of livelihood, as you can see behind me, but again, officials are trying to prevent that from happening. The state's governor, though, he is not happy with the way the utility

has been acting. Take listen to what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. GAVIN NEWSOM, (D) CALIFORNIA: Years and years of greed, years and years of mismanagement, particularly with the largest investor owned utility in the state of California, PG&E. That greed has precipitated in a lack of intentionality and focus on hardening their grid, undergrounding their transmission lines. They simply did not do their job. It took us decades to get here, but we will get out of this mess.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAFANOV: For context, it was PG&E's responsibility in the deadliest fires in the state's history last November that caused so much destruction and devastation here. The company expected to pay out billions of dollars in damages, and that is why there is so much anger by the governor. You heard him here.

The folks here, though, much more concerned about the immediate next few days, and firefighters are on the scene. They're trying to do what they can to save lives and homes, Fredricka.

WHITFIELD: All right, Lucy Kafanov, thank you so much.

Nearly a dozen 2020 Democratic candidates are spending the weekend in South Carolina. In addition to stumping for votes, they're also pitching their plans for criminal justice reform. Senator Cory Booker is among those in attendance. He joins me live, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:33:25]

WHITFIELD: It's a busy weekend in South Carolina. Ten of the 2020 presidential candidates are there stumping for votes. Among them, 2020 presidential candidate Senator Cory Booker, who joins me live now. Good to see you.

SEN. CORY BOOKER (D-NJ), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: It's great to see you, too. Thanks for having me on.

WHITFIELD: So you spoke at the criminal justice reform forum there in South Carolina this morning. If you become president, senator, what is the first thing you would do to help reform criminal justice in this country?

BOOKER: Well, as you probably know, this has been one of the signature issues for me in the United States Senate. In fact, the only major bipartisan bill to pass underneath this president was the one that I led with Dick Durbin from the Democratic side in the Senate, called the First Step Act, which we were able to get a lot of very big changes and reforms there. But we have a long way to go. And so I'm going to use every lever I

have from challenging the rest the field. There are about 17,000 people we know are unjustly incarcerated in this country that should have pathways to clemency, to driving down mandatory minimums, helping people when they come home from prison to expunge their records to make sure that they, frankly, have access to getting jobs, and to not fall back in the trap of recidivism.

And then bigger issues that we need to talk about, about expunging the records and legalizing marijuana and making sure we are not seeing this drug war continue, which is not a war on drugs but a war on people.

WHITFIELD: And you have power as a senator, but to have the power of the presidency, you have got to get the nomination. A recent Monmouth University poll shows that you're at two percent in South Carolina. What are you doing to boost your support in that key early voting state?

[14:35:10]

BOOKER: Well, gosh, we are feeling really comfortable, because there's never been a president from our party who got to the presidency who was leading in the polls this far out. Most of the people from Jimmy Carter to Bill Clinton were pulling in the single digits around this time. We are a party that usually has elected younger, exciting people who can unify party and energize them.

And where they distinguish themselves, as Clinton was the comeback kid, as even Barack Obama, 15, 20 points behind Hillary Clinton, behind her here in South Carolina, all upset by showing their strength in Iowa. And so right now, me and Elizabeth Warren are leading in Iowa.

Not only the quality of the teams we have on the ground, according to "The Des Moines Register" and others, but actually in endorsements from local leaders. And so we're doing a lot on our ground game, but, God, we are going to need a lot of help in these next few months just to continue to raise the money to build on those early states. And we're hoping more people will go to CoryBooker.com who want to see me not just stay in the race but really thrive so that we can win next year.

WHITFIELD: And speaking of money, I know you're in South Carolina, but "The Philadelphia Inquirer" said you were in danger of dropping out. But then you raised $2.5 million in a 10-day stretch, kind of challenged, perhaps nullifying that headline. So what is it that's driving to you stay in it to win it?

BOOKER: Well, I'm running for president not just because I believe I have great policy ideas, but I believe in America. In order to make those policies possible, we have got to create new American coalitions, which means we can't fall into tribalism. We can't have this country tear itself apart. We can't have a nation where people think the lines that divide us are stronger than the ties that bind us. So I'm running for president because I believe we need a leader that

after this president, who has been a moral vandal, demeaning, degrading, and dividing, the next leader is going to have to be someone who can inspire, unify, heal, and bring this country together to do big things. That's what gets me up every day in this campaign.

And one, we can't divide the Democratic Party. We've got to understand that whether you consider yourself somewhat on the left of the party, a moderate, we all have to come together. And then we have to not just beat Republicans. We actually have to have a bigger aspiration to unite Americans, to fight for justice in this country, because we have a lot of work to do.

WHITFIELD: So Joe Biden is leading, according to certain polls, there in South Carolina. Polls show that he leads the black vote particularly there, which is an important electorate, a powerful electorate in South Carolina. But you even a few days ago that you were the alternative to Joe Biden. In what way? What do you mean by that?

BOOKER: Well, clearly, we need a person that can unify this party, as I said. And we're somebody that has shown time and time again that in election after election, I've been able to bring out big voter turnouts, bit electorates, especially with key constituencies like African-American voters.

If we had the same vote from African-Americans in Pennsylvania, Michigan, as well as Wisconsin that we had in 2012, as we had in 16, we would have president Hillary Clinton right now. And so my ability to bring this party together, to energize, excite, and engage key parts of our coalition, I think my policies, which are policies that are fiercely pragmatic, pragmatic progressive policies, these are the things that are going to help, I think, us not just win the White House, because beating Donald Trump is the floor. It's not the ceiling. We have to have bigger aspirations than that.

I think I'll be the kind of president that not only can beat Donald Trump but can help heal our country so that we can do things from meet the urgencies of climate change to making sure everybody in America is covered with health insurance.

WHITFIELD: You just mentioned the president just a moment, saying he really promotes a division in this country. And just think of this week. On Twitter the president was equating the impeachment inquiry to lynching. I want to play you some sound yesterday from the president where he really is doubling down on that sentiment.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Well, it's a word that many Democrats have used. It's a word that many people have used over the years. But that's a word that has been used many times.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: So that is his position. And then while in South Carolina, he was given a criminal justice reform award. You have been outspoken. Even your colleague, Kamala Harris, has been outspoken about how blasphemous that appears to be in your view. So what is happening here that the president would be at an historically black college yesterday and liken his experience in this impeachment process to the experience of many African-Americans, people of color, disproportionately black men in the criminal justice system?

[14:40:05]

BOOKER: Well, look, it was offensive that the president of the United States didn't go to the black college to be a part of this incredible institution. In fact, young people were not allowed to be a part of it. The community was not allowed to be a part of it. Only a small number of students were even allowed in the room.

He uses that as window dressing -- he uses that as window dressing to insult the community, and to say outright lies. Like he's been the best president of the United States for African-Americans when he's destroying the social safety net, throwing millions of people off food stamps, when he is seeing environmental and justice cases against corporate polluters go down, when he's gutting the Department of Justice's efforts to secure and protect black people voting at the polls. I can go on and on and on with what this president has done factually to hurt the black community.

So I called him out for that on the stage. I think that this is something where we need to state moral clarity, that this is a president that is hurting minorities. And in fact, he's whipping up racism, preaching vile racist things from the highest office in the land. So we know who he is. This election is not going to be a referendum on who he is. It's a referendum on who we are and who we're going to be to each other. And that's why my theme of continually about the healing and the bringing together of this nation is so important.

WHITFIELD: Which then speaks to, voters want to be inspired by a presidential candidate. So how will you stay focused on trying to inspire voters so as to continue to win support in your pursuit for the White House?

BOOKER: Well, I think that most folks know that that's something I've been doing my entire political career is engaging and inspiring. It's one of the reasons why in past elections I am one of the most requested people to come out and talk to voters, to get them inspired to come out and vote in Senate races and House races.

Look, we are in a nation right now where we have that choice, is are we going to choose a president that divides or one that unites? Are we going to choose a candidate that can inspire and engage the highest of our angels or the worst of our angels? And again, this is not about one guy in one office. It is ultimately going to be about the spirit and the character of our country.

I believe if we are going to do the big things we need to do, the big policy agendas that all candidates are outlining right now, we need to put more indivisible back into this one nation under God. We need to stop demonizing each other, ripping each other down, and find ways to invest in each other and build each other up.

We are really at a moral moment in America. It's not right or left. It is right or wrong. And we need to have a revival of civic grace, a more courageous empathy for one another. We need to understand, and I warn people all the time, if I'm your president, I'm warning you that I'm going to ask more from you than any president has asked for you in your lifetime.

I'm not talking about paying more taxes or asking you to be embarrassed more, but we need a level of activism and engagement like when we've mobilized to do big things in the past. When the Russians put up Sputnik, we didn't tear each other down, tear each other apart. We joined together in new American coalitions to bring hidden figures together with white male astronauts to go further, to go farther, to defy gravity and put a human being on the moon.

That's the kind of mobilization and inspiration we need right now, and I think I'm the best candidate to do it. And I hope people will go to CoryBooker.com if they want my voice in this race and help out.

WHITFIELD: Absolutely. Good luck. And of course, that harkens back to just even thinking about President Obama yesterday as he was paying homage to Elijah Cummings and the challenge that Elijah Cummings would have, which is what are you doing? Which also makes people think about President Kennedy, too. Not what your country is doing for you but what you're doing for country as well. All the best. Good luck on the campaign trail to the White House.

BOOKER: Thank you very much. Thank you.

WHITFIELD: Senator Cory Booker, appreciate it. Thank you.

Still ahead, the Trump hotel in Washington has been mired in ethics controversies and lawsuits. But could there be a sale on the horizon? Details on the Trump Organization's possible plans ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:48:18]

WHITFIELD: A Russian woman convicted of conspiring to act as a foreign agent in the U.S. has just returned to her home country. Maria Butina arrived in Moscow this morning to warm greetings and bouquets of flowers. She was released from a federal Florida prison yesterday and immediately deported after serving more than 15 months behind bars. The Russian national tried to infiltrate conservative political groups in the U.S. and promote Russian interests. She said today she was pressured to plead guilty.

The Trump Organization is looking to sell its three-year-old hotel in Washington, D.C., amid a slew of complaints that President Trump is profiting off it. Cristina Alesci reports.

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CRISTINA ALESCI, CNN BUSINESS AND POLITICS CORRESPONDENT: The Trump Organization says it's exploring a sale of the right to lease the hotel because all of the controversy surrounding it. But there's more to the story based on my reporting. Eric Trump, the president's son who runs the company on a day-to-day basis, tells us, quote-unquote, "People are objecting to us making so much money on the hotel, and therefore we may be willing to sell."

Well, first off, ethics officials have a problem with any amount of profit the president makes from this hotel because they believe it's a conduit for corruption. Two, there are open legal questions as to whether the president's company is legally allowed to accept payments from foreign and domestic governments at this property. That issue is the subject of at least three lawsuits.

Now, as for the claim the hotel is making a ton of money, well, it's unclear. I've reported on this property for years, and while it is true the business profited during the inauguration, after that, it appears that the hotel's business did trail off.

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Remember, many companies that host conferences in D.C. or have their executive visit the city may not want to book there to avoid controversy. Also, the Trump Organization may be losing out to competitors on that specific front. And the company has to be more careful about marketing to foreigners.

So the Trump Organization may have decided to explore how much could it make by unloading the property. "The Wall Street Journal" is reporting that the Trump Organization wants $500 million for the lease rights to the building. That's a lot of money. In fact, the paper says a deal of that size would make the transaction one of the biggest hotel deals in the city's history. Back to you.

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WHITFIELD: Cristina Alesci, thank you so much.

It's a rare reprimand for a cabinet secretary. A federal judge held Betsy DeVos, the secretary of education, and her department in contempt of court for violating an order to stop collecting loan payments from students of for-profit colleges that went belly-up. DeVos and her department slapped with a $100,000 fine that will be paid by you, the taxpayer. Last month the department admitted that more than 16,000 borrowers were incorrectly informed that they owed payment on their debt. Some had their wages garnished and their credit reports damaged.

Still ahead, Felicity Huffman is once again a free woman. Why she was able to leave jail a few days shy of her two-week sentence.

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WHITFIELD: Actress Felicity Huffman is out of prison after serving the 11 days of a two-week sentence she received in the college admissions scandal. CNN's Alexandra Field has the latest.

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ALEXANDRA FIELD, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Actress Felicity Huffman is now a free woman, released from federal prison on Friday, no longer and inmate. She was serving time in a northern California prison, sentenced to 14 days behind bars. In the end she served just 11 days. The Bureau of Prisons explains she was given a one-day credit for the day she was processed, and they say it's normal to release inmates on Friday when they are scheduled to be released on a weekend day. Huffman would have otherwise been released on a Sunday.

Huffman is one of the 52 people who have been charged in relation to the nation's largest college admissions scandal, 29 of them, including Huffman have now pleaded guilty. She said she paid some $15,000 to have her child's SATs score inflated. Huffman expressed remorse when she was sentenced in a letter to the judge and also in a statement to the public, saying she apologizes not just to her family, not just to her own children, but all the other hardworking parents and students out there.

In New York, Alexander Field, CNN.

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WHITFIELD: Thank you so much for being with me today. I'm Fredricka Whitfield. The news continues with Ana Cabrera right after this.

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