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FBI Had Advance Warning of Capitol Violence; Interview with Rep. Jared Huffman (D-CA); Violent Plots Against Lawmakers Continue. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired January 12, 2021 - 14:00   ET

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

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: You couldn't go anywhere when you were in this room.

Now, three Democrats have tested positive. There's outrage, there's call for penalties. And my guess would be Republicans who don't wear masks probably will continue to not wear masks.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST, NEWSROOM: Yes, off the House floor, as you point out there. Phil, thank you so much for that, Phil Mattingly, live for us from Capitol Hill.

It is the top of the hour, I am Brianna Keilar. And history is unfolding --

-- history is unfolding right now on Capitol Hill. The House is moving ahead today, preparing to vote on a resolution calling for Vice President Mike Pence to invoke the 25th Amendment to remove the president.

And they will also set the rules for impeachment today with a vote on impeachment planned for tomorrow. Democrats say that they expect it to pass. And they also expect several Republicans to join them.

Today, President Trump is escaping the turmoil in Washington and his White House to get a glimpse of the border wall in Texas. And before leaving the White House, the president took aim at Democrats for moving to impeach him a second time, raising the specter that it will cause violence.

We will have more on that in a moment. But first, we do have some breaking news. The "Washington Post" is reporting that the day before the insurrection by pro-Trump zealots, the FBI developed a report that warned of a, quote, "war at the Capitol." Now, this contradicts reports that officials knew of no intelligence indicating that there would be violence.

With me now is CNN senior justice correspondent Evan Perez and we also have CNN senior law enforcement analyst Andrew McCabe, who was deputy director of the FBI, he's also the author of "The Threat: How the FBI Protects America in the Age of Terror and Trump." All right, Evan, let's -- first thing's first here, let's cover what is in this FBI report that came the day before the insurrection. What was in it?

EVAN PEREZ, CNN SENIOR JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, this is a report that came from the field office in Norfolk, Virginia, and it's one of the regional internal intelligence reports that were being shared, which we have previously reported.

There were plenty of internal reports that warned about some of the stuff that the FBI was seeing online that appeared to show that there were some violent people who were planning to be here, people who were capable of violence, and there was a lot of concern about it. The question is, Brianna, why didn't this prompt a harder exterior of protection for the Capitol?

I'll read you just a part of what the report said. It's based on an online internet discussion, it appears. And it says, the "online thread discussed specific calls for violence to include stating, 'Be ready to fight. Congress needs to hear the glass breaking, doors being kicked in, and blood from their BLM and" other soldiers. "Stop calling this a march or a rally, or a protest. Go there ready for war."

TEXT: The Washington Post, FBI report warned of 'war' at Capitol: "An online threat discussed specific calls for violence to include stating 'Be ready to fight. Congress needs to hear glass breaking, doors being kicked in, and blood from their BLM and Pantifa slave soldiers being spilled. Get violent. Stop calling this a march or rally, or a protest. Go there ready for war. We get our President or we die. NOTHING else will achieve this goal." by Devlin Barrett & Matt Zapotosky

PEREZ: And, again, this was a call to arms by people who said that they were going to stage -- there was even sharing of information about tunnels in the Capitol complex, a lot of detailed information.

The question that we have after this is, why did -- you know, how much of this information made it to the leadership at the Capitol Police? Did they know the specifics of these types of threats and why they didn't ask for more help.

They asked for help -- by the time they did ask for help, it was frankly too late, people were inside some of the perimeters, they had broken through some of the barriers, and it was too late and they needed help from the Metropolitan Police to finally hold the crowd.

KEILAR: And, Andrew, this was briefed, we just learned from the reporter on this story from the "Post," this was briefed in the Washington office. Is it your assessment, can you assess at this point if this was a failure that this did not appear to be elevated and taken seriously?

ANDREW MCCABE, CNN SENIOR LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Well, it's probably a little bit early to characterize it as a failure, but I have to tell you, Brianna, there are a number of really concerning, questionable aspects to this reporting. So just to kind of level set for your viewers, you should know that in

the lead-up to any inauguration, the FBI goes on its absolutely highest footing for intelligence collection. So they send requirements out to all the field offices to look for information exactly like this.

And the process is, when that's collected, it's put into one of these internal reports so it's raw intelligence, it's not yet verified or proven true, but yet it's relevant and concerning to the threats we're thinking about for the inauguration. That process sends the intelligence on to the field office that's in charge of the event -- in this case, the Washington field office.

Domestic terrorism is very sensitive to investigate in this country because of our First Amendment protections, so agents are always very careful to determine am I looking at just politically protected -- you know, First Amendment-protected speech here, or is this evidence of criminal activity that I can share with my partners?

[14:05:00]

In just my review of the reporting in the "Washington Post," it's really hard to see this as something you would not share with everyone involved in the preparation for this event.

KEILAR: Because there's operational details that they found --

MCCABE: That's right.

KEILAR: -- which would not be -- that's not First Amendment- protected.

MCCABE: No, it certainly isn't. So First Amendment-protected speech would be, you know, people talking about how much they hope that, you know, Trump would win in his efforts to undermine the election, something like that.

This is actually operational planning. You're talking about kicking doors in, breaking glass, spilling blood, getting violent. You know, they specifically say don't call this a march, a rally or a protest, go there ready for war.

That is operational planning, it is clearly inducing people into violent criminal activity. That is the exact kind of information that you want your colleagues on this event -- the Capitol Police, the Secret Service -- to know about.

KEILAR: And, Evan, real quick to you, there was information about, like, rendez-vous points and tunnels in the Capitol. Anyone who -- I mean, I covered Congress for a while, took me a year to figure out where the heck I was going. I mean, it is a confusing place --

PEREZ: Yes.

KEILAR: -- but there was information about tunnels there. PEREZ: Yes, no. And look, I think that's one of the tremendous

concerns, one of the top priorities for the FBI, the prosecutors who are doing this investigation, Brianna, is to try to figure out, you know, this kind of information is now being looked at to see, does this indicate that there was somebody who was inside and who may have provided some of that information? Was there help from someone in law enforcement?

Again, you saw two Capitol Police officers who were suspended, there are a number of them that are under investigation. There are also a number of officers from around the country who came in and who were part of this invasion of the Capitol. All of that is concerning because if you're dealing with a radicalization that has infected people in positions of trust, it presents an even bigger problem that the FBI's going to struggle to deal with because of the First Amendment reasons that you just talked about.

KEILAR: Yes, I think that's such a good description of what we're talking about, some radicalization here for sure.

Evan, Andrew, thank you so much to both of you.

Democrats are wasting no time trying to hold the president accountable for last week's mob violence at the Capitol, and a vote is expected later today on a resolution that is calling for Vice President Pence to use his powers under the 25th Amendment to remove the president from office.

We have CNN congressional reporter Lauren Fox who is tracking this on the Hill for us.

What's happening with the resolution right now -- Lauren.

LAUREN FOX, CNN CONGRESSIONAL REPORTER: Well, essentially, Brianna, you're seeing a bunch of procedural steps happening up here on Capitol Hill, first over this 25th Amendment resolution, brought forth by Representative Jamie Raskin.

And, you know, why the debate in the Rules Committee was so important this morning, was it was really our first glimpse at exactly which side Republicans and Democrats are falling on in this larger debate about whether or not the president should be held accountable or not for what happened at the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday.

You had Democrats repeatedly pushing their colleague Representative Jim Jordan, a close ally of the president, to basically say, look, we need you to tell the American public that the election was not rigged. And repeatedly, Jim Jordan sort of moved on, tried not to talk about that point. And I think that that was concerning for some Democrats in the room.

Now, look, we don't have a finalized rule yet, but what we expect is that they will come back and vote on that rule. Then we expect that later tonight, they will have a final vote on that 25th Amendment resolution. This afternoon, we expect that there could be a debate in that same

committee over the rules governing the debate on the impeachment resolution. Of course, that is what's going to come up tomorrow in the House of Representatives. That debate is going to begin in the morning, it could go on for several hours.

But of course, this is just moving very quickly, Brianna, because there is so much up here on Capitol Hill, members very concerned about both their security but also holding the president accountable -- Brianna.

KEILAR: Lauren, thank you so much. It will be a busy week or so for you, thank you for being with us.

And right now, the president is on his way to the U.S.-Mexico border. And as he left for this trip, he expressed no regret for his comments before the violent attack on the Capitol.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: If you read my speech -- and many people have done it, and I've seen it both in the papers and in the media, on television -- it's been analyzed, and people thought that what I said was totally appropriate.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Now, it's unclear who analyzed his speech because it was not appropriate. The president's words inspired his followers to terrorize lawmakers to brutally assault -- brutally assault -- law enforcement and vandalize congressional offices. So no, it wasn't appropriate and it is delusional and it is a lie to say otherwise.

Now, House Democrats are moving forward with an impeachment article accusing him of inciting the insurrection at the Capitol. CNN White House correspondent Kaitlan Collins is joining us now.

[14:10:01]

Kaitlan, are advisers worried that the president is just giving Democrats more ammunition? What are they saying to you?

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, I think the concern is also that he's not only giving Democrats ammunition, because Democrats seem pretty clear-set on where they are going. But he is not encouraging any Republicans to back off of, you know, their criticism of the president.

And some of those who have said they are going to vote for impeachment -- and as our Hill (ph) team (ph) was reporting, it could be as high as 10 Republicans who do vote for that -- the president isn't really giving them any leeway here to say, well, at least he expressed regret for what happened or apologized for the role that he played in the violence that ensued on Capitol Hill.

He's not doing any of that, because he is saying that what he said was completely appropriate, he is evading responsibility for any of his words during that speech, causing what happened on Capitol Hill. And he pointed to the end of his speech, Brianna, from The Ellipse last week, last Wednesday of course, before he was telling his supporters to go to Capitol Hill, and saying he was going to join them -- even though he had no intention of doing so.

But when you look back at the end of those remarks, that's when the president is saying we need to go up there and give Republicans courage because otherwise we are not going to get our country back, saying that they need to fight and fight like hell. And so of course, you can (ph) actually compare what happened with what the president is saying now, those two do not match.

But this is a road that we've been down with the president before, and the aftermath of events like "Access Hollywood" or like Charlottesville, where the president often, you now, comes out with his initial reaction, then tries to walk it back with a scripted statement that was written by his staffers. And then of course, it comes full circle when you see something like what the president said today.

So I think it seems inevitable at this point that the president is going to be impeached for a second time, the first president in history to do so. And today, he tried to rely on a tactic that he often used the last time he was being impeached, which was framing it as this witch hunt that the is a victim of, though of course this is a situation where even members of his own party are saying that they shouldn't rule it out.

KEILAR: Kaitlan, thank you so much. Kaitlan Collins, live for us, covering the White House.

Coming up, was the deadly insurrection just the beginning? A series of new threats issued before Inauguration Day, including one to surround the Capitol and kill Democrats.

Plus, a Democrat harassed and heckled at the airport by a group of pro-Trump supporters.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: -- the police let Antifa in, they opened the doors and walked in.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hey, you're lying, hey, your lie has been exposed, your lie has been exposed. Your lie has been exposed. Your lie --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Antifa had (ph) --

(END VDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Then later, the Trump administration changes course and adopts part of the president-elect's vaccine distribution plan.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:17:00]

KEILAR: More than 200 House Democrats have signed on as cosponsors of the article of impeachment against President Trump. And joining me now to discuss is California Democratic Congressman Jared Huffman.

Congressman, thanks for coming on.

REP. JARED HUFFMAN (D-CA): Good to be with you, Brianna.

KEILAR: You are, at this point, more than -- you are one of the more than 200 Democrats who have signed on to this. Congressman David Cicilline, who co-wrote the article, says he expects around a dozen Republicans to vote with you. How many Republicans do you think will join you?

HUFFMAN: Well, a dozen sounds great, and it's good to have a much more bipartisan showing than this last impeachment. This is fundamentally different than the last impeachment. What happened last week crossed lines that we thought were not even imaginable, and I'm grateful that more of my Republican colleagues are willing to acknowledge that.

KEILAR: Your fellow congressman, Conor Lamb, talked earlier today about a briefing where members were told about a plot to target Democrats in Congress. Were you on this call, did you learn anything about these threats?

HUFFMAN: Yes, I was. And we heard about multiple plots, some of which the media has been reporting.

KEILAR: And I'm assuming you would have liked to have heard about some of these things before the Capitol insurrection? We understand, according to an internal FBI report that warned of a war, that there were some details that were on the FBI's radar. The question is why weren't they really passed on?

This was a report that they got a day before the Capitol insurrection, it included some operational details like rendez-vous points as well as, you know, maps of the tunnels in the Capitol, connecting office buildings. What is your reaction to learning of that report?

HUFFMAN: Well, the more we learn, the more it becomes clear just how dangerous this was, just how compromised the Capitol was. We had lost the Capitol, for all intents and purposes, for a couple of hours, and no one was coming to help. So we really have to find out where the failures were, who is responsible, and we've got to make sure there's accountability so that this never happens again.

KEILAR: Impeachment is just one of the ways the Democrats are trying to hold people accountable for the insurrection, specifically the Republican lawmakers backed the president's challenge to the electoral vote count. Is there an effort to hold those lawmakers accountable?

HUFFMAN: Yes, there is. And it will depend on the individual member and, you know, just how far they went down this road of insurrection. But one member that I think everyone feels crossed the line is Mo

Brooks. When you put that much effort -- literally minutes before this crowd started making its way to the Capitol, and going there to incite them, carrying their water ideologically and otherwise, it's very hard to argue that you were not -- you don't bear responsibility for what transpired.

[14:20:02]

KEILAR: But do you have the votes to really do anything about that?

HUFFMAN: I don't know, but I feel like we have the obligation. I mean, the 14th Amendment, Section Three is there for a reason. It wasn't sort of a onetime provision to deal with insurrection in the Civil War, it was etched permanently into the Constitution for future insurrectionists so that they would not serve in the Congress.

So we have to take that seriously, we have to give some meaning to those words when you see an obvious insurrection like what we've had.

KEILAR: We've heard, now, about at least three of your Democratic colleagues who have tested positive for COVID-19 after being stuck in a room with a number of your colleagues, including a number of Republicans who refused to wear masks, for hours and hours while all of this was going down at the Capitol. Were you in that room?

HUFFMAN: I was not in that room, but obviously I've got a lot of friends who were. And I was talking to them in real time about their concerns, of being crowded in with Republicans who were mocking attempts to enforce our House protocol of wearing masks whenever we're together.

KEILAR: And so I wonder, at this point in time -- you were not there, there were a number of Democrats who were. Are there a number of Democrats who are currently quarantining? I mean, what -- you obviously have a lot on the agenda, so how is this being handled?

HUFFMAN: Yes. Well, the Capitol physician put out an immediate alert for members to -- that members may have been exposed, and so that's why you've seen so many tests. You need a couple days, obviously, for -- to find out if you have the virus. And so I think everyone who was exposed to one of those maskless Republicans has been doing the right thing and isolating themselves and getting themselves tested.

Unfortunately, many of them went back to their districts and exposed others on airplanes and their family before they got word about this possible exposure. So I'm sure we're going to see, unfortunately, more positive tests before this is over.

KEILAR: I'm sure we are as well. Congressman Huffman, thank you so much for being with us.

HUFFMAN: Thanks for having me.

KEILAR: In the last hour, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer called on the TSA to put Capitol rioters on the no-fly list. This is coming as we're also seeing more troubling examples of anger and threats directed at lawmakers.

Democratic Congressman Lou Correa of California is the latest lawmaker confronted and harassed at an airport by apparent pro-Trump supporters.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: -- the police let Antifa in, they opened the doors and walked in.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hey, you're lying, hey, your lie has been exposed --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, I'm not. No, I'm not.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: -- your lie has been exposed. Your lie has been exposed. Your lie --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Antifa had (ph) the constitutional (ph) --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: -- has been exposed. Your lie --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The people read the Constitution (ph) --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, it's not a democracy, this is a republic.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's not a democracy (ph).

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is a republic. This is a republic. No, this --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's a constitutional republic.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: -- is a republic. We the people, not you the elitist.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: -- democracy --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: -- you fill your money with pockets -- fill your pockets.

CORREA: I work for my constituents --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You (INAUDIBLE).

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Literally got no (ph) spine (ph).

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Who are you?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Who are you?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Looking at him, he's (INAUDIBLE) bent over.

CORREA: And I'm -- me too. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes?

CORREA: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Guys, let's get home, let's get home. Let's go home.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Nobody here voted for you, we don't want you.

CORREA: That's OK.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We don't want you.

CORREA: That's OK, I don't work for you.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Why are you ashamed (ph) of (ph) -- who (ph) voted for you?

CORREA: A lot of people, 70 percent of the people in my district voted for me.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What city?

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did they use Dominion?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Dominion did it --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What city?

CORREA: The best ones.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did they use Dominion?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You lie, you lie.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What's your name?

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What's your name?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: My children use (INAUDIBLE), my children use your (INAUDIBLE) like you.

CORREA: No, lady, it's because of you.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You steal.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, it's because of you.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You don't care about none of us.

CORREA: Why, because I don't take your lies (ph)?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And you talk (INAUDIBLE) to us.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I live in your district.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Lies, lies.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You're supposed to be taking care of us.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Where do you live, where do you live?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are you a Democrat?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Where do you live?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What county?

CORREA: Yes, I am.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You (INAUDIBLE) Democrat?

(END VDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: A Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority spokesman says at this point there are no arrests or charges related to the incident.

And that confrontation comes as a member of Congress tells CNN that there is a new terror threat to surround the Capitol in the coming days. The lawmaker says thousands of armed pro-Donald Trump extremists are plotting to surround the U.S. Capitol ahead of President-elect Joe Biden's inauguration.

For more on this troubling development, let's bring in Phil Mattingly on Capitol Hill.

Phil, what more do we know about this threat?

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, this is coming from a call that House Democrats had last night with several law enforcement and security officials, kind of walking through what I'm being told, from those on the call, several different scenarios that they're picking up right now intelligence-wise.

It doesn't mean the scenarios are absolutely going to come to fruition, but they are very, very serious and very, very terrifying. Take a listen to what Congressman Conor Lamb said earlier today.

[14:25:09]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. CONOR LAMB (D-PA): They're talking about 4,000 armed patriots to surround the Capitol and prevent any Democrat from going in, and they have published rules of engagement, meaning when you shoot and when you don't. So this is an organized group that has a plan.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTINGLY: And, Brianna, the other issues that were raised is the possibility of a large armed rally of some sort, obviously that's not legal in the city of Washington, D.C.; another rally potentially for the woman who was shot and killed as she was trying to jump onto the House floor as well.

I think the bottom line that members that were on that call took away from is a couple things. One, there are several very serious threats that are still out there. Two, law enforcement is paying very close attention to social media right now and is trying to track where any and all of these threats may be coming from.

And I think something also to underscore here -- I can see it personally, when you're walking into the Capitol, you can too ,when you're around, but also that I'm hearing from lawmakers -- the posture is so much different right now than it was on January 6th, it's night and day. Between the fencing, between the actual manpower that they have here, obviously the National Guard as well.

The expectation, because of the inauguration, that this will soon be named a national security event as well, will bring even more individuals in here, 15, 20,000 National Guard members as well.

Members themselves have been given personal briefings in terms of how to operate. You were just showing Congressman Correa at the airport, when they're traveling back and forth. Look, everybody is extremely rattled, everybody acknowledges that they feel like the posture and the scenarios that are out there right now, protection-wise, are better, getting better.

But nobody -- nobody who's working in this building right now feels comfortable, based not just on what happened on January 6th but also with what they're hearing from law enforcement.

KEILAR: Nobody feels comfortable. Phil Mattingly, thank you so much, live from Capitol Hill.

Up next, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, spreading lies while also trying to appear tough on President Trump. And we will roll the tape.

Plus, President Trump was too busy watching television during the insurrection on Capitol Hill. We'll go inside the White House as lawmakers pleaded for help and it fell on deaf ears.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)