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GOP Leaders Speak after Meeting with Biden; GOP Ousts Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) from Leadership for Refusing to Spread Election Lie; Former Trump Officials Testify on Response to January 6 Insurrection. Aired 1-1:30p ET

Aired May 12, 2021 - 13:00   ET

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

REP. KEVIN MCCARTHY (R-CA): The affordability is more difficult.

[13:00:04]

Those are the things I want to discuss and correct and also the border.

All right, last question.

REPORTER: You are not (INAUDIBLE) about your future in leadership given you protected Cheney for so long in these further calls to remove her (ph)?

MCCARTHY: Not at all.

REPORTER: You're not concerned at all?

MCCARTHY: No, I am looking forward to being the speaker in the next Congress. Thank you all very much.

ANA CABRERA, CNN NEWSROOM: Hello and thank you for being with us. I'm Ana Cabrera in New York.

We were just hearing from the House minority leader, Kevin McCarthy, as well as the Senate minority leader, Mitch McConnell, following a big meeting today with the president, as well as the two Democratic leaders in Congress, including Nancy Pelosi as well as, of course, Chuck Schumer.

Let me bring in Phil Mattingly real fast since we are just getting those first words out of this meeting. What is your reaction to what we just heard, Phil?

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: I think there're a couple of takeaways. Obviously, we've just heard from the Republicans, we haven't heard from either the two Democratic leaders in the meeting or the president himself. We expect to get readouts from all of them at some point in the near future.

I think a couple of things. One, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell made very clear the bulk of this meeting, more than 90 minutes long, was about infrastructure. Now, there's some expectation that would be the case. President Biden made it clear his first in- person meeting with the top four leaders in Congress could cover a myriad of issues that he was looking for some type of bipartisan pathway to forward on.

However, this underscores the importance of this moment, of this week, really, Ana, when it comes to the president's infrastructure goals at this point in time. And as it pertains to those goals, obviously, the president has put a $2.3 trillion infrastructure and jobs proposal on the table. Republican senators have countered with a $568 billion proposal, a pretty wide gulf there when you look at things.

But I think the takeaway, particularly from Senator McConnell, is they believed it was a good conversation, they believe it was a conversation focused on at least the elements of infrastructure that they thought might be able to get done, primarily physical infrastructure, something the administration knows is the key to any type of agreement with Republicans, and the red line.

I think we've known the red line for a lot of Republicans has been any type of tax increases on the corporate side, which is what the president has put on the table to pay for his infrastructure proposal. Mitch McConnell and Kevin McCarthy, the House Republican leader, making crystal clear in their minds, that is their red line. There will be no touching their 2017 tax law that dropped the corporate rate down to 21 percent.

That's something President Biden has put on the table. If that's off the table, it's an interesting conundrum in terms of how you actually finance a proposal, which the president has made clear it's something he very much so wants to do.

Republicans have put on the table the possibility of using unused COVID relief funds or COVID relief funds that haven't been tapped yet from past proposals, perhaps using user fees, perhaps increasing the gas tax. The president has rejected those latter two options. So it will be interesting to see how they thread the needle on the pay-for side of things, but I do think this underscores how big of a week this is for that infrastructure proposal.

The White House making clear going into this meeting, President Biden kind of wanted to take the temperature, kind of wanted to see where the leaders stood on the possibility of doing something on a bipartisan basis. And at least, according to the Republican leaders, they believed it was at least a constructive conversation on that front.

CABRERA: Okay, much more to come on this conversation. We know you're going to work your sources to find out what Democrats are saying about this meeting as well as what the readout is from the White House. We'll come back to you in just a bit, Phil Mattingly.

But we have other news today as well. She is out. Congresswoman Liz Cheney has been purged from Republican leadership, not because she did anything wrong but because she did something we teach our kids is right. She refused to spread a lie, or carry water for those who did and still do.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. LIZ CHENEY (R-WY): I will do everything I can to ensure that the former president never again gets anywhere near the Oval Office. We have seen the danger that he continues to provoke with his language. We have seen his lack of commitment and dedication to the Constitution, and I think it's very important that we make sure whomever we elect is somebody who will be faithful to the Constitution.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: Just moments ago, as you saw live on our air, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy rejected the idea that members of his conference were questioning the results of the election. What?

Let's head to Washington, D.C., now. CNN Chief Congressional Correspondent Manu Raju is live on Capitol Hill. Manu, how are Liz Cheney's words being received by Republican lawmakers?

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, most of them are just ready to move on. They don't want to address what she is saying, which is that Republicans need to reject Donald Trump's lie, that the election was stolen, and say that Joe Biden was a legitimate president. And that is not something that most Republicans actually want to say.

Most of them -- a lot of them in the House Republican Conference still raise concerns about so-called irregularities with the election, saying that states did something nefarious and the way they changed their election laws.

[13:05:07]

Of course, we saw court case after court case reject any effort to overturn the elections, and also Donald Trump's own officials have said that there was no widespread fraud. In fact, today, at a House hearing for the acting attorney general, Jeffrey Rosen, said that there was no widespread fraud that would have overturned the election.

But, nevertheless, what McCarthy just said out of the White House is that no one is questioning the legitimacy of the election is not true when you talk to a lot of the members of his own conference. But the reason that they have ousted her in large part was because they don't want to deal with a fight between her and Donald Trump over the legitimacy of the election. In fact, they want to move on from that.

And that is what Kevin McCarthy is signaling here. They want to focus on an economic agenda, fighting back against the Biden administration. They believe that is the road map to winning back the majority. And having Liz Cheney in that position reminds them for the fight that they are having with the president or that many want to ignore about whether or not the election was legitimate or not.

And so McCarthy making his first comments there after Liz Cheney's ouster, which he, himself, Ana, has engineered and supporting her replacement, Elise Stefanik, who is someone who did, in fact, question the legitimacy of the election and signed on to litigation to overturn electorals. That's across a number of battleground states. But she is poised to ascend that number three spot as soon as the end of this week. Ana?

CABRERA: Right. It's so interesting that they want to move forward because it seems like the person they should be talking to then is the former president, who is the one who continues to try to re-litigate the last election and continues to triple down on his big lie. But, Manu Raju, I appreciate that update. We will come back when you have more information too on the next steps with who is going to replace Cheney in that position of power. Thank you.

I'm joined now by two former Republican members of Congress, Charlie Dent of Pennsylvania and Mia Love of Utah, both served alongside three major players in this saga, Cheney, McCarthy and Stefanik.

Congresswoman Love, let me talk to you first, because both you and Congressman Dent stuck to your principles. You were critical of then President Trump, neither of you are in office anymore. Do you see things ending any differently for you Liz Cheney?

MIA LOVE, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, I'm not really sure. She's got a big battle in Wyoming and I don't think that the president is going to layoff of her. I think actually they're going to do everything they can to primary her and make sure that she is no longer there.

However, I think that this has elevated her status. If they believe that Liz Cheney is just going to go away, she has made it very clear that she is going to do everything in her power to make sure that the former president doesn't see the Oval Office again. I don't think she said that lightly.

And, remember, this is a person -- this is a woman who was willing to go in -- she was not backing down, she wasn't saying, I'm going to resign. She was willing to go in, hold her colleagues' feet to the fire and say you are going to have to vote me out. And this is not about me, by the way. This is about choosing between the former president and the Constitution and rule of law. You are going to have to make a choice between the two.

And so she went in there. I think it was very brave of her to go in there and actually allow them to take the voice vote, and she's laid the gauntlet and said, okay, you guys have chosen and I am going to choose to do what I believe is right.

CABRERA: We hear from some Republicans that this really is about the GOP voters, giving them what they want and those voters are still in love with Trump The problem is those voters are sucked into the lie because the people they trust are not telling them the truth. Listen to what Congressman Adam Kinzinger said on CNN this morning. He is referencing Kevin McCarthy here.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) REP. ADAM KINZINGER (R-IL): For him to go on T.V. after the election and say, this election was stolen, I mean, he said that on one news channel, I know for a fact that it wasn't, you know? And I think the thing is we have to recognize the Republicans that believe it was stolen -- we can't be mad at them because all of their leaders are telling them that. So what do you expect if everybody you respect is telling you that?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: Congressman Dent, who is leading whom right now? Is it the chicken or the egg? It's seems like just a never-ending poisonous cycle?

CHARLIE DENT, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, yes, Ana. Adam Kinzinger and Liz Cheney are right. But in order to change the narrative about the election being stolen, which it was not, Republican leaders in Congress need to stand up as Liz and Adam and a few others have and state the truth repeatedly. We need a critical mass. That's how we change the narrative.

I mean, the message that was sent today to cancel Liz Cheney while standing by Matt Gaetz and Marjorie Taylor Greene? I mean, what kind of message is that?

[13:10:00]

They are marginalizing sane and rational voices, while in the end standing by the extreme elements. And that's what many of us are concerned about, that the GOP really does -- if there's going to be a purging that's going to go on, it should not be the principle people like Liz Cheney or Adam Kinzinger, it should be to purge the extremist elements, the QAnon conspiracy theorists, the 9/11 truthers, the birthers and all of these whacky elements. That's where the energy should be directed. So that's why it's just so misguided but Kinzinger is right.

CABRERA: Let's remember what Republicans said in the days and weeks following the insurrection. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R-SC): Trump and I, we have had a hell of a journey. I hate it to end this way. Oh my God, I hate it. From my point of view, he has been a consequential president, but today, first thing you'll see. All I can say, count me out, enough is enough.

MCCARTHY: The president bears responsibility for Wednesday's attack on Congress by mob rioters. He should have immediately denounced the mob when he saw what was unfolding. These facts require immediate action for President Trump.

SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY): There's no question, none, that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day, no question about it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: Congresswoman Love, what happened between then and now? Did Republican leaders just completely squander an opportunity to make a clean break from Trump and the lies that keep him happy?

LOVE: Well, I think that they lost a couple opportunities here, and I think that what they are planning on doing is saying, look, we don't want to lose -- I believe that some do not want to lose the funding from Donald Trump and they do not want to feel the wrath of Donald Trump. He's still incredibly influential when it comes to people.

However, they lost an opportunity to, one, lead out on the issues that Republicans believe in, right? They have an entire list of spending that they could actually go after and start messaging.

The other thing that I think that they lost a major opportunity with is Liz Cheney gave Republicans that are not with the former president permission to be a Republican. She actually gave them an out and they lost that opportunity.

A Republican that is in the middle or a Republican that is -- you name it, anywhere on the spectrum could have looked at Liz Cheney and said, you know what? It's okay to still be a Republican because she's still in leadership and she gives me permission to not like the former president and still be a member of this party.

CABRERA: Very quickly, both of you, are either of you ready to say goodbye to the Republican Party at this point? Charlie?

DENT: No. I'm a Republican, and I want to change the party, I want to reform it, but my patience is not unlimited either. But for the moment and foreseeable future, I'm going to be a Republican.

CABRERA: Mia?

LOVE: Absolutely not. I am a Republican. I have been a Republican longer than the former president, even though I am a lot younger. And I think it's important for us to do everything we possibly can to make sure that we bring back the ideals that we believe in. And so I am going to go stay here. I am not being removed from this position.

CABRERA: And we will check back with you guys in the days and weeks ahead. Thank you both so much for being with us.

LOVE: Thank you.

CABRERA: Former Congress Members Charlie Dent and Mia Love, good to see you.

More on that meeting that just wrapped up at the White House, is there a bipartisan way forward on these major spending proposals?

Plus, gas prices surging to their highest levels in years, pumps across the southeast running dry after hackers hold a key pipeline hostage.

And the pain for the American consumer, unfortunately, doesn't end there. Ahead, what you can expect at the grocery store.

And dozens dead in a major escalation in fighting between Israel and the Palestinians. We'll take you there live.

Stay with us.

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[13:15:00]

CABRERA: Welcome back. Hours after Congresswoman Liz Cheney was voted out of her GOP leadership post for criticizing Trump and calling out the big election lie that has overtaken her party, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy lied about the lie.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MCCARTHY: Well, first of all, the conference will decide but I don't think anybody is questioning the legitimacy of the presidential election. I think that is all over with. We are sitting here with the president today.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: CNN Senior White House Correspondent Phil Mattingly is back with us and CNN Chief Political Analyst Gloria Borger is here as well.

Gloria, what is your reaction to McCarthy's comments there?

GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, my reaction is that's ridiculous. He knows very well that there are many people challenging the legitimacy of the election all over the country, in states like Michigan, in states like Arizona, all over. And so he knows that.

Within his own conference, perhaps he has taken the pulse of every one, but there are people, including himself, who signed on to challenges to the election. And so I think that's ridiculous. I think what he is trying to do is clean up and change the subject. You heard him talking about policy. You heard him talking about inflation. You heard him talking about the tax bill that they're not going to budge on repealing any part of the 2019 tax legislation.

[13:20:01]

And what he's trying to do is turn the page on this Cheney disaster and make sure that they have not given her a megaphone in purging her from the leadership, and that is exactly, I believe, what they have done.

CABRERA: At least he did acknowledge Joe Biden as president. I wonder how that's going to go over with Trump. But, meantime, Phil, hours --

BORGER: He'll be down at Mar-a-Lago in a weekend to apologize.

CABRERA: Get ready for it. You're first, right? BORGER: Yes.

CABRERA: So hours after the Republican vote that we saw, which was basically a declaration of Trump's hold over the party, it is kind of ironic that McCarthy was in the White House in the name of bipartisanship, right? Phil, how serious is the White House taking Republicans when they say they want bipartisanship?

MATTINGLY: The president, at least, is taking it seriously. Look, I think there's no shortage of the president's advisers who are pretty skeptical of the Republican intent here, pretty skeptical after Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said last week that 100 percent of his focus was on blocking the president's agenda.

But I think the president has made very clear to his team, I have been told several times, that he wants to see whether or not a pathway exists. That has been the driving force behind several meetings he has had in the Oval Office, certainly the meeting he had today, a meeting he has tomorrow with six key Republican senators. He's trying to see if there's something there.

I think you need to view this through the prism of how the president approaches this, at least how it has been relayed to me, and that there's no -- at least given the timeline they are working on right now, there's no downside to trying to see if there's something there.

The president believes, from a big picture perspective, it would -- at least as I've been told, it would be better for the country if they could figure out a way to show that there's bipartisanship to reach an agreement that more than just 50 senators vote for, 218 House members vote for. And he's willing to have these meetings to see if there's a possibility there.

I think this meeting today was not about reaching a deal, it was not about reaching an agreement. This is about seeing if there's a pathway. And I think the takeaway from the meeting, based on what we heard from the Republican leaders, based on what I've been hearing at least early stage notes that I am getting from folks who have been briefed on the meeting, is that that was what this meeting was. It was a positive, productive meeting in the sense that they believe there is a potential pathway if they work at it towards a scaled back physical infrastructure proposal.

I would underscore though they're going to have to work at it. It's likely going to take some time and there's nowhere near any agreement on how to pay for it at all. And so there is a lot of roadblocks and hurdles ahead. But I think this is the purpose of these early stage meetings from the White House perspective.

CABRERA: Just the fact that they were meeting together, all four leaders in the White House, the last time we saw that happened was in 2019, as they were discussing Syria, and it resulted in that now infamous picture of Nancy Pelosi standing up at the table and pointing her finger at the then-President Trump. Do you see this as a sign of progress, Gloria, just the fact that all four of them are talking together? BORGER: Well, it is progress because if you believe in democracy, you probably believe that it's a good idea for Republicans and Democrats to sit down with each other and say what they believe, what they will do and what they won't do. Is it progress, meaning that they are going to get to yes?

I'm not so sure. I think the big issue that was raised today, and Phil just mentioned it, is that tax bill. If you are not going to repeal the -- or repeal parts of the 2017 tax legislation, as the Democrats believe you should, the question then is out there, how do you pay for all of this infrastructure.

Now, Jen Psaki said today that, well, that's up to Republicans to decide now. If they don't want us to do that, they need to come up with a better way to pay for this. And so that's going to be really the crux of the matter. If you want to do things, you have got to figure out how to pay for them. That's not how it worked last time around but Biden is committed to figuring out a way to pay for these things. And that's really going to be difficult.

CABRERA: All right. Gloria Borger, Phil Mattingly, to be continued, thank you both.

BORGER: Thanks.

CABRERA: Turning now to another major story playing out in Washington. Former top Trump officials were grilled about the administration's response to the January 6th Capitol riot. And today, we heard from the man who was in charge of the Pentagon that day for the first time under oath.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHRISTOPHER MILLER, FORMER ACTING SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: I want to remind you and the American public that during that time, there was irresponsible commentary by the media about a possible military coup, where that advisers to the president were advocating the declaration of martial law. I was also very cognizant of the fears and concerns about the prior use of the military in June 2020 response for the protests near the White House.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: Now, previously, Miller said Trump's speech that day directly led to the march on the Capitol. Today, he tried to walk it back, leading to this heated exchange.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. STEPHEN LYNCH (D-MA): Per your written testimony for today, for today, this morning, you stated the following about the president's quote, I personally believe his comments encouraged the protesters that day.

[13:25:10]

That was this morning. So this is -- this is -- this is a very recent reversal of your testimony.

MILLER: Absolutely not, that's ridiculous.

LYNCH: You're ridiculous.

MILLER: Thank you for your thoughts.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: CNN Anchor and Chief National Security Correspondent Jim Scuitto is with us now.

Jim, it's not just the big lie about the election, now it looks like a whitewash of January 6th.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Watching that hearing, Ana, really was remarkable. We talk about information bubbles and two separate realities. You had two separate realities now, just about the election, but about events on January 6th that, by the way, threatened every person in the room in that hearing, every member of Congress and their staff.

You listen to Democrats, they talk about the president's words and citing it, they talk about the more than 400 people now charged with crimes. You listen to Republicans and they say, well, there's a lot of violence that's happening in a lot of places, maybe these guys weren't so bad.

I mean, it's remarkable. We have grown used to -- probably too used to an entire party now being required to accept the president's lies about the 2020 election results, now apparently that party has to be comfortable with downplaying what happened on January 6th. Were they really Trump supporters? Were they really violent?

And to believe that second whitewash, you have to ignore everything your eyes tell you. They played that video, not just in the impeachment hearing but folks watching now saw it on news many times of how that crowd assaulted the Capitol, what they heard from the president before they assaulted the Capitol, and yet you still have sitting lawmakers willing to sort of, well, turn a blind eye to it or contradict the facts on it.

CABRERA: Right, and watching some of that testimony with these former Trump officials was such a strong reminder of who held positions of power in the administration in Trump's final days, and, really, how willing they were to do his bidding.

SCIUTTO: Yes. So here's the former secretary of defense, Miller, who, by the way, was the senior most civilian in the largest most powerful military that the world has ever seen. And the first thing you hear out of his mouth is not accepting one scintilla of responsibility for perhaps responding too slowly or the decision-making process in terms of deploying the National Guard, and instead saying, well, the media is responsible here, right, that there was media hysteria about the military getting involved. It's remarkable. And then, of course, when pressed on what he said in the immediate wake of this, giving the president some responsibility for his words, now, you know, based on listening to his comments, at least not willing to say that with the same clarity.

You know, here was someone who, in the late stages of the Trump administration, was willing to toe the Trump line on many things and now even four months later out of the administration appears willing to toe the Trump lie on the facts of that day.

One thing we did not get a clear answer to, he says that he did not speak to the president on that day. He did speak to the vice president. But he said it was not the vice president who told him to deploy the National Guard. It wasn't his role in the change of command. And he says he did it on his own. What you did not hear from him was any confirmation that the president called him or anybody else to say, I'm worried about this and I want to call these guys off and let's do something about it, right?

CABRERA: That's right.

SCIUTTO: There's still a lot to be investigated there so we know the full truth.

CABRERA: I mean, I think that was one maybe new piece of information or at least information confirmed that the president did not speak directly to his defense secretary or his attorney general at the time. Jim Sciutto, we appreciate it, thank you for being with us.

SCIUTTO: Thank you.

CABRERA: Also today, a critical CDC meeting on vaccines for children as the nation fights this pandemic.

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