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Senate Back after GOP Stall Tactic; GOP Holds up January 6th Commission Vote; Paul Ryan Criticizes Trump's Hold on the Party; Biden Unveils Budget Proposal; Unreviewed Evidence on COVID Origins; China Pushes COVID Origin Conspiracy Theory; San Jose Shooter Used Legally Obtained Guns. Aired 9-9:30a ET

Aired May 28, 2021 - 09:00   ET

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

[09:00:00]

RAHUL DUBEY, CNN HERO: They were washing their eyes out with milk, baking soda.

Everyone was tending to each other.

Protesting in an organized way was not my thing. I would hear of these verdicts, and yet I would say to myself, oh, my God, that's terrible. And then I would still go to dinner. But to see the atrocity show up on your front door, if people like me don't open the door, then, really, who will?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: And CNN's coverage continues right now.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: It's Friday morning. Good morning. We're glad you're with us. I'm Poppy Harlow.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Jim Sciutto.

A critical vote at a critical moment.

Overnight, Republican senators pulled out all the stops to further delay a highly anticipated vote on a bipartisan proposal for a bipartisan commission to investigate the attack on the U.S. Capitol. Right now the Senate is reconvening after what turned out to be a marathon night.

The vote is now slated for some time today. But even when the bill does hit the floor, Democrats really face an uphill battle. It looks like Republicans will successfully filibuster this bipartisan plan. You need ten GOP votes for that not to happen. Right now, only those three there say they're willing to move forward with this investigation.

HARLOW: This as sources tell CNN that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is pressuring colleagues to oppose this bill as a, quote, personal favor to him. That's right.

We're live on Capitol Hill in a moment.

As this plays out, though, former House Speaker Paul Ryan is speaking out against former President Trump with a warning for his party. This as embattled Republican Congressman Matt Gaetz insists the GOP is the party of Trump.

Let's begin with our Jessica Dean on Capitol Hill.

Jessica, good morning.

Big delay. So where do things stand on a vote today?

JESSICA DEAN, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, we're going to find out, Poppy. As you and Jim just laid out, they are reconvening as we speak. So we're hoping to get a little more clarity once the Senate gets into session this morning.

It played out throughout the night, overnight, senators taking the floor to speak. This is all centered around a separate bill. This is a bill centered around making America more competitive with China. And there was supposed to be a deal yesterday. That, obviously, fell apart as Senator Ron Johnson kind of led this group of senators who want to hold up this bill.

So here's what we do know. They're reconvening right now. They've got -- they could have more debate on this. They've then got four votes on this China bill. Then they can vote on the bill's passage and only then can they get to this key vote on moving forward with a bill to create that January 6th commission.

So, look, they were supposed to wrap this up yesterday. A lot of senators were ready to be out of town today. So it's up to them how quickly or how slowly this will play out. And it's the Senate. We've seen it go both ways before. So we should get a little better feel for this in the next hour or so seeing how things play out this morning.

We are expecting them to vote on whether or not to move forward with this January 6th bill, this key procedural vote with which they could move forward. But as you laid out, we are not expecting that to pass. That it will be filibustered by the Republicans. The question, Jim and Poppy, when does that vote happen? We just don't know yet.

SCIUTTO: And what happens in the vote?

Officer Sicknick's mother, along with Officers Dunn and Fanone, they met with a number of senators yesterday, including Senator Ron Johnson, to urge them to vote for this bipartisan commission. That meeting with Johnson seemed to have a particular fireworks aspect to it. I mean Fanone, our understanding is, let him have it because, of course, Johnson has, well, he's questioned the facts of January 6th.

What more have you learned?

DEAN: Well, right. And, remember, Senator Johnson is the one that said that January 6th was a peaceful protest, which we all know is just simply not true. And we're told by sources that that's when Officer Fanone just let him have it in those quotes about those comments.

That was, obviously, quite upsetting to Officer Fanone. He was brutally attacked on that day. He has been on our air talking about his experience that day. And he and Officer Sicknick's mother and girlfriend, Officer Dunn, all here trying to persuade Republicans to take their side on this and to move forward with the commission.

That simply does not seem to be how this is going to play out. Again, at this point, we only know that Senator Romney, Senator Collins and Senator Murkowski are on board with that.

I will say this, Senator Lindsey Graham does not support the commission. He did say quickly, he said, I would suggest that the testimony of the two officers and others be captured to dispel any notion that what happened on January 6th was anything other than a violent, vicious attack on the Capitol.

Jim and Poppy.

SCIUTTO: Yet he will not vote for the commission, it seems.

DEAN: That's right.

SCIUTTO: Jessica Dean, thanks very much.

Let's discuss now with Jackie Kucinich, Washington bureau chief for "The Daily Beast," and CNN's senior political analyst John Avlon.

[09:05:01]

So, Jackie, what's going to happen today is Republicans almost certainly are going to filibuster this. I mean we should describe it as it is, they're going to filibuster a bipartisan proposal negotiated by a Democrat and a Republican in the House as commissioned by the House Majority -- Minority Leader, rather, Kevin McCarthy. They're going to filibuster it.

Is this good politics for Republicans? I mean Mitt Romney has said, you know, this is not going to make us look good. I mean do they have the politics right here?

JACKIE KUCINICH, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: So, short term, probably, because they are making the calculation that they're not going to be punished for this by their voters, many of whom don't blame the president for -- and don't see that, you know, the insurrection was any more than, you know, either people breaking the law or in some more extreme cases people, you know, just demonstrating against their government.

So they're -- and they don't want to see this commission, which, if it went forward, it would issue a report later in the year. They don't want to see this bleed into the 2022 midterm elections and perhaps keep casting this pall over the party among people who might not side with the Republican Party and might have a tendency to look at this with a more truthful gaze. So that is the calculation.

Now, long term, you know, this will be investigated. This will -- there will be reports issued. And, you know, frankly, it -- we'll have to wait and see, but it doesn't seem like history will cast a kind eye on filibustering a commission to investigate the biggest -- the, you know, a riot on the Capitol in (ph) 200 years.

HARLOW: John, Jackie's, obviously, precisely right, this will get investigated, but it looks like this is going to be a House select committee. So it looks like it's going to be a partisan effort. And the most recent one, I think, or I can think of, or most of us can think of is Benghazi. And I'm not equating the two, apples to apples, but what I am asking you is, then where do we land in terms of something that all Americans can really see as fully fact-based?

JOHN AVLON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: That's the fundamental problem. And you can't equate the two at least in terms of Republicans' determination to investigate.

HARLOW: Right.

AVLON: Ten Benghazi committees.

HARLOW: Right.

AVLON: And they can't muster support for a single bipartisan report?

You know, look, if they want to filibuster this, frankly, they should be made to filibuster it out loud. They want to turn the page and stop talking about it, they should be forced to talk about it. They should be forced to defend the indefensible on the record.

But that House select committee, by the way, which would have Republicans on it, here's another idea, ask John Katko, the Republican who negotiated this bill to co-chair it --

SCIUTTO: Yes.

AVLON: Because the -- you know, the reason a bipartisan committee -- commission on this, along the lines of 9/11 is so important, which is nonpoliticians, civic leaders, is that you need an authoritative report that transcends partisan politics, because we all know the game that's going to get played. The House select committee will move forward with this and the Republicans will say it's a partisan report and use that as an excuse to ignore its findings.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

AVLON: If we can't unite after an attack on our Capitol, that's just confirming the conditions that created this attack and showing that Republicans are still afraid of those forces.

SCIUTTO: Yes, this is a domestic terror attack.

AVLON: Yes. SCIUTTO: I mean that's what it was. And it's remarkable to imagine, under any other circumstance, any other terror attack, Republicans or any party refusing to look at it in a bipartisan fashion.

So, Jackie Kucinich, Paul Ryan added his name to the list of former Republican lawmakers willing to call out where the party is going right now, although he didn't mention Trump by name. I don't know why. I mean it was what he was talking about.

Does he have a voice in the party that moves people today, Paul Ryan?

KUCINICH: So Paul Ryan has tried to occupy this mythic gray space between being all in with Trump and being, you know, a principled conservative. And that space doesn't really exist anymore. There is -- I mean there -- sure, there are people who are listening to Paul Ryan and agree with him, but they are the minority in the Republican Party now. They are right now the recent past.

The future and a bit more cartoonish future is what you heard from Marjorie Taylor Greene and Matt Gaetz. They're the more extreme examples of the MAGA Republicanism. But that is where the power center is. That is where the grassroots is.

And, you know, for Paul Ryan, he tried, before Trump was elected, he spoke out against Trump, and then got quiet again. And now it's just, he's a guy giving a speech in California who used to be speaker.

HARLOW: I did -- I did think it was interesting, John, that, Jim's right, he like didn't say Trump's name through the whole speech and then there was this one moment where he did use Trump's name to praise him for what he called inclusive economic growth ahead of the pandemic. But then said this. He said it was the populism of Trump in action tethered to conservative principles that worked.

So what he's arguing, or what I took away from that speech is, we can win again, Republicans, and we can be the party we need to be if you combine the populism of Trump with the conservative ideals of Reagan.

My question to you, John, as an expert on all of this and the history of the party is, can you do that anymore?

[09:10:05]

Can you do that today?

AVLON: No.

HARLOW: OK.

AVLON: No, because you can't triangulate between truth and lies. You can come up with all the kind of, you know, political calculations you want and talk about a big tent party, but, you know, if Marjorie Taylor Greene and Matt Gaetz are not getting condemned for anti- Semitic insanity and calling for Second Amendment solutions by Republican leadership, not immediately anyway, while they cast out Liz Cheney for being consistent in her conservative principles because she refuses to endorse the big lie, that says all you need to know.

And Ryan is an example of this. Not only because he's on the board of directors of Fox News and decrying, you know, the decline in civic conversation in our country, but because he, when he was speaker, tried to work with Donald Trump and ended up surrendering all the principles he spent a career confronting in public because the deficits rose. And so now -- good for him for speaking out. I'm not going to say too little, too late. But we need more Republicans to speak out. But you cannot play footsy with fanatics and win.

HARLOW: Thank you both, John Avlon, Jackie Kucinich. Always a pleasure.

AVLON: Take care, guys.

HARLOW: All right, well, in hours, President Biden will officially unveil what is a $6 trillion plan for America's future. The budget. The president is eyeing a budget proposal that will really revamp the economy if he gets what he wants.

And, Jim, Republicans are eyeing that price tag.

SCIUTTO: For sure.

Jeff Zeleny's at the White House.

So, Jeff, you know, already Biden running into issues with some other, you know, multitrillion-dollar or trillion-dollar proposals, COVID relief, of course, that passed, but infrastructure and other plans.

I mean does the White House think they're going to get this passed given opposition, certainly from Republicans, but even skepticism among some Democrats?

JEFF ZELENY, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Well, good morning, Jim and Poppy.

I mean this is a $6 trillion budget proposal and really not a lot of surprises, at least that we're expecting in this bill, largely because, as you said, we do know the outlines of his proposals already. The COVID relief bill, of course, but also the American Jobs Plan, the American Families Plan. And that's, you know, an infrastructure bill in one sense but also reshaping so many parts of the American economy.

So that is what is going to be contained in this budget proposal. And as we all know, this is simply a request to Congress. Congress, of course, appropriates the money and decides where it goes. But this is the Biden administration laying out a blueprint.

And we do know that really the central theme here of the Biden presidency is to lift more people into the middle class. He was in Cleveland yesterday trying to sell this first part of this, the jobs plan, and he said something very simply that crystallized his thinking. He said, this is an opportunity for the wealthy to stay wealthy, the poor to have a shot at the middle class, and the middle class to breathe a little easier. So that is what's contained in this budget.

But it also, of course, comes with rising spending going up to $8 trillion in the next ten years by 2031. Also, of course, deficits, $1.3 trillion at the bottom end over the next decade. It's going to be even a little bit higher than that.

So, of course, there are complaints from Republicans about those deficits. We heard very little, if anything, from them over the last four years when deficits were rising in the Trump administration. So this is an opening gambit, a $6 trillion proposal for fiscal year 2022. But, again, most of this is already contained into what we know he wants to do to shape this economy. So an opening bid here. We'll see the president in the next hour. He'll be traveling to Virginia to talk about COVID.

Jim and Poppy.

SCIUTTO: Yes, I mean, it's gotten to the point where one party's happy with deficits rising for tax cuts, right, another party happy with deficits rising for spending.

ZELENY: Right.

SCIUTTO: Jeff Zeleny, thanks very much.

ZELENY: You bet.

SCIUTTO: Still to come, a new report says that U.S. intelligence has a stockpile of unexamined evidence surrounding the Wuhan lab. The big question, will it lead to any new conclusions about the origins of the virus? Lots of unanswered questions. That's next.

And new overnight, a major Russian cyberattack from the same group behind the massive SolarWinds hack. How this stunning escalation could impact the upcoming summit between Presidents Biden and Putin.

HARLOW: And later, we are live at the scene of an active volcano. Tens of thousands of people evacuated after a warning the volcano may erupt again at any moment.

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:18:46]

SCIUTTO: This morning, we are learning more about why President Biden ordered a 90-day investigation into the origins of COVID-19. According to "The New York Times," U.S. intelligence officials told the White House there is still a trove of unreviewed evidence that could give some insight into the mystery.

HARLOW: And this comes amid public division and controversy within the U.S. intelligence community about whether the virus emerged naturally or leaked from a lab in Wuhan, China.

Our Alex Marquardt has a lot more on this.

I mean that is significant. If there is this intel, whatever it is, that actually wasn't fully assessed.

ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jim and Poppy, this indicates an issue that the intelligence community grapples with across the board, that they have a staggering amount of data to sift through. And in this case, it would look like signals intelligence or Chinese communications, conversations, phone calls, emails, anything that would indicate what the Chinese know about how this virus broke out, who got sick, how it spread.

What we do know, what we have reported, is that a number of the workers at the Wuhan lab were hospitalized in the fall of 2019 with flu-like symptoms.

[09:20:00]

Many people have jumped on that, particularly supporters of President Trump, as evidence that the virus leaked from the lab and that the Chinese covered it up. That is not a smoking gun. The virus could have gotten into the lab with the workers. We don't know exactly what they got sick with.

In fact, what is clear is that the intelligence community is still very much trying to figure this out and that they have made very little progress in doing so. They put out a pretty remarkable statement yesterday that I'm going to read part of.

It says, the U.S. intelligence community does not know exactly where, when or how the COVID-19 virus was transmitted initially but has coalesced around two likely scenarios, either it emerged naturally from human contact with infected animals or it was a laboratory accident. The majority of elements within the intelligence community do not believe there is sufficient information to assess one to be more likely than the other.

Poppy, as you alluded to, there are differences of opinion among various agencies within the intelligence community. So this is why the president has ordered this 90-day review. And at the end of that, for the intelligence community to come back and tell the American public in an unclassified way what it knows.

Jim and Poppy.

HARLOW: Alex Marquardt, in Washington, thank you for that reporting.

Well, in response to President Biden ordering the intelligence community to redouble its efforts to uncover the origins of COVID, China, not a surprise here, is countering with a renewed counter- conspiracy theory that the virus actually started in the United States.

SCIUTTO: Let's be clear, this is not apples to apples. We do know that the virus, or at least the pandemic, began in Wuhan. The question is, you know, how. HARLOW: Right.

SCIUTTO: Let's go to CNN's David Culver, live in Shanghai this morning.

So, David, China will often push out propaganda like this to counter what they see as damaging stories or revelations. What are they claiming today and what's the substance, if any, behind it?

DAVID CULVER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: To counter it, Jim and Poppy, and to recraft their own narrative.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

CULVER: And we know because of where the outbreak started, we were there. We were in Wuhan as that started and the lockdown took place and we saw, of course, the frantic reaction to it. And we saw the cover-up. We saw the silencing of whistleblowers.

And what we're seeing now, and it really dates back to shortly after the outbreak, is this shifting of the narrative, is the suggestion that perhaps it started at Ft. Dietrich in Maryland. This is something that they have been putting out in documentaries on state-run media, they've putting out in western social media, along with Juavo (ph), Chinese social media. So they're pushing out that unfounded with no evidence backing it.

And they're also going forward with perhaps it came in on frozen foods. Perhaps it was imported. You might recall last year one of the foreign ministry spokespersons suggested it was the U.S. Army that brought it in to Wuhan. What they're doing here is they're putting all these potential theories out there and that continues to sow doubt, continues to muddy the water and continues to really bring anything conclusive with regards to how this virus started, Jim and Poppy.

SCIUTTO: And we should be clear, they're not actually theories. These are propaganda stories designed to push back on something that would be very damaging for China, that they were lying about the origin of this from the beginning and lives could have been saved if they were --

CULVER: Yes, without evidence.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

CULVER: Yes.

SCIUTTO: And lives could have been saved if they were -- if they were fulsome and truthful.

CULVER: Yes.

SCIUTTO: David Culver, thanks very much.

We're learning new details about the gunman who killed nine people in San Jose, California. How the FBI says he obtained his weapons, what kinds of threats he made before. That's just ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:28:06]

HARLOW: Really disturbing news to report this morning. CNN has learned that three semiautomatic handguns used by the gunman who killed nine people at the San Jose light railyard were legally obtained and they were registered. They're just getting a grip, Jim, on what weapons were used.

SCIUTTO: Yes and what kind of arsenal he was able to acquire.

HARLOW: That's right.

SCIUTTO: Law enforcement says the gunman, he was armed with 32, that's right, 32 high-capacity magazines. Those magazines are illegal in the state of California.

CNN's Josh Campbell joins us now from San Jose.

And, Josh, I mean this exposes so many consistent threads in this. First of all, I don't know a soldier who has 32 high capacity magazines, right? But it also exposes the issue of, you know, what may be banned in one state if it's legal in another, you just -- heck, you just drive across the border, you order it on the Internet or something. I mean what is the FBI saying about how he's able to amass this arsenal?

JOSH CAMPBELL, CNN SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Yes, that is the question. After these shootings, we want to get to that. You know, how did the shooter obtain the weaponry? Was it lawful? Was it unlawful? We are learning, according to law enforcement officials here, both the sheriff's department and the top FBI agent here in the Bay area, who I spoke with yesterday, that the three handguns believed to be used in this attack were obtained legally.

Now, we're also learning new information about what investigators have found behind the scenes. Of course we recall over at the shooter's residence, around the time of this mass shooting, a fire erupted. I talked to this top FBI agent. He described what was found there.

Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CRAIG FAIR, SPECIAL AGENT IN CHARGE, SAN FRANCISCO FBI FIELD OFFICE: Firefighters would insert into the residence, try to put the fire out. They'd have to retreat for fear that there was potential explosive material in there.

What we did recover, along with our ATF partners, were intact Molotov cocktails that were made with paint thinner and alcohol and multiple weapons.

(END VIDEO CLIP) CAMPBELL: So a small arsenal here. They found multiple weapons there, again, as well as Molotov cocktails and explosives.

[09:30:02]

Of course, that raising the question about whether anyone knew this.