Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

Meadows Email Shows National Guard Ready to Protect Pro-Trump People; CNN Reports, Biden, Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) Spoke Last Week as President Works to Secure Senator's Vote on Social Safety Net Bill; Monster Tornado on Ground for 227 Miles. Aired 10:30-11a ET

Aired December 14, 2021 - 10:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:30:00]

ERICA HILL, CNN NEWSROOM: The January 6th committee is expected to vote later today to recommend that former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows be held in contempt of Congress for refusing to cooperate with its subpoena.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN NEWSROOM: But we're also learning regardless of that refusal about a whole host of new documents and emails that have been shared, including by Meadows himself with the committee.

CNN Law Enforcement Correspondent Whitney Wild joins us now.

Key language in one of them, and I believe this email was sent January 5th, Meadows saying that the National Guard would be present that day but to, quote, protect Trump people.

WHITNEY WILD, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT CORRESPONDENT: Yes, pro-Trump people.

SCIUTTO: Do we know what that means?

WILD: We don't know what the context, but it falls into this greater question about what was going on at the White House and Department of Defense as there were questions about whether or not the National Guard would actually be utilized. And it is especially important because when we look at what actually happened on January 6, when it became clear more forces were necessary, there was a significant time lag between when that initial request went out and when members of the National Guard and when these members of the National Guard were activated and once they finally got to Capitol Hill.

So, when we look at like the totality of the Meadows information, that sticks out because it is one of the main lingering questions and then, ultimately, Jim, it is one of the reasons that people think that the Capitol ended up falling is because there just weren't enough bodies there to try to shore it up after the chief of police had asked for that presence. So, a lot of questions continuing to surround that.

There are a ton of revelations in this 51-page resolution. Additionally, there is information about communications Meadows had with members of Congress about the possibility of appointing an alternate slate of electors, which would overturn the election. And there was one member of Congress who told Meadows in a text message, it is highly controversial. Meadows replied, I love it. So, there's more and more information about the list of avenues that Meadows was trying to go down to try to overturn the election.

Also I thought this was very interesting. We've talked a lot about Jeffrey Clark. He was the top DOJ official now possibly facing a contempt of Congress charge for his role in trying to use the Department of Justice to overturn the election basically at Trump's behest. And that is why the committee is so interested in talking to him. Meadows introduced Jeffrey Clark to Trump. That's in that document.

And also I think, finally, before we wrap, when you look at the footnotes in this resolution, that is also important because a lot of it is documents on filed with the committee, Meadows production, Meadows production, Meadows production. He gave this list of documents to the committee and yet, Jim, won't answer questions about them, which is why we are now at this very possibility --

SCIUTTO: Listen, as I was saying, listen to what they say, right? And he said some things that could have meaning to the investigation. Whitney Wild, thanks very much.

Erica?

HILL: Well, CNN has learned the president spoke with Senator Joe Manchin late last week, perhaps one topic of conversation, the Build Back Better vote. So, this morning, could President Biden put Manchin in the yes column? That is next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:35:00]

SCIUTTO: This morning, CNN has learned about a previously unreported conversation that took place late last week between President Biden and Democratic Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia. According to a source familiar with the conversation, Manchin conveyed that he is not there yet when it comes to supporting Biden's Build Back Better Act, expressing deep concerns about the size and scope of the plan.

The two are expected to speak again soon, possibly as early as today, but Biden needs that vote.

Joining me now to discuss, Democratic Congressman Brendan Boyle of Pennsylvania, he is assistant whip in the House, also a member of the Ways and Means Committee, very much involved in these negotiations. Congressman, thanks for taking the time this morning.

REP. BRENDAN BOYLE (D-PA): All right. Great to be back, thanks.

SCIUTTO: So, you know Manchin's concern here, right. It is about inflation. Inflation is rising. It is hitting people in their pocketbooks very directly. Why does pumping more money into the economy right now not risk worsening inflation?

BOYLE: Yes. Well, first, I would refer got to my own review but a letter from scores of Nobel Prize-winning economists showing their belief that this would actually help long-term on the inflation front, number one. Number two, in the bipartisan infrastructure bill that we just passed and the president just signed into law, there is money there to help with our supply chains and reduce the sort of inflation that we're seeing right now, which most economists agree was brought on by the interruption in supply chains due to COVID. Frankly, the quicker we get the rest of the world vaccinated and we get over COVID, the quicker we will deal with this short-term inflation issue.

[10:40:00]

SCIUTTO: Let's talk about costs here. Because the scoring of the CBO on the plan as it stands puts it at a smaller figure. But if these plans and measures and benefits do not sunset, as called for in this original bill, it puts it the actual cost at $3 trillion over the next nine years.

Now, you and I both know very well that once folks have benefits, Congress does not like to take those again benefits away. In effect, you would have to repeal them in a year or two. Isn't this the more realistic estimate of the bill's actual cost?

BOYLE: No, I don't think so and here is why. Because if that is the case, which, candidly, as someone who supports these, I hope would be the case, then you would have to have the expectation that five, seven, ten years down the line, depending on which provision we're talking about, additional revenue measures would come -- they would come up with at that time.

So, I think that the original CBO figures, which showed that this bill actually reduces the deficit, in other words, we raised a little bit more in revenue than we're spending in this, I think that is the more accurate measure.

I would also just point out that if we don't pass the Build Back Better Act by December 31st, one of those popular measures that we're talking about, the tax cut for families with children, that will expire at midnight on December 31st, which means that so many families in my district will not get the check on the 15th of the month that they have come to expect and count on.

SCIUTTO: Right, that would be the effect.

I do want to talk about the filibuster. Because to raise the debt limit, there was a one-time exception to the filibuster, negotiated, mind you, by Democrats and Republicans, so that only 50 votes were needed, not normal 60. Jim Clyburn, of course, the majority whip who works along with you in the House, at Sunday, he has faith Democrats will find a way to get around the filibuster to pass voting rights. And I wonder, do you see an opportunity there, a carve-out, an exception to the filibuster, to pass voting rights legislation?

BOYLE: I hope so. I would point out that I stand with our founding fathers who opposed the filibuster, i.e., a supermajority vote requirement in the Senate. It didn't come about until the founding fathers generation had long passed. There is no constitutional justification for the filibuster, in my view.

But that said, even if someone wants to keep the filibuster, we have all of these carve-outs or exceptions to it. Reconciliation is probably the most famous of that. Here, we just created another. Why not create then one more carve-out for what is, in my view, the most important fundamental right and that is the right to vote?

SCIUTTO: Yes. Well, you would need like so many things, you'd need Manchin on board for that.

Redistricting we're seeing happen across the country, yes, by many GOP-controlled legislatures, as you're seeing in the state of Pennsylvania, which this newly drawn map, if it comes through, would put you against another incumbent, a Republican, Brian Fitzpatrick, put your seat in danger. We are though seeing similar machinations in a state like New Mexico, a state like Illinois, by Democratic- controlled legislatures. What needs to be done to stop this? Because we've had members of Congress of both parties on the air here saying that only worsens the divisions.

BOYLE: That's correct. I mean, not only does gerrymandering dramatically skew election results, for example, Pennsylvania, for most of the last decade, voted a little bit more Democratic at the congressional level than Republican. And yet for eight years because of gerrymandering, our delegation was 13-5 Republican. That is unfair. But also, if you had more members coming from these either very Democratic or very Republican seats, it takes away any incentive to reach compromise.

Now, in terms of what can be done with this, I've already put my money where my mouth is, I have voted for HR-1, which would eliminate gerrymandering nationwide. That seats in the Senate right now. If the Senate were to take that up and pass it, we could ban gerrymandering once and for all in the United States. I think that is the best thing.

SCIUTTO: Quickly before we go, sources say Speaker Pelosi plans to file, run for re-election, not ruling out the possibility of trying to stay in leadership after 2022. Do you think it is time for a change in the Democratic leadership in the House?

BOYLE: Yes, one election at a time. We still have a year to go that. I've been proud to be a supporter of Speaker Pelosi. I think she is a historic speaker and we wouldn't have gotten a lot of this legislation done this year without her leadership. But let's focus on getting Build Back Better Act passed and then actually holding on to the House in November before we start talking about who our leaders are going to be.

SCIUTTO: All right. I'll bring you back, I'll ask you then.

[10:45:00]

Congressman Brendan Boyle, thanks very much. BOYLE: Thank you.

HILL: It's always worth a shot, Jim. I'm glad you asked.

The head of FEMA calling the effects from climate change the crisis of our generation. So, how much of that is potentially related to these unusual often deadly weather patterns that we're seeing? We'll discuss.

But, first, here are some of the other events to watch for today.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:50:00]

HILL: As the recovery begins across the Central United States, we're learning more about the devastating and, frankly, historic nature of these storms.

SCIUTTO: At least 50 tornadoes were reported across eight states, just one of them was on the ground for 227 miles. It cut a swath of destruction across four states.

CNN Meteorologist Chad Myers joins us now. Chad, you've been covering weather a long time. I mean, have you ever seen something like this in the month of December?

CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Not this far north. Now, tornadoes happen in December. But they are usually down around the Gulf Coast where it is warm. But guess what, the afternoon before the tornadoes began, Memphis, Tennessee got up to 80 degrees.

Now, since the 1870s, when they have been keeping track, there's only been three other years that any date in any December has ever been that warm. So, is it a very odd thing? Yes, absolutely, to get that kind of heat in the wrong places.

It can be warm to the south, but not this far north. Here are the tornadoes. They were on the ground for a long time, as you said. EF-3 is the strongest that they have found so far, but more experts are going out today to do more assessment of the damage. How long they were, how wide they were, how long they were on the ground. They started in Arkansas, moved through Missouri, into Tennessee and into Kentucky. That's why we're talking the quad states, the four states there.

There were more than 100 tornado warnings issued that day. That is the most in any December in history, since we've been issuing warnings.

Now, here is the 23 tornadoes that do occur, but they are down across the Gulf Coast. They are down where it is hot and humid and that's where the moisture is, that's where the muggy weather is.

Part of the problem here, after dark. Look at the areas here, 40 percent around here after dark tornadoes, guys, those are the most dangerous. They are hard to see, they are hard to forecast. Obviously, we have radar now but people are asleep and they don't get that warning. There is the track right there.

HILL: It is massive. Chad, I appreciate it, thank you.

SCIUTTO: Yes, it's not like hurricanes, where you get a warning in advance.

There is growing concern that climate change is contributing to more deadly weather events like we saw last weekend.

Joining us now, Harold Brooks, he is Senior Research Scientist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Severe Storms Laboratory.

Harold, walk us through this, if you can, the science behind it. So, the FEMA administrator, Deanne Criswell, she was on CNN this weekend, and she said that climate change, that the science shows, would cause more deadly storms like what we saw in Kentucky. I want you to listen to what she had to say and get your sense.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DEANNE CRISWELL, FEMA ADMINISTRATOR: I don't think that we have ever seen one this late in the year but it is also historic. Even the severity and the amount of time this tornado or these tornadoes spent on the ground is unprecedented. This is going to be our new normal and the effects that we're seeing from climate change are the crisis of our generation.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: Does the science, in your view, back that up?

HAROLD BROOKS, SENIOR SCIENTIST, NOAA SEVERE STORMS LABORATORY: Well, I don't really think that we can say that about tornadoes. Our expectations about how tornados will change as the planet warms are pretty weak. Some of the ingredients, such as the temperatures, are certainly favorable for more tornadoes. But the big thing that controls the intensity of tornadoes and whether we -- in some sense, whether we actually get a tornado at all out of a thunderstorm, has to do with how the wind profile in the atmosphere changes, so the -- what we call the wind shear, the winds increasing with high (INAUDIBLE) from the ground up. And that may actually decrease in the future.

What we have seen historically over the last 50 or 60 years has been an increase in the very ability of tornadoes occurring. We have fewer days per year now which a tornado occurs, but we have more big days that they occur. And we've also seen evidence of an increase of occurrence, not intensity, but just occurrence of tornadoes in the mid-south region, so in the region where the long-trek tornado began.

HILL: And do we know why that is?

BROOKS: No, we don't. And that is one of the really big questions. While the timing of it is, you know, tempting to say that it is global warming, we really can't make all of the physical linkages along the way. [10:55:00]

Clearly, the patterns in the atmospheric change, but is that because of the global warming? And if the patterns have changed, is that actually -- what does that say actually about tornadoes? That is really a difficult call to make.

Tornadoes are so small scale and the fact that the different ingredients we want to see from them are likely to be made in very different ways makes it not as straight forward to say high temperatures or heavy precipitation.

SCIUTTO: Okay. Because the models talked exactly about that, right, is heavier precipitation in some areas, higher temperatures, longer droughts in others, which some scientists like yourself say, do contribute to other events we've seen, such as greater number of and intensity of and scope of forest fires as well as flooding. Is the connection there a clearer one based on the science?

BROOKS: Absolutely. I mean, temperature is really clear obviously, because as the globe warms up, you would expect individual locations to warm up, in general. And precipitation is a lot more straightforward, that is related to the amount of water vapor that the atmosphere can carry.

But tornadoes is a lot further down the road there because we have to worry about the amount of moisture at the low levels of the atmosphere, we have to worry about the wind profiles. We actually have to worry about the way that the storms initiate because isolated individual storms are much more likely to make a tornado than if you have a long solid line of storms. So, all of those things are just a lot more difficult to speak about.

SCIUTTO: Understood. Harold Brooks, thank you. And I know it is a politically-charged area of science, but it is nice to have you break through the numbers there and show what the science shows. Harold Brooks, thanks very much.

And thanks very much to all of you for joining us today. I'm Jim Sciutto.

HILL: And I'm Erica hill.

Stay tuned. At This Hour with Kate Bolduan is coming your way after a quick break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

JOHN BERMAN, CNN AT THIS HOUR: Good morning, everyone. I'm John Berman live in Mayfield, Kentucky, Kate Bolduan in charge back in New York.

We begin with the catastrophic destruction here after at least 50 tornadoes tore through eight states over the weekend.

[11:00:03]