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FBI Searches Rep. Henry Cuellar's Texas Home & Campaign Office; Biden: Elections May Be "Illegitimate" if Voting Bills Fail; GA GOP Gov Candidate Perdue Calls for Election Police Unit; Restaurant Owners Fear Omicron Will Crush Them. Aired 2:30-3p ET

Aired January 20, 2022 - 14:30   ET

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

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[14:31:59]

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN HOST: So why did the FBI search the building where Congressman Henry Cuellar's campaign office is as well as his home in Laredo, Texas?

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN HOST: CNN's Rosa Flores has the latest for us.

Any clues coming out of this, Rosa?

ROSA FLORES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You know, Victor, the FBI is keeping all these details very close to the vest.

But there are some clues. Let me take you through them.

Let me start with the FBI's statement that was issued.

This says, quote, "The FBI was present in the vicinity conducting court-authorized law enforcement activity. The FBI cannot provide further comment on an ongoing investigation."

We learned that it is a court-authorized search and there's an investigation going on.

Here is the statement that was released by Cuellar's office through a spokesperson saying, quote, "Congressman Cuellar will fully cooperate in any investigation. He's committed to ensuring that justice and the law are upheld."

Now, take a look at the video of the activity going on in his home. If you look closely, you'll see that the agents are wearing marked T- shirts, clearly saying the FBI.

But if you look at the wider shots, you'll see that the vehicles are not marked. You don't see any local police. You don't see any sheriff's deputies.

I called the city of Laredo and they say the local police had, quote, "zero involvement."

I also called the sheriff's office. By the way, Congressman Cuellar and the sheriff, the county sheriff, they're brothers. His office says that they were not requested to assist the FBI. So there was no assistance there.

But of course, in America, law enforcement can't just barge into a property to search. There should be a warrant. I've been looking for this warrant. I have not been able to find it.

I asked the DOJ for this document and they did not provide it.

But in this document, in my experience, we would learn exactly probable cause why the FBI is going into this residence, what they're looking for in this warrant. It would delineate that they were looking for "X" items and why.

There are more clues. A reporter that was on the scene a newspaper reporter, Valerie Gonzalez, from "The Monitor," she tweeted because she observed this.

According to her tweet, she saw that agents grabbed plastic bags with stuff and also bins and a computer, Alisyn and Victor.

Again, those are clues as to what the FBI was searching for, what they were looking for.

But again, keeping the information very close to the vest, still not in public documents that we've been able to find.

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CAMEROTA: Rosa, that's really interesting reporting. Thank you for sharing all of that with us. And come back to us as soon as you have any updates.

BLACKWELL: Thanks, Rosa.

President Biden is getting criticism for raising concerns about the legitimacy of future elections. But some are pushing back on Trump comparisons.

[14:34:52]

And now that the effort to pass voting rights legislation has failed, what's next?

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BLACKWELL: White House is doing damage control today after comments President Biden made during yesterday's news conference suggesting the midterm elections could be illegitimate if no action is taking on voting rights reform.

CAMEROTA: Vice President Harris dismissed the criticism this morning, calling it, quote, "political gamesmanship."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) KAMALA HARRIS, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We, as America, cannot afford to allow this blatant erosion of our democracy, and in particular, the right of all Americans who are eligible to vote to have access to the ballot unfettered.

[14:40:10]

That is the topic of the conversation. Let's not be distracted by the political gamesmanship.

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CAMEROTA: Joining us now is White House correspondent at "Politico," Laura Barron Lopez, and senior editor at "The Atlantic," Ron Brownstein.

Great to have both of you.

Laura, help me understand all the hue and cry about President Biden saying he has concerns about the upcoming midterm elections when we already see evidence of what's happening at the local level that everybody should be concerned about.

Let me just give people some examples if they haven't seen them yet.

Wayne County, Michigan, a GOP supporter of Trump's big election lie was elected to be voting canvassers, which will certify the election results.

Genesee County, Michigan, a 13-year veteran lost her seat because she said correctly there was no evidence of widespread fraud.

Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, handful of candidates who supported Trump's false election claims won elections to serve as local judges and election inspectors.

This is what President Biden was referring to, I think.

LAURA BARRON LOPEZ, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: I agree with you, Alisyn. Look, should the president have been more clear and careful in his statement? Yes.

Should the press seek clarification and the White House has sought to clarify what he meant, which was to talk about election subversion? Yes. They should do that.

But it also shouldn't distract us from the larger point in the press. There's one party that is overwhelmingly perpetuating election lies.

And there are a lot of Republican candidates that are running on the basis of furthering those lies and are running saying that they may not certify future election results or that they wouldn't have certified the 2020 election results.

One example is David Perdue in Georgia, who is running for governor there. He has launched on entire platform on Trump's lies of a stolen

election. And has said he would not have certified the 2020 election results.

So these are legitimate concerns. And to compare Biden's comments yesterday to years of Trump sowing doubt about the election, saying it was rigged and stolen, is a false equivalence.

BLACKWELL: To be clear about what the president said, just so we have the quote as part of the conversation, what the president said was, "The prospect of an illegitimate election is in direct proportion to us being able to get these reforms passed."

Suggesting that if these laws are not passed, the John Lewis Voting Rights Act and others, that that could be related to a legitimate or illegitimate election in 2022.

But, Ron, let me come to you specifically your new piece in "The Atlantic." There have been questions about, why call the vote if you don't have the votes, a question to Leader Schumer.

And you say this shows that there's been a dramatic shift on the filibuster in the party. Explain that.

RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: By the way, first, I second everything Laura said.

What we've seen is about the failure in journalism to recognize the magnitude of the threat to democracy we're facing than it does about Biden who admittedly could have been more clear, not for the first time in his career.

Look, a lot of people are asking, why did Democrats move this all the way to this climatic vote knowing it couldn't pass? I think the evidence is very clear. And by doing so, they accelerated a historic shift in the party.

The evidence strongly suggests after this week that Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema will be the last two Senators ever who oppose exempting voting rights from the filibuster.

Look around the country, both centrist and liberal Democratic Senate candidates, Conor Lamb and Val Demmings, to the people much more to their left, are taking that position.

You had a succession of Democratic groups saying they will not support candidates who refuse to embrace this carveout for voting rights.

The consensus in the party has solidified to a much greater extent on changing the filibuster than seen possible a year ago.

It would be very difficult to find any elected Democrat above the level of mayor anywhere in the country who would not support doing that. Manchin and Sinema truly stand alone at this point.

While that has enormous consequences, I do think this vote established a new norm for Democrats.

CAMEROTA: Laura, a second ago, you brought up David Perdue, who is now running for governor of Georgia.

Much like Ron DeSantis, he has now floated this idea of his plan to create basically an election police force to arrest people that, let's be honest, Republicans feel are committing some sort of election problem.

This is chilling. This is chilling to hear that they want a new police force. And I just don't know what we're supposed to do with the information that this is what's on their minds to do.

[14:45:07]

LOPEZ: What's important for viewers and readers to know about this is that Perdue believes that the past election was illegitimate, wrongfully so.

He has repeated that lie and over again. That's his motive in pushing this type of police force.

It's a motive for a lot of Republicans that are pushing these different police force units and these laws across these different states to try to restrict voting.

It's that they are perpetuating Trump's lie, and they are trying to convince their base and they have been successful in it. Some 60 percent to 70 percent of Republicans think the election was stolen.

And so that's the danger here, is what these Republican candidates are motivated by.

CAMEROTA: All right.

Quickly, Ron?

BROWNSTEIN: They are making the case for why you need federal voting rights protections.

Susan Collins last night took great umbrage at the suggestion she didn't support voting rights.

She voted for it in 2006 but subsequently, the Supreme Court in their decisions have eviscerated what they voted for in 2006.

And now they're filibustering the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act that would restore the law basically where it was when they voted.

So you are seeing this kind of twin movement where on the one hand at the federal level. The Republican filibuster in the Senate and the GOP majority in the Supreme Court are kind of providing air cover.

And then you see this ground offensive in the red states by Republican legislatures and governors who are rolling back voting rights.

And the same dynamic will be coming with abortion rights with protection from their Republican colleagues at the federal level.

CAMEROTA: Ron, Laura, thank you for giving us all that context.

Meanwhile, lawmakers give emergency relief to restaurants that are, of course, once again struggling to keep their doors open.

So we're going to speak to a business owner who says the Omicron surge is costing tens of thousands of dollars.

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[14:51:50]

CAMEROTA: So, 286,000 people filed for unemployment last week. That's a jump from 55,000 from the previous week. Economists chalk most of that up to the Omicron surge.

Many restaurants still experiencing a big slowdown. And now a Democratic Senator says there are bipartisan talks underway for a dining industry bailout in the range of $48 billion.

BLACKWELL: In an op-ed in the "New York Times," Atlanta restaurant owner, Ron Hsu, wrote this:

"The week before Christmas, one member of our 41-person staff tested positive for COVID, forcing us to close for the weekend. Over two days, our restaurant lost over $38,000 in revenue. I felt a sickeningly familiar sense of uncertainty and fear."

Chef Ron Hsu joins us now. He is the co-founder and chef of Lazy Betty and Juniper Cafe in Atlanta.

Chef Hsu, thank you so much for being with us.

First, I wonder, $38,000 in a weekend because one person tested positive. You end your op-ed with the question, how long can you go on? What's the answer to that?

RON HSU, CO-FOUNDER & CHEF, LAZY BETTY & JUNIPER CAFE: I mean, it's kind of up in the air because we don't know how the coronavirus is going to develop and evolve. And we also don't know how much help I'm going to get from outside sources.

CAMEROTA: Ron, the op-ed that you wrote in the "New York Times" a few weeks ago opened my eyes so much to the consequences, the very expensive consequences of when customers call your restaurant and cavalierly cancel.

Cancel a reservation for that night because maybe we're not feeling well or just don't feel like going out.

Of course, we always balk at paying any cancellation fee and try to get out of it.

But will you help everybody understand what that does to your restaurant when you get those calls? HSU: Yes. We're a high-end restaurant, so a lot of our ingredients are

very expensive. Unlike other business models where your inventory is pretty static, restaurants have a very short shelf life on their products.

So when customers make a reservation and then they cancel, we are sitting on product that will probably go bad within a day or two after their cancellation.

So it's not like you're buying a plane ticket and then you have to cancel your plane ticket. The plane will still be there in a year or two years or five years.

Whereas, in restaurants, if you buy food because you're banking on customers to come, and they don't show up, you lose that money.

BLACKWELL: And it's not just the loss of the resources, those ingredients. It's now getting them. The supply chain has compounded the issues you're having at your restaurants. Talk about that.

HSU: Yes. I mean, the new restaurant we opened, which was kind of our answer to a to-go and open-air dining solution to COVID.

At my new restaurant, called Juniper Cafe, we have issues of getting something that used to be plentiful, like chicken. We're dealing with chicken from different farms and different cuts of chicken.

[14:55:01]

And the fallout from that is customers are expecting one type of chicken one day, and we have no recourse but to give them a different type of chicken. So that's just one small example.

We're also delayed in supply chain in terms of building materials. When I opened up Lazy Betty, there was -- the supply chain was fine. We could rely on a schedule of materials to be brought in.

But with Juniper, it was like basically walking through a minefield. You had no idea when the plywood would get here, the kitchen equipment would get here, the product to do our food.

So it's encompassing the restaurant industry 360 degrees.

BLACKWELL: Yes, we know the plight of restaurants across this country certainly over the last two years have gotten to much more difficult to just keep the doors open and keep people on staff.

Again, this $48 billion package under discussion, so we'll see if that moves forward.

Chef Ron Hsu, thank you so much.

HSU: Thank you for having me.

BLACKWELL: Thanks.

HSU: Thank you, Alisyn.

BLACKWELL: A Georgia district attorney has just requested a special grand jury with subpoena power to help investigate former President Trump's efforts to overturn the state's 2020 election results. We've got new details, ahead.

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