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Russia Tensions; Texas Man Charged With Threatening to Kill Georgia Election Workers; New Coup Plot Revelations. Aired 1-1:30p ET

Aired January 21, 2022 - 13:00   ET

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

[13:00:00]

JOHN KING, CNN HOST: The White House launching a hot line this morning. That's an expansion of the Web site launched earlier this week. People can request four at-home tests per household. The White House expects those tests to ship to you in about seven to 12 days.

Thanks for joining us INSIDE POLITICS today. Hope you have a fantastic weekend.

Ana Cabrera picks up our coverage right now.

ANA CABRERA, CNN HOST: Hello on this Friday. I'm Ana Cabrera in New York. Thanks for being here.

We began with revelations of secret meetings during former President Donald Trump's final days in office and an administrative coup plot possibly coordinated by his right-hand man, Rudy Giuliani, this filling in more of the picture of what led up to January 6, and capping off a whole week of revelations that could spell legal trouble for Trump and his allies.

We now know Trump campaign officials were directly involved in efforts to install bogus pro-Trump electors in at least seven states Trump lost. And that effort was apparently led by Rudy Giuliani.

Now, this news is on top of all the new developments from New York to Georgia this week. We have learned the New York attorney general's investigation into the Trump Organization turned up several misleading statements and omissions in financial documents. So now she wants to get Donald Trump, Don Jr. and Ivanka under oath.

Meanwhile, the Fulton County district attorney has requested a special grand jury in that probe of Trump's pressure campaign to reverse his election defeat in Georgia.

And just in, as source telling CNN the January 6 Committee has received hundreds of Trump White House documents just two days after the Supreme Court rejected Trump's executive privilege claim to keep these records secret.

Plus, the committee is now setting its sights on the inner circle, seeking phone records from Trump family members and testimony from Ivanka Trump, all of that as Trump's former White House press secretary opens up about what she knows, today telling CNN the White House residence was a covert meeting spot leading up to January 6.

Let's bring in our Sara Murray now.

And, Sara, we know Stephanie Grisham recently met with the January 6 Committee. What have we learned about what she told them?

SARA MURRAY, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, she essentially told them that, in the run-up to January 6, Donald Trump was so paranoid, he was so worried about leaks in the White House that he decided to move his meetings to the residence.

Here's a little bit about what she had to say earlier on our air.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEPHANIE GRISHAM, FORMER WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: The "Guardian" reporting is accurate. There were meetings taking place up there. I don't have visibility into what was discussed and all of the people who were there, but I can say that Mark Meadows would have been there, as well as the legal team that was working on all of the bonkers little plans that you were actually talking about right before this segment.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MURRAY: So she points out, of course, that Meadows might have been privy to this, the legal team might have been privy to this.

But the reason for holding these meetings in the residence was to keep them away from the many prying eyes at the White House.

CABRERA: Sara, stay with us as I bring in our former Deputy Assistant Attorney General, former U.S. attorney Harry Litman, as well as CNN legal analyst and former federal prosecutor Jennifer Rodgers.

Jen, what's your reaction to this? What stands out most?

JENNIFER RODGERS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Well, a number of things, Ana.

I mean, the notion of secret meetings, you don't have secret meetings unless you're trying to hide something. And they now give the committee somewhere else to aim. They already have tried to engage with Mark Meadows. But now, and hopefully through the records they're getting from the National Archives, they can pinpoint who attended these meetings and start talking to some of the people who were there to figure out exactly what was happening inside those walls.

CABRERA: I also want to highlight something else Grisham said today here on CNN. She was asked about whether the Trump White House documents that are now being turned over to the committee, which show these meetings as part of Trump's schedule, or potentially what his plans were on January 6. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GRISHAM: There's something called a line-by-line. And that documents every movement the president is going to make.

So, potentially, it could say the president will conclude his remarks. And then it could say, he may walk down to the Capitol with people. It may say that. It may not. So there's definitely documents that could kind of have all the different options of what he may or may not do.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: And the remarks she was referring to were those that he made prior to the insurrection on January 6 in front of all of his supporters who ultimately stormed the Capitol.

So, Harry, why would it matter if Trump had planned to walk to the Capitol or not?

HARRY LITMAN, FORMER U.S. ATTORNEY: It's huge. He's telling them, I'm going to be at the Capitol with you. That animates them, exhorts them to go and do what they really did.

If he never intended to be there -- and what Grisham is saying is, look at the Secret Service records, because, if he was going to go, the Secret Service would have known it -- then we know it was it was all a ploy to get them to do exactly what they did, while he stayed safely in the White House and kind of rejoiced watching it on cable TV.

[13:05:19]

CABRERA: So, Jen, if the documents speak to his intent, then you actually need the testimony from Trump or others who were with him that day to prove it?

RODGERS: Oh, Ana, they're going to want everything.

I mean, you really want to hear from all of the witnesses, especially if you're talking about meetings that happened contemporaneously with what was going on. Yes, you want to hear from everyone. You want to gather as much information as you can.

If criminal cases are brought here, they're going to be tough cases. And there are going to be a lot of obstacles. So they're definitely going to want to get all the information they can, and each piece that they build helps them kind of get the next piece. So that's what they're working on now.

CABRERA: Sara, I want to ask you about additional reporting, this alleged plot led by Rudy Giuliani to install fake electors in seven states Trump lost.

And now we're learning Trump campaign officials were far more involved in this plot than previously thought. What more do we know?

MURRAY: That's right.

My colleagues talked to a number of sources who uncovered that this effort this push to get these fake electors in a number of states, it was coordinated with Trump campaign officials. Rudy Giuliani was helping to lead this push. There were conference calls between Trump campaign officials and GOP state operatives.

The Trump campaign folks were suggesting people who could fill these roles of fake electors. They even went so far as in some cases to help them secure meeting spaces in the statehouses, so these fake electors could meet and come up with their plans.

CABRERA: And just to add to this, the co-chair of the Michigan Republican Party actually alluded to the Trump campaigns involvement at a public event earlier this month, which was recorded. Listen.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

MESHAWN MADDOCK, CO-CHAIR, MICHIGAN REPUBLICAN PARTY: We fought for investigations into every part of the election we could. We fought for a team of people to come and testify in front of the committee.

We fought to seat the electors. The Trump campaign asked us to do that. Under a lot of scrutiny for that today.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

CABRERA: "The Trump campaign asked us to do that."

Harry, will any of these participants, whether it's in Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and so forth, will any of them face charges?

LITMAN: Oh, very possibly.

I think Jen and I could get together and come up with four or five federal crimes they might have violated in short order. And then there's all the possible state crimes. But look at the centerpiece. They're -- it's a blatant forgery. They are writing on it and sending to the Archives, we are the duly constituted electors. They're 100 percent not that.

And a way you really know it is because two of the states wouldn't play ball. They insisted on putting on, if a court holds it, but the other five went right along. And it's a broad conspiracy that had to be shepherded from Washington and appears to have been done by Giuliani.

It's interesting that it's been hiding in plain sight for this year. But it really could -- really sprawl out of control and be kind of the biggest thing going against team Trump overall in the near future. There's so many different prosecutors who could get involved.

CABRERA: Yes, it was Pennsylvania and I believe New Mexico in which the fake electors had some additional language added into whatever they signed to say that they'd be willing to step forward as the electors in those states and throw out the old ones, only if a court basically cited that the other electors were illegitimate or that the election should be overturned in those states, which obviously did not happen.

(CROSSTALK)

LITMAN: Yes.

CABRERA: But, Jen, bigger picture here, I guess one of the key questions is, who is really directing all of this, if this plot begins and ends with Giuliani or if someone gave him the green light and asked him to lead this effort.

How will the answer to that question change the stakes?

RODGERS: Well, that's a great question, Ana.

I mean, we know that the directives came from Washington. And I think we all know, just as a matter of common sense, that it came from the top, from Donald J. Trump. But the question is, how do you prove that? And the committee is being very forceful. They're pushing to speak to all these people. They're pushing to speak to Rudy Giuliani.

And I think that enough people were involved and heard that they will eventually get there. They will eventually learn the scope of this conspiracy, what happened here, who said what, who directed it at the end.

It'll take a little bit more time, but I'm getting more confident that we're going to get there and learn that, in fact, it was a plot driven from the very top, from Donald J. Trump, the former president, to overturn this election. He's the one that had the most interest in it. He talked about it in roundabout terms in all sorts of ways publicly.

And it seems like he's the one who actually initiated this covert effort that we're just learning about too. We just have to dig out the evidence, or the select committee does.

CABRERA: It'll be interesting to know what's in that treasure trove of National Archives records that the committee is now going through. We have been told hundreds have been turned over at this point.

[13:10:08]

A source also telling CNN that then-Vice President Mike Pence was concerned about the possibility of these alternate electors, so his team carefully worded his remarks for January 6, so that he would only recognize the legitimate electors.

Harry, does that indicate to you that he was aware of Giuliani's actions?

LITMAN: Yes, I mean, it really -- it really does.

And it also, to me, indicates that these electors really have a sense of what's going on and it's a broad scheme. To add to what Jen said, it's connected to the Eastman memo that we have heard about. A lawyer put this together on the 2nd of January, gave it all to Trump. And it was that that laid the groundwork.

Get these alternate electors in place. Make Mike Pence say, oh, it's all confusing. I don't know what to do. That will at least delay things. So it was all part of a scheme generated initially with Trump's knowledge from this Eastman memo.

CABRERA: At the top of the show, we laid out all these different investigations that had developments this week, from New York to Georgia to the January 6 probe.

I want to know for both of you, Harry and Jen, what do you see, of all these different investigations or developments, as the biggest legal threat to Trump?

Jen, you first.

RODGERS: I think that these recent developments with these seven states and the fake electors are the biggest risk, both in terms of state criminal liability in at least five of those seven states and federally, because now there's another avenue towards potentially charging those folks with impeding Congress in their required duties.

First, we had the insurrection, but you have to prove that they knew that there would be force used, violence, like that they would go inside the Capitol. Now you have a whole 'nother avenue, where it seems to me it became much easier to prove that conspiracy.

So I think that this seven state electors news is the biggest news and will lead to the most liability.

CABRERA: Harry, how do you see it?

LITMAN: I agree.

Trump personally, the Fulton County case, which is clean, discrete, and has this great audiotape. But the whole kind of brouhaha, the whole possibility of really bringing down the whole operation of those few weeks, I agree with Jen, it's this emerging forgery story, which is metastasizing more every day.

CABRERA: And so we try to play all of these different developments as we get them. We bring those to our viewers.

As you watch it all play out, though, I think, for a lot of Americans, it feels like these investigations are dragging on and on. And people are wondering, is there an end to this at some point? The New York probe, for example, started years ago.

Any insight, given your expert legal experience, how much longer these investigations could go, when you would anticipate an end to some of these, Harry?

LITMAN: So it's really specific. I'm surprised that the Fulton County case only just convened a grand jury. That would suggest another six months or so. And that's what she said.

New York DA seems to be going through -- to a close. This big thing that Jen just mentioned is in its baby steps, although January 6 Committee is also on it. And the DOJ, I think we now know well, if it does go big and go to the Oval Office, it won't be until after the midterms.

CABRERA: And, Jen, the January 6 Committee isn't actually a committee that would be able to charge anybody anything, right? So would it be on them to refer charges to the DOJ? Or is it a situation in which the DOJ reads the documents, the report that is delivered by this committee, and has to decide whether it wants to pluck something out of there and take action?

RODGERS: DOJ really should be working independently. I mean, it seemed for a while like they were stepping back and kind of waiting for the select committee to take the lead.

But I feel like, with these developments and the ramping up, that they must now be independently looking at this themselves. They won't wait for a referral. They won't really defer to the select committee's work. They will probably move more slowly, though, because they don't have any reason to bring a case before the midterm elections, whereas the select committee is going to want to finish their work before then.

So I expect that they're looking at it. And they won't be waiting. But in the natural course of things, I think it'll take a little longer.

CABRERA: And, Sara, as all this is piling up, I guess what is the thing that you're watching for next?

MURRAY: I mean, I'm looking ahead in Georgia. I know people were a little bit surprised that they have just now convened this special grand jury, but the DA has made pretty clear we are there that she wants to make a decision about whether to bring criminal charges in the first half of this year.

[13:15:05]

She's about to run up against the midterm elections, so she does have kind of a tight timeline to make a decision about whether to bring criminal charges against the former president. And she does have a relatively clean case, depending on how she decides to pursue it. So I think that could be an interesting one.

CABRERA: All right, Sara Murray, Harry Litman, Jen Rogers, thank you all. Happy Friday, friends.

LITMAN: Thank you.

CABRERA: More breaking news right now, this also out of the Justice Department, where officials have now charged a Texas man who allegedly threatened to kill election workers in Georgia.

I want to bring in CNN's senior justice correspondent, Evan Perez.

Evan, who's this man? What are the charges?

EVAN PEREZ, CNN SENIOR JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Ana, his name is Chad Stark. He was arrested today in Texas. And he's facing charges by federal prosecutors in Atlanta. According to prosecutors, he posted on Craigslist essentially offering to pay $10,000 to -- for someone to kill election officials in Georgia, election workers in Georgia.

I will read you just a part of what prosecutors said he posted on Craigslist. He said -- quote -- "Georgia Patriots, it's time for us to take back our state from these lawless, treasonous traitors. It's time to invoke our Second Amendment right. It's time to put a bullet in the treasonous Chinese."

And this is a reference, according to prosecutors, to a specific election official in Georgia. There's two other officials that the posting goes on to threaten, according to the court documents today. He's charged with making an interstate threat. This is the first charge that we're seeing come out of this task force that the Justice Department set up about six months ago to go after -- specifically after these types of threats against election workers.

We know that, Ana, this has been a surge of these types of threats in the past year or so all over the country. And, of course, a lot of this is fed in by exactly the things that you were just talking about with your panel, which is the big lie, the idea that there was fraud in -- enough fraud in the 2020 election to have made a difference.

Of course, we know that that is not true. But it doesn't matter because people are making threats. And now, according to the Justice Department, they're getting arrested for it -- Ana.

CABRERA: Evan Perez, hopefully, that sends the message. Thank you.

PEREZ: Sure.

CABRERA: Just in to CNN, the Pentagon now preparing options to bolster the U.S. military presence in Eastern Europe amid tensions with Russia over Ukraine. Details just ahead.

Plus: Not boosted? That's a problem in the age of Omicron. We will break down the new studies on this.

And how rising mortgage rates are putting homebuyers under enormous pressure to find a home fast.

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[13:22:13]

CABRERA: Just minutes ago, we learned of a new us response to the escalating tension with Russia and what's happening on Russia's border with Ukraine.

Two defense officials now tell CNN the Pentagon is preparing options to bolster the American military presence in Eastern Europe if Russia were to cross that border. And this news coming just hours after a high-stakes meeting with Secretary of State Antony Blinken. And he said this morning's 90-minute meeting with his Russian

counterpart was candid, but not a negotiation. Blinken says he told Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov that the U.S. and its allies will not accept a Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Right now, more than 100,000 Russian troops remain along the border. Blinken says his message amid the escalating tensions was blunt and nonnegotiable.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANTONY BLINKEN, U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE: We have been clear. If any Russian military forces move across Ukraine's border, that's a renewed invasion. It will be met with swift, severe, and a united response from the United States and our partners and allies.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: CNN Frederik Pleitgen is in Geneva, the neutral ground where this meeting was held. And Clarissa Ward is in Ukraine's capital, Kiev.

So, Fred, both the U.S. and Russia say they will continue talking. But is there any sense that the two sides are any closer to a resolution?

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, I would say that's certainly the positive thing out of the negotiations, sort of the talks that happened today, is that at least they said they want to continue to talk and keep all this in the diplomatic realm, rather than having anything escalate in that really dangerous situation that you were just talking about, more than 100,000 Russian troops apparently around the borders of Ukraine and moving into Belarus now as well.

And I think one of the things that we also saw is that the U.S. secretary of state very much remaining steadfast, saying that there would be those severe consequences, but at the same time also saying that the U.S. is willing to talk about some of Russia's security concerns which Russia has been talking about to the United States.

And there's two really major issues that the Russians have had. They said they want some withdrawal of NATO forces and weapons out of Eastern European countries. But the main issue for them is, they say they don't want any more NATO enlargement, and, specifically, they don't want Ukraine to ever become a member of NATO.

Now, Sergey Lavrov, the foreign minister of Russia, I had the chance to ask him how that point was dealt with in this meeting. Here's what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SERGEY LAVROV, RUSSIAN FOREIGN MINISTER (through translator): Antony Blinken repeated his position the right to choose alliances. I asked how America is going to fulfill its obligation, which was approved at the highest level in the framework of the OSCE. Along with the right to choose alliances, the obligation does not strengthen anyone's security at the expense of infringing on the security of others.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[13:25:00]

PLEITGEN: Today, the Russian foreign minister talking there, also saying that this was not the end of dialogue, so, again, both sides saying they are going to continue to talk to one another.

Nevertheless, of course, the situation down there near the border with Ukraine remains extremely dangerous, Ana.

CABRERA: Clarissa, Lavrov says Russia does not plan to invade Ukraine.

Of course, a similar assurance was made in 2014, before Russian troops invaded and annexed Crimea. Is Ukraine now more or less worried about a Russian invasion after the talks this week?

CLARISSA WARD, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I think you -- if you talk to certain quarters of the Ukrainian government, there is indeed maybe not relief, but certainly a sense of optimism, that at least the talks are continuing, because, as long as those talks continue, there is at least a mitigated specter of an imminent invasion, although everybody accepts it is possible that Russia is continuing these diplomatic engagements not in a spirit of good faith, actually, but rather to act as some kind of a deterrent to allow them to continue to get their ducks in a row to go ahead with some sort of military invasion.

But if one is to take the Russians at their word, it certainly would appear for people in Ukraine that, the longer diplomacy is still an option, the more time they have and hopefully the more diminished the risk of war is, because there's a very real understanding here on the ground that, while most Ukrainians are patriots and believe that their army would fight very hard to resist Russian aggression, there is also an understanding that Russia is one of the most sophisticated militaries in the world.

And it would be devastating if there was an invasion.

CABRERA: And we do have reporting that Russia has also been sending military equipment to bolster pro-Moscow separatists inside Ukraine.

So, Clarissa, even while there's dialogue happening, it appears Russia's still making more aggressive moves.

WARD: I think you see this often with diplomacy, and particularly with the Russians in diplomacy.

You will continue to see acts of aggression, probably not raised above a certain threshold. And those are intended to apply maximum pressure. So we see, as you were saying, S-400 anti-aircraft missile systems being deployed down in Belarus near the Ukrainian border, things of this nature that are designed to make it clear that, if there isn't a sincerity with regards to how the Americans enter into this sort of continued diplomatic process, that, very quickly, the Russians can revert.

And I should say that it cuts both ways, by the way. I mean, we have heard in recent days that U.S. weaponry coming from the Baltic states will be arriving here in Ukraine. We saw the British military sending more -- more software here and weaponry here.

So, both sides obviously are keen to impress upon each other the sincerity and strictness of their positions by continuing to also make it clear that there will be absolutely no tolerance from the side of the U.S. and NATO of any kind of invasion.

And we heard Blinken really underscore that point again today. Any tiptoeing across that line, that Ukrainian border line will be seen as a re-invasion. And it will be met with swift, united, strong action. And on the Russian side, we're seeing the same thing, standing by their side.

But, ultimately, the fact that the U.S. is providing written statements as -- a written response next week, as requested by the Russians, I think has to be seen as some cause for optimism that it's at least not a complete dead end to try to pursue a diplomatic option.

CABRERA: Clarissa Ward and Frederik Pleitgen, my thanks to both of you for your reporting, your analysis. You know this better than anyone or as well as anyone.

We were warned our vaccines for COVID would be less effective against Omicron, but now we have the data. And clear as day, it highlights why most everyone should get a booster.

The numbers next.

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