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Biden on His Comment that Putin Can't Stay in Power: I'm Not Walking Anything Back," But Not Articulating a Policy Change; Jared Kushner Expected to Appear before January 6 Committee this Week; January 6 Committee Will Seek Interview with Ginni Thomas; Will Smith Hits Chris Rock on Stage During Academy Awards. Aired 3:30-4p ET

Aired March 28, 2022 - 15:30   ET

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

[15:30:00]

MJ LEE, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: And some scripted remark that was supposed to be an announcement about a policy change, but that he speaking really out of frustration and anger, right. And I think we've actually seen this kind of thing coming from the president before. What I'm thing on the recent moment where there was rope and a reporter asked him, do you Vladimir Putin is a war criminal? And he said, again, in that unscripted moment, yes, I think he is a war criminal.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN HOST: Yes. Colonel, I want to get your take on all of this. And also, the idea that something that's something that President Biden says could escalate Putin. Biden seemed to dismiss out of hand and say, no, President Putin is escalating all on his own.

COL. CEDRIC LEIGHTON (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Yes, exactly Alisyn. Well, I think, you know, one of the things that we have to keep in mind here, Alisyn, is that when you heard the reaction of the Russian spokesman, Dimitry Peskov to the remarks that President Biden made, the reaction wasn't as visceral as we might have expected. It was relatively calm. Just basically saying the Russian people are the ones who decide that. Which is actually exactly what President Biden said when he spoke about this.

So yes, is it a possibility there that it could escalate? Yes. Has it happened yet? No. Because the escalation has happened over here. It happened on this map. It happened in Ukraine and that's I think the real issue here that we have this going on right now, which is a really hot war. And the president is trying hard to keep us out of it and is watching very carefully. But then he also has the emotions that he has to deal with in this case.

CAMEROTA: Yes. Oren, what about from the Pentagon perspective there. You heard one of the reporters ask President Biden -- say that there were a couple of verbal flubs -- basically as the Fox channel reporter characterized them -- that would complicate things for either the military or the State Department. What's the take from there?

OREN LIEBERMANN, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Sure, and there's also been some threats from the Russian military to target what the U.S. is doing now. Which is sending in weaponry to Ukraine along with NATO allies. That continues despite the threats just as the policy of the U.S. will continue even if President Joe Biden's words are interpreted in this way or that.

It is worth pointing out that, that if I remember correctly, it was a year ago this month that Biden interviewed call Putin a killer and said he has no soul. So, it's not like Biden's position on Putin is anything new. He's had years to observe him. He's met him a few times now, as he pointed out. And his position on Putin is absolutely clear even if he had to clarify his remarks and say, look, I wasn't calling for a regime change. I was speaking personally and moral outraged here. So, Biden's position on Putin has been clear and the position of the Pentagon is it will keep doing what it's been doing. Which is sending in weaponry and leasing the White House approve even more hundreds of millions of dollars to go in, and that will continue.

Ed, President Biden had just met with refugees. You were there. You've talked and met with refugees. Give us your take from Lviv.

ED LAVANDERA, CNN SENIOR CORRESPONDENT: I wanted to echo a bit of what Don was saying earlier. And I think we can't understate exactly how much this connects with the countless refugees that I've spoken with over the last couple of weeks. I would probably argue that what the president has said doesn't go as far as what most refugees would say.

I mean, I've had some incredibly chilling conversations. I was just telling Don about a woman that we interviewed, a refugee who had evacuated with her 4-month-old baby and she works as a police officer in Ukraine. I asked her, would you like to be the officer if Vladimir Putin was convicted of war crimes, would you want to be the officer that arrested him? And she just looked at me straight in my eyes, didn't even flinch and said, I don't want to arrest him. I want to be the one that kills him. So, there is an intensity that goes far beyond anything that the president has said. And I don't think you can understate the intensity of the feelings of all of the refugees that I've spent the last few weeks speaking with.

And we have to remember too, that we are sitting here reporting this and kind of removed from it in a way because we have to be buttoned up on television. And we read, you know, the press release and we do these think pieces.

[15:35:00]

But the average person sitting at home watching all of this footage and seeing all of these interviews day in and day out on CNN and other networks, they are feeling for the people here. And they hate what Vladimir Putin is doing. No one hates what Vladimir Putin is doing more than the people of Ukraine. For the people in America and around the world who are watching CNN in more than 200 countries around the world, they are feeling the outrage and the anger and the sorrow that these people are dealing with. And I quite frankly, I know that they do not believe that Vladimir Putin should be in power.

Does that mean that someone should remove him from power? It doesn't mean the same thing. There can be nuance. You can see Vladimir Putin shouldn't be in power. But it is not our job to remove him. That is up to the Russian people.

So, I think that, you know, we should take a step back and think about, you know, what folks are saying, what they are dealing with and what the president's actual words were. If the president had said it's time for a regime change in Russia, then I think we should go off on this tangent about, you know, why he is saying that and what it means diplomatically. So, there you go.

GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: I would say to Don --

CAMEROTA: Yes, quickly, go ahead.

BORGER: I agree with Don. I think candor is unappreciated in diplomacy. This is a president who can very often be candid and tell you what he's thinking. And he's hugging children who have lost their parents and have seen death as our colleagues are talking about. And so, that's what he was reflecting. It wasn't a policy change. And we're not used to presidents who do that. And so, his staff could be saying, you know what, that wasn't politic because we really didn't need you to say that because people will misinterpret it. But Biden said, look, I'm sorry. But that's what I felt and it's not going to change a thing.

CAMEROTA: Yes, I hear what all of you are saying. It's hard to be diplomatically dispassionate about something like this where children are dying every day. Don, Ed, Gloria, MJ, Oren, Colonel, thank you for all very much for all the context. Great to have you here.

OK, meanwhile, Jared Kushner is expected to appear before the January 6th committee sometime this week. And now the panel says it also wants to interview the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CAMEROTA: Two big names may soon appear before the House Select Committee investigating January 6 insurrection. We're learning that Donald Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner is expected to appear before the committee this week. And the panel is meeting tonight behind closed doors to talk about Ginni Thomas. That's the wife of the Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. Her text with then President Trump's f White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows show her urging Meadows to push the big lie that Trump, not Biden won the election.

Let's bring in our senior legal affairs correspondent Paula Reid. So, Paula, tell us more about what you're learning about Jared Kushner and Ginni Thomas.

PAULA REID, CNN SENIOR LEGAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: All right, Alisyn, let's start with Ginni Thomas. It all comes around and connects but we have learned that the committee is going to seek an interview with Thomas. And that is a shift from last week when there were some members of the committee were willing to go ahead and try to pursue her as a potential witness in their ongoing investigation.

Sources tell CNN that she has been an ongoing topic of discussion among committee members. Because they have these 29 texts between her and former Trump White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows.

[15:40:03]

Now Thomas is a long-time conservative activist but the fact she was using her direct line to one of the most powerful people in the Trump White House to encourage him to overturn the election while married to a Supreme Court Justice has raised some serious questions. Now Mrs. Thomas has long tried to distance her work from that of her husband. But in the text messages, Alisyn, of course, we've see that she refers to, quote, talking about this with her, quote, best friend. She and her husband, Justice Thomas, have referred to one another as such in public. But at this point, it's not clear if her husband was aware of her advocacy on this matter.

Now interestingly, Meadows may not have been the only person she was talking to inside the Trump White House. She also texted Meadows in November referencing a message that she sent to Jared which could be a reference to the president's son-in-law and senior advisor Jared Kushner. It appears now the committee will have an opportunity to clarify whether she was messaging Kushner when he testifies voluntarily and remotely before the committee later this week.

CAMEROTA: Yes, I mean, there are laws pertaining to Supreme Court justices' spouses that you would think would cover this. But we'll get into that as we learn more.

Meanwhile, a federal judge is saying now that, quote, it's more likely than not the former President Trump and right-wing attorney, John Eastman, may have been planning a crime. What does that mean?

REID: This is a big win for the House Select Committee, Alisyn. Because they have used this ongoing litigation over e-mails that were sent by conservative attorney John Eastman. They've used this litigation to really publicly layout their theory of potential criminal conduct by former President Trump.

In a filing earlier this month in this case, they laid out exactly why they believe that Eastman and former President Trump had engaged in a conspiracy to defraud the American people by trying to undermine the outcome of the election. And here, you have a federal judge effectively saying, yes, I agree. It's more likely than not that they were planning a crime. So, to have a Federal Court weigh in like this and endorse the idea the former president may have engaged in criminal conduct, that's a significant win for the House Select Committee. We expect, Alisyn, it this may embolden the committee to eventually to eventually make a criminal referral to the Justice Department.

CAMEROTA: That's an interesting development. Paula Reid thank you for all that reporting.

Joining us now is former U.S. attorney Harry Litman. Harry, what is your reaction, OK, to the news that Ginni Thomas and Jared Kushner could appear before the January 6 committee?

HARRY LITMAN, FORMER U.S. ATTORNEY: Well, Jared Kushner looks pretty likely and he figures in a lot, not just personally, but as a witness to other activity. We know that Ginni Thomas said that she reached out to him. Ginni Thomas, wow. There are these issues about recusal but I think that is secondary here.

She is coming off in just these 29 e-mails which are the only reproduced by happenstance by Meadows before he stopped. There's a wealth of other material very likely and she is the sort of one of the most buzzing in the beehive people who are not simply trying to change the results but are completely endorsing the big lie. And she is in the center of a sort of power elite of conservative politics in D.C.

So, that makes it all really unsettling and something that the committee obviously wants to get to the bottom of. It's not simply that she wants Trump to stay but the endorsement of the whole crazy big lie.

CAMEROTA: But, Harry, as an aside, let's not dispense too quickly with the recusal of Justice Thomas. Because there's a law. I mean, let me just read to everyone the law. It says here this is U.S. Code 455.

LITMAN: 28 U.S. Code 455.

CAMEROTA: God you're good.

Any justice, judge or magistrate judge of the United States shall disqualify himself in any proceeding in which his impartially might reasonably be questioned. He shall also disqualify himself in the following circumstances. He or his spouse is known by the judge to have an interest that could be substantially affected by the outcome of the proceeding.

I mean, it spells it out. Why are we still debating this?

LITMAN: It sounds pretty good, doesn't it? The reason we're still debating it is because with Supreme Court justices, bizarrely, unjustly in way that needs to be changed, it's up to them to decide whether it applies to them. In a law that you can be the judge of is really no law.

Remember duck hunting and Justice Scalia? The very party raised a motion under this very provision. Scalia was the one who decided and said uh-uh.

[15:45:00]

So, yes, that's out there. He's duty bound in a sense to apply it but he decides for himself. Unlike other levels of the federal judiciary. So, it's tenuous to call it a law. The Supreme Court is looking at trying to bolt things up. It's one of the reasons why people need more confidence in the court because it will be up to Thomas and he's already rebuffed these motions in the past.

CAMEROTA: Well, just so everybody knows what we're talking about. Let me just read one of Ginni Thomas' texts that have been -- this is to Mark Meadows at the time, Chief of Staff.

Quote, help this great president stand firm, Mark -- this is November 10th. OK, so after the election. You are the leader with him who is standing for America's constitutional governance at the precipice. The majority knows Biden and the left is attempting to greatest heist in our history.

So, she's, you know, falling for the big lie. Won't his -- won't Justice Thomas' fellow justices pressure him to recuse himself?

LITMAN: No, is the short answer. It's so well established. Same with Justice Scalia. It's possible the Chief Justice Roberts has a word with Thomas. Who is after all the most senior member of the committee. But the general idea that it's up to each justice to decide is really well established up there. But as you say, it's crazy. In theory, Thomas will look at that law and say hmm. And it's not simply her possible liability. Any motion for any documents could well ask for stuff that concerns her and puts a bad light on her. It really ought to be close to a no brainer. But it will be up to Clarence Thomas and only Clarence Thomas for now. So, you know, you just have to cross your fingers. That's not normally what law means.

CAMEROTA: Yes. Harry Litman think you for explaining all of that. Really helpful.

Here's some breaking news. The motion picture academy is condemning Will Smith for slapping Chris Rock at last night's Oscars. So, they are now launching a former review of the incident and will, quote, explore further actions and consequences. This is a changing, fast- moving story. We have all the latest next.

[15:50:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

We have breaking news on the slap heard around the world. The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences is now condemning Will Smith for slapping Chris Rock during last night's Oscar ceremonies and a formal review is under way. In case you missed it, here is the jaw dropping moment.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHRIS ROCK, OSCARS HOST: Wow. Wow. Will Smith just smacked the [bleep] out of me.

WILL SMITH, ACTOR: Keep my wife's name out of your [bleep] mouth.

ROCK: Wow, dude.

SMITH: Yes.

ROCK: It was a G.I. Jane joke.

SMITH: Keep my wife's name out of your [bleep] mouth.

ROCK: I am going, too. OK.

OK, that was the greatest night in the history of television. (END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Let's bring in the host of "Entertainment Tonight" and CNN contributor, Nischelle Turner from Los Angeles. Nischelle, great to have you here. And before we get to what the Academy is going to do about this -- and we do have breaking news about that -- I want to talk to you about Will Smith's mind-set and motivation for what he did. Because I have not seen anything as illuminating as the interview that you did with Will Smith a month ago. Where I think he sort of telegraphed why he would do something like this. So, let me just play for everybody what he told you about feeling protective over black women. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SMITH: All of these black women that I get to protect, I just feel, you know, such a responsibility, you know. It's like me and all black women. It's a responsibility I've always wanted to shoulder. I want to be that man.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Nischelle, there it is. There it is. I mean, he told you he wants to be that man. He was sort of channeling Richard Williams, who he played in "King Richard."

NISCHELLE TURNER, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Well, he was in many ways. And, you know, it's interesting because I thought a lot about that interview today and talked a lot about that interview today. Because he said to me in that moment, Alisyn, that he feels like his life has taken a different direction and that he has been charged to do this. Like this was now deep down in his core and this is the man he would be. This is how he would walk from there on out in walking in protection over these black women in his life.

So, yes, I felt like at that moment last night that's what he felt like he was doing. Again, I'm still trying to wrap my brain around the whole thing because it's the most outrageous and jaw dropping thing that I've seen in a really, really long time where he thought he was doing that, in a way he was protecting his wife. But in the manner that he did it, like how do you justify or explain or rectify that?

[15:55:00]

CAMEROTA: I mean, I think it's just remarkable. To me, how professional Chris Rock was throughout all that, unflappable. I mean, the show must go on and he carried on. I'm astonished by how well Chris Rock responded and now, of course, the Academy has to figure out how they're going to respond. Will Will Smith going to be allowed back? What's the plan?

TURNER: That's a good question. The Academy just announced a few minutes ago, that they're going to launch a formal review into what happened last night and that, you know, they did just send us their code of conduct statement and they also sent us here at "Entertainment Tonight" a statement saying that they formally condemn what Will Smith did. So, we don't know what the outcome is there. You know, Will did during his acceptance speech of best actor award last night, he apologized to the Academy, apologize to the other people in this category, and apologize to the people in the room. He did not apologize to Chris Rock, however.

But then, you know, what was also stunning to me is after this was all over, I mean, I feel like maybe he felt he had to salvage something, but Will went on to go to the "Vanity Fair" party last night with his family and his friends and, you know, he seemingly had a good time there.

We also do know Chris Rock went to a Gio Series party last night and the information we have is that he was there having a good time, just trying to put it all behind him. So, I don't mo what comes of this. But I know there does need to be healing, definitely.

CAMEROTA: I mean, we only have a few seconds left -- but Jada Pinkett Smith had also talked in the past about how having to shave her hair or losing her hair because of alopecia had sort of empowered her. And so, all of it is just confusing.

TURNER: Well, empowering but she talked about the struggle. She talked about feeling kind of the shame of it and you know, how to kind of move past that. And you could see the hurt in her eyes during that joke. You definitely can. I don't mind a man taking up for his wife. It's just that manner, you can't do it on that stage. You can't do it in that matter.

CAMEROTA: Nischelle Turner, great to talk to you. Thank you very much for being here.

TURNER: Absolutely.

CAMEROTA: And "THE LEAD WITH JAKE TAPPER" starts after this very quick break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)