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Oath Keepers Founder Found Guilty; Congress to Act on Rail Strike; Heidi Przybyla is Interviewed about Congress' Deadline; Extreme Storms in the South; U.S. Economy's Growth Stronger than Expected. Aired 9-9:30a ET

Aired November 30, 2022 - 09:00   ET

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

[09:00:26]

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: A very good Wednesday morning to you. I'm Jim Sciutto.

BIANNA GOLODRYGA, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Bianna Golodryga.

We are following several major stories for you this morning.

First, Oath Keepers leader Stewart Rhodes, and another high-ranging member of the right-wing militia group, Kelly Meggs, both found guilty of seditious conspiracy for their roles around the January 6th Capitol attack. Now the two face a 20-year maximum prison sentence on that charge. We'll have more on that in just a moment.

SCIUTTO: Plus, on Capitol Hill today, the House is set to vote on legislation which is intended to prevent a nationwide railroad strike after grave warnings from President Biden on the severe economic consequences of such a shutdown. Congress is also working on a deal to fund the government with a looming deadline in December. We're going to be live on Capitol Hill with all those developments just ahead.

Let's begin, though, with a significant win for the Justice Department, the founder and another leader of the Oath Keepers found guilty of seditious conspiracy.

CNN's senior legal affairs correspondent Paula Reid joins us now.

The most serious charge brought so far in these ongoing investigations of January 6th, and not an easy one to prove.

PAULA REID, CNN SENIOR LEGAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: No, not an easy one to prove at all. And now these defendants, they're all facing up to decades in prison. And defense attorneys have signaled that they intend to appeal these verdicts and they see hope for their clients in that this was a split verdict.

But make no mistake, Jim, I mean, this was a victory for the Justice Department as it was the first time in a trial related to the Capitol attack where a jury found that the violence on January 6th was not a spontaneous disruption, but the product of an organized conspiracy.

So, let's break down exactly what happened here.

Rhodes, the leader of the far-right Oath Keepers, the militia, and one of his subordinates, Kelly Meggs, were both convicted of seditious conspiracy. And this, again, like you said, it's the most serious charge that has been brought in any of the criminal cases stemming from the Capitol attack.

Rhodes, Meggs and three other defendants, Jessica Watkins, Kenneth Harrelson, and Thomas Caldwell were all convicted of obstructing an official proceeding and several charges.

Now, the Justice Department was alleging that the Oath Keepers conspired to forcibly stop the peaceful transition of power. The lead prosecutor told the jury in his closing statements that Rhodes and his subordinates, they claimed to be saving the republic but they fractured it instead.

Now, I do want to note that on the day of the insurrection, Rhodes remained outside the Capitol, but prosecutors compared him to a general overseeing his troops.

And, look, this trial was a major test for the Justice Department, for their ability to hold accountable those who participated in January 6th. And, Jim, I think you're going to see this really embolden prosecutors, not only the ones working on the cases already in the pipeline, but expand that beyond to the newly appointed Special Counsel Jack Smith. They're going to see that here a jury was able to see this wasn't spontaneous and were able to hold people accountable for what they saw as an actual conspiracy.

SCIUTTO: No question. One thing to indict, another thing to be able to convict in front of a jury.

Paula Reid, thanks so much.

GOLODRYGA: Joining us now to discuss is former federal prosecutor Elliot Williams.

Elliot, good to see you.

So, as you know, this was a closely watched trial. It was one that even Rhodes' own attorney said was a fair one. Now, the DOJ didn't get everything they were seeking but this is a major conviction. What is the significance of it, in your view?

ELLIOT WILLIAMS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: It's significant, Bianna, really in the sense that seditious conspiracy is very rarely charged. The last time it was even charged in a case was 2010. The judge threw that out. Before that, in decades it had only been charged, I think, three times prior to that, for a couple of reasons. One, people usually don't try to overthrow governments. And that's a good thing. But, number two, actually establishing that someone used force to prevent, hinder or delay the execution of a law is actually quite hard to do legally. And so on account of the fact that the Justice Department established here that they could get a conviction on the seditious conspiracy charge is very big. And then I think beyond that there's the macro almost moral point that

an attack on America ended in a conviction here. And so even setting aside the legal questions, it's just a significant moment for the country.

WILLIAMS: Good for you for citing that essential fact there, right, that folks don't normally try to overthrow the government or disrupt the electoral process in this country. And here you have a case of a rare charge where they got a conviction.

I do want to ask, and all cases are different, the evidence is different. However, there is a commonality between this case and the allegations at least against Trump, and that is that he conspired, right, with -- he and some of his allies, to try to disrupt the process of a peaceful transition and to overthrow an election.

[09:05:00]

Do you see any lessons here from the way this case was prosecuted for how the Justice Department might prosecute if they decide to indict the former president?

WILLIAMS: Look, conspiracies can be tricky, Jim, only insofar as, you know, often the person who doesn't, let's say, pull the trigger is the one you're going after here. And you have to establish not just -- so, for instance, that he thought he won an election and was zealously advocating on his own behalf, but that he set out to break the law. And with respect to, at least in this seditious conspiracy case here, Stewart Rhodes, it was clear to the jury that there was the -- that level - that extra level of intent, not just to do something bad, but to break the law, too.

Look, it could be difficult to charge the former president with any number of crimes because of this intent question that we've talked about frankly for, you know, a couple of years at this point. But, at the end of the day, the person who actually committed the act need not necessarily be the one who's charged and convicted.

GOLODRYGA: And, Elliot, as we heard from Paula, this will likely embolden prosecutors. This was the first of three seditious conspiracy trials starting this year. Others are also going to be facing charges from the Oath Keepers and even the Proud Boys.

What message does it send to those who are currently awaiting trial now?

WILLIAMS: OK. Well, a couple things. One, I think it sends a message to the people who were acquitted yesterday that they really skated by and could easily have been convicted here. This is the very rare crime, Bianna, in which the crime itself took place on national television and the evidence was all in text messages. If you read that indictment, it's all these guys texting back and forth about in effect how they want to overthrow the government.

SCIUTTO: Yes. WILLIAMS: So, that could show up in these future cases as well. And they ought to be scared. And I don't say that often. It's just the evidence is there here.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

WILLIAMS: So, if the prosecutors do their job, who knows what will happen.

SCIUTTO: It's a great point, too, because so much of it was public, right? Public statements about what the -- at least the goal of this was.

Elliot Williams, thanks so much.

WILLIAMS: Thanks, Jim.

SCIUTTO: In the next hour we are expecting the House to begin voting on a key piece of legislation aimed at preventing a national rail strike. It is one of several priorities for the Democratic-led House ahead of a change in leadership and ahead of a change in party control.

GOLODRYGA: Yes. CNN Capitol Hill reporter Melanie Zanona is following all of this for us.

So, Melanie, walk us through the top priorities and what the focus is today. It's going to be a busy day there.

MELANIE ZANONA, CNN CAPITOL HILL REPORTER: Yes, absolutely going to be a busy day.

First up in the House they're going to take two critical votes to avoid a rail strike. First they're going to vote on the deal that was struck in September but has since been rejected. As a reminder, that includes a 24 percent pay increase and better health benefits. And then the House is going to hold a separate, second vote on adding paid sick leave. That's something that unions have been pushing for and the reason why progressives were critical of the deal as-is.

All of that will then head to the Senate. It is unclear if the Senate will take up the paid sick leave portion, but both Republican and Democratic Senate leaders are vowing to get this deal done. So, really it's just a matter of timing, which can be a little tricky in the Senate.

But this is just one of several tasks facing Congress and the administration during these critical lame duck session period. The other thing that they're trying to do is pass same-sex marriage. Next week the House will take up the Senate bill. They passed that last night in an historic vote. Now it's on its way to becoming law.

And then Congress is also racing to do an omnibus spending deal. That is a massive spending deal to fund the government by the December 16th deadline. It's a heavy lift. That's something that takes a lot of work around here, but the holidays are usually a pretty good motivating factor to get people to get their work done. And all four big congressional leaders, so Kevin McCarthy, Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer and Mitch McConnell left a White House meeting yesterday vowing to try to get an omnibus spending deal done as opposed to a short-term patch. We'll see if they're able to get it done or if they need to buy themselves a little bit more time, which tends to be the case around here, guys.

SCIUTTO: Wow, a rare outbreak of bipartisanship on Capitol Hill. Sound the alarm.

Melanie Zanona, on The Hill, thanks very much.

ZANONA: Thanks.

SCIUTTO: Joining us now to talk about all this is Heidi Przybyla. She's national investigative journalist for "Politico."

Heidi, good to have you on this morning. Thank you.

HEIDI PRZYBYLA, NATIONAL INVESTIGATIVE JOURNALIST, "POLITICO": Good morning.

SCIUTTO: So, that's no small thing, right? I mean when you look at this, you've got a same-sex marriage, interracial marriage protection through the Senate, got those ten Republican votes. They're saying at least that they want - they don't just want to have a short-term continuing resolution, they want to have something omnibus that lasts longer, which, by the way, is not insignificant, right, because that takes away some of the Republican leverage to hang over Democrats when they take control of the chamber.

Do you believe that? Do you think they can get to that bigger goal as opposed to a short-term goal on spending?

PRZYBYLA: They both -- when I say they I mean the leadership, Jim, both have motivation to do this because, on the Democratic side, they know that when Republicans take over they're going to have a lot more leverage, the right flank of the party, and they don't want them to use the funding to -- this as kind of leverage to shut down the government.

[09:10:03]

We've seen this movie before, Jim, ever since the rise of the Tea Party, which is now really the MAGA wing of the Republican Party that this is one of their preferred methods of torture -- John Boehner would attest to that -- that extracting spending cuts, whether it be over the debt ceiling or in these never ending spending battles would be a way to extract whatever they're trying to get out of leadership. And so this is a way for Republicans to head this off, as well as Democrats who don't want to see the government shut down. The Republican leadership knows if that happens next year that when that's happened in the past it's been Republicans who are to blame by voters.

SCIUTTO: That's a good point. Yes. GOLODRYGA: Also, Heidi, it looks like a rail strike will likely be avoided through legislation. We heard from Speaker Pelosi they will be taking two votes today, one to codify that legislation and that deal that President Biden helped negotiate back in September, raised wages, but not sick leave. The second bill does address sick leave. Is there any chance that Republicans can get on board for that to pass as well because passing both of those would be seen as a victory for President Biden, who was hoping to avoid coming to this point to begin with.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

PRZYBYLA: Well, this is probably the most intriguing tale of this holiday season. The answer in the House is they really don't need them. This is expected to -- both of them -- to easily pass the House. The bigger interesting part of this is, what's going to happen in the Senate. Senator Sanders has already said that he's going to block the broader bill if he doesn't get a vote on his amendment to create sick leave, the seven days of sick leave, for the workers. But the interesting part of this is, he's got some unexpected allies, like Senator Marco Rubio, who we've seen huddling with on the floor of the Senate yesterday. Also some senators like Josh Hawley.

Look, in the past, union bosses and demands from union bosses were seen as kind of like the boogieman of the Republican Party. And here you have, as the Senate Republicans are kind of going into this wilderness period over at least the next two years, a lot of soul searching about how they want to reposition the party and, surprise, surprise, here you have them coming out in favor, at least with Rubio and maybe some others, of these pro-union measures.

And yesterday Senator Cornyn said he thinks that there may even be enough votes for this to pass.

SCIUTTO: Wow.

PRZYBYLA: So, stay tuned, what happens in the Senate. In the House, I think it's going to pretty much be an easy, easy slide here.

SCIUTTO: Wow, Republicans forcing paid sick leave. Interesting.

GOLODRYGA: Yes.

SCIUTTO: Given blocking in the past attempts to establish that on a national basis.

Just quickly, other big challenge is will Kevin McCarthy get the votes he needs to be speaker? Where does that stand? Is it trending negatively for him in terms of vote counting?

PRZYBYLA: It's trending negatively. But, again, I feel like we've all been through these leadership battles before and ultimately you can't know until the end what's really in the hearts and the minds and the main motivation of these individuals and who would step up to replace him. Does anyone think, for instance, that Steve Scalise wouldn't have an equally difficult sledding trip here with some of the right frank. And, in the end, a lot of these guys who are making these threats really don't want to be in a position of leadership. They feel more empowered when they are blocking things and throwing sand in the gears of government versus having to be in those leadership positions themselves.

So, I think this is just -- probably just a preview of what Kevin McCarthy's life is going to be like over the next two years versus knocking him off of his throne. But, again, I am out of the predictions business when it comes to elections, including elections of leadership because anything can happen.

SCIUTTO: Yes. That's smart.

GOLODRYGA: Even if he does get the leadership position, it won't be an easy one to maintain. Sort of a careful, what you wish for there for Kevin McCarthy.

Heidi Przybyla, thank you.

PRZYBYLA: You're welcome.

GOLODRYGA: Well, this just into CNN, the Spanish national police say they are investigating after an explosion at the Ukrainian embassy in Madrid this morning.

SCIUTTO: They say an explosive device was inside an envelope. Officials are unsure if the explosion happened when the envelope was opened or when it was moved. The Ukrainian foreign minister spokesman says the staffer was slightly injured. Thankfully, no one else was hurt. Security stepped up at the embassy in Madrid. We're going to bring you any updates on the story as we learn them.

GOLODRYGA: Well, up next, we are live in Mississippi where more than 20 tornadoes were reported overnight causing widespread damage. We are tracking where tornado watches are still in effect right now.

SCIUTTO: Plus, were you watching? We were. U.S. pulls off a massive win to advance in the World Cup to the breakout stages, not, though, without an injury to their star player. Man, if you saw that collision. What Christian Pulisic is saying about whether he will play on Saturday.

[09:15:03]

That is one strong dude

And later, the prince and princess of Wales arrive in the U.S. today for the first time in eight years. Why they've jumped across the pond and what's on the agenda.

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SCIUTTO: Wow, that is powerful. More than 25 tornadoes tore through the southeast overnight, killing two people, injuring one in Alabama. Take a look at some of the damage in Greene County, Alabama. Roof and walls of an apartment complex torn off, although the majority of the tornadoes touched down in the state of Mississippi. The threat for severe weather continues today for Alabama, Florida and Georgia, as the storms make their way through the south.

GOLODRYGA: Yes, we've been following this since yesterday for you.

CNN national correspondent Ryan Young is on the ground in Mississippi.

So, Ryan, what have you seen so far this morning?

[09:20:00]

RYAN YOUNG, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, a long night for a lot of these crews who have been working this situation for several hours now. We've got power crews who are out here now trying to restore some of the power to this area.

I grabbed this gentlemen right here, Neil Austin, who's the fire coordinator for this area.

You said your teams actually had to rescue people last night because of this storm.

NEIL AUSTIN, LOWNDES COUNTY, MS FIRE COORDINATOR: Yes. Our first calls that came in were rescue calls, people trapped. And responders, this is all volunteer area. They responded here. Found this station that was out of service then. So, by the time we got in there with other apparatus, we were successful in getting some people that had to hunker down in their homes that were just messed up.

YOUNG: Now we're going to watch this direction. Guys, you can see just how blown out this station is. But one of the things that caught us off guard here is the tornado siren actually got blown off its perch as well. It was working before -

AUSTIN: (INAUDIBLE). Yes, it was - it was sounding. We had multiple - we had sound it multiple times last night. So, it was operational. But this was - wasn't able to just take a direct hit.

YOUNG: Everybody in this area is OK at this point, right?

AUSTIN: Yes, we had no fatalities, no injuries.

YOUNG: OK. Well, thank you so much.

As we were walking - we'll probably talk to you a little more. But we wanted to show you guys this. Look at that tree that went through this house last night. This was so immediate people said they heard the siren. It went down. And then all of a sudden they heard the big bang. And this - the people who were in this house were able to get out luckily. As you heard before, there were no fatalities in this area, but the damage is widespread through little swaths because of just how powerful this storm was.

I'm actually going to turn you to the side right here. There's a pickup truck that's there. That's smashed in half. The house next door is smashed. The temperature also dropped here to 50 degrees this morning and so the woman who lived here actually had to borrow a jacket from someone else. So, you start seeing people come out and try to put the pieces together.

The tree cutting service just arrived here. But look at all the damage in that field that's over there. And we're just getting a chance to assess this ourselves because when we arrived here early this morning, you couldn't see a thing. All the lights were out. So, you can understand the pieces are getting put back together, but they're not used to having storms this late in the season. So, everybody's trying to wonder what's going to happen next and whether or not today there will be any more storms.

Guys.

SCIUTTO: Yes, those poor people in that house there. And, Ryan, watch those power lines, man. I see them on the ground there. Can't be that safe.

YOUNG: Oh, absolutely. Absolutely.

GOLODRYGA: Well, this morning, encouraging signs for the U.S. economy. New data shows the GDP grew much faster than expected in the third quarter by an annualized rate of nearly 3 percent. Now, this comes just hours ahead of a critical speech from Fed Chair Jerome Powell. Investors will be listening for any new indications of rate hikes to come.

CNN chief business correspondent Christine Romans joins me now.

And I'm laughing, Christine, because we were just talking about this during the commercial break.

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: I know.

GOLODRYGA: What do you make of this? Because prior to these numbers, you know, we had been talking about stronger than expected retail sales, right?

ROMANS: Yes.

GOLODRYGA: Black Friday. Cyber Monday.

ROMANS: Yes.

GOLODRYGA: And the question this morning was going to be, what's the confusion going on amongst Fed officials as to what their next move looks like and how quickly do they start to slow. When you have numbers like this, that may change the calculus for the Fed chair.

ROMANS: I know. It shows an economy still plugging along. It shows solid business investment in equipment. It shows solid consumer spending. The only weak spot you see here is in the housing market. So all these Fed interest rate hikes so far may be tipping housing into a recession but the rest of the economy is plugging along. We're going to get jobs numbers later this week that will probably still be pretty robust.

So, here is the conundrum for this Fed. So many on Wall Street want to hear the Fed start to say, OK, we can -- we don't need to be raising interest rates 75 basis points every time. We want to - we want to --

GOLODRYGA: Taper.

ROMANS: Cool -- cool down that pace. How do you cool down the pace of rate hikes when you have an economy that is growing at 2.9 percent. And 2.9 percent for a quarter pre-pandemic would be the envy of any quarter in any president, quite frankly. That's still strong growth. So the Fed has been raising interest rates to cool these numbers. These numbers are still pretty good.

Also, if you look sort of at a bar chart, I think I made you one, first quarter and second quarter, those two little red bars down 1.6 percent in Q1, down 0.6 percent in Q -- that was what caused all of that recession -

GOLODRYGA: Right.

ROMANS: To -- look at how well the economy has snapped back from all that recession talk of two down quarters.

GOLODRYGA: So, what are you expecting now to hear from Powell this morning as he takes in this information and also knowing that for the first time in a while you are seeing some dissent amongst his colleagues, the Fed governors.

ROMANS: Yes. So, you know, I think he's going to talk -- inflation is still too high. Inflation is still too high, and that is issue number one for this Fed. You have a job market. The title, the subject for his speech for the Brookings Institution is the labor market. So, we'll hear what he thinks about the labor market and whether you can have an economy meaningfully slowing with the job market still as strong as it is.

And we'll be looking for any kinds of hints from the Fed chief about whether they feel ready to slow down from the very aggressive paces of rate hikes. We've had six rate hikes this year, an unprecedented four of them in a row that were 75 basis points, just has never happened before, and there's a real hope that maybe they'll start slowing that pace and let all these rate hikes catch up to the economy and cool the economy without, you know --

[09:25:14]

GOLODRYGA: Putting it into a deep recession.

ROMANS: Putting it into a tough recession. Yes.

GOLODRYGA: Christine Romans, thank you. It was good to see you.

ROMANS: Nice to see you.

SCIUTTO: Still ahead, big moment of triumph for the U.S. men's soccer team as they came back to their hotel. Notably in that video you'll see Christian Pulisic, who was injured while scoring the winning goal. He gave them the big welcome back. Up next, how likely he will be ready to join the team's match on Saturday against the Netherlands. We're going to be live in Doha for an update right after the break.

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