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GOP Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) Reacts to Trump's Jan. 6 Pardons; Trump Calls Jan. 6 Attacks on Cops Very Minor Incidents; Trump Administration Shuts Down White House's Spanish Language Website. Aired 10-10:30a ET

Aired January 23, 2025 - 10:00   ET

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


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[10:00:00]

JIM ACOSTA, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning. You are live in the CNN Newsroom. I'm Jim Acosta in Washington.

This morning, we're following new CNN reporting about a statement Pete Hegseth's ex-wife gave to the FBI about his alcohol use.

Plus, President Trump staunchly defending pardoning Capitol rioters, even those who beat police officers.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: Most of the people were absolutely innocent, okay? But forgetting all about that, these people have served horribly a long time.

Some of those people with the police, true, but they were very minor incidents.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: Not true. What happens if one of those offenders re offends? I'll speak to a former member of the January 6th committee.

And later, wildfires exploding again in Southern California, flames are battering Los Angeles and Ventura counties as dangerous fire weather conditions persists.

But in the meantime, we begin the hour with CNN's Manu Raju up on Capitol Hill. I'll get to your reporting on Pete Hegseth in a moment, but you just caught up with Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski, a key senator right now with these slim margins up on Capitol Hill. What did she tell you?

MANU RAJU, CNN ANCHOR AND CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I just talked to her about Pete Hegseth. Remember, this vote will happen this afternoon to break a Democratic filibuster, which means that they need to have all Republicans except for three, except for four in line. They can lose three Republican senators. If they lose four, that'll be enough to scuttle this nomination all together. She is one of the key votes, one of the swing Republican votes. And she just indicated to me moments ago that she had concerns with Hegseth. She would not say how she would vote. And she also waited on Donald Trump's blanket pardons of January 6th prisoners.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RAJU: So, there's a big part of it this afternoon.

SEN. LISA MURKOWSKI (R-AK): Yes.

RAJU: (INAUDIBLE).

MURKOWSKI: There is a big quote this afternoon, the initial vote on except this afternoon. And you will see my vote when I go to the chamber?

RAJU: Do you have concerns about --

MURKOWSKI: Yes.

RAJU: What are those concerns?

MURKOWSKI: I will articulate those later, and you will have a full readout.

RAJU: Do you feel like you've gotten enough information about Pete Hegseth?

MURKOWSKI: Yes, I actually did.

RAJU: You do? So, do you go to the (INAUDIBLE) for a background check?

MURKOWSKI: I will comment more fully after the (INAUDIBLE).

RAJU: Okay. What about the pardons? You have spoken about it.

MURKOWSKI: I remain of the same view on blanket pardons that include pardons for those who committed criminal acts of violence on our police officers, on our National Capital Police and stand by that statement.

RAJU: Do you -- what message did this send to the police, to everything about January 6th?

MURKOWSKI: I've shared, as recently as yesterday evening, I'm very concerned about the message.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

RAJU: Now, Murkowski is someone to watch in the United States Senate, just given her profile. She's someone who has been a longtime swing vote among Republicans. She voted -- she opposed the Brett Kavanaugh nomination, for one. She voted to convict Donald Trump in the second impeachment trial after the January 6th attack, which is one reason, perhaps why she has been one of the more critical voices on the party.

But, of course, Jim, on those key votes, including on Hegseth this afternoon, someone to watch very, very closely. But her indicating she has concerns will undoubtedly get the attention of Republican leaders as they count the votes this afternoon. Jim?

ACOSTA: Yes, they'll be putting that up on the whiteboard. I mean, they can't lose too many votes here on Pete Hegseth or the whole thing goes down the tubes.

All right, Manu Raju, thank you very much.

Let's discuss more now with Republican Congressman Rich McCormick of Georgia. He's a member of the House Armed Services Committee. Congressman, thanks so much for being here.

What's your reaction to what you just heard?

[10:05:00]

Senator Murkowski, a member of your party, indicating she has concerns about Pete Hegseth for the Pentagon.

REP. RICH MCCORMICK (R-GA): Sure. I think everybody's going to have their own opinions when it comes to about Pete Hegseth. I've personally interviewed him. I feel comfortable with where his head is at. I think he knows what he knows and he knows what he doesn't know. I think he'll be good for getting the military back on track to make us lethal.

As you know, I spent over 20 years in the military, 16 years in the Marine Corps, 4 years in the Navy, also spent time attached to Army and Foreign Forces. I think he's the right kind of guy with the right vision for what we need to do as a military.

ACOSTA: And let me ask you this, because the President has talked about this, Pete Hegseth has talked about this, that things should be merit-based inside the government, should be merit-based over at the Pentagon. Is Pete Hegseth the most qualified person to be Secretary of Defense? A lot of people don't think so.

MCCORMICK: When you talk about a vision, when you talk about the president, a lot of times we were like presidents don't have a lot of military experience, they're the commander-in-chief. But if you're talking about a vision, about putting the right people in the right places to be successful, about leadership skills, about the ability to think on your feet, to react, to have an idea of what the military needs to be, that's what's more important than all the experience you might think, when it comes to contracting, which is a big part of the secretary of defense's oversight. He's not going to have that kind of experience, but, quite frankly, most people that have that job don't have that experience.

ACOSTA: And let me ask you about something else Senator Murkowski was talking about just a few moments ago. She said she had concerns about Donald Trump's pardons of violent January 6th offenders. Do you? MCCORMICK: Well, I can understand the concerns and I don't know all those different cases. I know that many of them have already served jail time and they had confrontations with police officers with violence. But if we're not going to be partisan about this, we won't be really fair. There was a person who was pardoned by Joe Biden who killed two FBI agents.

Now, I'm a guy who's in the Marines who have a lot of my buddies who came out of the Marines, went in the FBI who put their life on line every single day, two and by the same guy?

ACOSTA: But, Congressman, does President Biden's pardon for folks over here excuse Donald Trump pardoning people who beat up cops, who attacked police officers? I mean, I'm asking you about that.

MCCORMICK: Yes, I'm telling you. So, I don't excuse that. I don't excuse those people who beat up a police officer or gotten a confrontation, but they've served jail time. You're talking about somebody who killed two FBI killed. I think that's unprecedented. It's never happened in the history of pardons. It's never happened in the history of pardons where somebody pardoned multiple family members for things that they haven't even been charged with.

ACOSTA: But Joe Biden is not the president anymore.

Let me ask you this. The last night Donald Trump gave his first T.V. interview where he talked about pardoning the January 6th insurrectionists. Let's listen to that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: They were treated like the worst criminals in history. And you know what they were there for? They were protesting the vote, because they knew the election was rigged and they were protesting the vote.

Some of those people with the police, true, but they were very minor incidents.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: First of all, fact check, the election of 2020 was not rigged. The president just won't give up on that. But some of those rioters, as we were saying, beating police officers, even tasing them, would you call that minor?

MCCORMICK: I don't think it's minor, but it's not really the same thing as killing somebody, is it?

ACOSTA: Right. But as we were saying earlier, Joe Biden is not the president anymore.

I mean, let me ask you this.

MCCORMICK: But he used presidential power to do that, to be fair, right?

ACOSTA: He does have the power to do that. Correct.

There were -- I mean, I will say, Congressman, and you know this, there were police officers who died in the aftermath of January 6th. And there were people who were there at the Capitol that day who died. But one of the things I did want to ask you about, the Oath Keepers founder, Stewart Rhodes was photographed eating in one of the cafeterias at the U.S. Capitol. Apparently, this picture was taken yesterday, if we could show it to our viewers.

Should Speaker Johnson bar people like Rhodes who helped orchestrate the insurrection from entering the Capitol? How is that appropriate that Stewart Rhodes is eating in a Capitol cafeteria?

MCCORMICK: Yes, there's a lot of people who enter the Capitol every single day, including our buildings that we do business and hearings in. I would love to bar, believe me. It is the people's house. There are people who get up and blow up our hearings all the time. And I'm like, can that they be barred since they break our rules, since they do things I don't like? I'm not a lawyer and I'm not sure what Speaker Johnson's purviews are but I --

ACOSTA: Do you feel comfortable with January 6th insurrectionists and cop beaters milling around the Capitol?

MCCORMICK: If there's no violence, then I feel comfortable. I'm my own self. I think everybody has their own opinions on that, like I said. I'm not going to make this a partisan issue, though. I think we have to have equal application of the law.

ACOSTA: All right. Congressman McCormick, thank you very much for your time. We appreciate it.

MCCORMICK: Absolutely.

[10:10:00]

ACOSTA: President Trump pardoned two D.C. police officers convicted in the 2020 death of a 20-year-old black man. This is Karen Hilton Brown with his daughter. He was killed during a police chase in 2020. Investigators say the officers covered up the incident as Hilton Brown lay dying in the street. His death just months after the murder of George Floyd sparked days of protest up on the Capitol.

CNN's Evan Perez joins me now. Evan, what do we know about this? Well, the reaction from the Metropolitan Police and from the union and from the officers themselves is obviously very overwhelming. They are thankful for receiving this pardon from Donald Trump. And, look, the president made clear in talking about this that he believes very much firmly in this idea of backing the blue no matter what.

And in this case, look, this was a case that happened in 2020. And, you know, the police unions and the Metropolitan Police themselves, they say that if it hadn't happened at that time, right, after the George Floyd protest, they believe it would have been handled differently. But part of the problem with this case, and this was the case of two officers, Andrew Zabavsky and Terrence Sutton, they, according to the investigation and according to the prosecution, they were also charged with obstructing the investigation by trying to cover it up. And so it wasn't just the police chase, but it was the obstruction that made this worse.

And so the FBI and the U.S. attorney at the time said that this was a matter of trying to restore public trust in the police. It was a very sensitive time. Both of these men were appealing their sentences. I'll say that that Sutton, in particular, spoke to CNN last night to Gabe Cohen and he said that that he wants to try to return to the Metropolitan Police because he's very thankful for this and he believes that that should be what happens.

It's also very unusual to see a statement from the police department itself. In these cases, usually they distance themselves from these officers, but they said that this was a grave injustice that was done to these two men. Obviously, the family of the young man who was killed, they view it differently. They believe that he was murdered and that this should never have happened.

One additional piece of context that I should note, Jim, yesterday, the Justice Department issued a new memo, which basically -- which directs the civil rights division to essentially stop trying to do these police reform agreements, these consent decrees that are often court-imposed and court-ordered, right? And in the case of Minneapolis and Louisville, those two had just been done by the Biden administration are still pending before judges, they have not been finalized. So, it's very likely that we might see those two agreements scuttled.

Again, that the idea of trying to reform police and trying to make sure that police --

ACOSTA: Well, Donald Trump has gone out on the campaign trail and said he essentially wants to give cops carte blanche to do whatever they want.

PEREZ: Right. And he's made some comments about like, you know, roughing people up and so on.

ACOSTA: This is a bit of a signal in that direction.

PEREZ: Correct.

ACOSTA: One might take it that way.

PEREZ: Right. It's a very sharp turn from the, the era from 2020 when everyone, including Republicans, said that there needed to be some changes to reform police departments.

ACOSTA: All right. Evan Perez, thank you very much.

Coming up in just a few moments, the head of the nation's oldest Hispanic and Latin American civil rights organization joins me to talk about the impact of Trump's executive orders as the first case around birthright citizenship heads to court.

Be right back.

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[10:15:00]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: To the black and Hispanic communities, I want to thank you for the tremendous outpouring of love and trust that you have shown me with your vote. We set records, and I will not forget it. I've heard your voices in the campaign, and I look forward to working with you in the years to come.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: That's President Trump thanking black and Hispanic voters in his inaugural address. Just hours after that, his administration, though, shut down the White House's Spanish language website. You can see here when you go to the page whitehouse.gov/es, you now get a page not found message. The Spanish profile of the White House on X was also removed.

The changes coincide with a spate of executive actions Trump signed related to his immigration crackdown. A White House official says the administration is in the process of editing the White House website and is committed to bringing the Spanish section back online.

Today, President Trump's bid to end birthright citizenship heads to the courts. A Seattle judge is set to hear from four of the 22 states that are suing to block the executive order Trump signed earlier this week. Just a reminder, in 1898, the Supreme Court ruled that anyone born on U.S. soil is a citizen citing the 14th Amendment, which says in part, quote, all persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof are citizens of the United States. But Trump, for his part, claims that the law has been misinterpreted and does not apply to children whose mothers are undocumented or on temporary visas.

Joining us now is Juan Proano. He's the CEO of the Latino advocacy group, LULAC. And, Juan, thank you so much for being here.

I, you know, as we know, just because the president says something doesn't make it so. Do you think he could be successful, though, in these efforts to eliminate birthright citizenship, maybe try to get a case to the Supreme Court through his allies and take it on there?

JUAN PROANO, CEO, LEAGUE OF UNITED LATIN AMERICAN CITIZENS: Well, there's no question that that's his goal, that's his strategy here. But really what he's tried to do is reinterpret the 14th Amendment. You know, he's seeking to, you know, redefine longstanding protections. This policy disregards legal precedence and could create stateless individuals and even deport U.S. children along with their families. This would only exacerbate the humanitarian crisis that we have now. ACOSTA: So, is he trying to rewrite the Constitution?

[10:20:00]

I mean, what would be the fallout if all of a sudden birthright citizenship were to go away?

PROANO: Well, you know, we've actually had a couple of cases here. You know, we also have a lawsuit with ACLU and also the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. So, one scenario, for example, is you have an undocumented mother who actually has children who are U.S.-born citizens. She's actually expecting in the near future. And so she'll be in a situation where she's undocumented in the United States. She has U.S.-born children, and her next child could potentially be undocumented as well.

So, we're here to basically fight for her civil rights and the civil rights of not just Latinos, but every immigrant in this country as well.

ACOSTA: Which obviously could lead to family separation, the kind of painful stuff that we saw during the first Trump administration, and Trump's border czar, meanwhile, who has talked about that sort of thing, just deporting families all together, says the handcuffs are coming off when it comes to the administration's immigration crackdown.

There was all this anticipation as Trump was coming into office that we were going to see these mass deportations taking shape. Are you seeing any signs of that? It doesn't sound as though that is happening just yet, but I suppose it is to be expected. You're still expecting it?

PROANO: Absolutely. I mean, we've actually started to hear that there have been some deportation efforts, very small ones, including in Washington D.C., for example, in some restaurants where there are a lot of Latino workers.

But, you know, here we see a couple of things, Jim, number one, the erosion of due process for unauthorized immigrants, the militarized intervention and national emergency declarations, which really stretches executive powers and really conflates enforcement of national security, fostering fear and racial profiling in the Latino community. And as you mentioned, the website, the website all really what it's doing is restricting accessibility for Latinos that need critical information about their government.

ACOSTA: You know, what do you think is behind that, taking down the Spanish language website. Twitter account, so on?

PROANO: You know, for us, really, you know, it's not an administrative decision. It's just really a clear marginalization of Spanish-speaking populations without access to critical information and their preferred language. Many Latinos will be left uninformed and disconnected from what's going on. ACOSTA: And the Department of Homeland Security has issued new guidance that immigration enforcement raids will now be authorized in places like schools and churches. Are we really contemplating the prospect of ICE officers going into schools, going into churches? What might that look like?

PROANO: We absolutely are. I mean, these are tenants that we've held now really for, you know, decades at this point. And so it really is concerning and really unnerving for our community.

We have a LULAC member Emma Lozano (ph), who is a pastor in Chicago, for example, one of our best advocates in the immigration reform space. She has significant concerns. And so we're working to make sure that Latinos, immigrants know their rights, that they know that they do have civil rights in this country and that they really, you know, apply that in every single case.

And then we haven't even really talked to her about the Laken Riley Act. You know, the Laken Rally Act on its own has significant consequences, primarily targeting Latinos, but it could potentially be weaponized when you factor in all of these executive orders. It could be the case, for example, if a young child or young adult is caught shoplifting who may be undocumented, who maybe doesn't know his rights, I mean, you'll potentially see them only within 24 to 48 hours.

ACOSTA: All right. Well, Juan Proano, we will stay on top of that. Thank you very much for your time this morning. We appreciate it.

All right, coming up apocalyptic scenes to show you in Southern California, as firefighters battle at least two more new fires around Los Angeles. CNN's Josh Campbell is live for us. The winds are still a major factor in all of this, Josh. You just can't catch a break.

JOSH CAMPBELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Can't catch a break, and authorities here in L.A. now battling at least five separate fires, a new one erupting overnight near a populated area. Right now, the winds have calmed down, but that's expected to change, which has authorities here across L.A. County on edge.

More on that ahead.

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[10:25:00]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEWART RHODES, OATH KEEPERS FOUNDER: We were wrong (INAUDIBLE) for political purposes because of who we were, because of our identity, because we're Oath Keepers. That's why we were prosecuted for seditious conspiracy.

We didn't hatch a plan, there was no plot to invade the Capitol, and we didn't bring any weapons, it's just all kabuki theater to justify trying to prevent President Trump being able to run again under the 14th Amendment, trying to disqualify him, or put him in prison. Neither one of those things worked.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: All right. That was Oath Keepers founder Stuart Rhodes not telling the truth there, but back on Capitol Hill yesterday. He was to meet with Republican lawmakers following his release from prison. Rhodes was serving an 18-year sentence for seditious conspiracy, but is now walking free, roaming the halls of Congress following President Trump's sweeping clemency order earlier this week, a move that sent shockwaves throughout Washington.

Trump defended the move last night in an Oval Office interview and continue to downplay the violence that day.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Most of the people were absolutely innocent, okay? But forgetting all about that, these people have served horribly a long time.

[10:30:01]

Some of those people with the police, true, but they were very minor incidents.

(END VIDEO CLIP)