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Former President Trump to Appear in Court for Arraignment after being Indicted for Possession of Government Documents; Judge Presiding over Indictment of Former President Trump Profiled. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired June 12, 2023 - 08:00   ET

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

[08:00:00]

ERICA HILL, CNN ANCHOR: That, of course, is the mayor of Miami just there. That city ramping up security as Donald Trump prepares to surrender himself on federal charges tomorrow.

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN ANCHOR: The former president will leave New Jersey and fly down to Miami in potentially just a couple of hours. We'll break down former President Trump's plans for today and for tomorrow, and what he's saying about the historic indictment against him.

HILL: Plus, Trump's former national security adviser John Bolton is going to join us live to weigh in on these very serious allegations against his former boss, his take on what those mean, too, in terms of national security.

This hour of CNN THIS MORNING starts right now.

This morning, former President Trump is set to fly south to Florida as he prepares to turn himself in on federal charges tomorrow. Live pictures there outside his resort in Bedminster, New Jersey. Again, he'll be departing within the next few hours from there, making his way to Florida, because, of course, he's now facing this historic, unprecedented legal battle after being charged with 37 counts. Special Counsel Jack Smith's team of prosecutors says the former president illegally kept a stash of highly sensitive records, including military secrets and documents about America's nuclear program, and that he allegedly stored them in various places, including a bathroom, a shower, even his bedroom at his Mar-a-Lago resort.

MATTINGLY: Now, Trump, as you would probably expect, is vowing to stay in the presidential race, even if he's convicted. He has railed against the indictment over the weekend while he was on the campaign trail. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: As far as the joke of an indictment, it's a horrible thing. It's a horrible thing for this country. The only good thing about it is that it's driven my poll numbers way up. Can you believe this? Way up.

(APPLAUSE) (END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTINGLY: In a matter of hours, officials in Miami will hold a news conference as they ramp up security ahead of Trump's initial court appearance. Sources tell CNN the FBI is tracking potential threats as violent rhetoric surges online. We're told the far-right group the Proud Boys is discussing traveling to Florida to show their support for the former president.

Now, we're covering this from all angles. Sara Murray, John Miller, Audie Cornish, and Elie Honig are all in studio. Carlos Suarez is in Miami, but let's start with Alayna Treene who's in Bedminster where the former president is preparing to leave his golf club and head to the airport. Alayna, what's your sense of things right now in talking to his team?

ALAYNA TREENE, CNN POLITICAL REPORTER: Right, well, good morning, Phil and Erica. We are here in Bedminster, where Donald Trump will be leaving soon. He's expected to pass just right by here on his way to Miami ahead of his arraignment tomorrow at 3:00 p.m. Now, once he is in Florida, we are told that he is going to be meeting with his attorneys to discuss his new Florida-based legal strategy. And that's after Donald Trump abruptly removed two of his attorneys, Jim Trusty and John Rowley on Friday, just hours after learning of his indictment.

Now, tomorrow, Donald Trump will be arraigned, and his advisers tell me that immediately after he's going to be flying back to Bedminster, where he will be giving a fundraiser and also a private dinner and giving live remarks tomorrow night.

And we've seen this playbook before, Erica and Phil. After he was arraigned in Manhattan earlier this year, he swiftly flew back to Mar- a-Lago, took to a stage and spoke to his crowd of supporters. And his advisers tell me that we should expect a similar speech tomorrow night, where Donald Trump will remain defiant. He will deny any wrongdoing as he's been doing for the past several days now, and he will try to frame these charges as a political persecution.

HILL: So as we wait for those remarks, which as you rightly say, we know that playbook quite well, there is also talk about what's happening behind the scenes. Dana Bash talking about the conversations she's had about the concern both legally and politically. What are you hearing about whether there are any efforts to maybe temper those remarks at all of the former president?

TREENE: Right, well, Dana's reporting is exactly right. It's what I'm hearing as well. I've been speaking with his advisers and several of his allies over the past several days now, and they've admitted that concern has settled in among many on his team as they worry about what the legal implications of this could be like. But I do think, even though we're seeing that a little bit behind the scenes, Donald Trump was still going to remain defiant and use the bravado that we've seen, even over the weekend, when we were in Georgia and North Carolina during his campaign stops on Saturday, I think we're going to see that again tomorrow. But I just want to add, given that concern, even Donald Trump himself

has admitted that he does not want to be indicted. He had an interview with "Politico" aboard his plane on Saturday where he said, quote, "Nobody wants to be indicted. I don't care that my poll numbers went up by a lot. I don't want to be indicted. I've never been indicted. I went through my whole life, now I get indicted every two months. It's been political."

[08:05:05]

And that's what Donald Trump told "Politico". So you can see that even though he's publicly pushing back against these charges, privately, there is concern and, really, he does not want to be indicted here, Erica and Phil.

HILL: Alayna Treene, appreciate the reporting. Thank you.

MATTINGLY: The 45th president will travel from New Jersey to Florida in coming hours. CNN's Carlos Suarez is outside the federal courthouse in Miami where Trump will appear tomorrow. Now, Carlos, what security measures have you heard are actually being put in place right now?

CARLOS SUAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Phil, good morning. So the Miami police department is expected to detail their safety and security plans ahead of the former president's appearance in federal court here on Tuesday. It is our understanding that the entire Miami- Dade police department, all of its officers are being told that they are being put on standby, ahead of Tuesday, should any protests take place outside of this courthouse.

Now, law enforcement sources tell CNN that a group of FBI agents have been assigned to a domestic terrorism squad and that they are identifying any possible threats to this building here in downtown Miami. We're told that they're also keeping a close eye on the Proud Boys group, because apparently, there has been some communication between group members about traveling to Florida, though it is important to note that we're being told right now that there is no indication of any specific or credible threat.

Now, law enforcement here in south Florida is growing increasingly concerned about some of the political rhetoric that we're seeing surrounding the former president's indictment. The former Republican governor -- candidate for governor, rather, in Arizona, Kari Lake, she is coming under increased criticism for some words that she expressed over the weekend about this indictment. Here are some of those comments.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KARI LAKE, (R) FORMER ARIZONA GUBERNATORIAL NOMINEE: We are at war, people. If you want to get to President Trump, you're going to have to go through me, and you're going to have to go through 75 million Americans just like me.

(APPLAUSE) LAKE: And I'm going to tell you, yep, most of us are card-carrying members of the NRA.

(APPLAUSE)

LAKE: That's not a threat. That's a public service announcement.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SUAREZ: Phil and Erica, as you can imagine right now, the overall security posture is what you would expect it to be considering a number of federal buildings here in downtown Miami. We're talking about the new federal courthouse behind me, the old one right across the street as well as the U.S. attorney's office. And then you've got the federal detention center just next door.

MATTINGLY: Carlos Suarez for us in Miami. Thanks so much.

HILL: There is a lot of discussion this morning about the federal judge assigned to oversee this case. It's a name that is familiar to Donald Trump. In fact, he appointed her to that role. And it's a name that's likely familiar to you as well, Judge Aileen Cannon. You may remember that name because she, of course, oversaw the legal fight following the FBI's search of Mar-a-Lago last summer.

CNN's senior legal analyst Elie Honig joining us now. He's also a former assistant U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, and a former federal and New Jersey state prosecutor. So we have talked about this judge before. Refresh our memories. What more do we know about her, about her experience, about her background?

ELIE HONIG, SENIOR CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Erica, any time the judge gets wheeled out or assigned in a case, that is a moment of great suspense for the parties. You're sort of holding your breath, hoping you get a good judge. I suspect Donald Trump's team was delighted when they saw Judge Cannon. I suspect prosecutors less so. She's fairly young for a federal judge. She graduated law school in 2007. She's 42 years old. Apparently, I'm older than federal judges now. I don't know when that happened.

(LAUGHTER)

HONIG: She then did clerkship for a conservative federal judge and then she was a big firm lawyer in private practice. She then spent seven years as a federal prosecutor in the Southern District of Florida. So she understands how criminal trials work. And she was nominated to the federal bench, by who? Donald Trump in 2020. She was confirmed by a 56 to 21 vote in the Senate, including 12 Democrats who voted "yes."

Now, as you said, if people recognize this name, it's because she was involved earlier, after the August search of Mar-a-Lago. Donald Trump went to court and asked for a special master to review the documents for privilege or any other issue before they went over to DOJ. That case went to Judge Cannon. She gave Trump the special master. But then DOJ appealed and the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals rejected, reversed her in pretty staunch terms. The 11th Circuit wrote that Judge Cannon had, quote, improperly exercised equitable jurisdiction. Let me translate that. It means she went out of her lane. She did more than she's allowed to do as a judge. And the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals wrote, the law is clear, we cannot write a rule that laws any subject of a search warrant to politic government investigations after the execution of the warrant nor can we write a rule that allows only former presidents to do so. So Judge Cannon does have some history on this case already.

HILL: So there's a little history, as you point out. You can't pick the judge. You get the judge. This likely makes the Trump team happy.

[08:10:00]

HONIG: Yes.

HILL: Do you see a scenario at all where DOJ would say, maybe there's a conflict of interest here?

HONIG: Big question here. So if anyone is going to make a motion to recuse the judge, to move her off the case -- the judge herself could do that. Judges all the time say, I have a conflict of interest, I'm out. They just assign it to another one. Or DOJ can make a motion and say, judge, this is a little awkward, but we think you ought to recuse yourself, and here's why.

Could there be a potential conflict of interest? First, there's the point that she was a Trump nominee. We've never had this before, because we've never had a president capable of appointing federal judges as a defendant. My suspicion is that's not going to be enough. Or they could say you had that prior ruling, but usually giving a prior ruling in favor of somebody and then getting reversed is not quite enough for a conflict of interest, but we'll see. This could be the first time we see this.

HILL: All right, Elie, appreciate it. Phil?

MATTINGLY: Back with us now, Audie Cornish, John Miller, Sara Murray. Sara and John were just engaged in a very intense conversation that I kind of really want some insight into, but I'm not going to ask, because you weren't on camera. You can tell me later.

John, I want to get to what Carlos was kind of detailing in terms of the scale of the operation, given what's coming on the law enforcement side of things. We've seen what's happening publicly. Behind the scenes, walk us through the preps both on the state and the federal level.

JOHN MILLER, CNN CHIEF LAW ENFORCEMENT AND INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: So they have a couple of scheduled rallies. One for 10:00 a.m., and then one at noon at the courthouse. We're looking at a 3:00 appearance, so that's people gathering fairly early. The flyer for the 12:00 noon rally says peaceful rally. They actually point that out, as if it didn't need to be. But between Miami city -- this is in Miami city. Not Miami Beach, that's an 1,100-person police department. And they still have to patrol the city. So that's going to take a lot of resources from them.

Then you've got the county, which is Miami-Dade. They can supply extra people. Then you've got the U.S. marshals and the Florida state police. All of that coordination is happening today. They've been doing that all weekend. They did the walkthrough of the courthouse with Secret Service. How do we bring him in? What's the pathway to the courtroom? Where is he going to get booked in this building in terms of fingerprinting and pretrial forms and all that. How are we getting him out? Is it the same way? All of those wheels have been turning, and that's to protect former President Trump. Then there's the outside piece. So there's a lot going into that.

But really they're looking at the intel. What are they saying in the online chats? Peaceful rally, that's great. That's the job of the police is to protect people's First Amendment right to protest or to support, but when you look in the chat rooms and you see things on TikTok like, "We've got to 1776 these MFs. It's time to start loading magazines," or this is time for civil war, in context, we saw all of that for the New York indictment too, and we saw no violence. Some of that is puffery. But they're going to be on edge because they're watching the traffic.

HILL: And Sara, you pointed out earlier that what we're hearing even from some of those staunchly in Donald Trump's corner is a little pushback on some of that language and a reminder just like the flyers that they want any appearance that someone may make in support of the former president to be peaceful.

SARA MURRAY, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: There has been some cautioning. I was listening to an interview that Roger Stone with Donald Trump yesterday, and Roger Stone is talking about all the people who are going to come to Miami to support him and saying, but it's going to be peaceful, it's going to be civil, it's going to be legal. He even asked Donald Trump if he wanted to say anything to his supporters, and Trump was very demure, he gave a ranting answer about upholding the Constitution, and then he goes on to say that any protest needs to be peaceful.

Look, Roger Stone is someone who has been indicted before, they see what has happened to a bunch of Donald Trump's supporters who showed up at the Capitol on January 6th and have now faced lengthy prison sentences. So you hope that that's a deterrent.

But again, unlike New York, Florida's a much Trumpier place than New York. So I think it's kind of hard to predict what the turnout is going to look like.

HONIG: Let's also remember, these words matter. If you look at the January 6th defendant who have been prosecuted, dozens of them have said at their sentencings, we believed that -- my client believed he was following the president's wishes. He was doing what the president wanted.

AUDIE CORNISH, CNN ANCHOR AND CORRESPONDENT: And their social media was used against them in their cases.

HONIG: Exactly rice.

CORNISH: The other thing going on is, remember, we're many years after the sort of 2020 Black Lives Matter protest in many cities, and cities do have a better idea about large-scale protests or even a better idea of how to cooperate in preparation for any kind of feared, kind of mass gathering.

MATTINGLY: Can I ask Elie, I'm going to direct this to you because you have some expertise on the former attorney general, in a book, I believe, related to --

HONIG: -- the guy in office.

MATTINGLY: We're talking about the atmospherics and the protests and the politics around things. But on the actual substance itself, this is what former President Trump's attorney general Bill Barr had to say. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

WILLIAM BARR, FORMER U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: If even half of it is true, then he's toast. It's a very detailed indictment, and it's very, very damning. And this idea of presenting Trump of is a victim here, a victim of a witch hunt, is ridiculous.

[08:15:00]

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ELIE HONIG, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: You're going to make me say it on national TV, aren't you?

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN ANCHOR: Yes. kind of.

HONIG: I -- here we go. I agree with Bill Barr on this point. I think he's right about this indictment. It is a detailed, fact-based, specifically sourced, incited indictment.

Look, I've seen a lot of indictments in my career. Some indictments are sort of so general, you can't really tell. This one is on point. And I think he's in real trouble.

The other thing that I think is, again, gosh, again, that I agree with Bill Barr is, it is entirely self-inflicted by Donald Trump. When you read this narrative, if he had just at any point said, guys, give them the documents back, it would have been over. He didn't actually get charged for any of the documents that were voluntarily turned over to Archives, no criminal charges on that.

So --

AUDIE CORNISH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: But another piece of context, I think, is that Bill Barr is a flawed messenger fundamentally, right?

HONIG: Very much so, yes.

CORNISH: He didn't come out and say, well, actually, I, too, was a person who helped weaponize the Justice Department, right?

HONIG: Thank you. Yes.

CORNISH: He is not saying that. He's just saying, hey, look, this case is really solid and I do think that affects how he is heard by both diehard supporters, and I don't want to talk about how wide that group is, but also people who are in the maybe category.

Is there a problem here? Should we think a little bit more about how justice is applied? Is there something going on at the Justice Department? Those people will not be calmed by hearing someone like Bill Barr, who just sort of like has such a messy history of comments around various investigations on behalf of Trump.

They're now going to hear him and be like, oh, okay, now I've got the real -- yes, Bill Barr said this.

ERICA HILL, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, I am with you.

CORNISH: And a lot of people are in that position who are coming out now to say one thing or another. They've already spent a lot of time behind Donald Trump making the arguments that they are now speaking out against.

MATTINGLY: Yes, it is -- there's nothing black and white in this when it comes to the actual supporters.

Guys, thank you.

Guaranteed you're coming back. Do not go anywhere. We won't allow it.

Also, Trump's former national security adviser, John Bolton will join us live to weigh in on the allegations against his former boss and most importantly, the highly sensitive documents former President Trump was accused of keeping at Mar-a-Lago.

HILL: Plus, a miracle in the Amazon, a group of children found alive after more than a month. How officials say they were able to survive in the jungle.

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[08:20:48]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARR: ... shocked by the degree of sensitivity of these documents and how many there were frankly. And so the government's agenda was to get those, protect those documents and get them out, and I think it was perfectly appropriate to do that. It was the right thing to do.

And I think the counts under the Espionage Act that he willfully retained those documents are solid counts.

(END VIDEO CLIP) MATTINGLY: That of course was former attorney general, Bill Barr

saying he is shocked by how sensitive the documents are at the center of the new indictment against his old boss, his old boss he defended quite often in the past.

I want to read a specific paragraph from that indictment that gets at what Barr was talking about. In it, it says: "The Justice Department alleges the documents included information regarding defense and weapons capabilities of both the United States and foreign countries, our nuclear programs, potential vulnerabilities of the United States and its allies to military attack and plans for possible retaliation in response to foreign attack."

Now, it goes on to say: "The unauthorized disclosure of these classified documents could put at risk the national security of the United States, foreign relations, and the safety of the United States military and human sources."

I want to bring in Donald Trump's former national security adviser, John Bolton. He joins us now. He also served as the US ambassador to the United Nations.

And Ambassador Bolton, look, you are neither secretive nor subtle about your desire to see the former president out of the race for president or to be a candidate for president anymore. I don't really want to ask about the politics because I want to ask you about what these documents actually mean.

There is a lot of classification markings. There's a lot of words and descriptions that people might not understand. Tell people from a national security perspective, what's in the documents laid out in this indictment.

JOHN BOLTON, FORMER US AMBASSADOR TO THE UNITED NATIONS: Of course, neither I nor anybody else not involved in the case knows what's in the documents yet. But I do know what kinds of documents were put in front of the president during my time, I'm sure during the entire four years of his term. And they did go to absolute, the most important secrets that the United States has directly affecting national, security directly affecting the lives and safety of our service members and our civilian population.

If he has anything like what the complaint -- what the indictment alleges, and of course, the government will have to prove it, then he has committed very serious crimes.

This is a devastating indictment. I speak here as an alumnus of the Justice Department myself, because not only is it powerful, it is very narrowly tailored. They didn't throw everything up against the wall to see what would stick. This really is a rifle shot, and I think it should be the end of Donald Trump's political career.

MATTINGLY: He has obviously made clear he doesn't think that's going to be the case. It should be no surprise to anybody, but I do want to ask you still on the documents, I know you don't know the specific documents themselves. But when you look at the classification levels, can you explain to

people how difficult it would be for an average government employee, one, to have access to them in the first place and two, to be able to get them out of compartmentalized area where you're supposed to be reading secretive documents?

BOLTON: Well, it will vary depending on the level of the employee and where they are. My office, my old office at the White House, the whole office was a SCIF, because we just were drowning in classified information.

And at least in theory, the Oval Office ought to be a pretty safe place, too. And it's very important, obviously, to give the president all the information he needs to make a decision. Unfortunately, Trump didn't pay too much attention to a lot of what he was given, but he paid enough attention to it to have a constant fixation of trying to hold on to documents, a lot of things we got back from him, obviously, a lot of things we didn't.

MATTINGLY: I've been interested to see some of your Republican counterparts who maybe aren't as hyperbolic, I guess would be the word on some things related to the former president saying, look, this isn't great, but a trial or an indictment of a former president and the frontrunner in the Republican nomination is far worse for the country than what actually happened here.

How do you -- what do you make of that?

[08:25:05]

BOLTON: Well, I don't buy that argument at all. But look, give those who are saying it some credit. Assume, for example, for the sake of discussion that Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, Hunter Biden, fill in the blank, should be indicted, should be prosecuted, and the failure to do so constitutes a double standard. Just assume that for purposes of discussion.

Now look at this indictment of Donald Trump. Do those people who make that complaint say, therefore, the answer is not to prosecute Donald Trump? That the response to a double standard is to move to no standard at all? Absolutely not.

You know, Republicans used to believe that not prosecuting criminals led to more crime. The answer here is take the politics out of the decision, and in this case, proceed with the prosecution, and do the same for anybody else who does anything even remotely like it.

MATTINGLY: So then why is every single other top Republican candidate seemingly critical of the indictment and seemingly afraid to attack him on it?

BOLTON: I don't know, honestly. You know, we hear a lot these days about public opinion polls taken over the weekend. Political leadership doesn't take public opinion polls as blocks of granite. They are interesting pieces of information. Political leaders change public opinion. I think it's critical for those who seek to be the Republican nominee

to tell Republican voters the truth about this indictment. I wish the RNC could e-mail a copy of the indictment to every registered Republican in the country, and I'd simply say, I'm not going to make a lot of arguments with them, just read the indictment and ask yourself, if the government can prove what they allege here, shouldn't this man go to jail?

MATTINGLY: One of the things that I've been trying to get my head around in terms of the scale of what happened here, what's alleged here is the why. Why would the president take these?

You know, there's a lot of theories out there as to why he would want these documents. You were with him. You saw him in action at a very close level. Why do you think? What was the intent here?

BOLTON: Well, I'm not sure I can give you a good answer, but I would say this. Throughout my 17 months there, it is perfectly clear that Donald Trump addressed almost everything that came before him through the prism of the question, how does this benefit Donald Trump?

And so I think a lot of these documents, he may have just thought were cool. A lot of them he thought might be souvenirs, a lot of them, he thought might be useful to him later. I can't answer the question until I see the document.

MATTINGLY: How so do you think?

BOLTON: But -- well, there are a lot of theories that he could use it as information against his enemies, that he could give it to people in exchange for favors.

We don't know. And frankly, I don't think speculating about the reasons is all that helpful. The simple fact he had the documents for any reason or no reason, should subject him to prosecution.

MATTINGLY: How do you think this is for the former president?

BOLTON: Well, I think if I were an innocent person, if I were Donald Trump, and I were innocent, I'd be saying I want this insult to my integrity -- I use these words loosely -- removed as soon as possible. I'm prepared to waive a lot of frivolous procedural motions. I want to go to trial in the next 60 days. I don't want to drag this out. I'm innocent. I can prove it. Let's go.

Does anybody think Donald Trump's really going to do that? I hope the Justice Department really does try for a speedy trial, because frankly, the sooner it goes to a jury, and we find out their answer, whatever -- whatever that answer is going to be the better for the country.

Justice delayed, as they say is justice denied and the court should not let Donald Trump get the kind of delay I suspect he wants.

MATTINGLY: Ambassador John Bolton, thanks so much for your time, sir.

BOLTON: Thank you.

HILL: This just into CNN, JPMorgan Chase settling a class action suit from victims of Jeffrey Epstein. We have those details for you just ahead.

MATTINGLY: And we have some new polling on how this second indictment is faring for the former president politically. Stay with us.

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