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U.S. and China Look to Cool Tensions after Setbacks; Catastrophic Damage from Tornado in Louin, Mississippi; 2024 GOP Rivals Questioned Over Potential Trump Pardon. Aired 6-6:30a ET

Aired June 19, 2023 - 06:00   ET

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

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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh.

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CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR/CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: That's Disney and Pixar's "Elemental." And No. 3 --

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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Want to get out of here?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Whoa! When?

So wait a minute. There's an elite crew with all the best fighter people in it?

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ROMANS: Another superhero story, "Spider-Man: Across the Spider- verse."

All right. Happy Monday, everybody. Thanks for joining me. I'm Christine Romans. CNN THIS MORNING starts right now.

ERICA HILL, CNN ANCHOR: Good Monday morning. I'm Erica Hill, alongside Victor Blackwell this morning. Let's get you started with "Five Things to Know" for this Monday, June 19.

A high-stakes meeting between Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Chinese President Xi Jinping aimed at cooling tensions between the U.S. and China. Xi says the two have -- two sides have made progress. In just a few moments, we will hear Blinken's take on the talks.

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN ANCHOR: More than 50 million people in the Southeast are under severe storm threats today. A large tornado left damage in Mississippi, and a heatwave is pushing Texas's power grid to the brink.

HILL: Across the state of Kansas, at least 100 public officials and legislators have received letters containing suspicious white powder, prompting a federal investigation.

BLACKWELL: Another holiday weekend in America marred by gun violence, from Washington state, to Illinois, to Georgia, lives are lost, communities left on edge.

HILL: And 29-year-old American Windham Clark captures his first career major. How he managed to hold off his opponents to claim victory at the U.S. Open.

CNN THIS MORNING starts right now.

BLACKWELL: All right. Good to be with you this Monday morning. Yes, it is a weekday, and I am here at 6 a.m.

HILL: And you're back in New York, which makes us all very happy.

BLACKWELL: And I'm back in New York. It's beautiful to visit. Glad to be back in the studio.

Today is Juneteenth, third time Juneteenth will be observed as a federal holiday. Juneteenth is an annual commemoration of the end of slavery in the United States after the Civil War.

It was June 19th, 1865. Enslaved people in Galveston, Texas, learned of their emancipation. Now, that was two years after President Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation.

It's been a significant day for years. President Biden, though, signed a law making Juneteenth a federal holiday in 2021.

Now, in honor of Juneteenth, be sure to watch CNN tonight. Some of the biggest names in music will perform a global celebration of freedom. Pre-show coverage starts at 7 p.m. Eastern, highlighting black advocates, trailblazers, creators. It's going to be a good show. It's a good show every year.

HILL: It is. I'm looking forward to it. And I don't have to get up early tomorrow morning, so I can watch the whole thing.

BLACKWELL: Look at you! I will have to watch some of it and then go to bed, because I'm back tomorrow morning.

HILL: That's right. But I'm happy you're back.

Well, we do begin this morning with two super powers trying to manage tensions and also bring the temperature down.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken in China right now. He just met with Chinese President Xi Jinping, who said the two sides have made progress. Blinken said a good relationship between the U.S. and China is in the world's best interests.

Earlier Blinken met with China's top diplomat for about three hours behind closed doors. The State Department calling that meeting candid and productive. We do expect to hear from Blinken himself soon. He's set to hold a

news conference this hour. CNN's Kylie Atwood has more for us now on why the trip is coming at such a critical moment.

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KYLIE ATWOOD, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Secretary of State Antony Blinken shaking hands with President Xi during his two-day high-stakes diplomatic visit to China, as the United States sets out to normalize communications between two super powers.

ANTONY BLINKEN, U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE: The trip has three objectives. First, to establish open and empowered communications so that our two countries responsibly manage our relationship including by discussing challenges, by addressing misperceptions and avoiding mis miscalculations.

ATWOOD (voice-over): On Sunday, Blinken invited Foreign Minister Qin Gang to Washington, an offer that was accepted. U.S. officials say there won't be major deliverables from the two-day visit but deemed the engagement critical, particularly as they hope to regularize military-to-military contact.

In the last few weeks, aggressive Chinese maneuvers resulted in two military incidents between the U.S. and China in the international waters and air space of the South China Sea.

Last month, China also refused a meeting between Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin and his counterpart on the sidelines of a defense conference.

LLOYD AUSTIN, U.S. SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: I think it's important that countries with a significant military capacity and capabilities have the means to talk to each other.

ATWOOD (voice-over): China's foreign ministry called the first day of meetings candid and constructive, but said Blinken received clear demands on Taiwan, saying that the self-ruled island presents the most pronounced risk to the U.S.-China relationship.

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Blinken planned to address U.S. concerns about China's aggressions toward Taiwan among a whole host of other issues, including three Americans wrongfully defended in China and fentanyl precursor chemicals originating in China.

BLINKEN: No. 1 killer of Americans, age 18 to 49. Think about that for just a second. Last year, we seized enough fentanyl to kill every single American, and that's just what we seized.

ATWOOD (voice-over): President Biden hopes that this visit eases tensions, as he looks ahead to a possible meeting with President Xi later this year. JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I'm hoping that, over the

next several months, I'll be meeting with Xi again and talking about legitimate differences we have, but also all those areas we can get along.

ATWOOD (voice-over): Chinese officials, including the Chinese leader himself, claiming recently and repeatedly that the United States is leading an effort to encircle and contain China.

But China is also economically intertwined with the U.S., a key factor as China's post-COVID economic growth has recently slowed down.

And just on Friday, the Chinese leader sat down with U.S. billionaire and businessman Bill Gates, noting that Gates was the first American friend he had met with this year.

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ATWOOD (on camera): President Xi and Secretary Blinken's meeting lasted for about a half hour here in Beijing. And according to Chinese state media, President Xi said that they made progress, and there were specific agreements reached on a number of issues.

Of course now we're waiting this hour for the secretary to have a press conference here in Beijing to give us an update as to what those specific agreements actually entail -- Erica.

HILL: Kylie Atwood, appreciate it. Thank you.

BLACKWELL: Let's go to CNN's Beijing bureau chief, Steven Jiang.

Steven, China's foreign minister said that relations between the U.S. and China were at their lowest point since diplomatic ties were re- established in 1979.

What's the response in Beijing to the meeting between Xi and Blinken?

STEVEN JIANG, CNN BEIJING BUREAU CHIEF: Yes, Victor, you know, that much-anticipated meeting, as you just heard, wrapped up under an hour ago. But even before Secretary Blinken arrived here, I think the one thing everybody seemed to agree was, if Xi Jinping did not meet him, that would be a major snub; that would not bode well for the future direction of this already very much fraught relationship.

Now, that meeting took place -- did take place. This visit seems to have cleared a very low bar, achieving what both sides have set out to do, which of course, was to resume this kind of senior-level dialogue.

But the underlying challenge facing this relationship, as Kylie was pointing out, very much remains the same. Xi Jinping not only said that the U.S. is out to get China, to contain, to suppress China, but more recently, he's been using language like this -- China is facing this external threat environment with dangerous storms ahead, with -- warning officials here to really prepare for extreme scenarios, which has been interpreted by many as hinting on an eventual and a potential conflict with the U.S. But of course, Xi Jinping can play the long game, because he doesn't

face elections and such. So he can still right now publicly saying he's willing to work with the U.S. to stabilize and -- and improve this relationship, which of course, is now the next step for the officials here to really climb down -- back off that anti-U.S. rhetoric and to really prepare the nation to -- to prepare for what their leader has told them to do.

And that reason, of course, as you heard Kylie saying, one of which being the economy. The other, of course, is they very much want to have their leader go to San Francisco in November to have that state visit -- Victor.

BLACKWELL: Steven Jiang for us there in Beijing, thank you.

HILL: Let's bring in CNN senior political analyst and senior editor at "The Atlantic," Ron Brownstein; and "Washington Post" columnist Josh Rogin. He's the author of "Chaos Under Haven: Trump, Xi and the Battle of the 21st Century."

Nice to see you both this morning. So Ron, as we're waiting to hear from Secretary Blinken, get his take, right? We heard a little bit there from Steven Jiang about what's being said in China, domestically. What are you listening for? What -- what will make this meeting a, quote/unquote, "success," even though we're talking about this very low bar --

RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes.

HILL: -- for the U.S.?

BROWNSTEIN: You know, it's one of those cases where success is preventing things from getting worse. Right? There has been a spiral in U.S./China relations.

I'm thinking about the long arc of this. I mean, you know, I remember covering around 2000 the Bill Clinton administration, there was a broad bipartisan view that integrating China more closely into the global economic system would moderate their behavior, both internationally and domestically.

I mean, four-fifths of the Senate Republicans voted to give China most -- permanent most favored nation trading status.

Fast forward, you know, 20 years later, and now there's a broad bipartisan consensus on a tougher posture toward China, including decoupling our economies as much as possible. That -- you know, that points toward a confrontational adversarial future, I think. And finding some way to prevent that downward spiral, with the parallel responses in China, I think that is the definition of success.

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BLACKWELL: Yes. Josh, similar question to you. What will you be looking for to determine if the U.S. has created, as members of the administration have said, that floor? And will you see it today? JOSH ROGIN, COLUMNIST, "WASHINGTON POST": Right. Well, I'll be very

curious to see what specific agreements that Secretary Blinken mentions in his press conference. We can expect them to be on sort of the most low-hanging fruit: countering narcotics, maybe commercial flights, that kind of thing. If gets a couple of Americans home, that would be great, too.

So there's no doubt that there's an interest in preventing the relationship from getting worse than it is.

But I think the problem really is that still, the United States and China do not agree on why it is, as Ron just said, that relations have gotten so bad in the 20 years since we had a great relationship with China.

I think some would say that that's because of some sort of U.S. bipartisan hawkish consensus, but I think it's actually more because China went a different way. Because since Xi Jinping took power in 2013, they decided that engagement wasn't the path that they wanted; and they amped up their economic aggression and military expansion, and started a genocide, and started menacing Taiwan.

And I don't think we're going to hear any overlap between Blinken and his Chinese counterparts on any of those issues. And that's why I think we're really -- this is only really a speed bump as the relationship is going to continue to get worse.

And not because of Congress's hawkishness, but because the Chinese government is now presenting a new face to the world and to the United States, which is, Don't tell us anything about Taiwan; don't tell us anything about the Uyghurs. If you want to have good relations, then you have to have them on our terms.

But I don't -- I think it would be hard for any U.S. president to accept those terms, and that's the fundamental problem that Blinken's trip will fail to solve.

HILL: So then, Ron, how does Biden get over that?

BROWNSTEIN: Yes, look, I think -- I mean, Josh is right that there -- Xi's China, there's a limit to how positive the relationship for any U.S. president is going to be.

But there's a lot of space between that and an endless downward spiral. You know, and the question is whether you can prevent this from becoming, in effect, a new cold war, recognizing the limits of -- of how much we are going to agree with the direction that they're on.

And I think that that is where Biden is. I mean, I think there is still a meaningful space between how Biden views this relationship, more of a competition than, say, Trump and some of the other Republicans, who view it more flat-out adversarial. In many ways, it's an echo of the 1950s, when you had Republicans arguing for disengaging from Europe and focusing more on confronting China. I think we are moving back into that. So there is still, I think, a meaningful space between what Biden

envisions and what I think Trump, DeSantis and others might have in mind.

BLACKWELL: Hey Josh --

ROGIN: Yes.

BLACKWELL: Go ahead, go ahead.

ROGIN: I would just say that, you know, while I don't necessarily disagree with a lot of that, I think it's a very Washington-centric view of the problem.

And as I travel around Asia, I find something different, which is that Japan, the Philippines, South Korea, Australia, India, these are not countries that are worried about China's threat to them because of some Washington consensus. They're worried about it, because China is a threat to them.

And you know, if we always look at it as, Oh, what can Biden and Washington do to improve U.S.-China relations, we're playing into their trap. We're playing into their frame, which is that the U.S. is the problem and not China.

But the demand signal is coming from the region. And there are a lot of countries around the world that have the same problem with an aggressive China that's not following the rules of the road, that's using its power in malign ways, and using it to influence, to control other countries' economies.

And so I think -- I just think we just need to remember here that it's really not all about us. It's not -- good U.S.-China relations are great, but that's not the goal of U.S.-China policy.

The goal of U.S.-China policy is to work with our friends and allies and partners to protect ourselves from the actual threat that China's aggression presents as China rises.

And if China wants to play ball on any of that, that would be great, but that's not really just about Tony Blinken. It's about making sure that China understands that it can have a peaceful rise but not on any terms, and not while it continues to be aggressive and genocidal and threatening the region and the world.

BLACKWELL: Yes. Interestingly enough, H.R. McMaster, former President Trump's national security adviser, said over the weekend that Blinken's trip could project a degree of weakness, by going and saying that we are now working on China's terms. We'll get into that into greater detail. Ron, Josh, stay with us. We'll talk about that in a moment.

Now, as we mentioned, Secretary of State Antony Blinken will hold a news conference a short time from now. We'll bring you there live when that begins. HILL: New this morning, we're seeing the first images after a massive

tornado struck the town of Louin, Mississippi, overnight. Officials say it left behind catastrophic damage. You see some of that there. Homes, buildings torn apart.

Today more than 50 million people across the Southeast are under severe storm threats.

CNN meteorologist Derek van Dam is in the weather center for us this morning. So in terms of these threats and what is ahead for tens of millions of folks today, what are you seeing, Derek?

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DEREK VAN DAM, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Well, Erica, where the tornado occurred late last night in Louin, Mississippi -- that's Jasper County -- they're still under a tornado watch, and they're threatened by very active storms moving through right now.

That shading of red, that's the tornado watch. That's local. Valid through 8 a.m. local time; Eastern Standard, 9 a.m.

But here's Louin. This is the area that got hit hard by what is likely a tornado. We've seen the damage. You saw it just a moment ago on your TV screens.

Notice all the pop-up showers and thunderstorms, none of them tagged severe at the moment, but they could intensify at any moment. We know the conditions there are ripe. We know these storms have a history.

We had eight tornado reports on Sunday. Look at the wind and large hail reports across the Southeastern U.S.

And here we go again. Millions of Americans under the threat of severe weather, stretching from New Orleans to Tallahassee, all the way to Savannah, with a marginal risk for Atlanta.

Now, the other big story we continue to monitor is the triple-digit heat across Texas and Louisiana. This will once again, just like the past weekend, will test the power companies. They say that this will -- they'll be able to meet the demand.

But when you look at temperatures like this, 120 degrees in Corpus Christi, that's what it feels like. There's no escaping that kind of heat -- Victor, Erica.

BLACKWELL: No. Not with the numbers that high. All right. Derek, thank you.

VAN DAM: Welcome.

BLACKWELL: It's becoming kind of a litmus test for the 2024 Republican field.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) CHUCK TODD, HOST, NBC'S "MEET THE PRESS": You have been asked a few times whether you would pardon the former president if he's convicted and if you were the president. Would you?

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BLACKWELL: Mike Pence's answer, ahead.

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JAKE TAPPER, CNN ANCHOR: Based on your experiences working with the Trump and the actions alleged in the indictment, do you think Trump can be trusted with the nation's secrets ever again?

MARK ESPER, FORMER U.S. DEFENSE SECRETARY: Well, based on his actions, again, if proven true, under the indictment by the special counsel, no. I mean, it's just irresponsible action that places our service members at risk, places our nation's security at risk.

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BLACKWELL: That, of course, was Donald Trump's former secretary of defense, Mark Esper, suggesting Trump could be a national security risk if elected again.

Donald Trump's indictment for allegedly mishandling classified documents continues to cast a shadow on the 2024 presidential race. His Republican primary rivals are fielding a barrage of questions about it over the weekend. One focus: whether they'd pardon Trump if he's convicted.

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TODD: You have been asked a few times whether you would pardon the former president if he's convicted and if you were the president. Would you?

MIKE PENCE, FORMER VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Well, I just think the question is -- is premature.

TODD: If you were President Biden, would you pardon him right now?

PENCE: I just think this whole matter is incredibly divisive for the country.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Will you sign on to a pledge that our next guest is asking all GOP candidates to sign onto that you would pardon Donald Trump, if convicted and you became president?

SEN. TIM SCOTT (R-SC), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Well, I'm not going to deal with the hypotheticals. But I will say that every American is innocent until proven guilty.

(END VIDEO CLIP) BLACKWELL: Ron Brownstein is back with us. Do you think the -- the electorate in the primary, they're going to accept that ambiguity?

BROWNSTEIN: Well, look, I mean, it is a -- promising to pardon Trump seems to me a no-win position for a Republican presidential candidate, in that any voter who would demand that you do that is going to prefer Trump himself while he's still an option.

And once you do promise to pardon him, you are basically signaling to the broader electorate that you are under his thumb, and makes it easier for Democrats to portray whoever wins as an extension of Trumpism.

You know, the polling, I think, is pretty clear on two fronts. These indictments are helping him within the Republican primary. But outside of the Republican coalition, it's having the effect that you would expect it would have. There are a lot of voters who view this, outside of the Republican coalition, as a threat to national security and question whether someone who is -- if he is convicted of a crime, should serve as president again.

You hear that from Mark Esper. You hear that from Bill Barr. You are not hearing that from the other Republican presidential candidates. They're kind of ignoring the elephant in the room, as it were, that this could be an enormous problem for Trump in a general election, if the party nominates him.

HILL: But that's what's so interesting, too, right? Is not only ignoring that, but ignoring the allegations in this indictment --

BROWNSTEIN: Yes.

HILL: -- which are incredibly serious and were very clear and pretty detailed. And to not really be willing to have that conversation either.

Does this trouble you? Do these allegations trouble you, if true? It's an immediate pivot to something else.

BROWNSTEIN: Right. Yes. Look, I mean, this is -- this is not unusual. When you talk to political scientists who study authoritarian and quasi-authoritarian movements around the world, they will tell you that moments of legal challenge are often a chance for the strongman leader in the party to assert his dominance by forcing even his rivals to publicly defend the indefensible.

And that's what we are seeing from most of these Republican candidates. Maybe not overtly defending it, but refusing, as you say, to condemn it.

And in stark contrast -- I mean, we're talking about Mark Esper, Bill Barr, people who were in his cabinet. Will Hurd, former CIA official, who will say explicitly --

HILL: Yes. BROWNSTEIN: -- what, I think, many Americans understand. This was incredibly reckless behavior; as Esper said, put our national security at risk.

And the fact that no Republican presidential candidate in the inner tier -- as opposed to someone like Christie or Hutchinson, on the periphery of the race -- is willing to say that is kind of a statement of how little market they think there is in the party coalition for a full-scale attack on Trump.

But part of the reason that exists is because no one they trust is making that argument.

BLACKWELL: Yes.

BROWNSTEIN: And so a self-fulfilling prophecy.

BLACKWELL: President Biden's not going to touch it either.

BROWNSTEIN: Yes.

BLACKWELL: He didn't touch it at his first rally in Philly. The -- the campaign says he's not going to get involved. The White House says he's not going to comment on it.

Does he have to if you have Esper out there, if you have, as you say, the periphery candidates --

BROWNSTEIN: Yes.

BLACKWELL: -- Christie and Hutchinson talking about it? Does he lose a really potent cudgel if he doesn't talk about it?

BROWNSTEIN: I think if he gets to a general election against Donald Trump, you will hear about it.

BLACKWELL: He has to then?

BROWNSTEIN: I think. Yes.

But in the broader -- in a broader indictment of Trump's volatility and unpredictability and refusal to kind of follow rules.

But I think most people would say it does not make sense for Joe Biden to be talking about this now, since it is his Justice Department and special counsel that is pursuing the case. You know, Republicans will want to argue that he's politicizing it.

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Now, whether it also is -- is the right decision for the broad Democratic Party, and in particular, former national security officials in the Democratic Party to be so silent, that's a very different question.

When you have so many voices on the right, basically trying to preemptively delegitimize this investigation as inherently political. You know, nothing to see here. The fact that you don't have former defense secretaries or CIA directors or, for that matter, Democratic senators out there making the case that Mark Esper and Bill Barr made, I think there are Democrats who find that a little mystifying.

HILL: What is behind that, do you think? I mean, based on people that you're speaking with --

BROWNSTEIN: Yes.

HILL: -- is there a push to get more people out there and to be more vocal, and there's some resistance to it?

BROWNSTEIN: Yes, I think. I think -- well, what's behind it is that the Biden administration is reluctant to do anything that would feed into this conservative narrative that this is inherently political.

HILL: Yes, but it is -- it's not the administration saying.

BROWNSTEIN: Now the administration, they don't want -- you know, they -- they have -- there's this kind of an excess of caution. I mean, it goes with their -- their broader view that governing, you know, is the key contrast with the kind of chaos that always surrounds Donald Trump.

But I think there are a lot of Democrats who are uneasy with how silent the broad party has been, including former national security officials, in the midst of this very sustained attempt, offensive by Trump's defenders to kind of preemptively delegitimize the -- the indictment.

HILL: All right. Ron Brownstein, stick around. Much more to talk about this morning.

Meantime, another weekend marred by gun violence in America. At festivals, celebrations, even a teen party. Plus --

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He takes down all the stars in Los Angeles to win the United States Open.

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BLACKWELL: Golfer Wyndham Clark makes it count. How he managed to outswing the likes of Rory McIlroy, next.

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