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Hunter Biden Facing Nine Charges in Federal Tax Case; Cheseboro Helping Four State Probes of Fake Electors Plot; New Video Shows Israeli Forces in Gaza Detaining Dozens of Blindfolded Men Stripped to Underwear. Aired 7-7:30a ET

Aired December 08, 2023 - 07:00   ET

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

[07:00:00]

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN ANCHOR: Let's do it. Coy, you're coming too.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: Thank you.

MATTINGLY: Thanks, buddy.

And CNN This Morning continues right now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Criminal charges accuses Hunter Biden of evading federal taxes on millions of dollars.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Nine counts, they have filed, alleging that he engaged in a four-year scheme

ELIE HONIG, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: Now we're into felonies, and the stakes are much higher.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Donald Trump's return to his high-stakes New York civil fraud trial.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This witness was unequivocal in giving Donald Trump exactly what he wanted to hear.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A campaign stop when he does take the stand again.

DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: It's a political witch hunt meant to influence an election.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Stark images of dozens of Palestinian men being beaten by Israeli forces.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Israel is claiming that it has taken out a number of Hamas leaders.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Still organized to fire rockets against cities in Israel and we've seen those barrages tick up again.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: An investigation into Harvard, U. Penn and MIT after their presidents failed to condemn anti-Semitism.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Board of Advisers calling for a leadership change at U. Penn.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It must be condemned and condemned unequivocally.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTINGLY: A good Friday morning, everyone. I'm Phil Mattingly with Poppy Harlow in New York.

This morning, the 2024 campaign trail is on a collision course with the U.S. justice system. Hunter Biden now facing nine new federal criminal charges as investigators say he avoided paying $1.4 million in taxes, instead spending that money on things like drugs, escorts, pornography and luxury hotels.

HARLOW: Now, Hunter Biden is not President Joe Biden, and there is no allegation in the 56-page indictment that the president did anything wrong. He's not even mentioned, but that is not stopping House Republicans from making Hunter Biden's business dealings a basis for their impeachment inquiry.

MATTINGLY: Now, one presidential candidate who is facing legal trouble to the tune of 91 criminal indictments, that's Donald Trump. His legal team now working to delay his federal election subversion case, which is set to go on trial currently in March, the day before Super Tuesday. And he is set to take the stand in his New York City civil fraud trial on Monday.

HARLOW: We also this hour have new exclusive CNN reporting. Former Trump Attorney Kenneth Cheseboro, an architect of Trump's fake elector scheme who pleaded guilty in Georgia, well, now, he is cooperating, helping investigators in at least four other states. More on that in a moment.

First though, let's go to our Senior Legal Analyst Elie Honig with more. Elie, walk us through this indictment and what stands out to you.

HONIG: Yes, Poppy. The stakes are so much higher now for Hunter Biden. Now, you may recall that back in July, Hunter Biden walked into a federal courtroom expecting to plead guilty to two tax misdemeanors with a probation sentence attached. That deal fell apart at the last minute.

Now, let's look at how things have changed. Now, Hunter Biden is looking at nine separate charges, tax evasion, tax fraud, and non- payment of taxes. And really importantly, these two, there's one count of evasion, two counts of fraud, these are felonies now, much more serious. Tax evasion carries a max sentence of five years. Fraud carries a max sentence of three years. Nobody gets the max, but much more serious than before.

Now, if we look at the indictment, this alleges a scheme covering four years, 2016 through and including 2019. The allegation is that during that time, Hunter Biden made around $7 million in income primarily from foreign companies in Ukraine and China. It doesn't allege that those were bribes, does not allege Hunter Biden was engaged in illegal influence peddling as a lobbyist, but makes clear he did not do actual work meriting $7 million worth of income. And the allegation is that he failed to pay and committed fraud with respect to about $1.4 million in taxes owed.

Now, the indictment lays out in detail the way Hunter Biden would allegedly commit this fraud. For example, he took false business deductions. The indictment alleges as one example that in 2018, he claimed he had $388,000 worth of business travel, but, in fact, the allegation is he was doing no business, no real work. So, he writes that off and that's a fraud.

The indictment also details lavish personal spending by Hunter Biden, $4.8 million worth of money that the government says he could have easily paid back instead of used on personal expenses ranging from cars and clothes to quote unquote, adult entertainment.

One other interesting thing from the indictment, the sources of evidence that DOJ uses, they use Hunter Biden's memoir. They use things he says in his book against him. It's quoted extensively in the indictment. That's fair play. It's a statement by Hunter Biden. And they used certain texts from Hunter Biden, including one that references taxes. It's not exactly a smoking gun, but they say, well, look, he knew he had to pay taxes. He knew he owed these.

MATTINGLY: Hunter Biden already had another indictment. Do these two overlap at all?

HONIG: So, completely separate cases. Let's remember he's already charged with firearms charges relating to possessing a firearm while a felon. Those are brought in federal court in Delaware. And now, Hunter Biden is looking at literally a two-front battle here.

[07:05:01]

He's got two separate indictments, both federal, one in Delaware, one in California. It's tough enough to beat one federal case, never mind two. He can try to have those two cases combined into one. That's an interesting strategic call his lawyers are going to have to make.

HARLOW: What about this push for an impeachment? Because I will say California and Delaware are the two jurisdictions where when this plea deal was about to happen, critics of it, Republicans were pointing and saying, what about those two jurisdictions? Why has that even been brought here?

HONIG: So, no mention of Joe Biden, no reference to Joe Biden in the indictment. James Comer, of course, is teasing on this. And he says that Hunter Biden's corporate entities implicated by today's indictments funneled foreign cash that landed in Joe Biden's bank account.

Little bit of sleight of hand happening here, though, because Comer is focused on the payments, the $7 million that Hunter Biden received. But that's not the crime. The indictment makes clear, there is no charge. There could have been a charge of bribery if there was bribery. There could have been a charge of foreign lobbying if that was the case. There is no such charge.

The crime here is the tax part of that. And I don't see any link in the indictment or even in Comer's statement to Joe Biden. So, we'll see. We'll see if James Comer has the --

HARLOW: That's a really important point.

HONIG: Yes. Look, he's been promising quite a bit in this impeachment inquiry. The link is not there. We'll see if he finds something new. They've had a year to do it. We'll see where they go.

HARLOW: Thank you, Elie, very much.

Now to a CNN exclusive report, Kenneth Cheseboro, the pro-Trump lawyer who helped devise the 2020 fake electors plot, he is now working with investigators, helping them in Michigan and Wisconsin.

Cheseboro has already pleaded guilty to that plot in Georgia. He also recently testified to a grand jury in Nevada and has plans to sit for an interview in Arizona.

Zach Cohen broke this news. He joins us now. How significant that he's cooperating in multiple states?

ZACHARY COHEN, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY REPORTER: Yes. Good morning, guys. I don't think anyone would consider Ken Cheseboro a household name, but he was at the center of a key part of Donald Trump's effort to overturn the 2020 election, that was this effort to put forward fake electors in seven key battleground states. And as you've mentioned, he's already pled of guilty to a related crime in the Georgia state level investigation into Trump's efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

And now prosecutors in at least four other states also want to talk to Ken Cheseboro. They're conducting their own investigations into the fake electors that were put forward in their states. They want to know how those electors were organized, why they signed these fake certificates that were submitted to Congress and ultimately rejected by when Mike Pence declined to overturn the election on January 6.

But it remains to be seen really how much help Ken Cheseboro can be to these state level investigations. We've already seen criminal charges be brought down in two of them. Nevada recently, just as recently as this week, indicted all six of their fake electors after talking to Ken Cheseboro. So, we're going to have to wait and see what the ultimate result of these state level investigations is.

But that's not even to count in Jack Smith's federal indictment that does list Ken Cheseboro as an unindicted co conspirator. Of course, Donald Trump is the only one indicted and charged in the federal probe, but Ken Cheseboro could be involved down the line in that one as well. MATTINGLY: Yes, a key player. A lot of moving parts, but a key player, Zach Cohen, just been churning out scoops this week, thank you.

HARLOW: Also, these disturbing new images, they show Israeli soldiers detaining dozens of men in Gaza who are stripped down to their underwear. We will take you live to Israel with what we're learning about this.

MATTINGLY: And in just a few hours, the FDA could approve a potential breakthrough treatment for sickle cell disease. We meet one young patient who is among the first in the world to try it out.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JONATHAN LUBIN, CRISPR SICKLE CELL TRIAL PARTICIPANT: Wow, that's pretty cool.

FABIENNE DESIR, JOHNNY'S MOM: And scary.

LUBIN: And -- yes, and freaky.

MEG TIRRELL, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Do you feel like a medical pioneer?

LUBIN: I don't know. I feel like a guinea pig.

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MATTINGLY: Breaking overnight, two rockets hit the U.S. embassy in Baghdad, causing minor damage, but no casualties. The explosions were heard in Iraq's heavily fortified green zone, and sirens were activated, warning people to quote duck and cover.

No group has claimed responsibility yet, but Iranian-backed militias are believed to be behind the strikes. Since mid-October, American or coalition forces across the region have been under regular attack due to Washington's support for Israel's operation in Gaza.

HARLOW: New and disgusting images this morning showing the Israeli military detaining dozens of men in Gaza that are seen stripped down to their underwear. There they are. They're wearing blindfolds. They are kneeling with their heads down.

The human rights group says they were also severely abused. Family members confirm at least some of those men are civilians. The exact dates and circumstances of the detention not clear yet. The IDF has not responded to CNN's request for comment.

Meantime, the IDF has released a satellite image of video claiming it shows Hamas rocket launches near the humanitarian zone but CNN has not been able to independently yet confirm the location of that.

Today, the United Nations Security Council will vote on a humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza while Israel intensifies its airstrikes and its ground offensive there.

Let's go to Ben Wedeman. He joins us live from Jerusalem.

Obviously, seeing those images is incredibly disturbing especially considering some of their family members are saying at least some of those men are civilians and not Hamas terrorists. Is Israel responding at all explaining it?

BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, actually, one of the chief spokesmen for the Israeli military did come out with a statement saying that we check who is connected to Hamas and who is not, and we detain and question everybody.

And this is not -- although the image is disturbing, it's not the first time this has happened. Back in 2002, when I was covering Israel's reinvasion of the West Bank, we saw on multiple occasions that essentially all men, teenagers actually, from around 15 to 60 in many towns and villages were just rounded up, corralled into one place, and they were slowly, one-by-one, taken for questioning. Some were released, some were not.

But CNN has been in touch with people who say they recognize relatives there.

[07:15:03]

One, for instance, said he's a shopkeeper. He has nothing to do with any of the militant factions. Another, apparently, is a journalist. And he also -- his editor, has protested this.

But it does appear that what the Israelis are doing in areas that they control, particularly in Northern Gaza, they're going into these U.N. schools where people have sheltered. And they're just taking all the men of military age and probably a bit younger and a bit older and taking them away for questioning. We don't know when they will be released. Poppy?

MATTINGLY: Ben, I want to ask you about a separate issue, but one I know you've been following very closely in some degree personally. What do we know about the investigation into the death and injuries of journalists in Southern Lebanon? I understand you and your team saw one of them that morning, attended the funeral. Is there any update on what the IDF is looking into here?

WEDEMAN: Yes. This is an incident on the 13th of October in South Lebanon along the border. The journalist killed was a friend of mine, Issam Abdallah, working for Reuters.

Now, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, AFP have done an extensive investigation analyzing footage, analyzing the remains of the munitions that killed Issam Abdallah and injured six others, including an American stills photographer, Dylan Collins, who's also a friend of mine. Fortunately, he was only lightly wounded.

So, they've really analyzed every aspect of this incident, and they've come to the conclusion that they were targeted by an Israeli tank. Now, we were also that day on the border in a different location, essentially doing the same thing. We were out in the open wearing flat jackets, marked press with a car, marked T.V., as they were in the open. They were in that location for about an hour, and then they came under fire, first with one tank round and just about 45 seconds later with another.

Now, this investigation says that these investigations say that the Israelis deliberately targeted the journalists because it was obvious that's who they were.

Now just give me one more second. The IDF says they're investigating, they haven't reached a conclusion, but it's important to keep in mind that this is not the first time the journalists have died as a result in this conflict. And the Israeli human rights group, B'Tselem, has investigated all the IDF investigations and said they tend to be, this is their words, organized cover-ups aimed not to bring about truth and accountability, but on the contrary, to prevent that. Phil?

MATTINGLY: Ben Wedeman, we appreciate you sharing that. As you point out, dozens of journalists have been killed since this conflict began. We appreciate the reporting, Ben, thank you.

HARLOW: And so sorry for the loss of his friend.

All right, this morning, we are learning that the UNLV gunman mailed letters before his rampage. What are officials saying was inside those letters? That is next.

MATTINGLY: And some pretty incredible surveillance video showing a group of students in Utah racing to save a mother and her young kids who were trapped under a car. The mother was standing in the school parking lot when a driver was blinded by the sun and hit them. The school says the mother had surgery and is recovering in a wheelchair. The children, they'll be okay.

We'll be right back.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was just horrifying because you're hearing screams of students, everyone is confused, no one knows what's happening or where it's coming from. So, it was terrifying.

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MATTINGLY: We're learning new information this morning in the deadly shooting at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Three faculty members were killed, including 64-year-old Professor Jerry Chang and 39-year- old Assistant Professor Patricia Navarro-Velez.

Law enforcement has identified 67-year-old Anthony Polito as the gunman. He was a career college professor and had applied for several positions in Nevada but was rejected from all of them. He also had a list of people he was seeking on campus, although none of the victims were on that list.

HARLOW: Police arrived on the scene within minutes and confronted the shooter. You can see that in video from the Las Vegas Police Department. Police say the gunman used a 9-millimeter Taurus handgun, bought legally last year and had 11 magazines.

Prior to the shooting, Polito sent 22 letters to various university personnel nationwide with no return address listed. And some of those envelopes had white powder inside, but law enforcement says the substance was harmless.

Detectives are working with the Postal Service to try to find the rest of those letters and warn anyone in the education world to be careful if they receive any letter with no return address.

MATTINGLY: Well, Health This Morning, the FDA appears ready to green light the first treatment using gene editing. If approved, it would target sickle cell disease, which affects about 100,000 people in the U.S., many of whom are black.

Few treatments are available at this point, so this has the potential to be a game changer.

CNN's Meg Tirrell joins us now. Meg, you spoke to a young patient who's one of the first people in the world to have his genes actually edited, which sounds terrifying, but could be a tremendous breakthrough. Why?

TIRRELL: No, absolutely. I mean, he put it that way as well. And it will be so exciting for everybody to get to hear from him. This is a huge moment in science and also in medicine, because CRISPR itself, this gene-editing tool, was really only discovered almost a decade ago, won the Nobel Prize in 2020.

And sickle cell itself has also been a neglected disease in the pharmaceutical industry. So, this is a huge moment on multiple fronts. Check it out.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TIRRELL (voice over): Two years ago, it was hard to imagine 15-year- old Johnny Lubin doing this for very long.

Born with sickle cell disease, an inherited disorder affecting the red blood cells, Johnny has been in and out of the hospital his entire life, dealing with bouts of extreme pain and other serious complications.

LUBIN: It was kind of hard for me to do things, like have fun and stuff, because I'd always have to be worried about if I'd have a pain crisis or not.

It would mostly be in my back, like my lower back, and it would always be like really like a pounding pain in my back, so it hurt a lot.

[07:25:06]

TIRRELL: How long would they last?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Sometimes days.

TIRRELL: Until now, the only hope for a cure for the estimated 100,000 people in the U.S. with the disease has been a bone marrow transplant. But like more than 80 percent of patients with sickle cell, Johnny couldn't find a donor.

DESIR: We were desperate. At that point, we were like, okay, what's going to be next? We thought that we were going to lose him.

TIRRELL: So, Johnny and his family decided to try something that's almost never been done before.

LUBIN: I was worrying that I might be like, get like superpowers or something, like --

TIRRELL: As part of a clinical trial for a completely new kind of treatment, Johnny is now one of the first people in the world to have his genes edited using CRISPR to treat his disease.

LUBIN: I'm like, wow, that's really cool.

DESIR: And scary.

LUBIN And -- yes, and freaky.

TIRRELL: Do you feel like a medical pioneer?

LUBIN: I don't know. I feel like a guinea pig.

TIRRELL: In sickle cell, a genetic mutation causes red blood cells, which carry oxygen around the body, to be misshapen like crescents or sickles. They can get stuck in the blood vessels causing severe pain and decreased oxygen to organs.

CRISPR allows you to make a precise cut in DNA. In this case, cells are removed from the body and edited to turn on production of a different form of the oxygen-carrying protein hemoglobin, a type we have when we're babies explains Johnny's doctor, Monica Bhatia. Then the edited cells are returned to the patient.

DR. MONICA BHATIA, NY-PRESBYTERIAN/COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY IRVING MEDICAL CENTER: So, in essence, it's a fetal hemoglobin induction process.

TIRRELL: And that's good enough?

BHATIA: Fetal hemoglobin, we know, has oxygen, a higher oxygen carrying capacity than adult hemoglobin or sickle hemoglobin. And so, yes, it is more than good enough.

TIRRELL: And so far, it has been good enough. 29 out of 30 patients, including Johnny, met the trial's goal, being free from having a pain crisis for at least a year after treatment.

How long's it been?

LUBIN: Two years.

TIRRELL: Now, Johnny and his family celebrate his treatment day as his second birthday.

LUBIN: October 4th is when I got the infusion. So, basically, I got the whole new like dose of like cells and stuff.

TIRRELL: And while Johnny didn't turn into a superhero, what he got might be even better.

J.R. LUBIN, JOHNNY'S DAD: I'm starting to teach them how to drive, so that's another thing to worry about. So, yes, so we're stepping into the regular worrisome of you know raising a teenager.

TIRRELL: The chance to be a regular kid.

DESIR: He's a clown. My baby is a clown.

LUBIN: Yes, I am. Yes.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

TIRRELL (on camera): So, you guys heard there, it's been two years since he's had a pain crisis. They don't know how long this is going to last. The hope is that it's lifelong.

But you have to get the cells removed from your body. They're edited and then returned. That comes with a lot of complications. Chemotherapy, you have to stay in the hospital for a month. So, there are risks to that. This also could be very expensive, maybe $2 million per treatment. So, there are questions about how widely it will be used. But it is expected to get approved today and it will be a huge medical --

HARLOW: Big deal. And you don't need a donor.

TIRRELL: Right.

HARLOW: That is a game changer.

TIRRELL: Yes.

HARLOW: What a story. Thanks, Meg.

TIRRELL: Thanks guys.

MATTINGLY: Well, new overnight, a woman has been arrested for trying to set Martin Luther King Jr.'s first home on fire. We're going to be live outside that house.

HARLOW: There are more calls this morning for the president of the University of Pennsylvania to resign after her congressional testimony on anti-Semitism. We're going to be joined by the president of Wellesley University on that.

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