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CNN This Morning

President Biden's Son Hunter Biden Now Facing Felony Charges of Tax Evasion; Former President Trump to Testify in Civil Fraud Trial in New York; "The Atlantic" Publishes Articles Warning of Dangers of Future Trump Presidency; The Atlantic: Trump will Demand Military Loyalty, Russia Launches Cruise Missiles at Ukraine, Senate Democrats Propose Adding Conditions to Israel Aid. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired December 08, 2023 - 08:00   ET

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

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RUBY CHEN, FATHER OF MISSING IDF SOLDIER: But we need to remember the fact, Poppy, that we have here eight U.S. citizens. I'm a U.S. taxpayer, as well as the other families. We need to understand that if leadership of President Biden and the administration does not come to negotiate a deal, then there will be more American citizens that will die, adding to the 30 something U.S. citizens that have already been killed on October 7th.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: Ruby Chen, our hearts are with you very much. I am sure many in leadership are listening. Thank you very much for your time.

CHEN: Thank you for having me.

HARLOW: Of course.

And CNN THIS MORNING continues right now.

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DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: It's OK. It's just a fraud. It's election interference. It's keeping me here instead of Iowa and New Hampshire.

And I should be right now in Iowa and New Hampshire, South Carolina. I shouldn't be sitting in a courthouse. And I don't have to sit here. I could just do whatever I want to do. But I want to make sure that you get the true story.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us on this Friday. The 2024 campaign trail is running straight through the courthouse, or courthouses, if you will. Former President Trump set to take the stand in his New York civil fraud trial on Monday. He chose to be in the courtroom yesterday rather than the campaign trail. And in the federal election subversion case against him, Trump's legal team is working to delay the trial, which is set to begin in March in the heat of the presidential election season.

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN ANCHOR: And there are also new legal problems for the current president's son, Hunter Biden, now facing nine new federal criminal charges. He's accused of failing to pay at least $1.4 million in taxes from 2016 through 2019. Instead, prosecutors say he spent millions on, quote, drugs, escorts, luxury hotels, and exotic cars, in short, everything but his taxes.

HARLOW: Now, it's worth noting Hunter Biden is not President Joe Biden and there is no allegation in any of the 56 pages of this indictment that the president did anything wrong. He is not mentioned in the indictment. But it could still have big political implications for him as House Republicans have made Hunter Biden's business dealings a basis for their impeachment inquiry push against the president. Here is how the president responded to questions about his son.

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JOE BIDEN, (D) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: First of all, my son has done nothing wrong. I trust him. I have faith in him. And it affects my presidency by making me feel proud of him.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Can you explain to Americans, this impeachment inquiry, why you interacted with so many of son and brother's foreign business associates?

BIDEN: I'm not going to comment on that. I did not. And it's just a bunch of lies.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTINGLY: That last comment you heard coming this week.

Let's begin with CNN's Katelyn Polantz. Katelyn, these new charges, the 56 pages, very, very detailed, I would note. You have been following this case much longer and much more in detail than I have. Break down the new charges here.

KATELYN POLANTZ, CNN CRIME AND JUSTICE REPORTER: Yes, so this is nine federal charges filed in court to California. Before Hunter Biden had a plea deal that fell apart, those were all misdemeanors. But, surprise, they're back. The special counsel's office that revived this investigation after that plea deal fell apart, they've brought nine charges. They span related to the tax years of 2016 through 2019, but a lot of this is based around what happened in one year, 2018. That's a big year for Hunter Biden. These felony charges, two of them, are about that year, I believe.

And the difference here is it's not just that he is being accused of failing to pay his taxes. The IRS says he didn't pay $1.4 million that he owed them. There's also these felony accusations that boil down to lying to the IRS. That's where the Justice Department, the special counsel, the prosecutors, they are putting Hunter Biden on blast. It's a 56-page indictment and it goes into great detail about all of the things that Hunter Biden was spending his money on instead of paying his taxes.

And they are saying things like he is spending almost $700,000 towards women, that includes exotic dancers, people who are escorts, clothing accessories, adult entertainment, pornography website, $27,000 in 2018 alone. I'm going to come back to that in a second.

The other thing here is that with these, they are saying that he had the money to pay. He had $7 million coming in in all of the businesses, interests that he had. And then instead of putting it towards the IRS or telling the IRS, it was going towards an extravagant lifestyle.

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And that's where one of these felony charges comes really into play where the IRS, or the Justice Department is saying that Hunter Biden is claiming false deductions, including a $10,000 payment for his membership in sex club, among many other things, renting a Lamborghini, paying tens of thousands of dollars to luxury hotels. He is claiming those things are business expenses when the Justice Department says, no, those were personal expenses. One of those things particularly was this. He claimed this as a business expense, according to the Justice Department, and instead put $27,000 into online porn.

All of this taken together is quite a serious set of charges. Hunter Biden's attorney Abbe Lowell has been quite open, saying we're going to take you to trial if you charge them. They already are on the path to trial related to a gun charge in Delaware. Now in California we are very much expecting that as well. And the statement from Abbe Lowell, "If Hunter Biden's last name was anything other than Biden, the charges in Delaware and now California would not have been brought." They are ready to fight and they are ready, too, to say that he is a political victim, and also probably very likely to highlight that this distances him from his father. He had a couple bad years. He wrote about it in his memoir. 2018 was clearly a bad year where he spent quite a lot of money.

MATTINGLY: Can I ask how they interact, the two indictments? There's a Delaware that had already happened, now in California. Do they overlap at all?

POLANTZ: Well, a little bit in that his attorneys, because whenever he initially cut his plea deal, he cut it as two separate things, the gun charge and the tax-related misdemeanors. And whenever he went to court on that initially, his attorneys have been saying we had a deal with the Justice Department that he wasn't going to be charged elsewhere. So they -- we are going to see that argument come up in this case in Delaware that he should never have gotten charged in California because everything should have ended for him after that agreement was made that they weren't going to prosecute him on the gun case. And that should have applied to the tax charges as well. We'll see if that is something that can happen in the California court. It's a Trump-appointed judge on this case. We will see if they make that argument to him and if that is going to fly at all.

MATTINGLY: Katelyn Polantz, thank you. Poppy?

HARLOW: As we mentioned, Donald Trump says he will testify in the civil trial against him. That will be Monday. He will not be there today when court resumed at 10:00 a.m. Kara Scannell is live outside the courthouse. So interesting because Alina Habba, one of his attorneys, said publicly, I told him I don't think he should testify. But this is how passionately he feels about it, so he is going to take the stand.

KARA SCANNELL, CNN REPORTER: Yes, Poppy, that's right. Donald Trump is expected to take the stand on Monday. And this time he will have a lot more latitude in his answers than when he testified the first time when the New York attorney general's team called him as their witness. So he will be questioned by his lawyers, and, as you say, his attorney Alina Habba yesterday, she said that he is not afraid to testify. She said he will add some clarity to this, but she also said she didn't think he should. Take a listen.

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ALINA HABBA, ATTORNEY FOR DONALD TRUMP: He still wants to take the stand even though my advice is, at this point, you should never take the stand with a gag order. But he is so firmly against what is happening in this court.

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SCANNELL: Now, the gag order in this case is very narrow. It just prevents the former president from speaking about the judge's clerk. So that suggests that we might see a bit of a repeat of what we saw last time when Trump was essentially campaigning from the witness stand, criticizing the New York attorney general who was sitting in that room, and also criticizing a judge who was sitting just a few feet to his right. Trump, though, at that time did actually acknowledge that he had a role in the financial statements. He said that the banks did rely on them, but he said that he relied on the accountants to make sure that the numbers were right.

So we can expect it to be pretty long day on Monday and probably with a lot of activity. You may remember the last time the judge had even told Trump's lawyers they needed to control their client or he would control him, essentially remove him from the witness stand. So you can expect the tensions to be high in the courtroom because the stakes are high for the former president with his reputation as a wealthy businessman and the future of his business in New York. Phil, Poppy?

HARLOW: Kara Scannell outside the courthouse, thank you. Big day ahead on Monday.

MATTINGLY: As everybody continues to focus on the legal and the political, there are also an escalating number of warnings about what Trump would actually do if reelected. Our next guest just published a piece in "The Atlantic" warning about Trump's ambitions for the military. Tom Nichols writes, "If Donald Trump wins the next election, he will attempt to turn the men and women of the United States Armed Forces into pretorians loyal not to the Constitution but only to him." HARLOW: Trump tried to use the military to break up protests in 2020,

and his advisors later considered using the Pentagon to seize voting machines following his election loss. And now the Republican frontrunner is threatening to deploy the National Guard to crack down on crime in primary blue states, and also if he takes back the White House. Listen.

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DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: The next time I am not waiting. One of the things I did was let them run it, and we are going to show how bad a job they do. We did that. We don't have to wait any longer. We got to get crime out of our cities.

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HARLOW: Joining us is Tom Nichols, staff writer for "The Atlantic." We should note, your piece is one of so many. The entire edition of "The Atlantic" is dedicated to the danger of a future Trump presidency. Tom, help us decipher the rhetoric versus the reality here when it comes specifically to the military.

TOM NICHOLS, STAFF WRITER, "THE ATLANTIC": Trump makes a great show of venerating the military in public. He talks about how much he loves the military and talks about his generals when, in fact, he actually has a deep disrespect for the military, as I point out in the piece. This is a guy who referred to the -- to America's war dead as losers and suckers.

And he doesn't really understand, as John Kelly, four-star marine general, as John Kelly later said, doesn't understand anyone who has served their country honorably. What he does understand is the pomp and the parades and the salutes and sir, and he wants to use that force as his personal muscle. We know this. This isn't hypothetical.

And I think one of the things to point out about all of the articles in this special issue of "The Atlantic" is that these were carefully written and fact checked articles based heavily upon Trump's said and done already. So the distance between his rhetoric and his actions when it comes to the military or anything else is getting really vanishingly small considering that he has already tried to do a lot of the things that we talk about. He has already tried to use the U.S. military against its own citizens. He talked about how he wishes that America's generals were as loyal to him as the Wehrmacht's officers were to Hitler. He really isn't kidding. As my colleague David Graham points out, he is not bluffing.

And there are plans to gut any of the civilian civil service guardrails that are inside the Defense Department and the Justice Department and the rest of the government. So, in tandem, these are really dangerous things, and I think he is quite serious about not making the same mistakes twice.

MATTINGLY: Tom, the point you make about his frustration with loyalty or lack thereof from within the military, take a listen to what the former chairman of the joint chiefs, Mark Milley, who the president suggested said should be executed, had to say at his farewell ceremony.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEN. MARK MILLEY, CHAIRMAN, JOINT CHIEFS: We don't take an oath a king or a queen or to a tyrant or a dictator, and we don't take an oath to wannabe dictator. We don't take an oath to an individual. We take an oath to the Constitution, and we take an oath to the idea that is America, and we're willing to die to protect it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTINGLY: Do you feel -- are you concerned that others in military leadership don't share that perspective, or do you just think that this is going to bring forth a crisis between military leaders having to make that decision if challenged on constitutional issues?

NICHOLS: Military leaders have already had to make decisions that challenge the problem -- that are a challenge to the Constitution. They have had to make that decision about do I obey the president, or do I obey the Constitution, which is why Trump has such a grudge against the military, because he sees the professional military as people who thwarted him and slow-rolled him and didn't let him do the things he wanted to do.

And so what he'll do is replace those officers until he finds somebody that will do the things he wants to do. And again, I think that's what he is going to do throughout the rest of the government. The same thing he will do, for example, in the Justice Department. He will just roll through people until he finds an attorney general that is just going to do the things he wants him to do.

A little harder to do with the military, as you are taking people that have been in a lifetime of service. But as I point out in the article, it won't take that many officers. It will only take a small number who decide to take Trump's unholy bargain here and to serve the president in the belief that you really are serving the Constitution, because Trump has always made the case that the president is the state, the president is the Constitution, the president is the ultimate authority on everything in the country. He has a monarchical view of his own power.

[08:15:00]

And I think the problem for the rest of the US military is that they understand obedience to the chain of command. And so, if Trump corrupts even a small number of people at the top, then the chain of command and the structures of the military will do the rest.

And I think he will do the kind of things that people stopped him from doing before the war.

MATTINGLY: The piece is "A Military Loyal to Trump", it is part of that Atlantic piece or Atlantic full issue that is out this week that everybody's been talking about. Tom Nichols, thanks so much.

HARLOW: Letter of Putin's war in Ukraine raging on. And the first time, for the first time in 79 days, Russia launched cruise missile attacks on Kyiv.

MATTINGLY: And at this time next week, the House will be heading home for the holidays, maybe. Will they have passed aid for Ukraine by then? A congresswoman joins us next to discuss.

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MATTINGLY: After a nearly 80-day pause, Russia launched a barrage of cruise missiles on Kyiv and eastern Ukraine. The vast majority were intercepted by the Ukrainians, but the timing is crucial here, as Capitol Hill is deadlocked over additional aid for Ukraine's fight.

Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, stressed the importance to Congress.

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ANTHONY BLINKEN, SECRETARY OF STATE: This is an important moment and important because the people who want to see it fail, the people who want to see it not go forward, are sitting in Moscow, they're sitting in Tehran, and they're sitting in Beijing.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTINGLY: Our Senate negotiators have resumed talks to reach an agreement after Republicans blocked the foreign aid from advancing this week, demanding strict new border restrictions in exchange.

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At least one Democratic senator says his party should engage more on the border issue. Senator John Fetterman telling Politico, quote, "I hope Democrats can understand that it isn't xenophobic to be concerned about the border. It is a reasonable conversation."

He cited the nearly 270,000 border encounters reported in September saying, quote, "Honestly, it's astonishing. And this isn't FOX News kind of statistic, this is the government's; you essentially have Pittsburgh showing up there at the border."

Joining us now, is Democratic Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill of New Jersey. She's a former Navy helicopter pilot and a member of the House Armed Services Committee wearing a sweatshirt. And we can get to that in a moment. I know there's a big game this weekend, but I do want to start with the debate that's been rolling.

REP. MIKIE SHERRILL (D-NJ): We do have a disagreement.

MATTINGLY: We have a bit of a disagreement on that. But to start with, I think another point of disagreement, and that is how to get a very significant aid package. It's not just Ukraine, it's Israel as well. Border money, Indo-Pacific money across the finish line. There have been calls from some in your party for the President to get

more directly involved at this point, he needs to be the one in the room with Leader McConnell, with Speaker Johnson, do you think it's reached that point?

SHERRILL: I know the White House is slowly getting more involved, I think right now we've seen that people are going back to the table after a lot of reports yesterday that talks were stalled. So, I know the White House has been pushing this.

I think you will see greater involvement as this moves forward, but it was heartening to me to hear that the discussions are now back at the table because I don't think we should be going home until we get this supplemental passed.

MATTINGLY: Do you think the administration has made the case effectively enough? I think there are a lot of people who I think inherently understand the why, and yet the numbers in terms of support amongst the American public have dropped pretty consistently over the last several months.

SHERRILL: You know, I think there are a couple of reasons why this is so critically important because it's going to impact the very way, I think people across the world even live their lives, including here at home. So, we are now in one of those existential times in the world where we are fighting tooth and nail for our democratic values and priorities.

And if we are not successful here with our allies across the world, we will see people who have the larger say, in how we move forward on the new technologies, AI Quantum, et cetera. With more of a surveillance society, not protecting individual rights and liberties, as the United States has always strongly supported.

So, these are critical problems, but I'd also remind people that a lot of the money we want is actually to make sure we are pouring that into our defense industrial base, our workers, and making sure that we have the capacity here at home to fight for the things we need to fight for.

MATTINGLY: Yeah, well more than a majority of the money that has been spent has been spent at home, which is an important point to make. There are some in your party who want the Israel aid portion of the supplemental bill to be conditioned, a growing number to some degree, in the Senate.

What are your views on that?

SHERRILL: I think right now we need to make sure that Israel can defend herself. We have incursions, you know to me, Hamas, and the fight with Hamas is not the biggest threat. It's Hezbollah to the north as backed by Iran. So, making sure that we give Israel the capability of defending itself is critical right now because we know that this is greater than simply the fight between Israel and Hamas.

These are attacks that we're facing, that US Forces are facing from Iran, from Houthis. We know that Hamas has met with Putin, and we know that the antisemitism being promoted on TikTok by the Chinese Communist Party is egregious.

So, this supplemental is critical to the United States, making sure that our allies and friends and the United States itself can make sure we are safe and that we promote our democratic principles.

MATTINGLY: And to those who say the capability being provided is being used to create a humanitarian crisis in Gaza and Israel has not been as responsive as the White House would like them to be. What do you say?

SHERRILL: Well, I think that's a huge issue of concern and a huge problem. These casualty numbers are unacceptable. And I'll tell you, I think largely part of this problem stems from Netanyahu himself, who has not outlined what his strategy is for this conflict, what success looks like.

And in the meantime, over 20,000 civilians, many of them children, have been killed in this fight. That's unacceptable, and I have to agree with the White House and Anthony Blinken on the pushback against Israel right now with their lack of strategy.

[08:25:00]

We also saw this is why I've been repeatedly calling to return to the humanitarian pause. That is when we saw the best results for negotiations when we saw many of the hostages being released, we need to get back to that point.

MATTINGLY: Next week, the House Republicans are expected to vote to officially launch an impeachment inquiry. It will come just a few days after the President's son was indicted for a second time. The President's approval numbers are in the mid to upper 30s right now, about to head into an election year.

Are you concerned about the standing of the President, given all of these dynamics?

SHERRILL: What I'm concerned about here is the continuing attacks by far-right extremists on the institutions of our government and undermining the values that many of us hold. You know, here we have an impeachment looking for evidence. The Republican Party decided they wanted to impeach the President, and now they are desperately seeking evidence of wrongdoing, and they've not found it yet, for the President.

Even their witnesses have undermined their case. So why Hunter Biden is brought before Congress as opposed to allowing the justice system to take its course is, I think, confusing. And then the constant idea that they are going to impeach the President but can't even elucidate what their case is or what their evidence is against President Biden is concerning.

And I think that's something that we saw again and again and again during the Trump administration, and I think when people go to the ballot to make a choice, do they want to return to that kind of chaos, that kind of undermining of democracy, or do they want to move forward with a President who works incredibly hard to make sure America has the opportunity, that our standing in the world is strong.

I think they're going to choose Joe Biden.

MATTINGLY: Before I conclude with go army, beat Navy. Your sweatshirt, you're an academy grad. Big game this weekend. Who's going to win?

SHERRILL: I think we all know Navy is going to win this game. I've struggled even in my district with Picatinny Arsenal and General Ryan there, but I am convinced the Navy is going to have a great victory, and I'm excited.

As you can see, I'm a Jersey girl, I'm up here in Boston for the big game. My family will be joining me, so, we're very excited.

MATTINGLY: We just showed a picture of you. You're not in Annapolis territory, you're closer to West Point at this point. Go Army, Beat Navy. Congresswoman, we appreciate your time, as always, thank you.

SHERRILL: Thank you.

HARLOW: All right, that'll be a fun one to watch. Ahead for us, Donald Trump bringing the campaign literally into the courtroom. How the President is preparing for Iowa from a New York courthouse.

MATTINGLY: And the Texas Attorney General threatening legal action against doctors involved in a court-approved abortion. We're going to talk to the attorney for the pregnant woman at the center of the judge's ruling, stay with us.

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