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Judge in Manhattan to Hear Arguments from Former President Trump's Legal Team that False Business Reporting Case Should be Dismissed; Judge to Hear Arguments Regarding Possible Conflict of Interest for District Attorney Fani Willis in Georgia Election Interference Case against Former President Trump; KC Police: One Dead in Super Bowl Rally Shooting, 21 Shot; Deputy Mistakes Acorn for Gunshot, Shoots at Suspect. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired February 15, 2024 - 08:00   ET

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

[08:00:00]

NATASHA BERTRAND, CNN WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: With no end in sight to the Houthi attacks, U.S. officials tell CNN they don't know how much capability the rebels have left as they continue to be resupplied by Iran.

REAR ADMIRAL MARC MIGUEZ, COMMANDER, CARRIER STRIKE GROUP TWO: Level three is electronic attack.

BERTRAND: The commander of the carrier strike group told CNN they will stay in the Red Sea for as long as necessary.

MIGUEZ: The sustainability, we can go for a long time. We've got our logistics train already mapped out to stay here as long as the president needs us to stay here.

(END VIDEO TAPE)

BERTRAND (on camera): Now, one of the biggest questions that we were left with, Poppy and Phil, is just how much of the Houthis capabilities the U.S. has managed to destroy in its strikes inside Yemen on Houthi targets over the last several weeks. These strikes have been become extremely regular, happening on a near daily basis. But officials could not give us a good sense of just how much of the Houthis weaponry the U.S. has actually managed to destroy. That is going to be a really key part of how the U.S. determines how long this operation against the Houthis is actually going to need to last. Poppy, Phil?

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: Really remarkable reporting from Natasha there. Thank you, Natasha.

CNN THIS MORNING continues right now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES (R) AND CURRENT U.S. PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE (R): But when I get indicted the first time, all of these cases and all of these indictments are all him. It's him and his corrupt Department of Justice

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: Good morning, everyone. We're glad you're with us. What you just heard, that was Donald Trump at a rally last night falsely blaming President Biden for his criminal indictments. Also this morning, there are crucial hearings in two of the four legal cases against the former president. What's happening in courtrooms in New York and Atlanta could determine when Trump could stand trial.

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN ANCHOR: Also developing this morning, the tragedy Super Bowl celebration for the Kansas City Chiefs. The mass shooting kills a local D.J., injures nearly two dozen people, including children.

HARLOW: Also in space, the White House set to brief lawmakers on what is being called a serious national security threat from Russia.

This hour of CNN THIS MORNING starts now.

And this is where we begin this morning, two dueling courtroom hearings in the trials of Donald Trump, one in New York, the other in Georgia. Right here in Manhattan a judge will hear from Trump's legal team as they argue to have his hush money case thrown out. Trump is expected to be in the courtroom. He is accused of falsifying business records to cover up payments to adult film actress Stormy Daniels during the 2016 campaign. It could be the first case to come to trial if the judge keeps a trial date for next month.

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN ANCHOR: And in Atlanta, a hearing related to Georgia's election interference this case. Trump's lawyers want Fulton County D.A. Fani Willis disqualified for having an alleged improper relationship with the lead prosecutor, Nathan Wade, who is set to be the first witness today. Willis is also expected to testify, not clear currently when.

We have team coverage covering everything right now, with Kristen Holmes in New York, Zach Cohen in Atlanta. Kristen, let's start with you. Donald Trump decided to physically be in New York. Thats why you're here. What does it show you? What does that tell you about how he views this trial and how he views kind of the process going forward as courtroom and politics converge once again?

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, courtroom, campaign trail, all coming together yet again, Donald Trump here in New York. And I am told that he, at some points, wanted to go down to Atlanta to Fulton County, but that his senior advisors convinced him that this was more important, that this directly affects him, this is a criminal case. And as you said, it is a critical day here.

We are going to learn today likely if Donald Trump will face trial before the election in 2024 while he is potentially the Republican nominee for president. Now, let's talk about what this case is exactly. Just a reminder here of the charges that were brought by District Attorney Alvin Bragg. He is charged with falsifying business records, and accused of allegedly covering up to hide reimbursement payments. Remember, these are payments that Michael Cohen made to adult film star Stormy Daniels. They say that he covered this up with these reimbursements. Now, he has pleaded not guilty to 34 charges and denied the affair with Stormy Daniels.

I do want to point out something really important here. Donald Trump's campaign has said that they believed that he is going to be the nominee by mid-March. If this trial date holds, it would be March 25th, meaning the Republican nominee for president, again, if their math is correct, would be sitting through a trial ahead of a general election in November 2024. That couldn't be more crucial.

Now today, Donald Trump's lawyers are attempting to get this case dismissed. They will also likely attempt to delay that trial date. But again, if that trial date holds, that will be quite striking to learn that Donald Trump will be sitting through a criminal trial ahead of that 2024 election.

HARLOW: It really would. And Zach, what about today in Georgia, the fact that the lead prosecutor in that election subversion case is going to take the stand? What's he going to be asked, and what could the come here be?

[08:05:03]

ZACHARY COHEN, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY REPORTER: Yes, Poppy, Donald Trump may not be in the courtroom here in Fulton County today, but he knows and Fani Willis, the district attorney's office knows the stakes really couldn't be higher for this hearing. It is going to focus these allegations that Fani Willis and her top prosecutor, Nathan Wade, had an improper romantic relationship and thus, they should both be disqualified from the case. That's what Trump and his defense attorneys are arguing.

And we may hear from Nathan Wade directly today. Defense attorneys that surfaced these allegations initially said that they want to call Nathan Wade as their first witness. The judge in this case has said that he wants to hear from a Nathan Wade's former law partner first, so it'll be interesting to see if he allows the defense attorneys to call Nathan Wade first and question him about the timing of this relationship and ask me what but the name nature of it. Was it romantic?

And most importantly, the judge wants to nail down on whether or not Fani Willis benefited financially from her relationship with Wade. Take a listen to what the judge said on Monday when he was ironing out and laying out the parameters of today's hearing.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JUDGE SCOTT MCAFEE, SUPERIOR COURT OF FULTON COUNTY: I think it's possible that the facts alleged by the defendant could result in disqualification. I think an evidentiary hearing must occur to establish the record on those core allegations. The state has admitted a relationship existed, and so what remains to be proven is the existence and extent of any financial benefit, again, if there even was one. (END VIDEO CLIP)

COHEN: So proving those allegations will be key for the defense attorneys, and it really does lay out two outcomes. One is Fani Willis is disqualified and that could potentially derail this entire criminal case. But the other is Fani Willis stays in place and continues to oversee this investigation and it kind of sets the case back on track and shifts focus back to the criminal charges which is faced by Donald Trump and his other co-defendants.

MATTINGLY: All right, Zach Cohen for us in Atlanta, Kristen Holmes in New York, running point on a very big day of legal news here at CNN.

Joining us now to discuss all this, CNN legal analyst Michael Moore, CNN senior legal analyst Elie Honig, CNN senior crime and justice reporter Katelyn Polantz, and CNN political analyst and "New York Times" national politics reporter Astead Herndon. Guys, thanks so much.

Katelyn, I want to start with you because this New York case was the first one out of the gate, arguably changed the trajectory of the Republican primary. That's the politics stuff. But on the legal side of things, it's always been kind of framed in a pejorative manner. It's the runt, it's not the big deal. Am I wrong?

KATELYN POLANTZ, CNN SENIOR CRIME AND JUSTICE REPORTER: It's still a charged case though.

MATTINGLY: Right. So explain to people who maybe haven't been paying attention since April, what is this case? How big a deal is it?

POLANTZ: Its a former president on trial indicted by a grand jury. This is a situation where it's not just people making accusations about Donald Trump, how he was running his business, how he was paying off Stormy Daniels through Michael Cohen. Now, we are in the process of stress testing these cases. There are prosecutors that did the investigations, they took these through the grand jury. There are four criminal indictments against Donald Trump.

And whether you think the hush money case has the least likelihood of success before a jury, right now, this is where judges are coming in and looking at the validity of the case, the validity of the charges. The judge is looking at the motions to dismiss that Trump has filed today. We're likely to hear that, not just a trial date, if he wants to toss the case or keep it. There are checks and balances here within the system.

And then even with Fani Willis in Georgia, this is also a stress test day for that, stress testing the ethics of the prosecution team, letting it go forward. So allowing all of that to move forward, at the end of the day Donald Trump will be before a jury of peers, and those people will weigh on whether these charges are valid enough to convict, acquit, or ended in mistrial. It's momentous in any situation, whether you think it's a bad case or not, you just won't know until it's before the jury. HARLOW: Astead looking at the numbers that Harry broke down from earlier today -- between the two of us. The numbers for the hush-money case in terms of people who would turn to not vote for him if convicted are -- they're there, but there are much lower than the election subversion case, either the federal one are the ones in Georgia. Can you talk about the politics surrounding these cases?

ASTEAD HERNDON, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes. I think the herring numbers really laid out what we see anecdotally when we talk to Republican voters mostly, but kind of voters at large that the hush money payment deal, to Phil's point, was kind of seen as a thing that was already known. And so it's not necessarily the idea that the facts are in question. But when you are learning new information about Donald Trump, the more criminal elements, we always hear people talk a lot more about what happened in Georgia and what happened on January 6th, way more than I think I've actually heard from people about maybe the hush money payments or even the documents case down in Florida.

Now, I will say that it's important for us to kind of change our lens on the political question here. In the primary, it was really about Republican voters who but rallying around him and becoming closer to Donald Trump because of the kind of victimhood is created.

[08:10:02]

But when we look to a general election sense, getting indicted is not a good thing. Donald Trump is losing independents at a mass rate, is bleeding out winnable voters for Republicans, and has a very big electoral problem when it comes to November because of this.

So the numbers do tell us that even when it comes to convention - conviction, you can see more people drop off. But the facts of these indictments have really seeped in with a lot of winnable voters for Republicans, and it's the reason their party is in the trouble with this, no matter what happens going forward. The theater cannot overcomplicate us from knowing the facts here, and getting criminally indicted is not a good thing politically.

MATTINGLY: It's that astute analysis is why they pay him so much at "The Times."

(LAUGHTER)

MATTINGLY: It's not good to be indicted if you're running politically, in a general election.

Atlanta. I'm fascinated by what's developed over the course of the last several weeks, as just a general observer of news and reading things, I'm sitting there going, this is not good. But I don't know what it means. Can you explain for people what it means?

MICHAEL MOORE, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Yes. Well, I'm glad to be with you. It's not a good day for the state and for the district attorney today, and it wasn't a good day earlier this week when the judge basically said this is enough to have disqualification of the prosecutor here. And so really, what you're seeing is, while the law is pretty stringent with both what constitutes enough evidence to disqualify an entire D.A.'s office, what you're seeing play out is sort of this salacious tale of a prosecutor and somebody that works for her.

HARLOW: But what is that bar, Michael, in Georgia? What's the threshold?

MOORE: You've got to have the appearance of some impropriety and a conflict, and you show that by having some financial benefit paid back to her. So this is now about who she dates. This is about the flow of money that's created from this case. And it's about three-quarters of a million dollars on the on the low end, and maybe more when we start talking about other members of his law firm. And so that's what changes the argument ion the case and I think what the judge is saying. I think he sent the message, this may be enough to get rid of you. You better think about what you're doing. And it gives her a chance to say, well, maybe I should back away.

And today, the problem that they have is they maybe walking into a trap that was set for them by Ashleigh Merchant, the defense lawyer. She laid out in her motion a very simple allegation like this is happening. It baited the district attorney and Mr. Wade into giving a response under oath in a court filing. By all accounts, she has this evidence. And so now, if she proves that they told something that wasn't true in their court filings, they've fallen in the trap that a lot of people do, and that is that the coverup is what catches of more so than the acts themselves.

HARLOW: The calls Elie, for a couple weeks ago when this started to come to light for D.A. Willis to recuse herself from folks that said because then you can get another prosecutor in there and keep this going. Can you talk about what happens if, indeed, she is disqualified? Doesn't that really stall this whole thing?

ELIE HONIG, SENIOR CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Yes. If she is forcefully disqualified by this judge, that will take her entire office, the entire Fulton County D.A.'s office, out of this case. And what happens in Georgia, and Michael sort of walked me through this, but there's this special panel then that can reassign the case to a different county. But that takes forever.

You may recall two years ago, Fani Willis was actually disqualified because she had a conflict of interest on a small piece of the investigation. That piece of the case has still not been reassigned. So if Fani Willis is disqualified, that will be a major problem for this prosecution.

And I want to make this point. The judge tried to give Fani Willis a hint the other day, right. Judges do this, they will signal to you, hey, I'm kind of leaning this way. So if you want to work something out or do the right thing before we get to the moment of truth, go ahead. And they are proceeding with this today, I think, they, the D.A.'s office, very much at their own risk.

And one thing that Fani Willis could do here, it doesn't look like she's going to do, but that she could do is she could step aside. She could say, I have a conflict of interest. By the way, not necessarily any shame in having a conflict of interests. They happen all the time. It just means that you don't want it to look bad for the public. And so she could say -- she hasn't, but she could say, I'm going to step aside. I'm going to appoint such and such, my trusted longtime deputy will step in as acting district attorney for this case. She would spare the hearing that her office is about to go through, and she would save the case if she did that. But she's dug in.

MATTINGLY: Astead, to state the obvious, this is political gold for Donald Trump. It's not great to be indicted and running in a general election, but it sure is great to have ammunition to try and undercut those indictments in the public. And this has absolutely nothing to do with the actual charges in the case, which there are tapes that helped demonstrate. But politically, what does something like this do for all of the indictments that Katelyn's been talking about?

HERNDON: Yes, as someone who kind of tries to steep themselves in like kind of the language of Trump and the conservative media, when this stuff came out, I thought, oh, my goodness. It's like this is exactly what they have been -- the kind of language to really minimize the prosecutors, to try to act as if they're acting in their personal interests, and I think mostly just to distract from the substance of the case, right?

[08:15:00]

For voters, this is already a lot to keep track of. This is already a kind of legalese, spread out indictments of a person that kind of intuitively think they understand, and the more that Donald Trump and his kind of allies can point to things that are outside of the substance of the case, and make him kind of go from criminal to just a spat between the political system, that feeds their narrative, that's what they want to do.

And so, you know, it's not as if, you know, maybe the disqualification happens, or maybe it doesn't, but I think already, the ground has been muddied by these allegations. And, you know, the district attorney has no one to blame for that, but herself, right?

KATELYN POLANTZ, CNN CRIME AND JUSTICE SENIOR REPORTER: It could help with the jury, too, and not just on the political side.

HERNDON: Go ahead, sorry.

POLANTZ: No, it could help with the jury as well.

HERNDON: Yes, and so I just think that is in the air in a way that I think helps the kind of Trump and Republican allies, but obviously, he has got indictment after indictment, right?

So even if we're talking about Georgia, the January 6 case, what's coming from Special Counsel Jack Smith. That stuff is still going to really linger.

And so you know, he got a win here, I think on the rhetoric side, but there's more to come particularly financially, politically that he still has to overcome. POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: Just to put a button on it, I mean, the

Georgia case would be -- is a state case. So if he wins again, he would have less power to do something about it.

ELIE HONIG, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: Yes. I mean, look, that case is not happening before the election. Let's be clear.

HARLOW: Yes.

HONIG: I know our calendars just said the DA is in fact asking for an August trial date. That is not a serious request.

The DA has said that would mean we'd be on trial from August through 2025. There is no chance on earth that Donald Trump is on trial and kept in a courtroom from August through the election into 2025.

HARLOW: Thank you all very much.

Big day ahead to say the least. We will have special coverage of the Trump trial. It starts in less than an hour, 9:00 AM Eastern right here.

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN ANCHOR: The other big story we're following, the deadly shooting after the Super Bowl victory parade for the Kansas City Chiefs. A local deejay killed, 20 others shot. Witnesses tackling, you could see it there, the alleged shooter. Where the investigation stands this morning.

HARLOW: Also, US intelligence suggesting Russia wants to deploy a nuclear anti-satellite system, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee joins us next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:20:34]

HARLOW: Welcome back.

We are now learning that a local radio deejay was killed and nine children were among those injured during that mass shooting during the Super Bowl celebration in Kansas City just yesterday.

(VIDEO CLIP PLAYS)

HARLOW: What you just saw, that was the moment the gunfire erupted. It broke out at a victory rally while Chiefs players were still on stage. Around a million people were downtown for the parade and the rally.

You can see just a huge crowd running for safety.

MATTINGLY: And here, you can see the swarm of police, State Troopers, undercover officers, FBI agents in tactical gear who are all rushing in.

Investigators say three people were taken into custody for questioning. CBS News spoke to a survivor who says he overheard an altercation right before the shots rang out.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JACOB GOOCH, SR., SHOOTING SURVIVOR: I heard the altercation of the girl who -- some girl who said like "Don't do it. Not here. This is stupid" or something like that.

TONY DOKOUPIL, CBS NEWS ANCHOR: Oh, wow.

GOOCH: And then the gun -- the gunshots.

Right before it ended up happening, there was this group dressed in all black -- about four five, six kids -- who looked like kids with black on, black masks, and they disappeared into the crowd and then the show ended.

And as soon as we started walking out, there it happened.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTINGLY: Now, we are also hearing from the Good Samaritans who tackled one of them, wrestled him to the ground until police could get there. This video you're watching is of the dramatic takedown. Listen to them describe that confrontation.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PAUL CONTRERAS, SHOOTING WITNESS: I just heard somebody yelling to stop this guy. Tackle him. And as I'm taking him down to the ground, I see the gun on the ground, so I take him down and I put all my body weight on him.

TREY FILTER, SHOOTING WITNESS: We were pretty elated once we knew we had him. And they started yelling that, there's a gun, there's a gun.

CASEY FILTER, SHOOTING WITNESS: It was heavy. At first, I actually thought it was -- it looked like a toy. But then once I picked it up, I quickly realized it definitely was not.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTINGLY: And as we noted, one person has been confirmed dead. She has been identified as local radio deejay Lisa Lopez-Galvan by her station.

HARLOW: With us now, our chief law enforcement and intelligence analyst, John Miller.

Good morning. So glad you're here. You've got new reporting on this. There are a lot of questions, right? They don't even know if it was just one gunman or more.

What can you tell us this morning?

JOHN MILLER, CNN CHIEF LAW ENFORCEMENT AND INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: Well, police have been working through the night. As we know, they have three people in custody. What we don't know, and they are being very tight lipped about this for a reason, because they don't know how many other people who are not in custody are involved and they are trying not to show their cards.

But ultimately, they're going to be relying on three kinds of information, human information, what are the three people they have in custody telling them, if anything?

What are their human informants out there from the Gang Intelligence Division team that works with them giving them on what this might be about or who might be involved? What are the witnesses who saw things -- and we just heard from a couple of them which are giving extremely valuable information and descriptions coming up with.

Then there is the video. What did people capture on their phones? They've set up a drop where people can send in their video, whether they think it's any value or not, they won't know until later. But they'll bank all of that and go through that. That's an FBI program that they developed during the Boston Marathon.

And then there's the technology piece, and that's the shell casings on the ground at the scene. That could tell a lot of the story. It can tell us, is that one shooter with a lot of rounds? Is that two shooters shooting in the same direction? Is that two groups shooting back and forth?

Those shell casings will not only match up or not match up to the guns that they recovered yesterday as they took these people into custody. But in the NIBIN system, which is run by ATF, they can put those shell casings in and it can scan across every shooting in Kansas City, in Missouri, in the United States to see has one or more of those guns fired shots that turned up at a different shooting scene? A month ago? A week ago? A year ago?

Is that connected to a gang? Do we have named suspects in that? So all of these wheels are turning simultaneously in this investigation to try and give them a richer picture of something that happened in the pandemonium and it is pretty unclear.

[08:25:07]

MATTINGLY: The initial, I think, fear everyone has in a moment like this is that it's terrorism, that it's very clear that that is not the big concern right now.

You've mentioned gangs a few times. What do you think police investigators are looking at as they try and pin down the actual genesis of this.

MILLER: So Kansas City Police have a lot of experience here. They are almost always in the top 10 cities for gun violence, which is not the first thing you think when you would think about Kansas City.

Last year, 182 murders, but what does that mean in perspective?

New York City had twice that number of murders last year, but New York City has 8.6 million people, Kansas City has 500,000. So if you look at the rate of violence there, and what are they confronting? They're confronting gangs like the 247 Crew, the 51st Street Crips, the Benton street gang.

I mean, there is Crips sets, Blood sets. It's a city that has a terrible problem with youth violence, gang violence, 25 percent of their shooting victims are between 18 and 24.

So some of that is going to factor into the thinking here, but they also have a good base of knowledge of who the crews are and who the players are.

And we don't know what the shooting is yet, but there is a lot of people with knowledge in there who should be able to put those connections together if they're there.

MATTINGLY: Yes, absolutely. John Miller, we appreciate it. As always, thank you.

HARLOW: Thank you.

MATTINGLY: Well, a sheriff's deputy in the Florida Panhandle has resigned after mistaking the sound of a falling acorn for gunfire and shooting at a handcuffed suspect.

(VIDEO CLIP PLAYS)

MATTINGLY: This bodycam video was released of Deputy Jesse Hernandez shooting at the suspect, Marquis Jackson inside a patrol car after the officer thought he heard shots. Another deputy also fired.

It started with a disturbance call from Jackson's girlfriend who claimed he was violent and had a gun.

HARLOW: So this body camera footage shows Jackson being searched. No weapon was found, he survived the shooting. An investigation revealed the sound the deputy heard was likely an acorn hitting the roof of his patrol car. Here is what the sheriff said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SHERIFF ERIC ADEN, OKALOOSA COUNTY, FLORIDA: We're actually going to use this particular case as a potential thing that we need to watch out for to make sure that we never put someone's life in jeopardy again.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: Hernandez was found to have used excessive force. He and another officer were cleared of criminal wrongdoing.

Also developing now from Gaza, Israel's military enters one of the biggest hospitals there. We'll take you live to the region, next.

MATTINGLY: And two hearings today in the criminal cases against Donald Trump. He is expected in court here in New York in the hush money case.

Meanwhile in Atlanta, his attorneys will attend a hearing in the election interference case.

We're going to have special coverage starting at 9:00 AM. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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