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Special Council Smith Urges SCOTUS to Reject Immunity Claim; Monday: Jury Selection in Hush-Money Trial Set to Begin; House GOP Threatens to Hold Garland in Contempt; Multi-Day Severe Storm Threat Across the South. Aired 6-6:30a ET
Aired April 09, 2024 - 06:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KASIE HUNT, CNN ANCHOR: It's Tuesday, April 9. Right now on CNN THIS MORNING, delay denied. Donald Trump going on trial in six days after a legal setback in New York.
[06:01:43]
An Idaho teenager under arrest, accused of plotting to attack a church with guns, knives, and fire.
And one member of Congress threatening to take down the House speaker over aid to Ukraine.
All right, 6 a.m. here in the East. A live look at New York City. It's a beautiful shot; sun coming up. Good morning, everyone. I'm Kasie Hunt. It's wonderful to have you with us.
Six days and counting before Donald Trump's criminal hush-money trial gets underway in New York. A state appeals court rejecting the former president's latest delay tactic, which was a request for a venue change.
Jury selection now set to begin on Monday, and CNN has a copy of the questions the potential jurors will be asked, such as where they get their news; whether they, a relative or friend has ever worked for a Trump company; whether they've attended a Trump rally; or whether they've supported QAnon, the Proud Boys, or Antifa.
And developing overnight, Special Counsel Jack Smith filing briefs with the Supreme Court, urging the justices to reject Trump's claims of absolute immunity and to deny the former president any opportunity to delay his federal election subversion trial.
Smith telling the court in a filing, quote, "The Framers never endorsed criminal immunity for a former president, and all presidents from the founding to the modern era have known after leaving office they faced potential criminal liability for official acts."
Our panel is here: Leigh Ann Caldwell, co-author of "The Early 202" at "The Washington Post"; former Trump administration official Matt Mowers; and Mo Elleithee, former communications director for the DNC. Good morning to all of you.
MATT MOWERS, FORMER TRUMP ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: Good morning. HUNT: Thanks for being here.
Leigh Ann, I want to start with this jury questionnaire. I thought, in particular, the question about whether you have been a member of any of these particular groups was quite something. QAnon, the Proud Boys, Antifa. They mention a couple of others: the Boogaloo Boys. Why is -- do you think that that is in there, and how do you think we see it pop up next week?
LEIGH ANN CALDWELL, "THE WASHINGTON POST": Well, it seems by the questions that what they're trying to gather, people who are not overly biased in favor of the former president. And so I thought the -- I thought that was the question that stood out.
HUNT: Or against. I mean, Antifa --
CALDWELL: Or yes, yes.
HUNT: -- would be against.
CALDWELL: Yes, that is true.
HUNT: Yes.
CALDWELL: That was the question that stood out to me, too, the fact that they wanted to make sure that this jury pool, perhaps, won't be stacked one way or another against the former president.
But it was also interesting that they care about what news they read. Also, there's probably going to be questions about what they do for a living, those sorts of things, too.
So -- but this trial is coming very quickly. I know there's been lots of delays in all of these cases, but this is happening very soon. And the president's [SIC] going to be once again consumed by his legal cases.
HUNT: Yes. Matt Mowers, as sort of the Republican at the table, I mean, what stood out to you in terms of what they want to know here?
And also big picture, I mean, the idea that were headed for this jury selection process starting on Monday --
MOWERS: Sure.
HUNT: -- the first time a former president has ever gone on trial. What do you think is the impact of that?
MOWERS: What stood out to me is, remember, these these questions will not only decide who may not have partiality.
But also then when you're either a prosecutor or you're a defense lawyer, you're looking for predictability sometimes, too. I remember having lawyers sometimes tell me if you want to avoid jury selection, wear a bowtie. Can't figure out if you're a liberal -- can't figure out if you're a liberal professor or if you're some sort of conservative business guy who likes a bowtie. It's predictability.
So, you know, a lot of these questions help shape a lot of those answers. And so I'd say on that piece.
On the second piece, I think what it shows is we've got to remember out of all the four different jurisdictions right now where there's cases, politically and legally, most folks would say this is the weakest case, right?
They -- they look at the documents case. They think there's a lot of evidence there. They look at January 6 case, and I think that's really --
(CROSSTALK)
HUNT: Really substantial for the nation.
MOWERS: When you're talking about literally a hush-money case which occurred before Donald Trump ever became president, most Americans see this as political.
So from the political impact I don't think it's going to change much. Where it could change something is that this is the only case that's actually moving forward on schedule right now.
If there's a conviction, which is a big "if," right? I mean, you could have a hung jury.
HUNT: Of course. Sure, yes.
MOWERS: There's a very good chance that, you know, Donald Trump will beat these charges.
HUNT: Innocent until proven guilty.
MOWERS: Right. If he was convicted, that will have an impact logistically. You have travel restrictions when you become convicted. You have -- you have to check in with the court before you do travel. It does logistically become more complicated, if it happens, which I still think is a big "if."
HUNT: Mo, what do you think about this? I mean, the big question I keep always asking, obviously, is it worked for him to play the victim in the Republican primary.
I mean, Ron DeSantis is out there saying, Oh yes, I had a shot until Donald Trump got indicted. But now we're heading into a general election. To Matt's point, this case was always kind of viewed as the one that was least likely to significantly impact Trump from a political perspective.
That said, it is still a criminal trial.
MO ELLEITHEE, FORMER COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR, DNC: That's right.
And I think the biggest political impact this could have over anything else? Is remind people who haven't really been thinking about Donald Trump for a few years what it's like to have Donald Trump in your life --
HUNT: That's a fair point.
ELLEITHEE: -- every single day. Right? Every single day, the media is going to be covering this trial. They're going to see him sitting in that defendant's chair. And it's going to be a reminder of the chaos that swirled around his presidency, the chaos that drove a lot of independent voters to Joe Biden.
Remember in 2020, people were just exhausted, right? And so, will it remind them of that sense of exhaustion as we now enter into this new phase of the campaign, and they start seeing Donald Trump, the defendant, as opposed to Donald Trump's bluster?
CALDWELL: That's the Biden campaign's entire campaign strategy, right? As people -- they hope that people are reminded of the chaos of Donald Trump when it becomes a binary choice.
HUNT: Indeed. The other aspect, of course, is this question about immunity, which Jack Smith had these filings overnight.
I just want to remind you, what we heard from the arguments around immunity from the D.C. circuit, because this was one of the scenarios they threw out. Listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Could a president who ordered SEAL Team 6 to assassinate a political rival, who was not impeached, could he be subject to criminal prosecution?
JOHN SAUER, ATTORNEY FOR DONALD TRUMP: If he were impeached and convicted first, and so -- (ph).
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And so your answer's no?
SAUER: My answer is qualified yes.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: I mean, Matt Mowers, this is -- it seems like a really tough argument here. What do you see the Supreme Court doing here? We were talking to a lawyer, Joey Jackson. He's like, well, they've got to make a kind of a black and white, a bright-line argument on this, he said, because of questions like this.
The president, former president is basically arguing the law didn't apply to me when I was president.
MOWERS: And look, I think in this specific case -- and all qualifications, I'm not a lawyer -- but you know, with that said, they are going to have to, at some point, though, this is going to have a big impact on presidential powers. This is going to have a big impact on how the court views the role of the president and the executive moving forward constitutionally.
And so for that reason, I don't think it's going to be just black and white, because they are going to put some nuance to say, you know what? If you can't claim immunity here, when can a president make certain decisions that are in the nation's interests without being prosecuted? When can they maybe conduct, you know, an attack abroad or something like that that's in America's best national security interests? And, you know, when does that kind of play into -- come into factor on all those things?
And the presidential powers clause, I think, is going to be the big piece that they have to actually talk about on all this.
HUNT: Again, I think -- I do think that the SEAL Team 6 example illustrates the limitations of what you're talking about.
MOWERS: Sure.
HUNT: Although it does -- I mean, we've talked about Obama and drone strikes. There have been other questions around this, very complicated -- very complicated issue. I guess we're going to be talking a lot about it between now and November.
All right. Up next here, why House Republicans are threatening to file a contempt charge against Attorney General Merrick Garland.
Plus, Democratic Congressman Mike Quigley is here to tell us what he wants to see House Speaker Mike Johnson do about Ukraine aid.
And country singer Morgan Wallen's arrest caught on video. That's coming up.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[06:14:14]
HUNT: Welcome back.
The Justice Department refusing to turn over audio tapes of President Biden's interview with Special Counsel Robert Hur, despite House Republican threats to hold Attorney General Merrick Garland in criminal contempt over it.
In a new letter obtained by CNN, the DOJ writes to House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan and House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer, quote, "the committees' interests may not be in receiving information in service of legitimate oversight or invest -- investigatory functions but to serve political purposes."
The Justice Department claims that the committees already have the transcripts of the interviews they requested.
Our panel is back.
Leigh Ann, what is going on here? Because I mean, this impeachment inquiry has been on the rocks -- CALDWELL: Yes.
HUNT: -- for a long time already. They clearly don't really have what they need to go forward with it. What's this latest flap about?
[06:15:02]
CALDWELL: Yes, that's absolutely right. They don't really have anything in their impeachment inquiry into President Biden. Republicans know that. James Comer has mostly admitted that.
And so this is just another attempt to keep any sort of idea in the news, in the ether that President Biden is hiding something, that he is potentially corrupt, whatever. However Republicans want to paint him.
And so this is another attempt at that effort, really, despite the fact that we all know, and Republicans know, that impeachment is going to go nowhere.
HUNT: Mo, I mean, it also seems like this is a push to keep the Hur report in the news, right?
ELLEITHEE: Yes. No, that's right. I mean, this is surely political. It is -- there's no -- they don't need it. They don't need the audio tape for anything.
HUNT: Well, this is -- the letter basically says, like, we gave you this information.
ELLEITHEE: You have everything.
HUNT: Like, you have everything that was said here.
ELLEITHEE: That's exactly right.
And as Leigh Ann said, they ran smack-dab into a brick wall in terms of chasing this down. So in terms of the impeachment, and so they do need to keep this up, in their mind.
Now, will that work? We were talking in the last segment about how people view things politically.
Remember, House Republicans are maybe one of the few institutions, the House, that is less popular than either Donald Trump or Joe Biden right now in American politics.
MOWERS: If you're bipartisan here, but any Congress of many parties.
ELLEITHEE: I mean, just the institution.
And the Republican leadership in this case, they're not getting any traction with voters other than their own base. So this continued effort, I think, continues to be a base play to keep their folks energized. But I don't think it's going to help them politically in making a broader case to the American people. HUNT: Yes, I mean, is that how you see it, Matt? I mean, the reality
is, like, if this was politically great for the people that actually make -- I mean, the very small handful of people that make up the very tiny House Republican majority, right?
MOWERS: Sure.
HUNT: Like, they don't really have the votes to go forward with impeachment for that reason, right?
MOWERS: Well, a lot of this is -- also keeps it in the limelight in case another shoe drops.
I mean, look, I worked with the Trump campaign in 2016. I remember being on the ground in, I believe it is Lewiston, Maine, right before Donald Trump did a rally. The day that Jim Comey reopened the investigation because of the Anthony Wiener laptop.
You have no idea where these independent investigations are going to go.
HUNT: I remember sitting in the camera when that happened, yes.
MOWERS: No idea how the story is going to play out as bits of information come out. If a tape were released, was there maybe something that was missing from the transcript? Was there, you know, maybe a -- something that was read? And how it was construed when it was read, but maybe came across differently when it was said?
Those are all things that they're looking for in order to try to find out. And that is going to keep this in the news.
And they're going to keep it in the news, because look, the truth is that Joe Biden's lowest approval rating occurred a month-and-a-half ago or so as a result, and partially as a result, because of what came out from the Hur investigation.
HUNT: And let's be real, why do they want audio? What happens to the audio once House Republicans get ahold of it? What are they doing? They're campaigning for reelection or campaigning for former President Donald Trump.
Hearing what President Biden has to say and how he says it, much different from just reading it on a piece of paper.
Up next here, new U.S. intelligence suggesting Iran may be poised to launch an attack against Israel. We're going to talk to former defense secretary, Mark Esper, about that.
Plus, the UCONN men's basketball team celebrating back-to-back national championships.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[06:22:34]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JIMMY FALLON, HOST, ABC'S "JIMMY KIMMEL LIVE!" Now Marjorie Taylor Greene, I feel like this didn't get enough attention. On Friday, I think, she tweeted about the earthquake in New York and the eclipse saying, "God is sending America strong signs to tell us to repent. Earthquakes and eclipses and many more things to come."
That's right. There's a Godzilla coming, too. I don't know if you guys know that. I pray that our country listens.
And what makes this spectacular display of dim bulb very interesting is that the epicenter of the earthquake in New Jersey that she thinks God made happen to warn us was literally on Donald Trump's golf course. That is not a joke.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: Coincidence? Who knows? Only God does.
Twenty-two minutes past the hour, five things you have to see this morning.
NASA may have some of the best images of yesterday's total solar eclipse. Millions of people from more than a dozen states across the U.S. watched as the moon completely blocked out the sun. Just wild.
All right, new video of Morgan Wallen's arrest in downtown Nashville. He allegedly threw a chair from a rooftop bar that landed just feet -- get this -- from a group of police officers. Whoops.
He's facing felony charges.
The top seeded UCONN huskies dominating Purdue to win the men's college basketball championship for the second year running. It's the school's sixth title in the last 25 years.
And here's the moment NASA launched one of three rockets for the eclipse. The rockets are going to study how an eclipse affects Earth's atmosphere.
And we just had to shout out our own Brianna Keilar, and Boris Sanchez. They were reporting on and reenacting the eclipse from Indianapolis.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: This is either the best idea or the worst idea that we've had.
BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN ANCHOR: Setting aside all journalistic credibility.
KEILAR: Yes. Let's --
SANCHEZ: We're having fun today.
KEILAR: This is basically what's going to happen, if I can re-enact. The moon will be going in front of the sun, Boris Sanchez in this point.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HUNT: Go big or go home, as they say. Hats off, my friends. Hats off.
All right. With that, it is time for weather. We've got a multi-day storm system tracking across the South as millions from Texas to Mississippi brace for flooding, powerful winds and tornadoes.
Our meteorologist Allison Chinchar joins us now.
Allison, good morning. What do we got?
[06:25:00]
ALLISON CHINCHAR, CNN METEOROLOGIST: And good morning.
We've got a lot to talk about. And this is actually going to be a multi-day threat. So not just today, but it will continue tomorrow and the next day as this makes its way East.
Right now, the focus is basically portions of Texas all the way over into Alabama. You can see we've got some pretty strong thunderstorms right there along Texas and Louisiana.
We've also had several flash flood warnings in effect off and on throughout the morning. Those could likely continue throughout the day, because a lot of these areas are going to continue to see rain over and over again in the same spots.
So essentially, all of these areas you see here -- not just the red area, but also the yellow and green -- have the potential for flooding today.
Now, when we take a look at the next few days, it's also going to continue, but you start to see it shift a little bit further Eastward. So Wednesday the concern is still also over the Southeast, but that target point begins to move a little closer into Alabama.
Then by Thursday, it's pretty much mainly a concern across the East Coast.
We also have the potential for severe thunderstorms. We're talking damaging winds, the potential for tornadoes, and very large hail as we go through the day to day.
HUNT: All right. Allison Chinchar for us. Allison, thank you very much.
Coming up next here, Donald Trump's position on abortion upsetting both Democrats and anti-abortion Republicans.
Plus Democratic Congressman Mike Quigley joins us to discuss the fight over Ukraine aid on Capitol Hill.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [06:30:00]
