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Trump Attorneys Cross-Examine Stormy Daniels; Nearly 25M People Face Severe Storm Threats in Southeast. Aired 6-6:30a ET

Aired May 10, 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 Friday, May 10. Right now on CNN THIS MORNING, Donald Trump's hush money trial set to resume after the judge rejects the former president's motion for a mistrial.

[06:00:49]

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announcing Israel will stand alone if President Biden decides to halt weapons shipments.

And Robert F. Kennedy Jr. shocking his own running mate with his comments on abortion rights.

All right, 6 a.m. here in Washington. A live look at the White House on this Friday morning. Good morning. Good morning, everyone. Happy Friday. We made it. I'm Kasie Hunt. It's wonderful to have you with us.

Donald Trump's criminal hush money trial on track to resume in just a few hours. Back on the stand this morning, former Trump White House assistant Madeleine Westerhout. She's testifying about how checks for Michael Cohen were sent to the White House for Trump to sign on Thursday.

Judge Merchan rejected a request by Trump to have his gag order amended. He also denied a motion for a mistrial. The former president's lawyers wanted the case to be tossed, claiming Stormy Daniels keeps changing her story.

While the adult film star was on the stand, Trump's lawyers went on the attack against her. Quote, "You have a lot of experience making phony stories about sex appear real, right?" the attorneys asked.

Daniels replied, "Wow, that's not how I would put it. The sex in the films, it's very much real, just like what happened to me in that room."

The defense, determined to undermine Daniels' credibility in this exchange: quote, "You have acted and had sex in over 200 porn movies, right? And there are naked men and naked women having sex, including yourself in those movies, right? But according to you, seeing a man sitting on a bed in a t-shirt and boxer shorts, was so upsetting you got lightheaded?"

Daniels replied, "Yes. When you are not expecting a man twice your age to be in their underwear."

It is a moment that Daniels described in greater detail in a 2018 interview with CBS.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STORMY DANIELS, ADULT FILM ACTRESS AND DIRECTOR: I excused myself, and I went to the -- the restroom. You know, I was in there for a little bit and came out. And he was sitting, you know, on the edge of the bad when I walked out, perched.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR/CBS'S "60 MINUTES" CORRESPONDENT: And when you saw that, what went through your mind?

DANIELS: I realized exactly what I'd gotten myself into. And I was like, here we go.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: "Here we go."

Let's bring in CNN senior political analyst, Mark Preston; CNN legal analyst Elliot Williams; Meghan Hays, former special assistant to President Biden; and Mike Dubke, former White House communications director under President Trump.

Mike, you are already sighing.

MIKE DUBKE, FORMER WHITE HOUSE COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR UNDER PRESIDENT TRUMP: I think it's quite a way to wake up in the morning.

HUNT: So here we are. Who needs coffee when you've got Stormy Daniels on the stand?

What do you think the -- the attorneys for Trump accomplished yesterday in what they did with Stormy Daniels?

DUBKE: Well, look, again, I think there are really two juries that the -- that the Trump defense team and the Trump campaign are concerned about. Yesterday was all about the campaign team.

I think the defense was listening to their client. Probably Tuesday night was not happy with the way the testimony went, even though most legal analysts that I heard said they did a very good job with -- with that testimony. And yesterday was about discrediting her credibility and, you know, for the president to use that in rallies and other communications that he does outside the courtroom.

HUNT: Yes, so Stormy Daniels -- and I'm going to -- I'm going to give this to this side of the table. Mark -- Mark, you and Elliot can pick --

MARK PRESTON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Why?

HUNT: -- which one of you would like to respond to this. But Stormy Daniels, a couple of things here. So "The New York Times" noted -- and I was fascinated to read this,

this morning -- that when she was in court on Tuesday, she wore what seemed to be a very subdued dress. Right? So they write, quote, "With her messy hair and subdued makeup may have suggested a lack of calculation. However, the jumpsuit she was wearing on day one was the same jumpsuit she wore in her cameo in the 2021 film, 'Bad President,' a satire in which Donald Trump sells his soul to the devil to win the 2016 election. Given that the actual Mr. Trump was sitting across the courtroom from her, that is quite a subtext." OK. So that's Tuesday.

[06:05:13]

Follow-up last night, she writes on Twitter, quote, "Real men respond to testimony by being sworn in and taking the stand in court. Oh, wait. Never mind."

Of course suggesting, you know, Trump doesn't seem to want to say that he won't testify, although clearly, it would be a bad plan from a legal perspective, according to most of our legal experts. Right? Bad plan?

ELLIOT WILLIAMS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: It was a bad plan. I don't like stuff like that at all.

(CROSSTALK)

WILLIAMS: I'm sorry. I know. This isn't a question for Mark.

PRESTON: Take it, Elliot. Come on down.

WILLIAMS: You're welcome. But you know, no matter what you think of Donald Trump as a former president, as a defendant. And, you know, whether his behavior was amoral, objectionable. You didn't vote for him, whatever else. He is a defendant in the criminal system in the United States. He has a right not to testify.

And this whole game of why isn't he testifying? He should stand up and testify, even from another witness. There's just no place for that.

Now, we can talk all day about the alleged conduct. And frankly, all kinds of other conduct. He's allegedly engaged in outside of this.

But I -- that's just me. Sorry, to be the lawyer at the garden party. But I --

HUNT: No. That's why you're here.

WILLIAMS: I've never liked it.

HUNT: I think you're a lovely party guest.

WILLIAMS: I've never liked it when, you know, often juries when, after you argue, they will raise, why didn't the defendant testify? If -- if my life were on the line, I would have testified, too.

And that's a very human impulse from people to think that you want to defend yourself. But there's just no place for it, and it muddies what our criminal justice system's all about.

HUNT: Yes. I mean, Mark, it does seem as though President Trump, the candidate for president was, as Mike was saying, on display here, pushing his team to do this against Stormy Daniels.

And that's the same thing that would be driving -- it's driving how he's talking about the testimony. Right? How it plays politically.

PRESTON: Yes. And I think Mike's absolutely right. I mean, we're seeing what's happening in the courtroom right now. And we're paying a lot attention to these -- these sordid details.

In the court of law, I don't think the sordid details are going to matter and perhaps could backfire, what have you.

The court of public opinion, though. I mean, we're talking about trying to -- I assume now that there are women in these five or six states that we're looking at now, whether it's Wisconsin, or Michigan, or Pennsylvania, or Nevada, Arizona, Georgia, you know, who perhaps would have thought about voting for President Trump, but then they, you know, see this. And not to be very sordid. But this is pretty sordid.

HUNT: It's all very sordid.

PRESTON: I would assume, if I cheated on my wife, that would be -- I mean, she'd kill me, but that would be one thing.

HUNT: I would hope so.

PRESTON: Probably kill me twice. There's another thing, though. I believe to cheat on your wife and then have it publicly come out that you didn't use protection. And I think that that is -- I'm telling you, though, that is something that I think will hit home.

You're laughing, Meghan, but it's true. I think that that is something that --

MEGHAN HAYS, FORMER SPECIAL ASSISTANT TO PRESIDENT BIDEN: I hear you. I hear you.

PRESTON: I think that that is something -- there's a trust level. There's the moralistic level -- you know, issue, that people wrestle with as I'm wrestling right now on TV.

HUNT: I am, too, for the record.

HAYS: To your point about these five or six states that they're trying to play to, those are the Nikki Haley voters that are these moderate women in the -- in suburban cities that are going to vote. Who are they going to vote for? They are the undecided. And these are the things that are going to come up. And these are the ads that the super PACs and other people people are going to put forward come September and October to continue to remind these women of these details.

And also on this tweet that she put out, I think she's trying to bait Trump to respond, to get more of a reaction, to continue to fuel the fire of his gag order, et cetera.

DUBKE: She was very pulled together on the stand yesterday. She held her own. You're probably right about her tweet.

The other point, though, I would make is a lot of this information about the president [SIC] or the way Americans feel about the president [SIC] is already baked in.

So I'm not sure that yesterday really did any extensive damage for him beyond, you know, with those suburban voters. I think they already had some of those slots before him.

HAYS: But if that's true, then those Nikki Haley voters that are continuing to vote for her in the primaries are then --

DUBKE: That is a big --

HAYS: -- convertible to Joe Biden.

DUBKE: That is --

HAYS: To Joe Biden. And so it's kind of where do they sit?

DUBKE: Or our -- or our brain worm friend.

HAYS: Yes, I don't.

HUNT: Brain worm friend. OK. We are going to talk about him later on in the show.

All right. Coming up next here, Donald Trump slamming President Biden for his stance on Israel.

Plus, devastating tornado damage in Alabama. Three more states bracing for severe weather today.

And one very lucky -- lucky or good -- Oklahoma City fan leaving last night's game with $20,000. It's one of the five things you have to see this morning. I'm going to go with good.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:14:09]

HUNT: Donald Trump criticizing President Biden for his decision to pause shipments of some U.S. weapons to Israel, while also attacking Jewish Democrats who support Biden.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R), FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT/2024 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Well, I wouldn't do what Biden did. He just abandoned Israel. I've never seen anything like it. People can't believe it.

And why Jewish people vote for Democrats is beyond me. I think maybe they'll change their mind, but they've been wedded to Democrats for -- you know, for 50 years.

If you're Jewish and you vote for him, I say shame on you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: All right. Our panel is back.

Mark Preston, obviously, this is something we actually have heard from Trump before in talking about Jewish Democrats. I do think it's worth noting that Donald Trump said there were good people on both -- fine people on both sides in Charlottesville when you had neo-Nazis marching, resulted in the death of a woman.

But that said, we have seen very ugly antisemitism raise its head in the context of protests on campuses that are coming from the left. And that is something that -- that we're now grappling with as a country.

PRESTON: Yes, protests popped up. And then all of a sudden, coming in right behind it, or perhaps even fueling it, quite frankly, was this antisemitic wave that we're seeing go across the country.

But I also think that what we're seeing in Israel, right now and with the United States. And with everything else, it seems like, in this country is that we are so divided.

Like Democrats right now are divided on this issue. Angrily.

Republicans, you know, by and large, are together on this issue. But they're not necessarily, you know, in power so that they don't have to necessarily take the hits for what's going on with our foreign policy.

But I do think that it's something that, if we don't stop it right now, if we allow it to fester, this is going to cause a deeper problem down the road.

HUNT: So the Biden campaign responded this way. They said, quote, "Like a cuckoo clock of hate, he is popping up every month with the same patronizing antisemitic shtick and reminding Jewish voters that he has no respect for us" -- Meghan.

HAYS: Yes, I mean, it's clear that he's just trying to divide -- divide more people and create more chaos. And this is what gets people talking, right? So now we're covering this, and we're talking about it, which also just fuels more people to continue all of their different hate out there.

And it's just -- it's really unfortunate. Just -- it's not going to solve the problem. This is a -- an issue in a war that's been going on for long -- for many, many years. So it's like why -- why do we think that he is going to solve this problem? It's just crazy.

HUNT: Well, and Elliot Williams, Trump is also -- has tried to use what's going on on college campuses to give himself a pass on what happened in Charlottesville. Watch what Trump said recently.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) TRUMP: Charlottesville is like a peanut compared to the riots and anti-Israel protests that are happening all over our country, right now. It's a disaster. There's never been a time like it in the United States of America. And it's Crooked's fault. He doesn't have a clue. He doesn't know where he is. He doesn't know he's alive.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: So Charlottesville is like a peanut compared to the riots, he says. Again, let's just underscore it. Neo-Nazis marching.

WILLIAMS: It's just hard to know where -- where he's going with this.

You know, it was interesting that the statement that we'd shown a moment before, used the word "patronizing," because it's sort of almost treating Jewish voters like pawns of sorts and treating Jewish voters as a monolithic block and so on.

So there was just a lot of patronizing tone there.

And I think it's generally not in anyone's interest to say the word "Charlottesville" without saying the word, "and white supremacists" or "and hatred" and so on. And so whatever he's doing there and who's hearing it and intrigued by it is sort of beyond me.

DUBKE: One, I -- from using Charlottesville, I have no -- it's a grab bag of grievances. It seems sometimes to -- when the president's [SIC] speaking. I would not have brought up Charlottesville.

On the other hand, what we're seeing on campuses across the country, what I've really been paying attention to is when they've been making these arrests, how many of the protesters are students and how many of the protesters are professional protesters who have infiltrated these campuses.

So there is something else going on here that's beyond just a uprising of concerned 21-, 22-year-olds or 18-year-olds. And so there's something to be said about that.

On the -- on the outreach to Jewish voters that has been a bloc of voters that has moved -- that has voted for the Democrats for decades now. There is a division here vis-a-vis Israel. And I think it's smart politics for the president [SIC] to reach out to those individuals.

I don't -- I don't find it patronizing. I find that it identified an issue of importance. And the president [SIC] and the Democratic Party seemed to be at odds with each other.

HUNT: Well, I think we can say that reaching out to Jewish voters is one thing.

Saying that that -- you know, criticizing them for supporting Democrats is kind of another-- is kind of another thing.

All right. Ahead here, the fallout from President Biden's decision to hold back some weapons from Israel. Plus, Alabama torn-up by tornadoes. And three more states bracing for severe storms right now.

Plus, police clashing with student protesters at MIT. That's one of the five things you have to see this morning.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:23:40]

HUNT: All right. Twenty-three minutes past the hour, five things you have to see this morning.

Police clashing with pro-Palestinian demonstrators on the MIT campus campus outside Boston. Nine arrests were made. The students are calling on the school to divest from Israel.

In Sweden, thousands gathering to protest Israel's inclusion in the Eurovision song contest. Among them, climate activist Greta Thunberg.

Protests are expected to extend it to the weekend with the Eurovision finals being held on Saturday.

A horse stranded on a roof by floodwaters in Southern Brazil rescued by members of the military yesterday. The horse, which was trapped on the roof for four days, is one of 2,000 animals that have been saved since the flooding began.

And --

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sanders from mid-court, $20,000 richer. He's buying dinner tonight.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: That is Matt Sanders collecting a cool 20K for sinking a half- court shot at halftime at the Oklahoma City Thunder playoff game.

This is the third time in four Thunder home games that someone has made that half-court shot and won that money. Kind of awesome.

All right. Homes decimated, trees twisted. Northwest Alabama still in recovery mode after an EF-2 tornado with winds up to 135 miles an hour tore through a small town earlier this week.

[06:25:05]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The loudest noise I've ever heard in my life, and it just shook you to your core and just scared you to death.

(END VIDEO CLIP) HUNT: And the Southeast is facing -- facing a weakening storm system

this morning. But -- and the threat from tornadoes is diminishing today, but it is not gone completely.

Our meteorologist, Derek van Dam, tracking all of it for us. Derek, good morning.

DEREK VAN DAM, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Yes. The streak of tornadoes continues. Fifteen days straight of tornadoes touching down in the United States. Talk about severe weather fatigue.

Yesterday, there were four. Right now, there is a threat of more tornadoes. This time we have an enhanced risk which includes portions of Northern Florida. Look at that, including Jacksonville.

Slight risk, including Savannah, Georgia, with the threat extending into the Carolinas, as well.

Check this out: 342 tornado reports since April 25. You do the math. That's 15 days.

Here's the ongoing threat this morning. We have a severe thunderstorm watch until 11 a.m. However, there are a few embedded radar indicated tornado warnings. We're monitoring one just West of Tallahassee.

So we'll keep a very close eye on this. Again, radar indicated. So the potential there for a brief spin up is definitely there across the Northeast. You've got a very soggy start to early weekend.

Good news is that should clear out quite nicely by the weekend and then what everybody's been waiting for this large geomagnetic storm that will create a spectacular aurora borealis, or Northern lights display across much of Northern America and North America.

And by the way, Kasie, you can see the Northern lights as far South as Alabama this weekend.

HUNT: Pretty amazing. All right. Derek van Dam for us. Derek, thank you so much. Have a great weekend.

VAN DAM: All right. You, too.

HUNT: All right. Coming up next here, Prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu dismissing President Biden's warning about halting weapons shipments to Israel.

Plus, new body-camera footage released from a deadly encounter between a 23-year-old airman and police.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)