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Trump Braces For Final Act Of His Historic Criminal Trial; Deadly Israeli Airstrike On Rafah Was A "Tragic Error" Netanyahu Says; Donald Trump Heckled And Booed At Libertarian Party Convention. Aired 5:30-6a ET

Aired May 28, 2024 - 05:30   ET

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

[05:30:00]

KASIE HUNT, CNN ANCHOR: Just before 5:30 a.m. here in Washington. A live look at New York City -- wow, look at that -- on this Tuesday morning. Good morning, everyone. I'm Kasie Hunt. It's wonderful to have you with us.

In just a few hours, closing arguments there in New York will begin in Donald Trump's criminal hush money case. Jurors now on track to start deliberations as soon as tomorrow.

Trump taking to Truth Social to air a pretty familiar set of grievances, writing this. "Can you imagine a President of the United States who got more votes than any sitting president in the history of our country and who is also the Republican nominee for president in the upcoming 2024 election, and leading in all polls against the Democrat nominee Joe Biden, is tomorrow going before a corrupt and conflicted Democrat-appointed acting New York judge to see whether or not he will become a common criminal?"

All right. Well, we've got some fact-checking issues in that statement.

But let's bring in criminal defense attorney Lexie Rigdon to talk a little bit more about it. Lexie, good morning. It's wonderful to see you.

Can you talk a little bit about what we're going to see today? Trump is also complaining about the fact that the defense team is apparently going to make these closing arguments first. Is that unusual? Does he have a legit complaint there?

LEXIE RIGDON, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY: No, that's actually the way that it happens in New York. So the defense team goes first and then the prosecution goes second because the prosecution is the one that has the burden. So that's why that's happening. I mean, he's taken issue with a lot of what's going on in the trial, so I'm really not surprised that he's also taking issue with this.

But it's going to be -- it's going to be very interesting and both sides -- hopefully, it will keep them kind of short and sweet. I think that after weeks and weeks of this, any jury would be kind of tired of this. And they don't need to go over every last piece of evidence. They need to hit their strong points and then let them -- let them go and start deliberating.

HUNT: So, Lexie, can we talk about the jurors for a second? There's an interesting piece out this morning in The Bulwark. They're reporting on -- and we're still working on this here at CNN -- but they report that the Trump team is really focused on a guy that they call juror number two, who is in financial services and who they have interpreted via body language and some eye contact, and some others things is he might be the person that could potentially mean that Donald Trump is acquitted or that there is a hung jury in this case.

As a defense attorney -- I mean, how much time do you spend thinking about that? Like, which person in this box might be my client's savior and so I'm going to -- I mean, do you talk directly to people like that? And are you often correct about who those people are or is this a total crap shoot?

RIGDON: Well, you're always told by your parents you can't judge a book by the -- by its cover and, I mean, you learn that as a child. And so with jury selection that's essentially what you're doing and that's what they had to do weeks ago is they had to judge a book by its cover and they had to look at people and based on where they're from and what type of news they're consuming and how they get their news. Try to make some type of prediction about where the opinions of these people will lie.

And that's no different in terms of looking at this juror and the person's eye contact.

But as you'll remember, harkening back to the Alex Murdaugh trial, there was a lot of reporting about one juror who was apparently crying during Alex Murdaugh's testimony, and it ended up turning out that the juror was actually just reaching for a tissue because they might have been blowing their nose.

And so, I think it's -- I think it's not necessarily worthy of anyone's time to sort of speculate about anybody's body language or eye contact because you don't know what's going on in that person's head.

And then there's the very human peer pressure element of being back in a jury room and have potentially 11 other people saying we want to get out of here. You're wrong. We don't agree with you. He either did do it or he didn't do it. We want to convict him. We want to acquit him.

And if there's going to be somebody that hangs this jury it's going to have to be somebody that has some -- hangs it either way, it's going to have to be somebody that has some intestinal fortitude to stand up and disagree with 11 other people. And a lot of times that just -- that doesn't necessarily happen based on human nature.

HUNT: That's a really interesting way to think about it, honestly.

How likely do you think that it is that we could get something of a split decision here? Because the burden, right, to get to a felony conviction has been to convince the jury that basically, two New York state laws were broken.

RIGDON: Yeah.

HUNT: That the business records were falsified. But that also, they were done so in service of defrauding the voters of New York basically is the way it's written.

Is there a world where they convict him of a misdemeanor and not of a felony? Is that not how this is set up? What is -- what are the possibilities there?

RIGDON: Right. That's not how it's set up. The fact that it's even being brought is because it was elevated to a felony in the charging decision by saying that the falsification of business records were to conceal another crime. And so, he can't be convicted of a misdemeanor because the statute of limitations had long since passed since that time. So it's kind of an all or nothing here.

And it's 34 counts of falsifying the business records. But importantly, the jury has to believe that he did it to -- in furtherance of another crime in order to convict him.

HUNT: Fascinating.

All right, Lexie Rigdon for us. Lexie, thanks very much for being with us this morning. I really appreciate your time.

RIGDON: Thanks, Kasie.

[05:35:00]

HUNT: All right, now this. The White House is assessing the Israeli airstrike that killed dozens of people at a camp for displaced Palestinians in Rafah on Sunday. The Hamas-run Health Ministry says at least 45 people were killed and more than 200 injured after a fire broke out at the camp following the strike.

A U.S. official tells CNN that Israel told the Biden administration it sued a precision munition to hit a target in Rafah but that the explosion from the strike ignited a fuel tank nearby and started a fire that engulfed the camp.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the attack a tragic error while still pointing the finger at Hamas.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, ISRAELI PRIME MINISTER (through translator): Despite our best effort not to harm those not involved, unfortunately, a tragic error happened last night and we are investigating the case. For us, every non-combatant that is hurt is a tragedy. For Hamas, it is a strategy. This is the whole difference.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: All right, joining me now to discuss is CNN global affairs analyst, Kim Dozier. Kim, good morning to you. Thank you so much for being with us.

I want to start by just reminding everyone what President Biden told our Erin Burnett in an interview earlier this month. Let's watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: If they go into Rafah, I'm not supply the weapons that have been used historically to deal with Rafah, to deal with the cities, to deal with that problem. We're going to continue to make sure Israel is secure in terms of Iron Dome and their ability to respond to attacks like came out of the -- and the least recently. But it's just wrong. We're not going to -- we're not going to supply the weapons and the artillery shells used that have been used as --

ERIN BURNETT, CNN ANCHOR: Artillery shells as well?

BIDEN: Yeah, artillery shells.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: Kim, what is your understanding and reporting around whether the administration views this as having crossed the red line?

KIM DOZIER, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: We're still waiting to hear the full Monday morning, sort of, assessment. Of course, Memorial Day stopped some of that analysis from at least reaching us.

Biden's going to have to either eat his words or follow them after this strike because what Israel has tried to do is press ahead with the Rafah invasion but cut it into smaller operations and do precision strikes, as they've described it, to avoid these kind of casualties. But now you've got dozens of Palestinians dead and that's going to demand a response.

And you also have growing European anger over this. We've had Spain, today, recognizing Palestinians. And you've got Israel -- you've got Ireland and Norway saying that they'll follow this week. So the international outrage is building up. And simply saying sorry, this was a tragedy isn't enough for the Palestinian community, the Arab community, or a growing number of countries in the West, including the White House.

HUNT: Yeah. Kim, how do you think about this sort of increasing isolation that the Israelis are facing as more European countries, as you note, are recognizing a Palestinian state?

DOZIER: So, they've had a number of announcements in the past week that have been damaging to their international reputation. You've had the U.N.'s highest court calling on Israel to stop its operations in Gaza. You've also had the International Court at the Hague threatening to issue arrest warrants for Netanyahu and his defense minister.

But from the Israeli point of view, it took the U.N. five months to recognize that there was violence against women perpetrated in the attacks of October 7. The U.N. has just revised downward its estimate of Gaza civilian casualties after finally saying that perhaps the Hamas numbers are overblown.

So those kind of announcements from the Israeli point of view -- they say see, the world is against us and they don't understand what happened on October 7. They don't seem to acknowledge that Hamas has vowed daily to commit more October 7ths and that this action is necessary from their perspective to root out Hamas from Rafah.

And just today, in Israeli announcements from the IDF, you've got fighting going in all parts -- north, central, and south Gaza. So the fight against Hamas is continuing. And despite that, over the weekend, Hamas, in Rafah, was able to launch up to eight rockets at Tel Aviv -- the first time they've been able to do that in months. So the Israeli military feels its job isn't done.

HUNT: So, Kim, can I ask you what's up with the Egyptians in all of this briefly? Because there was apparently an altercation where an Egyptian soldier may have been killed recently. And then there were a lot of questions about the role that they played in the ceasefire talks, seeming to disintegrate when they had previously been rather promising.

[05:40:15]

DOZIER: Yes. The Israelis say that the Egyptians changed part of what they'd agreed to before it was presented to Hamas. And then remember, Hamas came out saying we've agreed to this negotiated ceasefire. And that left the Israelis on the back foot because what was in the fine print was something they hadn't agreed to. So Egypt got accused of bad faith negotiating there. From the Egyptian point of view, this is just the horse trading that goes back and forth.

But we watched either Qatar being on the outs or Israel -- or Egypt being on the outs, depending on what's happening internally within the Israeli government. The most depressing thing, though, is that Israeli reporting is that their own negotiating team thinks that with Netanyahu in power and the limitations placed on what they can negotiate, they're simply not going to come up with a deal.

HUNT: All right, Kim Dozier for us this morning. Kim, very grateful to have you. Thanks for being here.

DOZIER: Thanks.

HUNT: All right. Coming up next, Donald Trump booed and heckled in his attempt to court third-party voters. Plus, the Celtics on to the NBA Finals after sweeping the Pacers. Our Bleacher Report is ahead.

(COMMERCIAL)

[05:45:55]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Nominate Trump for President of the United States.

LIBERTARIAN PARTY CONVENTIONGOERS: (Heckling and booing).

TRUMP: Whoa, that's nice. That's nice. Only if you want to win. Only if you want to win. Maybe you don't want to win. Maybe you don't want to win.

If you want to lose, don't do that. Keep getting your three percent every four years.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: Wow, there is a lot going on there. Donald Trump getting heckled and booed at the Libertarian Party's convention on Saturday. His attempt to win over third-party voters clearing did not go as planned but it does show that his campaign is focused on critical third-party voters in November.

And there is, of course, one third-party candidate in particular that both Trump and President Biden have voiced concern about, and that is Robert Kennedy Jr. It's worth nothing neither Trump nor RFK Jr. won the Libertarian Party nomination over the weekend.

Joining me now, Axios senior contributor, Margaret Talev. Margaret, good morning.

MARGARET TALEV, SENIOR CONTRIBUTOR, AXIOS, DIRECTOR, INSTITUTE FOR DEMOCRACY, JOURNALISM AND CITIZENSHIP, SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY: Good morning.

HUNT: Can we start with what we saw?

TALEV: Oh.

HUNT: I mean, Donald Trump is never on a stage where he gets booed like that. He clearly wasn't happy about it.

TALEV: Yeah. I don't think that was the reception he thought he was going to get there. But the reality is that he has made inroads into the Libertarian Party just as he has made some inroads into every facet of American politics. And I think he thought if he can go there and court Libertarian voters who are sort of leaning more Trump, even if he was not going to capture a nomination, it would be worth courting those voters.

I think another big part of what he was trying to do was just not seed that floor to RFK Jr., right, because this could be an important year where a third-party candidate could be a spoiler. RFK Jr. certainly has the potential to do that. And there was some thought that RFK Jr. would be very well-received there -- and he was certainly received differently than Donald Trump was.

But, yeah. I mean, to your point, you see -- we do a lot of focus grouping with battleground voters and swing voters and at this point in the election, RFK Jr. is sort of a fascination or a maybe to many of them who don't actually know pretty much anything about his policies, and his stances, and his background. The ones who lean more Democratic know the Kennedy name. HUNT: Right.

TALEV: The ones who lean more to the right like the idea that there could be someone who is not Biden or Trump.

And all of those things make him potentially potent if he can get on ballots or get on a debate stage.

HUNT: Well, and that was kind of the interest, right? I mean, there was -- there were some conversations -- we had some reporting around RFK Jr. wanting to potentially be on the Libertarian ticket because they have ballot access --

TALEV: Yeah.

HUNT: -- across the country.

So you mentioned how there are voters that are in either Trump or Biden -- I mean, this is the big question we've been trying to answer. With RFK on the ballot, which major party candidate suffers the most damage?

Here's what RFK Jr. had to say about Donald Trump. I thought it was -- it's an interesting line of attack -- watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ROBERT F. KENNEDY JR, PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: With the lockdowns, the mask mandates, the travel restrictions, President Trump presided over the greatest restriction on individual liberties this country has ever known.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNT: I mean, that is -- it's obviously not a line of attack from President Biden. They attacked -- Democrats attacked Donald Trump for being irresponsible on how he fought the COVID pandemic.

TALEV: Sort of.

HUNT: But this is not a record that Donald Trump likes to talk about either.

TALEV: No. I mean, you're absolutely right, and that's why I think the idea was sort of go block and tackle. Don't let RFK just make his case alone.

Interestingly, Donald Trump did not go out on that stage and pan RFK Jr. He ended up going out on the stage and panning the audience that was there to receive him.

HUNT: Uh-huh.

TALEV: But it's -- we, consistently from voters, hear -- we do not hear the idea from most voters that they're embracing him because of his antivax or critical of vaccines position, or critical of mandates. It's just the opposite. Voters at this stage -- a lot of those swing voters or persuadable voters are embracing this idea that RFK Jr. is sort of splitting the difference. That his politics are in the middle between Trump and Biden.

[05:50:04]

They really don't know anything about him or his running mate. It's just sort of memes of superficial impressions, but that could be very powerful if he could harness it.

HUNT: Yeah, it's really interesting.

And there is this big question about the debate stage, right, because right now, RFK Jr. is not supposed to be on the debate stage in June -- the first debate coming up June 27 here on CNN.

The two big questions for him are ballot access and polling thresholds. The polling -- I mean, he seems to around 15 percent, which is where he would need to be in four major polls. Ballot access is a trickier thing.

What is your, sort of, expectation about whether we might see -- we haven't seen this since Ross Perot was on stage -- a third-party candidate on a debate state.

TALEV: Yeah. Many of the -- really, it's that crucial bloc of younger voters right now wasn't even alive the last time that a third-party candidate was sort of in this position. I think it's been 32 or 33 years, and we've seen it three times in history.

So the odds against him but he has moved very quickly to try to capture that ballot access in crucial states. So I think it bears watching.

And don't forget, there's a couple of debates -- but also, there's just name recognition, voters' awareness. Again, if it comes down to anywhere as close a race as the last one was, that vote and maybe the Libertarians' vote -- some of the folks who were at this convention -- could be pivotal.

HUNT: One of the places where RFK Jr. claims to be on the ballot is Michigan. How dangerous is that for the Biden team considering that there are so many people there who are so unhappy with what's going on in terms of Gaza and Biden there?

TALEV: Yeah. Michigan, obviously, is this really crucial state both because of the Arab American vote -- some of the younger vote that's sympathetic to the plight of the Palestinian civilians.

It was thought at one point that women's rights and abortion rights could sort of, like, help propel in Michigan. But right now, the concern really is not just Arab American voters but younger voters and the fact that so many of the auto union workers that were once strongly affiliated with the Democratic Party could now be susceptible to at least a white male -- HUNT: Yeah.

TALEV: -- auto union -- auto workers.

HUNT: Right. It happened in 2016 --

TALEV: Absolutely.

HUNT: -- right?

All right, Margaret Talev for us this morning. Margaret, thank you.

TALEV: Thanks.

HUNT: I really appreciate it.

All right, time now for sports. The Boston Celtics on their way to the NBA Finals after sweeping the Pacers.

Andy Scholes is back and has this morning's Bleacher Report. Andy, good morning.

ANDY SCHOLES, CNN SPORTS ANCHOR: Yeah, good morning, Kasie.

You know, the Celtics -- they've had the easiest path ever to the NBA Finals. They faced the Heat without Jimmy Butler, the Cavs without Donovan Mitchell for most of their series, and then the Pacers with a hurt Tyrese Haliburton. But that being said, they definitely took care of business.

It was not easy in game four in Indianapolis. The Pacers leading by eight with 5 1/2 to go, but that's when the Celtics just turned it on. They outscored the Pacers 15-4 to close the game. And Jaylen Brown here -- he's going to find Derrick White in the corner for the dagger three with 44 seconds left.

The Celtics win 105-102 to complete the sweep. Brown, 29 points in this one and was named the Eastern Conference Finals MVP.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAYLEN BROWN, BOSTON CELTICS, EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS MVP: I wasn't expecting it at all, you know. I never win (bleep). So I was just happy that we won. I give credit to Indiana. They played us tough. I know, like, people think that Indiana wasn't a good team or whatever the case being. I mean, I thought they were as tough as anybody we've played all season.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCHOLES: All right. Now, before the game, they held a moment of silence for legendary center and broadcaster Bill Walton who passed away yesterday after a lengthy battle with cancer. Walton was one of the most dominant centers the game of basketball has ever seen, winning two NCAA titles at UCLA and two NBA titles -- one with the Blazers and then one with the Celtics. Unfortunately, injuries derailed his career, but he was still named to

the NBA's top 50 and 75 anniversary teams.

Walton was always a joy to meet in person. He greeted everyone with that legendary smile. And I'll never forget how much fun he was when he was calling games and how much he made them to watch. "Throw it down, big man." Such a legendary line. Bill Walton was 71 years old.

All right, on the ice last night, the Stars and Oilers -- they played game three of the Western Conference Finals. A great start for Edmonton in this one. They went up 2-0 in the first thanks to this goal from Connor McDavid. But the Stars -- they then scored three goals in a span of three minutes and 33 seconds to take the lead in the second period.

And Jason Robertson had himself a night. He hadn't scored in 10 games, but he would complete a hat trick in the third period.

The Stars end up winning 5-3 to take a 2-1 series lead.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JASON ROBERTSON, LEFT WINGER, DALLAS STARS: I think -- I mean, I don't know. I got the first one and then I'm like OK, I'm going to shoot everything. So it's one of those things you just gain confidence. But, I mean, it's just a big character win from all of us.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[05:55:00]

SCHOLES: All right. And finally, former heavyweight champion Mike Tyson is recovering after experiencing a medical scare on a flight from Miami to Los Angeles on Sunday. The 57-year-old became nauseous and dizzy due to an ulcer flare-up, his representative told CNN, adding, "Mr. Tyson is doing great."

Now, Iron Mike is still set to fight YouTube star-turned-boxer Jake Paul July 20 in Arlington, Texas on Netflix.

And yeah, I told -- I told you before, Kasie, sometimes I don't get into these gimmicky boxing matches. I'm into this one. I want to see Tyson versus Paul. I'm just hoping that he's healthy enough to get in the ring and actually fight after what happened over the weekend.

HUNT: Yeah -- no, for sure. I'm pulling for him, I have to say.

Andy, thank you very much for that.

All right. Coming up next here, how Donald Trump's defense team plans to handle closing arguments this morning. Plus, two states facing a severe weather threat today just days after taking direct hits from tornadoes.

(COMMERCIAL)