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Inside Politics

Trump Appalled by Court Review; Sessions Talks Lawful Immigration; Supreme Court Nominee Controversy; Trump Defends Ivanka Trump's Business. Aired 12-12:30p ET

Aired February 09, 2017 - 12:00   ET

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

[12:00:00] KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Bill Maher and Van Jones right there. "The Messy Truth," that's tonight, 9:00 p.m. Eastern. A new episode with Van Jones. You don't want to miss it.

Right now, though, let us go to "INSIDE POLITICS" with John King.

JOHN KING, CNN ANCHOR: Thank you, Kate.

And welcome to INSIDE POLITICS. I'm John King. Thanks for sharing your day with us.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions is on the job. This Oval Office swearing in, one last salvo in a bitter confirmation battle that leaves Washington raw.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MIKE PENCE (R), VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I, Jeff Sessions, do solemnly swear -

JEFF SESSIONS, U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: I, Jeff Sessions, do solemnly swear -

PENCE: That I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States.

SESSIONS: That I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States.

PENCE: Against -

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: And speaking of raw, the president launches a morning tweet bomb against a Democratic senator. The senator's crime? Disclosing what Trump's own Supreme Court nominee told him about the president's public attacks on federal judges.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. RICHARD BLUMENTHAL (D), JUDICIARY COMMITTEE: I asked him to express his criticism and to condemn these kinds of public attacks on an independent judiciary. And at that point, after some back and forth, he did say that he found them to be disheartening and demoralizing.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Plus, notice a trend? More punching. Take issue with a Trump ordered military strike or one of the president's adult children, and brace for the official government backlash.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEAN SPICER, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: And for someone to take out their concern with his policies on a family member of his is just - is not acceptable. And the president has every right, as a father, to stand up for them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: With us to share their reporting and their insights, Abby Philip of "The Washington Post," Lisa Lerer of the Associated Press, Reid Wilson of "The Hill" and Mary Katharine Ham of "The Federalist."

A couple things we're tracking this hour. It's a busy day here in Washington. The president is looking to bridge the partisan divide on at least one issue, his Supreme Court fight. A handful of Democrats among those breaking bread with the president at the White House now. We hope to get a glimpse of that. We'll bring it to you if we do.

And a big federal appeals court ruling could come any minute. The 9th Circuit judges will decide whether to keep in place or to lift that lower court order that blocks implementation of the president's controversial travel ban. That ban, of course, people from seven Muslim - majority Muslim countries. The president, if you've been paying attention the last few days, he's been working the refs pretty hard on this one.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: You can be a lawyer or you don't have to be a lawyer. If you were a good student in high school or a bad student in high school, you can understand this. And it's really incredible to me that we have a court case that's going on so long.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Now, that was a calm president talking about this. He has been more energetic in some of his tweets and in some of his other public comments. And it has Washington talking about the appropriateness to the point where it's now exhibit a in a Supreme Court nomination. As we await - let's start, just as we await this ruling, which we expect to come today - we're not sure it will come today, but we expect it to come today - on how important it is for this president to win this round because he wants the ban in place and, number two, on Capitol Hill, they showed no appetite of stepping in to help him if he loses this round.

ABBY PHILLIP, "THE WASHINGTON POST": Yes. I mean I think the president is pretty clear that he thinks that both on this initial issue of, should the ban - the ban - the of the ban be lifted and also on the overall legality of the ban, he thinks that it's pretty clear cut that it's very easy and he is - he doesn't sort of buy into this idea that you should just sit back and wait for the process to unfold. And his staff is backing him up on this. And to some extent, I mean I think that he is helping to highlight the fact that the judiciary, although it is independent, is in some ways a sort of framed bipartisanship. Like the three-judge panel, for example, in the Ninth Circuit that's dealing with his case, two of them were appointed by Democrats and one was appointed by a Republican. And it's sort of - these criticisms really help to highlight that. And I think that no matter what the outcome here, you know, Trump is sort of setting this up for a kind of like battle against the sort of - the state of the judiciary in which some people on the court might have been appointed by Democrats, and he will assume that they are biased against him for that reason.

KING: You mentioned the word "battle." This word's going to come up a lot in the hour. It comes up a lot every day on just about every issue, whether it's Ivanka Trump's clothing line, whether it's Senator John McCain and his views on the Yemen raid, whether it's about the judges and this one judge who initially said no to the president and froze his ban. This is a White House that proves it will punch back and a president who proves it will punch constantly. And they - this is their M.O. and they think it works for them.

I just want to bring in this. Well, we just saw the swearing in of Jeff Sessions. The last several days have been pretty raw here in Washington as they finished the confirmation there. Just after being sworn in, Senator Sessions spoke here and he appears to be - listen here - he appears to be talking both about the travel ban and then the broader immigration issue, which he will now play a key part in.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JEFF SESSIONS, ATTORNEY GENERAL: He's led this nation to say we're going to respond effectively to the threat of terrorism, and you can count on your Department of Justice to do so in an effective way. And you've said something that I believe, and I think the American people believe, that we need a lawful system of immigration. One that serves the interests of the people and the United States. That's not wrong. That's not immoral. That's not indecent. We admit a million people a year plus who - lawfully, and having - we need to end this lawlessness. The threat is a public safety, pulls down wages of working Americans.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[12:05:32] KING: Now the latter part there has long been a Sessions passion, deal with the immigration system, both legal and illegal immigration into the United States. The first part, when he talked about the president responding to the threat of terrorism, he didn't say he was supporting the president, his boss, but he didn't say against so-called judges or things like that. There's a - there's a way to say, I think I'm right and there's a way to some people crosses the line. LISA LERER, ASSOCIATED PRESS: Yes, and, I mean, what is good politics

in a presidential campaign may not be good politics in governing. Clearly, Donald Trump has an ability to find people's weakest point and just nail them on it. And we saw that throughout the campaign. It was very successful.

Now he's in Washington. Congress can pass things. Congress can reject things. So targeting individual senators may not be the best approach, particularly on things that they feel, you know, sensitive about. I have to say, Senator Blumenthal, he was, of course, the senator who, you know, first made the comment that the judge had told him, you know, Trump's attacks on the federal judiciary were disheartening. I spoke to him before the nominee came out and, look, he's a Democrat. Is he going to vote for Trump's pick? Probably not. But compared to some of his colleagues, he certainly sounded more open to giving him a fair hearing. You got to wonder if he still feels that way after he's been, you know, pillared on the Internet by Donald Trump. So this may just not be good politics for him now that he needs to win over people in Congress.

KING: Right, so here's my question. Are we being had here in the sense that this morning, the president of the United States, yes, I - yes, I asked that question quite a bit actually - the president of the United States this morning on Twitter, his favorite vehicle, especially if it's coffee time, "Senator Richard Blumenthal, who never fought in Vietnam when he said for years he had, major lie, now misrepresents what Judge Gorsuch told him."

Let's focus on the important part. The president of the United States saying that the senator was misrepresenting what the judge told him. However, the spokesman hired by the Trump White House says that is what he said. The sherpa helping the Trump White House says that is what he said. Here, Republican Senator Ben Sasse, a conservative, yes, not a Trump fan, says that is what he said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. BEN SASSE (R), JUDICIARY COMMITTEE: Disheartening is a great word. Judge Gorsuch and I actually talked about that and, frankly, he got pretty passionate about it - about it. I asked him about the so- called judge's comment, because we don't have so-called judges or so- called presidents or so-called senators. And this is a guy who kind of welled up with some energy and he said, any attack on any of - I think his term to me was brothers or sisters of the robe, is an attack on all judges, and he believes in an independent judiciary.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Now, again, to the point, what the president - Senator Blumenthal was not misrepresenting what the judge said. So the president was not factual in his tweet this morning. But we're talking about this Judge Gorsuch being willing to stand up and criticize the president in these private meetings and prove his independence, which is exactly what Judge Gorsuch needs to do to get the Democratic votes he needs to get through a filibuster.

REID WILSON, "THE HILL": Right. This is the - the funny part is -

LERER: Right.

WILSON: That at the moment this looks like some big sort of negative for the White House, but it helps - it's going to help the judge in the long run. You can imagine that we all probably want to hear a confirmation from the judge maybe in a confirmation hearing. This is certainly going to come up. It's going to be the first question that anybody asks. And I can imagine that it will probably be asked repeatedly, whether or not this is somehow appropriate from the White House. So I suppose the question then becomes, what is the president of the United States going to tweet about his own Supreme Court nominee essentially standing up to him.

KING: And is - is - will President Trump tolerate criticism from his own Supreme Court nominee -

MARY KATHARINE HAM, "THE FEDERALIST": Right.

KING: If that criticism, in the long run, helps the president get his Supreme Court nominee?

HAM: So, yes, I think that's -

KING: Or if because he criticized the president -

HAM: Right.

KING: Should he prepare for the tweets?

HAM: No, I think that's a real open question. And I wonder, like, Trump's relationship with almost everyone is adversarial. Like even friends and family sometimes. And so I don't think we should be surprised, particularly from a very litigious man his entire life that he has an adversarial relationship with judges. He feels very comfortable in that space.

I also wonder whether he sometimes is saying, look, if you're going to come after me, especially Democrats, or actually anyone, I'm going to throw at you whatever scandal it was you were last embroiled in and you're going to have to pay the price for that again in some small way. And whether he thinks it might make them back off a bit. But I think for somebody like Blumenthal, even though that does get brought up again -

WILSON: Right.

HAM: His base loves him fighting with Trump. So it works for both.

WILSON: Yes.

LERER: Right. Like it's a political dynamic. I'm not sure it does help him because of the political dynamics. The Democratic senators are facing this base that wants nothing short of complete oppositional resistance.

HAM: Yes.

LERER: So when something like this happens, it just makes it harder for Blumenthal to even consider voting for Gorsuch because he looks like he's sort of being maybe steamrolled by Trump, and that's the worst thing he could possibly do given where the Democratic Party is these days.

[12:10:13] PHILLIP: And, to that point, the official line from Democratic leadership on this is that Gorsuch didn't go far enough. He has also refused to say it himself with his own mouth in public. So a lot of Democratic leaders, including, you know, Senator Schumer's office are saying, wait a second, like, let's not give this guy a pass for saying, oh, you know, it's disheartening in private and then refusing to say it in public. I don't think this story is going to die. It's not clear that what Gorsuch did this week with Blumenthal or with Ben Sasse is going to be sufficient to quell the concern.

KING: But let's also remember, the Democrats are in a political argument, too, and they say he has to say it publicly. They know full well that if the tides were - if the tables were turned, they would tell their nominees, don't speak publicly now. You do that just at your confirmation hearing. So there's a little bit of disingenuous to say the least.

HAM: Yes.

KING: In the Democratic arguments too.

So - but back to a point - a question I have to raise a lot, I always said during the campaign, is there a method to this madness or a madness to the method of how Trump communicates and how he gets things done because he wins. And so he's out there tweeting that a senator is not telling the truth when the senator actually was telling the truth and it sparks a discussion about the senator. Ninety-five, 96, 98 percent of what this president does is combat. Yet, he's sitting down for lunch right now and he brought in the Democratic senators, some of them who are the key. Those - we've talked about them before, the Trump state Democrats. They're on the ballot in 2018. In many cases, Trump won their states by 15, 20, or 30 points. So he's doing something traditional. He's doing something bipartisan, or at least trying to bridge the divide.

WILSON: Trying in that - in a sense to rekindle a tradition that has fallen apart in recent years. And President Obama tried to reach out to Republicans a number of times. There were a number of dinners after work and sort of more informal settings. None of that worked to - to bridge - to bridge any kind of partisan divide.

This is a very combative president trying to play the normal game of Washington in a Washington that has fundamentally changed. You know, sure, there are a lot of Democratic targets. I think it's ten senators who are up in 2018 who won - Democrats who won states that Donald Trump won. You know, those ten are the obvious targets to get to a 60- vote threshold in the U.S. Senate. But how many are going to be put off, like Richard Blumenthal who's going to be put off?

KING: Right.

WILSON: How many are going to be railroaded like Democrats have been railroaded by their own base in trying to come up with some opposition. So it's a traditional play, but in a totally different landscape.

KING: But is he perhaps a little more nuanced than we give him credit for?

HAM: This is - this is the thing about him is that he is combative, but he is not ideological. So I think there are opportunities often for liberals and for moderate Democrats to work with him on things but the base will almost certainly not allow that. But I do think he's this interesting character in perhaps that he's combative with everybody and he doesn't care what you believe. And when you come down and sit at that table, he actually does want to make the deal. He is that guy to some extent.

KING: And he likes to be liked.

HAM: Yes.

KING: And we know the outside game, Trump, candidate Trump, now President Trump, is often very different than what you hear from people who have the smaller meetings with him -

LERER: Right.

KING: Where they say that it's kind of - in the locker room, kind of sit around, small conversation setting, he can actually be charming.

HAM: Right.

LERER: And the one thing that I've spent a lot of time in the past week or two talking to senators up for re-election, people weighing challenges to senators up for re-election, and the one thing that everyone seems to agree on is that nobody knows how this is going to play out. The political dynamics are so much in flux. We're still less than a month in, although it feels like an awful lot longer.

KING: Just three weeks.

LERER: Just three weeks, but nobody knows how these dynamics are going to play out.

KING: Right.

LERER: Nobody knows if Democrats are going to primary their own. Nobody knows if Republicans are going to be weakened if Trump's approval ratings stay this low. So they're all sort of trying to keep options open in every place. So if you are a red state Democrat, you go to the white House, you know, and you see -

KING: Those are -

LERER: You don't know which way the wind's going to blow in a year from now.

KING: Those are the three least spoken words in Washington, "I don't know," but I think they apply to just about everything, tax reform, Obamacare, how long can people keep up the stamina. The president - I think, though, this is on purpose. The president is trying to - if the Democrats want to have a fight every day, they're going to have to bring it. They're going to have to get to the gym and stay fit because he's going to keep it up every day.

Up next, the Trump White House has "buy American" as one of its mantras. But now they're encouraging Americans to buy clothing made overseas?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:18:36] KING: Welcome back.

Hire American, buy American is a favorite slogan for President Trump and his America first White House, but there are exceptions.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KELLYANNE CONWAY, SENIOR TRUMP ADVISER: Go by Ivanka's stuff is what I would tell you (ph). I'm going to -

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, and there's - there's that -

CONWAY: I'm going to - I hate shopping, I'm going to go get some myself today.

It's a wonderful line. I own some of it. I fully - I'm going to just give a - I'm going to give a free commercial here.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.

CONWAY: Go buy it today, everybody. You can find it online.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: That plug for the Ivanka Trump clothing line from the White House Briefing Room by a taxpayer paid government employee, a pitch for a clothing line that relies heavily on cheap Chinese and other overseas labor. So what? Family business or across the line?

PHILLIP: This is a really easy one. You really shouldn't do this stuff, especially since there - there was this whole motion to separate Ivanka and Trump from their businesses, at least nominally. And this completely undermines that whole thing. I mean it - the federal statute that deals with federal employees not doing this sort of thing actually kind of exempts the president from that, but it does not exempt his aides. They are covered under this rule and it is one of the things that's pretty clear they're not supposed to do.

And I think actually that Kellyanne knows that, but this White House has made it pretty clear that when it concerns something that the president himself is personally very upset about, they will go up to that line, exactly where he was, and defend him.

KING: Right. That's the point I was going to make. I bet you a Nordstrom shopping spree that the boss liked that.

[12:20:03] PHILLIP: Yes. Absolutely.

KING: Because to say - he said - listen -- Trump yesterday, if you haven't followed the news, the Nordstrom store said they're no longer going to carry Ivanka Trump. They say it's an economic decision. They say it's not selling and that every year they review everything they sell and some things don't make the cut for next year. That's why they say they made the decision. President Trump thinks it's political, thinks it's personal, tweeted yesterday, "my daughter Ivanka has been treated so unfairly by @nordstrom. She's a great person, always pushing me to do the right thing. Terrible."

And before everybody else jumps in, here's what struck me again. That was Kellyanne Conway from the White House Briefing Room. Here's Sean Spicer. Ys, he's the president's press secretary, but he speaks for the United States government, standing in a room that is the official government podium, if you will. Listen here.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEAN SPICER, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: When it comes to his family, I think he's been very clear how proud he is of what they do and what they've accomplished. And for someone to take out their concern with his policies on a family member of her - his is just - is not acceptable. And the president has every right, as a father, to stand up for them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Not acceptable is the interesting language. Not acceptable. He speaks for the United States government. If you say something or do something critical or negative about the president's family, it's not acceptable?

LERER: Look, you know, I think it's clear this is an ethics violation. There seems to be little question about that. But I have to say, like, you know, the dresses seem lovely. I've seen them in the store. But like this - he's the leader of the free world. This is the White House. Like this -

KING: You think maybe he has better things to spend his time on?

LERER: I mean we're not here - there are thousands of troops in Afghanistan, we're not hearing about that. There's plenty of issues we're not hearing about. And what we're hearing about from him is his daughter's - his family business, his daughter's business. Like, I think there are questions about the appropriateness - beyond the clear ethics violations -

KING: Right.

LERER: There are a lot of questions about the appropriateness of his use of time of what he is doing in the office like - I mean is this really what the taxpayers -

KING: But I bet - but I bet a lot of Trump voters love it because he's just punching back at everything that gets in his way.

HAM: Yes. So there's something between like sticking up for your daughter, which is a totally admirable thing to do, and descending to QVC level, which we have not quite reached yet with, you know, exhibiting on air. But -

KING: It's only Thursday.

HAM: But, look, I think, you know, one thing that I think would help us understand the Trumps better is that there is no separation between personal and business.

KING: Right.

HAM: It is who they are. And I think that's how they understand it. That's certainly how Donald Trump understands it. And so separating those two does not feel natural to them. And will not feel natural as president. And I'm not sure how interested they actually are in doing it.

KING: Yes. For me, there's the family loyalty, number one, but I think it gets back to the thing we were talking about before, it is the relishing the combat too. That if you cross - if you - what are perceived or you do cross them, they get you back. Senator John McCain, this is a bug pivot from Ivanka Trump's clothing line to Senator John McCain, but Senator John McCain was raising questions about the raid in Yemen. Raising - you know, was it a success? Was it done right? Was it rushed? Was it properly planned?

Donald Trump, on Twitter again, his favorite weapon, "Senator McCain should not be talking about the success or failure of a mission to the media. Only emboldened the enemy. He's been losing so long, he doesn't know how to win anymore. Just look at the mess our country's in." And he goes on and on and on about this.

Number one, should not be talking about the success or failure of a mission to the media? His press secretary has talked from the podium at the White House about he's describing it as a success. The Pentagon has talked about this and released videos. There was a bit of a kerfuffle in all that. But, of course, we have - I think we have this thing called the First Amendment and I think as the chairman -

WILSON: And the separation of powers, right.

KING: The chairman of the Armed Services Committee has every right to talk about a military mission. What is this one about?

WILSON: Let me go back to the - to the Ivanka Trump product line at Nordstrom, by the way. This is something that Democrats wish they had done in 2016, attack Donald Trump like they attacked Mitt Romney, as a crass businessman who, you know, takes profit above all else and hurts workers in the process.

KING: I think they tried that with the Trump ties and all that.

WILSON: A little bit, but it was not the central focus of the message like the Obama administration - or the Obama campaign's assault on Mitt Romney was. I think - I feel like this is opening up a preview to the 2020 attacks against Donald Trump, not, you know, a president running for re-election who has ethical issues that here we are three weeks in, we've already seen a few of them. You know, these are not going away. There are going to be larger ones. And if they're - they were talking about a product line from the podium, that's -

KING: And these - and these can seem like petty fights or you can take the family loyalty to the Ivanka thing. A petty fight with John McCain, who we know he's been at war with throughout the campaign and he now thinks John McCain is pushing him on Russia and other things. They could take it as petty fights.

But listen to Senator John Thune here, a member of the Republican leadership, who can count the votes, who understands they have a 52-48 majority in the senate, who thinks every time you pick one of these fights and poison the well, it may cost you a vote down the line when you need it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JOHN THUNE (R), SOUTH DAKOTA: Yes, I don't think it's a - it's probably not advisable for that line of discussion or that conversation to be going on publicly. At some point the president is going to need senators, every Republican senator, because we only have a 52-vote majority here in the United States Senate, in order to accomplish his agenda. So I hope everybody can kind of dial it down a bit and keep focused on the things that unite us.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: I'd like to see that list of things that can unite us. Everybody hold their thought. We'll continue the conversation when we come back.

[12:25:03] President Trump's new attorney general sworn in this morning after a big clash with Congress. Will the fighting get even tougher for the remaining cabinet picks?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KING: Welcome back.

Democrats tried, oh, awfully hard, to sink Senator Jeff Sessions' nomination as attorney general. Today, President Trump reminded them in the Oval Office, they failed.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Jeff, I know you're going to do a fantastic job. Good luck. Thank you.

(END VIDEO CLIP) KING: Trump getting the last word there. President Trump. That's becoming a bit of a habit here in Washington. Even in the supposedly genteel U.S. Senate. When a United States senator is miffed, they typically start their (INAUDIBLE) by calling their targets "my friend," "my colleague." Well, no longer. Take a look at this tweet from Senator Elizabeth Warren. This is just last night. "If Jeff Sessions makes even the tiniest attempt to bring his racism, sexism and bigotry into the Department of Justice, he'll hear from all of us."

[12:29:50] I was joking with the staff before the show that we have to rewind and go back because every day you say it escalated again and it escalated again and it's unprecedented and we've never had rhetoric like this. We're only, to your point, Lisa, three weeks in and so how do we keep - we can't keep escalating.