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TX Dems Urge Biden & Congress To Act On Voting Bills; Tug-Of- War Between Dems, Biden Justice Dept. Over Trump Tax Returns; Soon: Biden Speaks In Tulsa To Mark 100 Years Since Massacre. Aired 12:30-1p ET

Aired June 01, 2021 - 12:30   ET

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

[12:30:00]

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: There are real tangible benefits to pushing forward on the John Lewis Voting Rights Act and there are Republicans who have traditionally supported these things. Its support has kind of dissipated over the course of the last several years. But when you pare back from what they're trying to do into that, just about preclearance, just about reinstalling what was done away within Shelby v. Holder, there may be a pathway to 60 because the filibuster is not going anywhere.

JOHN KING, CNN HOST: And so, it's not going anywhere. And the math, look, the Governor can call a special section on -- in Texas law they call a special session has to deal with the issue you've been called. So they have the votes. The Democrats can try, you know, parliamentary text, they can walk out eventually. They can pass it if they want.

This is what it does. Bans on solicited mail-in ballot applications, it prohibits overnight Sunday morning voting, expands access for partisan poll watchers, stops drive-through voting, makes it easier to overturn election results. What it does is roll back some of the things put in place during the pandemic here. And this is you're seeing this in state, so you can put up the map.

There are 22 restrictive laws enacted so far in 14 states. Republicans would essentially go back to the pre COVID era, because they lost, because more people voted in election year where we thought fewer people would vote because of the pandemic. The question is, to Phil's point, you know, will Democrats compromise to a smaller package? But to my point is, where's the President?

I know he has other priorities, right? He wants to deal with COVID relief, the vaccine rollout, try to work with Republicans on infrastructure. But this is the core issue for the country and a giant issue for his party. When will the President call Manchin down and say what do we have to do?

JULIE HIRSCHFELD DAVIS, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, that's a good question. And I mean, I do think it was interesting that when he put out his statement, his statement was about Democrat -- Congress should pass S1, which is the big, you know, comprehensive bill and the Voting Rights Restoration Act, which is a much narrower bill. But he called for both.

The problem with S1, the problem with the big bill, which again, would basically set a floor nationally, so that you actually couldn't make the kinds of changes that Texas and other states are trying to make right now is that not only just Joe Manchin not support getting rid of the filibuster, he actually doesn't support the substance of that bill. He thinks it's too broad. And he also thinks that you shouldn't, one should not pass a big voting rights overhaul with just one party, that that would not be a trusted thing to do, that people would not respond well to that, and it wouldn't be worth it.

And so the question is, though, I think, as Phil mentioned, Republicans have in the past, supported the more narrow approach, there's not really much sign that they're supporting that now.

KING: Right.

DAVIS: What you need is for the President to say, you know, this is what we are putting our weight behind.

BRITTANY SHEPHERD, WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT, YAHOO NEWS: Right.

DAVIS: This is what our strategy is. And which Republicans are going to come to the table on this? And we'll be interesting to see which would.

SHEPHERD: And to that point, Julie, Biden only has a limited amount of political capital, like the FOI bill, they had to throw out the window. We have infrastructure. We have guns. There's so much on this table that he has to trade in because he knows he needs those 10 Republican votes. So Republicans to sit back and say, well, you need me. So what can you give me?

So folks have to be pressuring Biden like, I'm surprised that we haven't seen Stacey Abrams knocking at the White House door every day saying, if you do not send an ultimatum, we are done.

KING: Well, if you don't turn your people out next year for the Democrats, you have power for two years essentially.

SHEPHERD: Right.

KING: If the Republicans take back one or both chambers in the Congress, so it's a two year Biden presidency from a legislative standpoint, then you go in to the reelection, you see what happens. But this is what this is about. Put these demographics up on the screen there. You know, 60 percent of the United States is white, 41 percent of Texas is, only 29 percent of Harris County.

These restrictions in Texas mostly strip away voting rights in places like Harris County where you have larger Latino or larger black population. Where at the Texas Republicans still run everything statewide. But if you're looking at the trend and the dynamics, this is what's happening in other states as well. So the question is, I get it, the President has a full plate. But if you know you're about to lose in Texas, you know, you have the Georgia law, you have the Arizona law, you have an Iowa law, you have all these other things is, at what point do you say I have to do this, I have to do it now.

JACKIE KUCINICH, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: And time is running short to everyone's point. I mean the closer we get to those 2020 -- the 2022 midterms, the less Republicans are going to be inclined to support anything that has bipartisan and that could move forward on particularly on voting rights legislation.

KING: Yes. And I agree with Manchin's point historically, you want these things to be bipartisan, both parties together. But you have one party now that's denying the last election. So it's kind of hard to have that conversation with a group of people who continue to deny the last election most of them happened. But it's just one man's opinion.

[12:34:00]

Up next, air travel is up. And today Vegas is back. We'll break down the COVID numbers allowing America to reopen.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KING: No more social distancing at the casino tables. Las Vegas officially reopening at the stroke of midnight, businesses including casinos now allowed 100 percent capacity. Beyond Sin City, Americans across the country packing stadiums and sporting events this weekend, the first big holiday weekend as things returned almost to normal.

Let's take a look at some of the numbers driving is the number one let's look at the travel numbers. The TSA saying nearly 9 million people traveled the Memorial Day weekend not to match 2019 when it was more than 12 million. But look at that during the pandemic holiday one year ago, things are getting back to normal, people are starting to travel.

This is why. You look at the COVID case map. You see all that green, 34 states holding -- going down, seven states going down dramatically, 41 in all going down, only three states in orange with more COVID cases now compared to a week ago. The rest five states holding steady. You can look at it this way as well. Not since March 2020, 14 months ago have we been below 20,000 in terms of the averaging of new COVID cases.

You see the Monday number, 17,000, pushing that down is one of the reasons America is reopening, people allowed to get out. How does that happen? The vaccine rollout is a big part of it. This is as of Sunday because yesterday was a holiday no new numbers. But 41 percent of Americans more 135 million fully vaccinated, 50 percent of the country, 167 plus partially vaccinated. The vaccine rollout driving this case count down which is why things are better if we keep them that way as we go.

[12:39:58]

Up next for us, Democrats in Congress, they want to see Donald Trump's taxes. The Biden Justice Department says not so fast.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) KING: New reporting today on the tug of war between President Biden's Justice Department and Congressional Democrats. This battle pits a Biden promise to not meddle with how its Attorney General does his work against a big Democratic priority investigating the former President Donald Trump.

[12:45:00]

Democrats want access to Mr. Trump's tax returns. But the Attorney General Merrick Garland is choosing instead to preserve executive branch power by keeping those documents at least for now out of sight, so not so far at least aiding congressional inquiries.

Let's get to CNN's Even Perez. Evan, why?

EVAN PEREZ, CNN SENIOR JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, John, if you talk to people inside this building, they tell you that this is what normal looks like. This is what the voters wanted. A lot of people in Washington wanted to return to normal. And according to them, this is what normal looks like. The Justice Department trying to preserve some of those equities that you're talking about the executive branch, the ability for Congress to reach in and see what the executive branch is doing, they say is limited.

And so they're going to keep fighting on some of these with a keen eye on the fact that, you know, you have a very close, closely divided Senate, you have a House that is very, very narrow in the Democratic side. And, you know, by next year's election, everything could change. And they know that other people could have the gavel. That's not to say that the Democrats aren't getting some of what they want.

For instance, I'll give you a couple of them. The Justice Department approved for the search warrants for Rudy Giuliani, the President's Personal attorney, the D.C. hotel that belongs to Donald Trump, or that is leased by Donald Trump's company has turned over -- the documents have been turned over to another House Committee that is doing an investigation of that.

And of course, later this week, we're going to see Don McGahn the former White House counsel is going to come in for questions, though, those questions are going to be limited, there's going to be a lot of limitations on what Don McGahn can say.

Again, John, a return to normal, one of the things that the Democrats really, really want is Trump's taxes. And there are still these discussions ongoing between the Justice Department and the House Democrats trying to get their hands on those.

KING: So some of those fights continue just different parties, different adversaries, if you will. Evan Perez, grateful for the reporting on that.

Our panel is still with us. Someone who edits a lot of congressional pieces, these Democrats thought they were going to get them. Did they not, when Joe Biden you get a Democrat in the White House, you get a Democratic Attorney General? Is this the President? Or is this Judge Merrick Garland as the Attorney General more of an institutionalist not a politician?

DAVIS: I think they thought there was a pretty good chance. I think it's probably actually both of them. I think -- there's a lot to what Evans said that they want to show that this is not going to be a president and it's not going to be a Justice Department that's going to allow politics to govern their decisions. They're not going to be retaliating against a former president in these ways.

But it's also the case that I mean, I've covered in a previous life three presidents and presidents guard their executive powers and privileges very jealously. And when you're the president or you're the Attorney General, you understand that those are pretty powerful prerogatives. And you're very loath to give any of that up, even if the Congress is in the hands of your own party at the time.

KING: Right. Both senator turned President Obama, senator turned Vice President, turned President Biden. When they're in Congress, they said one thing about executive power, once they actually get it, this is nice.

MATTINGLY: Yes, exactly the point. Point to the White House Counsel's Office or Office of Legal Counsel and the Justice Department that has said, yes, we are willing to give away the things that have been taken over the course of the last several decades or the last several administrations, it just simply hasn't happened. There might be some minor precedent of it.

But traditionally, over the course, particularly, I think, over the course of the last 40 years, it seems every administration has accumulated more and despite campaign promises or promises to allies on Capitol Hill, they tend to ignore them once they get into office. And I think that's kind of the point of what Evan saying there. That's normal right now, for any administration to come in and protect executive authority, executive priorities.

Obviously, the political considerations that Evan was laying out makes sense, I think that Merrick Garland and his reputation adds to it as well. But I think to Julie's point, the bigger picture here is every single executive branch is going to do everything they can to protect that executive branch and its prerogatives, not just for their administration, but for the administration's to follow.

KING: And Biden has said, I'm not going to touch, I'm not going to meddle, I'm not going to take my political views and impose them on my attorney general. So let's assume all that's true. And these are Merrick Garland's decisions, but this is what the institution requires, what he believes the institution requires. But also the political conversation in the sense that it's no question, you remember Biden during the campaign, he was not, shall we say from the lock her up crowd, right, that, you know, we saw that from the Trump team.

Biden is an institutionalist. He is more conservative on these matters. And not my safe bet is that he thinks, you know what, the Manhattan District Attorney is looking into this, the New York State Attorney General has joined that. If Trump is going to get in trouble for his taxes, let's leave it to somebody else so that nobody can say it was politically motivated from the new precedent.

SHEPHERD: Exactly. It's basically the White House is thinking let's put Trump getting the fight in somebody else's sandbox. A lot of staffers have a bit of a black eye as it were to the hubbub around the Trump impeachment that happened and impeded the transition. They weren't able to get so many people appointed. They're still trying to appoint ambassadors now. And there's some sickness about trying to essentially enable that happening again.

So they're like, well, if we don't have to meddle with Congress and Trump really don't want to because they're still trying to get folks appointed to their jobs that were, you know, messed up by the OMB and by Trump impeachment. You know, they did it in the morning and in the afternoon they could barely fit in their own agenda. So there's like a real hesitancy to even just jump on it.

[12:50:04]

KUCINICH: Anything that takes them off message is --

SHEPHERD: Right.

KUCINICH: -- something that they just don't, they don't want to deal with and they would rather not. That said, I don't think that the committee chairs in the House are going to go quietly.

KING: Right.

KUCINICH: They're certainly not going to let that happen.

KING: They certainly not. I think we have a little power issue here in the bureau. As you can see, I've gone into the dark right here. We're going to take a quick break, try to figure out who turned off the lights --

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KING: For those of you who are with us before the break, just a little power issue here in the building everybody is OK, a little electrical issues. We will figure them out.

[12:55:04]

Topping our Political Radar today, a big meeting on infrastructure at the Biden White House tomorrow, President Biden hosts Republican Senator Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia, her party's lead Senate negotiator in those infrastructure talks. A White House official telling CNN, the President looks forward to continuing discussions on quote, investing in our middle class and economic growth through infrastructure. Several White House officials saying the next several days will be decide, can you keep working with Republicans? Or is it time to go in alone with Democrats?

In New Mexico right now, a special election seen as an early test where the GOP attacks on police reform are effective. Democrat Melanie Stansbury is the heavy favorite against Republican Marc Morris in the race for Interior Secretary Deb Haaland's old congressional seat. Morris focuses much of his campaign on Stansbury support for progressive proposal that would cut police spending. So even if she wins, the margin will be looked at to see if those Republican attacks on policing are effective against the Democrats.

We're also watching Florida today where the state's Agricultural Commissioner expected to formally announce she's running for governor. Democrat Nikki Fried teased the announcement with this tweet a few weeks ago, she's been a fierce critic of the Republican Governor Ron DeSantis and she would be the second Democrat in the gubernatorial field. Congressman Charlie Crist announced his candidacy last month.

Vice President Kamala Harris dishing out inspiration to women and a new catchphrase during an interview this morning.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAMALA HARRIS, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I eat no for breakfast. So have I been told many times during my career things from, oh, you're too young, it's not your turn, they're not ready for you, no one like you has done it before. I've heard all of those things many times over the course of my career, but I didn't listen. And I would encourage anyone who has been told that whatever their gender to not listen.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Besides learning there that Harris eats no for breakfast in her words, she also encouraged women to quote, don't let people tell you who you are. You tell them who you are.

Thanks for your time today in Inside Politics. Hope to see you back here this time tomorrow. Ana Cabrera picks up our coverage right now. Have a good day.