Return to Transcripts main page

Inside Politics

Boris Johnson: Need to Learn Lessons From Pandemic, "Build Back Better"; Trump's DOJ Secretly Seized House Democrats' Phone Data; Trump in 2017: Leakers Will "Pay Big Price"; Trump DOJ Weaponized Power Against Members of Congress; Biden Meets With World Leaders At First G7 Summit As President. Aired 12-12:30p ET

Aired June 11, 2021 - 12:00   ET

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

[12:00:00]

ERICA HILL, CNN HOST: I'm Erica Hill in for Kate Bolduan. John King picks up our coverage right now.

JOHN KING, CNN HOST: Hello, everybody and welcome to "Inside Politics". I'm John King in Washington. Thanks for sharing your day with us.

Stunning new abuse of power allegations the Trump Justice Department seizing data from more than 100 accounts linked to lawmakers and others viewed as Trump political enemies. And is there really a bipartisan infrastructure deal?

10 Senators say yes, they have an agreement. But most progressives say it is way too timid. And the White House is in wait and see mode. Plus, President Biden's first big meeting with world leaders, the COVID pandemic, the climate crisis and cyber threats, top of pact G7 agenda.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BORIS JOHNSON, BRITISH PRIME MINISTER: Be sure that we're beating the pandemic together and discussing how we'll never have a repeat of what we've seen, but also that we're building back better.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Back to that story a bit later, but up first for us this hour Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee getting a briefing this hour on the scope of what some lawmakers already described as a shocking Trump abuse of power.

We know the Trump Justice Department took extraordinary measures to investigate leaks of sensitive information. Those measures we now know included subpoenas to Apple for data from accounts linked to at least two Democrats on the Intelligence Committee, Adam Schiff and Eric's Swalwell.

The subpoenas first reported last night by "The New York Times" were so broad. They covered more than 100 accounts and sought data not only from devices used by lawmakers but also staff, family members, even a minor child.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. ERIC SWALWELL (D-CA): Donald Trump identified Chairman Schiff and members of the committee as an enemy of his and just like Vladimir Putin, or Erdogan or Xi in China he used the power of government corruptly to go after his perceived political opponents.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: With me in studio to share their reporting and their insights CNN Justice Correspondent Jessica Schneider, our Chief Congressional Correspondent Manu Raju and CNN Legal Analyst Carrie Cordero.

Manu, let me start with you because this our number one it is committee members getting a briefing the Democrats that some of them aren't even sure if they're subject to this and number two, now some reaction from top Democrats in the Senate saying we want to know more.

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Chuck Schumer and Dick Durbin, the Majority Leader in the Senate Judiciary Chairman and was also the number two Democrat, they are very clear they want both Bill Barr and Jeff Sessions to come before the Senate Judiciary Committee and testify.

That's the first time we're hearing that from Democrats who control Congress control each Chamber and has the power to schedule hearings and invite witnesses. And we'll see how this plays out because they're also threatening in the statement they put out.

They say if they refuse, they are subject to being subpoenaed and compelled to testify under oath. Now the Senate has procedures that require also bipartisan support, in some cases for subpoenas. And we'll have to see how well the Republicans agree with this as well.

But no doubt there's going to be a lot of questions being asked not just the past administration, but also the current administration. I'm told from committee officials on the House Intelligence Committees were sort of the ones who were hit by the subpoenas, the two individuals, Eric Swalwell, Adam Schiff, the record their records being seized.

They have a lot of questions to the Justice Department under Merrick Garland, about what exactly happened? How many people were targeted? What exact records were, were actually obtained? What they were seeking?

They say they have not gotten that information yet. So expect that pressure point to continue that those questions to continue, we'll see if the Garland Justice Department comply.

KING: To that point let's listen a bit too now Chairman Schiff when this played out, though, back in 2018/2019. He was the Ranking Democrat. And we know it was Mr. Schiff. And we know as Mr. Swalwell. The question is was it more Chairman - now Chairman Schiff says that's what he wants to know, listen. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D-CA): People got these notices these emails from Apple and thought they were either spam, or that they were, you know, some kind of a spear phishing attempt or something. And so I'm not sure that we know how many are impacted. And, you know, I would like to know, we've asked the Justice Department.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Everyone's asking the Justice Department now what more do we know about exactly what happened here?

JESSICA SCHNEIDER, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, we know that the Justice Department has not talked directly at this point that we know of, to the people potentially involved here. Congressman Schiff indicated that what we've got from our reporting is that it's been legislative affair staffers at DOJ and communication.

We still haven't heard word from the Justice Department. It's interesting, John, because in just about two hours, the Attorney General Merrick Garland is scheduled to give remarks concerning voting rights. But we know there will be a roomful of reporters, no doubt he will get questions about this.

And to Manu's point the question is how does this administration handle it? Why didn't they alert Chairman Schiff? He got notice in May we understand why weren't they spoken with more? Why weren't they alerted here?

KING: And so let's walk through this Carrie, this is your wheelhouse. And look, the government has every right to have leak investigations. The government has every right to try to protect sensitive information. The government though has rules It must follow.

So we know 100 plus accounts targeting Schiff, Swalwell staff members, family members, including a minor a gag order on Apple at least three times saying you cannot share - you cannot publicly talk about this. Where's the line? Where's the line between a legit leak investigation and something that crosses into an abuse of power?

[12:05:00]

CARRIE CORDERO, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: So every time there is an investigation that in any way involves members of Congress that fault that is the highest level of sensitivity in any criminal investigation, including a national security investigation.

So first of all, it would - it should in the Justice Department go up to the highest levels of approval, including the Attorney General to approve some type of act - action like that. Second of all, there are two warning signs that I see in this not being handled in the way that I would want to see something handled.

Number one, it looks extremely broad. So if we're talking about 100, potential accounts, multiple members, their staffs, potentially family members, that indicate to me a lack of care in targeting specific timing specific individuals that this was a method of last resort. When it's this broad in this big and scale that looks that this was not the last resort in terms of the investigation.

The second piece is how was this handled in the National Security Division - division at the Justice Department? If I was the members of Congress, I wanting to hear not necessarily from former attorneys general, but from the current Assistant Attorney General for National Security, John Demers, who was the assistant attorney general during the Trump administration, and is still held over currently.

He's my former colleague; he's a national security professional. But given the fact that there was an individual brought in from outside of the National Security Division to handle this indicates to me that there was a problem in terms of the proper chain of command and normal approvals that we would want to see in a highly sensitive screen.

KING: Let's be clearer about that to somebody watching in the country who doesn't understand Washington as well and the procedures? Attorney General Barr at the time, brought in another prosecutor to oversee this, as opposed to going through what you would believe would be the normal channels, is that right?

CORDERO: So normally this would - a sensitive case like this would be handled out of the National Security Division of the Justice Department. According to "The New York Times'" report, the Former Attorney General brought in a prosecutor from someone else, not somebody with national security experience, not a seasoned counter intelligence investigator, who is the type of prosecutor that you would want on this type of case.

That's unusual. And Congress should be asking the current Assistant Attorney General for national security for whether he was involved in this and why that process change?

SCHNEIDER: And to Carrie's point, this was essentially an investigation that did ended under Attorney General Sessions. They had been pursuing this and by all accounts, there were no records that indicated that anyone from the Intelligence Committee actually leaked any classified information.

However, when Attorney General Barr took over, that's when he renewed this investigation brought in that outside prosecutor from New Jersey and said essentially, let's go back at this again. So that is deserving of question as well. Why if nothing was really found, did Barr go full steam ahead anyway?

KING: And this I believe, tell me if you agree is deserving of question because I believe we're having a repeat of something we've seen far too often, because this is forget the names involved. Just think about the significance of this. Forget the political parties involved.

Think about the significance of this. Leader Schumer, Chairman Durbin want answers. The Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat issuing a statement, the news about the politicization of the Trump Administration Justice Department is harrowing.

I support Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff's call for an investigation. I have not seen anything in my inbox Manu. The Republican Party often complains about Big Brother about the use of government the abuse of government too much government power crooked.

RAJU: Yes. And we've reached out to Kevin McCarthy's office, the House Republican Leader not responded neither Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, no response from them. Also the key members on some of the committees and judiciary and House and Senate side we have not also heard back from them.

And it's also unclear whether or not there was if this - it clearly seems like a partisan investigation going after the President's then President's very foremost critics. But there are still questions about whether Republicans swept up in this investigation.

Even the Democrats say we don't know if the Republicans were swept up in it. We've reached out to all the Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee and other as well, we have not heard back of any Republicans were affected by this subpoena.

So it does at the moment suggest it is another example of the Justice Department going after its perceived critics and the people that Donald Trump were calling out and news organizations that Donald Trump was calling out time and again.

KING: And at least so far again, forgive me the grand ostrich party sticking its head in the sand instead of asking what should be important questions whether it's a Republican President, Democrat President about the use of power, potential abuse of power?

We knew at the time let's listen, the Former President, sometimes understandably got hot about leaks.

[12:10:00]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, 45TH U.S. PRESIDENT: I've actually called the Justice Department to look into the leaks. Those are criminal leaks. Leaks are real. You know what they said you saw it and the leaks are absolutely real. The news is fake because so much of the news is fake. We're going to find the leakers. We're going to find the Lakers. They're going to pay a big price for leaking.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Again, this gets caught up in the politics. So help me from a legal perspective. Is there anything wrong? Allow me try this one yes or no president calling his attorney general thing these leaks are damaging, you need to do something anything wrong with just that?

CORDERO: I don't think there's something wrong with the President asking the Attorney General, are you are you looking into this?

KING: If the President then says I think it was Schiff, or Swalwell, go get him.

CORDERO: That's the problem, because that is political influence on an investigation. On off unauthorized disclosure of classified information is a crime. The Justice Department does have an obligation to conduct investigations when there are breaches of national security like that.

But the investigations have to follow standard investigative practice and national security investigations are the most sensitive kind that you can have.

KING: And your point is when you see 100 plus accounts, that's the red flag for you that this is a fishing expedition, not A, we started with one or two accounts, we found a clue we moved to somewhere else. And then we had probable cause to expand. If you start at 100, or you get to 100 pretty quickly, that tells you they were just looking under every rock.

CORDERO: That looks - that looks very broad. That looks very broad, in terms of any type of national security investigation, but you're talking about - we're talking about the House Intelligence Committee which conducts oversight over these types of activities.

So the fact that it's lawmakers, staff, their families, that would lead towards being even more targeted and precise in the investigation.

KING: And we expect to hear more from these Democrats as they get briefed on the scope of this today, in the next hour.

RAJU: This is a classified briefing in there all over the country. So we'll have to work our sources and reporting and if people come on air and talk about it even better, but at the moment, I don't think they're expecting a lot of information.

KING: I'll be right here for 48 more minutes and those people behind me if you learn anything, come on in. I appreciate everybody coming in. And when we come back, we're going to dig deeper into this unprecedented way the Former President appears to have weaponized the Justice Department. Stay with us more next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:15:00]

KING: Let's get some more now in the Trump Justice Department using subpoena power to target lawmakers and others the then president viewed as political enemies. The Former President was never shy about pointing fingers when there were leaks of information damaging to Trump.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I think it was leaked from the Intelligence Committee, House version. And I think that they leaked it I think probably Schiff leaked it, but some people within that Schiff leaked it in my opinion, and he shouldn't be leaking things like that. That's a terrible thing to do.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: What we now know about what the Trump Justice Department did raises severe questions, including this one, whether this crossed the line from a legitimate leak investigation into an abuse of government power?

And just this past week, there have been a number of revelations about conduct at the Trump DOJ that raise questions including about whether it's goes too far in its efforts to investigate leaks that angered Mr. Trump.

With us in studio to share their reporting and their insights "Wall Street Journal", White House Reporter Tarini Parti, CNN Senior Political Correspondent Abby Philip "AXIOS" Managing Editor Margaret Talev and "Washington Post" Congressional Reporter Karoun Demirjian.

It's good to see everybody at the table. This is a tough subject. I want to start with what we heard there. Because the President was never shy, like him or not watching at home, he was transparent all the time about what he liked and what he didn't like.

He named Adam Schiff several times. He names the House Intelligence Committee; we now know House Intelligence Committee Democrats are meeting just a few minutes to find out how many of them were targeted. The question is, where's the line between a legitimate inquiry and an abuse of power?

MARGARET TALEV, MANAGING EDITOR, AXIOS: Yes, it is absolutely the question. And I think we're going to find out a lot in the coming weeks and months. And one is, are the former officials, including the Attorney General Barr going to come and answer these questions?

You know, looking at people's spouses, their children going well beyond these core issues around Russia, these are going to be some of the sort of obvious low hanging fruit that investigators are going to want to know more to begin with.

KING: And it sounds forgive me, it sounds Nixonian. It sounds the President's mad. The President's going to use his political aides to exact revenge to look for dirt and to cause trouble.

KAROUN DEMIRJIAN, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes, I mean, look, like you said Trump has been very open about this. And tactically, it's pretty extreme, especially that there was a minor child involved in this, as we've learned, right?

But kind of Trump style to really go for the full court press, almost intimidation looking to like tactic, I think, a big decision line about whether it's an abuse of power or not, which it certainly seems like it is, is going to be was anybody from another party targeted.

It was anybody that, you know, seem to have a specific attribute other than they were the two faces that happened to be representing the Democratic talking points on TV, the most part of this net, but the surprising thing really is that DOJ seems to have gone along with it.

I mean, this started under Sessions, who is the guy who recused himself because he was involved in the campaign, but it seems like there were some moral lines they wouldn't cross and others that they had no problem with when the President made his intentions clear.

ABBY PHILLIP, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, it's surprising in the world in which things ought to not be like this. But in Trump's world, I mean, this is how he wanted his Department of Justice to operate.

And I think we still don't know for sure, but we can't rule out that Trump said explicitly to someone at the Justice Department do this thing. But we don't necessarily need that. In order to know as that clip that you just played, illustrates, Trump was out there saying that he thought that these leaks were coming from certain individuals on the Intelligence Committee, certain Democrats.

He was out there saying it publicly and often in Trump world. That's all it takes people around him take the context clues from what he says publicly, and then they go ahead and they act on what they know that he wants. What would prove loyalty to him if they were to act on?

KING: To that point let's just bring this is in, Michael Cohen many people watching will say, well, he's a liar. He has his own issues he does. He has his own issues without a doubt. But he has those issues because he worked for years side by side with Donald Trump and did his dirty work.

[12:20:00]

KING: And Michael Cohen says there's a code.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MICHAEL COHEN, FORMER PERSONAL ATTORNEY FOR DONALD TRUMP: He doesn't give you questions. He doesn't give you orders. He speaks in a code. And I understand the code because I've been around him for a decade.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: So the question and it's a good question was there a direct ask from the President to the Justice Department, first Attorney General Sessions, then the understanding of the reporting as this was then amped up under Attorney General Barr.

Well, the now Vice President of the United States when she was a Senator, tried to get an answer to that question, was it - was there a direct ask?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAMALA HARRIS, U.S. VICE PRESIDENT: As the President or anyone at the White House ever asked or suggested that you open an investigation of anyone?

WILLIAM BARR, U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: I wouldn't, I wouldn't.

HARRIS: Yes or no.

BARR: Could you repeat that question?

HARRIS: I will repeat it. Has the President or anyone at the White House ever asked or suggested that you open an investigation of anyone? Yes or no? Please, sir.

BARR: The president or anybody else?

HARRIS: Seems you'd remember something like that and be able to tell us?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Yes, then--

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It seems like--

KING: --then Senator now Vice President is correct. But Mr. Barr, he was not there to cooperate with Democrats on any questions at that hearing but that one now important then all the more so right now.

TARINI PARTI, WHITE HOUSE REPORTER, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: Right. And I think it goes to show if he gets called again to testify before any of the Congressional Committees, what he's how he's going to respond to that question now, given what we know how he responded earlier?

I think the other noteworthy thing right now to think about is what this means for the current Justice Department? You know, it continues to put the current Justice Department in this awkward position where they're all this stuff from the Trump Administration keeps coming up.

And we know, President Biden said he picked Merrick Garland for DOJ, because he would be politically independent. And now they're facing all this pressure from Senate Democrats and how they sort of respond to this pressure that they're facing from President Biden and Senate Democrats.

KING: It'll be--

DEMIRJIAN: It's not just awkward. I mean, people on the Hill are furious, right? I mean, like, they've been in an awkward position to this point. But this is a personal thing, for many of them that they look - I mean, they put out a public statement, those journalists, they haven't put out a public statement as members of Congress.

This is a real test of potential crack in this relationship, because if they don't do something soon, there's going to be a lot of anger that's going to just kind of metastasize in the days ahead.

KING: Well, the Attorney General the current Attorney General speaks later this afternoon. We'll see if he says anything about it, House Democrats on the Committee being briefed right now about the extent of it. So there's a lot more to be learned, including whether any Republicans will have the courage to speak up and at least say there are legitimate questions that have to be answered.

You don't have to have a conclusion. Just be nice if you'd want the questions answered. Up next for us, President Biden and other G7 leaders get to work after what you see right there, a seaside morning class photo.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:25:00]

KING: The G7 Summit now officially underway putting President Biden's America is back mantra to the test. Take a look here earlier he joined fellow leaders of the world's advanced economies for their first so called family or class photo.

It's a beautiful image along the coastline there. On the agenda in today's meeting a focus on building a fair and inclusive global economy post COVID pandemic. CNN's Kaitlan Collins joins us now live from Falmouth, England. Kaitlan, what are the big headlines today?

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, it's not just building a stronger worldwide economy post pandemic. It's also even just down to the granular level of seeing how President Biden is interacting with these world leaders?

Because this is the first time that we have seen world leaders gathered in this way since the pandemic broke out. Of course, it is a different President for the U.S. now that they have gotten back together. And you can even see in the body language as President Biden was walking up to that family photo just there.

The differences in the relationships that often were the subject of so much scrutiny under Former President Trump and how they are now under President Biden he was incredibly intimate with the French President. He had his arm around him at one point as they were talking really closely walking away from that photo.

We heard from the German Chancellor who of course had a pretty fraught relationship with Former President Trump saying that she was glad it's President Biden here talking about what she believes is his commitment to this multilateralism.

And of course, remember, that was the same world leader that during that G7 in Canada in 2018, I believe was the year where you saw at the end, they came up with this join agreement, there are all sorts of sign that they're at the end and Former President Trump refused to sign it.

It was a photo that went viral where you could see German Chancellor Merkel with our hands on the table kind of standing over Former President Trump as he had his arms crossed, as well, something that both sides later tweeted out, including John Bolton, the Former National Security Adviser standing there in the background, saying that Trump was standing up for America. You just aren't seeing photos like that emerging from this summit now

the President Biden is here. But John, I do think it raises the question of substantively what is going to be different because it's not just the diplomatic speak it's not just the warm language.

Do things actually changed because they do have key differences is still among these world leaders. And so they had their first session earlier they have another one again, tonight. The Queen is going to be present for the dinner later on tonight.

And all this is building up to that high stakes summit with the Russian President later on next week.

[12:30:00]