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Patel's Personal Battles With Intel Community Shaped His View Of FBI; White House Orders Freeze On All Federal Grants And Loans; Trump Administration Sued By Non-Profits Over Aid Freeze; Putting The "Gulf Of America" On The Map? Aired 12:30-1p ET
Aired January 28, 2025 - 12:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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DANA BASH, CNN ANCHOR: Brand new reporting about Donald Trump's pick to lead the FBI, Kash Patel and the battles he's waged over the years with U.S. intelligence agencies. Patel will be on the Hill for his confirmation hearing this Thursday for what is almost surely going to be a contentious public hearing.
More than any other nominee in recent memory, Patel's battles with the FBI, the very agency he is poised to run have defined his rise to political prominence. He frequently rails against a litany of alleged abuses by intelligence agencies and the FBI from the Russia investigation to the FBI's seizure of classified documents from Trump's Mar-a-Lago's residence.
Zach Cohen and Evan Perez were part of this team who did this great reporting. Zach, I want to begin with you. Tell us what you learned.
ZACHARY COHEN, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY REPORTER: Yes, Dana, this reporting really shows how the distrust between Kash Patel and the intelligence community runs both ways. Now, a lot of this centers around Patel's efforts during the first Trump administration to declassify and release documents related to the FBI's investigation into connections between Russia and Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign, an investigation that Patel believes was driven by the so- called Deep State.
Now, our reporting shows this came to a head in 2020 at the end of Trump's first term when the CIA referred Patel to the Justice Department for a criminal investigation. Now, details of this referral have not been previously reported, but we're learning from our sources that the CIA asked DOJ to investigate whether Patel shared classified information about the Russia probe with people inside the government who lacked the proper level of clearance to see it.
Now, it's important to note that Patel was never charged criminally by either Trump or Biden's DOJ, and there's no indication that national security prosecutors at DOJ took steps to escalate the referral beyond an initial review. Patel also denies that he ever mishandled classified information.
[12:35:05]
However, we're also learning that intelligence officials placed what is known as a red flag on Patel's security clearance file to document their broader concerns about his handling of classified information during Trump's first term.
We have a statement from a spokesperson for Patel saying, quote, "The leaking of years-old bogus referrals is evidence our government is in desperate need of reform. It's ironic that the same people who try to stir up the phony narrative that Kash would abuse power are the very ones abusing power to attempt to damage Kash".
BASH: And, Zach, as you point out, there is a history here, not just of policy fights or of sort of being out there to protect Donald Trump. For him, it is personal.
COHEN: Yes, this feud's been going on for years. Patel has accused the FBI and the intelligence community of carrying out a, quote, "deep state plot" against not only Trump, but his allies, including himself. Patel points to the fact that he had his communication seized by the government as part of a separate investigation that was hunting for leaks.
He was among a dozens of congressional staff targeted a dragnet that came under criticism from the Justice Department Inspector General. Patel even sued Trump-era officials, including former FBI Director Chris Wray, the man he would replace as FBI Director if confirmed for obtaining his communications without his knowledge.
So Patel's also suggested the FBI should curtail its intelligence responsibilities and instead focus on law enforcement, which would essentially be rolling back reforms made since the 9/11 attacks and intended to facilitate better cooperation between the Bureau and other U.S. intel agencies.
BASH: Thank you so much, Zach. And Evan is here at the table. I know there's a lot more to this reporting. What else do you want to add?
EVAN PEREZ, CNN SENIOR JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, you know, I think the interesting thing is his fixation on the idea that the intelligence part of the FBI is the problem. And he has suggested various ways to deal with it. Now, look, you know, 9/11 showed us that when you have the intelligence side and the criminal side of FBI walled off from each other, that there are problems, right?
The plot, the 9/11 commission found that this really did miss key elements that could have prevented the 9/11 attacks. So, it's going to be interesting when Kash Patel finally gets to the FBI, and it appears he's going to have the votes, right? I think he's going to learn from people inside what a mistake that would be, and we'll see whether he can change tack, you know, in the way he approaches the job.
BASH: Really interesting. Thank you so much to you, and of course, to Zach. Don't go anywhere.
Coming up, what, if anything, are Democrats going to do about what we started the program with the White House pausing all federal grants and loans? I have Senator Chris Coons as a guest, next.
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[12:42:13]
BASH: School lunch, childcare, suicide hotlines, these are just some of the crucial programs that may be impacted by the White House freeze on all federal grants and loans. It takes effect in less than five hours. It's already facing legal challenges with several non-profits announcing lawsuits against the Trump administration.
I'm joined now by Democratic Senator Chris Coons of Delaware, a member of the Senate Appropriations and Judiciary Committees. Thank you so much for being here. Not only that, you -- before coming to Congress -- were a county executive. So --
SEN. CHRIS COONS (D), APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE: That's right.
BASH: -- you have worked on a local level and dealt with how these federal dollars have real-world impacts on local communities. What are you hearing from those communities in your state right now?
COONS: Well, thanks, Dana. First thing this morning, I started receiving texts from lots of different organizations in Delaware that are concerned about this federal grant. It'll impact firefighters, police officers, veterans, construction projects, kids and their school lunches, seniors and their nursing homes.
The federal government distributes hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars of grants to state and local governments and to lots of non-profits. And I understand that as a result of President Trump being elected, he gets to have a fight with us in Congress, a discussion about policy priorities for spending going forward.
But that's not what this is. This is a blatantly illegal and unconstitutional attempt at shutting down federal spending that was voted on and signed into law by the last Congress and the last president.
If there is anything that defines Congress in our constitutional order, it's the power of the purse. And I hope other senators are hearing from their local communities, from their fire companies and schools and their Head Start programs, with concern bordering on alarm that if they get frozen out, if they're locked out of the federal aid portals, as some senators just shared with me on the floor, that their governors are calling them saying their states are locked out of the Medicaid portal.
They won't be able to draw down funds. They'll have to lay off staff, shut down programs and hurt Americans. Certainly, this is not what a majority of Americans voted for when they asked President Trump to reduce their prices and costs and to help deal with security issues. This is making us less safe and less prosperous.
BASH: I'm not sure if you're hearing some of that from your Republican colleagues in the Senate. COONS: I am not.
BASH: I do -- OK, well, that's interesting because I do want you to listen to what Republican member of the House, Representative Rich McCormick, told my colleague, Pam Brown, about school age child lunch programs.
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REP. RICH MCCORMICK (R), GEORGIA: Who can actually go and actually produce their own income? Who can actually go out there and do something that makes them have value and work skills for the future?
I mean, how many people got their start in fast food restaurants when they were kids versus just giving a blanket rule that gives all kids lunches in high school who are capable of going out and actually getting a job and doing something that makes them have value, thinking about their future instead of thinking about how they're going to sponge out the government when they don't need to.
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BASH: So I hear what you're saying about the constitutionality of this, potentially about the fight that the President and his people clearly want to pick to go through the courts to test a lot of these laws, these norms that Congress and the White House have followed for a long time. But on the policy, what do you say to that?
COONS: Look, the executive order says that what the President's goal is, is to challenge woke ideology to try and test the Green New Deal, which by the way, doesn't exist, wasn't signed into law. And in this sweeping freeze of all federal aid, of all federal grants to state and local governments and communities to force this fight over spending priorities. That's not how our system works.
It will result in lots of waste and lots of harm to real people and local communities. As you said, Dana, in the introduction, I was a county executive. The county police force relied on federal grants for training, for equipment, for recruiting, and so do police departments all over the country.
So do fire companies all over the country. Federal grants aren't just all waste. Most of them have a clear and defined and immediate purpose that helps make our community safer, that helps feed our children, that helps strengthen the quality of healthcare, that helps educate folks in our communities.
And I hope that my colleagues are hearing from as many of their impacted communities and community organizations as I am. And I hope that President Trump will reverse this order. I just voted against his nominee to be Secretary of Transportation.
I was going to vote for him, but I don't know if he's going to follow this unconstitutional order and shut down infrastructure projects currently underway in Delaware and lay off construction workers. If he does, then I think he's breaking our Constitution. So I voted against him and will vote against other nominees until I get clarity about the path forward.
BASH: Is -- I just want to, you know, we're talking about all of this within the confines of what you're talking about, the Constitution, the way that Congress has followed that and presidents certainly, and then laws have been updated even up until the Impoundment Act, which I'll let you describe.
But the reason I bring that up is because this is kind of the point. And my question to you is, is there kind of a failure of imagination or a -- not really a full understanding of the lengths to which President Trump and the people around him genuinely want to go to test and to disrupt the laws and the way and the practices and the way that this town has worked for many years, for decades and even hundreds of years.
COONS: That's right. So, on the one hand, supporters of President Trump are out there saying, as you just showed in a clip, this was the point. We elected him to shake things up and to challenge the assumptions of Washington. But that's not what's happening.
What's happening is that dollars that come from Washington to our communities, to our schools, to our senior centers, to our police departments and fire companies are being frozen so that money stays here in Washington so that Trump can spend it in expanded tax cuts later this year.
That's exactly what they're discussing at the Doral Golf Resort in Florida right now is how they can cut taxes further for wealthy individuals and profitable companies. And to do that, they want to stop spending on priorities that are already in the law that help children, help seniors, help keep us safe and help make us strong.
Whether it's SBA loans for small business startups or it's an --
BASH: Right.
COONS: -- emergency disaster response, it's not just wrong on policy, it's wrong on the law. And I expect there to be immediate challenges in federal court. And I frankly think this is what we predicted when those of us who campaigned saying President Trump would cause chaos would do so and here we are.
BASH: Yes. And, look, I think that he would agree with you. Chaos is what he wants, which is why he's doing this. The question is, what comes after that.
Senator, thank you so much for coming on with me today. I appreciate it.
COONS: Thank you.
[12:50:00]
BASH: Coming up, is the Gulf of America about to become Google Map official? We have some details, next.
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BASH: Goodbye, Gulf of Mexico. So long Denali. President Trump signed the order on inauguration day and now it looks like Google could make it official by relabeling Google Maps with the Gulf of America and Mount McKinley.
And you can see it hasn't happened yet. But in a post on X, Google explains it has a longstanding practice of applying name changes when they have been updated in official government sources.
Molly, I guess that's going to be seen here, but not necessarily everywhere.
[12:55:06]
MOLLY BALL, SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: That's right. Apparently that it will be American users of Google Maps who will see this change, but users in other countries will not, at least for now, until other countries decide whether they're going to go along with this.
AKAYLA GARDNER, WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT, BLOOMBERG: I mean, this is what happens when you rename international waters. Not everyone is going to recognize it and someone who is not so happy about this was the president of Mexico who suggested that the United States of America should be renamed America Mexicana, so.
PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN CHIEF DOMESTIC CORRESPONDENT: I find the Gulf of Mexico and or America, whatever style says to be remarkably trivial and a waste of our time. I think the most interesting thing about Mount McKinley now is that the Alaskan delegation and the Alaskan people wanted it to be Denali. And Lisa Murkowski made very clear --
BASH: Yes.
MATTINGLY: -- this was not a decision of the people. McKinley, of course, let's talk about tariffs, let's talk about McKinley's history. We've got a lot. We've got -- you want to do that? No, we're out of time. You don't want to do that? You don't want to do that?
BASH: We can do that. I mean --
MATTINGLY: It's a personal -- Trump is fascinated by --
BASH: I'm sure Brianna and Boris will be fine if we just kept talking --
MATTINGLY: Just keep going.
BASH: -- because --
MATTINGLY: History lesson.
BASH: We just want to talk a lot about McKinley, but we do have to go. I don't disagree with you about it being trivial, but guess who signed the executive order? Donald Trump.
Thank you so much for joining Inside Politics. CNN News Central starts after the break.