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New Day

Biden Considers Legal Action as Trump Threatens Transfer of Power; Bill Barr Tells Justice Department to Probe Voter Fraud Allegations. Aired 7-7:30a ET

Aired November 10, 2020 - 07:00   ET

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

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN NEW DAY: Talking to each other and start talking to the viewers.

[07:00:02]

Welcome to our viewers in the United States and all around the world, this is New Day.

President-elect Biden is preparing for a legal battle against outgoing President Trump's obstruction of the transition. The Trump administration and top Republicans continue to try to hang their hats on conspiracy theories about election fraud. No evidence has been presented.

The attorney general, Bill Barr, is going along with it, hook, line and sinker, telling federal prosecutors to investigate allegations of voting irregularities that as of yet no one has been able to show any evidence of. Because of this overnight, the Justice Department's top elections crimes prosecutor resigned in protest.

President Trump also just fired his defense secretary. There could be more to come including the beleaguered directors of the CIA and FBI.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN NEW DAY: So this is not an obstruction. This is happening before our eyes. The Biden transition is not getting certain security briefings. They can't work on coordinating vaccine distribution with government officials. Real things are not happening.

So, the president-elect is trying to focus on his job. He's announced the coronavirus advisors. He is going to talk about the Affordable Care Act today as it hangs in the balance before the Supreme Court.

And the pandemic is spiraling nearly out of control. Dangerous new heights, 111,000 new cases reported. The country likely to hit an all- time high for hospitalizations as soon as today.

We want to begin with CNN's Joe Johns live at the White House. The White House standing in the way of the peaceful transition of power, Joe.

JOE JOHNS, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: John, the president said he might do this, so it is no surprise he is essentially saying he will not accept the results of the election. But it has enormous consequences, as senior administration officials fall in line behind the president's intransigents and has the potential to stall or at least slow down what by law is supposed to be a smooth transition to the administration of Joe Biden.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOHNS: President Trump is still refusing to accept the reality of the election results this morning. And those around him are supporting the delay in allowing President-elect Joe Biden to get to work. One of them, Attorney General Bill Bar, who authorized federal prosecutors to investigate Trump's baseless claims of voting irregularities in the election. There is no evidence of widespread voter fraud or illegal voting in the United States, something officials in battleground states like Michigan are making clear.

JOCELYN BENSON (D), MICHIGAN SECRETARY OF STATE: I'm confident that any inquiries that proceed in Michigan or elsewhere are only going to reveal the truth. This election was smooth, secure, transparent and accurate.

JOHNS: On Capitol Hill, top Republicans, including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, amplifying the president's lies.

SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY): We have the system in place to consider concerns. And President Trump is 100 percent within his rights to look into allegations of irregularities and weigh his legal options.

JOHNS: Starting the transition of power between the Trump and Biden administration is extremely critical as the United States grapples with the coronavirus pandemic.

JOE BIDEN, U.S. PRESIDENT-ELECT: This election is over. It's time to put aside the partisanship and the rhetoric that designed to demonize one another.

JOHNS: But Biden is still unable to unlock all of the resources that should now be available to him as the winner of the election, including access to highly classified information and intelligence briefings.

Holding the key, the General Services Administration, whose Trump appointed administrator, Emily Murphy, has refused to cooperate with Biden's transition as president-elect. A GSA spokesman telling CNN there is no election winner. But that isn't true.

JEN PSAKI, SENIOR ADVISER, BIDEN-HARRIS TRANSITION: We've all seen these tactics for weeks if not months from the Trump team even before the election. And with every day, with every effort to delay this, it's delaying us getting access to the resources we need.

JOHNS: This after Trump started off the Monday suddenly announcing the firing of Defense Secretary Mark Esper in a tweet. Sources fear Esper may not be the last victim of Trump's lame duck firing spree, telling CNN, FBI Director Christopher Wray, CIA Director Gina Haspel and the attorney general could be the next ones to go. SEN. CHRIS COONS (D-DE): Frankly, he can do a lot of damage by destabilizing every major agency, by firing a whole series of senior leaders.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

JOHNS: According to a senior administration official, John McEntee, the White House Director of Personnel, has put out the word that anybody caught looking for a job will be fired, one more indication of how far this administration will go to push a false narrative.

[07:05:02]

John?

CAMEROTA: I'll take it, Joe. Thank you very much.

Joining us now, CNN Political Correspondent Abby Philip and CNN Political Analyst David Gregory.

Okay, Abby, it took a few days, I think, for the White House, President Trump, and his Republican allies and Fox T.V. to find their footing. They were sort of back on their heels after President Trump lost the election. They were -- there was a moment of kind of, oh, now what?

But now, as of today, we get to see what the plan is. The plan was never, obviously, to admit defeat. The we had always heard was to stay put and not go anywhere and not concede. And now, they have Attorney General Bill Barr, his buy-in, and they are just -- normally what happens is that you can do the investigations and certify the winner of the election simultaneously. But, no, they will not certify until all of these sort of vaporous investigations are done, whenever that is.

ABBY PHILLIP, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, first of all, I think that we should point out that what the president and his allies are trying to claim is that somehow there was fraud on such a massive scale that they would be able to roll back Joe Biden's lead to the tens of thousands of votes in more than three or four states in order to get the president to be able to claim victory. Not is only that implausible but it's, frankly -- I mean, I think we should just say that it is not -- it is impossible for that to happen.

Joe Biden right now is on track to have larger advantage over Donald Trump than Donald Trump did four years ago in many of these very same states, in Pennsylvania, in Michigan, in Wisconsin, in Nevada, in Arizona, and even in Georgia. So, it's a completely ridiculous idea.

But I do think that if we were sitting back and just looking at this situation from the outside, this was happening in some other country, it would be really be an alarming situation. You have a president who is refusing to accept the results of an election, refusing to leave and now using the levers of the government to try to hold on to power with the support of his political party. It is completely beyond the pale. But I think people are sort of treating it, and when I say people, I mean Republicans in particular are treating it as if it's just sort of like an everyday kind of run of the mill thing, and it is not. There is no voter fraud that is going to overturn hundreds of thousands of votes and this idea is completely ludicrous.

CAMEROTA: Yes. I really appreciate what Abby just said, but I don't have to be in another country to be alarmed.

PHILLIP: Yes, totally. Yes.

CAMEROTA: We see it right now this morning with our own eyes.

BERMAN: But, Daivid, where does this stop? I mean, my question is, it seems to me that there are people playing a dangerous game right now, William Barr playing a dangerous game, Mitch McConnell playing a dangerous game, because they have people on the inside of their offices whispering, we think this is going to end soon. We're doing this for a little while so the president can work off some of his anger. But sooner or later, everyone will come around. How can we be sure? Where does it stop?

DAVID GREGORY, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: I don't think we can be sure, and it is alarming. I mean, you know, it's not just how other countries might be -- or if we saw this in other countries. We're the United States of America. I mean, we're a pillar for the rest of the world for our democracy, which is far from perfect, but it's certainly an exemplar.

So when you see this kind of tyrannical behavior on the part of our president and the signs of corruption, it's deeply destabilizing and our enemies could be taking advantage of it. I think it's striking. And, John, I do think that's what's going on. I mean, there is no evidence of voter fraud. No lawyer has stepped forward to actually put something down on paper and file it in court, which is what you do. You don't have a press conference to claim that kind of voter irregularity. So, they've lost, it's over, he's going to leave.

But Republicans and leadership positions are so afraid of Donald Trump today and they're just as afraid of Donald Trump tomorrow, wielding influence on the outside that they won't push. They won't say, look, you can't do this, Mr. President. You know, four years ago today, Donald Trump was visiting President Obama at the White House because he just won. And there was that level of acceptance. So there is no basis for any of this.

And so to your question, where does it stop? At some point, people are going to have to step up who are in government and who are in the president's party and say, you just can't do this anymore, in a pretty high profile way.

CAMEROTA: I think it's going to be -- I think that it asks a lot, David, for Americans to trust that that's going to happen when you see today what Mitch McConnell is saying, what Bill Bar is saying.

And at the same time, Abby, President Trump obviously still has his hands on all of the levers of power.

[07:10:01]

He has just gotten rid of the secretary of defense. He can install whomever he wants, a crony, a yes man, if he wants. So is reportedly thinking about doing the same with the FBI, the CIA. And so he has 70 days to put the people around him that can help him still hang on to power. I mean, as Secretary of Defense outgoing Mark Esper said in an interview this week, if I'm fired and he installs a yes man, heaven help us.

PHILLIP: It's really terrifying when you think about it, that people who worked -- who are hired by Donald Trump and worked for him think that it is a scary proposition that the president could install a yes men or cronies into these positions.

I mean, I would like to believe this is not as much about holding on to power as it is about carrying out grudges and grievances against people who he thinks have wronged him and also acting in the transition the way that he's acted as president for four years, which is erratically tons of turnover and attempting to use the government to punish his political enemies.

But if it is about holding on to power, you know, I think that you've asked what the sort of guardrails are or what kind of resistance there might be among Republicans. And, really, I think we're seeing that there is not going to be very much.

Mitch McConnell yesterday made a very concerted, clear decision that he was going to back the president up on this. Republicans know they need to hold on to the president's base for as long as possible. They've got two Senate races coming up in January and they don't want to demoralize the president's base. So that's going to mean that for many months now, we are going to see this kind of enabling of I think behavior that is not in keeping with this country's very long history.

And I think that Republicans probably should think deeply about that, because it's not just about power over the next few months or for the next few years, it's about -- it's about democracy in this country and what that has looked like for over 200 years.

BERMAN: Abby, I think you brought up Georgia. And I think that is an astute observation. I have been told, do not underestimate the role that these Georgia runoffs have in all of this. Not just for the president, the president's bruised psyche and fragile ego is one thing but for Mitch McConnell and Republicans, their concern that if they get sideways with the president, either he won't help in Georgia with these two seats at stake or Trump voters will be depressed and stay home. So, again, they're playing this dangerous game to keep people energized.

David, I didn't mean to cut you off. Go ahead.

GREGORY: Well, no, it's the same point. I mean, look at Lindsey Graham. He just won reelection. He had a little bit of a scare. He is somebody who privately plays a role of trying to influence the president, but he's all-in on all of this garbage right now. And I do think that's about Georgia and I do think it's about fear that what does Trump do? He may talk about running again in 2024. He may go off and do some major media venture. Whatever he does, he potentially has an impact on his base of the Republican Party.

And Republicans are not willing to gamble with that. They want to be able to say, hey, I stood with you. Because I think they -- some of them may think, look, what does it cost us? We'll stand with him while he acts like a bitter ender for a finite amount of time until he can come around to seeing this. But we have -- there's no reason that we should trust that that just magically appears, where he just accepts it all.

BERMAN: Look, at this point, it is fair to ask, when will it stop and how you can be sure? And I think the answer is we just don't know and we can't be sure at this point. We have to behave that way.

Where the hell is the president? I mean, it's really odd that we haven't seen him for the last two days in the midst of this, and that is a strange little twist in all of this also. David, Abby, thank you very much.

GREGORY: Thanks, guys.

CAMEROTA: Conservative media is fueling President Trump's baseless claims of widespread election fraud. Here is just a little sample.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TUCKER CARLSON, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: We don't know how many votes were stolen on Tuesday night. We don't know anything about the software that many say was rigged. We don't know. We have to find out.

LAURA INGRAHAM, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: And there's no question that mass mail-in voting, it's been an unmitigated disaster. We must never again allow Democrats to foist this on our country given what we're seeing days and days later.

SEAN HANNITY, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: They want you to believe that this week's vote and same-vote counting process is totally normal and it's above board. Do you really believe that? They want you to ignore the irregularities, the lack of transparency, the serious instances where the law was broken?

LOU DOBBS, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: Biden's campaign says they're defending the election. They deny what they're really doing, which is stealing it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[07:15:00]

CAMEROTA: CNN's Chief Media Correspondent, Brian Stelter, joins us now.

Brian, it's just the alternate universe -- BRIAN STELTER, CNN CHIEF MEDIA CORRESPONDENT: Yes.

CAMEROTA: -- writ large there.

STELTER: Two parallel Americas, it cannot be more stark. And if you're not seeing what is going on in right-wing media, you're missing half the story. I mean, people's Facebook feeds, tens of millions of Americans on Facebook and Twitter are seeing this nonsense all across television and social media. And there's no one in charge, no one in charge except President Trump setting the tone and then others falling in line. There is no one at Fox News that is saying this is crazy. This is irresponsible. This is dangerous. The Murdochs are letting this run rampant all over Fox News.

And there are moments where, you know, once every 24 hours there will be some pushback on the lies about voter fraud. But that is not the story. The story is all of these propaganda shows telling the audience that there might have been mass voter fraud and that President-elect Joe Biden is not the president and that you shouldn't believe what you're hearing in the rest of the media. It is everywhere. This is being said everywhere.

And if you want to see the hypocrisy, just look at this video that Daily Show produced over the weekend. This is a video from The Daily Show looking at how Fox talked about the 2018 midterms and who are the sore losers then.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAYLEIGH MCENANY, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Democrats are being sore losers. They refuse to acknowledge they lost the election. So what do they do? They cry malfeasance, wrongdoing, criminality, fraud.

INGRAHAM: Democrats, more so than Republicans, seem to have a problem conceding defeat. Either the election system broke down or some mystery votes are hiding something where.

NEWT GINGRICH, FORMER SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: You know, whole series of Democrats who just said wrongly, if our candidate doesn't win, they stole the election.

HANNITY: Ramping up election conspiracy theories, accusing Republicans of outright stealing the election, kind of rich.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

STELTER: I think it's pretty clear what the takeaway is there. But this is deeper than hypocrisy. It is about a test for American democracy that was passed last week but is still under way. Because, as I said, tens of millions of people are indulging this fantasy that the election is not over, that Trump could actually prevail through the Supreme Court or through a bunch of legal challenges in states. Trump is in denial. The pro-Trump media is in denial. And lots and lots of people are consuming this stuff. As a result it's the new bertherism. It is this new lie that is an attempt to de-legitimatize a Democratic president. CAMEROTA: And, Brian, the problem is that everybody now -- I mean, we are all so entrenched in our own media bubbles that all of those people, the tens of millions of people for whom that's their only source of information, they believe it. And that's where we are today.

STELTER: That's where we are, yes.

CAMEROTA: Brian, thank you very much for showing us that fall to hypocrisy.

Attorney General Bill Barr giving the appearance of legitimacy to attempts by President Trump to de-legitimatize Joe Biden's victory, so what's the impact? We ask a former Republican attorney general next about where we go from here.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:20:00]

BERMAN: Developing this morning, the Department of Justice top election crimes prosecutor has resigned in protest after the attorney general, William Barr, issued a memo urging prosecutors to investigate these baseless allegations of election fraud before states certify the election results.

Joining me is the former Attorney General of the United States under George W. Bush, Alberto Gonzales. Judge Gonzales, thank you very much for being with us this morning.

Can you explain why the memo issued by the current attorney general, William Barr, is so unusual?

ALBERTO GONZALES, FORMER U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: Because there is a longstanding protocol at the Department of Justice to avoid and taking actions relating to prosecutions or investigations. That might have an impact on an election. And so that's a long held protocol and one that in my judgment is very, very important, because it protects the reputation, it protects the impartiality of the Department of Justice. And that's why that protocol is so very important.

This is unusual. There is no question about it. But, you know, one thing I always remind myself is I don't know what I don't know when a government official makes a decision like this. And it may be that Attorney General Barr has information, as we all know. At every election, the Department of Justice sends out monitors to various jurisdictions around the country. Perhaps these monitors are aware something. Although there are a -- there is a lot of testimony, a lot of, you know, conversations and reporting from officials, Republican and Democratic officials, that this election ran smoothly and that there are not cases of wide case fraud and abuse.

But nonetheless, the attorney general may have some information on the other hand. You can read the memo, simply do your job. I think the timing of the memo was very, very unfortunate, however, because I think it does contribute to the notion, the perception in the minds of some that the department is being used for political purpose. And I think that is very unfortunate.

BERMAN: Unfortunate. In other words, you think that the attorney general's decision to do this is wrong?

GONZALES: I'm not saying that, John. I'm not saying that at all because, again, I don't know what I don't know.

BERMAN: But you said, unfortunate. I'm sorry, you said, unfortunate.

GONZALES: It's unusual. And, again, without knowing more information, I have to question why. But, again, I also can look at that memo and say, this is the attorney general informing the U.S. attorneys around the country to do your job.

What makes this also more unfortunate for the -- I think for the attorney general and the Department of Justice is the previous musings or statements by Attorney General Barr about the potential for widespread abuse in our elections.

And so the combination of all these factors (ph), I think, leads to the perception of, I believe, in the minds of some Americans that the Department of Justice maybe being used for political purposes, and that is a terribly thing.

[07:25:08]

BERMAN: Look, you brought up the attorney general's history on this. It's not like he didn't muse about these things before a single vote was cast. And now that the votes have been cast, he is saying largely the same thing. So this perception is one that he very much created.

You said you don't know what you don't know, and that's fair. But you do know what you have seen. And the lieutenant governor of Georgia, a Republican, came on this show yesterday, and says he's seen no evidence of voter fraud. And I'm sure you've been glued to the television like the rest of us for the last eight days, and no elections official, no person, Republican or Democrat in charge of these elections large scale vote counting processes has come forward and said they see anything wrong. Have you seen anything to dispute that?

GONZALES: John, my brain, my gut, my experience tells me that President-elect Biden has won this election. So, based upon what I have observed -- again, I haven't been -- I haven't spoken to any elected officials. I haven't spoken to any election officials. I haven't spoken to any monitors. But based on what is reported, this is what I believe has happened.

We have to remember this is a highly contested election, emotions are still raw and there's a lot at stake here. And so part of this, I think, stems from the fact that some people are upset and angry and mad.

And so if you're asking me, do I think -- have I seen evidence of widespread fraud certainly to a level that would overturn the results of this election, no, I haven't. BERMAN: The General Services Administration won't turn over the keys, and I say that colloquially, but won't say that the head, Emily Murphy, that she ascertain that Joe Biden won. The practical impact, what do you think the impact is on the transition and the continuity of power in the United States?

GONZALES: Well, I flew to Washington on December 26th of 2000 right after the Florida recount. And we had a very different, compressed transition period. We got it done for the most part. Obviously, it involved a great deal of hard work and long days but we got it done.

So, you know, that was December 26th. So I think my own judgment is, is we can go for a period of time and still have an administration that is ready to go. Not at perhaps not as prepared as we might want it otherwise, but I think a lot can be done in a short period of time to get ready to govern this very diverse nation with some very complicated issues and the pandemic being number one concern and priority, of course, but, obviously, the sooner the better.

But I'm at a point just based upon my own experience that I'm, you know, just jumping up and down saying, my God, we got to have the keys right now. I think there is some period of time to get moving on this, but the sooner the better.

BERMAN: Just one last question. How can you be sure that this will stop? How can you be sure that Mitch McConnell and others will stand up and say, enough?

GONZALES: I guess it just comes simply from my belief in the fundamental institution that's exist in this country to continue to function the way that they function in the past and in the good will of individuals, John. You may say, well, that is silly and there is no evidence that that's going to happen, but I still have confidence in our institutions. And I still have confidence that this will come to a conclusion sooner than later, hopefully and that we'll move forward to the next administration.

BERMAN: I hope you're right. I hope that is the world we live in, not a world of rainbows and unicorns. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, always a pleasure to speak with you, Judge. Thank you for your time. I appreciate it.

GONZALES: Thanks for having me, John.

BERMAN: So when will this coronavirus vaccine, it maybe 90 percent effective, become available to all of us? We have new details on a possible timeline. Dr. Sanjay Gupta joins us next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:30:00]