Return to Transcripts main page

New Day

Storms Across Central Plains, Cold Front Heads East; Washington Post Reports, Grand Jury to Consider Potential Charges against Trump; How Majority of Republicans are Living in Trump's Fantasy World. Aired 7-7:30a ET

Aired May 26, 2021 - 07:00   ET

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

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN NEW DAY: First vaccinated on a holiday and this weather is bad news for that.

[07:00:03]

CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: There was baseball-sized hail in Texas again yesterday and an awful lot of lightning, Brianna. That's what they are concerned about, people being outside and lightning around everywhere.

This weather is brought to you by Carvana, the new way to buy a car.

So, yes, it acts up again today, the heat is here, the humidity is here. It's feeling like late spring. There will be more hail. There will be tornados today in the central plains. But now by tomorrow, that gets farther to the east.

There will be a chance of a wind gust or lightning around the northeast, Pennsylvania, New England for today as well. But this is the area. Look how this is lit up. This is tomorrow afternoon radar, thunderstorm, showers, all the way through the forecast. But then the cold front comes by and things get a whole lot better. You go from 90 in New York to 62 by Saturday afternoon. Brianna?

New Day continues right now.

KEILAR: Hello. I'm Brianna Keilar alongside John Berman on this New Day.

A grand jury is now reportedly convened to decide whether to charge Donald Trump or anyone around him as an investigation into his empire takes a dramatic new turn.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN NEW DAY: Plus, does the former insider who has been cooperating with state prosecutors give us a big hint that this was coming? What her recent CNN interview revealed.

KEILAR: Plus, cracks emerging in the republican wall against a commission for the attack on the Capitol on January 6th, but will enough Republicans join Democrats in the search for answers?

BERMAN: And in the race to figure out how the pandemic began, we have a guest who says President Biden is passing the buck and shouldn't leave the investigation to the WHO.

KEILAR: Welcome to our viewers here in the United States and around the world. It is Wednesday, May 26th.

And Manhattan's top prosecutor is prepared to make the case that the 45th president of the United States should be criminally indicted. A special grand jury has just been convened to hear the evidence.

BERMAN: They will be asked to determine whether Donald Trump or anyone associated with the Trump Organization should face trial. Investigators say the company misled lenders and insurance companies about the value of its property as it sought loans and also devalued some of those properties in an effort to pay lower taxes.

KEILAR: Joining us now is CNN Correspondent and Early Start Anchor Laura Jarrett. Laura, walk us through what this is, what a special grand jury is and the power that it has.

LAURA JARRETT, CNN ANCHOR: So, Brianna, this is a really big deal. A grand jury is made up of everyday people of all walks of life in New York, but together, they have enormous power. They can subpoena documents, listen to witness testimony and even ask prosecutors questions. But what makes sitting on a grand jury different than a regular trial is it operates in secret. And unlike a trial, they only hear one side of the story, a story from prosecutors.

Also important to recognize, the 23 jurors they don't have to reach a unanimous decision on whether to indict someone. It only takes 12 votes.

KEILAR: So what charges could prosecutors be investigating there?

JARRETT: So we know from all the reporting out there that this is a sweeping investigation. It's been going on essentially for years. But what this really comes down to is a fraud case. Prosecutors here are focused on whether Trump's company misled its lenders, meaning that it inflated the value of its properties to obtain more favorable loan terms or whether it deflated its assets to reduce its tax bills.

And remember the way all this started, hush money and Michael Cohen, Trump' former fixer who helped coordinate those payments to women on Trump's behalf before he became president. Trump, of course, denies those claims and any wrongdoing on this.

KEILAR: So what do we know? I mean, this has been going on, this investigation, for a long time. What do we know about the evidence that prosecutors have here?

JARRETT: Well, there's likely a mountain of paper here for the grand jury to sort through. You have testimony from Cohen, as I mentioned. You also have, importantly, Trump's tax returns. Remember, he fought for years tooth and nail to protect those, not to mention all the bank records from places like Deutsche Bank.

But what prosecutors really want right now is the cooperation of Allen Weisselberg. He's key here, as he handled the Trump Organization's finances for decades. But even without Weisselberg, the fact that the investigation has reached this level, this critical step with the grand jury, tells us a lot. It means that prosecutors believe that they have probable cause to believe someone or someone working with the Trump Organization committed a crime. In other words, this is not being done on a whim, there is evidence here, Brianna.

KEILAR: There is evidence. This has been going on for a while. Laura Jarrett, our Early Start Anchor and Correspondent, thank you so much.

BERMAN: All right. Joining me now is Shayna Jacobs, one of the reporters who broke this story for The Washington Post, terrific work, thank you so much for joining us this morning.

Tell us exactly what is going on here and for how long are we talking this special grand jury had been sitting?

[07:05:02]

SHAYNA JACOBS, NATIONAL SECURITY REPORTER, THE WASHINGTON POST: Good morning. The special grand jury is scheduled to sit for six months. There is a mechanism through which prosecutors can get an extension with a judge's approval. But over the course of the next several months, it is likely Vance's office will present a mountain of evidence in the form of testimony and documents to this panel and, ultimately, they may decide to present them with charges to consider or they may decide to do nothing with it. And it seems like the investigation on their end is still ongoing. So, really, a lot remains to be seen about this whole process.

BERMAN: What's your reporting in terms of how long it's been in existence? Have they already begun the process of hearing and seeing evidence?

JACOBS: My understanding is they have begun the process of putting witnesses in front of the panel. I don't believe that's been going on very long. I believe it's a relatively recent development, but things are certainly under way. The panel may hear evidence from other cases throughout the course of these six months, but certainly the Trump case is the big case that they're going to be asked to consider and handle.

BERMAN: And inside your article, you point out you need a special grand jury when it's a more complicated case. It requires maybe more time and more depth to dive into it. What's your reporting in terms of why Cy Vance has taken this next step to bring this case before the grand jury?

JACOBS: So, they will typically convene this kind of, quote/unquote, special grand jury for an investigation. It allows them to issue subpoenas that they can, you know, then get -- use to obtain documents that they will put in front of the panel. And it also gives them a lot of flexibility.

This panel is meeting for three days a week over the next six months, as I said. And, really, they could go out of order. They can hear other cases in between. They have a long time through which to finish going through, for instance, Trump's tax returns, which they only recently obtained.

So they're still investigating and the grand jury -- and this, quote/unquote, special grand jury gives them the ability to continue their investigation while they begin this very important process, which, by all accounts, is the last stage really in this whole thing.

BERMAN: And you spoke to lawyers and former prosecutors for your article, and so have we. We spoke to them and also to say that this type of action indicates the prosecutors think they have a case. That's why -- that's what would be required to do the type of thing they're doing.

I want to ask you about Allen Weisselberg, the CFO of the Trump Organization. What's your reporting in terms of his role with this grand jury? Do you have any knowledge about whether he's been called as a witness?

JACOBS: It's unclear. That's a big question on everyone's mind. Certainly, the D.A.'s office, we've confirmed, is trying to flip him against Trump, his boss, his current boss, as far as we understand. So that seems to be, you know, a wild card in this whole thing.

I'm sure the D.A.'s office would love to have him testifying, and that would raise other issues. I think he would be eligible for immunity at that point. So, yes, it's unclear where he stands in all of this. But, you know, as far as we know, the D.A.'s office is very, very interested in obtaining his cooperating.

BERMAN: Shayna Jacobs of The Washington Post, thank you so much for joining us. Congratulations on your break yesterday. I appreciate it. Brianna?

JACOBS: Thank you.

KEILAR: Let's get a legal perspective on this story that we just heard Shayna lay out there. I want to bring in Daniel Goldman, who is the Democrat's lead counsel in the first House impeachment proceedings against President Trump. And he's a former assistant for the U.S. District Attorney of New York. Daniel, thank you so for joining us this morning.

What's your initial reaction to this development, to this breaking story?

DANIEL GOLDAMN, EX-LEAD COUNSEL TO HOUSE IMPEACHMENT MANAGERS FOR TRUMP'S FIRST IMPEACHMENT: Well, it's sort of overstated and understated. I don't think it's a big deal, for example, that this is a special grand jury sitting for six months. In fraud cases, you have a lot of evidence, and you need to have the same grand jury, you can't rotate every month as a regular grand jury does.

But on the other hand, in fraud cases, you don't necessarily know that there is a crime. So the prosecutors in this case clearly believed that there is significant evidence of a crime that was committed in order to start to bring the evidence before a grand jury, which ultimately is the body that will vote on whether there is probable cause to indict someone.

[07:10:06]

And we don't know who that someone, someones, or perhaps something in the name of the Trump Organization is the target of the investigation, but unlike some run-of-the-mill violent cases, drug cases where you know there is a crime and you present evidence to the grand jury about who committed the crime, in fraud cases, you don't necessarily know that there is a crime, so you wouldn't, as a prosecutor, necessarily bring a case to the grand jury unless you believed there was a crime.

KEILAR: Okay. So if this does lead to an indictment, is it easier to indict an organization rather than an individual? And if so, what would happen to the individual, you know, the organization, being the Trump Organization, the individual being the former president?

GOLDMAN: So, generally speaking, prosecutors are far more reluctant to indict corporations than they are to indict individuals. You would have to show -- in order to indict a corporation, you'd have to show someone as part of that organization has committed a crime. It could be an institutional failure, for example, of the organization to be compliant with the laws, but in this case, because the organization is small and is so wrapped up in the embodiment of Donald Trump and there's Allen Weisselberg, as Laura mentioned, who's the CFO, who's been there for decades, and there are just a few other employees. It's not a big organization. I would be surprised if they simply indicted the organization and did not indict any individuals.

KEILAR: You mentioned it's a small organization. We know the leadership is small, it always has been. And it includes a lot of family. Is that a red flag itself, keeping the inner circling in an organization like this small?

GOLDAMN: Not necessarily. I think it's more a reflection of the fact that they do not have nearly as much business as former President Donald Trump advertised, but it does mean there's a smaller universe of people who know what happened there. And that's why Allen Weisselberg is so key.

Michael Cohen, for example, who is cooperating, obviously worked there for ten years, but he doesn't know the ins and outs of the finances. He doesn't know what representations were specifically made to insurance companies or bank lenders or tax authorities, so he is not the witness that can get you to Donald Trump.

You need someone who was dealing with those specific applications and representations to authorities who would be able to then cooperate and testify against Donald Trump because, remember, Donald Trump notoriously does not email. There's not going to be a written communication between Trump and anyone else. And we don't believe there are any recordings, or at least we're not aware of any recordings of Trump committing any fraud.

So what you're going to need is a witness who discussed the fraudulent scheme with Donald Trump and can say, I committed fraud and I did it at the direction of my boss, Donald Trump. And if you don't have that witness in the case, I think it's very difficult to charge Donald Trump.

KEILAR: So we don't know if they have that witness. We heard the daughter-in-law of Allen Weisselberg who say she believes that he will flip on Donald Trump. But we don't know that.

So based on what you do know, do you anticipate Trump will be indicted?

GOLDMAN: Based on what we know right now, I would say no. But that's why Allen Weisselberg is the key. And I think there has been reporting about the daughter-in-law turning over documents and being willing to testify. I saw some reporting about a grand jury subpoenaed to Allen Weisselberg's grandchildren's school to try to get records of, I guess, payments or transfers of some sort. So they're clearly circling the Weisselberg family, trying to put pressure on them (INAUDIBLE). My guess is that they also realize that Allen Weisselberg's cooperation is key to charging Donald Trump.

But we have no reporting that Weisselberg is cooperative. There were rumblings that he was not cooperative with the Southern District of New York sometime ago, whent hat federal investigation was going on. So he is very loyal to Donald Trump and the Trump family. Remember, he started working for Donald Trump's father before Donald Trump took over the company. He's been there for decades. So you would have to, I think, have very strong evidence and very significant jail time exposure for Allen Weisselberg in order to get him to cooperate.

[07:15:02]

KEILAR: It's a very good point. Daniel, thank you so much for breaking all of that down, as we search for answers here.

Much more on this, including a reaction from a Trump biographer, next.

Plus, Kevin McCarthy finally, after several days, deciding to condemn Marjorie Taylor Greene's comments five days after she compared mask rules to the Holocaust. We're going to show you the explicit response to the GOP leader.

BERMAN: And why the Biden administration shut down a secret COVID origin investigation that began under President Trump.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KEILAR: Developing overnight, former President Trump responding to reports that a grand jury has been convened as part of the investigation into the Trump Organization. Trump calling the development a witch hunt.

Joining us now is Tim O'Brien, Senior Columnist at Bloomberg. TRUMP actually sued you for $5 million over your book from 200,5where you argued that Trump's net worth was no more than $250 million.

[07:20:02]

We should note that the judge tossed out that lawsuit, but you are very acquainted obviously with the former president, and I wonder how you think he's viewing this latest development.

TIM O'BRIEN, SENIOR COLUMNIST, BLOOMBERG: Well, Brianna, he just said, I think, exactly how he's going to portray this going forward. He's calling it a witch hunt. Donald Trump has eluded Robert Mueller's investigation to impeachments and a defeat at the polls. And in each and every one of those cases, he's tried to impugn the process throughout, saying prosecutors were politically motivated at the federal level, Congress obviously has politically motivated it. And then he incited an insurrection to try to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

I think what he's going to continue to attack the bona fides of Tish James, the New York State attorney general, and Cy Vance, the Manhattan district attorney, to obviously sow doubt among his closest supporters but everyone else in the public but there's nothing legitimate about this investigation and it's purely political, which, of course, isn't the fact pattern, it doesn't involve any of that up, but that's what he's going to say about it.

BERMAN: So, Tim, you recently compared the former president to Al Capone. Why? Well, they got Capone on stuff. He ended in Alcatraz not really for organized crime or violence but tax stuff, which is what makes Allen Weisselberg here so important, the CFO, the financial wizard behind the Trump Organization.

Based on what you know about Weisselberg over the years, do you think he will flip? I mean, how will he behave here?

O'BRIEN: Well, I think there's a far more chance that Weisselberg will flip. If it comes down Allen Weisselberg having to choose between loyalty to Donald Trump or a prison term, you know, I don't think he's going go to prison. We know now that he's the subject himself of a criminal investigation. And investigators have clearly been pressuring him and his family members legally. Whether or not he'll flip, obviously, is the million-dollar question here.

But I think if investigators have the goods on him and his own liberty is at stake, of course, he'll flip. And I think that's going to be true of other people in the Trump Organization. There's been a lot of emphasis on Allen Weisselberg, of course, as there should be, because he knows where all the financial bodies are buried, but the children are steeped in a lot of this.

There are other executives inside the Trump Organization whose names have not been made public or have not been discussed very much who I think are at risk who, may also may flip. And there's an evidentiary trail that's in the hands of other people in that organization not only as witnesses but because of emails that they may have. While Trump didn't use emails himself, he used his administrative assistant, Rhona Graff, to communicate with other people in he's cited in those emails. So I assume investigators have her hard drive.

And, remember, the D.A.'s investigation began with a tape recording of Michael Cohen, his own tape recording, in which he said to Donald Trump, how should I pay off these women who may make public accusations against you, and Trump says to him, go talk to Allen Weisselberg about it.

KEILAR: Okay. You said there are maybe other folks who are being looked at for possibly flipping. Who all is that?

O'BRIEN: Well, you know, over the years, no deal got done at the Trump Organization without the approval of two people after Trump. Trump would not give his blessing to anything unless Allen Weisselberg signed off or Jason Greenblatt.

Jason Greenblatt was Trump's special envoy in the Middle East while he was president. But prior to that, he was the in-house counsel at the Trump Organization. There's no indication anywhere that Jason Greenblatt has done anything wrong or he's thought to have done anything wrong, but he's a person of knowledge that I assume investigators will be just as interested in as Allen Weisselberg.

KEILAR: It is fascinating. And, Tim, you know, you have followed this for so long and you know all the players and we appreciate you walking us through it. This is going to be a complicated six months ahead of us, Tim O'Brien.

Trump's fantasy world has more inhabitants than you might think. A stunning new poll is shedding light on GOP delusions on the Capitol riot and nonsensical election fraud claims.

BERMAN: Plus, a key Senate vote tomorrow on whether to create a January 6th commission. Some Republicans are already revealing how they plan to vote.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:25:00]

BERMAN: Tomorrow, the Senate will take a key procedure real vote on whether to establish a 9/1-style commission to investigate the January 6th Capitol insurrection. A lot of people are asking how could Republican members be against this? The answer, look at their voters.

Joining us now, Harry Enten, CNN Senior Political Writer and Analyst. Thank you so much for being with us this morning.

HARRY ENTEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL WRITER AND ANALYST: My pleasure.

BERMAN: When you look at Republican voters, what you find is there are many willing to believe the lies even when they're contradictory.

ENTEN: That's exactly right. They believe these falsehoods. Let's start out with one falsehood. Were January 6th protesters mostly peaceful and law-abiding? This is among Republicans. Look at this, a plurality. 48 percent say, yes, they were peaceful and law-abiding. Again, not really true, right? You could see it in the picture, not very much true.

But they also believe this. Look at this. Were left-wingers leading the January 6th riot to make Trump look bad? Look again here, 54 percent say yes. See that these contradictory ideas one hand that they were mostly peaceful, but on the other hand, if they were violent, it was left-wingers. It's a paradox.

BERMAN: Yes, the left-wing rioters were mostly peaceful.

ENTEN: Something like that.

BERMAN: These voters do not blame Donald Trump for this.

ENTEN: Right. They'll blame anybody but the former president of the United States. So how much blame does Trump get for the January 6th insurrection?

[07:30:00]

Just 24 percent of them say a lot or in my average of polls, 72 percent say little or none.