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DOJ Acknowledges It's Looking Into Coup Plot by Trump World; Anti-Semitic Flyers Being Distributed in Several Major Cities; Will Rep. Nancy Pelosi's (D-CA) Re-Election Galvanize GOP, Upset Progressives. Aired 7-7:30a ET

Aired January 26, 2022 - 07:00   ET

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

[07:00:00]

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN NEW DAY: Yes. I just wondered, Mara, like to his point about they're trumpeting, they're touting that they have Latina actors playing Snow White, it seems like the more minority a minority community is, the less representation they have, whether it's someone who was in the dwarfism community, Disney put it, or someone, say, who is Native American. There is just less representation. They are more likely to be exploited in these portrayals.

MARA SCHIAVOCAMPO, JOURNALIST: Yes, absolutely. And that's why representation is so important. And people will say, well, where does it end? Like now you have the Little Mermaid is black and snow white is Latina. We are making great strides to represent the diversity of the country and the world. But there are always groups who are left behind. It is important to listen and to hear and to acknowledge that we can always do better.

Disney has made vast strides towards changing story lines in ways that are empowering towards women. You can look at Frozen, you can look at Encanto, you can look at, really, all of their recent movies, Moana. They are really about female empowerment in a way that they never were before. So, they are making a lot of great strides but there is always room for improvement, especially when you're making content for kids.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN NEW DAY: Mara Schiavocampo, Bill Carter, thank you both very much.

And New Day continues right now.

KEILAR: Welcome to our viewers in the United States and around the world. It is Wednesday, January 26th. And I'm Brianna Keilar with John Berman.

Breaking overnight, a CNN exclusive, the Justice Department confirming publicly for the first time that prosecutors are looking into a specific event from the plot to overturn the 2020 election. Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco tells CNN that federal prosecutors are reviewing the fake Electoral College certifications from 2020 that falsely declared former President Trump the winner of seven states that he lost.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LISA MONACO, DEPUTY ATTORNEY GENERAL: On the issue you raised in terms of fraudulent elector certifications has been reported. We've received those referrals. Our prosecutors are looking at those. And I can't say anything more on ongoing investigations.

But more broadly, look, the attorney general has been very, very clear. We are going to follow the facts and the law wherever they lead to address conduct of any kind and at any level that is part of an assault on our democracy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: Trump allies in Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Georgia signed the fake electoral certifications claiming to be the rightful electors. And some of the bogus certifications were sent to National Archives in mid-December 2020 by top state Republican Party officials.

Joining us now is CNN Early Start Anchor and Attorney at Law Laura Jarrett. Laura, the significance here is that you have the number two person at the Department of Justice acknowledging for the first time there is an active investigation into the highest levels of the Trump political world, because we know Rudy Giuliani, among others, was involved in this.

LAURA JARRETT, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, John. This is really major news. For the better part of a year, we have essentially been operating in the dark, not quite knowing what exactly DOJ prosecutors were up to when it comes to investigating this attempted coup. But now, thanks to CNN's Evan Perez who got the scoop, got to sit down with Lisa Monaco -- Lisa Monaco, by the way, the person who actually supervises the U.S. attorneys around the country. There's no better person to speak to what is actually happening in that building. And he got her to say there is an ongoing investigation.

Now, she said she can't comment on the ongoing investigation but we at least now know prosecutors are actually looking into the referrals that they got from the state officials around the country and lawmakers who were concerned about these phony slates of electors that were being sent to the National Archives.

BERMAN: What do you think they are investigating specifically? What laws could be at play?

JARRETT: So, there's a couple. I mean, we're, again, still operating in a little bit a vacuum here on the information. We still need to see a little bit more meat on the bones. But based on everything we know, there is a conspiracy against the United States, conspiracy to defraud the United States and also mail fraud. Remember, what the whole scheme here was that there were actually phony people, phony slates of electors who were signing the certificates, saying that Trump was actually elected in states that he wasn't, meaning essentially trying to usurp the will of the voters in places where they had elected Biden as president. They wanted to toss out those votes. They wanted to send these dueling slates of electors over to Congress to give the vice president, Mike Pence, the pretext to essentially say, wait a minute here, there seem to be objections.

Now, thankfully, Mike Pence actually upheld the constitutional duties that he had and didn't go along with that scheme, but that appears to be what the whole goal was here, that we know based off our great reporting was cooked up by Rudy Giuliani and others who thought this was a misguided effort to, again, usurp the election.

BERMAN: And, again, this is the first public acknowledgment we have, that there is an investigation into those highest levels specifically of what went on there.

[07:05:05]

Laura Jarrett, thank you very much.

JARRETT: Sure.

KEILAR: The Justice Department has released new video of the attack on the Capitol, and two clips are noteworthy. One shows the initial breach of the east rotunda doors. Just take a look at the man in the green backpack who is helping rioters into the building. By the way, he is an active duty marine -- was at the time of the insurrection. He is charged with several crimes related to the riot, including assaulting a police officer. He has pleaded guilty.

And in this clip, a rioter is seen inside the Capitol building violently throwing a police officer to the ground. Another officer quickly runs to help his colleague, pushing rioters away while more of them pour into the Capitol. The officer helps his fellow officer up and they are able to leave the area.

This is actually very key, Berman, because we had heard from the lawyer for one of the folks who has been indicted in all of this saying, you know, these eastern doors, they were just opened up, sort of creating this idea that police just let people into the building. And what we are seeing here, very clear they did not.

BERMAN: No, there was violence.

So, as Donald Trump and his loyalists continue to peddle the big lie, confidence in America's elections continues to erode.

I want to bring in CNN's Donie O'Sullivan. Donie, you have been talking to people all over the spectrum here about really the undermining of trust in the system.

DONIE O'SULLIVAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right, John. We have spoken to hundreds of Trump supporters over the past year. And one thing is becoming very, very clear. Many of them no longer have trust in the American election process because, of course, they have been fed the big lie, conspiracy theories.

We took a look at what all of this might mean for the future of American democracy.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: What you're seeing and what year reading is not what's happening.

O'SULLIVAN (voice over): Former President Donald Trump's relentless attacks on the truth has eroded faith in American democracy and its institutions.

You don't trust election officials?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.

O'SULLIVAN: You don't trust the FBI?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.

O'SULLIVAN: You don't trust the courts?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.

O'SULLIVAN: Who do you trust?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Trump and his supporters, and anybody that when I listen to them talk, they don't turn my stomach with the disingenuousness.

O'SULLIVAN: Do you have faith in American democracy and American elections?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No. I mean, I think whoever wins, wins. I'm all about that. He will win if he runs again. But the people that know that we were cheated are almost at the point of saying, I don't want to vote because it will happen again. Because it will happen again.

O'SULLIVAN: What is your reaction to hearing from an American like that?

BARBARA WALTER, AUTHOR, HOW CIVIL WARS START: Well, ten years ago, it would have been shock and disbelief. And I would have thought, well, she is an outlier and she's not representative of anything larger than a fringe movement, maybe. But, of course, that's not the case anymore.

O'SULLIVAN: Barbara Walter is a professor at the University of California in San Diego. She has studied civil conflict for years, from Yugoslavia to Northern Ireland.

WALTER: Experts who study civil wars and know the warning signs. We have been talking about them but nobody wanted to believe it. And January 6th made it impossible to deny and ignore that there really was this cancer growing in our own country. There was a threat that was mobilizing.

O'SULLIVAN: She warns the constant barrage of lies undermining American elections from right-wing media, on social media and from Trump himself has put the United States on a perilous path.

WALTER: Citizens do believe what they are hearing. And if they hear it long enough and consistently enough, and if that's all they hear, they absolutely don't think it's a lie. They think it's the truth.

O'SULLIVAN: Will you trust the next election?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Probably not.

O'SULLIVAN: But that's a terrible thing, right?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, it's a terrible thing.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't think you can trust our government anymore. It's sad, but I really don't think you can.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's what Trump was all about and making the elections in the future fair so we can believe when you vote for somebody, that person is going to get your vote.

WALTER: You know, they're good people, they are trying to do what they think is right. It's the leadership that's cynical. It's the leadership that knows better, who is feeding them lies consistently.

TRUMP: They always talk about the big lie. They're the big lie.

O'SULLIVAN: While just 30 percent of Americans think there is solid evidence of widespread fraud in the 2020 election, 62 percent of Republicans say so. Looking to the '22 midterm elections, only 42 percent of Republicans say they are somewhat or very confident the results will be counted accurately.

[07:10:02]

WALTER: They are priming supporters to believe that democracy isn't worth defending because they don't want democracy anymore.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

O'SULLIVAN (on camera): And, John, of course, look, everybody has individual responsibility into what they believe and don't believe and falling for B.S. But as Barbara Walter, the expert therein that piece, made the point, if people are being fed this from all sides from their media, right-wing media, from social media on Facebook, and from Trump himself, the most powerful person in the Republican Party, it's kind of easy then to see how people can fall into this trap of deception.

BERMAN: Look, if you destroy the concept of truth, then you can operate with impunity. And that's one of the things happening here and the long-term consequences. Donie O'Sullivan, terrific reporting, as always, thank you. KEILAR: The White House calling an invasion by Russia imminent as American troops have been placed on high alert to deploy to Eastern Europe in a show of reassurance. President Biden also said that he would consider personally sanctioning Russian President Vladimir Putin if Russia invades Ukraine. This is a step that previous presidents have actually shied away from, so it is very significant.

CNN has reporters in both Russia and Ukraine with the very latest.

MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I'm Matthew Chance in Kyiv. And Ukrainian officials are pushing back on the idea that a Russian invasion is imminent, telling CNN they are not yet seeing Russian forces getting its combat mode or positioning themselves for an attack. One official told CNN it could take between one or two weeks for that to happen, if any order to invade is given. The assessment is, of course, at odds with the White House assessment of the threat, which it says is imminent.

The Ukrainian officials that we have spoken to say they are extremely happy with the stepping up of U.S. intervention and U.S. support for them during this crisis, but there is some frustration behind the scenes at the kind of messaging that's coming from the White House compared to what the Ukrainian governments see as the real situation.

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: I'm Nic Robertson in Moscow, where President Putin's spokesman has said that President Biden's possible personal sanctions on Putin would not be painful, but he said they would be politically destructive.

Meanwhile, Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has been addressing that Duma, the National Duma, the parliament, and he got a big round of applause when he said, if the west does not respond to us constructively, if it continues its aggressive line, then we will revert to other means. He didn't say that the country was going to war, but in the past, the statements have implied that they would turn to military alternatives.

KEILAR: Later in the show, we will speak to the Ukrainian ambassador to the U.N., Sergiy Kyslytsya.

Now, happening now, happening right now, Boris Johnson is bracing for results of a government investigation into illegal partying that went on during the U.K.'s strict COVID lockdown. The report could be released any moment, so we are waiting for that.

Plus, who is behind the hundreds of disturbing anti-Semitic flyers that are being disbursed across several American cities?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAYOR DAN GELBER (D-MIAMI BEACH, FL): We're not going to pretend like it doesn't exist. We're going to stand up and say, you know, screw you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: And should people who refuse to get vaccinated be denied organ transplants? This is a real issue with real-life consequences.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:15:00]

BERMAN: This morning, police are investigating hundreds of anti- Semitic flyers found in six states, including Florida, falsely, disgustingly claiming that COVID conspiracies are being orchestrated by Jewish Americans who work at health agencies and pharmaceutical companies.

CNN's Leyla Santiago live in Miami tracking these horrible developments. Leyla?

LEYLA SANTIAGO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: John, the Anti-Defamation League is telling me they believe this is orchestrated by one very loosely organized national group. We are, this morning, in the neighborhood, the Miami Beach neighborhood where this occurred. And when you talk to people here, we talked to neighbors, a local rabbi, you definitely get a sense of fear and vulnerability but you also hear them say this needs to be called out because this is not okay.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SANTIAGO (voice over): This is what hate looks like. A flyer delivered in the middle of the night to more than 200 Miami Beach homes, according to city officials, targeting Jews, falsely claiming the public health response to COVID is being orchestrated by Jewish people.

RONNIE ISSENBERG, RECEIVED FLYER: At first I thought it was targeted to me until I started just looking around, seeing every house was. So, this has kind of shocked a lot of people that lived on the island for over 50 years.

SANTIAGO: The mayor of Miami Beach, a city with a large Jewish community, called it pure garbage, a display of hate yet again.

GELBER: We're not going to pretend it doesn't exist. We're going to stand up and say, screw you. It's garbage what this guy or these people did. And we have to say that. Because if right-thinking people don't speak out against this kind of stuff, then people begin to think that it is okay and it's normalized.

JONATHAN GREENBLATT, CEO AND NATIONAL DIRECTOR, ANTI-DEFAMATION LEAGUE: We are already living in a moment where we have seen a remarkable rise in anti-Semitic incidents. We have about double the number acts of harassment, vandalism and the violence today than we did just a few years ago. And this weekend, we had these anti-Semitic flyers dropped in six different states.

SANTIAGO: Over the weekend, in San Francisco, police officers collected flyers with some of that same anti-Semitic language.

[07:20:01] In Colorado, flyers now under investigation, distributed in Denver. The ADL also reports flyer distribution in Wisconsin, Maryland and Texas over the weekend.

Meanwhile, at a rally in D.C., Anti-Vaccine Activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. --

ROBERT F. KENNEDY JR., ANTI-VACCINE ACTIVIST: Even in Hitler Germany, you could cross the alps into Switzerland, you can hide in an attic like Anne Frank did.

SANTIAGO: He has since apologized. Even his wife tweeted, my husband's reference to Anne Frank at a mandate rally in D.C. was reprehensible and insensitive. The atrocities that millions endured during the Holocaust should never be compared to anyone or anything. His opinions are not a reflection of my own.

The Anti-Defamation League reports a sharp increase over the last decade in anti-Semitic incidents, the dangerous rhetoric concerning city leaders.

GELBER: When any group that is -- that has hate thrown against them, prejudice thrown against them vile falsehoods thrown against them have a reason to be concerned because it's just one part of a continuum. Somebody who's willing to put flyers in front of over 200 homes in the dead of night, well, are they willing to throw a rock through a window? Are they willing to use a weapon?

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SANTIAGO (on camera): And, John, we've also heard similar reports out of Fort Lauderdale this week involving these flyers. As for the investigation Miami Beach Police telling us that they have located the rental car they believe to be involved and the mayor says they have solid leads.

BERMAN: Let's hope there's justice here because, as I said, it is disgusting. Leyla Santiago, thank you so much for bringing that to us.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announces she will run for re-election. What are the implications of this and what does it mean for House leadership?

KEILAR: And see who Ohio Senate Candidate J.D. Vance is teaming up with to, quote, take the country back from the scumbags.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:25:00]

BERMAN: An important political development this morning, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced that she does plan to run for re- election in 2022.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA): Our democracy is at risk because of the assault on the truth, the assault on the U.S. Capitol and the state- by-state assault voting rights. This election is crucial. Nothing less is at stake than our democracy.

But as we say, we don't agonize. We organize. And that is why I am running for re-election to Congress and respectfully seek your support.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: Joining us, CNN Senior Political Correspondent and Anchor of Inside Politics Sunday Abby Phillip.

Abby, with your political decoder ring on, what did she just say, what didn't she say and what does it all mean?

ABBY PHILLIP, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes. Well, we don't agonize, we organize is a very Nancy Pelosi-ism for we have got a tough road ahead and she knows that. I mean, Democrats are in the middle of a pitched battle for control of the House of Representatives, and Nancy Pelosi knows that she is the general and she cannot like leave the fight in the middle of the battle.

So, it is important for her to announce that she is going to stay on in part because this cycle, 29 other Democrats have already said that they are going to retire or not run for re-election. That is almost a high watermark in recent history. And it's a real sign that many members, rank and file members, know that this is going to be really, really tough. Many headed for the exits and Democrats are trying to hold on to as many of those seats as possible.

KEILAR: There is always this calculation, Abby, when a speaker or a leader is thinking about, you know, what does the future hold for me. Who would replace them? And I don't know how clear that is for Nancy Pelosi.

PHILLIP: I don't know if there has been a speaker in recent history who has been as difficult to replace as Nancy Pelosi and perhaps who has been the subject of this much speculation. There are a lot of Democrats, especially the younger ones, the progressive ones who want fresh blood in that position. But I think a lot of Democrats in the House right now agree that it's really hard to replace Nancy Pelosi. Democrats believe she has been largely effective. She has held this very kind of unwieldy caucus together in difficult times.

And so we don't know, though, whether or not it's the same thing to say Nancy Pelosi is running for re-election and also to say that Nancy Pelosi is running to be speaker of the House again. Those are different questions and we don't know the answer to the second one. And I think Democrats are still having a hard time figuring out, well, okay, who is going to replace her if she doesn't run again for speaker. She is though in her 80s. This is not sort of the beginning of her career. It's really very much the end. And so it is a question of how much longer she will want to stay holding onto that power. BERMAN: Yes. I think the two notable things for number one, she did not say she wants to stay or she is running to remain as speaker or Democratic leader. She also should be asked, will you vow to serve a complete term if you're re-elected, which she wasn't asked either.

I do want to shift gears to Ohio Republican Senate hopeful and the author Hillbilly Elegy, J.D. Vance, who was endorsed by Republican Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, and J.D. Vance is actually proud about that. He said, honored to have Marjorie's endorsement. We're going to win this thing and take the country back from the scumbags. What does this all mean?

PHILLIP: Pretty amazing. I mean, look, I don't think there's been a candidate thus far, this cycle who has worked as hard as J.D. Vance to remake himself into a Trumpian figure.

[07:30:06]