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President Biden Attends NATO Summit; NATO Set to Include Sweden and Finland in Recent Expansion; Russian Invasion of Ukraine Continues in Eastern Territories of Ukraine. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired June 30, 2022 - 08:00   ET

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

[08:00:00]

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR AND CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Good to have all of you this morning. As you know, conferences such as this can often be more talk than action. This one actually has some deliverables, the expansion of -- a significant expansion of forces on the eastern flank. I wonder, as you look at this, Evan Osnos, the president, central to these negotiations, has this been a success for President Biden, has it been a success for NATO?

EVAN OSNOS, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: I think they're feeling that things are a lot better than they were predicted to be. It's worth reminding people just a couple of years ago you had a U.S. president who was talking about withdrawing from NATO. The French president Macron was talking about NATO as being braindead. And here we are today.

It was predicted at the beginning of this war that Russian forces could be in Kyiv in three days. That didn't happen because of the heroics, frankly, of the Ukrainians, and because of this really unexpected coherence among NATO, which was the product of diplomacy. Now, four months in, it's complicated, things are getting harder. Every leader in that room has domestic politics they're contending with. But they're coming out of this summit having taken steps forward, to expand force presence, to establish American troops in Poland, and most importantly, perhaps, Jim, that they've talked about China as a strategic challenge. We may be talking about that for years to come.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

CLARISSA WARD, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: And Gloria, I think President Putin sees himself as playing a long game here, and he's banking on the idea that President Biden and other world leaders who are here at this NATO summit will have a difficult time keeping momentum and support going for this war. Do you think President Biden is going to have any challenges putting forward that to the U.S. people? There has been strong bipartisan support thus far, but could that be in any kind of jeopardy as we see inflation, food prices, gas prices continuing to soar?

GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: I think one thing the president really has not done yet, and maybe he'll do it today and maybe he'll do it at some other point with Congress and a larger audience, perhaps, but he has to explain what's at stake here as Americans keep sending billions of dollars into Ukraine and remind them what this war is about.

And I think one thing you can say about NATO, this NATO summit, is that the president is probably more popular with his colleagues over there than he is here, in America, where his popularity is now at, what, 38 percent. And this is a -- this is a stage that Biden plays very well on, that he believes that he's a leader in this stage, which he is, has gotten the NATO allies to work together in a way we haven't seen in recent past. As, you know, Evan mentioned, we had a former president who seemed to want to disband NATO more than anything else.

And so I think Putin is up against somebody very different from Donald Trump. And so I think the president sees this as one of his accomplishments, the cohesiveness of NATO. What he has to do is sell it back home and tell Americans how important he is. And he's got a lot of other issues as we will talk about, most notably the economy. And that's not an easy job.

SCIUTTO: No question. One thing that struck me here is the seriousness with which European officials, U.S. officials described the threat from Russia, not just to Ukraine, but to the NATO alliance itself. They do not speak of an attack on NATO allies as a theoretical. They speak of it as something they have to defend against potentially and do so today.

Kasie, as we have been mentioning, there is clearly an enormous amount on the president's domestic plate right now, and he is certain to face questions. He'll certainly want to focus on events here in Madrid, he'll face questions on the overturning of Roe v. Wade, on the shrinking economy. How does he get to those questions today?

KASIE HUNT, CNN ANCHOR AND CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: I think that's the careful line that he's going to have to walk here, Jim, because we have seen the reports about how some of the European allies are raising questions about the stability of the U.S. political system in the context of Roe v. Wade. This is a president who has been pretty careful on the issue of abortion so far as it relates to heading into these midterm elections. There's a lot of pressure from progressives in the U.S. for him to take a stronger stand, to take actions that may be more controversial, for example, allowing abortions to take place on federal lands, for example. There's a lot of political resistance to that inside the White House because they're concerned about that seeming polarizing as we head into the midterm elections and turning off swing voters. So there's no question that Biden is in a tough spot.

But one thing I will say about the Ukraine issue that I think, it's anecdotal, but as I've covered the midterms, when I've talked with voters at events at both Republicans and Democrats, Ukraine actually comes up pretty regularly.

[08:05:03]

And I do think there is an opportunity for the president. This is something that actually has, I think, resonated with many average people in America, even people who are not necessarily extremely tuned into politics. If you drive around the streets in rural America, you'll often see Ukraine flags hanging from windows and other things. So I think it's an opportunity for the president to lean into the leadership that he's taking here and to underscore that these two countries joining NATO is exactly the opposite of what Vladimir Putin had set out to accomplish.

SCIUTTO: It is a great point, and it has resonated in the states to a degree that I don't think was expected.

WARD: It has. And there is a sense that how much longer can this go on? And we did just hear from the director of national intelligence, Avril Haines, saying this is going to grind on for quite some time. And I guess the question I would put to you, Evan, is, are we going to hear President Biden today articulate how he sees this war playing out, what he sees the strategic objective as being, and how America would like to see it come to an end, and will there be a negotiated settlement? Is there a possibility of talking about land concessions? Obviously, a lot of that is up to the two major players in this, President Putin and President Zelenskyy, but I wonder if we'll see a more articulated version or vision of what is ahead.

OSNOS: Yes, I think one of the things you can expect from him is a discussion of what he's talked about recently as freedom comes with a cost, which is to say Americans are putting in money for arms, we're paying higher prices at the gas pump partly because of the war. He wants to remind people that this is part of this larger question of the defense of democracy not just in the United States but around the world. In a sense, freedom is on the ballot here.

I think that the reality is that the White House is going to leave the question of timing in the hands of the Ukrainians. As they will often say, it is theirs to decide when this war ends and all we can do is do as much as we can to support them. But the talk has become a little bit more vivid these days about what is this going to mean, how many more months, how many more years, and he'll have to address that in some way, even if it is not to take that decision away from the Ukrainians.

BORGER: You know, democracy in peril.

SCIUTTO: John Kirby --

BORGER: Go ahead.

SCIUTTO: Sorry, Gloria. I was just going to say I pressed John Kirby on that point yesterday to say are you going, is the administration going to pressure Ukraine to cede territory to end the war? And he said, as Evan was articulating there that this is -- that's up to Ukraine, right, that the definition of peace is up to Ukraine, and the U.S. position here, its role here, right, is to help Ukraine defend itself. Sorry, Gloria, back to you.

BORGER: I was just going to say that democracy in peril has been kind of a theme of the Biden presidency, particularly after January 6th. And the notion that authoritarianism cannot win over democracy, and you see what's going on in the states right now. You see we mentioned the discussions at the January 6th hearings, the astonishing testimony that we heard from Cassidy Hutchinson about Donald Trump wanting to go to the Capitol, knowing that there were people in the crowd who were armed and ready to go into the Capitol.

This is something that Biden talks about all the time, what's at stake here. And I think in terms of meeting with the NATO allies, that's the theme he continues to promote, which is we have to triumph, we democracies, Biden would say, have to triumph over authoritarianism. And what he saw on January 6th, before his own inauguration, was an attempted coup, and that's how he sees it.

And that is really so important to him in his term, and when he talks to the NATO allies, this is what he talks about, which is we have to be stronger, and we have to show the public that we can survive and thrive in the face of these authoritarian threats.

HUNT: Well, can I jump in there?

SCIUTTO: And longer than Putin, right, because Putin thinks he can wait the west out. Sorry, Kasie, go ahead.

HUNT: No, no, that's absolutely right. He thinks he can wait the west out. And to exactly that point, I think one thing that we should not forget is that it's likely to take more than just one election, more than just President Biden's election for our European allies to start feeling more confident in the United States' place leading the world. They're not necessarily convinced that the forces that brought Trump to power don't still exist and aren't waiting in the wings to step back up basically at a moment's notice.

I don't get the sense, when I talk to sources on the Hill in particular, even some Republicans will privately acknowledge that it's a problem when we are at the negotiating table, when we're talking with our allies, that this is kind of what's hovering over everything, hovering over the January 6th hearings is the specter of another Trump nomination as the Republican nominee and then potentially a win in the general election.

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SCIUTTO: People, when I speak to European diplomats, they will say privately they watch events in the U.S., division in the U.S., this attempt to overturn the election with concern, no question gloria. Gloria, Kasie, Evan, please stay with us. We're going to be back with you shortly.

We do want to bring in CNN chief international anchor Christiane Amanpour as well. Christiane, good to have you. It struck me that a year ago we were in Geneva, when Biden met Putin, the discussion there was strategic stability, stabilizing this relationship. Here we are a year later where the clear message is that the security situation in Europe has changed, remarkably, that Russia is a clear and imminent danger and needs to be addressed today. It's a remarkable change, and I think are we not seeing that highlighted here by these agreements that they're making and the forces that they're deploying? CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: A hundred

percent, Jim. Their whole new strategic doctrine lays that out in black and white, that Russia is now the major threat to Europe and to the west. There are several issues given all the things that you've been talking about. I talked to the Spanish prime minister, who is the host of this summit. He said, perhaps, in the past, we have been naive about what Russia intends and what Russia could ever bring to this table.

Remember, 10 years ago, in Lisbon, at the last strategic doctrine laid out, they had President Medvedev of Russia there and they were talking about a strategic partnership. Well, Putin has put that in the dustbin of history. I spoke to the Swedish prime minister, who just joined -- well, just about back on the fast track to joining NATO, and she said everything that we have all laid out and we're talking about and you've been talking about makes the case for escalating military aid to Ukraine, because none of this lofty rhetoric will mean anything if Ukraine loses its war and if Russia wins. None of it.

I spoke to the secretary-general of NATO just now before coming on the air. He says, look, we've had a victory of sorts. We've got two more members. That's more NATO, not less NATO. We've got hundreds of thousands of more troops pledged, that is a real deterrent posture, as opposed to 40,000, which were arrayed around the eastern flank of NATO until recently. And that's a real major deterrent threat.

But that's about NATO. It's not about Ukraine. And you can read "The New York Times" today and see that they don't even have radios on their frontline positions in the east. They do not yet have the precision long range artillery and the kind of antiaircraft and anti- missile defenses that they have been asking for and that they need in the east.

And remember, back in April, at the very beginning, where Russia was pushed back from Kyiv and then said it was going to redirect towards the east, there was a moment and a window of opportunity that every American analyst and general told us all was the window to leap through and make sure that these promises were matched with reality on the ground. And they simply have not been yet.

So Russia is consolidating in the east. Putin has come out of his bunker and headed off overseas now to talk about being Peter the Great again, factoring everything in that the west has done, figuring out that he understands the rules of the west road and can wait it out. So this is a very, very important moment. There needs to be an escalation of aid to the Ukrainians if they are going to do what the U.S. and NATO says they want to do, and that is win in Ukraine and weaken Russia.

WARD: You mentioned those weapons, Christiane, which some of them are now on their way to Ukraine. The issue, though, becomes that these are complicated, serious, sophisticated weapons. Training can take weeks if not longer. And so it does become much more complex, particularly given the situation in the east, now the province of Luhansk, all but basically under complete Russian control, Donetsk, 50 percent under Russian control, some serious counteroffensives going on the southern part of the fight. But, Christiane, I guess the question I would ask, we heard this impassioned plea from President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, saying if ever there was a moment now for Ukraine to be allowed to be part of NATO, this is it. And I just wonder what you're hearing behind the scenes, despite all the support, is there any sort of -- what are world leaders saying about that? How are they responding?

AMANPOUR: Well, as usual, Clarissa, not very directly, and they say, yes, fine, that's great to have President Volodymyr Zelenskyy address each and every one of our summits and make his usual pleas. But you feel and you get a sense that that particular request is falling on somewhat deaf ears. They're not yet ready to open the door to NATO to Ukraine.

On the other hand, the E.U., as you know, has put Ukraine along with Moldova on a fast track to E.U. membership.

[08:15:08]

And that's a positive. And, remember, that that was Putin's first issue with Ukraine, when it wanted a closer association with the E.U. in 2013 and then, boom, in 2014 Putin decides to punish them by invading and capturing Crimea, et cetera.

But just on the weapons issue, Clarissa, you remember that, you know, it has been three months now since we knew that Russia was moving towards the east. It has been three months of promises. So this time thing is a little disingenuous. It has been three months where they could have moved these heavier precision weapons.

They knew exactly what Russia was going to deploy. We have seen Russia's playbook. We have seen it in every other field of operation that it is engaged with. If you talk to American generals and the Americans who are watching all this, yes, a huge amount has gone to Ukraine.

But not enough and not fast enough so that their actual reality matches their rhetoric. This is important. If they say, hey, we don't care if the war goes on for years and years and years, let's help Ukraine survive, we don't care if they win back their territory -- well, that's one thing. But their public statements are that Russia must be defeated.

Well, in order for that to happen -- in Ukraine, must be defeated in Ukraine. In order for that to happen, they need to really speed up delivery and consequential weaponry and the training and all of that.

And just another thing, because you all understand the politics, yes, there will be Ukraine fatigue among Western publics as they see the ongoing inflation, the energy crunches, the famines and the starvation and the food crisis around the world. Therefore it is in the west's interest to speed up the end of this war and the West and NATO can do it, it is a question of will right now.

SCIUTTO: Yeah, and some of those weapons going in with deliberate restrictions, for instance. The range limited on some of the advanced rocket systems because the U.S. did not want to threaten or Ukraine to threaten Russia with those weapons systems and they're still going in quite small numbers.

Christiane, please stand by.

AMANPOUR: Yeah.

SCIUTTO: We are just moments away from President Biden's press conference as he addresses the NATO summit here in Madrid. He's got a lot to speak about, a lot of elements, but certainly questions from home he'll answer as well.

CLARISSA WARD, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Absolutely. In the meantime, we have new developments in the January 6th investigation as the House Select Committee subpoenas White House legal counsel Pat Cipollone. Will he talk and how significant will that testimony be?

This is CNN's live special coverage.

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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. LIZ CHENEY (R-TX): At this moment, we're confronting a domestic threat that we have never faced before. And that is a former president who is attempting to unravel the foundations of our constitutional republic. And he is aided by Republican leaders and elected officials who made themselves willing hostages to this dangerous and irrational man.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: A stinging rebuke from January 6th committee co-chair Liz Cheney. She was speaking at the Reagan library, calling the former president a domestic threat.

The man you're seeing on the screen there, that's the former White House counsel, Pat Cipollone, we're putting him up there because we learned that the committee overnight did issue a subpoena for the former Trump White House counsel to testify to them. And our Dana Bash reports that this might happen within limited parameters.

Joining us now, CNN anchor and attorney at law, Laura Jarrett, CNN chief legal analyst and former prosecutor Jeffrey Toobin and CNN chief political analyst Gloria Borger.

I do want to note to everyone, we are waiting for the president's news conference from the NATO summit. We'll bring that to you the minute he starts speaking because there is a whole lot he will be asked there, no doubt.

Laura, Pat Cipollone may sit down for limited transcribed interview. How significant?

LAURA JARRETT, CNN ANCHOR, "EARLY START": If they can get him, it is quite significant. The question is can they get him in time?

The committee's clock is ticking. They do not have the time or the interest, I would think, in litigating this, right? They just -- they're just not in that position anymore. They could go to court, to try to, you know, hash it out, but I just don't see it.

So I think what's more likely to happen is to have him sit down, for a limited set of questions that they all have worked out ahead of time and he can provide a lot of answers on things that have nothing to do with his conversations with the president. Things that he told Mark Meadows are not privileged. Things he told Cassidy Hutchinson are not privileged. Things he told other non-attorneys are not privileged.

These conversations with John Eastman, that's a little bit trickier, conversations with Jeffrey Clark, although a lot of that has already come out so far because all of the DOJ guys, Biden waived privilege on that, so much of the conversation is already out there that they may not need Cipollone on that.

But they do need, I think, Cipollone on what exactly he told Cassidy Hutchinson, especially because some of her testimony, and not on this part, has been called into question. And so if I was a member of the committee, I would want to shore that up.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: Yeah, Jeffrey, talk about that. What part of the picture can he fill in that we haven't already learned?

JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN CHIEF LEGAL ANALYST: Well, there are issues where Cassidy Hutchinson's recollection may be questioned, so anything he can do to back her up, just because she said it doesn't mean everyone believes it. If she backs him up, that corroboration is very important. But to me, the central issue in this entire investigation is the violence at the Capitol.

And what Cipollone knew about how informed he and everyone at the White House was about the prospects for violence, and what he said about how the White House should respond to that prospect is so important because that, to me, is the absolute key here. Did the White House, starting with President Trump, but not just president Trump, did they know that violence was likely, and did they encourage violence and what did they do, if anything, to stop the violence?

That, to me, is the central issue in this investigation, more important than the fake electors, more important than Mike Pence.

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And Cipollone was -- at least according to Cassidy Hutchinson -- very involved in that question and that's what I would want to know about.

BERMAN: Gloria, can I ask you a big picture question? Sort of biggest of big pictures. Where are we right now in all of this? Because we were saying, you know, I thought there wasn't going to be that much revealed in all of this, that's what people were saying, but, boy, we keep on learning so much new stuff here, with Cassidy Hutchinson testifying, all the new information there. Alyssa Farah just told us that Cassidy Hutchinson came to her a couple of months ago and said there is more I feel like I want to tell the committee, there is more that I didn't tell them the first round. So, that's why she ended up there a second time.

Now, Pat Cipollone, who's been closed mouth, might say something.

What does this all mean?

BORGER: Well, it means the committee's work isn't finished honestly. I think Pat Cipollone is to key. Cassidy Hutchinson gave them new roads to go down.

I was talking to a source on the committee who said we always wanted to hear from Pat Cipollone, we know Liz Cheney was goading him publicly, now they it is urgent and important to have him corroborate what Cassidy Hutchinson is saying. I mean, Pat Cipollone was running around like chicken little the day of January 6th, warning people, if you go to there, there is going to be blood on your hands, there is going to be legal action.

He was also so key in warning the president of the United States in a meeting in the Oval Office which we heard described by the department of justice people that if you do what Jeffrey Clark is saying, this is going to be a murder suicide pact. And people are going to quit.

He has been an important figure here and as they try and connect the dots, and piece this all together, about what was going on, inside the White House, what Donald Trump knew, we knew -- we now know from Cassidy Hutchinson that over a period of time, just before January 6th, and on the day of January 6th, they were warned on 15 separate occasions about violence at the Capitol. Pat Cipollone knew what they were heading into, if they listened to the president of the United States.

And the president of the United States didn't want to listen to anyone, including Pat Cipollone. So here's a man who has been really loyal to this president, who defended him on the floor of the Senate after all, on impeachment, and now he was there at the center of the action on January 6th, telling people please do not go. And they really want to hear from him.

And if they get to hear from him, even if it is only in a deposition that is limited, and that is not videotaped, I think it will be very, very important for the committee, and for history.

BERMAN: Gloria Borger, Laura Jarrett, Jeffrey Toobin, thanks to all of you.

We are waiting to hear from President Biden, this press conference coming from the NATO summit. He will be asked a number of questions, not just on the efforts of Ukraine, but also the aftermath of the decision overturning Roe versus Wade, not to mention the possible DOJ investigation into the former president.

Stick around. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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