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CNN Live Event/Special

Congress Certifies Trump's Election Victory Soon. Aired 12:30- 1p ET

Aired January 06, 2025 - 12:30   ET

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

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[12:30:34]

JAKE TAPPER, CNN ANCHOR: It is a winter wonderland here in Washington, D.C. as the United States Congress prepares to certify the 2024 electoral vote count despite the severe winter weather four years after the process was of course violently disrupted by the January 6th attacks.

CNN's Donie O'Sullivan is at the Capitol security barrier for us now. That's the same area where he was reporting around this time four years ago. Donie, take us through that moment four years ago and contrast it with what you're seeing now.

DONIE O'SULLIVAN, CNN SENIOR CORRESPONDENT: Hey Jake, it was right about exactly right now actually this time four years ago that we made our way with Trump supporters who had marched down Pennsylvania Avenue here from the ellipse where Donald Trump was speaking at the time by the White House and came down here to this intersection on Third Street and Pennsylvania Avenue.

These gates were not here. This barrier was not here. In fact, the supporters that we were walking along with made their way to what is ironically given what happened called the Peace Monument. And that is where the Trump supporters, which turned into a violent mob, first pushed over the barricades that had been set up by police.

By the way, the barricades at that point were nothing at all like this. They were those sort of small barriers that come up to your waist that you'd see at a football game or a concert. And it was in that moment when we heard the gates crashing and we saw people moving on to the lawn, that we knew something bad was happening and something terrible might occur. And, of course, the rest is history.

As for today, very different scene here, much bigger security presence. Obviously, there is a -- the Capitol is a fortress today. And in terms of the history, in terms of our understanding of what happened that day, you know, for a year or two, for a year, some time after the Capitol attack, people, you know, were somewhat sorry about it.

But today, we're going to see demonstrators, January 6 supporters actually marching around the Capitol. We're not sure how big a crowd calling for pardons for many of the convicted. And also not too far from here, MAGA influencers, some of the people more on the extreme end of the spectrum are holding an event calling for those pardons as well, which they're expecting to happen.

TAPPER: All right, Donie O'Sullivan, thanks so much.

Let's go back to Dana also on Capitol Hill. Dana?

DANA BASH, CNN ANCHOR: Thanks, Jake.

And joining me now here is Congressman Jason Crow, Democrat of Colorado. On January 6, 2021, he was trapped with other House members and aides and some police officers inside the chamber as rioters broke in. You see a now famous, unfortunately famous photo of Congressman Crow then, who was a former Army, Retired Army Ranger, trying to help his colleagues as they took cover as the rioters, the insurrectionists were breaking into the House chamber.

Thank you so much for being here. I just want to get your thoughts today as you prepare to certify Donald Trump as president again. How that feels given what happened in the photo that we just showed four years ago?

REP. JASON CROW (D), COLORADO: There's a lot going through my mind. It's a somber day. This always will be a somber day for me and for a lot of my colleagues and for the police officers and others who went through the trauma of that day.

First and foremost, my thought is with the police officers, both with the Metro police officers and the U.S. Capitol police officers, over 140 of whom were brutally beaten, brutally beaten. I mean, we get really close to those officers here. We see them every day. They're at our checkpoints.

We get to know them, their stories, their families. And to see many of them who have had to leave service, who are permanently disabled, who have trauma, several of whom took their own lives because of the post- traumatic stress, and to see where we are now, people trying to rewrite the history of that day, to see Donald Trump on the verge of entering office again is certainly tough.

BASH: It's such an important point. I covered this building, this complex, for a couple of decades. Some of those officers have been defending and protecting this complex longer than that.

[12:35:05]

Just coming here today, Congressman, you could see this sort of complex look in their eyes, a determination, of course, to do their job, but some trauma that is real and is still there because of what happened.

CROW: Well, how could there not be, right? I mean, I'm a combat veteran. I served in Iraq and Afghanistan. And you can't go through experiences where your life is threatened, where you're being beaten, where you don't know you're going to make it out without that staying with you. You know, that's not a normal human experience for folks. So, it always will be with you. And that's why making sure that we tell the story of what happened, that we don't allow history to be rewritten for political purposes is really important for them and for their families. And why we also make sure we stand by and we keep faith with them, that we make sure they have the health care, that we have the mental health support services for them and their families that they deserve and they have earned is also important.

BASH: Let's look ahead. As I mentioned, you do have a constitutional duty that you and all of your colleagues are going to be performing in a couple of hours. Do you see any of your Democratic colleagues challenging the results that will make -- officially make Donald Trump president again?

CROW: No, I don't see that happening because we believe in rule of law. We believe in the Constitution and we believe in reality and the truth. And the truth is Donald Trump won the election. It was a safe and secure election, as was the one before it.

We are not going to overturn the Constitution or attempt to overturn the Constitution like they did in 2020, 2021, to try to get the result that we want. In America, we settle our political differences at the ballot box, not by violence. We will set that standard. We will maintain that standard.

And I don't like the results of that, which means we have to go back. We have to do a better job of making the case. We have to do a better job of earning people's support and keeping their support. And that's what we're going to do.

But we are not going to cheat. We are not going to distort reality. We are not going to resort to things like, you know, stop the steal. Those are theories not grounded in reality. And they undermine the basis of our Constitution. And we are not going to do it.

Democrats are here to uphold the Constitution and to help us pursue that more perfect union.

BASH: Congressman, thank you so much for being here. I appreciate it. Thank you.

And as we get closer to the main event on this January 6th, we will look at Vice President Kamala Harris's role in certifying President- elect Donald Trump's win and her defeat. She is on her way right here to the Capitol. We'll talk about that after a quick break.

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[12:42:18]

AL GORE, 45TH VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: This announcement of the state of the vote by the president of the Senate shall be deemed a sufficient declaration of the person's elected president and vice president of the United States, each for the term beginning on the 20th day of January 2001 and shall be entered together with a list of the votes on the journals of the Senate and the House of Representatives.

May God bless our new president and our new vice president. And may God bless the United States of America.

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TAPPER: Remarkable moment from American history. That was 24 years ago today. Vice President Al Gore overseeing the certification of his own defeat in the 2000 presidential election after the U.S. Supreme Court determined that George W. Bush was the winner following the ill-fated Florida recount.

Today, Vice President Kamala Harris finds herself in a similarly uncomfortable position. CNN's MJ Lee is at the White House for us. And MJ, what is the Vice President's thinking about her role in this certification of President-elect Trump's win over her?

MJ LEE, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, the Vice President is making her way to Capitol Hill right now. And I'm told, you know, it's never been a question in the Vice President's mind whether she was going to oversee Congress certifying Donald Trump's victory and, of course, her loss.

But there have been questions being asked around Washington, D.C., some people wondering, is she, in fact, really going to do this? As some people have fought back on the events of the last four years, the insurrection and Donald Trump refusing to accept the results of the previous election.

And I'm told by one senior Harris adviser that the Vice President has almost been a little bit aghast to hear that those questions are even being asked, that she definitely sees this as an important duty and an obligation that she has as, vice president, to see this day through.

Now, even still, as you noted, Jake, today is going to be sort of a painfully stark reminder for the Vice President that she lost, and she lost decisively to Donald Trump. There are folks around her who say, look, she does seem determined to be focused on finishing out the business of being vice president. But there's no question that there are some less pleasant things that she has to finish out, like today, like sitting through inauguration.

I ask for just the questions about her future. Those conversations, I'm told, have begun, but that she is certainly in no rush to come to any decision about what's next. That thinking and those deliberations will really begin in earnest, I'm told, after January 20th, Jake.

TAPPER: All right, MJ Lee at the White House for us, thank you so much.

And Kaitlan, Harris has described today as a, quote, "sacred obligation". We have sound from her earlier today. Let's run that.

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[12:45:02]

KAMALA HARRIS, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: As we have seen, our democracy can be fragile. And it is up to then each one of us to stand up for our most cherished principles.

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TAPPER: It can't be easy to do this.

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR, THE SOURCE: I think, obviously, on a personal level, it's an unpleasant day, to say the least, for her to oversee the certification. I mean, it was for Al Gore and for Richard Nixon as well when they were up there.

And so -- but just also the stakes here of looking at this and what she is going up there, because she doesn't have to go. And as MJ said, you know, for her, it was never a question of whether or not she was going to go and preside over the certification.

But the moment in and of itself after the election and how she did talk about, not as much as Biden did in his race, but obviously, how she did talk about January 6th and democracy and what she believed was on the line here.

I was just thinking of this as, you know, Trump just posted a few moments ago saying that Biden is doing everything possible to make the transition as difficult as possible. And he's referencing executive orders that Biden is doing in his last few days, which Trump did as well when he was in office and the court cases against him, which are obviously not President Biden's doing.

But just, you know, to think about that --

TAPPER: We know what as difficult as possible actually looks like.

COLLINS: Because we --

TAPPER: And it's not a number of executive orders that Trump can undo on the first day with a stroke of a pen.

COLLINS: And it was pressuring the DOJ, having your attorneys file dozens of lawsuits, calling governors, leaning on senators, your other congressional allies to sow doubt about the election. I mean, those are all things that President Biden and Vice President Harris have not done.

They've not sown doubt about the election. They instead have accepted the results and said, you know, this is how it's going to be. I mean, Biden obviously hosted President-elect Trump inside the Oval Office. And so I just think it speaks to the moment that Trump is being afforded that obviously he did not afford to them. TAPPER: So, and just to underline that point, in 2004, there were all sorts of conspiracy theories on the left led by Robert Kennedy Jr., for one, that Ohio had been stolen. And against my better judgment, I went onto a progressive social media site last night, and they're out there about this election, too, that this was a hacked election.

I mean, the difference is, of course, that Kamala Harris is not leading the charge in pushing forward these deranged conspiracy theories.

JOHN KING, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: No, she will ignore the fringe and the conspiracy where Donald Trump has invited them from the edge to the middle of his world, actually. His orbit is full of people who peddle conspiracy theories.

But this is a fascinating moment for her. We're only going to see her once or twice in big roles again before she's gone, right, before the Trump team comes into Washington and she leaves. What next for Kamala Harris? If you talk to people in this town, they all -- most Democrats say, oh, you know, go away.

If you want to run for California, governor, fine. Please don't run for president again. I would remind you, and you made the point earlier, on this day four years ago, everyone said Donald Trump was done. So discount her as a potential nominee four years from now, or at least a player in that at your peril.

She just won 75 million votes. She just got 48.4 percent of the vote in the country. She just raised $1 billion. She's a black woman, popular with the foundational base of the Democratic Party, which is black women.

She has giant problems. She has giant problems. She did not learn to speak to working class Americans about their cost of living and about their disaffection with this town. She's viewed by many as a, quote, unquote, "coastal elite".

She has a lot of problems. Donald Trump had more when he left this town four years ago. The question I always have about politicians, do they learn from their mistakes and their environment? She did not lose all because of her mistakes.

She made some. She also had 100 plus days to do something that normally people spend four or five, six, 10 years preparing for.

JAMIE GANGEL, CNN SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT: It's -- losing is not fun. And that's what is going. You know, she's going to certify today, but she's not alone. You made the point in Al Gore had to do it with a very bitter race with George W. Bush in -- and Richard Nixon lost to JFK. So she's not the first vice president to lose.

I just look back at both Nixon and Al Gore. They both got standing ovations at the end of the certification. I think it'll be interesting to see what reaction she gets from the chamber.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) TAPPER: Coming up, inside the scramble to keep Vice President Mike Pence safe from pro-Trump rioters four years ago today. His former chief of staff will join us to discuss January 6th, then January 6th today.

Plus, the 2024 election certification begins the process itself just minutes from now after this break. Stay with us.

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[12:54:02]

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: On Snowy Capitol Hill, a joint session of Congress is convening to count each state's electoral votes and formally declare that Donald J. Trump is president-elect. We're waiting for senators to walk through Statuary Hall with the electoral votes into the House chamber so the tally can begin.

It is all getting away just minutes from now. You see there are people in Statuary Hall assembled, reporters and others. Back with the team here in New York, President-elect Donald Trump entering the White House in just 14 days. A lot to get to ahead.

Abby, just in terms of what we are going to see, I mean, this is probably something we hadn't covered -- wouldn't cover in decades past.

ABBY PHILLIP, CNN ANCHOR, NEWSNIGHT WITH ABBY PHILLIP: Yes, or at least not cover in this way. I mean, typically this is supposed to be ceremonial, and it actually is a celebration of what America is supposed to do, which is transfer power from one president to another.

The Congress meets in a bipartisan fashion. They count up the votes, they certify what the states have done in a decentralized way, and they do it without, you know, we're not supposed to put a mark on it.

[12:55:10]

COOPER: Right now what you're seeing is four Senate pages carrying two mahogany boxes containing the certificates of vote from the states. They're followed by the Senate Sergeant-at-Arms, Secretary of the Senate, Vice President, Senate Parliamentarian, Senate Tellers, Senators Deb Fischer and Amy Klobuchar as well.

PHILLIP: I mean, this is -- this should be, honestly, a good moment for the country, and I think it is today. It is today like it has been actually every other time except for four years ago, because people in general in this country have a tradition of putting the nation first, putting the history and the traditions that people have fought for first, and that is exactly what we're witnessing today. I think it's a good moment.

COOPER: Senators walking in. Congressman Kinzinger?

ADAM KINZINGER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes, what's interesting about this, so the mahogany box, I just want to point out, there was a period when somebody on the floor of the Senate basically said we've got to take those as they evacuated the Senate floor.

We've got to take those boxes, and there was one person, I think, who still doesn't want to be identified that made that decision. They took the boxes because he realized, had the, you know, the marauders who took over the Senate floor made the decision to open those boxes and tear up those ballots.

There was no provision at that point in the Constitution to allow any counting of votes if it wasn't the original ballots. I mean, the Constitution and the Electoral Count Act doesn't allow you to look and say, well, the New York Times said that, you know, Biden won New York, so we'll just count that.

So it could have been a constitutional crisis. But, you know, today is a good day. My hope is January 6th from here out, we'll remember what happened four years ago as a bad point in history, but that we can move on. That'll be up to Donald Trump.

Does he want to keep relitigating January 6th? It appears he does. And I'm fine with that because I'll be happy to remind the American people that day if he wants to go there.

COOPER: Alyssa, you're just struggling (ph).

ALYSSA FARAH GRIFFIN, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, to Abby's point, this is always supposed to be kind of a pro forma session. It's just something that's largely ceremonial. And I remember after Donald Trump lost, the initial thought with Mike Pence's team is this, you're going to go to Capitol Hill, you're going to do what vice presidents before you did.

Al Gore certified the election after he had lost. Kamala Harris will do the same today. And of course, that's not what the events were that unfolded. But I think it's a reminder of kind of the political moment that I think all polling shows that most Americans thought that was a bad day, it wasn't a good day, it was perhaps un-American, but that there were issues that just weighed higher on American voters' minds.

And as somebody who this was a deal breaker for me, I spoke out against it, I testified to the committee and the Department of Justice. It is a fact that more Americans were voting on the cost of living, on border security, and on issues that just deeply affected them personally, not this sort of nebulous idea of democracy.

COOPER: There's Senator Vance, Vice President-elect J.D. Vance, waiting to (INAUDIBLE).

ASHLEY ALLISON, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes, I mean, I agree with Alyssa. I do think that the voters got to make their decision, and they voted beyond just January 6th. To your point, Congressman, I think the question is, though, is what does Donald Trump do? He made a lot of promises to the American people.

Will he be able to keep the promises that he made about bringing the cost of living down when he is solely focused on doing it, fighting, you know, a battle about four years ago, whether or not he won the election or not? Does he actually want to bring this country together and say, again, this was a bad day, we should unify, we should look at how we make America stronger?

But that doesn't seem to be the signaling of the party. There seems to be no remorse today. There seems to be business as usual. And I think that's the question is, can he deliver for the American people if he's always thinking about himself?

COOPER: Let's go back to Jake in D.C. Jake?

TAPPER: All right, thank you so much. And we see Vice President Harris there in her ceremonial role as president of the Senate. She will oversee. She's there with the newly re-elected Speaker of the House, Mike Johnson.

There were, of course, many deeply disturbing moments when the Capitol was attacked four years ago. This one among the most chilling.

And we're supposed to show a scene there of Vice President Mike Pence's life, threatened by supporters of his boss, then-President Trump. But that thought did not come up for some reason. In any case, we all remember it.

We're joined by the former chief of staff for Vice President Pence, Marc Short. He also served as the Trump administration's director of legislative affairs. He's now chairman of the board for a group called Advancing American Freedom.

Marc, it's good to see you. Thanks so much for being here. So at just about this time on January 6, Donald Trump was telling his supporters to march to the Capitol. You have to fight to save your country. 90 minutes later, rioters were inside the building.

Secret Service agents were evacuating Vice President Pence and his family to a loading dock under the Capitol. What was that like for you? How worried were you about Vice President Pence's safety, the safety of his family? And what is it like seeing President Trump being -- his election being certified exactly four years later?

MARC SHORT, FORMER TRUMP ADMIN. DIRECTOR OF LEGISLATIVE AFFAIRS: Well, Jake, thanks for having me.