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Federal Judge Grants Dismissal of Trump Election Subversion Case; Trump Team Probed Boris Epshteyn for Alleged Pay-for-Influence; Source Says, Israel-Hezbollah Ceasefire Expected Within 24 Hours. Menendez Brothers' Resentencing Hearing Pushed Back To January; Ukrainians Looking for Clues In Russian Ballistic Missile Debris. Aired 6-7p ET

Aired November 25, 2024 - 18:00   ET

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

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[18:00:00]

ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN ANCHOR: Happening now, breaking news, the historic federal criminal prosecution of Donald Trump on election subversion charges was just officially dismissed by a judge. This comes after Special Counsel Jack Smith asked to drop that prosecution as well as the other classified documents case.

Also tonight, we're learning about an internal investigation of top Trump aide Boris Epshteyn for allegedly seeking financial gain in exchange for his influence with the president-elect. What Trump's lawyers found and whether the transition team is listening.

Plus, we're told a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon could be announced within the next 24 hours. Stand by for an update on an imminent vote by the Israeli cabinet and how this could potentially impact the wider conflicts in the Middle East.

Welcome to our viewers here in the United States and all around the world. Wolf Blitzer is off today. I'm Alex Marquardt and you're in The Situation Room.

We begin this hour with breaking news on a major legal victory for President-elect Donald Trump. Special Counsel Jack Smith has dropped both of his criminal prosecutions of Trump ahead of his return to the White House.

CNN Senior Justice Correspondent Evan Perez has been following this story for us. So, Evan, the judge in the federal election subversion case just granted Smith's request for that dismissal. The classified documents case also going away. Tell us about these new moves.

EVAN PEREZ, CNN SENIOR JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Alex. Look, all of this turns on the verdict, essentially, that was given by the voters on November 5th. They elected Donald Trump, he is president-elect, and as a result, the Justice Department says that the prohibition against prosecuting a sitting president also applies in this case to Donald Trump.

This is something we've never ever faced, according to the special counsel. And, obviously, that's why they had to go and get a reading from the Office of Legal Counsel at Justice Department, which rendered that ruling.

I'll read you just a part of what Jack Smith said in his court filing. He says, the department's position is that the Constitution requires that this case be dismissed before the defendant is inaugurated. This outcome is not based on the merits or strength of the case against the defendant.

This also is similar language that the special counsel, Alex, filed in the 11th Circuit case. Now, that has to do with the dismissal of those charges in the classified documents case. In this case, however, Smith is saying only dismiss the charges against Trump but keep the case going against the two co-defendants, his two employees who are accused of obstructing -- helping him obstruct the investigation.

What's key about these two court filings, though, Alex, is the special counsel's asking for the dismissal without prejudice, which raises the possibility that this only applies while Donald Trump is in office. And in granting the request, Judge Tanya Chutkan reiterates that language. She says that the immunity afforded to a sitting president is temporary, expiring when they leave office.

So now, obviously, that raises the question, right? After Donald Trump is no longer president in just over four years, does that mean that these two cases could be revived? That is possible, I suppose. But the other possibility remains that once Trump becomes president, he could order his Justice Department to go back to the courts and dismiss these cases with prejudice, which means that they would be done and dead forever.

One last thing, we expect that Special Counsel Jack Smith is going to go ahead and produce a report. He's required to do that. And if it comes before January 20th, Merrick Garland, the attorney general, has promised to release that report. Alex?

MARQUARDT: And could reveal a lot more in that report. Evan Perez with the breaking news, thanks very much.

Our panel is here with the reaction to this breaking story. Elie Honig, I want to start with you. President Donald Trump has now officially evaded any accountability before taking office for the January 6th attack and alleged mishandling of the classified documents down at Mar-a-Lago. Break down for us the significance of what has just happened today.

ELIE HONIG, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: Well, the bottom line is it's over. Both of these cases are over. Yes, Evan's correct. Technically, they were filed without prejudice, which means, theoretically, they can be revived in 2029.

[18:05:02] That's not going to happen. Let's be realistic. Some prosecutor is not going to come in for and change years (ph) from now and revive these cases. For all intents and purposes, it's over.

And it's really important to understand why Jack Smith is making these moves. He's not making them because Donald Trump has promised to fire him. He's making these moves because he has to. Under longstanding Justice Department policy that goes back to 1973, Jack Smith says, I asked DOJ to review that policy and they confirmed to me that I cannot carry on with the prosecution of Donald Trump once he gets sworn in on January 20th. So, this is really a result of DOJ's institutional policy and institutional interests.

MARQUARDT: As Evan just noted, Judge Chutkan wrote, quote, dismissal without prejudice is also consistent with the government's understanding that the immunity afforded to a sitting president is temporary, expiring when they leave office. Michael Moore, is it unlikely this case is prosecuted, as Elie was just saying? Is it unlikely this gets picked up again after Trump leaves office?

MICHAEL MOORE, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: You know, I'm glad to be with you all. I do think it's unlikely. I agree with Elie completely on this. I don't think you're going to find a prosecutor who wants to come in and sort of clean up the mess. I expected that you would see the special counsel asks that the case be dismissed without prejudice. That sort of leaves a little bit of an axe hanging over the head of the administration, but it's not going to be uncommon for him now to send his own handpicked DOJ successors in to ask that the court change that. I don't know if Judge Chutkan will change it or not, but it's really a distinction without a difference of the likelihood that somebody comes in four or five years later, it just doesn't strike me as something that's very realistic.

And, of course, you still got the question out there, whether or not Trump could come in and just issue some kind of pardon. That's still got to be litigated, I guess, if we go that way. But this will be a bird with his saddle, would be my guess, that he will not like the idea that this thing is still hanging out there. So, it wouldn't surprise me to see if they try to clean it up within the first few months of his administration.

MARQUARDT: And Lulu Garcia-Navarro, bigger picture, do you think that today showed that Donald Trump is above the law?

LULU GARCIA NAVARRO, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Yes. This was an unprecedented attempt to bring a former president to justice. You know, those who thought that Donald Trump should be prosecuted for his actions on January 6th and his keeping of top secret documents argued, you know, that no one is above the law. Trump and his supporters, on the other hand, saw this as political persecution, as, quote, lawfare.

And leaving aside the merits of the cases, Alex, Trump won. Trump was trying to run out the clock on these legal cases, and he bet that he would win reelection, and the voters who wanted him back in power knew that these cases were pending, and they either didn't care or they agreed with him that this was politically motivated. And either way, neither Congress, nor our legal system, nor our voters have constrained or punished Donald Trump for January 6th. So, that's it. And certainly I think there's going to be a lesson in that.

MARQUARDT: Yes. A fair bit of frustration that Merrick Garland and DOJ didn't move fast enough. Elie Honey, you predicted last year in -- sorry, in last January, rather, in, in a book that you wrote that Trump's cases wouldn't make it to trial because of Attorney General Merrick Garland's delay in appointing a special counsel, Jack Smith. You wrote quote, when considering Garland's glacial pace, a line from the 1993 chess prodigy movie, Searching for Bobby Fisher comes to mind. You've lost, you just don't know it yet.

So, Elie, explain why you foresaw this all along and what you think could have been done differently.

HONIG: Well, Alex, Jack Smith was named special counsel in November of 2022. And so that gave him exactly two years to get this case all done before the 2024 election. Anyone who's ever practiced criminal law in federal court, as Michael and I have, knows there is no physical way that you can take a big complex case like this, get it thoroughly investigated, go through all the grand jury, get it indicted, go through over 10 million pages of discovery, deal with the immunity issue, which obviously was lingering out there, would have to go up to the Supreme Court, and did, and get the case tried and get a verdict in a two-year stretch. That is just not possible.

So, there's been this debate ongoing, or was, I guess, about whether Merrick Garland took too long. I think that debate is over and we now have our answer.

MARQUARDT: And, Lulu, Democratic leadership has largely been silent about what happened today. Where do you think the Democratic resistance is against Donald Trump? Is there any kind of accountability that you're seeing growing against him?

GARCIA-NAVARRO: No, in fact, quite the opposite. I think what you're seeing and what I've heard from Democratic leaders is that they are going to stay pretty quiet at the moment. I mean, they just had a pretty bruising election and there seems to be no appetite among the voters themselves for any kind of resistance, unlike what we saw in 2016.

[18:10:02]

But let's, again, put this into context. I mean, at this point, what leverage do Democrats have? They have lost all three branches of government. They tried to impeach him twice in his first term and were unsuccessful. And so the criminal prosecution didn't work. So, there really isn't a lot left that they can do to Donald Trump, except maybe beat him at the ballot box in two years and then four years from now.

MARQUARDT: So, Michael, these are the two federal cases. There's, of course, the Georgia election subversion case. What happens to that one?

MOORE: Well, that case is not controlled by Jack Smith or DOJ policy. There's nothing out there that says that the case has to be dismissed. But the likelihood to me would be that you certainly will not see Trump going to trial anytime during his administration.

There was a hearing scheduled by the Georgia Court of Appeals on this whole issue of whether or not the district attorney should be recused, that there's been some rumblings about motions to dismiss. The thing is that hearing was surprisingly, to many people, taken off the calendar by the judges. There was no real explanation. The court just entered a simple order saying that they were going to remove it.

That could be for a number of reasons. It could be, number one, they think they've got enough evidence in the record or enough arguments in the record to make a decision about what to do. It can also be because they think, look, we're just going to wait and decide the whole motion to dismiss issue and just wrap all this up at one time instead of having multiple arguments. You could see that.

There are separate sovereigns in the country for the people to understand, the federal and the state system. The state can act against a former president without his ability to pardon it. The reality is that our courts have said that a president shouldn't be bothered with having to answer state court cases during his tenure, and so I just think that case is probably dead too. It won't apply to all of the other defendants. This is not a team sport. They can still be called to the field to have to answer the charges that have been brought against them. But as far as Trump, I think that this case is probably done.

MARQUARDT: All right. Well, at least as far as Jack Smith is concerned, well, we know we'll hear from him again in that final report essentially that he's going to be putting out.

Elie, Michael, Lulu, thank you all very much.

And just ahead, Donald Trump's legal team probes a member of his own inner circle. We'll tell you why some suspected Boris Epshteyn of trying to profit off of his connection to President-elect Donald Trump.

Plus, are Israel and Hezbollah finally closing in on a ceasefire deal? We'll get analysis from a leading expert on the Middle East.

Stay with us.

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[18:15:00]

MARQUARDT: Tonight, negotiators in the Middle East appear to be closing in on a ceasefire deal between Israel and Hezbollah. A Lebanese official who is familiar with these talks tells CNN that a deal could be announced within the next 24 hours.

For more on this, I want to bring in Middle East expert Kim Ghattas. She is a contributing writer at The Atlantic. Kim, thanks so much for being with us. U.S. officials, French officials have been working on this for quite some time. The main thrust of the ceasefire deal, as we understand it, is essentially to get Hezbollah away from the southern border in a way that they can't continue to fire those shorter-range rockets against Israel. Do you think that this deal will happen, first of all, and that it will accomplish the goal of both Lebanese officials and Israeli officials to get those tens of thousands of residents on either side of the border back home?

KIM GHATTAS, AUTHOR, BLACK WAVE: Alex, great to be here. I think that we've been waiting for a ceasefire in Gaza for a year. And so as hopeful as people are in Lebanon, and I assume also in Israel, that this is very close now to a ceasefire in Lebanon. I think everybody remains cautious until it is actually officially announced and everybody abides by it, both the Israelis and Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Will people rush back home? I think they will probably wait to see for a few days how things unfold. And then there's also the question of the Lebanese internal politics and what does that mean for Hezbollah internally and its chokehold on Lebanese politics. This has been a devastating war for them, but they retain quite some capability, I would assume.

MARQUARDT: Yes. Speak to that. We have Hassan Nasrallah, the head of Hezbollah, who's been killed, several layers of leadership who have been killed. A lot of their infrastructure, we understand, in the south has been taken out. To what extent do you think Hezbollah has been crippled? And to what extent do you think Iran more broadly has been weakened because Hezbollah is arguably their strongest proxy?

GHATTAS: I would say Hezbollah is down but not out. They have been decimated at the top tier level. A lot of their arsenal has been destroyed in these strikes over the last two months, and their top leadership has been taken out and continues to be taken out. But they're still capable of launching missiles at Northern Israel. So, they retain some capacity and some ammunitions.

But, again, I think for the Lebanese past the ceasefire, which is essential because life in Lebanon has become unbearable for so many people in Beirut, in the south, for the refugees, but including, you know, people who are not refugees but are living amidst these strikes. A ceasefire is absolutely essential, preserving Lebanese sovereignty or regaining Lebanese sovereignty. So, is Israel going to want to retain the right to strike whenever it wants if it sees Hezbollah movements? What does that mean for Lebanese sovereignty? And how does Iran really look at this moment?

I think they've decided that it's time for a ceasefire to preserve what is left of Hezbollah, their biggest asset in the Middle East and in Lebanon. And because, as you say, they need to be able to be in a position to defend themselves still if they're going to face another Israeli strike. Because as we've heard from assessments, their air defenses have been taken out, so they're a bit vulnerable at the moment.

MARQUARDT: More than a quarter of Lebanon's population is believed to be displaced.

[18:20:03]

Life in Lebanon was already difficult after the blast in the port a few years ago, an imploding economy. You live in Beirut. How has this war upended life for a regular Lebanese citizen?

GHATTAS: There are different wars happening in Lebanon at the moment. If you're in South Lebanon, you've been displaced. You've probably lost your house. You're living in a refugee settlement or with relatives in Beirut. In the southern suburbs, life has come to a halt. People have left as well. Those areas have been heavily damaged.

For the rest of the Lebanese, it's constant fear of the next strike, which is not only in the southern suburbs, but also in other neighborhoods in Central Beirut, as we've seen over the last few weeks, because strikes have intensified since President Trump was elected. And strikes on Lebanon on Beirut particularly have become very intense. They used to happen every now and then at night and now they're every day, several times a day and they are terrifying and they're very loud.

So, even if you're not a refugee, you're dealing with the fear of war. It is devastating the Lebanese economy even further, an economy that was already struggling. And it is making the Lebanese feel very much that they're stuck between Iran and Hezbollah on the one hand, and Israel on the other hand.

So, it's also a moment for the Lebanese to reckon with their own politics and how they want to move forward after there is a ceasefire and how they want to come together and move out of this quagmire that they've been in and this sort of, you know, arena where both Israel and Iran settle their scores.

MARQUARDT: So much rebuilding to be done. So many people impacted who have nothing to do with these warring sides.

Kim Ghattas, thank you so much. We're very lucky to have you.

GHATTAS: Thanks for having me.

MARQUARDT: I appreciate it.

Coming up, new CNN reporting on an internal investigation by Donald Trump's lawyers into one of the president-elect's top aides.

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[18:25:00]

MARQUARDT: Tonight, CNN has learned that a prominent and polarizing aid to President-elect Donald Trump has been the subject of an internal investigation.

CNN's Sara Murray is on this story for us. So, Sara, lay out for us what you've learned about Boris Epshteyn and the transition. SARA MURRAY, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, this is an internal investigation that lawyers for Donald Trump conducted because there were concerns and allegations about Boris Epshteyn's activities and essentially concerns that he was trying to gain financially from his influence over Donald Trump and others in Donald Trump's orbit.

So, we learned about this investigation, me, Kristen Holmes, Kate Sullivan, from half a dozen sources familiar with the matter. It's not a criminal investigation, but it was looking at instances where Epshteyn allegedly requested payment for things like taking, you know, the name of someone who wanted a post in the incoming administration and promoting that around Mar-a-Lago or with Trump.

And we learned about one instance where he actually went to Scott Bessent, who became Donald Trump's pick for treasury secretary, and requested payment from Bessent to promote Bessent's name with Trump and around Mar-a-Lago, Bessent refused to pay, and sources said this kind of led to a heated confrontation last week at Mar-a-Lago. So, these are the kinds of interactions that these attorneys were investigating.

Now, Epshteyn, Denied essentially all of this to us today. Here's what he said in a statement. I am honored to work for President Trump and with his team. These fake claims are false and defamatory and will not distract us from making America great again. But, obviously, there was enough concern about these activities to launch this internal investigation.

MARQUARDT: Really bold. So, what does that mean for his future in the Trump universe?

MURRAY: Well, Boris Epshteyn is a very controversial figure. As you noted, you know, he's known for his brash, combative personality, but also for being very loyal to Donald Trump. He sits in on a lot of these transition meetings. But what the legal team that was looking into this concluded initially was that Boris' behavior was potentially so problematic that he should be removed from Trump's orbit, and he certainly shouldn't be employed or paid anymore by Trump entities.

As of today, though, the transition says, look, you know, this is a standard review. It's completed. We're all moving forward together as a team. Donald Trump spoke to a conservative news outlet about these allegations today and offered a slightly different take. He said he didn't condone advisers who were, you know, sort of working for him, asking for payment for potential nominees, and said essentially it's all up to me. I decide who's going to be in the cabinet or who's going to be in my administration. But at least, so far, it seems like the transition is not taking the recommendations that this legal team laid out.

MARQUARDT: And trading on his name for access probably won't go down well.

Sara Murray, thanks so much.

Let's get more on the Trump transition as the president-elect appears poised to make major changes at the FBI.

CNN's Brian Todd is taking a closer look. So, Brian, Trump has a history of animosity, to say the least, towards the FBI and its directors.

BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Right, Alex. For years, Donald Trump has been smoldering over perceived injustices that he believes the FBI inflicted on him. In about eight weeks, the president-elect will be able to act on those grievances.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT-ELECT: We need an honest FBI and we need it fast.

TODD: The president-elect, by all accounts, planning a shakeup of the FBI as soon as he takes office. Sources telling CNN, Donald Trump plans to fire FBI Director Christopher Wray, even though Trump appointed Wray in 2017, and Wray has three years left in his ten-year term.

Why has Trump turned on Wray? Analysts say it's Trump who believes Wray has turned on him.

GARRETT GRAFF, FBI HISTORIAN: Donald Trump sees the FBI over the last decade as the agency sort of most to blame for his own legal troubles and the troubles of those around him.

[18:30:02]

TODD: Wray headed the FBI when the bureau launched a search of Trump's Mar-a-Lago home in August 2022.

TRUMP: They broke into my house.

TODD: The search uncovered classified documents that Trump had allegedly stored inappropriately at Mar-a-Lago. It led to federal criminal charges against Trump, which were just dropped by the special counsel. Trump has denied any wrongdoing.

GRAFF: To him, a major sign of how the Biden administration was trying to politicize the FBI and use it for political payback.

TODD: Agents from Wray's FBI also assisted Special Counsel Robert Mueller's probe of the 2016 Trump campaign's alleged ties to Russia. If Trump removes Wray, Wray would be the second FBI director Trump will have fired.

TRUMP: Oh, and there's James, James Comey. He's become more famous than me.

TODD: Then-FBI Director James Comey awkwardly greeting then President Trump in Trump's early days in the White House, after Comey said he had tried to blend in with the blue curtains so he wouldn't be noticed. Soon after taking office, Trump pressured Comey to drop an investigation into former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn. Comey claimed Trump put the squeeze on him personally.

JAMES COMEY, FORMER FBI DIRECTOR: I got the sense my job would be contingent upon how he felt I conducted myself and whether I demonstrated loyalty.

TODD: Trump denied asking for Comey's loyalty but ended up firing Comey, later saying he was frustrated over the ongoing Russia probe.

PROF. JULIAN ZELIZER, HISTORIAN, PRINCETON UNIVERSITY: He wanted that investigation shut down. He saw it as a political problem, and this was what Comey was up to.

TODD: Trump has recently been weighing whether to select Kash Patel to be FBI director or deputy director. Patel, a vociferous critic of the FBI, would be a controversial choice.

KASH PATEL, FORMER ADVISER, TRUMP NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL: I'd shut down the FBI Hoover building on day one, and reopening the next day as a museum of the deep state.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

TODD (on camera): Historian Garrett Graff says Donald Trump is not alone among presidents who believe that the FBI should have been more beholden to them. He points out that John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, and Bill Clinton had all expressed frustration with FBI directors who served during their administrations. Alex?

MARQUARDT: Brian Todd, thanks so much for that report.

Just ahead, former Trump Defense Secretary Mark Esper on the president-elect's controversial national security picks and whether he thinks they're up to the jobs they've been chosen for.

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[18:35:00]

MARQUARDT: Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank are eagerly awaiting the start of the Trump administration, and they're especially hopeful that they will have a powerful ally in the incoming U.S. ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee.

CNN's Nic Robertson has a closer look.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There is no such thing as a West Bank. It's Judea and Samaria.

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR (voice over): Mike Huckabee, an at times controversial visitor to Israel, looks set to return as President-elect Donald Trump's pick to be ambassador. If he does, he'll have to wait plenty of friends.

Yishai Fleisher, an activist and settler, has met with Huckabee many times.

YISHAI FLEISHER, SETTLER LEADER: He happens to be a great friend of Israel and of the kind of Israel that I represent that lives in its ancestral heartland, which is Judea and Samaria, what on CNN may be called the West Bank.

ROBERTSON: Even occupied West Bank?

FLEISHER: Right, even occupied West Bank, but we don't see it that way.

ROBERTSON: But the history of the West Bank is complex and deeply disputed. Under international law, Israel is deemed to be occupying the land.

Huckabee will be arriving when settler violence against Palestinians is significantly up over Trump's last administration. And the Israeli government's claim to the land is at its most politically charged in years. Powerful right wing nationalists in the government want to annex the entire occupied West Bank, so too does Fleisher.

FLEISHER: We're still fighting a war of liberation for that piece of land.

ROBERTSON: And is Huckabee going to be helpful in that liberation?

FLEISHER: I think he will be.

ROBERTSON: 50 miles north, on the fringes of the West Bank Palestinian village, Bardala, Israeli diggers are gouging out a new barrier through the middle of Palestinian farms, on land, they say, is a security risk.

The Israeli government is in the process of taking more land, the head of the council tells me, claiming no security threats here.

What the media is talking about with Huckabee is already happening, he says. These actions are part of Israel's systematic policies to occupy and annex all of this land. Their goal is to drive us out of this area. He shows me documents he says proved Palestinian families have owned this land for more than a century.

As we talk, Israeli troops show up to serve an eviction notice on the farmer below. He's been told his buildings are unlicensed.

What he's saying is this document is the official document informing him that he has to be off this land by 9:00 A.M. on the 4th of December. Otherwise, all of this, he loses it.

Khaled is 60 years old, heartbroken. I don't know how to describe my feelings to you, he says. This is my livelihood. My children rely on it. Then someone comes along and takes it away. You can't argue with them. We have no power. They have the power.

In the villages around here, they call this silent annexation, little by little, the Palestinians losing their land to Israeli settlement expansion.

[18:40:00]

ALON PINKAS, FORMER ISRAELI DIPLOMAT: If Israel unilaterally annexes large parts, large swath of the West Bank, this is not going to fly well in the Arab (INAUDIBLE).

ROBERTSON: Pinkas is a former Israeli diplomat, believes Huckabee's settler friends could harm Trump's bigger objectives, Saudi-Israel normalization.

PINKAS: He's going to be pressured by the Saudis, the Qatari, and the Emiratis to strike a bigger deal. He's going to want to build on the Abraham Accords.

ROBERTSON: By the time Huckabee arrives, more land, like Farmer Khaled's, will have been seized. What will the future hold, he says. It's a question everyone here is asking.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROBERTSON (on camera): And if you want to get a sense of what the government here is thinking, under the Biden administration, they were pressured into putting restrictions on some of the more unruly settlers. Well, just this week, those restrictions have been lifted. And today, the defense minister said he's announcing an acceleration of the building of these security barriers across the West Bank. Alex?

MARQUARDT: Nic Robertson in Jerusalem, thank you, Nic, for that very important report.

Joining me now is CNN Global Affairs Analyst and Political Commentator, Mark Esper, who also served as the defense secretary in the first Trump administration. Secretary Esper, thank you so much for being with us.

I want to ask you about Nic's report and what we're hearing from members of the incoming Trump administration. Do you expect them to support Israel likely annexing more of the West Bank? How much do you think that could increase the chances perhaps of yet another conflict breaking out in the region emanating this time from the West Bank?

MARK ESPER, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST AND POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes, it's a great question, Alex. And I don't know for sure. I don't know anybody does. Clearly, President Trump in his first administration made some bold moves when it came to Israel, for example, declaring that Israel had sovereignty over the Golan Heights moving. The U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem, the capital and did some other things.

So, it's not out of the realm of the possibility, but one would argue that could foreclose the opportunity for a broader peace deal, in which the Palestinians at some point would have their own democratically withheld (ph) state living side by side with Israel. And, of course, that is an important part, an important component of what the Arab states have laid out for the Biden administration and the Trump administration before them as part of the Abraham Accords.

So, if you want to see a broader piece in the Middle East, I would argue there has to be a way to find land for the Palestinian people so that they have a place to live to call their own. And it has to be one though, that they respect Israeli's security and Israeli's democracy.

And we do know that the Abraham Accords are a major priority for Prime Minister Netanyahu as well.

I want to switch gears a little bit, sir. As a former Trump defense secretary, I want to ask you about Trump's pick for that role, Pete Hegseth. He has served in a combat zone but he does not have defense policy or executive experience running a bureaucracy as large as the Pentagon, and he is facing sexual assault allegations. Do you think Hegseth is equipped to lead the Defense Department?

ESPER: Well, I like that he has military experience. That's a plus in my book. But he doesn't have the breadth or depth of experiences that his predecessors have had coming into the role. And I think that's obviously members of the Senate will press him on when he goes up for his nomination hearing.

But he does have this much, Alex. He has the trust and confidence of the president. Secondly, he shares his views with regard to the top issues that President Trump wants him to go to the Pentagon and implement on. And, third, I think President Trump likes the fact that he's good on T.V., that he can carry a message.

So, in Trump's perspective, those are the things that are important to Donald Trump and those are the reasons why I believe he selected him. But, again, under the Constitution, every nominee has to go before the Senate and get the advice and consent of the Senate before they actually get confirmed for the role. So, he's got a long road ahead of him over the next couple of months and ultimately into the administration. And he'll have some hurdles to cross to get there.

MARQUARDT: If you were a Senator, would you vote to confirm him?

ESPER: Well, look, I think you got to let the hearings play out and see what he speaks to. I think, obviously, they're going to ask about these this sexual assault incident. There'll be questions about his worldview. I want to know about the role of women in the military in combat. Women play a very important role in the United States military. They're a large part of the force, 18 percent or so, and they've proven themselves in combat. So, I'd want to know about that. I'd also want to know his views on the so called purge of generals and admirals.

[18:45:03]

So, look, there has been some wokeness in the Pentagon, in DOD, as I've said before, not as bad as some on the right would argue, but far more than what the Democrats would acknowledge. So I'd want to know what -- what he tends to do there.

So there are a lot of questions. It'll be a very interesting hearing if we get to that point and, and I think it's -- it's incumbent on everybody to hold their judgment until we get to that point.

ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN HOST: Secretary, back in 2019, when you were defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, he privately encouraged the then- president -- future President Trump, to pardon two American service members who were credibly accused of war crimes. And then Trump did pardon them which was against your advice. You warned at the time that those pardons could undermine the military judicial system.

So do you think that Pete Hegseth's nomination could set a tone for U.S. service members, that they might be able to act without accountability?

ESPER: Well, that was my concern at the time. If President Trump had followed on his advice, which he did, and I publicly and privately more so opposed that approach. I thought the Uniform Code of Military Justice and the Decisions of the military should be upheld, because at the end of the day, the United States military is the most professional and ethical fighting force in the world, and we stand as a beacon to others out there. And I think we hold our service members to a higher standard.

That's why Americans are proud of the United States military and why it's the most respected institution in America. So those were all of my concerns going into that. But look, I -- at the end of the day, the United States military is a very resilient organization. They understand the ethics, the professional demands the moral -- moral qualities of the of the service -- of the profession.

And I believe that at the end of the day, the institution will hold. But you have to leaders constantly have to reinforce those things and speak out and speak up against them.

MARQUARDT: Secretary Esper, before I let you go, I'd like to get your thoughts on Tulsi Gabbard being named to be the director of national intelligence. What do you make of that?

ESPER: Similar questions with regard to experience coming into the role as compared to predecessors. On top of that, she's -- she has made comments about Bashar Assad. She's parroted talking points that seem to come from the Kremlin, had kind of apologized in some ways for Edward Snowden and Julian Assange.

So, again, members are going to have a lot of questions about her views about how she regards U.S. intelligence, what her vision is for, for the for the intelligence community. And those are going to be all very important questions. And she's going to have to pass that test and get the support of at least a majority.

MARQUARDTZ: Yeah, these could make for some very interesting confirmation hearings.

Former Defense Secretary Mark Esper, thanks so much for joining us.

ESPER: Thanks, Alex.

MARQUARDT: Coming up, the Menendez brothers' quest to get out of prison for murdering their parents just hit another roadblock.

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[18:52:02]

MARQUARDT: Today, the case of Lyle and Erik Menendez was back in court.

CNN's Jean Casarez joins me now.

So, Jean, what happened in court today?

JEAN CASAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, it was supposed to be a status hearing and that's really how it turned out to be a status hearing, but are some fascinating things in this, because, first of all, Lyle and Erik Menendez, they were supposed to be via video from their prison in San Diego, California. The video wouldn't work so they had to be by telephone, but they were at their hearing.

And you have the defense right here just really wanting to focus in on that. They should be released because of new evidence because they've been rehabilitated in prison. The prosecution agrees with it. Everybody is on the line with but the fact is there is going to be a new district attorney next week who is tougher on crime.

And also the judge said, I've got 17 boxes of files that I need to go through here. But Mark Geragos, lead attorney for both of the brothers, he stepped out of court today and is very, very hopeful. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARK GERAGOS, ATTORNEY FOR MENENDEZ BROTHERS: It also was quite a moving experience at least from where we sit to listen to Aunt Terri and Aunt Joan, who are respectively Josie and Kitty's older sisters, both made impassioned pleas with the judge to send the brothers home.

JOAN VANDERMOLEN, KITTY MENENDEZ'S SISTER: They should never have been in such situations as presented themselves. What can a kid do when his father's -- I can't --

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CASAREZ: And the reason they testified in court today was because a judge needs to look at how the family members feel of the victims and also they are elderly and just in case anything would happen, their testimony is now preserved. But the reality is this was a premeditated murder. It has gone through many courts in California. They have held firm to that conviction of life without any possibility of parole. Any change would be significant.

MARQUARDT: Jean, thank you.

And we'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [18:58:41]

MARQUARDT: -- assessing the damage from a new large Russian ballistic missile strike.

CNN's Nick Paton Walsh reports.

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NICK PATON WALSH, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, it was the dead of night here that people in the Dnipro saw the extraordinary scene on their skyline of that multi warhead Russian missile experimental, according to U.S. officials.

And here a children's rehabilitation center where some of the debris from the attack that night indeed landed children were here at the time, still broken glass from the ground below me.

And really it's these vulnerable Ukrainians on the receiving end of the broader geopolitical message that Russian President Vladimir wanted -- Putin wanted to send. The parts of the debris of that missile on display to news agencies in Kyiv today, a select amount.

Clearly, Kyiv, trying to show the world exactly what technology was used against them. And there is, of course, going to be a lot of forensic attention as to exactly what those missile parts indeed show.

VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, UKRAINIAN PRESIDENT (through translator): Expertise experts are currently analyzing the evidence and working with our partners to establish all the details and the specifications of this missile, and to find a response together to this latest Russian escalation.

WALSH: There appears to be a consensus that this was a hypersonic missile and it was one with multiple warheads non-nuclear indeed.

Vladimir Putin suggested that it can potentially get through all Western air defenses. And I'm sure that the parts on display will be pored over to see if indeed, that provides any clues as to whether this is a technological leap by Russia or not.

But still, here the message itself was very much more immediate and terrifying, surely for those who saw multiple different fragments raining down on them from above, and the damage still here palpable in the freezing night.

Nick Paton Walsh, CNN, Dnipro, Ukraine.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MARQUARDT: Our thanks to Nick Paton Walsh.

"ERIN BURNETT OUTFRONT" starts right now.