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Trump Says Ban is Common Sense; Trump on Media Terrorism Coverage; Travel Ban in Court of Appeals; Storms hit Louisiana. Aired 1-1:30p ET

Aired February 07, 2017 - 13:00   ET

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

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, I'm Wolf Blitzer in Washington. Thanks for joining us.

We're following breaking news right now. Take a look at this, live pictures coming in from the White House briefing room. Shortly, we'll be seeing the press secretary, Sean Spicer, at the lectern this hour to take questions from reporters.

Spicer will likely have to explain further the government's defense of the travel ban, a ban president Trump says is, quote, "common sense." So, we're going to go to the briefing live as soon as it gets started. Stand by.

Also, a first on the U.S. Senate floor. Moments ago, the vice president, Mike Pence, cast the tie-breaking vote to confirm President Trump's nominee for education secretary, Betsy DeVos.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MIKE PENCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Both the yays are 50, the nays are 50. The Senate being equally divided, the vice president votes in the affirmative and the nomination is confirmed.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: The 51 to 50 vote to confirm Betsy DeVos followed a last- minute campaign by Democrats to block the nomination. Just moments ago, DeVos tweeted this, quote, "I appreciate the Senate's diligence and I'm honored to serve as education secretary. Let's improve options and outcomes for all U.S. students."

Our Senior Congressional Reporter Manu Raju is joining us live from Capitol Hill right now. Manu, this is unprecedented, an historic first for the vice president to cast the tiebreaking vote.

MANU RAJU, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL REPORTER: Yes, absolutely, Wolf. We have not seen this before. It just shows how controversial of nominee this has become.

And it also shows how narrowly divided the Senate is because just two Republican senators defective prompting that 50-50 tie. That is Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Susan Collins of Maine, expressing their opposition just days ago.

But they also worked with their party leadership to ensure that he knew -- Mitch McConnell, the majority leader, knew that they were voting no. That forced him to reschedule the vote on Jeff Sessions to be attorney until later this week, so Jeff Sessions could stay in the Senate, cast a vote, key vote, to make it 50 to 50. That forced Mike Pence to come in here and vote, yes, breaking that tie.

Now, this came after a pretty dramatic and intense pressure campaign organized by liberal groups, teachers' unions to try to put -- flood Republican senators' offices with phone calls, trying to convince people in blue states, like Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania to convince him to vote against Betsy DeVos.

But I just caught up with Pat Toomey. He told me he never had second thoughts about voting for Mrs. DeVos' nomination. A sign that Republicans, for the most part, are falling in line behind Donald Trump's cabinet.

Now, they're going to move to -- move to Jeff Sessions' nomination. Expect him to be confirmed this week as the Republicans try to push to -- forward to other controversial nominees, Tom Price to head Health and Human Services. Steven Mnuchin to head the Treasury Department also expected to be confirmed.

So, Donald Trump is getting his cabinet. Not in the time frame that he wants, Democrats are slowing things down. But, eventually, most, if not all of them, will get their jobs -- Wolf.

BLITZER: Yes, it's interesting. A vice president who also serves as president of the Senate often casts tiebreaking votes, but this is the first time it's been done to confirm a member of the cabinet.

After the vote, the Senate minority leader, Chuck Schumer, tweeted this. And let me put it up on the screen. Today, Vice President Mike Pence did something no one else has ever done, cast the tie-breaking vote on his own cabinet nominee. And the White House tweeted this, Congratulations to our new education secretary.

Was this the Democrats', do you think, last, best hope of blocking a Trump nominee?

RAJU: For the ones that have had hearings, yes, because this is -- these are the only -- these are the only nominees, so far, that are pending in which we have seen Republican defections which is one reason we saw this pretty intense pressure campaign.

But Andy Puzder could be the next labor secretary nominated by Donald Trump has not had his confirmation hearings yet and he just revealed yesterday that he hired an undocumented immigrant as a housekeeper and did not pay taxes on that immigrant until -- that hire -- that employee until later acknowledging that he did actually hire someone who was not legally in this country.

Now, I just spent time with a couple of our other colleagues, assessing whether or not Republicans would vote against Mr. Puzder's nomination. A lot of those senators on the key committee that's going to consider the nomination are withholding judgement, including Senator Collins of Maine, Murkowski of Alaska, the two who voted against DeVos, saying that they still want to learn about the situation.

So, expect this to be a line of questioning going forward. Republican leadership, like John Cornyn, telling me he's still confident that Puzder will get the job. But there are going to be a lot of questions and, perhaps, some Republican defections if he does not answer those questions to their satisfaction -- Wolf.

[13:05:05] BLITZER: And, as you point out, Senator Jeff Sessions, the Republicans needed his vote in order to get Betsy DeVos confirmed as education secretary. But it now looks like he's about to be confirmed as well, right?

RAJU: Yes, that's right. We're expecting that to happen later this week. They break -- the Senate broke a filibuster to push this through. Expect some Democrats also to vote with Jeff Sessions, including Joe Manchin of West Virginia, who announced, right out of the gate, that he was going to support Senator Sessions.

So, we're not expecting Republican defections on his nominations. And, as you know, Wolf, 51 Republican senators are required. Any senators are required to confirm a nominee and to break a filibuster. Fifty-two Republican senators stand united. He should not have a problem. Expect him to get the job sometime this week -- Wolf.

BLITZER: Yes, and he will, then, become the attorney general of the United States.

Manu Raju, thanks very much.

Let's get some more on the heated battles over President Trump's cabinet nominees. Louisiana Republican Senator Bill Cassidy is joining us from Capitol Hill. Senator, thanks for joining us.

SEN. BILL CASSIDY (R), LOUISIANA, SENATE FINANCE COMMITTEE: Thank you, Wolf. Thanks for having me.

BLITZER: All right. So, it took this historic tie-breaking vote by the vice president for Betsy DeVos to be confirmed as education secretary. What does that say to you about whether or not -- you believe she's the right person for the job. But it was really historic precedent. It took the vice president to get her confirmed.

CASSIDY: Vice presidents have voted to break ties before.

BLITZER: Not for a cabinet --

CASSIDY: This happens.

BLITZER: -- not for a cabinet nominee, though.

CASSIDY: I'm not sure of the great significance of that. I just don't. On the other hand, what I do like about Miss DeVos, she believes the parent should have the power. She also thinks that we shouldn't consign children in failing inner school school districts to remain in a failing school.

She has used her influential and her wealth and her activism to allow that mother to choose a better school for her child. I think that's where we need to be.

BLITZER: The attorney general nominee, Senator Jeff Sessions, the Congressman Tom Price, the nominee for Health and Human Services, they are waiting for their full votes on the Senate floor.

Do you think there's any doubt about their confirmation?

CASSIDY: I think they will be confirmed. They're both strong candidates. They're competent, more than competent. They will excel. And that's what our country needs right now in this kind of time of, we've got to get going again.

BLITZER: Do you have any questions at all about any of President Trump's nominees who are still awaiting confirmation? Some haven't even had hearings yet.

CASSIDY: Yes, I prefer to withhold judgment until we actually have their hearings. I'm a doctor and I never like to speak about theoreticals with patients. I wanted to have as much information as possible. That's kind of the way I'm approaching these hearings.

BLITZER: Because Andy Puzder, the nominee for Labor secretary, he's apparently got a problem now, that he hired an undocumented immigrant. Never paid taxes. Has now paid those taxes.

In the past, Democratic nominees and Republican nominees who have had similar problems, they've had their names withdrawn. How do you feel about that?

CASSIDY: Again, I'd rather withhold judgment on that particular issue until I understand it better. The first I heard about it was an hour ago, and I don't have any details other than what you mentioned.

When I met with him privately, though, he was all about creating jobs. He said Trump's directive to me is to create -- help create jobs. Private sector creates but what can we do to make it easier to create? I want a secretary of labor who is about creating jobs.

BLITZER: The Homeland Security secretary, John Kelly, testified before Congress today about the president's proposed travel ban which has now been stayed. He said he should have slowed down the rollout of the president's executive order. Listen to Secretary Kelly.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIOP)

JOHN KELLY, U.S. SECRETARY OF HOMELAND SECURITY: In retrospect, I should have -- this is all on me, by the way. I should have delayed it just a bit so I could talk to members of Congress, particularly the leadership of committees like this, to prepare them for what was coming.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: Do you believe the Trump administration moved too quickly on such a clearly complicated issue?

CASSIDY: Well, I think they, perhaps -- obviously, Kelly thinks they moved too quickly. So, I'd just be echoing the administration if I agreed with that.

My position all along has been, I understand the president's desire. He wishes to keep from happening in the U.S. that which has happened in Europe. Terrorists coming in as refugees, committing heinous crimes.

As a physician, though, I've pointed out, I know physicians from those communities, from those countries who provide health care in our inner city, our rural areas, other places that are under surge.

If they're not allowed to return because they are on a green card, those communities, their families, our communities, our patients, if you will, will be less well-served. So, I look forward to them refining this, protecting our security but understanding that there is a nuance of this which must be respected.

BLITZER: And as a physician, you also are interested in the future of the Affordable Care Act or Obamacare. President Trump is now promising quick action on repealing and replacing Obamacare. He certainly did so during the campaign.

[13:10:02] But now, he's lowering expectations. I want you to listen to what he said about the future of Obamacare, how quickly it can be repealed and replaced when he was interviewed on Fox News.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BILL O'REILLY, CONSERVATIVE COMMENTATOR, FOX NEWS: Can Americans in 2017 expect a new health care plan rolled out by the Trump administration, this year?

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: In the process and maybe it'll take until sometime into next year. But we are certainly going to be in the process. Very complicated. We're going to be putting it in fairly soon. I think that, yes, I would like to say by the end of the year, at least the rudiments, but we should have something within the year and the following year.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: Are you OK with that delay? Because it originally was going to be repealed almost on day one and then quickly replaced. Now, the president is talking about 2018.

CASSIDY: Senator Collins -- Susan Collins and I have introduced something called the Patient Freedom Act. And, in this year, if Congress would pass legislation which gives states next year the choices to choose between in order to complete the replacement. What the president said is thoroughly consistent with what we have rolled out.

Again, this year, Washington does its business to return power to the states. But we give states time to choose the option best for them and then to implement that option. We're on track if the president is reading our bill.

BLITZER: Well, do you think he supports your bill? Because I haven't heard him say he does.

CASSIDY: No, he's not spoken specifically on our bill. On the other hand, if you look at what he's guaranteed. Everyone's covered. We take care of those with pre-existing conditions. No mandates at a lower cost. The only way to get there is a bill like ours.

And so, the fact that he has laid this out as his goals, I think, in this sense, the only pathway to get there is through our bill. I consider that endorsement. I'm not sure if he would.

BLITZER: All right, well, let's find out, at some point. Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, thanks very much for joining us.

CASSIDY: Thank you, Wolf.

BLITZER: Later this hour, I'll be joined by Patrick Leahy. We'll get his take on the vote for Betsy DeVos and the court battle over the president's travel ban ahead.

And later tonight, Senator Ted Cruz will debate Senator Bernie Sanders on Obamacare. CNN's Manu Raju caught up with Senator Cruz and asked him his reaction to President Trump, saying the replacement for Obamacare may not pass until next year. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. TED CRUZ (R), TEXAS: The president has said he has committed to repealing Obamacare. Republicans in both houses have said we're committed to repealing Obamacare. And I look forward to our delivering on that promise.

RAJU: Do you want to do it this year? Do you expect it to be done this year?

CRUZ: Absolutely.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: And you can watch the debate live tonight, Senator Cruz, Senator Bernie Sanders at 9:00 p.m. Eastern. Our own Jake Tapper and Dana Bash, they will be moderating right here on CNN.

Coming up, the White House press secretary, Sean Spicer, getting ready to answer questions from the news media. That's supposed to start later this hour. He'll likely discuss the latest on the court battle over the president's travel ban. We're going live to the White House this hour to hear from Sean Spicer. Stay with us.

[13:13:06]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:16:54] WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: All right, take a look at this, live pictures coming in from the White House. Fairly soon, we're told, the press secretary, Sean Spicer, will go into the Briefing Room, take questions from the news media. We'll have live coverage as soon as that begins.

In the meantime, President Trump is calling it commonsense. He's talking about his proposed travel ban which is now in the hands of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco. The three-member panel will hear arguments later today, 6:00 p.m. Eastern. We'll have live coverage of that in "The Situation Room."

Let's talk a little bit more about this, the reactions we're getting from the White House. We have our senior White House correspondent Jim Acosta. He's already in the Briefing Room getting ready for the Sean Spicer briefing. Dan Simon is over at the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco. And our senior legal analyst, Jeffrey Toobin, is joining us from New York.

Jim, you're there at the White House. President Trump had two events already today, two meetings, and he did speak about this travel ban. Update our viewers.

JIM ACOSTA, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Wolf. President Trump met behind closed doors here with some of the nation's sheriffs here at the White House earlier today. The cameras were allowed in for a few moments and they were able to ask the president some questions about this legal battle over his executive order on that travel ban and putting in extreme vetting that has been tied up in the courts. The president said that he believes that this executive order is going to pass the muster when it comes to these legal challenges and that it will be upheld in the courts. He said that this executive order is commonsense. But he did say, Wolf, that he is willing to take it all the way to the Supreme Court. Here's what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: So we'll see what happens. We'll have a big court case. We're well-represented and we're going to see what happens.

QUESTION: Is it going to go to the Supreme Court, do you think?

TRUMP: Well, I mean, we'll see.

QUESTION: (INAUDIBLE).

TRUMP: Hopefully it doesn't have to. It's common sense. You know, some things are law and I'm all in favor of that. And some things are common sense. This is common sense.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: Now, that's just one of the issues that we're going to be asking White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer about during this briefing that's coming up in about 15 minutes, Wolf.

One of the other items that is certain to come up is this assertion that the president made yesterday that the international news media has been deliberately underreporting terrorist attacks around the world. The president did not give an explanation as to why he believes that. He said that the media have their reasons and he said to a military audience at MacDill Air Force Base yesterday that you know what he means. And the White House, to try to back up this assertion, did put out a list last night of 78 terrorist attacks that have occurred since late 2014.

But, Wolf, as you know, having gone through this list, many of these attacks, nearly all of the attacks were covered by CNN and the rest of the news media. Of course, the White House was saying, well, most of these attacks were not covered enough. That's just not the case. And so we'll have a chance to ask Sean Spicer about that coming up at the briefing as well, Wolf.

BLITZER: I'm sure a lot of other questions will be coming up as well. And we'll have live coverage. That's coming up later this hour.

Dan Simon, you're out there in San Francisco. Walk us through the procedure, what the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals will be doing. I know that the hearing begins at 6:00 p.m. Eastern, 3:00 p.m. on the West Coast. Walk us through what they're going to be doing and how quickly we might get a ruling.

[13:20:15] DAN SIMON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, that's right, Wolf.

First of all, legal experts say that you could see a ruling as early as this evening. And this is going to be an hour-long hearing, 30 minutes for each side to make their argument, and this could really go three ways. We're talking about a three-judge panel that will make the ruling. The first option is, is that the suspension could remain in place, meaning that visa holders from those predominantly seven Muslim countries could continue to come to the U.S. The second option would be is that the suspension is overturned, meaning the ban is back on. Or perhaps there could be some kind of mixed ruling here, that some parts of the executive order could be enforced and others could be tossed out. But as we've been hearing, most legal analysts seem to think that whatever happens here it's going to go to the Supreme Court, Wolf.

BLITZER: Stand by. I want to bring Jeffrey Toobin in.

Jeffrey, the Department of justice brief that was released last night points to Title 8 of the U.S. code which says this. The president, quote, "made by proclamation and for such period as he shall deem necessary suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens as immigrants or nonimmigrants or impose on the entry of aliens any restrictions he may deem to be appropriate." Here's the question, Jeffrey, why is that not the end of the discussion?

JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: Because that's not the only relevant part of the law or part of the Constitution. There's also part of the 1965 Immigration Act which said there cannot be any bias against any nation's immigrants in the course of the president's authority over immigration.

Wolf, this is a really hard case because there are very good arguments on both sides. I wouldn't venture a guess on how this will turn out. I think it's revealing that even some of the judge who have started to hear these cases have come out differently. It's just a hard case and that's why we have a Supreme Court because that's how - where it's going to wind up.

BLITZER: So you believe it will wind up in the Supreme Court?

TOOBIN: I do one way or another. The issues are too momentous and it is likely that we are going to get different rulings from different courts and that's why we have a Supreme Court to settle those issues if they can reach a resolution with only eight members. It could be a 4-4 split, which might mean that circuit court decisions, like the one we are - we are likely to get from the Ninth Circuit coming up today, that would be the law of the land if the Supreme Court splits 4-4.

BLITZER: Yes, Jeffrey Toobin's going to be a busy guy. Jeffrey, thank you.

Dan Simon, thanks to you as well.

Right now 18 states and the District of Columbia are involved in this travel ban case in one form or another, either as part of the primary challenge to the executive order by the president, or as supporters try to overturn the ban.

Joining us now from Hartford, Connecticut, that state's attorney general, George Jepsen.

Attorney General, thanks very much for joining us.

GEORGE JEPSEN, CONNECTICUT ATTORNEY GENERAL: It's my pleasure.

BLITZER: So what led your state, Connecticut, to join this fight against the president?

JEPSEN: Because we believe that it's a - the travel ban is a form of discrimination based on religion. It's driven by animus against the Muslim religious and we believe that that's unconstitutional. We also think, and I agree with Jeff Toobin, that there's a statutory grounds - I agree with Jeff that this is a tough case. I'll certainly grant that. There's statutory grounds as well because this 1952 law, which you quoted, is qualified by a 1965 law that says that you cannot discriminate on the basis of nation of origin.

BLITZER: They argue that it's not discrimination against Muslims and you've heard the arguments specifically that most majority Muslim nations are not part of this travel ban, including the largest Muslim nation, Indonesia, or the largest Arab state, Egypt, they're not part of the ban. So why do you say it's discrimination against Muslims?

JEPSEN: Equal protection is not an all or nothing constitutional phenomenon. The fact that you're not discriminate against all Muslims doesn't mean that it's OK to discriminate against some of them.

There are two reasons we think that the ban does discriminate against Muslims and can be distinguished from what President Obama did in 2011 with his slowing down of the visa process from Iraq. The first is very simply that the order itself carves out an exception for minority religions, which means that under this ban Muslims, who are the majority, over 90 percent of all seven of those countries are Muslim. It means that you have one standard, legal standard, for Muslims from those countries and another legal standard from religious minorities.

[13:25:14] The second reason is that President Trump has written - made very clear in his public statement, and this is relevant, that he does favor a Muslim ban and that he would, going forward, favor Christian admissions to the United States.

BLITZER: All right, we're going to continue these conversations I'm sure down the road. This case, presumably, as Jeffrey Toobin said, could wind up in the U.S. Supreme Court.

Attorney General Jepsen, we'll certainly have you back. Thanks very much for joining us.

JEPSEN: Great. Thank you.

BLITZER: All right, there's breaking news right now out of Louisiana. Take a look. There's a tornado warning around New Orleans. Look at the radar. A line of storms coming through the area. An earlier storm did result in the touchdown of at least one tornado that blew apart homes in the area. That's the same area that got flooded, by the way, in Hurricane Katrina. We're going to keep you updated on this breaking news as it develops.

I want to bring in right now our meteorologist Jennifer Gray. She's over at the CNN Severe Weather Center in Atlanta.

Jennifer, what can you tell us, first of all, about this storm and where it could be heading next?

JENNIFER GRAY, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Well, unfortunately, Wolf, we have a tornado warning for the same spot that had damage earlier today from a previous storm and so it looks like this is round two. We have tornado watches in effect, south Louisiana, portions of Mississippi, Alabama and the Florida panhandle. This is a serious, serious situation.

You can see this area just on the east side of New Orleans. That's where we had damage earlier today. Now another tornado warning in effect. Also, tornado warning north of Hammond. So let's zoom down on this one just on the east - east New Orleans. And you can see Chalmette right there being impacted by this. We'll scoot it over a little bit because it looks like they've extended it to the east. So Orleans, St. Bernard Parishes, Chalmette, Violet, those cities under that tornado warning. So get into your safe spot as fast as you can. You've been warned about this storm. They're moving at about 25 to 30 miles per hour. So you have time to get you and your family to that safe spot.

Also, northeast of Baton Rouge, Livingston, St. Helena, Tangipahoa Parishes, including the towns of Independence, this one also a very serious storm moving to the east. And you can see that tight circulation where the red and green come together indicates rotation. So some very tight spin in these storms. These storms have history of damage and so take them seriously.

We also have video you can see right there on the left side of your screen that was taken from one of the hospitals in New Orleans. And so, right there, tornado. And so these are very serious moving to the east, this cluster of thunderstorms that will continue to march to the east throughout the day today. So the threat remains all the way from the Ohio River Valley, all the way down to the Gulf Coast, with the biggest tornado threat being right around the Gulf Coast, from south Louisiana, all the way to the Florida panhandle.

So, Wolf, this is something we're going to continue to watch. It's an active situation. It's not going to be over any time soon.

BLITZER: All right, good advice from Jennifer Gray. If you're in that dangerous area right now, go to that safe zone. Very, very important.

Jennifer, thanks very much. We'll stay on top of this story.

We're also just moments away from the White House press briefing. The press secretary, Sean Spicer, expected to take questions about the confirmation of Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, the court battle over the president's travel ban and a whole lot more. Our live coverage, that's coming up.

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