Return to Transcripts main page

WOLF

Trump Ignores Comey Questions; Spicer to Hold Briefing; Lawsuit Filed Against President Trump. Aired 1-1:30p ET

Aired June 12, 2017 - 13:00   ET

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


(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, I'm Wolf Blitzer in Washington. We want to welcome our viewers in the United States and around the world.

We're following breaking news right now in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has just issued a ruling in the legal battle over President Trump's travel ban.

I want to bring in CNN's Paul Callan and Laura Coates, our Legal Analysts.

We have -- we're going through the ruling right now, Paul. But I want to set the scene for our viewers. What's at stake in this decision that we're about to get from the Ninth Circuit? We earlier received a decision against the president's travel ban from the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals.

But set the scene for us because this is another important decision.

PAUL CALLAN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: People have to understand that the Ninth Circuit really is where the battle began, with respect to the travel ban. And the president issued this ban, which is now the second travel ban, in an attempt to come up with something that was Constitutionally sound and that would have a better chance of being upheld, ultimately by the U.S. Supreme Court.

So, this will now be the Ninth Circuit's look at the second travel ban and ruling on its Constitutionality. Have the initial problems that they criticized in the first travel ban been successfully resolved and fixed by the changes in the second executive order.

BLITZER: And so, Laura, this is an important decision. The assumption, a lot of people assume the Ninth Circuit, a more liberal jurisdiction out there. It probably is going to do what the Fourth Circuit did but we don't know yet. We're reviewing this decision.

LAURA COATES, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: We don't know quite yet. And, of course, this all probably could be for not -- because, remember, it's already before the Supreme Court as it stands.

Jeff sessions and the Department of Justice did not wait for Ninth Circuit ruling, as is customary before, bringing it to see if there was a conflict between two circuits, that and the Fourth.

So, even if the Ninth Circuit should say, we don't agree with the Fourth Circuit ruling, it's already in the lap of the Supreme Court.

Now, whether they will have an actual hearing, what they will do on the case is, you know, not in our cards, though. But what we do know, however, is the president's words likely impacted the Ninth Circuit decision on how to rule.

Remember, he had a Twitter storm about this issue. He talked about the travel ban and his preference for the very first one which included language, as Paul said, perhaps defending the establishment clause.

So, where we are right now is the expectation the Ninth Circuit will rule like the Fourth. But either way, the Supreme Court will have its day.

BLITZER: Paul, and let's remind our viewers, this is the revised version of the president's travel ban. The first version, that went down because, of course, the Justice Department and the president then came up with a revised version. The president wasn't very happy with 2.0 -- the 2.0 version. He's made that clear on Twitter and elsewhere.

But that's the -- that's the decision of the executive order signed by the president that is now before the courts. And, as Laura points out, it is also before the U.S. Supreme Court. We have no idea when the Supreme Court might consider this, right?

CALLAN: No, we don't know. But, you know I would expect a faster track to a Supreme Court decision than you normally would see. And, of course, the Trump administration tried to solve the problems that existed with the first ban. They reduced the number of countries that the ban applied to.

And they tried to take out any reference to religion. Because as Laura just mentioned, the establishment clause was a big problem area for first ban and that has to do with the government discriminating against a religion. And, in this case, the Muslim faith.

So, all reference to religion is eliminated in the second travel ban or, as you just said, Wolf, travel ban 2.0.

BLITZER: And the president is not very happy with this revised scale back version, Laura. He's made that very, very clear. He really wanted to stick with the original version which also included, by the way, Iraq on that -- the ban of certain Muslim majority countries. Iraq was removed and now in this revised version which is on hold now for a long time and not being implemented, there are six Muslim majority countries.

COATES: And when did the president choose to express distain for 2.0? After the terror attacks in London. And he did so as an opportunity to point out that he would have preferred the travel ban. Actually, address very heads on the idea that, call it what you want, I want a travel ban.

Now, granted he didn't use the words, Muslim ban, which is what he was accused of having done on the campaign trail. But it signaled the one thing that everyone was waiting for.

Listen, up until now, the court was poised to decide whether or not statements made by a president on a campaign trail would somehow be able to dictate how the courts interpreted what their viewpoints are and the policy objectives of a sitting president's agenda.

Well, when you had the president then make comments as the sitting president, it gave insight that we otherwise did not have. So, the cost benefit analysis that any court has to go by is the presidential prerogative to do what's best for national security against whether there is ill or bad intent to try to undermine the establishment clause of the Constitution.

[13:05:06] When that Twitter storm came into effect, that balancing act, especially in light of the fact that there had been no national security things that had been accomplished to try to betrust (ph) that national security argument, it tipped in favor of saying this was not a lawful travel ban.

BLITZER: And, Paul, the argument that the White House, the president, the Justice Department under Attorney General Jeff Sessions, makes -- this is the president of the United States. He's in charge of national security for the United States. He's the commander in chief. And he can determine who should be allowed to enter the country and who should not be allowed to enter the country. That's the thrust of their argument.

CALLAN: Yes, that's exactly accurate, Wolf. And they invoked a statute that was enacted back in, I believe, 1952 which essentially said the president has complete discretion in this area to exclude anybody from the United States whom he believes poses a threat to U.S. security.

And the president, in the aftermath, of course, of the most recent London terrorist attack or Manchester, rather, terrorist attack, was invoking references to that 1952 clause and saying this really is my attempt to protect American citizens from terrorist attacks. And he was very angry, as a matter of fact, that his lawyers had talked him into watering down the initial travel ban one because he said he feels so strongly about it.

BLITZER: Assuming -- and we're still going through the opinion by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. We should get that decision momentarily, Laura. But assuming they agree with the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals -- you have two courts of appeal that are against the president's travel ban, what would the impact of that be on the Ninth Supreme Court justices who, in the end, are going to have to make the final decision?

COATES: Well, normally, the Supreme Court takes cases that have a conflict between two circuits. Essentially, they're saying, we want to step in and resolve issues that are confusing to the circuits below or that there is an obvious disconnect between two parts of the country.

If they rule in favor in the same direction, that conflict is kind of out of the picture. But I would suspect the Supreme Court would still want to resolve the issue. Because that balancing act of the national security interest against the establishment clause is a delicate balance and it's presidential prerogative.

There is -- there may be the basis for why the Ninth Circuit would rule. The Fourth Circuit talked about, very specifically, the idea the campaign rhetoric should have guided the court's hand.

And so, the court may say -- the Supreme Court may say, listen, even if there is the same result here, we may take issue with the underlying logic and that is a conflict to us in and of itself. And they may still grapple with that very issue.

BLITZER: It is possible, Paul, as Laura suggests, that maybe the Supreme Court will decide, you know what, they're not even going to take up this matter. Is that right?

CALLAN: Yes, they could -- they could decide to reject it. They -- of course, they haven't seen the new Ninth Circuit opinion yet.

But I think, Wolf, the interesting thing here is the Supreme Court now has the addition of another conservative, Justice Gorsuch, on the Supreme Court. Now, the court was ideologically split, essentially four to four. Now, you have a conservative majority.

And the real thing I'd like to see, and I think most lawyers are looking for, is will this change how the court decides a case like this? And one of the things that I'm looking at, when I see how the Supreme Court's going to react, is will the Supreme Court be angry about Mr. Trump's constant attacks on the Judiciary? He's made very personal attacks against individual judges and against the Ninth Circuit.

And even though you have a conservative majority on the Supreme Court, they are defensive of their institution. The institution of the Judiciary which is independent of the executive and the legislature. A lot of times, you see the court coming together, even though there's an ideological difference to defend the integrity of the court. So, it's going to be interesting.

BLITZER: All right, we just -- hold on a second because we're just getting the headline in from this decision. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled the travel ban remains on hold, we're told, but lets the government review vetting procedures.

All right, Laura, that's the headline. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals rules the travel ban that the president opposed when he signed that executive order, the revised version, remains on hold, meaning it's not going to be implemented but lets the government review vetting procedures. What does that say to you?

COATES: Well, it's as we expected that, one, they would say the travel ban cannot go into effect. And what that tells you is what we're talking about. The court is saying, listen, there is a very big interest in ensuring that the president can take the adequate and appropriate steps to ensure the national security. But that includes what he has talked about as in terms of extreme vetting or vetting procedures.

Remember, this case all began by saying that the vetting that we have in place prior to the first ban even being offered as a premise is that it was insufficient to try to tackle the national security interests that are looming over our country.

[13:10:08] Well, the first travel ban hearing showed that there was not a big substantiated basis to say that the vetting that was in place was no longer effective and frankly there has not been any update to it pending all the litigation.

So, the court is saying to Donald Trump, listen, we know you have the prerogative. We know that you have the right to have us engage in this balancing test. But you haven't given us enough to tip the scale in your favor to say that the vetting that's in place is insufficient, that it must be reexamined and looked at. And that alone is enough to overhaul our interest in having no preference for religion or to ignore the campaign rhetoric and your sitting presidency rhetoric with respect to travel bans.

BLITZER: All right. So, basically, it's a major setback. Another major setback, Paul, for the president, for his travel ban. First, you had the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals based in Virginia, ruling against the revised version of the travel ban.

Now, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals based out in California does the same thing. It says the travel ban remains on hold, cannot be implemented. It does say the government can review some vetting procedures.

So, now it's going to really be up to the United States Supreme Court to make a final decision. Walk us through that process a little bit, Paul.

CALLAN: Well, this -- you know, this is a setback for the -- for the Trump administration because, remember, when the court is now saying, well, you can review your vetting procedures, the whole problem with the vetting procedures before was that the administration was saying in places like Yemen and Somalia, there's no viable government in control of vetting. And, hence, that's why he wanted to ban everybody coming in from those countries.

So, now the court is saying, well, you can continue to vet like you used to. We'll not be responsive to what the Trump administration says are the new needs.

But following this down the path, I -- even though there's no conflict between the circuits, I still see a direct road to the Supreme Court. This is an important national question and those justices are going to want to get involved in it.

And I think it'll be a first real look at how the new ideological split on the Supreme Court plays out. Will they be supporting Trump or will they be opposed to Trump?

BLITZER: Tal Kopan is with us, our CNN Politics Reporter. Tal, walk us through the politics of this decision. It does represent another significant setback. The president had made it clear he thinks he's in charge. He can control who comes into the United States, who can't come into the United States.

Now, you have the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals saying to the president of the United States, not so fast.

TAL KOPAN, CNN POLITICS REPORTER: Absolutely. You know, there are a few factors at play here when you talk about the politics of this. One, of course, yet again, this is an instance where the Trump administration is not going to set the news of the day.

This has been a recurring problem for them. They want to pivot to certain issues to show that they are dealing with policy and these things keep coming up, you know, the blows from the court, various issues with the Russia investigation that keep throwing them off track. We're waiting for the briefing right now. Surely this is going to be a major topic. And, two, yet again, it looks like a blow to the Trump agenda and it's another thing that he's unable to claim he is moving forward with.

So, these are two sources of frustration for the White House and the president right now.

BLITZER: It certainly is. Politically, it's another significant setback for the president.

I want to bring in our Supreme Court Reporter Ariane de Vogue. You've had a chance, Arian, to go through the decision by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and the headline is the travel ban remains on hold.

ARIANE DE VOGUE, CNN SUPREME COURT REPORTER: Oh, that's right. It's another loss for the president. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, it upheld this lower court injunction. That means that this travel ban remains blocked.

And they did so on statutory reasons. Here's what the court said. We can conclude that the president, in issuing the executive order, exceeded the scope of the authority delegated to him by president -- by Congress. He said the president did not meet the essential precondition to exercising his delegated authority.

So, what remains blocked is that part of the ban for -- about travel. However, this court did allow one part of the ban to go into effect and that's the positions that allows the president and the administration to, sort of, review the vetting procedures. That's something that came up at oral argument. They are going to allow that to go forward. But the rest has been blocked.

And all this comes, of course, on the day that the Supreme Court is already taking up briefs on this case. So, this is just another court ruling against the president.

BLITZER: It's a significant setback for the president of the United States now for the second time. His initial travel ban rejected by the courts. His revised travel ban now, once again, rejected, earlier by the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, now the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

[13:15:03] A significant legal setback for the White House and the president. We'll see what the United States Supreme Court has to say about all of this.

All right, guys, thanks very much.

Take a look at some live pictures coming in right now from inside the White House Briefing Room. Certainly this issue is going to come up. The press secretary, Sean Spicer, will be back at the lectern. He'll be answering reporters' questions on this and a whole bunch of other sensitive issues. We'll have special live coverage. That's coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Take a look at the live pictures coming in from the White House Briefing Room. The White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer expected to come out at any moment now. He'll likely face several serious questions from reporters, including on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that just came in against the president's travel ban. It remains on hold. He'll also, I'm sure, be asked about the attorney general of the United States, Jeff Sessions. We're going to have live coverage of the Sean Spicer briefing. That's coming up.

[13:20:26] The president's relationship, by the way, with the attorney general will almost certainly be questioned. Is Sean Spicer today finally ready to say flatly that the president has confidence in his Attorney General Sessions? He was over at the White House today as part of the president's cabinet meeting, sitting in the room with the president for the first time since reporter surfaced that Sessions had actually offered to resign. That offer was turned down, but since then the White House has repeatedly side-stepped several opportunities to pledge the president's support for the attorney general.

We now know, by the way, that Sessions will testify tomorrow afternoon in an open hearing before the Senate Intelligence Committee. The attorney general is expected to fill us all in on his side of the story after what we heard from the fired FBI Director James Comey last week before that same Senate Intelligence Committee.

At the cabinet meeting today, by the way, the president refused to respond to any questions involving Comey. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Thank you. Thank you, everybody. Thank you very much.

QUESTION: Mr. President, are there tapes of you and Jim Comey in the Oval Office?

TRUMP: Thank you. Thank you very much.

(END VIDEO CLIP) BLITZER: All right, let's talk a little bit more about the attorney general's standing in the inner circle, the upcoming White House press briefing. Let's go to our senior White House correspondent Jim Acosta. He's inside the briefing room for us right now.

So, Jim, what are we expecting to hear this hour and did anything stick out to you during the open part of that cabinet meeting?

JIM ACOSTA, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, it was interesting to hear the president say during that cabinet meeting that only FDR has accomplished more as president than he has. I think a lot of historians at this point would disagree with that assessment from the president. But the body language between President Trump and the attorney general, it was all smiles in that room. You can listen to this sound that we picked up just a short while ago when the president was meeting with his cabinet. It appeared as if there were - there was no friction whatsoever between the president and his attorney general, Jeff Sessions. Here's what happened.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JEFF SESSIONS, ATTORNEY GENERAL: Mr. President, it's great to be here and celebrate this group. We are receiving, as you know, I'm not sure the rest of you fully understand the support, but law enforcement all over America.

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Great success, including MS-13, it being thrown out in record numbers and rapidly and they're being depleted. They'll all be gone pretty soon. So, you're right, Jeff. Thank you very much.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: Now, the one thing we haven't heard, Wolf, and you just mentioned this, is sort of a full-throated endorsement coming from the president about his attorney general, Jeff Sessions. This went back and forth, as you know, all last week. Does the president have confidence in the attorney general and so on? Finally Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the deputy press secretary, did say, well, the president has confidence in everybody in his cabinet, which wasn't really a direct answer to that question.

Speaking of direct answers to an important questions, we still haven't gotten a direct answer to the question, where are the tapes? Are there recording that the president has of his meetings with various officials here at the White House, most notably the former FBI director, James Comey. The president, as you heard in that cabinet meeting, was asked once again about this. He dodged that question. He said on Friday during that press conference in the Rose Garden that he's going to answer that question in short order.

Of course, when you talk to the president's - you reach out to the president's legal team, for example, there is no answer to that question. When you reach out to the White House press office for an answer to that question, there is no answer. And so this is going to obviously come up once again during the press briefing, Wolf. Where are the tapes? Does the president have tapes? And when does he plan on answering that question?

Wolf.

BLITZER: Do we know if Sean Spicer is bringing a cabinet member or anyone else to open up the Q&A with reporters on a different subject?

ACOSTA: We don't know yet, Wolf. Obviously - well, the attorney general certainly would be welcome if he were to come into the room, Wolf. The press secretary, you're right, has been bringing in various cabinet members lately. And Jeff Sessions certainly would be a welcome surprise in this Briefing Room as there are plenty of questions for him. But my guess is, we're going to have to wait until tomorrow to hear from the attorney general.

At the same time, though, Wolf, I do think that there are some critical questions for this White House to answer. And what we have seen in recent weeks from time to time is the press secretary will bring in somebody like the Veterans Affairs secretary who, of course, is very important, working on very important things, but perhaps may not speak to something that is exactly the hottest news item of the day in the view of people in this room. And so you could see something like that, but at this point, Wolf, we haven't been given any sort of heads up that a cabinet member is coming into the - into the Briefing Room in just a few moments from now, Wolf.

[13:25:05] BLITZER: Yes. All right, we'll see if anybody shows up, the labor secretary, Alexander Acosta, no relation to Jim Acosta, let's see if he shows up, talks about labor related issues.

ACOSTA: That would be something.

BLITZER: All right, stand by, Jim, we're going to get to that briefing shortly.

Meanwhile, the attorneys general of both Maryland and the District of Columbia are filing a lawsuit against President Trump, alleging he's violated the U.S. Constitution by accepting foreign money through his business dealings. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KARL RACINE, DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA ATTORNEY GENERAL: Never in the history of this country have we had a president with these kinds of extensive business entanglements or a president who refused to adequately distance themselves from their holdings.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: The suit accuses the president of violating the so-called emoluments clause of the Constitution, which prohibits the president from accepting money from foreign governments without permission from Congress.

Joining us now is Brian Frosh, the attorney general of Maryland, and Karl Racine, the attorney general of the District of Columbia.

Gentlemen, thanks so much for joining us.

I know you - you're arguing, the government is arguing, the president is arguing that the emolument clause was never intended to apply to a president's private businesses - business, and if it had, then just about every president has violated. Why do you think President Trump is different from his predecessors and, Attorney General Racine, let me start with you.

KARL RACINE, DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA ATTORNEY GENERAL: Sure. Well, we think the government's argument is factually and legally incorrect. We think the Constitution speaks quite clearly that, number one, the president is a federal officer and that, number two, the prescription that the president not receive money from foreign countries absolutely applies to the United States.

Wolf, I know that you were citing the government's brief in their rely last Friday in New York. Taken to its logical conclusion, what the Department of Justice is ask - is saying is that it's perfectly appropriate for Trump businesses to receive unlimited amounts of money from foreign countries. That cannot be the rule. We contest that it's unconstitutional.

BLITZER: All right, let me get the attorney general of Maryland -

BRIAN FROSH, MARYLAND ATTORNEY GENERAL: Well, I think they're wrong in the fact -

BLITZER: Yes, go ahead. Go ahead - go ahead, attorney general, go ahead and add to that.

FROSH: Thank you, Wolf.

We think they're wrong on the facts, they're wrong on the law. They don't cite actual payments from foreign governments to any president. And the law that they argue for is absurd. What essentially they're saying is that President Trump can stand right here and have his business hat on and take payments from China and Russia and everybody else in the world, but when he stands one foot to the side and has his president hat on, he's prohibited. The point of the emoluments clause is to prohibit, to stop presidential corruption, to put the president in a position where he can't be bought or sold. And their argument would just blow a cannon ball-size hole through the emoluments clause.

BLITZER: And you specifically, Attorney General Racine, you specifically refer to the Trump International Hotel on Pennsylvania Avenue, right down the street from the White House as a source of what you consider to be a violation of the emolument's clause. Explain.

RACINE: Sure, Wolf. And I know you're a native Washingtonian. You know and I know exactly what is going on down there at that hotel. Literally countries are swarming the Trump Hotel and are fawning over themselves to give foreign country money to the Trump business so that they can curry favor with the administration. I've never seen anything like it. I would add that I understand that the Trump Hotel has hired a diplomatic concierge to further encourage and facilitate and encourage that kind of business. This is a direct violation of the emoluments clause and it's happening in our backyard.

BLITZER: Well, what about in the state of Maryland, Attorney General Frosh? How does this impact a business, for example, in your state?

FROSH: So we have businesses that compete with the hotels in the District of Columbia and including the Trump post office hotel. The central point, though, is that if the president can be induced to receive payments from one source, a state, a country, he can disfavor another. And that's what we're fighting to stop.

[13:29:57] The sad fact is that President Trump is profiteering from the office of the president. He doubled the fees at Mar-a-Lago, his resort in Florida, from $100,000 to $200,000 after he was elected president. After he was elected president, he raised the prices of