hello. i'm wolf blitzer in washington. we begin with major breaking news. new indictments in the russia investigation,. just moments ago, the deputy attorney general of the united states, rod rosenstein, announced that 12 senior russian military officers have been indicted for trying to interfere with the 2016 presidential election here in the united states. >> 11 of the defendants are charged with conspireing to hack into computers, steal documents, and release those documents with

the intent to interfere in the election. one of those defendants and a 12th military officer are charged with conspireing to infiltrate computers of organizations involved in administering elections, including state boards of election, secretaries of state, and companies that supply software used to administer elections. >> let's bring in evan perez and also matthew chance, yowho's in helsinki. evan, walk us through this indictment and the specific organizations and the russian individuals involved. >> that's right. this indictment actually names the names of 12 military intelligence officers from russia who worked for the gru, which is the russian military

intelligence unit. the indictment actually lists their names. it also lists the unit they worked for in moscow, describes some of their communications as they went through trying to essentially hijack computer servers around the world using cryptocurrencies to try to hide their tracks. they broke into the dnc. they broke into the dccc as well as people associated with the clinton campaign. obviously this is the central focus of what robert mueller's investigation is all about, which is to try to figure out what happened in the 2016 election, what were the russians up to. what we don't see in this indictment is any indication or any names of any americans who were participating or who may have known anything about this. as a matter of fact, the deputy attorney general in his press conference behind me here just in the last hour made clear. he said there's no allegation in this indictment that any american was a knowing participate in alleged unlawful activity or knew that they were

communicating with russian intelligence officers. this investigation is obviously still ongoing, wolf, but one of the things that i think in reading this indictment that comes across is it's clear that the fbi, the intelligence agencies here in the united states have a great deal of communications that were going on between the russians as well as some of the unnamed people that they were communicating with, somebody who was in close touch with senior members of the trump campaign. there was a journalist who was communicating with them to get some of the stolen e-mails that the russians had hacked into. there's also an allegation in here about the russians' ability to hack into state boards of election. the election supervisors, the basics of the way the american election systems work. they stole the identities of 500,000 voters in the united states. now, we don't know what they did. the indictment doesn't say what they did with that information. they do make clear that they do

not believe that this changed any of the vote counts. but clearly, wolf, the timing of this indictment as the president is preparing for his summit meeting with vladimir putin in helsinki in just a couple of days, he's obviously said that he's going to raise this issue with the russian leader. here the justice department has laid out in plain language exactly who in the russian military intelligence units were behind these activities, and we'll see whether or not this is something that the president is able to bring up with the russian leader. wolf? >> we'll see how that unfolds. thanks very much. i want to bring in congressman adam schiff, the ranking member of the house intelligence committee. we've just learned that the top democrat in the senate, chuck schumer, has just called on the president to cancel the summit with putin on monday in helsinki given the enormity of these allegations in this indictment. what do you think? >> well, i agree with him. in particular because none of us

have any confidence in what he'll say during that meeting. it has to be of concern, i think, to all americans that the president wants this meeting to take place out of the earshot of any witnesses. and the president, by framing it that, okay, i'll ask putin about it, we don't need to ask putin about it. the evidence is ironclad. that's not how you confront someone, by questioning whether it took place or what the russians may have done. we know the russians did it, and now it's spelled out again in excruciating detail. this is the thing that leaps out at me about this indictment, which is again the intelligence community has blessed sharing very detailed information about what we know about different members of the gru and what the responsibilities are and when they took certain actions and what computers they used and where they used them. that's information they do not like to share, but i'm sure they feel and they're quite right about this. it's important that we let americans know that the proof is unequivocal.

it's important we let the russians know this. so yes, i think he ought to cut his losses with this disastrous trip to europe, not make it worse by a friendly meeting with vladimir putin on the heels of yet another indictment of russia. >> because the specifics in this indictment are enormous. they name names. the u.s. intelligence community hates to do that. they think it could compromise future intelligence operations. they go through point by point. it's one thing to say the russians interfered. it's another thing to bring it up with all this specific detail. >> exactly. what i've been looking at in these indictments, like the last indictment, is both what they include and what they don't include. here in the first indictment on the social media campaign, there was no mention of the hacking and dumping operation. so this indictment was foreseeable. we knew this was coming. but here, there's no mention, for example, of the russians communicating with papadopoulos. now, i'm going through this indictment in realtime, but i

haven't found any mention of that yet. why is that excluded, that the russians approached the trump campaign, letting them know that they had these documents that are spelled out in this indictment? the reason you wouldn't include that is if there may be more charges you wanted to bring later that do involve u.s. persons. so this still doesn't resolve the question of whether u.s. persons were knowingly involved. all the attorney general -- deputy attorney general said today is there are no allegations about that in this dooi indictment. >> listen to what the president said just a few hours ago at that joint news conference with prime minister theresa may as what he always describes as this rigged russian witch hunt. listen to this. >> i think that we're being hurt very badly by the, i would call it, witch hunt. i would call it the rigged witch hunt. i think that really hurts our country and really hurts our relationship with russia. i think that we would have a chance to have a very good relationship with russia and a

very good chance -- a very good relationship with president putin. >> what's your reaction when you hear that? >> this is exactly why he should not go to this meeting with putin. he is basically undercutting the work of our own intelligence agencies, throwing it open to question, suggesting that this is all a witch hunt. that is complete music to putin's ears. and on the heels of bashing our allies in europe to go to a meeting with putin in this kind of a subservient way to the interests of the kremlin would be disastrous to our national interests. the problem is not the investigation. the problem is that we have a president of the united states unwilling to confront our enemies and adversaries but who gratuitously attacks our allies. that's the problem. that's the threat to our country, not the good work of bob mueller. >> rod rosenstein said he briefed the president on this indictment earlier in the week. so how do you explain if the president was fully aware that

these 12 senior russian gru military intelligence operatives were going to be named specifically and all thee se details in this lengthy document were going to be released, how do you explain the president calling it a rigged witch hunt, the whole mueller probe? >> because his argument about witch hunt has nothing to do with facts. he's not so oblivious he doesn't realize that. this is all marketing for him. if he says it enough, if he says no collusion, no collusion, no collusion, which he repeats in threes like a mantra, maybe he can make the country or at least enough of it believe him. and certainly on the state-run tv that fox has become, they'll parrot his talking points. but this is precisely it. he has to be aware of what the exacts are. he believes if you deny it -- and in the world of donald trump, it served him well. in the world of donald trump, if you deny something, you'll not only not have a problem, but it

didn't happen. it literally makes the facts go away. that's what he's practicing. >> it's really the timing of this, from my perspective. on the eve of this potentially historic summit with putin and the president in helsinki, the deputy attorney general working with robert mueller releases all this damning information about russia's alleged interference in the u.s. presidential election. what do you make of the timing of this? >> the concern i had initially in listening to rod rosenstein talk about how he gave the president a heads up about this indictment, is this is no ordinary criminal case. this is a criminal case that potentially implicated the president and people around him on his company. to have the justice department giving a preview of an indictment to someone who has an interest in the indictment is problematic. but i do think in this case when the president of the united states is going into a meeting with the russian leader, you

don't let the president of the united states go in blindly. now, if this indictment had involved u.s. persons affiliated with his campaign, then it's a different story. but i think the justice department made the right decision to give him a heads up so he didn't go into that meeting with putin blind sided. but nonetheless, knowing this, the president knowing that there's unequivocal proof that the russians hacked our institutions, to go into this summit and continue to make these comments so favorable to putin and the russians is utterly inexplicable from the perspective of u.s. national security interests. it can only be explained by the fact that donald trump has a single ideology that trumps everything else, and that is the ideology of self. >> i want to point out rosenstein did say, and i'm quoting, there's no allegation in this indictment that the americans knew they were corresponding with russian intelligence officers. how significant is that?

>> you know, he said essentially the same thing in the last indictment, which is a very narrow legalistic way of saying we didn't include those allegations here, but we might include them in the next indictment. we can practically count down the amount of time it's going to take the president to say, i'm vindicated. the deputy attorney general has said there's no evidence that u.s. persons in my campaign were involved. of course, that's not what rod rosenstein is saying at all. >> didn't take very long for the president's advisers and supporters to say he's been vindicated by this indictment. mayor rudy giuliani, the former mayor, the president's personal lawyer, just tweeted this. i'll read it. the indictments rod rosenstein announced are good news for all americans. the russians are nailed. no americans are involved. time for mueller to end this pursuit of the president and say president trump is depletely innocent. that's rudy giuliani, obviously speaking for the president. he's his lawyer. >> i'm saying this in jest. they could be walking the

president away in handcuffs and rudy giuliani would say he's been vindicated. but only partly in jest. >> bottom line in all of this, when you read this indictment, all these documents, you're on the intelligence committee, you're briefed. you're in the zbang gang of eig they say. did anything surprise you? >> nothing surprises me in this. the only thing that really strikes me about it is just the extraordinary level of detail. you know, i, what do we need to basically dry up whatever sources the americans have. but no, this indictment was, i think, expected. and the question is will the next indictment go to the heart of what the russians told george papadopoulos? will it go to the heart of what was involved in the trump tower meeting? i think those are the questions

that are teed up by this indictment. >> we know the u.s. intelligence community believes the russians are planning to do the same thing in the midterm elections coming up in november. >> and on that, wolf, if i can just add, because i'm glad the indictment goes into this because most americans are not aware of this and should be. not only was the dnc hacked and clinton's campaign manager hacked, the dccc was hacked. the russians played in house races, which means that if they followed playbook from the last cycle, they'll play in the midterms. we obviously need to be doing everything we can to protect against that. >> u.s. intelligence community believes one of the main objectives of the russians was to sow dissent here in the united states. they clearly achieved that. thanks for joining us. >> thanks, wolf. >> adam schiff, the ranking member of the house intelligence committee. i want to get reaction. matthew chance is our correspondent already in helsinki, finland, getting ready for the summit, assuming it'll still take place on monday between presidents trump and putin. matthew, what are you hearing?

>> reporter: well, we're still assuming, first of all, that this summit will go ahead three days from now because we haven't heard anything otherwise to contradict that from the white house. and of course, it would involve a massive about turn by the u.s. president, for him to take the evidence presented today and say, okay, enough is enough, and i'm really going to hold russia over the fire for this. he certainly hasn't had that attitude so far, calling it a witch hunt, which by the way is exactly the same language, amazingly that, the kremlin uses when it describes these allegations. i've spoken to them time and again about this. i've been texting the kremlin tonight on my cell phone, trying to get some response. they haven't got back to me yet. i'll bring that to you as soon as they do. but i can predict what they're going to say, which is that this is politically motivated and that this is an attempt by the enemies of russia to make it look bad on the international stage. as far as they're concerned, this summit is still very much going ahead. and remember, this isn't the

only controversy hanging over this summit. you know, it's been a summit that was proposed and set up with a whole kind of laundry list of terrible controversies hanging over it. the u.s. election meddling is just one of them. the recent poisoning with a russian nerve agent inside the united kingdom, which killed a british citizen. the downing of mh-17 in 2014 over the boarder between ukraine and russia. another controversy. the annexation of crimea. the list just goes on, but despite all of that, the white house, president trump has set up this meeting with his russian counterpart, vladimir putin, and as far as everybody's concerned here in helsinki, that meeting is still very much going ahead, wolf. >> matthew chance in helsinki, thank you very much. that meeting scheduled for monday. much more on all the breaking news coming up. i'm going to be speaking live with someone who was hacked allegedly by the russians directly. the clinton campaign chairman

john podesta is standing by live. we'll get his reaction to this bombshell of news right after this. i was on the fence about changing from a manual to an electric toothbrush. but my hygienist said going electric could lead to way cleaner teeth. she said, get the one inspired by dentists, with a round brush head. go pro with oral-b. oral-b's gentle rounded brush head removes more plaque along the gum line. for cleaner teeth and healthier gums. and unlike sonicare, oral-b is the first electric toothbrush brand accepted by the ada for its effectiveness and safety. what an amazing clean! i'll only use an oral-b! oral-b. brush like a pro.

your hair is so soft! did you use head and shoulders two in one? i did mom. wanna try it? yes. it intensely moisturizes your hair and scalp and keeps you flake free. manolo? look at my soft hair. i should be in the shot now too. try head and shoulders two in one. but if something happened to you... you need life insurance!

and chances are selectquote can get it for you for under a dollar a day! selectquote found michael, 38, a $500,000 policy for under $23 a month. selectquote found anna, 37, a $750,000 policy for under $22 a month. selectquote's secret? they comparison shop select group of great companies like these for your best rate. give your family the security they need... at a price you can afford. since 1985, selectquote has saved over a million families millions of dollars on life insurance. call the number on your screen. or go to selectquote.com. discover what over a million families know. we shop. you save. my dbut now, i take used tometamucil every day.sh it traps and removes the waste that weighs me down,

so i feel lighter. try metamucil, and begin to feel what lighter feels like.

more now on the indictment today of 12 senior russian military officials accused of interfering in the 2016 u.s. presidential election. one of the accounts the russians are accused of hacking belonged to then hillary clinton campaign chairman john podesta. he's joining us on the phone now. give us your reaction to today's indictments. >> well, wolf, look, i think from the beginning at the heart of this matter were crimes that were committed against individual citizens, including myself, but what's more

important, crimes committed against the american democracy. i'm pleased that there's enough criminal evidence to bring an indictment, and whether or not we'll ever see any of those individuals brought to justice is a different question because obviously i think vladimir putin, who ordered this operation, will try to protect them, keep them in russia. but i think it's an important step and shows that at the heart of the mueller investigation is a set of serious questions and as i said, at the heart of it is criminal activity that occurred by the russian government. the president will have the opportunity to confront president putin with that when he sees him on monday. i don't hold out too much hope that he'll take this any more seriously than he has over the last 18 months. >> it's interesting that it

wasn't just you, your e-mail, your computer was hacked, but the indictment charges that these russian military intelligence officers, they hacked the presidential campaign of hillary clinton, the democratic national committee, the democratic congressional campaign committee, which works to elect democrats to congress, and they used that information, the hacked information, they used it under the names d.c. leaks and guccifer 2.0 and through another entity as well. the specific details in this indictment are really amazing. i know you haven't read the entire document, but it's very impressive the way they re-created step by step by step, john, what happened to you and others. >> yeah, i think, wolf, that we've known the general outlines of this from intelligence reports going back to right after the election and indeed from the letter that intelligence the community issued even in advance of the election that the russians who

are up to no good here, and we've known the general outline, but this is quite specific. they've done the forensics, and obviously they believe they have the proof to prove the charges against these actors. you know, the president likes to describe mueller's operation as a witch hunt. well, they've caught the witches here, and i hope at some point that they will actually be brought to justice. >> one final question, john, before i let you go. rod rosenstein, the deputy attorney general also said, and i'm quoting him, there's no allegation in this indictment that the americans knew they were corresponding with russian intelligence officers. what's your reaction to that, that there were americans who were communicating with guccifer 2.0 and these other fake organizations, but they didn't know these organizations were being run by the russian military intelligence unit? >> well, quite frankly, that's -- i take that with some

skepticism since the independent experts who looked at the hacks, particularly the dnc hack early on in july of 2016 identified guccifer 2.0 and identified d.c. leaks as russian operations. closely tied to gru units operating there. so if they didn't know, that was willful ignorance on their part. but we'll have to wait and see whether mr. mueller believes that anybody else committed crimes. you know, again, he's played things pretty close to his chest, but i think time will tell. and if there's actually the capacity to have a trial, we'll learn more about who knew what and when. >> yeah, don't hold your breath, john, for these 12 russian military intelligence operatives who are all presumably in russia

right now, to be extradited or voluntarily come to the united states. >> if i were them, i wouldn't probably be, you know, taking a vacation in cyprus this summer. >> yeah, i suspect you're right. john podesta, thank you very much. gloria borger, let me get your analysis, your reaction. it's a pretty startling development, the details contained in this document. >> first of all, the forensics are amazing. secondly, i think that we're learning details in this that we really didn't know before. the white house reaction to this is that no american citizen -- there's nothing in this indictment that says an american citizen created a crime or did a crime. >> hold on a second. mark warner is reacting. >> i want to start by commending special prosecutor mueller for his work . to date, 23 indictments, 5 guilty pleas, and now direct

evidence of russian agents interfering in our elections by hacking the democratic national committee, the democratic congressional campaign committee, the e-mails of john podesta, and interfering in over 20 states' lector systems. my hope would be that the president and his allies would cease and desist from calling the mueller investigation a witch hunt. as a matter of fact, this morning we saw something remarkable. the president was questioned in the uk why relations with russia are at a bad state. and he replied because of the mueller investigation. no, mr. president, the reason why relations with russia are difficult is because russia and its agents interfered dramatically in the 2016 elections. so going forward, there should be no one-on-one meeting between this president and mr. putin. there needs to be other americans in the room. secondly, if the president and

his team are not willing to make the facts of this indictment a top priority of the meeting in helsinki, then the summit should be canceled. next, on the question of election security, the congress has been working in a bipartisan way to make sure our election system is safe in 2018. as a matter of fact, we had hearings just this past week. but what we've lacked is any meaningful involvement from the administration and this white house. there needs to be someone designated in the white house to work with the congress, to make sure in a bipartisan way we keep our electin systems safe and secure in 2018 and on a going forward basis. finally, these indictments today further reflect the need for us to have strong alliances. matter of fact, on monday senator rubio and i are meeting

with parliamentarians from other countries to discuss tactics. we need to have this administration stop calling our allies adversaries and trying to treat our adversaries like friends. it's time for the country to step up in a bipartisan way to make sure that what happened in 2016 doesn't ever happen again. >> senator, what are you concerned about, having a one-on-one meeting between president trump and putin? what specifically is driving your concern to say they should not meet alone? >> i've been concerned for some time that the president's ad hoc style of going into meetings and winging it isn't appropriate, particularly when you're dealing with someone like vladimir putin, who's been on the world stage for 20 years, former kgb agent. he will come in with his facts, with maps, and i'm afraid that actually the president could be taken advantage of. equally important is i want to make sure that other americans

hear that the president makes this issue of russian interference a priority in the meeting and it's not something that's simply sloughed off with a quick response from putin saying he didn't do anything. and that's why if he and his team are not willing to make the subject of this indictment of russian interference a top priority in helsinki, then the meeting should be canceled. >> all right. so we're going to continue to monitor senator mark warner there, vice chairman of the senate intelligence committee. he wants that summit meeting canceled. others, chuck schumer, would like to see it canceled. adam schiff just told us a few minutes ago he would like to see that meeting canceled. gloria, i suspect it's not going to be canceled. >> no, no. but maybe you'll wind up with some other people in the room aside from the president of the united states. but it's hard to know. the president makes those decisions. the white house response to this

is to say that, you know, there's no allegation that any american citizen committed a crime. that is what rod rosenstein said. but as you read this indictment, it's not just american citizens they're talking about. they're talking about people who are affiliated with the trump campaign who had communications with guccifer 2.0. whether or not they knew that they were dmcommunicating with e russians remains to be seen, but we have some stunning quotes in this indictment. somebody -- one of the -- guccifer writing to a person who is in regular contact with senior members of the trump presidential campaign. guccifer writes, thank you for writing back, did you find anything interesting in the documents i posted? please tell me if i can help you anyhow. what do you think of the info on the turnout model for the democrats' entire presidential campaign? the person responded, pretty standard. what we also know from this,

which i think is interesting new information, is that on july 27th when the president came out and said to the russians, if you have any more information on hillary clinton's e-mails, send it my way, let it be known. that very same day, according to this indictment, the russians began their spear phishing and 76 e-mail addresses at the hillary clinton campaign domain were targeted. >> i think we have a clip along those lines. let's listen. >> russia, if you're listening, i hope you're able to find the 30,000 e-mails that are missing. >> that was the then-candidate during the course of the democratic national convention when he said those words. glen, you're a former federal prosecutor. tell us your reaction to this indictment. >> so wolf, first of all, i

think we need to take a sfep back and talk about what an indictment is and what it isn't. so as a federal prosecutor for 30 years, i spent countless hours in grand juries investigating and indicting criminal cases. an indictment is a determination by the grand jury that there's probable cause to believe these individuals committed these crimes. we all know that when and if we manage to get our hands on and extradite these folks and put them on trial, it will be a much higher standard. >> you don't think that's realistic. >> i think it's unlikely because we don't have an extradition treaty with russia. of course, the president could ask these men be sent to us for trial. we could all speculate how that would end up. but more importantly, i think it's little known that there's a department of justice policy that says when you're investigating a case in the grand jury, if you have evidence that cuts against the guilt of these individuals, you're required to present it. so on the one hand, it's only a probable cause determination.

but on the other hand, these prosecutors, and there are none better than bob mueller's team, would have been responsible to present to the grand jury any evidence that cut against the guilt of these individuals. and yet, what did we see? we saw an indictment returned. the second observation about grand jury indictments i'd like to make is this is yet sort of another intermediate step. the president's lawyer can certainly say he's fully exonerated by this, but i can tell you as a career prosecutor, when we investigate and indict the larger cases, for instance, the racketeer influence corrupt organization cases, it is entirely usual that we return indictments in batches. we either batch defendants together, we batch related offenses together, and i think that is what we're seeing here. i think it can be fairly observed that, you know, this is yet another nail in the witch hunt argument coffin, and there are more indictments to come. >> it's interesting, the white

house deputy press secretary samantha lindsey walters just issued a bunch of statements to the pool of reporters traveling with the president right now in the uk. among other things, she says, the deputy attorney general rod rosenstein said today there's no allegation in this indictment that americans knew they were corresponding with russians. there's no allegation in this indictment that any american citizen committed a crime. there's no allegation that the conspiracy changed the vote count or affected any election result. and then she says, today's charges include no allegations of knowing involvement by anyone on the campaign, no allegations that the alleged hacking affected the election result. this is consistent with what we've been saying all along. >> and i think that's exactly why these indictments are a gift to russia. these statements show the president and his team are so narcissistic that they're focusing on what these indictments aren't. they're not indictments against the president. they're not indictments against his inner circle.

what they're not speaking about in their statements, and the gop made a similar statement from their twitter account, is the fact that russians attackedour country, and the president went to brussels, refused to call the russians an enemy. he called them a competitor. he's going to meet vladimir putin. i think that putin's actually happy these indictments came out because there's a very strong chance that the president is going to continue to apologize to vladimir putin and say, i don't believe the justice department, i'm sorry these came out when they did, instead of saying we have incontrovertible evidence that was so clear that we indicted members of the gru, like president trump did back in march, and say these are the consequences for your actions, rather than saying, all right, i raised it, he said he didn't do it, and walking away. >> where's the president saying, by the way, great work of the justice department for being able to track this down? i haven't heard that. >> while we would expect the

president to say this, i don't think mueller really cares. >> no, i don't think he does. >> we didn't see him in these two huge indictments, these announcements of these two massive indictments. we have not seen mueller. it's always been rod rosenstein. that's the position i think mueller is going to continue to take. we may never see mueller speak on this. the other thing, this is an important day for the fbi. it's an important day for the department of justice, people who have worked years on this case should feel some vindication. they probably do. this was a big investigation for the fbi. this is their intelligence. this is their work. and they are, you know -- despite the fact the president continues to call this a witch hunt, this is the important stuff that's going on in the special counsel's investigation. >> i think there's a few different really important things that come out from this indictment. first of all, it's important the individuals who are indicted are russian military intelligence. so this was not just sort of any kind of side operation that was going on. this was something that was

centrally -- this was a strategic effort on the part of russian military intelligence that would have ultimate direction from the president of russia to direct this activity against u.s. elections. another key point, i think, is the use of false identities. gloria mentioned guccifer 2.0. that and d.c. leaks, which many americans think may have thought was an activist organization comprised of americans. these are false identities. as we go forward into the 2018 midterms and future elections, it's so important that we take more strong efforts, as senator warner was describing, to address these election threats. these are false identities online. they were in communication with individuals who thought that they were other americans. and in fact, they were involved in this hacking effort. the other piece is there were thousands of e-mails and

communications that were stolen from the dnc, from hillary clinton's campaign, personal office, and so there is a huge -- this was not only an attack on influencing the election, but there are many people who were involved in these campaigns who had all of their personal and professional communications stolen by the russian government. so the president's unwillingness to have an actual statement, he comments on so many issues yet has no statement on this national security threat as well as the long-term lack of strategy, i think, going forward is the big national security and foreign policy issue. >> d.c. leaks, guccifer 2.0. in the world of espionage and the intelligence community, they would call them cut-outs. >> well, in this case, i think they were actually -- it sounds like they were actually part of the conspiracy. so d.c. leaks -- well, there's an unnamed entity, which we

might take to be wikileaks. it's not named in the indictment but probably is wikileaks. that is more of a cut-out, where they work with the intelligence service providing the information. these individuals were really false identities who were intelligence officers or intelligence assets themselves. >> susan, you're our newest contributor. welcome to cnn. you spent a lot of time in russia. how do you think this indictment will impact the monday summit? >> well, it's very interesting, isn't it, to see the democrats very quickly coming out presenting a united front and suggesting that president trump should not go. remember, this is a summit that president trump himself set up. he invited vladimir putin even to the white house in that famous do not congratulate phone call back in march. trump has his heart set on this. what i find extraordinary amid the revelations contained in this indictment today are that the president was briefed on this before he went to europe, and yet has persisted not only in calling this a witch hunt, an alleged witch hunt, even knowing

that this indictment was coming through. he has also made repeated public statements in the last couple days attacking our allies, but also saying his meeting with putin is going to be a cake walk, it's going to be the easiest part of his trip. there's no problem. there doesn't need to be a specific agenda. earlier today he was asked by cnn's correspondent, would you raise the issue of election meddling? again, he news this indictment was coming out. he chose to respond, yelwell, y but he's probably not going to say much about it. this is extroaordinary. president putin, remember, is a career counterintelligence officer. this indictment is the stuff, you know, that vladimir putin was trained in the soviet version of. he's going to look at the timing of this release. he's going to look very carefully at the white house statements, the fact they're acting more as president trump's lawyer than saying this is the statement of the government of the united states. and he, i think, is going to

correctly believe that the president is coming to meet with him essentially at war with his own intelligence agency's finding, at war with his own justice department. so it's a very damaging message, i think, that it sends. i think putin and his advisers are certainly savvy enough to get the message. >> usually but not always when putin is being hit, he hits right back in a very similar, if not even more powerful way. >> you know, wolf, it's a great point. the thing that vladimir putin and donald trump have in common among other things is that they're both very zero-sum people. putin sees the world as i win, you lose. you hit me, we always respond. that is the heart and doctrine of republican national -- i mean russian national security doctrine. i think that right now, does anyone here really think that president trump is going to go and punch vladimir putin in the nose? >> last time we had these indictments, the treasury department followed up and issued a set of sanctions

against individuals associated with the gru. wel will they do a whole lot? no, but they were a step. one of my questions for the administration is are they going to follow up, take the intelligence from the department of justice and issue sanctions against these individuals under presidential authority like they did the last time. >> well, secretary of state pompeo has said he's a believer in the intelligence. so he's going to be there. whether he's going to be in the room right away or in the room afterwards, we don't know the choreography. >> there's two different foreign policies of the american government right now. so there is, you know, the foreign policy of our bureaucracy, our state department, our treasury department. by many naccounts, they've take quite tough measures in the year and a half president trump has been in office. arguably, measures that democrats or republicans would have taken forth. then there's the issue the president himself has refused to endorse as recently as hours before this indictment has been revealed. so it's mining the gap, if you will, between the two that's

president putin -- >> i can only imagine how the president of the united states, who's now in the uk, just wrapped up a beautiful meeting with the queen, had some tea, saw all the pomp and circumstance. he's reacting, if he's watching tv right now, and no one's talking about that. we're talking about this. let's take a quick break. we'll be right back.

does your business internet provider promise a lot? let's see who delivers more. comcast business gives you gig-speed in more places. the others don't. we offer up to 6 hours of 4g wireless network backup. everyone else, no way. we let calls from any of your devices come from your business number. them, not so much. we let you keep an eye on your business from anywhere. the others? nope! get internet on our gig-speed network and add voice and tv for $34.90 more per month. call or go on line today.

all right. more on the breaking news. the department of justice here in washington has announced the indictment of 12 senior russian military intelligence officials that are accused of engaging in what was described as a sustained effort to hack democrats' e-mails and computer networks during the presidential election in 2016. it comes just days before president trump is scheduled to meet with the russian president vladimir putin in finland on monday. joining us now, florida republican congressman frances rooney. congressman, thanks so much for joining us. i don't know if you just heard senator mark warner, chuck schumer, adam schiff, they're all saying this indictment should result in the end of not only the president calling this a witch hunt, this russia probe, but that the president should basically cancel the summit with putin on monday. what's your reaction? >> well, i can see an argument for doing that. i mean, this is a pretty outrageous step up in the nature of the conflict to go from a bunch of russian business people

that we figured were part of the government to really very hard line with russia. >> do you think the president should meet with putin monday in helsinki? >> if he does, i hope they'll have what they call note takers with them, perhaps the ambassador, and they reaffirm our commitment to nato, energy independence in europe, and make the point we do not like the fact that russia took over crimea and the marginalizing the people down there. the president is still calling the mueller probe, even today, as recently as a few hours ago, a rigged witch hunt. what's your reaction to that? >> in the sense we haven't found any direct collusion between the campaign and the russian efforts

to destabilize our country i guess you could say there's no evidence. they haven't found anything on that -- >> but the investigation clearly is still under way. we don't know what the outcome is going to be. but do you have confidence that mueller, rosenstein, that entire team they know what thaw're doing and should pursue all the leads? >> we talked about that before, mueller has a stellar reputation as a prosecutor, and we should see what happens. if he has the goods or not. the goods he came up with today were pretty serious. >> very serious indeed, were you surprised by the details in the indictment of the 12 russia military operatives and specifically how they used these fake organizations to try to penetrate the dnc, the hillary clinton campaign, no republican organizations were included in

this clearly. >> i think the same guccifer was used if first time around with the other people diindicted. i'm not surprised by the careful investigation headed up by a professional like moouueller. >> i recommend to our viewers they go online and read the indictment. thanks for joining us. >> thanks for having me. i know you have a lot going on. >> we do, every day we have a lot going on at cnn. we'll take another quick break. much more right after this.

we're just a couple of days away from president trump's historic summit with the russian president vladimir putin, fop democrats are calling on the president to cancel that meeting after the announcement that 12 senior military officers have

been indicted as part of special counsel robert mueller's investigation. william cone is with us, former congress member secretary of defense. let me get your quick reaction to this -- the nature of this indictment. >> number one, i would not have arranged for a summit with president putin given all of his activities which have been undermining the united states for some time, and that of our allies. i wouldn't cancel it either, number two. but i would make sure there was no private meeting without a record of what was said between president trump and president putin. >> the first meeting would be one on one with only their interpreters. >> i would like president trump to do what he did to the allies -- our nato allies, he engaged in the public shaming of our allies rather than taking it behind closed doors and saying i looked at these numbers you're

not measuring up. and then go in public and say we had a good conversation. that is the way you conduct diplomacy. if he would do that with putin, it wouldn't go over well, and i know he wouldn't do it. >> tom donlin what's your reaction? >> i would not have the summit. in terms of the one on one meeting -- >> if you were advising this president, you would tell him cancel it? >> i wouldn't have prepared it in the first place, there was no goals, it wasn't done with the allies. and he's never come to grips with the entire list of active hostility against the united states by the russian fr federation, directed by president putin. what's extraordinary about the indictment here today is it's part of a multi-dimensional, comp men sieve effort to

undermine the election. >> this shouldn't come as a surprise. the team around him, condemned the russians for firing digital bullets into the heart of our democracy. they came to that conclusion. this isn't a surprise that the grand jury said we agree with your intelligence community as opposed to the president doesn't agree with them. >> totally agree with that. we had the intelligence community january 2017 come out and say the russians attempted to interfere in the election. you had the senate intelligence committee last week endorse those conclusions, so not a surprise. but the details and the timing are aroun are important. i would not go fwrard with this, i don't think the president has come to grips with the full range of things that have been done. >> the president repeatedly blames president obama for crimea including today the news

conference with theresa may he said it was done under president obama's watch. he's to blame. >> president obama led an international effort against the russian federation for their annexation of crimea. you had ukraine, the shoot down of m 8217, huh the use of nerve agents on uk soil, the russians supplying the taliban in afghanistan against our forces. the president has not come to grips with this. today, i think mr. secretary would agree, the president has been briefed on these indictments and yet still went and spoke in a warm away about putin and what the prospects were. >> he refuses to say the russians are a foe. he says they're a competitor. >> what he refuses to do is accept the intelligence of his own intelligence departments. and has said, i believe, president putin. he strongly denies it, i believe

him. the notion of the press says are you going to raise the issue? it is folly to keep asking the question. mr. putin is going to say you invited me into your election, do you remember that? you invited me to get into hillary clinton's e-mails. i tried to help you, this shouldn't come as a surprise, but i'll deny it. i'll deny it for the sake of public appearance. >> this disconnect between the president and the intelligence community and his other advisers is really extraordinary at this point. he is really out there alone, right, and kind of denying the uniformed views of the united states government. >> those adviser that is he has will be in helsinki with him? >> i would have more confidence in the meeting if someone were in the room. why would you want to raise those kind of suspicions in the context of this meeting, number one. number two, vladimir putin has

been essentially the head of russia for 20 years and before that, 16 years experience as a kgb agent. i think in terms of experience, skill, it's an overmatch. >> and putin wants relief from the sanctions be, which he shouldn't get. he wants the president to endorse the annexation of crimea. >> if i were the baltics i'd be concerned about this, they're russian speaking they should be part of the old russian empire. i think what the president hasn't grasped is putin is an enemy of democracy. but i think president trump has