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tv   Wolf  CNN  August 17, 2018 10:00am-11:00am PDT

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taking jardiance with a sulfonylurea or insulin may cause low blood sugar. tell your doctor about all the medicines you take and if you have any medical conditions. isn't it time to rethink your type 2 diabetes medication? ask your doctor about jardiance- and get to the heart of what matters. hello. i'm jim sciutto in for wolf blitzer. 1:00 p.m. here in washington. wherever you're watching from around the world, thanks very much for joining us. show of force, a dozen of america's former senior intelligence officials uniting and rising up against the president's security clearance moves. this as we learn there are even more to come. plus, the president cancelling his own plan for a military parade. hear who and what he blames for the sudden reversal. and disturbing word from the pentagon that china is likely training pilots to target the u.s. with missions involving
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long-range bombers. right now, we are watching for a verdict in the paul manafort trial. jurors are working through their second day of deliberations in a virginia courthouse. this before leaving for the day, yesterday, when they asked the judge four questions, including a request to define the meaning of reasonable doubt. they're deciding manafort's fate on some 18 counts of tax evasion, bank fraud, and hiding foreign bank accounts. the verdict also carries implications for special counsel robert mueller's broader russia investigation. president trump, of course, has been calling that investigation a witch hunt, and he's been applying pressure to wrap it up. a short time ago, trump was asked point-blank about manafort's fate. >> i don't talk about that now. i don't talk about that. i think the whole manafort trial is very sad. when you look at what's going on there, i think it's a very sad day for our country. he worked for me for a very
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short period of time, but you know what, he happens to be a very good person, and i think it's very sad what they've done to paul manafort. >> cnn's jessica schneider is outside the courthouse. in about an hour, the judge is expected to hold a hearing on a release of information that could include the mysterious private conferences held during the trial that we couldn't hear. what are you learning about those? >> reporter: yeah, jim. so this hearing will be at 2:00 p.m. as the jury continues to deliberate here. the judge will hear this motion to unseal the transcripts of some of these secret proceedings. now, this was a motion that was filed by news outlets, including cnn. if it's granted, we might finally get to see what was happening inside the courtroom and up at the judge's bench when all of these secret proceedings were happening. we've seen them several times. at certain times, the court was completely closed off to the public. at other times, the lawyers on both sides went up to the bench
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to talk with the judge. that's when a noise or static machine was turned on so everyone in the courtroom couldn't hear it. so the judge will decide or hear the motions, hear the oral arguments at 2:00 p.m. as to whether or not to unseal these transcripts. if they're unsealed, we might get a glimpse as to what exactly was happening, particularly in what was five hours of secret proceedings on friday. we still have no idea what was happening. it sort of delayed this trial, delayed the closing arguments a bit. one thing, however, we will not see if these transcripts are unsealed, we won't hear any of the mention, and we know there was at least one, of the special counsel's ongoing russia probe. that will remain sealed because obviously it is an ongoing investigation. so jim, that all happens at 2:00 p.m. but all the while, the jury will continue deliberating while the judge is hearing this motion in his courtroom. the jury now going on three hours of deliberations after we saw seven hours yesterday. who knows if they're any closer to coming up with a verdict.
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jim? >> well, they've got 18 counts to consider. jessica schneider there at the courthouse. to politics now and president trump's security clearance hit list. a white house official confirms to cnn that the president may soon strip more former or even current officials of their security clearances, this despite a growing and bipartisan backlash. former cia director john brennan was the first to have his clearance revoked. 13 former senior intelligence officials who have served both republican and democratic presidents have now signed a letter criticizing that move. just a short time ago, the president was asked whether he's trying to silence critics like brennan over the russia investigation. >> if anything, i'm giving them a bigger voice. many people don't even know who he is. now he has a bigger voice, and that's okay with me because i like taking on voices like that. i've never respected him. i've never had a lot of respect. and senator burr said it best. if you knew anything, why didn't
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you report it when you were before all of these committees, including their committee? so he had a chance to report. he never did. this was just came up lately, and it's a disgusting thing, frankly. >> white house correspondent kaitlan collins joins us live from the white house. the white house named nine other officials whose security clearance they say when sarah sanders announced this are under review. do we know who's at the top of the president's hit list now? >> the president named him specifically today, jim. that would be bruce ohr, who's a current justice department official. that makes him a little different than everyone else on that list. he still works at the department of justice. taking away his security clearance, which the president said he's prepared to do rather quickly, calling him a disgrace, would effectively render him unable to do his job. when the white house was asked why they wouldn't just fire him instead of taking away his security clearance, sarah sanders said they didn't have any personnel announcements at this time. what the president did do there as he was boarding marine one is
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draw a direct line between taking away these security clearances and the russia investigation. listen to the president put it in his own words. >> i say it, i say it again. that whole situation is a rigged witch hunt. it's a totally rigged deal. they should be looking at the other side. they are should they should be looking at all the people that got fired by them. they should be looking at all these fbi guys who got fired and demoted. it's a really -- it's not us. it is a rigged witch hunt. i've said it for a long time. >> so the president there lashing out at this investigation. he seems to be using his presidential powers to do so. jim, he seems ready to go after anyone who he believes is involved in this investigation. >> seems to be the case. kaitlan collins, thanks very much. critics say president trump is striking back at his detractors by threatening to revoke those security clearances.
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the president himself drew a direct connection between the russia investigation and his decision to strip john brennan of his clearance. we want to take a closer look at who else is on the president's list. cnn political correspondent sarah murray is here to break it down. one of the commonalities in this seems to be many senior officials who were involved in this invest going back years. >> that's true, jim. some have called it ab enemy's list. if you look at the full scope of everyone who's under review, we obviously know what's happened with brennan already. his clearance has been revoked. let's just move on to this bucket of people who appear to have some kind of tie to the russia investigation. if you start with the former director of national intelligence, james clapper, he's of course one of the people who concluded that russia meddled in the 2016 election at vladimir putin's direction. he's also been falsely accused by house republicans of making public this salacious, now infamous dossier that included so many unfounded allegations against president trump. now, if we move on to james
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comey, he is the former fbi director. he was the first one to inform then president elect trump of the dossier, of the many claims going on around him. and of course trump fired comey. eventually that firing led to the naming of a special counsel to take over the russia investigation. comey's former deputy, the deputy director of the fbi, andrew mccabe, he wrote a memo after comey's firing. he was documenting an apparent meeting he had with his boss, deputy attorney general rod rosenstein, and in that meeting, rod rosenstein apparently recounted a conversation where president trump wanted him to cite the russia investigation when he was giving his reasoning, his rational for why to fire james comey. ultimately, rod rosen sistein d not do that, but andrew mccabe took these memos and turned them over to special counsel investigators. two names we have heard a lot, peter strzok and lisa page. they worked on the investigation for a while until these anti-trump text messages they
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exchanged became public. bruce ohr, this is a name we've been hearing a lot more. here's a current doj official. he's someone who had contact with christopher steele, the man who assembled the dossier, and also had contact with fusion gps. his wife also played a role with fusion gps. this is what the president had to say just today about bruce ohr. >> i think bruce ohr is a disgrace. i suspect i'll be taking it away very quickly. i think that bruce ohr is a disgrace with his wife. for him to be in the justice department and to be doing what he did, that is a disgrace. that is disqualifying for mueller. and mr. mueller has a lot of conflicts also. so you know that. >> if we love move on, these arh people who have ties to the whole michael flynn saga. if you look at susan rice, the
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former national security adviser, she unmasked a number of trump aides in various intelligence intercepts. one of those was michael flynn. if we move on to sally yates, she actually went to the white house and told officials at the white house that she believed mike flynn was compromised because he lied to the vice president as well as others. the one person who is kind of an outlier, michael hayden. he's the only person who did not serve in government during the trump campaign or afterwards. he has been a very vocal trump critic and apparently that meanings his security clearance could also be at risk. >> sarah murray, thanks very much. ill considered and unprecedented. that's how 13 former senior national security officials describe the president's decision to revoke john brennan's security clearance. they call the president's allegations of wrongdoing, quote, baseless. for more on this sharp rebuke, let's bring in bill harlow, co-author of the book "hard
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measures." thanks very much for taking the time. first of all, i understand you have more news. >> that's true. the letter went out yesterday was done in a short period of time. it was sent out to the cia directors, deputy directors and dnis. not all of them got back in a timely fashion. just this morning, we heard back from two more. admiral denny blair and vice admiral burt callen, who have asked to add their names to the list. there are now 15 former senior officials signing on to the letter that was released late last night. >> we should note these officials on this list served both and were appointed by both democratic and republican presidents. you served under both democratic and republican presidents during long service in the cia. the president likes to dismiss these folks, well certainly john brennan, as partisans.
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you've worked under and with these men and women for some time. is that an accurate appraisal? >> not at all. when i worked at the cia for seven years, i couldn't have told you what any of the people there, what their personal politics was all about. this is not about a person. this is about policy. you can disagree with what john brennan has to say, or you can disagree with the way he says it, but he has a right to say what he wants to say now that he's not in government. the u.s. government has a thick manual that gives examples of how you can lift somebody's security clearances. there are reasons why you can take away somebody's security clearance. none of these reasons are saying something that the president doesn't like. some people have said, well, this letter implies that we think the president was trying to stifle john brennan. i don't think that personally. i think the stifling is on other people in government, other people, former government officials who see what's
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happening to john brennan and might dial back what they're saying in order to not risk offending the president. nobody wants to offend the president, but when you're no longer in gho longer in government, you have a right to give your opinion. if it's an opinion which doesn't stand up, let the white house respond to that from the lectern at the briefing room but not by taking away their clearances. >> are you concerned beyond an attempt to stifle free speech that this is also about undermining the credibility of the russia investigation? you heard the president just there again make that charge. but several of the folks on this list, john brennan, head of the cia at the time the assessment was done that russia interfered in the election. part of that assessment was that it was to hurt hillary clinton and help donald trump, an issue the president has never been particularly fond of. james clapper was the director of national intelligence. he's on that list. james comey, of course, was the director of the fbi. he's been fired. he's on that list. are you concerned this is part of the president's intention here? >> i suspect it probably is. i think there's not a single reason why they did what they did. that's certainly part of the
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reason. it helps them undermine the credibility in their mind of investigation. it was also to change the subject. it came right after the difficult press briefing about omarosa's and the "n" word tapes. it's on the eve of potential results of court proceedings in alexandria. so throw up some dust and see if you can confuse the situation a little bit. i think there are a lot of reasons for doing this, none of them good. >> one reason that former officials keep their security clearances is to be consulted if there are issues of national security where their experience might be relevant and valuable. you speak of a guy like mcraven who was commanding special operations forces during the bin laden raid. he raised his hand, said, listen, take mine away. he's been involved in hundreds of raids against terrorists very successfully over time. we did some calculation of the other folks on that list. at least 268 years collectively
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in national security. is that experience relevant to a president when the country is facing threats? >> absolutely. you want the people who are currently in those top jobs at the cia, the dia, the pentagon, to be able to go back to predecessors predecessors and ask questions. people think they're going back and rifling through files. that's not the way it works. their successors invite them in and say, let me brief you an what we're seeing. what do you think? by taking away clearances, you can't do that. >> great to clear that up. that's been a confusion. it gives the option if the president says, listen, admiral mcraven, we have a terrorist operation we're considering, we'd love your counsel on this. we'll brief you. >> have you faced this problem before? how did you deal with it? give us your thoughts.
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they don't have to follow those thought, but if they don't have the clearances, they don't have the option of doing that. >> folks at home might want to know is that the kind of experience they think will make their country safer. bill, thanks for taking the time. njust in, a new poll shows that more than 40% of americans see russia as an enemy. that's up significantly. majority think that the president is too friendly with the kremlin. plus, president trump cancels his own plans for a military parade. hear who and what he's blaming and how the mayor of d.c. is now responding. and a new revelation that could open up the president's long time fixer and lawyer to charges over the payment of stormy daniels. please stand by. okay we need to get
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this just in to cnn. four in ten americans see russia now as an enemy of the united states, according to a new cnn poll. that is the highest share since 1999. let's look at the numbers. 5% view russia as an ally, 18% perceive russia as friendly, 33% unfriendly, 41% say russia is an enemy. as to the president's relationship with russia, 57% think he's too friendly. 4% think he is too tough. 35% say just about right. let's talk about this with democratic congressman rueben gallego of arizona. 57%, nearly six in ten, believe the president is too friendly with russia.
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is that going to affect the president's behavior, relationship with putin? >> i would hope so, but unfortunately, what we've seen that hasn't been the case. you can't blame americans for not trusting russia. they just finished poisoning our allies in great britain. they downed a civilian airliner, a dutch civilian airliner over the ukraine. they're consistently trying to interfere with our elections. americans are naturally recognizing that russia is not our friend. it's our enemy. at the end of the day, we wish that president trump would actually feel the same way instead of trying to suck up to putin as often as we see he does. >> senator rand paul is one of a handful of republican senators who has been making overtures to russia. paul just invited members of the russian legislature here to washington. there's a problem with some of the folks on that list. have a listen. >> the downside is the chairman of each of the committees is banned from coming to the united
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states because of sanctions. so one of the things i'm going to ask the president -- i'm going to talk to the president this weekend -- is i'm going to say, why don't we take people off the least who are in the legisla legislature. >> why take someone off a list to visit the united states who's been sanctioned by the united states government for russia's malign behavior? >> well, because rand paul is just doing the bidding of president trump, and he wants to couch it in some kind of legislative overture. they're on there for a reason. again, this is a country that has invaded sovereign nations, that has taken sovereign land, trying to claim it as their own, has funded, you know, third-party movements against other democratic nations, has downed airliners, has attacked our elections, and a sitting u.s. senator wants to treat them as if they're some normal other state. it's ridiculous. and the only reason someone like senator rand paul would do that is because he wants to carry
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water for the president. >> we should also note russian lawmakers not exactly free in democratic elections there. to call them equivalents of american lawmakers is not quite equivalent. i want to ask you about the president's planned military parade, which we learned just in the last 24 hours has been delayed. the mayor of washington, d.c., is hitting back at president trump who blamed basically d.c. for this. she says the president blamed local d.c. politicians for the cancellation of it slated for november, claiming the president -- that d.c. had inflated the cost. that was followed up by this tweet by muriel bowser. first of all, do you think the
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president is correct or can back up that this is democrats, particularly local democratic politicians who are responsible for cancelling this parade? >> no, in typical form the reason it's being canceled is because the price did go up. we talked about this on the armed services committee. i actually introduced legislation to try to ban this, knowing this would end up costing millions of dollars more, and in general it's a total affront to democracy. the fact he's blaming a woman for his, you know, shortfalls, again, is not surprising at all. he ended up pulling out because he realized that $90 million and after the american allegiance said don't spend this money, he pulled out. tell him to go to a base. he's a commander in chief. he has the right to do this on a base. but don't be rolling tanks down capitol hill as if we're some third world nation. that's ridiculous. >> congressman, thanks for taking the time. >> thank you. right now, a jury is
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deciding the fate of former trump campaign chairman paul manafort. did the do their questions to the judge give us a hint at which way they're leaning? plus, a stunning pentagon report suggests china may be training its pilots to target the u.s. for bombing. the details of that report ahead. -if you told me a year ago where i'd be right now...
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keeping our eyes on the paul manafort trial. right now the jury in its second day of deliberations. they're weighing a verdict on 18 counts of tax evasion, bank fraud, and hiding foreign bank accounts. yesterday they asked the judge four questions, including a request to define again the meaning of reasonable doubt. laura coates is a cnn legal analyst. gl glen, if i could start with you, these kinds of questions, jury comes back says, hey, judge, what exactly does reasonable doubt mean? does that signal to you as an experienced prosecutor either way as to where they're leaning? >> no, it is one of the most commonly asked questions by jurors after they retire to deliberate. the concept of having to decide an issue beyond a reasonable doubt is just not something we apply in our every day lives. you're sitting down with your family, trying to decide where to go for vacation, you don't
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typically use beyond a reasonable doubt to make that decision. but jurors are told in order to convict somebody, they must find guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, not to an absolute certainty, not to a scientific certainty, or a mathematical certainty. if they have doubt for which they can give a reason based on the presence or absence of evidence in the case, then they should not vote guilty. so it's an alien concept to most jurors, which is why they often ask a jung fdge for additional guidance. >> we heard from the defense attorneys yesterday after these questions came in. just the idea they didn't return a snap verdict, they said this is good for us, that kind of thing. on the flip side, it strikes me. i sat in that courtroom for a few days last week. it's 18 counts. they're quite complicated things for a layman to deal with here. bank fraud and foreign bank accounts and ownership percentages, that kind of thing. when you see a case like this, would you expect a jury to take some time? >> i would. you have 18 counts, all these elements built in. if the ostrich jacket is the
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sexiest thing you're going to present, it's a very dry case, a very document heavy case. in fact, there are thousands of pages of documents they have to go through. you can't just go back to the jury and say, let's take a poll, who wants to find him guilty and who wants to find him not guilty? you have to go through each element of the crime in order to do your actual judicial service. i'm not surprised by that. what i am surprised by is how they got right to the meat of the matter pretty quickly, asking more nuanced questions aside from the reasonable doubt question about things like, well, what are the requirements if you have 50% ownership of a particular account or you have different delegative duties with it. they're trying to really think about the nuances of these highly complex areas of law, and they're doing at this point an indication they're really plugged in. >> one of the interesting parts of this case is you've had a lot of these bench conferences. that happens in a lot of trials. but these had to be kept secret because of the content. the judge is hearing a motion to unseal parts of those
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conferences. of course, it's secret, so we don't know what's in it, but what kinds of things might be revealed if he decides to unseal them? are we talking about stuff likely to be related to mueller's russia investigation, or could it just be details about this bank fraud case? >> i think there are two strong possibilities. one is they're talking about ongoing investigations. rick gates, as we all know, is probably a player as a witness in the mueller investigation beyond this paul manafort trial. so you know, that may be something that the judge may keep under seal, even when this trial concludes because he won't want to interfere with any ongoing investigation of the mueller team. the second likely candidate is they're talking about juror issues. there's really no need for the public to hear about the ins and outs of maybe what jurors have been exposed to. often we're talking about juror scheduling issues, the juror has a doctor's appointment so they have to alter maybe the schedule
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moving forward to accommodate a juror. so those are the two things we most often see take place at side bars. they become sealed by the judge. sometimes the judge unseals them at the conclusion of the trial, and sometimes he or she doesn't. >> one question we might learn today. laura, glen, thanks for helping us through this. stand by. coming up next, new details on what caused michael cohen to offer a hush deal to porn star stormy daniels and why that could lead possibly to charges. plus, why experts are concerned that a russian satellite up in space right now could be a weapon, perhaps aimed at the united states. the first person to survive alzheimer's disease is out there. and the alzheimer's association is going to make it happen by funding scientific breakthroughs, advancing public policy, and providing local support to those living with the disease and their caregivers.
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we're now learning that the release of the now infamous "access hollywood" recording during the election campaign may have caused michael cohen to reverse course on a decision. "the wall street journal" reports that president trump's former personal attorney initially resisted the idea of paying adult film star stormy daniels hush money, this in september of 2016. but according to the journal, the day after that tape was released in october 2016, cohen informed a representative for daniels that he was now open to a deal. daniels claims that she had an a consensual sexual encounter with trump before he was president. let's bring back now laura coates and glen. laura, why is that timing
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important to the legality of that payment? >> because it shows you just how much the actual impending campaign and the election was going to be on the decision of whether or not to silence stephanie cli stephanie clifford, aka stormy daniels. the closer you get, the more you think about the campaign contributions that are made and campaign finance violations that may result in you're trying to silence somebody. so the fact that before the "access hollywood" tape came out, he was not receptive to it. then all the sudden you had this idea of grabbing them by the proverbial "p" word all the sudden. it makes it seem like it may not be elected and you want to silence somebody who would give indication he somehow was an unsavory being all the more. that's why it's so important. >> so glen, to be clear, as laura was saying, then that money to pay off stormy daniels becomes a misuse of campaign funds. is that the idea? >> yeah, you know, this is really one that we have to apply just a common sense test to.
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these deals that were struck, these payments that were made, these shell corporations that were set up to pass money through, this was all to impact the election and trump's chances of being elected. i mean, i don't think anybody is sort of pulling a fast one by suggesting that, well, maybe michael cohen out of the goodness of his own heart because of his affection for trump made these payments. i mean, it just doesn't pass the laugh test. >> now, on this issue, and this is something we've seen before, the president's story on the payment has changed. you'll remember that initially he said he didn't know anything about it. then he tweeted that cohen did it to stop a false allegation by stormy daniels. then rudy giuliani, the president's personal attorney, said the president did reimburse cohen for the payments. so of course the president was involved. does that changing story, beyond what it means publicly, in a legal sense does that matter?
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>> yes, it goes back -- remember, this is always about the nondisclosure agreement that's a case in california right now which is largely based on the idea that one of the reasons the nda -- you cannot abide by it or honor it is because it -- you cannot uphold a legal contact to make radar under the activity. think about the motivation, the intent. think about the air force one comment the president had to the press pool. you think about the fact that david dennison signed on to it and you have this changing story. a court of law is looking at this and saying, well, perhaps you were spending to deceive not only the public but perhaps the court into thinking you can uphold this nda. that's also a problem. >> glen, michael cohen is under investigation by federal officials for his business dealings. so beyond the payments, beyond his involvement with the president, just his business dealings, taxi medallions, you name it. of course, the question is, does that legal pressure, is that
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legal pressure sufficient enough in your view, you're a former prosecutor, to push him to testify against the president if there is something he can testify against the president on? >> you know, jim, it sure seems like there's a lot of pressure on michael cohen. we have to remember that although bob mueller referred out a piece of the cohen investigation to the southern district of new york, that doesn't mean he hasn't retained a great big hunk of the michael cohen investigation for himself as it may relate to russian collusion. because, you know, he has a mandate from the deputy attorney general regarding the scope of his investigation. i think he's being very careful to abide by that. when he finds something unrelated to russian collusion, he refers it out to the appropriate u.s. attorney's office, whether in new york or as we see with paul manafort across the river in the eastern district of virginia. but i'll tell you, i would bet he still retained a large chunk of the michael cohen
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investigation for himself because it likely does relate to contacts between russia and the campaign. >> none of this is ending soon. that's for sure. laura, glenn, thanks very much. a stunning new pentagon report suggests that china may be training its pilots to target the u.s. for bombing. the details of that report coming up. and a russian satellite suddenly acting much like the country's famous nesting dolls. why experts are worried it could be used as a weapon against the united states. t-mobile has unlid for the rest of us. unlimited for you. for them. for all. get unlimited for as low at 30 bucks per line for four lines at t-mobile.
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america in the cross hairs. a new report from the pentagon
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says that china is actively developing its fleet of long range bombers and likely training for missions over the u.s. joining me now diplomatic analyst, retired admiral john kirby. china has been making moves to expand its military power and influence abroad. what do we see in this report? >> this report makes clear they have continued that process. they view the first two decades of this century as an era of strategic opportunity to expand and develop what they call their comprehensive national power. this report lays out some very specific examples of how they're doing that. let's take a look at them. they're giving the chinese air force a nuclear mission, the ability to arm bombers with nuclear missiles and to attack u.s. targets. again, it's for the training of their pilots. they're also modernizing the people's liberation army to be
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able to conduct complex joint and out of area operations, something we've not seen the chinese army able to do. >> until this point they focused their attention on their borders and the immediate surroundings. now they want to be able to project power where the u.s. is dominant. >> exactly. it's not just about area dominance now. it's power projection in a way out of area and across the globe. in keeping with that they're expanding their ring of bases. we talked about the bases in the sphere of influence they're creating in the south china saw but they're contracting to build bases around the world. they really want a more robust global footprint. >> the other big adversaries is russia and folks think of russia cyber attacks et cetera. but in space there's a new satellite that's drawing the attention of the u.s. >> this has flumoxed experts. we're not sure what this is
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meant to do. they've been observing weird behavior. it has been drekiirecting itsel even to launch stages that put it into orbit, moving over and around them. it's got some sort of self-moving capability. in addition it appears to be able to launch smaller satellites, as you can see in this video here that can do that. we're not sure this is clearly peaceful. is it a repair and refuelling capable or is there a more sinister intent here to maybe weaponize space or to be able to knockout other satellites? >> that would hurt the u.s. because we're very dependent on satellite capabilities. >> absolutely. >> so is the u.s. -- one of the big debates has been does the u.s. weaponize in space to deter and respond to attacks? >> well, it's a very interesting question. it's controversial. but you can get the clues for where the united states is going by looking at the national defense authorization act that
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the president just signed which authorizes a space war fighting policy and tells the department of defense to stand up the space command. not the space force. but a unified branch. also look at the national defense strategy. if you just look at the first page, these two sentences sit side by side with one another and clearly make china and russia adversaries of the united states. >> when i speak to intelligence officials, they put china and russia at the top of the list of threats. >> and it's right here. >> admiral kirby, thanks very much. as fans remember aretha franklin, her granddaughter released a recent video. this is the queen of soul singing at her private piano not long ago. don't miss it. (man) managing my type 2 diabetes wasn't my top priority.
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♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ >> that's the queen of soul
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almost five months to the day before she died. her granddaughter also said god is telling her she's at peace and that she's going to make her grandma proud. that is it for me today. jim sciutto. thanks very much for joining us. the news on cnn continues right now. jim, thank you so much. hi, everyone. i'm brooke baldwin. thank you so much for joining me. this is cnn and this is where we begin. we're going to begin by putting the last 48 hours just into perspective. the president's former campaign chairman waiting to learn the verdict in his criminal trial. one of his fired aides still releasing secret tapes. a massive group of american journalists uniting against the president's assault on facts. a mass group of former intelligence officials uniting against the president's assault on free speech and the man who orchestrated the raid that killed osama bin laden daring the president to