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tv   Anderson Cooper 360  CNN  July 18, 2023 5:00pm-6:00pm PDT

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conspiracy theories and paranoid tropes are now replete in the land, and all over the world and it is sad to the a name so associated with the democratic party, a name that so many democrats love, participating and partaking in that kind of paranoid statement. was no evidence and no facts word, they're calling for bobby kennedy to come testify because they think you will be a divisive force and he doesn't have factual evidence to offer. >> certainly has not stopped him from saying these things. >> i appreciate your time and appreciate your time for watching us, and ac 360 begins now. >> after historic and whirlwind day, and the 2020 election, the
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special counsel has informed donald trump that he is a target of the federal investigation, the target letter as it is known is the clearest sign to date that the former president could be indicted and also the first time in history the former president has received a letter regarding overturning election. plenty of presidents wanted to stay in power, none of been accused of taking the actions this man did, we should point out it is not the first time a former president has received a target letter, it has happened once before, and the former president it happened two is also donald trump, he received that target letter almost 2 months ago, may 19, involving special counsel jackson instigation into the mishandling of classified documents and that led to an indictment 20 days later. more news today, a court hearing in florida attended by an indicted aid, walter not, but not the president himself.
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walt not to. meeting at any time. nauta. >> and suggesting the trial might not be as speedy as it had hoped but appeared skeptical pushing the trial after the election as the president's attorneys like her to. a big development in michigan, fake electors who signed document claiming the former president won in 2020 have been charged in his team to overturn the election. eight felony counts covering 16 people, top current and former republicans in the state, a lot to get to including how republicans are defending the former president, then we start with the target letter, proving intent will be important in any possible future indictment nealis say, did he know he lost the 2020 election but still schemed to overturn the results? according to testimony in the
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congressional hearings, he did know he lost. >> i remember maybe a week after the election was called, i popped into the oval to give the president headlines and see how he's doing and he was looking at the tv and said can you believe i lost to this f guy.>> raging about the decision how it's wrong and you to make more calls and just typical anger outburst at the decision. the president said -- he had said something to the effect of, i don't want people to know we lost mark, this is embarrassing, figure it out, i don't want people to know that we lost. >> i will be joined by griffin, he just heard from, laurence tribe, the co-author two and a presidency, appreciate you being with us. a conservative former judge, michael ludewig who counseled
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him on how to handle the syndication vote, he wrote sing today, that an attorney general or special counsel of either party would not bring charges, and s efforts to overturn the election, he has dared and taunted and provoked doj to prosecute him for ofnses on and relating to jaar6, for two and half years. the former president has left jackson with no choice but to bring charges that the former president make a mockery of the constitution of the united states and the rule of law. do you agree with him? >> i agree completely with the judge, special counsel jack smith had no choice and the target letter is one that makes it absolutely clear that within days, we don't know if it will be this week or at the very beginning of next week, donald trump will finally be in dated for his role in the attempt to
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overturn the election. by any means possible including aiding and abetting in insurrection, a charge, the most serious charge short of treason that could be launched. >> so confidently, the end of this week, thursday or friday or monday or so, early next week, what makes you confident of that, in the last for the actual indictment came down?>> i am not going to bet anything on exactly what is going to happen. i do think it is more likely to be quicker this time because we have seen a parade of people called by the grand jury, all the people around donald trump, and really nothing left for the special counsel to do but to actually the former president,
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i would be surprised if it were as long as a week or two. i wouldn't be shocked but one way or another it's going to happen, and it's going to make it very difficult for the former president claiming that he is the victim of a witch hunt. as the judge said, he has made it possible for any self- respecting special counsel or attorney general not to charge him all the people engaged as foot soldiers in the violent insurrection, they have been systematically charged, for the person who called them, and watched while they became violent and encourage them to remain violent, made it clear, that the sites run the former vice president, for that person to escape accountability would mean that we have one rule of law of war ordinary citizens and another for a former president.
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that can't be what we have any democracy. when he was president, the rule that he invoked was you can't charge me, i'm president, when he ceased being president he said you can't charge me, i used to be president, will that's not the way that democracy works. , that is a banana republic. >> do you have a sense of what possible charges might be or what they might encompass?>> that is for sure, there is no elaborate memorandum, almost 300 pages, by norman eisen any group of others, experts, former prussic is, laying out in great detail with the charges are likely to be, they are likely to focus on the fake electors and the attempt to say that the election was stolen, when the former president knew it wasn't, and likely to include a second act, pressure
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on various people, i the vice president, and finally likely to include aiding and abetting in insurrection. and if the president were convicted of that, then he would be ineligible to run again. and he's going to claim of course, he always claims he's the victim, he's going to claim the only reason it's happening is because he's running for president. that is getting it backwards. the main reason he is running for president is that's the only way he thinks he can stay out of jail and he wants to be president so he can pardon himself. or maybe declare himself unfit for while under the 25th amendment, so wherever he has his vice president can pardon him, just in case there is any legal doubt about the ability of a president to pardon himself. so this is a three act play, we are likely to see it quite dramatically play out and of course in the meantime we know
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that he's going to be charged by fanny willis in georgia, a sprawling indictment probably next month. and we know he is already on trial for the likely friendly judge, judge eileen cannon, for espionage in connection with the top-secret documents that he stole when he left the white house and refreeze return. he is of course also been charged by alvin bragg, and we have seen in georgia that fake electors, now in michigan are themselves being charged. so the walls are closing in from every direction and finally it would like you will be held accountable. >> professor laurence tribe, thank you for your time. to me now is political analyst and your time reporter, and a cnn political contributor
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and former white house medication director. caitlin collins, and the former assistant attorney, and andrew mccabe, former fbi deputy director, how worried you think the former president should be tonight? >> i think you should be very worried. a couple of things about target letters, i think we need to understand that the department is not required to serve a target letter on anyone get guided, they do in some cases they clearly done it here, it is a very clear indication that they are looking squarely at him, that they have substantial evidence against him and likely to indict things don't come out when the matter is still up for judgment in the prosecutor's office. so i think he should be very concerned about hitting and lighted on what will undoubtedly be a very serious case. >> you agree with professor tribe about the timing and the possible charges? >> i agree that it looks like charges are near, i would think
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a certain date, careful not to do that as well, i agree in part and disagree, we are likely to see, given jack smith's history, he looks for the most straightforward nondramatic charge he can bring in proof, that's why i've been saying we are looking at a conspiracy to defraud the united states, potentially in an effort to obstruct congress and a false statements charge relating to the submission of false electors. i don't expect to see a insurrection charge like professor tribe said, that would be the single most dramatic charge, and he doesn't need to prove that donald trump was trying to overthrow the government of the united date, i think that is a bridge too far for jack smith states.>> what about the former president's reaction and his circle back >> we heard from speaking out tonight, already mounting a defense, he clearly believes is going to be mounting a charge saying i have a right to protest the election results, is not what he was doing, he
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was trying to overturn the fair election results, he is team in the meantime have been calling out to attorneys, they got to know each other quite well, during the investigation trying to figure out if anyone else's got a target letter, we've been asking the question since trump posted it, and not one of the person has had a target letter, that surprised trump team, they thought other target letters would go up to the got to trump, the idea it is gone the trump first has surprised them to a degree that's what they've been doing today. >> are you surprised by that? that there are not other target letters out there, possibly he would be the only one? >> possible that he is received it, and it would surprise me he is the only person charged, not conceivable that was only donald trump, yet a lot of enablers, but there's a strategy if they're trying to get to the top person as
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quickly as possible and not lit up the invite the indictment with extra defendants and extra motions, go after the top guy, a case, and get to the others later in separately.>> bolsters his supporters and leads to more fundraising? figure it likely does if the evidence has been any clue, the difference between the legal perspective and he has a lot of reason to be legally afraid, but he's the front runner in the republican primary, and really rally behind him, a bad sign, ca group against him even amongst vokins, and 30s and 40s, increasing number of people, in they don't want them to be the nominee even amongst the republican base, general election, this is a bad thing for swing voters, and independents, those kinds of things have been worrisome on
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the front, and the short term, and we have consistently seen the republican electorate rally behind him and it's within the narrative of victimization, the weaponization against him. we know the parties going to play, it is worked to this point. >> the go to today, the weaponization, essentially joe biden, the president seeing the poll numbers going up, he pulled the levers of the doj and weaponizing the government against trump. >> exactly, the fact you haven't seen the top tier under donald trump come out forcibly and denounced this as they did the prior to indictment suggests all you need to know, >> and the shift? >> the fact that there has not been a forceful breakthrough i think it is going to be similar to the previous indictment, you will hear from the will hurd and asa hutchinson in chris
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cristi, will keep pounding the drumbeat that the loudest thing they need to be saying, so radioactive in a general election, the idea that donald trump cited an insurrection on january 6 is going to be some sort of credible general election candidate is insane, and trying to get voters to wake up to that, doesn't appear to be happening. >> and the news today, and in michigan and florida and obviously the target letter, you think a special counsel or the doj would be sending out a target letter if they didn't feel they had a start -- strong attention they know and the scrutiny on this? >> absolutely not, no chance that the special counsel is going to throw a hail mary on the case, absolutely not going to happen, an overwhelming amount of evidence just from those things we know publicly,
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let's look at it from the perspective of donald trump in the core of what will be the most repeated defenses, i thought that actually won, the election had been stolen from me. a mountain of evidence that contradicts that, the attorneys in the white house and is local people in the private firm that he hired privately and paid hundreds of thousands of dollars, to find evidence of fraud, and came back and said there's no evidence of fraud, and of course the witnesses who heard him say can you believe i lost of this guy, one of them in the room with you right now, there's an overwhelming amount of evidence for each one of the point, i'm sure the special counsel is feeling very confident, if they sent it out, see how it plays out, with respect to the political analysis you heard, i think that is something that stands in jack smith and his teams credit, they are moving forward the case regardless of how the
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pundits believe it will affect them politically, not about helping a political candidate for jack smith, bring a case when there is evidence to do so. >> we don't know what role mark meadows might be playing in the syddall or others in the former presents orbit, what does it tell you though that if you're right and they would've done this unless they were quite sure they could prove the case, and had a good case, and proving the case the president's intent is critical, what does it tell you, do they believe that people close to him that can testify about his tent, in a very convincing way? >> well we know that he has had a mass of list of insiders who have testified in front of the grand jury very recently, including hope hicks and jared kushner and mark metoxen is former vice president mike pence, we know the team has
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reached deep into that very close group of advisors and attorneys, all these folks have testified in many of tried not testified, and filing the legal motions, they are not going forward, because the testimony did not work for them right, they've collected the evidence they need, i would expect that some people would testify in the government behalf and maybe some of them under cooperation agreements to avoid their own liability. >> thank you, everyone else stay with us, the reaction from rational republicans to the target letter and kevin mccarthy calling it an example of what denies government. the documents case in the intense battle over when the trial may begin, the decision in the hands of the judge, details aheaead. fast. reliable. perfecectly orchestrated. the united states poststal service.
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(vo) subaru. more iihs top safety pick plus awards than any other brand. love. it's what makes subaru, subaru. a range of congressional reaction to the former presents second target letter and almost as many months, indicating that he is a target in the investigation to overturn the 20/20 election. mitch mcconnell was silent and did not respond to siemens questions, other republicans did have a lot to say.>> president trump went up in the polls and at the surpassing president biden for reelection, so what do they do now, what denies government to go after their number 1 opponent, time and time again, the american public is tired of this. >> yet again another example of joe biden's weapon eyes department of justice targeting his top political opponent
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donald trump. >> why are they doing everything they can to prevent him from being on the ballot in 2024, i tell you why, because donald trump will win in 2024 and they are scared. >> and the justice department, as well. >> are they going to rest president trump, and charged him with phony fake charges and hold him in prison, while he is winning the republican primary and going to win the general election 24? bigger just a reminder, speaker kevin mccarthy saying the justice department being what denies against donald trump actually initially blamed the former present for the attack, and changed his mind a few weeks later, back with the panel, and dick durbin, a one- time campaign advisor, to the former president, we haven't heard from you yet, how bad of a day was for the former president?>> there are two
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standards, the legal standard and the political standard, legally it pretty bad day, politically, just another day in trump world, we've been through two impeachments, i sat next to in the studio through two indictments and at this point i think the president just shrugs it off and keep moving forward, as he continues to lead in the polls. >> we just heard from a bunch republicans, there are couple of senators, mitt romney, the usual suspects, john soon as well, mitt romney said the reality is the president trump, he did a number of terrible things on january 6, and part of the distractions always running the former president, relatively tepid stuff given the charges. >> i want to take a step back i worked for jim jordan, one of the people spoke out, put the shoe on the other foot, this pretend that barack obama refused to leave office, inside an insurrection, his age around him try to do this doj fee collectors scheme, lettuce
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people would be those members of congress say he should be impeached, and he should be indicted.>> president obama, showing classified documents. >> all of the above, it has gone to such dangerous your partisanship it defies reality, after donald trump lost the election, everyone around them with the exception of peter navarro knew he lost election, donald trump knew it, was a matter of how are we going to handle it, some aids to the credit and myself included, let's go on the campaign trail and talk about accomplishments and get people vaccinated, instead he wanted different route and a lot of people enabled it and they are coming home to roost. >> looking at the republican field, the former president is far and away the leader. >> and the perspective, and the future nominee, focusing on the fact, still looks and the favor, the biggest legal defense has
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been a political one, the question is why do we hear a different thing from house gop leaders then and other portions, one will get the house, a lot of people are coming from places that are gerrymandered in safe seats, increasingly few swing districts in the house, political backing, all in for the base, a different kind of calculation in the senate, you hear different things are just silence, from them willing to defend him in a bigger sense but for those people who are more closely tied to the political base of donald trump, driving the kind of plurality of the support in the republican primary, they know who butters their bread, and really reflecting the kind of donald trump fandom at the core of the republican party, even though we continually states that the majority, we are not seeing him cracked the 50% ceiling or the base of support, seeing and being toxic to independents and swing voters for the general election, in the short term, people who are
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most important, for the district -- individual districts in the activist class, that's who's driving a, michigan electors, michigan was one of those days were you sought really rise in the party there, some the same people we see get charged today, and that's what we have seen in the apparatus the next couple of days -- last couple of days.>> and what is he actually running on? you would be hard-pressed to actually hear policies. all these other candidates can talk about policies and differences between them, he is just running grievances and the same playlist he ran before. >> as ron desantis has been criticized for missteps and trying to have this inflection point in his campaign and focusing on his policies and unveiling them, they kind of have this whole scenario planned out but here they have today, trumpets a target letter
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and makes it public, waiting to be indicted potentially as he is made clear, that's what sucks up the oxygen.>> the claimant seeking in the war in ukraine and 24 hours, which is not only what chris -- and chris, it is not sensible. >> being indicted for his supporters, just saying that. >> a jesus like martyr. >> indicted for you, but a meet and use what he is saying, and working to help get trump elected if he's the nominee, not some anti-trump person, asked if it's a winning message, the 2020 election, you're going to lose the state of georgia. >> you can see at the top of the hour, half an hour from now, definitely for another half hour, phone electors, certificates falsely claiming donald trump won the state of michigan in 2020, actual human beings are facing multiple felonies, that is a video of
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them there. extraordinary images is russia lunch is another retaliatory strikes, and the reporter was on the scene.
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group of democratic electors was meeting inside. the plots put forward fake electors is of course being investigated by special counsel jack smith.>> jaclyn benson. >> what is your reaction to the charges filed today? >> when i'm very pleased. and ceremonial temp, the effort to undermine the vote, and justice, and secondly, and facts and evidence and the law, that says it is not okay for you and anyone to try to block the will of the people to come to fruition in the election regardless of the winner, if you attempt to do that in election there will be consequences. >> is there a chance that the
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new state charges michigan might impact or impede the special counsel's investigation? >> no, i think facts are facts and the laws the law, and the violation of michigan law runs parallel to violations of the federal level if there are any, and any other states that saw similar issues occur, leading to federal conspiracy charges. and charges can proceed simultaneously, the bottom line, law violated, and the chief law enforcement officer acted accordingly to ensure the michigan laws were followed. >> it is remarkable to me, some of the 16 people charged include a current and former state gop officials, republican al committee member, a sitting mayor any school board member, what does it say that these are the profiles of the people that claim to believe the former president won the state of michigan but were willing to lie and take this action?>> yes and break the law in furtherance of that belief,
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it's not okay, it's not how democracy works, and extraordinary statement, such an important point to make, these were not just random individuals, these were deep party insiders and leaders who knowingly took a step and went into the basement of the party headquarters to take an oath of secrecy and sign these documents. there is lots of evidence here if you read through the allegations to suggest that this was far more than just a ceremonial act, trying to break the law to overturn the will of the people, led by people at the center of the republican party. >>'s charters are the first the ongoing effo to seek justice for the past but ensure they don't happen again, what are you doing to ensure it doesn't happen again in your state? >> one of the things, need to be very clear going the 2024 election cycle, and the result, people disagree with though accurate, any attempt to try to intervene with the counting of
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valid votes, will be met with consequences and serious ones at that. taking every instance of actionable election interference seriously in the state of michigan. so we hope and i expect this will have a deterrent effect for any plans afoot, and gives us the ability to say look, whatever you're planning, don't do it, it's not going to work and we will see consequences against you if an attempt is made. >> michigan secretary of state jocelyn benson, thank you. breaking news from ukraine, the second night in a row, russia is launching retaliatory airstrikes in odesa, and they are trying to repair -- they say stay away from the area and seek shelter, would've you been seeing and hearing tonight?>> reporter: anderson, this is the second night running of a major attack by russia on this city,
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tonight was far bigger than when you and i 24 hours ago, and extraordinary display of firepower, really can't overstate that, it really never seen anything quite like this, we saw tracers flying into the sky from the antiaircraft guns, close in the distance, impacts in the sky appearing to cause explosions and those objects, whether they are drones, or anything else being shot out of the sky, we believe russia carried out a strike using the iranian made, cause a drones, and the cruise missiles, not just what we can see but what we could here is the insane cacophony, of the antiaircraft guns, and the massive explosions, presumably making an impact, and a clip of what we saw tonight and not just see but really here we experience.
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>> [ explosions ] >> [ alarms ] >> [ gunfire sounds ] >> andy andersen, incredible footage shot by our photojournalist, we spoke 24 hours ago i could've told you have a blast i heard him we could count how many impacts had landed, tonight we lost count quickly, it was happening so fast and so much was happening over the course of about an hour i would say, it
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has been over for about an hour, it has been quiet, keeping eyes on the sky, because things can change at any moment. those alarms could start up again and those tracers could fly back up into the sky but anderson, it does appear to be a direct retaliation for the strike by ukraine on the bridge that connects russian anise crimea with the mainland, and and have to assume, and the same, exploring options for a response, tonight is part of the response, it continues, remaining to be seen, and extremely fluid situation. >> for you and the crew, thank you. as mentioned earlier, a court hearing involving the special counsel's other criminal case against the former president, the classified documents case, what the judge said about the mid-december start date, that's next.
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trump appointee, signaled a willingness to push it back due to what she called voluminous discovery in the case. the codefendant walt nauta was in the court, and paula reid joins us, he was there, tell us what happened. >> reporter: already a significant hearing, the first time that trump's attorneys in the special counsel prosecutors were going to appear before judge eileen cannon, a trump appointed judge that oversaw the case but also happened hours after the former president revealed he had received a target letter any special counsel's other probe. so all eyes were on the judge and looking to see just how receptive was she going to be to this trump legal strategy to delay and delay, from what i saw in court today, she is definitely open to delaying the trial at least until next year, she told prosecutors that their proposal doing this in december is just too soon, she said it was a compressed timeline and
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in cases like this, take a lot longer but she is not necessarily willing to leave a completely open-ended, she told defense attorneys that she at least knows that he needs to know from them how long will it take you to go through the evidence and be able to propose your own trial date. again she is definitely sympathetic to the far presence argument that this can't go in december, a little good news for the former president today. >> it was initially sought by prosecutors to go over how classified documents would be handled, was progress made? >> not much progress, certainly not as much is the special counsel would like. they are concerned that as it takes longer and longer for the two sides to agree to stipulations about how to handle classified documents, that has the impact of further delaying when it can the trial, what was also notable about today's hearing is that both sides were focused on the idea trump is a candidate and how it could impact the timing,
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prosecutors argue he is no longer president and should be treated as any other busy important american but his attorneys said no, he is a candidate, it does make it different and in order to be fair it has to be pushed until after the election but the judge was not interested in the question at all, she said we are not litigating that right now, instead she is focused on the mechanics, how long will it take the lawyers to do the work they need to do to at least get sensitive trial date on the calendar. that was notable, not getting into constitutional questions, just looking at the mechanics, which is a very safe place with a judge with as much scrutiny to be. >> joining us as well as the former federal judge, a senior lecturer at harvard, judge cott is a reasonable amount of time for both sides to prepare? >> it is hard to say in the abstract but one of the things that has been done is that a
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date has to be set, typically what would've happened is that the judge would say okay we will say december 11 as the months go on, it would be clear there is this impediment in this obstacle, then you would extend it by a month and then another month, the notion of trying now to predict whatever the issues are in it dance is really a fools errand in a way, she could keep december 11, and make it subject to delay when delay makes sense. one of the things i think it is clear she wanted you is to say an indefinite postponement, there isn't a defendant in the galaxy, that would like the indefinite postponement, one of the things i would want to know is how fast trials typically go in florida. now this case is not the usual case, but it should be variations on the usual name, as opposed to a completely different template. >> so certainly not a good day for the special counsel's office. >> disappointing for doj if
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they wanted to get it to trial before the election, two reasons, they say they don't have a trial date, a floating trial date, the only move one direction, the only go later and later, they never get moved up earlier, and for trump team to dragon get it to the election, as paula reported they didn't even get an agreement on how we are going to handle classified documents, until that's in place you can finish discovery and motions, that's two losses. >> one of the criticisms that the special counsel put forward i think last week, saying only two lawyers on the trump team have even applied for the process to begin, getting cleared to look at the documents. >> trump team is using the classified documents issue as a vehicle to drag their feet and they took their time registering and signing up to get clearances, doj is right to call them out, they are using
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the issue to slow down. >> judge, some wrangling in the courtroom about whether the case was politically motivated, talking to the appointment of the special counsel in the indictment by the grand jury, do you think it is strong enough on its own to prove there wasn't any political influence? >> it was a speaking indictment, on its own it lays out what seems to be an open and shut case. documents were found, illegitimately at mar-a-lago. he had no right to have them. there are variations on the theme, did you have a right to have them, did he know they were there, what was his intent of the reason why the special counsel began with this is this is by far the clearest case, i agree with what she said earlier, the very least, here are the procedures to deal with classified argument, the special counsel while others waited to classified documents in ways that prosecutors never do, to try to hasten this, so there really is no excuse to
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try to set a trial date and lisa down the procedures for dealing with classified documents. >> now there has to be another hearing to figure out how to handle the classified documents, and with the timing be settled at that hearing as well? >> find trump's lawyers i'm going to say no, i don't agree to anything, the judge has to city motion briefing schedule, that can take a month and 6 weeks for each of three rounds of briefing that after going to motions, then presumably there will be a trial date set, remember there is a state trial in manhattan for the hush money payments taking up the end of march, going into april, that is blocked off, the options are narrowing coming up next, one-on-one with will hurd. we'll get his take on the former president's mounting legal troubles.
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back to our top story. former president trump said he was told that he is a target of the criminal investigation into efforts to overturn the 2020
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election that could signal charges are imminent or prosecutors could decide not to charge him and will hurd seeking the presidential nomination wrote on twitter, losing to joe biden was so humiliating for donald trump he was willing to let people die for his lies about a stolen election. that was -- that's what january 6th was about. hurd is a former three-term republican congressman from texas and former cia officer and he joins me now. thanks for being with us. >> thanks for having me on and for quoting me right. >> well, i stumbled on it but i think i got it right. what is your reaction to the news of the day? >> it's more of the same. more baggage, more drama, more about him. more about, you know, him not protecting the constitution. it's shocking and it prevents us from talking about the real issues of the day. we had, you know, poor migrants dying in -- drowning in the rio grande river. we had what's going on in ukraine and instead we're talking about things that happened in the past.
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>> that's not going to change -- i mean, there's no way that that is going to change between now and election day. i mean, today wasn't just this letter. it was the court case in florida. it was the fake electors in michigan. >> look, the other thing that's like shocking to me is how some of the other candidates in the race have responded and news flash, if you're afraid of donald trump, then you're not ready to be president of the united states. i don't understand how some folks like governor desantis is more afraid of transgender kids and donald trump and cinderella instead of doing and talking about how we should be stopping war criminals like vladimir putin. instead he wants to discriminate against our friends in the lgbt community. here's what i'm wondering, when i go to new hampshire and talk about things people are worried about they're worried about the new cold war with china and how is a.i. -- is a robot going to
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take my job? they're worried about making sure their kids have a proper education regardless of their age or location, and that's a message that we're taking to places all across the country and that's what people want to see. >> when you hear speaker mccarthy today saying, coming out early this morning saying, well, joe biden saw donald trump's poll numbers go up, so he weaponized the department of justice to get the former president, is that a responsible thing for the speaker of the house to say? >> i don't think the president has the capability to do something like that. >> it doesn't work that way. >> and let's be honest, if donald trump is the nominee, the republican nominee for president, he will lose to joe biden. we are giving four more years to joe biden, and anybody -- let's go through this little exercise. what independent or democrat voted for joe biden in 2020 and then all of a sudden woke up and be, like, you know what, donald trump is my guy? it doesn't exist. and so, look, i think your
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earlier panel was talking about how the reason we have problems is because of the primaries. only 23% of americans actually vote in primaries. if we had more people voting in primaries, we'd have better options in november. that's why i'm hoping people that are watching your show want to see someone that's not afraid of donald trump and who has a vision for the future. >> why is it only you, chris christie, former governor asa hutchinson who have been willing to be tough against the former president. >> because everybody else is afraid of donald trump and why that is, they have to make that decision. you have to ask them those questions, and we need to be putting forward a vision of the future. we need to -- seven out of ten americans do not want joe biden to be president. this is a chance for the gop to take our brand, to take our message, to places that it's never gone before. >> is it too late for the gop? >> no. >> wasn't the time to do that on -- the night of january 6th and january 7th. >> look, anybody who is watching
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your show that is sick and tired of the baggage of donald trump, there's one easy way to deal with this, beat him in a primary, right? look, all of these court cases are probably going to last longer than anybody expects, but the opportunity -- and there is opportunity to win. this is not -- everybody says, oh, he has a commanding lead. look, anything is possible if you work hard. the numbers exist for him to be beat. there are more people that dislike donald trump in the republican party than like him, and so this is the opportunity -- we have 26 weeks to pull this off. i hope some of your voters go to hurdforamerica.com to give me a dollar so i can be on the debate stage so we can have a competition of ideas in the state. we are faced with a number of generational-defining challenges. if all we're doing is lit gating stuff in the past and dealing with trump's baggage we won't be able to make sure the rest of this century stays -- >> you think you'll get on the
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debate stage. >> we're working hard on that. people appreciate swung willing to fight a vladimir putin, not, you know, poor, you know, lgbtq teens. people are interested in helping someone that cares about how do we deal with things like technology and artificial intelligence and how that's going to impact every single industry. we're working hard, i think it's 35 days until that debate but everybody has to do is go to hurdforamerica.com and a dollar is all you have to do. >> the news continues. "the source with kaitlan collins" starts right now. tonight, straight from the source, to the target, donald trump. he tells the world that he has gotten another target letter from the special counsel, this time in the january 6th investigation, a sign that charges could be imminent. we heard from him just moments ago. we'll tell you what he said. plus, for the very first time suspects have been charged in a 2020 fake