i want to go to katelyn polantz as well.ne of the big questions all along has been also violations of campaign finance laws. what are you picking up on that? >> right. well, this is a really meaty indictment i'm still going through it but even at the top whenever you are looking at it the thing that jumps out is that the federal prosecutors were able to discover political contributions that did not go to george santos' political candidacy. so they say in this indictment that september and october in 2022, so not that long ago, he was taking in money that was supposed to be used to his candidacy into a company, but that was a false pretense. instead it was going to things like luxury designer clothing and credit card payments for personal expenses. he was soliciting it for personal expenses. that's a pretty meaty charge on its own. there are other violations here related to his political life. there are campaign finance violations that are outlined here. there are also violations relating to what he was telling the house abou

cnn's katelyn polantz is outside the courthouse. she's joining me once again. telyn, what's the latest you're hearing from inside the room? >> reporter: kate, we really are moments away from knowing what the result of this long, long trial, this long prosecution by the justice department is at this moment in time the jury is reading the verdicts that they have reached in the courtroom. we have a team watching this right now. and what is happening here, what is at stake here is that this is the case against the five leaders of the proud boys, people that the justice department have accused of not just wanting to have a war against the u.s. government after the 2020 election, after donald trump's loss but then going to the capitol on january 6th, revving up the crowd and being what the justice department says was the tip of the spear of the crowd of trump supporters that broke into the capitol. the defense team have tried to distance these men, these five men on trial from donald trump even though the former president during his candidacy told the proud boys stand

katelyn polantz, thank you. i i want to bring in evan perez.et's be clear about how we got to this point, what stewart rhodes did leading up to january 6th, and even after january 6th. >> right. and that's part of the key evidence that the prosecutors presented at this tile. they said, and they showed evidence of the amount of coordination that they say stewart rhodes and some of these other members went through before january 6th. there was efforts to do some training, military-style training, malitia-style training in north carolina. they stockpiled weapons in a van in northern virginia with the idea that if and when the former president, president trump at the time, were to declare and invoke the insurrection act, that they could be the food soldiers, they would be the malitia that would cross over into washington and help him keep power. even after the dust had settled on january 6th, even after it was clear that donald trump would be leaving, they vowed to keep fighting on, they vowed to prevent the new president, the lawfully elected pres

we have cnn crime and justice reporter katelyn polantz joining us. this just broke. tell us the very latest. >> reporter: right, so the judge has just delivered the sentence to stewart rhodes. he will be spending 18 years in federal prison for the crimes he committed up and until january 6th as he gathered oath keepers to washington, d.c. and they went inside the capitol, when he was leading the organization and wanting to essentially foment violence in the united states because of the transfer of power from donald trump to joe biden. the judge is just finishing his speech to rhodes and delivering that sentence right now, and he is fully aware -- you can tell by what the judge is saying, how worried he is, for the ongoing threat that this political extremism that stewart rhodes espouses. even today the judge just asked, i dare say, we now hold our collective breath when an election is approaching, will we have another january 6th, it remains to be seen. he pointed out to rhodes how much rhodes is not showing any remorse at all and how he is believing from what stewar

let's get straight to cnn's katelyn polantz. what you've learned. >> well, the special counsel jack smith, the man himself, the special counsel overseeing investigations into the mar-a-lago documents and january 6th, he personally was sitting in the grand jury observing testimony from former vice president mike pence last thursday when pence was here testifying. john, that is a truly extraordinary thing. smith has many, many prosecutors working for him. we see them coming in and out of the courthouse, wokking with the grand jury regularly here. we have never seen smith once, and it is as far as we know the first time that jack smith himself would come here and observe those secret grand jury proceedings, that testimony from mike pence. one source is telling kristen holmes, jamie gangel and i, that the two men, jack smith the special counsel and former vice president mike pence, they had respectful interactions during that day of testimony. and all of this, it just really underlines how extraordinary of a situation it is for a fo

katelyn polantz, cnn, washington. >>> more witnesses are set to take the stand in the hours ahead inhe civil battery and defamation trial against donald trump. the former president's attorney confirmed wednesday that trump's legal time will not put on a defense case and will not call a previously called witness. trump is being sued by e. jean carroll who is accusing him of sexual assault. he denies the allegations. the judge plans to charge the jury to begin deliberations on tuesday. >>> manhattan district attorney is investigating an incident where a man died after being put into a chokehold by another rider. and this video could be disturbing to watch. witnesses say a 30-year-old man jordan neely was acting hostile on a train monday. and a fellow passenger put him in a chokehold. neely lost consciousness and died a short time later at the hospital. a source says that neely was homeless. protestors took to the subway wednesday night chanting black lives matter and homeless matter. [ chanting ] cnn has not been able to independently confirm what happened leading up to this incident.

katelyn polantz, cnn, washington. >>> it is the start of holiday weekend in the u.s. but cextreme weather could dampn some plans. parts of west texas and the rockies could see storms. >> and the south could see gusty winds and dangerous surf along the coast. heavy rain is expected in the carolinas and mid-atlantic. further north, you will likely see some sunny skies. some of that weather could impact travel plans for the millions on the move this weekend. >> the transportation security administration says it is planning to screen about 10 million airline passengers between thursday and monday. delta air lines says holiday weekend ticket sales are up 17% from last year. the airlines insist that they are staffed up for the increase but worried that the federal government could cause delays because about one in five air traffic controller positions are vacant. for some passengers the price of a ticket is their biggest worry. >> way more expensive. i looked at it internationally, it is cheaper to fly internationally and stay at a hotel internationally than it was domestic

katelyn polantz, cnn, washington. >>> lawyers for donald trump are asking a judge to prevent e. jean carroll from amending her defamation lawsuit against the former president. carroll, a 79-year-old advice columnist, wants to amend the suit because of comments trump made in a recent cnn town hall. during that televised event, the former president referred to carroll as, quote, a whack job, and said the multi-million dollar judgment against him was, in his words, a rigged deal. jurors in that case found trump liable for sexually abusing carroll in a department store dressing room in the 1990s and then defaming her when she went public. >>> a south carolina judge has temporarily blocked the state's new abortion restrictions. on thursday, the governor signed a law banning most abortions after six weeks of pregnancy, before many people even know they're pregnant. but that's now on hold until south carolina's supreme court can review the case. the state's high court has already struck down a similar law passed in 2021. it concluded that the privacy protections of the state constituti

katelyn polantz has more. >>> stewart rhodes was sentenced to 18 years in federal prison on thursday. the reason he is receiving that much time is because the judge decided that he was the reason the members of the oathkeepers came to washington, d.c. on january 6 and decided to move into the capitol in their riot gear in military-esque gear. rhodes spoke to the judge today and said that he had no remorse at all, that he still believed that the election of 2020 was illegal, that this was and i will legitimate government governing the united states, and so the judge responded to that quite harshly telling rhodes that his crimes of seditious conspiracy and other crimes amounted to domestic terrorism. and also that he believed rhodes poses a continuing ongoing threat to the american republic, to american democracy. there was another person sentenced today too, a deputy who was working with rhodes on january 6, kelly meggs from florida. and he did express remorse. he said that he was sorry to be involved in an event that put such a black eye on the country. but the judge also gave him qui

katelyn polantz, cnn, washington. >>> when the late queen elizabeth ii visited the u.s.as concerned about her security. and now we know why. coming up, new details about a potential plot to kill the queen. during a visit to the west coast. stay with us. with gold bond... you can age on your own terms. retinol overnight means... the smoothing benefits of retinol. are now for r your whole body. plus, fast-working crepe corrector diminishes wrinkled skin in just two days. gold bond. champion your skin. eva's about to learn her fear of missing out leads to overeating. i totally eat stuff to not miss out. and that's just a bit of psychology eva learned from noom weight. sign up now at noom.com my husband and i have never been more active. shingles doesn't care. i go to spin classes with my coworkers. good for you, shingles doesn't care. because no matter how healthy you feel, your risk of shingles sharply increases after age 50. but shingrix protects. proven over 90% effective, shingrix is a vaccine used to prevent shingles in adults 50 years and older. shingrix does not prot

let's go back to katelyn polantz who's getting even more breaking details. telyn, i want to get right to you. what are you learning? >> reporter: so we don't have the exact verdict yet that the jury has reached in three more hours of deliberating today, but we do know that they have reached a verdict on that fifth defendant for that seditious conspiracy charge. this man dominic pezzola who the jury has already said they do find him guilty of taking a police shield from a police person at the capitol on january 6th and then using it to break a window and get inside the building leading many rioters to want to follow him inside, overcoming the capitol, and we have been waiting. we know that the jury has already found four of the proud boys leaders, the people who were in touch well before january 6th talking about civil war. they have found those men guilty of seditious conspiracy. they had not reached a verdict this morning on whether pezzola also would be guilty or not guilty of that charge. we haven't yet seen the jury come back in to deliver what that verdi

katelyn polantz, cnn, washington. >> fierce fighting is continuing in sudan, and a fragile cease-firers to have ended even before it properly started. we'll look at what students paramilitary forces are claiming next. stay with us. this is... ♪ this is iowa. we just haven't been properly introduced. say hello to the place where rolling hills meets low bills. where our fields, inside and out, are always growing. and where the fun is just getting started. this is iowa. so, when are you coming to see us? ♪ hi, i'm michael, i've lost 70 pounds on golo. i spent thousands on other diets that didn't work. on golo, i spent a couple hundred bucks and got back down to my high school weight. you're not gonna believe this thing is possible but it is. let me be direct. some people are paying more than double for teeth straightening with invisalign. and then there's smiledirectclub. you get a smile you love, directed by one of their doctors, with aligners sent directly to you. so the savings go directly to you sixty percent less than- invisalign and smiledirectclub guarantees your smile for life. y

let's go straight to katelyn polantz. the sentence against rhodes is the longest sentence for a january 6th defendant so far. what did the judge have to say about this and have to say about the sentence for the other oath keeper today? >> reporter: right. so stewart rhodes, the leader of the oath keepers, he got 18 years. and then his deputy essentially on january of 6th, kelly meggs, getting 12 years. and rhodes is different than any of the rest. rhodes is not only the leader. he is the reason that the oath keepers were in washington, d.c. on january 6th. that was what the judge found today. and he also believes that stewart rhodes poses an ongoing threat to democracy. rhodes made no attempt to try and dissuade the judge of believing that. and the judge certainly did say that explicitly after stewart rhodes expressed no remorse in court today and continued to be very far right in what he said to the judge and not saying that he believed that he had done anything wrong at all. now, the other thing, with kelly meggs, that

and we don't know. >> and i want to go to katelyn polantz outside the courthouse.rney general noting that both the leaders of the proud boys and oathkeepers, two different far right militia groups, have both been found guilty. and as we talked about for years, that is not an easy charge to prove in a court of law. >> reporter: it is not at all. it is very, very difficult for the justice department to even get to the point where they want to bring that charge. it was a charge that first was born out of civil war and then in recent years until the january 6 insurrection, it essentially was very, very difficult to gain any convictions on. and so since then, the justice department has used all of the video, garland talked about thousands and thousands of hours of video, all the photos, text messages, other messages that they gathered between these members of the groups to be able to say these aren't just people that arrived at the capitol on january 6 and were violent there, were swept up in the crowd, but there were people who were in the leadership positions in both

cnn's katelyn polantz is with us this morning.portant today. >> reporter: john, we're going to see a series of sentencings for people that are convicted as part of this group of the oath keepers that were led by stewart rhodes the founders of the oath keepers on january 6th, organized, planned for that attack at the capitol and made sure that there were people there to help support them and also to make sure that there were guns around d.c. today the two people we're seeing being sentenced are just another set of people in that group under rhodes. if rhodes is at the top of this structure, below him there was kelly meggs who was sentenced yesterday to 12 years and then there are a series of other team leaders essentially, one of them jessica watkins, she was called cap for captain because she was a leader. she was part of this conspiracy as well, not seditious conspiracy as far as her convictions go, but she was part of the group that was convicted and had a leadership role. the government is asking for, i believe, 15 years for he

>> katelyn polantz, appreciate it.legal analyst and former federal prosecutor elie honig. so, how big a deal of it is that the special counsel office is reportedly looking into the -- issue? >> and it's in, this tells me, months ago -- prosecutors here are squarely focused on obstruction of justice. it's important to understand why this surveillance video is so important. because the underlying case about the handling of these classified documents really depends on where were these documents stored, where were the actual boxes, who had access, and were they moved? this video footage from inside mar-a-lago would presumably be the best possible evidence of that. and anderson, one really important details caitlin polantz's reporting is that this is a new round of subpoenas. and this tells me that prosecutors, in what they had already gathered, saw something about this footage that made them say, hold on, there's a problem here. now we need to dig into this. >> what kind of evidence with would the special counsel needs in

katelyn polantz is standing by. what are you picking up?judge is on the bench. there is a partial verdict the jury has reached on some of these charges potentially maybe even that seditious conspiracy trial. like much of this trial the defense team is arguing vigorously. they have tried to derail this case dozens of times trying to get mistrials, and right now our reporters in the courtroom, they're sending information that there is a dispute going on about whether the defense team even wants that partial verdict to be read right now or if the jury should continue deliberating. that's what's going on, so this is a case that we really need to watch on so many fronts because this is not just about the people on the ground on january 6th. it is also about someone, enrique tarrio, the founder of the proud boys, the head of the proud boys who was not on the ground and the possibility he could be convicted for engaging in this agreement. and this is not just any conspiracy case either. it is a seditious conspiracy case meaning not only would thes

katelyn polantz and paula reid have been working their sources. they are joining us now with the latest. kaitlan, i want to go to you first. what are you learning about this critical key new piece of evidence? >> well, alex, this is an audiotape that the justice department now has and is part of their special counsel investigation into whether donald trump mishandled national security secrets and possibly obstructed justice. so, the justice department has this audiotape. they've heard it. they have asked people about it in a grand jury. they have asked other people about it including the current chairman of the joint chiefs of staff mark milley. and the reason that they are asking about it is because it appears to be quite significant. so this audiotape we have not heard, but it's been described to us by multiple sources. and on it donald trump is at a meeting at bedminster where he has his golf resort in new jersey. and in this meeting, it's trump, some of his aides, some people working on a book for his former chief of staff mark meadows. during

katelyn polantz is with us.t time we know of special counsel smith sitting in on an actual grand jury proceeding sf proceeding, jake. it just underlines how unusual this situation was, having the former vice president testify to the federal grand jury investigating january 6th compelling him to come in under court order to speak about his interactions with his former boss, donald trump, then the president. and we do know through multiple sources speaking to kristen holmes and me, jack smith the special counsel did sit in and witness some of that interaction. he also had some of his own interactions with pence. we are told from one source that it was respectful between the two men, but there are many prosecutors that are working this case, jake, and so having jack smith there, he doesn't have to be there. he's almost never there. i've nevaer seen him. we've never heard of him setting foot in the courthouse before in this investigation. it really is not just atypical to learn that he was there for the pence testim

katelyn polantz, thank you very much. let's get more on all of this. political analysts are joining us. elliot williams, these charges are under seal, what could santos be facing potentially from your perspective? >> well, first things first, wolf, welcome to the single craziest day in the history of american law, so putting that aside, you know, i think it might be irresponsible to really speculate as to what might be in there now if we're talking broadly speaking about crimes associated with political campaigns what you usually tend to find are mail fraud, wire fraud, those are using either the mail or electronic communication to defraud people of money and you see that in the context of political candidates, false statements, or potentially campaign finance violations, any of those, and some of the other crimes identified there, the financial irregularities or improprieties. not everything can get into federal court. some things would be state crimes. these are just the things that would bump it into federal court. i think we'll find out much more t

katelyn polantz for that report. as we are waiting to see what sentencing rhodes is going to get, and where do you believe this is going to land today? >> look, a massive delta between 25 years sought by the prosecutors and the time served by the defense counsel. the judge has a tremendous amount of discretion here, but the prosecution has portrayed this sentencing in particular as a real outlier, and they describe it as unparallel and unprecedent and it defies any comparison because witness after witness spoke about the impact and the trauma that january 6th had on them, but the government is portraying the real victim here as our normal democratic functioning, and the democracy itself which flies off of the page where they are talking about the injury to democratic functioning, peaceful transitioning of power and the rule of law. so that is a real focus for the judge in his decision today. >> and the prosecutors have called the oath keepers actions on january 6th terrorism, and in acting judge to weigh that in sent

katelyn polantz has been following the story and our federal prosecutor, jennifer rodgers is with us.er: the judge is speaking from the bench right now. he is about to deliver what he has decided the sentence should be. the justice department is asking for 25 years in prison for rhodes, and the judge already has indicated that he does want to give rhodes a fairly harsh sentence. he does believe the crime of seditious conspiracy and the planning that stewart rhodes engaged in on january 6th does amount to a crime of domestic terrorism, a significant finding from the judge. i don't have a number just yet to tell you, but right now the judge is reacting to stewart rhodes, who just spoke in the courtroom. at times rhodes was yelling about the constitution, but he really was revealing that as he's been awaiting trial, he's been stewing in the same level of extremism he had at the time of the 2020 election when he was leader of the oath keepers and bringing many of those people to the capitol building and watching them go inside the building. he attacked leftist groups, called the kkk democ

katelyn polantz, cnn, washington. >>> americans are about to pay more again for their mortgage, car loan and credit cards. the u.s. federal reserve hiked its benchmark interest rate for the tenth time if afif a in a r but now they are hinting that rate hikes might take a pause next time around. >> decision on a pause was not made today. you will have noticed that in the statement from march, we had a sentence that said the committee anticipates that some additional policy firming may be appropriate. that sentence is not in the statement anymore. we took that out. instead we're saying that in determining the extent to which additional policy firming might be appropriate 2% over time, the committee will take into account certain factors. so that is a meaningful change that we're no longer saying that we anticipate. so we'll be driven by incoming data meeting by meeting. and we'll approach the question at the june meeting. >> so the fed raises rates to try to tame the high prices you see when you go shopping or pay for services. but it also means that you end up paying more for things like

cnn's katelyn polantz, as the details. >> stewart rhodes, the founder of oath keepers, sentenced to 18 years in federal prison on thursday. that is a sentence, the largest among any january 6th capitol riot defendant, and the reason that rhodes is receiving that much time is because the judge decided, he was the reason that the member of the oath keepers came to washington d.c. on january 6th. they decided to move into the capital, in their riot gear, in military-esque gear, as a unit. now, rhodes spoke to the judge today and said, he had no remorse, at all, that he still believes the election of 2020 was illegal, that this was an illegitimate government, governing the united states so, the judge responded to that quite harshly, telling roads, his crimes of seditious conspiracy, and other crimes, amounted to domestic terrorism in his sentencing, and also, that he believed roads proposed to continuing, ongoing threat to the american republic, and to american democracy. there was another person sentenced today as well, a deputy, working with rhodes on january 6th. a man in kelly meggs, f

let's go straight to katelyn polantz.fendant so far. what did the judge have to say about this and have to say about the sentence for the other oath keeper today? >> reporter: right. so stewart rhodes, the leader of the oath keepers, he got 18 years. and then his deputy essentially on january of 6th, kelly meggs, getting 12 years. and rhodes is different than any of the rest. rhodes is not only the leader.

. >> katelyn polantz, we know you'll keep on top of it. jessica?up, your favorite shows may start airing rereturns. we'll take you to the picket lines of the writer's strike. >>> the autopsy of the murder of cash app founder has been released. details after this break. our dedell technologies advisors can provide you with the tools and expertise you need to bringng out the innovator in you. ♪ here's to the very first influencer in your life... mom! ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ this is how mom shines. find the perfect mother's day gift... ...at zales. the diamond store. - representative! - sorry, i didn't get that. - oh buddy! you need a hug. you also need consumer cellular. get the exact same coverage as the nation's leading carriers and 100% us based customer support. starting at $20. consumer cellular. somedays, i cover up because of my moderate to severe plaque psoriasis. now i feel free to bare my skin, thanks to skyrizi. ♪(uplifting music)♪ ♪nothing is everything♪ i'm celebrating my clearer skin... my way. with skyrizi, 3 out of 4 people achieved 90% clearer skin

cnn's katelyn polantz is tracking this. i think the most significant thing is how these charges differ and what the sentences could look like and how they could be different from other people who have been sentenced and charged with january 6th. >> right. whenever we look back, there are hundreds of capitol riot defendants, many of whom have been sentenced already, many of whom have served their time because many of them received relatively shorte sentences or sentences that didn't require them to go to prison. one person has gotten a sentence over ten years as far as we can tell so far in these cases. these guys, they are different and the justice department says that to the judge. this is the first group of people who are set to be sentenced for that seditious conspiracy charge, that idea that they have been convicted by a jury for wanting to, by force, block the u.s. government or wage a war. and the justice department doesn't pull any punches whenever they are arguing to the judge already on paper. they do quote somebod

cnn's katelyn polantz is here to bring us this new reporting. what are you learning?hs-long proud boys trial and was able to review notes that the proud boys and their lawyers were using to communicate with one another as that trial was going on. this is really an uncommon look at just the chatter that was happening in the courtroom as witnesses were taking the stand, as evidence was being presented. and what she was able to see is these examples of boredom, of commentary that either the defense team themselves or the dozen people around them, the proud boys, the defendants, how they were reflecting upon what was happening. they have commentary on some of the proceedings, writing things like, question for judge, can you be fair and impartial? that's one note. some other things they were doing, they clearly were commenting to one another about what witnesses were saying or what the prosecutors were saying. unnote, we're not roaming the streets because of election. there's another note where they were writing, ask him if i'm friendly and not confrontational. that appear

>> katelyn polantz, thank you so much. >>> and first let's get to the case against them. were saying with katelyn, going into there, folks, yourself included, said hard one to prove. >> yes. >> let's look at some of the things that these folks said via their text messages. here's one of them. we just stormed the effing capitol, took the mother effing place back, that was so much fun. celebrating. another one -- dude, we're in front of the american capitol. american citizens are storming the coloapitol, taking it back. taking it back, that kind of language there. how did they pull this off? >> how did they pull this off? seditious conspiracy is a charge you don't see that often. frankly in american history the last time it got charged was 2010 because there's surprisingly a fine line between protected speech and disrupting government by force or impeding the actions of government. now those two text messages were very, very important ones, jim, because what you're seeing is celebration at the fact that they impeded and obstructed or delayed the functionings of government. s

cnn's katelyn polantz has his reporting and is joining us now. how much detail is in these notes?at's what the new reporting here is. we knew the justice department really wanted to get access to these notes. they believed that they would show donald trump potentially committing a crime in his conversations -- or wanting to advance a crime as he was talking to evan corcoran and now we know that these notes, they number into the dozens of pages, there are multiple sets of them. they range in a very crucial time period from the moment that the just sent that subpoena to the trump org to hand over all classified documents in donald trump's possession, and they catalog evan corcoran's direct conversations with donald trump, his client, the whole way up to when the justice department comes visiting in june to collect 38 classified records that evan corcoran found and believed there was nothing else left at mar-a-lago, even though there were many other hundreds of classified records there. so these notes, our sources -- we have a team of reporters who have been talking to people about t

kait katelyn polantz, could this have any bearing on how jack smith pursues other charges in this january 6th investigation? >> reporter: wolf, jack smith is going to be following the facts. he's going to be looking at what evidence there is to potentially charge people in political circles, even as high as donald trump in the white house. he will also be looking at the law, and one of the things that happened today that's quite notable is the justice department secured one of these seditious conspiracy convictions against a man, enrique tarrio who was not on the grounds of the capitol on january 6th, who was just discussing with others on text messages, on other encrypted messages about wanting to come together, and so there was the ability for the justice department to make that case and for the jury to believe that was the case to be made. prosecutors as sara murray noted in her piece, that prosecutors had argued that donald trump was an inspiration for this group and the defense team had tried to tell the jury this is trump, this was trump doing these things, inspiring this violence.