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Michael Scherer is Interviewed about Trump's Comments on Venezuela; January 6th Still Brings Deep Divide; Rep. Ryan Zinke (R- MT) is Interviewed about Venezuela. Aired 6:30-7a ET

Aired January 06, 2026 - 06:30   ET

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

[06:30:00]

BIOIS OLSON, HOST, "BEERS WITH BIOIS" PODCAST: I would add Lisa Demuth and Chris Madal to your -- to your list. But there's a chance. But Klobuchar will change the dynamic to the race significantly.

AUDIE CORNISH, CNN ANCHOR: OK, Biois Olson, thanks so much for sharing your reporting.

OLSON: Happy to be here.

CORNISH: And straight ahead on CNN THIS MORNING, the U.S. has a warning for the new acting president of Venezuela. So, what does the president mean when he says she could face a fate worse than Nicolas Maduro?

Plus, today marks five years since the riot at the Capitol. How the president has tried to redefine the day.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CORNISH: Good morning, everyone. I'm Audie Cornish. I want to thank you for joining me on CNN THIS MORNING.

It is 6:34 here on the East Coast. Here's what's happening right now.

A defiant Nicolas Maduro pleads not guilty to drug and weapons charges in a federal court in New York City. Maduro told the judge that he had been kidnaped.

[06:35:01]

Through a translator he said he was, quote, "still the president of Venezuela." His wife, Cilia Flores, entered the same plea. Their next hearing is scheduled for March 17th.

And the Senate is prepared to vote on a measure to limit President Trump's war powers in Venezuela. A person familiar with the plans has told CNN that vote could come Thursday. And Democrats have the support of one Republican, Rand Paul, and expect to gain support from Lisa Murkowski as well. And gunfire rings out in Venezuela's capital Monday night. This

reportedly came after a misunderstanding and confusion between different security groups near the presidential palace. Venezuela's Ministry of Communication and Information says police fired at drones that were, quote, "flying without permission."

And a threat to the acting president of Venezuela, a warning to other nations and a defense of his actions. That's what President Trump told "The Atlantic" moments after his strike on Venezuela. Staff writer Michael Scherer writes, "during our call, Trump, who had just arrived at his golf club in West Palm Beach, was in evident good spirits and reaffirmed to me that Venezuela may not be the last country subject to American intervention."

Scherer joins the group chat now.

Thanks for being with us.

MICHAEL SCHERER, STAFF WRITER, "THE ATLANTIC": Yes. Thanks for having me.

CORNISH: So, first, let's talk about the kinds of things you were asking him. What was his perception of the concerns people have about the intervention itself?

SCHERER: Yes, I asked him. I said, you know, I remember the 2016 campaign. I remember you talking about regime change being a bad thing. About nation building being a bad thing. About, we should focus on the home front. And his answer was, when it comes to Venezuela, I don't care what you call it, this is a good thing. Total dismissal of his past position.

I asked him whether this was a hemispheric issue. Whether the fact that Venezuela was in our hemisphere made it different from Iraq. He said, no, it's a country by country thing.

I think the president has really evolved in his view of how the U.S. should project force. And I think he's really -- truly confident that there's a way of doing it almost remotely. It's, you know, it's like a domination from the air with targeted strikes.

CORNISH: The (ph) president's alone?

SCHERER: I mean, he's saying now, he's running the country. He's not in the country. I mean the U.S. is not in the country. But they --

CORNISH: Did he talk about boots on the ground and whether that is a concern?

SCHERER: Well, he said at the press conference the day before that he has no fear to put boots on the ground.

CORNISH: Yes.

SCHERER: I asked about -- you mentioned at the top about Delcy Rodriguez. She'd just given a pretty defiant speech -- CORNISH: Yes.

SCHERER: That did not in any way sound like what he had said she was saying privately to them. And then he issued that threat to her. I think that's still very much a live negotiation of where that's going to end up. But I think they view, you know, not just the president, but the president's team, view themselves as having significant leverage still. And the threat of other strikes, the economy in Venezuela, if the status quo continues, will collapse. And that's a real concern for Rodriguez and her government as well.

CORNISH: You know, we've been talking all morning about the Bush era and Iraq and all -- forever wars. And I think some people are like, why are you talking about that right now? It seems too soon.

But I remember people later on felt like reporters and analysts didn't ask enough questions then.

SCHERER: Sure.

CORNISH: And that is how the U.S. ended up getting wrapped up in these situations. So now there's a lot of outstanding questions. Are they prepared to answer any of them?

SCHERER: I mean, I totally agree with you. I mean I lived through that reporting in the early 2000. You know, at the press conference on Saturday, the president said that the president of Colombia is basically trafficking cocaine. He has cocaine labs. He's presented no evidence for that. I mean that's a -- he's basically establishing a public prerequisite for an attack on the president of another country without --

CORNISH: With no evidence for the prerequisite.

SCHERER: There was no evidence for the prerequisite. And we've been there. I mean that was our experience in 2002 with WMDs in Iraq. And I think the press rightly took enormous amounts of criticism afterwards for not vetting that and for just repeating the official line that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, was a threat to the world, without actually vetting it. And I think we're in a similar situation here.

CORNISH: Ashley, are we in a similar situation here?

ASHLEY DAVIS, FORMER WHITE HOUSE OFFICIAL UNDER PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: Well, I just think Iraq's a completely different situation because, remember, we were able to tie that to 9/11. So, I think that understanding that maybe you guys did get criticized as reporters for not asking that question, but we were still in the mode at that time of trusting President Bush. I mean, he's my old boss. So, I mean, I think that --

CORNISH: It was all tied to an anti-terror posture.

DAVIS: Correct. And so, this is a little bit different.

But, remember, and I think --

CORNISH: Yes. You sound like you have a thought here.

SCHERER: There wasn't -- there wasn't a tie, though, that Bush could have -- there was like the thinnest of ties Bush could establish to Osama bin Laden, the people who had perpetrated 9/11. The main rationale at the time was weapons of mass destruction and (INAUDIBLE).

DAVIS: Right. Absolutely. Absolutely.

I also think that something that's very interesting, which I said on this show when everyone was criticizing the boat strikes and I'm wondering what you guys all think about this, because we've now found out, which I said on this show, like, I guarantee the CIA is in --

[06:40:05]

CORNISH: Venezuela, yes.

DAVIS: Venezuela and understands what is happening on the ground. And so, it's finally just come out that our CIA has been on the ground. We're not just randomly shooting up boats.

SABRINA SINGH, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS COMMENTATOR: That wasn't really a secret, though. I mean, Donald Trump, earlier on in the summer --

CORNISH: Yes.

SINGH: Said, I'm authorizing the CIA to start covert action, which was an incredible statement to make because you never talk about CIA actions on the ground.

DAVIS: Exactly.

SINGH: And I think, just to the, you know, the comment on the boat strikes, I mean, I think we all knew this was never about drug trafficking. Because if it was about drug trafficking, we'd be looking at Mexico and where fentanyl is flowing from. It was always about oil.

CORNISH: And like, well --

SINGH: And I think, you know, the extraction of oil and wealth from Venezuela and getting our companies back in, I think, has been top of mind for this administration.

DAVIS: And also the -- sorry. And also the connection to Hezbollah and Iran and China. I mean, like, Venezuela is not just about oil.

CORNISH: Let me jump in here, and I'm going to talk about something that seems unrelated, but is. Because here we are talking about what do we remember, right? Like, what really happened? Is our final narrative of something locked.

And today is the five -- the fifth anniversary of the January 6th Capitol insurrection, riot, attack on the Capitol. We had a couple thousand people storming the building specifically to stop the certification of the 2020 election. This morning, all those people are free. Their records are clear. More than 1,500 people were either convicted or pled guilty to charges connected to that day. And at the time, the Justice Department called it one of the largest criminal investigations in U.S. history. And that investigation has now been wiped out with a stroke of a pen. A year ago, President Trump returned to office, and within hours, granted clemency to every single January 6th rioter. So, they were walking free within hours.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEWART RHODES, PARDONED BY PRESIDENT TRUMP: When we heard President Trump say that he's going to be taking action for the J. six hostages, that's when I knew for sure. But I always -- I always knew he was going to do it, you know. I had -- I had no doubt. I had full faith in him doing it.

REPORTER: So, what do you want to say to Trump right now?

RHODES: Just, thank you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: A new report just released by House Democrats finds 33 of those people who received pardons a year ago for January 6th related crimes, they've actually now been rearrested for other crimes. This includes Christopher Moynihan, one of the men convicted of breaking into the Senate chamber on January 6th. Back in October, he was arrested, again, for allegedly threatening to kill House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries.

Group chat is back.

I was reporting that day, not from the Capitol, but I had worked at the Capitol before, and I remember looking at the smokey image and thinking, how can we ever forget this moment? This is an indelible moment. Has the Trump administration been effective in rewriting the story around that day?

LULU GARCIA-NAVARRO, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Yes. And the evidence of that is that he was re-elected. I think there is no other takeaway than that one because it was shocking. It was unprecedented. There was an insurrection that was undertaken, you know, at least under the inspiration of Donald Trump. And what we saw was an American people who eventually shrugged their shoulders and said, let's put him back in office.

CORNISH: Do you think that's the casual understanding? I mean when I look back at something, remember the Civil War, there's a world of people who call it the war of northern aggression. That doesn't mean we stop looking at it as a civil war, even as there's a -- this obviously cultural divide about it still.

SCHERER: There was no political cost, clearly, for the president. The Republican Party that initially distanced itself from him came back to him, including officials who blamed him for what had happened that day. And the people who committed the crimes are set free. I don't think we're in a situation today where we can say, that's not

likely to happen again. I mean there's plenty of scenarios where, if the president were again to say, lets gather here to protest this, the same people who went to Capitol Hill now believe that, you know, they did do it with the authorization of the president and that they were set free by the president. And you heard Stewart Rhodes right there.

CORNISH: I want to know, for you guys, for the average person, I know we're focused -- I could show you some headlines of the effects on the FBI, the Justice Department, as those people were told, hey, you did your job, but you shouldn't have been doing that and you're fired.

But for the rest of us, like, how -- how should we make sense of this moment? I mean do you just let it go and move on? Do you -- if you believe, like, hey, would I -- I want to believe my eyes there. How do you hold on to that?

SINGH: I mean, I don't think you can let it go. And I think you have to remember this moment in history. And it was something so significant. And I think Lulu's completely right. Like, unfortunately, you know, the American people did say, OK, but we're going to re-elect Donald Trump anyways. And there were -- there were so many other things that went into the 2024 election.

But, I mean, I certainly remember that day. I remember, you know, it was Vice President-elect Kamala Harris that I was working for at the time.

[06:45:02]

We were trying to transition through the government. The Trump administration was not allowing us to transition. So, you know, we were basically walking in on day one with not having spoken to then Vice President Pence's team because there wasn't even -- we weren't allowed to do that.

So, I think it was -- I mean it's certainly a dark day, but you have to also remember it and learn from it.

CORNISH: Yes. And we're living through the political ramifications of that, whether that's the sidelining of Pence, or that's a variety of other things.

So, you guys, thanks for just spending some time to remember it because we should.

Michael Scherer, thanks so much for being here.

SCHERER: Thank you.

CORNISH: If any of you missed that conversation, maybe you want to share the show, we're a podcast. Scan this QR code. No, it's over here. Find it. CNN THIS MORNING is available anywhere you get your podcasts.

And next on CNN, should he have come to Congress before he arrested Venezuela's president? I've got a guest. Republican Congressman Ryan Zinke is here to talk about that next.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When we're talking about Greenland, we're not talking about a (INAUDIBLE) dictatorship. We are talking about a NATO allied country.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: And why are we talking about Greenland? We know President Trump wants to. Could NATO survive that kind of takeover?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:50:28]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. MIKE JOHNSON (R-LA): This is not a regime change. This is demand for a change of behavior by a regime.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CORNISH: So, what exactly happened in Venezuela? Is it a regime change, a police action, an act of war? The Trump administration basically says it's in charge after the capture of Nicolas Maduro, but nobody knows exactly what that means.

So, joining me now in the group chat to talk is Congressman Ryan Zinke of Montana.

I always like to talk to you because you have been the boots on the ground. When people say boots on the ground, you've been in Iraq. So, you know a lot about this conversation.

The last --

REP. RYAN ZINKE (R-MT): Well, and, remember, also, this is -- this is a lot like Panama with Noriega. It has a lot of references that you can -- you can follow the script. It follows closely with Noriega in Panama.

CORNISH: Is that a good thing? Because I'm pretty sure in the months after that went very sideways for the people living in Panama.

ZINKE: Well, I can tell you, the execution of this operation was better than what Noriega was in Panama. This was a near flawless military operation. Going back to Panama, we had loss of life on the U.S. side. Navy SEALs as an example. But Noriega, the same justification is what we have today, is that Noriega was an illegitimate leader. There's no dispute that the election was fraudulent. And secondly, did he present a threat to the United States with his drug trafficking? And on both those counts, yes. With Panama, it was also the Panama Canal. So, that's taken us --

CORNISH: Can I ask you, though, the other thing we've been talking about on set all morning is Iraq. And one of the things we were talking about is that everyone thought more questions should have been asked about the prerequisites to go to war in Iraq, what led us there. You don't have the same concerns now?

ZINKE: Well, Iraq was a little different in that, you know, I was a Navy SEAL commander in Iraq.

CORNISH: Yes.

ZINKE: And so, I was in the policy execution business and not the policy making business. But Iraq --

CORNISH: But you're a lawmaker now because you had real questions about what happened.

ZINKE: Well, remember the argument, that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. There were so many parts of it that, quite frankly, when the war ended, they weren't really true. The fact that, in one case, there was an alleged that there was a terrorist camp within the borders of Iraq. That's true, the northern part, but that was controlled by Iran.

CORNISH: So, how is that different here?

ZINKE: Well, it --

CORNISH: We have a number of claims from the administration that they have not provided evidence for.

ZINKE: Well, there is a 52-page indictment, which is pretty close to why we went. I mean you look at the indictment, if you read it. I think the evidence is overwhelming. He was a narco-trafficker. He was not legitimate. On those two points that the administration is on firm constitutional ground and legal ground.

Now, the second part is, what are we going to do now, right? And everyone's asking, all right, now since Madero's gone, my opinion is we should be viewed as a liberator and not a conqueror. Is that -- what my desire and hope is that Venezuela wins in this. That Venezuela has a free and fair election. That the economy that is now a potential is created where Venezuela benefits from it. The people benefit, and we have a prosperity that they haven't seen.

CORNISH: Let me play for you what Senator Lindsey Graham wants. This is what he had to say about what should happen next.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R-SC): No military in the world could have done it.

You just wait for Cuba. Cuba is a communist dictatorship that's killed priests and nuns. They prayed on their own people. Their days are numbered.

So, I pray and hope that 2026 will be the year that we make Iran (ph) great again.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ZINKE: A lot in there.

Well, you know, you look at this last period of a few days. You have Greenland. You have Iran. You have Cuba. You have --

CORNISH: Colombia.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Colombia.

ZINKE: Colombia and you have a firm establishment of a Monroe Doctrine that's taken from Monroe, and then a little Teddy Roosevelt with gunboat diplomacy and they're --

CORNISH: Going from, we don't want European influence in this part of the world, to, we should have influence in this part of the world, to aggression in this part of the world?

ZINKE: Influences in making sure there's freedom, prosperity. And the U.S. does have a vested interest in making sure that South America is not a front for drugs coming in.

Now, having said that --

CORNISH: So, respond to this. Iran --

ZINKE: Well, let me just finish the point here, is that also, we have a responsibility.

[06:55:04]

You know, along with influence comes responsibility. And responsibility is to make sure you set the conditions and help Venezuelan people be prosperous. We want to make sure we have a prosperous South America that's free of dictators, free of drug trafficking, free of human trafficking. We want to make sure that South America -- it's in our best interest. It's in everyone's best interest.

CORNISH: So, where else should we invade to do that?

ZINKE: Invasion? I'm not there yet on a lot of places on invasion. I don't think the president is either. The president has said, look, you know, clean up your act. And if you don't stop a threat to the United States, which drugs is a threat, those actions are going to have consequences.

CORNISH: One last thing I want to play for you. It's you, Ryan Zinke. You were here on December 10th. We were talking about the Venezuela boat strikes. And here's what you had to say at the time.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ZINKE: The president had powers -- has powers, but he doesn't have unlimited powers. When it -- when it comes to using force against another country of action is that this is why we have Article One and Article Two. He has to present a case to the Congress. Congress is the only body that can declare war.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ZINKE: I still stand -- this is not a declared war.

CORNISH: What is it?

ZINKE: This is an action. Well, law enforcement action. Removing a dictator that, again, on two points. One is that this dictator was a threat to the United States with his narco-trafficking. That's the 52- page indictment. And secondly is, the country itself. That election that he had was not -- was not legitimate. That's not in dispute. It was a fraudulent --

CORNISH: So, what prevents the president from moving to the next phase of this without Congress?

ZINKE: Well, money for one. Remember, Article One is about the purse. And the president can act. But when you say we're going to commit money, we're going to commit, you know, rebuilding, he's going to need Congress to actually approve that money. That's Article One. We're the power of the purse.

Same thing when a -- when a president acts, and I'll give an example of Teddy Roosevelt, because we were talking a little about him, he sent the great white fleet out. And he said -- and Congress said, don't do it, I'm not going to fund you. He said, well, they're gone. You might want to fund them to come -- to have them come back.

So, this president, no doubt, is using Article One, I think very aggressively to the authorities. But Congress is going to have to come in and approve the funding because rebuilding or even on structure, I don't think the oil companies are going to do it without some support, you know, to make sure that that --

CORNISH: What is support code for?

ZINKE: Well, all right, you're going to have to have protection. I don't -- I don't think Chevron or one of the big companies --

CORNISH: Is that code for people?

ZINKE: Well, people and resources.

CORNISH: OK.

ZINKE: No doubt resources. That's expensive. It's expensive to keep a carrier battle group sitting in the -- in the Caribbean.

CORNISH: You know, Lulu brought that up earlier.

Lulu, what was your question? You said -- GARCIA-NAVARRO: Yes, my question was, you know, that -- are we going to be keeping all those troops and, you know, naval forces sitting off the coast of Venezuela as the Damocles sword over this new government? Like, for how long?

CORNISH: Like forever?

ZINKE: Well, and, again, it's expensive.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: It costs a lot of money.

ZINKE: It's probably in the tens of millions of dollars to keep a carrier, you know, floating. Just gasoline and fuel alone is a lot.

But again, it goes back to the president has to faithfully execute the duties of his office. And Congress is the power of the purse. So, the president can't act --

GARCIA-NAVARRO: So, are you going -- are you going to ask the president to come to Congress?

ZINKE: Well, here's, I think, on a larger view what's occurring is that fraud, waste and abuse is never congressional intent. So, the president, in the first quarter of his first year has gone after fraud, waste and abuse very aggressively. Now, if the intent of Congress is clear and the president doesn't execute that, then we're going to have a constitutional issue between Article One and Article Two. Remember, the job of Article Two is to faithfully execute the law.

CORNISH: I need you to translate for my mom. Are you going to ask the administration that --

ZINKE: Yes, well, I (INAUDIBLE), I said I --

CORNISH: To come to the Congress for war powers? Or is this whole fraud conversation about the other places they'll get the money from?

ZINKE: I'm -- I think funding. I sit on Appropriations. And I think the administration has to ask and request funding for it, because it is expensive and he doesn't have the authority to move funds back and forth, you know, freely. So, there are laws --

CORNISH: OK. Hold on one second. Sabrina has a question.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Will you give him that money? Will you give him that money?

ZINKE: Yes, to present a case. What's the plan? I think we're all -- we're all looking at, you know, all right, Maduro's gone. He's not coming back. You have now an interim government that isn't so far away from the modus of operandi, why we went in and, you know, took Maduro. And now, what's the plan going forward? How is it are we going to reshape a democracy, a prosperous democracy in Venezuela, and what are the steps along the way? Those steps are going to cost resources. So, he has to present a case, the administration, these are the resources that are required to make sure Venezuela --

[07:00:04]

SINGH: But those resources are going to have such -- I mean it's already testing the readiness of the force. I mean, having this carrier outside Venezuela. And then if we're going to do Colombia, Cuba, Greenland, I mean, that -- we don't have the capability for that.

DAVIS: I think that's more of a threat than they're really going to do.

CORNISH: All right, unfortunately --

DAVIS: The president's speaking to him -- them today.

(CROSS TALK)

CORNISH: Yes, so, Ryan Zinke stays --

ZINKE: We're with the president today.

CORNISH: Stays in this group chat. OK, we're going to bring you back because we want to know. Thank you so much for being here.

ZINKE: (INAUDIBLE). You guys are great here. I've got to say also, congratulations to Montana State University for a great day and they are the national champions. But it was a nail biter.

CORNISH: OK. Thank you for waking up with us. The headlines are next.