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Intel Chiefs Testify on Russian Hacks; McCain Reacts to Russia Hacking Hearing; Trump Continues to Doubt Russia Hacking Intel; GOP Sen Graham: "Time to Throw Rocks"; NSA Chief Fears Losing "Good, Motivated People". Aired 12:30-1p ET

Aired January 05, 2017 - 12:30   ET

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

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[12:32:48] JOHN KING, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back. We continue to dissect and discuss a remarkable hearing this morning of the Senate Armed Services Committee extensively to discuss the broad cyber threats against the United States, including from China, Iran, North Korea. But most of the 2-hour 40-minute hearing dedicated to Russia's hacking of the United States during the presidential election, including the Democratic National Committee. Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta's e-mails and those e-mails released into the public. A remarkable discussion after the hearing, the chairman John McCain met with reporters.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Senator McCain, what message do you hope that the President-elect takes from this hearing today?

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN, (R) CHAIRMAN, ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE: Well, I hope he understands the importance of the role of the intelligence community and they may have made some mistakes in the past but they are still vital in their advice and counsel and assessment for us to be able to secure this nation and provide those defense and security. And it's clear that their conclusions, at least so far have been correct. And we should respect the intelligence community and appreciate their work, recognizing that they're not always perfect.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Does it concern you that he continues to downplay the role of Russia in the elections when -- does it concern you that he continues to downplay the role of Russia in the elections?

MCCAIN: We'll see how he accepts this report from the intelligence that he's receiving, I think on Friday -- tomorrow.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And you also were going after -- you're making the point that Julian Assange is not a credible source. Why did you decide to do that in light of Donald Trump using, relying on Julian Assange as --

MCCAIN: As I said under the source, Mr. Assange's name has been raised as some kind of a credible source of information, and the fact the person that he is one of the worst individuals because he put the lives of men and women that are serving this nation in jeopardy because -- by revealing their identities and where they were. This is really a person who has put the lives of Americans in danger. He cannot be trusted for anything.

(CROSSTALK)

[12:35:11] UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Should the American people be skeptical of the intelligence community that Donald Trump seems to be promoting?

MCCAIN: How Americans -- we should always have a healthy skepticism. That's why we have hearings. But we start that out with the assumption that the information they are giving us is correct.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Was there a risk in that kind of promoting that kind of skepticism?

MCCAIN: That's why we got friends to (inaudible) the information that we need. That's what the role of Congress is.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator McCain what strategy would you like to see the new administration pick up in the cyber domain?

MCCAIN: First of all, to come up with what they haven't had and that's our policy in changing. Right now there is no policy. Therefore there is no strategy, therefore there's no response to the attacks.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator McCain --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE REPORTER: Senator, give us a moment where you seem to suggest that the Russian hacking of the election didn't affect the outcome of the election itself. The director prevents -- he had pushed back and suggest?

MCCAIN: Well, we just don't know that.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Where do you stand in?

MCCAIN: Well, I was saying, we don't know. We don't know. We say you can't assume anything. For someone to assume that they affected the outcome of the election is not correct.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But Senator do you think --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you think Donald Trump's election is --

MCCAIN: Hang on, hang on will you? Please.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Does that raise the prospect that Donald Trump's election was not legitimate sir?

MCCAIN: No because it would have to be proven that it did affect the outcome of the election. They have not proven that.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator McCain, have you determined why the President-elect doesn't share the same concerns about Russia as many Republicans like yourself on Capitol Hill? MCCAIN: No, I don't know. I haven't talked to him. How should I know?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Does it worry you though in anyway?

MCCAIN: No, I do my job and hopefully that all the correct information will come out. I do my job, we have hearings as committee chairman I do a lot of work.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: His team has suggested that this entire incident has become politicized. What's your response to that?

MCCAIN: I think the hearing we just held was not politicized. I think that that's manifestation of a bipartisan approach to this issue which has characterized the work of the Armed Services Committee as long as I'm in charge.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you think it's important to keep the role of the director of national intelligence?

MCCAIN: To keep the role?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The President-elect has signaled that he --

MCCAIN: No, they're not, no they're not, they're not going to take out director of National Intelligence. They're talking about changing the composition of it and stuff, but they're not talking about doing away with the director of National Intelligence.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You said you don't think the outcome of the election was affected, do you think that's --

MCCAIN: I do not know. But I will not believe that the outcome of the election was affected unless there's proof that there is. I'm not assuming. And no one else should either.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you think Trump was helped by Russia's hacking?

MCCAIN: I have no idea. But I haven't seen no information that he was helped.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator McCain, do you believe that Hillary Clinton's campaign was hurt by what happened with Russia's meddling in the election?

MCCAIN: As I said, I have no evidence. I tell you for the fifth time --

(OFF-MIC)

MCCAIN: I have no evidence that the outcome of the election was impacted by the hacking but the fact that they were able to do what they did is a threat to National Security because they intended obviously to have an attack and that is amongst the situation. We have no policy and have no strategy in response. And that should disturb all of us. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you believe what happened was an act of war?

MCCAIN: I think that in the broadest context, it was an act of war, but we respond differently to different acts of war. Espionage is an act of war but you don't go to war over it. You don't go into conflict. So it fits the definition of an act of war. But it doesn't mean that all of a sudden you start shooting.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Senator McCain, Turkey has sent ground forces to Syria to fight against Daesh, United States coalition does not support the Turks, what do you think the logic of that? Does the coalition should support Turkish efforts in Syria against ISIS (ph)?

MCCAIN: Until we find out the true intent of Russia and spending some time, so I don't need to bother position of Aleppo from ISIS who took --

(OFF-MIC)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator McCain, how should the U. S. retaliate? The intelligence officials seem to suggest that a cyber response was not the right approach.

[12:40:04] MCCAIN: I think they're concerned about escalation, but my response to that is, are you going to do nothing? We have whole variety of actions we could take, including increasing sanctions. The Russian economy is very, very weak, 15th in the world. You can impose much harsher sanctions as your response. So far, we have really done nothing.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you have confidence that the incoming administration will agree with tougher sanctions on Russia?

MCCAIN: We'll find out. I have no confidence either way. I have no conclusion either way.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And if he opposes it, will Congress role (ph) him a new opinion?

MCCAIN: I don't count votes but I will certainly, and Lindsey Graham and I and Cardon and others are preparing very tough time sanctions against Russia. Whether they will pass or not or whatever, I'm not sure but made sure I'm going to try.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Senator, if President-elect Donald Trump continues to cast doubt on these intelligence assessments after he gets his briefing, would you consider holding off his cabinet nominees or what action might you consider?

MCCAIN: The President is entitled to his views. I'm entitled to my views and I'll do my job as chairman of the committee.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What's the most important things that you think --

(END VIDEO CLIP) KING: Senator John McCain there, the Chairman of the Senate on Service Committee speaking to reporters in a Senate hallway after a very important hearing on cyber threats against the United States. Much of the conversation in the hall, also much of the conversation at that hearing focused on Russia's meddling in the 2016 Presidential election including hacking of Democratic National Committee e-mails, hacking Clinton campaign Chairman John Podesta's e-mails and then the release of those e-mails into the public sphere.

Senator McCain saying he has no way of knowing whether they impacted votes here in this country. There is no evidence, no evidence we should be clear, that Russia hacked in a way that changed votes, hacked into voting machines or hacked into the counting systems. That didn't happen, at least there's no evidence of that.

But the conversation back to the table here. Listening to Senator McCain in the hall, there's a lot to discuss. We could take this in many different directions, but one of the things that is stunning to me is the policy going forward. The Obama administration put in sanctions against Russia for this meddling.

Hawks like John McCain and his friend Lindsey Graham don't think those sanctions are tough enough. Lindsey Graham saying at the hearing that was a pebble. It's time to throw rocks to send a statement not just to Russia but to others who meddle in cyber warfare. And Senator McCain, say he doesn't know what the new President will do. And another question about policy, he says he doesn't know what the new President will do because I haven't talked to him.

We know John McCain was not a fan of Donald Trump during the campaign. We know Donald Trump doesn't react well to people who are not fans of Donald Trump. But covering a number of transitions, Dan, you probably beat me one or two. Is it unusual that the incoming President of the United States has not yet -- he's met with the leaders but he has not yet reached out broadly to the policy experts in his party? If you'll have a conversation about foreign policy, you bring in John McCain and Lindsey Graham, maybe you bring in Rand Paul too to get the full conversation, differing views, but he hasn't done that.

DAN BALZ, WASHINGTON POST: No, he hasn't done that. And I don't know what to draw from that yet. I mean we know he has met with a lot of people about a lot of things. He's got a government that he's got to populate. There's work to be done on that front. So at this point, you know, you would have to say he doesn't have a particularly good relationship with Senator McCain and therefore that might be the reason. There may be other reasons. I think it's more important once he is in office to see how he begins to reach out to people on the hill other than the narrow leadership.

AMY WALTER, COOK POLITICAL REPORTER: And, John, you've seen many of these transitions. Every time a President comes in, they come in with the premise "I'm going to change Washington. I was voted to shake up Washington." And Congress usually comes back. Remember when Bill Clinton came in and Senator Moynihan pushed back on. That's really nice.

KING: Nice to see you, young man.

WALTER: You're going to be gone after four years. I'm here for a long time, right? So there's nothing new about Congress pushing back even a member of their own party who is President saying we have a lot of information. We have a lot of institutional knowledge. Maybe you should listen to us and the new President saying, "No, no, no, I was elected to push back on people like you. You are part of the problem."

So that to me there's a natural and healthy tension there. The question that is going to occur afterward is, throughout this presidency or the beginnings of this presidency is just how long these tensions are going to go and who else is going to be part of this? We know Graham and McCain on security issues are going to be here. What about when we get to economic issues? What about when we get to foreign policy? What about when we get to entitlements? Where are we going to see the party moving in that?

KING: Right. The trade, immigration, you got through a long list -- the election gave us the President it did not settle the ideological tensions and the issues tensions within either party. Both parties are fracturing on some of these big issues and we're going to watch this debates play out.

[12:44:59] As we continue the conversation one of the things Senator McCain said he does not know -- he said he's hopeful but he does not know President-elect Trump will get a briefing from some of the gentleman you just saw here today and some other leaders of the intelligence community, including the head of the CIA tomorrow.

He'll be given a classified version of this report. He will be told pointblank we are told that there's absolute unequivocal evidence that Russia meddled in the election with a motivation we are told to influence the election. To help Donald Trump and hurt Hillary Clinton that was Russia's intent, I'm not saying that's what actually happened, but that was there intent.

Will Donald Trump change his mind? One of the points at the hearing Lindsey Graham, senator from South Carolina, you heard him a bit earlier in the program saying he thinks it's critical Donald Trump changes his mind, not so much because of the Russian hacking issue but because of big policy questions going forward.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LINDSEY GRAHAM, (R) ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE: Here is what I hope he realizes. That if he has to take action against North Korea, which he may have to do, I intend to support it. But he needs to explain to the American people why. And one of the explanations he'll give is based on what I was told by the people that are in the fight. And let me tell you this. You don't wear uniforms but you're in the fight. And we're in a fight for our lives. I just got back from the Baltics, Ukraine and Georgia. If you think its bad here you ought to go there.

So, ladies and gentlemen, it is time now not to throw pebbles but throw rocks. I wish we were not here. If it were up to me we'd all live in peace, but Putin is up to no good and he better be stopped and Mr. President-elect, when you listen to these people, you can be skeptical, but understand they are the best among us and they're trying to protect us. Thank you all.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Is there anyone in the Trump inner circle who delivers that message with credibility? Mike Pence the vice President-elect is very careful publicly. He says of course, the President-elect Trump has every reason to be skeptical. Look at when Donald Trump has said, these are the people who screwed up during the Iraqi War weapons of mass destruction. The intelligence people say that was 13 years ago. We've learned our lessons. We have much better way of doing things now.

But who in the Trump inner circle, maybe he won't listen to John McCain, maybe he won't listen to Linsey Graham. Is there somebody in his inner circle? It General Mattis his choice for defense secretary who certainly respects the gentleman we saw today up giving the testimony? Who gets to him and says, "Sir, you have to change your mind, sir you got to change."

MATT VISER, BOSTON GLOBE: I think in the case that will come, you know, what is tweets tomorrow afternoon or as we speak. And sort of what his response is after that briefing tomorrow and how he recalibrates. We saw some early signs of him, you know, paving away for him to kind of back off a little bit. But what is his reaction after the briefing that he gets, and that's his opportunity really to sort of back off.

And the other thing, sort of at play is trying to figure out his motivations, his rhetoric on Putin and where that's coming from if he's playing some more strategic game than we give him credit for a lot of times or if he is cozying up for Putin for other reasons. So I think that that's -- that's another thing at play that we don't exactly know what the end game looks like.

NIA-MALIKA HENDERSON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL REPORTER: Yeah. And there's some -- Hugh Hewitt OK, has a column in "The Washington Post" saying there's some brilliant strategy behind this and he's really playing Putin in a way that other people may not understand. And he admits in that column that's maybe sort of a laughable conclusion.

But, you know, I think also what we've seen from Trump and some of his rhetoric is he might in the end say he believes the raw data, believe the conclusion, but let's move on, right? He said as much that the election was weeks and weeks ago. It's settled. But we need to turn the page in terms of how we deal with Putin in terms of how we deal with Russia. Wouldn't it be nice if we could get along with Russia, so we can work with them to take out ISIS, so that that could be where this is heading.

BALZ: I mean isn't it quite possible that his response to this will be, OK, I accept that the Russians were, you know, doing bad things. But the intelligence community says they have no evidence that it changed the outcome. Therefore, it didn't change the outcome, therefore, settled issue. We can move on. Cyber threats are a real problem, not just from the Russians. And you could see him kind of encompassing all of that in response.

KING: And then the question becomes, does he leave in place the Obama administration sanctions. Some of which were hard to unwind. One president does something it's hard to unwind and does he -- what does he do when Senator McCain and others say you should accelerate the sanctions, because that's what make them tougher.

VISER: Yeah, I think that's where the debate heads.

KING: Yeah.

VISER: And McCain seems on the occasions of digging in and the question is, you know, how much momentum when he's talking to Ben Cardin about, you know, having some sort of resolution and passing something along sanctions and does Trump veto that?

HENDERSON: And these are the people probably had a veto-proof majority.

BALZ: Will there be any momentum or energy for fuller hearings on the hill?

HENDERSON: Right.

WALTER: There will be one will be Rex Tillerson. I think we're going to be doing great. There's a --

BALZ: Right, but I mean a separate investigation.

WALTER: Absolutely. So we're going to have more of this next week and then we could have a full hearing.

KING: But some of it in the confirmation hearings of this choices especially the secretary of state choice, Rex Tillerson, the ExxonMobil CEO has a close relationship with Putin -- in so far in his meetings with senators apparently he's taken a tough line against Russia.

[12:50:05] We'll see what happens publicly, you mentioned that name. And then once this report is public it seemed to be indicated that these guys make a call back up there or they their deputies called back up there to talk about the public part of it. One of the fascinating things about (inaudible) politics in which I'll inside politic, but one of the fascinating things when you watch these hearings in Washington, I always love to watch lawmakers with known ambition.

Among the members of the committee today, Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas, he is an army veteran, Iraqi War veteran who is a strong conservative Republican. He is no fan of Vladimir Putin. He's a hawk on many military issues but he also understands the power of Trump voters in the Republican electorate. So watch Tom Cotton here trying not to side with Putin but to be a little bit more careful.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TOM COTTON, (R) ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE: There's a widespread assumption, this has been expressed by Secretary Clinton herself since the election, that Vladimir Putin favored Donald Trump in this election. Donald Trump has proposed to increase our defense budget to accelerate nuclear modernization and to accelerate ballistic missile defenses and to expand and accelerate oil and gas production which would obviously harm Russia's economy. Hillary Clinton opposed or at least was not as enthusiastic about all those measures. Would each of those put the United States in a stronger, strategic position against Russia?

JAMES CLAPPER, DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: Currently anything we do to enhance our military capabilities, absolutely.

COTTON: There is some contrary evidence despite what the media speculates that perhaps Donald Trump is not the best candidate for Russia.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: OK, Senator Cotton there -- it's an interesting point in the sense that he wanted to get into the mix. He wasn't defending the hacking, he wasn't defending the Russians base, what exactly was he trying to do there?

HENDERSON: Yeah, I mean he was making -- I mean this is what you were talking about before I mean there's Senator Lindsey Graham and John McCain on one end and then people in the middle are trying to triangulate all of these difference forces. And essentially praised Trump, right? And defend him and say that, you know, say that he would be better versus Clinton. You know, we'll have to see, we'll se what the Trump administration is like. What it's like in terms of its relationship to Putin. And if he, in fact, rolls back these sanctions, I don't know what Tom Cotton will say about that.

VISER: Was any -- it seems like the Hugh Hewitt argument in some ways of sort of giving Trump credit that, you know, he's saying nice things about Putin but underneath he's doing a lot more to build up the military or at least talking about that.

BLAZ: There also may be another, excuse me, aspect of this, of what Senator Cotton represents. Which is, there are a lot of Republicans who are uncomfortable with what Donald Trump has said and done, basically the intelligence community, but they don't want this report to give more fuel to the idea that in one way or another, Hillary Clinton has a legitimate argument to make about what happened to her. They want to cut the Democrats off. They want to make Hillary Clinton look less tough than Donald Trump on some of these issues.

KING: I want to make a point about the gentleman. Just to someone who has been in Washington a long time, he discovered the White House and kind of these things that Donald Trump has disparaged that -- in criticized of disparaging the intelligence community and for apparently taking the sides or viewing Julian Assange as a credible witness. Maybe says he hasn't taken a side, but he cites him on Twitter as someone we should all pay attention to in this debate.

And taking the side of the Russians. These are the three gentlemen who testified today. Jim Clapper is the Director of National Intelligence. He seemed very happy to tell everybody he's leaving in 15 days. But he's been in the military for some 40 years now, began his service in the intelligence community during the Kennedy administration. He's served Democrats and Republicans.

Marcel Lettre is the under secretary of defense for intelligence. And he goes back to Bob Gates. He has served secretaries Hagel, Panetta and Gates Democrats and Republicans, two Republicans and a Democrat there. He didn't get to talk much today because he's a civilian appointee. Admiral Michael Rogers, the head of U. S. Cyber Command, the Director of the National Security Agency, former director of intelligence for the joint chief of staff. He has spent 36 years in the intelligence community in the United States military.

Again, for Democrats and Republicans that is what has a lot of Washington dismayed that if you're going to attack -- if we have a Republican President he's going to fight with Democrats, so be it. Democrats are going to fight with the Republicans, so be it. Why is he disparaging the work of these people who try to be a political? And I thought Director Clapper was pretty honest, we don't always get it right, but we try to always get it right. We're not trying to shape more things based on politics. One of the things that came up is because President-elect Trump has been so critical of the intelligence community, could it affect recruiting? Here's Admiral Rogers on that point.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MICHAEL ROGERS, CMDR, U.S. CYBER COMMAND: I don't want to lose good, motivated people who want to help serve this nation because they don't feel they are generating value to help that nation. And I'm the first to acknowledge there's room for a wide range of opinions of their results we generate, we don't question that for one minute. And every intelligence professional knows that. I've had plenty of times in my career when I've presented my intelligence analysis to commanders and policy makers and they just look at me and say, "Hey, Mike, thanks but that's not the way I see it" or "You're going to have to sell me on this."

[12:55:06] That doesn't bother any of us. What we do, I think, is relevant and we realize what we do is in no small part driven impart by the confidence of our leaders in what we do. And without that confidence, I just don't want a situation where our workforce decides to walk because I think that really is not a good place for us to be.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALTER: John, what he's saying right there is what the leaders of almost every industry in America believe right now, right? You disparage the banks or Wall Street. We're not getting the best and the brightest to come. You disparage Washington and the people who come here as public servants. You're not getting those people to come. So, this is -- what he's saying is happening in every industry based on the fact that traditional institutions are not trusted in the way they used to be.

KING: Under attack in those sense, but remarkable in this case that President-elect doing it to the intelligence community. Amy, Matt, Dan, Nia-Malika Henderson. Thanks for coming in today for "Inside Politics" that's it for us. An abbreviated show because of that fascinating hearing, thanks for watching.

Wolf Blitzer, much more on the breaking news today up next after a short break.

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