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Schiff: Need "Wholesale Review" Of DOJ Politicization Trump Era; Sen. Schumer: "Misunderstanding" With Sen. Collins Over 1/6 Commission Vote; Fauci: Criticizing Me For Changing Advice Is "Criticizing Science". Aired 12:30-1p ET

Aired June 21, 2021 - 12:30   ET

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

[12:30:00]

JOHN KING, CNN HOST: If you realize, oh, this is a congressman, I need to brief this up, I need to stop this, I need to step back. There's a basic competence question here, isn't there?

CARRIE CORDERO, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: There is. And there's also a management and a leadership of the Department during this period question as well, I think. I think there's two points in time, potentially where one would want to have that internal conversation, if you're the investigator, or the lawyers of the Department working on this case, one is on the front end, before they actually serve the subpoenas. If they're conducting an investigation as being reported, of a staff member of the House Intelligence Committee, then one could anticipate that the person that person communicate, the people that person communicates with our other members and staff of the Committee.

So on the front end, you would want to brief that up, and make sure you have the approvals potentially have a leadership conversation about briefing, the leadership of that Committee. Then on the back end, when they received this information, they saw that the names returned from the subpoena included names of lawmakers and other probably staff on the Committee, that's the second opportunity where you would say, wait a minute, we got this sensitive information. Now, if we didn't before, we need to go back brief the appropriate people and determine the proper course of action.

KING: So Adam Schiff, who was one of the Democratic members, he was the ranking member then, he's the chairman of the Committee. Now, he says he wants to current, the Biden Justice Department to essentially look in every file, rip up every floorboard. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D-CA): The inspector general is doing an investigation. I talked with the attorney general about going beyond that. I think he really needs to do a wholesale review of all of the politicization of the Department of last four years. What happened to our Committee? What happened to members of the press? That's just a subset. These are gross abuses of the independence of the Justice Department. And we don't know how far they run. And our new attorney general has to find out.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: When a new attorney general comes in often it's, you know, anything egregious, yes. But we don't want to spend a lot of time looking backwards. Do they have a choice now when you're learning revelations like this?

CORDERO: Well, on one hand, they are going to look backwards because the attorney general has ordered this inspector general review to look at these particular subpoenas with respect to the House Intelligence Committee and also with respect to the former White House Counsel.

Does the Justice Department want to do a wholesale review of every way that the Department was politicized? I don't think they're going to want to spend that much time retroactively. But what they need to be thinking about is going forward. So for example, on this House Intelligence Committee subpoena, they want to be thinking about what briefing rules do we have in place?

In other words, what are the Justice Department's obligations to brief the leadership of a Committee? What briefing rules internally in the Department leadership approvals, attorney general approvals do we want to put in place for future investigations involving unauthorized disclosures of classified information? And what obligation do we have to notify lawmakers?

One of the worst things I think from the Department's perspective about this particular matter is that the lawmakers found out from the company --

KING: Right.

CORDERO: -- when they were notified by the provider that's not the way it should be. They should have found out from the Department.

KING: Like gag rules in place for up to three years that finally expires the company tells us what happens not the government tells them what happened. Carrie, Evan grateful for you coming in.

[12:33:23]

Up next for us, more of CNN's interview with Democratic Senate Leader Chuck Schumer, how he's running feud with the key Republican impacts the debate over lots of things including a January 6th Commission.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KING: Washington is built on relationships, at least in theory. So consider this a sign of why Washington doesn't work right now. There is big tension between the Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Republican Senator Susan Collins. Some of it stems from a recent dust up over the proposed commission to investigate the Capitol insurrection. Some of it goes back to last year's campaign. In a new CNN interview, Schumer tells our Manu Raju, it's all a big misunderstanding. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: One of the thing too, is that waiting over Republicans is important too. One of the Republicans that we talked to for this is Susan Collins, she's been -- she was critical of your handling of that vote in the January 6th Commission. She said she's perplexed at the state of your relationship. Why you think things have been wrong with the --

SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER (D-NY), MAJORITY LEADER: -- with that issue. It was a misunderstanding. I was always for her changes. I told our Democratic colleagues I'm for them, if we got 10 votes, so we'd vote for them. It was a misunderstanding, but I hope she can find the other four votes among the Republicans.

RAJU: I mean because she said that you didn't stand up and she said that you don't have lower voice, she even volunteer that it could be condescending and sexist the way that interaction went on.

SCHUMER: I'm not going to comment on that. It was a misunderstanding. I like to get along with everybody.

RAJU: Do you think you can work out, you can fix that relationship?

SCHUMER: I hope so.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Kind of a shrug on the hope so there. There's some history here. Senator Collins was mad a Schumer Alliance Super PAC dumped a lot of money into a race last year. I don't quite get that Democrats are supposed to try to beat Republicans in elections. But it's important because if you're at a 50-50 Senate, you need some Republican votes on some things.

RAJU: Yes. And she is a perennial swing vote. So it's interesting that the Senate majority leader and the key swing vote on the Republican side have this tense relationship. And she did talk about what happened on that January 6th Commission vote with our colleague, Ted Barrett. She went on, she told said that they talked about these changes that she wanted to make to this bill last month, it would make in her view the selection of staff more fair and have a timeframe for the probe to end at a certain time.

Schumer is privately supported that and made some comments to that effect. But then she said she was angry. She went up to him because he gave, in her view, highly partisan speech on the floor that could alienate some Republicans that they were trying to court at a key moment and she said that when she went up to him, he sat down, he motioned toward to lower her voice. And she said, he refused to stand to talk to me. He stayed seated and would not engage. Then she was asked, what did you think about Schumer's response? And she volunteered condescending and sexist, is that what you're asking? And she says, I'm not going to make a judgment on that, you can make a judgment on that.

[12:40:26]

And that's why I asked Schumer, what do you think about that? He didn't want to comment on her saying that, but he did say it was a misunderstanding. He supported those changes. And he told Democrats, he supported the change. But still question going forward, can they work together? She says they can and they have on some issues like the Asian American hate crimes bill, but still, there's still some tension there clearly.

KING: And if there is, it just tells you a lot about the polarization in Washington. I think most people at home watching their instinct would be, oh, that's the Trump supporters and that, you know, and the progressives that are polarized, there's distrust polarization, relationships have deteriorated across the town in recent years.

CLEVE WOOTSON, WHITE HOUSE REPORTER, THE WASHINGTON POST: Yes, extremely. And one of the reasons that Biden won, or one of the reasons that Biden said the people should elect him is because he can reach across the aisle, he can make those things work. But you know, three months in and four months in, we're not any farther along.

KING: Not further along, he's brought them to the White House. But then and you mentioned this is the dust up about the January 6th insurrection, Joe Manchin, who is important, again, on just about everything else, because of the 50-50 land. He says let's try that again.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JOE MANCHIN, (D-WV): I need to go back. I need to find three more Republican, good Republican senators that will vote for the commission. So the least we can tamp down where people say, well, republicans won't even do the simple lift, common sense of basically voting to do a commission that was truly bipartisan, you know. So once the people and it really, and it just really emboldens the far left saying, I told you, you know, how's that working for you now, Joe?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Is there a scenario in which you could go back to this and get the Republican votes or is that just fantasyland? I -- you know, he's genuine when he believes in bipartisanship. But, you know, if Republicans keep saying no, or keep voting the other way, at what point does Joe Manchin say math is math?

JACKIE KUCINICH, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: You think we'd be there at this point? Because it really doesn't, the closer I'm in, again, I hate to be talking about the midterms in June 2021. But the -- during the break, we were talking about the Senate schedule, how short it is until we are in -- we're going to be in the fall before we know it. And the political upside for Republicans isn't high to begin with on January, on January 6th commission, the closer we get to the midterm elections, the less they're going to want to talk about it and the less that vote is appealing from a political standpoint or Republican.

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, it's not just the closer we get to the midterms. It's the further we get from January 6th, there is no appetite for this.

KING: No appetite for this. I think is the key part there. Appreciate it, everybody.

[12:43:01]

The rollout started strong but now experts worry the country may not hit its 4th of July vaccination goal.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KING: United States now less than two weeks from the President's deadline to try to get 70 percent of adults at least one COVID vaccine shot by July 4th. Let's walk through some of the latest numbers. This is the case timeline. And this is encouraging. Now you see the Sunday numbers are often way down, just shy of 4,000 new infections reported on Sunday. But still averaging now below 12,000, 11,412 new infections a day that is significant progress, especially when you look back at the horrific winter peak, if you look at the vaccination map, the darker the states is what you want to be here. This is the population fully vaccinated, 64 percent Vermont, 60 percent Maine.

But remember places like Missouri at 38 percent, Alabama, Mississippi 32, 29. Some of the states are lagging well behind in vaccination. Why does that matter? Well, 16 states plus the District of Columbia have met the President's goal, gets 70 percent of your citizens at least one shot by July 4th, 16 states have met it, plus the District of Columbia. The issue is to get the other states there. You would have to have 848,000 first shots a day. Right now we're only averaging 370,000. So we're well behind that. And at that point, let's bring him to share his expertise and his insights, Dr. Jonathan Reiner, our CNN medical analyst and Professor of Medicine and Surgery at George Washington University Hospital.

Doctor, I'm going to show our viewers just if you look at now the CDC map about where is COVID still is there still is community transmission. I just want to note if you look at the red dots are the bad dots. And so look at Missouri in the middle of the country. You look at some in Florida here you look at Alabama, Mississippi, and Georgia. You look out here in Utah. I just want to come back to the vaccination map. You see the community transmissions in those places. Well guess what those states also happened to be 38 percent in Missouri, 32 percent, 35 percent. There is a direct correlation, right between whether you're still seeing some cases and lower vaccination rates.

DR. JONATHAN REINER, CNN MEDICAL ANALYST: That's right. So, you know, what I've been saying is that we are really rapidly approaching a situation where we have two different countries, vaccinated America, where things look totally back to normal, you know, the Northeast New England, the Mid-Atlantic states by the West Coast, and then big parts of the south and Midwest. So Missouri is a perfect example. They've seen a doubling of hospitalizations in case rates in the past couple of weeks.

Missouri has given at least one shot to 55 percent of adults, you know a place like Vermont or Massachusetts for that matter, have vaccinated over 80 percent of that population. So we're starting to see the curves really diverge. And when the virus comes back and it will, it's going to come back in places where the vaccination rates are low.

[12:50:22]

KING: And so one of the things we're all hopeful for and I know you share this with me is that people who have influenced in their community should speak out about people please get vaccinated. However, we do see, this is Cole Beasley, he's a Buffalo Bills wide receiver NFL player, quite colorful, high social media presence. He says I'm Cole Beasley and I'm not vaccinated. I may die of COVID. But I'd rather die actually living if I'm forced into retirement, so be it.

When you have professional athletes and other people who are influential in some sectors of society, saying I'm not going to get vaccinated and adding, essentially adding the damn it part of it. What is your reaction?

REINER: Well, what a missed opportunity. And what I would tell Mr. Beasley is that if he dies, he won't be -- he won't die living, he'll die alone on a ventilator in an ICU. Look, I think, first of all I think the NFL is missing an opportunity to really show the public why vaccination is so important. They should mandate vaccines throughout their entire enterprise.

First of all, it's right for business. And secondly, it's the right message for the population. G.W. University where I work is mandating vaccines for everyone. You know, our hospital, our medical faculty practice, all the students coming onto campus, everyone has to be vaccinated, because we are a community, and we are protecting each other when we do this. And that's the message I'd like to hear from our athletes.

You know, you're part of the community. Your fans are paying your enormous salaries. How about being responsible to them?

KING: I agree with you wholeheartedly. I'm just going to put up the case timeline. Again, we've all lived through this over the past 14, 15 months or so. And among one of the most public figures has been Dr. Anthony Fauci, who gets criticized all the time because he said things, Dr. Reiner, way back here at the beginning that changed over time. Welcome to science, right. Dr. Fauci says he's become a political figure. So be it. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, NIAID DIRECTOR: It is essential as a scientist, that you evolve your opinion, and your recommendations based on the data as it evolves. That is the nature of science. It is a self- correcting process. And that's the reason why I say people who then criticize me about that are actually criticizing science.

(END VIDEO CLIP) KING: As someone who's been with us from the very beginning here, again, when we were having conversations way back here more than a year ago. Yes, they were different about masking, about transmission, about whether you could touch surfaces than where we are now. When you hear Dr. Fauci say, if you criticize me, you're criticizing science. Is that right?

REINER: Absolutely -- changed or when you learn more of the facts. What I would remind everyone in this country is that if you feel good about the vaccines that you've received, the -- in particularly the mRNA vaccines, those vaccines were developed largely by NIH, under the direction and leadership of Tony Fauci. So no one and certainly, you know, myself included, no one has gotten all these facts, right. We've learned every day new things about this virus.

But, you know, demonizing, you know, someone like Dr. Fauci is sort of like trying to fire your oncologist when she tells you that you have cancer. It's really ridiculous and unfitting for the folks in the political world who keep doing this.

KING: They're just looking for someone to take a whack at. Dr. Reiner, grateful for your time and your insights today, Sir. Appreciate it very much.

[12:53:53]

When we come back, back to politics, a campaign volunteer of the New York City mayor's race stabbed in a brazen daylight attack. Details about exactly what happened next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KING: Topping our Political Radar today, the Biden administration now preparing additional sanctions against Russia that in response to the poisoning and imprisonment of the opposition leader Alexey Navalny. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan telling CNN those sanctions will be related to chemical weapons use but he was vague about the timing. That news of course coming just days after President Biden met face to face with the Russian President Vladimir Putin in Geneva.

A volunteer working with New York City mayoral candidate Eric Adams is recovering from surgery now after being stabbed with an icepick in the Bronx. Adams says police now reviewing video of yesterday's attack and it's not yet known if this attack is connected with the mayoral campaign. On this election eve, Adams also weighing in on his rivals Andrew Yang and Kathryn Garcia appearing together on the campaign trail forming a quasi-alliance. Yang even telling voters to rank Garcia second. Adams says their Juneteenth timing in his view, problematic.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Are you suggesting it's racial?

ERIC ADAMS (D-NY), MAYORAL CANDIDATE: No, I'm suggesting that those who are running in office in New York, those who are looking at the candidates in the field, they felt as though is sent the wrong message on Juneteenth to make that announcement on Juneteenth with all of the diversity that was in the field of African American and Latin speaking candidates.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: This quick CNN programming reminder, sex, power, feminism, she wrote the book on it. But this is the only story she never told CNN films, lady boss the Jackie Collins story Sunday at 9:00 right here only on CNN.

[13:00:07]

Thanks for joining us today on Inside Politics. Hope we'll see you back here this time tomorrow. Stay with us. Ana Cabrera picks up our coverage right now. Have a good day.