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Trump Calls Putin's Military Activity In Ukraine "Genius"; CNN: Biden Meets With At Least Three Potential Supreme Court Nominees; Sen. Rick Scott Releases GOP Agenda Focused On Culture Wars. Aired 12:30-1p ET

Aired February 23, 2022 - 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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JOHN KING, CNN HOST: At this moment of global crisis, Donald Trump is as clear as he can be. The United States, the NATO alliance, the United Kingdom, the European Union, Japan, South Korea, Australia, and more are united in condemning Vladimir Putin and his military aggression against Ukraine. Donald Trump, still very much the leader of the Republican Party has a very different take. Listen.

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DONALD TRUMP, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: And I said, this is genius. Putin declares a big portion of the Ukraine, of Ukraine. Putin declares it as independent. Oh, that's wonderful. So Putin is now saying it's independent, a large section of Ukraine. I said, how smart is that? And he's going to go in and be a peacekeeper.

That's the strongest peace force. We could use that on our southern border. That's the strongest piece force I've ever seen. There were more army tanks than I've ever seen. They're going to keep peace all right. No, but think of it. Here's a guy who's very savvy. I know him very well, very, very well.

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KING: There was a time in American politics not all that long ago that that would be disqualifying. Let's discuss. With me to share their reporting and their insights, CNN's Nia-Malika Henderson, Jackie Kucinich of The Daily Beast, and Vivian Salama from the Wall Street Journal.

Ronald Reagan said Mr. Gorbachev tear down that wall. Donald Trump is inviting Vladimir Putin to rebuild it, calls him a genius at this moment. Says his plan is genius at this moment. I'm not wrong in mind that, if you roll back the tape, say to 2015, anytime before that that would be disqualifying in American politics that would also be disqualified to try to steal an election, mind you. But that's nuts.

VIVIAN SALAMA, NATIONAL SECURITY REPORTER, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: Well, it's misinformed for starters. The former president wouldn't need a little bit of a history lesson as far as what these Russian peacekeeping forces tend to do there, anything but peacekeeping forces the majority of the time. And so, you know, that's just sort of the starting line there. But, you know, obviously, on a more broad -- on a broader issue, the most -- one of the most bipartisan issues right now in Washington is the fact that Russian aggression cannot be tolerated.

[12:35:20]

And the former president is out there, really trying to be an agitator, which he has always tried to do. But with regard to Vladimir Putin in particular, you know, he has always kind of expressed some sort of intrigue with the strong man approach that he's taken. Even if lives are at stake, and the sovereignty of independent nation is at stake. It doesn't seem to concern him as much as just this interesting, bold move.

KING: Right, the old guard of the Republican Party may be pushing President Biden say be even tougher, be even tougher, be even tougher, but they want him to stand up to Putin. And they might be saying Biden is not tough enough. That's one debate to have. But listen to here, again, one of the leaders of this new piece of the Republican Party, hosted primetime show on another network, and he says this.

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TUCKER CARLSON, FOX HOST: As an American, what's in this for me and my neighbors and the rest of us, and all I'm getting is that we can feel morally satisfied because we hate Putin.

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KING: What's in this for me and my neighbors and the rest of us? So it's OK for Vladimir Putin to steal a Democratic country? Can she then, next time, take Taiwan and then Iran can do whatever it wants too?

NIA-MALIKA HENDERSON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes. And it's not just Tucker Carlson, you hear sentiments from people like J.D. Vance, who of course is running for Senate in Ohio. You hear similar comments that Putin is a great man, from people like former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. This is the Trump effect. Trump adores Vladimir Putin. He admires him. He admires his anti-Democratic ways. He admires that he is a strong man and hard on the press and hard on all sorts of minority groups in Russia.

And yes, I mean, listening to a former president say that it's really, it's jarring, and it's really sad. I mean, to think about where the Republican Party is where Donald Trump is leading it to, in the fact that people are getting on board with this Trump.

JACKIE KUCINICH, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: And there was a fine line that there is an isolationist, part of the Republican Party that has been there and has expanded over the last couple of years. But there's a fine, there's a very not even a fine line, a bright line between rooting for Putin, like rooting for his strategy, and saying that United States shouldn't be involved in any more foreign conflicts. And it seems like they're trending much more to rah, rah, strong man to an actual coherent foreign policy belief. KING: Right. It's not America first, it's America alone in the sense that what you're hearing from Trump there at the beginning, was essentially. He flipped the burden NATO throughout his entire presidency. And he's doing it again there, the European Union, NATO Alliance. No, Putin is good, the West is bad, that's what he's saying.

SALAMA: Well, it's a disconnect from the realities of sort of national security concerns that the U.S. should be facing. He mentioned the southern border there, which is obviously a concern to the current administration as well as the past, but to not then equate that with what's happening in Eastern Europe and the fact that our NATO allies are under threat that their borders are under threat that the sovereignty of an ally has come under threat.

And also the fact that we have under Article Five, a commitment to support NATO allies, he sort of threw that playbook out the window a long time ago, and he's very different from presidents even within his party.

KING: And he wants to come back and lead his party yet again.

[12:38:26]

Up next for us, some brand new CNN reporting on the President's Supreme Court search, we will know the pick within days.

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KING: Very important domestic news story, CNN told President Biden has conducted interviews with three potential Supreme Court nominees and that the President is prepared to make his choice public within days. Nia-Malika Henderson and Jackie Kucinich back with me.

Let's just put up the three leading contenders whom we know the President has interviewed. You see, you know, Judge Jackson, Judge Kruger, and Judge Childs there. The President is going to make history. He's going to make history in the next 72 to 100 hours by nominating a black woman to the United States Supreme Court.

HENDERSON: Yes, listen, if you believe kind of the conventional wisdom in the chattering class in Washington, Ketanji Brown Jackson probably is the front runner in this. She was somebody who a lot of progressive a lot of black progressives wanted Obama to nominate her to the Supreme Court. He decided to go with Merrick Garland. But obviously three women here, three African American women, Biden about to make good on this campaign promise to make history by putting a black woman on the Supreme Court.

KUCINICH: You know, Childs also has some pretty powerful backups.

HENDERSON: Yes, Clyburn, yes.

KUCINICH: She has Clyburn. And she also has someone like Lindsey Graham and Biden having that bipartisan consensus on this pick, could be something that is very much something that he wants to make this not a total circus as this individual goes through the process. But, you know, he's -- Biden has been deliberate about this process. So even if he's made his decision at this point, he's going to go through it. He's needs to feel like he's crossed all the T's, dotted all the I's, before announcing who his pick is.

KING: Right. And assuming confirmation we can show you the current Supreme Court. This will be a left of center justice replacing a left of center of justice, replacing Stephen Breyer as you see right there. Still an important moment for the President, A, to make history, B, for the Democrats to get a younger justice on the court.

How would you like to be Dick Durbin? He's the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Well, Joe Biden held that role for a number of years. Justice Breyer was actually the last justice confirmed when Joe Biden was chairman of the Committee.

[12:45:04]

He said this to "The Washington Post" Senator Durbin did, the longer you wait, the more likely things get complicated with outside events. Oppression, what if in the middle of this, God forbid, war breaks out in some part of the world? I mean, things can happen. So if I have a singular focus, it's to get this done in an orderly, predictable way in a timely fashion. And the White House is already working with him, you know, saying, look, you're going to get a tax, the person is too liberal to this, to that, get it done.

HENDERSON: That's right. And the worry is does someone else get sick, right? Are they going to have the full complement of Senators available to vote on this person and to confirm her? And yes, I mean, you had Biden come out the box and say he was going to do it in February and as time went on in February, people were like, let's get this done.

KUCINICH: So the less vetting you have to do the better which is another reason that Ketanji Brown Jackson and justice -- Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson has kind of the inside track here because she's someone that was just confirmed last year.

KING: With three Republican votes.

KUCINICH: Three Republican votes and has really gone through a lot of the process already.

KING: All right. We'll watch. We get that one any day now. It'd be fascinating moment.

Up next for us, a new Republican election agenda, a border wall named after Donald Trump and a tax hike for more than half of Americans.

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[12:50:52]

KING: The man tasked with electing more Republican senators is pushing a brand new 11 point policy plan. And it has Democrats saying, thank you. Florida Republican Senator Rick Scott is the architect of this plan. It includes a border wall named after Donald Trump and Republican talking points on issues of race, gender, and education.

And get this, it calls for all Americans to pay income taxes. More than half of Americans who are poor working class currently do not make enough money to be required to pay federal income taxes. Jackie Kucinich, Nia-Malika Henderson are back with us. And let's just listen. Rick Scott was on another network last night. And he said no, no, no, no, no, Democrats say there are tax hikes here. There are not.

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SEAN HANNITY, FOX NEWS HOST: And you see Chuck Schumer saying that you, your plan is to raise taxes on more than half of Americans. I didn't see that in your plan. Did you have that on your plan? It was it in a visible -- invisible --

SEN. RICK SCOTT (R-FL): Of course not.

HANNITY: -- in the copy that I got because I don't see that.

SCOTT: Oh, no, Chuck Schumer who wants to raise taxes for everything while I've cut, I've cut, when I was governor, I cut taxes and fees 100 times. We're the opposite.

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KING: He talks about when he's governor. Let's help Senator Scott and Sean there. Reading is fundamental. I was taught that when I was young. It's right here in Senator Scott's plan. All Americans should pay some income tax to have skin in the game. Even if a small amount currently over half of Americans pay no income tax. This is the senator's plan. You go online, this is the senator's plan. It's right there or you can defend that proposal if you want. Instead, he denies it exists in his own plan.

HENDERSON: Yes. And it's not in invisible ink. It's right there in the plan. You know, I mean, I think Rick Scott wants to be president at some point. He wants to run. There's this fantasy among a contingent of Republicans that somehow Donald Trump will go away.

So part of this is that raising his profile. Mitch McConnell, I'm sure is not happy about this. They don't want to put out some sort of vision. They just want the Democrats to sort of triple on their own culture wars and wokeness, you know, in the parlance of Republicans and so there you have, you know, Rick Scott giving a real I think commercial campaign ad for Democrats.

KUCINICH: It's like a paella (ph) of GOP policy over the last five years.

KING: It's largely a base play, border wall, there are two genders, let's say the Pledge of Allegiance in schools. What he had to know, all Americans should pay some income tax. Again, if you want to defend that, OK, defend it. But now he's denying what's in his own plan, which is all Americans have to pay taxes working class Americans, poor Americans don't pay federal income tax right now. That's a tax hike. Republicans are running on a tax hike in the midterm election year. KUCINICH: Don't believe your eyes. John, believe Rick Scott. But no, when he was talking about his, to Nia's point, I mean, when he was talking about his record as governor, that doesn't sound like someone who is the head of the Republican Party. That sounds like someone who's setting himself up for something a little bit beyond the 2022 midterm elections.

KING: Right. In any year where right now the wind is in the Democrats face.

HENDERSON: Yes.

KUCINICH: Yes.

KING: It's the history, President's first midterm election, despite great economic numbers in a lot of areas. You have the pain of inflation kicking Americans in the teeth. So again, it's a gift to the Democrats to say this leading Republican senator, he runs the Republican Senatorial Committee, this is his plan, and it would raise many of your taxes.

Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary at Rick Scott and Senate Republicans just released an economic plan that doesn't include a single proposal to lower prices for the middle class. Instead, he wants to raise taxes on half of Americans, including seniors and working family. Seriously, that's their plan.

HENDERSON: Yes, I mean, and what will Democrats do with this, right? I mean, you imagine you'll see campaign ads on this. You imagine it'll be a talking point. But as you said, Democrats have such a tough road hoe at this point, even though the economic numbers are turning around, even though COVID seems to be lessening in terms of daily case count and higher vaccination rates. We'll see. I do think what's interesting about this is we do know that sort of the culture war playbook will be part of what they're going to do in 2010 -- 2022. And it works quite effectively for the GOP.

KUCINICH: Individually, I think this will be talked about in a lot of different races. But as a whole I think you're going to have a lot of senators who are asked about it saying I haven't seen that.

HENDERSON: Yes.

KING: Right. A lot of Senators going to say they want nothing to do with it because your point, McConnell's plan is just run against Bide, run against inflation, run against we're not them. And now you have this.

KUCINICH: Right.

KING: It's not a contract for America. It's something a little different.

[12:55:00]

HENDERSON: No it's a contract for Rick Scott to get on Fox T.V. and raise his profile.

KING: This quick programming note for us, the conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, could he be a threat to American democracy? This new CNN special report explores can he be stopped, Megaphone for Conspiracy: The Alex Jones Story, Sunday night 9:00 p.m. Eastern only here on CNN.

Appreciate your time today on INSIDE POLITICS. Don't forget you can also listen to our podcast download Inside Politics wherever you get your podcasts. Appreciate your time and a big breaking news day. Dana Bash picks up our coverage after a break.

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