Bannon: Trump Jr. Meeting at Trump Tower "Treasonous"; Trump Responds to Bannon Comments; Bannon Talks of Trump's Efforts to Woo Putin
DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: This was someone intimately involved, from the general election campaign when Donald Trump was like 12 points back in the polls in August of 2016, general election campaign through the transition into the presidency. This is somebody who was clearly part of the inner circle.</s>WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: He goes on and he accuses him of being a leaker, as well. And the statement about his former chief strategist, I guess, it makes it clear there's no love lost any longer</s>CHALIAN: We have seen deterioration of the relationship over time. Steve Bannon did fall out of favor. There was the battle between Bannon and Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump. Obviously, Steve Bannon was never going to win that battle in the heart and mind of Donald Trump. Because it's his daughter and son-in-law, Wolf. And ultimately, we saw the president sort of hang him out to dry and get rid of him. But a statement like this, which doesn't actually address Steve Bannon's characterization that was reported in the Michael Wolff book, the quotes about how Steve Bannon saw that Trump Tower meeting in June of 2016, that it was treasonous, Donald Trump doesn't deal with the specifics of what Steve Bannon described in the quotes to Michael Wolff. He wholeheartedly dismisses him and cuts him off at the knees.</s>BLITZER: Two instances also jump out. "Steve doesn't represent my base. He's only in it for himself." "Steve pretends to be at war with the media, which he calls the opposition party. Yet, he spent his time at the White House leaking false information to the media to make himself seem far more important than he was." And then he adds this. And I want your reaction. "It is the only thing he does well. Steve was rarely in a one-on-one meeting with me and only pretends to have had influence to fool a few people with no access and no clue whom he helped write a phony book." Phony books, maybe he's referring to this current Michael Wolff book about to be released.</s>CHALIAN: I'm sure that's what he's referring to. We have to learn from the White House sort of a detailed itinerary, if you will, of President Trump's communication with Steve Bannon since he left the White House. After the president fired Steve Bannon, we know they have had conversations since. Why, if the president believes he is a total leaker of false information, why was he still speaking to him after he left? And why does he claim he has nothing to do with him if, indeed, the president had communication with him after he left?</s>BLITZER: Ted Lieu is still with us from California. Let me get your reaction. A pretty stark, bold statement from the president of the United States. Not from a Democrat, not from a member of your party, but from the president of the United States, clearly attacking Steve Bannon, who now runs "Breitbart" once again, as someone who has, quote, "lost his mind."</s>REP. TED LIEU, (D), CALIFORNIA: Wolf, during Watergate, the administration would issue statements like this, which I would call a nondenial denial. Basically, the president is not denying what Steve Bannon said. He's attacking the messenger, Steve Bannon. The reason he can't deny what Steve Bannon said is because we have e-mails about this meeting. Now we also know why the president and his son, Trump Jr, tried so hard to cover up what happened at this meeting. If you remember, earlier last year, they issued two press statements about this meeting that were false and misleading. They said the meeting was just about Russian adoptions and nothing about campaigns. That was totally wrong.</s>BLITZER: Our White House reporter, Kaitlan Collins, is with us, as well. Kaitlan, you've carefully read not once or twice but probably three times this statement from the president of the United States. It's a formal statement. This is not a tweet.</s>KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: Certainly not. We rarely see a statement like this, especially blasting someone that worked inside the White House with the president for several months. Before that was essentially the CEO of his campaign. But we've seen this before with the president and Steve Bannon. He doesn't like Bannon taking too much credit for things or anything he's accomplished. We've seen a lot of that in, especially in the excerpt of the Michael Wolff book out today. We see that echoed here in this statement by the president, saying Steve Bannon only came after I defeated the other Republicans. And he didn't do that much to help me. Quite a striking statement from the president that we rarely have seen in this kind of a White House.</s>BLITZER: Yes. The president normally would not do that kind of a statement. My sense is he is angry, very angry at Steve Bannon because of the attacks on his son-in-law. Jared Kushner, on Ivanka Trump, his daughter. Once you start going right after his own family, for the president, that's a big deal.</s>COLLINS: We know that's something the president strongly dislikes. It's been one of the biggest sources of his anger regarding this entire Russia investigation, is that he fears it will reach into the inner circle, his family, not only Jared, but his son, Donald Trump Jr. And in that, those statements from Steve Bannon we saw on the record today, he goes after them multiple times. We weren't so surprised by the Kushner ones because we've known about this feud between Steve Bannon and Jared Kushner for some time. They're still startling to be on the record. And in the statement about Donald Trump Jr, saying he believes they're going to "crack him like an egg" is certainly something that didn't sit well with the president. We're waiting for a response. This is quite the response from the president.</s>BLITZER: The fact he used the word "treasonous" talking about Donald Trump Jr and the decision to have had meeting and not call the FBI. Give me your thought.</s>CHALIAN: That is a charge that is clearly what Donald Trump's reacting to. That is a charge and a characterization that has the potential to stick. Obviously, Steve Bannon may have -- I think he says he wasn't in touch with Russians, shouldn't be a witness in this investigation. These are his personal characterizations about what he saw at that meeting. Having somebody who did work in the White House attach that kind of description, Wolf, to that meeting is politically damaging. It's also worthy of noting, remember, when Steve Bannon left the White House, he was careful in public to not criticize the president. He had no problem criticizing other staff or the West Wing and how it operated. But he remained careful to not publicly criticize the president when he left, I think, because he feared this kind of retribution that the president could deliver.</s>BLITZER: The president flatly said he was fired. Didn't say he resigned. He was fired.</s>COLLINS: It's interesting because when Steve Bannon did leave the White House, there was a lot of speculation about something exactly like this scenario playing out. And a lot of the Bannon allies assured people he was going to fight for Trump outside of the White House regarding the Senate and the primaries, things like that. Now we're seeing this escalate between the two of them, like a lot of people predicted would happen when Steve Bannon, who has his own media site and not afraid to say things on the record, would say things like this.</s>BLITZER: Everybody stand by. We're following the breaking news. The president of the United States personally responding to his fired adviser's attacks on him and his family. Much more on the breaking news right after this.