Tornadoes and Floods Devastate Central U.S.; U.K. Prime Minister Facing Pressure To Resign; WikiLeaks Founder Assange Charged Under U.S. Espionage Act
ANNA COREN, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Hello and thank you so much for joining us. I'm Anna Coren live in Hong Kong. You're watching CNN NEWSROOM. Ahead this hour, a critical day for Theresa May. The British prime minister heads into an important meeting under increasing pressure to quit. Plus Julian Assange is hit with more criminal charges raising new questions about press freedoms. But the U.S. government argues that the WikiLeaks founder is no journalist. And Donald Trump sets up his feud with the U.S. House speaker calling her crazy and a mess. Nancy Pelosi says the president needs an intervention. The end may be near for Theresa May. Her Premiership hangs in the balance as Brexit devolves into further chaos. A fourth vote on her wildly unpopular Brexit bill is no longer scheduled for June 3rd. It comes after a prominent conservative, a senior cabinet member resigned because she opposed the deal. In the coming hours, Mrs. May is to meet with Graham Brady who heads an influential conservative committee likely to discuss her future. But the U.K. Foreign Secretary says the Prime Minister's not going anywhere just yet. He says she will still be in office during U.S. President Donald Trump's state visit in June.</s>JEREMY HUNT, FOREIGN MINISTER, UNITED KINGDOM: Theresa May will be prime minister to welcome him and rightly so, and we are absolutely at one with the United States on the threat of cyber.</s>COREN: For more on all of this CNN European Affairs Commentator Dominic Thomas joins us from Los Angeles. Dominic, there are some reports out there that Theresa May will announce her departure in a matter of hours. There's obviously been no confirmation from Downing Street as yet. It's obviously just gone 6:00 a.m. in London. What are you hearing?</s>DOMINIC THOMAS, CNN EUROPEAN AFFAIRS COMMENTATOR: The same -- exactly the same kind of reports because the Conservative Party wants to keep the narrative. They want to keep control over the situation. And so by meeting with the 1922 group, my understanding is she will essentially be told that they would go as far as to change their own party regulations in order to have a vote of no confidence in her. But the ideal scenario would be for her to agree to a departure date somewhere in early June after the state visit of President Donald Trump to give them the time to organize an internal leadership competition and race. The last thing the Conservative Party want to do is to keep going and with Prime Minister May and the thing they fear the most at this stage would be a general election. So by getting her to announce that she is stepping away, it allows them to save face you know, in what will be you know, some disastrous electoral results coming out later at the weekend and to keep the momentum going for them.</s>COREN: Yes. And the Trump visit, I guess there is a reason for her to stay on until that. It shows a semblance of order of normalcy and what has been a perpetual state of chaos for the British Parliament.</s>THOMAS: Well, yes, it has. But I think it's you know, it's quite a difficult situation in many ways. Donald Trump has you know, made all sorts of you know, complicated and undermining statements about Theresa May in the Brexit process arguing that he would have handled it very differently. And let's not forget that some of the people that Donald Trump has spoken of the most favorably or have in many cases being his cross- Atlantic interlocutors are actually people like Nigel Farage or Boris Johnson. And so one could also already imagine the sorts of ways in which the you know, the Donald Trump visit could be shaped by as some of his activities on Twitter and some of the things that he will have to say about the Brexit process and it certainly will not help things.</s>COREN: As you said, Theresa May is due to meet with Graham Brady, Chairman of the Tory backbenchers this morning. What can Theresa May can expect to take away from that discussion?</s>THOMAS: Well, I mean the discussion and ultimately the questions you or she will be asking you know, as the sort of as a waiter if anything tried to sort of rescue her position is what do they really think things are going to be like should she step down. This does not solve the divisions in Parliament. The agreement that she has proposed has thus far not been able to make it through. She moved to the center to try and compromise and this has alienated people in her party. So one of the only -- the really the only questions she can say to them is how do they see the outcome of this and how do they think that they can shape this conversation.</s>COREN: Dominic, who is in contention to replace her for the leadership.</s>THOMAS: Well, this is what is going to be you know so interesting if they do that. The MPs, there are 317 of them from the Conservative Party will be the ones that will deal with the list and try to bring it down to two candidates so that then the Conservative Party membership can end up voting on them. You have a lot of personalities. You have of course Boris Johnson, the former foreign secretary, you have the current Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt, the current Environment Secretary Michael Gove and the list just goes on. Essentially it's not so much about personalities I would argue, but the camps within the Conservative Party. You've got the hardcore Brexiters and you've got the more centrist, and you've even got some remainders within the Conservative Party. The balance and the trickier is going to be to get some kind of leader around which there will be consensus. One of the big risks, of course, is that it ends up being a Brexiter, an unelected leader of the Conservative Party who will take control of the process. The big risk with having a Brexiter in place is that they would rather leave the European Union with a No Deal than leave with any kind of negotiated deal. And so that ends up being back on the table. And the question will be as to whether or not the Parliament will have an opportunity to put forward a vote of no confidence should the Conservative Party come up with somebody that they've believed is just simply not representative of the way that the British people see this situation right now. So there's a lot of unexpected and uncharted terrain that we have lying ahead of us in this process.</s>COREN: And the reality is that May's departure won't solve Britain's Brexit problems. Her successor is going to inherit this mess.</s>THOMAS: They will inherit this. But I think that the evidence is quite clear right now that the British public is blaming the Conservative Party for what has been going on. Yes, Jeremy Corbyn is far from being popular. His position on Brexit is ambiguous, but the local elections showed widespread U.K.-wide dissatisfaction with the conservative party. The E.U. elections are an opportunity for the British people to weigh in and express their dissatisfaction. Now, of course, the Brexiters will spin the outcome of the E.U. elections by pointing to the fact that the Brexit party performed very well but that's only part of the story. The Brexit party is running in the European Union elections, they're not a party that currently sits in the U.K. Parliament even though much of their opinion is there. But the thing to not forget about the Brexiters, they want Brexit no matter what. And so even though they may not be able to get any kind of withdrawal agreement through the Houses of parliament, the default position remains there no deal, and that may just be enough to satisfy the Brexiters on this and they may even be willing to sacrifice that for a general election so long as they are able to get their Brexit deal through first. And the general election is really the most frightening thing right now for the Conservative Party that's why they're so eager to control this story as it moves forward.</s>COREN: An interesting a few hours ahead. All eyes will be on 10 Downing Street. Dominic Thomas, as always, great to have you with us. Thank you. Well, a new indictment of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has raised major questions about press freedom in the United States. The U.S. charged Assange with 17 counts under the Espionage Act accusing him of disclosing secret government information. It comes a month after he was removed from the Ecuadorian Embassy in London on a U.S. extradition warrant. WikiLeaks responded to the new indictment tweeting, this is madness. It is the end of national security journalism and the First Amendment. But the U.S. government argues that this is not an attack on journalism. Assistant U.S. Attorney General John Demers said Thursday Julian Assange is no journalist. Well, Greg Barns is a Barrister and Legal Adviser to Julian Assange. He joins us now from Australia to discuss all these matters. Greg, good to have you with us. When we spoke last month following your client's court appearance in London, you said that you feared more charges were on the way. Were you expecting this 17 counts of violating the Espionage Act?</s>GREG BARNS, AUSTRALIAN LEGAL ADVISER TO JULIAN ASSANGE: Well, it comes as no surprise really given the way in which the U.S. has conducted itself in this matter. I should point out too my new role with the campaign is now running the scientists trading campaign to puts the pressure on the Australian government to getting back here. And it's fundamentally important that happens because this is an extraordinary indictment. It's the very reason why Julian Assange feared as he did seven years ago that this would happen and now it's come to fruition.</s>COREN: And this really goes beyond your client Julian Assange. It now raises profound First Amendment issues in the United States. What is at stake for press freedom there?</s>BARNS: What's at stake is that any journalists anywhere in the world who publishes something about the United States which it doesn't like can find themselves subject to an extradition request to come before a U.S. Court and face up to life imprisonment or more. It's a very, very serious issue and it's an issue for Australian journalists, it's an issue for journalists anywhere in the world, and it's an issue for whistleblowers particularly all around the world.</s>COREN: Greg, the Obama administration debated whether to go down this path and charge Assange under the Espionage Act, but decided against it. Why do you think that the Trump administration view this differently? Could they have new evidence?</s>BARNS: Well, there's no suggestion that they've got new evidence. I think they're emboldened in the Trump administration and I think they think with the U.S. Supreme Court now stacked in its favor, this matter will end up there and they'll get a ruling in its favor. But the question, of course, is whether Britain will extradite in those circumstances and I think English judges are going to take a very long look at this particular extradition request given the fact that there is enormous disproportionality in the sentence 145 years he could get. No person in the U.K. or Australia would get 145 years for publishing information even that relating to national security.</s>COREN: Greg, as we heard from John Demers a short time ago, he said that Assange was no journalist. But seeking and publishing secret information on national security matters, I mean that is something that investigative journalists do.</s>BARNS: Well, that's right. And I think every journalist in the world ought to be alarmed by this indictment. And I think the United States any sympathy had had in the Assange case is now gone. Now certainly in Australia, they've been a real alarm raised by a number of journalists here today and by members of the Australian community. And the point that we are trying to make to the Australian government is that you've got an Australian citizen here and at the end of the day, that's the one country that can help him because he is an Australian citizen. And there ought to be --they ought to step up because this is a fundamental attack on democratic rights.</s>COREN: Greg, the actress Pamela Anderson is a friend and a vocal order of Julian Assange. She spoke to reporters at her AIDS charity event in France. We're just going to take a listen.</s>BARNS: Sure.</s>PAMELA ANDERSON, ACTRESS: An incredible person that I'm really -- more people should be proud of him because he's ruffled a few important feathers I guess, brought very powerful feathers and so they're not too happy with him at the moment. And so now he's shut off for the rest of the world and we have to speak up for him.</s>COREN: As she says, he's shut off from the rest of the world. Have you had an opportunity to speak to him how is he coping, how is his mental health?</s>BARNS: Well, he's remarkably resilient. I haven't spoken to him personally but I speak to his parents almost daily and they are extremely concerned about his long-term health and why wouldn't you be because he's in Belmarsh prison. And the risk, of course, is that while this extradition matter is dealt with in the U.S. courts, it'll take some months if not at least a year and he's detained all that time.</s>COREN: Greg, tell me finally, how will the British courts react to these new charges? Do you believe that it will strengthen or hurt the case to extradite Assange to the U.S. to face these charges?</s>BARNS: I think some judges will see this is a really political trial and they'll be very, very skeptical about it. Certainly, that would be the reaction of some judges in Australia. This is a political trial and I think English judges as I said earlier are going to take a really good look at it.</s>COREN: Greg Barns joining us from Hobart, Australia, great to have you with us, many thanks.</s>BARNS: Thank you, Anna.</s>COREN: Well, disgraced a movie mogul Harvey Weinstein has reached a financial settlement to resolve a civil litigation stemming from his alleged sexual abuse. A source tells CNN the proposed deal gives $30 million to alleged victims, creditors, and former Weinstein company employees. $14 million is for legal fees. A judge still has to approve it. Dozens of women have come forward accusing Weinstein of sexual assault dating back decades. The criminal case against Weinstein is scheduled to begin this September. Next here on CNN NEWSROOM, the votes have been counted and Narendra Modi sails to a second term as India's Prime Minister. We'll take you live to New Delhi for the latest. Plus, Donald Trump breaks out some new insults to the top Democrat in Congress Nancy Pelosi. What she's doing to get under his skin?