U.S. Attorney General Fails to Disclose Meetings with Russia
JONATHAN MANN, HOST: Hello. I'm Jonathan Mann in Atlanta, welcome to News Stream. The U.S. attorney general failed to disclose a meeting with a Russian diplomat who some say is a spy. We'll tell you how Russia is responding. Donald Trump hit the right notes with his first address to congress, but now comes the hard part, turning prose into policy. And a mother's agony at the death of her teenaged son. This is the front line of The Philippines' war on drugs. Thanks for joining us. Democrats in Washington are demanding answers as another member of the Trump administration is accused of meeting a Russian ambassador during the U.S. election. The Justice Department is pin pointing its finger at its own chief, U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions. What he says he didn't do anything wrong. The pressure is mounting. Joe Johns has details.</s>JOE JOHNS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The Justice Department revealing Attorney General Jeff Sessions met with Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak twice during President Trump's campaign in 2016. Contacts Sessions did not disclose under oath at his Senate confirmation hearing.</s>JEFF SESSIONS, ATTORNEY GENERAL OF THE UNITED STATES: I have been called a surrogate at a time or two in that campaign, and I did not have communications with the Russians. I would just say to you that I have no information about this matter.</s>JOHNS: Sessions denying any impropriety, releasing a new statement now saying, quote, "I never met with any Russian officials to discuss issues of the campaign. I have no idea what this allegation is about. It is false." But the Justice Department revealing that Sessions met with Kislyak last July on the sidelines of the Republican National Convention.</s>SESSIONS: Make America great again.</s>JOHNS: Four months after Sessions was named chairman of the Trump campaign's national security advisory committee. Sessions met again with Ambassador Kislyak last September in a Senate office. The White House blasting allegations by leading Democrats that he misled Congress as partisan politics, in a statement saying, quote, "Sessions met with the ambassador in an official capacity as a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, which is entirely consistent with his testimony." Sessions' spokeswoman says, quote, "There was absolutely nothing misleading about his answer." The denials from Sessions and the White House are in direct conflict with what the Justice Department says happened. Senior government sources tell CNN that the ambassador is considered by U.S. intelligence to be one of Russia's top spies in Washington. Last December, U.S. intelligence intercepted conversation between Kislyak and President Trump's former national security advisor, Lieutenant General Michael Flynn. Flynn was later fired for misleading the vice president about discussing sanctions with Russia. Meanwhile, "The New York Times" is reporting Obama administration officials scrambled to preserve any information about possible contacts between President Trump's campaign aides and Russia before Mr. Trump took office. The officials quickly spreading information about Russia's efforts "to leave a clear trail of intelligence."</s>DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I have nothing to do with Russia.</s>JOHNS: The White House has repeatedly denied any such contact.</s>DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I haven't called Russia in ten years.</s>SEAN SPICER, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: At what point, how many people have to say that there's nothing there before you realize there's nothing there?</s>MANN: Russia's foreign ministry has pushed back against the accusation that the Russian ambassador is one of the country's top spies. We'll have more on that in a moment, meanwhile members of Session's own Republican Party are asking him to recuse himself from any investigation involving ties between Russia and the Trump campaign.</s>SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM, (R) SOUTH CAROLINA: There is something there. And it goes up the chain of investigation. It is clear to me that Jeff Sessions, who is my dear friend, cannot make this decision about Trump. So there may be nothing there, but if there's something there that the FBI believes is criminal in nature, then for sure you need a special prosecutor. If that day ever comes, I'll be the first one to say it needs to be somebody other than Jeff.</s>MANN: Leading Democrats are taking it a step further calling on Sessions to resign. Congressman Elijah Cummings spoke with CNN just a short time ago.</s>REP. ELIJAH CUMMINGS, (D) MARYLAND: I think Attorney General Sessions ought to at least recuse himself and then I think we need to look in to figure out, well, if he doesn't remember a meeting with the Russians, then that's a problem too.</s>MANN: The U.S. Justice Department is looking into the various strands of this tangled story and the House intelligence committee appears to be one step closer to launching its investigation, it's to look into what cyber activity Moscow used against the U.S. and whether Russia had links to political campaigns. The committee is also to assess the U.S. government response and whether anyone leaked classified information. Now, in the last few minutes the Kremlin has responded to the revelations saying the reports are not Russia's headache. CNN's Nic Robertson joins us now from Moscow. And, Nic, the details are dripping out daily. Are authorities there taking much notice?</s>NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: They are. You have the foreign ministry spokesman today, Maria Zarahova (ph), on her Facebook page addressing the issue of Kislyak, the allegations that he is one of Russia's top spies in Washington, saying is this the media low or can they fall further? Dimitry Peskov, as you were just mentioning there, the spokesman for President Putin is saying - calling the situation in Washington at the moment an emotionally charged environment. Don't believe the allegations about Kislyak, the ambassador as being a spy. So, you know, for Russia, the drip, drip, drip, it's a very damaging feeling because they're being implicated as doing something wrong, which they completely deny. They say they don't interfere in the affairs of foreign governments. They've said that for quite a while about the allegations that they hacked into the DNC computer to influence the outcome of the elections. So, that's been on the record there for some time. But in the case of this current situation, there's a growing frustration that they can't do business with the United States on the issues they like to. They characterizing this as an internal domestic issue inside the United States. But there is a frustration because clearly they would like to see a cease-fire inside Syria and that's something that they need -- they feel they need United States involvement there as part of the negotiations involving the -- all the oppositions and the government parties there inside Syria. That's just one small tiny issue that's being held up here. So, frustration and emotive language being used here in Moscow.</s>MANN: I want to ask you about the Russian ambassador. To anyone's mind, he doesn't exactly look like the James Bond type, but Washington is describing him as exactly that way. He is considered to be one of Russia's top spies and spy recruiters. How much do we know about him?</s>ROBERTSON: Well, I suppose if you were a spy novelist, you might try to develop a character that looked like the anti-thesis this is the details we know about him. He studied at the university in the United States, the Institute of Physics in '73. '77 he joins the foreign ministry. He becomes the second secretary at the then Soviet mission to the United Nations. He's there for five years. That's '81 to '85. '85 he goes and becomes the first secretary of the U.S. -- the Soviet embassy in Washington. So he has about ten years in the United States. Then he comes back to Russia and the foreign ministry various different ministerial positions. In '98 he goes to the Russian ambassador to Belgium. He's the representative at NATO. '03, 2003, he comes back to Moscow. Deputy foreign minister. Then 2008 goes back to Washington again. I mean, this is a man who has a very, very solid diplomatic career that is perhaps mirrored by other ambassadors around the world. Perhaps where he stands out is that he did have that ten year spell in the '80s in the United States and that his tenureship as ambassador in Washington, D.C. was perhaps a little longer than average. He's been there for almost 10 years. But Russia's consistent position on this is don't believe the allegations about him. Russia doesn't interfere in the affairs of foreign nations. And of course, you know, when the United States expelled just around Christmas 35 russian diplomats from the United States, he obviously wasn't among them. You might argue, and a novelist might argue, had he been a spy, he might have been therfore ejected, a counterintelligence operative might say well if he was a spy and we knew about it, we'd keep him in place and we could keep watching him.</s>MANN: I just want to remind our viewers the Russian government is responding. And even at moment while we're talking the foreign ministry is giving a briefing and we're monitoring it to see what they're saying about all of this, but as Nic has been telling us, denials from the word go. Nic, in addition to denials, are we hearing anything else from Russia? I mean, one of the astonishing things about this is how much this entire drama is playing out in public at the highest reaches of the U.S. government. Are there any voices independent enough in Russia, free enough to come forward and examine the possibility that Russia may in fact have been meddling?</s>ROBERTSON: That's not a narrative that's emerging here at all. I think the sort of, if you can look for a narrative here in all of this, it does seem to be that, you know, the leadership here in Russia does want to try to preserve in some way at some point the opportunity to engage with President Trump. You know, we knew during his campaign, we knew in the early weeks after the inauguration that there was a desire it appeared to be on his part to form this closer relationship to make some deals with President Putin. That's clearly gone. But when you listen to Dimitry Peskov as he spoke in the past hour to journalists saying that,you know, let's not make any judgments while these emotionally charged events are going on in Washington. Let's not prejudge it in that context. He's clearly leaving the door open to wait for the temperature on these issues to lower. But at the same time, I mean, he has recognized here that the relationship between the United States and Russia is effectively being poisoned by what's going on in Washington at the moment. He was asked the question do you see an opportunity for Trump and Putin to meet in the near future and he said clearly these events in Washington are having a negative impact on when that could be, when such a meeting might become possible.</s>MANN: Nic Robertson in Moscow, thanks very much. Yes about Russia and the attorney general are threatening to derail the momentum from President Trump's speech to congress. Mr. Trump heads to Virginia in the coming hours to make his case for the agenda he laid out, but there's some concern about the price tag of his vision. Our Jeff Zeleny has that.</s>JEFF ZELENY, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: As President Trump basked in the glow of his big speech to congress.</s>DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Thank you very much.</s>ZELENY: The hard work of turning those promises into reality was the first order of business today at the White House, with the president sitting down for lunch with republican congressional leaders.</s>TRUMP: We're just here to start the process. It begins as of now. And we think we're going to have tremendous success.</s>ZELENY: Yet, tremendous success depends not only on Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Speaker Paul Ryan but on persuading the party's rank and file to pay for his agenda. The president delayed again today the signing of a travel ban to replace the one blocked in the courts. CNN has learned the Secretary of State, Defense Secretary, and National Security Adviser are all pushing for Iraq to be removed from the list of majority-Muslim countries included in the ban. But in most of his primetime address, the president struck a more optimistic note.</s>TRUMP: A new national pride is sweeping across our nation.</s>ZELENY: But it remains an open question whether it was a lasting pivot or a one-night performance after a rough start to his presidency. In either case, his wish list is an expensive and complicated one, even among republicans, not to mention democrats who are largely resisting the Trump agenda. From health care.</s>TRUMP: We should ensure that Americans with preexisting conditions have access to coverage and that we have a stable transition for Americans currently enrolled in the health care exchanges.</s>ZELENY: To tax reform.</s>TRUMP: It had been a big, big cut. At the same time, we will provide massive tax relief for the middle class.</s>ZELENY: To infrastructure.</s>TRUMP: To launch our national rebuilding, I will be asking Congress to approve legislation that produces a $1 trillion investment in infrastructure of the United States.</s>ZELENY: After the speech, Speaker Ryan offered praise but walked away when asked about the price tag.</s>PAUL RYAN, UNITED STATES SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: I thought he did a great job.</s>ZELENY: Did he answer questions how he would pay for things tonight?</s>ZELENY: So Speaker Ryan not answering our question, how much this will cost. But several fiscal conservatives are raising the question, how much will all of the president's agenda items actually tack onto the federal budget. Now deficit spending no longer in vogue like it was some decades ago, this is all a key part of the question of how much the president will have to push to get his agenda enacted. Jeff Zeleny, CNN, the White House.</s>MANN: To France now where presidential race all but consumed by controversy just had another particular turn. Marie Le Pen no longer has parliament immunity after a vote by EU lawmakers. The far right presidential candidate is under investigation for tweeting graphic images of ISIS executions in 2015. Melissa Bell is following developments in Paris and joins us now. Tell us about this decision. I gather it has nothing to do with what's seen like much more substantial and important accusations, about her use of EU government money.</s>MELISSA BELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's absolutely right, Jonathan. This is not the first time either that the European parliament has chosen to strip Marine Le Pen of her immunity so she can face prosecution here in France. It has happened before. She likened Muslim who parade in the streets to Nazis who'd occupied France in the way they'd conducted themselves while they were in the country at the time the lifting of her immunity had allowed that prosecution to to go ahead here in France as well. Now, this lifting of immunity this time was also asked for by French authorities. So, it is very likely that Marine Le Pen is going to be facing another judicial inquiry in addition to the one that you allude to in which he is accused of having helped pay her staff with parliamentary money quite illegally and a third investigation to do with party campaign financing. Those three clouds now very much hanging over the far right leader's campaign. And yet, Jonathan, can this cost her her place in the polls? Probably not. Her base of supporters really don't tend to hold this kind of thing against her. On the contrary, they buy her line that she is a victim of sort of persecution on the part of judicial authorities. Also Marine Le Pen is really the National Front since she took it over from her father. That is not the case for Francois Fillon. He is now third in the polls and the Republican candidate is facing a deepening judicial investigation of his own. He is plowing on, but the pressure today is really growing from within his own party. And the question is, really, and this is one being asked on television today by people from his own side, can he survive until the April 23 first round of voting? So, I would suggest that although both those right wing candidates are facing judicial procedures, the dangers facing Francois Fillon in terms of his candidacy and his future as the party's candidate are far more serious.</s>MANN: Still we're in the extraordinary situation now in a major democracy of two of the three leading candidates for the presidency being under a cloud for misuse of government funds. There is a third candidate, though, and he was in the news today for a completely different reason. Tell us about that.</s>BELL: And as you'd expect, Jonathan, he's trying to milk this for all it's worth. We're talking about Emmanuel Macron, the former economy minister, who is now doing something that simply never been done in French politics before, trying to become president having never been elected to any office in the past and with no established party behind him. So, today he finally, with just seven weeks to go until polling day, outlined the substance of his program. There had been many questions about the fact that he appeared to be plowing ahead in the polls, second now only to Marine Le Pen, but that no one really knew exactly what he was about. Well, that all changed this morning with an extremely detailed program being announced about what he will do if he becomes president. But of course, top of his list of priorities, and this will have been a decision made within the last few days as a result of the problems facing his two main rivals, a huge emphasis on the need to clean up public life and to change the laws here in France so that the political elites are less well protected than they currently are, Jonathan.</s>MANN: It's an astonishing campaign so far. Melissa Bell in Paris. Thanks very much. The British government says it's disappointed by a Brexit vote in the House of Lords, but ads the EU exit talks will start votes will start on time despite the hitch. The House of Lords voted to amend the Brexit bill demanding they guarantee on the rights of EU citizens in the UK after Britain's divorce. The amended bill must now go back to the House of Commons for its reconsideration. In the poor slums of The Philippines, a violent war on drugs that shows little mercy. We'll take you to a neighborhood where some of the most shocking killings have been carried out. Plus, CNN's Arwa Damon returns to Mosul months after she was trapped in that embattled city. Her journey to reunite with the shoulder she was embedded with in a new CNN special report.