Iran's Foreign Minister Hits Back; Mueller to Testify Before Congress; Democrats Subpoena Kellyanne Conway.
KEILAR: Iran's foreign minister is now hitting back. In a CNN exclusive interview, he responds to President Trump's threat to obliterate Iran if they attack anything American. We have CNN's senior international correspondent Fred Pleitgen. He is in Tehran with more of his exclusive. Fred, what did he tell you?</s>FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Brianna. Yes, we caught up with Javad Zarif at the sidelines of an event here in Tehran. Of course the first thing I asked him was, how does he react to President Trump's threats to not only obliterate Iran, but again saying this morning that a war with Iran would be very short. Here's what the foreign minister had to say.</s>PLEITGEN: What do you make of President Trump's threats of obliteration and that a war with the United States wouldn't last very long?</s>MOHAMMAD JAVAD ZARIF, IRANIAN FOREIGN MINISTER: Well, he's certainly wrong, but that statement indicates that the United States' intentions are certainly illegal. The United States is not in a position to obliterate Iran. They do not have the capability, other than using prohibited weapons to do this.</s>PLEITGEN: One of the thing he also said, Brianna, was that Iran does not want a war with the United States. But really one of the other really interesting things that I thought is, he also seems to still believe that President Trump also doesn't want a war with Iran. He kept telling me that he thinks that there are people around President Trump, like, for instance, National Security Adviser John Bolton, who are sort of trying to push President Trump in that direction and he believes that President Trump is actually trying to walk things back, Brianna.</s>KEILAR: Interesting. Fred, thank you so much for that interview. He's with us from Tehran there. And mark your calendars because three weeks from now we are going to hear from Special Counsel Robert Mueller. On July 17th, Mueller will testify publicly before members of two separate House committees. Both Republicans and Democrats will have a chance to ask him questions and you will hear his answers in real time, not through a transcript released later or a 400-page report that most people have not read. Let's go to CNN's senior justice correspondent Evan Perez. You have lived and breathed the Russian investigation -- you may have bled the Russia investigation, too, Evan, the last two years here. This is the day that Democrats and some Republicans and a lot of Americans have been waiting for. What are the most important questions that they're going to ask?</s>EVAN PEREZ, CNN SENIOR JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, that's right, Brianna. And you could tell from the way the president is already attacking Robert Mueller and the investigation that he already is anticipating what these answers might be. So let's take a look at some of the questions that we still have outstanding at this point. One of them, do you support the president's claim that you found zero collusion? You know, of course, if you read the report, the report says that there was not enough evidence found that -- enough to bring charges against anyone of a wider conspiracy. That was the answer that was in the report. We'll see what Mueller says at this -- at this hearing. Number two, do you agree with the attorney general, William Barr's, overall interpretation of your report? You, of course, will remember that Bill Barr, the attorney general, has been attacked for the way he portrayed the report before the report was released. We'll hear from Mueller in his own words how he sees that. Was this probe illegal? If not, why not? And, of course, it's going to be one of the major questions from some of the president's supporters during those two hearings. So we'll see how Mueller answers that question. That's going to be a big one. And, number four, did you mean to put the onus on Congress to act on your conclusions? That's, of course, one of the big overarching questions that we have after this Mueller investigation. The question is, did you intend for Congress to actually take the action that you, as a Justice Department employee, as a federal prosecutor, could not do because the law says or the Justice Department says that you cannot indict a sitting president? That's going to be a key question for Robert Mueller on that day, Brianna.</s>KEILAR: Yes, because he really seemed to put that in his report there that it, you know, is within Congress' purview to go ahead and do this. Why did he do -- why did he say that?</s>PEREZ: Right.</s>KEILAR: We want to know. Evan Perez, thank you so much. Add another name to the list of Trump associates who are facing subpoenas from congressional Democrats. This time it's White House Counselor Kellyanne Conway, who was a no-show at a House Oversight Committee hearing today. The panel, led by Democratic Congressman Elijah Cummings, voted 25-16 to subpoena Conway. A federal agency has recommended that she be fired for violating the Hatch Act, which is a law that limits the political activities of federal employees. Walter Shaub is former director of the Office of Government Ethics. He's also a CNN contributor. So how much weight does this subpoena hold for Kellyanne Conway?</s>WALTER SHAUB, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: So, you know, the subpoena's a serious escalation. And I -- but I think we can predict the White House is going to ignore it, as they have with others. I think, ultimately, this is going to have to be litigated in the courts. I think there's a very good chance the House is going to win this one. But, unfortunately, these things take time. And I think that's the broader strategy of the White House right now is resist everything across the board and stall, stall, stall.</s>KEILAR: So she refused to appear on the advice of White House counsel. Executive privilege has not been exercised here, right? So what's the legal -- what's the legal rationale for this?</s>SHAUB: So the White House is asserting sort of a strange claim that White House presidential advisers have absolute immunity to any kind of subpoena. That's not a viewpoint that either the Congress or the courts have endorsed at any point, which is why it's going to wind up having to be litigated. To be fair to the Trump administration, they're not the first administration to assert that. They are, however, the first one to stick to their guns on that and not accommodate the House and ultimately find some sort of compromise. At least not yet.</s>KEILAR: Same thing with Hope Hicks when she testified last week. Everything that she said was not -- everything about her time in the White House, she would not speak to, for the same reason.</s>SHAUB: Right.</s>KEILAR: So President Trump, at this point, he's ignoring this federal agency's recommendation that Conway be fired. They said she should be fired for, quote, numerous violations of the Hatch Act. Explain -- explain how she violated this and explanation this recommendation?</s>SHAUB: Yes, you know, interestingly, I sat in Henry Kerner's (ph) shoes. He's the head of the agency that recommended her firing because she violated the standards of conduct when I was leading the Office of Government Ethics. And just as the White House ignored me, they're ignoring Henry Kerner. The difference this time is Henry Kerner's a Trump appointee. So right there that makes it strange. The way she violated it is she's used her position to advocate for the success or failure of individual candidates and political parties while being interviewed on television and on her Twitter page, which the Office of Special Counsel, not related to Mueller, the agency that does this, found was essentially an official account because she tweets so much government information on it. The defenses from the White House have ranged from saying, oh, this is a violation of her First Amendment rights, which the courts have rejected, to now a new one saying that somehow the Hatch Act doesn't apply to senior White House officials. But these are actually rather extreme positions for the White House to take, and they're not going to be supported in any form, whether by Congress or in a court or anywhere else.</s>KEILAR: Thank you, Walter, for making us smarter. We appreciate it. Walter Shaub. Just ahead, it's one of the largest online furniture companies, employees of Wayfair, are outraged after learning it was selling beds to furnish migrant detention facilities for children. What they're hoping -- now hoping that a walkout will do to spark change. Also, just in to CNN, prosecutors reveal a possible cause for a fire that ravaged the Notre Dame Cathedral. What common, human habit may have started this blaze.