WSJ: Major Players Trump's Inner Circle Interviewed by SDNY
BURNETT: New tonight, major players in President Trump's inner circle interviewed by New York prosecutors as part of the probe into hush money payments made the women who claim they had affairs with Trump. "The Wall Street Journal" reporting that investigators questioned former White House communication director Hope Hicks and Trump's long-time body guard Keith Schiller, two people who were always by Trump's side, and we already knew the SDNY, of course, has talked to Michael Cohen, "The National Enquirer" publisher David Pecker, and Trump Org chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg, all of whom were intimately involved with these payments. Shimon Prokupecz is OUTFRONT. So, Shimon, now we know Hicks and Schiller have been interviewed. What does that tell you about how broad this now is?</s>SHIMON PROKUPECZ, CNN CRIME AND JUSTICE REPORTER: It's much broader probably than we anticipated or thought it was. The fact that they're going deeper into the folks who were the closest to the president during the campaign certainly and into the White House, when you think about Hope Hicks, she was very close to him. She helped craft many of the statements, many of the public responses, so you can see why prosecutors would want to talk to her. On the Schiller side, it's very interesting. It's really the first time that we're hearing that federal investigators were talking to him. There has been a lot of questions around him. His thing is he also was very close to the president. A lot of phone calls sometimes, you wanted to get in touch with the president or with Donald Trump during the campaign, you'd have to no through Schiller. So, you can see why perhaps prosecutors wanted to see who is Schiller in contact with? They were working this case to try to figure out, OK, what did the president know? What did Donald Trump know about these hush money payments?</s>BURNETT: All right. Shimon, stay with me because you also have some more news. I want to go now to add into the conversation here, Harry Sandick, assistant U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, your former title, and former very vice president for corporate relations firm American Media, obviously parent of the "National Enquirer", Stu Zakim. So, let me just say, Harry, as Shimon points out, Keith Schiller, 20 years with Donald Trump, OK? And, by the way, in the Stormy Daniels case, Keith Schiller is the guy who actually brokers the meeting in the room. I mean, Keith Schiller is not only is involved during the campaign and would know possibly about any payments, he knew what happened at the time in terms of the facts of what happened and with whom. Hicks, of course, was a much newer entrant but knew the president by watching the campaign, Shimon says. So, how significant is it that these two people are now a part of this?</s>HARRY SANDICK, FORMER ASSISTANT U.S. ATTORNEY, SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK: It's very significant. What it shows now the curtain is being pulled back a bit on the Southern District investigation is that it was never just, this is what Michael Cohen said. And that was the A to Z of the investigation. They talked to other people, very close to Trump as we know from the reporting and we've learned from other places, they've obtained e-mail, search warrants, even before it was a public investigation, they knew a tremendous amount about what was going on. So, the picture that was a painted in the story and by Shimon is of a very mature investigation that mostly seems to be at an end.</s>BURNETT: So, Stu, let me ask you, right? America Media is "National Enquirer", David Pecker is CEO of American Media. So, he and Trump go way back. He would often, as you said, buy stories, hide them, put them in the back of the room, they'd never see the light of the day. Hope Hicks calls David Pecker about a story at "Wall Street Journal" story on the Karen McDougal, the playmate that the president allegedly had an affair with. Why would Hope Hicks make that call?</s>STU ZAKIM, FORMER SVP OF CORPORATE COMMUNICATIONS, AMERICAN MEDIA INC.: Well, as a corporate communications person, your job is to protect your client. Her client is Trump. So, if you know an outlet has a negative interview about you, you want to use your influence to try and smooth that over, put spin on it, which I'm sure what her goal was in making that call to Pecker.</s>BURNETT: Right. But she would have known, I would presume, or would she have not known? Trump would have said call Pecker or she didn't know?</s>ZAKIM: I'm sure that's not an independent decision of hers. I'm sure she was told to call Pecker and try to figure it out and make it work.</s>BURNETT: So, Shimon, let's get to the other breaking news on this, the CEO of Amazon, Jeff Bezos. This story is incredible. He is now expected to meet with Southern District of New York prosecutors, same Southern District investigating the hush money payments, Bezos, of course, is the one that says Saudi Arabia was behind the Enquirer story that outed his affair after "The Washington Post". Which he owns, was so critical of Saudi Arabia.</s>PROKUPECZ: Right. So this tells us they are taking this very seriously. This investigation is, sort of, we can argue now, is escalating. They're meeting with the alleged victim in this entire situation, what they want to know, obviously, is whether or not they can prove these allegations from Jeff Bezos and his team that the Saudis hacked his devices, somehow got into his phones, got into his devices and were able to maybe leak some of this information. The other thing they are very interested in is this extortion, potential extortion scheme by AMI and whether or not there is any criminal charges that they can bring against the Southern District, whether or not they can bring criminal charges against AMI. And obviously the Saudis, too. The FBI is very interested in all of this material as well. Why all this is also important, obviously, the role that AMI played in the hush money payments, right? They already have an agreement, a non-prosecution agreement from the Southern District of New York because of their role in this entire scheme. Well, now, that could get ripped up. And essentially, they could face charges for that and now this as well. And that's something that prosecutors want to question him about what he knows, his communications with AMI, and obviously, they want his device, they want to go through his phones, his computers to see exactly if the Saudis got in. Look, Bezos people say we have the evidence. We have the proof.</s>BURNETT: Right.</s>PROKUPECZ: What they have and the FBI wants and what proof they need to make a case perhaps could be two different things. We'll see. It's definitely very significant. If the richest man now in the world now meeting with prosecutors in New York who have been investigating --</s>BURNETT: And it's incredible. It's incredible.</s>PROKUPECZ: The Trump campaign, have been investigating these hush money payments, have been investigating other issues surrounding Trump, this is significant.</s>BURNETT: This comes in the context of the yelling about "The Washington Post," yelling about fake news, gleefully celebrating the end of Jeff Bezos' marriage, Saudi Arabia, in support of Saudi Arabia, which has provided a lot of money to "The National Enquirer". I know it's complicated, but all roads lead to Trump. And do you have now the richest map of the world, a foreign power and Donald Trump and prosecutors involved in investigating things related to Trump all in one sentence.</s>SANDICK: And the prosecutors can really go wherever this leads. They're go him to start, not surprisingly talking to the victim, as Shimon said, looking at his devices, trying to figure out forensically if they can see the trail, who hacked into these devices and from where? If it leads to Saudi Arabia, they can go there. They can charge people anywhere around the world. Now, whether they'll come here and face charges on another story, that will allow them to tell the story of what happened here. Who you this very wealthy and powerful man was sort of brought down in this very public way.</s>BURNETT: Well, of course, and who knows what they will find. If they go there, you have the questions raised, about the president of the United States, choosing to take Saudi Arabia's side over that of his own intelligence actions, as "The Washington Post" was doing all that very, very incredible reporting on Jamal Khashoggi's death. Stu, we have a report tonight from "The Washington Post", which reports "The National Enquirer" is expected to be sold imminently. What do you -- what do you make with that?</s>ZAKIM: Well, as I've said for a long time, David Pecker is a very smart businessman, more importantly, he's a survivor. I predicted he was going to land on his feet. This is his out to land on his feet. The hedge fund company who owns them, clearly threw their arms up in the air and say --</s>BURNETT: Apparently, according to "The Washington Post", really disgusted by the Bezos reporting. What do you think of that?</s>ZAKIM: Well, you know, on the one hand, they should have known who they were going into business with. I mean, it's not an open secret how the "Enquirer" does business. So, David is a master salesman and, obviously, he did a sales job not knowing what they were buying into, because this isn't the first time the things hit the fan. This is a bigger level. But there has been many other topics where the "Enquirer" has been under the gun before. So, you have to -- yes.</s>BURNETT: Perhaps Jeff Bezos will buy it.</s>BURNETT: Thank you all. And next, President Trump saying no way will he turn over his taxes to the House Ways and Means Committee before tonight's deadline.</s>DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I'm under audit. I won't do it. If I'm not under audit, I wouldn't do it. I have no problem with it.</s>BURNETT: A member of the House Ways and Means Committee responds. Plus, President Trump is standing by his Federal Reserve pick Herman Cain, despite huge opposition from Republicans.</s>TRUMP: Herman is a wonderful man. He has been a supporter of mine for a long time.