Giuliani Seems To Confirm Trump Asked Comey To Go Easy On Flynn
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I'm very close to making a decision, have not made it official, yet, obviously, have not made it final. But we're very close to making a decision. Let's say it's the four people, but they are excellent, every one. You can't go wrong. But I'm getting very close to making a final decision.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Who do you have in mind right now?</s>TRUMP: I'll probably be deciding tonight or tomorrow.</s>NOBLES: Tonight or tomorrow, President Trump teasing his last hour discussing his potential pick for the Supreme Court. He's set to announce his decision tomorrow night. Meanwhile, there's been a pretty significant development in the obstruction of justice investigation into the President. Today, his attorney Rudy Giuliani seemed to confirm that the President did in fact ask former FBI Director James Comey for leniency when it came to his friend and former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn. CNN White House Correspondent Boris Sanchez is live in New Jersey where the President was spending his weekend. Boris, this request of Comey, and his eventual firing essentially is what led to the Mueller investigation.</s>BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Ryan, and the President has denied that James Comey's testimony about what happened during that meeting was accurate. The President has repeatedly said that Comey is lying specifically about whether or not the President asked Comey to take it easy on Michael Flynn. I want to point out this tweet from back in December of last year, specifically the President spells out, I never asked Comey to stop investigating Michael Flynn. Just more fake news covering another Comey lie. Well, today during an interview on ABC, Rudy Giuliani effectively said that the President asked James Comey to give him a break. Listen to this.</s>RUDY GIULIANI, PRESIDENT TRUMP'S ATTORNEY: He didn't direct him to do that. What he said to him was can you give him a break.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Comey said he took it as direction.</s>GIULIANI: Well, that's OK. He could have taken it that way. I mean, by that time he had been fired. And he said a lot of other things, some of which have turned out to be on untrue. The reality is, as a prosecutor, I was told that many times can you give a man a break, either by his lawyers, by his relatives, by friends, you take that into consideration, but, you know, that doesn't determine not going forward with it.</s>SANCHEZ: Give the man a break, that sort of contradict what is the President has said before, but ultimately Giuliani is making the argument that even if the President did make that suggestion to James Comey, it doesn't rise to the level of obstruction of justice. He laid out some very serious demands of the Special Counsel this weekend, essentially arguing that Robert Mueller has to prove that he has the jurisdiction to pursue an obstruction of justice investigation, among several other things. Effectively what Rudy Giuliani is doing is setting up a legal fight between the President's attorneys and the Special Counsel. He wants to make it so that Robert Mueller has to file a subpoena to try to compel the President to testify. Something he says he will fight in court. Ryan.</s>NOBLES: Boris Sanchez live in New Jersey. Boris, thank you for that report. As Boris said, President Trump has repeatedly denied that he asked Comey to go easy on Flynn. In fact, listen to what the President said just last May.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Did you at any time urge former FBI Director James Comey in any way, shape, or form to close, or back down the investigation into Michael Flynn, and also as you...</s>TRUMP: No. No. Next question.</s>NOBLES: All right, let's talk about this. We bring in CNN legal and political commentator Ken Cuccinelli. He, of course, the former Virginia Attorney General, and Editor for The Weekly Standard, Bill Kristol. Ken, I need your legal opinion on this, Rudy Giuliani says that Trump's ask is not out of the ordinary, that when he was a prosecutor, family members and friends of defendants always asked him to go easy on people. But this is the President of the United States talking to the director of the FBI not to prosecute one of his friends. Isn't that a little bit different than what Mayor Giuliani is talking about?</s>KEN CUCCINELLI, LEGAL AND POLITICAL COMMENTATOR, CNN: Well, certainly, it is different and the behavior isn't different, and I think the President is right in that it was structured as not an order as both sides describe it. So the unusual feature you've zeroed in on, Ryan, is that he was the President at the time, talking to the FBI Director, but I don't think the request is all that unusual, particularly in light of what we now know of the Michael Flynn plea, frankly.</s>NOBLES: OK. Bill, it's been hard to tell at times whether or not Mayor Giuliani is going off script, or trying to get ahead of the news by making certain facts public. I mean, what do you think of all this? Is this just a PR game by Mayor Giuliani?</s>BILL KRISTOL, EDITOR, THE WEEKLY STANDARD: Yes, I think he knows that President Trump has certain vulnerabilities. Things he's said publicly to the media that aren't going to be defensible absolutely. And he's been pretty clever. I mean, each one of these looks like a gaffe, and there's a little embarrassment, and people like us say for a day or two that well, I thought he never requested that Flynn get a break, and guess what, he did made the request. But you get these things out one by one, three or four -- every three or four weeks, by the time it actually comes out, which it could come out, but there's a patterned of this, and that the President hasn't been truthful, and why hasn't he been truthful if he doesn't have anything to hide, and all that. I think they're hoping is people say, oh look, we knew that already. What's the big deal? So I actually do think Giuliani -- and he has said this (Inaudible), at least alluded to this, that he has a bit of a strategy of to letting these things go out bit by bit. This was very Clinton's strategy incidentally in 1998, leaking things that looked damaging to the president, but getting them out there enough that people got kind of used to it.</s>NOBLES: Yes, I wonder in the beginning, people are wondering if maybe they were getting ahead of themselves. We're clearly seeing a pattern here that he's continuing, so it makes you think that this is part of a broader strategy. Now, Ken, this news comes out of a very critical two weeks for President Trump. Just take a look at what he had ahead of them. He has got the SCOTUS announcement tomorrow, then a NATO summit meeting.</s>CUCCINELLI: Right.</s>NOBLES: He's got to also meet with the queen one on one, and then a meeting with Vladimir Putin. Now, we're told that President Trump wants to meet with Vladimir Putin alone with no advisers around him. Do you think that's a smart strategy for President Trump?</s>CUCCINELLI: No, I don't. But I think that's part of why he wants to do it is he wants to defy everybody else's expectations. I'd add one more item in there, Ryan. It is very likely that a Texas court is going to enjoin the DACA program this month in the case brought by the attorneys general including Ken Paxton of Texas, and five others, so that's going to reheat the immigration issue here at home while he's traveling abroad.</s>NOBLES: That's a very good point. And, Bill, I mean, getting back to Putin, why do you think President Trump wants to be alone with him? I mean, what's the benefit there?</s>KRISTOL: Ryan, just on Ken's point, that also had trade. It does seem to be the definition where Republicans in Congress are getting sufficiently worked up that you can imagine an actual attempt to move legislation that would take on the President's tariffs, so there are a heck of a lot of big issues facing the Trump administration, and the President personally, and also Republicans, and everyone else on the Hill. In terms of Putin, look, I worked for Vice President Quayle, and there were times when you would have a one on one meeting before the larger group came in. There is a translator (Inaudible), presumably, it was always regarded as a courtesy, you don't really want business to be done in the media without a reliable note taker, usually your national security adviser, or someone like that, so that you don't get in a position where one person walks out with either genuine misunderstanding, which could be damaging to the national interest. Or someone like Putin taking advantage of something saying that Trump said this, Trump might say, oh no, I didn't, but meanwhile damage could have been done to our allies' confidence, and stuff, and so forth. So I would strongly -- I imagine John Bolton and Mike Pompeo are strongly recommending to the President that any one on one meeting be as short as possible, and as vague, and as general as possible.</s>NOBLES: Of course, we'll have to see if he takes that advice, if he is getting it, which isn't always necessarily a given.</s>KRISTOL: He always does that, Ryan. I mean, no problem.</s>NOBLES: Yes, no problem there. Ken, I know you're going to be watching tomorrow night when the President announces his Supreme Court pick is.</s>CUCCINELLI: Yes.</s>NOBLES: He actually just tweeted a few seconds ago that he's looking forward to making that decision at 9:00 p.m. tomorrow night. Still, holding his cards close to his vest. We kind of have an idea of who the four finalists are. But, of course, everybody who is talking to our reporters says we don't know for sure until the words actually come out of his mouth. I mean, Ken, what are you looking for? Are you just looking for a conservative jurist, or are there some specific things that you are hoping to see in the president's pick?</s>CUCCINELLI: Well, certainly, I think the list is spectacular. I mean, there isn't a bad judge on it. So you start above the Kennedy level to begin with, regardless of who they pick, and their finalists are also excellent. I think there are people who have favorites, and concerns, and so forth. I've expressed some concerns about Judge Kavanaugh recognizing he's an outstanding judge, but not as good as his competitors. I also think that putting my Senate conservative fund hat on where I try to help conservatives get into the Senate, Amy Barrett is an excellent midterm pick. When the Democrats still used the attack lines of the Republicans are somehow against women, to have a woman nominee would be an excellent shield in that, and you don't give up any merit based concerns. She's an excellent pick in her own right, so in an election year, she sort of gets an extra couple of points, if you will, compare to some of her competitors, she helps the Republican candidates for the U.S. Senate in this election cycle in addition to being a great pick for the seat. It would be interesting if she was selected, we'd get a Scalia clerk pick for the Kennedy seat, and a Kennedy clerk pick for the Scalia seat, Justice Gorsuch.</s>NOBLES: All right. Bill, I'll give you the last word on this. I mean, you've been very critical of the President obviously, but if he picks another conservative judge, will you approve?</s>KRISTOL: Yes, it's a good list, I agree with Ken on that. I think I've talked to some people who talked to the President actually, or people close to the President, I think Kavanaugh will not get it. I you get he's a good judge, but he's a D.C. Circuit judge, a D.C. insider. Easy to attack on those grounds for Democrats to attack and doesn't really add anything. I think -- I think the two judges in the Midwest, Hardiman, and Kethledge give you more of a kind of Gorsuch-like -- you know, people who didn't go to -- in their case, didn't go to Ivy League law schools, and all that, (Inaudible). And I agree with Ken that I think Amy Barrett is -- would be a risky and daring pick, and has the highest upside as well politically, they are all good judges, but -- so I think the decision becomes a confirmation decision, and to some degree a 2018 election decision.</s>NOBLES: Interesting, both of you kind of picking Judge Barrett as the dark horse tomorrow night. We'll have to see what happens. Ken Cuccinelli, Bill Kristol, thank you for a perfect conversation, we appreciate you being on.</s>KRISTOL: Good to be with you.</s>NOBLES: All right. We have some breaking news into CNN. A woman exposed to a deadly Soviet-era nerve agent has died. We're going to have the details on this when we come back.