Transcripts For CNNW Wolf 20180813

The president s lawyer completely backtracking on whether the president spoke with james comey about backing off the investigation into Michael Flynn. We begin today with the breaking news. The fbi agent peter strzok has been fired for sending antitrump texts to his thencolleague lisa page ahead of the 2016 president ial election. Once those messages were brought to light, strzok was taken off Robert Muellers special counsel team and moved to a different position. The decision to fire him was finalized just on friday. Cnn crime and justice correspondent Shimon Prokupecz joins me now. Strzoks attorney, hes saying that this decision goes against not only the agencys protocol but also against the recommendation from the Inspector General. Is that accurate criticism . Well, it certainly is when you think about the norms of the fbi and how usually things go through the process and the procedures. Certainly the attorney here arguing that that was not followed. That has to do with the fact that the opr, the office of professional responsibility, which was investigating peter strzok, had recommended suspension and demotion. They did not recommend that he be fired, but the Deputy Director went ahead and fired him anyway, announcing that to him on friday, saying that essentially he was fired. Were told there wasnt really a lot of explanation given as to why peter strzok was fired. Nonetheless, this decision was made. His attorney, Peter Strzoks attorney, releasing a statement a short time ago, essentially saying that the decision to fire special agent strzok is not only a departure from typical bureau practice but also contradicts director wrays testimony to congress and his assurances that the fbi intended to follow its regular process in this and all personnel matters. Now, of course, peter strzok testified on the hill about these Text Messages, about his relationship with lisa page. People close to peter strzok pointing out that the Inspector General found that there was no bias, so of course theyre questioning why was he fired then. Its likely that this will get appealed in an effo in an eff to do that, people have set up a go fund me page. As weve seen, the president has already reacted. Really, what goes forward, i think, politically in terms of this investigation, in terms of this whole entire situation will be certainly interesting to see it unfold. Shimon prokupecz, thanks very much. For more on the firing of strzok, what it means, lets bring in cnn criminal defense attorney, former federal prosecutor seth waxman, cnn Politic National security analyst, sean turner, and our chief political analyst gloria borger. The ig said this is not good behavior. Good he was taken off the Mueller Investigation. Now you have the Deputy Director in effect overruling another senior fbi official. What do you see behind that . Politics. And we have to report this out, but it seems to me that you know that rosenstein, rod rosenstein, has been in a fight with conservatives in congress who want him impeached. You know the fbi has been under fire by republicans in congress. You know how the president feels about strzok. And it seems to me that he may be a sacrificial lamb here. They may have just decided, you know what, lets just get rid of this once and for all. You remember that tenhour hearing. He did not back down one minute. So you know, something has occurred here that would make them say, okay, were not going to stick with protocol. Instead, were going to fire somebody who for a very long time was a respected member of his organization. I wonder that hearing in the end helped or hurt him. Just a reminder, he was quite a defiant presence as he was responding to those questions. Have a listen. I can assure you, mr. Chairman, at no time in any of these texts did those personal beliefs ever enter into the realm of any action i took. Furthermore, this isnt just me sitting here telling you. You dont have to take my word for it. At every step, at every investigative decision, there are multiple layers of people above me, the Deputy Director, director of fbi, and multiple layers of people below me, unit chiefs, case agent, and analysts, all of whom were involved in all of these decisions. Was he giving an accurate representation there by saying, listen, yes, you know, i did something bad here, but lets be clear, there are loads of folks below me and above me and this could not have affected the investigation, as the president has repeatedly and continues to argue . Well, look, i think its really possible that what he did, did not affect the investigation. I think theres something more interesting here. I agree with everything gloria said. I talked to a lot of former colleagues in the fbi, former and current colleagues. One of the things i take away from those conversations is that almost universally, whether people in the fbi support the president or they dont support the president , almost universally they have said that what peter strzok did in those Text Messages and what he did thin this testimony irreparably damaged his reputation. You leave your politics at the door when you do the business of bureau. I think the impression that he might not have been doing that, whether its true or not, is something that was a real concern for a lot of rank and file fbi officials. So i think that for a lot of them, they saw this coming. I think some of that inside pressure may be why were here today. Youre saying that performance, because he was so defiant . Not only because he was defiant, but he did not speak to the fbis strong belief he didnt speak Strong Enough to the belief that politics, that partisanship should not enter into the work of the fbi. Basically, he defended himself and took issue with the politicians who were questioning him. He did not defend the fbi in a way that people would have thought would have been the right thing to do. Now, karoun, republicans, including the president , have repeatedly pointed to strzok, the texts with lisa page as evidence the entire Mueller Investigation is biased, although we should note there are many people involved in the Mueller Investigation. He was removed from this investigation when these texts were revealed. But the president sticking with this line because just a short time ago he tweeted the following. Based on the fact strzok was in charge of the witch hunt, will it be dropped . It is a total hoax, no collusion, no obstruction. I just fight back. It strikes me that if strzok is a sacrificial lamb, he hasnt satisfied the president. Yeah, look, this is the thing. If its just about the politics, weve kind of learned in every other stage of this that when the fbi tries to clean out drk a and this is not the first time somebody has come up. We were talking about mccabe months ago. It doesnt actually stop things from happening. Strzok is a target for the tweets he sent. Rosenstein is a target because of the position he has. Theyre both fairly defiant when they appeared before the joint Congressional Committee hearings. And this is going to be something that continues. The difference, though, i guess, between strzok and rosenstein is you have leadership that does not want to touch the rosenstein thing. They dont want to get involved. Its a small subset still, very conservative house republicans, many in the freedom caucus, that want to push this connection to the entire investigation, take down mueller, have everything go away. Its not really backed by the paul ryans and Mitch Mcconnells of this world. That makes a huge difference. Strzok did something wrong. Its objectively difficult to defend, even though the democrats are trying to, and clearly strzok was trying to defend himself as well. It is evidence of bias, even the ig said, look, the investigation is fine, but this guy is not. That makes it much more difficult to thread that needle. As you see, the people that are beating this drum on other drums, i guess, are not necessarily going to stop that because this particular persons story has been terminated f y, you will. Looking at this as a former criminal prosecutor and defense attorney, you see the lawyers statement saying, listen, yes, he admitted he did something wrong here, but if you look at fbi protocol, suspension is what was called for. Lets set aside the politics. Legally, has strzok been done badly by this decision . He may have been. When you look at his single case, every employee of the department of justice is entitled to due process. If he was fired for political reasons as opposed to a meritorious base, we have the Inspector General who points to a suspension or demotion. I think his lawyer will have a basis to bring a case. Whether that will ultimately set t l or not out of court. The bigger political arena really drives this train. No question. Listen, stand by, everyone. Theres a lot more to talk about. Also developing right now, the president continuing to take shots at omarosa after she dropped yet another tape today. This one a conversation with the president himself. Plus, Rudy Giuliani contradicting Rudy Giuliani after saying the president never spoke with james comey about the Michael Flynn investigation. What this means for muellers case going forward. And an Airline Employee stealing an airplane, getting it in the air before eventually crashing. 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That firing taking place inside the secure situation room, an area where phones are never allowed or should never be allowed. Now omarosa says that she is threatening to, quote, blow the whistle on what she calls white house corruption. Cnns White House Correspondent Kaitlan Collins joins me now. Omarosa and the president have had a close relationship for many years, going back to the reality tv days. Now trump, as he often does when criticized or with former employees, hes criticizing her, attacking her. What reaction are you hearing today from the white house . Reporter well, its been quite the reaction. I dont think weve seen the president react like this about a staffer leaving the white house since Steve Bannons departure. The president is now referring to one of his highest paid aides here in the white house as a whacky low life, tweeting several times about omarosa this morning, saying she was not liked in the white house, that she was not smart but vicious. He said she would rarely see her, but that she was constantly saying bad things, missing meetings, and that when john kelly suggested getting rid of her, the president asked him to try to work it out because she said nice things about him. That last point is a remarkable one, jim, because of course the president is essentially saying that he paid someone 179,000 of taxpayer money because they said nice things about him and praised him. But thats not all. The president just tweeted a short while ago saying that omarosa has already signed a nondisclosure agreement. Thats something she talks about in the book, being offered to sign one after she left the white house. But the president seems to be referring to these nondisclosure agreements we reported on back in march. Youll recall the president insisted whenever he was first brought into the white house that his staffers sign ndas. Now, he was told by several people that just simply wasnt feasible, but instead the white House Counsel donn mcgahn finally relented and had this watered down, unenforceable version of an nda. The president seems to be confirming it there with his tweet. All this is going on, but also of course, we have to keep in mind we have sources telling cnn theyre worried it wasnt just omarosa taping conversations in the white house, which could spell more trouble for this administration. Kaitlan collins at the white house. Thanks very much. Back with me to discuss, karoun, shawn, and angela rye. I guess what strikes me about this beyond the drama of the day is this is a typical president ial relationship here, right . Hire someone knew for a long time, says he kept her on because she said nice things about him. Then when she leaves or he leaves, in this case she, attacks them as i always knew she was a low life, et cetera. Its a pattern here, is it not . Its definitely a pattern. I think whats frustrating to me is i find myself having to agree with the Trump Administration on something. The one thing that i agree with them on in this case is that it is not just inappropriate, it is certainly a National Security breach and a challenge to be recording anything in the situation room. I have Homeland Security background. You just know better. In this instance, you regularly find yourself on the other side of the administration saying, they dont know better. For whatever reason, whether its lack of training or lack of regard for the rules or regulations that exist, they dont know better. There still have to be repercussions for that. The other issue i have, frankly, is if omarosa knew all of this when she went into the administration, which she did, then she should have never gone. I think the issue that i have with both donald trump and omarosa is that theyre playing with lives now. This is not the apprentice the remix, what i called it on twitter. We have to say enough is enough. This is now a distraction. How many times have we said that since the election . This is now a distraction and its putting us all in harms way. Its time to stop. Gloria, as kaitlan was saying there, the white house is concerned there are other tapes. Why do people feel the need to tape conversations . Is it perhaps theyre concerned the president might lie about what was said in those conversations . First of all, i dont think they trust each other. Many of them probably dont trust the president himself. And if youre signing nondisclosure, nondisparagement clauses, maybe you want to do it to protect yourself to a certain degree. I think the level of paranoia is something we havent ever seen in a white house. And what was john kelly doing taking her into the situation room to fire her basically . I mean, you can fire someone somewhere else. It doesnt have to be there. And as angela is saying, everybody knows. You cant bring a phone into the situation room. You can in this situation room, but not in another. The point is that everything was handled badly. The president now is obsessed with omarosa, whom he told on that tape, i believe falsely, that he didnt know she was going to be fired because he didnt offer to rehire her. Did he . I dont love that youre leaving. Yeah, i didnt hear that. There was some play acting in his reaction to that. Its just all a mess. Shawn, i have to ask you, you served many years in the intelligence community. Listen, were a nation at war. We have two ongoing wars. Russia is attacking our democracy. There are genuine National Security risks. What does it mean for u. S. National security . How do u. S. Adversaries look at an administration, the most powerful man in the world, where you have people taping each other . You have apparently lies going back and forth. There was back stabbing. Very Public Comments from the president on people who very recently served in very senior roles. Is that a threat to u. S. National security for outsiders to see this very public display of dysfunction . Look, our adversaries who collect information, who collect intelligence on the United States look at an Administration Like this as divided against itself, an administration where theres all this infighting, all this distrust. Its a treasuretrove of potential information for our adversaries. It is a target of opportunity. When we talk about taking these devices into the situation room, look, theres absolutely no doubt that there are National Security implications here. Its not for the reasons that people might think. Certainly it is the case that we are concerned about people potentially recording conversations and doing things like what omarosa did. But these devices, these little Super Computers we carry around with us, these are some of the most soughtafter and most aggressively pursued targets of our adversaries when it comes to gathering information. So its not just about protecting the conversations that theyre having, but its protecting all the information these things could potentially collect or broadcast. In the National Security space, as we look at this administration, there is a lot of concern about what people in this administration who get upset with this president , get upset with other people in the administration, what they might do in order to express that frustration and that anger and how that might impact our National Security. To be clear, and others have mentioned this to me before, a phone like, this a Foreign Intelligence Service can turn it into a listening device. Absolutely. The reason we put these phones in boxing outside of secure spaces is we know theres lots of software that will allow our adversaries to turn these into listening devices and collect that information. Its also the case that they dont even have to turn them into listening devices. These devices are always broadcasting information. So if were in there and were sending emails based on whats happening, its all vulnerable to our adversaries. It appears we may have caught the white house in a lie, imagine that. If the president is tweeting that she signed an nda, a nondisclosure agreement, but kaitlan has said that the white house has denied repeatedly that staff were required to sign an nda and don mcgahn developed some sort of watered down something, regardless, the president thinks they signed an nda. If the president wants to call it an nda but it cant be legally enforced, thats one situation everybody could. Weve seen the president use it in his prepresident ial life. Its a very common corporate tool. Its come up with the Stormy Daniels issue. Its come up in almost every other episode, i guess, of trumps story that precedes his time in the oval office. This could be a kneejerk thing he likes to throw out there. His staff was placating his desire for the nda give kind of giving nonnda ndas. Thats an option. Raises the basic question, why does he feel he needs an nda from senior staff. I want to listen to the president s counselor Kellyanne Conway when she was asked to name a highlevel africanamerican adviser in the west wing now that omarosa is gone. Heres her answer. Who is the most prominent, highlevel adviser to the president on the west wing staff right now . Africanamerican . Yes. I would say well, first of all, youre totally not covering the fact that our secretary of housing and urban development and world renowned im asking you about the white house staff. Im asking you about the people the president is with every day. Well, the president works with secretary carson every day. Hes trying to break the back of who is there on the white house staff right now . We have does he have an office in the west wing . He as an office in the eop, absolutely. The extive office of the president. But not in the west wing. Your reaction to that belabored answer . Yeah, belabored is nice, jim. I dont have to be as nice as you. You know whats sad about this . I know jeron smith very well. Hes someone who i respect a great deal. I hate that hes in the white house, but he does work there. He was with the domestic policy counsel. Hes now on the legislative affairs team. Thats not a team that donald trump deals with on a regular basis. So i think that Kellyanne Conway stretched the truth. I think the unfortunate reality is there arent a number of black folks they can name at the white house at the table because nobody wants to work for a racist president. Nobody wants that type of association in history. That is the reality of that. I have no idea why he took that. But omarosa did it for selfserving reasons. We see it now. Shes wrote a book. She taped conversations that were selfserving. This is no whistleblower. This is someone who recorded conversations to protect herself later because she knew it was going to be a disaster. She liked to go around saying that people would have to bow down to donald trump. I guess were starting with her. Strong words. Thanks to everyone. Coming up next, flipping the script. Another contradiction from trumps legal team. Now Rudy Giuliani said that the president never spoke with james comey about the Michael Flynn investigation. Also, joining me next to discuss it all and what this means for the russia investigation t democratic congressman Eric Swallwell from the great state of california. From any one else. Why accept it from an allergy pill . 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If he goes in and testifies to that under oath, instead of just being a dispute, they can say its perjury. If they elect to believe comey instead of trump. How is he a good witness for the president if hes saying the president was asking him, directing him, in his words, to let the Michael Flynn investigation go . He didnt direct him to do that. What he said to him was comey says can you joining us now to talk about that and much more, democratic congressman Eric Swalwell of california, also a member of the House Select Committee on intelligence as well as the judiciary committee. Youre a lawyer. Can you figure out what giuliani is trying to say there . I trust the guy who went under oath a number of times and told congress under the penalty of perjury that the president told him to make the flynn case go away. That was james comey. The president has had a number of opportunities to go under oath, to go to bob mueller. Hes even been given the questions, and he wont go in. Giuliani is a lawyer. Hes got a tough client. I expect him to continue to be inconsistent. In a court of law, or before a grand jury, if you have james comey, a former fbi director who kept contemporaneous note, the famous memos, who apparently told colleagues immediately after that meeting, all the things you do to corroborate your version of events, versus a president whose lawyer and in his tweets has changed his story. How does a grand jury, in your experience, weigh those two against each other . Jurors are told all the time you can rely on a single witness testimony if you believe that witness. Particularly if theres contemporaneous notes, if other witnesses say that person told them that this was concerning to them. I think comey has a lot of credibility here. In our investigation, we asked all the people who had ever worked with comey what they thought of his credibility. Every person said that, you know, he had very high integrity. I think the president , you know, ball is in his court. Do you believe the president will actually sit down with the special counsel . I dont. I think hes had a very few times in his life has this guy met the truth. I cant imagine him going into that position. Heres whats interesting. This grand jury subpoena that may be coming for the president will be coming at about the same time that kavanaugh, Justice Kavanaugh is going through his confirmation hearing. Now, hes written this law review article saying that no president should be indicted or sued civilly. I think this is going to make questions about that belief and whether he should recuse himself all the more relevant. Do you know or believe that mueller is going to subpoena the president in the next month or so . Well, i dont think hes going to treat him any differently than any other criminal subject. If thats the case, mueller has already shown he will grand jury subpoena witnesses in the case. If hes consistent, i think the president will be facing a subpoena. We had some news today. The fbi deciding to fire peter strzok, famously the antitrump Text Messages with lisa page, overruling in effect the Inspector General, who looked into this for the fbi and said, well, by protocol, 60day suspension, other punishments, rep reprimand, et cetera. Do you think the fbi made the right call . He wouldnt be working for me. I think he had a solid career, but a mistake this large with the stakes so high, you have to send a message to the other agents that, you know, we expect them to do what they always do, which is be above but that does not change the fact that nearly a half dozen people have pled guilty. A case with Paul Manafort is about to go to verdict this week. About two dozen people have been indicted. That all happened with Peter Strzoks role in the case. So you dont plead guilty if you believe that strzok was doing something untoward. Understood. If i can turn to politics, were two years away from 2020. It has not gone unnoticed that you spent a lot of time in the great state of iowa, which happens to be one of the first places you vote. I was born there. I know you had some roots there. Youve called President Trump a wrecking ball. Are you laying the groundwork to challenge him . Im laying the groundwork to win three congressional seats in iowa. We have great candidates. Im going to make that decision after the midterms, but the president has been a wrecking ball. A wrecking ball to health care e protections, a wrecking ball to paychecks in declierngs aline, wrecking ball to our democracy. You have secret recordings, a domestic abuser serving as staff secretary to the president , and the president himself divulging National Security secrets to the russians in the oval office. This white house needs to be cleaned up. The best way is to first change the peoples house. That means changing congress. What you just laid out there sounds like a president ial campaign. Well, im going to decide after the midterms. I also have a full term coming, my wife is due in november. What decision will be made out of sleep exhaustion. Youre not closing the door to running . No, im not. Congressman, thank you. My pleasure. An Airline Employee stole an airplane, and we heard joking with air Traffic Control before crashing. All this near seattle. Why he did it in his own words and how he did it. The fbi has now located human remains in the wreckage of an airliner stolen from seattles airport and flown around for a full hour before crashing in a remote area nearby. 29yearold Richard Russell was identified as the Airline Ground worker who was able to board the empty plane and fly it out of the airport without being stopped. He spoke with air Traffic Controllers as he flew it around, even doing air stunts at one point. Have a listen to the tape. Just a sad tape to listen to. Joining me now is former ntsb managing director and cnn aviation analyst and cnns aviation correspondent renee marsh. If we can, starting now, where does the investigation stand, particularly as to what led to the crash . Right, so the fbi still, which is leading this investigation, still trying to piece all that together. We know they recovered the flight data recorders. By midweek, we expect that the ntsb will start the analysis on the data recorders. However, the cockpit voice recorder, which could pick up any other conversations he had, maybe he was talking to himself, maybe he called someone beforehand. We dont know. If that happened, that would be picked up on the cockpit voice recorder, but at this point, the fbi is saying they have only been able to recover components of that recorder. So they dont have the full thing just yet. Outside of the investigation, i can tell you that the focus really is now zeroing in on this idea of the Insider Threat at airports. We know in this hour, airport and Airline Leaders are meeting in seattle to discuss this issue. Spoke to a lot of people on capitol hill. Theyre pushing legislation. We know there was some legislation in the house from the house Homeland Security committee that pushed for more vetting of these type of workers. Renewed interest in pushing that through because it stalled in the senate. That really is the focus now, the Insider Threat. Peter, that would seem to be a natural 17 years after 9 11 that someone can walk into a plane and fly it off. I guess it exposes this idea that anybody whos inside, who has that ground crew pass could do the same thing . Sure, the threat of an insider is always the greatest threat. At some point, you have to have someone whos approved to move the plane. If that person is the weak link, then youve got a problem. The thing to avoid, though, are quick, easy answers. There are always unintended consequences. The aviation industry, airplanes are complex devices. Its a complex system. A quick answer may end up causing trouble in other areas. So i think the industry, the air carriers, and Law Enforcement are going to be looking at this for a number of months. Renee, there were two f15s up in the air. They scrambled very quickly. They followed this plane around as it went. I believe they were in contact with the cockpit directly. Do we know what their orders were . Were their orders to shoot it down if it came close to an ir kb urban area . We know they were armed. We have that confirmed. The pilots on the military jets were in communication with the air horizon employee at the time. Do we know if they had orders to shoot it down . We dont. What we do know is situations like this prompt a Conference Call with all the key players. The military, faa, tsa. Theyre all having a conversation, and theyre assessing the situation in realtime. We know how this story ended. They did not shoot this plane down. And that is likely because they made the assessment that this plane was over the ocean, the military jets led it over the ocean, and that they made the determination in that realtime that it was not a threat to the greater population. They were able to contain that threat. So that is likely the reason why we did not see it get shot down. However, the military not revealing much more. Peter, you talk about not a quick reflexive fix, but renee was mentioning legislation already pushing for greater background checks for ground employees. Reasonable step . Sure. Background checks have been an issue of contention since 9 11. On both sides. You have the secure side, the airside, where he worked. Then you have the semisecure side, inside the check points. Inside, the check point employees, thats been a real contention. Their lower wage jobs, and they have high turnover. Do we need to have better background checks . Do we need to have quicker background checks . The answer is yes. Right now its only mandated once every two years for background checks. This bill would do it much more often. And there are thousands of people, i imagine, with that kind of clearance at dozens of airports around the country. Renee and peter, thanks very much. Coming up, President Trump is firing back after omarosa releases yet another secret recording. Are there more tapes to come . The white house seems to think so. Is any of it illegal . And a key u. S. Ally accuses the Trump Administration of, quote, a stab in the back. The details of that conflict up next. Ally, were doing Digital Financial services right. But if thats not enough, we have more than 8000 allys looking out for one thing you. Call in the next ten minutes. And if thats not enough, well look after your every dollar. Put down the phone. And if thats not enough, well look after your every cent. Grab your wallet. beeping sound computer voice access denied. And if thats still not enough to help you save. Oh the new one well bring out the dogs. Mush dogs barking the old ones just fine well do anything, seriously anything, to help our customers. Thanks. Ally. Do it right. Aah . I would have said you were crazy. But so began the year of me. I discovered the true meaning of paperless discounts. And the indescribable rush of saving drivers an average of 620. Why does fear feel so good . I fell in love three times once with a woman, once with a country, and finally. With myself. So, do you have anything to declare or not . Isnt that what im doing . Turkey in a currency tailspin. The value of the turkish leera falling again today, threatening the countrys economy. Just days after President Trump vowed to double steel and aluminum tariffs on turkey, which we should mention is a key nato ally. The turkish president is accusing President Trump of waging quote Economic Warfare and is now threatening to abandon his alliance with the u. S. Cnns correspondent arwa damon is in istanbul with the latest. Reporter hi, jim. Times are tough here, to say the least. Its not just because of the deteriorating relationship with the United States. Its important to remember that the turkish leera has slowly been losing value. Yes, it was most certainly dealt a devastating blow by americas more recent actions to include the sanctioning of two turkish ministers, and then of course those tariff has the u. S. Slapped on imports of aluminum and steel, akin analysts are saying to someone punching someone this the gut when they are already down. And the turkish president has called it a stab in the back. Made more bitter because these two countries are made to be nato allies. But americas and turkeys relationships has been spiraling downward stemming from for example, the opposing views they have on syrias kurds. As well as americas willingness to extradite gulen, who turkey blames for the failed 2016 coupe. And more recently the issue regarding andrew brunson, who they are accusing of having links to terrorism. What we are seeing now is shaking Investor Confidence despite measures that the turkish government has tried to put in place to try to reassure investors and the population as well. Turkey and americas relationship has a direct impact on this country which is why the government is saying america is basically waging a war on the economy. Turks we talked to as you can imagine filled with anxiety. Their future is hanging in the balance. Some feel as if they are sinking in quicksand. Jim . Thanks very much. Fbi agent peter strzok fired for sending antitrump Text Messages. President trump now weighing in. How hes responding. Thats next. 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