Im Anderson Cooper here in new york, along with jake tapper in washington. Anderson, the indictment charges donald trump with four counts, you see them there on your screen, allegedly motivated by one single goal, one that is antithetical to any functioning democracy, the peaceful transition of power. Quoting from the indictment now, quote, despite having lost the defendant, donald trump, was determined to remain in power, unquote. We learned of the indictment in the 5 00 hour today, shortly after Special Counsel made a brief statement, it is now in full. Good evening, today an indictment was unsealed. Charging Donald J Trump with conspiring to defraud the United States, conspiring to disenfranchise voters, and conspiring and attempting to obstruct an official proceeding. The indictment was issued by a grand jury of citizens here, in the district of columbia, and it sets forth the crimes charged in detail. I encourage everyone to read it in full. The attack on our nations capital, on january six, 2021, was an unprecedented assault on the seat of american democracy. It is described in the indictment, that it was fueled by lies. Lies by the defendant, targeted at obstructing a Bedrock Function of the u. S. Government, the nations process of collecting, counting, and certifying the results of the president ial election. The men and women of Law Enforcement who defended the u. S. Capitol On January 6th are heroes. They are patriots and they are the very best of us. They did not just defend a building, for the people sheltering in it, they put their lives on the line to defend who we are as a country and people. They defended the very institutions and principles that defined the United States. Since the attack on our capital, the Department Of Justice has remained committed to ensuring accountability for those criminally responsible for what happened that day. This case is brought consistent with that commitment and our investigation of hundred individuals continues. In this case, where my office will seek a speedy trial so that the evidence can be judged by a jury of citizens. In the meantime, i must emphasize that the indictment is only an allegation, and that the defendant must be presumed innocent until Proven GuiltyBeyond A Reasonable Doubt in a court of law. I would like to thank the members of the Federal Bureau Of Investigation who are working on this investigation with my office, as well as the many Career Prosecutors and Law Enforcement agents from around the country who have worked on previous january six investigations. These women and men are Public Servants of the very highest order and it is a privilege to work alongside them. Thank you. A short time later, camera crews caught up with the attorney general, merrick garland, who is in philadelphia and had these brief remarks. Jack smith, the Special Counsel to take on the ongoing investigation, in order to underline the departments commitment for accountability and independents. Mr. Smith and his team experienced principal Career Agents and prosecutors, have followed the facts and the law, wherever they lead. Any questions about this matter will have to be answered by the filings made in the courtroom. The former president will be in thursday afternoon in washington. Kaitlan collins, evan perez, and paula reid are there tonight. Kayla, whats the reaction from the former president s allies . Well, of course theyre not happy about this anderson. They believed that it was going to come today, they were waiting like we were to see what the actual charges were and then former President Trump was informed, late this afternoon, after that indictment had been returned, that he was indeed the person who had been indicted. Obviously they did not say his name or his initials in the courthouse earlier today, he has been lashing out personally asking why he was not indicted on these charges two and a half years ago. Of, course two and half years ago it wouldve been right after january 6th had happened and so this is an investigation into a former sitting president. It took quite some time and clearly as we have seen this play out. His campaign, for their part, is also comparing it to not see germany and the holocaust, essentially, referring back to the 1930s saying that it is political persecution as they were arguing it. That is the comparison they made before the indictment had actually come down. The reality of this is that he is now facing his second set of federal charges, while he is in the midst of being the oregon front runner. And in the middle of this campaign. He is very clearly going to tie it back to the campaign, another defense that he is making is that he was just listening to the advice of attorneys, and of course we are seeing how theyre the ones referenced here. It is unnamed but listed coconspirators in this case and that is one thing that his allies are wondering. Why these people named in the indictment, but not indicted to themselves, were not done so yet. We talked to many of them, the ones that they believe they are. They have not received Target Letters out, for the most part, that we have heard, and that is a question that his own legal team has tonight about one that is going to happen, given, of course, the allegations in this indictment. Paula, in terms of the indictment, its a stunning document and jack smith was urging everyone to actually read it. What was expected, if anything, what was unexpected . The charges that we are seeing here is very much expected based on what the former president indicated that was in the target letter that he received. Conspiring to obstruct consent proceedings, to defraud the United States, and even that civil rights charge. That was not a surprise. What was a surprise was, especially that through these are conspiracy charges, is the fact that, under his name, there is about six inches and is it blank. The fact that no one else was charged. While they did list six coconspirators, it was still somewhat surprising that no one else was charged today. But we know the investigation continues. And, lastly, there is not a lot of new information here. This has been an issue today, lead Up To January 6th has been exhaustively investigated and there are not many new details. Unlike the maralago indictment where you have a sensational pictures, at times shocking and story, really supporting some very serious Criminal Charges, this indictment it is a pretty difficult if you are not an attorney to really follow the entire conspiracy, so it is not clear if it will break through to regular voters. A number of the lieshat the former psident has, told has repeatedly told, it goes in order of how many people in the former president s orbit explained to him why what he was saying was ally and was factually incorrect. I mean, no one reading this document of the people all around the former president , from his own attorney, the security people, Senior Leaders of the justice department, its own justice department, Vice President , all of these people explained to him why what he was saying was not true. And yet he just stopped listening to them and moved over to the giulianis and sidney powells. Right, exactly. Anderson, look, i think that part of the focus of what i think jack smith and the prosecution are trying to portray, to prove that, despite the fact that the former president has a right, or he had a right to challenge the election results, he has a right to live and to say that there was fraud. He has all of those rights, what he doesnt have a right to do is to concoct a scheme to defraud the United States, to have this conspiracy, to try to deprive the citizens of their right to have their vote counted. So that is what they go through in chapter and verse, and what prosecutors sort of draw a picture of is of someone who has been told, as you pointed out, by his Vice President , by his white House Counsel, by his intelligence committee, by the Homeland Security department that the people who do the protection of the system. All of whom are responsible for security election, all of whom he picked. And these are people that he chose, all of them telling him the truth and then he continued to listen to the people who are saying that there are italian satellites or venezuela or china that were responsible for fictional fraud. And so that is how prosecutors are trying to draw the picture that even if trump is claiming, it to this day, that there was a fraud that he knew better, that he was absolutely lying when he was concocting these claims. Caitlin, the former president has been some earned to the court In Washington For His thursday, to have any sense of how that will play out . What you will be doing in the meantime and will he actually go . I think that is the big question that we have not got answered yet, whether he is actually planning to show up what the logistics of that are going to look like here. Obviously we have seen a trial run of this before, what happened in miami. Trumps attorney will be on with me, in just a little bit, obviously well be asking him those questions of what exactly that looks like because we know that john rural, his new attorney has only been added to the team in recent weeks. He and todd blanche are going to be the ones who are handling this case now that it has become actual charges that have been brought down. And so i think it is a question of what thursday actually looks like, but we have already seen what trump has been saying online, if you want to guess what he is going to be saying over the next 48 hours or so. I will note that what is different here, about this indictment, these federal charges that he is facing, is that the indictment was unsealed almost immediately. We have got to read through it yourself and see what is laid out here in detail by jack smith and his team. Anderson, that was not the case last time trump was indicted. Of course, you and i were on air that night when he told us about the indictment and the documents investigation. There is a vacuum that we have not seen the filling the void there, making his argument, the governments argument. This is different here, you can read in this and that is what jack smith encouraged people to do when he made that rare statement earlier. You mentioned the coconspirators, the people mentioned, but not actually charged yet. The Special Counsel made a point of saying that its investigation continues. Is it clear to you what areas he is still looking into . Well, we know from our reporting that they have looked into fundraising. Campaign finance violations, fundraising off of statements and claims that they knew were not true. That is clearly not charged here, its unclear if it will be. We also know that the Special Counsel will be speaking to several new witnesses over the next few weeks as witnesses include the former new york police commissioner, bernie kerik, who worked very closely with Rudy Giuliani and his efforts to overturn the 2020 election. We also know that at least one former Trump Attorney is going to go and speak to investigators. These are not anticipated grand jury appearances, these are interviews with prosecutors, but it is clear that they are continuing to gather evidence. It is not just him saying that we continue to investigate. We see exactly what steps they are taking and any of those coconspirators, even if they were not charged today, does not mean that they cannot be charged in the future and i dont think that any of them should be slipping too easy right now. We appreciate it all from d. C. Thanks anderson, with me in studio is andrew mccabe, as well as the cnns abby phillips, dana bash, and senior chief legal analyst and former federal prosecutor, laura coates. So, lets talk about some of what is in this indictment. First of all, we should note, dana, that what is being alleged is no short of a criminal conspiracy. In fact it really resembles, in many ways, that Closing Statement that we heard from then congresswoman liz cheney about the degree to which this was not just happenstance it, was not just chaos, it was a concerted effort with many conspiracy conspiracists, coming up with various ways to try to overturn the results of a free and fair election. From state to state to state, it details from wisconsin to pennsylvania and beyond, and then the climax, of course, is what the former president did with regard to his then Vice President. Yes, you are absolutely right, the january Six Committee plowed a lot of this ground for the Special Counsel and his office, but they didnt talk about mike pence. Mike pence wouldnt do it, he did speak to the Special Counsel and some of the most detailed and new anecdotes in this indictment are in and about what happened between donald trump and mike pence, conversation after conversation, including a christmas call saying mike, youve got to do this. Going on as it got closer to the actual day of january 6th. Pushing the Vice President , the then Vice President , to overturn the election and the fact that mike pence had notes in this indictment, it said that some of the quotes in here or from mike pences contemporary news notes that he took at the time. It is really, really stunning and it turns the corner to the thenpresident not having this way with mike pence and private, and taking it public and we all know what happened then. One of the things that you heard, Paula Talking about is just how dense this indictment is bought the reason that it is so dense is that they are really methodically going through point by point date by state all of the actions and reactions, and what stuck out to me that a specific claim was false, that, for example, in georgia, there were not dead voters or that the votes were not being brought in from nowhere. His own Chief Of Staff telling him that a specific claim about georgia votes was not true and then the very next day he goes out and amplifies, or spreads, those false claims or, in some cases, very shortly after something has been told to people of trump or coconspirators in this case, that those things were untrue. You know, Rudy Giuliani, who is a sort of unnamed as a coconspirator here, picks up the phone and calls state lawmakers and says i need you to do this. I need you to cast more doubt on the election results. So they are really detailing not just words, i think what we are already hearing from trumps lawyers is how are they going to prove that trump didnt just genuinely believe that, he was not just using his First Amendment right to speak, what the Special Counsel does in the indictment is say is that he was told, first of all, by people close to him who he trusted, and that he went out and did things. Not just said things, but did things that are alleged here to be violations of the law. One of the things that we should note, because we talked about the degree to which the former Vice President mike pence cooperated with the Special Counsel. He did not cooperate with the january Six Committee. In between, of course, he did sell a book and which he did give some of his for profit in his version of the event. Pence issued a statement and, i would li to read some of it all, i dontif we have the full screen ready. He said that todays indictment serves iornt reminder. Anyone who puts himself over the constitution should never be president of the United States. Our country is more important than one, man our Constitution Isorimportant than one mans career, On January 6th, a President Trump demanded that i choose between him and the constitution. I chose the constitution and i always will. Now, look, trump and his minions will note that mike pence might not even make the debate in august, he might not have enough support. But his statement is accurate. I mean, it is not a matter of opinion, the first part is, the idea that the constitution is supposed to be more important than any one mans career, that is empirically true. There are also some points in there that are clearly political points, that he should not be, the partys nominee. And running for president again. To me, what is interesting, it is that we are already seeing a cross the board the republican Talking Points and there is always a phrase that you hear. This time it is a two tiered justice system. Kevin mccarthy put out a statement that he didnt even really talk about the indictment, you talked about hunter biden and i think that we are going to see that over and over again. And, just one of the things that i found a striking, this was, as dana said, what the January 6th Committee laid out and it is clear that the Special Counsel, he did not go abroad. This is a narrow indictment of things where he thinks that he can get a conviction, but donald trump is f