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The Situation Room
Second Impeachment Trial of Former President Trump; House Managers Present Chilling Surveillance Video Of Insurrection. Aired 5- 6p ET
Aired February 10, 2021 - 17:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[17:00:00]
REP. ERIC SWALWELL (D-CA): Those doors, to orient you at home, are the doors that the President of United States walks through when he or she gives the State of the Union address. You may have heard one man yelled, no violence, and another responded, it's too late for that. They don't listen without that. They were there to stop the certification of the election.
At this point inside the House chamber, we can now hear the pounding on the doors. At 2:35 p.m. members on the House floor were told an evacuation route was secured and it was time to leave. This video shows members of Congress exiting to the side of the podium where we would go through the House lobby and downstairs.
Because of coronavirus restrictions, congressional members had been waiting in the gallery for their time to speak just one level above the House floor. Representatives, staff, journalists all took cover under their chairs, helped each other put on their gas masks, and held hands as rioters gathered outside.
Here in this slide, you see Representative Jason Crow, comforting our colleague, Representative Susan Wild.
The rioters continued to surround the House chamber, flooding the halls and kicking on the doors as they pass them.
This security video shows Ashli Babbitt followed by others in the mob, turning the corner toward the House lobby doors where the members were leaving.
Chairman McGovern was one of the last members to leave the floor. As he left to the House lobby just after 2:40 p.m. he was spotted by the mob.
Minutes later at 2:44 p.m. Ashli Babbitt attempted to climb through a shattered window into the House lobby, to protect the members in the lobby, an officer discharged his weapon and she was killed.
I want to warn everyone that the next video, which shows her death is graphic.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's a gun. There's a gun. There's a gun.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SWALWELL: Inside the chamber, representatives, staff and journalists remain trapped in the gallery, one floor above the House floor and heard the gunshot. My colleague, Representative Dan Kildee produced this recording
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: -- your pants off.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes. The fuck.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Take your pants off.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Pants off.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SWALWELL: Out of fear that they'd be seen or taken by the mob, my colleagues were telling each other to take off their congressional pins. That buzzing sound that you hear in the background of these videos was the sound of the gas masks.
It was not until approximately 2:50 p.m., bout six minutes after the shooting, downstairs, remaining members, staff and journalists in the gallery were finally able to flee.
[17:05:00]
In this security footage video, you can see them exiting. Many members are still wearing their gas masks. They walk just feet away from where Capitol Police are holding an insurrectionists at gunpoint. Just minutes earlier that insurrectionists had tried to open the gallery door, and thankfully was stopped by a tactical team.
Although members were now being moved to another location, the mob continued to fight, to stop the count, to find the members, to engage with the police. The building was not yet secure.
This security video from 2:56 p.m. shows the mob in the House of Representatives wing on the second floor of the Capitol. Insurrectionists who are still inside the building are fighting with the police who are overwhelmed and trying to get them out.
Throughout this presentation, we have been very careful to not share where members of Congress were taken on the paths they followed to get out and off the floors. But that very issue was under discussion by the insurrectionists themselves.
One example comes from an FBI affidavit which stated that a leader of a militia group known as the Oath Keepers received messages while he was at the Capitol. The leader was given directions to where representatives were thought to be sheltering, and instructions to, "turn on gas, seal them in." And as you know, the threat to the Senate was no less than that of the members of the House. The mob approached the Senate with the same purpose, fulfilling President Trump's goal of stopping the count, delaying the certification of the Electoral College votes of the American people.
As you heard from Manager Plaskett, Vice President Pence was moved away from the area near the Senate chamber around 2:25 p.m. By that time, rioters had breached several areas close to this chamber. And they were flooding the hallways just outside and nearby.
The Senate chamber was not evacuated until 2:30 p.m. The mob had been in the building for more than 15 minutes. This new security footage of the senators and staff leaving the chamber will be displayed on the screens.
It is silent.
You cannot see it in this footage. But quick-thinking Senate floor staff grabbed and protected the electoral ballots that the mob was after.
Those of you who were here that day will recall that once you left the Senate floor, you move through a hallway to get to safety. That hallway was near where Officer Goodman had encountered a mob and let them upstairs and away from the Senate chamber.
You know how close you came to the mob. Some of you I understand, could hear them. But most of the public does not know how close these rioters came to you.
As you were moving through that hallway I pasted off, you were just 58 steps away from where the mob was amassing and where police were rushing to stop them. They were yelling.
In this security video, you can see how the Capitol Police created a line and blocked the hallway with their bodies to prevent rioters at the end of the hall from reaching you and your staff.
[17:10:04]
Because this is security footage that you have not seen before, I will play it again.
The top of the screen is the other end of that hallway where the mob is a mast and the officers are rushing to, to protect you.
Additional security footage shows how Leader Schumer and the members of his protective detail had a near miss with the mob. They came within just yards of rioters and had to turn around.
Here in this new video you see Leader Schumer walking up a ramp. Going up the ramp with this detail, he'll soon go out of view. Seconds later they return and run back down the hallway and officers immediately shut the door and use their bodies to keep them safe. At 2:45 p.m. shortly after senators were ushered to safety from the Senate floor, insurrectionists reach this Senate gallery. The following video was filmed by a "New Yorker" reporter.
Minutes later, the insurrectionists invaded and desecrated the Senate floor. These vandals shouted and rifle through the desks in this room. They took pictures of documents and of themselves celebrating that they had taken over the floor and stop the counting of Electoral College votes.
This objection to the Arizona is going to sell us out
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get a snap of that.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, take a picture.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Downstairs.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Look here, look.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Ted Cruz's objection to the Arizona.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is objection. He was going to sell us out all along.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Really?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That one. Objection to count an electoral votes on the State of Arizona.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Can I get a photo of that?
(Crosstalk)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hey, we're not going to fall.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SWALWELL: Larry Brock, who was arrested for his role in the insurrection was photographed on the Senate floor, wearing a helmet, tactical gear and carrying flex cuffs.
This man also in the Senate gallery is Eric Munchel. Like Brock, he was dressed in what appears to be tactical gear. Also holding up flex cuffs.
[17:15:05]
If the doors to this chamber had been breached just minutes earlier, imagine what they could have done with those cuffs. After insurrectionists occupied the Capitol and stop the Joint Session from counting the votes, the Capitol was in lockdown for five hours.
As long as it took to get back to the Capitol, to get back to the certification of the election, it could have been so much longer. Or we might not been able to resume at all.
As horrific as it was, 140 officers injured, three or four officers who ultimately lost their lives. We all know that awful day could have been so much worse. The only reason it was not was because of the extraordinary bravery of the men and women of the Capitol Police in the Metropolitan Police Departments.
For hours and hours, these insurrectionists were in hand-to-hand combat with these brave men and women.
Like some of you, I come from a law enforcement family. My dad was a cop. My two brothers, my little brothers are cops who walk the beat today. I'm proud of them.
And like in every law enforcement family, when we hang up the phone, we'd only say I love you. We say be safe.
So let's focus now on the attack and what it was like for the officers defending the Capitol that day. And again, I want to warn you that the following audio and videos are graphic and are unsettling. But it's important that we understand the extent of what occurred.
Here's an audio recording from the radio traffic of the DC Metropolitan Police Department describing the violence.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Cruiser 50, I copy. We're still taking rocks, bottles, and pieces of flag and metal pole.
Cruiser 50, the crowd is using munitions against us. They have bear spray in the crowd. Bear spray in the crowd.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: 1326.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Multiple deployments U.S. Capitol with pepper spray.
DSO, DSO, I need a re-up. I need a re-up up here.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SWALWELL: You hear the officer described they're using munitions. They, the rioters are using munitions against us.
This video shows how the sprays that were described were used against the officers.
In a separate Metropolitan Police Department radio traffic recording, you can hear an officer when he realizes that the insurrection is had overtaken the police line.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Cruiser 50. We lost the line. We've lost the line.
All MPD, pull back. All MPD, pull back to the upper deck ASAP.
All MPD, come back to the upper deck. Upper deck.
Cruiser 50. We're flanked. 10-33. I repeat, 10-33 west front of the Capitol. We have been flanked and we're lost the line.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SWALWELL: The MPD officer calls out 10-33. That's the code for emergency, officer in need of assistance. His words, "we've lost the line."
Hours after members of the House and Senate had left this area, on the west front of the building, the mob continued to grow, continued to beat the officers as they tried to get in.
In this new security video, you can see the mob attacking officers with the crutch, a hockey stick, a bullhorn and a Trump flag.
[17:20:08]
I want to show you that same I want to show you that same attack from the officers' perspective from his body camera footage.
SWALWELL: This body camera footage is from 4:27 p.m., over two hours from when the Capitol was first breached. The attack on police that afternoon was constant.
Metropolitan Police Officer Michael Fanone, a 20-year police veteran with four daughters was part of a line of officers protecting the Capitol. He was one of three officers that the mob dragged down the stairs.
When they dragged him. They stole his badge, his radio, his ammunition magazine, and they tased him, triggering a heart attack. Here he describes his experience.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MICHAEL FANONE, METROPOLITAN POLICE OFFICER: Look like a medieval battle scene. There's some of the most brutal combat, you know, I've ever encountered.
One point I got tased. People were yelling out, you know, we got one, we got one.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SWALWELL: Officer Christina Laury, who regularly serves in MPDs Narcotics and Specialized Investigation Division also protected the front Capitol entrance. Here's her experience.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHRISTINA LAURY, CRIME SUPPRESSION OFFICER: I mean, I can't say enough about the officers that were there the officers that were on the front line. And when I say the front line, I mean literally officers that were in align, stopping these people that were beating them with metal poles. They were spraying them with bear mace. I mean, they did everything in their power to not let those people in. And this was going on for hours.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SWALWELL: Around 4:30 p.m. hours into the Capitol riots, Officer Daniel Hodges was protecting a Westside Capitol entrance when rioters who were trying to stop the certification trapped him between two doors. When Officer Hodges was interviewed later. This is how he described what was happening.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DANIEL HODGES, MPD OFFICER: They threw down a huge metal logic that hit me in the head. I was also knocked down.
The medical mask I was wearing at the time, got pulled up over my eyes. So I was on the ground and blinded and they started just attacking me from all sides.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SWALWELL: Rioters crushed Officer Hodges. He was wedged in the doorway, blood dripping from his mouth, who's struggling to breathe all while the insurrectionists hit him.
Officer Hodges experience reminds you of what he and many other officers experienced that day. What they went through. We're also reminded of the three officers who lost their lives, Capitol Hill Police officers Sicknick, Liebengood, and Metropolitan Police Officer Smith.
And many law enforcement families we pray for our loved ones. And we know the scripture of Matthew Chapter 5, Verse 9. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God.
I'm sorry, I have to show you the next video. But in it you will see how blessed we were that on that hellish day, we had a peacemaker like Officer Hodges protecting our lives, our staffs lives, this Capitol and the certification process. May we do all we can in this chamber, to make sure that never happens again.
[17:25:45]
SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER (D-NY) MAJORITY LEADER: Mr. President will now have a recess for dinner and we'll resume at 6:15.
SEN. PATRICK LEAHY (D-VT), PRESIDING OFFICER IN TRUMP'S IMPEACHMENT TRIAL: The Senate will stand in recess.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: We've been watching the House impeachment managers make an extremely powerful case against Donald J. Trump using such dramatic, previously unseen recordings from inside the U.S. Capitol during the January 6 insurrection. I'm Wolf Blitzer in THE SITUATION ROOM with our special live coverage of the second Trump impeachment trial. The Democrats will resume their presentation we just heard soon and they say 6:15. We'll see what time exactly after showing very, very chilling security camera footage earlier during the course of the last two hours.
And they captured the attack in real time, and the life-threatening danger to the then Vice President Mike Pence, the House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and indeed everyone in the House and the Senate in the U.S. Capitol Complex that day as they fled from and they hid from the violent mob of pro-Trump terrorists.
The impeachment managers arguing that the 45th president was and I'm quoting now, "the insider in chief." The insider in chief who deliberately provoked his supporters to attack anyone and everyone, including, including his own vice president in a desperate bid to stop the counting of the electoral college votes and to hold on to power.
The question now, will any of this, will any of this convince skeptical Senate Republicans that Trump should be convicted and then disqualified from holding federal office ever again, Jake?
JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: Well, it was absolutely horrifying, chilling video that really gave the feeling for what it must have been like to be in the Capitol on that day. We saw police officer, Capitol Police Officer shoot one of the insurrectionists, four other people were killed that day, including Capitol officer Brian Sicknick, whose death we did not see in this, but it was really absolutely horrifying and chilling. The kind of terrorist attack that we don't really often see this much video from.
And I have to say, Dana and Abby, that when I look at this video, after the buildup of months, months and months that we covered, and then the video from that day of Trump telling his supporters to go down there, and then they did what they did. I have to say this, in all likelihood this will be Donald Trump's legacy. This will be what he is remembered for, you know, hundreds of years from now, president -- some presidents aren't even remembered for things. This will be what Donald Trump is remembered for.
And the fact that there are going to be dozens of Republican senators who in all likelihood vote to not hold Trump accountable for this is just stunning to me. And that will be their legacies.
DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: It will be an it should be his legacy. But the human emotion for anybody with a pulse, watching what we just watched, it's absolutely overwhelming.
Nevermind, for those of us who walk those halls for many years, me it's 20 years, knowing exactly where they are. It's impossible to really wrap my mind around the fact that these people were in there with weapons, you know, making these windows shatter, holding a flag, not just a confederate flag, but of a Trump flag. I mean, it's just -- it's remarkable.
And for the very first time, we know that the incredible American hero, Eugene Goodman, I mean, all of these police officers were heroes, but the fact that he saved Mitt Romney's life, we saw that for the first time. And my understanding is even top Romney aides didn't know that until they watch this just now.
ABBY PHILLIP, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I mean it's terrifying. The whole thing was just terrifying.
[17:30:03]
The whole thing was just terrifying. And it makes you wonder what kind of people would do these kinds of things. I mean, it's not just that they broke into the Capitol. They were screaming that they wanted to kill Nancy Pelosi and the Vice President. They were brutalizing Capitol Police officers. They were carrying Confederate flags.
It really is a window into something very dark in this nation that I think is scary beyond just what we, you know, the events of January 6th. But what would stir that up in people and we know that a big part of it was the big lie. And I think that's what this whole, you know, watching that footage, the question I asked myself is what would stir this up in people so much so that they would be willing to kill.
Some people in that crowd were willing to kill on that day. And the answer is a massive, massive, massive lie.
BASH: Yes.
TAPPER: Aided and abetted by House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy, House Republican Whip Steve Scalise, Senator Ted Cruz, Senator Hawley, they had a role in this too. And it is absolutely infuriating to watch this video and see our leaders including then Vice President Mike Pence, running for their lives. Here he is in security for footage, Mike Pence and his family, his family.
There he is right there looking back, being escorted out of the Capitol where he was abiding by his constitutional duties presiding over the counting of the electoral votes being escorted out so that they didn't kill him, which is what the MAGA mob said they wanted to do. They wanted to kill him.
And Dana, you were talking a minute ago about the video about Officer Eugene Goodman, one of the heroes of that day, and how his top aides. Romney's top aides did not even know that it was Goodman that had been the Capitol Police officer that whisked Romney to safety. Let's run that video, here it is, Capitol there -- that's Officer Goodman, I believe running right there. And there's Mitt Romney right there running, absolutely terrifying.
We talked we talked about Dana, we talked about what did -- what would the crowd have done if they had gone to Mike Pence? What would they have done if they'd gotten to Mitt Romney? Senator Mitt Romney, they don't deserve this.
BASH: No.
TAPPER: They don't deserve this. And the fact that there are Republican senators, who are not going to hold the President accountable, some of them are actually accountable themselves, is just utterly baffling.
BASH: Absolutely. When you talk about Mike Pence and Mitt Romney, in particular, Romney had been speaking out on this network and elsewhere before this warning of this exact thing, that if his colleagues didn't call out the President for not accepting the election, much less lying about the fact that it was rigged that this would happen. And then here we see Romney himself running for his life and being saved by these heroic officers.
And the fact that we are in the United States of America, and we knew that the President was incredibly hard on Mike Pence and incited -- effectively incited violence against his own vice president. But to watch this never before seen footage that you just played again, Jake, of the Vice President of the United States, being whisked out, there you see it again, with his family, as you said, because his boss, who he ran on, on the ticket with him who he defended up until the very end when he couldn't because he had to defend the constitution and said -- instead it's remarkable, it is absolutely remarkable.
PHILLIP: Keep in mind as this is happening, as Pence is being escorted out. Around the same time, Trump was tweeting about Pence.
TAPPER: Yes.
PHILLIP: Inciting the crowd by saying that Pence didn't do what he -- what Trump thought he should do on that day. That's what's also so remarkable about what happened that day was that as all of this was unfolding, there was this complete absence of a sense from the White House, from the President, that he needed to say something to stop it.
The people who were breaking into the Capitol, were listening intently to everything that Trump was tweeting and saying that day, and it took hours for him to say something. And it wasn't strong enough. It took him hours after even his first statement for him to say something that even got to the point where he said, get out of there. Go home.
TAPPER: Yes.
PHILLIP: So that's, you know, I mean, as this was unfolding, yes, it was Mitt Romney, but all of them could have been killed.
TAPPER: Anyone of them, any one of them. And in fact it's amazing that it wasn't more of a mass casualty event.
[17:35:04]
I think the timestamp on the video there, the Pence video, Vice President Pence was around 2:25 or so, which is around the time, if you look right there it says 2:26 I think. That's around the time that Trump was tweeting another attack on Mike Pence --
BASH: Yes.
PHILLIP: Yes. TAPPER: -- literally. So it wasn't just that he wasn't telling his people stop, as he had been yelling stop about counting the votes. It wasn't just that, he was actually inciting them even further with his tweets, which we all know they were reading.
BASH: And we -- exactly. And we know not just from the remarkable presentations that we've seen today and also yesterday, but from our own reporting from our own colleague who we know was in the mob, and he was holding his phone. And the people came to him and said, are you looking at what he's saying? Is he -- what is he telling us to do, talking about President Trump?
TAPPER: And Anderson one thing that is undeniable in this when you watch this video beyond what a clear and present threat it was to all the innocent people in that building from Mike, Vice President Mike Pence on down is how heroic the police officers, the Capitol Police officers, then later the Metropolitan Police Division officers, how heroic they were that day as they were physically attacked by the MAGA mob. One of them was killed. One of them lost fingers. One of them lost an eye, absolutely horrific, incited by President Trump and the other people who push the big lie.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST: And as we saw Officer Goodman and we saw one or two other officers in videos where they were the only officer on the scene in a particular location and would have had the rights to back off immediately. We saw one in riot gear trying to stop crowds of people coming in through this door being pushed back. But he continued to try to stop this. And, you know, Abby talked about the, you know, it was a long time before President Trump actually said anything.
But let's remember what he said in that first video. He said that those people that we watched, the people that we have just watched in all those videos are very special people. And he said I love them. I love you. That is what the President of the United States. That was his first message to the people who did what we just witnessed.
Let's just talk about what we have seen. I mean Ross Garber, the use of Mike Pence, we see that video of Mike Pence being ushered out with his family and his staff, Secret Service agents while the President is tweeting about him. It's interesting to me that more Republican senators are not. Or it'd be interesting if they are not looking at that and thinking, you know what, Mike Pence, you know what his crime was, he was slavishly loyal to President Trump this entire time. Then he finally did what was right.
And all of that service to President Trump, it didn't matter. It didn't matter at all, because President Trump has no loyalty. I don't understand what the Republican senators don't realize. Each one of them could be Mike Pence in that situation. And, you know what, if President Trump sticks around and continues to run the party, it could be them three years from now.
ROSS GARBER, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: I think that's the subtext, right? I don't think these House managers could be doing a better job. They are operating on a whole bunch of different levels. And that's one of them is, is they're talking about Mike Pence, they're doing everything they can to, number one, appeal to Republicans. And number two, show that this is not partisan.
You saw that they showed Mike Pence, they showed Mitt Romney, they showed staffers, they showed police officers, they are trying to do their best to show. This isn't a partisan exercise. And, you know, Trump's team right now has a lot of things to answer for.
COOPER: And I mean that, you know, Ted Cruz watching this if in fact, he is watching it, no cameras on him, because that's what they didn't want cameras on them. But is he watching Mike Pence and does he actually think, oh, there's no way Trump would do that to me. I mean, Trump's already insulted his wife, what --
GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: Right. I have no idea.
COOPER: -- more evidence --
BORGER: I have no idea what Ted Cruz is thinking. But if you're sitting in that chamber, it just got a lot harder for you to vote no, I think, because we learned that they were just 58 steps from the mob. We learned that the President had put a target on their back. And I think this is the final link that they need to make. I mean, I'm not a lawyer here. But it seems to me that they need to make the link and they've done a little bit of it already that none of this would have happened, had it not been for Donald Trump.
And if, you know, that right now, that line is pretty easy -- it's pretty easy to draw, because we see what these people were saying and we see that Mike Pence's only crime was his dedication to the Constitution. These people in that Senate chamber also take an oath to the constitution.
[17:40:18]
COOPER: And Norman just focusing on the case that they are now meticulously building. What do you -- how do you see him?
NORMAN EISEN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Well, Anderson, today they delivered on the promise that they made yesterday with that 15 minute video. They showed that over a course of months, Donald Trump incited this mob by lying to them that their democracy was being stolen. They showed his words on January 6th that sent that human explosive hurdling down Pennsylvania Avenue towards the Capitol. And we just saw the payoff, the horrible violence and the devastation and death that that wrought.
The missing piece now, they're very astute these House managers, the trial lawyers who are advising them, the trial lawyers in their myths, the missing piece now, as Gloria points out, and this is what is coming, they've built for it, I predict that what we're going to see now in primetime, that's not an accident, is Trump's role, they're going to go back to Trump and his -- it's not just his sending them there.
It's his inaction while this happened. And it's his words to killers, insurrectionists attacking our democracy and the human beings who make that democracy work in the Capitol. We love you. We're going to hear a lot of that I predict in the next segment, they have set it up.
COOPER: Ross, just in terms of what you expect coming up, you know, you do look at this. And you think if those people, those instructions were from any other group in this country, no Republican in that Hall would think twice about, you know, voting the President responsible.
GARBER: Yes, but that's not how it was. And we saw what happened with Senator Cassidy yesterday, Senator Cassidy made his vote. And then immediately the Louisiana Republican Party, chastise him, cascaded him. And so, you know, these Republican senators have to go back home.
You know, I'm going to be very interested to see when the voting comes, whether Republican senators, you know, are going to be able to stick to the jurisdiction issue. Are they going to be able to say, you know, I'm going to not even talk about all of these facts? I'm not even going to talk about what happened. I'm just going to talk about the legalistic jurisdiction stuff or they're going to defend what happened on the facts.
And in the meantime, I'm going to be very interested because we've been talking about it all day, to see if what Norman predicts comes true, because --
COOPER: I mean you're showing the President's --
GARBER: Yes, yes. But, you know, we've been talking today about, maybe they haven't yet completely tied up, you know, the violence as connected to the President, you know, the President knowing about it in advance. You know, he's been charged with willful, you know, violent insurrection. And the President know in advance to the will this to happen, maybe they haven't completely tied that up.
COOPER: If he is willful, does that have to mean that he knew the violence would occur or that he should have known or any -- with any --
GARBER: I mean we --
COOPER: -- person would have known?
GARBER: Yes, we can get legalistic about it as we talked about. This isn't a criminal case. You know, I think at a minimum he had to intend for the violence to happen, his intent for the violence to happen.
COOPER: Let's go back to Wolf.
BLITZER: Anderson thanks very much. John king is with me as well. You know, the Trump legal defense team, the two lawyers who showed up yesterday did a pretty pitiful job trying to make the case for the unconstitutionality of this entire trial. They're going to have an incredibly difficult job responding to these House managers who have really put together a very brilliant argument that the President of the United States incited this insurrection.
JOHN KING, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: And they're still building. And so they have been incredibly effective and disciplined. So far, one has to assume, as Norman was just talking about that they have more, and that they are building toward a conclusion.
A few things just on this day, number one, thank you to every person who wears the uniform, when you watch all that video, the Vice President, the Speaker of the House, staff members, Senators, this could have been almost -- you almost thinking I don't mean to say it this way, but should have been so much worse. When you see how close the leaders and the rank and file members of Congress and the staff members and the custodial staff came, if not for the heroism of those police officers, so just thank you and we cannot say thank you enough to police officers there and anywhere around the country for what they do.
Number two, you're right. These House managers are presenting a very disciplined, methodical, emotional but factual case as they put all the pieces together. They showed remarkable discipline in not leaking any of this security video in saving it for this presentation. This is the time where things leak out all the time. They could have gotten a daily splash on cable television and in the newspapers for doing it. They held it to make this methodical case at the trial.
[17:45:18]
You see senators coming out. I'm looking at my feed, senators coming out. They don't realize it. It's like think about when you see a car accident or something, you see it at the moment, but you only see it from your perspective as they watch all these senators, even Republican senators coming out saying, I didn't realize what was happening on the House side, I didn't realize what was happening here.
The challenge now is for the Trump defense team, but it's also for the Republican senators. I've used this term over the last four years, the grand ostrich party. They constantly just want to put their head in the sand and pay no attention to Trump and what he is responsible for and what they have enabled, what they have enabled by saying it's just a tweet, or can we just not talk about that, or I don't pay attention to that.
You cannot watch this today. And I'll say it again, I'm a broken record on this question, but if you do not believe the former President should be convicted in the impeachment trial, what do you believe? What is the accountability test? Does he get a pass? Does he get to walk?
That's what you want here, if you want to make that case make that case. But I think it's incumbent that Republican senators who do not want to convict that they not be allowed to hide behind the process argument, that they have to explain it after seeing that an attack on their building, which is our government, by a mob, that by the grace of God and the courage of those police officers did not kill more people.
BLITZER: Yes. And they're making the case, the House managers that not only do they want to convict Donald Trump, of this incitement of insurrection, but they also want to disqualify him from ever again, holding federal office. KING: Right. And look, again, this is the hypocrisy of the past four years, the cynicism of the past four years, most of the Republican senators would whisper to you or I, or send us a text or tell us in some private conversation, they hope he goes away. They think he's a cancer on their party. OK.
But as Congressman Raskin said this morning, here's where we are now, we're not in a debate over some policy. We're not in a debate over some silly tweet that in a day or two we'll all forget. We're in a debate about how or whether the former President should be held accountable for an attack on his own government, incited by him, encouraged by him.
And I think that House manager has been very effective and saying all the times, he used his platform to stop things or to make clear what he wanted. And he didn't after, think of all the video we saw today, now this new video, plus the other video when you see it all collected together.
After all of that, the President of the United States at the time, now the former President called them patriots. He said he loved them. He thanked them for what they did, but said now please go home. This day will be remembered that that was his take on this after it played out.
So I just -- the challenges on his defense team to counter what they've heard so far, and what is still to come from the prosecution. But I also think as I said at the beginning yesterday, the Republican Party is on trial here too. If you want to make a case that you don't think that the former President should be impeached, OK, make it but what is the accountability then? Do you think none? That's -- after watching it, it was hard to explain anyway. It's hard to defend none, no accountability anyway, after today, that's a very steep hill.
BLITZER: Yes. That video was really, really powerful. Jeff Zeleny is up on Capitol Hill watching. I assume you're watching a lot of these Republican senators to reacting to what they are seeing and what they are hearing. What are you seeing?
JEFF ZELENY, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, indeed and it was incredibly different from the rest of the presentation, senators were sitting in their desks almost to a person and held in rapt attention, reporters who were in the chamber describe Republican and Democratic senators alike watching this video in many cases, it was silent video. But, you know, certainly and Mitt Romney at one point watching video of himself, shaking his head.
Senator James Lankford of Oklahoma who of course was speaking at the very moment that the Senate was abruptly recessed, he appeared to grow somewhat emotional. He was comforted at least for a brief period of time by a Montana Senator Steve Daines. So this was just a sense here. This was a very different moment. This is so personal to them. And we've been talking about how this is indeed the scene of the crime. Some of the very video they were watching, the desks that were being sort of looked through and ransacked are the very desks the senators are sitting in. So this certainly, you know, are new moments that many senators are saying that they were not even aware of some of these things, in fact, going on. Now, we do not know is it's going to change any minds. But a couple things here, this, yes, was a presentation for the jury, those 100 senators sitting in the chamber, Republicans and Democrats alike, but it's also more than that. It's a presentation for history for the ages to chronicle this era of time, the Trump era, and that insurrection in greater detail than we have you ever seen before.
BLITZER: The Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is over the microphone, I want to hear what he's saying.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
[17:50:05]
SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER (D-NY), SENATE MAJORITY LEADER: As for me and my situation, I just want to give tremendous credit to the Capitol Police officers who are in my detail like the rest of the Capitol Police officers, they are utterly amazing and great, and we love them. That's it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLITZER: All right, let me go back to Jeff Zeleny. Jeff, you were making your point, I interrupted you but go ahead.
ZELENY: Now and we saw Senator Schumer there that was very dramatic video that we had not seen before he was walking up a really -- it looked to me like the Capitol Visitor Center with his detail. And then abruptly was walking back the other way into the underground tunnels from the Capitol building over to the Senate office building.
So these are very familiar hallways to these senators, but they usually are not filled with, you know, these rioters and these people. So we saw several instances of senators and perhaps the most dramatic of all, was the Vice President Mike Pence, his family, his aides being spirited out of the back of the Senate chamber, down a set of stairways, and then into a hiding area and then the Pelosi staff.
This is something I am told that Speaker Pelosi is here in Washington, she's watching this trial unfold as she's turning to other matters as well. But seeing the Speaker's a hallway there and those staffers hiding inside that conference room, seeing people try and open the door, ramming the door and hearing that audio, we have not seen this from this perspective.
So, again, we do not know if this will change any votes. But this was the most emotional part of the trial. And unlike a criminal trial, again, this is a public trial as well. This is something as John was saying before that the Republican Party is on trial. It absolutely is. That's why so many Republicans here are bothered by this. But this, of course, will set the President's legacy going forward. Wolf?
BLITZER: Yes, we just showed that video of Schumer escaping, escaping the terrorist -- ZELENY: Right.
BLITZER: -- who we're inside the U.S. Capitol. And let's take a quick look. You can see right now he's going to start there coming up. He's got his aides, his security around him, but then all of a sudden, you're going to see him walk up there. You see him. He's walking a little bit slower than the others. But he's escaping right now. I probably didn't realize at the time, he was escaping probably for his life.
Manu Raju is up on Capitol Hill. He's always up on Capitol Hill. You and I were -- you were reporting you were in the middle of all of this. When all of this was breaking on January 6th, Manu, I was so worried about you and all of our colleagues.
MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, we were locked here actually, in where we're broadcasting from right now is the insurrectionists. We're just outside and pounding on various doors, as we've seen through the course of the footage that has come out piece by piece and in this comprehensive way today.
And I can tell you, Wolf, I just spent some time after this new chilling security footage has been shown to the Senate and talking to Republicans about how they reacted and it's very clear from the Republican senators I'm talking to they're shaking.
They view this as chilling footage, it does not mean they're going to change their votes, which are likely to acquit Donald Trump. But it does mean that they are taken aback. And they're reminded about how harrowing of an experience that was for all of them and for everybody who here in this building, who experienced that day.
But just a sampling of some of the reactions that I got in the hallway just moments ago, Senator Mike Braun of Indiana, I asked him was he shaken by this? He says same way that I was before. And I said, was that could change your mind on how you're going to vote, he said, but if I think the process is flawed, it's hard for me to vote to convict.
So they're still resting on that same process argument saying if Donald Trump is to be held accountable, he should be held accountable in a court of law, not in a court of impeachment in the Senate. He's no longer president. That is still the view that Republican senators are still espousing.
And also some Republicans were likely to convict are signaling. What they're hearing is absolutely damning that's for -- including Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, who just told us this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. LISA MURKOWSKI (R-AK): I think that that the House managers are making a very strong case for a timeline that laid out very clearly with the words that were used when he used them, how he used them to really build the anger, the violence that we saw here in this Capitol. The evidence that has been presented thus far is pretty damning. I just, I don't see how Donald Trump could be reelected to the presidency again.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
RAJU: But, Wolf, this is -- she's in the minority of Senate Republicans right now, while they saw this footage just now they are still signaling a very likeliness to acquit Donald Trump. We'll see if any minds are changed as more and more of this footage comes out, but at the moment still resting on that process argument that we've heard for days here now
BLITZER: Yes, these House managers, impeachment and managers, they're making the point that Trump must not only be convicted, convicted of this impeachment but he should also be disqualified from ever again holding federal office. They keep saying convicted and disqualified.
And remember it was Madeleine Dean, one of the House impeachment managers who made a very important point. This is the first time in more than 200 years that the seat of the U.S. government, the U.S. Capitol has been ransacked, the last time in the war of 1812 by the British who attack the U.S. Capitol.
[17:55:27]
The impeachment trial will resume right here in THE SITUATION ROOM. Coming up next, we'll take a much closer look at all of that never before seen surveillance video during the insurrection and new reaction coming in from former President Trump standby. I'm wolf Blitzer. You're in THE SITUATION ROOM.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BLITZER: We want to welcome our viewers here in the United States and around the world. I'm Wolf Blitzer in THE SITUATION ROOM.
[17:59:50]
We're standing by for the Trump impeachment trial to resume. Before their break, House impeachment managers presented an amazing amount of very disturbing new evidence showing videos inside the U.S. Capitol during, during the deadly insurrection.
