[Poppy Harlow, Cnn Anchor:] All right, welcome back. I'm Poppy Harlow in New York. We continue to cover Hurricane Florence as she battered the Carolina coastline. We do have major breaking news I want to get to out of Washington, D.C. In just minutes, the president's former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, is expected to plead guilty to two counts of conspiracy. And doing so in federal court today, he will avoid a second trial that was said to begin on Monday. What we do not know yet, and this is very critical, is whether or not this guilty plea will include a deal to cooperate with Special Counsel Bob Mueller. Will that happen? We may find out in just moments. And what would that mean for Manafort to essentially flip and to cooperate with other strands of the Mueller probe? Let's bring in our chief national security correspondent Jim Sciutto. Co-anchor of the show who will be sitting next to me starting Monday, and there will be a lot of news to cover then. This is your beat. This is very significant because he is admitting to committing a host of crimes that he had denied before.
[Jim Sciutto, Cnn Chief National Security Correspondent:] A significant victory for the special counsel, no question. Second victory against Manafort, of course, because he had a conviction in the Virginia case, just a couple weeks ago. But it's also a significant turnaround for Paul Manafort. I mean he had fought tooth and nail against the special counsel. He spent millions of dollars on lawyers to fight this, and now he's pleading. As you noted, he's pleading to two crimes. Conspiracy, conspiracy to witness tampering.
[Harlow:] Right.
[Sciutto:] He's forfeiting assets. He has not pleading to the other. He faced a total of seven charges. He's pleading to two of those seven but he's admitting to those other charges which included money laundering, illegal foreign lobbying, et cetera. So, in effect, acknowledging responsibility, but just pleading to two of those counts.
[Harlow:] We continually hear from the administration, from the president, as we did after his first conviction, this is nothing to do with me. He's still a good guy. This was a long time ago. Russia is your beat. Talk to me about how this all ties back to Russia.
[Sciutto:] It is true that the bulk of this happened before he started working for the president. It is also true that this is tied to Russia. He was working for pro-Russian Ukrainian politicians, many of them not the greatest people in the world. No question. That said, others did that, too. Paul Manafort was not alone in there, but there are issues. The witness tampering, to be clear, took place afterwards. This didn't take place 10 years ago. It took place in recent months. So that, you cannot claim that all this happened in, you know, in ancient history. There's that. The big question, as you mentioned, is does this mean he's cooperating now? Because that, of course, would be a troublesome development for the president. We don't know the answer to that question. But let's look at clues here. He was charged with seven crimes. He's pleading just two of them. Typically, when a prosecutor accepts a plea like that, they want something in return. Rick Gates, Manafort's former deputy, he was charged with seven crimes, pleaded to two of them. We know he's cooperating. Doesn't mean that Manafort is, but it's an indicator.
[Harlow:] Just on the cooperation point. We should find out in minutes in court here. Rudy Giuliani yesterday told "Politico" there's no fear that Paul Manafort will cooperate against the president. There's nothing to cooperate about. To that, you say?
[Sciutto:] Well, he's the president's lawyer. And he has every incentive to say that. Robert Mueller is also a very serious man, as you know. Would he give a deal like this if he wasn't getting something in return? In terms of cooperation? There are a lot of circumstances where he would not.
[Harlow:] All right. We'll be watching very closely. Jim, thank you. I'll see you back here.
[Sciutto:] See you Monday. We couldn't wait until Monday.
[Harlow:] I can't wait. We'll have a lot of news to cover. I do want to get back to the breaking news. Of course, we're covering Hurricane Florence as she batters at the Carolina coastline. We'll get back to Anderson Cooper down there in just a minute.