[Sanjay Gupta, Neurosurgeon:] And the other way, too you've got to heal the mind to be able to heal the body.
[Fredricka Whitfield, Cnn:] I love it.
[Gupta:] Yes.
[Whitfield:] We're going to be watching all of that. I can't wait to see the other as you go all over the world right? You're in Italy, you're in Poland.
[Gupta:] Yes, Italy, Turkey...
[Whitfield:] Bolivia.
[Gupta:] ... Norway, Bolivia. I think you'll love this.
[Whitfield:] Fantastic.
[Gupta:] And you're a tri-athlete, I think you will love this.
[Whitfield:] I can't wait. I'm ready for the journey. Dr. Sanjay Gupta, always good to see you. Thank you so much.
[Gupta:] Thank you too.
[Whitfield:] And of course you don't want to miss the premiere of "Chasing Life" with Dr. Sanjay Gupta, tonight at 9:00 Eastern on CNN. Hello again everyone and welcome. I'm Fredricka Whitfield. We are following breaking news. The clock is ticking on a new deadline for the IRS to turn over President Trump's tax returns. House democrats sent another letter to the agency demanding the documents in ten days now. The House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal says he's within his rights on this request, but Trump and his allies have taken a defiant stand saying democrats will never see those tax returns. CNN politics Congressional reporter, Lauren Fox is following this for us. So the back and forth is just the beginning, isn't it?
[Lauren Fox, Cnn Correspondent:] Well that's right. We expect a prolonged court fight but we're not quite there yet. Richard Neal sending a letter again asking for the administration to turn over six years of the president's tax returns, that's both personal returns and business returns. And in this latest request, Richard Neal said quote, "I am aware that concerns have been raised regarding my request and the authority of the committee. Those concerns lack merit." He then goes on to say, quote, "I expect a reply from the IRS by 5:00 p.m. on April 23, 2019. Please know that if you fail to comply, your failure will be interpreted as a denial of my request," and that is, of course, very important language here because as they sort of lay the groundwork in their preparations to go to court, that's essentially they're looking for a refusal from the administration. Then next steps on Capitol Hill could include a subpoena or they could go right to suing the Trump Admnistration for these documents. But all of that is still up in the air. Very clearly, Richard Neal, the Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee has been setting the groundwork to go to court. He knew this entire time that this was going to be a long court battle and while he was getting pressure from the liberals on his committee to try to make this request faster, you know there's been a couple of months now on Capitol Hill where liberals have been demanding these answers from the administration. But Richard Neal waited to make his request until earlier this month. Obviously he is trying to set a ground for exactly what he wants so that when they go to court, he's ready to go. Fredricka.
[Whitfield:] All right, Lauren Fox, thank you so much. All right House Speaker Nancy Pelosi slamming President Trump for tweeting edited excerepts of a speech by Congresswoman Ilhan Omar when she referenced 911. Trump's tweet which we will not show includes video of the burning Twin Towers and Trump is seizing on four words out of Omar's 20 minute remarks when she said "some people did something." Listen.
[Omar:] Far too long, we have lived with the discomfort of being a second class citizen and frankly, I'm tired of it and every single Muslim in this country should be tired of it. CARE was founded after 911 because they recognized that some people did something and that all of us were starting to lose access to our civil liberties.
[Whitfield:] The backlash to her comments were swift. "The New York Post" had this cover criticizing her remarks. Democrats coming to Omar's defense saying her words were taken out of context and have condemned Trump's tweet as disgraceful and wrong. And one quick fact here C.A.R.E., the organization was not founded after 911 it was actually founded in 1994. CNN White House Reporter, Sarah Westwood is following all of this for us. So what more is Speaker Pelosi saying in defense of Omar?
[Sarah Westwood, Cnn Correspondent:] Well Fred, Speaker Pelosi became just the latest democrat to lineup in support of Congresswoman Omar after President Trump shared that provocative clip of just part of her remarks on his twitter feed. Speaker Pelosi writing in part this morning, "The memory of 911 is sacred ground and any discussion of it must be done with reverence. The president shouldn't use the painful images of 911 for a political attack." And of course, this comes after Congresswoman Omar has received death threats. One man was charged for threatening her life after many of her previous comments have come under scrutiny. Democrats arguing that President Trump could be inciting violence against her while republicans have argued that Congresswoman Omar may have minimized the threat of terrorism through her comments of President Trump, Fred, continuing this pattern that he has of seizing on comments from one democrat to try to paint the entire Democratic Party as extreme.
[Whitfield:] And then Sarah, on this Trump is being accused of playing, you know, revenge politics going against his own administration officials. Trump says he does want to release immigrant detainees into sanctuary cities to spite Democrats, and it's something he's seriously considering. So he's even calling out states by name. Tell us more.
[Westwood:] That's right, Fred. President Trump signaling some aggressive shifts in his immigration policy. And he has said that his administration is seriously considering this plan to bus migrants to sanctuary cities for release because Customs and Border Protection is saying their facilities at the border are at capacity. They're overrun. He said he was considering doing that just hours after White House officials have said repeatedly that this idea about the sanctuary cities was something that had come up informally during a meeting and then had been dismissed. President Trump obviously thought the opposite. Take a listen.
[Donald Trump, President Of The United States:] We are looking at the possibility strongly looking at it, to be honest with you. California is certainly is always saying, oh, we want more people, and they want more people in their sanctuary cities. Well, we'll give them more people. We can give them a lot. We can give them an unlimited supply, and let's see if they're so happy.
[Westwood:] Well, this dramatic plan comes amid a massive reorganization at the Department of Homeland Security, starting all the way at the top with the Homeland Security Secretary now been replaced in an acting capacity moving down the chain. President Trump clearly trying to take a more aggressive stance when it comes to what he is increasingly describing as the crisis on the southern border, Fred.
[Whitfield:] All right. Sarah Westwood, thank you so much for that, appreciate it. All right, joining me now, White House correspondent for Reuters Jeff Mason, CNN political analyst Lisa Lerer, and CNN national security and legal analyst Susan Hennessey. Good to see all of you. All right, so, Lisa, you first. You know, these attacks on Congresswoman Omar, you know, play right into the President's base. You know, how important is this for the President? Or does he feel that this is so important heading into the election cycle?
[Lisa Lerer, Cnn Political Analyst:] Well, I do think we're seeing the President take a lot of steps that are pushing the norms of the presidency, whether that's butting up against potential legal challenges like some of his moves on immigration or, you know, just sort of pushing the bounds of what was considered polite and civil in Washington, particularly with a congresswoman who has already received death threats. And I do think a lot of these moves are designed to motivate pieces of his base. We are he it is clear we know that his re-election is on his mind. And when it comes to Congresswoman Omar, of course, I'm sure many of your viewers remember that part of what sparked a lot of interest in her were his her comments that were perceived by many as anti-Semitic. The President believes that he can pull more Jewish voters over to his side. And also, a lot of that is really about the Evangelical vote, which is a strong part of his base. They care deeply about Israel. This is a way to remind those voters that he is, you know, as he would like to be, looking out for them or their interests.
[Whitfield:] But, Susan, what about, you know, the imagery? I mean, in this video we're not airing it out of, you know, respect and deference to so many impacted by, you know, 911. But then, why is there not, I guess, a fallout or criticism of the President for even using those images, weaponizing those images as he also tries, you know, to demonize a member of Congress?
[Susan Hennessey, Cnn National Security And Legal Analyst:] Right. I mean, I think it is very difficult to actually genuinely believe that this kind of response is motivated by, you know, a real sense of wanting to honor the victims and the memory of the 911 attacks, right? Using these images in this way is, itself, quite irreverent and sacrilegious. Of course11 even in the early days, sort of gloating about now having the tallest building in Lower Manhattan. You know, stating falsehood that he saw Muslims celebrating immediately afterward. So I do think that his response makes even more clear that this really isn't about genuine outrage at Congresswoman Omar's comments. This is really about sort of attempting to use a bad faith argument to attempt to stoke to further stoke some of those internal divisions within the Democratic Party.
[Whitfield:] And, Jeff, you know, Congresswoman Omar, you know, she quoted a line from President George W. Bush saying, you know, the people and the people who knocked down these buildings will hear all of us soon and then, you know, asked if he was downplaying the attack in that statement and, you know, what if he were a Muslim. You know, so how detrimental is this, you know, controversy for Omar? Or, you know, does it really kind of backfire for the President?
[Jeff Mason, White House Correspondent, Reuters:] Well, it's hard to answer that question, Fred. I mean, it's certainly possible that it would backfire for both. Although, for President Trump, it's if we look at his history from the time that he began as a candidate to now in the middle of his presidency, many of the things that he says that people consider outrageous, that people consider offensive don't end up backfiring, at least not with his political base. And I think Lisa is right there to say that he has his eyes and his head focused on that going into 2020. And you see that both on the immigration issue as well as this issue in terms of stoking some racial divisions and some divisions his desire to perhaps gain some more or some more Jewish votes and to create some divisions in the Democratic Party there. I think that's all I mean, it's hard ever to guess what's going on in President Trump's head, or anyone's head for that matter, but the evidence suggests that that's part of what he's thinking.
[Whitfield:] And, you know, Lisa, turning to the, you know, President's latest immigration move, he says the administration is strongly considering bussing undocumented migrants into sanctuary cities outside of political retribution. So what does the President gain from this, particularly when the White House already said, no, that's not a consideration?
[Lerer:] Well, look, it's really hard to see this move as anything but a political stunt. The President's major goal, the thing he ran on, was coming down on undocumented immigrants coming into the United States, you know, taking a more hardline approach to immigration. And this move would actually make it harder for authorities to arrest and deport undocumented immigrants because they would go to sanctuary cities. Of course, it also would cost a huge amount of money to figure out the transportation logistics to get these people all over the country. So from a policy standpoint, this really does not make a lot of sense, which is why you see people in the administration saying, you know, generally, without their name attached, that this is not something that they're actively considering. But clearly, the President believes that it does make sense politically. And part of that, I think, is he needs to find a way to make good on this promise he made, that he will take steps on immigration or at least to find a reason why he hasn't made good. And the reason perhaps could be the courts or it could be Congress. So you do feel like he's setting up this fight to argue this you know, to make the political argument that he's being stymied by forces beyond his control but he's fighting hard.
[Whitfield:] So this is how Senator Mazie Hirono, you know, characterized this entire situation. Take a listen.
[Sen. Mazie Hirono , Hawaii:] One, he doesn't think immigrants are human beings; and, two, he doesn't have to apply the law with regard to his treatment of them. There's a level of uncaring cruelty to the President that is off the charts.
[Whitfield:] So, Susan, doesn't the President need to grow this base? And this "us versus them," I mean, why does that promise to allow him to gain more traction heading into a possible second term?
[Hennessey:] I mean, clearly, this is the President's strategy, right? Not really attempting to grow his base but sort of doubling down on energizing his base to turn out and, frankly, exhausting the other side. I do think that this is an example of the fact that the President is not really putting forward a tenable policy proposal. So presuming that his base is genuinely concerned about immigration enforcement, concerned border security is a concern that's actually shared by both parties. And so instead of actually sort of moving forward with sensible policies or even controversial policies that are aimed at the border, you know, Trump is, instead, essentially preferencing kind of trolling the other side, putting out this outlandish ideas that actually wouldn't just sort of help solve the problem but would exacerbate the issue and make things worse, further overburden immigration enforcement, you know. And there is always sort of an element of cruelty, right? The idea here that these individuals, you know, their human lives, are essentially political pawns. You know, the President has sort of mocked the idea of people sort of raising genuine asylum claims and that the United States is obligated under international law to hear and grant asylum requests. And so particularly to take these very, very vulnerable populations and act as though moving them into areas with the intention I assume it's sort of embedded in that of overburdening the resources of those locations, you know, it is cruel. And it's also pretty profoundly irresponsible.
[Whitfield:] And, you know, Jeff, it had been reported that the President, you know, really put in charge of his whole immigration policy, you know, his senior policy adviser, Stephen Miller. So is Stephen Miller driving this train, or is it at the direction of the President?
[Mason:] Well, the President never likes to give the impression that anyone aside from him is driving the train and he'll correct you if you ask him something like that directly, but I think, yes. I mean, I think Stephen Miller is the hardline adviser behind immigration and many of the other policies that President Trump is pursuing. He is the one who is certainly one of the main drivers and one of the people who have the President's ear.
[Whitfield:] Jeff Mason, Lisa Lerer, Susan Hennessey, thanks to all of you. Appreciate it. All right, still ahead, Senator Cory Booker expected to take the stage in just a few moments. The 2020 presidential candidate is carrying out a kick-off rally in Newark, New Jersey. We'll take you there live. And later, Pope Benedict is breaking his silence, speaking about the child sex abuse scandal dogging the Catholic Church. Who he says is to blame, coming up.