Senate Defies Trump on Saudi Arabia After Khashoggi Murder; Lindsey Graham Flips Saudi Arabia Vote; Trump's Ex-Attorney Michael Cohen Expected to Plead Guilty for Misleading Congress About Russia Probe.
SCIUTTO: The Senate delivering a rebuke to President Trump's handling of the murder of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi. A majority, a large one, voted to advance a measure to end U.S. military support of the Saudi-led war in Yemen. In a briefing to senators on Wednesday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said there was a, quote, "no direct reporting linking the Saudi crown prince to the killing."</s>POPPY HARLOW, CO-HOST, NEWSROOM: No, notably missing from that briefing, CIA Director Gina Haspel, one of the president's biggest supporters on the Hill, Senator Lindsey Graham expressing more than just a little frustration with her not being there. Why? Because she is the one who heard the tape --</s>SCIUTTO: Yes --</s>HARLOW: Of the murder of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Listen to Senator Graham.</s>SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R), SOUTH CAROLINA: I'm glad we had it. I admire both the secretaries, but it was inadequate because the CIA was not there. Any key vote, anything that you need me for to get out of town, I ain't doing it until we hear from the</s>CIA. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Have you made that clear to the president?</s>GRAHAM: I just did.</s>HARLOW: All right, we have significant breaking news to bring you this morning regarding President Trump, regarding Michael Cohen. Let's go to our colleague Pamela Brown, and Pamela, give us the main headlines here.</s>PAMELA BROWN, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: What we are learning, Poppy and Jim, that Michael Cohen, the president's former attorney for more than a decade is expected to make a surprise appearance in front of a federal judge in New York this morning where he is expected to plead guilty to misleading Congress in the Russia investigation. So we know that Michael Cohen has previously testified to Congress on a number of issues related to the Russia probe including his efforts to brand the Trump Tower in Moscow. He has previously told Congress that those efforts have ceased in January of 2016. He also had told Congress that the president barely knew about it. So that was just one of the issues that we know Michael Cohen has previously talked to Congress about. And now this morning, we are learning ahead of his sentencing coming up later in December, that he is going to be appearing before a federal judge and pleading guilty to misleading Congress. This is significant for a number of reasons because the question is how will this impact the president? Michael Cohen is someone who has previously said he would take a bullet for the president and now it turns out he could be one of the most damaging witnesses to the president and his presidency. And so we could learn more about potentially, what the president has known as it pertains to the Russia investigation. We are waiting to find out what happens when he does appear before this federal judge. Shortly, he has already pleaded guilty to eight counts as we all know, as we've covered previously, that involves tax fraud as well as campaign finance violations. So this is certainly significant, because this is different. This is pleading guilty to misleading Congress and the Russia investigation. Poppy and Jim --</s>SCIUTTO: So Pamela --</s>HARLOW: Yes --</s>SCIUTTO: The timing here is key because he had testified that the talks regarding Trump Tower, the Trump Tower project in Moscow ended in January, 2016. He is now saying, is it correct, that those talks continued into June of 2016? That timing of course key because the president by then was presumptive Republican nominee for president. That timing key, no question. Is he also testifying that the president was aware that those conversations were continuing?</s>HARLOW: We're going to have to wait and see what he says. I can only just tell you what he has testified to Congress in the past. He says that those discussions about Trump Tower in Moscow ceased in January of 2016. And he also said that the president barely knew about it. So those are two key points he has previously told Congress. And we know that the president has come out and said on several occasions that there is no deals with Russia. He has no financial dealings with Russia. He said that during the campaign. He said that again January 2017. So it certainly would be significant if Michael Cohen does appear before a judge and says that he misled Congress in terms of what the president knew about Trump Tower in Moscow and those efforts. Of course, nothing ever came of it as we know, the deal fell apart. But there was a letter of intent signed by the president in 2015. But again, the president continually distanced himself, saying he didn't know anything about it. Michael Cohen has come out in the past when he was Trump's attorney, he no longer is, and said that he didn't know much about it. So we're going to have to wait and see exactly what Michael Cohen is going to say in terms of pleading guilty to misleading Congress.</s>HARLOW: So also, Pamela, you know, up until now, at least Michael Cohen has not -- yes, he pled guilty to those eight counts. He has not had a cooperation agreement with prosecutors in the Southern District. A, do we know if that changes today? Because we know he's facing a sentencing on December 12th, the sentencing where he could get 46 to 63 months in prison, and in the federal sentence, you have to serve 85 percent of it. So is he -- is this a cooperation agreement now? Do we know, and B, do we know if prosecutors from the FDNY or from Mueller's team will say anything about the effectiveness of what he has told them or how truthful they think it is?</s>BROWN: Well, we're waiting to find out, you're right, there is no cooperation agreement between Michael Cohen and Robert Mueller's team, even though Cohen has been a significant of time, talking to Robert Mueller's team about the Russia investigation. He's also spoken to prosecutors in the Southern District of New York about the other charges that he pleaded guilty to including of course as we know, tax fraud in campaign finance violation. So the question is, is this an effort to perhaps get more leniency ahead of his sentencing coming up on December 12th. It's unclear at this point who will be present in that courtroom when Michael Cohen does plead guilty to misleading Congress. But that is certainly something to watch out for. Robert Mueller's team, their reaction to this, and what led to this because presumably he told Congress what he told Congress. But we know Robert Mueller's team has already been looking into this issue, what the president knew about the Trump Tower deal in Moscow. And so the question is, is through that investigation they were able to uncover that what Michael Cohen has told Congress didn't line up with the facts that they had from other communications from other people involved in this investigation. And as Michael Cohen is pleading guilty to misleading Congress in an effort to get leniency in his sentencing. We'll have to wait and see what happens on that front --</s>HARLOW: Right --</s>SCIUTTO: Well, so this is happening now, well, presumably, we're going to know a lot more, one, about how far he goes, about the president's knowledge, et cetera, based on what he says in that courtroom, but also how the special counsel views his -- how helpful his testimony has been. That's correct, right? He is making this -- he is making these statements now in a courtroom here in New York.</s>BROWN: That's right. He's going to be in front of a federal judge pleading guilty to this. And it's significant and unusual for this to happen, for this turn of events before someone is sentenced. I mean, this is someone who has already pleaded guilty to eight counts related to campaign finance violation and tax fraud. And now in a turn of events just before his sentencing, he's going to go before this federal judge in a surprise appearance and say that -- and plead guilty to lying to Congress. So the question is what role did Robert Mueller's team in this, and how will this impact things moving forward? And will it shed any light on the testimony that Michael Cohen has been giving to the Robert Mueller's team, how helpful it has been as it pertains to the president. You can imagine the president and his legal team would be paying close attention to this because Michael Cohen knew the president very well. He was his attorney for more than a decade, again, he was one of his fiercest defenders and of course he had then come out -- came out in court and said that he paid off those -- the two women in campaign finance violation at the direction of the president. So that sort of up ended any legal defense agreement between the president, his team and Michael Cohen's team. But certainly, the big question today is how has the testimony Michael Cohen has given to Robert Mueller's team impacted the president in this --</s>HARLOW: Yes --</s>BROWN: Russia investigation.</s>HARLOW: So --</s>SCIUTTO: We're getting those --</s>HARLOW: Yes --</s>SCIUTTO: We'll be getting those reports from inside the courtroom. Pamela Brown, thanks very much as this goes forward, we have with us Jeffrey Toobin, Asha Rangappa. Jeffrey, let's talk about and again, we're going to be getting more information here, clearly. We have someone inside the courtroom, we're going to share that once we know -- once we know the details of that reporting. But just on what we know now, so he's going to say that he misled Congress on when those discussions regarding Trump Tower in Moscow ended. Initially, he said January, now he says it goes all the way into June, a month before the Republican convention when the president is the presumptive nominee. Legal significance to that, is it about abuse of the position, right?</s>JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Well, I mean, legal significance in terms of Michael Cohen is you can't lie to Congress.</s>SCIUTTO: Right --</s>TOOBIN: I mean, that's pretty straightforward --</s>SCIUTTO: For the president --</s>TOOBIN: What it means for --</s>SCIUTTO: Right --</s>TOOBIN: The president is a lot more complicated. I mean, you know, this is an investigation about whether Donald Trump was working with the Russians to get himself elected. That's what this is about. That's what collusion means. And what the president has said over and over again is I have nothing to do with Russia. Here you have Michael Cohen saying apparently, that there were discussions, negotiations, something -- I mean, we'll see in court today between the president and his -- between the president's representative, at least, and the Russians in the middle of the 2016 campaign at a time when he was been extremely solicitous --</s>SCIUTTO: Right --</s>TOOBIN: To Vladimir Putin at a time when they changed the Republican platform at the convention to make it more --</s>SCIUTTO: Yes --</s>TOOBIN: Sympathetic to Russia --</s>HARLOW: I mean, with the Russia -- and that, by the way, tied into Ukraine as well which is obviously --</s>TOOBIN: Paul Manafort bailing writ, yes --</s>HARLOW: A key interest right now and for the president has responded to Russia's aggression against Ukraine. Let's remind people what Michael Cohen told Congress behind closed doors when he said, look, all talk about a Moscow-Trump Tower ended in January 2016. He said because, quote, "the proposal was not feasible for a variety of business reasons and should not be pursued further." He said it ended then. Now we know from this reporting that there are questions about the honesty of that and where it went and who was involved and who in Russia was involved, Asha. As you look at this, Pam noted how rare it is for him to be coming forward and saying, look, I did this. What do you think this means about a cooperation agreement? What --</s>ASHA RANGAPPA, CNN LEGAL & SECURITY ANALYST: Well, you know --</s>HARLOW: Are we two weeks away from a sentencing?</s>ASHA: When Cohen originally pleaded guilty, there were -- you know, it was clearly that he was trying to posture himself as somebody who could help Mueller and it seemed that Mueller was kind of rebuffing it, he was not interested. So the fact that he is doing this and clearly has information that's valuable to Mueller is significant. I would say that the other significant thing here is that Mueller has enough information to know that Cohen lied to Congress. And we have had many other people also testify in front of Congress, and I think they should be very worried because if Mueller gets a hold of those transcripts, he clearly has intelligence information evidence of what actually went on and those people could be on the hook as well.</s>SCIUTTO: OK, this is ongoing as we speak. Michael Cohen's surprise appearance in the court of the Southern District of New York federal court there. We have a reporter inside the courtroom and our colleague Kara Scannell who is in Washington is getting color from inside the courtroom. Kara, tell us what you are hearing about what Cohen is saying to the judge.</s>KARA SCANNELL, CNN REPORTER: Well, Jim, so we do have a colleague in the courtroom who is telling us that Michael Cohen has waived his right to an indictment which signals he is about to plead guilty, if he hasn't already. And what he is going to say that he did according to our colleague there is that he made false statements regarding the Moscow project and discussions about the Trump Tower-Moscow project. Now, this was a project that Cohen was involved with starting in the Fall of 2015 when Trump was beginning his presidential bid, and that he told Congress that it ended in January of 2016, you know, when the president was really getting underway with his bid for the then candidate. But Cohen is now saying that he lied about this, so the question is what did he lie about and what did the president know about this project? This was, though, a critical meeting, it was, as we had seen Michael Cohen has provided Cnn previously with the letter of intent about this deal that he has -- that Trump had signed between -- in the end of 2015. And this was all plans to build a luxury condominium tower like Trump has done elsewhere where they would make $4 million off that project. Michael Cohen has said to Congress that, you know, he reached out to the spokesman for Vladimir Putin trying to get a deal. And he had told us previously that, that had gone nowhere. So now we're learning that some of these statements that Cohen had made were not true, we don't know the details of that yet, but it's likely playing out in court right now as Cohen is pleading guilty. Again, he had already pleaded guilty in August to other --</s>HARLOW: Yes --</s>SCANNELL: Offenses, and that time --</s>HARLOW: Right --</s>SCANNELL: He implicated the president in the campaign finance piece.</s>HARLOW: So Kara, stay with us on this because we're just getting these alerts out of our colleague Julia Jones in the courtroom, and significant what she is reporting is that Michael Cohen is now saying that he had discussions about this project as late as August of 2017 --</s>SCIUTTO: That's after -- that's after Trump has already -- he's already the Republican --</s>HARLOW: He's president --</s>SCIUTTO: Nominee.</s>HARLOW: Yes --</s>RANGAPPA: In 2017 --</s>SCIUTTO: August 2017 --</s>HARLOW: August 2017 --</s>SCIUTTO: August 2017 after he's --</s>HARLOW: President --</s>SCIUTTO: Elected president. So this is even further than -- well, it's more than a year and a half beyond what he initially testified to Congress --</s>RANGAPPA: And when the special counsel was already investigating.</s>SCIUTTO: Yes, so our legal experts sitting next to us here, significant, Asha, for the president.</s>RANGAPPA: Well, then you're getting into, as Jeffrey mentioned earlier, you are now in a place where he is holding an office and has certain fiduciary duties to his office to, you know, to not be profiting from, you know, whatever leverage he has over foreign relations or anything that Russia might want. And I think that this is really critical because I would like to know if any of the written questions that Mueller presented to Trump included questions in this vain. I expect that they did if Michael Cohen was already talking to them about this, and if he lied about those questions, dealings with Trump Tower, that could be a big problem for him as well.</s>TOOBIN: Let me just give another piece of context for all of this. I -- you know, I went to Moscow, I did a "New Yorker" piece about the Miss Universe pageant which his business partners in the Miss Universe pageant was the Agalarov family. The Agalarov family, the leader of that family is a big builder and sometimes called the Donald Trump of Moscow. Agalarov was the person who wanted to build the Trump Tower in Moscow. END