‘It’s Striking!’ CNN’s Kaitlan Collins and Pam Brown Shocked Trump Team Keeps ‘Losing Most Every Executive Privilege Fight’
CNN anchor Kaitlan Collins told colleagues she was “struck by” the fact that ex-President Donald Trump’s legal team keeps “losing most every executive privilege fight that they’ve been waging.”
Despite strenuous efforts to get out of testifying against Trump, former Vice President Mike Pence is headed for the witness chair in the Special Counsel Jack Smith-led Justice Department probes into Trump’s conduct surrounding the January 6 insurrection. He has decided not to appeal a judge’s decision ordering him to testify with a very limited shield of privilege.
On Thursday morning’s edition of CNN This Morning, co-anchor Don Lemon asked correspondent Pamela Brown about the development, and both she and Collins agreed it was “striking” how consistently Trump has been losing privilege challenges:
LEMON: How significant do you think Pence’s testimony will be for the special counsel, Jack Smith?
BROWN: I think very significant. I know, Kaitlan, you probably feel the same way, like this was Trump’s number two. As you mentioned, there was a heated phone call on the day of January 6th before that happened. There were many conversations, our reporting indicates, leading up to January 6th, where Trump was pressuring Pence to intervene and to go outside of the bounds of his constitutional role. And, you know, essentially, all an effort to overturn the election results.
And so now, as it stands, and we don’t know whether Trump’s team is going to appeal an executive privilege grounds, but as it stands now, he will have to testify most likely before a grand jury to prosecutors without any protections except for the limited speech or debate clause protections, which is a little fuzzy in terms of like what exactly that’s going to cover.
But it seems as though a lot of those one on one conversations will be part of it.
LEMON: Just to clarify, he is not going to appeal, Pence, but Trump’s team could appeal. Is that what you’re saying?
BROWN: Yes, Trump’s team. Yes. So, Pence, he said he is not going to appeal. But Trump’s team can still appeal on the executive privilege grounds.
COLLINS: Even if they do appeal, I mean, they have been losing most every executive privilege fight that they’ve been waging. It’s not — that’s what I’m struck by, is that Pence obviously could be the most consequential one because he had the one-on-one conversations with Trump. But it’s Mark Meadows, it’s all of these other top Trump officials that they tried to get them from testifying, but they’ve lost those battles, as we reported earlier this week.
BROWN: It’s striking!
COLLINS: It didn’t get a lot of attention Trump was in court that day, but it could be very significant for Jack Smith’s investigation.
BROWN: It is striking, and it would be actually a little bit surprising if they appeal on that, because then potentially they’re going to have another loss, right? And, I mean, it’s clear where that is going given what you just said, with the Mark Meadows and others that they have lost with on the executive privilege grounds.
But this is a huge development that Mike Pence is going to be talking to Jack Smith and the prosecutors, potentially a grand jury, about his conversations with Trump. And what it does is it helps prosecutors, investigators understand Trump’s state of mind too in efforts to overturn the election. You know, did he know that he lost, but he was still engaged in this pressure campaign to have people like Mike Pence engage in these efforts? So, it’s significant.
Watch above via CNN This Morning.
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