In the moments following former President
Donald Trump's conviction,
conservative media
figures took to the air
to repeat the verdict, slam the trial
and take aim at the judicial system.
Then we're going to vanquish
the evil forces
that are destroying this republic.
It's a sad day for our justice system,
the best justice system
ever created by man.
The foundation
of our constitutional republic.
It's literally dying before your eyes.
So are we going to establish a precedent
where the president
can put his political opponent in jail?
It's the type of power
we usually see dictators
exercised in China
and Cuba and North Korea.
So some of the right's
most popular names openly
calling for the government
to become Trump's
weapon of choice for revenge
against his political enemies.
Here's
some of
what we've seen from folks online.
The Daily Wire's
Matt Walsh,
whose millions
of social media subscribers
said Trump should, quote,
make and publish
a list of ten high ranking
Democrat criminals
who he will have arrested
when he takes office, end quote.
Sean Davis,
the head of the Federalist, wrote
he wants to see a list,
quote of which
Democratic officials
are going to be put in prison, end quote.
Joining us now to talk more about
this is CNN's Chris Wallace.
He's host of Who's
talking to Chris Wallace on Max
and The Chris
Wallace Show airing Saturday mornings
here on CNN.
Does any of that rhetoric surprise you?
No, unfortunately,
it doesn't surprise me.
That's where it's been headed.
But think
how how different
the situation
is from a years ago in 2016.
Donald Trump's brilliant move was to
put out a list of conservative judges
who he would consider
to name to the Supreme Court.
Now you've got right
wing commentators saying,
put out a list of the top Democrats
you're going to put in jail
as soon as you get into office.
That's a sign of how much
the Republican Party and MAGA world
and the political conversation
in this country
has changed over the last eight years.
It seems like
some of the rhetoric, rhetoric
and some of the lines that we hear there
that just gets co-opted
by some Republican officials
who who run with it,
even some who you might suspect
don't always believe it in their hearts.
But that's the political messaging
that they go with.
You know,
how damaging do you
think it really is
when they're taking aim
at the judicial system,
especially, I think of like
Tim Scott saying
the judicial system hunts Republicans.
Well, it protects Democrats.
But, you know,
Bob Menendez and Hunter
Biden might think otherwise.
Well, some of the people that you showed
on that screen a moment ago,
I don't think no better.
There are people who do know better.
And I think that somebody like Tim Scott
and some of the of Marco Rubio
knowing better.
But you got to fall in line
if you're going to have a place
in this Republican Party.
You got to fall in line with the MAGA
talking points and with Donald Trump's
talking points.
I mean, you had a moderate governor
of former governor of Maryland,
Larry Hogan,
who's running
for the Senate
in Maryland, a really blue state,
and the real possibility
that he can turn a blue seat
red and maybe give the Republicans
control of the Senate.
Pretty important thing.
All he said yesterday was
we in this country
need to respect the verdict of the jury.
And one of the chairs of the Trump
campaign said his campaign is finished.
The point is, if you don't fall in line,
you are out.
What does this do
more broadly to a system
that has served as a beacon of light
for the world? Right.
A huge part of the judicial system
in this country
is based on the belief
that it functions fairly.
And if you have these leaders
essentially saying that it's corrupt
and a lot of people believing them
without evidence, what does that do?
You know, Boris,
if you'd asked me this four years ago,
I would have said,
well, it's rhetoric
that's overheated rhetoric.
The white right knows how to throw
red meat
to its constituents
and the left knows how to do the same.
But January 6th, 2021,
changed everything.
We saw them.
That rhetoric
can actually turn into action
and action can turn into violence.
So when you hear people
talking about going
after top
Democratic officials,
when you hear them
talking about
not complying with the rule of law,
I think it has a different meaning,
a different resonance
and a different fear factor,
if you will, than it did three years ago.
Do you think they're pardon me?
Do you think there are guardrails
that would stop President Trump from,
if he's reelected, weaponizing some parts
of his administration
against his political rivals or enemies?
You know,
you do have the Supreme Court
and you do have Congress.
Of course, it depends
who's in charge of Congress.
But,
you know, you do have to raise questions
when you look back to the
the investigation in the House,
January six committee did.
There were a few key moments there where
the acting attorney general
said, no, we're not going to do that.
Or the White House counsel
said, no, we're not going to do that.
And one of the concerns
I think, is that is that Donald Trump 2.0
isn't going to go as he did
in the beginning of his first term
for the respectable
the Rex Tillerson,
the Jim Mattis, as the H.R.
McMaster is, he's going to pick people
because he knows how the system works.
Now, he's going to pick
people who will toe his line
and follow his orders.
And under those circumstances,
I think the question of guardrails
becomes much more in doubt.
To your point
about how much things
have changed in a relatively short
amount of time,
somebody that didn't toe the line,
Mike Pence,
who certify
the results of the 2020 election
today, came out
and basically said
that this was a corrupt proceeding.
The conversation has been somber.
So we're going to pivot slightly.
Who was talking to
Chris Wallace this week?
Well, it's interesting,
but it's right on these lines
that we talked to Bill Maher,
the very popular host of Real Time
on HBO and Max.
And one of the questions
I wanted to ask him about
was the fact that even before Trump ran
the first time in 2016,
he said if he is elected,
he won't leave voluntarily in 2020.
He won't admit that he lost.
And here's that conversation
starting in
2018, you
started predicting with some regularity
that if Donald Trump
lost his bid for reelection in 2020,
that he wouldn't leave it
before he was elected.
The first time I kept saying
slow moving coup.
It's it's happening
and it's going to happen.
And it's and we see it.
I mean, the stages of it,
we just keep going down this road.
And I notice that the right wing now has
sort of
talked themselves into this idea
that he's just this buffoonish comedian.
He says crazy things.
You know, he's always said crazy things.
He it's like he's not a serious.
So they don't take it seriously.
And that's the problem we have
is that this is very serious.
And he's running a much more serious
campaign this time.
So what do you think happens
if he loses this time?
Well,
on January
20th, 2025, he's
going to show up in the inauguration.
Whether he wins or loses,
because he will claim that he won.
That is the one thing
I can absolutely predict
with utter certainty.
He will never as I kept saying
all those years,
will never concede an election.
He's certainly not going
to concede this one.
Interestingly enough, Bill Maher,
who is no fan of Donald
Trump, said
he thinks
now this was prior to the
verdict yesterday.
He thinks Trump at this
moment is odds on
to be reelected president.
And you can watch the interview,
the full interview.
Not right now because we're watching you.
But as soon as the show is over,
you can watch it on Max
where it's posted right now.
All right. We'll check that out.
Chris, always great to have you.
Chris Wallace,
thank you so much for being with us.
My pleasure.
Still plenty more news to
come on CNN News Central.
The vitriol isn't just reserved
for politicians.
We're also seeing growing anger
toward jurors.
CNN is learning that right now
on certain online forums,
people are threatening
violence and are attempting
to publicly identify the 12 New Yorkers
who convicted the former president.
Let's bring in trial
consultant Richard Gabriel.
Richard, you know, when jurors walked in
to deliver their verdict yesterday,
we're told that
some had their heads hung,
maybe feeling the weight
of their decision.
What do you think they're
experiencing today?
Well, I
think they're
experiencing some relief
that they're out of the trial.
But I do think
that there is some trepidation.
Obviously, they know
going into this trial
that there is some risk about this.
I really just want to remind the public,
you can disagree with the verdict,
but the jurors are 12
ordinary citizens
who really swore to do their job,
look at the evidence, follow
the judge's instructions and do it.
So I think this heated rhetoric
about veiled threat and violence
towards the jurors or towards
the judiciary
really does threaten
the entire institution of justice.
And I think we need to really dial down
the heated rhetoric about this.
Again, plenty of room
for disagreement about this,
but I think it's important to honor
what the process was
that did arrive at this verdict.
Richard,
after handing down a verdict
that could potentially send
a former president,
the presumptive Republican
nominee to jail,
do you anticipate that
members of the jury might speak
about this case publicly?
It's possible that they may
feel compelled to do so at some point
to explain the process in their verdict.
That being said,
I think a lot of them are very concerned
about their own personal safety,
about the harassment
of friends and family,
and will just
basically want to disappear.
The judge has kept them anonymous.
And even though there are threats
maybe to reveal their identities,
I think a lot of them
just want to say, look, I did my job.
I don't want to be in a public forum
anymore about this.
And I've done my service.
Richard Gabriel,
thanks so much for spending
time with us this afternoon.