These days it seems like the epicenter of americas secrets isnt the cia, the pentagon or even the white house. Its maralago, where donald trump apparently likes to keep and tell secrets. Tonight, abc and the New York Times both reporting that after leaving the White House Trump told a club member at maralago Sensitive Information about u. S. Nuclear submarines. That member is not only a foreign national, but also an australian billionaire who allegedly spread that information to more than a dozen foreign officials. Among the allegations that trump shared the number of Nuclear Warheads those submarines carry and how close they can get to russian submarines without being detected. Donald trump, of course, is already under investigation for his handling of government secrets and for keeping classified documents at maralago. This certainly fits into that pattern, but in the early stages of his presidency, trump reportedly did other things, including using an Unsecured Phone in 2017 at maralago. The terrace became a Situation Room where trump and the japanese Prime Minister openly discussed a north Korean Missile test. Now, later that spring, trump invited russian officials into the oval office, where he revealed Classified Information from an ally about isis. He also told the philippine president about two Nuclear Submarines off the korean peninsula. A couple of years later, he tweeted a classified picture of an iranian launch pad. His former aide suggests it was common for trump to overshare this kind of information. The short answer is yes. I watched him show documents to people at maralago on the dining room patio. He has no respect for Classified Information, never did. Its not just witness testimony. All sorts of stuff, pages long. Wait a minute. Lets see here. [ laughter ] yeah. Isnt that amazing . This totally wins my case, you know . Except it is highly confidential. I was just saying because we were talking about it. He said, he wanted to attack iran. You did. This was done by the military, given to me. I think we can probably, right . Well have to see. Declassify see, as president i could have declassified it. Now i cant. You have a problem. Isnt that interesting . Yeah. Its so cool. And you probably almost didnt believe me. Now you believe me. Now i believe you. Its incredible, right . That from trump from bedminster, new jersey. Tonight trumps spokesperson did not deny the submarine reporting, but they did slam leaks and said trump did nothing wrong. I want to bring in Cnn National Security analyst james clapper, the former director of national intelligence. What was your first reaction to hearing these revelations . Well, shock, stunning development, but unfortunately not surprising. You know, im having trouble coming up with new adjectives to describe how serious and how dangerous this is. You just presented a very succinct litany of the things the former president has done that reflects his complete disregard for protection of National SecuritySensitive Information and for that matter the very National Security of the country. In this latest episode, one aspect of this that i think is worth mentioning is that when this kind of thing happens and this Sensitive Information is spread out as ubiquitously and pervasively as it was and an adversary gets a hold of it, particularly russia or china, they can use that to confirm or refute their own intelligence holdings. Theres no end to the potential consequences here or the endangerment to sources and methods, the endangerment of the crews that man these multibillion dollar submarines. So from all perspectives, this is really egregious. As assuming, of course, the reporting is accurate. At the moment cnn has not confirmed all the details here. According to abc, the australian businessman, mr. Pratt went onto share this information with a lot of people just within a few minutes. Dozens of people would have heard some version of what trump told him. When you think about the number of people who could be involved here, what do you think are the consequences of that . Well, potentially quite serious, because how many people did those people tell . So theres no knowing, at least at this point, how many people this information was conveyed to, whether accurate or not. Again, if it falls into the wrong hands, which it potentially could do, since both the chinese and the russians certainly look now to the former president as a valuable source of intelligence for them. So they would go to any lengths to gain information, particularly about the holiest of holy for us, which is our nuclear tdeterrent. That is the very essence of protecting this country. The recklessness thats been displayed here is really reprehensible. Its potentially quite serious. So i should point out, joe hockey, whos a former australian ambassador to the u. S. Says australian submariners have been on u. S. Subs for years. Hes downplaying the significance of at least some of the information being shared with australian nationals. Does he have a point . Well, not really. I have Great Respect for former ambassador hockey, but the fact is this has been exposed to people who have absolutely no obligation to protect it. There is no inhibition legally for them not to share what they heard, what theyve learned with many others. So i suppose its reassuring that it wasnt a chinese billionaire, but thats faint reassurance. Director clapper, always good to have you. Thank you for joining us tonight. Thanks, abby. Tonight, in a brand new interview, former Secretary Of StateHillary Clinton was telling Cnns Christiane Amanpour that donald trump will likely be the republican nominee. Shes also issuing a stark warning about a potential 2024 rematch with President Biden. Listen. So for those outside this country who may not know, it is not so much a fight between two different parties. Its an internigh seen warfare within one party, the gop. Yeah. Is there any area of Coalition Building that could happen . There are pragmatic republicans, as you say. Could a whole new way of trying to get legislation going and crossparty governance going by democrats and certain republicans forming a coalition . Well, you saw the number of republicans who voted along with democrats to keep the government open. So theres clearly a common sense, sane part of the Republican Caucus in the house. But i think they are intimidated. They oftentimes say and do things which they know better than to say or do. And it will require us defeating those most extreme measures and the people who promote them in order to try to get to Common Ground where people can again work together. Thats the way it used to be. We had very strong partisan in both parties in the past and we had very bitter battles overall kinds of things, gun control and Climate Change and the economy and taxes. But there wasnt this little tail of extremism wagging the dog of the Republican Party as it is today. Sadly, so many of those extremists, those maga extremists take their Marching Orders from donald trump, who has no credibility left by any measure. Hes only in it for himself. Hes now defending himself in civil actions, criminal actions. At some point maybe there needs to be a formal deprogramming of the cult members. How do you do that . How does this change at all . At this point, i think, sadly, he will still be the nominee and we have to defeat them and we have to defeat those who are the election deniers, as we did in 2020 and 2022. And we have to just be smarter about how we are trying to empower the right people inside the Republican Party. Nancy pelosi had a majority of five votes when she was speaker. Kevin mccarthy had a majority of five votes. Nancy pelosi passed consequential legislation. And she clearly had members of her caucus who ranged across a spectrum of political beliefs and ideology and she kept everybody together and kept everybody focused on the future. He couldnt do that. So he paid a price, but more importantly, the country paid a price. So when you see another matchup between potentially trump and President Biden, what goes through your mind . And particularly, how do you process that this person who defeated you back in 2016 is still at it given all that youve said, 91 indictments, civil fraud, sexual transgressions, according to the courts . How is this still happening . Its a classic tale of an authoritarian populist who really has a grip on the emotional psychological needs and desires of a portion of the population. The base of the Republican Party, for whatever combination of reasons and it is emotional and psychological sees in him someone who speaks for them. And they are determined that they will continue to vote for him, attend his rallies, wear his merchandise, because for whatever reason, he and his very negative, nasty form of politics resonates with them. Maybe they dont like migrants. Maybe they dont like gay people or black people or the woman who got the promotion at work they didnt get. Whatever the reason, you know, make America Great again was a bid for nostalgia to return to a place where people could be in charge of their lives, feel empowered, say what they want, insult whoever came in their way. And that was really attractive to a significant portion of the republican base. So it is like a cult. Somebody has to break that momentum. Thats why i believe joe biden will defeat him. Hopefully then that will be the end and the fever will break and republicans can try to get back to fighting about issues and elect people who are at least responsible and accountable. To see more of the interview tomorrow morning. We also have Breaking News involving the speakers race in washington. Donald trump has floated himself for the position, but now apparently that is no longer the case. Hear who he is backing when we return. Plus, his lawyers are now raising a variation of the nixon defense in one of his cases. We have two watergate figures joining me live next to discuss. Breaking news tonight. Donald trump is no longer coming to capitol hill next week for the speakers election. And hes no longer floating himself as an option for speaker of the house. Instead, sources tell cnn that he is expected to endorse congressman jim jordan. Jordan has been making the rounds and calling around to colleagues. Speaking of jordan, listen to what liz cheney, the former congresswoman said about the prospect of a speaker jim jordan. Jim jordan knew more about what donald trump had planned for january 6th than any other member of the house of representatives. Now, somebody needs to ask jim jordan, why didnt you report to the Capitol Police what you knew donald trump had planned . If they were to decide that, there would no longer be any possible way to argue that a group of elected republicans could be counted onto defend the constitution. Ed rollins is a republican political consultant and the former chief political advisor to president reagan. Also with us is ana navarro. Let me ask you about this news that donald trump after saying he would go to the capitol and maybe put his name in contention to be speaker isnt doing that, but hes going to endorse jim jordan instead. Its beneficial that hes not going to the circus. We need to get focused and pick a leader to lead. I think the former president would be a distraction. The thing i worry about, i like jim jordan and scalise. I ran a congressional committee, so i know most of these members. Im not sure they thought this thing through if jordan is going to be their candidate. Unless you get every single republican to vote for you in conference, youre not going to win this thing. You need a couple democrats. Unfortunately jim jordan, because of his aggressive behavior, certainly is not going to attract democrats and certainly trump is not going to help attract democrats. Its a good point. Look, jim jordan is a very polarizing figure. As liz cheney was pointing out, he does have ties to the stop the steal movement. There are videos and pictures of him outside the capitol with stop the steal signs. All of that ties in. For moderates, do you think it will matter . Will he be able to get to 218 . First of all, i do think it matters. Kevin mccarthy, who after 15 rounds did become speaker also had some ties. Lets remember that just a few days after january 6th, where was he . He was at maralago kissing Donald Trumps ring among other body parts. That wasnt enough. So the problem with jim jordan, i think, is for republicans in districts like where i live, florida 26, which is represented by a republican, who understands that its a swing district. In swing districts, the polarizing nature and character of jim jordan is going to be very hurtful to republican congresspeople. It will be a question of whether the moderates say enough to potentially stop that. We have to remember that Steve Scalise is super popular and hes running as well. Ed, i want to talk to you about some 2024 politics. Earlier today we heard from ron desantis some pretty strong criticisms of former President Trump. Take a listen. Nobody is entitled to be nominated. Nobody. Especially anybody that couldnt even stop joe biden. You are not entitled to be nominated. Youve got to earn the nomination. Youve got to show how youre going to be able to get the job done. The reason im interested in what you have to say here, you used to work for the Desantis Super pac. Do you think that is enough to really signal to voters that desantis is going up against trump here . No. No one knows florida better than ana. Shes the next generation. Desantis has not run a good campaign. He cannot connect. Hes overspent his budget. He has good operatives, but he has chaos in his campaign. It takes a lot to make this happen. To beat donald trump in a primary is going to be very, very tough. My sense today is that the debate and all the rest of it is going to go on. Weve got to settle who our nominee is quickly just as we have to settle on a speaker quickly because we have a big task to hold the house and the presidency back. Ed has so much experience on this, but i dont think the problem with desantis is he hasnt run a good campaign. I think the problem with desantis is ron desantis in that hes not a good cant. He frankly was a paper tiger. He looked incredibly strong on paper, because he managed to win in florida. He was running against charlie crist, who i said here on Election Night was like beating a corpse. I apologize to corpses. Yes, ron desantis looked very, very strong coming out of november in that election. But he wasnt. He is a person that lacks charisma, that is not likable, is very awkward. And he based his entire campaign on this notion of being woke and antiwoke and fighting with disney and fighting with drag queens. Well, guess what . Taking on the largest employer of florida, which is disney world, because they express an opinion on policy is not a conservative value. So i dont know how he thought that was going to make him that popular. That might be a question for ed. I mean, at some point we will need to discuss what happened there with desantis. I want to raise this to you. The Trump Campaign says this about desantis. We took out ron, a far less talented person than people originally believed. Crooked joe is down to us by 11 points. Now we have to focus on one of the most overrated people we know, nikki. Hes talking about nikki haley. Is trump right that theyve already taken ron desantis out of the race and this is about him and nikki haley . I agree totally with ana on desantis. I didnt see a good candidate when i was working with him and ive seen a lot of candidates in my lifetime. I think to a certain extent he didnt define himself. The critical thing is President Trump has got a lot of legal challenges ahead of him and he doesnt get to define his message all the way as hes done pretty well in the past. I think this thing is still wide open. I would bet on him to win the nomination. But politicians is about addition. Ana is the new generation. Im the old generation. I tell people go find more voters. We need more voters. Thats how we win races. Its a game of edition. I dont think the house or the senate or the National President ial politics is adding new voters. We need democrats and independents to win in the general. Pivoting to the middle weve seen in some of these debates she pivots all over the place. Nikki haley, as i look at her, is a human wind sock. She goes whichever way the political winds are blowing. She will be protrump when she has to be, she will be antitrip when she has to be. Shell say anything, shell do anything. I do think its good news for her, in part because she has performed well on those debate stages, but also because everybody around her has been to mediocre or less than mediocre. The reason there is room for nikki haley to be on an upward trajectory is because ron desantis has failed and flailed like a fish desperately gasping for some oxygen when theyre out of water. Well see, first of all, if there is another debate and how that goes for all of those candidates. Debates dont win the presidency. Debates are a great exercise and entertaining. What wins campaigns is getting out and meeting people, articulating issues they care about. None of these candidates are connecting. The two debates weve had has been disastrous as far as im concerned. Nice to be on with you. Up next, in one of the legal cases trump