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The Lead with Jake Tapper

Royal Baby Watch; What Next For George Zimmerman; Is Zimmerman A "Free" Man?; The "Classically Responsible Whistleblower"; Twinkies Get Downsized; Lucky Fan Grabs Four Foul Balls

Aired July 15, 2013 - 16:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

MAX FOSTER, CNN ROYAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, the latest is that we know that Prince William has taken the next few days off work. He's been working in Anglesey where he's a search and rescue pilot. He's now back in London at his wife's side, giving some suggestion that he's bracing for a due date. We've only been given mid July as a due date, so we really do think it's going to happen this week. But we all know, pregnancies and births, they just don't happen by the book. In fact, there was some research out today saying only 9 percent of British babies are born on the due date.

But certainly the media is taking its chances, Jake. If you just have a look at the press pack that's gathered outside the hospital. And I have to say, it's a surprise to many people here how much interest there is from around the world. All the U.S. networks are here. But as just one other example, there have been some Polish networks today here covering this royal birth. And one of the experts, one of the pundits here has been interviewed five times by five different Polish networks today. It's extraordinary.

JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: Five different Polish networks! I didn't even know there were five different Polish networks. There are, of course,millions of Americans fascinated with the royal family. There are also, I might say, some of us that don't quite understand what the big deal is. Can you explain what this is like for the average British citizen, how big a deal it is?

FOSTER: Well, I have say, a recent poll said more people were uninterested than interested in the royal baby. And from my experience from working with CNN International, there's a lot more interest outside the U.K. than in the U.K. in the royal family. And your guess is as good as mine about that.

But certainly when I've traveled in the U.S., just from an outsider's perspective, there seems to be this element of celebrity, really. Certainly to Kate. It re-epitomizes the Disney princess. She brings that to live And it's sort of a level of unattainable celebrity, a level above celebrity. You know, you can't become a prince or princess without marrying a prince or princess. And that's part of the fairy tale. And certainly our special events people said the royal wedding was the biggest outside special event ever. And that was the beginning of the story, the beginning of the fairy tale. It was the ultimate royal wedding. It unfolded brilliantly and perfectly, and this is the next stage in that is the baby that emerges out of that royal wedding.

So maybe the media's got it wrong, but certainly they think it's going to be a big ratings winner and part of a story which we're all following over the years.

TAPPER: Max Foster, thank you so much.

And what happens if it's a baby girl? Well, they just changed the law in England in case that happens. We'll tell you more about that after this break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: Welcome back to THE LEAD. Back to that royal baby story. So what happens if William and Kate's baby is a girl? Well, it could potentially help to modernize this thousand-year-old monarchy. Royal historian Kate Williams joins me now to explain.

Kate, thanks for joining us. Regardless if the child is a boy or girl, he or she is next in line for the throne. But explain to us for the first time in the history of the royals, what?

KATE WILLIAMS, ROYAL HISTORIAN: What's really interesting is previously you have to be a boy to get that throne pretty much, and the only girls who get the throne are those with no brothers. For example, Victoria, Elizabeth II and Elizabeth I. Let's all remember that Henry VIII was so eager to have a son, he actually broke from the church in Rome and set up his new church so he could marry his mistress, Anne Boleyn.

In British history, we've always privileged the king, and now this is completely different. This baby, if it's a girl, will be our next queen. And it doesn't matter how many brothers she has. She'll get the title, she'll get the land, she'll be the richest woman in Europe and one of the richest women in the world. And this, I think, is a big move forward. It's a big (INAUDIBLE) for female equality. We're saying a woman can do the top job. And it also suggests that really, the monarchy has caught up with the rest of Britain, where it's supposed to be about equality here.

TAPPER: It's interesting because the Parliament just passed this. You'd think this would have happened decades ago. But it just happened relatively recently. Two of England's best loved monarchs, were of course, women. There have only been six queens in the thousand-year history, but Queen Victoria and Queen Elizabeth II, very, very popular. Could the birth of a baby girl be enough to modernize this monarchy?

WILLIAMS: As you say, the law has been really rushed through. And we're behind our European cousins. Sweden, for example, put it through over 20 years ago. We are a bit slow on the uptake. And yes, monarchy has a lot of tradition. But you know, every time we've had a queen, they make a lot of changes. They are modern, they're exciting. Victoria, Elizabeth II. And I think what makes the difference is we love Elizabeth II in this country. She's one of our most popular monarchs. She sets a great example in terms of longevity, in terms of being politically mutual and dignified. And we just want another girl to do the same job. And that's what hopefully we'll going to see sometime this week. As Max was saying, fingers crossed.

TAPPER: All right. Well, I'm rooting for you, Kate. Royal historian Kate Williams. We'll have you back on again soon as this story continues to develop.

Next up, he's facing death threats, potential civil suits and federal prosecution. Will George Zimmerman's life ever go back to normal? We'll ask Casey Anthony's attorney, coming up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: Welcome back to THE LEAD. I'm Jake Tapper. Continuing now our National Lead. The protests over the George Zimmerman verdict have been overall peaceful with some exceptions. But online, some particularly violent threats have been made against Zimmerman. His brother and defense attorney describe the life that's awaiting the man who was just found not guilty of murder.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIPS)

ROBERT ZIMMERMAN, GEORGE ZIMMERMAN'S BROTHER: The threats are vile, they're vicious, they're disgusting and they are sometimes in person. Like people wearing shirts with my brother's face on it in crosshairs, or encouraging others to act out violently against him.

MARK O'MARA, GEORGE ZIMMERMAN'S ATTORNEY: I think he has to live mostly in hiding. He has to be able to protect himself from that periphery that still believe that he's some racist murderer.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: Jose Baez knows the difficulties in representing a controversial client in a very public trial. He represented Casey Anthony, who was acquitted in the murder of her young daughter, Caylee, two years ago.

Jose, thanks for joining us. You just heard from Zimmerman's brother and attorney. Zimmerman is facing what his brother describes as vile threats, with his attorney saying he'll likely need to stay in hiding. You know this well from your former client, Casey Anthony. Talk us through what you think are the big, legitimate safety concerns for Zimmerman right now.

JOSE BAEZ, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, I think the attorneys involved probably have the better idea as to whether there are any legitimate threats. I mean, let's face it: when it comes to the online blogosphere -- suddenly somebody gets a computer and gets a set of cojones with them. It's one of those things where you have situations where people decide to vent their frustrations online, but of course, they wouldn't act out personally. Now as for the encouragement that's going on there, there's always someone out there who is unstable. And those are the ones you worry about.

TAPPER; I know you're not comfortable talking about things you've directly told Casey Anthony in terms of advice to her. But if you were George Zimmerman's attorney, what kind of advice would you give to him right now in terms of safety? Would you tell him to move to another state? Would you suggest that he not give any interviews? What would you tell him?

BAEZ: Well you know, first and foremost, George is going to have to decide how to live the rest of his life. Unfortunately for George, he has a certain demographic that believes in his innocence and has supported him. In fact, his entire defense was funded by private donations. So, you have a situation where there seems to be a split. Certain demographic supports him, others don't.

So, he's going to have to, one, find out what he can do financially first and utilize that demographic which helps him. So I think that's what's going to take a priority because in order to ride off into the sunset, you're going to have to have a little bank to do it.

TAPPER: I want to play something you said in your press conference after Casey Anthony was acquitted in 2011 in the murder of her two- year-old daughter-in-law Caylee. Let's play that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BAEZ: While we're happy for Casey, there are no winners in this case. Caylee has passed on far, far too soon. And what my driving force has been for the last three years has been always to make sure that there has been justice for Caylee and Casey.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: That's a very different situation. But Zimmerman's defense team was criticized by some for spiking the football on Saturday night, for not talking about the loss of the life of Trayvon Martin. Talk, if you would, about the difficult balance between defending your client and also being mindful of the fact that there is a loss of life.

BAEZ: All right. Well, first off, different lawyers handle things differently. They may have felt that's the way they wanted to be portrayed. When you give that conference that, press conference, it's very spontaneous. And it's what's you're feeling and what you're going through at that time. So however they wanted to portray themselves, that's the way they proceeded.

Now what people forget is that these are tragedies from the very beginning. And what a lot of people do, they see this on TV, they think it's entertainment. And many people take it up like a sport and they root for one side and they get happy when there's a victory for that side, as if it were a sporting event.

But you know, everyone has to remember this is a tragedy. Trayvon Martin will never graduate from high school. His folks won't see him walk in graduation. He'll never be able to get married. He'll never be able to have a son or a daughter and look at them in the eye and watch them grow and live his life. He was cut off. His life was ended far, far too soon, and people need to remember that. And I'm sure the defense lawyers know that, and I'm sure they're cognizant of that. But at the same time, their role in the process was to defend Mr. Zimmerman. So, sometimes you get caught up in that process.

TAPPER: All right. Jose Baez, thank you so much for your time. We appreciate it.

BAEZ: Thank you for having me.

TAPPER: Coming up, the sensitive data he's leaked may be nothing compared to what he's still sitting on. We'll talk to the reporter who has become Edward Snowden's confidante about the documents that could bring the NSA to its knees.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: Welcome back to THE LEAD. I'm Jake Tapper. It's time for the "World Lead." He's already revealed the NSA's massive reach into our personal information, but what could be so sensitive that Edward Snowden has not yet spilled it? Well, just the whole play book for every move the NSA ever made. Glenn Greenwald, the reporter to whom Snowden continues to leak information told the "Associated Press" that Snowden has the blueprints for the NSA, how it's built, how it operates.

But Greenwald says Snowden does not want that information made public. Of course, this could be the ultimate dead hand for Snowden, a term used in the cold war, an insurance policy in case anything happens to him. In that event, Greenwald says Snowden took steps to get certain people access to the encrypted documents he walked off with.

But it's not clear how that would happen or who would get them. Snowden is no doubt very familiar with the offerings in the Moscow airport food court by now. He's been stuck there for more than three weeks. On Friday, Snowden requested asylum again from Russia and reportedly said he'd agree to the Russian's conditions that he'd stop leaking information, something he seemed to initially bristle at.

President Vladimir Putin today acknowledged that Snowden's position appears to have changed and says his situation is not clear at this point. Snowden also blames the U.S. for trapping Snowden in Russia for revoking his passport.

Glenn Greenwald who broke this story for "The Guardian" and remains in contact with Snowden joins me now from Brazil. Glenn, thanks for being here. Let's talk about this information that is out there, that has not been published. If this campaign of Snowden is supposed to be true transparency, why the slow reveal? Why is Snowden holding on to this information as an insurance policy? Is this what was referred to in the cold war as a "dead hand?"

GLENN GREENWALD, COLUMNIST, "THE GUARDIAN": No, the reason that it's been a process, that isn't instantaneous, that it's not an indiscriminate document dump is precisely because he is the classically responsible whistleblower. He vetted thousands and thousands of documents and didn't just dump them on the internet. He came to us as journalist, as established news organizations and said I want you only to publish what really is in the public good and not publish things that would cause gratuitous harm.

When I refer to the massive amounts of documents he has that could really do damage to the U.S. government, what I'm saying is that the claim that he's trying to harm the U.S. government is ludicrous. He's done the opposite. He's been incredibly responsible and asking us to report on the story as judiciously as we can.

TAPPER: But there is all this information out there if something happens to him, it will be released, is that right?

GREENWALD: No. It's been incredibly sensationalized and distorted what that issue is. At the very beginning when he had these documents and went to hongkong, before he came to the media, he made sure that if anything happen to him that the documents would be released and that the stories would still come out by placing them with other people or on the internet and ensuring people had access to that.

His idea was if they try and kidnap me or even kill me, something really extreme, I have planned that these stories will still come out. I won't have thrown away my life for nothing. At this point that's totally methodical. He's much too public, that's not going to happen. He has safeguarded these materials with extreme amounts of encryption. Nothing that's been released has been remotely damaging to national security and that is going to continue to be exactly how it is.

TAPPER: Obviously people in the government would disagree with you on that. But Glenn, you've been critical of the media's focus on Snowden, the fugitive, the American media's focus, as opposed to the information he's revealed about the NSA and surveillance. What do you think the public is not getting? What do you think the media is not reporting?

GREENWALD: I actually think the public is getting it. The most recent poll shows it views him as a whistleblower and not a traitor. I think the media is off as usual in trivial distractions. In his first interview about why he came forward, he said the NSA is trying to build a system that intercepts every single call or e-mail that Americans have with one another and the world.

I've said repeatedly that a report shows that they're trying to destroy privacy globally and there was an article just this morning in the "Washington Post" that reported that Keith Alexander, the head of the NSA's strategy when he was in the Iraq war was a phrase "collect it all," aimed at people in Iraq in a war.

And that is the approach that has now been transplanted to U.S. soil, collect it all, every phone call and e-mail activity that people have with one another. We ought to be debating it and having transparency of it. That's the substance of the story.

TAPPER: Glenn Greenwald, thank you so much for your time as always. Coming up next, Hostess is calling it the sweetest come back in the history of -- Twinkies. What they're not telling you about the return of the next Twinkie. It's not many same frosting filled sponge cake you're used to eating. We'll tell you what's different this time around coming up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: "The Money Lead," it's another great day to have a 401(k). U.S. stock only made modest gains. That was enough for the Dow and S&P 500 to keep the winning streak going. The Dow closed up 20 points, 15,484 today. Despite the economic rebound, it appears not even Twinkies are safe from being downsized. The return of America's sweetest treat hit a sour note and some fans realized the snacks are much smaller than the original. The company that revived them insists they're the same size. While the boxes used to use 15 ounces, they now weigh about 13.5 ounces.

"Sports Lead" now, even some of the biggest baseball fans go a lifetime without ever catching a foul ball, but one guy in Cleveland caught four of them during one single game. The broadcast team didn't catch on until Greg Van Neil caught number three and then it happened again. He says he just tossed the fourth one away to another fan. He did bring his baseball glove to the game.

Good thing the little kid in him won out. Idealseat.com is a web site that created a mobile tracking system solely to up your odds of catching a foul ball and they put the odds in catching four in one game at progressive field at about 1 in 1 trillion. Make sure to follow me on Twitter @jaketapper and also @theleadcnn, and check out our show page @cnn.com/thelead for videos, blogs and extras.

That's it for THE LEAD. I'm Jake Tapper. I now turn you over into the able hands of Wolf Blitzer. He's right next door in "THE SITUATION ROOM" -- Mr. Blitzer.