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More Cases of Misconduct at TSA; Weiner Camp Apologizes for Comments; A-Rod Expected to Fight Any Ban; Unfinished Business for Congress; Unfinished Business for Congress; American Economy Grows in 2nd Quarter

Aired July 31, 2013 - 09:00   ET

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


CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: You have a great day. Thanks so much.

PEREIRA: Thank you, Carol.

BOLDUAN: Thanks, carol.

COSTELLO: NEWSROOM starts now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: Happening now in NEWSROOM fighting forgery and the F-word. Oh, the TSA and their bad behavior from stealing out of your bags to sleeping on the job.

REP. JOHN MICA (R), FLORIDA: Why are there so many cases and then what is TSA doing about it?

COSTELLO: This morning the agency we love to hate in the hot seat.

Also, are they a drug or nutrition?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Red Bull gives you wings.

COSTELLO: Red Bull rock star monster. Should the energy drinks you see in your grocery store every day be regulated just like alcohol?

Plus, NASCAR shocker. Tony Stewart's sprint car flipping over five times and he walks away.

And pictures of a princess. Diana, played by Naomi Watts, the people's princess. A new movie, new photos and an unbelievable story.

You're live in CNN NEWSROOM.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: Good morning. Thank you so much for joining me. I'm Carol Costello.

There are few government agencies Americans love to hate more than the TSA and this morning the agency is in hot water over bad behavior.

The Transportation Security Agency was set up after 9/11 to protect us, but it is perhaps best known for those pat downs that feel more like assaults, or worse when a child is involved. Remember this little boy who was forced to remove his shirt in 2010?

Well, that same agency is dealing with more than that this morning. Cases of misconduct by TSA agents showed 26 percent over the past three years. More than 9,000 cases were reported. Everything from stealing to letting family and friends skip through security lines to sleeping on the job. In fact, close to 2,000 of those cases could have been security threats.

Next hour, the TSA will have to answer to the House Homeland Security Committee about that report. But for now our Rene Marsh is in Washington with more on the uptick in misconduct.

Good morning.

RENE MARSH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol. You know, the reporting of misconducts and follow-up needs improvement, as well as their policies. They're a bit inconsistent. That's what we expect to hear at this hearing from lawmakers very critical of the TSA and some of these employees who are behaving badly.

Now some of the misconduct is commonplace, excessive absence or tardiness, but some is troubling and it could have a major impact on security.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARSH (voice-over): The list includes everything from forgery, sexual misconduct to physical fighting and using abusive language.

MICA: There is not even a way to properly report some of the offenses, so this may just be the tip of the iceberg of some of the offenses.

MARSH: It's the agency some fliers love to hate. Posting their pat- down.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But if you touch my junk I'm going to have you arrested.

MARSH: But now criticism from the government, not for pat down procedures, but for incidents like this. TSA screener supervisor Michael Arato admitted accepting bribes and kickbacks from a co-worker who stole money from passengers at checkpoint at New Jersey's Newark Airport.

And at New York's JFK TSA employee Persad Coumar pleaded guilty to stealing $40,000 from a checked bag. The report also notes in a three-year span more than 9,000 cases of TSA misconduct were documented, 56 screeners were involved in thefts and more than 1900 incidents that could hurt security like sleeping on the job and allowing family and friends to bypass security.

The union representing screeners says the numbers suggest a majority of screeners are doing a great job. DAVID A. BORER, GEN. COUNSEL, AMERICAN FEDERATION OF GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES, AFL-CIO: If you look at a population the size of a small city, 56,000 people in this workforce, and the numbers then on an annual basis are really very, very small.

MARSH: Congressman John Mica, a longtime critic of the TSA, called for the audit.

MICA: Why are there so many cases and then what is TSA doing about it? The report says they really can't get a handle on it. That raises a lot of issues.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MARSH: Well, the government wants the TSA to make improvements to how they monitor allegations of misconduct. We did reach out to the TSA and they tell CNN that they're already working to implement the recommendations -- Carol.

COSTELLO: All right. Rene Marsh reporting live this morning.

Signs this morning Weiner campaign may be imploding. First Anthony Weiner's campaign manager quit, now Weiner's communications director has apologized after bashing, and I mean bashing a former campaign intern.

In an interview with the liberal blog "Talking Points Memo" Barbara Morgan called Weiner's former intern, and forgive me for saying this, but it's the only word I can share with you this morning, she called that intern a slutbag, and worse. Trust me, I can't say the rest on television.

Morgan was upset the intern had spilled some inside information to the "New York Daily News" and so she thought her mean girl comments were off the record. In the meantime, Weiner has released a new campaign ad insisting he don't quit.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANTHONY WEINER (D), NEW YORK MAYORAL CANDIDATE: You know, sometimes people say to me, you know, you, this campaign is pretty rough. You may want to quit. I know that there are newspaper editors and other politicians that say, boy, I wish that guy Weiner would quit. You don't know New York. So you don't know me. Quit isn't the way we roll in New York City.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: CNN's Rosa Flores is live in New York to tell us more. And, yes, there is more.

Good morning.

ROSA FLORES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Carol, you know, just when you thought all of the bomb shells had dropped in this story, nope, yet we are here, again. Another distraction to Anthony Weiner's message to the people of New York and what has become very typical of this ongoing scandal like Carol said, it's filled with words not fit for TV.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

WEINER: Someone wants to come out with something embarrassing about you in your private life, you've got to talk about that for a little bit.

FLORES (voice-over): Weiner in damage control mode, tweeting out a revamped online message.

WEINER: You know, sometimes people say to me, you know, you, this campaign is pretty rough. You may want to quit. Quit isn't the way we roll in New York City.

FLORES: But his message could be drowned out once again by an explosive and graphic rant by Weiner's lead spokeswoman Barbara Morgan about a former intern's criticism of the campaign in the "New York Daily News." In a four-letter word rampage to "Talking Points Memo" Morgan used offensive language including the word "slut" and other expletives. Describing the ex-intern Olivia Nuzzi as fame hungry, then threatening to sue Nuzzi while saying she, quote, "sucked at her job."

In a statement to CNN Morgan said, quote, "In a moment of frustration I used inappropriate language in what I thought was an off-the-record conversation. It was wrong and I am very sorry."

But that's not all. The controversy escalated again following Weiner's response to "Daily News'" columnist Dennis Hamill. When asked, "There is no one who are sexting now," his answer, quote, "You can quibble about beginnings, middles and ends, but what we're talking about is over a year ago."

So we asked the question ourselves. But we couldn't hear his answer. Morgan, the same spokesperson now tangled up in her own media frenzy, confirmed his response to us following the event.

(On camera): What was his answer?

BARBARA MORGAN, ANTHONY WEINER'S COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR: The answer was no.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FLORES: So despite all of the noise around all of these new developments, Weiner continues to hit the campaign trail today. He has one event scheduled for 7:30 this evening.

And, Carol, we will of course be standing by for any new developments and we will share as much as we can -- Carol.

COSTELLO: Just makes my head hurt. It really does.

(LAUGHTER) Rosa Flores, many thanks to you.

The FBI reportedly offered to fly Edward Snowden's father to Moscow in an attempt to persuade the NSA leaker to come on home and face criminal charges. But Snowden's father told the "Washington Post" he backed out of the plan when the FBI could not assure him he would actually be able to talk with his son. He didn't want to be a pawn either.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LON SNOWDEN, EDWARD SNOWDEN'S FATHER: I was asked if I would consider flying to Moscow. And I said, yes, however, I want to know what the objective is because -- and I want to be able to speak to my son to see if there is value because I'm not going to fly to Moscow to sit on the tarmac to be an emotional tool for you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: Edward Snowden has been at the Moscow airport, as you know, since June. He's applied for temporary asylum in Russia. Snowden faces espionage charges for leaking information on the U.S. government surveillance program that tracks the phone calls of millions of Americans.

Happening right now, Army Private Bradley Manning in court as his sentencing phase begins. He faces up to 136 years in prison convicted in the biggest, the largest leak of classified information in U.S. history. But he was found not guilty of the most serious charge, aiding the enemy, and that spares him from a life sentence.

Manning was found guilty, though, on 20 other charges, including stealing classified information and wrongfully causing intelligence to be published on the Internet. The case has sparked a debate on what is considered whistleblowing versus what is considered espionage.

CNN senior legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin and "Guardian" journalist Glenn Greenwald discussed the issue, if you can call it that, during a segment on "AC 360."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GLENN GREENWALD, COLUMNIST, THE GUARDIAN: The thing that I find most bizarre is that anybody who would go into the field of journalism or call themselves a journalist, who would call for the prosecution and imprisonment for decades of a source like Bradley Manning who, as I said, didn't publish anything top secret the way that most sources for large media outlets in America do all the time, it's baffling. What Bradley Manning did is the job of journalists which is to bring transparency to what the government is doing.

JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: The people who wrote those cables have devoted their lives to try to make the world a better place. Particularly foreign service officers. You know maybe you disagree about that, Glenn, but I admire the foreign service a great deal and, you know, I trust their judgment about what's a secret a lot more than I do Bradley Manning.

GREENWALD: This is how journalist, investigative journalism works, Jeff, is that people inside the government with a conscience come forward when they find out things that their government is doing that are wrong.

TOOBIN: I appreciate your education to me of what journalism is, but, you know, releasing 700,000 cables in the completely blunder bust way is not the same as the work of Dana Priest and Bob Woodward.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: Bradley Manning said he just wanted the public to know what the government was up to, like when he leaked this video which showed a U.S. helicopter in Baghdad gunning down two Reuters' journalists after mistaking their cameras for guns or like the diplomatic cables on WikiLeaks that described government corruption in the Middle East. Some say those revelations triggered the Arab spring uprising.

Manning's fate now lies in the hands of a judge. It is possible Manning could testify in his defense. Experts say a likely sentence could be between 20 and 40 years.

By Friday, Alex Rodriguez and a few other players will be suspended for doping for a very, very long time. It won't end there, though. Major League Baseball can now go after their alleged source. A judge has ruled that baseball officials can sue the Biogenesis Clinic and several men associated with that clinic. The now closed South Florida clinic allegedly supplied players with banned substances.

Bleacher Reports' Andy Scholes is here to tell us why this is so important.

ANDY SCHOLES, BLEACHER REPORT: Yes, you know, Carol, this is a big win for Major League Baseball because now they can use the legal system to basically talk to and get depositions from everyone that was involved in the Biogenesis Clinic and that includes the intermediaries that, you know, worked between the clinic and the players, and deliver these performance enhancing drugs.

Now this is definitely going to be big for baseball and their case against A-Rod because, you know, he's the big fish and he is the one who's been saying all along, I'm going to fight this tooth and nail to try to get back on the field.

Now a big deal in this is MLB has already subpoenaed Yuri Sucart. Now you might remember that name because A-Rod's cousin and last time A- Rod or the first time, I should say, that he admitted to using performance enhancing drugs back in 2009, he said my cousin Yuri Sucart, he's who gave them to me, he's the one who encouraged me to use them. Basically throwing him under the bus.

So -- and Yuri Sucart's name had shown up on these Biogenesis documents. And now MLB is going to get to talk to him, get his deposition, that will help them in their case against A-Rod. You know, reportedly they want to suspend him maybe for life, ban him from the sport for life. So that's a big deal for Major League Baseball because now they can interview him and get these depositions on paper and that will definitely help them in their case against A-Rod when he tries to appeal.

COSTELLO: So all this will start going very fast now, I would suspect. Major League Baseball is not going to wait around and say, whoa, we can interview him now, we'll take our time.

SCHOLES: Exactly. By the end of the week, they're supposed to announce the suspension for A-Rod and up to as many as eight other players.

Now remember that first number that first came out, it was around 20? Now Major League Baseball saying they didn't have enough evidence to get the other guys and now maybe with these depositions they're going to get to intermediaries, maybe will get that evidence.

COSTELLO: All right. We'll talk to you in a little bit.

SCHOLES: All right.

COSTELLO: Thank you, Andy.

Your bosses probably would not like you taking a month off of work for your -- if your performance review stunk. Well, voters have to feel the same as lawmakers with a do nothing reputation leave Washington for their August vacation.

A new CNN poll shows just how fed up we are with Congress. Seventy- seven percent disapprove of how Congress is handling its job. Seventy-seven percent.

Dana Bash, that's awful.

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: It's not great but it's not surprising. And actually President Obama is going to be here to talk to members of Congress in about an hour. He is talking to House and Senate Democrats, though. And that's the thing to keep in mind, just Democrats. So this meeting today is not going to be really an attempt to do some last-minute legislating. It's going to be more about a pep rally trying to reassure members of his own party before they go home, certainly not going to do much to raise that very low approval rating.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BASH (voice-over): Let's start with the positive. A recent burst of bipartisan. A deal to make sure many student loan rates don't double. A rare meeting of all senators that led to confirmation of several Obama nominees.

SEN. BOB CORKER (R), TENNESSEE: The Senate certainly has functioned better over the last six weeks and it has in some time.

BASH: Perhaps but elementary school civics taught us a bill can't be law without the Senate and House agreeing. And both leave Friday through September with a lot left undone.

SEN. JOHN TESTER (D), MONTANA: The dysfunctionality is real. I don't know who the 9 percent are who thinks that we're working well.

BASH: Still unfinished the farm bill, governing everything from farming to food stamps. Immigration reform. It passed the Senate, but the House is developing its own plans, likely with no path to citizenship for illegal immigrants.

And again, Congress is way behind on its basic function, funding the government, which runs out of money September 30th or the government shuts down.

Conservatives like Ted Cruz say that may be necessary if they can't cut money for Obamacare.

SEN. TED CRUZ (R), TEXAS: Under no circumstances will I support a continuing resolution that funds even one penny of Obamacare.

BASH: Some Republicans oppose that tactic.

CORKER: Yes, I just think that's a very self-defeating effort.

BASH: Bob Corker will spend August continuing bipartisan talks with the White House on a spending plan.

CORKER: During August recess, most of us work harder than we do here.

BASH: Also looming, the debt ceiling. The U.S. risks defaulting on loans as soon as Labor Day.

TESTER: We could put the economy back into a tailspin and it's absolutely not the thing we want to do in Washington, D.C.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BASH: Now, they're elected to be here on Capitol Hill and legislate. But talk to many lawmakers, Carol, they say these days they're better off working for their constituents back home with them. And, you know, we are looking at the end of the week where they are going to be home for an entire month and actually five weeks for this recess. Tends to be a time where the big issues that are going to be taken up in the fall really are shaved.

Remember the angry health care rallies and people are bracing for maybe something similar when you're talking about immigration and that really could seal that bill's fate in the fall.

COSTELLO: We'll see. We're waiting with bated breath as they say.

Dana Bash, many thanks to you.

BASH: Thanks, Carol.

COSTELLO: Let's look at your money now, a surprise jump for the American economy. We're still a long way from where we need to be, though.

CNN business guru Christine Romans is in New York to break it all down for us.

Good morning, Christine.

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol.

I would say that we're crawling forward here. These economic numbers show we're crawling forward in the second quarter. Economy growing at 1.7 annual rate and that's better, better than anyone thought it would.

But look at the last three quarters and fourth quarter of last year, first quarter of this year and second quarter -- that's still below potential, still below par. You want to see it growing more.

One thing I'll say about the second quarter is that economists saying this economy is slogging through the worst of those federal budget cuts, the worst of the sequester, that's something that has been holding the economy back, the federal budget cuts and sequester. We would have done better without that. Housing a bright spot within the economy right now, but housing not really enough to really bump those numbers much higher.

Another report we just got. ADP is a private payroll processors. They do all the paychecks for companies and get a look at what the private sector is doing. Showed 200,000 jobs created in a month. Private sector, again. About 82,000 of those were small businesses, Carol. Companies with less than 50 workers.

This could be a little foreshadowing for the big jobs report on Friday. Sometimes it matches, sometimes it doesn't exactly. But what this tells us is that we are seeing some hiring, 200,000 in the private sector and, again, you want to see more, you want to see jobs with higher wages and we saw those protests this week, the fast food protests. A lot of the quantity of jobs we're creating in this country are not high-quality jobs in terms of wages and benefits. Still a structural image we have to figure out before all the Congress people go home for five weeks.

COSTELLO: Somehow I don't think anyone will figure that out at the moment. But, you know, I'm trying to see the glass half full here. I'm having trouble, Christine. But thank you so much. Bringing a little brightness to our morning.

ROMANS: You're welcome.

COSTELLO: Just ahead, police say this guy was high on magic mushrooms when he attacked them. We'll tell you what happened when the guy reached for the officer's gun.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: Checking our top stories. Twenty-two minutes past the hour. Bagged salad is believed to be the culprit in a stomach bug outbreak in Iowa and Nebraska where hundreds of people have become ill. The news comes as the CDC tries to pinpoint the exact cause of additional cases reported in 13 other states. Now, officials won't say which brands of bagged lettuce you should avoid, but the salad mixes that cause the sickness in Iowa and Nebraska, according to the CDC, have been removed from store shelves.

A bizarre story a out of Oregon where a teenager high on mushrooms wrestles with four police officers and, of course, it's all caught on camera. Police say the kid was hallucinating and at one point grabbed an officer's gun and the gun went off and fired a shot into the wall.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SGT. JIM SHUMWAY, BEAVERTON POLICE: And if you don't feel pain and you're experiencing almost super human strength because of whatever you're on he's somehow broken. During this struggle he was tased seven times and it didn't have an effect on him.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: Wow. After breaking through handcuffs, the teenager was subdued and now faces charges for assaulting a police officer and possession of a controlled substance.

Another woman has come forward accusing San Diego Mayor Bob Filner of sexual harassment. Lisa Curtin seen here in a KPBS interview is a director at San Diego City College and she says that in 2011, Mayor Filner grabbed her hand and tried to kiss her as she pulled away. That brings the total to eight women who have accused the mayor of inappropriate conduct.

Check this out, the cell phone video of a waterspout that formed over Tampa Bay. Strong storms hit the area just after rush hour yesterday. The waterspout stayed up there for about 15 minutes. Oh, that's so weird and amazing.

Indra Petersons, good morning.

INDRA PETERSONS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yes, good morning.

I mean, very typical kind of weather we see in Florida. It doesn't seem that way, but almost have own weather in the area. Because conditions are so right, we have all that warm, humid air, all it takes one cell kicking on through to spawn what we're looking at there, that waterspout. So, a again, very typical but hard to believe when you don't see that much activity in that area.

Speaking of severe weather. Flossie is gone, I want to give you an update. Gil right behind it. Very active season going on.

I wanted to superimpose Gil over Flossie's path. And here's what's so interesting -- even though it's rare to see activity in Hawaii, once again, following the identical path almost. Difference here, it's expected to be a hurricane in 48 hours. Something we're definitely monitoring here over the next few days.

Also taking a look the rest of the U.S., looking at this low now starting to produce some showers in the Northeast. I know you had a break for about a day and so much rain and another one to two inches is added to that for this summer. As far as anyone from the Midwest all the way to the Northeast, we're going to watch fast-moving cold front, really producing showers. Again, the timing of this, more showers in the Midwest and Ohio Valley and spreading to the Northeast there right around Thursday or so.

So, a lot of rain back in the forecast, Carol.

COSTELLO: All right, rain, rain, rain. Yes. Indra, thank you.

Opening bell just minutes away. We'll see if positive job report boosts stocks. We're back in a minute.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: Good morning. Thank you so much for being with me. I'm Carol Costello.

Stories we're watching right now in THE NEWSROOM, at just about 30 minutes past the hour. Screeners behaving badly. A new government audit finds more than 9,000 cases of misconduct by TSA agents over the last three years. The report also details thefts by 56 screeners. Two former employers pleaded guilty last week from stealing $40,000 from a checked bag.

A Florida judge says major league baseball can go right ahead with its suit against the biogenesis clinic. The now closed south Florida clinic supplied baseball players with banned substances. According to multiple reports, Major League Baseball told the players union that Alex Rodriguez and eight other players will be suspended this week.

Wall Street opening for business with investors having two, count them two, positive reports to pour over, one on jobs and the other on economic growth.

CNN business anchor Christine Romans is in New York and we're waiting for the opening bell to ring, but just about to ring, Christine.

ROMANS: I know. There's two, count them two economic reports and the market's doing nothing. I tell you nothing this morning.

Let me tell you first the GDP report shows the economy is growing. It is accelerating in growth. I would say it's crawling forward, 1.7 percent was the reading, much better than it was a couple months ago, a couple quarters ago. That's nothing to write home about.

A job's report, ADP number showed 200,000 private sector jobs created in the month. 200,000, that's good. We'll see if the big monthly jobs report on Friday corresponds with that or validates that number. I'll tell you, Carol, future's hardly moving and stock market barely moving. The Fed, the Fed is meeting. It's second day of a Fed meeting and everyone waiting to see what the Fed statement is going to be later this afternoon.