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Obama Speech on ISIS; Kerry Travels to Baghdad; Interview with Sen. Dan Coats of Indiana; Goodell: NFL Has Domestic Abuse Problem

Aired September 10, 2014 - 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: Happening now in the NEWSROOM, President Obama set to deliver a primetime address tonight. This morning we have new details about his strategy to take on the brutal ISIS militants. And it could involve airstrikes in Syria.

The Secretary of State John Kerry, as I said, expected to speak at any minute now.

And NFL commissioner Roger Goodell answering questions this morning about the violent elevator video that shows running back Ray Rice knocking out his future wife. What did the league know and when did they know it.

Also two new iPhones and a smart watch. Are you ready to line up at the Apple Store after the big unveiling?

Let's talk live in the CNN NEWSROOM.

And good morning, I'm Carol Costello, thank you so much for joining me.

ISIS, tonight, one day before the anniversary of 9/11. We will finally hear from President Barack Obama. We'll hear about his game plan for degrading and eventually defeating the terror organization after weeks of mixed messages and the rising tide of calls for action.

The primetime address will be Obama's best chance to prove once and for all he does indeed have a strategy to combat this growing ISIS threat.

Whatever the president's plan, air superiority will be the key. Airstrikes against ISIS are already underway in Iraq. And now as I said, U.S. officials say airstrikes in Syria are a real possibility.

And the sales job is not limited to the American taxpayers. Right now the nation's top diplomat John Kerry is in Baghdad. It is his first stop to gather Middle Eastern support to fight against ISIS.

CNN is using its global resources to follow all the angles of this rapidly changing story with correspondents and analysis and guests stationed around the world.

We begin, though, with senior White House correspondent Jim Acosta.

Good morning, Jim. What might the president say? JIM ACOSTA, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Carol, this

speech is designed to show the president is now ready to go on offense, as he said earlier this week. A senior administration officials says the president will frame the threat posed by ISIS, offering a big picture of how he views ISIS, how it's become a core national security priority and how ISIS cannot be allowed to secure a safe haven as they're calling it here in the White House in both Iraq and Syria.

He will lay out his strategy, which involves building an international coalition including air partners in the region and beefing up support for Iraqi and potentially Syrian rebel forces. But no U.S. combat boots on the ground. A senior administration official also says the president will lay out a series of new proposals on how he plans to take the fight to ISIS to degrade and ultimately destroy the terror group.

Officials say the president is open to airstrikes on ISIS targets in Syria, but whether he will hear -- whether we will hear that tonight from the President that he has authorized those strikes, that is the big question. But consider this quote from a White House official. Want to put this up on screen. It says, "Tonight you will hear from the president how the United States will pursue a comprehensive strategy to degrade and ultimately destroy ISIL including U.S. military action and support for the forces combating ISIL on the ground, both the opposition in Syria and a new inclusive Iraqi government."

Meanwhile, Carol, the White House says the president has the authority to carry out the mission. He will lay out in the speech tonight. So for now a senior administration official said the president will not be asking Congress for any additional authority. But Carol, keep in mind, officials here in the White House have said privately and publicly, they said it to me, that you have to deal with the problem of ISIS on both sides of that Iraqi/Syrian border.

I think look for the president to talk about that extensively tonight. The details, though, the details officials at this point are being very tightlipped about that as you might imagine --- Carol.

COSTELLO: Well, I must say, Jim, that much of America is confused and frankly scared about the ISIS threat. You know, we did that CNN/ORC poll and 71 percent of Americans think that ISIS poses a grave threat to the homeland. So part of the president's job tonight will be in the laying Americans' fears. I'm sure he's aware of that.

ACOSTA: I think that's right. And I think when you have something like three quarters of Americans in that CNN/ORC poll saying that they would approve of airstrikes on ISIS targets in Syria, that is an indication that in some ways the public is almost ahead of the president on this. That they are ready to strike. He may not be ready to strike or he may not be ready to authorize airstrikes in the speech tonight. But the public seems to be ready for it.

Carol, at this point, I don't think the White House needs anymore indications from the public or really frankly from the politicians up on Capitol Hill as to what to do about ISIS. I think the president is ready to take the fight to this terror group. He's gotten the message loud and clear.

The question, though, at this point, while they may be ready to expand military operations in Iraq, really provide arms and assistance to Iraqi security forces in Iraq and potentially in Syria, I think the timetable for launching airstrikes on ISIS in Syria, that is the big question because at this point, they are still assessing, I'm told, the right targets, you know, how to work with the opposition in Syria. Some of that has not been fully baked.

Also keep in mind, the president is going to go to the United Nations later this month. So that coalition building process is still in the works, if you will, at this point, Carol. So they're not -- I don't think they're at the point where the president is going to come out and lay out sort of a 10-point, you know, battle plan for going after ISIS in Iraq and Syria starting tonight. I just don't think they're there at this point but he wants to show the American people that he's ready to go on offense.

He's ready and take the fight to this terror group and frankly that he's heard Americans' concerns, as you just mentioned, loudly and clearly.

COSTELLO: All right. Jim Acosta, stand by. I want to bring people actually to Iraq on tape. We do expect the Secretary of State John Kerry to leave the embassy, the American embassy in Baghdad at any time to address the cameras, to talk about his meeting earlier with the new prime minister of Iraq. You saw pictures of him there beside Jim Acosta meeting with Iraqi officials earlier this morning.

I'm going to take you inside that room now and let you listen to a little bit of that.

JOHN KERRY SECRETARY OF STATE: We're delighted and look forward to working very closely together. Your comments today and particularly your description to me in our private meetings of the steps that you're prepared to take not only with respect to ISIL, which is critical, and your own military's commitment to reconstituting itself and to being prepared to take the fight to ISIL, but also your commitment to the broad reforms that are necessary in Iraq to bring every segment of Iraqi society to the table.

Your willingness to move forward rapidly on the oil agreements necessary with the Kurds, on the representation of Sunni in government, and participation. This is really important from the international community's point of view and certainly from the United States, which has been working so hard to achieve these things in the past years. So we're very encouraged by the comments you have made here today and by your commitment to do this.

The boldness with which you move to bring the government together quickly and meet the deadline, which has never happened before, is its own signal. So I'm grateful to you, and as I told you, the president will lay out tonight a more detailed description of exactly what the United States is prepared to do together with many other countries in a broad coalition in order to take on this terrorist structure, in which is unacceptable by any standard anywhere in the world.

COSTELLO: All right, we're going to step away with this. Again, Secretary of State John Kerry in Baghdad speaking with the new Shiite prime minister. His name is Haider al-Abadi. He took over from Nouri al-Maliki. And a lot of people blame, of course, Nouri al-Maliki for the terrible problems that are happening within Iraq since he didn't bring the country together. He was against Shiite, for example, and shut them out of the political process. And in turn, kind of degraded the Iraqi military in the process.

Elise Labott is traveling with Secretary of State John Kerry.

Of course, the reason Mr. Kerry is speaking to this new prime minister in Iraq is going to play a vital role in degrading and destroying ISIS.

ELISE LABOTT, CNN FOREIGN AFFAIRS REPORTER: Well, vital role, Carol, really the center piece of the administration's strategy. The U.S. is hoping that a new Iraqi government that is more inclusive, that gives marginalized Sunni Arabs more of a power-sharing role in the government, a stake in the future of the country will be able to get these people to turn away from ISIS and actually shun them.

And that's what Secretary Kerry will be doing today in meetings with leaders. He is really stressing the idea of making sure that this Iraqi government is including all of the sects and solving old grievances not just with the Sunnis, but with the Kurds. Another thing that they're going to be looking for the Iraqis to do is have Sunnis become part of the National Guard. So this way they're in fact just like you had the Sunni awakening in which local tribes were fighting, really teaming up with American troops to fight al Qaeda.

He wants these local tribes to become part in a sense of a national military, they will become part of the security structure and they will be fighting ISIS. Clearly, a long way to go, but Secretary Kerry saying today that he does see some progress in the formation of a new government. Tomorrow he'll be traveling to Jeddah, Saudi Arabia where he will be meeting with Gulf nations to enlist their support for this fledgy government. Not just with military support of cracking down on financing and the flow of foreign fighters, which is really seen as the lifeblood of this group.

COSTELLO: All right. Elise Labott, I'll let you get back to it.

As we said, we expect John Kerry to make formal remarks outside of the embassy there in Baghdad. When he starts making those remarks, of course, we'll take you back to Baghdad live.

I've got to take a break. When I come back, we'll -- we'll check in with Republican Senator Dan Coats to get his thoughts on Congress' role in degrading and defeating ISIS. I'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: All right. As I told you at the top of the show, President Obama is expected -- actually he will make a primetime address tonight to lay out his strategy to degrade and destroy ISIS. The president's speech will come your way at 9:00 p.m. Eastern Time.

I want to bring in Republican Senator Dan Coats of Indiana now. He's a member of the Senate intelligence committee and the ranking member of the Homeland Security Appropriations Committee.

Welcome, sir.

SEN. DAN COATS (R), INDIANA: Thank you.

COSTELLO: What do you want to hear from the president tonight?

COATS: What I'd like to hear is a very clear definition of the threat as well as the proposal and the strategy to deal with this threat. As you know, many know, that I have been critical of the president for not taking the leadership during crisis times. This is his moment because this is a threat that we face that impacts on the world as well as the United States and the president needs to stand up and take leadership, so I hope he will do that to find clearly what his goal and strategy is, try to pull a coalition together, which I think is absolutely necessary to succeed here.

American invasion, troops on the ground has proven in Iraq and Afghanistan, it does not solve the problem. We need to bring the moderate nations in with us. They are at stake. Their culture, the perversion of their religion, we're looking at barbarism here in a form that we haven't seen in our lifetime, and it needs to be addressed.

COSTELLO: Senator, I want you to take a look at this picture because I found it interesting. President Obama met with congressional leaders to talk about ISIS. When you look at the picture of them meeting at the White House, there it is, they don't look like people actually want to be in the same room together. But it's vital they work together to defeat ISIS.

Is it possible to put partisanship aside?

COATS: We have no other choice. We must put partisanship aside. This is a threat to the world order. This is a moral issue that faces not just people in the Middle East, but faces us with foreign fighters coming back into our country, to European countries, bringing this form of barbarism back to our shores.

So, this is something that steps above politics regardless of the election, regardless of anything else. This is a challenge for all of us.

But we do need a leader. And the president is that person. George Bush had his 9/11.

This is President Obama's defining moment. We'll see what he says tonight. And I hope we can support and do what's right for the future of America and for the world.

COSTELLO: I hope so. But it seems like we just can't escape the midterm elections. I mean, one of the senators in that room, Mitch McConnell, he just released a campaign ad criticizing the president for a lack of strategy.

Let's watch just a bit of that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

AD NARRATOR: These are serious times.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That ISIS can't be defeated without hitting --

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Three hundred and eleven thousand jobless claims.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Waves of unaccompanied children, 52,000.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Obamacare has a potential to be the train wreck.

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We don't have a strategy yet.

AD NARRATOR: In Kentucky, we have a proven leader.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: So, there are valid criticisms contained within that ad for sure. But again, don't our leaders have to unite to defeat this new threat?

COATS: Well, absolutely we do. Unfortunately, we're behind the curve here. We're behind the curve because the president has not given us the leadership we need prior to this point.

As I said, we have to push that aside and say, this is the defining moment. This is the threat that goes to all Americans and people around the world that believe in a civilized, orderly rule of law world instead of this barbarism that's taking place through ISIS -- a well-organized, well-funded, well-managed growing daily group of those who want to impose a radical agenda on the world and they have named us as direct threat as well as Europe.

So, it's time for us all of us to step up to the occasion and not let politics interfere with what we need to do as a world to deal with this problem.

COSTELLO: OK. So, the president, we hear, he claims airstrikes over Syria. He says he doesn't need congressional approval for that. In your mind, does he?

COATS: You know, we have been debating this issue back and forth forever. What we need to do is ensure that the American people know exactly what the threat is, that what the strategy is and we need to stand together.

Any president is wise for that president to bring to the Congress the American people's representatives, the plan and give support behind him. If not, it will fail. And so, that's a challenge for the president. We'll see if he's up to it this evening. COSTELLO: All right. Republican Senator Dan Coats of Indiana, thank

you so much for joining me this morning.

COATS: Thank you.

COSTELLO: I appreciate it.

CNN will have -- thank you, sir.

CNN will have live coverage of the president's address beginning tonight at 9:00 p.m. Eastern Time. I'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: The NFL commissioner finally admits we have a problem. It's true. On CBS this morning, Roger Goodell says maybe the NFL doesn't have a clue about how to deal with domestic violence. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NORAH O'DONNELL, CBS NEWS: Is domestic violence more widespread than in the general public? Do you look at the NFL and say, I'm the commissioner, we've got a problem.

ROGER GOODELL, NFL COMMISSIONER: Absolutely. We're saying, we have a problem. We have one incident, that's a problem. And what we want to do is by the policy that we implemented two weeks ago is say, we haven't done this right.

We have had lots of conversations, lots of listening and learning right here in this room, with experts not just in the last two weeks or three weeks or month, but over the last couple years say, how can we deal with this issue better? How can we prevent cases from happening? And when they do happen, how can we send the right message to say this is unacceptable?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: As you well know, ray rice has been suspended indefinitely, but that only happened after the world saw videotape of him punching his then fiancee, Janay.

Goodell, no matter how contrite, cannot escape the calls for him to step down. The National Organization for Women has joined the chorus. They are citing statistics from the NFL arrest database. Since 2000, there have been 83 domestic violence arrests -- by far, the most arrested any offense involving an NFL player.

CNN's Andy Scholes is here and also Michaela Pereira joins me.

Welcome to you both.

So, let's start with you, Andy, for the nuts and bolts. The heat is on Goodell. It's not likely he's going to step down, though, right?

ANDY SCHOLES, CNN SPORTS CORRESPONDENT: No, there's no way you can see Roger Goodell leaving his job. You know, he made $44 million last year as a commissioner of the NFL for a reason because he makes NFL owners a lot of money.

But what -- in this CBS interview, he said a lot of things that maybe put him on the hot seat because fans aren't buying some of the stuff he said. He didn't see the tape of Ray Rice hitting his now wife and he didn't know what was on it.

What? I thought we all knew what was on it. Ray Rice said to the Ravens and to probably Roger Goodell, that he punched his then fiancee and she fell, flip (ph) her head, hit a bar and was knocked out. So, him saying he didn't know what was on this tape, it's hard to believe.

And this takes me back to bounty-gate, Carol, because, you know, Roger Goodell used to be considered the guy that handed out the stiff suspensions. Back when bountygate happened with the New Orleans Saints, he suspended Sean Payton for the entire year, because he said, "Even if you didn't know what was going on with your team, you should have."

So, he said that back then. It's the exact case right now. Roger Goodell, if he didn't know what was on that tape, he should have. And that's why he might be on the hot seat.

COSTELLO: Well, I think he is in the hot seat. It's getting hotter. So, in the days to come, it will be interesting. He's going to have to continue to say other things about this incident, because he has to explain himself to NFL fans, Michaela.

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR, NEW DAY: Absolutely has to explain himself to NFL fans. You know, I had an opportunity today on "NEW DAY" to speak to somebody who has a unique perspective on this. Dewan Williams married to Wally Williams, played with the Browns, Ravens, the Saints, she has a very interesting and very personal and very candid take on her own experience with domestic violence.

She said when she went to the NFL, not only did they not acknowledge it, they didn't act, they didn't support her. And she says she's not the only one. I want you to take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PEREIRA: Patted you on the head, is that what it felt like?

DEWAN WILLIAMS, MARRIED TO RETIRED NFL PLAYER: It happened to me, it happened to others. And it will continue to happen.

PEREIRA: Did it happen to others or did you think? Did you and other wives speak? Tell us about that.

WILLIAMS: It was a common practice. I had friends who had black eyes, they said they walked into cupboards. I had friends who said they ran them over like on the football field. You have these men -- they are playing violent sport and it's OK to use aggression and force and to enforce their will on someone else on the football field. They come home at night and they are not used to not getting their way. So, when you say no, when you say you're not going to do this, they

enforce their will. And you don't stop it, you don't break it. If you call the police, the police say you don't want this in the news.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PEREIRA: I was so surprised by how candid she was.

You gasped. I did too. I mean, that's shocking to hear. What surprised me, though, Carol, too, is she's not among the voices to support Ray Rice's suspension. At first, I thought why is this? You think this woman would be on the side of suspending him for life.

She says, he shouldn't be made a poster child for a problem that is league-wide. Why should he have to penance for everything, everyone else has done?

COSTELLO: That's fascinating.

PEREIRA: Isn't that interesting?

COSTELLO: For me, I'm up in the air about a lifetime suspension for Ray Rice. To me, the legal system has to be reviewed. The judicial system, like why did he just get counseling for clocking his fiance?

PEREIRA: A couple separate things. You're right, from a criminal investigation point of view, and then the league point of view. I feel those two things have to be dealt separately alongside each other. But they have to be dealt with separately.

COSTELLO: I think the bigger problems in the legal system. I don't understand how that can happen, Andy, because the attorney general saw the tape.

SCHOLES: Yes, I was going to make the point that, you know, Ray Rice, he is suspended indefinite live right now, but there are guys -- Greg Hardy who was convicted of domestic violence, and then you have Ray McDonald who has pending charges, they are playing right now. Just because we don't have a videotape of their incident, and that's what it boils down to.

PEREIRA: And as you said to us yesterday on "NEW DAY," Carol, all of those people, all of those victims of domestic abuse where there isn't video, where it's not happening in public, where it's not happening in a public space.

COSTELLO: That's right. It's easy to close your eyes and pretend it's not happening.

PEREIRA: It's right there.

COSTELLO: Right in front of you.

Thanks, Michaela. Thank you, Andy Scholes.

Still to come, as an anxious nation awaits President Obama's speech tonight on ISIS, what should he say to soothe concerns? We'll talk about that, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)