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Legal View with Ashleigh Banfield

Cancer Survivor Joins Fit Nation; Obama to Speak on ISIS Threat; ISIS Threatens Twitter Employees; Kerry Calls ISIS a "Cancer" That World Must Address

Aired September 10, 2014 - 12:30   ET

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

ASHLEIGH BANFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Congressman, thanks so much for being with us, live. First of all, I think I'm a little confused. Sometimes I hear the president say that he does not need Congressional authority for what he wants to do to combat ISIS, ISIL, whatever anyone wants to call these thugs.

And yet Congress -- that's you -- often says, yes, he does. So what is it?

REP. PETER KING (R), HOMELAND SECURITY COMMITTEE: We have different views. My view is that the president as commander in chief has the constitutional authority to carry out -- if he's talking about attacks in Syria and Iraq, I strongly believe as commander in chief he has the constitutional right to do that without going to Congress.

I think what should be done -- ideally the president to take whatever action he feels is necessary, start taking that action and Congress should ratify what he's doing.

But the president should not wait for Congress to act. I think Congress should be heard on this, though, not just for the president's sake but for the country's sake, to show a united front.

So as quickly as possible, probably wouldn't be until -- probably in November. But have a resolution of approval by the Congress, ratifying what the president is doing.

BANFIELD: I want to take you to task. I remember many years ago Congress was asked to make a very controversial vote that came back to bite a lot of them.

I think Hillary Clinton has felt that the most in terms of giving the authority for going into Iraq. I wonder if congressmen are trying to duck worrying about that this time around?

KING: If you don't have the guts to vote on war or peace, you don't deserve to be in Congress. I have no sympathy for those people.

We're not talking about a highway bill or something. We're talking about whether or not people should live or die. It's the most important decision any member of Congress can make. If you duck that decision, you don't belong here.

BANFIELD: Let me ask you this. It was only a year ago the president was asking you and your colleagues in Congress to rally around the air strikes against Assad in Syria for the use of chemical weapons against his own people.

Is the ISIL threat a bigger problem for America?

KING: I supported the president. I met at the White House with his chief of staff, Denis McDonough, and other Republicans who supported the president on that. The president made that request at the last minute. I publicly supported it.

This year, I think what has changed is, when people thought of chemical weapons in Syria, they thought it was just people in Syria that were going to be killed. Now seeing the brutal executions of Americans by ISIS has brought home to the American people how deadly, vicious and diabolical is ISIS, and that's brought pressure on the members of the Congress.

BANFIELD: Let me ask you about this so-called blank check. It's a fund the president has had in front of Congress for about five or six months now. It's about $500 million -- excuse, $5 billion to fight terror, and many in Congress have said, don't ask us for that amount of money without giving us specifics.

Do you think the unbelievable advance of ISIS and the crisis that it's presented has made the specifics a little less necessary now?

KING: I would think so. There's no reason that can't resolved. You're never going to get specifics down to every dollar and cent. If both sides are serious, if the White House and Congress are serious, that should been easy issue to resolve.

We're talking about war or peace, talking about stopping a brutal terrorist organization which is almost a terrorist nation state now. We shouldn't get bogged down in those type of details because I think certainly the broad parameters can be agreed on. And that's important to go ahead on.

BANFIELD: It's always good talking to you. I sure appreciate you taking the time, Congressman King.

KING: Thank you, Ashleigh.

BANFIELD: Thanks.

KING: Thank you.

BANFIELD: And, by the way, a reminder to our viewers, you can watch the president's speech live right here on CNN. Nine o'clock Eastern time, it gets under way.

Are ISIS terrorists threatening Twitter now? Really? Twitter workers?

Find out why social media employees are being targeted now or potentially could be if the threats are real.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) BANFIELD: So it seems not even Twitter is safe from ISIS. This is just one of the warning tweets directed at anyone who dares to shut down ISIS-related accounts, and I'll quote.

"The time has arrived to respond to Twitter's management by directly attacking their employees and physically assassinating them."

Joining me to talk about these threats is CNN correspondent Samuel Burke. First of all, I can't believe that this has actually happened. But what's been the reaction from Twitter?

SAMUEL BURKE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: And this is just one in a series of tweets that you read. There were other ones directed at Twitter employees and calling for more attacks against employees in Europe.

I spoke to the folks at Twitter, and I asked them, have they done anything specific, stepped up security at their offices here in the U.S. and around the world. They wouldn't tell me that.

But they did say -- a spokesperson told me, quote, "Our security team is investigating the veracity of these threats with relevant law enforcement officials."

BANFIELD: What kind of law enforcement officials, and how close do they think they are to figuring out who's doing this?

BURKE: So we talked to the FBI, and they told CNN's Pamela Brown that they are aware -- the FBI is aware of these threats, and they will take any steps they have to. They will do any investigation necessary as appropriate.

Who are these people? It's very difficult to say. We have Arabic speakers here at CNN who are tracking ISIS very closely on social media, and sometimes you see differences in nuance and language.

But we have to remember, there are a lot of people who may not be part of the main ISIS group who are pledging allegiance to ISIS in various parts of the Middle East, all over the Middle East.

BANFIELD: And it could be a lone wolf, for all we know as well, but hopefully it's trackable.

One last quick question, there are some reports out there suggesting that it might actually be beneficial to keep the accounts up because then you can keep an eye on who's who.

BURKE: I speak to a lot of counterterrorism analysts who track ISIS very closely on social media. They've also told me about whispers of that, possibly governments saying, could you keep this up?

But never seen any proof of that. The counterterrorism officials I speak to, what I've seen, in fact, to the contrary, we've been told by administration officials that the White House has gone to Twitter and said, please take down content.

And these tweets that you just read, they have been taken down by Twitter.

BANFIELD: All right, well, keep us posted if they find out who it is, definitely update us on that one.

Sam Burke, thank you. Nice to see you back with us.

By the way, Twitter is looking into the threats, but the spokesperson for the social media site telling CNN that they are clearly finding this a very important issue.

BANFIELD So, next, coming up, what military options does the U.S. have in its fight against ISIS? Our experts are going to weigh in next on what role the U.S. forces might play.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BANFIELD: Welcome back to LEGAL VIEW.

Tonight, the president outlines his plan to bring down the militant group known as ISIS.

We're told he's going to be specific about the military missions to take out the fighters on the ground, and also missions to take away their money and cut them off from the rest of the world as well.

So the specific part comes from the secretary of state, who is in Baghdad right now. John Kerry calling ISIS a cancer that needs to be stopped. He also said there is no way the U.S. is going to do it alone.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN KERRY, SECRETARY OF STATE: Nearly every country on Earth could have an ability and an interest to join in this effort, whether by providing military assistance, by helping to track and stop the flow of foreign fighters, helping to track and stop the flow of money,

All of these are things that sustain ISIS' terrorism, and all of them are things that are subject to impact by other countries in the world.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: CNN military analyst Lieutenant Colonel Rick Francona is here to talk about this. Also Professor Austin Long from Columbia University School of International and Public Affairs, who also just so happened to be a former analyst and adviser for the multinational Iraq forces.

You're perfect, both of you, for this.

I'm going to start with you, colonel, if I can. If that's the case, if what we're going to hear tonight is that yes, indeed, bombs from the skies will start dropping over Syria sometime soon, what could possibly go wrong?

LT. COL. RICK FRANCONA (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: There are so many moving parts in Syria, a lot could go wrong. As long as we know what we're doing there and who we're going to hit. But the problem will be, who are you going to bomb, what are you going to bomb, what are the target sets going to be? In Iraq, it's much more defined. We know who the bad guys are. We know where they are. I don't think our --

BANFIELD: And by the way, we have people who have specific expertise in calling those kinds of strikes in with their boots on the ground.

FRANCONA: Yes, but are they in Syria?

BANFIELD: Right.

FRANCONA: Are we willing to put them in Syria? Are we going to put them in harm's way there? Iraq is one thing because we control the airspace and we have a lot of sway in what goes on in the country. Syria, still kind of a wild card and many, many moving parts, so it would be very dangerous.

BANFIELD: Speaking of the moving parts, Austin, this notion that there's this potential for arming and training the friendly insurgents -- I hate to even use the word because I know many, many years ago we called the mujahedeen in Afghanistan friendlies. How do you determine who are the friendlies? How do you determine how long they'll stay friendlies?

AUSTIN LONG, FORMER ADVISER, MULTINATIONAL FORCES, IRAQ: That's the real issue is it's very difficult to tell who is friendly at all. There are many groups that are fighting against the Islamic state. But it's not clear in ideology they are all that much different. So finding out who your potential - and I think you have to put friends in quotation marks, your "friends" are is very difficult. It's probably the key intelligence challenge.

FRANCONA: And it changes day to day because you'll see this patchwork of different Islamist groups and the Free Syrian Army and they will make temporary accommodations in a certain area to do certain fighting. So on one day you would be allied with one group and then anti them the next day.

BANFIELD: For the kids that are 25, the friendlies were the mujahedeen, who ultimately turned into al Qaeda, as we know them, who ultimately, you know, morphed into what we've got now with ISIS.

Let me just ask you guys both to weigh in on a statement from Marie Harf, the State Department spokesperson, who talked yesterday about what this coalition needs to deliver, effectively not just a military coalition but a financial coalition, a diplomatic coalition, a coalition to fight foreign fighters and a humanitarian coalition. Are all of those the buzzwords that you need to bring in, say, a Qatar, a UAE, a Saudi Arabia, A Jordan, a Lebanon, you know, who have been pretty darn quiet up till now?

FRANCONA: I'll start. On the military side, I don't think you're going to see any coalition troops on the ground until the U.S. commits to providing the leadership. And that means U.S. boots on the ground. Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Jordan, even the Turks, we could see them provide forces, but they will not do it unless there are U.S. troops there. The U.S. has to pony up.

BANFIELD: But even though these are the countries, you know, Qatar, you know, excluded, that actually share borders and could ultimately end up as ISIL territory. Don't they have the most at stake, Austin? Shouldn't they be the ones putting boots on the ground?

LONG: They do, but they can't agree on what to do. I mean if you look at Libya right now, Qatar and the UAE are essentially fighting a proxy war against one another there. So you can draw a big tent, but you have to get everybody on the same page inside that tent. So -

BANFIELD: So, colonel, are you serious that these other countries won't join the coalition with boots on the ground unless America puts boots on the ground? So no one effectively is going to be actually willing to step on that turf?

FRANCONA: I don't see them doing - this is - you know, you've talk a good game, United States, but, you know, and you're willing to do air strikes. But when it comes to putting boots on the ground and have to do the slugging out and fighting, you know, face to face these guys, you want us to do it? I think they're in a -- they're in the position, they have the luxury of sitting back and watching because they believe that we broke Iraq, now we have to fix it.

BANFIELD: And just one last question as to the money, because that seems to be a big part of discussions, and we may hear a lot about it from the president tonight. Austin, money and things that money can buy, can they be easily tracked, say, five years down the road when those things can, you know, all of a sudden be overrun and taken by an enemy of the United States?

LONG: Yes, that's true of everything. It's true of money. It's true of weapons, et cetera. And the Islamic State, one of their core strengths is the ability to get money and do things with it.

BANFIELD: All right, well, both of you, terrific, and I'll be looking forward to see what the president has to say and we'll have to have you both back to reanalyze whether we had the right idea or whether we are in for a big, long haul. I think no matter what, we're in for a big, long haul on this one.

Austin Long, Colonel Rick Francona, thank you.

Remember, you can tune in to see the president's speech on ISIS tonight, CNN, 9:00 Eastern Time.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Eighteen months ago, Jamil Nathoo was in his prime, young, healthy and training for a triathlon. But race day came and went.

JAMIL NATHOO, CANCER SURVIVOR: I was diagnosed with stage three c testicular cancer and it had spread into my abdomen and chest. GUPTA: His triathlon dreams had to be put on hold as he battled the

cancer with chemotherapy and surgery. It took a toll on his body. But he was determined to get healthy again.

NATHOO: I owe it to myself and I owe it to other cancer patients and survivors to let them know that you can be fit again. You can be healthy again.

GUPTA: Nathoo started training and joined the CNN Fit Nation triathlon team. Over the past seven months, he has rebuilt his strength in the water, on the bike, on the run. Even held a cycling fund-raiser in New York, raising more than $30,000 for Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. And now he is cancer-free, ready for his next triathlon this weekend with the Fit Nation team.

NATHOO: I feel good. I feel strong. I feel like I'm ready for next week. It's exciting to kind of just feel like me again.

GUPTA: And he has a renewed determination to his cause.

NATHOO: I took an oath early on that if I can get through it, that even if I can get through the ordeal, the journey will never be over for me.

GUPTA: Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN, reporting.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

BANFIELD: And I've got some breaking news to update you on a case that we brought you some time ago about a 19-year-old woman in Colorado who had been caught on a jetway at Denver International Airport on her way to Germany. She had admitted, according to the police, several times in several different interviews that she was headed over to join an ISIS fighter, to marry the ISIS fighter and ultimately to become a nurse for ISIS forces.

Shannon Conley has now entered a guilty plea in U.S. district court. This happened just this morning. She is - she was facing this charge of conspiracy to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization. And she could face up to five years in a federal prison, as well as a $250,000 fine. She's made this agreement but pending some psychological evaluation and, of course, the probation department often does presentencing evaluations. She will ultimately be sentenced later on. I think the date of which is coming up, January 23rd of next year, 2015. So there you go, Shannon Conley entering a guilty plea, helping ISIS fighters.

Thanks, everyone, for joining us. Stay tuned. "WOLF" starts right after this quick break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Right now, President Obama and the White House finalizing his address to the nation tonight, a speech in which the commander in chief will announce that the United States, for all practical purposes, is launching a new war. This one against ISIS terrorists, not only in Iraq but in Syria as well.