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Supreme Court Rejects Same-Sex Marriage Appeals; ISIS Raises Black Flags In Kobani; FBI: Khorasan Plotting Terror Attack; Ebola- Infected American Arrives In U.S.

Aired October 06, 2014 - 10:00   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning. I'm Carol Costello. Thank you so much for joining me. This just into CNN just minutes ago. The U.S. Supreme Court decided it will stay out of the same-sex marriage debate. Five states had asked the high court to review its bans.

Senior legal analyst, Jeffrey Toobin joins us by phone. So, Jeffrey, why doesn't the U.S. Supreme Court want to rule on any of these cases?

JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST (via telephone) Well, the Supreme Court doesn't explain when it declines to review so we have to infer the reason. But apparently they feel like the issue was developing at a -- in an appropriate way in the lower court at the moment.

There is no conflict among the lower courts, all the circuit courts that have addressed this issue have found that there is a constitutional right to same-sex marriage so they don't feel the -- the justices don't feel like they need to solve a dispute among the circuit courts at this point.

But I think in real life same-sex marriage is now going to become even more available, although not yet in all 50 states.

COSTELLO: Well, the five states that asked the U.S. Supreme Court to rule were Virginia, Oklahoma, Utah, Wisconsin, and Indiana. So if you're a gay couple and you're married in these states, does your marriage stand?

TOOBIN: Well, in most of those states they have not been allowed to -- yet to have same-sex marriage and I think as a result of today's decision they will be allowed to get married in those states. So I do think will that will have a substantial effect.

Today's non-decision will have an effect of legalizing same-sex marriage in those states, but it will not affect all 50 states, which would have been the case if the Supreme Court decided the issue on the merits.

COSTELLO: So some time down the line in the future the U.S. Supreme Court will take these cases under consideration?

TOOBIN: Probably at some point, but you never know with the Supreme Court. I think most people, including me, expected them to decide it this year. Obviously that's not the case yet. I think most people feel eventually the Supreme Court will have to address this question for all 50 states, but there's never a guarantee. It's just up to the justices when and whether they want to accept any case.

COSTELLO: All right, CNN's senior legal analyst, Jeffrey Toobin, thanks for your insight as usual.

In another bit of breaking news to pass along to you, ISIS fighters are on the verge of capturing the strategic Syrian city of Kobani, that's right along the Turkish border.

A short time ago, the black ISIS flag was spotted at the top of one of the city's buildings. Now we've learned ISIS has raised a second flag in the city. Kobani has been besieged for days with Kurdish fighters trying to hold off ISIS tanks and heavy artillery.

For more on the ISIS advance and what it means, let's bring in CNN's Arwa Damon on the Turkish/Syrian border. Hello, Arwa.

ARWA DAMON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Carol. That first flag you mentioned there on a building, we saw that earlier in the day, some of the residents here that have been watching ISIS' advance on Kobani saying that they believe it was hoisted in the morning.

The second flag on the hilltop put up, at least as far as we are aware, just a short time ago. This is a town that had been under siege for two weeks now as ISIS began inching closer. Now entrenching itself in the south eastern part of the city.

Just to give you an idea of how desperate the situation is, yesterday one of the top female commanders of the Kurdish fighting force, the female unit carried out a suicide mission against an ISIS position, inflicting casualties, although numbers at this stage are unclear.

The Kurdish fighting force inside the YPG has for weeks now ever since the U.S.-led airstrikes began been begging for more additional assistance, for something to be done to stop the ISIS advance.

This city is strategic for ISIS in the sense that should they capture it they would have a straight logistical route down to their stronghold of Raqqa, but there's also the humanitarian disaster continues to unfold, these fighters, these Kurdish fighters standing their ground because that is their homeland.

And they fail to understand how it is that this coalition that the U.S. seems to be so proud to put together has failed to come to assistance. They feel as if the U.S.-led coalition is simply mocking them and allowing them to become victims of this terrorist organization -- Carol.

COSTELLO: So why hasn't U.S. airstrikes targeted Kobani within the city limits?

DAMON: Well, that's a great question. What we keep hearing from U.S. officials is that they are concerned about civilian casualties, especially if ISIS is entrenched within these residential areas. However, before ISIS managed to breach the city's perimeter, they were in fairly open spaces and this is why so many people are angry and frustrated.

Last week, for example, we were watching ISIS battling it out on a hilltop completely exposed. Additionally, the Kurdish fighters will tell you that ISIS has managed to mass a fair amount of its fighters, but also its tanks, its armor, its military vehicles.

And that to get to the positions that they are in right now, they would have traveled through open terrain. You can see how open the terrain is around our position right now. And so people don't understand why the coalition did not take advantage of these situations.

The convoys, the open positions that ISIS had taken up to take them out before they even reached the outskirts of Kobani.

COSTELLO: All right, Arwa Damon, reporting live for us this morning, thank you.

The parents of an American aid worker held by ISIS are now pleading for mercy. ISIS said Abdul Rahman Kassig is the next Western hostage who will be executed.

CNN is respecting Peter Kassig's parents' wishes to now refer to him by a Muslim name. Kassig's parents revealed he had written of a letter in June in which he said, "I am obviously pretty scared to die."

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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Please know that we are all praying for you and your safe return. Most of all know that we love you and our hearts ache for you to be granted your freedom so we can hug you again.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Like our son, we have no more control over the U.S. Government than you have over the breaking of dawn. We implore his captors to show mercy and use their power to let our son go.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: In the meantime, aid worker, Alan Henning, is being mourned in his native Britain after ISIS beheaded him last week. Two hundred British mosques had appealed to ISIS to stop the execution.

A U.S. Marine is believed to be the first American casualty in the operation against ISIS. The Navy has now identified Corporal Jordan Spears as the Marine presumed lost at sea.

He bailed out of an MV-22 Osprey when it lost power. The Osprey had taken off from the USS "Mayken Island" in the Persian Gulf. Another crew member went into the water and was later rescued. The Osprey's pilot was able to regain control of the aircraft and return safely to ship. The director of the FBI is warning that the Khorasan terror group, a lesser known al Qaeda affiliate, is plotting an attack on the United States and its allies. Here's what James Comey told CBS' "60 Minutes."

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JAMES COMEY, DIRECTOR, FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION: Khorasan was working and may still be working on an effort to attack the United States or our allies and looking to do it very soon. I can't sit here and tell you whether their plan is tomorrow or three weeks or months from now. Given our visibility we know they're serious people bent on destruction and so we have to act as if it's coming tomorrow.

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COSTELLO: CNN's Evan Perez joins me now with more. So I guess those airstrikes against the Kobani group weren't effective?

EVAN PEREZ, CNN JUSTICE REPORTER: Well, Carol, the FBI director has to worry that some of these guys are escaping these air strikes. As a matter of fact, they know that some of them are still alive and plotting against the United States.

Now he made reference to the Americans who have come bag and sources tell me that there are about two dozen Americans that are back here in the United States after going to Syria.

There are various different groups over there. Some of them may have been helping pro-Assad forces. So the FBI is having a very hard time tracking all of those people obviously.

In May, there was an American who came back and went back to Syria and carried out a suicide bombing, Carol. And the worst part is the FBI didn't know about it until he had done the bombing.

COSTELLO: On another topic, Comey also called out the Chinese for, quote, "aggressive and widespread efforts to hack Americans." Tell us more about that.

PEREZ: Well, Carol, this is a big problem for the FBI. They foresee the day that terrorism will be a secondary concern in the national security area to these hacking attacks from China and other countries and here's what he had to say in "60 Minutes" yesterday.

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COMEY: There are two kinds of big companies in the United States. There are those who've been hack by the Chinese and those who don't know they've been hacked by the Chinese.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Chinese are that good?

COMEY: Actually, not that good. I liken them a bit to a drunk burglar, kicking in the front door, knocking over the vase while they're walking out with your television set. They're just prolific. Their strategy seems to be "we'll just be everywhere all the time. There's no way they can stop us."

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PEREZ: Carol, the problem with that analogy is the FBI has very little hope of ever putting in prison any of these hackers especially if they work for the Chinese military.

Earlier this year, they indicted five members of the PLA, the People's Liberation Army, for hacking into very big American companies and there's pretty much no way those people are ever going to see the inside of a U.S. courtroom -- Carol.

COSTELLO: All right, Evan Perez reporting live from Washington this morning, thank you.

Still to come in the NEWSROOM, two people here in the United States being treated for Ebola. One just arrived this morning. Now the CDC chief is going to the White House to talk all things Ebola. Jim Acosta is there. Good morning, Jim.

JIM ACOSTA, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol. Does the Obama administration have the right battle plan to prevent an Ebola outbreak here in the U.S.? The president wants an answer to that question. He's meeting with top officials at the White House later today. We'll have a live report coming up in a few minutes.

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COSTELLO: A freelance photographer infected with Ebola is back in the United States for treatment. The plane carrying Ashoka Mukpo arrived in Nebraska a short time ago. He's the second American who will be treated at that Omaha hospital.

Mukpo was diagnosed with the deadly virus on Thursday in Liberia while working with NBC News chief medical correspondent, Dr. Nancy Snyderman. Snyderman says Mukpo is in good spirits and eating and drinking on his own.

As for the first person diagnosed with Ebola in the United States, CDC officials say Thomas Eric Duncan is not being treated with an experimental serum. They say it may actually worsen his condition. He's currently fighting for his life after his condition was downgraded from serious to critical over the weekend.

Duncan flew all the way from his hard-hit homeland in Liberia to Dallas. His case now has the CDC considering enhanced screenings at major U.S. airports.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. THOMAS FRIEDEN, DIRECTOR, CDC: We're looking at all options to protect Americans because that's our number one priority. We do that 24/7. The first thing we did was to implement control measures in every airport in West Africa. Every patient who leaves, every person who leaves has their temperature monitored. The patient in Dallas had a temperature of 97.3 when he left. He didn't become ill for about four days after he arrived.

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COSTELLO: Later today the man you just heard will head to the White House. CDC Director Dr. Thomas Frieden is expected to brief President Obama on all that's going on with the Ebola fight here at home.

CNN's senior White House correspondent, Jim Acosta, joins us now at the White House. He's following that story. Good morning, Jim.

ACOSTA: Good morning, Carol. That's right. President Obama meets with Dr. Frieden from the CDC. He also meets with members of his national security team later today to talk about U.S. efforts to deal with the Ebola outbreak.

One measure under consideration, you just mentioned it, is to have the CDC do screening at airports where travelers may be coming in from West Africa. One CDC official told me over the weekend they want to make sure any new screening is worth the disruption to travelers.

And that was also a consideration that was mentioned by Dr. Anthony Fauci of the NIH when he was on "NEW DAY" earlier this morning. Here's what he had to say.

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DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: The discussion that is under way right now and all options are going to be looked at is what kind of screening do you do on the entry end. Namely, when people come in here right now.

And that's something that's on the table now and the discussion is, is that extra added layer of screening going to be worth the resources that are put into doing it?

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ACOSTA: Now, the other thing being discussed, Carol, is which airports to put this screening at. It has not been determined which airports would have this additional screening and official caution over here at the White House that no final decision has been made.

But, Carol, one interesting and perhaps worrying development that Dr. Fauci mentioned in that interview is that the federal government is out, completely out, of the ZMapp medicine, that treatment that has been help to feel people who have had Ebola so far here in the U.S.

And Dr. Fauci said -- told CNN earlier this morning it may be another month or month and a half before additional doses of that treatment, that ZMapp medicine, is available for use. So we might just have to hang on until the medicine is ready -- Carol.

COSTELLO: All right, Jim Acosta reporting live from White House this morning, thank you.

Still to come, if you love extreme couponing you will not like one grocery store chain's new policy. Business correspondent, Alison Kosik has what you need to know before checking out. Good morning.

ALISON KOSIK, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol. The crackdown could be in the works. It looks like some people are pushing the limits and grocery stores are saying "wait a minute." I'll have details coming up.

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COSTELLO: The popular grocery store chain, Publix, is changing up its coupon policies trying to crack down on extreme couponing. Really? Business correspondent, Alison Kosik is with us. Why?

KOSIK: You sound so disheartened! Get used to it. I wouldn't be surprised, Carol, if the coupon crackdown becomes a trend, especially since many of these extreme couponers push the limits of what's allowed. Not only does it wind up costing the store money, but for those waiting in line behind somebody with a stack of coupons, that can be really, really annoying.

Well, guess what? Publix is putting its foot down, changing the amount of coupons it will accept. This begins on October 18. I spoke to a Publix in South Florida. Someone picked up the phone in customer service and told me that extreme couponing there is getting out of control so they are cracking the whip.

Now at Publix you can only use eight of the same coupons per trip. You can't print out the same coupon 50 times. It will also limiting how many dollar-off coupons you can use. Let's say $10 off $100 purchases. You can only use one a day.

They'll limit how much people can save and save the company money. That's really the point there. Publix is, however, a store that is a little more lenient than others. Most grocery stores have restrictions in place.

You look at Win Dixie doesn't allow coupons that are greater than the value of the items. Kroger only accepts five manufacturers' coupons on an item at a time it so it's more restrictive than Publix.

So let's say you have six boxes of Tide and six coupons, you can only use five coupons, Carol. So sorry to burst your bubble there.

COSTELLO: I just know some people, they get free stuff at grocery stores because of extreme couponing. It's very effective and it saves people a lot of money in a tough time.

KOSIK: And they still will be able to use their coupons, just not go crazy. And you have to be organized and you have to really stay on top of it if you're an extreme couponer.

COSTELLO: It's a lot of work, Alison. KOSIK: It's like a second job, isn't it? And stores are catching on because at this point they're under pressure. You look at what happened during the recession, they got hit hard. Shoppers really, really focused on discounts and couponing, cheaper generic brands so you saw sales suffer at these stores.

Now things are picking up, the economy is getting better, families have more disposable income. They're buying more expensive products. Things are not back to where we want it. An industry report predicts that gross restore sales will only increase slightly over the next few years.

So it's a delicate balance these stores are walking. They want to still accept your coupons, they want you coming in the door, but they also don't want to be taken for more than they're trying to sell -- Carol.

COSTELLO: I understand, kind of. Alison Kosik reporting live. Thanks so much.

Still to come in the NEWSROOM, Vice President Joe Biden laying blame on our Middle Eastern allies for the rise of ISIS and, boy, are our allies angry at Joe. We'll talk about that next.

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COSTELLO: Good morning. Thank you so much for joining me. I'm Carol Costello. Vice president Joe Biden talking tough about our Middle Eastern allies saying they are partly to blame for the rise of ISIS.

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JOE BIDEN, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Our allies in the region are our largest problem in Syria. They were so determined to take down Assad and essentially have a proxy Sunni/Shi'a war, what did they do?