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Will Netanyahu Influence Congress on Iran; Interview with Rep. Adam Schiff; India Pulls Documentary on Infamous Rape; War with ISIS; Hillary Camp Pushes Back on E-mails

Aired March 04, 2015 - 10:30   ET

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

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CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: As he works to hammer out an agreement that would curb Iran's nuclear program, John Kerry says that while progress has been made quote, "significant gaps do remain". The Secretary of State added he will not be distracted by external factors or politics. His comments coming just a day after Benjamin Netanyahu warned Congress to, in his words, "not be fooled". That Iran, he says, "will always be an enemy of the United States and that any deal would pave the way to a nuclear bomb".

President Obama who did not watch Netanyahu's speech or meet with him while he was here in the United States fired back.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: On the core issue which is how do we prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, which would make it far more dangerous and would give it scope for even greater action in the region, the prime minister didn't offer any viable alternatives.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: Democratic Congressman Adam Schiff of California joins me now. Welcome, sir.

REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D), CALIFORNIA: Thank you.

COSTELLO: Congressman, you attended the speech. And after you wrote in part, quote, "We must approach negotiations with Iran with our eyes wide open and at the same time we must consider the consequences of a failure to reach an agreement and whether there's a plausible alternative to military action." Did Netanyahu say anything to address your concerns?

SCHIFF: He didn't say very much -- Carol. Look, I think the prime minister did lay out legitimate concerns that many Israelis have, that many Americans have but what I was really eager to hear is what is the alternative? If this falls through, if we go ahead and impose new sanctions, which we will, what is the likelihood that that brings Iran back to the table and what is the likelihood that in contrast it just causes Iran to spin up those centrifuges and go back to 20 percent or more highly enriched uranium, and then we really get into a discussion about where Israel's red line is and where our red line is. I would have liked to have heard a lot more on that point.

COSTELLO: And when you talk about red line, are you talking about possible military action against Iran? Could that actually happen?

SCHIFF: Well, it certainly could happen. This is where I think the prime minister's speech fell short and that is let's say we do impose these sanctions and let's say that we are able to keep the international coalition together, and that second part will be difficult, but let's say we can do that. What is the timetable that would allow these new sanctions to go into effect and pressure Iran? And what's the timetable for their newly enhanced enrichment program which is exactly what's going to happen if this falls through.

And I'm not sure there's enough time before they get to the point where Israel believes they are too close to the bomb for those new sanctions to work. And that's one of the hard choices we're going to face and one of the reasons why it's not enough in my view to say I don't like this or I don't like that. You have to provide a plausible alternative.

COSTELLO: Mr. Netanyahu also said Israel is well capable of taking care of itself. Let's say Israel did, I don't know -- did take military action against Iran. At this point in the relationship between Israel and the United States, would the U.S. Congress fully support Israel if it took military action against Iran?

SCHIFF: Well, the Congress' support for Israel remains very strong. But a lot will depend on whether the members of congress feel that we gave negotiations a chance to succeed. The American people in particular are very wary to go back to war particularly if they think there's a viable alternative to that.

And in this respect it's very dangerous to have this kind of a rift between the prime minister and the White House because while the prime minister doesn't like this agreement and doesn't feel he needs the President right now, if there's no agreement, the prime minister is going to need the President more than ever because my suspicion is if there's no agreement, those centrifuges are going to spin up with even greater alacrity the Iranians are going to bring out a new generation of centrifuges.

And in that context, Israel is going to be more dependent than ever on the United States. So yes, Israel can act on its own. It has a military power to do that. That will set back the Iranian program for a time. But the U.S. will need America more than ever in that context and so this friction I think is very ill suited to the important relationship between our countries.

COSTELLO: Democratic Congressman Adam Schiff of California -- thanks so much for your insight. I appreciate it.

SCHIFF: Thanks -- Carol.

COSTELLO: To India now where the government has told all news channels not to air a documentary about an infamous 2012 bus gang rape that sparked protests throughout the country. The reason fears that some parts of the documentary could in the government's words "appear to encourage and incite violence against women". Critics say that decision is equivalent to censorship.

Sumnima Udas is in New Delhi for more on this. Tell us more.

SUMNIMA UDAS, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Carol, this has essentially become a debate about ethics, about free speech versus the promotion of hate speech. There are three main aspects to this really. All of this that we see being played in parliament, outside parliament, on social media, in main stream media here. A lot of people say how dare the rapists say what he actually said to the filmmaker basically blaming the victim for that brutal gang rape that we saw back in 2012.

We can't talk about what exactly he said because of this government ban but really just some outrageous things there. And then there are those who ask him why the filmmaker would interview a rapist and basically given a platform. Is this responsible journalism? That's certainly what the government is asking.

And then there are those who are saying why is the government banning something when there are still people in India who think in the same way that the rapist does and this does raise awareness and it should be allowed to be broadcast.

So, a lot of different debates going on all at the same time. The government, of course, saying this documentary needs to be banned because it can incite violence. It can encourage more violence against women and the home ministry here saying that not only is this film going to be banned in India, he wants to ensure that this film is banned all over the world -- Carol.

COSTELLO: I know. Sumnima Udas -- thanks so much, reporting live from India this morning. And I know that Sumnima couldn't tell exactly you what was said in that documentary. And I'm going to find it for you so that I can share it with you so you will better understand this story. But we couldn't say it while Sumnima was on the air.

Still to come in the newsroom, controversy swirling over Hillary Clinton's e-mails -- why did she use a personal account for government business? Her side next.

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COSTELLO: In the fight against ISIS, the United States has conducted six months of air strikes, committed millions of dollars in weaponry and equipment, and will soon start training Iraqi forces to battle the terror group.

But for one religious group, a powerful religious group, it's not enough. The Southern Baptist Convention posted an open letter to President Obama asking him to quote, "Take the necessary action to bring an end to these human atrocities. The abuse, brutalization, and murder of children, women and men that is occurring before the world calls our country to lead forward and bring this to an end." So let's talk about this letter. I'm joined by one of the authors, Dr. Ronnie Floyd of the Southern Baptist Convention. Welcome, sir.

DR. RONNIE FLOYD OF THE SOUTHERN BAPTIST CONVENTION: Thank you, Carol, for the privilege. And good morning to you.

COSTELLO: Good morning. Pastor, what prompted you to write this letter?

FLOYD: We're really convinced in this urgent hour, Carol, that we are simply humbly requesting of the President of the United States to take a strong, clear, firm leadership in relationship to doing everything he can do in today's world to put an end to the crisis of ISIS.

COSTELLO: He would say sir, that he is doing everything in his power to combat is. How would you respond to that?

FLOYD: Well, my response would be is that ISIS is still growing. Obviously there are people joining the movement according to news accounts and obviously people are still being brutalized and murdered across the world, which we believe that due to the tragedy of this that these human atrocities must come to an end.

And whatever role the President would so choose to do that, it is our heart and our goal to support him and say, "Mr. President, we're behind you. Take the needed action to do what needs to be done to bring an end to this global crisis."

COSTELLO: In your mind, what is that needed action?

FLOYD: Well, Carol, I don't think our decision as a group of former presidents along with current president of the Southern Baptist Convention, which by the way is pretty well an unprecedented action which shows right there the urgency of this moment in the minds of our former religious leaders and our current president today, which is me.

Our goal is not to tell the President how to do that. The President is empowered by the people and empowered by the powers to be in this nation to bring action. And we need to do everything we can to always preserve nationally and globally for every person in the world to have the freedom to believe. And that freedom is being violated and ending up in many, many people losing their lives. And we just do not believe that's right. And we need to understand that each one of us, we believe, as Christians and followers of Christ who believe in God's word will one day stand in front of God himself and we will give an account of ourselves before God.

And I, along with these other presidents, do not want to say that we were silent, but we had simply the heartbeat and the goal to say, "Mr. President, we're behind you. Let's go and do whatever is necessary to bring an end to this crisis globally."

COSTELLO: And sir, does that include war? I bring this up because I'm Catholic. I follow the words of Pope Francis who has a difficult time in saying or using the right words when it comes to fighting ISIS. You know, protecting Christians around the world. So are you talking about war? Are you talking about killing? What are you talking about?

FLOYD: Well, Carol again, our decision is not the how. That's the role of the President and leaders of our country. I mean he can use diplomacy. He can use economic sanctions. If need be, he can use war. The purpose of the government is to award those who do good and living right and good. And the purpose of government as well would be according to scripture to punish those who are doing evil.

I mean even the United Nations believes that every person in the world has the freedom to believe and that in and of itself is a human right. And that human right is being violated right now not simply behind the scenes but is being violated for all of the world to see.

COSTELLO: All right. Dr. Ronnie Floyd, Pastor Floyd, thank you so much for being with me. I appreciate it.

FLOYD: Thank you, Carol, for the privilege. Hope you have a great day.

COSTELLO: You too. Thank you. We'll be right back.

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COSTELLO: Hillary Clinton's camp is pushing back on suggestions she may have broken the law by using a personal e-mail account during her time as Secretary of State. At a gala fundraiser last night, Clinton didn't address the growing controversy but some of her aides are talking about it. So let's talk about it ourselves.

I want to bring in senior political correspondent, Brianna Keilar, to bring us up to date. So she spoke before this gala crowd of supporters, mostly women in the crowd. But she didn't broach the subject of these e-mails why?

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: No, that's right, she didn't. Obviously She's not at the point where she wants to talk about this. I think certainly this is something that's really continues to have legs -- Carol. And I think her team is formulating still how they're going to respond to this.

It's important to note that in 2014, Hillary Clinton's team turned over 55,000 pages of e-mails to the state department. This came after a request from the Obama administration of all former secretaries of state. Remember, because her e-mail was solely a private e-mail account, Clinton and/or her aids had the discretion to turn over whichever e-mails they saw fit. They've said they complied with the request to the letter but there's really no way to be sure.

That's why experts are saying that in this case where Hillary Clinton and her aides had the sole control over the e-mails it raises some issues about why she would do this if it was just to maintain such a tight hold on her communications.

Listen to what a Republican said. This is Trey Gowdy, he is the head of the select committee on Benghazi.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. TREY GOWDY (R), SOUTH CAROLINA: The state department does not have all of Secretary Clinton's e-mails on its servers. Only she has a complete record and the committee is going to have to go to her and her attorneys and her e-mail providers to ensure we have access to everything the American people are entitled to know.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Outstanding in all of this Carol -- is why? Why did Hillary Clinton use this personal e-mail address only instead of the government account? She may not have broken the law. She certainly violated the spirit of it. And at this point the reasoning that an aide is giving is she used had her Blackberry before she was secretary of state and liked to use it afterwards and Colin Powell did something similar to this -- I don't really think it's going to hit the mark. I think they're going to need to come out with something else.

COSTELLO: Ok. We're going to talk about that next. Brianna Keilar, thanks so much.

All of this surfacing as Hillary Clinton is gearing up for what many assume will be a run for the White House. So how will this play into things and how should she combat this controversy?

I want to bring in Lanny Davis. He's a former White House special council attorney and crisis manager. He's also the author of "Crisis Tales: five rules for coping with crisis and business, politics and life". Thanks for being here. I appreciate it.

LANNY DAVIS, FORMER WHITE HOUSE SPECIAL COUNCIL ATTORNEY: Thanks -- Carol.

COSTELLO: So Hillary Clinton is going to say, you know what? I really didn't do anything wrong. I didn't really violate the law. But others say she violated the spirit of the law. I think that's pretty much all that it will take for some like the Republicans to come down hard on her.

DAVIS: So your reporter, the Republican, word "spirit" is subjective. People will react differently. They're entitled to their opinion. She should have done something different. She should have used government.

I don't do that. I do facts. Let's just start with three facts that aren't in dispute. Fact one, the law changed in 2014. What she did while she was secretary, was lawful and Secretary of State Colin Powell used a private e-mail account to correspond with foreign governments and conduct official business.

Fact two, she openly sent this e-mail to thousands of people at the State Department who knew the e-mail address wasn't government. That gives me the conclusion there was nothing intended to hide or deceive. She did it openly.

Fact three, this is really the most important fact, which we heard Congress and Gowdy a question raised about. These e-mails are completely accessible and preserved on a server. It doesn't matter whether it's a server or it's Gmail. If this is subpoena, if there's somebody at state who suggests that she's not turning everything over --

(CROSSTALK)

COSTELLO: Did you hear about the IRS and the Lerner e-mails and what happened to them?

DAVIS: They will say it and they also don't answer it which is you have the ability through the legal process to get anything you want from Secretary of State Clinton and so far 55,000 shows there's nothing to hide.

COSTELLO: Ok. Let's talk about that. She's turned over 55,000 e- mails. Why not turn over all of them?

DAVIS: Governor Bush would give you this answer. His press answer says we've been transparent. Excuse me. I love his brother. We went to college together -- the former president. I'm an admirer of Jeb Bush. He didn't put out all his e-mails. He held back his personal e-mails.

My point on facts, facts, facts; let's use the same standard. Colin Powell, Hillary Clinton, Jeb Bush. Should she reveal all of the e- mails? Some of them are personal. Nobody wants that.

COSTELLO: You say facts, facts, facts but I've got to say during a political campaign sometimes facts, facts, facts don't really matter.

DAVIS: You're right. And part of what I do for a living professionally and for my friend Hillary Clinton is try to get people to see what the true facts are and then the arguments are fair. Politics is about arguing. Let's all agree on facts. What happened in the New York --

COSTELLO: There's nothing fair about political arguments. Are you crazy?

DAVIS: Yes I'm will to say that debating is fair. But "The New York Times" omitted this fact that the law changed in 2014. Why would the "Times" do a front-page story setting this off other than not deliver it, no conspiracy here? The reporter I think and editing was careless and public editor of the "Times" said an important fact is the law changed after she left office. Most of the dialogue right now isn't taking into account that fact. You let me do that on your show today.

COSTELLO: So when all is said and done, will this be a long-term problem for Hillary Clinton? And why doesn't she come out right now and say those things?

BUTCH: Well, in my opinion why doesn't she? When she's ready she will. I'm just her friend, country lawyer from Washington. But at some point what's going to matter to this country is the economy, jobs and national security in the face of ISIS and terrorism. And in October 2016, if she's a candidate, and I hope she will be, that will decide who gets to be the next president. Not whether she followed the law but somebody thinks the spirit was violated two years after when the law was changed.

COSTELLO: Right. Lanny Davis thanks for stopping by. I so appreciate it.

We'll be right back.

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COSTELLO: Checking some other top stories for you this morning.

The trial of accused Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev is under way. It's been nearly two years since the deadly blast. And the now the life of the accused, 21-year-old is at stake.

The trial will unfold in two parts. First, to determine whether Tsarnaev is guilty of any charges. Second to decide his punishment, life in prison or death.

The manufacturer of the scope linked to the deadly superbug outbreak did not have permission to sell them. Olympus started selling the scope in 2010 but according to the FDA in late 2013 the agency realized the company never obtained clearance to sell the devices. Last month the scope spread a bacteria called CRE to patients at UCLA. Seven patients were infected. Two of them died.

Seven seats were empty as Idaho state senate began their session on Tuesday. The session opened with a Hindu prayer, delivered by a Nevada statesman named Rajan Zed.

Some senators took offense purposely boycotting the prayer, others said they were simply running late.

Thanks for joining me today. I'm Carol Costello.

"ATTHIS HOUR" with Berman & Bolduan ahead.