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Early Start with John Berman and Zoraida Sambolin
Georgia Executes First Woman in 70 Years; Kim Davis Says She Met the Pope; U.S. Pulls Spies from China; Derrick Rose Fractures Eye Socket. Aired 5-5:30a ET
Aired September 30, 2015 - 05:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: It has falcon wing doors that hinge at the top and open wards. They open for the approaching driver without even a touch.
[05:00:03] ALISON KOSIK, CNN ANCHOR: Oh, that's cool.
ROMANS: The Model X air-conditioning system has a bio-weapon defense mode that prevents bacteria and viruses from entering. And Musk expects it to get 5-star NHTSA crash safety ratings in all categories.
KOSIK: Where do I buy one? Where do I get the money?
(LAUGHTER)
KOSIK: EARLY START continues right now.
(MUSIC)
KOSIK: Breaking news this morning: Georgia executes its first woman in 70 years. Why three last ditch Supreme Court appeals and a plea from the pope couldn't save her.
ROMANS: More breaking news this morning, Kim Davis, the Kentucky clerk once jailed for refusing marriage licenses to gay couples, she said she met the pope.
KOSIK: And breaking overnight, the U.S. pulling its sides from China. Their identities at risk of being exposed after a hack attack. We are live.
Good morning and welcome to EARLY START. I'm Alison Kosik.
ROMANS: So nice to see you this morning.
KOSIK: Good morning.
ROMANS: Nice to see all of you as well.
I'm Christine Romans. It's Wednesday, September 30th. It's 5:00 a.m. in the East.
We begin this morning with breaking news. Just a few hours ago, the state of Georgia executed female death row inmate Kelly Gissendaner for orchestrating the 1997 murder of her husband. Her death by lethal injection followed three unsuccessful appeals to the U.S. Supreme Court and pleas for mercy from Gissendaner's children and from Pope Francis.
Our Martin Savidge is in Atlanta. He's got the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The effort to spare Kelly Gissendaner's life went well beyond the time when she should have been dead. Prison officials put the 47-year-old convicted murderer's execution on hold to let the legal process run its course.
MARCUS EASLEY, A RETIRED CHATTANOOGA POLICE OFFICER: She was very strong and she was very assured in whatever the process was going to be and she handled herself with poise that was just beyond belief.
SAVIDGE: But when the last court turned her down, time and hope ran out.
Gissendaner's attorneys weren't the only once fighting on her behalf. Her grown children begged a parole board to commute her life in prison.
KAYLA GISSENDANER, DAUGHTER: She is so supportive of me. I can talk to her about anything, any troubles I have or anything that not only celebrate. I know that she's my biggest cheerleader.
My brothers and I really want my mom to live. She is all that we have left.
SAVIDGE: Even the Vatican weighed in with a letter from the emissary of the pope, quote, "Please be assured of my prayers as you consider this request by Pope Francis for what I believe would be a just act of clemency," it read.
But others felt that her sentence for the 1977 murder of her husband was just. Doug Gissendaner's parents said in a statement, quote, "As the murderer, she's been given more rights and opportunity over the last 18 years than she ever afforded Doug, who, again, is the victim here. She had no mercy, gave him no rights, no choices, nor the opportunity to live his life."
Kelly Gissendaner planned her husband's murder but did not do it. The beating and stabbing death was committed by her boyfriend, Gregory Owen. In a separate trial, Owen actually got a lesser sentence of life with the possibility of parole.
The disparity between his sentence and hers was a point attorneys and death penalty opponents focused on as evidence of a flawed judicial system.
There was also Gissendaner's life after her conviction, in which she turned to her faith, studied theology and counseled fellow prisoners. In a strange twist, two previous execution dates were postponed, once
by a winter storm. Another the expert said the chemicals that made up her lethal injection looked cloudy.
With her execution, Gissendaner earns two very different distinctions, the first woman executed in Georgia in 70 years and the last woman on Georgia's death row.
Martin Savidge, CNN Center, Atlanta.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KOSIK: OK. Martin, thanks, for that.
And more breaking news the Kentucky county clerk jailed for refusing to issue marriage licenses to gay couples met privately with the pope last week during his U.S. visit.
That's the word from lawyers for Kim Davis who say she and her husband spent ten minutes with Pope Francis at the Vatican embassy in Washington.
For the latest, let's turn to CNN's Delia Gallagher live for us from Rome.
Good morning, Delia. Walk me through this, because this is -- these are extraordinary claims here. Who initiated this meeting?
DELIA GALLAGHER, CNN VATICAN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Alison, let me tell you that the Vatican spokesman, Father Lombardi, says the Vatican will neither confirm nor deny that a meeting took place between Pope Francis and Kim Davis. So that is the Vatican's statement this morning, anyway.
We do know two things. One is that the pope on the plane back from the United States was asked about his stance on conscientious objection. And he said that it is a human right and it is a right that should be allowed for by the law.
[05:05:02] And he was asked, in particular, if that replied to government officials, to which he responded -- government officials are human people, and, therefore, yes, they also have that right.
We also know, Alison, that the pope met when he was in Washington, D.C. with the Little Sisters of the Poor. This is a religious group of nuns who are involved currently in litigation with the Obama administration over the contraception mandate. So, also a situation of conscientious objection.
They have nursing homes and health care facilities throughout the United States. He met with them. When he met with them, the Vatican spokesman said this is obviously a sign of the pope's support for them in their litigation.
So, we do know that in a general way, Pope Francis is supportive of conscientious objection. We should also add that the idea of conscientious objection has long been a part of the Catholic teaching. The pope spoke a lots about religious freedom and for the Vatican, conscientious objection is a part of religious freedom -- Alison.
KOSIK: Delia, what seems to be the reaction of these claims of this meeting between Kim Davis and the pope? I mean, Pope Francis is being billed, obviously, as a pope of the people. But Kim Davis, obviously, not winning many friends these days.
GALLAGHER: You know the pope we know does support people in a private manner as well without the Vatican making it necessarily public. Certainly, if it did happen on the trip, they would not have wanted to make it public because it might overshadow the other things that the pope was saying and doing on his trip to the United States.
So, in a general way, we know that Pope Francis is supportive of people who believe with a good conscience that they cannot follow the rule of law. As I said, it's a part of catholic teaching. So, it's not just a Pope Francis. It would be something that other popes have spoken about.
Certainly, Pope Benedict and John Paul II in a general way, and also in some specific instances, lend support to those people who felt in goods conscience they couldn't follow the law. It also applies to those people in good conscience can't follow Catholic law. There is also that exception made for people because the conscience in the Catholic idea is the first point of reference.
So, if your conscience won't allow you to do something, they allow for that right -- Alison.
KOSIK: All right. Kim Davis' legal team apparently saying there are pictures that they could release soon. We are looking forward to that.
Delia Gallagher live from Rome, thanks for that.
ROMANS: All right. The U.S. is pulling spice out of China, worried this morning that their cover has been blown by that huge hack of government employee records. The U.S. believes Chinese hackers were behind the cyberattack on the Office of Personnel Management that exposed the personal data of 21.5 million federal workers.
For the latest, I want to bring in CNN's Saima Mohsin live for us from Beijing -- Saima.
SAIMA MOHSIN, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Christine, this is an extraordinary revelation from the U.S. officials who told CNN that this simply risks and exposes so many U.S. intelligence agency workers, working right here in China, right now. Now, this spans the CIA the NSA and the defense intelligence agency.
Now, the CIA's own data office of the U.N. intelligence actions has not been exposed according to this U.S. official. But it's the government employees that they are concerned about, 5.6 million fingerprints are out there, too. They believe this is all in the hands of Chinese intelligence agencies. They believe that Chinese were behind this massive hack attack.
China, for where it stands, has always said that it does not sponsor any kind of hacking. Issued a while ago, the foreign ministry held a briefing, it holds one regularly.
CNN was there. We asked a question about this report. They told us, "The Chinese government firmly opposes any form of hacking. China and the U.S. are the stop two big Internet using countries and we both face the same challenges and will gain mutual benefits in protecting cyber security."
But just how far does that protect really go, Christine? Because you will remember, that deal between President Xi and President Obama last week wasn't far reaching. They managed to agree that they won't hack each other's companies, steal blue prints, trade secret and intellectual property. That's what U.S. companies have been very upset about. They have been losing innovation to Chinese companies. They believe state sponsored hacks doing that.
But it doesn't cover traditional espionage and this is where the waters become murky. The U.S. is known to be one of the best in the world in intelligence gathering. The Snowden leaks exposed that, too.
But President Obama wanted to draw a line. He wanted to draw a line between traditional espionage, be that cyber or otherwise for national security purposes and commercial purposes.
[05:10:02] Well, hey, this still goes on to perhaps national security purposes as far as China maybe concerned, even though they deny carrying out this hack -- Christine.
ROMANS: Yes, I think it's fair to say we are in the early innings of the disagreements between the United States and China over governments using the Internet and using hacking.
Thank you so much for that, Saima Mohsin in Beijing.
KOSIK: As the government shutdown over funding for Planned Parenthood now receding, at least in the short term, a stopgap funding bill is expected to get through Congress today shepherded by John Boehner. The House speaker no longer worried about keeping his job now that he's decided to step down.
Longer term negotiations are set to begin on the federal budget with Republican leaders calling for a two-year spending plan to avoid a budget fight during an election year. But weather Speaker Boehner's replacement will be on board with a plan that averts a government shutdown, that's an open question.
The front runner for the job, California Congressman Kevin McCarthy, defending the extending grilling of Planned Parenthood's president. McCarthy telling CNN's Jake Tapper the hearing is part of a larger plan, much like earlier House hearings aimed against Hillary Clinton.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. KEVIN MCCARTHY (R), CALIFORNIA: When you look at the poll numbers of Hillary Clinton, they've dropped.
JAKE TAPPER, CNN ANCHOR: Right.
MCCARTHY: Unfavorables is pretty high, because people say they don't trust her. They don't trust her because of what they found about the server and everything else. Would you have ever found that out? Had you had not gathered the information for the Benghazi Select Committee?
So, if we want to able to show what this Planned Parenthood has done. We see a few videos. So, there's a real question. Have the select committee get all the information, all the hearings, so the public can see that, so you win the argument to win the vote.
TAPPER: Speaking of votes, do you have the votes? Will you be the next speaker and have you locked it up?
MCCARTHY: I feel very good about where I'm at.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROMANS: New this morning, the White House signaling a shift in its position on Syria's Assad regime. Secretary of State John Kerry indicating Russia's military buildup in Syria and its support of Assad could provide the U.S. with an opportunity.
Kerry telling CNN's Elise Labott -- getting rid of Assad immediately is no longer viewed as a necessity.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOHN KERRY, SECRETARY OF STATE: For a period of time, all the coalition were saying he had to leave immediately. That was the original statement, way back when.
We have changed that over a period of time. We said, no, that's not going to work. We need to have an orderly transition, a managed transition so you don't have fear for the retribution, loss of life --
ELISE LABOTT, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: A vacuum?
KERRY: You don't have a vacuum.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROMANS: Kerry called on Syria's leader to, quote, "go off into the sun set." He insists without Assad in office, Russia, Syria and the United States could oversee a cease-fire and end the violence.
KOSIK: Fugitive Edward Snowden making his debut on Twitter and the former contractor who, of course, leaked the NSA's mass surveillance operation already have four times more followers than the agency he exposed, picking up nearly 300,000 followers in less than two hours.
Snowden living in asylum in Russia, taking a subtle jab at his former employer with his first tweet, "Can you hear me now?" No response from the NSA.
Donald trump's tax plan attacked by his rivals and a new review that finds Trump's Texas cuts carry a hefty price tag, next.
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[05:17:06] ROMANS: All right. The first reviews of Donald Trump's tax plan are in. The verdict: Donald Trump's tax proposal has a very big price tag.
Trump proposes deep cuts to the income tax rate for people across the board, zero tax rate for those at the bottom and 25 percent tax rate for those at the top. That's down from 39.6 percent right now.
According to left-leaning Center for Tax Justice that would reduce revenue by $900 billion a year, or $9 trillion over a decade. The right-leaning Tax Foundation, it finds a similar estimate: $10 trillion in reduced revenue over the next 10 years.
The Trump campaign says those estimates are off. And with increased economic growth, the plan is revenue neutral.
Before they were would-be rivals in the 2016 presidential election, Bill Clinton says Donald Trump repeatedly saying Hillary Clinton's praises, telling him what a wonderful job she did for New York as a senator following 9/11.
Speaking to CNN's Erin Burnett, Clinton took his own veiled shot at Trump and the Donald-led Republican race.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BILL CLINTON, FORMER PRESIDENT: I think they believe that authenticity is created by making your campaign look as much like a reality TV show as possible. I really do. And so, they think that real voters have a limited bandwidth for policies and I think as the field winnows down, I hope it will get more serious, because the American people deserve some sense of what the heck you are going to do if you actually get the job because the day after you take the oath of office --
BURNETT: It's yours.
CLINTON: -- you can't level an insult or have a -- you're not in an episode of "Survivor".
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KOSIK: Clinton also hinted we may be seeing more of him on the campaign trail.
ROMANS: A wild scene at a soccer match in Brazil. A referee pulls out a gun on the pitch. Andy Scholes has the detail in the morning's bleachers report. That's next.
Entrepreneur Elon Musk says the transition to renewable resources is critical, crucial. The challenge is finding alternatives economically feasible. Many scientists believe nuclear fusion could be the answer.
But as Rachel Crane reports, making it work is a near impossible task.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ELON MUSK, CEO, TESLA AND SPACEX: Well, the biggest problem that Earth faces this century or it has to be solved this century is sustainable energy production and consumption. You've got to make electricity in a sustainable way. We either solve that or there will be huge economic collapse towards the end of the century, independent of any environmental impact.
RACHEL CRANE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The word nuclear is often associated with dangerous things, weapons, meltdowns, terrorism.
But there is a good side to nuclear, too. General Fusion is one of dozens of companies going after the silver bullet energy solution. But the odds are not in their favor.
[05:20:00] For nearly a century, scientist versus tried and failed to capture what they call lightning in a bottle.
(on camera): Why is nuclear fusion the answer to the world's energy crisis?
DR. MICHEL LABERGE, FOUNDER AND CHIEF SCIENTIST, GENERAL FUSION: This would produce energy for the whole planet. It is a source of energy that produce almost new plugs and the source of the fuel is limitless, if you extract the (INAUDIBLE) from the ocean, we have energy for running this planet for billions and billions of years. It's the only real energy. You crack that, you have it done.
NATHAN GILLIALAND, CEO, GENERAL FUSION: We're going to have abundant energy for the world forever. It changes the dynamics of poverty. It changes fossil fuels. It sounds like I'm overstating it, but it will change humanity forever.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROMANS: All right. Stop me if you heard this before. Bulls star Derrick Rose injured at practice, and may not be ready for the start of the regular season.
KOSIK: Andy Scholes has more on this morning's bleachers report.
Good morning.
ANDY SCHOLES, CNN SPORTS: Hey, good morning, guys.
You know, Bulls fans certainly tired of hearing this. Derrick Rose leaving practice yesterday after taking an elbow to the face. The team announced he has an orbital fracture that will require surgery.
The time line for his return is still to be determined. Players who have had a similar injury have missed between five and 28 games in the past. Over the last four seasons, Rose has only played in 100 of the Bulls 312 games.
All right, to baseball, the Los Angeles Dodgers are heading back to the post-season for the third straight year. Clayton Kershaw throwing a one-hitter, striking out 13 as L.A. beat the defending champion San Francisco Giants 8-0, eliminating them for a post-season contention.
[05:25:03] Dodgers will now face the Mets in the division series which gets going next season.
All right. The Oakland A's can't be anywhere near the playoffs this year, but they did make history yesterday, announcing that Justine Siegal will be the guest instructor for the club's 2015 instructional league. That will make her the first female coach in Major League Baseball history. It's not the first time Siegal has broken through a glass ceiling in baseball. Just a few years ago, she was the first woman who drove batting practice for a major league team.
All right. Finally, check out this video from a low level soccer match in brazil. He pulls out a red card -- oh, no, wait, that's a gun. According to a report the referee had been kicked and slapped prior to going to his get his gun from the locker room.
Now, ref is apparently a policeman, I don't know if that makes this any better. He has been ordered to undergo psychological testing before being allowed back on the case.
KOSIK: OK, we laughed, but that's really scary.
ROMANS: But the slapping and hitting a ref, bad news in the first place. And then the gun in the locker --
KOSIK: I agree.
SCHOLES: It's so stressful you feel the need to go get your gun. I think you should get a second job or a hobby, because it's not a good situation.
KOSIK: I'm with you on that.
ROMANS: All right. Thanks, Andy Scholes.
Breaking news this morning, three last ditch Supreme Court appeals and the pope cannot save a Georgia woman from being executed. Details next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ROMANS: Breaking news this morning: Georgia executes its first women prisoner in 70 years. A punishment even the pope couldn't stop.
KOSIK: More breaking news this morning, Kim Davis, the Kentucky clerk once jailed for refusing marriage licenses to gay couples, says she met the pope.
