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Trump Calls Black Protester "Troublemaker"; Investigation into Manipulated Pentagon Reporting on War with ISIS; 3 Groups Claim Responsibility for Mali Terror Attack; Interview with Bernie Sanders. Aired 2:30-3p ET

Aired November 23, 2015 - 14:30   ET

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

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

[14:30:00] DONALD TRUMP, (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE & CEO, TRUMP ORGANIZATION (voice-over): And this guy started screaming by himself. Maybe, roughed up, maybe he should have been roughed up because it was disgusting what he was doing. I have a lot of fans and they were not happy about it. This was an obnoxious guy who was a troublemaker who was looking to make trouble.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: Joining me is one of the protesters that was at the rally, Carlos Jr.

Let me first ask, how is your friend doing? Is he all right?

CARLOS CHAVERST JR, BLACK LIVES MATTERS PROTESTER: First of all, thank you for having me. He's a good friend of mine. I spoke with him this morning. You all wanted him this it morning and he refused to come on because he was speaking with his attorney and he may have to have medical attention after what happened at the Trump rally.

BALDWIN: What happened before these cameras started rolling and after? Give me details.

CHAVERST: We had been out protesting since about 8:30 Saturday morning. We had a permit to protest outside. And we went inside before that morning. I didn't go in until 11:15 that morning. Mr. Trump was already speaking. When I got inside, the plan was to meet up with my friend and the other protester so that we could exercise our first amendment rights on the inside. Upon doing that, I'm recording live on Periscope that allowed us to broadcast live from anywhere in the world. I'm broadcasting live from Periscope and the next thing I know is we began chanting dump the chump. It eventually led to Black Lives Matter. In the Periscope video, you see there are several men and women that knocked my phone out of my hand. They even went as far as putting their hands up stopping me from being able to record Mr. Trump and the rally.

BALDWIN: If you're at this Trump rally and you are chanting "Dump the Trump" and "Black Lives Matter," by no means do I condone any of this behavior or the fact that your friend was taken down. But I want to understand. You knew you were walking into -- tell me why you wanted to go in and chant like you did, attend the rally.

CHAVERST: It's pretty simple. We wanted to exercise our first amendment rights. Donald Trump came into the city of Birmingham, a city that is known for demonstrations in the '50s and '60s. My grandmother was a part of the churn's march. For him to come to Birmingham, the same night we are honoring a huge pioneer in a civil rights movement is a total disrespect to our city. We believe we are raising our minimum wage. We believe that immigrants are welcome in our city. Mr. Trump is against that. We didn't want --

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: Hang on, I understand where you're coming from and I understand that very important significance of Birmingham, being from the south myself. But the fact that thanks to the Constitution, you got to attend this rally. Shouldn't the same rights be handed to Mr. Trump to throw a rally in any city he'd like?

CHAVERST: Absolutely. Just like I afforded the right to protest against him just like people are there to protest him. But as a citizen of the United States, I do have the right to protest Mr. Trump. My Constitution does not limit where I can protest. I wanted to protest Mr. Trump's rally because we didn't want him welcome here in the city of Birmingham.

BALDWIN: Let me end on this with a question because I would bet you have a message for Mr. Trump. I don't know if the Black Lives Matter movement would want to invite Mr. Trump and have a discussion as they have with other candidates with the national action network. Would you want to extend an invitation and if so, what would your message be to him?

CHAVERST: I would love to invite him. I would love to sit down and talk about the real issues that matter to not only blacks, but everyone across this country, including the immigrants here. There's a series of discussions that needs to. Happen. No one is taking Mr. Trump serious in the things he says. He spews hate in our country and I'll tell you this. I believe that Donald Trump is a modern-day bull cutter. He cannot continue to go around spewing hatred and racism amongst anyone. We deserve an apology. We are due an apology from Mr. Trump himself. So as everyone else that has the freedom as I do.

No way that Donald Trump is allowed to say that a black man should be roughed up in the city of Birmingham. That's not acceptable. We have fought so hard to get to where we are today. For him to say that on national television is outright ridiculous and he should really be held accountable for the things that he says about black people.

What they didn't show you is, in the protest as we were being escorted out, Mr. Trump said he criticized the media for turning towards the back. He's made the comment that you have the cameras in the back where they belong, implying that black people belong in the back. Mr. Trump is 69 years old. This is not the 1950s. We do not belong in the back anymore. And he has to understand that. And the things he's saying is not acceptable and we won't tolerate it. [14:36:06] BALDWIN: Carlos, I feel your passion all the way here in

Paris. I don't have Mr. Trump here to respond to some of the words you're throwing around at him. Let us know if he accepts an invitation to speak with you for sure.

And I appreciate you being on and sharing your perspective. Thank you so much, Carlos.

CHAVERST: Thank you, Brooke, for having me.

BALDWIN: Coming up next, Mali in a state of emergency after the siege on a hotel leaves 20 people dead. We will hear from survivors of that attack next.

Also ahead, the deadly attack on that Mali hotel by an al Qaeda- affiliated terror group in the wake of ISIS being front and center in the battle against terror. Is al Qaeda beginning to step up attacks?

You're watching CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:41:21] BALDWIN: The number of victims in the al Qaeda-linked terror attack on a luxury hotel climbing to 20 today. Security forces hunted down suspects in Mali in Western Africa. By the time the bullets stopped flying at the Radisson on Friday, bodies were scattered across the floors. American citizen among those killed. Mali remains under a state of emergency as it begins three days of national mourning.

Three groups are claiming responsibility. One of the groups, an al Qaeda affiliate in Africa.

David McKenzie joins me from Bamako, Mali.

David, what do we know about the terrorists, specifically taking credit for this attack? Who are they?

DAVID MCKENZIE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Brooke. Both terror groups have claimed responsibility and said they cooperated. One is the al Qaeda Islamic Maghreb, an offshoot of al Qaeda in West Africa. Another one says they had two attackers in there and put out a propaganda audio message saying they were trying to strike back at the crusaders.

A lot of people in that hotel were people trying to help Mali rebuild after years of conflict.

I spoke to an American specialist at the Centers for Disease Control. She described the harrowing hours.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KATHIE FAZEKAS, MALI HOTEL TERRORIST ATTACK SURVIVOR & SPECIALIST, CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL: I e-mailed my husband, "There was something going on and I want you to know I love you." When the fire down the hallway, I wrote another e-mail and said, "I do believe there are shooters here. If I don't make it, I want you to know I love you and my family. But I am coming home."

I do this because I love doing this work. And where we are in the world and where we need to continue on.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MCKENZIE: Brooke, Kathie said that, in fact, she was stuck in there for hours for training. Those Malian forces that came and knocked on the door with a special code were the ones who saved their lives -- Brooke?

BALDWIN: All these attacks, what a story.

David McKenzie, thank you for sharing, live from Mali for us.

Al Qaeda's claim of responsibility for the Mali attack coming on the heels of ISIS taking responsibility for the carnage here in Paris. Are the terror groups locked in competition?

Joining me from New York is CNN global affairs analyst, David Rohde, who was held hostage by the Taliban for a time.

David, nice to see you.

We talked about the notion of trying to one up one another. The three different attacks, you have Mali, what happened here in Paris and what also happened in Beirut, Lebanon. How does this group, ISIS, how does al Qaeda compete?

DAVID ROHDE, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: Well, they compete with what looks like this attack in Mali. It sounds strange and we sort of talk about jihadists as one group, but they are very diverse and there are many different groups and they compete with each other. So ISIS and al Qaeda share the same goal. They want to create this caliphate where Muslims live under one ruler, but they are divided under strategy. The Mali attack was to get attention for al Qaeda after is got so much attention for these Paris attacks.

BALDWIN: I was talking to a forum of people about ISIS specifically. With al Qaeda, I understand the group has been condemning attacks for killing children and women and, in some cases, Muslims drawing almost like a terrorist line in the sand, which sounds bizarre to even say. ISIS has no such line?

[14:45:20] ROHDE: And it's almost a generational difference. So the successor to Osama bin Laden is Ayman al Zawahiri, who is 64 years old. And he claims that Muslims should not be killed and the split between the two groups occurred in Iraq and in. The past the local Iraqi insurgents were slaughtering these attacks in markets. When al Qaeda asked them to stop that, they refused to do that. The leader of ISIS, Abu Bakr el Baghdadi, is 44. That's 20 years younger than Zawahiri. And ISIS's philosophy is to film graphic violence with Hollywood-style production, and it works. They talk about a generation that watches cell phone videos and the quality of the videos and the horrific nature of the violence has drawn the young people to join is and it's a destructive rivalry because now al Qaeda tries to respond with its own violence.

BALDWIN: How would al Qaeda's strategy now shift because of precisely the point you just made?

ROHDE: Al Qaeda is better at where it tries to work with local insurgent groups. So they are strong in Mali and in Yemen and strong in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Whereas ISIS is sort of less forgiving. They don't make alliances. You are loyal to them and no one else. I don't know which strategy would work. I hope neither of them work, but al Qaeda is trying to show that it's relevant and I don't know where this will lead to next.

BALDWIN: Just quickly, is there Benefit? I have been wondering in this one-upmanship in the two terror groups. Any Benefit from a western terrorism perspective?

ROHDE: They have battled each other in Afghanistan and pro al Qaeda groups. They are turning off and we talked about this over and over again the vast majority of Muslims totally disagree and loathe these tactics. So in a sense is, the belief that ISIS's brutality will backfire. If al Qaeda becomes more brutal, it will backfire as well. Muslims, the vast majority across the world are horrified by this.

BALDWIN: Always great to have your voice. Thank you for your time.

ROHDE: Thank you.

BALDWIN: Coming up next, did the Pentagon change ISIS reports for the president to paint a rosier, more optimistic picture? We have presidential candidate, Bernie Sanders, joining me live after the break on how he would respond to his advisers if he were in the Oval Office. That, and so much more, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:52:41] BALDWIN: Welcome back, you're watching live coverage here from Paris. I'm Brooke Baldwin.

We'll be speaking with Bernie Sanders in just a moment.

But I want to set the scene for you. We're at the Place de la Republique. This is not necessarily an area where a lot of tourists would come, but it's the heart of Paris were one specific reason. You can see here we are now two Mondays in. The wake of the attacks and people are still coming in, dozens and dozens. A week ago, it was about 2,000 people all surrounding here. We're about a half a mile away from the attack sites. So in just a moment, I'll show you what Parisians are telling me about this beautiful home and how it definitely feels different.

But as promised, politics now.

The presidential candidates from both parties have been vocal about the Paris terrorist attacks and how to control ISIS. They have given insight into how they would handle the world's terror crisis, U.S. national security and foreign policy.

Democratic contender, Senator Bernie Sanders, joins me from Atlanta, Georgia.

Senator Sanders, it's a privilege. Thank you for joining me.

SEN. BERNIE SANDERS, (I), VERMONT & DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: My pleasure.

BALDWIN: Let me begin with -- since I'm here in Paris, I want to begin with terror. There is a report, sir, indicating that the Pentagon changed a -- significantly changed its assessment of ISIS on the ground and gave a more rosy optimistic outlook to President Obama, and now he says he's going to get to the bottom of that. Is that not troublesome when the U.S. is leading a coalition that the commander- in-chief isn't getting the right facts?

SANDERS: Well, of course, it is. I think we're going to have to upgrade intelligence not only within the Pentagon but the type of communication that exists with our allies all over the world. Every major country on earth has good intelligence. They are spending a lot of money on intelligence. It's important that one country is able to share with another country what they learn. We have a lot of work to do to improve where we are.

BALDWIN: I know it's easy to say, but if you were sitting in his seat, as commander-in-chief, how would you confront your advisers?

[14:55:02] SANDERS: Obviously, not getting the kind of intelligence that you should be getting is unacceptable. That has got to improve. But once again, what we have to utilize is the international community and all of the intelligence. Russia has intelligence. The U.K., France has intelligence. That type of intelligence has to be communicated to the entire world so we are effective in destroying up ISIS.

BALDWIN: We're speaking live with Senator Bernie Sanders, who would like to be the next president of the United States here.

We have to take a quick break, sir. Standby.

You're watching CNN. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:59:52] BALDWIN: We are back. You're watching CNN. I'm Brooke Baldwin, live in Paris.

We have been talking with Democratic presidential candidate, Bernie Sanders.

Senator Sanders, thank you so much for staying with me here.

We already discussed, as I'm in Paris, obviously, very mindful of terror and specifically ISIS.

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: -- political thread of the day but -- go ahead, sir.