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Trump Continues to Question Cruz's Eligibility; President Obama to Deliver Final State of the Union; Sean Penn interviews El Chapo for "Rolling Stone"; American Woman's Death in Italy Triggering Murder Investigation; Interview with Michael Fineman's father. Aired 5-6p ET

Aired January 10, 2016 - 17:00   ET

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


[17:00:00] FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN HOST: The next favorable (ph) drawing is Wednesday, maybe then. All right, that's going to do it for me. Thanks so much for being with me this afternoon. I'm Fredricka Whitfield, much more straight ahead with Poppy Harlow in the NEWSROOM.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN HOST: Hi everyone, 5:00 eastern. I'm Poppy Harlow in New York, top of the hour. Thank you so much for joining us.

We begin with a shocking twist in the dramatic capture of drug kingpin El Chapo. A secret meeting between the cartel leader and actor Sean Penn that may have led to his capture. Details from inside the meeting, and how the famous Mexican actress are looking at right now, how she help set all of this up.

But first, we begin with politics this hour in the race for the White House. Donald Trump, rallying a large crowd in Nevada right now. He spent the entire weekend on the campaign trail. After yet another new poll shows he is trailing Senator Ted Cruz in the crucial early voting State of Iowa. Cruz leading Trump, 28 percent to 24 percent now, that's according to the latest numbers, just out today from the "NBC", "Wall Street Journal" and "Marist Poll".

At the same poll puts Trump in a much better position in New Hampshire. He is well ahead of the competition with 30 percent support there. He's close to his competitor, Senator Marco Rubio, stands at 14 percent.

CNN's Maeve Reston joins us now from Trump's rally in Reno. Once again, he went hard, no surprise, you're hard after Cruz and hard after this point of, you know, he is questioning whether or not Cruz is actually eligible to be president since he was born in Canada. He won't let that one up.

MAEVE RESTON, CNN NATIONAL POLITICAL REPORTER: Well, let it go Poppy. And, you know, it's really interesting. They are tapping to folks in the crowd. There are a lot of voters here who's saying that Ted Cruz would be their second choice. So, it's very clear why Donald Trump is doing this. Just a few minutes ago, he talked about this citizenship issue for Ted Cruz. His mother was born in the U.S. but -- and is U.S. citizen. But Trump is repeatedly returning to it and I think we have a little bit of that sound here where he talks about this being an unclear issue in the court.

So, let's take a listen to that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: And here's the problem, it's called uncertainly. It's called, you just don't know. Now already, a Congress spent and another Congress spent, and by the time, and it's going to happen. Nobody's more -- does anybody know more about litigation than Trump, OK?

I know a lot. I'm like a PhD in litigation, OK? And what's going to happen is the other side will bring a suit. Now, is he a natural born citizen? Some people, I don't know. Honestly, we don't know. Who the hell knows?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

RESTON: And so obviously, he's really bringing this issue up again and again in the rallies. They are going straight at this as being an electability issue for Ted Cruz, trying to raise questions about his background, get voters to worry a little bit about whether or not Cruz is the strongest candidate to go up against Hillary Clinton.

Ted Cruz so far is not taking the bait. He's really avoided trying to go back at Donald Trump on this issue. But as said, that this is a settled matter. That's it's, you know, there's swamp theories out there but this is not something that should be a big issue in the race. So, we'll have to see how it plays out.

HARLOW: Right, absolutely. We heard him say that to J. Tapper this morning on STATE OF THE UNION. We're going to hear a little bit -- more from a constitutional lawyer on exactly that a little bit later in the program.

Let's listen in, Maeve, to Donald Trump for a moment.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: ... one of the most beautiful tackles made this year, right? I mean, I don't need it. It's boring. But although I love Tom Brady, I got to tell you, I do love Tom Brady. He's a great guy. But it's a different -- you know, it's different. But it's become soft and our country's become soft. Our country has become soft.

Do you know on of the reasons, this is true, reported by these people. One of the reasons we haven't bombed the oil over there, you know? Environmental impact, they didn't want to disturb the environment. No, no, this is true. Can you believe it? OK, environmental impact.

You know one of the reasons they never built the wall along the southern border to stop drugs and people and everything from coming in? The environmental impact study, they couldn't get it approved. It's true and this was a while ago. They couldn't get an environmental impact study approved to build the wall to save lives, to be good for our economy, to stop drug traffic. They couldn't get it because ...

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: All right, we'll keep monitoring Donald Trump live in Reno, Nevada. But I want to talk more about this now with CNN Senior Political Analyst, Adviser to four former presidents, David Gergen. Nice to see you David.

DAVID GERGEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Good. Good to see you Poppy.

HARLOW: Yes, we heard Donald Trump say he's actually doing Ted Cruz', quote -- this is a quote, "a favor" by raising the issue of citizenship. I'm not sure Ted Cruz sees it that way.

GERGEN: Yes, sure.

[17:05:00] WHITFIELD: But he's like -- he says look, I don't want it get it mired in the courts if he should win nomination. Here's what Cruz said to Jake Tapper this morning.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TED CRUZ, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I think most Americans, they couldn't care less about a bunch of politicians bickering like school children.

JAKE TAPPER, STATE OF THE UNION ANCHOR Well, they care if you're constitutionally eligible, right? I mean, that's something you could ask about that.

CRUZ: But the substance of the issue is clear and straightforward. It's a legal matter. The constitution and federal law are clear that the child of the U.S. citizen born abroad is a natural born citizen. And the dynamics that's happening, you know, it was interesting. Three weeks ago, almost every Republican candidate was attacking Donald Trump. Today, almost every Republican candidate is attacking me. And that kind of suggests maybe something has changed in the race.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: David, how does Ted Cruz put this to bed once and for all?

GERGEN: I'm not sure he can in the timeframe that he's got. And I don't know, you know, from my point of view, Cruz is right. Every child born to an American couple overseas has been, in my experience, considered an American citizen.

But by raising what I think is a red herring, it is I think having some impact on the race. They looked about two or three weeks ago that Cruz actually might pull away in Iowa. He had a, like, a nine or ten-point poll lead in some of the polls. That lead in the last two polls have been about 4 percent.

HARLOW: Yeah. GERGEN: He's ahead in terms of popular vote, but maybe this birthright issue is having some impact already. It's hard to sort out.

HARLOW: Yeah.

GERGEN: We don't have enough information to say for sure.

HARLOW: You know it's interesting, "New York Times" had a fascinating piece on the division that this race is causing or has already caused in the GOP. And it talked about the fact that neither Cruz nor Trump has the backing of a single senator or a single governor. Does that matter, David? Or does it actually benefit them because the American electorate is so sick and tired of politics as usual?

GERGEN: Well, I don't think it's having much impact on the outcome of the race. What it does suggest is that a President Cruz or a President Trump, if that would happen, might have much harder kind of governing. They don't have the kind of natural allies even in their own party that you would like to have when you go in as president.

So, I think it's -- I don't think it's a good sign. I think it may - it means rougher waters ahead, but maybe not in the elections. I don't -- you're right about, you know, because of the anti- establishments ceiling, you know, getting another senator to support you doesn't make any difference usually. It may make a difference in a place like Iowa, you know, in a contained race or a place like New Hampshire. But when you go and do that, it's super choosy, it's not going to make much difference.

HARLOW: So I mean building on this, right, in this article in the "Times".

GERGEN: Sure.

HARLOW: You've got the former Nixon and Reagan and Adviser Pat Buchanan who ran himself twice in the '90s for president. Here's what he said, "The chickens have come to home to roost. Putting the party back together again will be very hard after this nomination. I think the party is going to shift against trade and interventionism, and become more nationalist and tribal and more about protecting the border." Is he right?

GERGEN: Poppy, he's a good analyst. I think that there is that danger that the Republican Party will come more of a native party. I think it -- but if it does so, it -- there's a threat that it kind of also it become a minority party, you know, their dream, Reagan's dream was to build the Republican Party into a majority party.

HARLOW: Right.

GERGEN: And as you get -- you know, if get caught up in these issues, it's really hard. And with given the changes in Democrat if it's a country, it's really hard to put together a majority and they need to be thinking about that. I think a really thumping (ph) in November, if that were to take place, they get a nominee, you can't rally your country as a whole. They take a thumping (ph).

The better thing to do is go back to the drawing board and see if you can, you know, refocus your party. That's what happened when Bill Clinton got elected. The Democrats had lost two in a row by nominating someone who's quite liberal. And when Clinton came in, he moved the party more to the center and made it more of a majority party for the next presidency.

HARLOW: You had Chris Christie come out last week, David, and warn (ph). Among others who said this, that the fractures in the party in the GOP could actually help a Democrat win the White House. Do you actually believe that, that some of these votes could shift away from a ...

GERGEN: Yes.

HARLOW: You do?

GERGEN: Yes, I do. I think some people could stay home. I think that's sort of -- that's a serious danger, especially after you run an anti-establishment race, one of the dangers is you don't have a lot of the apparatus then to call and to get the votes out. And people would tap in their support. It's the same as Hillary is facing to some degree. And she's has this sort of enthusiasm gap and is that going to show up the number of people to get out and vote for? We don't know right now.

[17:10:04] HARLOW: Yes.

GERGEN: But of course that's a concern in her campaign.

HARLOW: All right, David Gergen, stay with me. Got to get a quick break and we'll be back with more from David ...

GERGEN: OK, sure.

HARLOW: ... in just a minute. But we have a lot ahead this hour. The White House promising an unconventional speech for the president when you hear his final State of the Union on Tuesday night.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARRACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I don't think I have ever been more optimistic about a year ahead than I am right now.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: What the President is planning? Is he out to prove he is not a lame duck?

Also, breaking news out of Italy, an American woman mysteriously found dead in her apartment, what her boyfriend just told CNN.

Also, the secret meeting between the infamous drug kingpin, El Chapo, went after Sean Penn. Why it happened, and the role of famous Mexican actress played in the entire deal. Stay with us. You're watching CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARLOW: You're looking at live pictures in the campaign trail right now. Hillary Clinton at a rally in Manchester, New Hampshire. She'll be followed by her daughter Chelsea there on Tuesday. In Reno, Nevada on the right, you have Donald Trump swarmed there by people right after he finished his remarks. We'll keep an eye on both.

On Tuesday night, the current president, President Obama will deliver his final State of the Union Address. He is promising this address will not be a traditional one. That means no laundry list policy proposals, no recapping of his accomplishments. Instead, he'll take a last shot at telling Americans why he wants this country to change more, and what he thinks this country can be, something he hinted at in this preview.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: And just the remarkable progress we've made, not just what I want to get done in the year ahead, but what we all need to do together in the years to come, the big things that will guarantee an even stronger, better, more prosperous America for our kids.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: Back with me, CNN Senior Political Analyst, former Adviser to four presidents, David Gergen. David, how do you read this? I mean we've gotten a lot of hints as to what we're going to hear in the State of Union Address. No laundry list they say. Is this a president who you see as trying to fend off those that call him a lame duck? Or is this a president admitting that he is a lame duck and I can't lay out a lot of policy proposals, I have to focus on a few key things?

GERGEN: I think this president, who wants very much to go out in a dramatic fashion. You know, he's already saying he doesn't want to leave anything on the field.

[17:15:00] He wants to play this out. He's talked repeatedly about this being the fourth quarter of his presidency. And his reputation in basketball is he pulls it out in basketball in the last second, so he likes to make that final shot. I think he has that kind of spirit about him.

So, I do think he's going to give us a laundry list of his accomplishments. So, just inevitably, he wants to build his legacy. And he want to day, if Hillary's going to be the nominee, he wants to make sure that he gets his approval rating up enough that it helps her win the White House. So, he's going to tell us. And he's got people up and about, I mean, you know, family that got saved through Obama Care for example. He's going to tell us a lot about his accomplishments.

But there is a historical president. Back in 1944 and basically in his last State of the Union Address, you know, Franklin Roosevelt laid out an agenda for the future. It was sort of very idealistic, aspirational kind of agenda. It wasn't a landslide of new agenda. But rather, one of these, the big things we need to do and that became a template, a model for a lot of Democrats that followed him. They went back to what FDR had said.

You know, and Obama likes to play that kind of role. So, I wouldn't be surprised if he does, you know, turn this into -- it's a hard speech to give. It's a hard speech to make exciting. It's a hard speech to rally the country. The only other thing I'd say, Poppy, is I hope this speech does not ignore the international scene because there are things that's going to be unravel so rapidly.

HARLOW: Right.

GERGEN: And so many different countries, and people around the country are hugely anxious about this. They don't understand what's happening around the world. They want somebody or somebody's to explain it to them so they don't -- it doesn't seem like such a dangerous place.

HARLOW: I mean, how does he effectively do that, David? If you were the one advising him as you have so many former presidents, how does he do that when people see him as being reactive to ISIS, his approval ratings are abysmal when it comes to dealing with ISIS. When it comes a week after, diplomatic relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran completely broke down. And North Korea says that they set up a hydrogen bomb.

GERGEN: Well, exactly. So, you got so many things happenings. You've got North Korea that's got this big bomb that exploded, the Saudis and the Iranians are getting into it and resist the cuts of cops (ph) and it may be very dangerous, so even more just stabilizing the Middle East. And just in the last few days, you know, the stock market has had the worst beginning in the history.

HARLOW: Right.

GERGEN: Based on large part on the turmoil in China. You've got all these things happening and I think the President has to put on his commander-in-chief hat during his speech for a significant portion of the speech, and tell you what he is trying to do to solve it. His ISIS speech did not work.

HARLOW: Right.

GERGEN: And people came out of that thing. He misses. He's just a holding action. He doesn't have a strategy for victory. He has a whole lot of strategy to finish out his presidency. And I think people -- what people are looking for, and it's going to affect this presidential race is, what do you think the United States really ought to do about this? Where is the leadership coming? How do we keep the transit lining (ph) partnership with Europe? Europe may fracture here over this migration issue.

He's got to be the lead player not only in the United States but in the world to tell us how we're going to deal with these variety -- these huge challenges that are open to him.

HARLOW: And let me ask you before I let you go David, what the White ...

GERGEN: Sure.

HARLOW: ... reaction with what the White House did this morning. They came out, they announced that the guests that will be seated in the first lady's spot for the State of the Union, they include that a vacant seat for the victims of gun violence. Also, you have a Syrian refugee, Staff Sergeant Spencer Stone, a French train attack hero, and also the CEO of Microsoft, Satya Nadella. What do you make of those choices? It fascinates me.

GERGEN: Yes. They were fascinating choices. I thought it was really smart to have that empty seat. I mean, because the President is clearly, you know, that the Town Hall with Anderson, you know, went all in this. He cares about this so deeply and I think he needs to bring this issue up and keep pushing it.

And the array of others things I think does give us a clue what's going to be in the speech. You know, you see each of these, everything, he's going to talk about the future of technology. You have Microsoft there. He's going to talk about the health care issues. He's going to talk about the veterans. You can perceive the makings of his sort of vision of what the United States ought to be doing in the years ahead.

HARLOW: Yeah, and then it'll be interesting when we find out at some point what this president will do in the years ahead once he is out ...

GERGEN: Absolutely.

HARLOW: ... out of office.

GERGEN: Yeah, I know he's ...

HARLOW: We'll be watching.

GERGEN: I know he's -- yeah. It's interesting how his energy is coming back as president.

HARLOW: Yeah.

GERGEN: It's a bit striking to watch this.

HARLOW: It is. David Gergen, thank you so much as always.

GERGEN: Thanks so much Poppy. Take care.

HARLOW: You can see all of CNN's special coverage from the best political team on television Tuesday night, coverage of the State of the Union Address, President Obama's final one begins at 7:00 p.m. eastern, right here.

Still to come, the Mexican government not happy at all with these two actors. You recognize at least one of them, Sean Penn.

[17:19:58] He certainly have some explaining to do about how they found one of the world's most illusive drug lords, when frankly, nobody else was able to. Details next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARLOW: The prison escape and recapture of the notorious drug lord, El Chapo Guzman. It has, well, everything that perhaps you would see in a movie, a bad guy, a shootout, a perp walk, back to prison but none of it is fictional. It's all real. And also stunning news that Actor Sean Penn was able to interview El Chapo before any authorities in the United States or in Mexico were able to find him.

We want to talk about all of this with Brian Stelter, CNN Senior Media Correspondent, Host of RELIABLE SOURCES. CNN Legal Analyst, Danny Cevallos. The actress, by the way, you see there in the screen, she's the one who helped facilitate this interview. Before I get to the two of them, let's get this report from Nick Valencia in Mexico City.

NICK VALENCIA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Poppy, the article by Sean Penn for "Rolling Stone" comes a day and a half after the capture of El Chapo. In that two-minute clip posted on Rolling Stone's website, we hear from El Chapo in his own words about this life and his role in drug trafficking.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOAQUIN "EL CHAPO" GUZMAN, MEXICO'S TOP DRUG KINGPIN [through translation]: I want to make clear that this interview is for the exclusive use of Miss Kate del Castillo and Mister Sean Penn.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VALENCIA: For the first time, we hear from the drug kingpin himself. Despite being on the run, the drug lord, Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman agrees to an interview with actor and activist Sean Penn, a cinematic plot twist to an already surreal story.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

EL CHAPO [through translation]: Look, all I do is defend myself. Nothing more. But do I start looking for trouble? Never.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VALENCIA: In a report for Rolling Stone, Penn writes, the pair met face to face in October 2015, three months after El Chapo's brazen prison escape. According to Penn, the meeting happened somewhere in the middle of a Mexican jungle and included tequila and tacos. His irrational fear of being washed by armed drones and being surprised by El Chapos, "chivalry". These clips are part of replies to follow up questions from Penn sent to a Guzman representative who asked the questions off camera.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) [17:24:57] EL CHAPO: Well from the age of 15 and on, where I'm from, which is the Municipality of the Badiraguato, I was raised on a ranch called La Tuna. In that area, and up until today, there are no job opportunities.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VALENCIA: The meeting Penn says was brokered by Mexican actress Kate del Castillo. It was 2012 when del Castillo reportedly developed a friendship with El Chapo after posting a series of tweets, critical of the Mexican government, while celebrating the notorious drug trafficker. Del Castillo has not commented since publication of the Rolling Stone article, Saturday night, CNN has reached out to her.

Their communication continued over the course of the next three years, even after the 2014 arrest of El Chapo that landed him here at the Altiplano Penitentiary. They stayed in touch via blackberry messages and letters. And it was that relationship between del Castillo and El Chapo that eventually led to the meeting between Sean Penn and the notorious drug lord. It was a month of backdoor dealings that included encrypted messages, disposable phones, and even clandestine communications with El Chapo's associates.

In a two-minute clip posted at Rolling Stone's website, El Chapo talks candidly about drug trafficking, violence and his role in it all.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

EL CHAPO: Well, it's reality, that drugs destroy. Unfortunately, as I said, where I grew up there was no other way and there still isn't a way to survive. No other way to work in our economy to be able to make a living.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VALENCIA: A senior Mexican law enforcement official tells CNN, they want to question both del Castillo and Penn, specifically about the location where the meeting took place.

We are now getting contradictory information from the Mexican government as to whether or not they knew about that meeting between Penn and El Chapo. Senior Mexican law enforcement official tells me that the Mexican government did not know about the meeting until it was published on Rolling Stone's website on Saturday night. However, a separate source tells CNN that the Mexican government did know about the meeting and it actually helped them lead to the capture of El Chapo on Friday night.

It does however beg the question, if the Mexican government did know about this meeting, why it took them an additional three months to pinpoint El Chapo. Poppy?

HARLOW: Nick Valencia in Mexico City. Thank you very much. Our Senior Media Correspondent, Brian Stelter. Here also, CNN Legal Analyst, Danny Cevallos. Brian, let's begin with you. The timing of this article and your first thought when you saw Sean Penn talk to El Chapo before anyone in law enforcement could?

BRIAN STELTER, CNN SENIOR MEDIA CORRESPONDENT: It was shocking for use. My first thought was that Sean Penn was, in some ways, doing a service here, getting El Chapo on the record for the first time in decades. He talks about dealing drugs. He talks about how and why he does it, his excuses for doing it. It was valuable information but the way it was obtained was very, very strange. Not least to which because Sean Penn is an actor and activist, not necessarily a journalist. Also, because he gave El Chapo prior approval of the article, that means this ...

HARLOW: And this doesn't happen in journalism, I mean.

STELTER: No, this is something that journalism schools teach them not to do. The subject of the story was given the article. He got to read it and approve it. Now, the Rolling Stone says this drug lord never wanted any changes to the article, but the mere existence of prior review is very, very unusual.

HARLOW: Danny, did Sean Penn break any laws in Mexico or in the United States by seeking out, speaking with a drug kingpin, one of the most wanted men in the world, and not going to the authorities and saying, by the way, here he is. Did we know of yet?

DANNY CEVALLOS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: First, let's start with the United States. Now, I say this with the caveat that federal law is so expansive, so broad in its power, both within the U.S. jurisdiction and abroad, that there may be a creative prosecutor that can come up with some federal law that was violated. However, as a general rule, citizens don't have a responsibility to go out and report the whereabouts of criminals to assist police officers affirmatively. There is no affirmative duty to go out and do that.

So I imagine there's even less of a duty when you're abroad to help local law enforcement. Now, Mexico may allege that he is in some way assisted a fugitive. But at the same time, they would have to show that he's somehow assisted that fugitive in staying a fugitive, where all indications are at this point, that the very act of seeking out El Chapo may have contributed to his capture.

HARLOW: But Brian, Brian -- well right, and it may have ...

STELTER: That's where it gets really interesting.

HARLOW: But Brian, at the same time, when you look at Rolling Stone, the magazine editorially is responsible for what's on its pages, right?

STELTER: Yeah.

HARLOW: How do you fact check a drug kingpin?

STELTER: It doesn't seem like there was much editing of this article at all, never mind fact checking. And there are claims in the article that don't make a whole lot of sense.

[17:30:00] I do think this was a different editorial process than Rolling Stone was used to. Seems like Sean Penn worked very directly with Jann Wenner, the publisher of the magazine on this. And we should mention Sean Penn has written for the magazine before. He's also interviewed for del Castro (ph) before. He's interviewed other people before.

In some ways, it's a little bit reminiscent of John Miller, Peter Arnett, other journalists who were able to interview Osama bin Laden in the late 1990's. Again, they extracted really important information from bin Laden. It as a dangerous, risky assignment back them.

The difference here, of course, is that Sean Penn is an actor, no formal training as a journalist so it's strange in that way. Also, keep in mind, this article was going to be published before El Chapo was captured.

HARLOW: Either way.

STELTER: Yeah, this was on the printing press. This is about to go to the printing press when he was captured. That means that Sean Penn wasn't planning or wasn't, you know, there was no indication that he was going to be giving information about the whereabouts to authorities.

HARLOW: What timing though.

STELTER: Yes.

HARLOW: Danny, what about protection in Mexico? I mean, obviously the laws are quite different in Mexico and in the United States. We've also got Mexico sort of, you know, shamed by the fact that he escaped once from their prison. Any kind of, I don't know, like could we see Sean Penn face any charges in Mexico?

CEVALLOS: Isn't it interesting that we've been talking about extradition from Mexico ...

HARLOW: Right.

CEVALLOS: ... back to the United States, and now people may be talking about, can Mexico force Sean Penn to appear in Mexico for an investigation? Now, he's not charged with anything yet. But can you force a citizen, a U.S. citizen out of the U.S. to at least answer what we're hearing, it's called, answer some questions or whatever the Mexican government wants to do for the investigation? And it is a far bigger thing to demand that U.S. citizen leave the country just to answer some questions.

If on the other hand he is charged with a crime, we are going to see a fascinating reversal here because this is a bilateral tree. That means that both sides should honor ...

HARLOW: Sure. CEVALLOS: ... the others request within the rules and parameters of that treaty.

HARLOW: And I think will a celebrity be treated differently at all than an average citizen?

STELTER: Of course Sean Penn wants a conversation to be about what he says as, are failed drug lord.

HARLOW: Sure.

STELTER: He wants El Chapo, in some ways, to be humanized, personalized by the story. I'm not sure that's been the result though. It's a pretty despicable story from the perspective of what El Chapo says about why he deals drugs for a living.

HARLOW: Danny, quickly.

CEVALLOS: And depending on your perspective, Poppy, when you talk about Sean Penn being a celebrity, you could make the argument that in his home country, El Chapo is a far bigger celebrity than Sean Penn, ever was, respectfully to both sides.

STELTER: True.

HARLOW: All right, Brian, thank you. Danny, thank you. Appreciate it.

STELTER: Thanks.

HARLOW: Coming up next, I'm going to take you to Italy. An American woman's mysterious death there in Florence triggering a murder investigation. Police found Ashley Olsen with bruises and scratches on her neck in her apartment, up next. See what her boyfriend just told CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:35:58] HARLOW: Breaking news out of Italy. The U.S. State Department has confirmed the death of an American woman in Florence. We're looking at images of her there, mysterious circumstances triggering a homicide investigation for Ashley Olsen, a 35-year-old artist from Florida. She was found dead in her Florence apartment. Police discovered her with bruises and scratches around her neck. No suspects have emerged yet.

Police did speak with her boyfriend who became concerned, he said, when he didn't hear from her for days. Friends say Olsen was frequently spotted around Florence walking her beloved dog, a beagle named Scout.

CNN Contributor, Barbie Nadeau, is in Rome. And I know you spoke with her boyfriend. He is the one who ultimately found her when he went with the landlord to knock on her apartment door after not hearing from her for days. What did he say to you? BARBIE NADEAU, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Well, he basically said he couldn't make any comment, whatsoever, because of the investigation. But we do know that they had a fight some three days before her body was found. And that he had did tried to call her, she didn't answer. And then eventually, her phone just didn't work at all and that's when he became very concerned that there -- something had gone wrong. He went to the landlady, she opened the apartment, and they found her body without any clothes on on the sofa in her apartment in Florence.

She rented alone. She was -- and she lived alone. Very tiny studio apartment, but really, you know, the life so many people dream of, to go to Florence, live this life. She moved two years ago after her marriage broke up in the United States to join her father who's an architect and an instructor at an Institute of Arts there in Florence. So, she really was getting her life back together. It seems that she had lots of friends, very well liked, very well known, very recognizable. You know, just really no one has anything so far, by any means, bad to say about her, Poppy.

HARLOW: I know they're doing an autopsy. Do we know when that might be done?

NADEAU: The autopsy is scheduled for tomorrow, which means we may get some information tomorrow afternoon. For sure, we should hear something by Tuesday. It may take longer for toxicology reports though.

HARLOW: And what about these reports that we're just hearing about in the last few hours about her Instagram account, and specifically some post made in the days before her death?

NADEAU: That's right. A couple of weeks ago, she -- according to her Instagram account which is still public, she started posting pictures that someone had taken of her. And she had used hash tag about I have a stalker, hash tag, this is creepy. What we don't know though is where she got those photos that she found them on Instagram, if someone sent them to her.

But some people who have been interviewed in the neighborhood where she lived in Florence said that she did talk about her fear that someone was taking these pictures of her. That, I'm sure, is part of the investigation. The police took her computer. They're looking for anything they have on that personal compute that could lead them in the direction of her killer.

HARLOW: Absolutely so sad, just 35 years old. Barbie, thank you very much, live of for us in Rome tonight.

Still ahead, President Obama lays out his plan to tackle gun violence in America. Is it enough? I will speak with the father who lost his son to gun violence nearly 10 years ago, what he said he would ask the president.

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[17:42:13] HARLOW: Michael Fineman was gunned down by a stranger while he was out to dinner with his wife. He was an Army medic, a father of three. He was remembered for his boundless energy and his verve for living. At his funeral, a friend described him as, "a tornado of a man who was so animated". They quote, "If you had to tie his hands down, the guy would never be able to talk." His killer was finally captured after a two-month manhunt, and that's when Fineman's wife spoke publicly about her lost.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

THUY FINEMAN, HUSBAND WAS SHOT IN CAFE: And I just hope that justice will be served so that my husband, Michael, will be able to rest in peace. I miss Michael a lot.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: That was in 2007 and Michael's father, Elliot, bowed to honor his son's death by fighting for tougher gun control. Founder and CEO of National Gun Victims Action Council, Elliot Fineman joins me now. Thank you for being with me.

ELLIOT FINEMAN, FATHER OF MICHAEL FINEMAN, KILLED BY GUNMAN: Thank you for having me Poppy.

HARLOW: No doubt you've been watching this conversation very closely at the Town Hall here on CNN with president about guns this week. Tell me about your son and your fight in the aftermath of his death.

FINEMAN: Well, my son's killer, it would turn out to be, had been in a mental institution two times. And despite having been in an institution two times, was legally able to buy the gun that killed my son. When I was able to function after hearing about my son's murder, I decided that I would dedicate the rest of my life to working on the gun issue and to bring my skill set. I had my own practice. I was a strategic marketing adviser to Fortune 500 companies to bring that skill set into the fight for seeing the gun laws.

HARLOW: You wrote to CNN.com up at this week after the president's Town Hall. And you said this, you said, "The president needs executive action that cannot be obstructed by Congress. That's only possible under a declared National State of Emergency for the Gun Violence Epidemic. Examples of executive actions that are necessary and would be blocked by Congress absent and declared National State of Emergency include: universal REAL background checks, suspending the gun industry's immunity from lawsuits, monitoring ammunitions sales, and banning those on the terror watch list from buying guns."

You say the president needs to call this a National State of Emergency. And you also say that if you had a chance to ask him that question, that's what you would say, "Why not call this a State of Emergency?" Do you think that's realistic? Do you think that could happen?

[17:45:01] FINEMAN: First of all, it's not only realistic, it's almost required under the National Emergency's Act. When there's a threat to the public safety and health, the president is obliged to call a National State of Emergency if they can't be contained by normal means.

We have of death threat of 82 people losing their lives everyday to guns, a cost of over $625 million a day. If that's not a national emergency, I don't know what it is, you know, what it. And he should call it because the executive orders that he can issue under a national state of emergency are the ones that need to be issued. The ones that he issued absent in early (ph) one are meaningless.

HARLOW: He did issue more money funding for mental health issues and care, for example. And as you said, your son was murdered by someone who'd been to a mental institution twice. Does that give you any hope to see that included?

FINEMAN: The mental health is something we should always invested in. It's an important social goal and one that we should cherish and work for. But it's just the red herring that the NRA and the pro-gun has throw up every time there's a gun massacre.

The fact is that the mental health is not the reason we have people doing gun massacres who have mental problems. In all the other developed countries such as ours, England, France, Italy, Germany, Japan, Canada, Sweden, they have the same percentage of people with mental health issues as we have, but they don't have people with mental health issues committing gun massacres. Why? Because they have same gun laws and they keep the guns out of the hands of people with mental health issues.

HARLOW: Let me ask you this Elliot, ultimately for there to be sweeping change, like what was proposed after the Sandy Hook Massacre in Newtown, a Congress needs to do it, frankly. It can be the president. It can't be executive orders. And we have not seen an appetite for that among our leaders in legislature right now to get something through.

Do you have any hope that Congress will? And is this a single voting issue for you and those that you know? Will they vote on guns? As the president said in his Op-Ed (ph) the "The New York Times" this week, he said I will not vote for certain lawmakers if they haven't done X, Y and Z on guns. Is it a single voting issue at this point for those you know?

FINEMAN: It's a fantasy to think that Congress will do anything about the gun violence issue because the math doesn't work. There are 17 pro-guns states, Utah, South Dakota, Wyoming, Alabama, where the senators represent what the people want and they will never vote for any say in gun laws. That's 17 states means 34 senators are gone. So to pass any thing, you need 60 senators, and that would require you getting 60 out of the remaining 66 to support it. It's not going to happen.

The only way we're going to get say in gun laws is for the president to declare a national state of emergency, and we have a petition on our website, www.gunvictimsaction.org, and you can go there and sign that petition. We've got to let him know that there's 500,000 of us got want him to do what he needs to do and what he's supposed to do.

HARLOW: Elliot Fineman, thank you very much for joining me. And also, I'm so sorry for the lost of your son. Thank you, Elliot.

FINEMAN: Thank you Poppy.

HARLOW: Two nights from now, President Obama will give his final state of the union speech. One of his great challenges, a world in turmoil and millions of Americans living in fear of terror. What do the American people, what does the world need to hear from this president in his final State of Union Address?

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[17:52:18] HARLOW: Just days after North Korea claimed that it tested a powerful hydrogen bomb, the U.S. blew a B52 bomber over South Korea, their warning, sent from United States. North Korea, just one of the many foreign policy headaches, frankly, facing President Obama right now as he prepares to give his final State of the Union Address. Let's talk about all of it, what ahead, especially in the foreign policy front.

Aaron David Miller is with me, thank you for being with me. You are a scholar on the Middle East. You've spent so many years studying it, advising so many leaders on it. You wrote this up in a journal this week, entitled "How Foreign Affairs Will Shape Obama's Final Year and Legacy". We know that his State of the Union Address will be, in part, about reassuring Americans that they are safe at home. What do you think he can do in his final year to actually make that happen?

AARON DAVID MILLER, VICE PRESIDENT, WOODROW WILSON CENTER: I mean president rhetoric is a funny thing. We have this notion that somehow words can inspire they can, words can motivate. But words are no substitute for result or actions.

In the first year of any administration, words are difficult to use to persuade. In the 8th year of a president who's image on foreign policy is clearly locked in the public's mind as unsuccessful, I think it's going to be extremely difficult for the president to make a case that somehow, he can reassure the country on a couple of the issues, one in particular, their fear of another terror attack.

HARLOW: Right.

MILLER: It's going to be a tough case to make. And the other issue is that this administration has tendency, you know, fair or unfair, to allow their rhetoric in words to unstrip (ph) their capacity to act and to get results. So, this is going to be tough sell.

HARLOW: What do you mean by that? Are you talking about sort of, for example, drawing a "red line" on Syria and then not acting on it?

MILLER: Well, there's that. There's that and there's the repeated efforts to use rhetoric to demonstrate the fact the president thinks Assad, Bashar Assad must go. And, you know, the cruelest of ironies is that Bashar Assad is likely to be around much longer than Barack Obama. A call for a comprehensive settlements freeze, Middle East peace agreement, training Syrian opposition, $500 million commitment, all of these things. It's a tough hand to president has dealt. I mean, you've got to be fair. But the reality is words won't do it anymore, particularly in the eighth year of his presidency.

HARLOW: So should he say less on that front? I mean when it comes to ISIS, for example, you've got 64 percent of Americans as of mid- December who were disappointed, disapprove of his ISIS strategy, should he say less on that and do more?

[17:54:58] MILLER: I mean, the problem is, yes, he should say less that -- so not over promise, even while he tries to reassure. I mean, he clearly doesn't want to create the image that Americans should live in fear. After all, 14 years after 9/11, there still hasn't been a successful attack on -- kind of the United States directed.

HARLOW: Right.

MILLER: I have foreign (ph) terrorist organization. The problem is, Poppy, that he faces either lost causes or long shots abroad. And wherever you go, I mean, three out or four out of the four tests that the North Koreans have undertaken have occurred on the president's watch. They could make the argument, of course, that the Iranian Nuclear Agreement prevented the administration from having to deal with two nuclear crises rather than one. But the reality is the President is, in some respects, is going to be driven by events. He's really no longer in control of them. And this, I think, is the real danger. You get another set of San Bernardino.

HARLOW: So, let me ask you this quickly though. When you look at Iran, I want to read you, what the speaker of Iran's parliament said today, basically coming out, warning Congress on adapting any, "anti0Iranian measures". Saying, "If the U.S. Government does not prevent Congress' anti-Iranian measures, Iran's parliament will adopt reciprocal measures."

Given the breakdown in the last week of Saudi-Iranian diplomatic relations, whatsoever, how big of a challenge is that for this president in his final year?

MILLER: I think it's a big deal because it almost ensures that the fight against the Islamic State is going to be more complicated. The Iranians will continue to back Bashar al-Assad. The Saudis will back the Sunni opposition, including groups we don't like.

And sectarian tensions between Sunnis and Shia are basically going to increase in Yemen, in Iraq, and clearly in Syria. So, you know, the image of -- the images that there's world on fire out there, and the President is going to have a very difficult time controlling it, now that I suspect is going to be his greatest foreign policy challenge in the year ahead, that it's going to be tough really to find comprehensive or definitive solutions to any of these problems.

HARLOW: Aaron David Miller, thank you so much, nice to have you on. Straight ahead ...

MILLER: All right, nice to see you.

HARLOW: ... the actor and the kingpin, details surrounding the secret meeting between the infamous El Chapo and actor Sean Penn. I will speak with a Chicago cartel attorney, the man alleged drug lord has turned to for defense. What is next for El Chapo and what about Sean Penn?

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