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Obama Makes Statement on Afghanistan; Trump Blasts Clinton and FBI Director on E-mail Probe; GOP Leaders Hold News Conference on Gun Bill. Aired 10-10:30a ET

Aired July 06, 2016 - 10:00   ET

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

[10:00:00] CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: And good morning. I'm Carol Costello. Thank you so much for joining me.

Right now we're following two big breaking stories. First, we're just minutes away from a statement by President Obama on Afghanistan. Pentagon chief Ash Carter and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Dunford, also expected to be there.

Plus, FBI director James Comey now set to face a grilling by lawmakers tomorrow after a decision not to recommend charges against Hillary Clinton. Any minute now House leaders expected to speak, too. Paul Ryan already saying Clinton should be blocked from access to classified information during her presidential run.

So let's get right to CNN national correspondent Suzanne Malveaux. She's at the White House.

Suzanne, what do we expect to hear from the president in just about 25 minutes?

SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Carol, what's going to happen here is the president is going to talk about the plan moving forward, or at least the wish list regarding Afghanistan. What we expect is that the president is going to be leaving for Warsaw, Poland, tomorrow. He's going to be attending the NATO summit over the weekend.

This has been a U.S. endeavor that's lasted for 15 years. This is certainly not something the president had anticipated that would extend beyond the two administrations that he's been in charge of, but that has been the case. And there's been a certain reluctance if you will for him to be a war president but that has happened.

What we expect in the next couple of days is the president is going to reach out to the leaders, fellow leaders, alliance in NATO, and ask them for more support, to continue their support. It was just ask back in May that you had those foreign ministers committing, saying that they will go beyond the 2016 mission, that they will continue with the financial support, with the training of the forces there. That is something that the president is going to reiterate.

And also, Carol, I should let you know that the president does have a decision. Is he going to go ahead and cut those U.S. forces inside of Afghanistan in half or will he actually keep the remaining force there. These are the kinds of issues and the kinds of questions that the president has been grappling with. It is something that he did not anticipate, but as we've seen over the last nearly eight years, the president has had to accept this role.

That yes, there is a robust force inside of Afghanistan. Things have not gone as well as they had hoped. And they continue to need financial support from the critical NATO alliance that he is going to be meeting with this weekend, Carol.

COSTELLO: All right, Suzanne Malveaux, reporting live from the White House this morning, thank you.

In the meantime, the political fallout from that FBI decision on Clinton's e-mails now fueling Donald Trump's attacks against his political rival.

Let's get that part of the political story from CNN's Chris Frates. Good morning.

CHRIS FRATES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, good morning, Carol. Well, you're right. Hillary Clinton might be off the hook legally but politically Donald Trump's been hitting her on where she's most vulnerable with voters, and that's on her trustworthiness. In a classic Trump tweet storm this morning, Trump said, "Crooked Hillary Clinton lied to the FBI and to the people our country. She is so guilty. But watch, her time will come."

And at a campaign rally last night, Trump repeatedly used the FBI's decision to argue that Clinton is part of that same dishonest political establishment that he intends to upend if he's elected.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESUMPTIVE PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: We now know that she lied to the country when she said she did not send classified information on her servers. She lied. Like a criminal with a guilty conscience, Clinton had her lawyers delete, destroy and wipe away forever, except I still say there are geniuses that can find them. 30,000, think of this, 30,000 e-mails.

Today is the best evidence ever that we've seen that our system is absolutely totally rigged.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FRATES: And going a bit off message, Trump once again praised former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: We shouldn't have been there. We shouldn't have destabilized. Saddam Hussein was a bad guy, right. He was a bad guy. Really bad guy. But you know what he did well? He killed terrorists.

(END VIDEO CLIP) FRATES: Now Clinton's campaign jumped on those remarks, saying Trump's praise for brutal strong men seemingly knows no bounds and again demonstrates how dangerous he would be as commander-in-chief, and how unworthy he is of the office he seeks so Clinton was able to play a little offense there on a day where Trump mostly kept her on defense, Carol.

COSTELLO: All right. Chris Frates reporting live for us this morning, thank you.

One key issue for Hillary Clinton in this e-mail controversial was whether or not those e-mails contained classified information. Here's what Mrs. Clinton has said in the past.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESUMPTIVE PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: I am confident that I never sent nor received any information that was classified at the time it was sent and received. I never sent classified material on my e-mail and I never received any that was marked classified.

[10:05:10] I'm confident that this process will prove that I never sent nor that was marked classified.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: But the head of the FBI, James Comey, contradicted Clinton when announcing his decision.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAMES COMEY, FBI DIRECTOR: From the group of 30,000 e-mails returned to the State Department in 2014, 110 e-mails in 52 e-mail chains have been determined by the owning agency to contain classified information at the time they were sent or received.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: All right. Here now to talk about this is David Gergen, former presidential adviser to Nixon, Reagan, Ford and Clinton, and Larry Sabato, director of the University of Virginia Center for Politics.

Welcome to both of you. David, I want to try something new here. I want to remove politics completely from the equation. So let's do that, shall we?

DAVID GERGEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Are we going to go dark?

COSTELLO: We're going to go dark because this is really important. According to the FBI, Secretary Clinton was careless with some of the nation's most sensitive documents. Top secret information. How concerned should voters be about this?

GERGEN: When the FBI says she's been extremely careless, there's a natural reason that voters should be concerned. The FBI went on to say that had this happened to someone who was working at the State Department there would have been sanctions. There would have been punishment. We don't know what that would be but presumably firing or blocking access to e-mails. So there is a -- there is a distinct impression left here that even though she may not be guilty of a felony, she's been careless with national security. And that I think has -- I think people have a sense either the system is rigged or that they have a sense of entitlement.

That there is one set of rule also that apply to everybody else. If you work at the State Department, you get fired. But there's a different set of rules that get applied to us. And I think Hillary Clinton has got to deal with that. I think she now has to sit down with someone -- a group of press, and really have a serious conversation and open it all up and review everything.

COSTELLO: Larry, that's what I suggested to Hilary Rosen, who supports Hillary Clinton, that Hillary Clinton ought to sit down and explain to voters exactly what happened, and why voters should still trust her judgment because that's largely what she's running on, right? She keeps saying that Donald Trump isn't fit for office because he doesn't have good judgment, but this incident calls into question her judgment.

LARRY SABATO, DIRECTOR, CENTER FOR POLITICS, UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA: Carol, it does, and that is exactly why it is such a legitimate issue as opposed to so much of the fluff that we hear on the campaign trail from both sides, things that don't really matter that are frivolous. This is a serious issue.

I think David is on to something here. Hillary Clinton needs a "Come to Jesus" moment. She needs it in exactly the right context. It can't be at the convention where you're going to have thousands of partisans, you know, cheering and yelling whatever you say. I wouldn't recommend a Richard Nixon checker speech going back to 1952. We don't do those sorts of things anymore.

It has to be in a serious interview with a journalist or maybe journalists who will ask her very tough questions and she's going to have to answer all of them. You know, she can't answer a few and then have her staff signal that time's up. She needs this. Whether she recognizes it or not.

COSTELLO: I also want to -- go ahead, David.

GERGEN: Yes, she's been through this with Benghazi very recently. And she handled herself extremely well. If she can -- if she comes forward now, answers questions, and reviews everything, she could help to clear the air. Otherwise there's going to be this continuing sense that she's ducking and dodging and it only further erodes trust.

COSTELLO: Exactly. And so James Comey, the FBI director, is going to testify before the House Oversight Committee, right, so Republicans are keeping this thing going. And, OK, so again, I want to take -- politics out the equation. So the Republicans charge the system is rigged. They're intimating that there's something about James Comey that's kind of rigged. And he did this all for political reasons. So they're talking about an FBI director who's in charge of ferreting out terrorists in the homeland.

GERGEN: Sure.

COSTELLO: Isn't that dangerous?

GERGEN: I -- look, I -- this is a dog that won't hunt, as they would say in Larry Sabato's country -- part of the country. James Comey has a reputation, well-earned, on both sides of the aisle, as a straight shooter. He was a man who is a registered Republican. A deputy attorney general in the Bush administration, George W. Bush, you know, rushed in and prevented administration aides going after a sick John Ashcroft, attorney general, to get permission for wiretapping. This is the same man who was appointed by President Obama to be head of the FBI. So I don't think there's much there.

[10:10:01] I think the Republicans -- you know they've got a legitimate set of questions to ask about what Hillary did. They've got questions to ask about what's the difference between being extremely careless and gross negligent. And gross negligence under the statute could bring felony charges. So they've got some legitimate questions to ask. But I think going after the FBI, unless they he proof that's been malfeasance, somewhere in the system, I don't think that dog will hunt.

COSTELLO: I know, aren't they attacking the wrong person, Larry? I mean, if anybody should testify before Congress, shouldn't be Hillary Clinton?

SABATO: Well, I don't know if you can get her to do that. But look, again, I agree with David, everybody I know who knows Director Comey tells me that he's a person of rock solid integrity. He's a Republican. Everything we know about him suggests he's a conservative. And you can disagree with the decision he made, but by and large, what he did was defensible.

And, too, this is so typical of Donald Trump's campaign. And it's the reason why he can't get traction. He always goes too far. He's got Hillary Clinton pinned. So what does he do? He attacks the integrity of James Comey. He suggested the attorney general of the United States has been bribed. Then he says something positive about Saddam Hussein.

You know, is there anybody who can rein him in? And I think we all know the answer now. No.

COSTELLO: Well, I think the saddest part to me is, you know, people already don't have much faith in our institutions, right?

GERGEN: That's right.

COSTELLO: So to continue to tear down an institution without any evidence really just because --

GERGEN: I agree.

COSTELLO: It seems to be wrong. GERGEN: It plays to people's fears. It plays to people's paranoia.

But I think Larry Sabato is exactly on target and on point here about this. You know, they're -- if anything, I actually think this was one of the finest hours of the FBI. Now there -- listen, I'll change my mind if evidence comes to the fore that says they -- you know, they rigged it, the investigation. But we have no evidence like that.

The concentration ought to be now on who should be president of the United States. That's what the big question is. And is Hillary Clinton the right person for that job? Many, many Americans still believe that. Many other Americans don't. But let's focus on what's central here.

COSTELLO: I hope we can. David Gergen, Larry Sabato, many thanks. And I appreciate you.

GERGEN: Thank you.

COSTELLO: Taking the politics off for just a little while.

All right. We are awaiting the president. He is expected to speak in just about oh, 15, 20 minutes. He's expected to speak on the subject of Afghanistan. I would assume the war on terror.

We're also expecting House Speaker Paul Ryan to talk at his weekly press thing, you know, the thing he held -- holds every week for reporters on Capitol Hill. We expect House Speaker Ryan to talk about James Comey and his testimony before Congress.

I'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: All right, to Capitol Hill, Paul Ryan is holding his weekly news conference for reporters. Let's listen. That's not Paul Ryan, by the way, but let's listen.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: To Protect America Act, HR 4237, which would prevent terrorists from purchasing firearms or explosives while protecting the due process rights of Americans. I have not met one member of Congress in favor of terrorists being able to purchase firearms. The real debate is whether and how to assure due process for Americans.

My proposal with Senator Cornyn is no way, shape or form infringes upon the rights of law abiding gun owners. What it does is ensure the terrorists do not have the ability to legally purchase firearms. Isn't that really the goal here?

Two weeks ago, House Democrats waged a disruptive and destructive sit- in to shut down Congress because they supposedly wanted legislation that prevents terrorists from being able to purchase firearms.

[10:15:02] Now they can. But this proposal coming to the House floor, but Democrats are opposing it for no good reason. It's because they only want the political fight and because they don't want to confront the three inconvenient truths I'm about to address. Regardless of whether you are a liberal Democrat or a conservative Republican, my proposal with Senator Cornyn should be supported by all.

It would require only the most partisan bad intentions of my Democratic colleagues not to be praising and supporting this legislation. Just think about it. It would also be the height of hypocrisy and irony not to push this measure with their full energy.

This bill wasn't written by the NRA. This proposal was drafted by members of Congress who understand how to prevent terrorists from purchasing firearms while protecting the due process rights of Americans. There are three very important truths that my Democratic colleagues shouldn't find so inconvenient.

First, the Orlando shooter was this Islamic terrorist pledging allegiance to ISIS yelling Allahu Akbar. And two, the rifle and handgun used in the Orlando shooting didn't just march itself into the nightclub that night and discharge itself.

I'll get to the third inconvenient truth in a moment. But first, I want to point out that in reality there's a whole lot more going on here beyond a gun control debate. And attempts by members of Congress to narrow this issue so glaringly is alienating the rest of our country who understands the bigger picture.

We also must unite to I.D. the threat of radical Islam because you cannot eliminate a threat that you're not willing to identify. And what makes matters worse is that it's clear that even if the president I.D.'d the threat, he has no idea how to eliminate it. And that unfortunately is the third inconvenient truth.

Congress has a duty to prioritize national security over party politics which is why Democrats should join House Republicans in passing this important proposal to prevent terrorists from purchasing to keep America safe. It is their duty.

REP. PAUL RYAN (R), HOUSE SPEAKER: From the beginning, I have been saying that we need to be clear eyed about who the enemy is. We need to stay focused on the threat of home grown terrorism. Right now we have an administration that simply refuses to step up its game. Last month, as part of our better way agenda, we put out 67 recommendations to keep America safe. Last week, Leader McCarthy, while working with our terrorism task force, proposed common sense legislation to address the threat to our homeland including the Zeldin legislation.

It's common sense because it requires our government to prioritize its efforts to counter violent extremism. That includes defining the enemy as radical Islamic terrorism. Believe it or not, we do not do this already. This legislation is also common sense because it takes steps to make sure that guns don't fall into the hands of terrorists.

This is something that we have to get right. Law enforcement has been telling us over and over we have to get this right because if we get this wrong we could undermine their own terrorist investigations.

Let me say this. There isn't a person in Congress that wants a terrorist to get a gun. But we also want to make sure that we do not undermine those ongoing terrorism investigations that law enforcement is conducting. And as I have said, we are not going to compromise the Constitution. We are not going to infringe upon anyone's rights without due process. This is very important.

The Constitution is a beautiful document. It is so efficient you could fit it in your pocket. We are not going to actually pass legislation that infringes upon a person's constitutional rights. So we have to get this right. We don't want to fringe upon the Second Amendment. We don't want to infringe upon the Fifth Amendment. We don't want to infringe upon anyone's basic constitutional rights.

We can get this right while honoring the Constitution. This is what we all swear to serve. When we take the oath of office, we swear to support and defend the Constitution and that is our duty. Now we need to define this enemy. We need to defeat this enemy.

I also want to take a moment to note today that the House will take up landmark legislation to reform our mental health system. This is what Congressman Tim Murphy, a clinical psychologist, has poured his life into. He has spent years working on mental health reform. This is bipartisan reform. It came out unanimous from the Commerce Committee.

That also is something that we think needs to be addressed to address the gun violence that's occurring in America which is dealing with the -- the issue of mental illness. That is coming to the floor today. So I want to thank Congress Murphy for that. Because of this bill, people will get the treatment that they need when they need it. It's a great breakthrough. And I look forward to today's vote.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Terrorism has come to America's shores. And we've seen time and time again just in the last seven years more than a dozen terrorist attacks on American soil.

[10:20:06] And every time it happens, all you see is the president trying to shift the debate to gun control. Why shouldn't the president be working with us here in Congress to confront the real threat of radical Islamic terrorism, instead of trying to take away the gun rights of law abiding citizens? So here in the house we're going to continue --

COSTELLO: All right, we're going to break away from this. You heard the Republicans are going to introduce a gun control bill. We don't know exactly what's in it but we do know that Democrats do not like this bill because -- how do we know that, well, because they're holding a rally on the steps of the Capitol, saying that they don't like this bill. They have families who have lost loved ones to gun violence speaking. You see one of them right there. You see Steny Hoyer from Maryland standing there beside Nancy Pelosi, also somewhere in the crowd. So we'll keep you posted on all of this.

Also, in just about five minutes, President Obama is due to issue some kind of statement on Afghanistan. He'll have the Defense secretary with him and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. So let's head up to the White House. Suzanne Malveaux is covering this part of the political equation for us this morning. Suzanne, what is the -- what is the president expected to say?

SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol. Well, the president is expected to go to Warsaw, Poland, tomorrow, that is, where he's going to be meeting with NATO summit leaders to talk about their commitment inside of Afghanistan. It has been 15 years, Carol, since the U.S. has been involved of course since the September 11th attacks. It has relied heavily on its international partnership. And what we expect the president to talk about is the need to continue that. So that is something that the U.S. has relied on.

It is a position that the president has not really been enthusiastic about taking. He has been a reluctant really commander-in-chief when it companies to a war president. But this is something also that he's emphasized time and time again, the need for this international coalition to really lead in this effort. So we expect a couple of things are going to happen.

Recently the Pentagon had announced that the president had given them more authority, the military commanders, more flexibility, if you will, to strike the Taliban where they saw the forces, the Afghan forces, threatened. That that was something that was flexible in their judgment.

That is something that could possibly, Carol, open the door to more U.S. strikes inside of Afghanistan or even perhaps more combat missions inside of Afghanistan. There's a very limited role in terms of the U.S. military and what they can do in those strikes because it has been something where, yes, you have people who are training, the U.S. forces training those inside of Afghanistan on the ground.

But the Pentagon has expressed a need that, look, you know, for all intents and purposes, you might have special forces, you might have trainer, U.S. trainers on the ground, but for all intents and purposes, there is combat that is taking place inside of Afghanistan. They wanted the leeway. They wanted kind of that flexibility to go after when they felt that either U.S. forces or Afghan forces were threatened on the ground. So that is one thing that the president has been considering and talking about with Pentagon officials.

The other thing of course is whether or not the forces, U.S. forces, are going to be cut in half. Right now there are 9800 forces on the ground. Perhaps that could be limited to 5500 by the beginning of next year. So that might be something that he actually talks about.

And then there's the financial commitment, Carol. We are talking about in the tune of $5 billion a year that's committed by NATO summit foreign ministers at least. We expect that the leaders will also make that pledge this weekend. And that goes into 2020. The United States carrying the bulk of that, $3 billion a year, Carol, that the U.S. is still spending on that mission, that war mission inside of that country.

I have to tell you, one of the things that this administration is emphasized for many years now is this is a training mission. That this is something that they are trying to help the Afghan military, the Afghan police, independently handle, without necessarily dependence on the United States and its NATO partners.

I actually had an opportunity to go to Afghanistan. This was back in September of 2011. This was the tenth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. And what we were there for is to actually feature the training that was taking place. U.S. military. With those Afghan police and the Afghan military.

And the people I spoke to, there was a lot of frustration still because there was corruption, there was a sense that they were not ready. They were not prepared. And they didn't have the heart in them really to go after the Taliban. During that same time, there was a Taliban attack on the U.S. embassy and the NATO headquarters in Kabul where we were covering that story.

And so at the same time, they say look, you know, we are trying to build up their confidence and skills, but it has been a very frustrating experience, Carol.

[10:25:04] COSTELLO: All right. Suzanne Malveaux, stand by. I want to go to Wolf Blitzer right now. The president expected to speak at any moment now.

Wolf, I would suppose he chose this moment because of those wave of terror attacks across the Middle East and also criticism from John McCain about troop levels in Afghanistan.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, the president has got to make a very important decision. Does he keep a lot of those troops in Afghanistan for a lot longer. He wanted to get those out -- those troops out of there, most of them, if not all of them, by the end of the year. He's got to make a major decision now because when you have troop deployment, as you know, Carol, it takes a long time for the U.S. military to get ready.

If there are about 10,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan right now, and this has been the longest war in American history, going back to October 2001, right after 9/11, the U.S. began deploying, sending troops to Afghanistan, they've been there ever since. And if the U.S. is going to maintain a significant troop presence in Afghanistan, the president has to make that decision with the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, the secretary of Defense, as other top military commanders, at this point.

So the assumption is he's going to go forward and say that American troops will stay even longer in Afghanistan. We'll hear precisely what he has to say, but this is a significant decision. It will affect a lot of American military personnel and will affect the overall war on terror because the assumption is that not only the Taliban, al Qaeda has a presence in Afghanistan, in neighboring Pakistan as well but ISIS is now developing a presence there as well so there's clearly a lot at stake for the U.S. right now.

The president presumably will be underling those points when he goes out and makes the statement in a few minutes. COSTELLO: OK. I want to go to David Gergen now. And we just got the

two-minute warning, the president is speaking so I may have to interrupt you.

GERGEN: Sure.

COSTELLO: But it's interesting that this news conference from the president comes at this particular time. He just got back from North Carolina. We weren't given a warning about it at all. It just says the president is going to talk about Afghanistan.

GERGEN: Absolutely. He's under a lot of pressure to extend and to keep a sizable force there because Americans tend to be the glue that's holding that together right now. So I think he's probably going to announce he's going to do more there than he wanted to do. But the second thing about this NATO conference he's going to, it comes on the heels of the Brexit vote in England and this is an opportunity to talk about how important it's going to be to strengthen NATO even as the EU is under pressure and may disintegrate.

COSTELLO: Interesting. I want to go to Lieutenant Colonel Rick Francona. He's our CNN military analyst. What do you suppose the president will say? The Defense secretary is going to be right there beside him so you would expect they're going to be talking about more troops in some way.

LT. COL. RICK FRANCONA, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: I think we're going to hear that the president has decided to keep the troop levels where they are.

COSTELLO: OK, sorry. Sorry, Rick. We got to listen to President Obama.

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Good morning, everybody.

More than 14 years ago, after Al Qaida attacked our nation on 9/11, the United States went to war in Afghanistan against these terrorists and the Taliban that harbored them. Over the years and thanks to heroic efforts by our military, our intelligence community, our diplomats and our development professionals, we pushed Al Qaida out of its camps, helped the Afghan people topple the Taliban and helped them establish a democratic government.

We dealt crippling blows to the Al Qaida leadership, we delivered justice to Osama bin Laden and we trained Afghan forces to talk responsibility for their security. And given that process, a year and a half ago in December of 2014, America's combat mission in Afghanistan came to a responsible end.

Compared to the 100,000 troops we once had there, today, fewer than 10,000 remain. And compared to their previous mission, helping to lead the fight, our forces are now focused on two narrow missions: training and advising Afghan forces and supporting counterterrorist operations against the remnants of Al Qaida as well as other terrorist groups, including ISIL. In short, even as we've maintained a relentless, you know, case against those who are threatening us, we are no longer engaged in a major ground war in Afghanistan. But even these narrow missions continue to be dangerous. Over the past year and a half, 38 Americans, military and civilian, have lost their lives in Afghanistan on behalf of our security, and we honor their sacrifice. We stand with their families in their grief and in their pride and we resolve to carry on the mission for which they gave their last full measure of devotion.