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Report: Ivanka Trump, Husband Moving to D.C.; Trial of Michael Slager Results in Hung Jury; Fake News Story Causes Real Assault and Arrest; Kenyan American Returns to Kenya to Do Healthcare Work. Aired 3:30-4p ET

Aired December 05, 2016 - 15:30   ET

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


[15:30:00] ANA CABRERA, CNN ANCHOR: Something that has opened up a whole new can of worms as we continue the discussion. I know you'll continue to work on getting more answers for us. Manu Raju, thank you so much. Just days after the election, one of the incoming President's closest confidantes said she wanted to play no role.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARBARA WALTERS, ABC NEWS ANCHOR: People think you're going to be part of the administration, Ivanka.

IVANKA TRUMP, DAUGHTER OF PRESIDENT-ELECT TRUMP: I'm -- no, I'm going to be a daughter, but I've said throughout the campaign that I am very passionate about certain issues and that I want to fight for them.

WALTERS: But you won't be --

IVANKA TRUMP: Wage equality, child care, these are things that are very important for me. I'm very passionate about education. Really promoting more opportunities for women. So, you know, there are a lot of things that I feel deeply, strongly about but not in a formal administrative capacity.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: Could she be having a change of heart? CNN has learned Ivanka and her husband, Jared Kushner, are house hunting in Washington, D.C., as they look to move from New York to D.C. On top of that, today Ivanka and her father met with Al Gore to talk climate change. Now, these moves are increasing speculation that Ivanka will, in fact, take a policy role in her presidency. Her husband, Jared, also expected to be involved in some decision-making in the Trump administration. So, let's talk more about this with the man who knows the Trump family

well. Michael D'Antonio, Donald Trump biographer and author of the book "The Truth About Trump". Thanks for joining me. Would it surprise you if Jared and Ivanka were part of the Trump administration?

MICHAEL D'ANTONIO, DONALD TRUMP BIOGRAPHER: Not one bit. I think we're dealing with completely uncharted territory here. The Trumps really don't feel they're beholden in any way. They can say one thing at the moment of the election and then another a week later and then another thing two weeks later. So, I would not be surprised to see that even a formal role is in store for Ivanka and definitely for Jared Kushner.

CABRERA: Given how much you know about the family, your closeness to the family, let's say both of them are a part of the administration. No doubt there would be questions about nepotism and conflicts of interest, but what would each of these two people bring to the administration. Ivanka and Kushner, their strengths.

D'ANTONIO: Well, they're very bright young people. And I think one of the things that a lot of people who are concerned about Donald Trump might feel good about is that they'd bring a more modern, younger sensibility. If you hear Ivanka talking about child care and equal rights in employment for women, these are things that a lot of younger, moderate Americans really want, so I think this is encouraging. In Jared Kushner's case, there's a very intelligent guy who knows technology. So far, we only know Donald Trump understands technology enough to tweet. And I think someone who understands how technology fits into the economy and how the government can be informed by technology would be a real asset to his circle of advisers.

CABRERA: Now, you don't think Ivanka Trump could have one foot in the administration and one foot in Donald Trump's businesses still, right?

D'ANTONIO: Well, this remains to be seen. I think he said he's going to have an announcement on December 15th about his businesses. If he says that he's divesting and that the whole enterprise is being liquidated, then I think people could have confidence there would be no conflict of interest. But if he retains ownership or the family retains ownership, we're going to have to take them at their word that there's not some self-dealing going on.

And Americans are not accustomed to that. I think there would be serious questions. And then you wonder, who would come up against Jared Kushner or Ivanka Trump within the administration? Say, there's a disagreement. Are other advisers going to feel confident challenging them, knowing they're related to the President? This is a serious thing to work out. And I think Americans are going to want to have some straight answers about it.

CABRERA: All right. Michael, thank you.

Coming up, they have been deliberating now for more than 20 hours. Is the jury any closer to a verdict in the case of a former South Carolina police officer Michael Slager? He shot and killed an unarmed man as he was running away. It was caught on camera. More on the lone juror who says he can't convict the defendant. We'll discuss next.

[15:35:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CABRERA: Breaking news just into our CNN news room right now. Getting word of a major moment in the trial of a former police officer from South Carolina charged with murder in the 2015 shooting death of Walter Scott. Let's listen to the judge.

JUDGE CLIFTON NEWMAN, SOUTH CAROLINA: Not be discriminated against in jury selection or in jury service. And to reach a unanimous verdict. And there's no unanimous verdict, then we're back to square one. That's where we are in this case. So, I want to thank you and want to give the parties an opportunity to thank you as well. I would say to you that you're about to be released from jury duty, which means that all the restrictions that you are under with regard to discussing the case and consulting the media and social media and watching TV and all those things you're released from all those restrictions.

[15:40:00] Can you discuss the case with anyone you might want to, but you're not obligated to speak with anyone concerning the case. And if anyone bothers you or interferes with you with regard to this case, you can notify the court, we will address the issue. We are already addressing issues raised with regard to media attempts to photograph -- suspected media attempts to photograph you. And all those issues will be addressed. But I want to thank you for your service. You've given this case a good, long deliberation. And the longest that I've ever been involved in. And it is what it is. Madame?

SCARLETT WILSON, LAWYER: Thank you, judge. We're not going to do closing arguments. When I say to you in closing, I want you folks to know, y'all have been remarkable. And I really wish that y'all had something to compare it to know how remarkable you have been. Your service has been exemplary. You have put in, I believe, more than any trial we've ever had. I know more than any criminal trial we've ever had, at least civil trial. Y'all have worked harder and longer than any jury we've had, and were more responsive and responsible. We could tell that by the way you were acting during testimony, by your promptness, by your alertness. You name it --

CABRERA: We're going to break away from the courtroom. We just heard the judge declare a mistrial, saying there was not a unanimous decision reached by the jury in the trial of former police officer Slager who did shoot and kill Walter Scott as he was running away. We saw it on video. Again, no unanimous decision. That ends in a mistrial. Let's bring in Nick Valencia, joining us from the scene there in South Carolina. Nick, what more can you tell us?

NICK VALENCIA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: This is what we anticipated. Friday, we heard there was a lone juror who said against his good conscience he could not convict Michael Slager, that North Charleston police officer. Today the headline being a majority of the jurors were still undecided as to whether or not they would convict the officer with first-degree murder. The day started, with a series of questions from the jurors. Some of them asking, what is imminent danger? What is malice? Why consider this voluntary manslaughter charge?

Those series of questions were presented to not just the state but also the defense to instruct the jurors to go back and deliberate. This being the fourth day of deliberations. At least five hours spent by the jurors today. We were called into the courtroom a short time ago. Andy Savage, defense attorney for Michael Slager, asking for them to be an alternative charge. The judge did not issue that. It was minutes after that that the jurors spilled into the courtroom, handing a note to the judge saying they were unable to reach a unanimous verdict.

It was because of that, a mistrial would be declared in this case. We should remind our viewers that Michael Slager is not totally off the hook just yet. He's facing a federal civil rights charge. That case to be presented sometime later next year. We were in that courtroom. I was sitting about a row behind his wife, who throughout the whole day was biting her nails, sitting in the same row was Scott's family. Many of the family members for both sides, Slager and Scott were present in the courtroom. We saw Mrs. Scott clasp her hands in prayer throughout the day. Very tense and emotional scene inside that courtroom. Now we are hearing in this case a mistrial has been declared by the judge. The jurors unable to reach a unanimous verdict.

CABRERA: A lot of people watching this trial closely, given just the conversation that we're having around the country regarding use of force, incidents involving police, involving people of color. So, Nick Valencia, this is a significant development. Thank you for joining us and filling us in on the latest information out from the judge.

I want to bring in our two legal minds here, Joey Jackson and Charles Coleman Jr. Thank you for being here to weigh in on this situation. We just heard from Nick Valencia. I think a key piece of information and that is, that the majority of the jurors apparently were undecided, hence, the not a unanimous verdict. Joey.

JOEY JACKSON, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: We don't know undecided on what. Just to reset, the jurors had to consider two different things. One was murder and murder, of course, is the element of malice. Did he do it with ill will? The second thing there was to consider was if it wasn't with ill will, that is the killing, then did he do it out of the heat of passion? Some other provocation involved?

[15:45:00] That's what the jury was considering. When you talk about a hung jury, of course, he's not out of the clear at all because the state has the ability to retry him on this particular case. So, we know that. That there's going to be a retrial. In addition to the federal charges that you heard Nick Valencia talk about. But whenever you have a hung jury, as Charles has had, right, and I have certainly had, the fact is that it's a disheartening thing.

Because when the judge gave what's called the Allen charge last week, the dynamite charge to say, look, there's no juror more qualified than you. There's no set of jurors more qualified than you. They're going to hear the same things. They're going to hear the same witnesses. They'll listen to the same arguments. You can do it. Go back and try it again. He attempted with that Allen charge to get them to talk again. Then, of course, we get the note from the juror that said, I've considered it and I'm sorry to the family, but I'm not convicting.

CHARLES COLEMAN JR., CIVIL RIGHTS ATTORNEY: I want to jump in right there when you start talking about the note because that's particularly troubling when you're thinking about these jurors being -- going through the process of voir dire, where the judge interviews them in different courtrooms, attorneys have the opportunity to interview prospective jurors and find out -- and I've asked this so many times as a prosecutor. If I'm able to prove my case beyond a reasonable doubt, can you convict? Will you convict?

And these are things that are standard questions for prosecutors. Even in many cases for judges during criminal trials as part of the voir dire process. I'll be frank with you, I have a hard time believing -- when I read that note on Friday, that the juror sent to the judge, I had a hard time believing that juror had not previously decided that they were not going to convict even before they had sat down and been sworn in. I think this was a case where we had a stealth juror who had already made up their mind there was no way they were going to convict Michael Slager.

JACKSON: That's one part of it, and that certainly could be true. On the alternative side, it's difficult to convict a police officer. Now, you look at this case, and Charles and I were talking about it, there's very few clearer cases you see someone running away --

CABRERA: Because it's on video. That's what gets me. He's running away. He was shot on the back based on the evidence that came out of the autopsy. Given that you can't have a conviction in this case, what does that send in terms of a message regarding police and use of force?

COLEMAN: That's exactly what is most troubling about this decision, about the fact that we had a mistrial. This is as clear a case as you are going to find when you talk about deadly use of force and misuse of force with respect to law enforcement. You're bringing up concepts like imminent danger and the threat to someone's life. This is a man who was running away. And here's the thing I said to Joey during the break. When you're talking about the defense being able to advance this theory, they had to do so primarily, even though there were a number of witnesses called, in terms of accounting for the events that took place, primarily through the testimony of Michael Slager himself.

CABRERA: Joey, what about -- What about the race and makeup of the jury. We know it was predominantly white people, one African American man, who was the foreman. Everybody else was Caucasian.

JACKSON: I can't blame it on that. Even in the event there's one African American juror, this was a lone holdout. Nick Valencia gave the indication there were a number of jurors undecided, maybe that was to murder. Maybe the note all 11 felt it was manslaughter and one holdout. I can't equate or otherwise contribute the fact there's one holdout to the issue of race.

Now, is it a stealth juror, a juror who was there, who had his mind predetermined or a person, consistent with what we've seen in terms of not being able to prosecute police in many cases, was it the juror who said, I was in fear, we had this fight, he ran away, I shot until the threat was stopped. That's why I discharged my gun eight times, hitting him five. It could have been this juror simply felt he couldn't do it based on the evidence. Why? You might think it unreasonable. Charles Coleman may think it unreasonable. I might think it unreasonable. This juror, we also when we select jurors say, stick to your guns. In the event, you have an opinion, it's different from everyone else's, you're the lone juror, I ask you on voir dire, if you're the lone juror and you have an opinion as to something, would you let someone change your mind? You're going to tell me no and I'll say, I want on you that jury.

COLEMAN: To your question about race, it is critically important to remember. This is a county that has a 28 percent African American population and there was only one African American juror on the jury. What that tells me is, quite frankly, folks have to show up to jury duty. That's something we can't ignore. Yes, Joey, you're absolutely right that that one holdout could have made a difference if it was ten African Americans and one white person on that jury. But with 28 percent of folks in that county [15:50:00] being black and there being one juror who was black on that jury, That tells me there were a lot of folks who tried to get out or just ignored it altogether.

[15:50:00] CABRERA: And the jury is not representative of the broader population, necessarily.

JACKSON: It's not the end of the story, though.

CABRERA: No, it's not. We heard Nick Valencia talk about the federal charges too. And we could see another trial in this case too at the local level. Thank you both.

Much more on this breaking news coming up, and we're back in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CABRERA: Rampant, fake new stories could be having real consequences. Just last night an armed gunman stormed a pizza place in Washington, D.C. known as Comet Ping-Pong. He pointed an assault rifle at an employee. He began firing after that worker ran away. Investigators say the 28-year-old, Edgar Welsh of North Carolina, claimed he was there to investigate the so-called Pizzagate. This is a totally false, bogus conspiracy theory claiming Hillary Clinton is actually involved in a child sex ring run from this pizza restaurant. But again, this is not true. The owner of the restaurant says they have been targeted for weeks over this fake news story.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAMES ALEFANTIS, OWNER COMET PING PONG: So essentially, they would go into our social media accounts and they would take photographs that were on my Instagram of my friend's children or my associate's children, and post them around thousands and thousands of fake news sites and on Reddit and on YouTube and use these images of happy playing, innocent children as proof of some kind of human trafficking scheme led by the Clintons.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: Joining me now to discuss the founder of the news and opinion blog Mediaite. And the restaurant's owner says what happened shows promoting these false ideas, these false stories, conspiracy theories, has real consequences. He talks about the threat that he and his family have felt. How do you combat this?

DAN ABRAMS, FOUNDER, MEDIAITE: I hold the people who are distributing this, who are disseminating it, responsible. You're talking about sites that are kind of shadowy with no real ownership most of the time, no one knows who is running them, et cetera. And you have people who are putting them out on Twitter Facebook, et cetera, and first of all, it's people's responsibility when their friends do it to say, wait a second, what is this thing? Are you sure this is true? Shame your friends.

Also the public figures, say, look, I'm not sure this is true, I'm just saying. Donald Trump has done it, we have seen Michael Flynn now do it. Send out certain stories that say, I'm not the one judging whether it's true or not, I'm just putting it out there.

What does that mean? You're just going to put out there a story that may very well not be true and you're just saying --

CABRERA: I'm just saying. People are saying this. I don't know if it's true.

ABRAMS: What does that mean? Shame on you and shame on the people who aren't holding their friends accountable when they send out this nonsense.

CABRERA: Here's what's concerning to me, lieutenant general Mike Flynn who we now know is the national security adviser who Trump has picked for his secretary of defense.

[15:55:00] His son came out and said until Pizzagate is proven false it will remain a story. The left seems to forget the Podesta emails and many coincidences tied to it. He is suggesting unless you prove something false, it could be true. What do you do to break through?

ABRAMS: First of all, I think my dad would say please don't hold the son responsible for -- don't hold the dad responsible for what the son says.

CABRERA: His dad has also been laced to these conspiracy theories.

ABRAMS: With that said, that's crazy, right? Put something out there that has no basis in fact. Now it's you, the world's responsibility, to disprove this story. What? The notion that we now have to prove something is false, and if you can't do that, therefore, it is a mixed-up Alice in Wonderland world. The bottom line is don't put something out there -- let's say you're

not 100 percent it's true, but let's say you're 99 percent certain. OK, go ahead. When we say on Twitter that retweets don't mean endorsements, I think we have to take that seriously again which is to say, you know what? If you're going to retweet something, you have to think about the fact you're endorsing it to some degree. You can't just say, you know what? Retweets don't mean endorsements, therefore, I'm not responsible for what anyone else says.

This is crazy stuff, and this stuff really matters. Do I think that the reason this guy went into the pizza place is because people were purveying false news? Maybe. But it's a larger problem, it's not about the pizza guy.

CABRERA: That is why we are talking about it. It is important. We as the media have a responsibility to try to point out the fake news when it comes up. Thank you, Dan Abrams, for lending your thoughts. We appreciate it.

Back to our breaking news now, to South Carolina where this video you've seen over and over and over again, but a judge just declared a mistrial in the case of the former police officer who fired those shots, killing this unarmed black man as he ran away. We're live at the courthouse.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:00:00] CABRERA: Voting is under way right now for the CNN hero of the year, and one nominee left her career in the west to bring medical care to Kenya.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) UMRA OMAR, CNN HERO, HEALTHCARE WORKER, KENYA:If you look, one of the biggest challenges in health care are professionals, health care professionals. We have about six villages that have absolutely zero access to health care. To come back to where I'm born, it was kind of a sense of responsibility. We see multiplex in at least 10 of the villages, going in with a medical officer making sure drugs in each facility are available.

Being here, being close to home, to be able to fill some of the gaps in accessing health care, it's been an IV drip for life and purpose. You can see the impact in 0.1 seconds. I have absolutely zero regrets toward taking the leap of faith. I wouldn't trade it for anything in the world right now.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CABRERA: Talk about making a difference. Vote for your favorite heroes --