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Trump Attacks Union Boss in Series of Tweets; Trump Draws from Military for Staff Picks; GA Manhunt Underway after Officer Killed. Aired 10-10:30a ET

Aired December 08, 2016 - 10:00   ET

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

[10:00:16]

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: And good morning. I'm Carol Costello. Thank you so much for joining me. President-elect Donald Trump resuming his "Thank You" tour tonight but focused on assembling his administration this morning. Anytime now, the trademark gold elevators of Trump Tower whisk the latest candidate upstairs to the transition headquarters.

Retired admiral James Stavridis is said to be on the growing list for Secretary of State. If chosen, he would only add to concerns that Trump's White House will have a heavy military influence. President- elect has already chosen three retired generals to serve atop his administration.

Trump also coming under fire for his selection of Scott Pruitt to head the Environmental Protection Agency. Pruitt would become the guardian of a mission he has often criticized and lead the very agency that he has sued as Oklahoma's attorney general. CNN's Ryan Nobles is outside -- Ryan Nobles rather is outside Trump Tower with the latest. Good morning.

RYAN NOBLES, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Carol, good morning to you. And yes, the big meeting here today at Trump Tower will be with retired admiral James Stavridis. He is right now being considered for the role of Secretary of State, the ever expanding role of potential candidates for the president-elect. In this meeting today comes after a busy day filling out appointments to the Trump administration.

As you mentioned, tonight Trump will formally introduce Terry Branstad, the governor of Iowa, as his new ambassador to China. He also appointed WWE executive Linda McMahon to the role -- to head up the small business administration and General John Kelly will become the next Secretary of Homeland Security. But the appointment that is raising eyebrows today is that of Scott Pruitt. He's currently the attorney general of Oklahoma and has been a big critic of the EPA. He will now become the administrator of that agency. He's also someone who has often criticized the science behind climate change.

So, a busy day for Trump, no doubt, and that busy day comes on the same day as a report out of "The New York Times" that gets into how Trump is going to handle his global business empire once he becomes president. According to "The New York Times" Trump may not fully divest himself from that business and his daughter Ivanka may just take a leave of absence from her work with the company. Today, Trump attorney Michael Cohen made his way in the Trump Tower and he spoke to reporters about that topic. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: I want to talk to you about what's going to happen with the business.

MICHAEL COHEN, ATTORNEY TRUMP ORGANIZATION: Rather not talk about it at the moment.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Yes?

COHEN: If that's all right. I know everybody is concentrating on what he's going to do with the business. They're going to find out on December 15th. I believe he said he's going to make a statement. And he's going to describe how the business will be run in the future once he takes the White House.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Is there any truth to "The New York Times" story that he may keep a stake?

COHEN: I'm not going to comment on that. That again, Mr. Trump will talk about it on December 15th at his press conference.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: OK. Any word if Ivanka Trump is stepping away, possibly moving to D.C.?

COHEN: That's a question you should be asking of Ivanka, correct?

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Yes.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

NOBLES: Of course, Trump has said time and time again that his business is not important to him anymore, that he has a much bigger job now as President of the United States. So Carol, we'll have to wait and see what he says when he explains his new role with his company at his first press conference since winning the election on December 15th. Carol?

COSTELLO: Stay tuned. Ryan Nobles reporting live for us, thank you.

The local union boss representing thousands of Carrier workers is taking aim at Donald Trump, calling the president-elect a liar. Chuck Jones says Trump inflated the number of jobs -- his deal with Carrier would save and he has no regrets about calling out Trump on it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHUCK JONES, PRESIDENT UNITED STEELWORKERS LOCAL 1999: We had a lot of our members when the word was coming out of 1100. They thought that they would have a job. Then they find out the next day after -- last Friday that most likely, they weren't, 550 were still going to lose their jobs.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: Just a few minutes after that live interview, Donald Trump tweeted this. "Chuck Jones, who is President of United Steelworkers local 1999, has done a terrible job representing workers. No wonder companies flee the country!" Then an hour later, Trump tweeted, "If United Steelworkers was any good, they would have kept those jobs in Indiana."

So let's talk about that and more. I'm joined by CNN political analyst and senior editor for "The Atlantic," Ron Brownstein and politics editor at the "TheRoot.com," Jason Johnson. Welcome to both of you.

RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST AND SENIOR EDITOR "THE ATLANTIC": Good morning.

JASON JOHNSON, POLITICS EDITOR "THEROOT.COM" AND PROFESSOR MORGAN STATE UNIVERSITY: Good morning, Carol.

COSTELLO: So Jason, the President-elect of the United States gets into like a Twitter argument with a local union guy. What do you make of that?

JOHNSON: I think it's horrible, Carol, and it's dangerous. And let's be clear. He's not in an argument. He just attacked the guy. You know, Chuck Jones came out and said look, we're happy for the jobs that were saved. But you told us you were going to save a lot more jobs than you did. And that's a problem and you shouldn't lie to people, and you got people here who know they will get laid off at the end of the year during Christmas time.

He has every right to say that. It's his job to work with and protect those people. And he can say that Donald Trump lied. And then Trump attacked him. And now this man is getting death threats on the phone, via e-mail, there have been reports of death threats at him. So I think it's horrible, it's irresponsible for the president-elect but that is unfortunately who he is and how he's going to behave going forward.

[10:05:16] COSTELLO: And by the way, Ron, Mr. Trump did not dispute Mr. Jones' numbers. Mr. Jones was on "New Day" this morning and had this to say. Let's listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JONES: Maybe you know, the choice of words weren't the best, but the ultimate message was the same. He didn't tell the truth. He inflated the numbers and I called him out on it. He overreacted, president- elect Trump did, and I would expect if he was going to tweet something, he should have come out and try to justify his numbers.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: So Ron, I mean, in the great grand picture of life, where does this go?

BROWNSTEIN: This is -- I agree, this is very significant, the President-elect of the United States attacking an individual citizen by name because that citizen criticized him. After we have seen him also criticize other sources of kind of skepticism, ranging from "Saturday Night Live" to "Hamilton" to Corey Lewandowski, who used to be on this network, saying that the editor of "The New York Times" should be in jail because he published information about Donald Trump not paying federal taxes for many years.

So, what you have got -- is a systematic kind of really assault here on voices that are critical in a way that we simply have not seen before. This tweet yesterday, if it continues into the presidency, is an extraordinary kind of shift in our public dialogue where the President of the United States with all of that implies, leader of the free world, commander-in-chief, kind of bringing all that power to bear to criticize an individual American citizen because of you know, raising questions about their performance, that is kind of -- a new world. And I'm not sure it's one that many Americans will be comfortable with.

COSTELLO: Well, but Jason, what's the goal here? Is it just because Mr. Trump is thin-skinned or does he want to intimidate people into going along with whatever he does?

JOHNSON: Because he's basically auditioning to be a dictator and a bully. --

COSTELLO: That's strong, Jason.

JOHNSON: Like this is -- it is because this is dangerous. Because what happens if some crazy person -- look, we have seen people run into pizza restaurants in D.C. and try and shoot them up because of conspiracy theories. What happens when Chuck Jones gets attacked? What happens when someone sets fire, what happens when someone who Donald Trump attacks online. And again, he attacked him. The guy didn't say I hate Donald Trump. We don't even know if Chuck Jones voted for him. He just said look, he said he was going to save 1100 jobs --

COSTELLO: He voted for Hillary Clinton, by the way. I do know that.

JOHNSON: OK. But I mean, he's like look, he said he was going to save 1100, he only saved 700. This is dangerous. And dictators do that. Dictators bully people. Dictators use that kind of arbitrary power. If Donald Trump wants to save jobs that's great, that's what he ran on. I always think he should bring his own companies back first before going to local places but this is dangerous and I think it should concern any American citizen, Republican or Democrat.

COSTELLO: So Ron, I mean, Jason is using the word dictator. That's strong.

BROWNSTEIN: Yes. Now look, you know I don't think -- I don't think we are in that point. I mean, I think that is -- you know I can see why people would feel that you know -- this is kind of a road toward a kind of you know, rejecting kind of the voice of pluralism and legitimate voices of dissent. I would not go that far. But I do think people ought to be concerned about what the implications of this may be. And I think you know, Donald Trump, look, Donald Trump won the election fair and square. He won the Electoral College.

But the fact is that he's going to lose the popular vote by more than anyone who has ever taken office before. There are a lot of Americans with questions about the direction that he is setting. And the issue really for him is his goal to persuade and kind of include those Americans in his vision, or is it really to just kind of intimidate them -- into being quiet. And I think this kind of -- you know this kind of personal criticism of an individual American who is raising questions about the president is a line that is a dangerous line to cross.

COSTELLO: All right. Guys stick around, Ron Brownstein, Jason Johnson, because we have a lot more to talk about. Still to come in the NEWSROOM, Donald Trump once claimed to know more than the generals, at least when it comes to ISIS. So why is he picking so many generals for his cabinet?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:13:23] COSTELLO: A familiar theme is emerging as Donald Trump unveils his staffing picks for his upcoming administration. Military experience is in high demand. John Kelly and James Mattis joining Michael Flynn as the retired military officers Trump is trusting on Homeland Security, Defense and national security and the list doesn't end there. Today, Trump meets with James Stavridis, a retired navy admiral believed to be on the list for Secretary of State which is also rumored to be a potential job for General David Petraeus. All of this coming after Trump famously claimed to know more than the generals on ISIS and later said this during a town hall.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENTIAL-ELECT: I think under the leadership of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, the generals have been reduced to rubble. They have been reduced to a point where it's embarrassing for our country.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: Whoa. Let's talk about this. With me now, again is Ron Brownstein, senior editor for "The Atlantic" and Jason Johnson, politics editor for "TheRoot.com" and political science professor at Morgan State University, Barbara Starr also joins me, she's a CNN Pentagon correspondent. Welcome back and welcome to you, Barbara. And I will start with you, Barbara. -- I mean, is this unprecedented to have so many generals possibly serve in an administration?

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, it certainly -- it appears to be so in recent times. Now let's start with Mike Flynn as national security adviser. We certainly have had that in the past where military people have served in that position, even retired. -- So that's one thing. To be Defense Secretary and be recently retired from the military, of course, this all dates back to James Forrestal in the 1950s. Secretary of Homeland Security, that department hasn't been around long enough.

One of the big challenges here may be the unique personalities involved. Mike Flynn will be the traffic

[10:15:16] manager, if you will, for national security affairs moving in and out of the White House chain. He will be the traffic manager for reports, for analysis, for decision making, for meetings with the president. But Mike Flynn is a retired three-star. He was an intelligence staff officer, somebody who might have been on the staff of somebody like General Mattis or General Kelly. So it will be very interesting to see how those two four-star's deal with that situation and how all three of them may be called upon publicly to defend partisan policies really for the first times in their careers, Carol.

COSTELLO: OK. So Ron, going back to what we just heard Donald Trump say during the campaign, that these generals don't know nothing from nothing, so what changed?

BROWNSTEIN: Yes. Look, Donald Trump is an executive and he likes executives. I mean, I think that's a clear pattern here. We are not only seeing generals being put in these positions, but you are seeing a number of even former business officials, right? I mean, Linda McMahon and Wilbur Ross. You know, -- there's a kind of preference for kind of executive experience as opposed necessarily to kind of demonstrated experience in the public sector which is more like -- which are more likely to see from a Democrat. Certainly Generals Kelly and Mattis have stellar reputations and many Democrats have praised them as well.

The kind of cumulative concern is when you know all you have grown up with is hammers. All you see are nails, right? So that you know -- whether having such a tilt toward the military in senior ranks of the administration gives you a kind of predilection towards seeing the military as a solution to any problem that arises.

COSTELLO: So much of a solution to any problem that might arise is that scandals of the past are left there and I want to bring up General Petraeus right now, possible pick for Secretary of State, because General Petraeus gave classified information to his mistress. He was cheating on his wife while serving in the military. And Paula Broadwell, his mistress, appeared on a CBS morning show this morning. She actually cannot find a job. Here's what she said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAJ. PAULA BROADWELL, U.S. ARMY RESERVES: No, I think he's unequally qualified for many positions, but that's not my position to say. I think the president-elect would have to decide and members of the Senate. As I woke up to the news, you know it was a bit of a shocker that he was being considered for a cabinet position. And I was both shocked that I'm still in this tenuous position and yet happy, because I think he should be able to go on with his life.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: So Jason, she still admires this man greatly but -- she has a very admirable past herself with lots of military experience. And she can't get a job. And I know I'm making a little left turn here but it just seems so wrong to me. JOHNSON: She's the nicest ex-mistress I think anyone has ever seen. She's like I know he kind of ruined my career but I really think he's a good guy. I mean look, Carol, I think the general thing is this. Number one, it seems like the list of people to potentially be Secretary of State keeps getting bigger and bigger. I'm waiting for Trump to suggest like Omarosa and Bill Belichick or whoever. I mean, I don't know what he's really going for because the people he seems to be pointing out for Secretary of State are very different and they don't seem to have any sort of universal ideological theme.

I think the other issue is this. Trump has a right to pick any generals he wants. I, generally as a philosophy, think the president should be able to put together their cabinet. The Senate has to approve who those people are. The people we need to be more concerned about are you know people like Steve Bannon, Reince Priebus and Michael Flynn, who are the people who are really, as your other guest mentioned, who control what information Donald Trump gets. If Michael Flynn decides he doesn't want to take the text messages from Mattis because he really does want to continue with torture, that's more of my concern. But I think president-elect Trump has a right to put together as much of his administration he wants, whether it's executives or generals or anybody.

COSTELLO: Yes and Barbara, just a last question because it's not just the generals, right? Because Mr. Trump is also thinking as a choice for CIA director, Mike Pompeo, along with senior counselor Steve Bannon, both of them have military ties as well. So --

STARR: Well, you know, I think we probably don't want to risk overgeneralizing Mr. Bannon's experience was many, many years ago in the Navy. I think what really -- I think what we are discussing here is really key. If Mike Flynn, recently retired, is at the center of national security in the White House, exactly how much control will he have over the flow of information going to president Trump, will Secretary of Defense, if you will, James Mattis, Homeland Security Secretary, if you will, John Kelly, and potentially an admiral or general in charge of the State Department, have all the access they need and want to President Trump or will retired Army General Mike Flynn control that. All of that remains to be seen. In every administration,

[10:20:16] whether they have been a general, admiral or a civilian their whole lives, there is always this political to and fro with the White House. It will happen this time. It's just going to be very interesting since they are all ex-military and they all have known each other for years, how all is going to work out.

BROWNSTEIN: Real quick, Carol. You know, and in foreign policy, all of this is even more consequential than on the domestic side because as we talked about, it is really -- on dealing with the world, Donald Trump departs from traditional Republican thinking much more than he does on many domestic issues. For example, naming Scott Pruitt to the EPA is something that you would have seen from a lot of conservative Republicans trying to roll back regulation. But finding a Secretary of State who is both credible on the international stage and shares the coordinates of views that Donald Trump expressed in terms of kind of reset with Russia and re-questioning NATO and proliferation, that is a difficult needle to thread. And you are seeing the difficulty play out in real time.

COSTELLO: All right. I got to leave it there. Ron Brownstein, Jason Johnson, Barbara Starr, thanks to all of you.

Coming up in the NEWSROOM, small businesses, big concerns, is a world wrestling mogul the best advocate for the little guy, their thoughts on Donald Trump's choice to head the small business administration.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:25:49] COSTELLO: A massive man hunt now underway in Georgia for a suspect who shot two police officers, and then fled the scene. Authorities are on the lookout for this man. His name is Minquel Lembrick. He's accused of opening fire on police following a domestic dispute call. CNN's Victor Blackwell is following the story, good morning.

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Carol, good morning to you. Let me get you the very latest that just came in from the Georgia Bureau of Investigations. The reward for information leading up to the arrest of this accused cop killer has more than doubled --overnight. Now up to $70,000, more than 50 local and state officers and investigators have swarmed this small community of Americus, Georgia, about 140 miles South of Atlanta.

We are told that this man on your screen, Minquel Lembrick 32 years old, is said to be armed and dangerous. He went into hiding about 24 hours ago after investigators say he shot two police officers, killing one. Here's what we know. Officer Nicholas Smarr with the Americus Police Department and Officer Jody Smith with the Georgia Southwestern State University Campus Police Department responded to a call about a domestic dispute at an apartment complex roughly 24 hours ago. They encountered Lembrick, when officers say, he started firing shots. Smith is now in very critical condition at a hospital but we are told that Smarr died soon after the shooting.

Here's what we know about Lembrick. This is from the Americus Police Chief, Mark Scott, who says that Lembrick was someone who was known to his office and to the officers there. But they did not know when they responded to this call that he was the suspect. That he had open warrants relating to kidnapping charges and other charges relating to a previous domestic dispute. There was a woman and a child who were found at that location. They are safe.

But this is a real concern for Georgia's Southwestern State, which is so close to where this happened. The shooting did not happen on campus but there was a lockdown at the university, at local grade schools. The university is now, they finished with their finals yesterday and we know that the grade schools are open there but with extra security. When it comes to the question of where could this suspect be. The police chief there says, that he doesn't know where he could be, but they are getting tips in. They are checking those locations. So this manhunt is broad and growing and again, in just the last few moments, we learned that information leading up to that arrest, up to $70,000. Carol?

COSTELLO: All right, Victor Blackwell reporting live for us. I'll be right back.

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