Return to Transcripts main page
Wolf
Program to Track Muslim Men Ending; Conway Explains Trump's Muslim Ban; Record Obamacare Enrollment as Trump Pledges to Repeal. Aired 1-1:30p ET
Aired December 22, 2016 - 13:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: Hi there, I'm Brianna Keilar in for Wolf Blitzer. It is 1:00 p.m. here in Washington, 6:00 p.m. in London and 8:00 p.m. in Jerusalem. And wherever you're watching from around the world, thank you so much for joining us.
We are starting with the manhunt in Germany for the man police believe slammed a truck into a crowded Christmas market. This is the suspect, Anis Amri. And police are asking the public for help finding this 24- year-old Tunisian.
Now, there is a new video clip of Amri. This is something that was posted on Facebook. But, at this time, it is unknown when or where it was shot.
Our Erin McLaughlin is live for us in Berlin where the Christmas market there has actually reopened. And, Erin, tell us about the manhunt and the police raids. Are German police confident that the suspect is still in the country?
ERIN MCLAUGHLIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Brianna, for the moment, they're not saying. What we do know is that they are casting their net wide.
Police across Europe are on the lookout. In fact, there was a raid at a port in Denmark today, although that turned out to be a false lead.
For the most part, though, authorities seem to be concentrating, the police raids here in Germany, in Berlin as well as in the Cologne area.
According to the prosecutor, they received a tip-off to search a coach in the German city of Hillsong (ph) today, although that looking to be a false lead as well.
Meanwhile, here in Berlin, life seems to be getting back to normal. A sign of resilience just behind me. The Christmas market, the scene of the attack, has been reopened this morning, albeit to intense security presence. A lot of police officers here.
They've also installed concrete barricades to prevent this kind of attack from happening again. They've also set up a makeshift memorial just outside there. You might be able to see the candles and flowers to remember the victims of this attack. The kiosks, though, are open, selling spiced wine as well as gifts. I spoke to one customer today and she told me that she's here because she believes in hope -- Brianna.
KEILAR: It is really something to see that market reopen. Thank you so much for sharing that with us, Erin McLaughlin.
And we are learning some new information about the suspect. His ties to a known terror group and what officials knew that he was capable of.
Joining me now from London is CNN Terrorism Analyst Paul Cruickshank. He is also editor-in-chief for "CTT Sentinel."
Paul, what have you learned about plans for this attack?
PAUL CRUICKSHANK, CNN TERRORISM ANALYST: Well, Brianna, CNN has obtained a 345-page investigative file about this ISIS recruiting network that the suspected attacker was a part of. I've been poring through it over the past few hours.
And some extraordinary revelations. And that's that the German security services had an informant inside this network feeding them information in the months leading up to this Berlin attack.
And one of the pieces of information is that Anis Amri had discussed launching an attack inside Germany on several occasions. They already knew that before this Berlin attack. And, in fact, they knew that many months ago, it would appear.
And also, this police informant was party to conversations when other members of this network discussed launching truck ramming attacks into crowds in Germany and actually with the idea of loading these trucks up with gasoline and explosives to try to create an even more spectacular attack.
They were also aware of him trying -- the suspect, Amri, to get hold of a weapon. So, they had a very clear image of this guy as being extremely dangerous, as being somebody who had aspirations to launch an attack inside Germany.
And they also knew that this was being sanctioned at the leadership level of this radical network, this ISIS recruiting network in Germany. And that this -- these leaders were offering him sanctuary, places to hide, if he wanted to launch one of these plots.
So, one of the concerns is going to be that this network is actually now hiding him right now.
KEILAR: So, Paul, why not act on that intelligence that he had plans or talked about attacks multiple times? Were German authorities hamstrung by something?
CRUICKSHANK: Well, they're going to have to answer for that. One can only think that they needed to prioritize to a certain degree, triage to a certain degree, given that the scale of the threat they're facing, the number of people that they're having to monitor, to follow.
[13:05:06] And they did roll up the leadership of this organization, this network, in November. They arrested the five key figures. The five key proselytizers, the people indoctrinating the youngsters, people organizing the logistics, with all the contacts to help smuggle people to Syria and Ira to join ISIS.
But what didn't do in November, just a few weeks ago, was to roll up all the foot soldiers as well. And so, the worry is that there are other foot soldiers out there, youngsters radicalized by these proselytizers, in and around Dortmund in northern Germany, who will move forward now with attacks inspired by what they've seen their friend do.
KEILAR: All right, Paul Cruickshank, thank you for that insight.
I want to talk more now about the security landscape in Europe and also here in the United States. Here with me now is William Cohen, he's the former secretary of defense and a leading international security expert.
So, you have German authorities, at this point, admitting that they had this suspect in custody and then he is -- then he is released. He sort of drops out of the picture a little bit because they do release him. I mean, is that stunning to you?
WILLIAM COHEN, FORMER U.S. SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: It's not stunning. You asked the question, were the German officials hamstrung? And I would say yes, by history. They have had a history of the German stussy (ph), the intelligence services in East Germany and along with the Soviet Union.
And so, there's a strong sentiment, on the part of the German people, to put more emphasis on privacy rather than government surveillance.
Now, that's going to change, obviously. They've got to be even more intrusive, if they're going to prevent or at least reduce the likelihood of more of these taking place.
But this is a soft target. There are soft targets all over Europe, the United States, elsewhere. They're easy targets to hit, if, in fact, you can get through the perimeter of your security which means your intelligence capability.
KEILAR: So, you find it hard to believe that something like this -- the multiple contacts with authorities through a deportation hearing, and then a release, and so on, there were others, you think it would be difficult for that to happen here in the U.S.?
COHEN: Well, we've had examples of it happening here. That what is the difference between thought, talk and action? Can we, in fact, interrupt someone who is talking about it but not taking any action?
We may get to the point, in the future, where we have something equivalent of the minority report, where we have the kind of analytics that are predictive -- KEILAR: It's almost anti -- un-American, isn't it?
COHEN: It's almost un-American to say, we're going now to try to look at the information we have and predict whether or not this individual, based upon his or her conduct, religion, theology and sociology is likely to commit this act.
Having talked about it on the Internet, having contact with radical groups, do we take them now or do we have to wait until they take and act? And that's something that every liberal democracy has got to contend with in the coming years.
KEILAR: Could you really -- I mean, is there -- do you really see that happening in the U.S., especially considering there are some of these lone wolf suspects that we have seen who certainly their lawyers are claiming entrapment, that they have been talking to who they think may be someone facilitating their extremist act. But, in the end, it's law enforcement and they catch them right before they're going to do something.
COHEN: Well, we have --
KEILAR: I mean, that poses some legal problems.
COHEN: -- we have Dylann Roof, a neo-Nazi white supremist --
KEILAR: The church shooting in Charleston.
COHEN: -- (INAUDIBLE) who killed nine people in Charleston. Did we know that he had these proclivities? Did we follow him? Should we have? Should we follow all of the neo-Nazi groups in the United States or wait until some of them take action? This is a problem, a challenge, for all of us who live in a free society and not a dictatorship.
KEILAR: Secretary Cohen, thank you so much. Really appreciate it.
A Virginia man has now been charged with attempting to help ISIS. Lionel Nelson Williams was arrested yesterday, and prosecutors say he was trying to provide material support to ISIS.
In this case, they believe that he was collecting money to help the terror group buy weapons and ammunition. And they also say that he's posted online support for ISIS, targeting police officers and the U.S. military.
Now, coming up, President Obama is trying to end a program created after September 11th. His goal, to keep President-elect Trump from using it.
And President George W. Bush's chief of staff Andy Card is going to join us live to talk about that and also what it's like to be in the White House while the commander in chief is waging a war on terror.
[13:09:36]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KEILAR: Breaking news now on what the U.S. intelligence community knew about the suspect in the Berlin Christmas market attack.
I want to bring in CNN Justice Correspondent Evan Perez for this story. Evan, tell us what you've learned here.
EVAN PEREZ, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Brianna, we've known that U.S. authorities had put this suspect on a U.S. no-fly list, essentially after getting information indicating that he was a member or he was associated with a group operating in central Europe that was communicating with people in Syria ISIS members in Syria.
Now, we don't know what the -- when exactly he was put on this no-fly list. But we do know that this occurred before this attack.
So, it appears that while the Germans had not -- did not feel they had enough information to arrest him before this attack happened in Berlin, they all -- they did possess information which they shared with the U.S. intelligence. That indicated that he was somebody who they needed to be aware of. That he could not get on a plane, for instance, and travel to the United States.
Now, it appears, according to information that we've reported here on CNN, that he used various identities. So, it's not clear exactly which of these identities the U.S. was aware of. But we do know now, from talking to officials, that the U.S. intelligence community was aware of him. They had put him on a no-fly list before this attack occurred.
KEILAR: All right, Evan Perez, thank you so much for that update. We know that you are going to continue to dig on this.
And the Obama administration said today, it would end a program once used to track mostly Arab and Muslim men. It is a program that Donald Trump has suggested he is considering resurrecting.
I want to discuss this now with Andy Card. He served as chief of staff to President George W. Bush. Andy, thanks so much for being with us today. And you're someone who can speak about this in a very informed manner.
This program, the end SEERS program for national security, it's a re- entry program. It involves what's called special registrations both for foreign nationals and the also for immigrants from Muslim nations as they come and go from the U.S., mainly Muslim nations I should say. And this was started under the Bush administration in 2002.
[13:15:03] President Obama is ending this now, a dormant program that, effectively, registered and monitored a lot of Muslim and Arab men in the U.S.
[13:15:00] BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: Muslim nations, I should say, and this was started under the Bush administration in 2002. President Obama is ending this now dormant program that effectively registered and monitored a lot of Muslim and Arab men in the U.S. and this is something that the president-elect has wanted to institute. In your opinion, is this something that is necessary today?
ANDY CARD, FORMER CHIEF OF STAFF FOR PRES. GEORGE W. BUSH: Well, first of all, I want the president to be able to have all of the tool necessary to help protect America. And this was a valuable tool. I can't imagine that it's lost its usefulness. I would suspect it's still a very valuable tool to have, so I'm disappointed that they're going to take that tool away from the next president. And maybe he'll have to put it back in so that he can use it.
But I world thing, especially with the would as hypersensitive as it is today to the reality that terrorists want to attack soft targets, that they would be paying attention to every tool in the tool box. And that was an important tool. And I think that it should be available for the president to use to help protect America.
KEILAR: Do you think it's different, though, I wonder, in terms of, look -- looking at Donald Trump's rhetoric during the campaign, talking about really a Muslim registration program and a Muslim ban and there being a lot more amped up rhetoric than there was around the time that this program was instated, that that added to using someone like an NSEERS program could be a recruitment tool essentially for ISIS or other groups?
CARD: I suppose you could make that argument. I don't think that it's quite the same as Donald Trump was talking about registering all Muslims or prohibiting Muslims from coming into the country. I thought it was a very targeted program. One that was appropriate to better understand the nature of people applying to come to the United States. And I think it's a valuable responsibility for the United States government to have that.
It's a privilege to come to the United States. It's not a right, it's a privilege. And before we grant that privilege, we should be able to ask some important questions and exercise some judgment as to whether or not a person is coming here for the purpose they claim they are or they're coming here for some other purpose where they're trying to hide an attack and get into the country and do something. So I think they should use all of the tools that are available to protect the country.
It's a tricky job to be president. It's not an easy responsibility. But this is one of those areas where the paramount concern for the president should be to protect America. That the ultimate oath that he takes.
KEILAR: You are someone who firsthand discussed with and watched George W. Bush make decision about how he was going to communicate things to the country. We saw Donald Trump this week say before the White House said and certainly before foreign countries said that this was radical Islamic extremism that we were seeing in this attack in Germany, and also in Turkey, and he got out ahead of those folks. I want you to listen to something that Kellyanne Conway, who we now know is going to be one of his top aides in the White House, how she explained some of those comments.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) KELLYANNE CONWAY, TRUMP'S PICK FOR COUNSELOR TO THE PRESIDENT: Donald Trump is constantly criticized here and elsewhere as, oh, my God, look, he doesn't even have the evidence yet and he's saying it's ISIS. He's been right every single time. And he's not saying it to be right, he's saying it to remind us.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KEILAR: "He's not saying it to be right, he's saying it to remind us." What do you think about that coming from a president?
CARD: Well, you know, he's the president-elect. He's not the president. But I - I don't have a problem with him offering opinions. He doesn't have to be as knowledgeable today as he will be the day he becomes president of the United States. So I don't have a problem with him conjecturing on something. Yes, it's dangerous to do. I'd like him to taste his words before he spits them out and get some counsel from his advisers, but I don't think that it was malicious and I don't think that he is - he's not the president yet. He is going to be the president and I hope he's doing everything to get ready. And I know that President Obama's team is working very hard to make sure that he will be ready, especially to understand the nature of the threats to America and the ones that are real and the ones that might be imagined.
KEILAR: If he doesn't make a somewhat dramatic change in how he messages things, and I did say president, and I misspoke, president- elect. If he doesn't make a dramatic change once he gets into the White House, what are the dangers of that, of saying something before it's confirmed by intelligence or foreign countries?
CARD: I think the President-elect Trump will learn, when he becomes president, that the words he uses really do make a difference. And he'll be very careful with what he said. That doesn't mean that he has to prevent himself from opining about what's happening in the world. But he has to be very careful because the words spoken in America are heard all around the world. And some people in other places around the world don't hear the way we hear in the United States. So I do think it's important for him to taste his words before he spits them out when he becomes president. I'd like to have seen him doing that as a candidate for president.
[13:20:05] He's putting good people around him. The White House staff is starting to get in place and I'm impressed with the people that he's put around him. Most of them have the courage to speak truth to power and that's critically important. Reince Priebus, I know, is doing a good job of getting ready to be the president's chief of staff. So I'm confident that he will have the right information around him. I hope that he exercises some discipline to keep a secret a secret. He doesn't have to talk about everything the moment it's brought up to him. But I would like to see him meet the responsibility protecting the United States without exacerbating the threat to the United States. And I think that's a fine line to walk. I witnessed George W. Bush do an outstanding job understanding the nature of the threat to the country and then working very hard to protect us. KEILAR: Andy Card, thank you so much. And advice we can all follow, I
think, taste your words before you spit them out. We do appreciate you, as always, being with us.
CARD: Thank you very much.
KEILAR: And coming up, Obamacare enrollment reaches a record high as the president-elect promised to repeal it next month. What this mean for Trump's plan and the millions of people who use it, next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KEILAR: President-elect Donald Trump promises to repeal Obamacare when he takes office next month, but some now wonder if he could face growing opposition. Why? Well, enrollment in the program just hit a record high. Nearly 6.4 million Americans have already selected Obamacare policies through the federal exchange for the new year and that is about 400,000 more people than last year.
Let's discuss what this could mean with my panel of CNN political commentators. Joining me, we have Ryan Lizza, Washington correspondent for "The New Yorker," Patti Solis Doyle, a former presidential campaign manager for Hillary Clinton, and Doug Heye, a Republican strategist and former communications director for the RNC.
[13:25:16] KEILAR: So you have these concerns over enrollment a few months ago and now we're seeing - we've seen that premiums were skyrocketing, although fair to say a lot of people actually weren't going to feel that. But now you have a lot of people saying, wow, Donald Trump might be leery, might need to be leery politically of getting rid of Obamacare.
RYAN LIZZA, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, he - he - I think he - and during the campaign, didn't quite understand or - at least publicly he never quite articulated what he would replace Obamacare with. And when you get into the details, it's enormously complicated. That's why a lot of Republicans on The Hill right now are a little worried about how to proceed. Do they repeal and replace? Do they repeal and then have a waiting - a sort of period where they wait and try and get some Democratic buy-in during that period. It's a big complicated thing to transition from one health care system to another, especially one that's been intact now for eight years.
And I think the surge of enrollment you saw was obviously people who realized the results of the election meant that Obamacare wasn't going to be there. There's a big push by the administration in this last enrollment period to get people to sign up. So this is - this is going to be much more complicated, I think, than Trump realized during the campaign.
KEILAR: Yes. Patti, what are Democrats really worried about losing when it comes to Obamacare, or are they pretty confident that Donald Trump just won't have the political ability to do away with this?
PATTI SOLIS DOYLE, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, look, I agree with Ryan when he said that during the campaign Trump didn't realize just how complicated it is. And I find it ironic that it took his meeting with President Obama to really sort of open his eyes as to how complicated it's going to be to repeal Obamacare without - not having anything to replace it with.
And that's the real problem here, how do you tell 20 million people that you're not going to have insurance anymore and then give them no alternative. So I think that's the political problem for Donald Trump and Republicans on The Hill is they have nothing - there is no alternative for all of these people who will be without health care.
KEILAR: Donald Trump has said, Doug, that there's not going to be a lapse even of days. He said that in his "60 Minutes" interview right after he was elected. But congressional Republicans aren't so definitive about that. How can Republicans really make any big changes to Obamacare that would allow them to say, hey, we repealed it?
DOUG HEYE, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, the - I think the repeal vote will happen first, and then there will be a long waiting period. Republicans, obviously -
KEILAR: Before anything takes effect?
HEYE: Before anything takes effect. The repeal vote will be politically first and foremost of importance to Republicans to fulfill that promise that they've made now for six years. And if they don't do it, they'll be politically a lot of problems. But in the meantime, Republicans have talked about repealing Obamacare for a long time without replacements in place. I spent two year, two and a half years in Congress working on different replacements -
LIZZA: I was just going to say, you know -
HEYE: And people like Ryan would call me and say, where's your replacement bill? And I would say, we're still working on it. So this will go on for a long time. But it also emphasizes where Republicans are, reinforces where Republicans are on entitlements. These are very tough, complicated things. It took two years for Obamacare to be enacted through Democrats. And when we enact big, social program, it's very difficult to repeal them. It's very difficult to change them. Once you create an entitlement, it's usually there to stay.
LIZZA: I mean one possibility for Trump is to fix Obamacare, call it Trumpcare, and call it a day. Now, I don't think that would satisfy a lot of Republicans, but there -
KEILAR: It's not going to.
LIZZA: Their - if he sort of gets - if he decides that it's just too much of a mess to go forward with the main conservative plans on The Hill, he could do what he's done on Social Security and Medicare, which is just become defenders of those programs. He's not on board with a lot of Republicans in terms of changing to those programs.
HEYE: No.
LIZZA: I mean that's one way out of this is call it Trumpcare, but - KEILAR: Sure.
DOYLE: Well, but the irony in that is, that's exactly what Hillary Clinton campaigned on, is not repealing it but fixing it. And so I think - I think it's going to have a hard -
LIZZA: I think a lot of Trump supporters would listen to him before they would listen to Republicans on The Hill. You know, correct me if you think I'm wrong, Doug.
HEYE: No, I agree, but let - but the bill that goes through will emphasize the primacy of Congress in this issue.
LIZZA: That's the thing, yes.
HEYE: We can call it Trumpcare, but it is up to the Republican House and the Republican Senate to do it.
KEILAR: Congresscare.
HEYE: Congress cares.
KEILAR: GOPcare.
I think - mostly I think you don't want your name attached to the word "care."
DOYLE: Pretty much.
KEILAR: I think that's - does it give you some solace that Donald Trump is more of a pragmatist than he is an ideologue about some of these things? And you're even seeing daylight between congressional Republicans and Donald Trump on what they want to do here?
DOYLE: Some, not a lot.
KEILAR: Yes.
[13:29:44] DOYLE: I - you know, I think I see this transition and many of its appointments or its nominees and I, you know, as someone who did not vote for him as a woman and as an immigrant and as an Hispanic, I am still sort of very wary and very fearful of some of these appointments, like Jeff Sessions, Mnuchin at Treasury, Rex Tillerson at State with his ties to Russia after Russia