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Rapper Eminem Unleashes Blistering Attack on Trump; Victim Manhattan D.A. Couldn't Prosecute Weinstein & NBC News Failed to Report on Weinstein; Katherine Kendall Talks Harvey Weinstein; House Intel Committee to Release Russian-linked Facebook ads. Aired 2:30-3p ET
Aired October 11, 2017 - 14:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[14:31:03] BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: The musical sphere and political sphere all waiting to see if and when the president will respond to the new war of words, not with the politician or with Pyongyang, not with a football player, but against a rapper. Eminem launched a free-style performance at the BET Hip-Hop Awards last night. He eviscerated the president in a four-and-a-half minute free- style performance. And after he unleashed he left the fans with ultimatum, you are with him, Eminem, or the president.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
EMINEM, RAPPER: Like to take a step forward, step backwards. But this is his former of distraction. Plus, he gets an enormous reaction when he attacks the NFL, so we focus on that instead of Puerto Rico or gun reform for Nevada or these horrible tragedies, and he's rather cause a Twitter storm with the Packers.
And any fan of mine, who is a supporter of his, I'm drawing in the sand a line, you are either for or against. And if you can't decide who you like more and you're split on who you should stand aside, I'll do it for you with this. The rest of America stand up. We love our military. And we love our country. But we -- (EXPLETIVE DELETED) -- hate Trump.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BALDWIN: Wow.
Christopher Farley, senior editorial director for the "Wall Street Journal," who has covered Eminem for years and years.
It's great to have you in here.
CHRISTOPHER FARLEY, SENIOR EDITORIAL DIRECTOR, WALL STREET JOURNAL: Thank you.
BALDWIN: Of all of the four, four and a half minutes, what line or lines really struck you the most?
FARLEY: Well, the line you played I think struck me a lot. Because Eminem has roots in Michigan, Detroit, battleground states. And here he is saying, I'm drawing a line in the sand, either for me or against me but you can't be for both me and Trump. And that's striking coming from entertainer. Because these days, entertainers are reluctant to get involved with politics because they know they might lose a large section of their audience. But in recent days, more and more people are in the public, like Lebron James and like Eminem, now you can support me or someone else, I don't care, I'm going to speak my mind. And him saying that lyrically was striking.
BALDWIN: Almost creating like a cultural divide in the country. And the fact you point out, this is Michigan. I was looking back at the figures. Then-Candidate Trump won only by 10,000 votes in Michigan. And to know Eminem has such deep root in Detroit, that's Trump country, more blue collar, some of his fans, white, were also Trump voters. Do you think people will start choosing?
FARLEY: Well, we'll see. It's important to remember that this is not the first time Eminem has spoken up politically against Trump. He's wrapped mean things about him in the past.
BALDWIN: This is different.
FARLEY: But not the first time taken on the president. He had a song where he went against George W. Bush about war. Rapping has been political a long time. Why he took on the president last year. But of course, Eminem draws the attention, and eye balls, so here we are talking about it.
BALDWIN: Isn't there also something different about it, how he talks about Colin Kaepernick and how he talks about race?
(CROSSTALK)
BALDWIN: That feels like the difference.
FARLEY: I think you are onto something there. I think what makes this particular bit of burst so interesting, why people are talking about it, it's so specific. He's not just saying generally I'm upset with Trump, his policies. He's being very specific about Puerto Rico, about Colin Kaepernick --
BALDWIN: Nevada.
FARLEY: -- and other things he sees in different ways with Trump and bringing them up. And specificity of his argument is what's really gotten I think the Internet afire about what he had to say.
[14:35:06] BALDWIN: You, I'm going to give you credit for having us look and find this video. This is from archives of MTV from 2004. Let me set it up where you see. This is like a mock political convention for Slim Shady. And guess who comes in to endorse him? Watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
(CHEERING) DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Of course, I'm right. I'm always right. I'm Donald Trump. I'm always right. And Donald Trump is telling you right now, Slim Shady is a winner.
(CHEERING)
(APPLAUSE)
TRUMP: He's got brains. He's got guts. And he's got Donald Trump's vote.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BALDWIN: What's the first thing you thought when you saw that video?
FARLEY: What's interesting about that is in the past Donald Trump was actually held up as icon of wealth and power in rap worlds. Go back through the rap lyrics years ago, he pops up. But only in recent years and months, as Trump has become a politician, that you start to see a negativity creep in about what he's about, policies, and see it pop up in the lyrics of Kendrick Lamar as well, not just Eminem. So when he became a politics, he became fair game for rappers to take a stab at. But before that they had him on stage, like back in 2004, mock political convention.
BALDWIN: But, President Trump has criticized members of his own cabinet, Senate, ESPN's but has nothing so far on Eminem. Are you surprised?
FARLEY: I'm a journalist who can't make a comment on what the president has time to comment on. But I think his supporters and don't support him would be happy that he spends time on other things, with things going on in Puerto Rico without power, other things to comment on. But we'll see if he has time to tweet on what Eminem had to say last night.
BALDWIN: Christopher Farley, thank you very much.
FARLEY: Thank you.
BALDWIN: Thank you for your voice.
Coming up on CNN, breaking news in the Harvey Weinstein scandal. The district attorney in Manhattan explaining why charges were never brought regarding allegations of sexual assault. Also, why NBC News could have reported on the story multiple months ago, decided to pass on it. NBC News defending that decision. Brian Stelter has those details.
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[14:41:48] BALDWIN: We're back with new allegations against Harvey Weinstein. More than two dozen women, including some of Hollywood's biggest actresses, speaking out about the movie mogul, alleging years sexual harassment, abuse, and in the case of three women, rape. Meantime, Manhattan D.A. held a press conference, fending off
criticism for not pursuing a case against Harvey Weinstein despite evidence, they had a wiretap where Weinstein admits to groping a woman.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HARVEY WEINSTEIN, MOVIE MOGUL: Go to the bathroom.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Please, I don't want to do. I don't want to.
WEINSTEIN: Coming here. Please listen to me.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm scared.
WEINSTEIN: I won't do anything. You'll never see me again. If you embarrass me in this hotel.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's I don't feel comfortable.
WEINSTEIN: Please, I'm not going to do anything. I swear on my children. Please come in. On everything. I'm a famous guy.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm feeling very uncomfortable right now.
WEINSTEIN: Please come in now. And in one minute, if you went to leave.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Why yesterday you touch my breast.
WEINSTEIN: Please, I'm sorry, I'm used to that.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You are used to that?
WEINSTEIN: Yes, come in.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BALDWIN: And here is what Manhattan district attorney, Cyrus Vance, had to say about that today.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CYRUS VANCE, MANHATTAN DISTRICT ATTORNEY: I understand that folks are outraged by his behavior. I understand that there are many other allegations that have surfaced. But in our case, we did what the law obligates us to do. If we had a case that we felt that we could prosecute and that my experts thought we felt we could prosecute against Harvey Weinstein, we would have.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BALDWIN: This, as the Weinstein company board, including his own brother, insist they knew nothing about this alleged abuse. But the "New Yorker" reports this morning some employees say they witnessed or at least had knowledge of unwanted sexual advances. Let's go more on the breaking news with Brian Stelter. He's back.
Our CNN media correspondent.
The expose in the "New Yorker" was a product of this 10-month investigation by Ronan Farrow, an NBC contributor, he raised question, do you want this. They never went with it. Now there is it all the criticism as to why. What's the back story?
BRIAN STELTER, CNN SENIOR MEDIA CORRESPONDENT & CNN HOST, RELIABLE SOURCES: That's right. Ronan Farrow wanted to broadcast on television, started back in January. Working on this trying to convince women to come forward and share their stories telling them you will be heard. You'll be on television with this. By the summertime, though, NBC decided he didn't have enough. The bosses told him stop working on this. You don't have enough. Doesn't meet our standards. Partly because the women were speaking anonymously. So he went out to the "New Yorker" magazine instead. The "New Yorker" was thrilled to talk to them. Now "New Yorker" is keeping all the credit and acclaim for helping expose Harvey Weinstein to the world.
BALDWIN: So what's the line from NBC?
STELTER: Official line is -- just had a town hall meeting. He just didn't have enough reporting. We wish he had. He didn't have it. He wasn't fully nailed down with the story. That strikes a lot of people at NBC as fishy though. Because this was a story that Weinstein was trying to suppress. He had succeeded in convincing other news outlets in the past. He kept the lid on his secrets for many years, actually decades. And now I wonder this is another case of Weinstein exceeding and stopping a news outlet from uncovering him. So thanks to the "New York Times" and "New Yorker," we eventually learned.
[14:45:17] BALDWIN: Another crazy piece to this is the fact celebrities have been openly joking about the Harvey Weinstein on television. Watch this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Congratulations. You five ladies you no longer have to pretend to be attracted to Harvey Weinstein.
(LAUGHTER)
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: Don't do it. You don't want to miss what we would have.
UNIDENTIFIED ACTRESSS: Oh, please I'm not afraid of anyone in show business. I turned down intercourse with Harvey Weinstein on no less than three occasions out of five.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BALDWIN: What? Joking about it.
STELTER: Looking back now, even if they didn't know he was a criminal, it was clearly obvious to lots of folks in Hollywood and New York that he was a creep.
BALDWIN: So gross.
Brian Stelter, thank you.
STELTER: Thank you.
BALDWIN: One of the Weinstein accusers, Actress Katherine Kendall, said she was 23 when a naked Weinstein chased her around his Manhattan apartment.
And Katherine is good enough to be with me.
Katherine, thank you so much.
KATHERINE KENDALL, ACTRESS & VICTIM OF HARVEY WEINSTEIN: You're welcome.
BALDWIN: Let's go back to 1993. You are starting out. You had met Harvey Weinstein in his office. He says to you welcome to the Miramax family. Help put us in your shoes at the time at age 23 what did this feel like to be standing in front of the Harvey Weinstein.
KENDALL: Well, it was, I felt like it was incredible honor. I felt so lucky that I had the meeting, that it went well, that he was inviting me into the Miramax family. I also felt it was a legitimate situation. I didn't -- it wasn't -- I didn't have a meeting alone. There were people. Doors in his office was open. Women coming in and out. Women I was meeting that worked there. You know, I felt like he was going to be a mentor for me. And he was going to help me learn my way through the business.
BALDWIN: So he had some scripts he wants to show you. Makes sense. He's this mega producer. Invites you ultimately after a little bit, my understanding back and forth, says come to my apartment. You go. How did the whole thing start? Were you just chatting in his foyer?
KENDALL: The whole thing started, he actually invited me to a screening of a movie. And I ended up going. And ended up being a movie with me and Harvey at the movies. Which was very strange. And afterwards, I sort of made an excuse like I have to go home now. He said let me just go to my apartment really quickly. I have to get something. And I said I'll wait downstairs. And he negotiated with me and bullied me. You know, you saw on the tape you heard how he talks. He's intimidating and manipulative. And he's a bully. And you end up sort of giving in, somehow going. But I thought, OK, there is pictures of his wife in the apartment. It's all right. We have a conversation for a long time about art and politics and movies. And I think that he's treating me like an intellect. And I feel sort of like, OK, this is safe. This is all right. And he goes to the bathroom and comes back after an hour of us having a conversation. And he comes back in a robe. And asks me to give him a massage. And I say no. And he doesn't like that answer. So he asks several times. Says other people do it all the time. Sort of what's wrong with me that I'm making a big deal out of it. Just a massage. I don't want to. That goes become and forth. Then he comes back, goes to the bathroom and comes back out completely naked.
BALDWIN: And you're thinking how do I get out of here? I mean, how are you feeling? What are you thinking? What do you do?
KENDALL: It's an immediate my memory is an immediate adrenaline rush of how do I get out of here. What's going to happen. Is he going to rape me? Let's be honest, you know, he's naked.
BALDWIN: That actually went through your mind?
KENDALL: Absolutely. He's between me and the door. He's naked. He's a man. He is not taking no for an answer. He doesn't like this. He doesn't like that I'm not giving in to him. It's not -- I mean, you don't know. How do you know? What kind of situation have I ever been in that's like that that would make me -- I know, there is no preparing for that moment. At least not in my world.
BALDWIN: No.
KENDALL: I mean, maybe for other people, he might try to make me think that is normal. But you know it's not. And I knew, my body knew that it wasn't, you know.
[14:50:00] BALDWIN: Yes. So then how do you get out of there?
KENDALL: Then it becomes a negotiation of, you know, let me go. I can't believe you are doing this. Now I'm insulted angry. He becomes, you know, he kind of chases me around a little bit. And says well if you won't give me a massage, will you at least lift up your shirt and let me see your breasts?
BALDWIN: He's bargaining, if you don't do this, maybe you can do this?
KENDALL: He's bargaining and it goes on for a long time and it's exhausting and wears you down and makes you think you won't get past it.
BALDWIN: How do you get out?
KENDALL: I finally get out. Somehow, he says I'll let you leave if you let me take you to a taxi myself. Let me take you to a taxi myself. I promise, everything will be, OK, I'm sorry, I'll take you to a taxi. He takes me to a taxi he gets in the taxi with me. I go downtown to a bar. I get out. I go into the bar. I ask the bartender to look at me, like he knows me, and please talk to me. Because Harvey is still sitting in the taxi staring at me through the taxi window, which is creepy. And I'll never know why.
BALDWIN: You feel his eyes on you?
KENDALL: Yes, absolutely. I can see him. I can see the taxi. I can see him looking at me.
BALDWIN: And then he leaves?
KENDALL: And then he finally leaves.
BALDWIN: Did he ever try contacting you?
KENDALL: Yes, he called me afterwards several times in the following weeks. And I, you know, I never saw him a planned way. Later on, I saw him at some screened movies. I always felt who horrible.
BALDWIN: Did you ever tell anyone?
KENDALL: I did. I cried on my mom's shoulder and told some of my closest friends. And I got messages recently from people who very sweetly said, you know, I hope I was a good enough friend to you at that time. I remember you telling me the story and I remember feeling helpless with you.
BALDWIN: I heard you earlier saying you felt shame.
KENDALL: I did feel shame.
BALDWIN: Why?
KENDALL: Well, you know, it's a funny thing. I think that I've come to learn that when somebody perpetrates against you, they put their shame on you. It's not yours. But they put it on you. Now you are carrying their shame. And you don't know why you feel so bad. Because they did something to you. But you do. And so often we talk to people who feel that way. They feel like there is something wrong with them. They did something to deserve this or ask for this. They have that creepy slimed feeling that it's their fault somehow. And that's the crime in all of this, you know, is the innocent person feels dirty.
BALDWIN: What would you like to see happen with him?
KENDALL: It's hard for me to even say what I want. I mean, he needs to get help. I think he's really -- he's got -- he's sick. Heels got a problem. But I think that I'd like to see women in general feel like their voices are heard. I don't want people to be afraid anymore to speak up. Women and men who have been perpetrated against. I feel like it should be a new time, a new time for people to feel safe to talk about this stuff.
BALDWIN: I agree with you. And it's stunning for those of us not in the Hollywood sphere and learning about 30 years of these stories and stars coming outs and saying they are shocked. I mean, even the legendary Merrill Streep, she said she had no idea. If this was such an open secret, how can they be shocked?
KENDALL: He was a manipulative man. She's a smart guy. You can see that quickly meeting with him and talking with him, I think. I don't know how so many people didn't know. I really don't. But I'm suspecting that he did a good job, just like he did a good job of convincing maybe some of these other news stations to not run his story. I mean, or even his own board, that he was innocent. Master manipulator. BALDWIN: Here's my last question. You know, now that all of this has
come out, Katherine, if you could look Harvey Weinstein in the eye today, what would you say to him?
[14:55:10] KENDALL: I would say that what you did really hurt me, and you need to know the damage that you caused, and I hope you are sorry, and I hope you are sorry.
BALDWIN: Katherine Kendall, thank you so much for speaking up.
KENDALL: Thanks. Thanks for having me.
BALDWIN: Moving on now, got to talk about some breaking news involving Russian-linked Facebook ads used during the 2016 election. And when we will get to see them. Next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BALDWIN: All right. Breaking news now on CNN. Members of the House Intelligence Committee investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election say they plan to release Russian-linked Facebook ads.
Let's go to senior correspondent, Manu Raju, who is over this.
Raju, tell me more.
MANU RAJU, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL REPORTER: That's right. After a meeting with Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg, the two leaders of the House Russian investigation emerged saying these Russian-linked Facebook ads will be linked as quickly as possible, according to the words of Congressman Mike Conaway, of Texas. Adam Schiff also said, when I asked him is this going to be released by Facebook or the committee, he said it would be done by the committee. The committee will work with Facebook to scrub any personal identifying information. Get that out as soon as possible. This will likely not happen before that November 1st public hearing on this very issue.
This is significant, Brooke, because Facebook has been resisting for some time releasing these 3,000 ads, at least roughly 10 million people during the election season. Some appearing in swing states and different areas of the country. But now, after the pressure from the House Intelligence Committee, the committee will release these ads in the coming days. The Senate Intelligence Committee has decided they will not release the ads. So this the first time we'll get a sense of the Russia's strategy using Facebook and how they try to manipulate the election results, try to sow dissension among the American electorate once they are released in the coming weeks -- Brooke?
BALDWIN: Manu, thank you.
All right. We continue on. I'm Brooke Baldwin. You are watching CNN. Thank you for being with me.
We begin this hour with President Trump escalating his war of words with North Korea and touting the U.S. military might. Just a short time after being accused of being "lit the wick of war," he's talking the country nuclear power. Here he is moments ago, alongside his Canadian counterpart, Justin Trudeau.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Right now, we have so many nuclear weapons. I want them in perfect condition, perfect shape. That's the only thing I've ever discussed. I want to have --
