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At This Hour

NYPD: Three Bystanders Hurt In "Attempted Terrorist Attack"; NYPD: 27-Year-Old Suspect Strapped Bomb To His Body; Obama Records Robocall For Democrat Jones; GOP's Senator Shelby: "I Can't Vote For Roy Moore" Aired 11-11:30a ET

Aired December 11, 2017 - 11:00   ET

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

[11:00:00]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: -- Emily (inaudible) and Ben Ferguson, thanks so much for being with us. Sorry we're so tight on time.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: Thank you guys very much. Thank you all for being with us this very busy Monday morning. I'm Poppy Harlow.

BERMAN: I'm John Berman. "AT THIS HOUR with Kate Bolduan" starts now.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone. I'm Kate Bolduan. We are following breaking news. Just moments ago, we learned that the bombing in the heart of New York City was an attempted terror attack and now new video is just coming out. You'll see it on your screen showing the moment of the explosion.

You can see a burst of smoke as commuters are going about their morning in this major transit hub in New York City, the Port Authority. NYPD tells CNN that a 27-year-old man was wearing that pipe bomb, attached to his body by Velcro and zip ties. He is alive, his injuries described as serious.

Let's get the very latest on where things stand right now. What we know about this bomber. CNN's Jason Carroll live at the scene of the bombing. Jason, what do we know?

JASON CARROLL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, we are at 42nd and 8th Avenue, Kate. The explosion happened below ground from where I'm standing now. The suspect described this way, 27 years old, his name Akayed Ullah, again 27 years old. He was seriously injured in the explosion.

Investigators describe it this way, they say he was wearing a low-tech device, the way they described it, a pipe bomb, attached to his body with Velcro and zip ties, according to investigators a device he made at work.

Again, the explosion happened below ground at 42nd and 8th Avenue. Initially, Kate, there were reports that the explosion happened in Times Square. That's because those people were unfamiliar with New York, the area below where I'm standing is a huge transportation hub, Port Authority. The walkway beneath ground connects where I'm standing one block east to Times Square apparently the suspect was at 42nd and 8th walking in the walkway to 42nd and 7th. Here's one of the headlines from what investigators said, Kate, and that is this investigator is talking.

That's very important for their investigation going forward. Unclear at this point more of what he is saying other than that he made this device apparently at work. Unclear at what he does.

Investigators do say three other people were injured during the explosion their injuries minor. They were able to get to the hospital on their own speed. We are talking about a loss of hearing and those types of results from this particular explosion.

I can also tell you at this point that investigators say this area where we are, 42nd and 8th, they plan to have this opened by rush hour -- Kate.

BOLDUAN: That's amazing. When you think of how many people go through there and what a huge area that is that they are -- that was a part of the crime scene. Jason, thank you so much. Really appreciate it.

Joining me now to discuss this, is James Gagliano, CNN law enforcement analyst and retired FBI supervisory special agent, Jonathan Wackrow is here as well, former secret service agent under President Obama. Guys, great to have you here.

I have a lot of questions actually. What do you make of this news that Jason had, which is that this man apparently, according to sources say that he made the device at his workplace. That's amazing to me.

JAMES GAGLIANO, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Sure. 27-year-old man from Brooklyn. Not originally, he's a Bangladeshi. Here's what we know --

BOLDUAN: Do we know how long he's been here?

GAGLIANO: No. Don't have any information on that yet.

BOLDUAN: CNN doesn't have (inaudible).

GAGLIANO: Not reported yet. We do know this, that he was either directed or inspired apparently by ISIS and that's a big distinction.

BOLDUAN: How do we know?

GAGLIANO: Well, that's going to take a lot of work by the feds to get and do all the criminal intelligence checks, human intelligence, put sources out and try to find that out. In a city like New York, Kate, 8.4 million people, on an average commuting day could see an additional 1 million people and we understand that 6 million daily ride the subway. So, this is the classic soft target and that's why he went there. BOLDUAN: Jonathan, what do you make of this? What do you make of just what's coming out that we've heard from them they don't know yet that this was the intended location of where they -- of a detonation, if you will.

JONATHAN WACKROW, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Absolutely. So, investigators are going to have to look at everything about this individual. They're going to have to dig back into his life going back years. They're going to have to look at his social media. They have to look at, you know, his computers.

They're going to have to ascertain how did he get this information to build a pipe bomb. How did he know to strap it to his body, was there targeting a selection, a dry run done, there beforehand, where was he going to detonate this device, was it in that tunnel? I highly to your point, highly unlikely. It looks like it was, you know --

GAGLIANO: Premature detonation.

WACKROW: Premature detonation in this case. I mean, again, you look at Port Authority, the terminal itself, a lot of people. In that hallway, you know, there is a lot of commuters, but it's not a location that you would think about having that device go off.

[11:05:03] BOLDUAN: In a strange way, do you call this a near miss then? I mean, it is amazing when you think of how big the Port Authority is, what a critical transportation hub it is, in and out of the city, how many people go through as you listed out every day. He's seriously injured, three other people suffered nonlife- threatening injuries and took themselves to the hospital. How big of a near miss was this?

GAGLIANO: Goes back to the original point, the bad guys only have to get it right with once. Law enforcement has to get it right every single time. Since the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center, the 2001, the 9/11 attacks, there have been about 26 attempted terrorist attacks in New York City.

The vast majority of them are either interdicted or broken up before anything bad happens. You had the event in Times Square about ten years ago. You also had recently, I think in 2016, the Chelsea bombing, you had the attack on the West Side highway, I mean, law enforcement has done work in preventing these things from happening.

WACKROW: But it's beyond law enforcement. Let's look at the reporting here. He built this device at work.