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President Trump Demands DOJ Investigation on Informant Claims; Interview with Representative Sheila Jackson Lee; Santa Fe School Shooting Suspect Held Without Bail; Community Mourns Victims of Santa Fe, Texas School Shooting; Prince Harry and Meghan Markle Won't Leave for Honeymoon Right Away. Aired 2-3p ET

Aired May 20, 2018 - 14:00   ET

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

[14:00:00] ZAKARIA: -- on May 31st. Thanks to all of you for being a part of my program this week. I will see you next week.

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN Breaking News.

FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone. I'm Fredricka Whitfield. Thank you so much for joining me this Sunday. We start with this breaking news.

President Trump making a strong demand on Twitter just moments ago, writing, "I hereby demand and will do so officially tomorrow that the Department of Justice look into whether or not the FBI, DOJ infiltrated or surveilled the Trump campaign for political purposes, and if any such demands or requests were made by people within the Obama administration."

Let's get straight to CNN's Ryan Nobles who is joining us live now from the White House.

So, Ryan, put all of this into context for us in what may have elicited this from the president.

RYAN NOBLES, CNN WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Well, Fred, there's no doubt that the president has been, at the very least, annoyed with Robert Mueller's investigation to his campaign's conduct during 2016. But this weekend it has gone on to a new level with the reports that the FBI had placed an information, attempting to get access to the Trump campaign before the election and then after, and that Robert Mueller's team then met with that informant and has used it as part of their investigation.

The president attempting to imply that that meant that maybe even perhaps President Obama was behind this attempt and he's called it an attempt to spy into his campaign, and today he's just put out a flurry of tweets talking about this particular topic. Let me read just a couple of them to you.

He said at one point, now that the witch hunt has given up on Russia and is looking at the rest of the world, he's talking here about a "New York Times" report this morning that detailed a meeting with the president's son Donald Trump Jr. and a group of businessmen from the Middle East that we now know the Mueller team is looking into. The tweet goes on to say, "They should easily be able to take it into

the midterm elections where they can put some hurt on the Republican Party. Don't worry about Dems, FISA abuse, missing e-mails or the fraudulent dossier." Another tweet from the president this morning, "Whatever happened to the server at the center of so much corruption that the Democratic National Committee refused to hand over to the hard-charging, except in the case of Democrats, FBI. They broke into homes and offices early in the morning but were afraid to take the server," he asked.

Goes on to say, "And why hasn't the Podesta brother been charged and arrested like others after being forced to close down his very large and successful firm? It is because he is very well connected. Democrats working in the swamp of Washington, D.C." He asks, with a question mark.

Now, Fred, all of these tweets again direct attacks at the FBI and the Department of Justice but they've taken on a new level with that first tweet that you read off this morning where he said that he's now hereby declares that he's going to ask for a formal investigation into the DOJ's conduct into all of this. Now we have really no idea what he means by demanding that someone looks into this. Does he mean a special prosecutor? Does he mean that someone from Congress looks into this?

We're still attempting to get some context to all this from the folks here at the White House but we should point out that whenever we ask for context to the president's tweets, that the president -- the White House usually tells us that his tweets speak for themselves.

I want to also point out how Democrats are reacting to some of these news. Senator Mark Warner, who is the vice chairman of the very powerful Senate Intelligence Committee which is of course conducting its own investigation into the 2016 campaign, had this to say about that "New York Times" report this morning.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. MARK WARNER (D), VICE CHAIRMAN, INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE: If the "Times" story is true, we now have at least the second and maybe a third nation that was trying to lean in to this campaign. And I don't understand what the president doesn't get about the law that says, if you have a foreign nation interfere in an American election, that's illegal.

I would also like to find out if there was this other pattern, if the "Times" story is accurate, and there's this pattern that other countries were offering, and clearly the Trump campaign was receptive at these kind of offers, how that is not the beginnings of evidence of stuff that needs to be investigated.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

NOBLES: So you see here the two sides of this story. Democrats like Mark Warner saying that the reason that this investigation kicked off was because there was some concern that perhaps the Trump campaign was acting illegally and that's why the investigation continues. But of course the president's view of this is much different. He believes that the FBI purposely was attempting to essentially break into his campaign for the purpose of political reasons, which at this point, there isn't a whole lot of evidence for, Fred.

This clearly is something the president is not going to let go. I guess the broader question here is how does that affect Robert Mueller and his investigation -- Fred.

WHITFIELD: And of course, all this happening at about that one year anniversary of the start of this Robert Mueller investigation.

Ryan Nobles, thank you so much. Want to check back with you momentarily. Meantime for now I want to bring in CNN legal analyst and former special assistant to Robert Mueller at the Department of Justice.

[14:05:06] So, Michael, let me one more time bring up the latest tweet from the president just so I can get real clarity on how you might be able to react to it. When the president says, "I hereby demand and will do so officially tomorrow that the Department of Justice look into whether or not the FBI, DOJ infiltrated or surveilled the Trump campaign for political purposes," just on that phrase, can the president do so?

MICHAEL ZELDIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Well, in theory, Fred, yes. He is the chief executive of the executive branch and he can ask the FBI and the Department of Justice to look into matters that he thinks is worthy of inquiry. It is, though, you know, to do that, essentially contrary to about 40 years' worth of processes between the White House and law enforcement agencies where, to prevent an appearance of political meddling in federal law enforcement, administrations have, you know, avoided doing that sort of stuff.

They want to try to appear impartial, that the law enforcement agencies act according to what they determine to be facts worthy of inquiry. So he has the power, I believe, but he shouldn't, I think, create an appearance that he is investigating or seeking others to investigate that which he thinks are political rivals of his, as in the case of the Clintons or Podesta in the later e-mails, or to undermine the investigation that Mueller is undertaking.

So we'll have to see how it's executed. It's not desirable by any analysis of White House, FBI, DOJ communications policies that as I said have lasted for years and years and years, of course, multiple administrations. But as a Constitution matter, I think he can ask those who work for him to carry out, you know, a request to inquire.

WHITFIELD: And isn't there a difference, however, about an investigation that may be precipitated or an informant or looking into a campaign for political purposes versus whether another country might in any way be meddling?

ZELDIN: Well, you know, it's hard to sort of separate -- you know, sort of a purely domestic investigation from a counter-intelligence investigation, that's counterintelligence being in foreign interference but they could have, as in this case of the FISA warrant against Carter Page or the recent stories about the FBI informant talking to George Papadopoulos.

These things sort of bleed into one another, so the hallmark of, you know, sort of non-interference has been that the White House, irrespective of whether it's counter-intelligence investigation or a domestic investigation leave it to the law enforcement agencies to act according to their own internal policies to determine whether or not criminal laws have been violated.

WHITFIELD: I also want to bring into the conversation, Michael, two others about the political influences here. CNN political and national security analyst David Sanger, he also works for the "New York Times," and CNN political analyst and senior political correspondent for "The Hill," Amy Parnes.

All right, good to see you both. So, David, it appears as though the president's tweets are precipitated by a few different reports. Reports of a possible informant or someone who had made contact with people working for the Trump campaign, at the same time this "New York Times" reporting, talking about emissaries of at least three other countries, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, among two of them, who may have met with Donald Trump Jr.

And these items may have inspired the president to say, wait a minute. There are too many people who have been looking into our campaign, the activity of such, and so now I want to get to the bottom of who is responsible. Might it even be the Obama administration. Is that what you see here?

DAVID SANGER, CNN POLITICAL AND NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Well, pretty close. Pretty close. So he woke up angry this morning, it seems, or at least angry enough to tweet on three different counts. The story that my colleagues in "The Times" had suggested that Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates also at a parallel effort, completely separate from whatever the Russians were doing to try to at least offer some help in the social media sphere, not at all clear whether the campaign took that up. So that was one.

The second was that the president then tweeted about the FBI's failure to get the server -- physically get the server from the Democratic National Committee. A legitimate concern why they didn't take possession of the server itself, but they certainly had all the data from the server because it had been downloaded previously by a private firm, CrowdStrike, co-founded by a former FBI cyber investigator, and that data was turned over to the FBI.

[14:10:12] It would have been better, I think, had they given them the server themselves. And then the third thing that's come along now is his argument that the Obama administration had infiltrated the campaign. We don't see any evidence of that. In fact, I think the bigger question would have been, had the FBI had the evidence that at least these three members of the campaign appears to have extensive Russian contacts? Were they supposed to ignore that in the months prior to -- WHITFIELD: And that was some of the criticism that the Obama

administration did get that perhaps if they knew more about how Russia have been making overtures to the Trump campaign, why is it that publicly it wasn't known --

SANGER: Yes, if anything --

WHITFIELD: -- what the Obama administration may have been doing about that.

SANGER: Yes. If anything I think the evidence shows the Obama administration kind of under reacted.

WHITFIELD: And Amy?

AMY PARNES, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes, I mean, I completely agree with that. I mean, this is an investigation that has gone on for a year now. He is clearly annoyed by what has been happening. I think that he woke up clearly reading the story yesterday. He knows that there is -- this is another drip, drip, drip in this larger case against him. And he's trying to kind of, you know, change the subject and go back to Hillary Clinton and go back to his old enemies, so to speak, to kind of change the subject.

And I think that's exactly what he's trying to do here, when in fact, you know, he tries to make the point that there is no collusion. But, you know, the Mueller investigation has sort of, you know, come down hard on Manafort and Rick Gates, and other people, and this is just another drop that, you know, goes against him and what he stands for. And I think it's really annoying to him.

WHITFIELD: And Michael, if you're still with us on the phone, you know, this reporting, additional reporting, "New York Times," "Washington Post" reporting, all of them have reported on variations of all that we're discussing here, but with today's reporting about these emissaries of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, and that perhaps this meeting with Don Trump Jr. came because these countries had expressed an eagerness, and I'm just reading now from what the "New York Times," and how it's reporting, the eagerness to help his father win the election, that perhaps the scope now would look wider based on that kind of reporting, that it wouldn't be just potentially Russia but potentially other countries that would want to curry favor with this administration if it is Donald Trump who becomes president.

ZELDIN: Well, so Mueller has a broad mandate, and that is to continue the counterintelligence investigation that Comey started which includes interference with the 2016 election and any coordination by Trump Organization -- Trump campaign officials with it. If this feels to Mueller as part of that investigation, then he will make inquiry of these things. If he feels that it's not part of his investigation but that it merits inquiry by someone in law enforcement, he'll go to Rosenstein and say what he want to do with it.

And as we saw in the case of Cohen, he'll go to the Southern District of New York or in the case of Manafort's son-in-law to go to the Central District of California, Los Angeles U.S. attorney's office. So you have mechanisms in place to ensure that if there is ongoing criminal conduct or past criminal conduct that Mueller comes across in the course of his investigation, he can be, you know, either assumed by him or given out by Rosenstein to the appropriate investigative official. So that makes a lot of sense.

The Trump tweets, however, that he's going to order the DOJ to look into it, as I said, Fredricka, I think in theory he has the, you know, constitutional right to do it. There is a question probably about whether that somehow interferes with or raises due process and equal protection provisions. There is a code section, the United States code, 28 U.S. Code Section 15516, which says the conduct of litigation in the United States is reserved to the Department of Justice and under the direction of the attorney general. So to the extent that he's interfering or trying to exert political influence, then I think that could be problematic.

We'll have to see how it plays out. It's troubling in one major respect, which is that the DOJ and FBI really should be free from partisan intervention but he may some, you know, theoretical authority to try to launch an investigation like that as, you know, sort of to distraction.

WHITFIELD: All so fascinating.

All right, Michael, Amy and David, I'm going to ask you to stick around. We're going to take a short break for now. We'll continue our conversation, based on now what appears to be a litany of responses via tweet coming from the president today. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN Breaking News.

[14:19:24] WHITFIELD: All right. Back with our breaking news. President Trump making a strong demand on Twitter moments ago, writing, "I hereby demand and will do so officially tomorrow that the Department of Justice look into whether or not the FBI, DOJ infiltrated or surveilled the Trump campaign for political purposes, and if any such demands or requests were made by people within the Obama administration."

I want to bring in Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee. She is a Democrat from Texas and a member of the House Judiciary Committee.

Good to see you, Congresswoman. So what are your thoughts on the president's tweet?

[14:20:01] REP. SHEILA JACKSON LEE (D), TEXAS: Well, Fredricka, good to be with you this afternoon, and I must start with acknowledging the tragedy that is in my community, of course, and praying for those families and praying for action.

I wish the president of the United States was equally focused on the tragedy that his constituents are facing, and I also wish that he would understand that, first of all, that we do not have a monarchy. We do have a Constitution that is three equal branches of government. That unlike a king or queen, we're not able to tell or dictate precisely to his or her servants what to do.

The Department of Justice, in particular, is the people's lawyer. The attorney general is the lawyer of the people of the United States. This is appalling that President Trump would be so uninformed and that his chief of staff, his counselors, the White House counsel, would allow him to spew into the thinking of Americans that he has any right or authority to dictate to what the Department of Justice does.

That would skew the independence of the Department of Justice to fairly go after individuals who have broken the law. It is a decision that is made by thoughtful staff lawyers in the Department of Justice in many different areas, from civil rights to antitrust to the criminal justice division. They are all separate divisions and they review information. Otherwise the president could use the Department of Justice as an attack instrument on any political figure he didn't like, i.e., he has thrown President Obama's name so many times into some of the incorrect assessments.

He's now thrown the former president again as conspiring or being involved in something as dastardly as what he's suggesting. This would be a terrible country if any president elected could then begin to target civilians or citizens as was done in the Nixon administration. So my view is, that any one of us in the United States Congress will stand up to this kind of unfair targeting and dictate from the president of the United States. That is not his job, that is not his power, his responsibility. And I hope the attorney general of the United States does not fall victim to his attacks and instruction.

WHITFIELD: So what's your expectation on how the Attorney General Jeff Sessions will respond to that because the president has committed by Tweet that he will be demanding that so won't that mean that a response from the attorney general would have to follow?

JACKSON LEE: Well, here's where the attorney general should be the attorney general for the people of the United States. Here's where the attorney general should look at the model that was evidenced by those who were in such positions during the Nixon administration who absolutely stepped down. But before he would do that, I would hope that he would make a very forceful decision, that decisions about investigations and prosecutions are that of the attorney general and the Department of Justice alone.

It is not to be forced upon that department by any elected official, including the president of the United States. As I said, we are mourning here in Texas. We have children that are dead. We have a president who gave a limited commentary maybe 24 hours ago. We've not heard him say one more thing about parents that are hurting and children that are dead, and teachers that are dead, and law enforcement officers that are healing and others that are healing, and I'm appalled.

So the answer would be I certainly would expect the Congress to weigh in, in ways of comments, and ways of hearings, to assess that the Department of Justice needs to go into any investigation, it is doing it independently and not at the instruction of the president of the United States. I think the world would look at this and say America has truly lost her way.

WHITFIELD: And Congresswoman --

JACKSON LEE: I would like to --

WHITFIELD: Go ahead. Sorry.

JACKSON LEE: I wanted to comment on helping these children that have been so desperately hurt in the last 48 hours.

WHITFIELD: And before I ask you one final question about the Santa Fe High School tragedy, and on this issue, you know, despite the separation of powers, is it your feeling that the president would have access to retrieving information about any reported informant that may have been in contact, interviewed, talked to any campaign aides which has helped precipitate this, you know, string of tweets from the president?

JACKSON LEE: If it involves the investigation that Mr. Mueller is engaged in, I believe that the president would and should not have access to an ongoing investigation. If the president wants to violate the norms of his presidency and, of course, the independence of the attorney general, he certainly can secure representation of counsel and begin to fight this out in the courts.

[14:25:06] But he should be given no information just based upon the fact that he is the president of the United States and he has no authority to inject in the Department of Justice the opportunity in this instance a presidential witch hunt that will attack civilians and use his Justice Department as his tool to attack them.

Any member of Congress worth their salt or read the Constitution, whether they're a Republican or Democrat, the speaker of the House, and I know the leader of the House, should join in to raise a question of the president's appropriate behavior. And that behavior may constitute an abuse of power. So I would hope that we would look at this thoughtfully. I hope the president will reflect on his words and I hope his council, meaning his chief of staff and others, will ask the president to allow any investigation to proceed under the direction of the Department of Justice solely, not by his involvement, direction or attack on civilians who cannot stand up to the power of the president of the United States.

That would be shameful and undermining the very democracy that we love and that those who wear the uniform have been willing to sacrifice their life for.

WHITFIELD: And Congresswoman, our hearts go out to all of those impacted at Santa Fe High School after this shooting taking place. Nearly immediately, and again reiterated today, the lieutenant governor says a potential solution is minimizing the numbers of exits and entrances, hardening schools. How do you see a potential answer to either prevent another tragedy

from this like happening or to at least address the recent tragedy that just unfolded?

JACKSON LEE: Fredrick, thank you so very much. My heart is deeply in plain. Yesterday I stood with students demand action and many of my constituents in a vigil, and we hugged each other but we also talked about action. We've mourned these children, and as you may have heard, this has been one of the most deadliest year -- the most deadliest years compared to 2000 to 2017 up until this time. It has also been compared to being more deadly than the soldiers who died in combat in 2018.

So we have mourned these children but we have not honored them. And I think that we need to look at a vast array of solutions. I would hope that a school would be a sanctuary, and not a lockdown. And to do that, you have to talk about guns, we have to talk about intervention.

I intend to introduce this week my bill that indicates that all guns should be in locked boxes. And particularly if you allow your children to get guns that are not locked boxes in your home you'll be held responsible --

(CROSSTALK)

WHITFIELD: Have you learned any detail -- sorry to interrupt, but have you learned any detail as you whether this young man, the access that he had to, his father's guns, who reportedly had them legally, do we know how the child got his hands on his father's guns?

JACKSON LEE: Our representation is that the guns were secured legally by the parents, and that the child got the guns. A shotgun of course and a 38 caliber. But the point is that parent was not responsible. They must not have been locked in a lockup that the child could not access. And that's the important point. But I do think that if we talk about locking down schools and we don't talk about guns, and I'm not suggesting that we should not recognize the Constitution, but let me speak to those who continuously tout the Second Amendment.

The First Amendment is not without Supreme Court definition that if you cry fire in a private theater, that is not protect by the First Amendment. And that means that if you take assault weapons and use bump weapons -- bump fixtures to make an assault weapon and you kill hundreds of people, tens upon tens of people, that's not protected by the Second Amendment, it should not be. And so we've got to find a way to keep guns away from people who would do harm.

We have to find a way to intervene in the lives of young people. This young person shot people he did not like. You have to find a person like that that has a "Born to Kill" T-shirt shown on his Facebook. That child needs intervention either by way of mental health needs or behavioral needs. And therefore we've got to honor these children, not just mourn these children. It deals with guns, it deals with parents' responsibility in locking them up.

It deals with intervention on a child's mindset, and it certainly deals with enhanced school safety, but I want a school to be a sanctuary of learning. And -- what I will say to you, Fredricka, isn't it said that a child said, a child said, were you surprised when she was asked the question? And she hung her head, no, she just wondered when it was going to happen.

WHITFIELD: It's heartbreaking.

JACKSON LEE: We, as law enforcement and lawmakers must stand up to these dastardly acts, and the NRA must stop being the third government in this nation.

[14:30:07] And the parents and those of goodwill and faith leaders and others, and educators and our wonderful teachers must stand up against the dastardly prohibitions or fight for the NRA for us to do something decent for our children and for Americans.

WHITFIELD: We will leave it there.

Thank you so much, Congressman Sheila Jackson Lee. Appreciate your time.

JACKSON LEE: Thank you for having me.

WHITFIELD: Straight ahead, the lieutenant governor of Texas says, and you'll hear him in his own words, the best way to prevent more school shootings is for teachers to have guns in the classroom. We're live from Santa Fe next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:35:06] WHITFIELD: Sadness in Santa Fe, Texas. It's been just two days since a gunman killed 10 people and wounded 13 others at a high school. A service to remember one student is set to begin next hour.

And this morning the community and governor of Texas attending a church service to honor the students and teachers killed.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TED ELMORE, SOUTHERN BAPTIST OF TEXAS CONVENTION: It will stays around a long time, and there's help. But none of us know that you need that help until you let your pastor know.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: This outpouring of grief as police try to piece together what led the suspected gunman to kill.

CNN anchor Erica Hill is leading our team coverage live from Santa Fe.

So, Erica, a lot going on, a lot of mourning and it's really just beginning.

ERICA HILL, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, it really is. And still so many questions at this point, Fredricka. We are learning more information, though, about the victims and it's important to remember each and every one of them here. We do now know the identities of all 10 victims.

A service for exchange student Sabika Sheikh will be held next hour, in just about 30 minutes, before her body is flown home to Pakistan. Also killed, 17-year-olds Chris Stone and Jared Black, substitute teacher Cynthia Tisdale, 16-year-old Shana Fisher, as well, along with Glenda Ann Perkins, Christian Riley Garcia, Kimberly Vaughan, Aaron Kyle McLeod, and Angelique Ramirez.

Shana Fisher's mother telling CNN she believed her daughter was targeted. Earlier today I spoke with the attorneys for the 17-year- old suspect and I asked them directly about that and what else they've learned from the alleged shooter.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

HILL: You met with your client yesterday.

NICHOLAS POEHL, ATTORNEY FOR DIMITRIOS PAGOURTZIS: Correct.

HILL: How is he?

POEHL: He's having a difficult time right now. I think he's in some kind of shock. It's going to be a while before I can tell you more. It is going to -- there are some professionals that are going to have to be brought into these evaluations, but it's obviously difficult circumstances.

HILL: Is he remorseful?

POEHL: We're not even there yet.

HILL: Is he aware that 10 people are dead?

POEHL: I don't -- I don't think we know the answer to that yet.

ROBERT BARFIELD, ATTORNEY FOR DIMITRIOS PAGOURTZIS: We've had brief, brief visitations with our client. I mean, two 30-minute visitations, and he really hasn't been able to answer the questions. We're going to have a sit-down for hours and ask him.

HILL: You said he hasn't been able to answer the questions. Has he been responsive, though? Is he actually -- I mean, are you engaging in conversation with him?

BARFIELD: We have had conversations but we're telling him what he needs to do right now to get through the next few days. We're not asking him pertinent questions at this point.

POEHL: Well, at this point we don't have the information with which to even start asking those questions. I mean, the timing, this happening on a Friday and then a weekend where the information flow is really just what's in the media, nothing from the state. Once we start to begin that discovery process, we can start asking more intelligent questions.

HILL: Have you spoken with investigators at all? BARFIELD: We've spoken to the DA.

POEHL: We've spoken with the DA's office.

BARFIELD: The first assistant.

HILL: And so everything at this point has to wait until Monday.

POEHL: It's going to wait until Monday.

HILL: In terms of what we do know, and a lot of this obviously is based on the affidavit, in that affidavit, your client reportedly confessed to shooting, and I'm quoting here, multiple people with the intent to kill. Did he confirm that with you?

POEHL: He has not confirmed that, and we do -- at this point we don't have the information to be able to confirm what's in the PC affidavit.

HILL: So also in that affidavit is that he intentionally spared people he, quote, "liked," so they could tell his story.

POEHL: Same answer. We just don't -- we don't know at this point if that is accurate or not.

HILL: The mother of one of the victims, 16-year-old Shana Fisher, told us at CNN that she believes her daughter was specifically targeted because she rebuffed his advances. Were people targeted?

POEHL: We have spoken to the DA's office to try to get a little bit of information on that when that story broke yesterday. Right now we don't have anything and the DA doesn't have anything to either confirm or deny that.

HILL: There were also reports of bullying that were put out. And the school district came out pretty strongly against those reports saying, we've investigated, this didn't happen. Has any of that come up in conversations from either your client or his family?

BARFIELD: Well, there has been some conversations on that. We need to delve into it more. But the other problem is the school district doesn't say how they investigated it when they investigated it. If they investigated it after the shooting happened, that's a really short investigation.

HILL: Do you believe that it may have been reported prior to the shooting?

BARFIELD: We're not sure. We don't have that information yet.

POEHL: What's interesting about that Santa Fe statement is again it was released just a little bit more than 24 hours after. At this point there are no indications I actually spoke to the student survivors that were reporting this bullying and reporting it to the media in the last couple of days. Without talking to them, I'm not sure how Santa Fe could be in a position to strongly deny, or I think they used the words confirm the untruth of it. I don't know how they could be saying that at this point. It will be

interesting to learn as we go forward what exactly that investigation consisted of.

[14:40:05] HILL: They -- they actually referenced coaches. So they referenced baseball coaches.

POEHL: Correct. Correct.

HILL: Not just students. So do you believe that they have not done due diligence in terms of speaking with those coaches?

BARFIELD: We don't know. We don't know what they did. That was a very short statement.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:47:27] WHITFIELD: Welcome back. A short time ago we heard an interview Erica Hill did with the attorneys representing the teen who is in custody for that tragic and fatal shooting at the Santa Fe High School.

I want to check in with Polo Sandoval with what more is being learned about the investigation -- Polo.

POLO SANDOVAL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Fred, what we witnessed today only about a mile from where those shots rang out was a community here in Santa Fe turning to the power of prayer hoping for some healing. It's something that we've seen in previous cases before, similar cases.

We heard today even from the head of the congregation that yes, condolences taking time to pray is certainly important in the healing process, but it's not enough.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JERL WATKINS, PASTOR, ARCADIA FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH OF SANTA FE: We need to pray for our children every day. Every day. We need to pray as a nation and begin to turn back to the Lord that this these senseless killings might be stopped from our schools.

Do we need to do more than just pray? Yes, we certainly do.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SANDOVAL: Do more than just pray, exactly what that is it really depends on who you ask because we heard not too long ago here from Texas' lieutenant governor Dan Patrick feels that our teachers should be armed and perhaps less ways of getting on to these campuses is the way to go.

We should point out Texas does allow teachers to carry weapons, licensed teachers to carry weapons, but ultimately it's up to the superintendent and the school district to decide if that happens.

Back on to what's happening here on the ground, though, and here at the Arcadia Baptist Church a mile away from Santa Fe High, later today we expect many of these students to come together for a previously scheduled graduation event. Earlier today there were five students in the congregation that there were accomplishments celebrated, but we have to remember, Fred, this is certainly a very difficult time for these students.

Yes, they feel like they should not only celebrate but be celebrated, but there is also at a point where the focus is on their fellow students, on their two teachers that did not make it after Friday's shooting. So we expect to see them again later today as they come back here to find out exactly what is next as part of the healing process -- Fred.

WHITFIELD: All right. Terribly sad time. Thank you so much, Polo Sandoval.

All right. Let's check back in with Erica Hill.

So, Erica, just listening to the interview that you did with the two attorneys representing the teenager who is now in custody for that shooting leads one to believe they haven't had a whole lot of time to hear his end of the story, talk to him, get to know who it is that they are representing.

[14:50:12] HILL: No, they haven't. That's exactly what they told us. They've met with him twice for about 30 minutes each. Most recently, they met with him yesterday. So they haven't got a lot of information out of him. They made it very clear that he -- I don't want to say that he's not been forthcoming, but in terms of the questions that we asked them, I don't know how much they're either not telling us because of attorney-client privilege, obviously, and because, Fred, they want to figure out their defense strategy.

In terms of a legal strategy, they said there's no way we can have one right now because we're still lacking in information, also from investigators. But they have not spent a lot of time with him. And so they do plan to do more of that moving forward.

The other frustration that they put worth is the fact that this is all happening of course over a weekend and that there hasn't been a lot of communication. So that's something else that has been brought up and just how common it is that when you're dealing with an event of this magnitude for things to essentially shut down over a weekend, Fred.

WHITFIELD: All right. Erica Hill, thank you so much for that. Appreciate it, from Santa Fe, Texas.

We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:55:49] WHITFIELD: In Windsor, England, the party continues today. People are still celebrating after yesterday's amazing royal wedding. The last we saw of the newlyweds, Prince Harry and now the Duchess Meghan, well, they set off in a vintage Jaguar convertible and they were headed for a reception hosted by Harry's father Prince Charles.

CNN's Nick Watt joins me now from Windsor, so, Nick, now that they have both said "I will," now what for them?

NICK WATT, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That is a massive question, Fred. I mean, you know, it was very obvious from that service yesterday that Meghan is not going to be the doe-eyed princess just doing what she's told. She ran that show yesterday, they did what she wanted to do, and listen, I think we will see her play a very different role than we've seen people who join the royal family in the past, even Kate Middleton who married William. You know, she kind of does what she's told.

Meghan is 36 years old. She's had a career herself, a great career. She is going to carry on doing what she wants to do. She's been an activist since the age of 11 and I am sure she will carry that on. In terms of the two of them themselves, well, they spent last night here at Windsor Castle with the grandma, and they are not going to go on honeymoon just yet because they have their first royal engagement Tuesday which is a garden party at Buckingham Palace. Royals do a lot of that garden parties, eating sandwiches, that kind of stuff.

Then maybe they'll go on honeymoon. We don't know where they're going to go on honeymoon, but obviously they're going to go somewhere and hopefully we won't know, and they'll get some peace after this. You know, hundred thousand people here --

WHITFIELD: Yes, right. They're not going to get any peace.

WATT: One in four British people watched from TV.

WHITFIELD: They are the "it" couple.

WATT: Well, Fred, we need to give them a little bit of peace, OK? They are "it" couple, we need to give them a little bit of peace. And also today, what everyone is talking about today, obviously the ceremony was great. Bishop Michael Curry from Chicago, apparently 40,000 tweets a minute during his spectacular address.

And to me one of the highlights, Doria Ragland. Listen, you know, a lot of people talk about the British royals being, you know, elegant and poised. To me the most elegant and poised presence in that (INAUDIBLE) yesterday was Doria Ragland there to support her only daughter, Meghan Markle, who's no longer Meghan Markle. She is now the Duchess of Sussex -- Fred.

WHITFIELD: Right. There were so many beautiful moment. I think everyone is kind of reliving them, whether you're watching on TV, whether you're, like you, Nick, right there, you know, seeing it front and center. It was extraordinary by all counts.

All right, Nick Watt. Thank you so much, in Windsor, England. Appreciate it.

And tonight Anthony Bourdain is in Armenia, a country that is still reckoning with its past. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANTHONY BOURDAIN, HOST, "PARTS UNKNOWN": Genocide.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This isn't about revenge. This is about recognition.

BOURDAIN: War.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If we lose, we know that we will be destroyed, annihilated.

BOURDAIN: Earthquake.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm the generation who literally learned alphabet with a candlelight.

BOURDAIN: Armenia has endured a lot.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This isn't some geopolitical conflict on a map. Every family is touched.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Every day, 100 people leaves Armenia.

BOURDAIN: But it remains a place that millions of Armenians are very, very sentimental about.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I, myself, I will never leave Armenia. I was born in Armenia and I will die in Armenia.

BOURDAIN: And I've been hearing it for years, when you go to Armenia, when you go to Armenia, when are you going to Armenia? Well, finally, I'm here.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: Catch an all new "PARTS UNKNOWN" with Anthony Bourdain, that's tonight 9:00.

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN Breaking News.

WHITFIELD: Hello again, everyone, and thank you so much for joining me this Sunday. I'm Fredricka Whitfield. We're following breaking news.

President Trump's anger on the Russia investigation boiling over on Twitter. His latest tweet saying this, "I hereby demand and will do so officially tomorrow that the Department of Justice look into whether or not the FBI, DOJ infiltrated or surveilled the Trump campaign for political purposes and if any such demands or requests were made by people within the --