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Early Start with John Berman and Zoraida Sambolin

Limo Crash Kills 20 In Deadliest U.S. Transportation Accident Since 2009; Kavanaugh Fallout For Midterms; Secretary of State Pompeo And Chinese Foreign Minister Exchange "Aggressive" Words; China: Missing Interpol Chief Under Investigation; U.S. Quietly Working Missing Saudi Journalist Case. Aired 5:30-6a ET

Aired October 08, 2018 - 05:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[05:31:00] CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: The deadliest transportation accident in the U.S. in a decade. What caused a limo to crash in New York, killing 20?

JOE JOHNS, CNN ANCHOR: Democrats are said to be a mob. Republicans are said to have angered women. Now, both sides are trying to spin that Brett Kavanaugh debacle for gains in the midterm elections.

ROMANS: China says the missing head of Interpol is under investigation for corruption. He's been missing for days. His last contact, a text message with a knife emoji.

JOHNS: And hurricane watches are now in effect as Tropical Storm Michael heads for the Florida Panhandle.

Welcome back to EARLY START. I'm Joe Johns.

ROMANS: And I guess a Wednesday landfall they're thinking for that tropical storm, everybody --

JOHNS: Yes, I know.

ROMANS: -- so get ready.

I'm Christine Romans. Nice to see you this morning. Thirty-two minutes past the hour this Monday morning.

Let's begin here with this tragedy in Upstate New York. State and federal investigators on the scene following the deadliest transportation accident in the U.S. since 2009.

Twenty people died when a limousine carrying several couples to a 30th birthday party plowed through an intersection and crash into a parked SUV about 40 miles from Albany. State police say all 18 people in the limo were killed, including the driver, and two pedestrians near the SUV also killed.

Among the victims, several married couples and four sisters.

Here is their aunt. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARBARA DOUGLAS, AUNT OF FOUR CRASH VICTIMS: They were fun-loving. They were wonderful girls. They'd do anything for you.

And they were very close to each and they loved their family, they loved their parents. They had -- one had two little -- one has two little children and one has one child, and they now have no home -- or no parents.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JOHNS: So far, officials have not been able to answer crucial questions about the limo and its safety record, but one woman says her niece, who died in the crash, was uneasy about riding in it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

VALERIE ABELING, NIECE KILLED IN LIMO CRASH (via telephone): And my niece said before she got in the vehicle she texted a friend of hers and said oh my gosh, you wouldn't believe what they just sent. And she says that this vehicle is a little sketchy because it made a lot of noise, it didn't look good. She says I don't know if we're going to survive this, and 20 minutes later she died.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JOHNS: Officials have not yet identified the company that owned the limo. It's unclear whether passengers were wearing seat belts, if the brakes were working, or even if the driver was speeding.

ROMANS: The Supreme Court confirmation fight is over. Now both sides are digging in, trying to use the fallout from this bruising battle for gain in the midterms.

President Trump and the Republicans are defiant, branding Democrats as a mob for the way they attacked Brett Kavanaugh.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: In their quest for power, the radical Democrats have turned into an angry mob.

SEN. MITCHEL MCCONNELL (R-KY), SENATE MAJORITY LEADER: We refused to be intimidated by the mob of people that were coming after Republican members at their homes and in the halls.

SEN. CHUCK GRASSLEY (R-IA), CHAIRMAN, SENATE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE: What we have learned is the resistance that has existed since the day after the November 16 -- 2016 election is centered right here on Capitol Hill. They have encouraged mob rule.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: Senate Democrats argue that many voters, women especially, are still furious. Hawaii Sen. Mazie Hironos said Democratic voters will be highly motivated to punish Republicans in November.

[05:35:05] (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN MAZIE HIRONO (D-HI), MEMBER, SENATE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE: He's going to be on the Supreme Court with a huge taint and a big asterisk after his name. And the partisanship that he showed was astounding and the conspiracy theory that he accused us of behaving in was bizarre.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JOHNS: Meanwhile, Sen. Susan Collins, one of the crucial swing votes, is defending her decision to back Kavanaugh. She says she thought he stepped over the line during the confirmation process but that he had some justification.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. SUSAN COLLINS (R-ME), MEMBER, SENATE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE: I put myself in his shoes. He is coming forth in answering an allegation that includes that he was involved in gang raping and doping girls. I mean, that is so devastating. And I think he reacted with anger and anguish as a father of two young girls.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JOHNS: Collins says she believes Professor Christine Blasey Ford was assaulted but she does not believe that Brett Kavanaugh was her assailant.

ROMANS: All right, joining us this morning, CNN political analyst Julian Zelizer, historian and professor at Princeton University. Good morning.

JULIAN ZELIZER, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST, HISTORIAN AND PROFESSOR, PRINCETON UNIVERSITY, AUTHOR, "THE FIERCE URGENCY OF NOW": Good morning.

ROMANS: This bruising battle is behind us or is it because it's going to be, I think, a launch pad for both parties as we head into the 29 days until the midterms. How do you see it playing out?

ZELIZER: Absolutely, the battle doesn't go away. Democrats are already energized, they're mobilized. Suburban-educated women were already furious and that only amplified it. It goes from 10 to 11 after this.

But on the other hand, I think Republicans are suddenly invested in the midterm battles and so I think there is a way in which this might kind of boost turnout on both sides.

ROMANS: Do you believe the Brett bounce idea? I mean, that's certainly --

ZELIZER: I do.

ROMANS: -- what we're hearing from Republicans -- that the right is just really furious at the mob. You could see that --

ZELIZER: Sure.

ROMANS: -- word going through all of them.

JOHNS: But look --

ZELIZER: Yes.

JOHNS: -- Republicans and Democrats energized though, right?

ZELIZER: Yes, they're both energized but now Republicans have a major victory. This is a major victory for the president. He just shifted the court to the right for a long time.

And at the same time, all of a sudden it was framed as this battle against mob rule and against character assassination with the target toward white male voters, which is the base.

So I do think in these midterms for the Senate, all of a sudden things are a little better for Republicans, unexpectedly.

JOHNS: Can you unravel a little bit what Mitch McConnell said the other day? Number one, he's suggesting if in 2020 there is another vacancy, they'll go ahead and fill it. And then he said this -- listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MCCONNELL: We simply followed the tradition in America, which is that if you have a party of a different -- a different -- a Senate of a different party than the president, you don't fill a vacancy created in a presidential year. That went all the way back to 1888.

CHRIS WALLACE, FOX NEWS ANCHOR, "FOX NEWS SUNDAY": Are you saying that if Donald Trump --

MCCONNELL: Well, the answer to your question is we'll see whether there's a vacancy in 2020.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JOHNS: So is he revising history here, especially as to 1888, or is that just sort of a historical anomaly?

ZELIZER: Well, it's called shifting the goalpost -- goalpost politics.

Originally, it was you can't do it during an election year, which turned out not to be true. Even Anthony Kennedy was in 1988. So now he's kind of pulling another fact out. We can look all of a sudden and they have power and he's going to want to do it.

So it's one of those things that's true --

ROMANS: Yes.

ZELIZER: -- but it's primarily a justification to do what he just said shouldn't be done a few years ago.

ROMANS: You know, I'm just struck by what a great -- you know, great few days the president has had here.

He got Justice Kavanaugh to become Justice Kavanaugh. He had, Friday, a jobs number that was 3.7 percent for the jobless rate, the lowest since 1969. He can rightfully sail into the midterms claiming the U.S. economy is very, very strong -- the strongest in a generation.

At the beginning of the week there was this expose in "The New York Times" that destroyed the myth of a self-made man, looking at his tax records. That's almost forgotten here. It was a good week for this president.

ZELIZER: Absolutely. He is on the cusp of being a transformative president if you are a supporter of his. The economy is humming and this court achievement is very big, and he's doing a lot of deregulation. So if you're a rock rig (ph) conservative you're excited about what you're seeing, and he's able to wipe away the bad news very quickly.

And so, Democrats should take this seriously --

ROMANS: Yes.

ZELIZER: -- because that's what a lot of people are seeing.

ROMANS: Well, they say --

JOHNS: Right.

ROMANS: -- the economy is strong at what cost? That's what they say, you know?

ZELIZER: Yes, but a lot of people -- that's not how they see it. They're going to see it 'I have a job' or 'I don't have a job' --

ROMANS: Yes.

ZELIZER: -- and that's a powerful thing in American politics.

JOHNS: Yes.

ROMANS: If the economy is doing good that's another presidency, right.

ZELIZER: Let's go back to the Clinton campaign.

ROMANS: That's right.

All right, Julian, nice to see you. ZELIZER: Thank you.

ROMANS: Thank you.

Things are off to a rough start for Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in Beijing this morning. Pompeo's meeting with China's foreign minister started with, quote, "bold, aggressive language" on topics including trade. That's according to pool reports -- the reporters who were watching them. Their opening remarks were unusually sharp.

[05:40:02] These meetings come just days after the vice president launched a reset of sorts with China.

Let's bring in Josh Rogin, columnist for "The Washington Post" and a CNN political analyst.

I mean, we knew the Chinese were not happy about Mike Pence's speech -- about this hard reset in American policy. It looks to me as though those opening moments of the foreign minister and Mike Pompeo bear that out.

JOSH ROGIN, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST, COLUMNIST, THE WASHINGTON POST: Well, that's right. Secretary of State Pompeo is in a tough spot here because his goal on this trip is to make progress on the North Korea denuclearization issue. It didn't go very well and he needs Beijing's support in order to really make that happen.

On the other hand, as you noted, the Trump administration has made a very public and sharp turn in its China policy and is now calling out the Chinese Communist Party for its internal repression and external aggression.

And they knew that the Chinese government wasn't going to like that but they decided to do it anyway because they felt that the U.S.-China relationship was so far out of whack that they needed to, as you said, quote-unquote "reset" it. And that reset has some costs and some risks in terms of other things that we want to do with China.

But this is now the new U.S. policy. It's not going to change.

ROMANS: Yes.

ROGIN: And if you needed to sort of look at whether or not the U.S. is right in saying that China is acting outside of international norms, all you really have to do is look at the fact that the Chinese government, just this last week, arrested the guy who's in charge of Interpol --

ROMANS: Right.

ROGIN: -- the organization that's meant to encourage international law enforcement, OK?

So, you know, there's something to what the vice president is saying. China is not acting like a normal country. They don't like being called out on it but that's tough. JOHNS: What's the backstory on all of this, especially as to what's happening with the next summit -- President Trump?

ROGIN: Yes, so we've got two things going on here.

On the one hand, Sec. Pompeo wants to regularize the process by introducing his new envoy Steve Biegun to Kim Jong Un. He did that.

The idea is that the Secretary of State can't fly around the world every time he wants to have a meeting. He's got to have somebody to do this for him.

Steve Biegun is as good as anyone, and if the North Koreans accept him, then great. We can have meetings without having the Secretary of State devote his precious time and resources.

But the actual progress on denuclearization is basically zero. And this missile site thing is --

JOHNS: Right.

ROGIN: -- almost nothing.

And now, President Trump wants a new summit and, of course, Kim Jong Un wants that too because he thinks he can play President Trump better than Pompeo. He can get more out of him. He can maybe even trick him into doing some stuff that we never even thought of like he did at the last summit.

So there's a good political reason to have that --

JOHNS: Right.

ROGIN: -- new summit on both sides. For national security reasons it seems like a risk, but the bottom line here is that North Korean denuclearization is going nowhere slow.

ROMANS: Going nowhere slow.

Meanwhile, you've got Colin Powell in this remarkable interview with Fareed Zakaria -- Colin Powell was former Secretary of State -- alongside Madeleine Albright, a former Secretary of State as well, both of different parties. And he talks about China and his concern about this new direction from the United States -- listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEN. COLIN POWELL (RET.), FORMER SECRETARY OF STATE: Talk to the Chinese with respect when we have disagreements, as we do, or when there are trade challenges, let's work on it. If they're doing things that are getting into our technology improperly then let's do something about that. But let's not create a cold war situation with the Chinese.

(END VIDEO CLIP) ROMANS: We're concerned that a cold war could turn hot real, real quickly. And you've got China, also a player in the negotiations with North Korea. Is the United States -- how risky is it and is Colin Powell right?

ROGIN: Yes, I talked to a very senior administration official last week after Vice President Pence made his speech and he responded to that criticism pretty directly. And what the official told me was that this is a response to Chinese actions.

This is not us making the relationship out of whack. This is us trying to put it back into whack. In other words, how did that policy of like being nice to the Chinese government and quietly --

ROMANS: How'd that do for us, right?

JOHNS: Right.

ROGIN: -- and gently encouraging them to behave better work out.

It didn't, OK, so now we're going to try something new. And, Colin Powell and Madeleine Albright had their chance to fix U.S.-China relations. Now, the Trump --

ROMANS: Yes.

ROGIN: -- administration is going to take its turn.

ROMANS: One of -- one of my sources --

JOHNS: Right.

ROMANS: -- close to trade in the White House says don't forget China is the bad guy. The United States is not the bad guy.

JOHNS: Yes.

ROMANS: And you have to remember that China is the bad guy on trade.

JOHNS: Yes.

ROMANS: On trade. It's not the U.S.

JOHNS: Yes. Josh Rogin, always great to get your take on this stuff. Thanks.

ROGIN: Good morning, thank you.

JOHNS: You bet.

A journalist for "The Washington Post" goes to get a marriage license and hasn't been heard from since. Are his harsh words about the Saudi Crown Prince the reason? We're live in Istanbul.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [05:48:46] ROMANS: After days of mystery surrounding the disappearance of the head of Interpol, the international police agency, the Chinese government admits Meng Hongwei is under investigation for alleged corruption. Chinese officials say Meng insisted on taking a wrong path and had only himself to blame.

Now his last message to his wife is under the microscope.

CNN's Sam Kiley monitoring the situation for us, live from Hong Kong with the latest.

And he was the first Chinese person to be in charge -- to run Interpol. He was on a flight from France back to China and hasn't been heard from since?

SAM KILEY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, he disappeared at the end of September. The only communication his wife has had as to his -- hinting at his whereabouts was a text message that said wait for my call. And then four minutes later followed up with the emoji symbol of a knife, which may have indicated that he felt that he was in some kind of danger.

He now turns out, nearly two weeks later, to have ended up in the custody of the very ministry that he was the vice minister of at the time, and that is the public security ministry responsible for the police force and other security forces are facing accusations of corruption.

[05:50:04] Simultaneously with that, his wife has received threats over the phone and over social media, so much so that the French police where she is still living in Leon where the Interpol is headquartered is offering her police protection.

But in the end he faces potentially, if convicted, a capital offense. He could face the death penalty.

ROMANS: Remarkable, all right. Sam Kiley for us in Hong Kong. Thanks, Sam.

JOHNS: The U.S. government is quietly working the case of missing Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi. "The Washington Post" writer and outspoken critic of the Saudi Crown Price went missing after entering a Saudi Arabian consulate in Istanbul last month.

CNN's Jomana Karadsheh live in front of the consulate in Istanbul with more.

JOMANA KARADSHEH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Joe, this has been such a mystery -- more questions than answers almost a week since that disappearance of Jamal Khashoggi. One thing that everyone agrees on is that he disappeared after walking into this building right behind us. That is the Saudi consulate here in Istanbul.

Last week, I met his fiance, who was waiting for him out here, and she said that he was quite reluctant. He was really nervous about this visit to the consulate. This is a critic of the government. He's a man who left the country

during the crackdown on critics and on activists and he didn't feel comfortable going into the consulate. But she says he thought he had to do this because he needed to obtain that paperwork that would allow him to get married to his Turkish fiance here.

Now, over the past week, Turkish authorities have maintained that what they know is that he walked in and he never left the consulate. In the past couple of days we're hearing these leaks -- these comments from unnamed officials speaking to "The Washington Post" and also an adviser to President Erdogan all say that there's a possibility he may have been killed inside the consulate. But so far, they have not provided any evidence.

The official line from Turkey is that there is an investigation going on right now.

Saudi Arabia, for its part, has denied these allegations that he may have been killed, saying that they're baseless allegations and saying that he was in the consulate but he left a short time afterwards, something many here are asking why doesn't Saudi Arabia simply release footage from their security cameras showing him leaving the building.

And some feel that the United States and President Trump can do more by putting pressure on the Saudis -- on their ally, the Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, for more answers -- Joe.

JOHNS: Jomana Karadsheh in Istanbul. Thank you for that.

ROMANS: All right.

Another major storm bearing down on the U.S. Hurricane watches now in effect in northern Florida. The full forecast and when this thing is supposed to hit, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[05:56:08] JOHNS: The first hurricane watches now in effect as Tropical Storm Michael barrels toward the U.S. Forecasts have Michael strengthening to a hurricane and hitting the Florida Panhandle Wednesday.

Meteorologist Ivan Cabrera is live in the CNN Weather Center with the latest -- Ivan.

IVAN CABRERA, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Hey, Joe. A lot of people don't think of hurricanes arriving in October here so we have to play close attention because we only have a couple of days before it makes landfall. And as you said, potentially as a cat two, maybe even a cat three here moving in very close.

It's wrapping up, it's intensifying here. Once it gets into the Gulf it's really going to get going. It really doesn't have anything that would stop it from turning into a real monster here.

Seventy mile an hour winds right now. At 74, you get a hurricane and we're going to get that, I think later on today, certainly by lunchtime.

Look at the squalls already impacting over the Florida Keys and into South Florida, as well. Now, in South Florida, you don't have to worry about a direct strike from this thing but you will have to deal with some very heavy rainfall.

The center of circulation -- that's where the strongest winds are -- look at that. By Wednesday at 2:00 a.m., 110 -- 111, that's a category three. So we're going to be between those categories here by the time it makes landfall and it's going to happen I think by the time we get into Wednesday afternoon.

I'll zoom in here a little bit closer. By the way, once it moves north and east you don't have to worry about it. It's just going to be rain.

Watch this now -- the clock -- Wednesday, 4:00 p.m. This is an estimate, right? We're not going to tell you that's exactly when it's going to make landfall but that's what we're thinking.

This is also a cone. If this were to move a little bit further to the west I would be more concerned because that's the right front quadrant. That's where the Gulf of Mexico is going to go into a lot of people's homes if that is going to be the case here.

So we're hoping this stays a little further to the east but that could change as this thing continues moving up.

Hurricane watches posted now from the Alabama-Florida border all the way to Cedar Key. That's in the pink. And the yellow you see there, tropical storm watches as well.

So again, two days to prepare if you're in this area. A potentially major hurricane will be making landfall on Wednesday afternoon -- guys.

ROMANS: All right, Ivan. Thank you for that. We are warned. Thank you, sir.

OK, that's your weather. Here's your business. Let's get a check on "CNN Business" this morning.

European and Asian stocks lower right now. Shanghai fell 3.7 percent as China pours more cash into its flagging economy. China's been hurt by slowing growth, persistent debt, and by President Trump's trade war, so China's central bank plans to free up $109 billion to spur growth there.

Wall Street stocks closed lower Friday.

The S&P 500 lost nearly one percent for the week, its worst week in a month. Blame the bond market. The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury is at a 7-year high, 3.2 percent.

Two very different movies become instant blockbusters this weekend, bringing in October's best box office ever. Sony's comic feature "Venom," now in the top spot -- $80 million. That's the best haul ever for a movie released in October.

"A Star Is Born," the new music-heavy film starring Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper, brought in $42 million, beating expectations.

Both films helped boost total U.S. ticket sales to $174 million. That's a record for October when moviegoing tends to be light.

I didn't see either of them.

JOHNS: Me neither.

ROMANS: A lot of sports in my house.

JOHNS: Let's go tonight.

ROMANS: All right, let's -- we'll try. This afternoon, actually.

JOHNS: Yes.

ROMANS: We have an early show.

JOHNS: Exactly.

ROMANS: Thanks for joining us. I'm Christine Romans.

JOHNS: And I'm Joe Johns. "NEW DAY" starts right now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's a horrible tragedy. There's no words.

ROBERT SUMWALT, CHAIRMAN, NATIONAL TRANSPORTATION SAFETY BOARD: Twenty fatalities -- it's horrific. This is one of the biggest loss of lives that we've seen in a long, long time.

DOUGLAS: They were fun-loving. One has two little children and they now have no home.

HIRONO: He's going to be on the Supreme Court with a big asterisk after his name.

KELLYANNE CONWAY, COUNSELOR TO PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Justice Kavanaugh should not be seen as tainted.

SEN. KAMALA HARRIS (D), CALIFORNIA: That Supreme Court process was a sham.

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R-SC), MEMBER, SENATE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE: I'm glad those who tried to overturn the rule of law and replace it with mob rule lost.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Alisyn Camerota and John Berman. JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, welcome to our viewers in the United States and all around the world. This is NEW DAY. It's Monday, October eighth, 6:00 here in New York.

Alisyn is off. Erica Hill with me this morning --

ERICA HILL, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning.

BERMAN: -- for Columbus Day. Happy Columbus Day.

New details emerging this morning about the deadliest transportation accident in the United States in nearly 10 years.