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Authorities Recover Ninth Package; Cuomo on Suspicious Packages; Trump Criticizes Press; Aired 8:30-9a ET

Aired October 25, 2018 - 08:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:30:31] ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: All right, again, it's been a very busy hour here on NEW DAY.

We have just gotten a photo of a ninth package that this morning has come to authority's attention. This one addressed to former Vice President Joe Biden. However, look at the address. It is peculiar. They include his full name and his middle name, Joseph Robinette Biden Junior. There to his address in Delaware. It's just another piece of a peculiar puzzle.

This envelope, John, looks so much like the other eight suspicious envelopes that had the bombs in them.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Identical to my eyeballs.

CAMEROTA: Identical with the -- with the same six stamps. And this now is a live aerial view of another containment vehicle --

BERMAN: Yes.

CAMEROTA: That this bomb, or at least suspicious package, will have to go in to be examined.

BERMAN: Yes. And, again, and Shimon Prokupecz is here watching this with us and Shimon's been doing so much of the reporting on this. And the first thing he thinks when he sees this containment vehicle is that authorities are treating this as if it is very real, as well they should because it looks exactly like the other bombs, Shimon, that were sent.

SHIMON PROKUPECZ, CNN CRIME AND JUSTICE REPORTER: Yes, exactly like it. If you look even the way that the package -- you can tell there's -- it's circular, right? Whatever is in there, probably another pipe bomb, the weight of it. You know, this is another thing that authorities have been using to decide whether or not something's related to this, is the weight of the package. We're told that the New York package, the weight of that package that was delivered to Robert De Niro is similar to the weight in the package was delivered here. There are a lot of similarities. And I bet whatever's inside this envelope is going to be similar. Now, this is the package that the authorities have been looking for

overnight. They found it -- finally found it overnight. They know that it had been mailed to the former vice president. They knew where it came from. But then it had been returned. And so it was in the postal system and they were trying to find it. And then they found it, it looks like, overnight.

And we're seeing exactly the same scenario play out there in Delaware, as we've seen here in New York. You have the containment vehicle. You have the bomb techs that are going in, going through this and now transporting this. And then it's going to go to the FBI. I mean now we have nine of these. So now the FBI will have nine pieces of evidence, nine bombs that they are going to have to investigate and pull apart to try and determine and link all of them. And, really, the race is on now where they need to find this guy because -- or people because, you know, certainly, as we heard from the mayor a short time ago, there is concern that there's going to be others.

CAMEROTA: Yes, why wouldn't there be?

PROKUPECZ: Right.

CAMEROTA: I mean we've had two on our watch just as NEW DAY began.

Phil Mudd, there is a serial bomber on the loose this morning. What are your thoughts?

PHIL MUDD, CNN COUNTERTERRORISM ANALYST: My -- I don't think about the bomber. I think about the opportunities these bombs are providing. You look at themes as a risk to the public, but on the inside every one of these bombs potentially could be tracked. For example, by the U.S. Postal Service. Now it's tracked times nine, including potentially couriers delivering these.

Obviously on the packages and within the packages, you have the potential of a stray hair, a fingerprint, some sort of DNA evidence. So when you're looking at a bomber like this, even if the bomber is potentially unbalanced, that bomber has to look for balance between risk and aggression. This bomber has clearly said, I am so angry that I'm going to take tremendous risk, multiplying risk by sending out these packages. My bottom line is, that accelerates the prospect that we'll find this individual because there are too many clues going around.

BERMAN: Again, nine now packages. Nine bombs sent around.

Juliette Kayyem is with us as well.

And, Juliette, Phil says he's going to focus on the bombs. I want you to focus on the security, the homeland security aspect of this. It's extraordinary when you look at these targets. You're dealing with former president, former vice president, former attorney general, former secretary of state, former director of the CIA, a member of Congress. This is a full-scale attempt at decapitating, you know, either literally, physically harming or threatening or scaring, you know, the entire Democratic, in a way, political leadership. JULIETTE KAYYEM, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Yes. Right. And two

weeks before an election as well. So, you know, in the context of what's coming around the pike, that can't be ignored.

And, John, I don't think you are exaggerating by saying -- by talking about the gravity of this. You can call it as an assassination attempt across the board. I think that would be appropriate when you talk about the presidents.

[08:34:59] Two things on the homeland front. One is just, picking up on what Phil said, not only are the devices, right, materials that the guy can be found, but, remember, the way we think about homeland security now is that there's a community around the person or people, the culprits. They may not know that they're part of a community, but right now I've got 11 envelopes that were bought, stamps, purchases that may have been made online, statements that were said about someone wanting to do this. People around this person or group know and so just, you know, this is the see something, say something. Just, you know, get the word out that there's a community that knows something, you know, whether it's the private sector, friends, family, neighbors, a stray statement made by the guy.

The other thing I just want to say is, you know, in this world of uniqueness, right, just under this administration, the absence of a presence by the Department of Homeland Security for now 24, 36 hours is really odd to me from the operational perspective. This is an ongoing terror attack. You can label it what you want. But I think that the cabinet's silence has just not -- you know, we talk about unity of effort in the Homeland Security enterprise, and it would be probably smart to get the department out there at this stage because of the local and state impact. This can't -- this cannot rely on the New York Police Department alone.

BERMAN: Juliette, Phil, stand by, if you will, for a moment.

And, again, the picture you're looking at on the screen right now are live pictures from New Castle County, I believe, Delaware, where this ninth device sent to Joe Biden has been found. It is now being contained or about to be contained in this vehicle.

And, Juliette, Phil, stand by, because on the phone with us now is the governor of New York, Andrew Cuomo.

Governor Cuomo, thank you so much for being with us.

I'm going to ask you the same question we asked to the mayor of the city a moment ago, are you concerned that there is a serial bomber on the loose in your state?

GOV. ANDREW CUOMO (D), NEW YORK (via telephone): The -- good morning, John. Good morning, Alisyn.

Let's put the terminology aside because I think we're going to need to develop a new lexicon when this is over.

There is no doubt that there has been a pattern. There has been a number. And I would not at all be surprised if we found more. As you've mentioned, we've found more this morning.

You know, when it started with the first package to George Soros, my heart was in my mouth because the question was, is this a one-off or is this the beginning of a pattern. We got the answer very quickly when 1:00 the next morning I got a call from the state police saying there was a package at the Clinton residence. So, once you went to two, assume three, four, five, six, seven.

It's also true that the number one -- number one path now is the manhunt. The more packages, the more evidence, more the possibility for DNA, et cetera. And we are all over that.

We are working in a coordinated way. We do have the Joint Terrorism Task Force, which is a federally organized task force with the state police on it, NYPD, et cetera. And the first order of business, find the person.

Second order of business, what was the intent, which we are not sure of. The obvious intent would be to kill, to maim, et cetera. Or there may be an intent to intimidate on the cusp of this election.

And, third, we're going to have to talk about what this all means. I mean, yes, we have political debate, but we've never had political violence. And, yes, we're Democrats and Republicans, and they talk red and blue, but we're red, white and blue, right? We're one America. And we have to remember that.

BERMAN: We just heard from the White House press secretary who says the president has been briefed on the new packages this morning, the one sent to Robert De Niro in your state, the state of New York, lower Manhattan, and the one believed to be sent to Vice President Joe Biden in Delaware.

Have you heard from the president directly?

CUOMO: I have not heard from the president directly. We have exchanged phone calls last night. But, in fairness to your previous report, the federal officials are fully engaged.

BERMAN: Good.

CUOMO: The FBI is engaged.

BERMAN: Good.

CUOMO: The Joint Terrorism Task Force is engaged.

BERMAN: Good. That's great to know.

You mentioned unclear what the intent was, whether it was intended to kill or intimidate. One of the questions we had this morning, and we've been trying to get to the bottom to of is, whether or not these bombs were built in a way that they even could detonate. Do you have any information on that?

CUOMO: Well, they were -- they are bombs capable of detonation. That has been established. They did not detonate.

BERMAN: OK.

[08:40:06] CUOMO: Was that purposeful or incidental? Was it a poorly constructed bomb? You know, you can go to the Internet now and learn how to build a bomb. We've dealt with that in New York where we've had terrorist attacks on the more traditional sense from international -- with international implications where people went to the website, they learned how to build a bomb and they built a bomb and the bomb exploded. So it could just be a person who was not proficient --

BERMAN: Right.

CUOMO: And therefore the bombs didn't explode. Or it could be there was an intent not to have the bomb explode, but only intimidate. You won't know that until you know who has done it.

BERMAN: Right.

CUOMO: So really you still have to solve the first step. You have to find the sender or senders.

But we are on high alert. We have more police, et cetera. And we do have people who are informed as to the mail, both from the Postal Service point of view --

BERMAN: Good.

CUOMO: As well as independent mail services in buildings, which is how we have spotted some of these packages.

BERMAN: Well, it is good to know, though, that information that you were providing, that these were these devices capable of exploding, because there's a lot of misinformation out there these were fake devices. You know, these aren't bombs at all. No, these are things that could have exploded and killed or maimed or hurt a lot of people.

Governor Andrew Cuomo, we do appreciate you being with us this morning. Thank you for paying such close attention to this. We thank you for your help yesterday here at CNN as well.

The governor telling us the information that federal authorities, the Joint Terrorism Task Force, very much involved, along with state and city officials right now in this investigation in keeping the people and the city and the state of New York safe.

We're going to take a quick break. We have much more information, much more breaking news. CNN's special live coverage of this ongoing apparently domestic terror attack continues right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:46:07] ANNOUNCER: this is CNN breaking news.

CAMEROTA: We do have breaking news, as we have all morning. We have new pictures in from Delaware. That's where a ninth suspicious

package has been found. This is the containment vehicle that will take that package to be examined. This was connected, we believe, to former Vice President Joe Biden. In fact, we have some pictures of the envelope that showed up or that was addressed to him. It bears all the same hallmarks as the other eight suspicious -- well, actually bombs that authorities have found in these envelopes. So, again, the same six stamps, the same look at address labels, the same envelope itself.

So just since we have been on the air, there have been two more packages found. This is what authorities feared yesterday, that there would be more, and sure enough there are more because there's a nationwide manhunt for whoever the culprit is. And this person has not been caught.

So we want to talk about all of this and the political ramifications of all of this. We want to bring in Joe Lockhart, Anita McBride, and David Gregory.

David Gregory, as the announcement of these two new envelopes were -- we were broadcasting it and as the president was being briefed as we now know from Sarah Sanders, the president decided to tweet more insults and criticism about the press.

What happened to the man that we saw yesterday, probably 18 hours ago, talk about bringing down the rhetoric?

DAVID GREGORY, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: You know, I continue to be confounded by this because I do believe at some level the president agreed with those who advised him to do what a president does, which is to go big, to unite the country, to tamp down political hysteria and finger pointing in a moment like this when you need some calm and when you need a sense of direction and a sense of unity. And he read those lines last night at a rally and he said the right things. He appeared presidential.

But it couldn't last long. It didn't last long last night and it carries over to this morning. The notion that you have a now widespread attempt at political violence, maybe even assassination, and you have a president who just wants to go after the media for the coverage of him is beyond unfortunate. It is unpresidential and it is destructive at any time, particularly in such an incendiary political moment.

BERMAN: There are bombs being sent to people this morning, including former presidents, media organizations and actors. And what we heard from the president was an attack on a media. And what it smells like to me, and I'm sorry, Joe, for this analysis, it sort of feels like, you know what, if you hadn't worn such tight clothing you wouldn't have been assaulted.

JOE LOCKHART, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Sure. I'm not confounded at all by this. This is a pattern. We saw it in Charlottesville where he read off the teleprompter and said the right things that someone wrote for him. And then over the next few days it came (INAUDIBLE).

We saw it with Brett Kavanaugh and Dr. Ford, where he said the right thing, you know, given some, and then over time.

He's incapable of not telling you what he really thinks. And we find out what he really thinks.

What -- you know, if I were advising him, and as crazy as that sounds, he needs to do something now. And it's not speeches about unity. And he doesn't even have to take responsibility. He has to send a message to his supporters and say something along the lines of, if you think from what I say that I support this, you are wrong. You are very wrong. There's no place for political violence. We solve these things on Election Day at the ballot box. But he's incapable of it. He only thinks -- and it goes back to -- from the first day. He only thinks he's governing for his supporters. The rest of the country doesn't matter. And, you know, it's well beyond, you know, being unpresidential.

[08:49:59] CAMEROTA: Anita, one of the intended recipients of the bomb, John Brennan, had tweeted at the president. He says to the president, stop blaming others. Look in the mirror. Your inflammatory rhetoric, insults, lies and encouragement of physical violence are disgraceful. Clean up your act. Try to act presidential. The American people deserve much better. By the way, your critics will not be intimidated into silence.

Sarah Sanders is on a morning show just now and she has just responded to that. Here's this moment.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SARAH SANDERS, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Look, the president, I think, could not have been more presidential yesterday when he spoke directly to the American people. He condemned this violence.

Let's not get lost in who is responsible for this heinous act. It is the person who made and sent the suspicious packages. Let's not forget that that is ultimately the person that is responsible and will be held responsible by this administration.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You have no reaction directly to John Brennan?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Anita, is the president -- I mean when the president this morning tweets that his biggest qualm and beef is with the press, is he acting presidential today?

ANITA MCBRIDE, AMERICAN UNIVERSITY CENTER FOR CONGRESSIONAL AND PRESIDENTIAL STUDIES: Well, I think one of the things that Sarah Sanders just said that is important and is something that the president does need to say now, and he does need to be a bipartisan, nonpartisan healer for the country, as we are all, of course, so worried about this. But he does need to say, look, these acts are criminal. And political violence will not be tolerated in this country.

He claim -- he says he's a law and order president. Well, the full weight of the law will need to be used against this person, or persons, that is doing this. And he does need to remind Americans, look, the institutions of our law enforcement, of our government, are perfectly equipped to protect us and keep us safe and will be used against those that are doing this. That's what he does need to say. And I agree with Joe and David and others, you know, he started out right, but he needs to stay on the right path here.

BERMAN: David Gregory, again, in some of what Anita and Joe are calling for the president to do, he did do last night. He said the full weight of law enforcement is on this. He said that acts of political violence should not and will not be tolerated by everyone. But he just didn't stop there.

And in the scripted portion of the speech last night and in his thought out tweets this morning, he is quite deliberately trying to refocus the blame, and to a certain extent claim his own level of victimhood here.

GREGORY: Yes, I mean, I think that's the point. And I think Joe said it. I mean he can't -- he can't help himself from telling you exactly what he thinks and for looking for the fight. And that's far more important to him than thinking about the presidency, the office he holds as being bigger than him and his pugilistic instincts.

It falls to others, even Sarah Sanders, who I was critical of yesterday for her initial statement, not including the fact that CNN was targeted by this bomber or bombers, which I think was outrageous. But even she this morning can articulate things that he should be articulating better. We should keep our focus on who's responsible for this as the primary focus at the moment.

CAMEROTA: David Gregory, Anita McBride, Joe Lockhart, thank you very much for being with us on this very busy morning full of breaking news.

MCBRIDE: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: We will have final thoughts and share with you what was happening at CNN yesterday as some of this unfolded. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:57:11] ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

CAMEROTA: We have had a lot of breaking news this morning, and we fear it will not end any time soon.

Yesterday it was a surreal moment here for us at CNN. Our colleague, Poppy Harlow and Jim Sciutto, were on the air. They were reporting about the bombs that were sent to the Clintons and the Obamas when this moment happened.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR, "NEWSROOM": They have projectiles. I mean that's a -- excuse me, that sounds like a fire alarm here. We'll keep you posted on that. But to have projectiles --

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR, "NEWSROOM": OK. We're going to jump in. There's a fire alarm here.

SCIUTTO: There's a fire alarm here. You might have heard it in the background. We're going to find out what the latest here at CNN.

HARLOW: We'll be right back.

SCIUTTO: We're going to be right back.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: OK. Shortly after that, Poppy Harlow and Jim Sciutto popped up, not from their set, because we all had to be evacuated at that moment, but from the street corner of New York City. And they continued reporting. They continued doing their jobs. They continued covering the story.

And, Poppy, I'll just start with you.

We all had to evacuate, we all went together, all of NEW DAY, to an undisclosed location. And it was so comforting and heartening to see you guys not missing a beat and the news not being silenced and you continuing to report.

Tell us what that experience was like.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: It was the people around us. I mean there are people -- Jay, come over here. There are people that you don't see every day -- Jay on the set, like Marlin, if he can come up here, that rushed us off the set. We didn't want to leave. You were like the dad. You turned the lights off. You took our mics off.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, he didn't give us a chose.

HARLOW: And he walked us out. I mean it's those people, right? It's the amazing technical director -- Jay, thank you -- on -- that got us up on that cell phone signal, Jim.

SCIUTTO: And we had this -- we had this living organism around us, folks like Jay, folks holding the 14 phones Poppy and I were operating on, power supplies, as the police kept moving us further and further back.

HARLOW: Right.

SCIUTTO: Carrying the tripod and keeping us on the air as that was happening.

HARLOW: With our colleague, Kate Bolduan, as well.

SCIUTTO: Exactly.

And it wouldn't have happened -- it certainly wouldn't have happened without that team. Couldn't have happened without that team around us. HARLOW: And as we walked out -- go ahead, guys.

BERMAN: I was going to say, you know, it's such an amazing moment. And it's not one of these, you know, all heroes don't wear capes thing.

HARLOW: Yes. Right.

BERMAN: This is a -- you guys were doing your jobs, which you do so well sitting where you are or standing outside, and it's not just that you managed to keep on reporting, it's that you managed to tell people what was happening and what they needed to know because this is a moment of public safety. This is a moment when people are under attack. And if the goal was to silence you, it didn't work.

HARLOW: Yes.

SCIUTTO: No. Listen, you saw it. You were reporting it earlier, John and Alisyn. The president tweeted this morning about the media purposefully reporting false news. No, we don't. And yesterday was a demonstration of that.

[09:00:05] We work hard to report the news as it happens factually.