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Early Start with John Berman and Zoraida Sambolin
House Democrats Dig in to Trump Oversight; Venezuela Blocks Bridge, Halting Humanitarian Aid; Aired 4:30-5a ET
Aired February 07, 2019 - 04:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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[04:30:52] REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D), INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE CHAIRMAN: The American people have a right to know, indeed have a need to know that their president is acting on their behalf.
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: It's called presidential harassment.
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CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: That unity push did not last long. Democrats defy the president with aggressive new investigations after the president warned against it.
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REP. MATT GAETZ (R), FLORIDA: We have an immigration system that allows people to come here violently. We engage in --
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DAVE BRIGGS, CNN ANCHOR: A congressman uses a gun violence hearing to push for a border wall. Parents of Parkland shooting victims were not having it.
ROMANS: The loyalty of the Venezuelan military is at stake. A tense exchange between John Bolton and Nicolas Maduro as desperate citizens search for supplies. We're live at the Venezuelan border.
BRIGGS: And the former top editor at the "New York Times" accused of plagiarism, Jill Abramson, now says she will review passages from her new book.
Welcome back to EARLY START, everybody. I'm Dave Briggs.
ROMANS: Good morning, everyone. I'm Christine Romans. 31 minutes past the hour this Thursday morning.
Let's begin here in Washington where House Democrats are starting to flex their new power in earnest. House Intelligence Committee Adam Schiff announcing an aggressive investigation into whether President Trump's business and financial interests are driving his decisions. The probe will go beyond contacts between Trump's team and Russia. It will include whether foreign interests hold any kind of leverage over the president or anyone in his orbit, whether anyone of those people is at risk of manipulation from abroad, whether anyone has tried to obstruct the current investigations.
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SCHIFF: The American people have a right to know, indeed have a need to know that their president is acting on their behalf and not for some pecuniary or other reason that pertains to any credible allegations of leverage by the Russians or the Saudis or anyone else.
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BRIGGS: The president dismissed the new investigations saying Schiff had no basis for it.
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TRUMP: This is a political hack who's trying to build a name for himself. It's called presidential harassment and it's unfortunate. And it really does hurt our country.
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BRIGGS: The move came less than 24 hours after President Trump warned in his State of the Union against Democratic probes.
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TRUMP: If there is going to be peace and legislation, there cannot be war and investigation. It just doesn't work that way.
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BRIGGS: Only about 18 months ago the president gave a similar signal against investigating his finances.
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MICHAEL SCHMIDT, NEW YORK TIMES CORRESPONDENT: Mueller was looking at your finances and your family's finances unrelated to Russia. Is that a red line?
MAGGIE HABERMAN, NEW YORK TIMES WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Would that be a breach of what his actual charge is?
TRUMP: I would say yes. Yes. I would say yes.
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ROMANS: Federal prosecutors in Manhattan may pose a bigger threat to the president than Special Counsel Robert Mueller. The Southern District of New York specifically looking at Mr. Trump's finances and it has already enlisted cooperating witnesses like his former lawyer Michael Cohen and Trump Organization CFO Alan Weisselberg. Now Democrats circling the president in other ways as well. House
hearings are scheduled today on Mr. Trump's tax returns and on family separations at the Mexico border, and a session is set for tomorrow to question acting attorney Matthew Whitaker. Democrats will ask about his decision not to recuse himself in the Russia probe among other things.
BRIGGS: House Judiciary chairman Jerry Nadler says he'll have a subpoena in his pocket just in case Whitaker refuses to answer questions. Also House Financial Services chair Maxine Waters says her panel is in talks to bring in Treasury Security Steve Mnuchin. They want to talk to him about the lifting of Russian sanctions on companies connected to oligarch Oleg Deripaska.
ROMANS: And Michael Cohen's closed door testimony before the House Intelligence Committee that was scheduled for Friday has been postponed until later this month. Intel chairman Adam Schiff said mysteriously that Michael Cohen's appearance was put off in the interests of the investigation. Schiff did not elaborate.
Meanwhile, meantime, there is another sign that the Mueller investigation may be wrapping up. We're learning that prosecutor Scott Meisler has finished his special counsel detail and returned to work at the Justice Department. He's the fourth of 17 prosecutors who joined the Mueller team to leave.
[04:35:05] BRIGGS: The bipartisan group of 17 lawmakers is making progress on a deal to head off another government shutdown next week, but a source tells CNN no one is certain what the president will sign. The White House staying out of the talks to this point.
The deadline is next Friday but negotiators want a deal done this week to give Congress and the president enough time to process it. Acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney is scheduled to meet with the group this weekend at Camp David. He is still warning the president could use executive authority.
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MICK MULVANEY, ACTING CHIEF OF STAFF: If it comes to this, find the money that we can spend with the lowest threat of litigation and then move from that pot of money to the next pot that maybe brings a little bit more threat of litigation and then go through the budget like that.
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ROMANS: The 17 lawmakers met with Customs and Border Protection officials on Wednesday. They agree the best way to secure the border is to marry new technologies to additional personnel and new barriers. But they disagree about how to do that.
CNN has learned the government shutdown ended after just 10 air traffic controllers stayed home on January 25th, the 35th day of the impasse. The absence of those few workers, six in northern Virginia, four in Florida, that was enough to temporarily shut down travel at New York's LaGuardia Airport and causing delays at other major hubs.
BRIGGS: Tension at a congressional hearing on preventing gun violence. Republican Matt Gaetz of Florida using the hearing to actively campaign for the president's border wall. And it didn't go over so well with some in attendance.
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GAETZ: HR8 would not have stopped many of the circumstances I raised, but a wall, a barrier on the southern border, may have. And that's what we're fighting for.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. Chair --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE)
GAETZ: We have an immigration system that allows people to come here violently. We engage in --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There will be no comments or demonstrations, please.
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BRIGGS: Gaetz's comments angering the fathers of two victims at the Parkland school massacre, Manuel Oliver and Fred Guttenberg.
ROMANS: At one point, Rhode Island Democrat David Cicilline posed this question.
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REP. DAVID CICILLINE (D), RHODE ISLAND: Is there any committee rule that prevents a member of Congress from reciting false statements in a committee hearing that are unsupported by the evidence?
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CICILLINE: That are unsupported by the evidence or are members of Congress entitled to just make things up?
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ROMANS: The House Judiciary Committee has been hearing testimony on a bipartisan measure that would require background checks for all gun sales and most gun transfers.
BRIGGS: Planet earth just emerged from the fourth hottest year ever recorded according to the NASA and the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration. That means 18 of the hottest 19 years have occurred since 2001. The warming driven largely by increased carbon dioxide emissions and other greenhouse gases caused by human activity. Many countries suffered through extreme weather and climate events in 2018, but the U.S. was hit particularly hard. There were 14 separate weather and climate disasters that caused $1 billion in damage or more last year. ROMANS: All right. The U.S. trade deficit is shrinking for the first
time since President Trump started putting tariffs on Chinese goods. The Commerce Department shows the trade shank to $49.3 billion in November from $55.7 billion in October. Now that drop follows five straight months of growth in the trade deficit, worsening in the trade deficit.
The president's tariffs on Chinese goods began in July, his duties on foreign steel and aluminum started in March. Now a lower deficit, that's good news for the president. But foreign bankruptcies are not. The "Wall Street Journal" reporting bankruptcies in three regions covering major farm states last year rose to the highest level in at least 10 years. That's right. The highest farm bankruptcies in 10 years.
Now the president's trade negotiators will head to Beijing next week to continue trade talks as the clock runs down ahead of a March 1st deadline. U.S. Trade representative Robert Lighthizer and Treasury secretary Steve Mnuchin will travel to China for a third round of negotiations after those critical talks last week. The president has threatened to jack up tariffs on Chinese goods if the two sides cannot reach a permanent truce in this trade war.
BRIGGS: You're not done with me just yet. The words of longtime Michigan Congressman John Dingell. A source tells CNN the 92-year-old former dean of the House is in hospice battling cancer. His wife, Congresswoman Debbie Dingell, announcing she has left Washington to be at his side. Dingell served 59 years in the House. On Wednesday he tweeted his wife has agreed to keep up his Twitter account while he dictates messages. Dingell thanked all his supporters for their prayers and kind words.
ROMANS: All right. Today President Trump launches the Women's Global Development and Prosperity Initiative. It's a goal to I guess coordinate efforts to empower women in developing countries. The program was spearheaded by the president's eldest daughter Ivanka. It rests on three pillars, education, entrepreneurship and eliminating barriers blocking women from participating in the economy, including legal and regulatory, cultural hurdles.
[04:40:08] Ivanka Trump says the plan is to empower 50 million women by the year 2025.
BRIGGS: That's tough.
ROMANS: All right. You may have to change what sunscreen you use if you visit a major beach town in Florida.
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BRIGGS: 4:44 Eastern Time. As the political crisis in Venezuela escalates, U.S. National Security adviser John Bolton and embattled Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro clashing, with Bolton tweeting, quote, "The U.S. will consider sanctions off-ramps for any Venezuelan senior military officer that stands for democracy and recognizes the constitutional government of President Juan Guaido." Maduro hitting back, saying his military is loyal and would never defect. Meantime, for Venezuelans trying desperately to survive, things are going from bad to worse.
[04:45:03] CNN's Isa Soares with more from neighboring Colombia.
ISA SOARES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Christine and Dave, I'm standing on the Simon Bolivar Bridge. It's the main pedestrian bridge between Colombia and Venezuela. As you can see behind me, it says Bienvenido Colombia, welcome to Colombia.
Just in front of me, directly in front of me are about two -- less than two minutes' walk is really Venezuela. And what we have been seeing is an influx of people coming here every single day. They come with trolleys, they come with prams, pushchairs, anything stuffed with money. Money that's worth nothing because of hyperinflation. And they come here and they buy, really, groceries.
They buy flour, they buy eggs, milk, toilet paper, anything, the basic staples that you need for every day. And they do this every couple of days because it's so expensive, first of all, to get food on the other side, but also to actually -- to actually find food in the first place.
Meanwhile, 15 minutes or so away from here in the bridge that's called Tienditas, a bridge that is brand new but has never been opened, the government of Venezuela has blocked that bridge. Has blocked their side of the bridge. One oil tanker, two blue containers. And they're doing that to stop any eventual humanitarian aid to come -- coming through there.
Food, chicken -- and flour, and flour, too. So some of the basic staples. And, of course, worth remembering, once they get to the other side they still have a long journey to go.
Just food. That's all I have, he says. And when I ask everyone walking down this corridor back to Venezuela who they blame, so many have told me time and time again there's only one man and that is Nicolas Maduro. The man, we've said in the last couple of days, has said this is not a humanitarian crisis. This is not economic -- this is an economic crisis. We are not a country of beggars. But look at these people. Just look around. People are in need of food -- eggs. So many people desperately trying to make ends meet.
Back to you.
ROMANS: And the desperation mounts every day.
Thank you for that, Isa Soares, for us.
All right. Almost every kid's favorite video game Fortnite crushing its competitors. Stocks of Electronic Arts and Take-Two Interactive taking a hit. CNN Business is next.
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[04:51:50] ROMANS: The Milwaukee police officer killed in the line of duty Wednesday has now been identified. The officer, 35-year-old Matthew Rittner, was fatally shot while executing a search warrant for illegal firearms sales and drugs. The suspect is now in custody. Officials say Rittner, a husband and father, was a 17-year veteran of the Milwaukee Police Department. He is the city's third police officer killed in the line of duty in just the past eight months.
BRIGGS: A decades-old cold case getting new attention from police in San Francisco. They released an age progression sketch of the suspected serial killer known as the "Doodler," who terrorized the city's gay community in the 1970s. Police also released audio from a 1974 911 call hoping to jog the public's memory.
A $100,000 reward being offered for information leading to the killer's arrest and conviction. Police say the "Doodler" killed at least five gay men in the 1970s and attacked several others. He was dubbed the "Doodler" after telling one of the assault victims he was a cartoonist and was doodling while they talked at a late-night dinner.
ROMANS: All right. A stunning revelation in the case of a serial killer in Toronto. When police moved in to arrest Bruce McArthur last year, they found a man tied to his bed alive. Searching McArthur's hard drive for evidence, they found eight folders labeled with the names of different men, each folder filled with photos of his victims. A ninth empty folder was labeled with the man -- name of the man tied to the bed.
The details revealed as Bruce McArthur was sentenced for luring the man to his home, then strangling, dismembering and burying them in garden planters and a ravine. McArthur who also worked as a mall Santa pleaded guilty last month.
BRIGGS: Teachers in Denver plan to strike Monday but Colorado's governor is hoping to overt the strike saying both sides are close to a deal. Still teacher salaries remain a major sticking point here. The union says its proposal would -- could be funded if some of the $4 million slated annually for administrator bonuses was invested in teacher salaries. Denver Public Schools said it has added a 10 percent average salary increase for teachers next year.
We're also keeping an eye on Oakland where another teacher strike could happen. Talks are under way to avoid it.
ROMANS: A truck driver is facing drug trafficking charges even though the company that bought the cannabis he was carrying says it's perfectly legal. This unfolded when the driver was stopped by an Idaho state trooper for a routine inspection. 7,000 pounds of cannabis on board. State officials say field tests show the plants were positive for THC, the substance in marijuana that helps people get high.
BRIGGS: The Colorado company that bought the cargo in Oregon says it is legal hemp, but because of mandatory minimum drug sentences in Idaho where marijuana is illegal, the driver faces five years in prison and a $15,000 fine. The driver spent four days in jail and was released after posting $100,000 bond. ROMANS: A Colorado wildlife trail remains closed after a runner
fought off a mountain lion to save his own life. Wildlife officials say the 80-pound lion bit the man's face and wrists.
[04:55:04] The victim managed to break free and choke the animal to death. He was running by himself Monday in the Horsetooth Mountain Open Space near Fort Collins. He was taken to a hospital, later released. Rangers will reassess the safety of the trails tomorrow.
BRIGGS: That dude needs a reality show.
ROMANS: Yes.
BRIGGS: Officials in Key West, Florida, are moving to ban the sale of some popular sunscreens to protect the coral reefs there. A city commission voted to ban those containing oxybenzone or octinoxate. Chemicals shown to damage coral reefs. Up to 70 percent of sunscreens on the U.S. market contain oxybenzone including products from Neutrogena, Coppertone and Aveeno. The ban won't take effect until January 2021.
Now the city can't keep visitors from bringing banned sunscreens to its beaches. It can only discourage them.
ROMANS: Scary moment caught on video in Missouri. A school bus overturning in Kansas City as it was dropping students off. The school district spokesman says it may be due to freezing rain and icy roads.
BRIGGS: First responders rescued the three students and driver on the bus. No major injuries. One student who was in a wheelchair had to be removed from the bus with a gurney.
The family that runs the Chicago cubs apologizing after a splinter news story revealed racist e-mails from owner Joe Ricketts. He expressed fear of Muslims and shared racist jokes. In one 2012 e-mail exchange he says, quote, "Christians and Jews can have a mutual respect for each other to create a civil society. As you know, Islam cannot do that."
Ricketts who is not directly involved with the day-to-day operation of the Cubs now says, quote, "Sometimes I received e-mails that I should have condemned. Other times I've said things that don't reflect my value system. I strongly believe that bigoted ideas are wrong."
ROMANS: Late last night former "New York Times" executive editor Jill Abramson tweeted she is reviewing passages in her new book after being accused of plagiarism. Just hours earlier, Abramson rejected the claim she lifted parts of her new book "Merchants of Truth" from other works.
Those allegations made earlier Wednesday by "Vice News Tonight" correspondent Michael Moynihan. He tweeted out several examples where Abramson's language was a close match to phrasing that first appeared elsewhere. Moynihan says he stumbled on the issue while fact checking the book which profiles for outlets, Vice, BuzzFeed, the "Times" and the "Washington Post."
BRIGGS: Ozzy Osbourne waking up in a California hospital this morning. The 70-year-old rocker was admitted Wednesday after suffering complications from the flu. His wife Sharon Osbourne sharing the news on Twitter saying doctors felt it was the best way to get Ozzy on a quicker road to recovery and she thanked everyone for their concern and love. Last week Ozzy Osbourne announced he was postponing the European leg of his tour with Judas Priest due to illness.
ROMANS: All right. Let's get a check on CNN Business this morning. Global stock markets are mixed amid news of more trade talks between the U.S. and China. On Wall Street, taking a look at futures there, it looks like -- you can put the screen for me, I can show you that futures on Wall Street -- there are. They're down slightly. I would call that directionless this morning after the Dow closed nearly lower, down 20 points Wednesday. The S&P 500 fell slightly snapping a five-day winning streak. The Nasdaq fell a bit as well.
Snap had a big day, up 22 percent. It came a day after it reported the number of daily users on Snapchat was holding steady at 186 million. General Motors has found new jobs for many of the workers at soon to close auto plants. The automaker said nearly 950 workers at the Lordstown, Ohio, and him tracked a plant in Detroit have accepted jobs at other plants will also take jobs at the Flint, Michigan, assembly plants and the Spring Hill, Tennessee, plant. Back in November GM announced that 8,000 salaried workers and 6,000 hourly workers will either lose their jobs or be reassigned to other plants.
Layoffs for about 4,000 salaried workers at GM started Monday. The job cuts and plant closing is part of ongoing cost reductions to free up $6 billion every year to invest in electric and self-driving vehicles.
All right. Fortnite is crushing the competition. Shares of video game makers Electronic Arts and Take Two Interactive tanked more than 13 percent after reported weaker sales and profits because of competition from Fortnite. Now it has become a cultural phenomena. The dances, the skins, the games. Oh, my god. It's free to play, it's free. But it is not free because it makes its money on in-game purchases and they've done a really good job of having this sort of like must-have, must-have additions that cost money.
Take Two Interactive CEO dismissed Fortnite's dominance highlighting the success of its game Red Dead Redemption Two. Because we all pretend like Fortnite. It's a sign that the gaming industry can handle more than just one hit. It doesn't have to be just Fortnite.
BRIGGS: Yes. The Super Bowl just passed and the NFL is focusing in on Fortnite and how it can grow their audience.
ROMANS: Yes. Yes.
BRIGGS: It's taking on over the globe, folks. So I guess we just better allow it.
EARLY START continues right now.
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