Return to Transcripts main page

Early Start with John Berman and Zoraida Sambolin

Trump's Plan to Declare National Emergency Shocks GOP; Andrew McCabe Confirms 25th Amendment Discussions at the DOJ; U.S.-China Trade Talks End; White House Says President in "Very Good Health Overall". Aired 4:30-5a ET

Aired February 15, 2019 - 04:30   ET

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


(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

[04:31:13] SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R), MAJORITY LEADER: He's prepared to sign the bill. He will also be issuing a national emergency declaration at the same time.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: President Trump just hours away from triggering a high stakes power showdown over his border wall.

DAVE BRIGGS, CNN ANCHOR: The former acting director of the FBI claims President Trump called a North Korean missile launch a hoax. Wait until you hear why.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAYOR BILL DE BLASIO (D), NEW YORK: We got a call this morning saying we're taking our ball and we're going home.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: New York's progressive mayor rips Amazon for pulling out of a $3 billion deal due to backlash from progressives.

BRIGGS: Plus, the race to save a man getting swept away by flood waters.

Welcome back to EARLY START on a Mar-a-Lago Friday. I'm Dave Briggs.

(LAUGHTER)

ROMANS: I'm Christine Romans. Thirty-one minutes past the hour this morning, this Friday.

President Trump is just hours away from signing a compromised border security bill to avoid a second government shutdown and declaring a national emergency. That tactic along with executive powers will be used to cobble together $8 billion from a variety of funding sources to finance construction of his wall, a move that has the full backing of Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MCCONNELL: I've just had an opportunity to speak with President Trump and he, I would say to all my colleagues, has indicated he's prepared to sign the bill. He will also be issuing a national emergency declaration at the same time. And I've indicated to him that I'm going to prepare -- I'm going to support the national emergency declaration.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRIGGS: The presidential plans to use executive orders to collect $8 billion for wall funding. $1.375 billion already in the spending bill he'll sign later this morning. $3.5 billion will be taken from military construction funds, $2.5 billion from Pentagon counter narcotics funds, and $600 million from Treasury forfeiture funds.

Many Senate Republicans appear to be stunned by the president's decision to use his emergency powers to try and build a wall. Some call it inappropriate. Others say it's a slippery slope that may come back to haunt the party.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. SUSAN COLLINS (R), MAINE: I continue to believe that this is not what the National Emergency Act was intended to be used for. It was contemplated as a means for responding to a catastrophic event like an attack on our country or a major natural disaster.

SEN. MIKE ROUNDS (R), SOUTH DAKOTA: What about if somebody else thinks that climate change is the national emergency and then what will they do and how far will they go?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says Democrats will fight the president possibly with legal action over the declaration of a national emergency to get his money for the border wall. Pelosi calls the move an end run around Congress that sets a dangerous precedent.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D), HOUSE SPEAKER: We will review our options. We'll be prepared to respond appropriately to it. I know the Republicans have some unease about it no matter what they say because if the president can declare an emergency on something that he has created as an emergency, an illusion that he wants to convey, just think of what a president with different values can present to the American people.

You want to talk about a national emergency? Let's talk about today, the one-year anniversary of another manifestation of the epidemic of gun violence in America. That's a national emergency. Why don't you declare that emergency, Mr. President? I wish you would. But a Democratic president can do that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRIGGS: And just might. With President Trump poised to use executive powers to get funding for his border wall, it's important to note what he said back in 2014 when President Obama used executive authority to halt the deportation of undocumented parents.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Now he has used executive action. And this is a very, very dangerous thing that should be over ridden easily by the Supreme Court.

[04:35:07] So we're looking now at a situation to absolutely not pass muster in terms of constitutionality. But depends on what these justices do.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRIGGS: During that same interview, Donald Trump expressed the opinion that President Obama could be impeached for taking executive action on immigration.

Voters are not behind President Trump when it comes to declaring a national emergency. A CNN poll from earlier this month found 66 percent oppose the idea.

ROMANS: All right. Big news in New York. Amazon backing out of building HQ2 in New York. Back in November Amazon chose Queens and Northern Virginia to split duty as its second headquarters. Each city was expected to have more than 25,000 workers over time. But there was big backlash from politicians and the community. Amazon decided to scrub plans to build in New York.

In a statement Amazon said this, "A number of state and local politicians have made it clear that they oppose our presence and will not work with us to build the type of relationships that are required to go forward with the project we and many others envision in Long Island City."

New City Mayor Bill de Blasio called out Amazon for walking away, for caving, instead of talking about the community's concerns.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DE BLASIO: Instead of an actual dialogue to try and resolve those issues, we get a call this morning saying we're taking our ball and we're going home. I've never seen anything like it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: New Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez celebrated the decision as a victory for members of the community who protested this deal.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) REP. ALEXANDRIA OCASIO-CORTEZ (D), NEW YORK: We should not be giving away our infrastructure, our subway system, our schools, our teachers' salaries, our firefighters' budgets to a company that has not shown good faith to New Yorkers.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: Amazon said it has no plans to reopen the HQ2 search at this time. Instead it plans to move forward with its office expansions in Virginia as well as Nashville.

And a reminder, you know, was going to pony up $3 billion in taxpayer money to do this.

BRIGGS: A ton. That's 120 grand per job.

ROMANS: Around the country, there were all these communities who were vying for this high, high-profile search, and Amazon's walking away from New York.

BRIGGS: But won't a dozen other states put their hand up immediately or already have?

ROMANS: We'll see. Look, they haven't said that they're going to look for a new place. I mean, they're going to -- they have Nashville and they have Virginia.

BRIGGS: Right.

ROMANS: Maybe they use those two locations to absorb what would have happened in New York.

BRIGGS: Nashville very pro-business environment at this point.

The White House firing back against stunning allegations made by former acting FBI director Andrew McCabe. McCabe confirming publicly for the first time that high-level meetings were held at the Justice Department to remove President Trump from office using the 25th Amendment. McCabe was fired from the FBI last March. He says he also ordered an investigation to determine whether the president obstructed justice by firing James Comey.

White House press secretary Sarah Sanders ripping McCabe in a statement saying he has no credibility and is an embarrassment to the men and women of the FBI and our great country.

More now from CNN's Laura Jarrett.

LAURA JARRETT, CNN JUSTICE REPORTER: Christine and Dave, good morning. As a new attorney general takes the reins at the Justice Department, the former acting director at the FBI now laying bare the ghosts of 2017. That period that rocked the Justice Department and the FBI, and in a new interview with "60 Minutes," Andrew McCabe describes why he felt the need to open an obstruction of justice investigation after the president fired former FBI director James Comey. And he also confirms reports that the Deputy Attorney General Rod

Rosenstein discussed recruiting cabinet members to possibly invoke the 25th Amendment to remove Trump from office and wearing a wire to record his conversations with the president.

In a fresh statement on Rosenstein's behalf, the Justice Department now saying in part, quote, "The deputy attorney general never authorized any recording that Mr. McCabe references. As the deputy attorney general previously has stated, based on his personal dealings with the president, there is no basis to invoke the 25th Amendment, nor was the DAG in a position to consider invoking the 25th Amendment."

The White House and the Justice Department also point to McCabe's credibility issues given that he was fired for lying to internal Justice Department investigators. But as we've previously reported, he did keep contemporaneous notes on all of his conversations. So more to come on this for sure.

Dave, Christine, back to you.

ROMANS: All right, Laura. Thank you so much for that.

Vice President Mike Pence says he does not believe McCabe's claims about discussions that took place to remove President Trump from office. He tells MSNBC no one ever brought up the subject up with him.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MIKE PENCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I never heard of it. I never heard any discussion of the 25th Amendment, and frankly I find any suggestion of it to be absurd. This president has been producing for the American people, and I couldn't be more proud to stand with him and the words and the writings of the disgraced FBI agent won't change that fact for the American people.

ANDREA MITCHELL, MSNBC HOST: And you've never heard of this before?

[04:40:02] PENCE: I have never heard any discussion of the 25th Amendment by members of this government and I would never expect to.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRIGGS: McCabe is also making some shocking allegations about President Trump in his new book. According to the "Washington Post," the former acting FBI director provides new details about what he calls the president's subservience to Vladimir Putin.

McCabe writes, "Trump dismissed a July 2017 North Korea missile launch as a hoax. He thought that North Korea did not have the capability to launch such missiles. He said he knew this because Vladimir Putin told him so."

Kim Jong-un test-launched an ICBM around July 4th, 2017, and dedicated it to, quote, "arrogant Americans."

ROMANS: In his book, McCabe also describes former attorney general Jeff Sessions as a man who seemed obsessed with immigration. According to the "Wall Street Journal" McCabe writes that Sessions once told him about the FBI workforce, "Back in the old days, you only hired Irishmen. They were drunks but they could be trusted, not like all those new people with nose rings and tattoos."

Sessions has not responded to request for a comment but a person close to the former attorney general tells the "Wall Street Journal" the idea of Sessions ever saying a disparaging thing about anyone in law enforcement is laughable.

BRIGGS: California hit with heavy rain, snow, wind and flooding. Sections of Palm Springs, a desert, under water. Authorities forced to close entire roads. Seems like that playing out all over the state, including in Orange County where roads were turning into muddy rivers. Police forced to close several streets in the area. In the meantime, 50 homes were evacuated in Sausalito after massive mudslides. One woman who heard it here describes the heart-pounding moments.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It sounded like a tornado, kind of. Then I thought it was an earthquake.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRIGGS: One home in the area actually slid into another home. A woman in one of those homes was taken to the hospital. She is OK.

In Sacramento damaging winds uprooting this tree. It fell right on top of an SUV crushing it and trapping the driver inside. She was taken to the hospital and suffered broken bones.

ROMANS: All right, high stakes --

BRIGGS: Wicked.

ROMANS: Yes. Unbelievable.

All right. Big trade talks between the U.S. and China just ended in Beijing. Is any progress made? We'll take you there live, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[04:46:33] BRIGGS: 5:46 p.m. in Beijing where two days of trade talks between the U.S. and China just wrapped up in Beijing. Both sides scrambling to at least produce a memorandum of understanding by the end of negotiations. That could pave the way for a meeting next month between Presidents Trump and Xi. Right now a widening trade war between the two countries is scheduled to escalate if no deal is reached in the next two weeks.

Let's go live to Beijing and bring in Matt Rivers. Matt, is there optimism?

MATT RIVERS, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I think there is, Dave. I think it's safe to say that both sides are talking about progress here. On the one hand, you had Secretary of The treasury Steve Mnuchin saying in a brief tweet that he had productive talks with his Chinese counterpart. He also tweeted out a picture, a family photo if you will of both sides of the -- both delegations that were involved in the negotiations but perhaps more interestingly was the fact that we now know that Chinese President Xi Jinping actually dropped in on negotiations, had a meeting with both leaders of the U.S. delegation. And that's not something that we would expect if these talks were breaking down or not going that well.

So I think looking at that, you can see some progress there. The question is it enough progress for the president of the United States to decide to let that key March 1st deadline slide. That's when tariffs on $200 billion worth of Chinese imports, Dave, go from 10 percent to 25 percent. And that would escalate the trade war perhaps irreversibly.

If the president decides to let that deadline slide that would also give him a chance to meet in person with Xi Jinping which is something that both sides I think needs to happen in order for some deal to work out. We're really just in the wait and see mode now. We're waiting to hear from the U.S. side and the Chinese side about how the negotiations this week went, whether they were able to make headway on some of these very thorny issues or are they really just going to kick the can down the road completely in the hopes that the leaders of both countries can make some sort of progress here overall.

But it does seem at least that both sides left these meetings with positive feelings.

BLITZER: Certainly the markets here would like to see that can kicked.

Matt Rivers live in Beijing, thank you.

ROMANS: All right. Freshman Democrats have made a big splash in the new Congress creating some viral moments while also making themselves targets for Republicans. At her weekly press conference, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, was asked about their influence and like a congressional den mother, Pelosi says they make her proud.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PELOSI: Welcome to the Democratic Party. We are not a rubber stamp for anybody. We are not a monolith. We never have been, and who would want to lead a party that would be described that way. The members come, they bring their enthusiasms, their priorities. We welcome that, and they are not programmed. They are spontaneous, prepared, and I'm proud of them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: The speaker did not name any specific members in her remarks.

BRIGGS: She's not sure what to do with that wing of the party, is she?

ROMANS: I think that she's -- yes. She's got to harness it. Right?

BRIGGS: Proud of them, but she must fear that a little bit.

ROMANS: Right.

BRIGGS: Ahead, General Motor's newest product is not another car but an e-bike. CNN Business has the details next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[04:54:08] BRIGGS: 4:53 Eastern Time, and the state of the president's health is, quote, "very good over all but clinically obese," according to the White House. Results of the physical exam President Trump underwent last week were released Thursday.

More now from CNN chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta.

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Christine and Dave, the most remarkable thing about this report may be how little information there was.

Keep in mind, it was a four-hour exam, physical exam the president had last Friday. There were 11 consultants, it took six days to release this report, and there wasn't a lot in it, especially as compared to what we received last year.

Take a look at some of the numbers, compare the left to the right, 2018 to 2019, you can see his height and his weight there. He gained a few pounds. His cholesterol has dropped. That's a good thing, but take a look at that bottom line, that Crestor, that's the medication stat and medication for cholesterol, and the dose has been quadrupled there, from 10 milligrams to 40 milligrams. That's why the cholesterol levels have dropped.

[04:55:10] So those are some of the main results that came out of this. It's in comparison to what he had done last year, some of the results that were released last year, the echo cardiogram, the stress test, the Montreal cognitive exam. Remember that was a test that he asked for to test for his own cognition, got a perfect score on that.

And at the very top there, the coronary calcium scan. That was something that was not in the official report. I asked about it, and we saw that in fact he had the scan and he had an abnormal finding last year and that is, you can see the numbers there, 133. That was what he scored on the coronary calcium scan last year. Anything over a hundred, between 100 and 300 puts you at relatively high risk of having some sort of heart problem over the next three to five years.

So that's where the doctors are probably focusing a lot of their attention. We know now that he is clinically obese. He has high cholesterol, he's taking a medication for that. And over the next year or so, I'm sure doctors are going to continue to advise him to try and drop some weight and improve his diet -- Christine, Dave.

BRIGGS: As they did last year. Dr. Gupta, thank you.

Teachers in Denver returning to the classroom after a three day strike under a tentative agreement with Denver public schools. Teachers and other educators will receive pay increases between 7 percent and 11 percent, and a 20-step salary schedule. The deal would also end what the union says are exorbitant five-figure bonuses for senior administrators. The head of the Denver Classroom Teachers Association calls it a win, plain and simple, for students, educators and the school communities.

ROMANS: Nevada's Highway Patrol responding to more than 100 crashes on rain slicked roads, including, look at this, this dramatic rescue. This is a driver seen being swept away by rushing water in a flood channel. Firefighters using a ladder to rescue the man who was taken to the hospital in stable condition. Emergency responders say none of the 110 crashes involved life threatening injuries thankfully. They said they had to deal with three times the typical number of crashes on any given day.

BRIGGS: So a truck, it's driving down a highway with a bear hanging off of it. Might sound like a set up line, but it's no joke. Check out this Facebook photo. It shows a bear stuck in netting on top of a garbage truck that was headed to a North Carolina landfill. The driver told police he was unaware there was a bear on his trailer. When he rolled back the netting, the bear hopped off and the truck and the bear just ran into the woods.

ROMANS: That's one smart bear.

BRIGGS: Nothing to see here.

ROMANS: You know, you go where the people and the garbage is. That's how you get fed. Oh my goodness.

Let's check on CNN Business this morning, global markets mostly lower, speaking of bears, amid fears of a slowing U.S. economy on Wall Street. We see Tokyo, Shanghai, Hong Kong all down, and then Wall Street now a little bit lower here.

This is after a drop in December retail sales. The Dow fell 104 points, rebounding from a loss of as much as 235 points. The S&P 500 fell slightly. That snaps a four-day streak. The Nasdaq rose just a bit.

Now Wall Street did not react significantly to the news that President Donald Trump will sign the spending bill and declare a national emergency but that slowdown in retail sales, something that the world's largest economy, that's why around the world you're seeing global markets a little concerned. If retail sales are slowing in the world's largest economy.

All right. Coke says the global slowdown will be a drag for it in 2019. Coke issued a disappointing forecast of 4 percent growth for the year, blaming global economic slowdown, and political uncertainty. Coca-Cola shares fell 8 percent after the news, marking its worst day since October 2008. That's a big one-day move.

Coca-Cola has been expanding its offering focusing on lower calorie and lower sugar drinks and most recently launching a new flavor, orange vanilla, in the hopes of encouraging people like Dave Briggs to stick with Coke rather than pick up a different soda.

GM, General Motor's newest product is not another car, but an e-bike. The e-bike called Arrive was developed with the help of engineers who worked on the Chevrolet Bolt EV electric car. And this bike will be available in folding and non-folding versions, charged to 3 1/2 hours and then provide 40 miles of motor assisted riding.

GM said the bikes will first be available in Germany, Belgium, and the Netherlands where e-bikes, believe it or not, are particularly popular. No word on when customers will be able to get this bike in the U.S.

There really is sort of an arms race --

BRIGGS: Actually cool.

ROMANS: -- for electric vehicles, and not just cars.

BRIGGS: Yes.

ROMANS: I mean, you're really seeing some of these traditional automobile companies really thinking outside of the box.

BRIGGS: And Atlanta for the Super Bowl they had the scooters.

ROMANS: Yes.

BRIGGS: And you can just leave them wherever you wanted.

ROMANS: Oh really?

BRIGGS: It's not like city bike where you plug them in. You just leave them wherever.

ROMANS: I don't get invited to the Super Bowl so I wouldn't know.

BRIGGS: Sorry. Next year we'll get you to Miami.

EARLY START continues right now with a national emergency on our southern border.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

(END)