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Boeing Aircraft Use by Ethiopian Airlines Crashes Soon after Takeoff; President Trump Asks Congress for $8.6 Billion for Border Wall; Bernie Sanders Has The Advantage Among Younger Caucus Goers; Trump Asking A Now Divided Congress For Billions Of Dollars In Border Wall Money. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired March 11, 2019 - 08:00   ET

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

[08:00:00] This is CNN breaking news.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, everyone. Welcome to your NEW DAY. It's Monday, March 11th, 8:00 in the east. And we do begin with breaking news. Investigators have now recovered the cockpit voice and data recorders of the Ethiopian Airlines plane that crashed, killing all 157 people on board, including eight Americans. Boeing facing intense scrutiny this morning. Several countries and airlines around the world, they are grounding the company's 737 MAX 8 aircraft.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: So pressure is now growing on U.S. carriers to decide whether they're going to ground this fleet. And it isn't just any aircraft. This is Boeing's bestselling passenger jet with hundreds in service here in the U.S. and thousands in service around the world. CNN is the only network that is live at the crash site in Ethiopia. Our David McKenzie is there with all of the breaking details. Tell us what you're seeing happening around you, David.

DAVID MCKENZIE, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: John and Alisyn, good morning. It's a terrible scene behind me. The digger has just started up again, trying to move the earth in this crater where the airline crashed into this hillside on Sunday here in Ethiopia. This brand-new Boeing 737 8 MAX. Now, the latest information is, as you say, the flight data recorder, the audio cockpit recorder, were recovered just a short time ago from the scene. There was a lot of commotion around those crucial devices that could provide clues as to why this brand-new plane just a few minutes after takeoff then crashed into the side of the mountain where I'm standing.

We briefly spoke to the U.S. ambassador who was on the scene here looking to make sure that everything was secured. There is an NTSB team coming in overnight, he said. He said that Interpol is working with the U.S. officials and Ethiopians to try and identify the bodies that are being brought out over time through this day that we've been watching this recovery effort. Just tragic scenes. They're also trying to take the personal effects they find, particularly handbags or backpacks off people to see if they can find any I.D.s to try and give some kind of solace to the loved ones as we move forward.

But right now, it will be shock. And across the world, there's an impact of this crash because China has grounded all of its similar airlines, as well as an Indonesian airline, and here, of course, in Ethiopia. This airline has an excellent safety record. It is also -- has one of the newest fleets on the continent. So the questions will be mounting about Boeing and whether there is any issue with this plane. No evidence yet of that, and no clear indication of just what happened here and what has caused all these horrible scenes to be playing out behind me. Alisyn, John?

BERMAN: David McKenzie, it's so good have you there on the ground to see those efforts behind you. Thank you so much for your reporting.

Let's bring in CNN Aviation Analyst and Science Correspondent for "PBS NewsHour," Miles O'Brien, and CNN anchor and correspondent Richard Quest. Richard, two crashes, brand-new aircraft, same exact model in less than five months, perfect weather in both cases. You say this is a full-blown crisis for Boeing.

RICHARD QUEST, CNN ANCHOR AND CORRESPONDENT: Oh, yes. Oh, yes. There's no doubt about that. It's not there just were two new, brand- new planes. It was the phase of flight when it took place, within the first 10, 12 minutes. There are similarities in the fluctuations in altitude in both cases. The pilots asked to turn back and declared they were having problems.

Now I'm very well aware before you can't just say one and one and, therefore, it makes two. You've got to sort of have more to it than that. But now the Chinese have decided to ground the MAX fleet, and the Ethiopians and the Indonesians. For the traveling public, this is an almost impossible situation because you've got U.S. carriers and European carriers saying we have confidence in the fleet, and the Chinese regulator saying, well, maybe you do, maybe you don't, but frankly, we're grounding them until we know.

BERMAN: Miles, after the Lion Air crash, which was just eight months ago, and again, in very similar circumstances, Boeing sent out an emergency bulletin, basically saying pilots needed to retrain to use this new equipment. Does that seem to you to be a likely cause of this?

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: Well, I will say this, John, that every pilot who put his or her hands on the controls of a 737 MAX 8 would have been very familiar with what happened to Lion Air and would have thought about what they would do in that situation. What's interesting about this scenario, hauntingly parallel to the Lion Air crash, is that things happen so quickly and in such a dynamic fashion so close to the ground. So even a pilot who had taken the time to read that air worthiness directive, and any good pilot would, of course, when the chips are down, when you're in that moment fighting this automated system designed to improve safety but perhaps actually making things worse, when you're in that moment, if you do the right thing in short order is a difficult thing.

[08:05:13] BERMAN: Explain to me what the automated system, that automatic control, would do, and why pilots need special training to know how to counteract it. O'BRIEN: So when they built this new model of the 737, they put

bigger engines on, more fuel efficient engines, and they moved them forward. So what that did was it changed the control properties of the aircraft. It made it tend to pitch up more. So what they did was they basically put some software into the system to make it harder for that situation to occur. It's called angle of attack, nose-high attitude. If you get too high there's an aerodynamic stall. So that was the system that was put in place. Pilots were really unaware of it, and that's a source of some contention and concern inside the airline industry.

But the fact is there is a procedure to disable that system in a pinch. But if you're in a situation where the aircraft is violently headed toward the ground at high speed, you don't have a lot of time to deal with it.

BERMAN: And if you don't have the training and aren't ready for it, it can get you by surprise. Richard Quest, anecdotally we're hearing from people asking us, does the plane I'm flying on today, does my American plane, is it a 737 MAX 8? We're hearing about people going to websites to check it out. Mary Schiavo who was on with us before said it might be reasonable, it would be reasonable to ground this type of aircraft until they know for sure what's going on.

QUEST: Whenever the reasonableness of the position, the traveling public's confusion will only be enhanced by this discrepancy. You cannot have the Chinese, which has got a huge fleet of aircraft and 95 MAX 8 in the flat, you cannot have the Chinese regulator saying we're going to ground them. Meanwhile, every U.S. airline is putting out statements saying we have confidence in the plane and we have confidence in everything. The two are inconsistent.

The aviation industry should speak with one voice when comes to safety and security. It doesn't always, but the traveling public shouldn't be caught in the middle. And that's why I think by tonight you're going to see some sort of clarity one way or the other because you simply cannot or should not, maybe, have this discrepancy of authorities determining the safety or the reliability of an aircraft.

BERMAN: And Miles, just to put a fine point on it, generally speaking, in perfect weather like this with a brand-new aircraft, this shouldn't happen.

O'BRIEN: Modern aircraft like this simply should not fall out of the clear blue sky. And the fact that it's happened in a hauntingly parallel fashion in a matter of months, I think, puts the burden of proof on Boeing to prove this is a safe aircraft. And I think the prudent thing to do is to ground these aircraft. Now that they've discovered the black boxes, we should have an insight into what happened fairly quickly, and fast action should be taken.

BERMAN: Richard, you want a quick last word?

QUEST: Not often Miles and I fully agree. But he said it more clearly than I could. It's time to seriously think about grounding the fleet as an abundance of caution. BERMAN: Two major crashes in less than five months, 157 killed in

this one, 189 in the first. Richard Quest, Miles O'Brien, thanks for helping us understand what's happening this morning, appreciate it.

CAMEROTA: So my family and I are flying this weekend. I've already been online trying to figure out if this is the plane. It would make it a lot more calming for me and everybody who is flying right now and this week if they would just ground this fleet until they figure it out. As Mary said, they're going to have the answer by the end of this week. So it's not that long that we're asking for them --

BERMAN: American, United, and Southwest all fly this plane. There are dozens in service. I will say chances are American pilots have gone through -- U.S. pilots have gone through the training that might be the issue here.

CAMEROTA: I agree, but I don't even like the idea of the pilot having to override the automated system while it's bucking, while the plane is bucking. Even that's nerve-racking.

BERMAN: They have got to investigate. They've got to get to the bottom of this fast.

CAMEROTA: Now to politics. President Trump will ask Congress today for an additional $8.6 billion for his proposed border wall, setting up a new budget battle with Democrats. This amount is much more than the president's initial ask last year which Congress rejected.

Joining us now is David Gregory, a CNN political analyst, Jackie Kucinich, Washington bureau chief at "The Daily Beast" and also a CNN political analyst, and Laura Barron-Lopez, national political reporter at "Politico." David Gregory, this is just political theater, right? This is just a messaging exercise because Congress has already rejected this as we all remember just a few weeks ago.

[08:10:00] DAVID GREGORY, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Right. It's definitely theater. It's a hedge for the president who is going to be defeated on this emergency declaration and may hope for some support in the courts. But if he doesn't do that, he still wants to assert his priorities. Any budget documents are no more than wish lists now. We haven't passed a budget in a long time around here.

So as a result, this is a president saying this is still something that I care about. Defeat or no defeat, this is what I stand for. And the wall, by the way, is simply campaigning by metaphor. It is just a way of saying I'm going to be tough on the border. I'm going to make sure that my voters understand that they should be afraid of people coming from the southern border, and that's what I'll campaign on, fear, as I did in 2016. He'll do it again in 2020.

At the same time, I think it's worth noting two things. One, he could have had this wall if he had done a larger agreement on immigration. Two, he's telling some of these same supporters, oh, the wall is already being built. I'm already succeeding, at the same time he's asking for so much more to complete it. So he's got a lot of different messages here, all part of the theater. BERMAN: Jackie, it's interesting, because before the midterm

elections there were Republicans who were surprised and unhappy that the president was leaning in to immigration when he had other issues that Republicans wanted to run on. Those same Republicans were surprised when he leaned in to the shutdown when there were other things Republicans wanted to deal with. And now he's saying I'm going to lean in to immigration all the way until November, 2020.

JACKIE KUCINICH, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes, and they better snuggle in and not be surprised this time, because the president has seen this has been a winning issue for him in the past. We'll see if he can replicate that again in 2020. But this isn't going anywhere, regardless. And that's the x-factor when you look at how the president is building this massive campaign structure going into 2020.

What the president is going to focus on, because his campaign and Republicans writ large are going to have to follow that messaging, whether they like it or not, either rejecting it or embracing it. So we can just expect more and more of this. And the more he kind of goes up against Congress, he hopes that he will reap the political benefit of that from his base who this issue matters the most to.

CAMEROTA: Laura, the deficit and debt, meanwhile, are exploding. Do you remember when Republicans were very concerned about this? I remember the talking point of the debt that you would be crushing your grandchildren with, that it would be ruining the country. And these are some of the same people who are now the president's top advisers, and the idea that the deficit has ballooned under him doesn't seem to be spoken about now.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ, NATIONAL POLITICAL REPORTER, "POLITICO": Right. No, it hasn't phased Republicans at all. They've completely thrown out that talking point and they fully embrace the president's agenda, and they fully have embraced his talking points about the border wall. And so I think you can expect Republicans to say that they are behind these $8.6 billion that the president is now requesting. But again, we have to remember that Democrats control the House now. It's not one-party rule anymore the way it was when last year Trump was trying to get some $25 billion for the wall last January, and that didn't even work when all of Republicans controlled all of Congress. So now with Democrats in charge, you can expect Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer to say no to this money.

BERMAN: So Democrats control the House. They want to control more than that, namely, they want to control the White House as well. And Laura, we have a poll out with "The Des Moines Register" of what Iowa voters want to see in the Democratic primary. And Joe Biden is leading that field right now, 27 percent, 25 percent for Bernie Sanders.

Now Joe Biden continues to top these polls, Laura. And people say, oh, it's just name recognition, it's just name I.D. I'm old enough to remember, not just deficits, but also the 2016 race where Donald Trump led in Republican primary polling for a long time, and people just dismissed it as, oh, they know him from "The Apprentice." Sooner or later that bubble will burst. Maybe the Biden bubble won't burst. BARRON-LOPEZ: You're right. Maybe it won't. Biden is definitely a

formidable candidate, and that is why, as soon as he jumps in, which many expect that he will, he's going to shake up the entire field. He's going to be right up at the front with Sanders.

But I think there's two interesting points in the poll that came out this weekend, which if you're a rival Democratic candidate, if you're Kamala Harris or Booker or Elizabeth Warren you're going to be looking at. And that's that 31 percent of Iowa Democrats said that Biden's time has passed and 41 percent said that Sanders' has passed. So that's why -- that's what rival Democrats are going to be looking at, and they are hoping that there's room enough in those numbers for stuff to change as the caucuses approach.

GREGORY: I agree with that. But I also think that Biden occupies his own lane right now, which is a more establishment, older Democrat, not just age but older in terms of longevity within the party.

[08:15:00]

DAVID GREGORY, POLITICAL ANALYST: And among older caucus goers where you see he's got an advantage. Bernie Sanders at the moment has that advantage among younger caucus goers.

And he now shares a lane with a lot of candidates who are running for the first time who are trying to take that progressive mantel away from him. And that of course is going to be he big challenge for Biden, which he is not going to be known ads a progressive.

There's no doubt the party would have to pull him left quite a bit. But he is still going to occupy not just the name recognition but the person that democrats look up and say oh yes, he can be president. He can restore America's standing in the world.

He could take on Trump. He could speak on working class. But there's a level of certainty that people will project on to him while they are still questions about others are who more progressive in the party.

JACKIE KUCINICH, POLITICAL ANALYST: But that longevity is going -- could be a blessing a curse--

GREGORY: Yes.

KUCINICH: -- for Joe Biden. He hasn't been vetted--

JOHN BERMAN, ANCHOR: Right.

KUCINICH: -- in a climate where his words could come back to haunt him. We're talking about the crime bill. We're talking about that Anita Hill video, which is really shocking when you watch that now knowing with the Kavanaugh hearing so fresh in everyone's mind.

So, how Joe Biden will stand up to that sort of vetting, that is an open question at this point.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, ANCHOR: And then Laura, Beto O'Rourke is deciding this week, we think.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ, NATIONAL POLITICAL REPORTER, POLITICO: That's right.

BERMAN: We think.

BARRON-LOPEZ: Yes, that's right. I mean Beto could also shake up the race. I know from a number of members of congress that are from states where other 2020 candidates are running from California and New York. But they're waiting on Beto.

He has a lot of strong relationships within the house, and that could help him as he gets his campaign running. It's the same with Biden though. There are a number of house members who have known him for a long time. And they are going to be excited when he jumps in.

GREGORY: But that goes to your point John, which is that one of the reasons that Trump survived that field is that it was such a huge field, right? And you have to wonder whether Biden can enjoy something similar, which is how fractured the field could be.

BERMAN: I actually heard from Biden people back in January which either feels like 100 years ago or not that long ago, that one of the things that kept on making the race more attractive was that there were so many people in because what you need to win in a 20 person race may be 19 or 20 percent which is achievable--

GREGORY: Right.

BERMAN: David Gregory, Laura, Jackie, thank you very, very much.

KUCINICH: Thank you.

BERMAN: All right, President Trump is asking a now divided congress for billions of dollars in border wall money, how will that go over, a democratic member of congress, a senator joins us next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:20:00]

BERMAN: President Trump shows no signs of giving up on his border wall. Today the president will ask congress for another $8.6 billion to pay for it as part of his new budget request. Joining me now is democratic senator Doug Jones from Alabama.

He's also the author of "Bending Toward Justice," about the decades long struggle to bring justice -- or deliver justice for the victims of the 1963 Birmingham Church bombing. Senator, thanks so much for being with us--

SEN. DOUG JONES, ALABAMA (D): It's my pleasure, thank you--

BERMAN: Before I ask you questions about today, there was a tornado, this terrible tornado that struck Alabama, your home state last week. How's the recovery effort? SEN. JONES: I think it's going great. I was down there three or four days afterwards, and it was amazing what the first responders had done, how they were cleaning up. Everyone has stepped up. EMA, the churches, the faith community, everyone has stepped up.

The hospital did an extraordinary job in a matter of hours dealing with all of this. And our -- the porch band of Indians has stepped up. And they are paying for all of the funerals because this is a very poor area of Alabama. So, everyone has stepped up in an amazing way.

BERMAN: It's going to take a big effort to recover.

SEN. JONES: Oh, absolutely.

BERMAN: So, I'm glad we had a chance to ask you about that. Let me ask you about the president's request for more than $8 billion for the border wall funding. Is this real or is this just Washington theatre at this point? He is begging for a fight.

SEN. JONES: I hope it -- I hope what they'll do -- we'll do this, his budget has been kind of a moving target on the border. What I'm hoping is he will submit this and then we can have some hearings on it. Let's get this out in the open.

One of the biggest criticisms of the presidents asks has been that we haven't seen what he really wants. And seen and let the experts talk about it in a hearing. So, we'll see how it goes.

I think its part of the budgetary process where you ask and then you negotiate. What I'd really like to see is some regular order with Senator Shelby and Senator Delahay with a hearing and let's talk about it.

BERMAN: This may be regular order. His request--

SEN. JONES: Absolutely.

BERMAN: -- could be part of that. But you're not one of these democrats who's going to say no new money for a border wall at all?

SEN. JONES: Well, because every time I talk to people about a border wall, they really just want border security.

BERMAN: OK.

SEN. JONES: I mean that is clear they want better border security, and there's a lot of ways to do that. If we can get some hearings and get the experts in, I think we could come up with some -- with whatever is necessary to secure that border.

BERMAN: Right. You are a working lawyer; you've been a lawyer for a long, long time and a successful one. I want to get your take on what house intelligence Chair Adam Schiff says that he wishes Robert Mueller did. He wishes Mueller actually had gone the distance and tried to put the president before a grand jury. Listen to this. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ADAM SCHIFF, CHAIR, HOUSE INTELLIGENCE: Yes, I think ti is a mistake. And I said along that I don't think Bob Muller should rely on written answers. I think the constraint that Bob Muller is operating under is he had an acting attorney general who is appointed because he would be hostile to a subpoena on the president.

And now he has a permanent attorney general who has chosen for the same hostility to his investigation would like appose that step.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: Was it a mistake for Robert Mueller not to get the president under oath to testify before a grand jury?

SEN. JONES: I can't say that it is was a mistake. I'm sure he tried and wanted to. But I've been a prosecutor before I was a U.S. attorney, so you can't always get potential targets or subjects in front of a grand jury and get them under oath.

And the president's legal team was going to resist that mightily and would have just delayed the process. I got a lot of confidence in Mueller and the special council and their team to understand where they are, what they need to do and what can be completed for his investigation.

BERMAN: Enough confidence that if -- and I know it's a hypothetical, if this report comes back and says there was no collision that we found between the president or the 9inauidble) with Russia, we didn't find it. Will then you say OK, time to move on?

SEN. JONES: Well, I'll say on that particular report for sure I've said from the very beginning, we need to go where the evidence leads it and accept the conclusion. I mean I think most folks that know Bob Mueller know that he is going to do an incredibly through job.

And if there are things there that can be under covered, he's going to uncover them. But that doesn't always lead to where a lot of people in the political world want it to lead. So, we'll see how that goes. But I'm going to accept those conclusions because I believe he will have had the opportunity to do a very, very through job.

[08:25:00]

BERMAN: Do you worry that all republicans will -- sorry, that all democrats will not accept those conclusions though?

SEN. JONES: Well, there's always going to be people that are not going to accept the conclusion just like if he comes up and says there is collision, that there're going to be a lot of republicans that are not going to accept that.

We live in a political world. But I think when you go through the facts and you look what Mueller has done. And remember, there is much more to the Mueller investigation than simply whether or not there was some collision.

What he is looking at is absolutely how the Russians -- communist Russia have interfered in our elections. We've already got two major incitements. So, there is going to be a lot of information that comes out of this report--

BERMAN: That is already done. All right, Jude Rot Moore, you beat him in a special election to take the sante seat you're in now. He is making the motions perhaps to run again. What would you say if he jumped back in?

SEN. JONES: I'm not worried about who's running in my race in 2020. We're focused on the same things that we focused on the last time, the kitchen table issues, the issues that mean so much to people. There will be a lot of people that run for that.

What's really kind of comical to me is watch the reaction of the republicans who all supported him a couple years ago and no they're talking about he's a flawed candidate and (inaudible). So, I just think it's a -- it's kind of comical to watch these days. But we'll be ready for whoever the nominee is next spring.

BERMAN: I want to ask you about your book. And I love the title, "Bending Toward Justice," of course the Martin Luther king quote, "the arch of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice." It's about the work you did and the case stemming from the Birmingham Church bombing. What's the major lesson you learned from that? From--

SEN. JONES: Wow, that's a -- there are a lot of lessons I think to learn. I think as we look back now, I think the biggest lesson is to go back and to reexamine yourselves and where we were as a society at that point under the Jim Crow laws in the south and other places too.

This just wasn't just the -- segregation was just not limited to the south during those times. And also to listen to what we're doing now. And we're sliding back on voting rights. We're sliding back on civil rights. In today's world, civil rights mean more than just an issue between black and white.

It involves race, it revolve religion, it involves gender. And we need to be careful. Words matter and I think that there was a part of that in this -- in the book that we talked about the fact that people on Governor Wallace and Bull Connor really empowered people to do things that they might not otherwise do.

And I'd like to make sure that everybody has a discussion. I do think we need to have discussions about where we are in this country on race and other issues.

BERMAN: When you say words matter, obviously there are words that are used now in our public discourse in language that is used that really hasn't been used ever.

SEN. JONES: That's correct. And it's -- we talk about the president and some of his words. But I think we have to be very careful on both sides of the political aisle, because it really makes a difference. People are listening.

And in today's world and our social media world when more people have their phones and they're watching and listening in the privacy in their own home, and we tend to stay in these silos (ph).

We really need to have more dialogues and discussions. And to be a lot more civil to each other and to work across the aisles to kind of get things done. I think that's what the American people really want.

BERMAN: All right, Senator Doug Jones, the book is "Bending Toward Justice." Thank you so much for being with us.

SEN. JONES: My pleasure, thank you.

BERMAN: Alisyn?

CAMEROTA: ALL right, John. President Trump's friendship with Kim Jong-un is possibly a one way street amid reports of new provocations by North Korea. We discuss next.

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[08:30:00]

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