Return to Transcripts main page

New Day

The FAA And Boeing Facing Growing Questions About Why This 737 Max 8 Jet Is Still Flying; House Speaker Pelosi is against impeachment saying it is divisive to the country; New Polls Show That 50 Percent Of Americans Will Not Vote To Reelect Trump; Kirsten Gillibrand Saying One Of Her Top Aids Was Sexually Harassing Women. Aired 7-7:30a ET

Aired March 12, 2019 - 07:00   ET

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

[07:00:00]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: NEW DAY continues right now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNKNOWN MALE: We're hearing horrific, heart wrenching stories of the moment the families heard.

UNKNOWN FEMALE: You want to know if there aren't any questions surrounding safety. I would not fly on this plane until we get some answers.

UNKNOWN MALE: The U.S. is saying, we have nothing more to say at the moment. It leaves the traveling public in an intolerable position.

UNKNOWN MALE: The Speaker is absolutely right. Putting the country through a failed impeachment is not a good idea.

UNKNOWN FEMALE: I don't think it further divides the country by any stretch.

UNKNOWN MALE: We've got three committees doing investigations. It may very well be that we must impeach. We don't know right now.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

UNKNOWN MALE: This is NEW DAY with Alisyn Camerota and John Berman.

BERMAN: All right, good morning and welcome to your NEW DAY. New this morning, the FAA and Boeing facing growing questions about why this 737 MAX 8 jet is still flying.

An increasing number of countries and airlines have grounded Boeings best selling jet after two deadly plane crashes involving that new model. Two crashes in just the last five months. The FAA is telling U.S. carriers that they can still fly the plane despite new concerns from union leaders for pilots and flight attendants.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: The FAA insists that they will, quote, "continuously access the jet's safety performance," as investigators try to figure out what caused this weeks crash in Ethiopia minutes after takeoff. Investigators are analyzing the plane's black boxes to see if there is any link between that crash and the Lion Air crash back in October.

We're also learning more about those lost in the crash, including a 36-year-old woman on her way to a United Nations conference and a Georgetown law student who was heading back to Kenya for the death of his fiances mother.

CNN's David McKenzie is live in Ethiopia at the sight of the plane crash for us. David?

DAVID MCKENZIE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning Alisyn, yes, this is the debree field behind me. All morning up until a few moments ago they've been picking through that field trying to get any evidence from the sight of this catastrophic crash.

And Alisyn, I spoke to investigators here a short time ago. They said that they felt that the plane might have come at a very vertical angle into the ground because of how deep that crater is in this hillside.

The black boxes, the audio and flight recorders are in the hands of Ethiopian Airlines. They are investigating those, hope to analyze them soon, because questions mounting about this Boeing 737 800 MAX , the airline manufacturer is standing by that aircraft and the FAA as you mentioned, but just look at this list of aircraft, airlines and countries that are grounding these planes.

And it's a bit windy here, but China, Singapore, Indonesia, Australia, Ethiopia, the Caymans, Magnolia, (inaudible), that's just a partial list of all of those countries and airliners that have grounded this brand new type of plan.

The Ethiopian Airlines, of course, has done the same. They have a very new fleet but this crash has shocked them, this nation and this region. You mentioned 21 people from the United Nations died in this horrible crash. They are flying their flags at half staff, they are in shock here.

This was a commuter route between Ethiopia and Kenya. And today they hope the NTSB investigators will arrive, we met with an Israeli group of search and rescue who are here with families, obviously we need to respect their privacy, but they're trying to get closure here and so many questions being asked about this type of plane this hour. Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: David, thank you very much for being there at the scene and showing us what's happening. Joining us now is Richard Quest, CNN International Business Correspondent and host of Quest Means Business and Les Abend, he's a retired American Airlines pilot and author of "Paper Wings."

Les Abend you retired from American Airlines, if you were still flying for American Airlines, that's one of the airlines that is still using this 737 MAX 8, would you feel comfortable flying it today? LES ABEND, RETIRED AMERICAN AIRLINES PILOT: No, I would not today. I have to be honest with you, I would not feel comfortable with it. Would I feel comfortable with the -- with the -- my colleagues that are flying the airplane, a lot of them were my co-pilots, yes, because I know the training they've gone through.

I know they've educated themselves with reference to the particular situation if we refer back to Lion Air in October and if they were faced with a similar situation I have confidence that they would be able to get the airplane under control.

CAMEROTA: So Richard, I mean let's put the list of the airlines that are still flying it today, including American Airlines, Southwest, Norwegian, it goes on. Why are they making this choice?

RICHARD QUEST, CNN INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: They're making this choice because there's no evidence in their view to the contrary. But, one has to now say that with the decision of Singapore and Australia to ban the use of these planes within their airspace.

[07:05:00]

QUEST: The FAA is basically saying, we do not have any technical reason to ground these planes and until we get further evidence we're not going to.

But this is not a matter that's being prosecuted in some technical fashion. This is, as Les just pointed out, this is happening in the court of public opinion and the FAA is seemingly, exceptionally deaf in this today, or it appeared to be to what the public are saying.

The worries about the plane, the worries about whether it's safe and whilst they wait for some information, everybody else is left saying, well hang on a second, the Australians say it's not safe, the Singaporeans say it's not safe, the Chinese say it's not safe, you get the idea.

CAMEROTA: Yes. I mean, so the court of public opinion, yes, and the emotions in the cockpit. I mean, I think it I is really telling to have Les say that he would not feel comfortable. You want your pilot feeling comfortable with the machinery obviously.

So Les, to that end, Boeing announced a flight control software enhancement, OK, that's what they're doing in response to this. Now this has been in the works since the Lion Air crash, so they're sending out this flight control software enhancement, it concerns me because are the rushing to send it out? Was it ready to be sent out? Might this thing be glitchy as well? What do you hear in Boeings announcement?

ABEND: Well, it's -- most of that information is pretty confidential. I know that Boeing has had direct, which is direct communication with pilots unions, especially those in the United States, so that might be the reason why some of the foreign countries flying this aircraft don't have that direct dialogue perhaps, Boeing didn't make it that direction or they did it in some other fashion rather than direct eye- to-eye.

But that being said, a software update seems very curious to me, the timing seems very curious to me. The FAA has to trust the manufacturer to some degree, that's way our system works, it has to trust the airline, but this -- is this software update going to solve the whole problem? It's hard for me to say.

My concern is that the remedy or the band-aid that seemed to have put on this back when Lion Air had their crash back in October that the bottom line was, there's no doubt in my mind that this Ethiopian crew knew bout the Lion Air crash and what the remedy for the -- and that particular checklist they had to follow.

Were they so overwhelmed with the situation that they just didn't get to it or was it possible that they did the remedy and it didn't get the airplane in control? That's what concerns me.

CAMEROTA: Richard, your thoughts.

QUEST: This is design modification that people are focusing on, it's something of a -- it's not totally relevant and for the simple reason, firstly this was a design modification that was happening anyway.

Secondly, it's a design modification that relates to how the plane tells you about this system. What warnings it gives you. It doesn't make any fundamental changes to how it operates.

And thirdly, all this announcement the FAA said yesterday is, we're made while (ph) dating them to tell us by April of 2019. So, to that it's not immediately relevant to what we're -- in the sense of Ethiopian Air.

I think Les has hit the nail on the head when he says, this is really going to be about whether the workaround that was put in place was sufficient or is this something completely extraneous.

What worries me, what worries me is that, again, I'm sorry to keep coming back to the traveling public, but there are people waking up all over the United States, going to airports, facing a 737 MAX 8 plane.

The airline's proudly telling them it's brand new and they are legitimately entitled to say, why are you flying this plane when other reputable, recognized authorities have said not to?

CAMEROTA: And Richard, to that point, I am one of that flying public, on Saturday I am flying with my family. If people are not comfortable when they find out that their plane is a 737 MAX 8, what are they to do?

QUEST: I have absolutely no idea, frankly, none whatsoever, because if they decide not to take the flight, will the airline reimburse them or put them on another plane? If they decide to fly, that's up to them, we just don't know. And for those reasons, it's not acceptable.

[07:10:00] Would I fly or would I not fly? I have no doubt about the superb excellence - par excellence of the safety of the U.S. fleet, but we're not in a normal situation here.

We have a divergence of views upon the safety of a brand new plane. It won't be long, by the way. I think there's (inaudible). We'll get information from this black box as soon as they read it out and I would say within five to seven days maximum before we are getting some idea of what this is all about.

CAMEROTA: So Les, what would you say to passengers who are skittish today about getting on a plane?

ABEND: Well seeing that you're getting on the airplane, what I would suggest is that if you know it's a 737 Max talk to the customer service agent and say, listen I'm uncomfortable I'd like to change the ticket or wait for another flight.

And if they refund you they refund you, but if I was the airline I would certainly take that into consideration with my passengers.

CAMEROTA: I'm sure they're getting lots of those calls to me.

ABEND: It just seems like good business to me.

CAMEROTA: Yes, for sure. I'm sure they're fielding a lot of those calls and we'll see how they handle it. Les Abend, Richard Quest thank you very much for your expertise on this, John.

BERMAN: Up until now, the passengers have had to eat the change costs. And Mary Shiavo, who we spoke to last hour said, "You know what I would just make that extra payment. I would pay the extra to change flights I'm that concerned".

CAMEROTA: Yes, I mean and - to what everybody has pointed out it's only a week - they will probably have the answer, maybe even Mary Shiavo said by the end of this week.

So it feels as though airlines could do whatever they need to do for their passengers for the next few days.

BERMAN: All right, there's so many victims from this latest crash. The United Nations lost 21 staffers itself.

Joanna Toole was on her way to attend the U.N. Environment Assembly. The 36 year old worked for the U.N. as a fisheries officer.

Her colleagues say she was passionate about helping them make the world a better place. And her father said she was, "bonkers" about animals her entire life.

CAMEROTA: Karim Saafi was co-chair of the African Diaspora Youth Forum in Europe, which helps support sustainable economic development in Africa.

In a message on Facebook, Karim's colleagues say in part, his noble contribution to Youth employment will never be forgotten. Karim leaves behind a fiance.

BERMAN: All right, Cedric Asiavugwa was a student at Georgetown Law. He was on his way back home to Nairobi after the death of his fiances mother. We want to learn more about Cedric.

Right now we're joining by his former colleague at Georgetown Law, Mary Novak. We're so sorry for the lose to the Georgetown community and thank you so much for being with us this morning.

Mary, if you can just tell us who Cedric was.

MARY NOVAK, COLLEAGUE OF CRASH VICTIM: Well first of all, thank you John. This is a real horrible lose for the Georgetown University community and really for humanity itself given who Cedric was.

I work at Georgetown Law School as you said, in campus ministry, and I knew Cedric well because he was an essential part of our interfaith team.

He - I saw him almost everyday as he created a welcoming presence so that students of all faiths and no faith at all could feel supported and welcomed and attended to. He was born in Mombasa, Kenya into a very strong Catholic family that took his education very seriously.

And so he went to the University of Zimbabwe and he graduated with highest honors in Philosophy. And it was this intellectual formation that provided the ability for him to see the needs of the world beyond his direct experience.

He went on to work in the east African region. He created a community based organization that served women and children fleeing the war in Somalia. He was the editor in chief of a philosophy journal and all this at the same time he was producing a peace and reconciliation television program.

And he then became a Jesuit for eight years and it was during this time that his Catholic faith deepened and his concern for the world broadened.

BERMAN: You mentioned his passion for refugees and people in crisis in war town countries. Do you know what his plans were for after graduation?

NOVAK: Absolutely. He brought all of this rich background to Georgetown Law when he came here in 2016 and he began perusing his joint J.D. LLM Degree.

And his intention was to focus on human rights, but as he spent more time involving himself in the various clinics - the human rights clinics here at Georgetown Law, his concern for migrants and refugees fleeing because of climate change and environmental impacts in the East African Region was going to be the focus on his advanced law work next year after he graduated with his J.D. degree.

[07:15:00]

BERMAN: What a loss. You talked about how impact faith was to him - his faith...

NOVAK: Absolutely.

BERMAN: What do you think he would be telling to people right now? What would he say to his friends and to your colleagues at Georgetown Law now feeling his loss?

NOVAK: Well, Cedric loved people and walked, always, with a broken heart. And it was broken by the pain and suffering that we cause each other, but he didn't sit in this midst of his broken heartedness.

His deep faith compelled him into action. So at Georgetown Law, our motto is "Law is but the means, Justice is the end" and Cedric embodied that in his life.

He was really what we hope our students become in the world. He brought his body, mind, and spirit to his life and to his work for the common good. He was 32 years old and when someone that young passes we grieve their lost potential.

Cedric actually lived to that potential his entire life and as he did, that potential kept expanding.

BERMAN: In that sense I suppose you could all be grateful for what you had with Cedric, while at the same time grieving what you know might have been.

Mary Novak, thank you so much for joining us this morning and helping us understand what was lost with the passing of Cedric Asiavugwa. Thank you.

NOVAK: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: Her words were really poetic there and poignant, of course. Seeing his picture it's - we don't know him but hearing her words against his picture - look at his beautiful smile, look at his sort of countenance. We get a sense of what he really was like.

BERMAN: And what a difference he made already, just 32 years old.

CAMEROTA: And just one of 157 lives who were lost. We will continue to cover all the developments of that plane crash.

We also turn to politics. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says President Trump is "not worth impeaching". Do her fellow Democrats and voters agree?

(COMMERCIAL)

[07:20:00]

CAMEROTA: In a "WASHINGTON POST" interview, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi made some news when she said, on the subject of impeaching President Trump, "impeachment is to divisive to the country that unless there's something so compelling and overwhelming and bipartisan, I don't think we should go down that path because it divides the country and he's just not worth it".

Joining us now is Abby Phillip, CNN White House correspondent. Jonathan Martin, national political correspondent for the "NEW YORK TIMES" and Joshua Green national correspondent for "BLOOMBERG BUSINESSWEEK".

Abby, did this surprise her Democratic colleagues that she felt so basically unequivocal about impeachment that she doesn't want to go down that road?

ABBY PHILLIP, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: I don't think it did. In part because I think she's been saying a version of this for some time now.

This is the clearest she's ever been about it because I think she's trying to put her foot down as the speaker about what she thinks is possible for the Democratic party over the next two years.

And there's going to be some disagreement, particularly among those younger members of her caucus who came into office, some of them, saying that they are going to impeach Donald Trump, but Nancy Pelosi is looking - she's not even looking at the long game.

She's literally looking at the next two years where she's seeing the small likelihood that - there's not much of a likelihood in the Senate that you will have bipartisan support for impeachment because Republican's continue to support the President no matter what happens.

That's been true of the last two years. She's not wrong that it will probably be true in the subsequent two years. It will get harder for her to have this position, of course when there's more information coming out about the Russia probe potentially.

And as these ongoing probes go on in the House, Democrats are going to be trying to unearth things and it's going to be harder for her to say, no this is not reaching the bar for impeachment.

But her position is based on a desire to actually replace Donald Trump in two years not just attempt to kick him out and inadvertently empower him into a second term.

I think that's what she's mainly concerned about for her party and that's why she's basically said, I don't think that the bar is - I don't think that we are - any of the things that I've seen so far rise to the level of impeachment at this point.

BERMAN: What I thought was significant, Josh, was she wasn't just saying it but she was waving flags around during the interview saying, hey not only am I saying this, you need to pay attention to the fact I'm saying this.

I'm laying down this marker. I want you to know this and I want you to know it right now. Why?

JOSHUA GREEN, BLOOMBERG BUSINESSWEEK, NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well I think she's doing two things. One by being so public about it by putting down a marker, I think she's giving cover for her caucus that might be tortured about how to answer the impeachment question not wanting to go against the leadership versus not wanting to upset the base and be able to say, well look our leader doesn't go along with it but I disagree.

I think the other thing here - the calculation that Pelosi is making is that if Democrats were to launch some kind of impeachment effort in earnest (ph), it would blot out everything else on cable news for the next two years.

And if you looked at the issues the Democrats succeeded on in 2018 Elections, healthcare, jobs, the environment. These are the things that Democratic voters care about. All of that stuff would be shunted to secondary status if Democrats were to launch an impeachment proceeding and it's probably one that wouldn't work.

Barring (ph) some kind of shocking revelation in the Mueller report there isn't really any obvious path to get the Republican votes in the Senate necessary. So I think Pelosi sees it, essentially as a fool's errand.

CAMEROTA: Well, but she did gives herself a big out, J. Mart where she said unless there is something so compelling and overwhelming, i.e. the Mueller report.

[07:25:00]

So, she's not saying no under any circumstances.

MARTIN: Yes, I think she was saying no under all of the information that we have at the moment. No, pending some kind of a smoking gun. But Josh is right, this is basically a four word strategy, don't screw this up and this is the 2020 election.

Look, polls show that nearly 50 percent of Americans will not vote to reelect Donald Trump. That's a lot of people dug in pretty early on. I think Democrats look at that and they want to take him out at the ballot box for a lot of reasons, but chief among them, because it's the most legitimate way to counter Trump and Trumpism and it would not leave any kind -- or it would leave less blood on the floor I should say than a sort of messy impeachment.

If I -- and given the polarization that we're so aware of on this show, the fact is, is that with what we have right now, you're not going to get anywhere near the senators we need on the Republican side to convict him, so why would you just give Trump the opportunity to portray himself as a victim for the next year and half.

BERMAN: Abby, I can tell you wanted to say something.

PHILLIPS: Yes, I mean that's clearly what the president and his campaign want to do, they want to run on impeachment.

MARTIN: Persecute ...

PHILLIPS: I mean, it is an easy strategy I think for the president to be the victim and to have enemies in the entire House of Representatives or among the entire Democratic Party, so that's something that from the president's perspective, they are eager to run on that.

That's why when you hear talk of impeachment, it's from Republicans, it's from the president's allies, it's from people who are saying, this all Democrats care about. And to Josh's point, if Democrats don't have an agenda that they are able to pursue over the next two years, that will only make the president's job of reelection easier.

Nancy Pelosi knows this, President Trump knows this, we'll see though whether or not she is successful in sort of taking this off the table, at least in the short term. It is possible that this doesn't really do the trick, that people in her caucus continue to talk about it, they continue to push toward it and then she has a problem on her hands, where it's still in the news every single day even though it's not happening.

CAMEROTA: Josh, I wanted to move on, but did you have something you wanted to add to that point?

MARTIN: Yes, I do.

CAMEROTA: Go ahead.

MARTIN: I mean, the other thing when talking to Democratic strategists, the fear with impeachment, not only that it will fail, but that Trump on the ticket is Democratic voter's biggest voter to turn out in 2020.

I think from a raw political standpoint, Democrats want him on the ticket because that's what drives their voters, that's what angers their voters, that's what gets them out to vote, not just for the Democratic nominee, whoever that happens to be, but also for Democratic Senate candidates in all kinds of important states. There is so much at stake, that in a sense, the entire Democratic electoral strategy is built on having Trump on that ticket in 2020.

BERMAN: That's what they wanted in 2016 too. So, be careful what you wish for. But, go ahead.

MARTIN: Touche.

CAMEROTA: Abby, I want to talk about Kirsten Gillibrand. I think it's hard to get our minds around what's happened -- what happened there in her office with the sexual harassment claims.

So, a former staffer claimed that one of her top aids was sexually harassing women, but what I'm finding hard to understand is what he did exactly. Because there are things -- so, at times it says, that the specific behavior, this is what Gillibrand says, did not rise to sexual harassment. Well, we kind of need to know what the specific behavior was.

And then there's the question of, if it was just derogatory comments towards women, where is that on the continuum? Some sexual harassment is crystal clear, Roger Ailes, things like that.

Then there's the greyer areas and should everybody loose their jobs over offensive comments, say? And so, this one is hard to know who's in the right. Where is Kirsten Gillibrand on this problem?

PHILLIPS: Yes, that's such an important point. It really highlights why this issue is so difficult, broadly, I think for society, but particularly for Kirsten Gillibrand because of the stand that she's taken on this issue in the Senate, in the body that she's a part of, but also in the military and she's taken a stand.

Like, she is the senator who has taken a stand on this issue, so it becomes extremely difficult when there is something going on in her own house, we don't know exactly what it is that happened.

And I think that we have seen examples in the public sphere of people loosing their jobs or loosing their place because of inappropriate comments, because there can be inappropriate comments that are so offensive and they make people so uncomfortable in the workplace that it is something that ought to have consequences in the workplace, we just don't know.

And for Gillibrand, she's in a tough spot where it's going to be difficult for her to air this out because it involves other people.

[07:30:00]

END