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Early Start with John Berman and Zoraida Sambolin

White House Forced To Say Trump Is Not A White Supremacist; President Trump Unhinged On Twitter; New Trouble For Boeing; Mosque Massacre Death Toll Stands At 50; Deadly Floods In Nebraska. Aired 4:30-5a ET

Aired March 18, 2019 - 04:30   ET

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


[04:30:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MICK MULVANEY, ACTING WHITE HOUSE CHIEF OF STAFF: The president is not a white supremacist.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DAVE BRIGGS, CNN HOST: The White House forced to offer an unprecedented defense of the president. He refused to condemn white supremacy after mosque attacks in New Zealand.

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN HOST: The president spent his weekend lurching from grievance to grievance, slamming his opponents and some allies. And an epic weekend tweetstorm against the late John McCain. Saturday Night Live (ph) a re-run GM and Fox anchor just for starters.

BRIGGS: And subpoenas have been issued as the Feds probe the Boeing 737 Max planes, new similarities between two jets that crashed in just five months.

ROMANS: Big development there.

BRIGGS: It is indeed. Welcome back to "Early Start." I'm Dave Briggs.

ROMANS: I'm Christine Romans, it is 31 minutes past the hour. File this under words you'd never imagine you would hear in defense of the president of the United States.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MULVANEY: The president is not a white supremacist. I'm not sure how many times we have to say that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: The fact that it had to be said remarkable. That was acting Chief of Staff, Mick Mulvaney. The White House forced to address the president's response to the shooting Friday in New Zealand. A terror attack at two mosques that left 50 people dead. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you think white nationalism is arising threat around the world?

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I don't really. I think that it is a small group of people that have very, very serious problems.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRIGGS: The president seemingly unconcerned despite the gunman's manifesto filled with anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim invective. The 87 page diatribe claiming he was inspired by Trump and by white nationalists. It was not the first time President Trump hesitated to be critical after an attack by someone espousing white nationalism.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: You also had people that were very fine people on both sides. The world is a violence -- the world is a violent world. And you'd think when you're over it, it just sort of goes away, but then it comes back in the form of a madman, a whacko. This has little to do with, if you take a look, if they had protection inside, the results would have been far better.

There are attacking us, because we are speaking the truth, changing people's minds and proving every day that our policies work. I get attacked also, you'd get attack. I get attacked all the time. In fact, I'm just thinking, come to think of it, who gets attacked more than me?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRIGGS: But on a subject of radical Islam, the president sounds drastically different.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Donald J. Trump is calling for a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country's representatives can figure out what the hell is going on.

I think Islam hates us. There is something -- there is something there that there is a tremendous hatred there. There is a tremendous hatred.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: President Trump also on the attack this weekend, he was busy on Twitter as our Manu Raju notes with nearly three dozen tweets over the weekend lurching between grievances, hitting the late John McCain twice, GM, and the union, as similar re-runs, that's right, Saturday Night Live re-runs, Hillary Clinton, Robert Mueller, even Fox News. We will unfold some of those for you in a minute. BRIGGS: That is quite a list. First off, breaking news, cabinet

officials in New Zealand agreeing in principle to toughening gun laws in the wake of the mosque attacks. According to the Prime Minister, the changes will be announce in about a week. Family members bracing now for the agony of claiming the remains of their loved ones, the first body now released by New Zealand police. Let's go live to Christchurch and bring in CNN's Ivan Watson. Ivan.

[04:35:06] IVAN WATSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: All right, Dave. You know, the country here and the authorities are still struggling to cope with the scale of this terrorist attack that took place here on Friday.

For example, it has taken days for the officials to start releasing the bodies of the 50 victims, men, women and children killed in the attacks on two mosques here. And that has been agony for families who are waiting to bury their loved ones according to Islamic tradition, but the chief coroner saying they don't want to make any mistakes whatsoever and that they need a lot of experts to work on identifying all of the victims here.

The Christchurch hospital, it has had to postpone previously scheduled surgeries, because they are struggling to keep the critically wounded people alive. In addition to that, the police are saying this is the biggest investigation they have ever mounted. It is the deadliest terror attack in modern New Zealand history.

The police commissioner says that they believe that this was the attack of one person and the man charged is an 28-year-old Australian named Brenton Tarrant, he was charged in court here in Christchurch with murder on Saturday, live streamed the beginning of his attack on a mosque not far from where I'm standing. And he has told public defender that he wants to defend himself in court.

The Prime Minister says that the gun laws will change in this country as a result of this. New Zealanders said they never believed that the kind of gun massacres that we see on an almost monthly basis in the U.S. would ever happen here. The Prime Minister saying that changes need to be made, gun laws need to be tightened as a result of this and that will happen within 10 days of the initial terror attacks.

BRIGGS: There's no time in making change, as Ivan Watson live for us just 9:36 p.m. there in Christchurch. Thank you, Ivan.

Also growing criticism of Facebook this morning for at least 17 minutes on Friday, the terrorist streamed live video of that mass shooting. As CNN's Don Sullivan notes, if the artificial intelligence systems built by one of the richest companies in the world can't identify and take action on a video containing weaponry, repeated gunfire and murder, what can they identify?

Samuel Burke joining us live in London. Samuel, what is Facebook doing in response to all these demands for action?

SAMUEL BURKE, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Dave, over the weekend Facebook published numbers which really give us a better idea of the massive scope of the problem, it is with people trying to upload this video.

And I just note that it is not only sharing the video. Just watching the video helped it spread online. So if you see it, you are part of the problem. Facebook admitting that they didn't notice the live broadcast until police alerted them to it.

Now they were able to block 1.2 million of the 1.5 million attempts to upload the video in the first 24 hours before they even published. That is the good news, but of course, you can do the math there. Facebook won't say how many times this 300,000 videos that were uploaded managed to make it on, but when you think about these numbers, Dave, I mean, 1.5 million attempts, what does that say not only about the social networks, but about us, humans trying to upload and view this content.

BRIGGS: Yes, there are a lot of questions there. So, how did hundreds of thousands of the uploads get past Facebook filters to begin with?

BURKE: So, Facebook uses something called hashing. Once they have identified the video, they put a hash in it. So if it gets up loaded again, it will stop before it can even get published, but if people altered it out, maybe change the color, maybe change the speed, if the news outlet puts it up with their logo on it, that can confuse the algorithms and then it can get uploaded for people to see.

That can radicalized people. We just have to remember that an investigation not long ago, talked about how Facebook's own moderators have become radicalized watching the contents they are supposed to be taking down, embracing views like holocaust denial and the earth being flat. So imagine over the weekend, if you're not a Facebook moderator, you don't have the professional training about what to do and you view this type of content, imagine how that has affected people's minds and there are two plus billion users on Facebook.

BRIGGS: Another reason people are getting off of the social media platforms. Samuel Burke, live for us this morning in London, thank you.

All right. We mentioned the President Trump's buffet of Twitter hate this weekend. Here are just a few noteworthy examples. President Trump reviving his attacks on a familiar target John McCain, criticizing the late Senator on Twitter for his ties to the controversial Russian dossier.

CNN has reported the dossier was received by a McCain associate and shared with a reporter at BuzzFeed. President Trump also going after McCain for his vote against repealing Obamacare, even calling him last in his class at Annapolis.

[04:40:00] ROMANS: A strong response from the war hero's daughter, Meghan, she tweeted, no one will ever love you the way they loved my father. I wish I had been given more Saturdays with him, maybe spend yours with your family instead of Twitter obsessing over mine. And here is a prime example of the control President Trump has over his party. Senator Lindsey Graham, McCain's closest friend in the Senate, falling short of outright criticism of this president for his comments.

BRIGGS: Instead Graham tweeting quote, as to Senator John McCain in his devotion to his country, he stepped forward to risk his life for his country, served honorably under difficult circumstances and was one of the most consequential Senators in the history of the body. Nothing about his service will ever be changed or diminished.

ROMANS: And President Trump apparently using the Oval Office to moonlight the program director, Mr. Trump urging Fox News to put Jeanine Pirro back on the air. Sources tell CNN the controversial host was suspended for Islamophobic remarks doubting the patriotism of Congresswoman Ilhan Omar.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JEANINE PIRRO, FOX HOST: Is her adherence to this Islamic doctrine indicative of her adherence to Sharia law?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: Pirro well known for her full throated defense of the president and her attacks on his enemies. The president tweeting at Fox to bring back Jeanine Pirro, telling the network to stop working so hard on being politically correct which will only bring you down.

BRIGGS: With Jeanine Pirro off the air, President Trump had more executive time to watch and attack Saturday Night Live. Apparently he wasn't watching too closely though.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CROWD: Live from New York, it is Saturday Night!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRIGGS: You can see it on the screen, recorded from an earlier live broadcast. Yes, it was a rerun. The Christmas theme might have been enough to tip off the president, not ordinarily. SNL was in fact a rerun.

ROMANS: And in a Sunday morning tweetstorm, the president said this, it is incredible that shows like "Saturday Night Live" can spend all of their time knocking the same person, me, over and over without so much of a mention of the other side. He also suggested federal election officials and the FCC should quote, look into this. For the record, there is no guarantee of equal time on comedy shows, even reruns.

BRIGGS: I will tweet out here in a couple minutes several mentions of the other side, several segments aimed at Democrats.

ROMANS: Like Beto O'Rourke, right? That was a good segment.

BRIGGS: We'll tweet out a couple of those.

More trouble though for Boeing in the wake of the two deadly crashes of its 737 Max jetliners. The "Wall Street Journal" reported a grand jury has issued a broad subpoenas as two federal offices probes the development and approval of the jets.

Now investigators have found similarities, between the Ethiopian Airlines crash last week and that Lion Air accident last October. Both involving the 737 Max.

For the latest, let's welcome in Melissa Bell, outside the French accident investigation agency near Paris where the black boxes from Ethiopia are being examined. Melissa, good morning.

MELISSA BELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Dave. What we now know about those -- he data from those boxes is that it has been successfully downloaded here in the building behind me. Dave, we're waiting to hear more about the contents. That could take up to a month however. And crucially what they are going to be looking at are those similarities that you mentioned. We are heard from the Ethiopian transport minister who made reference to the similarities between the Ethiopian Airlines crash of March and the Lion Air crash just off Indonesia back in October.

And the reason that it is crucial for the time being and even as we await more from these data, Dave, is that we know so much about what went wrong with the Lion Air crash. We know from a preliminary report that it was to do with the flight's automated software forcing the nose of the plane down, something that the pilots tried to correct several times failing ultimately to do so.

One of the big questions will be whether this was also the case for the Ethiopian Airlines flight. We've heard on the day that the FAA slightly belatedly announced that it was grounding this particular type of Boeing on Wednesday, Dave. That question of the trajectories and the similarities between the two, the similarities between the trajectories of those two planes, is what had led them to ground this particular type of plane.

We need to know much more about precisely what their similarities were and whether what happened in Ethiopia might in fact have been prevented.

BRIGGS: All right. So, hopefully some answers come on the next couple of days. Melissa Bell, live for us, just before 10:00 a.m. there near Paris. Thanks.

ROMANS: All right, 44 minutes past the hour this Monday morning. A major change in health guidelines, a daily low dose of aspirin no longer recommended for older adults.

[04:45:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROMANS: All right. Among the dozens of aggrieve tweets this weekend, the president slammed the General Motors demanding GM reopen or sell its recently closed plant in Lordstown, Ohio. General Motors has now responded quote, to declare the terms -- under the terms of the UAW GM national agreement, the ultimate future of the unallocated plants will be resolved between GM and the UAW. The president tweeted he spoke with the GM CEO Mary Barra about the

Lordstown plant on Sunday, he said, he asked her to sell it or do something quickly. He says that Barra blamed the union. Now the tweet was the third time President Trump took to Twitter to voice his frustration about GM's plans to cut thousands of jobs and factories.

On a Saturday, he suggested a new owner could manage the Lordstown plant, with a quote, time is of the essence. Production on Lordstown ended earlier this month. The president also criticized the local union president, David Green, telling him to get his act together and produce. Green didn't immediately respond to a request for comment. GM in its statement Sunday says its focus is offering employees jobs at other plants where they have growth opportunities.

BRIGGS: A top U.S. General denying reports the military may keep nearly 1,000 U.S. troops in Syria. His comments came in response to a "Wall Street Journal" report claiming the U.S. military was developing plans to keep up to half the present troop deployment in Syria.

[04:50:09] They would continue working with Kurdish fighters who face threats from Turkey. In an unusual move though, joints chiefs chairman Joseph Dunford confirmed the U.S. and Turkey agreed to an initial concept regarding some type of security arrangement along the Syrian Turkish border.

ROMANS: A U.S official told CNN that up to 400 U.S. troops could stay in Syria, but no final decision has been made. This follows the president's order in December to immediately draw down troops. Director of national intelligence, Dan Coats told Congress in late January, ISIS maintained a presence in Syria despite the president's claim that the militant group has already been defeated.

All right. So how much money is Amazon going to get? A multimillion- dollar incentive package for Amazon for its second headquarters in Virginia. CNN business has the numbers next.

[04:55:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BRIGGS: Australia's Prime Minister is siding with this teen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When people are getting attacked in their own --

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRIGGS: So-called egg boy who smashed a raw egg on a lawmaker's head on live TV. Prime Minister Scott Morrison suggested Queensland Senator Fraser Anning should be charged for retaliating against the teen. And he had blamed immigration for the deadly shootings at two mosques in New Zealand.

ROMANS: Historic flooding in Nebraska has broken records in 17 places across the state. Nine million people in 14 states along the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers are under a flood warning. Aerial video shows flooding after multiple levees breach along the

Missouri River in Nebraska. Major flooding on an air force base near Belleview were about 30 buildings are flooded, two deaths are blamed on the flooding. Hundreds of people have been rescued and close to 700 are in shelters and there's more rain this week.

BRIGGS: Charge out of the killing of a reputed Gambino crime boss does not look to be mob related. Police say the suspect 24 year-old Anthony Camello is in custody, will be charged with murder in the death of Frank Cali. A police source tells CNN that Camello had some kind of a relationship with one of Cali's family members, the mob boss apparently disapprove of that relationship and Camello took a friend to that which led to the shooting.

ROMANS: A North Carolina man wanted in connection with his wife's death is in custody this morning. He was captured Sunday on the other side of the country in Arizona. Police say Rexford Keel Jr. was arrested during a traffic stop near Tucson. His wife Diana was reported missing earlier this month and found dead three days later. Keel is charged with first-degree murder. Police say, investigators are now looking -- taking a second look at the death of his first wife in 2006. At the time, that was ruled an accident.

BRIGGS: New guidelines advise against taking regular aspirin to prevent heart disease. Three recent studies found that for healthy older adults taking a daily low dose aspirin is at best a waste of money and at worst may raise their risk of internal bleeding and early death.

Doctors may consider aspirin for certain high risk patients such as those who have trouble lowering cholesterol or managing blood sugars, however for anyone who has had a stroke or a heart attack, aspirin can be lifesaving.

ROMANS: And just on the top of the hour, let's get a check on CNN business this Monday morning. Global stock markets beginning the week higher after a good week for U.S. markets. And Wall Street right now, futures are moving higher here. The DOW Friday up 139 points. For the week the DOW rose 1.6 percent. The S&P 500 up almost 3 percent and NASDAQ, a very good week, 3.8 percent higher there. The S&P, the NASDAQ, now the highest since early October.

What to watch this week? Wednesday the Fed will make its latest interest rate decision, no rate hike expected, but the Fed Chief Jerome Powell will hold a press conference right after, so that could be very news worthy. Existing home sales figures for February come out on Friday. Sales fell 1.2 percent from December to January, but some economists think they might have rebounded last month, so we have to watch and see if there might be some healing in the housing market.

Two of Germany's biggest banks are discussing a merger that could result in a national power house capable of competing with Wall Street. Deutsche bank confirmed Sunday it was holding merger talks with Commerce Bank. Deutsche Bank said talks were part of a strategic review aimed at improving its growth profile and profitability. The merger would help consolidate Germany's crowded retail lending market by creating a single bank of combined assets and roughly 150,000 employees.

A multimillion dollar incentives package for Amazon, for that HQ2 in Virginia. The Arlington County board unanimously approved a $23 million package for Amazon's Crystal City facility that was approve over the weekend. The vote was the final action giving local and state subsidies to the online retail giants. Part of Amazon's plan to create at least 25,000 jobs over 12 years. Over all Amazon says it will receive performance based incentives of $573 million from the state county. Last month Amazon canceled its plans to build half of its HQ2 in New York's Long Island City following a lot of backlash there.

BRIGGS: Yes. To save the least. OK, "Early Start" continues right now.

The president spent his weekend lurching from grievance to grievance, slamming his opponents and some allies. And an epic weekend tweetstorm against the late John McCain. Saturday Night Live re-run, remind you, GM and even Fox anchor just for starters.

ROMANS: Changes to gun laws already on the way to New Zealand after the mosque attacks.

END