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Early Start with John Berman and Zoraida Sambolin
Preliminary Finding Reached in Ethiopian Crash; Dems and Trump Refuse to Move on From Collusion; British Parliament to Vote Again on Brexit. Aired 4-4:30a ET
Aired March 29, 2019 - 04:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[04:00:18] DAVE BRIGGS, CNN ANCHOR: Breaking overnight, the strongest sign yet the same system failed in two deadly Boeing crashes. We're live in Ethiopia.
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DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The Democrats have to now decide whether they will continue defrauding the public with ridiculous (EXPLETIVE DELETED).
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JESSICA DEAN, CNN ANCHOR: President Trump in full attack mode in his first rally since he was cleared of collusion.
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TRUMP: I have overridden my people, we're funding the Special Olympics.
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BRIGGS: The president will keep funding for the Special Olympics after his Education secretary spent two days backing up the proposed cuts.
DEAN: And no shortage of madness. The one seed barely hangs on and two two seeds are still in.
Good morning, everyone. Welcome to EARLY START. I'm Jessica Dean, in for Christine Romans.
BRIGGS: Good to see you.
DEAN: Hi.
BRIGGS: Happy Friday, everybody. I'm Dave Briggs. My bracket is busted. It's Friday, March 29th. We start with breaking news this morning in the Boeing investigation.
According to the "Wall Street Journal," preliminary findings show a stall prevention feature automatically activated before the 737 MAX jet crashed this month in Ethiopia. That's believed to be the same sensor that brought down a Lion Air flight last October.
Let's go live to Ethiopia and bring in CNN's Robyn Kriel with the very latest.
Robyn, good morning.
ROBYN KRIEL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, good morning, Dave. Very technical aspects obviously coming out about this MCAS system. But here on the ground in Ethiopia, Addis Abba, still a very human element existing, speaking regularly to some of the families who have been -- who lost their loved ones, 157 people in total killed in that flight on the 10th of March. And they still have no remains.
They have nothing to take back with them. Some of them are still on the ground here in Ethiopia. But as you say, Boeing now, according to this preliminary report from the "Wall Street Journal" noticing that there are these similarities, also the minister of transport here in charge of the investigation has said that there were similarities in both the Lion Air crash and the Ethiopian air crash.
But two days ago on Wednesday we were invited by the Ethiopian Airlines to see inside the simulator of this 737 MAX 8. And we were told as we were in there that this quick reference handbook has no mention of the MCAS system which means if something were to happen, if a failure like this were to happen, an Ethiopian Airlines pilots would have gone through those quick reference handbook which is sort of like a bible to pilots and crew, that there would have been nothing in there referencing what was going wrong.
So you can imagine the panic on board during an event like this. As I said, still a lot of questions being asked here, nothing today coming from the Ethiopian government -- Dave and Jessica.
BRIGGS: 346 people killed in the two crashes. Robyn, thank you.
DEAN: Some Democrats refusing to move on from collusion and so too it seems is the president. Here he is at his first rally since he was effectively cleared of collusion.
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TRUMP: After three years of lies and smears and slander, the Russia hoax is finally dead. The collusion delusion is over. The Democrats have to now decide whether they will continue defrauding the public with ridiculous bullshit.
(CHEERS AND APPLAUSE)
TRUMP: Partisan investigations or whether they will apologize to the American people.
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DEAN: House Intelligence Chairman Adam Schiff still maintains there was collusion even if the special counsel could not prove it beyond a reasonable doubt. He is facing full throated attacks from Republicans on his committee.
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REP. MIKE CONAWAY (R), TEXAS: Your willingness to continue to promote a false narrative is alarming. The findings of the special conclusively refute your past and present assertions and have exposed you as having abused your position to knowingly promote false information. We have no faith in your ability to discharge your duties in a manner consistent with your constitutional responsibility and urge your immediate resignation as chairman of the committee.
REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D), INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE CHAIRMAN: My colleagues may think it's OK that the Russians offered dirt on a Democratic candidate for president. But I don't think it's OK.
[04:05:01] I think it's immoral, I think it's unethical, I think it's unpatriotic, and, yes, I think it's corrupt. And evidence of collusion. And the day we do think that's OK is the day we will look back and say that is the day America lost its way.
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BRIGGS: Schiff's claims may be debatable, but at least one person on the president's favorite television network agrees with him.
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JUDGE ANDREW NAPOLITANO, FOX NEWS SENIOR JUDICIAL ANALYST: I think that Congressman Schiff is correct in that report will be evidence of the existence of a conspiracy. Not enough evidence to prove the existence beyond a reasonable doubt.
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BRIGGS: Wow. The Mueller report is 300 plus pages. So far we've only seen that four-page summary from Attorney General Barr. Democrats are demanding the full release of the report by April 2nd, but the primary obstacle to getting it is the presence of grand jury information.
DEAN: CNN has learned House Judiciary Chairman Jerry Nadler offered Barr to opportunity to work together to get a court order to release that grand jury information. An aide to Nadler says Barr is open to Nadler's arguments but is still a far cry from where the chairman is right now.
BRIGGS: Funding for the Special Olympics will continue after all now that the president has overruled his Education secretary. Betsy DeVos spent two days on Capitol Hill defending the decision even though she said she wasn't personally involved in making it.
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BETSY DEVOS, SECRETARY OF EDUCATION: Let's not use disabled children in a twisted way for your political narrative. That is just disgusting and it's shameful. And I think we should move on -- UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, Madame Secretary, let me tell you what.
Eliminating $18 million out of an $80 billion -- $70 billion or $80 billion budget I think is shameful, too.
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BRIGGS: DeVos went on to say the Special Olympics already gets a lot of private donation that the federal budget is tight but after she made the case, President Trump publicly undermined her.
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TRUMP: I've been to the Special Olympics. I think it's incredible. And I just authorized a funding. I heard about it this morning. I have overridden my people. We're funding the Special Olympics.
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DEAN: Now shortly after the president's comments, DeVos issued a statement saying, quote, "I'm pleased and grateful the president and I see eye-to-eye on this issue. This is funding I have fought for behind the scenes over the last several years." DeVos proposed similar cuts in previous years. She did donate a portion of her salary last year to the Special Olympics.
BRIGGS: President Trump and South Korean president Moon Jae-in are set to meet at a summit next month to talk about North Korea. It will take place in Washington on April 11th, barely a month after President Trump's failed summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. Those talks unraveling over sanctions relief in exchange for the dismantling of Pyongyang's nuclear weapons program.
DEAN: The city of Chicago is now demanding "Empire" actor Jussie Smollett pay $130,000 for the police investigation into his alleged attack. He was indicted for staging a hate crime against himself in Chicago but all charges were dropped this week.
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MAYOR RAHM EMANUEL (D), CHICAGO: Given that he doesn't feel any sense of contrition and remorse, my recommendation is when he writes the check in the memo section he can put the word "I'm accountable for the hoax."
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DEAN: Prosecutors insisting their case was solid even after charges were dismissed.
BRIGGS: President Trump calling for a federal review on Twitter. Neither the FBI nor DOJ have said they'll do so.
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TRUMP: That case is an absolute embarrassment to our country. And somebody has to at least take a very good hard look. (END VIDEO CLIP)
BRIGGS: In another bizarre twist, the office for the city's top prosecutor Kim Foxx now says she did not formally recuse herself in the Smollett investigation. Her office saying she only separated herself from decision making out of an abundance of caution.
Questions have been raised over texts Foxx received from Tina Chen, a friend of the Smollett family who used to be an aide to former first lady Michelle Obama.
DEAN: The embattled CEO of Wells Fargo Tim Sloan is stepping down. Sloan has worked at Well Fargo for three decades and says Wells Fargo would benefit from a fresh perspective. The bank's board plans to replace him with an outsider. The company has struggled to overcome a litany of scandals. In 2016 there was national backlash over employees creating millions of fake accounts to meet sales quotas.
Wells Fargo also admitted charging borrowers for auto insurance they didn't need and mortgage fees they didn't deserve.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Dribble himself free. He's going to have to take a long one. Step back three for the tie. He's done it again.
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BRIGGS: The Madness was back Thursday night for the Sweet 16.
[04:10:02] Purdue held off a big rally by Tennessee before pulling away in overtime for a 99-94 win. Boilermakers reaching the tournament's elite eight for the first time since 2000. Virginia, the top seed in the south, advanced for a hard-fought win over the number 12-seed Oregon 53-49.
And Gonzaga in the Elite Eight for the fourth time as the Zags' top seed in the west defeated Florida State 72-58. Texas Tech head to their second straight Elite Eight, the Red Raiders crushing Michigan 63-4. Michigan's 44 points, the fewest by a number two seed in tournament history and a real shocker for those of us that have the brackets all busted up at this point.
DEAN: So it's -- you're just done.
BRIGGS: Not looking good.
DEAN: OK. Well.
BRIGGS: Fell from the top.
DEAN: I'm sorry for that.
A cold case has been cracked. We'll tell you how one man's job application made him the suspect 20 years later.
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[04:15:05] BRIGGS: A check on CNN Business at 4:14 Eastern Time. The U.S. economy showing more signs of a slowdown. New data from the Commerce Department shows economic growth slowed in the fourth quarter with a gain of just 2.2 percent. The economy grew 4.2 percent the second quarter of 2018 and you can see the steady decline, 3.4 percent and then the aforementioned 2.2 percent in the final quarter.
Politically this wraps up a good year of growth. 2.9 percent, that is the highest since 2015. But it's not the 3.2 percent the White House predicted more recently. The president's 2020 budget proposal. Economists have said growth could decline as the sugar high of the Republican backed tax cuts fade. And now many economists expect growth to continue to slow this year.
The Federal Reserve recently lowered their growth forecast for 2019 to just 2.1 percent. The Fed cited trade tensions with China could possibly drag down the economy as well as slowing growth around the world.
DEAN: Today is the day the U.K. was supposed to leave the European Union. That's off the table now but a big moment for Brexit is at hand. Lawmakers in Britain deciding to vote for a third time on Prime Minister Theresa May's plan for exiting the E.U.
We go live to London and bring in CNN's Nic Robertson who's been following all of this.
Nic, what is the latest today?
NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Well, Jessica, perhaps the most important man to Theresa May, the prime minister, on this day at least just stepped in through the doors of Number 10. He is the chief whip. He will be in charge of making sure she gets all the votes she wants. Of course her track record on this vote so far is the historic defeat in January by 230 votes, so then just two and a half weeks ago she lost by the 149 votes. What she has decided to do this time is to split the vote in two parts.
Leaving the European Union is a divorce part and then a future relationship part. So she's taken the divorce part, how the two countries separate, the withdrawal agreement. That's what MPs will vote on today and the indications are that she doesn't have the support of the opposition. No surprise there. They will always going to vote against her. They said they'll vote against it. She doesn't have the support of a significant number of the hard liners in her own party. That is a blow for her. She's managed to turn some of them around but not all of them.
And significantly she doesn't have the support of the Democratic Unionist Party, that party from Northern Ireland that gives her those 10 additional votes that prop up her slender majority. They said they will oppose this vote as well.
What does that mean? At the end of today, if the vote goes down, then Britain has just two weeks to tell the European Union, leave without a deal or give us a really long extension -- Jessica.
DEAN: Wow. It's really remarkable. Nic, thanks so much.
BRIGGS: All right, ahead, one woman, two wombs, three kids all in less than one month. A wild story you don't want to miss next.
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[04:22:31] BRIGGS: 4:22 Eastern, and a cold murder case from 1998 solved when the suspect decided to apply for a job. Sondra Better was stabbed and bludgeoned to death at a consignment shop where she worked over 20 years ago in Delray Beach. And even though the killer left behind a trail of his own blood and fingerprints.
DEAN: The break in that case didn't come until last December when 51- year-old Todd Barket of Brandon, Florida, agreed to provide a fingerprint sample while applying for a nursing assistant job. Well, it matched the samples at the murder scene. Barket was arrested at his home Wednesday morning and now faces first-degree murder charges.
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JAVARO SIMS, DELRAY BEACH POLICE CHIEF: One of the daughters said that over the years every time she heard of a DNA case where somebody was made on Ancestry DNA, she would cut the article out. She has a complete file of all the successful DNA cases that were made across the country and she was hoping that one day she would get that call and today was that day.
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DEAN: Following Sondra Better's murder, her husband Seymour volunteered for the Delray Beach Police for almost 15 years before he passed away.
BRIGGS: The former head women's soccer coach at Yale University pleading guilty for his role in the nationwide college admission scandal known as Operation Varsity Blues. As part of the deal Rudy Meredith admitted he accepted almost $900,000 in bribes to get students admitted to Yale under false pretenses. He spent more than two decades as head women's soccer coach at Yale and resigned in November.
Meredith helped federal investigators unravel the scheme and is among the 50 people charged in the operation. More than a dozen defendants all facing fraud charges will make their initial appearances in a Boston courtroom today.
DEAN: Google and Twitter now under scrutiny by the Department of Housing and Urban Development. HUD firing off letters to the tech giants questioning their advertising practices. The agency also announcing charges against Facebook for alleged housing discrimination through its advertising platform.
Facebook says it was caught off guard by the charges because it's been working with HUD to address its concerns. BRIGGS: The agency does not have an open investigation into Twitter
or Google. The letters were intended to start a conversation about how housing is advertised. Twitter tells CNN Business it does not allow discriminatory advertising and Google said it has longstanding policies that prohibit targeted ads based on race, ethnicity, religion or disability.
DEAN: It is a smoke free world after all.
[04:25:01] Disney says smoking will be banned at its parks in Florida and California effective May 1st. Smoking will be limited to designated areas outside park entrances and in specific locations at Disney Resort Hotels. They are also banning strollers larger than 31 inches wide and 52 inches long. Guests will be able to downsize with stroller rentals. The policy changes come ahead of the opening of Disney's "Star Wars" theme "Attraction Galaxies Edge" that is sure to draw throngs of visitors.
BRIGGS: Yes. You have to have reservations at that park if you think you're headed.
A woman with two wombs has given birth twice in less than a month to three children. 23-year-old Arifa Sultana of Bangladesh delivered a boy in late February and less than four weeks later returned to the hospital with lower abdominal pain. Doctors performed an ultrasound and realized she was pregnant with twins. Sultana has two uteruses, a condition called uterus didelphys. Her first baby and the twins were conceived and grown in separate wombs.
Doctors performed a C-section to deliver the twins, a boy and a girl. All three children are safe and healthy and mom is doing fine.
DEAN: Isn't that remarkable story?
BRIGGS: Remarkable.
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DEAN: It's the clearest sign yet the same sensor failure brought down two Boeing flights. We're live in Ethiopia with preliminary findings.
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