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Sri Lanka Bombings were Retaliation; ISIS Claims Responsibility for Sri Lanka Attack; Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) is Interviewed Mueller Findings and His New Book; Mom of Missing Boy Fights for Custody of Youngest Child. Aired 9:30-10a ET

Aired April 23, 2019 - 09:30   ET

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

[09:30:00] POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: Explosion there.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, right before all that bloodshed.

Meanwhile, a top government official claims the attacks were in retaliation for last month's New Zealand shootings at mosques there.

Ivan Watson, he has the latest from on the ground in Negombo.

So, Ivan, the more we learn about this, the more sophisticated, the more wide-ranging, but also still concerns about perhaps members of this cell at large?

IVAN WATSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: There are. And the security forces have announced a curfew that should start in about two hours for a third straight night. The prime minister in his press conference saying that he does believe that there's still people running around on the run with explosives. These security forces have tightened up security at this Catholic Church here that was attacked on Sunday to such deadly effect with more than 100 people killed inside when a suicide bomber walked in with a backpack full of explosives on Easter Sunday. There were two other churches that were hit on the same day at roughly the same time.

The security forces have located suspected vehicles, for example, and have conducted controlled blasts. We witnessed one that was very powerful on Monday in Colombo, and learned from the police later that it did carry explosives, which was probably why the blast was so powerful.

So there are certainly extra precautions and the authorities clearly are worried that there still could be a threat out there. Certainly many of the members of the catholic Christian clergy that we've talked to say they're worried that they could be targeted and the community here is traumatized by the scale of the loss of life. A senior defense minister in parliament says that he believes that this was the work of a home groomed group, little known outside of Sri Lanka, an Islamist extremist group called National Thowheed Jamath, which previously had only been accused of vandalizing statues. So there does seem to be consensus that it must have had some kind of international support to have carried out an attack on this scale with this much coordination.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

WATSON: Poppy and Jim.

HARLOW: OK, Ivan Watson, we appreciate you being there again for all of your reporting.

Let's talk about this with our chief international correspondent Clarissa Ward.

Clarissa, you have a unique lens, having covered ISIS in a way that very few have. So what do you make of ISIS claiming responsibility? Is it possible that it's a false claim? We've seen that before. But also, if it was ISIS behind it, what does it say about their abilities still and their tentacles?

CLARISSA WARD, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Poppy, I think the fact that we're asking this question exactly shows you why ISIS wants to claim responsibility for this attack, why this is so important from the group. From a PR perspective, after taking such a beating in Iraq and Syria with the deterioration of their physical caliphate, why it is crucial for them to show that they are still alive, that they are still thriving, that they are popping up in unexpected places, and that they're able to carry out sophisticated, coordinated attacks.

At the same time, while it's clear that this is a PR essential for ISIS to claim responsibility for this attack, whether or not they had something to do with it, it does appear plausible that they may indeed have had a role.

Now, why is that? Well, it's for a number of reasons. Firstly, as you've heard Ivan said, it just doesn't add up that this small relatively obscure Islamist extremist group in Sri Lanka, who previously were known for defacing Buddhist statues, would suddenly be able to launch an attack like this with the sophistication that that requires, with the bomb-making stills that that requires, with the manpower that that requires, several suicide bombers, different locations, churches, hotels. This is not an easy attack to pull off. And so it is entirely plausible that ISIS or a group like ISIS would have had some kind of a role in this, especially as they try to sort of expand their political capital and their PR campaign outside of Iraq and Syria, outside of the Middle East and really keep some degree of momentum going on their side, Poppy and Jim.

SCIUTTO: You know, Clarissa, and I'm sure you've been hearing the same thing, for months national security officials here in the U.S. have been saying to me, do not discount the risk of international terrorism, even during what's been a relatively quiet period -- I should say relatively because people have been dying in a lot of places, but you know what I'm saying, at least in terms of the capability of carrying out attacks around the world.

Regardless of the ISIS tie or how significant it is, it's a reminder, is it not, that these groups still are able to carry out sophisticated attacks and draw people in to do that for them? [09:35:01] WARD: And these reminders, Jim, you're exactly right, they always come at the moment where, you know, perhaps security forces are getting a little bit cocky, where they're feeling very confident, where they're making declarations that ISIS no longer exists, that the caliphate has been obliterated. And the reality is that ISIS was ultimately born as an insurgency group. So you can take away the caliphate, you can take away their political and state apparatus, but they will simply return to where they came from and what they know best, which is terrorists, quick hits, bold, brutal, massive massacres that will garner a lot of attention and get them back on the front pages, which is where they want to be.

SCIUTTO: And, of course, the other group I get warned about, I'm sure you do too, is al Qaeda. It's been quiet, but doesn't mean they're gone.

Clarissa Ward, thanks very much.

WARD: Don't discount them yet, exactly.

SCIUTTO: And we'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:40:12] HARLOW: All right, well, days from now Attorney General Bill Barr will be before lawmakers for two full days of testimony. This, of course, is after his version of the Mueller report was released, Jim.

SCIUTTO: Sure to face some tough questions. Barr will be appearing before both the Senate and the House Judiciary Committees.

Joining us now is a Republican who will get to question him. Senator Mike Lee of Utah. His new book, "Our Lost Declaration" hits shelves today. We've been reading it here at NEWSROOM. It's a good one. I suggest you read it as well.

Senator, thank you for taking the time this morning.

SEN. MIKE LEE (R-UT): Thank you, Jim. Good to with you.

SCIUTTO: So responding to the Mueller report, you have said, quote, there's nothing in this report that changes your view of this president. As you know, the special counsel established that members of Trump's team were willing to accept help from Russia during the campaign. They never reported it to law enforcement. And, as you know, the president publically cheered the release of this information.

You, as a candidate, whether for Senate or for higher office, would you accept help from a foreign country, particularly an adversary that at the time was interfering in the U.S. political process? Would you accept that help?

LEE: I'd like to think that I wouldn't. I've never faced that exact scenario. It doesn't seem like a good idea. It seems to me to be something that would cause me to have great pause and to look somewhere else for help rather than a foreign government.

SCIUTTO: Are you disappointed then that President Trump's aides, campaign staff did not make the same decision?

LEE: Oh, sure. Sure. But, look, it's a presidential election. They were in the heat of this moment. I was not. It's difficult for me to cast too much judgement on them. I wasn't involved in the process at the time. I'd like to think that if I had been, I might have raised a word of caution, but hindsight is 2020 and I wasn't there.

HARLOW: So, senator, before we get to the book, which is fascinating, and we'll dive in, in a moment, let me just talk to you about transparency because if the American people don't know one thing about you is when you don't agree with the president, you do speak out. You were at odds with him on declaring a national emergency. You were actually with Democrats like Bernie Sanders when it comes to Yemen and again the president on that.

LEE: Just feeling the Bern on getting us out of the war on Yemen.

HARLOW: There you -- there you go. Well, I would you, would you vote for Bernie Sanders? I don't think you'd go that far.

LEE: Correct.

HARLOW: But you've work with him. OK.

So, the president has lacked transparency and continuing to. And I'm wondering if you have a problem with it. Yesterday we saw the president file a law to prevent Congress from obtaining his financial records. Deadline day that Congress has asked for those tax return is today. The White House isn't going to turn them over. Now the White House is telling Carl Kline (ph), who used to run the personnel security director, he was, to not testify, even though the Oversight Committee has called for him to testify after this whistleblower raised concerns about 25 security clearances. Are you concerned about the not only lack of transparency, but these pushes against it in the face of Congress?

LEE: Look, I can't speak for the president. I'm not going to purport to (INAUDIBLE).

HARLOW: But I'm asking you as a member of Congress, does it concern you?

LEE: As a member of Congress, I see a president who has undergone a very significant, very prolonged two-year investigation. They've taken the White House. They've shaken it every way they possibly can. They've looked into it. And I think it's easy for most Americans to understand why he might not be overly eager to hand over even more information where it's not required by law.

HARLOW: Well, IRS code, as you know, says "shall furnish." So maybe this -- you clerked for a Supreme Court justice. Maybe this will go all the way to the Supreme Court to decide the definition of "shall" there, but it is IRS code. LEE: Perhaps. But, look, this is going to have to be ironed out

between his lawyers and the congressional investigators looking for it.

HARLOW: Jim.

SCIUTTO: Senator Lee, I'm going to make your day. I'm going to quote from your book here. And this gets to what is really the core for folks at home who don't know the thrust of the book. It's about the Constitution and what it means and how, as Americans, in effect, we can defend it today. Here's the quote, the steady usurpation of legislative authority by the executive branch is a creeping phenomenon. The people's elected representatives have made countless choices that have steadily diminished their own power and with it that of the people they represent, delegating to others the difficult and contentious task of making law has a tendency to make reelection easier.

I mean you're taking a shot at Congress here for in effect not defending their constitutional powers. You have a president who just bypassed Congress to get money for a wall that Congress, even when Republicans controlled both houses of Congress, the president couldn't get that money, tried multiple times, shut down the government. I wonder, do you believe this president is violating the spirit of the Constitution that you're extolling in effect in this book by taking that power away from you and your colleagues in the Senate.

LEE: Yes, look, one of the reasons I wrote this book, one of the reasons I voted the way I did with respect to the resolution of disapproval under the national emergency declaration a few weeks ago, and one of the reasons why I sponsored with my friend Bernie Sanders a resolution to get us out of undeclared, unconstitutional civil war in Yemen is that I believe that Congress has given too much authority to the executive branch, power to make war, power to start trade wars, power to impose tariffs, power to declare broad national emergencies.

[09:45:25] This has been a convenient tool over time by Congress. It was headed by Houses of Representatives, Senates, and, with the assistance of White Houses of every conceivable partisan combination. So it shouldn't be surprising to us that our current president, at any moment, this moment or any moment going forward, would maybe take advantage of some of those. It is our fault as a Congress, and we, as a Congress, need to take that power back.

My whole book, "Our Lost Declaration," is all about the fact that the fight for liberty in America, as from day one, focused on the need to limit the amount of power that any one person or group of people can accumulate. And there are risks today, just as there were two and a half centuries ago, at the time of the American Revolution, with one person being able to exercise too much power.

HARLOW: Let me ask you about something else that struck Jim and I from your book. You write about your party and you write about conservatives. And you say conservatives are still in danger of losing not only the culture war but also the hearts and minds of an entire generation of young Americans. That's why we lost the House of Representatives in 2018. It is why we could lose the presidency in 2020.

That is a stark warning. What's your advice to your own party?

LEE: My advice to my own party is to get back to the basics, get back to the fundamentals of what made us a country. And one of the central themes of this book, a book that I think could be a great give for Mother's Day, for graduation, for Father's Day, any parent who wants to make sure that their child or their children has access to the stories that inform us about why we are our own country can help with this. And they certainly can help with the Republican Party being able to regain that which it purports to stand for.

HARLOW: Because your point is -- and you write more about this -- you know, that you think many in your party have resorted to simple sort of easy phrases like, conservative judges, lower taxes, less regulation. And it seems like you find that disingenuous.

LEE: It's not that it's disingenuous so much as it is incomplete. It's incomplete if we focus only on putting conservative judges on the court, especially if we don't pay attention to what that means. Most people don't even understand what it means to be a conservative judge. I -- a good judge is someone who would just read the law based on what it says.

But even more than focusing on the courts, we need to focus on the legislative branch and what we're legislating, what we're enacting, what we're not enacting. And on the dozens, indeed the hundreds of instances in which we have, as a Congress, handed over defacto law making power, legislative power to the executive branch, that's inexcusable. And we shouldn't rest until we have brought, pursuant to Article One, all that power back to our branch, otherwise we're going to be acting in many ways similar to the way that our government in London behaved prior to the American Revolution.

HARLOW: We appreciate your time. Jim and I are so glad that you could be with us. Congratulations on the book and come back on the show soon.

SCIUTTO: Yes, we'll be watching. We'll be watching.

HARLOW: Senior senator of Utah, Mike Lee.

We will. Thanks so much.

All right, ahead for us, nearly a week since the disappearance of that 5-year-old little boy, we told you about him yesterday, this little boy in Illinois, police now say his mother is no longer cooperating with their investigation, and she is headed to court today to fight to regain custody of her youngest child.

SCIUTTO: And see what happens when victims and offenders of violent crimes meet face to face on CNN's new original series "The Redemption Project" with Van Joan. The series premiere is this Sunday night, 9:00 p.m. Eastern Time, right here on CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [09:53:26] SCIUTTO: This is quite a story and a sad one. The mother of a missing five-year-old boy will be in an Illinois courtroom this afternoon. She's fighting to regain custody of her youngest child, even as police say she is no longer cooperating with their search for her missing son.

HARLOW: Yes, that little boy, AJ Freund's parents say they last saw their son on Wednesday night when they put him to bed, but police in Crystal Lake, Illinois, say there's just no indication he was abducted or that he walked away from the home.

Ryan Young is with us.

The scrutiny now is on the family. What's the latest?

RYAN YOUNG, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I thought I was going to have some new details for you guys today, but so far it's really thin. It's a tough situation because the community and police all want to know the same thing, where is AJ. And right now there's still no sign of the missing five-year-old. And it seems there are few answers.

AJ's parents reported him missing from his home last Thursday. In fact, Monday it appeared that a large group of investigators gathered in a park near the boy's home, but we have not received information on what they were doing or what tips led them there so far.

The search has included 15 police agencies, including the FBI. Teams have been using drones, rescue canine units, and even a sonar team to search a nearby lake. They've found nothing. One detail that sticks out is the canine teams only picked up AJ's scent within his home, which leads police to say he did not walk away.

Now, of course the community's upset about this. In fact, listen to one neighbor just talking about this just in the last 24 hours or so.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JANELLE BUTLER, NEIGHBOR: Everybody has been concerned and has let the authorities know that over the last year. We let the DCFS know that. We've seen the kids being taken away and are always shocked that they have been returned.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[09:55:05] YOUNG: Yes, if that's not enough, Jim and Poppy, now, according to the police, AJ's mom is no longer talking with investigators and her lawyer told "The Chicago Tribune" that she's seven months pregnant. Now, this afternoon, there will be a hearing where AJ's mom will attempt to get custody back for another child that was removed from the home and placed in protective custody.

But in the end of this, it's all about that face that we see here on the screen. Where is this young boy? What answers do they have so far? And what are investigators digging into? Are there cell phone records? What can the father tell them? That is the question that so many people in the community are asking at this point. SCIUTTO: Goodness. A lot of warning signs there.

Ryan Young, thanks very much.

We are following the breaking news out of Sri Lanka this morning as government officials say that the bombings that killed more than 300 people on Easter were in retaliation for the deadly shootings at two New Zealand mosques. There's more to come.

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