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Buttigieg Announces $24.8 Million Fundraising Haul for 2nd Quarter; NYT: U.S. Considering Settling for a North Korea Nuclear Freeze; Hong Kong Protestors Try to Break Into Legislature; Man Charged After Dragging Deputy 1,000 Yards During Traffic Stop. Aired 7-7:30a ET

Aired July 01, 2019 - 07:00   ET

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

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Reports, much of it hard to watch but really eye-opening. Thank you very much for that report.

[07:00:05] All right. Back to politics here. A big fundraising haul for one of the 2020 candidates. NEW DAY continues right now.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Stepping across that line has been a great honor. This has been, in particular, a great friendship.

WILL RIPLEY, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: What the United States needs to get out of this is an agreement from North Korea to take actual steps to denuclearize.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We need to have a peace agreement. I think the framework is there. I'm glad President Trump is exploring it.

JAMES CLAPPER, FORMER DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: I personally don't believe the North Koreans have, long-term, any intent to denuclearize. It's their ticket to survival.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The tweet of Donald Trump Jr. was the act of a coward.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A clear sign that 2020 is going to be that kind of campaign, where things get pretty deep down in the mud.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: These are the same racist attacks his daddy tried on Barack Obama. And they didn't work then, and they're not going to work now.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Kamala Harris, she's got game. She'll be a force to be reckoned with.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: We want to welcome our viewers in the United States and around the world. You're watching NEW DAY this morning.

New reporting of a possible major concession in nuclear negotiations with North Korea. President Trump is back at the White House after this historic meeting with Kim Jong-un at the DMZ. Mr. Trump becoming the first sitting U.S. president to set foot in North Korea.

This morning "The New York Times" reports that the Trump administration might be headed towards accepting North Korea as a nuclear power and allowing Kim Jong-un to keep his nuclear weapons in exchange for a freeze of production of new weapons. Now, that is a position the administration had previously said it would not stand for.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right. We also have breaking 2020 news. South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg has announced a monster fundraising haul in the second quarter, just shy of $25 million. This really cements his status in the top tier of Democratic presidential candidates.

Let's break down those new fundraising numbers and the message it sends.

Joining us now, Jess McIntosh, CNN political commentator, a former director of communications outreach for the Hillary Clinton campaign; David Chalian, CNN political director; and Bianna Golodryga, CNN contributor.

David Chalian, if one year ago, I had told you in the second quarter, Pete Buttigieg would raise $25 million -- not if I had told you. If I had told the average American, they would say two things. They would say "Wow," and then they would say, "Who?"

DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: That's exactly right, John. I mean, this is just an eye-popping number.

And not only, as you said, does it cement his status in the top tier, but what it really does here is it guarantees his longevity in this race. Right? He may not be sitting atop the polls right now. But when you have a number like this -- and by the way, I think they've reported they've got $22 million cash on hand. So a lot of that money that they're raising is actually in the bank there and able to be used.

This guarantees that this is a candidate not going anywhere. He's going to have the ability to fund the organization that they're building as the votes begin.

Now, obviously, for all candidates, rules still apply. You've got to start winning some contests as the voting begins to maintain your viability. But Pete Buttigieg, out of nowhere, is going absolutely nowhere out of this race any time soon.

CAMEROTA: And Jess, you were part of the Hillary Clinton campaign, of course.

JESS MCINTOSH, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes. CAMEROTA: She, in her second quarter, raised more than that. But she didn't have 24 other candidates on the Democratic side.

MCINTOSH: She also started with a very strong existing fundraising infrastructure, which a mayor or a relatively small city does not. So this is even more impressive coming from him.

I think the first debate was a moment for a lot of Americans who had tuned in to see whether the people that they were thinking about supporting could pass a major hurdle. I think we saw a lot of support move to Kamala Harris right after that debate, because a lot of black women were waiting for the moment to see her really shine, and she absolutely did that.

I think a lot of folks were similarly looking at Mayor Pete and thinking, "He seems great. I like what he's saying, but I just met him a week ago." And then he absolutely -- I mean he was, probably, the clear second winner of the -- of the debate. They saw that. They realized he could hold his own with the top tier, and they opened their wallets.

BIANNA GOLODRYGA, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: It is a breakout number. Some 400,000 donors, right, for his campaign. But one has to remember that this is a lagging indicator. That in the meanwhile, in the past few weeks, he has had some stumbles, specifically with how he's handled racial issues back in his home town. Nonetheless, this is a really stunning number. And again, thinking about the fact that many Americans, most Americans, didn't even know who he was a few months ago.

BERMAN: Lagging indicator, spoken like an economics reporter, a business reporter. Thank you, Bianna.

This sets another bar in my mind, David Chalian, also, for Vice President Joe Biden, who's had a challenging few weeks. And I don't know where the Biden number will come in. I suspect it might be around this, but it's not going to be double it. And so you're going to have a comparison where you've got someone who's been in the political game for longer than Pete Buttigieg has been alive, raising perhaps comparable numbers to a guy who's mayor of South Bend.

[07:05:11] CHALIAN: Yes. There's no doubt. And I agree with you. The Joe Biden number is going to be a big number. Remember, this is the first time we see a Joe Biden number. He got into this race in this quarter. So this is going to be the first fundraising metric.

We had seen Buttigieg race more money than I think many expected in the first quarter. And obviously -- what is this? More than triple that this quarter?

You're right. Joe Biden will be around this number, but Joe Biden's expectations are to be around this number. I mean, that is a difference here, right, as you -- as you look at what a candidate, sort of that expectations game, John, matters.

I would also just note, Joe Biden has been a dominant force in this race in the polls in a way Buttigieg hasn't been yet. Joe Biden has a reservoir of support in the party that we've seen over these last several months. Pete Buttigieg is trying to build that. So I don't want to compare, just because their fundraising numbers are the same that they hold the same position in the race.

CAMEROTA: Kamala Harris' performance, I guess, has gotten the attention of Donald Trump Jr., possibly, I don't know, threatening them, because they're putting out -- he retweeted sort of a nasty tweet about her.

And I'll read it because, Jess, in the last hour, you told us what we need to look for when we see tweets like this. And that it is part of something more organized than first meets the eye.

MCINTOSH: Yes.

CAMEROTA: Here is what Don Jr. Retweeted from a guy named Ali Alexander: "Kamala Harris is not an American black. She is half Indian and half Jamaican. I'm so sick of people robbing American blacks (like myself) of our history. It's disgusting. Now using it for debate time. These are my people, not her people. Freaking disgusting."

What would you like us to see between the lines here, Jess?

MCINTOSH: I would like you to see the coordinated attack behind this tweet. So Ali Alexander is an actual person, a black American. But that exact message was written out on multiple, on multiple -- on almost a dozen tweets immediately following the debate.

So this was something that we saw in 2016 where the right, where Russia -- we don't know where it's coming from or who's doing it at this point -- but they would engage in something that wound up being called digital blackface, where they would pretend to be black Americans who were very angry about something -- something racist perceived in the Democratic primary.

We're starting to see this happen again. And we saw it with that tweet, which populated across Twitter, coming from seemingly different places. Some of them are bots; some of them are real. We don't know. But when you see things like this, it's important to recognize that there is a coordinated attack behind it, and it is not just bunches of black Americans suddenly standing up and saying, "We're angry at Kamala Harris."

BERMAN: I will say, Donald Trump Jr.'s not anonymous. I mean, this is --

MCINTOSH: Certainly not.

BERMAN: -- the son of the president of the United States, who's one of the president's chief surrogates here. And for him to post, "Wow. Is this true?"

Now, you know, the campaign spokesman later said he just didn't know that Kamala Harris was half Indian. GOLODRYGA: It's inexcusable.

BERMAN: That's what he was asking there.

GOLODRYGA: Really? He can't go to Google and read about Kamala Harris's background? He has to just retweet something that he sees? That's just an inexcusable answer from the campaign, and he should know better.

But going back to the coordinated efforts, I mean, I agree with you. The Russians were notorious for focusing on and really honing in on U.S. issues, social issues, specifically race relations issues in 2016. RT was the first to really focus on the Black Lives Matter movement and really take advantage of it. And we could very well be seeing the same in 2020.

CAMEROTA: Yes. The Kamala Harris campaign spokesperson, David, put out, "This is the same type of racist attack his father used to attack Barack Obama. It didn't work then and it won't work now."

CHALIAN: Yes, and you're going to see these campaigns -- I mean, you saw this weekend all of her competitors sort of coming to her defense and speaking out against this, I think exactly for the issues that Jess and Bianna were just getting at.

But also because, much like the Obama campaign had to deal with some of those smears, these campaigns have learned you have to fight them back at its inception right away. You can't allow one of these false narratives to take hold, because it has a life of its own, despite the fact that it is totally not based in any fact.

BERMAN: All right. The major news over the weekend -- and by major, I mean historic -- is the picture of the president of the United States, Donald Trump, stepping into North Korea over the DMZ. You know, he took about 19 or 20 steps. Then he met for an hour with Kim Jong-un inside the Demilitarized Zone. It is a remarkable picture. This is their third meeting.

There are questions this morning about the substance behind what's going on in these discussions. And Jess, there's reporting from "The New York Times," David Sanger and Michael Crowley, that the United States is considering, instead of the complete and total denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, something like a freeze. The tacit acceptance of North Korea as a nuclear power. They can keep what they have.

Now, that may lead to peace. James Clapper, who I'm going to speak with in a second, has actually been advocating for that for some time. But it's vastly different than what we've heard from this administration in the past.

[07:10:00] MCINTOSH: And obviously, I'm not the expert that Clapper is. At this point, I want to put it into the context throughout the trip.

It seemed like at every turn, Trump bowed to authoritarianism, saying that he was honored to be in North Korea, which -- which tortured a college student of our country's to death relatively recently.

He joked with Putin about getting rid of the press and meddling in our elections.

He seemed to annoy the leaders of the G-20 by bringing his daughter, who didn't have any reason to be there, and wound up bumping shoulders with some really high-level conversations that were honestly quite embarrassing that she was around.

This was just a disaster of a trip, on par with the Helsinki summit.

So I might be willing to say that there could be some good in having reached an agreement with North Korea. But I don't believe that Donald Trump is working in America's interests at any turn. So I'm highly skeptical.

GOLODRYGA: Yes, it is historic. But one has to remember that the reason why so many U.S. presidents never set foot in North Korea prior to Donald Trump is because they did not believe that they would denuclearize. Right?

So if they now say, "We are going to work towards denuclearization, and perhaps that's not even our ultimate goal. A freeze our an ultimate goal," it's a huge shift in our foreign policy. It's a huge shift for our allies in the region. What does that mean for them consequentially, and what does that mean for Iran? Right?

Iran's watching this and saying, "We're in the midst of our own nuclear debate here with the U.S. and internationally. If the U.S. Is willing to step back in what they were demanding from North Korea, what does that mean for us?"

So I think a lot of detail need come forward. That is something that's lacking. But what makes this historic is not that this is the first president to come to North Korea just because they're the first to get along. It's because President Trump has been willing to take this huge risk and bet.

CAMEROTA: And to your point: if Donald Trump didn't like the Iran deal --

GOLODRYGA: Exactly.

CAMEROTA: -- that President Obama had put together, David, why would he like this deal that "The New York Times" is reporting? It's the same thing, basically, as what has been spelled out if they get to keep it.

And furthermore, he's making claims that they haven't done any ballistic missile testing. But his own national security adviser a month ago said that they have been and in violation of the Security Council.

CHALIAN: I mean, why? Because his name would be attached to this one, not Barack Obama's, to answer your question. And I do think it raises the question of does Donald Trump, on the

world stage in these kinds of negotiations, is it his real-estate -- New York real-estate mentality deal making with public relations fully sort of locked together that is driving this? Or is there more a geopolitical strategic thing that he's doing here? And I don't know that we have the answer to that.

BERMAN: I will note -- I want to read a statement from John Bolton, who put this out on his Twitter account moments ago, the national security advisor.

He said, "I read this 'New York Times' story with curiosity. Neither the NSC staff nor I have discussed or heard of any desire to settle for a nuclear freeze by North Korea. This was a reprehensible attempt by someone to box in the president. There should be consequences."

I will note that he wasn't next to the president. You know, crossing the --

CAMEROTA: In that private meeting?

BERMAN: Tucker Carlson was, from FOX. I don't know -- I don't know if John Bolton is in the inner circle in this. He might be, but he may not be the one who knows the most right now.

All right, friends. Thank you very much.

We do have more breaking news. Hundreds of protesters are clashing with police, some trying to break into Hong Kong's legislature. The demonstrations come on the 22nd anniversary of the former British colony's return to China.

Our Nic Robertson has been in the middle of this, witnessing some remarkable scenes. And he's outside the Legislative Council right now with the latest details -- Nic.

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Yes, John. This has been an extraordinary day.

Every year for the last 22 years on the first of July, the people of Hong Kong come out to demonstrate, to have a show of the -- of their thoughts about the Britain handing over, to Chinese mainland, Hong Kong. This a symbolic protest.

What we've witnessed today is absolutely the opposite of that. What we have witnessed, the hundreds of thousands of people in peaceful protest, and tens, perhaps, of thousands of others gathered outside the government building behind me, the Legislative Council building.

They have been trying to smash their way into the building and literally been standing by the windows as they've been smashing through them. They've been breaking up barricades that police have put out there to keep them back. They've been using whatever they can find -- big crates full of rocks -- to drive into those thick, thick glass windows. And the windows have -- have slowly, over a period of time, shattered

and then been forced back and broken down. And the police who have been on the inside have rushed forward with pepper spray to hold the crowd back.

The amazing thing has been that the crowds haven't, then, tried to get into the building, that they've just moved onto another area. And right now -- right now, they have moved to another part of the building. This is a systematic effort to smash this building as much as they can, the government building -- Alisyn.

[07:15:06] CAMEROTA: Oh, my gosh, Nic. What a remarkable -- what remarkable pictures you've shown us. Please stay safe there as you report.

Meanwhile, back here in the U.S., a Florida man is facing attempted murder charges after dragging a deputy about a hundred yards. These scary moments were caught on camera. You can see what happened here.

Police say the sheriff's deputy pulled over the driver of the SUV over his tinted windows. But the officer eventually thought he smelled marijuana. He asked him about it, and that's when things began to escalate.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Listen, listen. Do me a favor. Do me a favor. Do me a favor. I'm telling you right now. I'm telling you right now! Stop! Stop! Stop! Stop! Put it in park! Put it in park! Put your hands up! Put your hands up! Put your freaking hands up! You just tried to take off with me! Stick them up now!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I didn't do nothing.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm telling you put your hands up! Put your hands up! Put your hands up! I swear to God! Put your hands up! Put it in park.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. That's terrifying. He dragged the deputy. The deputy was eventually thrown from the SUV. We're happy to report he was treated for minor injury. The suspect is named Rocky Rudolph. He was caught a short time later. He is scheduled to appear in court this afternoon.

John, this is why police say all the time there's no such thing as a routine traffic stop. OK? So any time they -- I mean, they're just taking their life in their hands. Whenever they pull someone over who they don't know what they are going to encounter. And you can see that that's just one of the things that they have to be prepared for.

BERMAN: That was terrifying.

All right. "The New York Times" reports the U.S. could make a major concession in nuclear negotiations with North Korea. What is President Trump giving up and what is he getting in exchange? We're going to speak to the former director of national intelligence, More next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:21:10] BERMAN: All right. Breaking this morning, "The New York Times" reports the Trump administration might be headed toward accepting North Korea as a nuclear power, allowing Kim Jong-un to keep his nuclear weapons in exchange for a freeze on the production of new weapons.

Joining us now is the former director of national intelligence, James Clapper.

Director, thanks for being with us. Let me read you the reporting from our friend David Sanger, which broke about two hours ago in "The New York Times."

"The concept would amount to a nuclear freeze, one that essentially enshrines the status quo, and tacitly accepts the North as a nuclear power, something administration officials have often said they would never stand for."

Now, I want to note, this is actually something for some time you have been telling me you believed might be the only logical outcome in negotiations with North Korea. Why?

JAMES CLAPPER, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Well, John, a lot of people are uneasy with the fact the likes of India and Pakistan have nuclear weapons. But the fact, the reality is they have them, and the reality is they've been responsible with them.

So I've came around to the position some months ago that, perhaps as at least an initial plateau, in the interest of getting something done, it might be worth considering capping what the North Koreans have now. And then maybe on a much, much longer-term basis, you know, trying to get them to reduce their nuclear holdings to zero, which I think is going to be very difficult.

You know, the North -- for the North Koreans, their nuclear weapons capability is their ticket to survival. And they know that no one would be paying any attention to them at all, were it not for their nuclear capability. So I think the likelihood of them giving up their entire nuclear arsenal on a short-term basis is just not -- not realistic.

BERMAN: What does the U.S. get in return for this? Because this is something that is truly diametrically opposed to what the Trump administration said it was going for in these negotiations.

CLAPPER: Well, the quid pro quo here, you know, what the North Koreans do would be to induce them to institutionalize behaving responsibly, which for the most part, they've done lately.

I think this would get -- this would require some very complex negotiations. I think it wouldn't be realistic or saleable unless there were some verification regime, which would be a hard pill for the North Koreans to swallow.

But I do think the general idea of accepting the current nuclear arsenal, whatever it is, is a good start point.

BERMAN: Yes. And it may be. And ultimately, that may be where it's heading. But you don't argue that it would be a concession from the United States, based on what terms it's been talking about up until this point.

CLAPPER: Clearly. I mean, the long-held position -- and it's not unique to this administration -- has been the complete elimination of the nuclear enterprise of North Korea, which particularly after my encounters with North Koreans, I think is kind of impossible.

BERMAN: I also want to note, again, if this is a concession to North Korea. And frankly, if stepping into North Korea was a concession to North Korea. I mean, this is something that Kim Jong-un and North Korean -- North Korean leaders would have wanted for generations and something no U.S. president would do until Donald Trump. So this is giving the North Koreans something they wanted.

It came on the heels of President Trump giving China something it desperately wanted, too, which is some of the restrictions of technology sales to Huawei. Yes, you know, the United States got a trip back to the negotiating table with China, but that's a major concession after the president said he was going to basically try to starve Huawei of this technology.

[07:25:02] CLAPPER: Yes, I think it's a common lesson learned here is -- is not be so bold about these mountaintop pronouncements about the ultimate full monte on any issue with, you know, the likes of China or Iran or North Korea.

And so I think it's not all that bad to be -- to be flexible and the -- provided you get something in return.

BERMAN: Just reflect on this trip. Because we have seen a lot of images. Whether it was President Trump with Kim Jong-un, a dictator. President Trump and Mohammad bin Salman, responsible for the death, so says the United Nations and all kinds of other reports, responsible for the death of Jamal Khashoggi.

These are pictures that the president was all too willing to be seen in over the last week or so. What's the lasting impact, do you think, of this?

CLAPPER: Well, I don't know what the lasting impact would be. I do think it's -- it doesn't reflect well, this deference to autocrats and dictators; joking with Putin about not meddling in our election process; giving prominence to the likes of Mohammed bin Salman on the heels of the Khashoggi murder, which I -- in my view, clearly, MBS is implicated. And so this is so counter to -- and then of course, honoring Kim Jong-un, who is one of the most brutal despots in the world.

There's been a lot of activity of the Internet just recalling Otto Warmbier, which I think is completely appropriate. Someone who was probably tortured to death by the North Koreans.

So I think it's not good in the context of advancing and defending the values that this country has long stood for.

BERMAN: Former national security director, James Clapper, thank you for being with us this morning.

CLAPPER: Thanks, John.

BERMAN: Alisyn.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: John, a congresswoman hoping to help others after her unthinkable loss. Congresswoman Susan Wild's new push to save people from suicide.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. SUSAN WILD (D-PA): Harry was 63 years old. He shouldn't --

(END VIDEO CLIP)

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