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Fears Turned into Reality; Ten People Killed in Germany's Shooting; Many Questions Rick Grenell's Background; Democrats Targeted Michael Bloomberg on His First Debate; U.S. Wants to Have talks with Iran; Elections Underway in Iran Amid Economic Crisis. Aired 3-3:30a ET

Aired February 20, 2020 - 03:00   ET

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

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ROSEMARY CHURCH, CNN ANCHOR: Hello and welcome to our viewers joining us from all around the world. I'm Rosemary Church. And this is CNN Newsroom.

Leaving the ship. Passengers on the Diamond Princess are finally allowed get off but that has many, many medical experts concerned.

A deadly shooting in Germany leaves at least 10 people dead and investigators with a number of questions.

Plus, ganging up on Michael Bloomberg. U.S. Democratic candidates for president faced him on the debate stage for the first time.

Well, Japan is allowing more people to leave a cruise ship that's being quarantine in Yokohama over the coronavirus. Up to 500 more people are now allowed to get off the Diamond Princess and return home. The Japanese officials also say two passengers have contracted the virus and died.

Meantime, the number of new coronavirus cases keeps dropping in China but that's likely because the country changed its counting methods once again. It no longer counts clinically diagnosed patients or people who showed symptoms even if they tested negative for the disease.

Officials report that 394 more infections across the mainland on Wednesday. More from Hubei province and that's about 1,300 fewer than the day before. Worldwide, the virus has infected more than 75,000 people and killed at least 2,100.

Well, CNN's Blake Essig is live in Yokohama, Japan and Steven Jiang is in Beijing. Good to see you both. Steven, let's start with you. And China is telling the world the number of new cases of coronavirus is dropping but that drop is probably due to the new counting method. So how liable are any of these numbers and what do they really tell us?

STEVEN JIANG, CNN SENIOR PRODUCER: Well, Rosemary, officials from the National Health Commission just gave their version of a story at a press conference here in Beijing. They explain, as you mentioned, last week they added this category of clinically diagnosed patients in Hubei province to a clear backlog of suspected cases at the epicenter.

Meaning, these patients who were showing severe symptoms but either cannot get tested or tested negative. So, they were doing that as a temporary measure to basically make it possible for these people to get treatment more quickly.

But now they are saying their testing and treatment capabilities in Hubei province has greatly improved so that's why they no longer need this separate category for Hubei province so they are again standardizing the definition of what cost to confirm the case nationwide.

That's why we're seeing in similar locations in Hubei the number of confirmed cases dropped overnight but they say this kind of change won't be dramatic, and of course, they are portraying this latest redefinition and these changes as yet another positive sign of how things are gradually but surely being brought into control and the situation is improving nationwide including at the epicenter. Rosemary.

CHURCH: All right. Steven Jiang live from Beijing. Many thanks to you. Let's turn now to Blake Essig in Yokohama, Japan for more on that quarantined cruise ship. And Blake, what more are you learning about the deaths of the two passengers from the Diamond Princess and what are authorities saying about concerns over passengers being tested and sent home with no quarantine procedures in place at the other end?

BLAKE ESSIG, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, so far concerning the two passengers who died, the Japan health ministry released us details earlier today. Both in their 80s, both contracted, tested positive for the virus last week. And both had pre-existing conditions which is pretty consistent with a lot of the cases that have resulted in deaths so far as a result of this coronavirus.

Noa as for all those people that are continuing to disembark from the ship, right, we saw yesterday about 800 people got off the ship, today another 500 or so and the disembarkment will continue tomorrow.

[03:05:01]

The concern as far as infectious disease specialists and even Japanese residents just on the streets here is the fact that they don't believe that the quarantine that exists on that cruise ship was effective in any way shape or form.

When you look at the number of cases that have developed over the past 14 days started with one now well over 600. That's -- those are huge, huge leaps and bounds. This cruise ship essentially instead of this quarantine where you're trying to, you know, limit the spread has turned into this incubator where this virus has had the opportunity to fester and spread rapidly.

And that's the concern. That's the concern of infectious disease specialist. They don't know where the virus lives on the ship, where it doesn't. You have these passengers who have been going back and forth on a daily basis walking around the decks potentially interacting, coming into contact with the virus. And for those that might have the virus not knowing starting to spread it.

And this virus has the potential to live on surfaces for five minutes up to nine days. And so, when you're -- when they're testing people and that's the requirement for these people to get off the ship after 14 days, they test negative after their 14-day quarantine they can leave.

But according to the CDC any test early during the early infection period of this virus has the potential to return a test result that's negative even if that person does have the virus and is still able to spread that virus.

So the potential for all of these people that are on that cruise ship more than 3,700 including crew members that will eventually come off the ship and the go, you know, whether it's into Japan or onto planes and go elsewhere, have the potential to have this virus even if they're not showing symptoms and even if they test negative before getting off the ship.

And all that being said, the Japanese government has stood by their measures that they have taken as far as the quarantining of those passengers the way they've handled this whole situation to say, essentially, that they would not change the thing despite the fact that you have infectious disease specialists coming out saying what has happened here is not a quarantine and that the situation really has the potential to spiral out of control as these passengers enter the general population. Rosemary?

CHURCH: It is no wonder medical experts are concerned. Blake Essig, joining us live from Yokohama in Japan. Many thanks.

Well, there's also been a development with another cruise ship caught up in the coronavirus crisis. Cambodian authorities have now cleared all of the passengers and crew of the Westerdam to return to their home countries after finding no cases of the virus.

The ship was never quarantined and there were no confirmed cases of the disease on board, but an American passenger who got off the ship last Friday tested positive after arriving in Malaysia.

We have complete coverage of the coronavirus outbreak and instant updates on the story. Just go to cnn.com.

We'll take a short break here. Still to come, a deadly shooting spree in Germany comes to an end. Next on CNN, we will have the latest information from police on the fate of the suspected gunman.

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PETE BUTTIGIEG (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Let's put forward somebody who's actually a Democrat. Look --

(APPLAUSE)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHURCH: The Democrats pile on to the newcomer on the debate stage. The fierce attacks on Michael Bloomberg in the run up to Nevada's caucuses.

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CHURCH: A gunman suspected of going on a deadly shooting spree in Germany has been found dead in his apartment. Police believe he was responsible for two attacks killing 10 people in a small-town east of Frankfurt Wednesday night.

So, let's bring in CNN's Nic Robertson. Nic, what more are you learning about this deadly rampage?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Well, there are some video clips on Twitter of the sort of aftermath of the incident itself. And one of those it appears, and again, this is the first analysis as we begin to look at this material that's coming in.

It appears to show somebody lying on the ground being treated by medical workers and in the background, you can still hear gunshots going off quite methodically. The area where these two attacks took place is predominantly, we understand, again, early analysis, an immigrant neighborhood.

It appears that the two targets here where shisha bars, you know, they are popular with young Germans but also popular with young immigrants as well. It does -- it tells us perhaps who the targets were, intended targets were here, but certainly not conclusively at this stage.

We know that nine people were shot and killed at these two locations. And the police say when they founded the attacker at his apartment, he was dead and another person in that apartment was dead as well. We don't know who they are.

Interestingly, federal police have now taken over the investigation. This is a very big killing by Germany's standards. It's been four years or so at least since there was a killing of this magnitude. We're expecting a briefing by local officials within the hour.

But at the moment, perhaps the biggest clues for police are going to come from our affiliate RTL in Germany is reporting that police are saying that is the attacker has left a video and a written statement behind.

Again, we don't know the details or the contents of the video and the letter at this stage but one would imagine that that's going to provide the clip -- the police with clues, if not motivation, about something to give an idea of why the attack took place.

CHURCH: All right. Our many thanks to Nic Robertson joining us live from London with those details. I appreciate it.

U.S. Democratic candidates logged it out in their ninth contentious debates. They turned on each other with enthusiasm reflecting how high stakes the upcoming caucuses and primaries are.

Former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg made his first appearance in a debate. The billionaire has been surging in the polls after spending $419 million in campaign ads and he immediately came under fire.

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SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (I), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We are giving a voice to people who are saying we are sick and tired of billionaires like Mr. Bloomberg seeing huge expansions of their wealth while half a million people sleep out on the street tonight.

SEN. AMY KLOBUCHAR (D-MN), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I actually welcomed Mayor Bloomberg to the stage. I thought that he shouldn't be hiding behind his TV ads.

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN (D-MA), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I'd like to talk about who are running against. A billionaire who calls women fat rods and horse faced lesbians. And no, I'm not talking about Donald Trump, I'm talking about Mayor Bloomberg.

We are not going to beat Donald Trump with a man who has, who knows how many non- disclosure agreements and the drip, drip, drip of stories of women saying they have been harassed and discriminated against.

(APPLAUSE)

JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: It's easy. All the mayor has to do is say you are released from the nondisclosure agreement. Period.

(APPLAUSE)

BUTTIGIEG: Let's put forward somebody who is actually a Democrat.

SANDERS: Mr. Bloomberg had policies in New York City of stop and frisk which went after African-American and Latino people in an outrageous way.

MICHAEL BLOOMBERG (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I've apologized, I've asked for forgiveness but the bottom line is that we stopped too many people but the policy -- we stopped too many people and we've got to make sure that we do something about criminal justice in this country.

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CHURCH: And here's what's next for the Democratic race. Caucus goers in Nevada will have their say on Saturday. The next debate will be February 25th in South Carolina. The South Carolina primary is on February 29th. Then 14 states will vote on Super Tuesday on March 3rd.

Well, President Donald Trump has appointed staunch loyalist Richard Grenell as the acting Director of National Intelligence and it is drawing harsh criticism. The president tweeted out Wednesday saying, "I am pleased to announce that our highly respected Ambassador to Germany, Richard Grenell, will become the acting Director of National Intelligence."

Many in the U.S. intelligence community are raising concerns over Grenell's lack of experience and close ties to the president.

CNN's Kylie Atwood takes a closer look at how this decision came about.

KYLIE ATWOOD, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY REPORTER: Now this is coming as the career person who is in that job, Joseph Maguire, is facing a deadline. On March 11th he will no longer be able to serve in an acting capacity because he has already done so for six months.

So, in this situation, the White House is going to be solving a problem. They are going to be putting in Rick Grenell, who is considered to be a loyalist of President Trump into this position. And Grenell is not expected to be officially nominated for the job. That means he does not need to be confirmed by the Senate.

Now, when he was confirmed to be the U.S. ambassador to Germany, it was a contentious confirmation. And sources tell CNN that they do not expect that he could be confirmed for this job in a long-term capacity. But the White House will be able to keep him there for six months until they figure out a long-term solution.

And Grenell is someone who has been a supporter of Republicans throughout his career and he does not have a deep background intelligence beyond his capacity as the U.S. ambassador to Germany. He really has no experience with regard to intelligence. And in this role, he will be overseeing all U.S. intelligence agencies and helping the president as he looks at his daily intelligence briefing which is provided by the director of national intelligence.

Kylie Atwood, CNN, Washington

CHURCH: And U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is in Saudi Arabia right now. Son he will meet with Saudi leaders to discuss ongoing tensions with Iran. Pompeo says the U.S. is willing to talk to Iran if certain conditions are met.

So, let's bring in CNN's Sam Kiley who joins us from Abu Dhabi. Good to see you again, Sam. So, what's expected to come out of this meeting between Mike Pompeo and the Saudi leaders?

SAM KILEY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I think this is part of an ongoing and frequent trips to Saudi Arabia by Mike Pompeo, and indeed, trips by leading Saudis to Washington, D.C. A very close relationship indeed with the Trump administration. Really built around a sense of fear and deep concern over the activities of nearby Iran. Of course, you recall last year, Iran fired missiles into Saudi

territory with great accuracy. After the Soleimani killing by the United States inside Iraq there were more Iranian missiles fired again with great accuracy and considerable potency, causing some brain, minor brain injuries to over 100 U.S. military personnel in Iraq in response to that Soleimani killing.

This has upped the ante in terms of the ability of the Iranians to conduct war. Of course, they are no match where it to come to war but for the United States and her allies. But it doesn't mean that they are without power.

Now Mike Pompeo has said that he is prepared to reach -- to go to talks with the Iranians on this. He said this during his trip. So long as they meet drastically modify their behavior, and by that he means any kind of effort to develop a nuclear weapon and to stop destabilization as they would describe it or support for terrorist groups, as the White House would put it, around the world.

There is no sign whatsoever that Iranians are doing that in the context of this extremely sour relationship they have with United States and her allies. And then Mike Pompeo has also said, though, on his way in, that he would be raising the thorny issue of human rights with the Saudi leadership.

He doesn't have a particularly stellar record on that issue, not least over the murder of Jamal Khashoggi. So it will be very interesting to see or to hear after their meetings whether indeed that issue or those issues were raised and whether or not they were seriously raised by the United States, or whether they were lip service in the context of the much more important from White House's perspective -- long term strategic alliance with the house of Saud, Rosemary.

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CHURCH: All right. Many thanks to Sam Kiley, joining us live from Abu Dhabi.

We'll take a short break here. Still to come, the stage is set for Iranians to elect a new parliament. We will tell you why some are concerned voters won't show up. That's next.

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CHURCH: Well, the duke and duchess of Sussex will close their Buckingham Palace office on March 31st and begin a 12-month transition period as they step back as senior members of the British royal family.

A spokesman also says Prince Harry and Meghan will return to the U.K. this month for their final royal engagements. That will include a charity event and an awards ceremony for wounded and ailing service members and veterans.

The couple planned to split their time between Britain and North America. Meanwhile, Buckingham Palace is reviewing whether they can use the word royal as part of their Sussex royal brand.

We are now just one day away from Iran's parliamentary elections. But voters are disillusioned with the process as Tehran's hard line vetting body has disqualified most of the moderate candidates from contesting in the polls.

Plus, the country is battling a severe economic crisis and growing frustrations with the government amid heightened tensions with the U.S.

CNN's Frederik Pleitgen joins me now live from Tehran. So, Fred, the big concern is people won't turn up. Is that the only way they can share their message with their government?

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, there certainly is big concerned about how high the turnout is actually going to be at this election, Rosemary. And you could feel that when you are on the streets here in Tehran. You can see that the political leadership is really trying to get people here out to vote.

And you're absolutely right. of course, all this comes in a very difficult and very trying time for the Islamic republic of Iran. If you look at just some of the events that happened in the past year and a half and in the past half year especially you have that maximum pressure campaign by the United States, the economy in a very difficult situation.

Iran and the U.S. almost at war with one another. The shooting down, the accidental shooting down of a civilian airliner that also caused a great deal of criticism here internally in Iran. Protests that have been happening as well.

And so, therefore, the leadership here of this country really wants to try and get people to come out and to vote despite the fact that these times are so very difficult. We actually went on the campaign trail here in Iran with both moderate and hardline candidates to see how they are trying to get out of what. Here's what we learned.

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PLEITGEN: Campaigning Iranian style. Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf one of the conservative candidates at a rally in a mosque south of Tehran. The biggest issues the tough economic situation and a Trump administration's maximum sanctions.

"Enemies of the Islamic resolution led by America, when they feel our power, when they feel they are in danger, then they pursue a fight against our religion, our beliefs and traditions, which are the basis of the Islamic revolution," he says.

[03:24:57]

Not far away, the moderates try to rally their troops but their popularity has shrunk as Iran's economic turmoil deepens.

One of the leaders of the reformists least saying they want to try and end Iran's economic isolation.

"Fighting the roots of corruption, promoting civil liberties and expanding social participation of the people in their destiny, as well as developing relations with the world," he says.

But moderates around President Hassan Rouhani are under fire as the Trump administration's pull out from the Iran nuclear agreement and campaign of maximum pressure have battered the country's economy.

In November, protest over a fuel price hike caused a harsh reaction from authorities. And the recent killing by the U.S. of top Iranian general Qassem Soleimani, and Iran's counterattack firing ballistic missiles at installations housing U.S. troops in Iraq nearly brought the two countries to war.

Iran continues to face international backlash after it accidentally shot down a Ukrainian commercial airliner killing all those on board during the standoff.

Voter turnout will be a major factor to watch after thousands of candidates, many of them moderates, were disqualified from running by Iran's Guardian Council.

At a press conference, I questioned the spokesman for the council about the issue.

Can you explain a little more the process that you go through when vetting and also disqualifying candidates for this election?

ABBASALI-ALI KADKHODAEI, SPOKESMAN, IRANIAN GUARDIAN COUNCIL (through translator): The candidates should meet the standard such as age and degree and police clearance, and also, they should not have crime records such as graft (Ph), corruption and bad reputation.

PLEITGEN: Iran's leadership has started a P.R. campaign urging people to come out and cast their ballots as the country battles voter apathy from a public that continues to face major hardships.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PLEITGEN: So, as you can see there, Rosemary, really, turnout is something that a lot of people are going to be looking at very closely. President Hassan Rouhani has actually urged people to come out and vote and so has Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. He said that it's their religious duty to come out and vote.

So, as you can see this is something that the leadership of this country takes very seriously and it's certainly something that's very much on their minds. And tomorrow when people go out and vote, it's going to be very, very important day here for this country to see where the balance of power is but also to see how many people will actually show up, Rosemary.

CHURCH: Absolutely. We'll all be launching. Frederik Pleitgen, many thanks to you joining us live from Tehran. And thanks to you for joining us. I'm Rosemary Church. Going Green is

next. But first, I'll be back with a check of the headlines. You are watching CNN. Do stick around.

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