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New Day

Biden Seeks Assault Weapons Band and Background Checks. Aired 6-6:30a ET

Aired March 24, 2021 - 06:00   ET

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

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MAGGIE MONTOYA, BOULDER SHOOTING SURVIVOR: I was up front, and I happened to glimpse to the side, I saw a body of someone who was working (ph).

[05:49:26]

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The weapon used was an AR-15-style firearm. But still, no word on what was behind the violence.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The victims were engaged in an everyday act, and it turned out to be their last day on earth.

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I don't need to wait another minute to take common-sense steps to save lives.

SEN. TED CRUZ (R-TX): Every day there's a shooting, we play this ridiculous theater. What happens in this committee after every mass shooting is Democrats propose taking away guns from law-abiding citizens.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: To Senator Cruz, I would say thoughts and prayers are good, but they're not enough.

(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 all around the world. This is NEW DAY. It is Wednesday, March 24, 6 a.m. here in New York.

And this morning, the country continues to grieve the ten victims in the Boulder grocery store massacre. The flag at the White House flying at half-staff for the second time in a week after also being lowered to honor victims of the Atlanta spa shootings just days before.

The people of Boulder gathering outside the grocery store to mourn and remember the lives lost. We now know all of the victims' names. These are some of their faces, and we will tell you more about them this morning and bring you the latest details on the investigation.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: So this morning, lawmakers face a choice. It's a choice they have faced before. Will they choose to take action, do something, anything, to try to stop these mass shootings, or will they choose the status quo? Which means looking at what happened in Boulder this week, in Georgia last week and saying, I choose this. Let's stick with this. Boulder is working for me.

President Biden was asked about this yesterday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you believe you have the political capital to make changes on gun measures right now?

BIDEN: I hope so. I don't know. I haven't done the counting yet.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: The Boulder suspect appears in court for the first time tomorrow. Investigators have not said anything about his motives, but his brother claims he was paranoid and may have suffered from mental illness.

CNN's Dan Simon, live for us in Boulder this morning. Dan, why don't you give us the latest?

DAN SIMON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, John.

Well, the suspect, 21-year-old Ahmad Alissa, according to his brother, as you just said, showed signs of mental illness. You take that, combined with the fact that he had access to weapons, and then you have the recipe for disaster. One of the weapons purchased just six days before the attack.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SIMON (voice-over): This morning authorities are investigating why a gunman opened fire at a Colorado supermarket and killed ten people.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We don't know if there's a shooter, active shooter somewhere.

SIMON: Witnesses say they first heard shots around 2:40 p.m. local time Monday.

ANNA HAYNES, WITNESSED BOULDER SHOOTING FROM APARTMENT: We can see the entire front of the store from out our living room window. I initially heard maybe ten gunshots. I assumed it was a firework or a car engine failing. I saw a -- a body in the middle of the parking lot.

BRIAN KRUESI, WITNESSED BOULDER SHOOTING: He was walking through the parking lot and just shooting towards the other doorway from what I was -- from where I was.

SIMON: Maggie Montoya was inside the King Soopers of Boulder, working at the pharmacy, signing people up for the COVID-19 vaccine.

MONTOYA: It sounded like he was right outside our door. We couldn't see him through the crack of the door, but it sounded like he -- we could hear him so clear.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is the Boulder police department. The entire building is surrounded.

SIMON: Less than an hour after responding to calls of a shooter, police taking the 21-year-old suspect into custody.

According to an arrest warrant affidavit, authorities say the gunman started the shooting in the parking lot before moving inside, where they reported him wearing a tactical vest, armed with two semi- automatic weapons. A law enforcement source tells CNN one was purchased just six days earlier.

The suspect is now behind bars and charged with ten counts of murder and one charge of attempted murder.

MICHAEL DOUGHERTY, BOULDER COUNTY DISTRICT ATTORNEY: There's an extensive investigation just getting under way into his background. He's lived most of his life in the United States, and beyond that, we're still in the very early stages of the investigation.

SIMON: At the White House, President Joe Biden calling for immediate action.

BIDEN: I don't need to wait another minute, let alone an hour, to take common-sense steps.

SIMON: Back in Boulder, a memorial growing outside the grocery store as the community mourns the victims of Monday's massacre, one of them Officer Eric Talley, his police car now covered in flowers.

CHIEF MARIS HEROLD, BOULDER POLICE DEPARTMENT: He cared about this community. He cared about his family, and he was willing to die to protect others.

SIMON: Local authorities pledging to find justice for the victims of yet another mass shooting in the United States.

DOUGHERTY: I promise you that all of us here will work tirelessly and also to make sure that the killer is held absolutely and fully accountable for what he did.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SIMON: Now, when he first surrendered to police, Alissa did not answer police officers' questions, but he did say that he wanted to speak to his mother. He will have his first court appearance tomorrow morning -- Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: OK, Dan, thank you very much for all of that reporting.

So ten Americans from all walks of life were killed in the grocery store massacre. The youngest victim just 20 years old. Boulder's police chief overcome with emotion as she read each of their names.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) HEROLD: I'm going to read the names of the deceased: Denny Strong

[SIC], 20 years old; Neven Stanisic, 23; Rikki Olds, 25; Tralona Bartkowiak, 49; Suzanne Fountain, 59; Teri Leiker, 51; Officer Eric Talley, 51; Kevin Mahoney, 61; Lynn Murray, 62; Jody Waters, 65. Our hearts go out to all the victims killed during this senseless act of violence.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[06:05:32]

CAMEROTA: Joining us now is Daniel Oates. He was the police chief in Aurora, Colorado, when a gunman killed 12 people in a movie theater in a movie theater massacre nearly a decade ago. Also with us is CNN legal and national security analyst Asha Rangappa. She's a former FBI special agent.

Chief Oates, in terms of the investigation, do you think that police now, by this time, know where this suspect bought the gun? And why don't we start there? Why -- in case -- in terms of making change, since it seems intractable at the national level, why don't we go to gun shop owners and say, Do you think that this 21-year-old who comes in and wants an AR-15-style weapon, do you think that he looks like he's going hunting with this weapon? Did you ask him, by the way, Do you ever think that people are chasing you? Do you ever hear voices saying that people are coming for you? Do they ever ask questions like that, because this guy, it sounds like, according to his family, would have answered yes.

DANIEL OATES, FORMER POLICE CHIEF, AURORA, COLORADO: The -- the short answer is in our society, we don't ask those questions. We don't demand of gun shops that they ask those questions. We have a -- a perspective in America that there is a right to buy a weapon, absent some compelling and obvious circumstances, and gun shops don't ask those questions. And it's -- it's very, very painful. And we're -- we continue to struggle with that.

The latest effort in America is this effort, you know, in individual states, at what's called red flag laws, where if there is some indication that someone is mentally not capable of possessing a weapon, government, the police can go through pretty significant steps to deprive that person of the right to bear a weapon.

CAMEROTA: Yes.

OATES: You know, pending court hearings and due process, et cetera. But those -- those laws vary from state to state, and the amount of work that has to be done by law enforcement to actually get such an order from a court can be significant.

CAMEROTA: Asha, how about that? I mean, how onerous would it be to have a gun shop owner just say, By the way, are you hearing voices? Do you ever hear anybody -- do you think people are chasing you? Do you think everybody is watching you? I mean, that -- it would have weeded out, possibly, this guy. ASHA RANGAPPA, CNN LEGAL AND NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Well, Alisyn,

I -- I completely agree with the concerns that you're mentioning, but based on the law, even asking those questions wouldn't -- wouldn't allow a buyer to prevent the purchase, at least under federal law.

So with mental illness, at least under the federal firearms disqualifiers, you have to actually be committed to a mental institution or adjudicated by a court as mentally defective in order to be legally disqualified from purchasing a firearm.

You know, the -- an eyeball test wouldn't work, and I don't even think that, you know, a psychologist having evaluated someone would reach that level. It's a very high bar.

And I think it gets to why friends and family are aware of these kinds of red flags, you know, more than, say, a gun shop seller, and they are going to be more aware if somebody is unstable and also in possession of firearms, which appears to be the case in this situation.

His family members knew that he, you know, had potentially, you know, some paranoid thoughts and that also he possessed weapons. And it's unclear, you know, what they did about that or if they just let that situation stand.

BERMAN: Asha, so "The New York Times" is reporting that the suspect's identity was previously known to the FBI, because he was linked to another individual under investigation by the bureau. That's "The New York Times" reporting that. CNN doesn't have that.

What would the significance of that be? What does that mean?

RANGAPPA: It basically means that the FBI has connected the dots with him as a contact, perhaps, in -- in a prior or active investigation that they, you know, have. It wouldn't make him, necessarily, a suspect in an investigation. It would just -- you know, since 9/11, the -- the idea has been to paint a picture, if you have someone under investigation. Who is their network?

That's what the reporting that you just told me tells me, but I don't think that that would necessarily rise to the level of, you know, they think he's a terrorist or under investigation without -- without further facts.

[06:10:16]

CAMEROTA: So, Chief, you know there was this 2018 law in Boulder, where Boulder, after the Parkland school shooting, they -- they were trying to protect their local citizens and realized that this could happen in their community.

And so the city council passed this law against this style of weapon. That was overturned on March 12, OK, two Fridays ago. This suspect bought the weapon on March 16, OK? Because, you know, a judge had made these weapons available. And I was so struck by, in this CNN article, where they said that the

Ruger AR-556, which is the AR-15-style weapon that he had, the -- a ATF agent, former ATF agent said this isn't a hunting rifle. This isn't a sporting rifle. This is made for military combat. And yet, again, I just come back to, that's OK when a 21-year-old comes into a gun shop and wants to buy that? I mean, where do you think we start with solving this?

OATES: Well, first of all, it's very, very hard to regulate weapon sales and possession at the local level. And the whole time that I was in Colorado, this issue versus of home rule versus legislative action was -- was a very big deal.

And, again, the decision by the district court recently in Colorado is probably going to be subject to appeal. But I'm not surprised that -- that the position of the courts would be that this is a state regulation situation.

The other issue is the weapon itself. You know, make no mistake about it. As I understand it, it's technically classified as a pistol under federal law, simply because it doesn't have a full stock, you know. The back of the gun.

However, it is a rifle. It fires a rifle round. It fires it with the force and capacity of a rifle. And -- and my understanding is -- and there's reporting out there on this, and I've been told by a source, that he, to account for the lack of a stock, he had a strap attached to his arm to balance and control the weapon.

So one of the issues out there -- and it comes back to the period when there was an assault weapons ban for ten years in America -- is manufacturers tried and designed weapons that technically don't meet the definition of an assault weapon but still have all the capacity and destructive ability of an assault weapon.

And that's another challenge for legislators, is if you -- if you ultimately decide to ban assault weapons, what is a weapon? How is it described under the -- under the law? So there are a host of challenges here with regard to actually regulating weapons.

BERMAN: Yes. I mean, there are videos online that talk about this specific weapon and brag about how it gets beyond or around certain gun laws. And even that law in Boulder, if you didn't purchase it in Boulder, it was still legal for him to have it in his car. So --

CAMEROTA: And they hadn't enforced it. And that's the other thing, is that --

BERMAN: They never -- they have never issued a fine.

CAMEROTA: They had never issued a fine for that. So there's just so many places that, in hindsight, after ten people are dead, you realize could have, perhaps, stopped this explosion. But we aren't doing that.

Asha, Chief, thank you both very much. So where will the debate over gun violence go now? Well, new clues

about whether legislation that just passed in the House stands any chance in the Senate, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

[06:17:49]

BIDEN: I don't need to wait another minute, let alone an hour, to take common-sense steps that will save the lives in the future and to urge my colleagues in the House and Senate to act. We can ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines in this country once again.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: President Biden giving his most vocal push for gun laws since taking office, calling for an assault weapons ban and universal background checks.

Joining us now, CNN White House correspondent Jeremy Diamond. Also with us, CNN political analyst Rachael Bade. She's the co-author of "The Politico Playbook."

Jeremy, we heard from the president right there. What is he going to do? How hard will he push? What are we actually going to see from him on this today?

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, clearly, you can see that he is considering action, which is notable, given how quickly it came after this Colorado shooting, also given the fact that so far in his administration, it had not been the top priority that many thought it might be.

But clearly, this is proving up on the priority list, and now we have President Biden not only pushing members of Congress to pass, pushing the Senate, specifically, to pass those two pieces of legislation in the House aimed at expanding background checks, but also considering a range of executive actions.

White House officials have told me over here that they are considering a range of executive actions to address gun control measures, including one as it relates to guns that don't have serial numbers and talking about those kinds of sales.

So there is some momentum here, some discussion here.

But really, the question is will it change anything? Will it fundamentally change the dynamics in the Senate, where you have not only the slimmest of Democratic majorities and a filibuster still in place that will prevent Democrats from getting any substantive pieces of gun reform legislation passed.

But also even just within the Democratic caucus, you have somebody like Joe Manchin, who has worked on gun reform issues in the past. But he is resistant to going as far as those two pieces of legislation passed by Democrats in the House, mainly because he's opposed to requiring background checks on private sales between individuals.

So there are a number of challenges, and despite the fact that the president is coming out here strongly out the gate, talking about the need for action, the fundamental political dynamics, those have not changed.

[06:20:11]

CAMEROTA: Yes. See, Rachael, I feel like we've seen this horror movie before, and waiting for some sort of bipartisanship in Congress on gun violence is just a complete fool's errand. I mean, so once again -- but let's go down that road for a moment. Let's pretend that something could happen. Once again, does Senator Joe Manchin hold all the cards here?

RACHAEL BADE, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: I mean, not just Senator Joe Manchin, but also ten Senate Republicans. I mean, the House, as Jeremy just noted, past these two expanded background check bills that are pretty popular with the American public.

I've seen polling showing that upwards of something like 90 percent of Americans believe that background checks should be expanded to all gun purchases.

But in the Senate, I mean, they've still got the reality of the filibuster. And they need ten Senate Republicans and also every single Senate Democrat to be in line here.

I think, look, Democrats, they also have a problem with the clock and the calendar here. I mean, they want to do all these things. They want to talk about the minimum wage. They want to talk about infrastructure. They want to talk about immigration possibly, too.

And so there's all these things that are sort of competing for oxygen, and that's another big challenge Democrats have. Are they really going to spend -- is Biden, President Biden, going to spend his time and the political capital that it would really need to beat this into submission and get some sort of compromise across the aisle? I'm very skeptical about that. And they're a long way from those 60 votes.

BERMAN: It might be worth it, though, to take a roll call, to figure out who exactly stands where on what? Right? And Joe Manchin, it can't help without Joe Manchin saying, I support something and letting people know exactly where he is.

He's talked about Manchin-Toomey, which was the legislation back in 2013. If you can, explain exactly how that is different than what the House passed. As far as I can see it, Joe Manchin says he doesn't support universal background checks, because he wants to protect private arms sales, which is to say --

CAMEROTA: Person to person.

BERMAN: -- person to person. But not gun shows. He wants background checks for gun shows. So if you carved out person-to-person sales, would Manchin support background checks?

BADE: I mean, that's what he did back in 2013 that you just referred to. Manchin-Toomey was a bipartisan deal. There was a lot of hope that something could actually pass the Senate. And it ended up just getting 54 votes, six shy of the 60 needed to actually get it moving.

And as you mentioned, Manchin has said he's definitely for expanding background checks, but only for those commercial sales. And that's what that bill would have done. It would have just done expanded background checks for commercial sales, not for private individual sales from a family member to another family member.

But look, that was right after Sandy Hook happened. And if that couldn't pass after 20 six -- 20 six-year-olds and 7-year-olds were murdered in elementary school, do you really think something like that can pass now? I'm very skeptical.

And we also heard from Democrats yesterday, including Chris Murphy, who is a top gun control sort of advocate on Capitol Hill, Senator Chris Murphy. He was sort of dismissive of Manchin to me and said, Look, that was negotiated in part with the NRA. They were supportive, or semi-supportive of that. He wants to keep (AUDIO GAP). And so you're seeing (AUDIO GAP) on this issue (AUDIO GAP) thirteen (AUDIO GAP) that something like that could actually get through.

CAMEROTA: Jeremy, let's talk about Senator Tammy Duckworth. So she had said that she did -- was going to oppose Biden nominees unless they had more Asian-Americans represented, and she's dropped that, because I think they've promised that they will do that.

BERMAN: They've promised to put a liaison in the White House to be someone they could talk to about that. I think that's the concrete action they've taken now.

CAMEROTA: OK. So here -- here was her rationale. She said, "To be told that you have Kamala Harris, you don't need anybody else, is insulting. That's not something you would say to the Black Caucus, that you have Kamala. We're not going to be putting any African- Americans in the cabinet. Why would you say that to AAPIs?"

So Jeremy, where are we?

DIAMOND: Well, as John said, what they've got here is a commitment from the White House in a statement from the White House secretary, Jen Psaki to hire a senior White House official who will focus on liaising between the White House and the Asian-American community in the United States, to make sure that that community's concerns are heard, particularly at a time when there is such rising levels of hatred and crime against Asian-Americans in this country.

She didn't quite get what she was looking for, which was another cabinet member who would be Asian-American. So far, the White House does have, we should note, one cabinet-level official beyond the vice president who is Asian-American, and that is the U.S. trade representative. The OMB director, Neera Tanden -- or sorry, the nominee to be the OMB director, Neera Tanden, her nomination failed. She was also Asian-American. She's south Asian.

And so that left a gap in Tammy Duckworth and Mazie Hirono's mind here, for this -- for this cabinet. So they're not quite getting another cabinet-level position, but they are at least getting a high- level focus on Asian-American issues, which I think is ultimately what their goal was here.

BERMAN: Jeremy Diamond, Rachael Bade, thank you both very much.

Big news overnight. North Korea conducting its first missile test since President Biden took office. New information about the White House response, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CAMEROTA: Developing this morning, U.S. officials tell CNN North Korea has conducted its first missile test since President Biden took office. CNN's Barbara Starr is live at the Pentagon with the latest. Barbara, what do you have?

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, good morning, Alisyn. Administration officials are just downplaying it a little bit. They and the North Koreans -- pardon me, the South Koreans.