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Demonstrators Take To Streets in Minneapolis after Killing of Duante Wright by Police at Traffic Stop; Defense Calls First Witness in Derek Chauvin Murder Trial; CDC Advisory Panel Holds Emergency Meeting Today on J&J Vaccine; Biden to Announce U.S. Withdrawal All Troops from Afghanistan by Sept. 11; Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-IL) is Interviewed About U.S. Withdrawing All Troops From Afghanistan. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired April 14, 2021 - 08:00   ET

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

[08:00:00]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: At one point demonstrators stopped and knelt for nine minutes and 29 seconds to honor George Floyd.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: Emotions very raw, understandably, in and across Minneapolis from these deadly policy shootings that keep on happening, especially their members -- look at this yesterday -- of the Wright and Floyd families came together to meet each other for the first time to console each other through all of this. This as the defense in the Derek Chauvin murder trial will call more witnesses today. Yesterday their first witness took the stand, and that witness claimed that Chauvin's actions were justified while suggesting that Floyd was resisting because he wasn't, quote, resting comfortably on the pavement. So many questions about that testimony that we'll get to today.

But let's begin this hour with Adrienne Broaddus. She joins us live in Minnesota with the top store in Brooklyn Center. Good morning, Adrienne.

ADRIENNE BROADDUS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Poppy, good morning. Last night we saw another night of unrest, the third night of protests following the shooting and killing of Daunte Wright. Out here in front of the Brooklyn Center Police Department, debris is everywhere, including bags of medical supplies.

This case is moving swift. That's something some of the protesters are pleased with. We could learn later today if the officer who fired that shot that killed the 20-year-old father will be charged. Yesterday she submitted her resignation letter to the city of Brooklyn Center, but the mayor told me he's not accepting her resignation, and protesters said a resignation is not enough. That's part of the reason they took the street well beyond the curfew yesterday. At least 60 people were arrested.

And prior to the demonstration we saw here last night, we heard from Wright's family, including his aunt, who was still trying to get her mind around everything that's happened. Listen in. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NAISHA WRIGHT, DAUNTE WRIGHT'S AUNT: My nephew was 20! Did you all not see my little great-nephew? Did you all not see that beautiful baby? He is fatherless. Not a mistake. That was a murder. That's murder. Say his name.

CROWD: Daunte Wright.

WRIGHT: Say his name.

CROWD: Daunte Wright.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BROADDUS: So the big question this morning is, will that 26-year veteran Kim Porter be charged? Protesters who were taking the street overnight want her charged, and they also want to see changes with the police department. Yesterday I learned none of the officers who work in Brooklyn Center live in this city. Poppy?

HARLOW: Wow. That is really significant. Also significant that we'll get into next, Adrienne, is the lack of diversity on that police force. Thank you for your reporting there on the ground.

Anthony Barksdale is with us. He is the former acting Baltimore police commissioner. Also with us again this hour, CNN political commentator and criminal defense attorney Bakari Sellers. Good morning to you both. And Bakari, if I could just begin with you on charges. Any moment now we could get charges handed down from the prosecutors there in Washington County. What's interesting is after the killing of George Floyd, the decision was made that in cases akin to this with officers, they move those to the neighboring county so they're not prosecuted -- this isn't being prosecuted in Hennepin County. What do you expect to come down in terms of charges?

BAKARI SELLERS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, first, let's tell viewers why they made that decision. There is oftentimes an incestuous relationship between prosecutors and law enforcement, meaning that it's very difficult for these same prosecutors to then prosecute the law enforcement in their own county or district or jurisdiction because they need those law enforcement officers day in and day out to make their cases. And so moving it is actually a step in the right direction. A lot of states are pushing for independent prosecutors and some state agency to prosecute these crimes. That's first.

Second, the decision is going to be made, I would presume, between a murder in the third degree, which requires the mens rea, which is your state of mind to use the legal term. My criminal law professor would be proud of me for stating that on national TV. And it would be murder in the third or involuntary manslaughter, that heat of passion. So it's a depraved mind versus in the heat of passion.

And I think that from her behavior, her crying, her saying, oh, my God, I can't believe that I shot him, and those tears she shed, it's going to be difficult to have a charge for third-degree murder. But in that heat of passion where you commit an act that causes the death of another, that's that involuntary manslaughter. I presume that's probably the charge you'll see.

HARLOW: Commissioner Barksdale, I'd like to play sound from the defense's first witness they called, a use of force expert in their words.

[08:05:05]

It's a little bit extended, but I think the whole context is important, and then get your reaction on the other side. Here he is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEVE SCHLEICHER, PROSECUTING ATTORNEY: What part of this is not compliant?

BARRY BRODD, USE-OF-FORCE EXPERT: So I see his arm positioned in the picture that's posted.

SCHLEICHER: Right.

BRODD: That a compliant person would have both their hands in the small of their back and just be resting comfortably, versus like he's still moving around.

SCHLEICHER: Did you say resting comfortably?

BRODD: Or laying comfortably.

SCHLEICHER: Resting comfortably on the pavement?

BRODD: Yes.

SCHLEICHER: At this point in time, when he's attempting to breathe by shoving his shoulder into the pavement.

BRODD: I was describing what the signs of a perfectly compliant person would be.

SCHLEICHER: So attempting to breathe while restrained is being slightly noncompliant?

BRODD: No.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: Given what you just heard, and I'm sure you watched and read a lot more of that, I can see it on your face, would you even call that expert testimony? What do you take from it?

ANTHONY BARKSDALE, FORMER ACTING BALTIMORE POLICE COMMISSIONER: He sounds like a complete idiot. I don't know what they paid him to get him on the stand.

HARLOW: It was $11,400. BARKSDALE: You know what, it wasn't worth it. Actually, that was so

disturbing that it just doesn't work for me, Poppy. I am -- I'm disgusted by that testimony. I'm someone that is under arrest with someone's knee on their neck for nine minutes and 29 seconds trying to breathe, trying to communicate and say, I can't breathe. That can't be justified no matter what experts the defense tries to put on. I'm just sorry. I can't believe that.

HARLOW: I'm the daughter of a trial lawyer, Bakari, and I kept thinking yesterday watching this, that's the first witness. It's not only important as an attorney what witnesses you call. It's the order you call them in. And does this mean this was their best witness?

SELLERS: I don't know. Maybe they were trying to set the bar really low? I would -- that's about all I can have. I agree that this witness was not good. Just thinking about some of the pretzels he put himself in in making an excuse for, or trying to justify the behavior of Derek Chauvin in this case.

But again, Poppy, look. We know that there are people, there are individuals, Chief Ramsey said it earlier, there are individuals in this country who will attempt to justify any action done by law enforcement. The criminal defense is just hoping that there's one in that jury box. I'm not sure that this expert even got you that one. But there's always that prayer.

HARLOW: Commissioner Barksdale, having led many officers in Baltimore, I want to ask about Adrienne Broaddus' important reporting, and that is that the officers, 47 of them that make up the police department in Brooklyn Center, which is back to the killing of Daunte Wright now, don't live in the community. And we learned yesterday from the mayor that only four of those 47 are black in a community that is 30 percent black. The issue of representation comes up over and over again. It came up in Minneapolis after the killing of George Floyd. Why does this continue, and how does it play into the severe issues that continue between communities and their police?

BARKSDALE: Well, I believe that it continues because politicians tend to say, OK, well, I'm going to put this chief in, and this chief is going to run the police department, and I can go through my day and handle all of my business. One of the big things when I was hired in Baltimore city, I grew up in Baltimore city, I knew the community. And now you have a jurisdiction just like Baltimore that will go to outside chiefs that aren't familiar with the communities, but they come in, and you're not bringing in the citizens who know the communities, know the people, know the streets, where to turn left, where to turn right.

And it's happening again and again. And now the small agency, Baltimore is the eighth largest police department in the United States when I was there, you have small agencies based on social media, body cams, community engagement now exposing this type of poor decision- making when it comes to the staffing of a police department. And you said four minorities in that --

HARLOW: Four black, four out of 47 black and I believe seven minorities total.

BARKSDALE: Look at that ratio.

HARLOW: It's about eight percent.

BARKSDALE: It's sickening. OK, so they need to diversify immediately. And there's a black mayor there. Get in there, diversify. Hire from within the community.

[08:10:05]

And if you cannot find qualified applicants, OK. If you're from outside, we're hiring, but I expect you to protect and serve my city.

HARLOW: Commissioner Barksdale, thank you. Bakari Sellers, as always, thank you very much.

Dr. Anthony Fauci just moments ago right here on NEW DAY with a message for anyone who may this morning be waking up feeling hesitant to get a COVID vaccine because the Johnson and Johnson vaccine is paused for now. You'll hear from him, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, BIDEN CHIEF MEDICAL ADVISER: There is a concern about hesitancy out there. The fact that this was done would, in my mind, underscore and confirm how seriously we take safety, even though it's a very rare event. So if anybody has a doubt that, oh, they may not be taking safety very seriously, I think this is an affirmation that safety is a primary consideration when it comes to the FDA and the CDC. That's why it was done, and that's why it's a pause. It isn't a cancellation. It's a pause.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[08:15:01]

BERMAN: Dr. Anthony Fauci just moments ago on NEW DAY. And just hours from now, a CDC advisory panel will hold an emergency meeting about the Johnson & Johnson vaccine pause due to a rare and severe type of blood clot in very, very few people. Six cases that we know of 7 million people who have received doses of the vaccine.

Joining us now, CNN chief medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta.

Sanjay, that CDC panel will meet today. We could know a lot more within the next several hours.

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, I think so. We can see, I think there's a couple of important things. Is there something that ties these patients together?

We know a little bit more about these six patients. We know that they all have these types of blood clots. We also know two of the patients also had in addition to the brain blood clots also had blood clots to -- and blood vessels leading to the spleen and to the liver. That's important.

Four of the patients had hemorrhages within the brain as well and as you know, one patient died. What was it about these patients? Is there something to learn there specifically?

And I think perhaps most importantly, maybe we'll hear today, what are they going to do about this? Does this mean they'll say, hey, look, the vaccine should not be used for certain age group, people with certain underlying conditions? We'll see. It's a tough call. And maybe we won't get all those details today, but that's the sort of stuff they're going to be looking at.

HARLOW: Sanjay, in many states if not all, it was the J&J vaccine that was used for many of the most vulnerable populations. I don't mean the older. I mean homeless, particularly, people who are hard to ensure that they will be able to come back for a second shot. And the fact that it was one shot and it didn't need to be kept at those deep, deep freezing temperatures.

What happens to them now?

GUPTA: Yeah, that's the biggest concern. Overall, if you look at the numbers, I think we'll have plenty of vaccine because of the mRNA vaccines. By the way, Pfizer and Moderna are a different type of vaccine, the mRNA vaccines, hundreds of millions of doses given. They haven't had these safety signal concerns. The concerns with Johnson & Johnson here in the United States and AstraZeneca over in Europe, they're both an adenovirus vaccine.

But you're right, Poppy. I mean, I think transient populations, people not likely to come back for their second shot, are going to be -- they're going to be probably most adversely affected by this. So, we'll see how that plays into their recommendations as well.

Again, you can get the two-shot options. It's harder to reach some of those populations.

BERMAN: And, look, Johnson & Johnson, while not being produced at the same level as the other vaccines, the country will miss those millions of vaccines if there's a significant delay here.

Sanjay, we played the sound from Dr. Fauci beforehand saying that he thinks this, I guess he hopes, this will make people less hesitant to take the vaccine because they'll see how seriously government scientists are taking the issue here.

I'm not sure that hope is justified based on what we have seen in other places in the world that have done pauses. Take Europe and AstraZeneca. Explain.

GUPTA: Yeah, you know, we've been following this for some time, and, you know, I just tell you as a medical reporter, you're always trying to sort of understand the impact of these sorts of things on people's confidence levels overall. And I think it would be naive to believe there won't be an impact.

In France, for example, after all the news that came out about the AstraZeneca vaccine trial and the concerns about clots over there. Only about 20 percent of people, roughly, according to some of our surveys in France, actually are -- have confidence in the AstraZeneca vaccine. So that's despite the fact they came out and they said, here's what we found. Here's what we're recommending. We're thinking people, at least in the U.K., people under the age of 30, they should not be recommended this vaccine.

It was an important message. And the message was, look, if you pause something like this, and even if you come back and say, okay, no longer people under the age of 30. It's not like people who are 40 or 50 are going to say, hey, I'm totally good with this, as we saw from the data coming out of France.

I'll balance that, again, just as a medical reporter, by saying, hey, if we had all woken up yesterday and you guys were breaking with the news that someone has died in relation to a vaccine and that was all we heard, that could have really shaken people's confidence a great deal as well. So the fact that you actually look at this and you say, hey, we're announcing it, here's what we've found. This is what we're doing about it.

Maybe that's -- they both are going to cause vaccine hesitancy but maybe one more than the other.

HARLOW: Sanjay, do you have a message to any men watching who may think, oh, this is only -- it's six women between the ages of 18 and 48, so I don't need to keep an eye out for these symptoms?

GUPTA: You know, I would say we need to get the full data here right now. I think that at least according to this most recent data it is all women.

[08:20:01]

There was concern last year. You may remember in the fall of a 25- year-old man who at the time was described as having an unexplained illness. But we subsequently learned had a blood clot in one of the blood vessels of the brain. At the time, they paused the J&J trial for that and said it wasn't related. But I'm sure that's going to come up again here today as well.

I don't want to unfairly or unnecessarily suggest that's going to be the case. So we'll see what they show. Maybe there's something specifically about young women that make them more vulnerable to this, maybe not. We'll see.

But right now, I think we just have to wait for the data.

BERMAN: Dr. Sanjay Gupta, thank you, as always, for being with us.

GUPTA: You got it.

BERMAN: So, President Biden will soon announce his plans to pull all U.S. troops out of Afghanistan by September 11th. A live report from Kabul and reaction from the Senate majority leader, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: In just hours, President Biden will announce that he will withdraw all U.S. troops from Afghanistan by September 11th, this year, ending the nation's longest war.

[08:25:06]

CNN's Nick Paton Walsh live in Kabul.

Nick, what will Afghanistan look like after, without U.S. troops there?

NICK PATON WALSH, CNN INTERNATIONAL SECURITY EDITOR: Yeah, it's important to remember that the end of the war for America is not the end of the war. And certainly it's key exactly what details we hear from commander-in-chief, President Joe Biden, shortly.

Now he said, most importantly, this withdrawal, by September the 11th, so it cannot be said, that the U.S. has been in Afghanistan for 20 years, that that will happen regardless of the conditions. It will not be conditions-based, which is extraordinary, frankly, because it says we're gone regardless of what happens in the months ahead.

Now, of course, there's a caveat that he can change his mind but even with that statement from Joe Biden, who, it has to be said, for over a decade has not been an advocate of long-term U.S. involvement in Afghanistan even when he was vice president under Barack Obama. Even with that said, the Taliban have not exactly been welcoming of this statement. In the last minutes, we heard from their spokesperson a number of tweets which give the Americans 16 days to get out of Afghanistan.

They say they want them out under the terms of the earlier Doha agreement signed by former -- then-President Donald Trump, his Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. Or they will hold those who do not comply with it liable.

Now, we have heard them make big talk in the past and still, regardless of demands for the full withdrawal of foreign troops they've made still negotiate. We may see that possibly in the weeks ahead because the Biden administration's call to summit for peace in Istanbul, they want a transitional government together to start the Taliban working with the current Afghan government and then move forward from there.

The Afghan government, well, they are not happy with that. They want elections first, even though they agree they won't stand in them, President Ghani himself. So it's a very messy few months ahead.

The point is the Taliban already in the ascendant on the battlefield. The warmer summer months known as the fighting season, they're very close to us now as well. The U.S. are frankly holding them back from major advances with their air power. Otherwise they may move forward quickly, and some U.S. assessment suggests it could be a matter of months without U.S. support the Afghan government are able to hold on.

So, it's an exceptionally tense months ahead, the rhetoric are very loud, and stakes for ordinary Afghans extraordinary. Rural Afghanistan, a lot of it, under Taliban control. The bubble of Kabul pumped full of billions of American dollars. Now millions strong in population and quite now possibly bracing for how that may change in the event of a Taliban surge at some point in the months ahead -- John.

BERMAN: Things will change. That's for sure. It's a major moment.

Nick Paton Walsh, thank you for being there for us.

Joining me now is Senate Majority Chuck Schumer.

Senator, thank you so much for being with us.

You were critical last year of President Trump's decision to reduce the Trump levels in Afghanistan because you said it was an incoherent policy. How do you feel now about President Biden's decision?

SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER (D-NY): I think President Biden has come up with a careful -- careful and thought out plan.

Look, John, the president doesn't want endless wars. I don't want endless wars. And neither do the American people.

And it's refreshing to have a thought-out plan with a set timetable instead of the president waking up one morning getting out of bed and just saying what just pops into his head and then having the generals walk it back.

So, I think this is a careful, thought-out plan. Now, there are questions that remain. I am happy to let you know that the administration has agreed to a classified briefing for all senators, which we'll have shortly so questions can be answered.

But I think the president's plan is a very good one. You want to make sure that the September 11th date is stuck, is a date that sticks. That it's not kicking the can down the road.

BERMAN: Can I ask you --

SCHUMER: I've spoken to -- I've spoken to administration people and they believe just that as well.

BERMAN: Can I ask you about that date?

SCHUMER: Yeah.

BERMAN: As a New Yorker yourself, September 11th, are you comfortable with giving that date as a withdrawal? That will be the 20th anniversary of the September 11th attacks.

SCHUMER: Well, I think, again, endless wars have not -- it's 20 years. Endless -- the terrorist attack was terrible. We're much, much better at fighting terrorism today than we were. And Obama took out bin Laden.

And so, I have a great deal of respect for what we have done to fight terrorism. Praise God there hasn't been the kind of incident that we saw that horrible, horrible day which we all still live with in New York and in America on 9/11. And so getting the troops out of this endless war is a good thing.

BERMAN: You're not worried about the symbolism that may be taken by terrorists around the world saying, hey, the 20th anniversary, look, the U.S. is on the run?

SCHUMER: Terrorists take all kinds of things into symbolism. The key issue is having the ability to stop them, to penetrate them. We've done a very good job of that thus far.

BERMAN: A lot going on in the U.S. Senate that --

SCHUMER: Yes.

BERMAN: -- that you are central to, needless to say, as the Senate majority.

[08:30:00]