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Flynn Under Fire for Pushing Conspiracy Theories; Trump's 35 Percent Tariff Facing GOP Resistance. Aired 9-9:30a ET

Aired December 06, 2016 - 09:00   ET

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

[09:00:00] ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: -- casually he just punched him.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: That's a real man right there.

CAMEROTA: That is a real man, so.

CUOMO: You see what the New York men were like?

CAMEROTA: Oh, that's not nice.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: OK.

CUOMO: Australian man wall.

HARLOW: Yes. On that note, that's advice for my daughter, you guys, when approaching a kangaroo, approach cautiously, like --

CAMEROTA: Yes.

CUOMO: Always have your hands up. Always have your hands up and in front of your face.

HARLOW: Right.

CAMEROTA: Good comment, yes.

HARLOW: That's the lesson.

(CROSSTALK)

HARLOW: All right. Guys, thank you.

CAMEROTA: Thanks, Poppy.

HARLOW: Have a good day. NEWSROOM begins right now.

Good morning, everyone. I'm Poppy Harlow in today for Carol Costello. So glad you're with us. At any moment, we will take you live to a news conference in Oakland, California. Officials there set to give the latest update on that horrific warehouse fire. The death toll now stands at 36 people. And as memorials build outside of the gutted rooms, the criminal investigation is moving forward. Meantime, the man who held the lease on that property is lashing out

at claims that he allowed the residents or the warehouse to become an illegal residence and a fire trap. Here's the end of his emotional interview this morning on NBC.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MATT LAUER, NBC HOST: You will be charged --

DERICK ION ALMENA, LEASEHOLDER OF BURNED WAREHOUSE: I'd rather get on the floor and be trampled by the parents. I'd rather let them tear my flesh than answer these ridiculous questions.

LAUER: Mr. Almena, we'll --

ALMENA: I'm so sorry. I'm incredibly sorry. What do you want me to say? I'm not going to answer these questions.

LAUER: Then we will call this --

ALMENA: I'm just going to say that I am sorry.

LAUER: Then we'll end the interview there, Mr. Almena.

ALMENA: If you have to hold my soul accountable. If you have to hold my soul accountable for believing in something.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: Our Stephanie Elam is there with the latest. And, Steph, you've been there obviously throughout the weekend reporting on this tragedy, as the number of dead has grown and grown and grown. How far have they made it through the building at this point in time to try to recover everyone?

STEPHANIE ELAM, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Right, tragic story. As the story's been unfolding here, Poppy, we know that 36 people have been found. They've now made their way through 70 percent of the building. They say they don't expect a huge number more of deceased to be found, but they're not ruling out that they may still find some more people there. And then we also know that of the 36 people that have died, 32 of them have been positively or tentatively identified. So they're working to notify the families in that regard as well, Poppy.

HARLOW: And, Stephanie, what do we expect that they might tell us at this press conference?

ELAM: What they've been doing is they've been updating us on these efforts to update the family, also if they found more remains overnight, the progress that they're making overnight, what they've encountered, if there's been any issues. They brought in a crane they needed to gain access to the space, and so they may update us further about any other difficulties or safety concerns that may be inside there as well. So that's what we're all waiting to hear.

HARLOW: OK. And they are beginning. Let's listen in. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

OFFICER JOHNNA WATSON, OAKLAND POLICE DEPARTMENT SPOKESPERSON: -- Watson. I'm one of the public information officers for the Oakland Police Department. We would like to provide you with an operational update. At this time, I would like to turn it over to Alameda County Sheriff Deputy Modeste.

DEPUTY SHERIFF TYA MODESTE, ALAMEDA COUNTY SHERIFF'S OFFICE: Hi, good morning. Tya Modeste, T-Y-A M-O-D-E-S-T-E, one of the public information officers for Alameda County. There has been no change overnight in the total number of victims located and recovered. The numbers have shifted. Within the 36, at this time, we have 26 families that have been notified. We have nine tentative IDs, and we still have one Doe remaining that needs to be notified.

WATSON: Please allow me to introduce Oakland Fire Department Battalion Chief Lipp. He will update you on operations that took place last night and early this morning.

ROBERT LIPP, BATTALION CHIEF, OAKLAND FIRE DEPARTMENT: Good morning. So as you recall, yesterday, we were forced to suspend recovery operations interior due to the instability of the structure. Working throughout the day yesterday and last night, we were able to remove the parapet wall that was presenting the greatest danger and then we're also able to put in some shoring to stabilize some of the flooring areas.

This morning at 2:20, we went back in and resumed recovery operations. At this time, we've been able to search through the building and clear approximately 85 percent of the building right now. We'll be continuing that throughout the day. There's one corner that remains unstable and then that's another thing that we're going to be doing throughout the day today, is stabilizing that corner so that we can search that last section.

[09:05:01] WATSON: I'd like to update our citizens and our community regarding the PG&E planned power outage. Currently, the power is still off in this specific area. They are anticipating that the power will be returned by maybe 8:00 a.m., but right now, safety is paramount so the power will remain off while the crane and heavy equipment is here still processing the scene.

I would also like to call in my partner, Public Information Officer Marco Marquez. We would like to provide some information to our community. We have a lot of very good-willed citizens, community members, people outside of the city of Oakland, outside of the state, even outside of the country, who want to donate and deservingly so donate. Logistically, it is challenging for us to take donations here, so we have a system set up. And we have information we would like to share for anyone who would like to donate, so please allow him to provide that information.

OFFICER MARCO MARQUEZ, OAKLAND POLICE DEPARTMENT SPOKESPERSON: Good morning, everyone. My name is Marco Marquez. That's M-A-R-C-O M-A- R-Q-U-E-Z, one of the Oakland Police Department public information officers. And the information I have to share with you is there is a Web page set up on youcaring.com -- that's Y-O-U C-A-R-I-N-G dot com -- and if you go on the search bar there and search up "Oakland fire" or "Victims of the Oakland fire," you will see a link that is connected there that is set up by the city as well as the Red Cross.

Now, here at the site, we are experiencing overwhelming amount of support, people coming in bringing food, and asking how can they donate financially. And it is overwhelming here, and so it is set up online to where you can make those donations, whether you're here or if you're across the nation or even international. As we all know, the magnitude of the impact here on the families as well as our community, and one way we're asking those who want to give back is to give back through this Web site.

It goes a long way. The funds will be appropriately distributed, and if you visit that site, you can see how. But this is just an ask to the community. We know you're praying. We know that your thoughts are with us, but if you feel like giving financially, please visit the Web site. Again, that is youcaring -- Y-O-U C-A-R-I-N-G -- dot com and search up "Victims of the Oakland fire." Thank you.

WATSON: Thank you, Officer Marquez. At this time, we're going to open up for questions. I'm going to ahead and start on the right and we'll work our way around. Go ahead, sir.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So there's still about 15 percent of the building to search. Can you talk about what the challenges are? Are there other some specific challenges about that 15 percent remaining to search that is kind of holding that part up?

LIPP: Sure. It's primarily that B, C corner. So as you face the corner, that left corner of the building, we're not able to totally secure that yet. We're going to be putting in some bracing, exterior bracing, today, and then that will finalize that corner. And then there's a very small section that's in the back that still needs to be processed with ATF and our crews.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Did you guys have some tarps up in case of rain to (inaudible)? Will the rain affect anything when it rains?

LIPP: You know, I haven't really approached that with rain and tarps as of yet. The rain shouldn't adversely impact what we're doing.

WATSON: Go ahead, Will?

WILL: Do you anticipate the number of people to go up (inaudible)?

LIPP: Based on the areas that remain unsearched, I don't anticipate it going up. There's one section that's still in an area that has some potential but otherwise, no.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: On the website you mentioned, Officer Marquez, there are several pooling funds, obviously. There's one that (inaudible) Mayor's office as it progressed?

MARQUEZ: Yes, sir, that is correct. There also is an Oakland A's one that is set up as well that's right next to it that you'll see.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.

MARQUEZ: And so those two are set up for this specific incident.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you.

WATSON: OK.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (Inaudible).

LIPP: Yes. So the issue with that corner is it's unsupported laterally as you move across, so that load then gets shift along that left wall, what we're calling the Bravo wall. If we remove the parapet there, then that can cause that wall to become unstable. So what we need to do is put bracing in so that we can support that entire corner. If we remove the parapet wall, that raises the possibility that the B sidewall could become unstable, and we don't want to do that.

[09:10:07] WATSON: OK.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (Inaudible).

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HARLOW: All right. An update from officials there in Oakland. Some of the main headlines here. No update on the number of casualties at this point in time, so 36 people who have perished in this tragic fire. But they are not completely through the building. They said there's still a corner area of this warehouse that they need to search. About 70 percent has been searched, but still, they do fear they could come across even more victims. Let's go back to Stephanie Elam who's live in Oakland for us.

Stephanie, what else stood out to you?

ELAM: I think what's interesting here is that every time we have heard from a press conference, they have said that the number of people who've lost their lives has gone up. They're saying now that they did not find any more bodies overnight. And now that they've made their way 85 percent of the way through, they're feeling that they are getting to the end of the recovery efforts but still taking their time methodically to go through that.

Also, last we heard, there were three people that they were not able to identify. They're now saying that they have one person that they're not able to identify, so making some progress there as well. This one corner that is unstable is part of what has been slowing them down for the last couple of days on making their way through the building, and so that's what we heard a lot about. This is one corner that they don't want to make their way into because it could fall or could collapse so that's why they're taking their time.

But really learning more now about the fact that 26 of these people, they've been able to identify, nine as well. So between those numbers together, you've got positively identifying and tentatively identifying. They're making their way through the 36. They're letting family members know that their lost loved ones, that they've been able to identify them.

HARLOW: Absolutely heartbreaking. Stephanie, thank you so much, live for us in Oakland.

Meantime also in California, Los Angeles this morning, on high alert after a terror threat on the subway system there. The FBI confirming it did receive an overseas tip about a possible bombing at the Universal City stop that is right near Universal Studios. Officials calling the threat, quote, "specific and imminent." Law enforcement ramping up security as they search for possible explosives.

The Mayor of Los Angeles, in the meantime, says he will ride that line, the Red Line, today in an effort to show that it is safe. We will continue, of course, to follow this story out of Los Angeles this morning as we learn more.

Meantime, President-elect Donald Trump back on the road this week. Today, he travels to North Carolina for the second leg of his "Thank You" tour, but first it is all about business. A busy day of meetings as Trump weighs potential Cabinet picks. Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson, former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, and conservative radio host Laura Ingraham, all on today's schedule to meet with the President- elect. All of this as his pick for National Security adviser retired General Michael Flynn continues to face a lot of heat.

Let's bring in Jessica Schneider. She's live for us this morning outside of Trump Tower.

Good morning. What does the elevator watch tell us?

JESSICA SCHNEIDER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, good morning, Poppy. You know, it's another adrenaline-fueled day for the President-elect, just the way that Donald Trump likes it. We're expecting a number of meetings throughout the day, but then, of course, it's onto to the second stop in his "Thank You" tour this time in Fayetteville, North Carolina that's happening at 7:00 tonight.

But before he hops on that plane to head down South, he will be meeting with an array of people who are actually drawing a lot of intrigue. You mentioned Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson. Well, it turns out, the sources are telling us, that he's being potentially considered on what's a growing list of Secretary of State names. Of course, sources say that it is a long shot but that Donald Trump is very intrigued by Tillerson's world view.

Other notable names that will be here at Trump Tower today, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser as well as former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, who just arrived back into the United States from China where he met with President Xi.

Also, conservative radio host Laura Ingraham. She has been floated out there for the possibility of Press Secretary. She talked about it this morning. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LAURA INGRAHAM, HOST, THE LAURA INGRAHAM SHOW: We've been friends for a long time, and I'm looking forward to having a conversation. There's no agenda. There really is no agenda. Obviously, my name has been bandied about for Press Secretary. There is a lot of considerations.

But, you know, I talked to someone over the weekend who you all would know and I said, well, you know, if this opportunity presented itself, and he said, sometimes it's really good to change up your life a little bit. Give it a little jolt. Give it a couple of paddles on the side and like, change things up a little bit. And sometimes if your country calls you and if God opens that door, you have to really seriously consider it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCHNEIDER: So it is down to business here at Trump Tower with all of those meetings, but, you know, Donald Trump did get out on the town tonight making another stop to his favored 21 Club in midtown Manhattan. It's a New York institution, a former speak easy. Of course, that's also where Donald Trump was a few weeks ago when he ditched the press pool and went there.

[09:14:58] But you can see some of the pictures when Donald Trump walked into the restaurant, some of the people there cheering for him. He did dine at the restaurant with his wife, Melania, as well as his three eldest children, Donald Jr., Ivanka, and Eric Trump. So a little bit of fun before getting back down to business today. And then, of course, later tonight, hitting the road for one of those rallies that his top advisor Kellyanne Conway called the oxygen for the president-elect -- Poppy.

HARLOW: There you go. We saw him during the campaign and they continue in this period and perhaps into his presidency.

Thank you, Jessica. We appreciate it.

Coming up, Donald Trump might be in talks with future appointees, but it's one that he has already made. A decision he's already made about this man, General Michael Flynn, that is taking a lot of heat. Why dozens of activist groups have penned a letter saying Flynn must go.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARLOW: President-elect Donald Trump now facing increased pressure to rescind his offer to retired General Michael Flynn as his national security advisor pick.

[09:20:04] More than 50 progressive organizations, including MoveOn.org, signing a letter arguing that Flynn is, quote, "unfit for the job".

Among their concerns, comments made by Flynn that, quote, "fear of Muslims is rational" and also concerns about his ties to foreign governments when he was advising. They write, "His appointment will damage America's standing in the world and pose a threat to our national security."

It is really important to point out Flynn's position doesn't need Senate confirmation. So this is pretty much a done deal.

Let's discuss. With me now, Lynn Sweet, she's a Washington bureau chief for "The Chicago Sun-Times". Errol Louis is here with us here in New York, CNN political commentator and political anchor of Spectrum News. And Heidi Przybyla, she's a senior political reporter for "USA Today".

Welcome to you all.

And, let's first look at the major concerns are about things that he's tweeted and a lot of it about also not just the comments about Muslims but about fake news. This is a tweet that he put out there in November but has left up, quote, "you decide, NYPD blows whistle on new Hillary e-mails, money laundering, sex crimes with children, et cetera, a must read."

Now, here's the issue. There's no basis in fact for that, but we've just seen this week the real life impact that fake news can have when a man armed with an assault rifle went into the D.C. pizzeria, fired shots because of a fake news story tying Hillary Clinton to a conspiracy theory that he wanted to, according to his own words, investigate for himself.

Lynn, to you. You wrote in your column today that the Oxford Dictionary's word of 2016 is post-truth. This is a serious problem. How should Flynn be addressing this?

LYNN SWEET, WASHINGTON BUREAU CHIEF, CHICAGO SUN-TIMES : Well, I don't know because you're dealing with somebody in a new world here, somebody, a prominent public official going into a presidential administration who wants to push false news stories. This is somebody who comes out of the world of intelligence. He was -- he is somebody who has vast responsibilities to advise the administration on what is true and what is not in the world.

Now, you mentioned a moment ago that groups complained about him. Well, those are all Democratic allied groups, Poppy --

HARLOW: Right.

SWEET: -- so I don't think they'll have any sway at all on the situation.

HARLOW: But I think, you know, Errol, to you, when you look at the bigger concerns over fake news, those aren't just among Democrats. I would argue there are many conservatives that are concerned about things like that, especially seeing what played out in D.C. as a result of a fake news story.

ERROL LOUIS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, sure. But let's be clear. The problem goes all the way to the top. We're talking about a president-elect who launched his public career based on the lie of birtherism which he has never renounced.

HARLOW: But he did come out, as you know, near the end of the campaign and say, with two sentences, the president was born here.

LOUIS: OK. Right. So, rather than make excuses for him, let's be clear. He spent years telling a lie over and over again that he has never renounced. And that's at the beginning of the campaign. At the end of the campaign, he makes a claim about millions of false votes or sort of stolen votes and he's never renounced or clarified that either.

So, you know, you can't really fault General Flynn for doing what his boss, his future boss, has been doing to great success for a number of years now. And I think this letter as partisan as it is, and Lynn is correct, it won't hold a lot of political weight, this is not something Congress has to approve, but I think it will at least signal to General Flynn that he is being watched and that his performance has to really step up quite a bit from these kind of tweets that he's been putting out.

HARLOW: There has also been, Heidi, a lot of concern about his son in terms of what he has tweeted in the past. Very controversial things. But including what he just tweeted on Sunday night.

Let's read that because this is about the pizza gate issue, the fake news story that led that person with a gun into the restaurant. He tweeted, "Until pizza-gate is proven to be false. It will remain a story. The left seems to forget, Podesta e-mails and many, quote, 'coincidences' tie to them."

It's not just that this is son. I mean, this is someone who he is his chief of staff and this is someone who is right now working for and employed by the Trump transition team.

HEIDI PRZYBYLA, SENIOR POLITICS REPORTER, USA TODAY: And you ask yourself, how can he possibly get away with tweeting this, and then standing by it and digging in? And I think this is basically at this point magnifying what is a really broader systemic problem of accountability here in Washington.

Now, you talked about both parties being concerned about fake news. That's probably true. But the autopsies show that the overwhelming majority of the fake news infrastructure is targeted at Democrats.

So, that is why when you see leaders like Paul Ryan who are asked, for example, about Donald Trump himself tweeting out fake news about millions of illegal voters, which is completely unproven, and he does not push back, instead he says, "Well, he won, so let's move on," that is where you see that you have a real problem that we are not in -- we're in a -- we are in a post-truth world if folks like Paul Ryan won't set the facts straight.

[09:25:09] Going back to 2008, for example, John McCain had a moment, the no ma'am moment, where he was asked whether -- or he was -- a voter stated that the president is Muslim and he said, no, ma'am. We're not seeing Republican leaders step up like that on these issues. HARLOW: That's a very interesting comparison. I remember that moment

vividly.

Before I let you guys go, a brand new tweet from Donald Trump this morning. Let's pull it up, talking about Boeing, the major U.S. aircraft maker. "Boeing is building a brand new 747 Air Force One for future presidents but costs are out of control $4 billion. Cancel order."

This is fascinating to me for a lot of reasons. But, Errol, this is him talking about government waste and, of course, any president-elect should be talking about what they deem to be government waste. But he's doing it in a unique way, through Twitter and he is taking on this company head on, not calling the CEO saying can we negotiate. He's putting it out for the public --

SWEET: The CEO is in his transition advisory team.

(LAUGHTER)

HARLOW: It is just -- there are so many layers to this that fascinate me. Lynn, go ahead.

SWEET: The CEO is on his transition advisory team. He has total access to him.

HARLOW: Right. So why put it out there like that, Errol? I mean, this is what he did with Carrier, too. He saved those jobs.

LOUIS: You know, sooner or later this is going to end up in court, this kind of behavior if it continues, because there are procurement rules. There are things that you are and are not supposed to do to try to influence the outcome of a bid like this.

Frankly, I'd start with the number that he's putting out there. That $4 billion claim sounds wildly out of whack compared with the actual cost of a plane, which apparently is from what I can tell from the aircraft website $370 million. You've got to have two planes.

HARLOW: Look at you doing your research on the fly.

LOUIS: Then you add security enhancements and so forth, the expected life of 30 years. Frankly, it may not be that much. You know, it's expensive to protect the most powerful man in the world.

HARLOW: Quick thought, Heidi.

PRZYBYLA: This is all about branding. We're continuing to see the president kind of brand himself as the populist just like he did with Carrier even though the effects may be minimal. He's getting -- if you look at the polls, he's getting a lot of credit from the public by highlighting these things --

HARLOW: Yes.

PRZYBYLA: -- which is fairly -- it's fair to point out, this is something that President Obama didn't do, for example, with the bailout which was worth so much more in terms of jobs.

HARLOW: Good point.

SWEET: Good point.

HARLOW: Lynn, Heidi, Errol, nice to have you on. Thank you so much.

I'm sure the CEO of Boeing and Donald Trump are probably talking right now.

Quick note, Vice President-elect Mike Pence will be live on "THE LEAD" today with Jake Tapper, 4:00 p.m. Eastern, don't miss that.

Also, Donald Trump doubling down on a campaign threat to U.S. companies. The only problem, some GOP leaders not buying in. They don't like this. Mr. Trump re-vowing on Twitter that he will impose a 35 percent tariff on companies who moved jobs overseas. Top Republicans this morning raising major red flags.

CNN's Alison Kosik is with me.

And I should note, we have a history lesson here, right? I mean, the last time this was done in the 1930s, it was disastrous for the economy.

ALISON KOSIK, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Yes, there is historical precedent. I think this is a very different situation but there are deep seeded concerns about, you know, if Donald Trump goes ahead and -- goes ahead and taxes these companies 35 percent for goods that they bring into the U.S. and a way to punish them for sending job overseas.

There are a lot of concerns. For one, it would make goods here in the U.S. more expensive. It could hurt companies. It could ultimately cause a trade war and I think that's part of the reason why you're seeing a lot of the top GOP leaders really not stand behind Trump with this. They're coming out with very strong statements.

One from House Speaker Paul Ryan saying this, "I think we can get at the goal here, which is to keep American businesses American. Build things in America and sell them overseas -- that can be properly addressed with comprehensive tax reform."

And yet another statement from House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy saying, "I don't want to get into some type of trade war. I don't think government should be picking winners and losers." The idea here is let's think of something else to incentivize companies to keep jobs here, to stay here. And the only way to do that, they say, is to redo the tax code.

HARLOW: Which hasn't been done in a long, long, long time. Before I let you go, the market. The wild card is how would the market react if, indeed, these tariffs were instituted, which he could find creative ways to do in the short term.

KOSIK: Right. He could. But I don't think you're not going to see the market react, favorably. Right now, you're seeing the market open at a record high. It's 19th

of the year. And you're seeing the market really react to a Trump presidency for what the hope is that he can bring. You're seeing low taxes, less regulation, you know, this pro-growth theme that Trump has ushered in.

Everybody thought the market was going to tank when he came into office but -- if he was elected but we're not seeing that. We're seeing this run up for stocks.

HARLOW: He's being handed a pretty remarkable economy.

KOSIK: He is starting off on a strong foot.

HARLOW: On a strong foot. Alison, thank you very much. Appreciate it.

KOSIK: Up next, Donald Trump's thank you tour heads tonight to North Carolina. That is where we will take you, next.

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