Return to Transcripts main page

New Day

Nepal Earthquake; Bruce Jenner Sparks National Dialogue; Bush Criticizes Obama's Approach On Iran; CNN Special Report: "Blindsided: How ISIS Shook The World." Aired 8:30-9a ET

Aired April 27, 2015 - 08:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:31:03] ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Back to our continuing coverage of the crisis in Nepal. More than 3,800 people are dead following a 7.8 magnitude quake, and thousands more could still be buried. Nearly 100 aftershocks creating even more terror and hampering rescue efforts.

Also, at least 17 people killed by an avalanche at Mt. Everest, with many still trapped on that mountain.

So let's get more from CNN's chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta. He's live for us from a hospital in Kathmandu in Nepal.

Sanjay, we wanted to get an update on the little girl who you performed emergency brain surgery on earlier this morning. How's she doing?

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Some good news there, Alisyn. She's doing - she looks like she's doing well. So she recovered well after the operation. The pressure off of her brain. You know, moving all of her limbs well, awake. Even learned a little bit more about her parents. Her parents were actually found. It was unclear where - what their whereabouts were earlier, but they were - they were found. They were actually in their home with other child. So, some good news, I think, for her.

But, you know, there are so many people who are still in need. In fact, shortly after we saw that little girl, there was another girl, same age, also eight years old, with a similar injury, also a blood clot on top of the brain, who's also going to need an operation. So, you know, good news for that first little girl.

I imagine that this other little girl is here soon enough that she'll get good care. But just gives you an idea, Alisyn, of the constant demand for care. This is two days out. People still coming in with what would normally be very, very acute injuries that are getting their care here.

CAMEROTA: Sanjay, we're so happy to hear that her parents were found. I mean that was - at the beginning of the program you said that she had been separated from her parents and we didn't know if they were ever be reunited. Can you tell us a little bit more about, without communication, how they were able to put them back together? GUPTA: I know. You know, I don't know for sure how that happened, you

know. I - we know that there was other relatives who showed up and gave us that good news. You know, it's so ad hoc here. You're so used to being able to pick up the phone, call and figure things out. The communication is terrible right now. I mean the infrastructure is so poor right now because of the earthquake. But, yes, it is really good news. And, you know, I mean, and it was just - it was so good to see that part of it. I think she had been understood that her, you know, her parents were OK and so it is good news.

CAMEROTA: Wow.

GUPTA: And I - you know, I bring up the fact that there are more patients that need care, obviously, because we don't want to forget that. But, yes, good news for little Selena (ph), eight years old.

CAMEROTA: Yes, of course. No, that is a bright spot in the calamity that you've been covering there. Sanjay, thanks so much for that and for the work you're doing there.

GUPTA: Yes.

CAMEROTA: Great to see you.

Let's get over to Chris.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: In a situation like that, you take good news where and when you find it.

All right, another big topic this morning, Bruce Jenner is now a woman. The word transgender is echoing through households all over the country. Is that a good thing? Part of our cultural evolution? Or does it mean the death of decency? To discuss, Ryan Anderson, a senior fellow at American principles and public policy at The Heritage Foundation.

Ryan, thank you for being here.

RYAN ANDERSON, SENIOR RESEARCH FELLOW, HERITAGE FOUNDATION: Hey, thanks for having me.

CUOMO: So, broke the ratings, broke the Internet, was a big deal, a big spectacle. Do you see this as part of the solution or the problem?

ANDERSON: I think this is part of the solution in the sense that we all need to be having a conversation about this. This is great that Bruce Jenner is telling his story. I think it will be important that we hear other people's stories, that we hear Walt Heyer, who has spoken about his experience being transgender and he had the sex reassignment surgery. It didn't help him in that situation. He's speaking about that. We spoke to Dr. Paul McHugh (ph), the chief of psychiatry at Johns Hopkins Medical School and Johns Hopkins Hospital. He stopped Johns Hopkins from doing sex reassignment surgery. Said it created more problems than it solved. So I think we need to hear all these voices. CUOMO: Why? Why do we need to hear voices about who it helped and who it didn't help and why it should be done and why it shouldn't be done if it is a matter of legal right and your own personal choice?

[08:35:05] ANDERSON: Sure, I mean, I just think we need to be having an informed discussion. I mean we should know, how do we respond in love to someone like Bruce? I'm not interested in for the government taking sides one way or the other on these issues. I don't think the government should be involved. It should be up to each individual. But I think how we respond as a community needs to be based on good information. And that's why all voices, all stories matter.

CUOMO: But because of your first concern, how we respond as a community, you have forced the government to get involved because that reaction from the community has been overall or overweighed negative. Judgmental. We get to judge this. We get to say if it's good or not. We're going to balance voices on it, when you could argue this is a personal decision. We don't have community change about how I do my hair. Why do we have to have it about what I decide to do with my life? So the law has had to get involved because LGBT is now arguably discriminated against as a class.

ANDERSON: Well, I don't know about that. I think we have tons of talk shows that talk about how you should do your hair. We have lots of community discussions about fashion, about -

CUOMO: But not your right to do your hair a certain ways.

ANDERSON: But no one's suggesting that he should have a right here. Is anyone suggesting that Bruce Jenner shouldn't have a right to speak out the therapy or the hormones or the surgery if he ever opts for that option, if he chooses to? I don't - I don't know of anyone trying to limit his freedom here.

CUOMO: Well, certainly there are those who are doing exactly that but they don't have the power to enforce it. You see that power come into play when it comes to same-sex marriage and the rights to be enjoyed as a class under the Constitution. That's the issue.

ANDERSON: Well, sure. So in the case of the - tomorrow morning in the Supreme Court, we're going to hear whether or not states can define marriage for themselves. There's nothing in the Constitution that tells us what marriage is. They are good arguments that think marriage should be a genderless institution. It's just a consenting adult relationship between two people. Other people think there are good arguments that marriage is between a man and a woman, a husband and wife, a mother and a father, that's how the entire world had been doing it up until about a decade ago. I don't think nine unelected judges can settle this question for the whole nation. This is a type of thing that needs to be settled democratically. And there are good reasons on both sides.

CUOMO: But if you allow it to be settled democratically, you can then play to cultural mores and norms that are not necessarily fair to everyone. As we saw with slavery, you're now seeing an evolution here in law and in culture with LGBT. They say, I get you may like it, you may not like it, but I want the right to do it. And the Constitution, as Representative Bingham (ph) tried very hard when he put together the 14th Amendment, extends to all people and I'm a person.

ANDERSON: Of course. So the Constitution protects equality before the law. And I think everyone in this discussion is in favor of marriage equality. We want the law to treat all marriages equally. The question is, what type of consenting adult relationship is a marriage? And that's the question that the Constitution doesn't answer.

CUOMO: Why -

ANDERSON: That's the question that the people have to answer.

CUOMO: But that's a legal question. Is that a legal question?

ANDERSON: It's a policy question. And in this case, the people in the four states in the sixth circuit, they went to the ballot box and they voted to make marriage policy as the union of a man and a woman, a husband and a wife, a mother and a father. If you're in favor of a different marriage policy, convince those citizens democratically and then win a vote. This isn't the type of issue for nine unelected judges to solve for the entire nation.

CUOMO: But, arguably, is it for a population whose mores change and go back and forth or maybe they never do but their feelings in their absolute way limit the rights of a class. And then it doesn't matter how many want it right?

ANDERSON: Well, no one - no one's limiting the rights of anyone. So in all 50 states, two people of the same sex can live with each other and love each other. They can have a wedding ceremony at a church or a synagogue. They can work for a business that gives them marriage benefits. None of that is being limited by the government. The only question here is, what sort of relationship are the states going to recognize as a marriage? And that's a question that can only be solved democratically. Judges have no greater insight into the answer to that question than you and I have.

CUOMO: Right, but they -

ANDERSON: So we need to have this discussion.

CUOMO: Their role is to say whether or not there's right has a remedy under law. And that's going to be their question. When you look at the state of Alabama, the concern becomes, you have people who 99-1 vote that they want marriage to be between a man and a woman, they have a constitutional amendment, and now those judges won't marry anybody else. That is an infringement of rights, many would argue, of the LGBT class that is excluded by that amendment. So if the Supreme Court finds otherwise, then those states would have to change their laws.

ANDERSON: Right. And if the Supreme Court rules in an activist way, if the Supreme Court says we're discarding the votes of millions of citizens in the 50 states who voted to define marriage between a man and a woman, yes, that would redefine marriage in those states. It would be a travesty. CUOMO: Why?

ANDERSON: It would be just like what the court did in Roe v. Wade. We have a culture war now over abortion because we can't make marriage policy democratically. Look at Europe. They don't have a culture war over abortion because they have settled their marriage policy with compromise solutions. Roe v. Wade took it out of the democratic process, tried to settle it once and for all for all 50 states and now every four years at election time abortion is the most divisive issue in American politics. Why would we want to repeat that mistake now on the marriage question?

CUOMO: Because if you didn't have Roe v. Wade, you would have had a cultural institution in place that said women didn't get to decide what to do with their own bodies. And that required legal help.

[08:40:00] ANDERSON: On the other side of that you have - but the other side of that would be, we would have a cultural institution that could protect unborn children from being killed in the womb. We could find compromise solutions like the 20 week bill. We're one of only seven nations that allows abortion after 20 weeks. Why would we want to be in the company of those other six nations that are not human rights champions, they're human rights violators. We would be able to have much better abortion policy in this nation if, as you pointed out, mores are changing, values are changing, we allowed it to change through the democratic process, not through the wisdom of the high court.

CUOMO: How do you protect those who are exposed to the slow movement of everybody else? That becomes the question, law, culture, it's being debated. We'll see how it plays out in the court.

ANDERSON: Yes.

CUOMO: We won't know until June, but it starts tomorrow.

Ryan -

ANDERSON: Hey, thanks for having me.

CUOMO: Thank you for laying out both sides. Look forward to having you back.

ANDERSON: Thank you.

CUOMO: Mic.

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: All right, Chris.

Former President George W. Bush harshly criticizing President Obama over that Iran nuke deal. Ahead, more on his blistering attack on his successor.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) GEORGE W. BUSH, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: I don't think it's good for the country to have a former president undermine a current president. I think it's bad for the presidency for that matter.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[08:44:59] CAMEROTA: Well, that was former President Bush's opinion last year of speaking poorly about his successor. But now President Bush is voicing pointed criticism of President Obama. Here's the rub, though. The critical comments came during a closed-door meeting.

So let's bring in Josh Rogin. He wrote an article about this for Bloomberg View and about specifically what President Bush's comments were.

Josh, great to see you. So this was a rare appearance by President Bush, because he has generally stayed out of the limelight and certainly out of political discourse. What did he say during this meeting?

JOSH ROGIN, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Good morning, Alisyn. You're right. He was speaking to a group of Jewish donors in Las Vegas, Republican Jewish coalition meeting, but there were so many people in there you would think that he would know that this was going to leak out almost immediately. And of course it did.

And after six years of saying almost nothing about President Obama's foreign policy, he went into a pretty much 40-minute criticism. He said that the president was being naive on Iran, that this president of Iran, Rouhani, was just a new spokesman, not a new policy in Iran. He said that the president's policy that sanctions could be lifted, and then snapped back was just not plausible. He says that the president is losing the war against ISIS. He said that the president has miscalculated against Putin and went into several other things as well. It was really kind of a vicious across-the-board critique of Obama's foreign policy especially in the Middle East.

CAMEROTA: That's interesting because your characterization of this is a little different than "The New York Times" account which I'm reading right now. They make it sound as though he did give his take on foreign policy, but he didn't directly criticize President Obama. Did he use President Obama's name or was all this more oblique?

ROGIN: I think what you're seeing here is that I got a lot more direct quotes than "The New York Times" did so I had a little bit more detail than them, or a lot more detail. What he said was he said that - he was kind of was cute about it, he said that oh, well Lindsey Graham says that the withdrawal from Iraq in 2011 was a strategic blunder, right, referring to President Obama's decision not to keep troops there. He said that the president was not -- didn't have a plan to defeat the Islamic state in Iraq. He touted his own plan. He said that the surge was a success because when Iraq policy wasn't doing well he changed it and Obama won't change the policy even though he's losing the war against the Islamic State now. So he went into a lot of detail. And I think we see a lot of different reports roll out pieces of that. CAMEROTA: As we mentioned this was a closed-door meeting. So what are

the rules here? Was this supposed to be off the record?

ROGIN: For the people who were in the meeting and who agreed to keep it off the record, yes, it was supposed to be off the record. Those people broke the agreement and the journalists who didn't agree to those terms were free to report what leaks they could get. I got almost a full transcript of the remarks.

But I think it's kind of understood that when you speak to a room of 300 people that it's very hard to keep all of those remarks off the record, especially when you're the former president and you're speaking so bluntly and so extensively about the current president, especially in this charged environment.

CAMEROTA: Alright, Josh Rogin, thanks so much for sharing your report with us.

ROGIN: Any time.

CAMEROTA: Nice to see you.

CUOMO: ISIS was dismissed as a JV team by the president and now it is the most opposed force in the world since the Nazis. Mistakes were made and Fareed Zakaria has a look inside ISIS that will open your eyes. Check out this "SPECIAL REPORT" when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:51:16] CUOMO: It is a question that is asked each time ISIS strikes. How can a terror group like this rise to such power, seemingly out of nowhere when they're so brutal? Who would buy in? And how didn't we see it coming?

These are questions that often we look to Fareed Zakaria to answer for us. He's going to do just that in a CNN "SPECIAL REPORT" called "Blindsided: How ISIS Shook the World," airing tonight at 9:00 p.m. Here's a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FAREED ZAKARIA, CNN HOST, "FAREED ZAKARIA GPS" (voice-over): This extraordinary video gives us a rare look into everyday life under ISIS. It brings to mind the (INAUDIBLE) concept, the banality of evil.

ISIS has its own license plates and traffic cops who give parking tickets. And there are friendly shopkeepers.

JURGEN TODENHOFER, GERMAN JOURNALIST (on camera): Completely brainwashed. I've never in my life met people like this.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: So fascinating to see this at work because you always tell us ISIS isn't just about terror, they want to rule and this is just a taste of a five-part series. Tell us about the access, the journalist involved, and what the big take is.

ZAKARIA: Well, you know, Tom Friedman in the documentary, in the special, says this is the most difficult story I've ever covered in 40 years of covering the Middle East. Why? He says because ISIS has a department of killing journalists. They don't want observers. Most, you know, he covered Hezbollah, he covered Hamas. So this is unusual. This is a German journalist, Jurgen Todenhofer, who managed to go in, obviously cooperating with them, but came out with this kind of video that made you realize they are very focused on something al Qaeda was not. This is where they're different. They want to create a state. They want to create a caliphate. That's very important to them. They're trying to figure out not simply how to do terrorism. Terrorism is all in service of creating the caliphate.

CUOMO: So, as the material started to come in and you're organizing your thoughts, what stood out to you most?

ZAKARIA: Probably the most interesting aspect of it was how we were blindsided. That's why the, you know, that's the title. But it's not just the United States. It's the Arabs. It's the people around. The neighbors. Everyone, no one saw this coming, and why? Part of it was we were all focused on al Qaeda. Right? This is something that comes, when your eye is in one direction you don't see something coming out of the other side.

The other piece of it was the Americans thought they had killed Zarqawi who represented al Qaeda in Iraq which was the precursor to ISIS. We didn't see this phoenix-like rising up from the ashes.

And finally, you know, we thought it was contained in Syria. We didn't realize that these guys really were about Iraq. And one of the real revelations I think in this primetime special is the military backbone of ISIS is Saddam Hussein's old army.

CUOMO: I remember you saying, boy, if this Iraqi reassemblage of government does not embrace the Sunnis, you're going to lose a lot of leadership and where will they go? And I remember presenting that ominous question, we now know the answer to it. They went and created the formation of ISIS which is why they're as organized as they are. Right?

ZAKARIA: Absolutely. I mean it's extraordinary now the more you dig the more you realize that the military operations of ISIS in Iraq and Syria are essentially run by colonels and generals from Saddam Hussein's army.

And what's particularly striking about this is, these guys are not Islamists at all, at least ostensibly the baathist party was a very secular party. It was a socialist, secular type of party. So what they're about is not so much religion, as power.

[08:55:09] But they are very well-organized. These guys are good at what they do. There's an organizational chart that the German weekly "Der Spiegel" got, and it's, you know, it's like the way the U.S. army would do something, or the Europeans would do something. CUOMO: It's a little bit of an opposite paradigm. Usually religion is

the reason and then you have to find the muscle for whatever your change mechanism is. Here, it's you have these former Baathists who are looking to control, and have a real caliphate, as you say, and they're using religion as the muscle to get people to sign on board. Five-part series. Great work.

ZAKARIA: Thank you, sir.

CUOMO: Thanks for bringing it to us. Remember, tonight 9:00 p.m. Eastern, the CNN "SPECIAL REPORT" "Blindsided." You got the handsome guy there on the screen to remind you, Fareed. And it's called "Blindsided: How ISIS Shook the World."

Our thanks for Fareed for taking us inside that there are journalists so brave living among some of the most fearsome people in the world.

PEREIRA: There is so much more for you ahead here on CNN on the search and recovery efforts that or ongoing after that deadly Nepal earthquake.

We have the "NEWSROOM" with Carol Costello. It will start right after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:00:05] CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning I'm Carol Costello. Thank you so much for joining me.