Return to Transcripts main page

New Day

New Information on Killer of Two Journalists Surfaces; Two Journalists Killed on Air Remembered by Colleagues; Donald Trump Stirs Controversy by Using Phrase "Silent Majority"; Interview with HUD Secretary Julian Castro. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired August 28, 2015 - 08:00   ET

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

[08:00:00] DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: You have a silent majority in this country that feels abused, that feels forgotten, that feels mistreated.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This really is racially based.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: People hear what they want to hear. There's no racism in that.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It looked like the movie set of an Armageddon scene.

BARACK OBAMA, (D) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: American city dark and underwater.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The 10th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina.

OBAMA: This is a city that slowly, unmistakably is moving forward.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Chris Cuomo, Alisyn Camerota, and Michaela Pereira.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, Welcome to your NEW DAY. It is Friday, August 28, now 8:00 in the east. And the man who shot and killed two members of a news crew on live TV in Virginia may have turned to suicide as plan b. Search of the murderer's car turned up some odd items suggests that he was gearing up for what could have been a big spree and a potential getaway.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: And a new push for gun control emerging in the wake of these shootings led by the father of Alison Parker, that's the reporter who was killed. CNN's Polo Sandoval starts our coverage from Roanoke this morning. Good morning, Polo.

POLO SANDOVAL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Alisyn, good morning. It has been a very busy 48 hours for investigators working around the clock, trying to make some sense of what happened Wednesday morning. And after review of all the evidence, a closer look at that very chilling suicide note, they now have a clearer picture of who Vester Flanagan was and what may have compelled him to do such a terrible act. And new evidence suggesting he may have planned to make it out alive.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SANDOVAL: This morning, evidence of an apparent getaway plan found inside 41-year-old Vester Flanagan's rental car. A search warrant revealing that Flanagan had a wig, shawl, and sunglasses, along with multiple license plates, a to-do list, six clock magazines, and a pistol. But the gunman was unable to evade police, shooting himself as they closed in on the side of a Virginia highway.

This is video of his one bedroom apartment obtained by NBC. You can see the refrigerator covered with photos of himself, possible warning signs of the anger fueling his murderous attack on Adam Ward and Alison Parker live on air began surfacing over a decade ago. In 2000 he was fired from a television station in northern Florida.

MARIE MATTOX, ATTORNEY FOR SHOOTER FROM 2000 LAWSUIT: I was concerned about just his mental status and whether he needed counseling.

SANDOVAL: Then in 2013 he caused a disturbing scene being fired from WDBJ, lashing out at coworkers including victim Adam Ward.

JEFF MARKS, GENERAL MANAGER WDBJ: On the way out he handed a wooden cross to the news director and said "You'll need this."

SANDOVAL: Prior to being let go, internal documents show coworkers said he made them feel threatened and extremely uncomfortable. And the stations' manager says Flanagan was asked to seek mental health assistance.

ANDY PARKER, FATHER OF KILLED JOURNALIST: I'm not saying let's take away guns. I'm just saying let's make it harder for people with mental issues.

SANDOVAL: In an interview with NEW DAY's Chris Cuomo, Parker's father says gun regulations have to change.

PARKER: There has to be a way to force politicians that are cowards and in the pockets of the NRA to have sensible laws so that crazy people can't get guns.

SANDOVAL: A father's crusade for stricter gun laws --

(SINGING)

SANDOVAL: -- met with a rally against gun violence at the WDBJ station Thursday night.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SANDOVAL: And that growing makeshift memorial a true sign and really a large tribute to not only the victims here but also the rest of the staff at WDBJ. And we are also being told by the general manager of that station that they do expect a visit by Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe here in the next hour or so, Alisyn. We'll let you know if that happens.

CAMEROTA: Polo, we've come to learn what a family that staff at the station is. Even before this, they all considered themselves family. So we did earlier speak with the anchor there, Kimberly McBroom. She was on the anchor desk of WDBJ's morning show as the murders unfolded live on air. Here's what she told us about how they working together to remember Alison and Adam.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KIMBERLY MCBROOM, WDBJ ANCHOR WITNESSED SHOOTING: We are keeping each other together. We are hugging, we are crying, we are holding hands during the newscasts. We are a family. And I have said that probably a million times in the last couple of days, but we are. That's what's getting us through this.

And just the outpouring of love that we've gotten, not just here in our community, but from all over the world through social media. I've heard from people in Nigeria, Scotland, England, Canada, of course all over the country though e-mails, Twitter, Facebook, you name it. We've gotten food, cards, flowers, balloons. If you've seen what our station parking lot looks like, it's a loving tribute to two fine people that we lost. We lost two family members on Wednesday morning, and we're still trying to come to terms with that.

[08:05:00] But I know that Alison and Adam would want us to keep going. This is what we do. We are WDBJ7. Adam's Twitter handle was "Do Work." And he believed in that. And so this morning the meteorologist and I were looking at each other, like, do work, do work. We're doing this for Adam and Alison. That's why we're here. It is hard.

CAMEROTA: We can only imagine. It is remarkable to many of us that you remember able to do a newscast yesterday. That did seem like the right answer to honor your colleagues. But just that you could get through it. What was it like when the lights went on yesterday morning without your colleagues?

MCBROOM: It was just unbelievably sad. There was a big hole there in our morning family. There was. But, you know, I had my partner by my side. I had Leo with me. We have such a great station here. We are a family. And I will say that a million more times before all this is over. We are. And Alison was just a shining light. She could have gone all the way to the top. And I always felt that she would. She wanted to be a news director someday, and she would have been a great one.

Adam always had a smile on his face, even at 3:00 in the morning, which isn't always and easy thing to do, but he would come in and he had this loud, booming, cheerful voice every day. And hey, Kim, how are you? We've got a story later this morning. He'd go around our newsroom, go talk to Leo. What's the weather going to be like today? He had his little ritual.

And he had found love at our station, he and our morning producer Melissa Ott were engaged to be married. And there are just so many poignant moments. Wednesday was going to be her last newscast with us anyway. She had taken a job in Charlotte. He was going to follow her down the Charlotte. They were going to start their life together there. Alison was in love with our 6:00 anchor Chris Hurst. They were probably going to get engaged too. There's so much loss here for so many reasons, so many relationships. Adam and Alison were both from our area. This is their is their community. They've got classmates and family that are mourning them along with us. This is just huge.

CUOMO: A couple things for you. One, what does it mean to you the way the community has come out and put their arms around you? Not just the mimosa tree behind you with the memorial there but the way they've come and wanted to see how you are and brought food and made it like you were part of their extended family, not just people they watch on the news. What does that mean to you, and how is Adam's fiance doing? We're doing our best obviously to leave her alone and let her heal. But to be in the control room when this happened, is she getting all the help and support she needs?

MCBROOM: She is. Her family is here with her. And that's who she needs right now. We texted back and forth yesterday. She is devastated. She lost the love of her life. And I don't know how you move on from that. But she will, she will in time. And we're going to help her.

And just the out pouring of support that we've gotten from the community, from our colleagues. We've gotten help from our sister station. We've got our general manager, his boss, who was in here this morning helping us write stories. Everybody has come together in so many different ways to help us get through it. And if there is any good at all in any of this, it's that we know what family means. We know what our own families at home mean to us. We know what our WDBJ7 family means to us. Everybody has just rallied around us during this. And it is so appreciated. We can't begin to express how much it means. Just thank you doesn't seem like enough. But thank you.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CUOMO: Look, it is so impressive that they were able to come on and do that show, the same people the next day. And we will continue thinking about them. That's for sure.

Other news for you, Donald Trump stirring up controversy on the campaign trail in South Carolina on Thursday, saying he's bringing back a phrase, "silent majority," a term many find racially charged and many do not. All this amid new questions about his campaign fundraising. So let's go live to South Carolina and bring in CNN political reporter Sara Murray. Sara, what do you see?

SARA MURRAY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Chris. You are right, Donald Trump stirring up controversy once again. Who could have seen this one coming? Not only by the things he's saying on the campaign trail, but also the things he's doing behind closed doors.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MURRAY: This morning the GOP frontrunner, the Washington outsider caught in the act, acting like a politician.

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: So give yourself a nice applause. Wow.

MURRAY: This time stirring up debate after using what some consider yet another controversial phrase, the "silent majority."

[08:10:06] TRUMP: So you have a silent majority in this country that feels abused, that feels forgotten, that feels mistreated. And it's a term that hasn't been brought up in years, as you know. People haven't heard that term in many years. And it's sort of interesting as to why.

MURRAY: The main reason? People say the phrase originally coined by Nixon --

RICHARD NIXON, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: The great silent majority of my fellow Americans --

MURRAY: -- was fraught with racial undertones, an appeal to white voters amid the civil rights movement.

Trump also wooing voters with a promise to reject big contributions.

TRUMP: A couple of weeks ago somebody came to me, a very powerful lobbyist. I'd like to put money into your campaign, $5 million. I said I don't want it. I don't want your money.

MURRAY: But Trump now appears to be saying one thing and doing another. CNN has learned the candidate is appearing at his own big dollar fundraising events, both for a super PAC supporting him and for a group that accepts unlimited contributions and keeps its donors secret. Donors yearning for an up close look at that Trump bravado need to only come to his campaign events.

TRUMP: I don't wear a toupee. It's my hair. I swear. Come here. Is it mine?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It is.

TRUMP: Say it, please.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, I believe it is.

TRUMP: Thank you.

(LAUGHTER)

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MURRAY: Potential donors will have another chance to up get up close and personal with Donald Trump tonight. He's headed to Massachusetts tonight to host a fundraiser. Donald Trump's campaign meanwhile, insisting that it is not a fundraiser whatsoever. Back to you, Alisyn. CAMEROTA: All right, well, one mystery solved. It is his hair.

Thanks so much for that, Sara.

Meanwhile there's a conservative group that tells CNN they have found incriminating e-mails from Hillary Clinton's server suggesting that she was trying to set what you they classify as a slush fund. This is the group Citizens United and they claim that Clinton had e- mails on her private server showing that she and her aides mixed government business with the Clinton Foundation's fundraising efforts. The chief of staff to then secretary of state Clinton denies those allegations.

CUOMO: Now to breaking news. Three people under arrest in the deaths of at least 71 migrants. The victims' decomposing bodies found in an abandoned truck on a highway near the Austria-Hungary border. Officials say the refugees most likely were fleeing war ravaged Syria and died of suffocation.

In the meantime off the coast of Libya as many as 200 migrants killed and 198 rescued after a boat capsized. Rescuers are still looking for others believed to be on board.

CAMEROTA: Chris, you must see this next story. This is dash cam video out of Minnesota that shows a state trooper pursuing and erratic driver that you'll see right there. This went on for at least 20 miles before this driver pulled into the driveway. He then puts the car in reverse, hitting a trooper's car. Now, I may be burying the lead because the driver is an eight-year-old boy.

CUOMO: It happens all the time.

CAMEROTA: He was out for a joy ride during the morning rush hour. And look at who his passengers are -- his little brother and sister. Look at that little pajama clad little boy. I'm happy to report they're all OK. That could have gone worse.

CUOMO: Yes. And I am treating it with levity because they are all OK. But I don't know what is most shocking about this, that he drove that well at eight years of age. How does that happen?

CAMEROTA: It was 20 miles. I don't know. Maybe it's very easy to drive a car or maybe he had done it before.

CUOMO: Now, we're talking about the kids. Of course, the obvious question is --

CAMEROTA: Where were the parents?

CUOMO: Where were the parents? How did the kid get the keys? How did he get in the car and leave? How did they not know for that long? I'm sure the police are asking all of those things, and thank God nobody got hurt.

CAMEROTA: I wish I had some of those answers, and I will attempt to get those for you. CUOMO: A decade ago hurricane Katrina essentially wiped out

entire neighborhoods in New Orleans. Ten years later, where are we? We do know this -- the rebuilding is continuing. So what have we learned and what do we still need to learn? We discuss.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:18:05] CUOMO: President Obama visiting New Orleans ahead of the 10th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina tomorrow. The president met with leaders and locals at the Lower Ninth Ward. Now, remember, that is the place that was hardest hit and he's trying to celebrate the city's revival a decade after the epic disaster.

But he also acknowledged what is very obvious to anybody who's been there. There's a lot of work to do.

Joining us live from New Orleans is the secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Julian Castro.

Secretary Castro, good to have you on.

JULIAN CASTRO, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT: Great to be with you, Chris.

CUOMO: You did not create the situation in Katrina. But you are charged with doing what is probably most important. You don't just build houses. You're dealing with urban development and revitalizing areas that needed it badly before Katrina and no one has to tell you, that place is not back to where it needs to be yet.

What do you see as the challenges ahead and the lessons of Katrina?

CASTRO: Well, I think the president said it very well yesterday. We've learned over the last ten years how resilient the people of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast are. He said there's been tremendous progress made. You can see a lot of that progress happening in neighborhood.

At the same time, we also need to keep working because you can go to many neighborhoods in the city and see that there's still a lot of work to be done. So, we have to keep investing and created more affordable housing opportunities for folks, making the kinds of infrastructure investments that enhance quality of life, whether that's in transportation or things like basic streets and sidewalks.

At the same time we have seen real progress here. For instance, since 2005 the graduation rate here in New Orleans has skyrocketed. It's gone up almost 20 percent. And just few months ago, New Orleans became the first big city in the nation that could declare that it had officially functionally ended veteran homelessness.

[08:20:02] So, this community has shown just a tremendous resolve, one that all of us are very proud of. And the president expressed that yesterday. And that we're going to keep working with New Orleans and the rest of the Gulf to make sure that the recovery is completed.

CUOMO: Conversation for another day, but that report shining a light on how big a problem veteran homelessness is in this country. Very few know about it. But to Katrina specifically, do you believe what is being trumpeted as rapid growth is actually a reflection of how poor a state that city and its people were in prior to Katrina? Because that was a part of the narrative with the hurricane is that, it didn't create problems, it exposed problems, right down to the urgency that the federal government showed then in helping people who needed it.

CASTRO: Oh, there's no question that New Orleans has faced these inveterate stuff challenges for a long time. There's nothing new about a lot of the challenges that New Orleans faces and you're right, when Katrina happened, the spotlight was on this city in a way that it had probably never been before. And it did expose a lot of those challenges.

The good news is that over the last few years, folks at every level have rolled up their sleeves. We have invested about $20 billion in the Gulf Coast, a lot of it here in New Orleans to create more affordable housing. We've invested about 5,500 business that created 6,500 permanent jobs. We've seen in New Orleans, a high school graduation rate, the educational achievement go up.

And in some ways, it's fair to say this city is facing some of the challenges we see in big cities across the United States. For instance, there is a housing, a rental housing affordability crisis happening. There was a report about a month ago that said that in no single city could you rent a two bedroom apartment on minimum wage, working 40 hours, and in very few cities could you actually afford to rent a one bedroom apartment.

And so, what we see in these other places is magnified in a place like New Orleans.

CUOMO: Well, that's why we're covering the story there. We want to make sure the place gets attention and so do the issues.

Let me ask you political questions -- 40 years old, good looking, former mayor of a major city, San Antonio, secretary of housing. They mentioned you as a possible running mate for Hillary Clinton. I'm not telling you that. You've heard it before.

Would you consider it?

CASTRO: I hadn't heard that before, Chris.

CUOMO: You'd heard it, Secretary. Would you consider it?

CASTRO: I'm kidding.

I've said that, you know, I'm focused on doing my work here at HUD. That's flattering. Who wouldn't be flattered to hear that? But I have learned in life that the best thing that you can do to create a great future for yourself is don't forget about what's in front of you. And so, I'm trying to do a great job at HUD with what's in front of me.

CUOMO: Handling that question like somebody who could be considering a run for vice president. All right. We'll leave it to another day.

You've also said in the past that the investigation into the Clinton e-mails was a witch hunt. Do you still feel that way?

CASTRO: I do. If you look at what they're doing on the oversight committee, Representative Gowdy and others, you know, the political talk is one thing, but what they're doing in Congress in that committee is another. I believe that Secretary Clinton has said -- has acknowledged that that was not the best way to handle her e- mails back then. She has said that if she could go back, she obviously would have done it differently and has turned over all the information, the e-mails and documents and now the server.

And so, this political process is going to take its course. But folks need to understand that she did not handle classified information that was classified at that time. It may have become classified later, but it was not classified that way at the time.

And she said, look, if I could go back and do it differently, she would. You know that campaign has cooperated with the review that's going on.

CUOMO: Secretary, thank you for taking the questions here on NEW DAY this morning and shining a light on what's going on in New Orleans and what still needs to be done. We look forward to having you on again, sir.

CASTRO: Thanks a lot.

CUOMO: All right. What's your take about what's going on in New Orleans? And what's going on with the other answers that Castro gave us. You tell us. Go to #NewDayCNN, or you can just go to Facebook, Facebook.com/NewDay.

Alisyn?

CAMEROTA: OK. Chris, Donald Trump resurrecting the term silent majority. Is he trying to energize his supporters or is that phrase racial code for something? We'll let him say it and you hear it and then you can decide for yourself. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:28:22] CAMEROTA: Donald Trump resurrecting an old political term, the silent majority. The phrase dates back to the '70s and President Nixon. Some believe it is racially charged. But Trump insists he is just trying to motivate his voters.

So, for more on this, let's turn to Pax Hurt, he's a Trump supporter, and an IT specialist at JPMorgan Chase. And Mindy Finn is a Republican political consultant and a co-founder of Engage, that's an online media strategy company.

Great to have both of you with us this morning to talk about this term. Donald Trump used it a couple of times in recent months and a couple of times yesterday.

Let me play for you the silent majority.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R), 2016 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: So you have a silent majority in this country that feels abused, that feels forgotten, that feels mistreated. And it's a term that hasn't been brought up in years, as you know. People haven't heard that term in many years and it's sort of interesting as to why.

There are all different reasons. Uh think it's a very descriptive term. Every time I speak I have sold out crowds, every time I speak, I have standing ovations. Every single time.

It's the silent majority. They want to see wins. They want to see us have victory.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Pax, people who don't like that term say it smacks of white supremacy. That it was something from the '60s that means that whites didn't like the civil rights movement.

How do you hear it?

PAX HART, TRUMP SUPPORTER: That's kind of a reach, I think, that it has anything to do with white supremacy. I think particularly it has to do with Donald Trump's immigration policy.

CAMEROTA: How so?

HART: You know, the -- what we're having right now is hundreds of thousands of third world immigrants dumped onto American communities. The American people have no say over that. You know, the politicians are not listening to the American people.