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Poll: Ben Carson Ties Donald Trump in Iowa; New Batch of Hillary Clinton's Emails Released; Interview with Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina; Suspected Cop killer "Mentally Incompetent" in 2012; Stock Futures Point to Ugly Open; President to Call for More Icebreakers in Arctic. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired September 01, 2015 - 08:00   ET

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

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

[08:00:04] UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Two guys who have never held political office leading the race.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Ben Carson now tied with Donald Trump in Iowa.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How concerned should the Republican establishment be at this point?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A hundred twenty-five of the 7,000 e-mails upgraded to classified.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Classification is not an exact science.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There's new revelations coming out every week.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She didn't break any rules.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Fifteen shell cases. You can do the math. He unloaded the entire pistol into Deputy Goforth.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The assassination of police officers is on the rise.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let's hope that it wasn't because of a uniform. Let's hope that it wasn't race related

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We have another incident of somebody with mental illness being able to get a gun.

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

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning. Welcome to your NEW DAY. It is Tuesday, the 1st day of September. It is 8:00 in the East.

Is Donald Trump losing his appeal? A new Monmouth University finds yet another political newcomer, neurosurgeon Ben Carson, even with Trump in that critical state of Iowa.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Meanwhile, a new batch of Hillary Clinton's emails released by the State Department, what's in them, do voters care, and what if any of this have to do with Gefilte fish?

Let's get right to CNN's Nia-Malika Henderson. She's live in Washington with the very latest for us.

Good morning, Nia.

NIA-MALIKA HENDERSON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL REPORTER: Hey there, Alison.

So, Dr. Ben Carson has some good news today. I believe someone has called Ben-mentum, a wise man called it that. And so, he's about 23 percent in these new polls tied with Trump there. You see Fiorina at 10 percent. A lot of the newcomers doing really well. If you look at Carson there, he's up from 8 percent from July. Fiorina is up from 3 percent in July, now at 10 percent.

Another poll out from "The Des Moines Register" and Bloomberg also shows the same thing. Trump there at 23 percent, Carson at 18 percent, basically neck and neck there within the margin of error. People like Huckabee not doing so well. He's at 4 percent.

If you look overall at these numbers dating back to January, what you see really is this trend with these outsider, antiestablishment, nonpolitical figures doing really, really well. And one of the reasons is that folks in Iowa, these likely caucus goers, when you ask them what they want their next president to be like, 23 percent say they want someone with government experience, and 66 percent say they would prefer the next president not have any government experience. And that's why you've got people like that pediatric neurosurgeon named Ben Carson and that reality tycoon named Donald Trump doing so well.

Back to you, John.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right. Nia, thank you so much.

While many of you were sleeping, the State Department released some 7,000 pages, e-mails, new e-mails we haven't seen before from Hillary Clinton's time as secretary of state. Some of them now considered classified, but not before.

CNN's Elise Labott live in our Washington with more on what is inside these documents, Elise.

ELISE LABOTT, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIR CORRESPONDENT: Well, John, we're talking about 125 of the 7,000 e-mails have information that's now been classified. As you said, they weren't marked classified at the time. But the State Department has upgraded them before releasing them to the public, and several parts of them redacted.

Now, once again in this type of emails, we get a sense of her close relationship with former Clinton advisor Sidney Blumenthal, who was constantly sending her advice and that's been a very controversial thing that this House Committee on Benghazi has been looking into, her ties to Sidney Blumenthal.

There's also a memo from Chelsea Clinton, reporting back to her mother and to her father, former President Bill Clinton on her trip to Haiti with the Clinton Foundation.

Interestingly, there are also e-mails suggesting that the State Department tech analyst didn't recognize Clinton's server. We have a screen grab of one of them.

In one of the emails, her aide Huma Abedin says an e-mail bounced back from someone on the State Department system. When this person called the help desk, Huma says they had no idea it was you.

Now, there are several emails about Clinton's new iPad. You remember she said she only one use that one device, a Blackberry, but her aide Philippe Reines, says, "Your pad has arrived." Clinton was very excited, wanted to get some instructions on a flight to Ukraine.

Now, some of these, you just be there at the time to know the backstory about what they all mean. For instance, one of the emails getting a lot of buzz on the Internet was about Clinton called the Gefilte fish problem. She wanted an update on Gefilte. Now, those of us covering the State Department at the time remember this was related to a trade dispute with Israel that was holding up a huge shipment of Gefilte fish right to the Passover holiday.

[08:05:05] That was at the time called the Gefilte fish wars.

Back to you, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: Thank you for explaining the Gefilte fish connection. That was very helpful, Elise. Thanks so much.

Now joining us this morning to weigh in on all things politics and to preview a rally opposing the Iran nuclear deal today in New York, Republican presidential candidate and South Carolina senator, Lindsey Graham.

Good morning, Senator.

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R-SC), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Good morning, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: OK. Great to see you.

Let's talk about this newest Monmouth poll that's getting a lot of attention this morning. As you can see, Ben Carson is tied with Donald Trump at the top, at 23 percent. And then, Senator, we go all the way to the back of the pack and we see Lindsey graham at zero percent.

Senator, what is going on here?

GRAHAM: I've got a lot of growth potential. You know what I think is going on is that --

CAMEROTA: I like that.

GRAHAM: -- well, I do. Ben Carson is a nice guy. I think he fits Iowa much better than Trump.

But what we'll see overtime is the electorate start to think about, OK, who do we want to be the next commander in chief? I don't know what Mr. Carson has done over the last year, which is surgery which is amazing. It's something I couldn't do.

For the last decade, I've been going to Iraq and Afghanistan for over 35 times, learning from my mistakes, Bush's mistakes, Obama's mistakes and I'm ready to be president on day one and destroy ISIL, and the strategy we have is not working. And the other candidates, I haven't heard a real concrete plan much different than Obama.

So, I think that will matter overtime.

CAMEROTA: Senator, one of the things you've done, one of the tactics you've used in your campaign is to go against Donald Trump, to verbally spar with him. You've said some colorful things about what you would like to do, in fact, to Donald Trump. But some of the other candidates seem to be taking almost a page from his play book.

Let me play for you how Scott Walker and Chris Christie seem to be sounding a little Trump-like and get your response. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIPS)

CHUCK TODD, MEET THE PRESS: We don't talk about a northern border where if this is about securing the border from potentially terrorists coming over. Do you want to build a wall north of the border, too?

GOV. SCOTT WALKER (R-WI), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Some people have asked us about that in New Hampshire. They've raised legitimate concerns, including law enforcement folks that brought that up to me at one of our town hall meetings about a week and a half ago. So, that is a legitimate issue for us to look at.

GOV. CHRIS CHRISTIE (R-NJ), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: At any moment FedEx can tell you where that package is. Yet we let people come into this country with visas and the minute they come in, we lose track of them.

We can't -- so here's what I'm going to do as president, I'm going to ask Fred Smith, the founder of FedEx, come work for the government for three months.

(END VIDEO CLIPS)

CAMEROTA: Senator, do you think they're letting Donald Trump set their tone on immigration?

GRAHAM: I think building a wall between us in Canada is not a good idea. The Canadians come to Myrtle Beach in March in South Carolina and they go swimming. We're glad to have them. It's too cold for us this wind (ph) in March.

So, I don't want to make it hard for them to get to Myrtle Beach.

A broken immigration system is a national security problem. It's not a package problem. The bill that I've worked on multiple times has a way to secure the border. It doubles the border patrol, triples the drones. And we have a visa tracking system to allow law enforcement to know if you've overstayed your system.

So this idea of building a wall between us and Canada and treating people like packages is probably not helping our overall cause.

CAMEROTA: Senator, let me get your take on something that Donald Trump has said about the economy and what he plans to do. Basically, he said something that does resonate with a lot of people, and that is that he plans to make hedge fund managers millionaires, multimillionaires, pay a higher tax rate, though it's not going over well with everyone.

So, let me play this for you and see how you would respond.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: So, I would say to the head of Ford -- sorry, I'm not going to approve, you're going to pay a tax, every car and truck and part that comes across that southern border you're going to pay a 35 percent tax, OK?

And I would let people making hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars a year pay some tax, because right now, they're paying very little tax, and I think it's outrageous. I want to lower taxes for the middle class.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Senator, what's your answer to taxes?

GRAHAM: Well, number one, you've got to get taxes through the Congress. He's not king even though me may think he might be. There's no way the Congress is going to do what he says regarding Ford Motor Company. We have a trading relationship with Mexico. They're one of our largest trading partners. If we start taxing their goods, they'll start taxing ours. And so, that's a nonstarter. That's not going to happen. That's a pretty naive approach. It may sound good, but it's not going to happen. As to hedge funds, I would change the tax rates if it were part of an

overall deal to fix the broken entitlement system. To Democrats listening, I will do revenue, I will change the hedge fund tax system if you will help me adjust the age retirement for younger workers and means-test benefits so we don't have Medicare and Social Security to go broke. But there's no way I'm just going to increase taxes without a plan to get us out of death.

CAMEROTA: Senator, let's talk about the Iran nuclear deal and whether or not Congress -- there are enough votes in is there and how Congress is feeling about it and what your plan is today. [08:10:10] GRAHAM: Well, number one, we're going to have a rally.

This is a terrible deal.

When somebody says they want to cut your throat, the last thing you should do is buy them a knife. The ayatollah gets a hundred billion dollars of new money to be spent anyway he would like, without changing his behavior. He gets a pathway to a bomb and money to pay for it all.

So, I really do believe the deal would be disapproved. Whether or not we get 60 is still a question. I promise you this, that the money we're going to give Iran is going to go into their war machine, not roads and bridges. In 15 years, they're going to have a nuclear device even if they don't cheat, with a missile to deliver it.

So, this is a horribly bad deal that will disrupt the Mideast, and the terrorist organizations that mean to hurt us and Israel will have more money. You might as well write the check to Assad, Hezbollah and Hamas because that's where the money is going to go. And we're going to try our best to get 60 votes to disapprove this deal.

CAMEROTA: Well, the people on the other side say, you don't have to like it, but what's the alternative? Sanctions actually were not working to keep them from their march towards a nuclear weapon.

GRAHAM: Sanctions did work. They were at the table because of sanctions.

To my friends who say it's this deal or a war, that's a false choice. It's between a bad deal and a better deal.

President Obama said you'd have to be crazy to oppose this deal. To my friends on the other side, you'd have to be crazy to trust this ayatollah. You'd have to be crazy to give him more money without a requirement for him to change his behavior. And what this deal about their nuclear program have to do with a missile, the ICBM, so they can build in eight years, and they can buy weapons in five years.

So, at the end of the day, you've empowered the ayatollah. And if he'll kill his own people for trying to have a better life in Iran, what do you think he'll do to us and Israel?

This guy is a religious Nazi. And he will overtime use whatever weapons he develops or buys against us and Israel, and this is the biggest miscalculation since the '30s. President Obama has made the world a far more dangerous place. My Democratic friends, you don't understand who we're dealing with here.

CAMEROTA: Very quickly, Senator, we only have a few seconds left but I do want to get your reaction to Hillary Clinton's e-mails.

GRAHAM: OK.

CAMEROTA: Voters in the latest polls seem to suggest they don't consider this a big issue. They have bigger fish to fry. Do you believe that the e-mail controversy or questions surrounding it will go away soon?

GRAHAM: I don't know. But my big fish to fry with her was where were you at as secretary of state when people in Benghazi requested additional security five times and nobody helped them? Where were you on the night of the attack? Why would you tell the families we're going to find the guy who made the video when there was nothing about the video or a protest? This was an organizer terrorist attack. To me, it's always been about her leadership or the lack thereof that led to the death of four Americans. It was a death trap in Benghazi, everybody left but us. That's what she needs to be held accountable for above all else.

CAMEROTA: Senator Lindsey Graham, we always appreciate talking to you. Thanks so much for being on NEW DAY.

GRAHAM: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: Be sure to join Lindsey Graham and more than a dozen other Republicans vying for the Republican nomination for the next GOP debate. CNN will host the event. It is September 16th from the Reagan Library in California. Coverage starts at 6:00 Eastern, with the main debate at 9:00, only on CNN.

PEREIRA: Some new details are emerging on the fatal shooting of a sheriff's deputy in Houston. The suspect was found mentally incompetent to stand trial on a felony assault charge back in 2012, according to a Texas prosecutor.

How is this going to impact the current case?

We get more now from CNN's Rosa Flores, who's live in Houston -- Rosa.

ROSA FLORES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Michaela, new revelations about the suspect's background, about his criminal past and also his history with mental illness, raising new questions this morning. And a case of -- in a case where a prosecutor described what happened here at this gas station like a cold-blooded killing of a deputy.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

FLORES (voice-over): This morning, new insight into the mind of alleged cop killer Shannon Miles. Miles, appearing in a Houston courtroom Monday. The clanking of his shackles the only thing breaking the silence as dozens of deputies stare him down.

DEVON ANDERSON, PROSECUTOR: He unloaded the entire weapon into Deputy Goforth.

FLORES: Prosecutors say the 30-year-old ambushed Deputy Darren Goforth at a gas station, the suspect shooting him, execution-style, a total of 15 times. The motive, prosecutors say, is still unclear.

BRIAN MCCULLAR, FRIEND OF DEPUTY DARREN GOFORTH: Let's hope that it wasn't because of uniform. Let's hope that it wasn't race-related.

FLORES: Now CNN has learned the suspect was previously ruled mentally incompetent.

[08:15:00] Back in 2012, Miles was charged with aggravated assault against a homeless man. Miles, also homeless at the time, was sent to a mental institution for six months. He then ruled competent, but the case never went to trial.

Even given the suspect's mental health history, one Texas sheriff still suggests the killing could have some relation to the Black Lives Matter movement, an ongoing uprising against police brutality.

SHERIFF RON HICKMAN, HARRIS COUNTY, TEXAS: It isn't very far stretch to believe that that kind of rhetoric could influence someone.

FLORES: The leaders of the movement say calls for police reform cannot be blamed for the senseless murder.

RASHAD ANTHONY TURNER, LOCAL ORGANIZER, BLACK LIVES MATTER, ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA: Our mission is to end violence against black people and the fact that every 28 hours a black body is killed.

FLORES: As the Houston suburb community continues to mourn the loss of their deputy, President Obama called Goforth's widow Monday to give his condolences, saying he will continue to stand up for the safety of police officers wherever they serve.

ANDERSON: This crime is not going to divide us. This crime is going to unite us.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FLORES: As we take another live look here, you can see a group of organizers raising money and awareness for this deputy. I want to put out one thing in particular, there is a bear there with the purple heart. Someone dropped it off in honor of this deputy.

This memorial growing with not only flowers and balloons and notes that say this man is a hero -- Michaela.

PERERIA: Very moving tributes. Rosa, thanks for sharing that with us.

We should point out that in just a few minutes time, we're going to speak with Ron Hickman. He is the sheriff of Harris County. We'll get an update from him about the investigation. We'll talk about the suspect. We're also going to ask him about the comments that he made after the shooting that are drawing some criticism.

BERMAN: We do have some breaking news. Brace yourselves, folks. Looks like an ugly day on Wall Street. For the last several minutes and hours, U.S. stock futures have been tumbling.

So, does this mean we are in for another bonkers week down in the market?

CNN chief business correspondent, my "EARLY START" co-anchor, Christine Romans, here to tell us all -- Christine. CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: It doesn't look good so far, John. You know, it was an awful august. It's starting out as a sorry September.

I want to show you futures right now. You've got the Dow futures down 355 points. If this mood holds into the opening bell, you're going to have another big pullback for stocks, sitting just above 16,000.

The problem is what's happening around the rest of the world. Look at European stocks, all down sharply.

And over in Asia, a really bad performance there. Here's why, another number from China about manufacturing was weaker than expected. It underscores this worry about how slowly China is growing right now. Maybe more slowly than Chinese officials and official Chinese statistics are telling us. That's what people are concerned about here in the U.S.

I want to show you some something very, very quickly here. I want to show you oil prices. They're down a little bit here again today. But take a look. I'm going to give you the last six months here. Look at all the way over here on my left. Big, big jump in oil prices, a three-day jump in oil prices over the past three days.

It's mitigating a little bit this morning, but something to keep watching here. There were some supply numbers that were a little bullish for oil. But that big jump has a lot of people saying, wow, the speculators have been in the oil market and have been making a lot of money there. So, watch oil.

But we have another hour to go until the opening bell. And it looks like for your 401(k) it's going to be another rough morning.

CAMEROTA: Boy, OK, keep us posted, Christine.

ROMANS: Will do.

CAMEROTA: Thank you so much for all that.

Well, act now or condemn the world tonight mare, those words from President Obama blasting climate change deniers. The president set to call for more ice breakers in the Arctic, allowing the U.S. to expand its foothold.

CNN's White House correspondent Michelle Kosinski is live with the very latest.

What does that mean, Michelle?

MICHELLE KOSINSKI, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Alisyn.

Well, as the Arctic becomes more navigable because of less ice, today, the White House is announcing that the president wants more U.S. ice breakers in the region, also to keep pace with other countries like Russia are doing there. He'll also announce more monitoring of the climate and environment. And while he's in Alaska, he's visiting glaciers that are disappearing

in a rate of 75 billion tons of ice a year. Villages that are having to move because of rising sea level. And speaking of the climate conference, he is having none of the climate change deniers.

Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The time to head the critics and the cynics and the deniers is past. The time to plead ignorance is surely past. Those who want to ignore the science, they are increasingly alone. They're on their own shrinking island.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KOSINSKI: And there is some controversy of this trip over his name change of Mt. McKinley back to Denali, its original name, which actually Alaska has been trying to do for decades. And also, even though the president has protected millions of acres of Alaska shoreline, at the same time, he's also allowed Shell to do some exploratory drilling there.

[08:20:05] That's raced some questions -- Michaela.

PEREIRA: All right. Quite an eventful trip, I think, you could say to Alaska, Michelle. Thanks so much for all of that.

Sometimes we need just a little cuteness. Wouldn't you guys agree? Aside from the amounts that John provides.

Adorable game of peek-a-boo between a baby gorilla and a 12 year old. This is (INAUDIBLE). His mom says apparently, he pounded his chest as he walked into the Congo exhibition at the Columbus Zoo Thursday, and that got the gorilla Kamali's attention. This is what followed. Five minutes of absolute blissful play until the pair was worn out.

CAMEROTA: That is adorable.

BERMAN: Yes, I was trying to come up with something cynical to say, but I can't. It's too cute.

PEREIRA: I mean, it's adorable, right?

CAMEROTA: This is out cynical John Berman.

BERMAN: No, it's too cute.

PEREIRA: We needed that today.

CAMEROTA: Oh my gosh, that's even cuter.

OK, meanwhile, one of our top the stories to tell you about, because the man suspected of gunning down that Texas police officer was ruled mentally incompetent three years ago. We are talking to the sheriff whose deputy was killed, next. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PEREIRA: That emotional moment as the alleged sheriff's deputy killer is walked into a Texas courtroom, passing a blue wall of officers, all there showing support for their fallen colleague.

[08:25:04] The alleged killer ruled mentally incompetent back in 2012. What effect is that going to have on this case?

With us this morning, Sheriff Ron Hickman of Harris County. Slain Deputy Darren Goforth was a member of his force.

Sir, thank you so much for joining us.

First of all, we have to ask how you are doing, how the wife of your fallen officer is doing.

HICKMAN: Clearly, this kind of incident devastates the entire family, the Harris County family, as well as his wife and two children.

PEREIRA: We know that the president called the widow yesterday. Have you had a chance to hear how she reacted to receiving that call?

HICKMAN: I have not spoken with her about the call, although the White House reached out to us yesterday. I spoke with one of the executive staffers in the department and made the arrangements for that connection.

So, we are relieved that the White House has reached out to the family.

PEREIRA: Yes, I can imagine that was a relief and it was probably -- although the comfort was small, I'm sure it did comfort her a bit.

I have to ask you that scene that we just saw play out on video of the suspect being walked into the courtroom, I know, sir, you were there. That must have had a profound effect on all of your officers.

HICKMAN: It has an effect on every officer to know that an individual who is accused of taking the life of a police officer is being brought to justice.

PEREIRA: So, sir, we want to talk about the motive. Right now the investigation is ongoing and we know there's probably things you can't tell us.

But have we learned anything further? I know we've learned that Mr. Miles was accused of a crime and was found mentally incompetent to stand trial back in 2012. He spent some six months in a mental hospital. Are you concerned how this is going to impact the case?

HICKMAN: Well, certainly, that's a concern for us. You know, whether he was incompetent at the time he committed this offense, will be something for the district attorney and the court to determine. As you mentioned earlier, he was ruled incompetent and then ruled competent and released. PEREIRA: Right.

HICKMAN: So, questions will arise about what influenced him, what factors motivated him. When we ruled out any other contact between the officer and the suspect, one's left to speculate exactly what kind of influences caused him to do this.

PEREIRA: Well, and that lead me to some comments you've made, because, you know, you often and law enforcement often caution us in the media to tread slowly in the beginning stages of an investigation because we know they certainly do take time.

To that end, are you now regretting at all the comments that you made linking this to perhaps the Black Lives Matter movement?

HICKMAN: No, I don't. As a matter of fact, you know, I would like to clarify that my statements were about the extremism. You know, some people would like to pervert what I said for their own political purposes. But what I said was extremism in those views, much like some of the chants coming out of Minnesota this week.

Certainly, those kinds of extreme rhetoric can lead to unintended consequences. Surely people who have a degree of susceptibility or some mental instability can be influenced by such comments.

PEREIRA: But is it too early in the investigation, sir, to make that kind of statement, given the fact that investigators are working right now to try to clearly understand what exactly what happened?

HICKMAN: We know for certain and have ruled out any contact between the two. So what you're left with is the fact that the deputy was wearing a uniform. So absent any other influence, absent any other contact or motivation, the fact he's wearing a uniform is left as the only target.

PEREIRA: I say this with all due respect, but a guest on our show made the interesting point that when you blame the group that is calling for reform, by that logic those who want greater reform in schools are to blame when somebody shoots up a school.

HICKMAN: But is it really reform when you talk about killing cops? Is that's the kind of reform they're looking for?

PEREIRA: But that's not what these -- all of the people that are part of the Black Lives Matter movement are calling. I understand that you said that you're concerned about the extremist view, but you can understand that there are a lot of people, while emotions are running high, that are concerned the rhetoric is getting ramped up.

HICKMAN: Exactly what I spoke of is the rhetoric being ramped up to that level. Again, if the dialogue of the black lives matter movement is going to be heard in a reasonable fashion, we have to separate that from this extremist rhetoric. We start talking about, you know, pigs in a blanket, fry them like bacon, killing cops, taking pictures of dead people, you know, that's a rhetoric that has to be separated and held accountable.