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Wolf
Obama to Address 60-Nation Summit; Interview with Nabil Elaraby, Secretary-General of Arab League; Ukrainian Cease-Fire Holding But Fighting in Debaltseve; Poll Shows Mike Huckabee Leading GOP Pack.
Aired February 18, 2015 - 13:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: Welcome back to our viewers in the United States and around the world. I'm Wolf Blitzer, reporting from Washington.
Sixty nations, one objective, countering violent extremism. Right now, the White House is holding a summit to formulate ways to fight terrorism. President Obama said, "Our campaign is ultimately a battle for hearts and minds." The president is expected to make a keynote address at the summit in about three hours or so. CNN will have live coverage for our viewers here in the United States and around the world.
The summit comes on the heels of terror attacks in Ottawa, Sydney, Paris, Copenhagen. And just this past week, we saw horrifying pictures coming out of Libya. The extremist group, ISIS, releasing a video showing the beheading of 21 Egyptian Christians in Libya. As a result, Cairo has been drawn directly into conflict across its border in retaliation. And Egypt deployed jets to strike Islamic State militant camps, training sites and weapons storage areas.
I'm joined now by the secretary-general of the Arab League, Nabil Elaraby. He's the former Egyptian foreign minister.
You're here for all of these meetings, these summit meetings with the president of the United States. How much of a threat does ISIS represent to all of the Arabs? You represent all of these Arab countries. You're the secretary-general of the Arab League.
NABIL ELARABY, SECRETARY-GENERAL, ARAB LEAGUE & FORMER EGYPTIAN FOREIGN MINISTER: It is a dangerous threat that everyone is looking at. The Arab League started last summer. And we have worked together with many -- practically all the Arab countries to work out a strategy, a comprehensive strategy, not only confined to military and security, which is very important and has to be addressed but also to look at what you have said now, the hearts and minds of people in the area.
BLITZER: People are looking to the Arab countries to destroy ISIS right now. You've got, what, 20 -- how many countries in the Arab League?
ELARABY: Twenty-two.
BLITZER: Twenty-two countries in the Arab League. They're looking for you to take the lead and go after these ISIS positions in Iraq, in Syria, now in Libya and elsewhere as well.
ELARABY: First of all, you have to take into consideration that we don't have the military arms. But we do have a treaty, 1950 treaty, mutual defense. I've been asking since last September that it should be activated and that a task force from all Arab countries interested can take action.
BLITZER: Including ground forces? I know Egypt and Jordan, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, they're getting involved in air strikes. But will these Arab countries, the Arab armies go in there on the ground to destroy ISIS?
ELARABY: The question you have asked is put before the Arab foreign ministers and it will be put before the summit. The next --
(CROSSTALK)
BLITZER: When is the summit?
ELARABY: End of March.
BLITZER: We have to wait till the end of March?
ELARABY: No, we have another meeting on the 8th of March. And we hope that action will be taken and that these countries will decide that along with the long-range, comprehensive strategy, to confront the terrorist attacks, which really is global, if you look at it --
(CROSSTALK)
BLITZER: Because the threats.
(CROSSTALK)
BLITZER: There may be threats but the real threats are in the Arab world.
ELARABY: The Arab threats (INAUDIBLE) but it has been individuals from all over the world joining. From Australia and New Zealand --
(CROSSTALK)
BLITZER: How do you fight that and convince these young men and some women not to go ahead and join ISIS?
ELARABY: This is a very delicate and important question and has to be addressed in all candor. You have to change the social, economic, religious, ideological thinking. It will take time. The military security might take much less, I don't know, a few months or -- but to change the hearts and minds of people throughout the world, not only the Arab world, to join ISIS or Daesh in this area, but they come from all over. BLITZER: You call ISIS "Daesh." That's a derogatory term.
(CROSSTALK)
BLITZER: They don't like to be called Daesh, ISIS.
You heard the Iraqi ambassador to the United Nations say that ISIS is organ harvesting. They're killing these individuals and then taking out their kidneys or whatever and selling them. Do you believe that?
ELARABY: I would not exclude anything. I saw myself people massacred like the Jordanian pilot, Muath Kaseasbeh --
BLITZER: And the Egyptian Christians.
ELARABY: -- and the Egyptian citizens that were massacred in a way that we have not seen since the Iron Age maybe. They want to revert the whole world to a mentality and concepts which have been long forgotten.
BLITZER: I know you're going over to the White House to participate with the president and the summit. You'll be meeting with Secretary of State Kerry tomorrow. You're familiar with this debate that's going on. Should the U.S. call it Islamic terrorism, keep the word "Islamic" or "Muslim" out of it? What's your analysis?
ELARABY: Well, Islam is being brought in, in a very derogatory away. Islam has nothing to do with that. And those attacking Daesh's actions or ISIS are Muslims. And the victims are mainly Muslims. But they just decided to use the mantle of Islam and use these concepts of Islam which is against everything in Islam.
BLITZER: Do you think we should be calling it "Islamic radicalism" or "Islamic extremists" or "Islamists"? Is that fair or not?
ELARABY: I think it could be considered reasonable which is it covers all the world, the ones that kill the American journalist spoke with a British accent. They were from Britain, most probably. The ones who committed suicide elsewhere, they were from other countries. The one -- "Charlie Hebdo" in France, they were French citizens, maybe from Algerian origin, but French citizens. I think it's an international phenomenon. It has to be attacked from an international point of view to ensure that will be eradicated once and for all.
BLITZER: Nabil Elaraby, secretary-general of the Arab League, welcome to Washington. Thank you.
ELARABY: Thank you very much.
BLITZER: Thank you very much for joining us.
ELARABY: Thank you.
BLITZER: Don't leave yet.
Up next, there's other stories we're following, including mew fighting, cracking the cease-fire in Ukraine, putting the government troops there on the retreat. We're going live to eastern Ukraine. Stay with us.
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BLITZER: Now to the fragile cease-fire in Ukraine. At least it's holding in some areas. But in one key city, rebel forces have routed government troops and forced the government military to retreat.
Our Nick Paton Walsh joins us live from Donetsk in eastern Ukraine.
Nick, why is this one city so important to these pro-Russian rebel forces that they're endangering potentially the entire cease-fire over it?
NICK PATON WALSH, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, there's a geographical region. Separatists claim it's technically theirs. They need it to round off the area. And it's a strategic railway hub that everybody wants for its infrastructure. But it's also vitally important now because it was the gaping hole in the peace agreement signed in Minsk. The separatists claim the boundaries established there effectively meant it was theirs. But Kiev said it was theirs. And most people monitoring the cease-fire said the cease- fire was holding except for Debaltseve.
We are seeing one of the bloodiest periods in this Ukrainian crisis unfold. Ukrainian troops were leaving that town today, the separatists for their part say, well, they simply were dealing with an internal matter by forcing the Ukrainians out of their territory and they themselves say in pictures they supplied us, you can see them here, that they've been withdrawing their heavy weaponry from their part of the agreement under the Minsk protocol signed just before the weekend.
What we've seen today in Debaltseve is shocking. Huge caches of artillery shells were left behind by the Ukrainian military as they fled. Of course, a real sense that the separatists have the military upper hand here. Does this victory in Debaltseve herald perhaps the beginning of a truce for real or is it, in fact, the beginning of continued violence because they have ambitions to reclaim the whole of Donetsk region not just that town of Debaltseve -- Wolf?
BLITZER: It's a very, very tenuous, dangerous situation right now.
Nick, we'll stay in close touch with you. Thank you very much.
When we come back, his father was a president of the United States, his brother was a president of the United States, now we're going to see what Jeb Bush is trying to do to put a little distance between himself and his dad and his brother. And he's delivering a major national security speech. Stand by.
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BLITZER: This just coming in to CNN. Crews are responding to an exPLOsion at an ExxonMobil refinery in Torrance, California. These are the pictures of the aftermath of the exPLOsion from our affiliate, KTLA. People living in the area reported hearing a loud exPLOsion that shook the ground. Nearby schools were initially told to shelter in place. That order has now been lifted. No official word on any injuries, but some local reports say at least two people were hurt. We'll update you when we get more information.
The White House dismissing a government panel's recommendation to name an outsider as the Secret Service director. Instead, President Obama has named the interim director, Joseph Clancy, to lead the agency. Clancy stepped in three months ago during a shake-up at the Secret Service. His return to the agency followed a string of embarrassing incidents, including a fence jumper who made it all the way inside the White House.
Former Florida governor and potential 2016 Republican presidential candidate, Jeb Bush, sharply criticized the Obama administration's foreign policy today. His speech before the Chicago Council on Global Affairs just wrapped up. Besides his criticism of President Obama, Governor Bush also tried to distinguish his views from those of two former presidents. One was his brother, the other, his dad.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JEB BUSH, (R), FORMER FLORIDA GOVERNOR: I've also been fortunate to have a father and a brother who helped shape America's foreign policy from the Oval Office. I recognize it as a result my views will often be held up in comparison to theirs. In fact, this is a great, fascinating thing in the political world for some reason. Sometimes in contrast to theirs. Look, just for the record, one more time, I love my brother, I love my dad, I love my mother as well. I hope that's OK. And I admire their service to the nation and the difficult decisions that they had to make. But I'm my own man. And my views are shaped by my own thinking and my own experiences.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLITZER: Let's discuss. Joining us, our CNN political director, David Chalian; and our CNN chief national correspondent, John King.
John, how important is it for Jeb Bush to go ahead -- he clearly wants to be the next president of the United States -- to differentiate himself from his father and his brother?
JOHN KING, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: It's important on two scales. First, for the Republican primary electorate, and then for the general electorate. For the general electorate -- take you backwards -- remember, George H.W. Bush lost his reelection campaign to Bill Clinton. People thought he had fallen asleep at the switch, wasn't properly administering the economy. George W. Bush lost the support of a broad swath of the American people because of the Iraq War and Katrina, especially Independent voters that thought he wasn't a competent president. That's the general election challenge.
But remember, Bush is literally a four-letter word to many consecutive primary voters. George H.W. Bush raised taxes. George W. Bush implemented Medicare Part D, No Child Left Behind, had the stumbles in the Iraq War. Among conservative activists, the Bush name, yes, can help you raise money and gives you an infrastructure, but in the activist base of the party, there are a lot of minuses as well as the pluses.
BLITZER: We went back to the archives and took a look at what Jeb Bush told our Candy Crowley back in 2010. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CANDY CROWLEY, CNN HOST, STATE OF THE UNION: Publically or privately, what's your biggest political disagreement with your brother?
BUSH: I will tell you, I'm the only Republican that was in office when he was in office as president that never disagreed with him. I'm not going to start now. Why do that now after two years?
CROWLEY: Not one time did you call up and say, don't do that?
BUSH: I'm not going to start now. It's just until death do us part.
CROWLEY: Those are between you. It's not that they are not political differences. You don't do that to each other publically?
BUSH: Well, here's the problem -- of course, I wouldn't do that because the news the disagreement. The news is the brothers. There is a schism with the brothers. We love each other and we're very close and would never do that to each other.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLITZER: I think that's true. They love each other. They are very close. They love their father as well. This is a sensitive, delicate matter for Jeb Bush as he goes into Republican primaries. If he gets the nomination to go against the Democratic nominee.
DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: No doubt about it. I can guarantee that clip will be in a DNC ad or web video before long, as long as George W. Bush is still seen by a large swath of the American public in negative territory. It is a difficult dance, although I think Jeb Bush is forgiven a bunch, because it is his brother. I think although he needs to declare himself his own man, I think people will forgive him some notion of not trashing his own brother.
BLITZER: He was very tough in his national security speech today. He went after the president of the United States, basically saying he's been very, very weak when it comes to foreign affairs.
KING: It was a muscular speech from Jeb Bush. He doesn't want to talk about Iraq and Afghanistan. Those were his brother's wars, if you will. He feels he's failing the ISIS test. He was much more muscular saying this president has a naive view that you can cut a nuclear view with Iran. Planting himself in the muscular camp of the Republican Party, which is where his brother was without embracing policies.
CHALIAN: It's important -- George W. Bush more than other past presidents we have seen really left the stage. Really has ceded the stage. Hasn't raised money for the Republican Party. Has not been active in debates about foreign policy or is. I don't think he's created -- other than his own tenure, which Jeb Bush is trying to deal with -- I don't think he creates a complication for Jeb Bush.
BLITZER: All right, stand by. We have a lot more to discuss, including our brand new CNN poll numbers when it comes to the race for the White House. The name at the top of the Republican list, as of right now, six months before the first Republican presidential debate, may surprise you.
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BLITZER: We're back with David Chalian and John King.
We were talking about Jeb Bush's speech on security in Chicago today. He has been leading in the polls among Republicans, especially in December. But take a look at the brand new numbers that are out today. A shift in the polls from December until now. Look who is in the lead. Mike Huckabee is now at 16 percent among Republicans out there versus 6 percent in December.
Are you surprised, David? Huckabee from 6 percent to 16 percent. Bush was 23 percent. He's now down to 14 percent.
CHALIAN: This makes more sense than the December poll. I think there were a bunch of guys near the top. Now we see fourish front runners in double digits, Huckabee, Walker, Bush and Rand Paul. I do think when-- announced in December and jumped the gun nobody was in it. He was able to consume support in the December poll. Now that Mike Huckabee left his FOX show, indicated interest in doing this, Walker had the boom after the Iowa speech. We see folks engaging and you see the field spread out.
BLITZER: You look at the numbers, John. Your analysis?
KING: Number one, David is right. There is no clear front runner. You have Jeb Bush as the establishment front runner. Keep that lower case. He's raising money. When Huckabee left the FOX show he put out a book, got a lot of attention in the blogosphere and conservative groups. Some of the outlets attacked him for legal status for citizenship and I immigration and common core immigration. Jeb Bush under attack a little bit from conservatives. Mike Huckabee, at a time conservatives have been losing on issues like same-sex marriage, promised to stand with him on the issues. This is a result of media coverage.
BLITZER: I look at these numbers, and we can study and study them. That's what uh you do. But look at the governor of Wisconsin from 4 to 11 percent. A nice bump for him. The governor of New Jersey went from 13 percent in December down to 7 percent now. You see Scott Walker doing well. Chris Christie, not so much.
CHALIAN: It's fluid. As John is saying, so much is dictated by news media coverage now. Scott Walker got a lot of attention for a strong speech in January in front of a lot of Iowa conservatives. That got him noticed. Chris Christie has not been in the hunt as much now that way. I think you are going to see things move. We saw in 2011 and we'll see it this time around, too. Different people have that numerical top one advantage.
BLITZER: What I keep hearing, John, is politics -- money talks. Jeb Bush is raising tons of money. A lot more than any of the other Republicans. That potentially could be significant.
KING: Even though he doesn't like the comparison, is he like George W. Bush who raised the money early on in 2000 and was clearly because of the name identity, the money, the network, clearly the front runner and almost coasted to the nomination. A few bumps and bruises. John McCain challenged him in New Hampshire. Does Jeb Bush get a formidable like a mini Hillary Clinton or is he Phil Graham, Steve Forbes, somebody who comes to the table with money, has good poll numbers early on. As people vote, flames out. That's the question.
The thing I take away is there is no clear front runner. Walker carved an early space for him. If you are Chris Christie or Marco Rubio, you have to worry about Scott Walker. If Jeb Bush is the establishment favorite, there is a number two spot.
(CROSSTALK)
BLITZER: Walker has done well with Republicans lately.
CHALIAN: He has. No doubt about it. The question for Jeb Bush, is he Mitt Romney, the establishment guy who gets bruised if he emerges with the nomination.
BLITZER: Speaking to the Democrats, Hillary Clinton supporters worry about Jeb Bush. He's popular in Florida. That's a state she needs as the Democratic nominee, given the Electoral College issues.
Guys, don't go far.
That's it for me. Thanks for watching. I'll be back at 5:00 p.m. eastern in "THE SITUATION ROOM."
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