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Secret Service Detains Man for Trying to Fly Drone Over White House; Jeb Bush Offers Another Clarification. Aired 1:30-2p ET

Aired May 14, 2015 - 13:30   ET

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

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ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

[13:31:39] WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Getting some disturbing breaking news. We're learning a man has been detained by the secret service outside the White House for apparently trying to fly a drone over the White House.

Let's go to our White House producer, Kristen Holmes who is joining us on the phone.

Kristen, what do we know?

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN PRODUCER (via phone): Well, Wolf, we're still trying to figure out exactly what happened. But what we know right now is that just about 15 minutes ago, they completely cleared the park. It happened very quickly. We saw masses of people being pushed throughout of the Lafayette park, on the north side of the White House, and closed the street completely.

What they say happened, witnesses say they saw a man trying to fly something over the White House fence. (INAUDIBLE) whether or not it was a drone, couple of people said they swore it was a drone. Others people said it may have been a model airplane. So we're still trying to figure out exactly what happened. But the effects were very quick, very fast. They pushed everybody out, they closed the entire block from all the way from Connecticut avenue down to 15th street on the side of the street. They're not letting anyone through. Even if you (INAUDIBLE) in the building. They are keeping you out. So they're reacting to this pretty quickly. We just saw that marched into a police car.

BLITZER: So it's still ongoing, this incident? Even though they've detained this individual, is that the Pennsylvania avenue, that whole pedestrian area north of the White House just in front of Blair house, Lafayette park over there, that whole area has now been swept clean and no one is there? Is that right?

HOLMES: Yes, it's completely empty. They are not letting anyone through at this time. They actually closed down the end of 16th street as well. That whole entire block where the park is, down the street, they're redirecting traffic as well. So it's completely shut down as well. They are working on this. BLITZER: We should point out, the president is currently meeting with

gulf Arab state leaders at Camp David. So he's not at the White House. I don't know about the first lady. I assume that the rest of the family, the daughters, they're in school right now. But this is a picture we are just getting in showing what's going on. It looks like the secret service uniformed personnel are detaining somebody on the ground there. But, the individual -- do we know if this was really a drone, it was possibly some sort of model plane, Kristen?

HOLMES: Well, that's what I'm saying, we are not positive yet. We did hear two conflicting witness reports. We have people telling us it was a drone, and then someone else said it might have been model airplane. When I asked her I it looked like the same. She said she wasn't sure. She just saw it flying up and she had assumed that it was.

So I'm not positive that it was a drone now. We did have someone say they saw it on the ground, but I was not able to see that. So I didn't get a good look at whether or not. It could have been either a drone or airplane. But he was trying to fly something over the fence. And I should mention that it never got over the fence.

BLITZER: The drone or the small plane, whatever it was, the model plane, the drone, it never got over the fence surrounding the White House, is that right? Is that what you said?

HOLMES: Yes. It did not get over the fence.

BLITZER: And so, basically, they saw something going on and then all of the sudden, the secret service went into action.

Now, this follows a few weeks ago, a lot of our viewers remember, that there was a drone that flew over the White House and actually landed on the grounds of the White House, but that was an incident involving someone who just did it by mistake, right?

[13:34:51] HOLMES: Yes, and that was definitely a mistake. And he had been cleared of those charges. But what is interesting is that several witnesses here remember that event and told this man who was about to fly something, they said, don't do that, you're going to get trouble. And a few seconds later, secret service was on him.

BLITZER: And we know there were been other incidents of fence jumpers at the White House, including one guy who actually jumped over the fence on the north lawn, ran across the north lawn of the White House, got into the White House itself, ran around, they got up there in the east room of the White House. And so there have been some disturbing incidents. And totally understandably, the secret service personnel uniform and non-uniform, they're very sensitive right now to potential threats, right?

HOLMES: Yes. They are very sensitive. And there have been several reports on what they can do at the White House to make the security better. There was a lot of different proposals done by the department, even a mote was one of them. They said they were going to increase the fence to make it taller, maybe put spikes on the end of the fence. We did learn about, I think it was in January or March of this year, they were testing drones to see, the secret service was testing drones, they had to get a permit in the middle of the night, and that was one of the things they were coming back to combat the entire things. The drone (INAUDIBLE) made by their owned grown to stop them in the case of something like this. Because what happened, you know, as you mentioned in that incident where someone did end up flying a drone over the fence. What happened in that incident was that they didn't have anything to combat that. So they have been looking at ways to security the White House and make it safer, especially as mentioned as well, the man who made it all the way into the White House doors wielding a knife.

BLITZER: Yes. There was another incident a few months ago, where there was actually some gunshots that were fired towards the White House, and they didn't discover the remnants of those gunshots for several days, only accidentally, some people found those gunshots.

So there's a lot of concern right now about security at the White House for understandable reasons. Once again though, the president is up at Camp David meeting with gulf leaders right now, Arab leaders. And we see one individual now detained for apparently wanting to fly some sort of drone over the White House.

And as far as we know, we've done some checking, detecting drones flying at relatively low levels, that's very, very difficult, if not impossible around sensitive areas like the White House or Capitol Hill or elsewhere in the nation's capitol, is that what you're hearing from sources over there as well, Kristen?

HOLMES: Yes, exactly. That's why they've been working on different kind of programs, do kind of combat this to learn how to deal with these new security measures. I mean, new technology, new kinds of security that they need to deal with. And so, whether it obviously can't just be tall fences, that they're (INAUDIBLE), that they are looking at different ways as I said, testing out drones on the national mall in the middle of the night. We heard about that a couple months ago to try to combat these drones, to try to keep up to date with the technology that can come with the people flying these.

BLITZER: Where are you now, Kristen? I understand that movement for White House personnel, White House reporters had been restricted.

HOLMES: Yes, you can't go in or out of the White House, you can't even go in or out around the park area. So, I'm actually at the corner of Connecticut and eighth street, and I'm facing the White House. Pushed off to the side because they closed, as I mentioned, the entire mile on the north side of the White House. And they have secret service members, and I believe I see park police as well blocking people off in this area.

BLITZER: And we don't know if this lockdown area is because there is fear of something else could be going or simply as a result of an abundance of caution to just clean it up and make sure there's no problem there before they let people walk around and let everybody go back to normal around there. All right. I want you to standby, Kristen. I know the ranking member

of the house intelligence committee, representative Adam Schiff is also standing by. Let's take a quick break, a little reset, resume our coverage right after this.

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[13:42:12] BLITZER: We're following a breaking news outside the White House. We're learning a man has now been detained by the U.S. secret service for trying to fly some sort of aerial device, maybe a drone, over the White House. The entire area around the White House including Lafayette Park, the north side of the White House, Pennsylvania Avenue, just outside the White House has been locked down, if you will.

You see a picture there of secret service personnel detaining an individual for apparently trying to fly some sort of drone over the White House, the aircraft, the small aircraft, whether it was a drone, something else, did not make it across the White House. But you see what is going on. Maybe out of an abundance of caution.

Our justice correspondent Pamela Brown is joining us.

Pamela, are you picking up new information? What are you learning.

PAMELA BROWN, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, have the calls out, Wolf. And I can tell you right now that this is something that D.C. U.S. attorney's office is going to take a look at just as it did with the other drone case we saw a few months ago where there was an government employee who flew his drone that ended up over the White House fence. It turned out that the D.C. U.S. attorney's office did not press charges in that case. It determined that there was a malfunction with the drone of that employee.

But Wolf, depending on the facts that come out of the case, of course it could be different whether or not this was intentional. Whether this person intentionally was trying to fly this drone over the White House fence. And also, of course, what was in the drone. I can tell you, this has been an issue, the White House, the national security council, the justice department, the FAA have been trying to grapple with. What do you do about this problem? And how do you combat it? Of course, there's been a lot of talk about drones being used as terrorist weapons. That kind of thing. So I think that this is just another example of why they're so concerned, Wolf.

BLITZER: There's obviously protecting the White House, the compound, even though the president is not there. He's at Camp David, that's about, you know, in Fairmont, Maryland. It's a good hour and a half away from the White House. The president's not there. I don't know about the first lady. I assume the daughters, the Obama daughters, they're in school right now. But still, there are a lot of people at the White House.

Kristen Holmes is one of our White House producers.

Kristen, you're not inside the White House. You're just outside that area. I take it the area has still been blocked off, no one can get close to the White House from Pennsylvania avenue or from Connecticut avenue, 17th street, any of the areas around the White House? Is that right?

HOLMES: Yes, it's still completely blocked off. We have a couple of people asked when is this going to cleared out. They are telling us they don't know. They're hearing sirens. We've been hearing sirens for 20 minutes. But I haven't seen anything news so far coming up, but it's completely jammed up. They have cars blocking off traffic. They have caution tape up, and they have several officers on every corner making sure that no one crosses by the White House. So it still completely out of red lock here.

[13:45:06] BLITZER: Yes, there's been all series of incidents in recent months involving security at the White House.

All right, we're going to stay on top of this story. We'll continue to follow the breaking news. Update our viewers here in the United States and around the world.

We'll also check some other news, including Jeb Bush's slip of the tongue that has a lot of people talking, including our political panel. We'll go to them when we come back.

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[13:49:04] BLITZER: We are following the breaking news, man has been detained outside the White House for apparently trying to fly some sort of aerial device, maybe a drone, over the White House. You see the picture on the left part of your screen, secret service personnel detaining this individual. The drone or whatever aerial device it was did not make it across the White House grounds, but that whole area outside of the White House has now been in lockdown.

It's been going on for at least half an hour. People can't get to Pennsylvania avenue on the north side of the White House or any of the streets nearby. This perhaps out of an abundance of caution by the U.S. secret service. But for whatever reason, the lockdown continues. We'll continue to follow this story, update you as we get more information.

But I want to go to another story we're following today involving major politics. After days of questions over his answer about whether or not he would have gone to war in Iraq, Jeb Bush, the former Florida governor, just offered yet another clarification.

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[13:50:04] JEB BUSH (R), FORMER FLORIDA GOVERNOR: As governor of Florida, I call -- I didn't keep tabs, but I usually called over 100 family members who lost a loved one in service to our great country. Not an easy thing to do, to do it that many times. The president has to do it. I'm sure other governors did it as well. And it's very hard for me to say that their lives were lost in vain. In fact, they weren't. We have the greatest military on the face of the earth. And the families that suffer have gone through a lot too. Their sacrifice is worth honoring, not depreciating. And I believe that in the bottom of my heart.

So here is the deal. We're all supposed to answer hypothetical questions knowing what you know now, what would you have done? I would not have engaged. I would not have gone into Iraq.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: You heard him say it there.

Let's discuss what's going on with our chief congressional correspondent Dana Bash and our CNN politics reporter Sara Murray.

Dana, so he now says flatly knowing what he knows now, he would not have gone to war as his brother did back in 2003. Does this put the matter to rest?

DANA BASH, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I don't think so because he's opened up a whole other can of worms. And that can is called how come it took you four times to answer the same question? And I think what is really noteworthy is that maybe you didn't get from that clip is what he just said, just within the past hour in Arizona, he said unsolicited. This time he didn't get a question. He said that right out of the gate because he knew that this is something he tried to clean up over the past several days and wasn't able to do so. So now he had his very clear talking points. I would not have done it, I would not have gone to Iraq knowing what I know now.

You know, you can go back to the interview that he did over the weekend, which aired on Monday on FOX which Megyn Kelly. He said that he didn't understand the question. He thought it was about at the time would you have done it. And then he very much defended his brother. They clearly knew inside Bush world that was a mistake. But the open question, Wolf, is still why did he bob and weave in so many different ways in so many different areas over the past several days to get to where he is now which is if your name is Bush and you're running for president, it is probably something, and I'm guessing, it was something they thought would be an obvious question from any reporter or any voter.

BLITZER: And as you know, Sara, he's getting a severe criticism from unlikely quarters, from conservatives and Republicans, who think he's totally misplayed this particular issue.

SARA MURRAY, CNN POLITICS REPORTER: Yes, Wolf. We're hearing from his donors, we are hearing from his allies, who are saying this is the most predictable question Jeb Bush should expect to be getting running for president. And they do not understand why it has taken him this long to get the answer right.

The other thing they're saying is he knew that he messed up the question when this originally aired, the interview originally aired on Monday. So why did it take his campaign so long to sort of pull him in and say, look, this isn't the answer we talked about. This isn't actually your stance on this or whatever. And here's how we need to go out and fix this. The fact it's taken him four days to answer a question that is central to many people's concerns about his candidacy, how he's different from his brother, what he would do differently, is a big concern.

BLITZER: And Dana, listen to this. This is another clip. This is Jeb Bush, the former Florida governor, some say the front runner maybe for the Republican presidential nomination yesterday. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BUSH: I'm running for president in 2016, and the focus is going to be about if I run, how do you create high-sustained economic growth where more people have a chance to earn success?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: All right. He basically announced he's running for president of the United States. I thought he was supposed to wait a few more weeks to do that. What happened there, Dana?

BASH: He had a slip of the tongue. He said very clearly, I'm a candidate for president in 2016. And then clearly he put the "if" in there, which is an important qualifier. And this isn't just a kind of fumble rhetorically. It's a very important legal issue. Because somebody like Jeb Bush, Scott Walker, Chris Christie, others who have super PACs and other things that are going on to raise money but they are not yet formal federal candidates cannot say even like that, that they are a candidate because it changes the way they have to raise money. Right now he can raise unlimited sums and ask for that money for his super PAC. He can't do so when he's a federal candidate, which is a big reason why he's waiting to announce, because he wants to kind of fill the coffers in his super PAC as much as he can from donors who can give a million dollars, whereas when he's an actual candidate, there's a total cap of a little over $5,000. That's why it's important. But his aides say they feel really confident that they're on the right side of the law because elsewhere in that same press conference, he made very clear he's not an official candidate for president.

But it does kind of show you the kabuki dance that a lot of these candidates, not just Jeb Bush, or would-be candidates are going through in order to stay on the right side of the law but maybe they're not exactly in the spirit of the law because we all know that they are going to run.

[13:55:17] BLITZER: But to his credit, Sara, for all the criticism he's getting, he's out there, he is giving speeches, he is answering questions, he is having town hall meetings, he is doing interviews on television. So he's willing to go out there and face the fire, if you will.

MURRAY: Yes. And Jeb Bush will definitely remind you of that, that he's there, he's taken questions from the press. Obviously this is a big contrast with the Democratic front runner Hillary Clinton, who is not taking questions from the press.

And on the issue of Iraq, this is really interesting because she's the one who is in the field who actually voted to authorize the war in Iraq when she was a member of Congress. And she hasn't had to answer for that since she has announced her run for president.

Now, when she released her book "Hard Choices," she admitted there it was a mistake. But it is interesting to see that Jeb Bush is coming out day after day, he is answering these questions, whether it's on the economy, whether it's on Iraq, and Hillary Clinton has done very little of that.

BASH: And real quick --

BLITZER: Hold on, Dana. Very quickly. We got to run.

BASH: To be fair to Jeb Bush, other Republicans running for president are not doing the same. Scott Walker was just in Israel. He didn't even take any press because his foreign trip last time did not go well. So that shows you the contrast there.

BLITZER: Good contrast. All right. Thanks very much, guys.

That's it for me. I'll be back 5:00 p.m. eastern in "the SITUATION ROOM."

For our international viewers "AMANPOUR" is coming up next. For our viewers in north America, "NEWSROOM" with Brooke Baldwin will start after a quick break.

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