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Anderson Cooper 360 Degrees

Appeals Court Allows Trump's National Guard Deployment In Portland; Comey Claims "Vindictive" Prosecution, Seeks Dismissal Of DOJ Case; US Envoys Jared Kushner And Steve Witkoff In Israel For Talks, Vice President J.D. Vance Arrives Tomorrow; Trump Denies He Asked Zelenskyy To Concede Donbas Region To Russia, Endorses Freezing Conflict At Current Front Lines; Manhunt On For Thieves Who Stole "Priceless" Jewels From Louvre; Amazon Says Systems Back Online After Global Internet Outage; Demolition Begins To Replace WH East Wing With Ballroom. Aired 8-9p ET

Aired October 20, 2025 - 20:00   ET

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

GEOFFREY KELLY, ORIGINAL MEMBER OF FBI'S ELITE ART CRIME TEAM: And so you've seen thieves now are shifting the focus to jewels because obviously jewels can be broken down. The gems can be recut and the settings can be melted down. I would hope, and I'm optimistic here, that of course, the clock is ticking, but hopefully we have a little bit of time.

Because if these guys are smart and they seem to be professionals, they're going to hold on to it for a little while, they're going, they're not going to break it up immediately, because if the French Police come knocking on their door, they're going to need to get out of jail free card and those jewels are their get out of jail free card.

And so, hopefully they're going to hold on to it for a while. We saw it with the Green Vault robbery in Dresden in 2019 when they recovered in 2022 and the jewels were recovered when they were arrested.

ERIN BURNETT, CNN HOST: All right, well, we shall see. Fascinating, and, Jeffrey, thank you so much and thanks to all of you. AC360 starts now.

[20:00:53]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN HOST: Tonight on 360, an appeals court allows the President for now to send troops where they don't seem wanted, even as he claims once again, that he doesn't even need permission to send them anywhere he wants.

Also tonight, the former FBI Director decides offense is the best defense against the charges he faces. We have details on the case he is making that his prosecution is the work of a vindictive president.

And later, with French authorities racing to find many of these priceless treasures before they're broken up and fenced, all we are learning about into The Louvre and made off with them, including video of them in the act.

Good evening, John Berman here in for Anderson.

We begin tonight in Portland, Oregon or as the President has put it war-ravaged Portland. Today, just two days after thousands there rallied as part of the almost universally peaceful No Kings demonstrations across the country, and after weeks of protesters, some dressed as animals, inflatable or otherwise confronted authorities again, largely peacefully outside federal ICE facilities, a three- judge federal appeals panel okayed sending in the National Guard. The vote was two to one.

Quoting from the ruling now, "After considering the record at this preliminary stage, we conclude that it is likely that the President lawfully exercised his statutory authority under 10 USC Section 12406, which authorizes the federalization of the National Guard when the President is unable, with the regular forces, to execute the laws of the United States."

And if you've been listening to the President lately, that's certainly the impression you would get.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: I watched Portland, Oregon last night burning to the ground, just burning with people. And these are agitators, and we're going to stop them. We're going to stop it all.

REPORTER: Do you see what's happening in Portland?

TRUMP: This is like, nobody's ever seen anything like it every night and this has gone on for years. They just burned the place down.

These are professional agitators. These are bad people. You go out to Portland, people die out there. Many people have died over the years in Portland. Portland is -- I don't know how anybody lives there. It's amazing but it's anarchy out there and that's what they want.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: Keeping them honest, the facts really don't bear that out. Portland is not burning. It has not burned to the ground. But some of those remarks, we later learned, came just a day after Fox News aired footage of parts of the city on fire during the 2020 Black Lives Matter unrest.

More recent protests, as we showed a moment ago, have been largely nonviolent and almost exclusively confined to the federal facility in South Portland. That said, the two ninth circuit judges in the majority today, both of them Trump appointees, gave at least some credence to the President's claims, quoting again, "The evidence the President relied on reflects a colorable assessment of the facts and law within a range of honest judgment," not a hearty endorsement, but apparently enough to rule in his favor.

In dissent, Judge Susan P. Graber, a Clinton nominee, writes that today's decision is not merely absurd. It erodes core constitutional principles, including state control over the National Guard and the First Amendment right to assemble and protest.

The state of Oregon is now asking for a so-called en banc hearing of the case by a larger group of ninth circuit judges. As for the President, he is restating his right, as he sees it, to use the Insurrection Act to bypass the courts and send troops anywhere he wants. This is from yesterday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Allowed, as you know, as President, like 50 percent of the presidents have used the Insurrection Act. They can use that and everybody agrees you're allowed to use that. And there's no more court cases. There's no more anything. We're trying to do it in a nicer manner, but we can always use the Insurrection Act if we want.

We want to have great crime free cities. So, I'd be allowed to use it if I wanted the Insurrection Act. And then all of this nonsense would go away. You have the absolute right. It's the strongest power of President has and you have the absolute right to do it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: For reference, the Insurrection Act was created not in response to crime per se, but an actual insurrection, the Whiskey Rebellion. And most recently it was used by President George H.W. Bush during the Rodney King riots after large swaths of Los Angeles actually had been burned to the ground and looted.

Perspective now from National Security law expert and retired Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Rachel Vanlandingham and CNN senior crime and justice correspondent Shimon Prokupecz, who's done extensive reporting from Portland in recent weeks.

And to that end, Shimon, what difference do you think that National Guard troops will make when they arrive there on the ground? Will it take the temperature down?

[20:05:29]

SHIMON PROKUPECZ, CNN SENIOR CRIME AND JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, the concern certainly is, John, that it could actually bring the temperature up. You know, when you start seeing people in military gear outside this building, there is legitimate concern within the law enforcement community, within the community there in Portland, that it could start to inflame the situation. We saw some of that, you know, things started to die down, really, in Portland.

They were quieting down and then once the President started ratcheting up and saying that he was going to start sending National Guard troops in, you saw the protests start to increase.

And really, what's been happening out there that -- it's something that any well-trained police force, law enforcement official can handle. You're not talking about thousands of people you're talking about on a busy night. A couple of hundred people who stand outside the gate of this driveway. It's a half a block, not even, and yell and scream at the federal law enforcement that's there and it goes back and forth.

And then things do escalate when vehicles come in and out of the building, because what happens is the federal law enforcement, that's Border Patrol, it's ICE officers in camo gear. They come out with gas masks holding those pepper guns and that escalates things. It gets the protesters agitated and then it escalates and then the agitation starts and then what happens is you'll start seeing teargas. And then from the roof, federal law enforcement firing pepper balls down at the protesters.

There's no de-escalation. There's only escalation, and there's a lot of fear that that could grow if these troops are brought in.

BERMAN: Colonel, what I was reading the ruling from the panel there, the phrase "a colorable assessment." If the President has a colorable assessment that the National Guard are needed, he can send them in. How much leeway does it give the President to send to the National Guard to anywhere?

LT. COL. RACHEL VANLANDINGHAM (RET.) U.S. AIR FORCE FORMER JAG OFFICER: Well, it vests pretty wide authority within the President. The court really focused on the facts at hand that the government put forward, that the administration had to deploy 25 percent of its, "federal protective services" to the city of Portland in order to ensure that the ICE agents and federal property were being protected and the court seem to give that pretty great weight. So as long as, so they're looking at through a soda straw.

But they did criticize the trial judge who issued the original two temporary restraining orders. And the fact that she said, hey, look, its peaceful now. And they said its legitimate for the President to take a broader view and to look at the threats, such as the shooting down in Dallas. The potential for increased violence to take that into consideration and whether or not he can, "execute the law, enforce the laws" using his regular forces.

So, it seems like these specific facts, particularly the plussing up of the federal protective services that the government claimed was unsustainable, really swayed this panel, which means it doesn't take very much to defer to the President.

The problem is this particular statute and the Insurrection Act is far worse, is rather ambiguous. And it does vest not complete authority like the President said, but it vests a great deal of discretion within the President to decide when to send military troops to our city streets.

BERMAN: Well, it will continue to work its way up through the courts. The state of Oregon likely to appeal. In the meantime, the National Guard, we imagine, will deploy. Lieutenant Colonel Rachel Vanlandingham, Shimon Prokupecz, thanks to both of you.

Now, former FBI Director James Comey, who launched a legal offensive today to get the federal charges he is facing for allegedly lying to Congress thrown out two court filings, one arguing that the interim U.S. attorney who brought the case, Lindsey Halligan, was appointed unlawfully. Halligan, you will recall, is the former Trump personal attorney who got the job when the DOJ veteran in charge of the Eastern District of Virginia refused to pursue an indictment.

The second filing alleges vindictive prosecution, calling it a, "egregious abuse of power by the federal government." Comey's lawyer going on to say, "The United States Constitution entitles individuals to speak out against the government and in turn forbids the government from retaliating against individuals for their protected speech, but that is exactly what happened here."

The filing says Comey was singled out for prosecution because he has spoken out against the President, who has made no secret of his "personal spite" for Comey, which the President certainly has not concealed.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Comey and all this, you know, sleazebags.

Comey lied to everybody.

We fired Comey, that fraud.

That phony Crooked Comey --

Comey should hang his head in disgrace.

Comey is a dirty cop.

Comey is a corrupt person.

One of the best things is firing James Comey's (bleep) out of there.

He's a leaker.

Comey, who's the worst --

They lied to Congress many times. You know, Comey and all those guys.

Comey lies and leaks. He's a liar and he's a leaker. Is this guy being looked at? But we're going to straighten it out.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[20:10:23]

BERMAN: With us now is Michael Moore, former U.S. attorney for the Middle District of Georgia. Counselor, good to see you. So, what's the bar to prove selective or vindictive prosecution and how persuasive is the brief here for James Comey?

MICHAEL MOORE, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT CONTRIBUTOR: Yes, well, I'm glad to be with you. This is a good brief, and it's a good motion. I think it has a lot of strength and I think it will get the court's attention. I mean, they basically have to show that there's an illegitimate purpose in bringing the case. And can they show, in fact, that he's essentially discriminated against and that his equal protection rights have been violated by bringing this case against him? Has it been selected because he's an individual who has spoken out?

And they point to some pretty unique circumstances in the motion, which I think is clever. And that is they said, look, you know, the administration is not prosecuting similarly situated people for doing the same things, and they go through this long list of Republican officials who have given testimony that appears to be incorrect, at least and that may be being generous. But they say, look, you're not prosecuting them, but you singled Comey out because he has been a critic of the President.

The motion is very strong. I mean, I think the judge is going to get his attention and I think you're likely to see some pretty serious discussion about it when they have a hearing. If he does not dismiss the case, I mean, if the judge doesn't dismiss the case, Comey's lawyers have asked that there be some discovery, and that is to allow them to dig into, well, what was the motivation for bringing this case? What e-mails exist out there? What directives have we seen, you know, from the Attorney General to this newly appointed U.S. attorney down there?

You know, what was the motivation behind bringing the prosecution? That I think is going to make the government squirm more than anything else because it really puts them on the hot seat, and it sort of opens up their hamper or dirty laundry as they think about the case.

BERMAN: Very quickly, the idea of tossing the case on the technicality that Lindsey Halligan was not appropriately appointed because she was appointed after a 120-day temporary term, had already been filled. What about that?

MOORE: I think that's a good motion, too. There's this federal statute that actually says that you would appoint a temporary U.S. attorney, an interim U.S. attorney for 120 days. If that expires, then the judge can appoint somebody here. Trump has tried to sort of get around that. I mean, and the reason that there's a statute is so that, you know, administrations can't bypass Congress' right to advise and consent or the Senate's right to hear these candidates and approve them.

Otherwise, you would just have Presidents appoint people for 119 days and then another 119 days and basically everybody that worked on the campaign would find themselves in line to be U.S. Attorney somewhere at the expiration of 120 days.

So, it's a good motion. It's going to be heard by a different judge, by all appearances. And so, because of the circumstances of the court appointment of the former U.S. attorney, they'll have another judge come in and hear it but it's a strong motion. I think it'll see some daylight.

BERMAN: A lot for a couple judges to chew on here. Michael Moore, counsel, great to see you.

MOORE: Great being with you. BERMAN: Next: He is up for a big job within the Department of Justice. But maybe not for long because tonight, after a new report of deeply disturbing text messages sent by Paul Ingrassia to a group of fellow Republicans, the Senate's top Republican Majority Leader John Thune has just weighed in.

And later a jewelry heist so brazen you could make a movie about it, yet so unprofessional no one would buy it. New details on The Louvre break-in and what could become of the priceless loot.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think the pieces are already far from the country. So "Ocean 13," it's "Thomas Crown" so easy and not sophisticated.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[20:18:22]

BERMAN: All right, breaking news tonight that an already controversial Presidential appointee's nomination is now in the deepest of trouble. His name is Paul Ingrassia, the President's pick to head the Office of Special Counsel, the Justice Department's internal watchdog.

And a short time ago, the Senate's top Republican Majority Leader, John Thune, said he hopes The White House withdraws him from consideration. He's not going to pass, Senator Thune says.

This comes after POLITICO today published racist and otherwise offensive text messages attributed to Ingrassia, who is scheduled to have a confirmation hearing on Thursday.

According to POLITICO, he made the remarks in question in a text chain with a half dozen Republican operatives and influencers, one from January of last year, "MLK Jr. was the 1960's George Floyd and his holiday should be ended and tossed into the seventh circle of hell where it belongs." "Jesus Christ," one participant responded.

In another message from a month earlier, Ingrassia uses an Italian- American equivalent of the "N" word, saying, "No blank holidays from Kwanzaa to MLK Jr. Day to Black history month to Juneteenth," adding "Every single one needs to be eviscerated."

In another text, someone writes, Paul belongs in the Hitler youth with the Obergruppenfuhrer Steve Bannon." To which Ingrassia responded again, according to POLITICO, "I do have a Nazi streak in me from time to time. I will admit it."

Now, reached for comment by POLITICO, Ingrassia's attorney said, "In this age of A.I. authentication of allegedly leaked messages which could be outright falsehoods, doctored or manipulated or lacking critical context is extremely difficult." He continues. "What is certain, though, is that there are individuals who cloak themselves in anonymity while executing their underhanded personal agendas to harm Mr. Ingrassia at all costs. We do not concede the authenticity of any of these purported messages."

With us now from the left and right, respectively, CNN political commentators Bakari Sellers and Brad Todd. Bakari, your reaction to these messages that POLITICO reported on today.

[20:20:12]

BAKARI SELLERS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Not much of a reaction? I mean, I think that there is an issue of racism and race being utilized as political currency in the Republican Party and until people call it out, check it. I'm not sure anything will change. And so, I think where we are as a country is that I'm not surprised.

I mean, we just saw the same thing last week with the Young Republicans and people were trying to couch that as its youthful endeavors. But what we're seeing right now is that its more than that. It's people who literally are playing a role in our political policy. And if that's how you feel about me or even more importantly, that's how you feel about J.D. Vance's wife, then you don't have any place in government.

I remember when racists were like in the darkness. They were in the corners. Now racism is popular.

BERMAN: Now, you quoted another one of the text messages inside this piece, which refers to Indians and people from China. Again, we only scratched the surface of what's in this political story. People should go look at it so they can get the full spectrum of what's in there.

Brad, the best guy to be the special counsel of Justice Department, Paul Ingrassia?

BRAD TODD, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: No and he's not going to be confirmed. In fact, I don't even expect him to make it to the hearing on Thursday.

Rick Scott and Ron Johnson, two members of that committee who are highly respected, have already said that they're against his nomination. And I think before you get to Thursday, everybody on the committee will be against his nomination. I mean, this guys a punk and doesn't belong in government unless he can convince Verizon to demonstrate that those are fabricated, then he's not going to get anywhere close to the Justice Department.

BERMAN: How do you think he got this far and ingratiate himself this much into the Trump orbit then, Brad?

TODD: I don't know. I can't tell you how, but I can tell you he's 30 years old and there's a lot of his life left to live. And I think that gives him plenty of time to sort of square up his viewpoint.

But, you know, The White House is not going to put up with this. I mean, somebody who's 30 years old, there are no -- there's nobody who's 30-years-old and indispensable in any job, unless you're a six- time pro bowl quarterback. So, I think that this nomination will be yanked.

BERMAN: Bakari, how surprised are you? Or you said you're not surprised by this? How surprised will you be if The White House does pull it.

SELLERS: No, I mean, I don't get surprised or excited when people do the bare minimum. I mean, this guy is racist. And I think that he, you know, people including Dr. King and many others, I'm not sure who the quote is attributed to, but they say your character is who you are when no one is watching. And he thought no one was watching in these group chats.

I mean, the problem is that a lot of these individuals, they don't get their group chats exposed. I mean, I have group chats with friends and no, I don't want people to read them, but I don't go to the depths of hell with my group chats. I don't just espouse racism and say, I love Adolf Hitler.

I mean, it is a unique, inherent character flaw that I'm, you know, Brad is right, I don't think that this is somebody who should be in government for one. And two, you know, I think Ron Johnson and many others are just going to make sure that doesn't happen. They don't want to answer these questions.

TODD: Well, the problem is not that he texted it, it's that he thought it. You know, the lesson of this story, if you're a young person out there who is nuts, don't text the wrong thing and don't think the wrong thing.

BERMAN: So, where was the mistake made then? Again, from an administration perspective, I mean, people, generally speaking, are vetted for jobs that involve overseeing like the Justice Department. It's not just any job. This is someone who is going to be the internal watchdog at DOJ.

TODD: You know, there's a lot of people that apply for these jobs. There are a lot of jobs to fill and I -- obviously, they hadn't seen these text messages or he wouldn't have been nominated. And obviously, somebody got fooled in an interview but this is going to be old news in about 12 hours, I would suspect.

BERMAN: Well, we will see. Bakari Sellers, Brad Todd, nice to see you both tonight, thank you very much. Talk to you both on our group chat soon.

All right, just ahead, there is word that President Trump is once again insisting Ukraine must give up territory to Russia to end the war.

Also ahead, as French Police investigate the ease by which thieves stole historic crown jewels from The Louvre, there is growing concern that the French National Treasures may never be recovered.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[20:29:07]

BERMAN: Hamas has released the remains of one more of the deceased hostages. Israeli Police escorted a vehicle carrying the body to the National Institute of Forensic Medicine in Tel Aviv. He has been identified as a Sergeant Major who was killed in the Hamas attack on October 7th and is the 13th of the 28 deceased hostages to be returned.

The ceasefire agreement calls for the release of all of the remains, but last week Hamas said that special equipment will be needed to recover more bodies due to significant destruction in Gaza by two years of war.

President Trump's Special Envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff met today in Israel with top officials as they work to keep the ceasefire intact. Vice President J.D. Vance will visit tomorrow.

Over the weekend, Israel accused Hamas of launching an attack that killed two of its soldiers, much to discuss with Fareed Zakaria, host of "Fareed Zakaria GPS" -- and Fareed, since the President has sent Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner and the Vice-President to Israel, what does that tell you about the level of concern that this deal could fall apart?

FAREED ZAKARIA, CNN HOST OF "FAREED ZAKARIA GPS": Well, in a sense, I don't want to in any way minimize the important work that Witkoff and Kushner did. It was really a very high quality diplomatic work that pulled off work that pulled off that ceasefire.

But the ceasefire has to turn into some kind of peace. If you remember, Biden was able to get a hundred-plus hostages out, and there was a temporary pause in the fighting. The challenge here has always been what happens next. And will Hamas be willing to cede power? Cede its weaponry? And if it is not, is Israel still going to withdraw?

[20:30:43]

You remember this. We went through stage one, stage which was the hostages were released in exchange for the end of the bombing. Stage two is Hamas disarms and Israel withdraws. Israel is still in control of a majority of the Gaza Strip.

So that second phase hasn't happened yet. And I think the reason they're all there is they can sense that this could spiral downward fast. The problem is we still don't have an adequate solution to what to do about Palestinian governance if Hamas is to go away. Will it go away? And if it goes away, who replaces it?

The Israelis have never provided an answer to that. And I don't think the Americans have one yet.

BERMAN: They are huge, huge questions. We will see how far they get in discussing them over the next several days. Other major foreign policy news, really the other major challenge facing the President. New details emerged about Friday's meeting between President Trump and Ukraine's President Zelenskyy. According to European officials briefed on the meeting, President Trump raised his voice several times and insisted that Ukraine must give up land to Russia to end the conflict. What do you think brought the President back to that position, which feels pretty similar to where he was a few months ago? That's in addition to not giving Zelenskyy the tomahawks that he had come to ask for.

ZAKARIA: You know, John, I've always felt that Trump has really only had one position on Ukraine all along, which was the easiest way to end this war is if Ukraine simply surrenders, capitulates. If you look at how he began his second term, it was to say, I know how to solve this one. He basically went to the Ukrainians and forced them to accept all of Russia's demands.

The Russians had various negotiations, mostly in Istanbul, had made three key demands. We get to keep all the territory that we have conquered. Ukraine will never be a member of NATO and there will never be American troops in Ukraine.

Trump basically gave all those concessions to Putin before even beginning a negotiation. And yet Putin was unwilling to make a deal because he, you know, he wants more. He thinks he's on a roll. He thinks he's got with Trump a -- an enabler, as it were.

So now Trump frustrated that he couldn't get a deal is doubling down on the original strategy, which is get more concessions out of Ukraine, force them to surrender even more fully. I don't think it's going to work, you know, because the Ukrainians are fighting for their country. They're fighting for their lives. And even though the President of the United States is enormously powerful, they're not going to give away their country.

BERMAN: He has said publicly, he said this on Air Force One. He said that, why don't we just freeze things where they are? And he almost sounded like he thought that was a concession. I mean, Russia was making a concession by freezing things where they are. And the Ukraine should somehow be excited by that notion. But what do the Ukrainians hear and freeze things where they are?

ZAKARIA: Well, first of all, it means rewarding aggression, rewarding the illegal annexation of territory. Secondly, as you point out, freezing things as they are is not some great concession to the Russians. The Russians have been trying to take more territory this year and they have barely gotten anywhere. And they are losing 7,000 troops a week, John, 7,000 dead Russians a week for nothing.

So the Russians are under enormous pressure as well. The most important concession, of course, that Trump doesn't talk about is the ones he's already made. Ukraine will have no real security guarantee, as in NATO membership. It will not have American protection with an American base or American troops on the ground. And those have already been given. So what he's looking for now are additional concessions. And I think

the way that the Ukrainians look at it is like we've already, you know, we've already paid at the office. We've already done all the things you wanted us to do. You went to Putin.

And in Alaska, instead of getting a deal, what you got was a long lecture from Vladimir Putin on the history of Russia-Ukraine relations, which is apparently what annoyed President Trump. But somehow he never draws from that the conclusion, John, that the place you need to apply pressure is on Russia, not on Ukraine.

[20:35:15]

BERMAN: Fareed Zakaria, great to see you tonight. Thank you so much.

Up next, the brazen jewel heist taking just seven minutes at the Louvre in broad daylight. Priceless treasures stolen from the world's most visited museum. How the burglars pulled it off and the latest on the investigation ahead.

And then later, the reasons behind a major Internet outage that affected so many people, ominously everyone I know today, and why the White House is looking more like a major construction site.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[20:40:26]

BERMAN: Louvre in Paris, the world's most visited museum, remains closed today as authorities investigate a daring jewel heist. Police say on Sunday morning thieves just took seven minutes to swipe priceless jewels, including some that you see in this display case.

Melissa Bell is in Paris with the latest on how all this went down.

(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)

MELISSA BELL, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It was 9:30 a.m. when a witness calls the police from outside the Louvre to report suspicious individuals wearing motorcycle helmets breaking into the museum using a truck with a lifting platform.

By 9:37 a.m., a museum alarm was triggered. Shortly after, a camera catches one of the robbers wearing a yellow vest as they break into a display case, then quickly escaping through the window they used to get in. By 9:38, the thieves flee the scene on scooters.

The entire heist was done in just seven minutes and involved the most rudimentary of tools, this angle cutter and blowtorch.

MAYOR ARIEL WEIL, PARIS CENTER: It does appear that these were extremely well-trained robbers. They planned this meticulously, obviously.

BELL (voice-over): The thieves made off with priceless jewelry worn by French queens in the 19th century, like this tiara necklace and a single earring of Queen Marie Amelie, this large bodice bow brooch of Empress Eugenie, the wife of Napoleon III, and her tiara.

BELL: One thing the robbers dropped as they fled from that window on the first floor was the crown of the Empress Eugenie, the wife of Napoleon III. What they made off with, though, were eight pieces of jewelry of inestimable value in historical and cultural terms, and they did so on the back of scooters as they headed down this bank of the Seine River.

NATHALIE GOULET, FRENCH SENATOR: I think the pieces are already far from the country. It's the Ocean's Thirteen, it's Thomas Crown, so easy and not sophisticated. It's a drama for the French culture and also for our image.

BELL (voice-over): By Monday, the Louvre remained closed as investigators tried to piece together how so much could have been stolen so quickly and why.

LAURE BECCUAU, PARIS PROSECUTOR (through translation): Either it was commissioned by a collector, in which case if we identify this collector and commissioner and can't find the jewels in good condition, or it could also happen that it was commissioned by people who just want the stones and pearls that they were made of.

BELL (voice-over): Authorities say the investigation continues, but the longer it takes to identify the suspects, the slimmer the chances of recovering the jewels.

(END VIDEO TAPE)

BELL (on-camera): John, with every hour that passes in this investigation, this manhunt, with no news emerging at all, the greater the fears here in France that this is a mystery that may never be solved at all. That means we may never find out where the jewels ended up, who was behind this heist, but of course, more importantly, this is an immeasurably important part of France's history and culture that disappears forever, John.

BERMAN: Yes, no kidding.

Melissa Bell, thank you very much.

For more on the heist, I'm joined by Robert Wittman, a former FBI special agent who founded the Bureau's Art Crime Team and CNN Chief Law Enforcement and Intelligence Analyst John Miller, former FBI Assistant Director of Public Affairs.

Robert, how in the world does something like this happen at any museum, let alone the Louvre?

ROBERT WITTMAN, FORMER FBI SPECIAL AGENT, FOUNDER OF BUREAU'S ART CRIME TEAM: Well, John, it's a situation where, you know, museums have a certain amount of security. And in this case, the alarms did go off. There were guards there at the museum, but they couldn't attack the thieves because they were being threatened, you know, by the thieves using those cutters. So, you know, rather than lose their lives because they're not armed, they backed off. And these guys were, you know, intent on doing what they were doing and were able to run out quickly. So it's not hard to understand how this could happen. It could happen anywhere in the world, in any museum. If you have individuals who are willing to give up that much effort and do all that, they can do that.

BERMAN: John, how do police start looking for these thieves?

JOHN MILLER, CNN CHIEF LAW ENFORCEMENT AND INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: Well, they start with what they have at hand. They have that truck with the lift. There's the possibility someone forgot to put on a glove, maybe a latent fingerprint, maybe DNA. They'll build from there.

But the longer game is going to be looking backwards through the security video at the museum, not on the day of the robbery, but on the days leading up to it. You're looking for were the same people there casing it. You know, it's interesting because this fits the training tactics and procedures of a group called the Pink Panthers that operates out of Montenegro.

They're not museum thieves, but what they are is they're jewel thieves who do smash and grabs. But what you have here -- and I think you can look at some footage of them doing different smash and grab robberies and jewelry stores across Europe, Harry Winston's, you name it, they've hit them all.

[20:45:12]

They show up with guns and hammers. They break cases. They take stuff. So while this is a museum robbery done in broad daylight, what did they go after? A priceless painting or something else? They went after the jewels. So that's one possibility they'll look at.

This is a network that has been followed by Interpol in the, you know, Project Pink Panther, collecting names, fingerprints, identifiers. And it's a place that they'll begin.

BERMAN: Robert, how and where and when do you expect these jewels to be sold? Do you think they will be broken up or, you know, melted down or you think they'll try to be sold as whole pieces?

WITTMAN: Well, the fear is that they'll break them up and try to melt down the, yes, the precious metals. It doesn't look to me -- and I'm not disagreeing with John, but it doesn't look to me like it's the Pink Panthers because the Panthers are well known for Harry Winston hits, high-end jewelry store hits, which are much more lucrative than doing something like in a museum.

These diamonds and these precious metals were mined back in 300 years ago. And so the purity of some of this material is not going to be the same as what's coming out today because today we have much better refining techniques. So to do a situation where the Pink Panthers are usually getting out very quickly, they do the smashing grabs, they get into the store, they break it out, they steal the most important things, and they're gone. And it's easy to sell that material because it's basically gold and diamonds. This is jewelry. And it's a little bit of a different situation. I think that these guys may have be part of another group that hit the Natural History Museum last month in Paris and may have stolen some gold nuggets from there as well.

BERMAN: John, those of us who have seen a lot of heist movies and are therefore experts on this type of thing know about, you know, the fence. You have to be able --

MILLER: In "The Italian Job," "The Thomas Crown Affair" --

BERMAN: I've seen all of them. Like, I got a PhD in this stuff. So how do you move it? I mean, if you are these --

MILLER: Well --

BERMAN: -- how do you move it?

MILLER: So this is the thing -- and no one knows more about this than Bob Wittman., but this is the disappointing part of the story, which is these are planned intricately on the front end, you know, historically through these. And when I was at the FBI, you know, Bob and I talked about this, is they end up in the back of somebody's garage.

They end up in somebody's attic. They end up in some place where they're trying to sell it back to the insurance company because on the back end of their well-planned crime, they never had a plan on exactly who was going to buy this famous work of art or this incredibly famous gems.

You know, we have the myth of the collector who orders these special and has some gallery in the basement of their castle on the corner of a mountain. But nobody's ever found that to exist either. So I think what they're going -- and I think Bob's point is right on, which is if they're going to break them up and sell them, they could have done better other ways. And if they're going to move them as they are, they're a little too hot to handle.

BERMAN: John Miller, Robert Wittman, great discussion. Thanks so much for being with us tonight.

Tonight, Amazon says its systems are effectively back up and running. A huge outage earlier today by Amazon's cloud computing services unit, AWS, caused major disruptions to thousands of apps, websites, online platforms, including Snapchat, Facebook, Fortnite, I mean, you name it.

There was so much affected. Airlines, too. Millions of people worldwide impacted by the outage, which lasted more than two hours, really lingered well over the course of the morning into the afternoon.

Let's discuss more about what happened here with cybersecurity expert Theresa Payton, who is CEO of Fortalice Solutions. She was the White House chief information officer under President George W. Bush. Great to see you tonight. Can you walk us through the scale of this outage?

I do a morning show, so I wake up, you know, at 4:00, and between 4:00 a.m. and 7:00 a.m., there was almost nothing working. I mean, you couldn't get on Venmo. The Starbucks app was down. Airlines were suffering. Everything was on the fritz there.

THERESA PAYTON, CYBERSECURITY EXPERT: Yes, your day is about as long as AWS. You've had a long day today. Here's what happened today. So this outage, it looks like the outage originated in the Northern Virginia data center. And what really gave AWS or Amazon's cloud services trouble was something called DNS, which is the domain naming system.

This is the phone book of the Internet, if you will, for AWS. And so, for example, when you type in Amazon.com, it's actually a numerical address behind the scenes. They were having problems with the DNS routing. That created downstream impacts, which then impacted global operations, which is astounding.

[20:50:04]

Now, in fairness to AWS, this can, does, and will happen to other cloud services providers. It was just a really bad day for them today and for customers and services relying on AWS.

BERMAN: Yes, what are the vulnerabilities of so many people relying on this one thing? And what does it tell us about what kind of target it could be? I mean, this appears to have been some kind of a mistake, but what if you deliberately wanted to do this?

PAYTON: And there's going to be a lot of questions asked. AWS, to their credit, has committed to doing a full investigation and reporting out on what they learned, which will not only help AWS and their customers, but also other cloud services providers like Google, like Microsoft.

So it does point to the fragility of our infrastructure. And this should be a big reminder for businesses large and small that you need to have more than one cloud services provider and or a plan that when technology fails us, because this was not a cyber-incident based on AWS's reporting, that technology will fail us. Just like, unfortunately, our appliances in our house can fail, our car can fail, technology can fail.

And so you need to have a backup plan. You need to rehearse. If this cloud service was down, what does that mean for us?

BERMAN: Yes, I mean, when my espresso maker goes down, it doesn't affect tens of millions of people all around the world. But I get your point here. The scale of this was truly astounding for the time that it was going on.

Theresa Payton, great to see you. Thank you so much.

PAYTON: Thanks.

BERMAN: Up next, why part of the East Wing of the White House is being torn down.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[20:56:23]

BERMAN: All right, demolition has begun on the East Wing of the White House to make way for the President's 90,000 square foot ballroom, which is expected to cost around $200 million. It's being paid for by the President and other private donors. The East Wing traditionally houses the First Lady's staff. The President says it will be fully modernized.

With us now is Alyssa Farah Griffin, who was the White House Communications Director in the first Trump administration. We both keep looking at these pictures going like, wow, that just looks weird. Let me play you something the President said about this proposed ballroom earlier.

(BEGIN VIDEOCLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: It won't interfere with the current building. I won't be. It'll be near it, but not touching it. And pays total respect to the existing building, which I'm the biggest fan of. It's my favorite. It's my favorite place. I love it.

(END VIDEOCLIP)

BERMAN: So he said it won't interfere with the current building. He said that back in July here. It seems to be interfering with a big chunk of the building that got knocked down here. How surprised are you that he's doing this?

ALYSSA FARAH GRIFFIN, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, listen, he advertised he was going to do this. And I do remember in the first term he had this huge frustration with the fact that he couldn't do massive state dinners that you'd see in other countries. So, like, the State Room can only hold something like 150. The East Room maybe a little more than that.

So he's always wanted this grand ballroom, something that you would see in England or something. But I think it's going to end up, based on what I've kind of heard, is it's going to look a lot more like a Mar-a-Lago ballroom than perhaps like Buckingham Palace. But we'll see. We'll wait for the designs to come through.

But this is something he wanted. He wants that pomp and circumstance and he wants to leave his mark on this White House. He wants in 50 years and 100 years for there to be a reminder that Donald Trump was in this White House.

BERMAN: It is jarring, though, to see wrecking balls, like, tear down these walls that we used to see.

FARAH GRIFFIN: It's also -- it's a fully working building. Even the East Wing, you've got the First Lady's staff has their offices there. Some of legislative staff did in his first term. So even when construction starts, I wonder what that's going to be like during the day.

Because I imagine he's going to want to move very quickly here. He's going to want his ballroom soon. He's certainly not going to want the next guy to inherit it in three years.

BERMAN: So it's not just this, right? He also paved over part of the Rose Garden here.

FARAH GRIFFIN: Yes. And the theme seems to be Mar-a-Lago, but make it D.C. Because you see the new Rose Garden. You've got even the umbrellas from Mar-a-Lago, those sort of yellow country club looking ones. I'm curious what this will end up looking like.

He does like grand, ornate, Trumpian style. I expect there'll be a lot of gold. But I think there's -- listen, you're going to have critics of this. I'd like just plain and simple. If it doesn't adhere to the original architecture of the White House, if it doesn't look like it fits in and kind of keeps that sort of, the look that it has. So I think it's what we'll see.

BERMAN: What do you think the next president will do -- I guess when you're talking about the ballroom, they're not going to change that. That is what it is. But I do wonder about the Rose Garden.

FARAH GRIFFIN: I could see somebody going back to that. Like, listen, Trump complained both on the South Lawn and the Rose Garden. It's hard for events. The chairs, the risers, they sink into the ground. Women's shoes do. That's a very legitimate concern. But I think the paving over it, I could see somebody later, actually, deciding that they want to change that.

BERMAN: So the President also last week unveiled plans to build a triumphal arch, which some are calling the Arc de Trump, across from the Lincoln Memorial. I mean, how far do you think he's going to push this remaking of Washington, D.C.?

FARAH GRIFFIN: I think he's going to push it quite far. I mean, listen, from the Kennedy Center becoming practically the Trump Center with his board of directors, him hosting events there, I think he wants to leave his mark on Washington.

There is a comfort level that Trump has in the second term that he did not have in the first term. It was a lot of learning the building, learning the machinations of government, and now it's he wants to leave his mark on history. So I expect you're going to see even more of this.

BERMAN: You were in the White House, just very quickly, how much did he talk about building stuff when he was there?

FARAH GRIFFIN: The ballroom was a real concern because it is tough when you want to do something large. You can have to expand to the outside or open up doors. There isn't something that can really fit if you want 300, 400 people. So this was a long-term concern. The Rose Garden as well, I didn't think he was going to go full concrete. I thought maybe like some lattices, something a little, I don't know, more gardeny.

BERMAN: You can play four-square out there --

FARAH GRIFFIN: Yes.

BERMAN: -- even nine-square if you have enough chalk.

Alyssa Farah Griffin, great to see you tonight. Thank you so much.

FARAH GRIFFIN: Good to see you. Thank you.

BERMAN: All right. The news continues. The Source with Kaitlan Collins starts right now.