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At This Hour

New Attorney General Decries Riots in Baltimore; Baltimore Rocked by Violence, Fires and Looting; Demonstrators Loot Stores, Burn Building; Supreme Court Takes Up Landmark Case. Aired 11:30-12p ET

Aired April 28, 2015 - 11:30   ET

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

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[11:30:29] JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right. Live pictures now from the streets of Baltimore. You can see some of this new security presence on the streets there. That appears to be, you know, the police force itself but in addition to the city police of Baltimore -- you can see them lined up there -- also a state police presence. Also now a National Guard presence. That Heavily armed National Guard presence that we've been seeing all morning in front of city hall hoping for a much different day and most importantly a much different night on the streets of Baltimore.

To that end, we just learned minutes ago that the Baltimore Orioles game against the Chicago White Sox scheduled for 7:00 tonight, it has been postponed. They will not play that game tonight given the situation as we were just told by a security expert. You know, baseball can wait.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: And remember this. The chaos in Baltimore is happening really just about 50 miles from Washington, D.C. And that violence started just a short time after Loretta Lynch was sworn in as the nation's next attorney general. The first African-American female attorney general.

Lynch, in a statement, she criticized these senseless acts of violence. But with all of this happening essentially almost in his backyard, is it time for President Obama to speak out as well?

Let's check in with our senior White House correspondent Jim Acosta.

Jim, there may be an opportunity to see the president in public today. Do you expect for him to make any public comments about what's going on in Baltimore?

JIM ACOSTA, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Kate and John, you know, we've seen this before. We're seeing it again. And President Obama is once again facing another test on this issue of police brutality and civil unrest in Baltimore as he did in Ferguson, Missouri, last year. We do expect the president to speak out on the violence in Baltimore at this news conference with Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. That is supposed to happen within the next hour.

But as you said, it was quite the first day on the job for his new attorney general, Loretta Lynch. They both met yesterday here at the White House about the unrest in Baltimore. It's important to point out, though, that the White House only allowed a picture, a photograph, of that meeting. They did not allow reporters to go in and ask questions. And so, you know, they are managing the optics somewhat here at the White House, even though White House press secretary Josh Earnest told reporters yesterday that this situation in Baltimore is primarily a local issue.

Here's what Josh Earnest had to say.

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JOSH EARNEST, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: I would point out, however, that this is -- this is fundamentally a local issue. There does need to be a commitment from local elected leaders and local law enforcement leaders to confront this challenge and to demonstrate some determination about trying to build bridges with the citizens that they are sworn to serve and protect.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: Now the president also spoke by phone with Baltimore's mayor, Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, and Maryland Governor Larry Hogan last night. Lynch is sending Justice Department officials to assess the situation in Baltimore in the coming days.

You know, guys, the president has not always raced out to the microphones to speak out after an incident like this. He hasn't talked about this issue since the episode in South Carolina a few weeks ago. But he may have no choice but to -- to do talk about this within this next hour. We do expect that to happen. If not right off the top in his remarks, certainly during a question during this press conference.

Kate and John, back to you.

BOLDUAN: All right. Jim Acosta at the White House for us.

Everyone will be keeping our eyes for that to hear from the president, making comments about the violence, the riots that really broke out in Baltimore overnight.

Ahead for us AT THIS HOUR, we're going to be talking about that. The National Guard is on the streets of Baltimore right now, so are many residents there. Many of them working now to try to clean up in the aftermath -- in the aftermath of the violence. Everyone looking ahead to what can be done to prevent the violence and what is going to happen tonight.

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[11:27:59] BOLDUAN: We've just learned that some federal employees in Baltimore, they're getting ready to go home early today as their office is near a mall that authorities have just shut down in the area. They're concerned that the mall was being targeted for more violence, obviously afraid that last night was going to spill over into today and this is part of what we assume and we see is an effort to prevent Monday's violence from returning once again.

BERMAN: Yes. A lot of developments to tell you about. We just learned that Baltimore Orioles have postponed their game tonight. It was supposed to be at 7:00 against the Chicago White Sox. They will not play tonight. Security officials, as they just told us, say baseball can simply wait.

The governor of Maryland, Larry Hogan, who has moved his office to Baltimore for the time being, he is expected to hold a news conference 30 minutes from now. He was meeting with pastors and community leaders at the top of the hour. He already declared a state of emergency. He's activated the National Guard. At least 500 members are now on the streets. There are hundreds more on the way.

Just to recap, 15 police officers were hurt yesterday. Some seriously. More than 200 people have been arrested. We mentioned that Larry Hogan, the governor of Maryland, will speak in 30 minutes.

We also know this. That President Obama who's meeting with the prime minister of Japan, he will hold a news conference in the next hour and you can bet that the president will address the situation in Baltimore. He almost has to. Either in a statement or in a question from reporters.

So that is what we are watching right now. As we said many, many developments on this story. We'll have more news from you -- for you in just a moment.

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[11:42:51] BOLDUAN: Going back to our continuing breaking news of what is going on in the streets of Baltimore. What is going to happen today and tonight.

One person who's been around it all is a man named Reverend Jamal Bryant. He's a pastor at Baltimore's Empowerment Temple Church. He gave a very powerful eulogy at Freddie Gray's funeral. He also organized some of the peaceful protests that we've seen. He is condemning the violence while still pushing a bigger message of justice. A message that honestly could get overwhelmed and lost in the chaos unfolding on the streets there.

BERMAN: What he's doing right now is he's urging parents to send kids to his church to learn about nonviolent protests and he wants these kids to help clean up the mess that so many people created overnight. And Pastor Bryant joins us right now.

Pastor, thank you so much for being with us and taking time out of what I know is a busy mission for you today and the coming days and in fact the coming weeks. I wonder if you can just give us an update on what's happening right now. You have kids in your church right now. What are they saying? What are they telling you?

REV. JAMAL BRYANT, PASTOR, EMPOWERMENT TEMPLE CHURCH: Baltimore is today a phoenix rising from the ashes. We have young people going through the community and the areas that were hit the hardest to help in the cleanup.

It is our community. And as a consequence, we have a responsibility to it. I share with the young people that even if you were not a rioter, you still have to know how to take care of that which belongs to you. It's our city and all of us have a hand in its success and its survival.

BOLDUAN: Reverend, are you confident after what you saw last night that it really all started just as you were finishing up honoring the life of Freddie Gray? You leave this funeral service and the streets of Baltimore are just getting lit up. Do you have confidence that it's going to be different tonight?

BRYANT: I do. Tonight we're having an emergency town hall meeting for the city of Baltimore asking every person to come so two things can happen. Dr. King said something very critical years ago, is that riots are the language of those who are unheard. And so a lot of people in Baltimore are in frustration. So we want to give them voice for the first half an hour. After that we want to sit down with the larger community and talk about strategy and solution.

[11:45:11] Where do we go from here? It's alright to be angry and frustrated, and we have a right to be both. But after that we've got to do something because looting CVS and burning cars is not going to get us to our desired end.

BERMAN: The Martin Luther King quote is so poignant. Riot is the language of the unheard. It's an explanation for what happened last night but not a justification for what happened last night.

So how do you separate these two issues? What so many consider to be an injustice, how African-Americans are treated by law enforcement, that's been going on for years and years. How do you separate that from the riots, from the looting, from the violence that you saw last night and how do you convince these young people, Pastor, who last night didn't seem convinced that they were making the wrong decision?

BRYANT: Last night so much of the news has been split between Nepal and Baltimore. In Nepal, there was a natural disaster. In Baltimore, an unnatural disaster. It did not have to happen. And I'm trying to express to this generation of that violence and justice never come together as one. They are always polar opposites. And for us to get complete reform about what's been taking place against the police and African-Americans, it cannot happen when you're throwing rocks at the police.

And so I think that there's got to be a complete redress as to how we approach and a greater understanding of what it is that we're going after. Otherwise, we're going to lose the bigger picture of what we were marching peaceably about for six days uninterrupted.

BOLDUAN: And that's one thing that actually John and I have been talking about. One thing that hasn't been discussed much today is Freddie Gray. And that's something that you were trying to honor yesterday and you'll continue to honor and that change, that systemic issues that you're trying to take on. A huge challenge, a noble mission. We'll continue to talk to you about it.

Reverend Jamal Bryant, thanks so much for your time.

BERMAN: And we certainly wish you the best of luck tonight in going forward.

We do have other news to talk about. An update from Nepal. The huge earthquake there. We'll be right back.

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[11:50:18] BOLDUAN: New developments on the ground in Baltimore as we've watched the chaos kind of unfold overnight and the cleanup they've been trying, we've been seeing throughout the morning. But we understand that a local pharmacy there was one of those that was looted and hit last night, hit again this morning.

Athena Jones is there. Let's get straight to her.

Athena, what are you seeing?

ATHENA JONES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Kate. Well, we started the hour talking about positive news, people cleaning up a few blocks a away. Well, they're cleaning up here, but they're cleaning up because of looting that took place overnight. It didn't happen early this morning, but it took place overnight here at the pharmacy here, and at another pharmacy owned by the same pharmacist a short -- a few blocks from here.

Let me show you, though, what happened here. This is a shelf, empty shelf now, it was filled with people's prescriptions. All sorts of prescriptions that were taken by these looters. We're told by the owner that they began trying to break in around 9:00 and that their alarm company alerted the owner and asked them to call the police. They called the police over and over again. The police still to this moment, still to this moment today after almost noon, police still have not arrived to take a police report.

The looters robbed the shelf, taking all kinds of prescriptions like Abilify, that's an anti-depressant and an anti-psychotic. Moving back here I can show you an area where they stole a 300-pound safe. The pharmacist told us that it would have taken at least three or four people to lift that 300-pound safe and get it out the back door. It contained pharmaceuticals like Oxycontin, Oxycodone, Xanax, Percocet, Adderall, so controlled substances. That's what they were after.

They spent, though, about three hours here, we're told, according to the alarm monitoring company and this pharmacist says in this store alone, $200,000 worth of damage and looted property, and again, I should tell you, there's been a lot of talk about the police response or lack of police response. And this is one example of that because this pharmacy still has not been visited by the police.

One of the looters left his cell phone here, and they are hoping that when the police finally do come that they can give that to the detectives and that will help track down those who did this. They're also going to be reviewing, of course, their surveillance footage. But this pharmacist told me he's been here seven years. He's not scared, he's going to rebuild, he has insurance, but he needs a police report. He needs to be able to file one in order to get things up and running again.

But this is an example, Kate, of some of the destruction that was caused last night. And also an example of the lack of police response. Just a couple of doors down, a store was set on fire. We can smell the smoke -- Kate.

BOLDUAN: I can absolutely say that. It's worth highlighting once again what you just said, Athena. This was looted or this store was looted overnight, this pharmacy, and according to the owner of this pharmacy, the police have yet to arrive, not only help, but to take a police report, for this -- for the owner of the pharmacy.

Do they have any idea how long this looting took place? I mean, it looks like they cleared them out, if they were able to also pick up, as you said like a, 200, 300-pound safe and haul it out?

JONES: They did. Well, right. They went upstairs, they smashed a window, there was nothing really upstairs to steal but they did some destruction upstairs. We have video of that, maybe we can show later on. But no, we are told by the owner, a pharmacist -- the owner who's a pharmacist himself, opened this pharmacy about seven years ago, that he first got alerted to the fact that folks were trying to break in around 9:00 p.m. so -- but it took them several hours to be able to bust through the door.

His alarm company called him repeatedly, telling him to call the police, and they did that, but the police have yet to arrive. The police have not been here according to this pharmacist, even this many hours later. We spoke with him just a few minutes ago and he was on his way to the other pharmacy where they're also trying to clean up, pick up the pieces. That one also suffered a similar situation, though, they were not able to take the safe -- Kate.

BERMAN: Maybe your presence there, Athena, and maybe your presence there will spur things on a little bit.

Athena Jones, for us, in a pharmacy right now, looking for some answers, looking for some help from the police.

Thanks, Athena.

We'll get back to Baltimore in a minute. Right now, though, we have breaking news from the Supreme Court. History being made as we speak. The justices hearing a challenge to state bans on same-sex marriage, hearing those arguments at this very moment.

The two key questions at play, whether all 50 states must allow same- sex marriage and the other question, if state bans are allowed to stay in place, whether those states must recognize same-sex marriages performed in states where marriage is legal.

CNN justice correspondent Pamela Brown has been inside the court listening to these arguments which, Pamela, sometimes, can be so revealing. What have you heard?

[11:55:02] PAMELA BROWN, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: It's so revealing but, John, I'll tell you, the two justices who could have the swing votes here did not show their hands. Of course we're talking about Justice Roberts and Justice Kennedy.

As you point out, there are two questions at play here. The oral arguments for the first question on whether state bans on same-sex marriages are unconstitutional, just wrapped up. Right out of the gate, both justices, Roberts and Kennedy, seemed deeply concerned about the institution of marriage. In fact, Justice Kennedy said for millenia the definition of marriage has been between a man and a woman. He says, who are we to come in as a court and say we know better?

And as Roberts said, you're not asking to enter into this institution, you're asking to redefine it. There is also talk about the democratic process and how the court could influence that. But on the other side, we heard arguments that look it's time that discrimination against same-sex couples come to a stop. The discrimination has been happening for decades and Justice Kennedy seemed deeply concerned about the dignity for the same-sex couples, and that is key here because he's authored three pro-gay rights cases and a consistent theme in those cases is his concern that discrimination against gays deprives them of their dignity.

Through all of this I should say there was a surprise moment when a protester came into the court and said that same-sex marriage would be an abomination of God. He was dragged out and there was a movement of levity when Justice Scalia said that that was refreshing.

Back to you.

BOLDUAN: That's one way you can put it when you talk about protesters in the courtroom you can also hear the protesting outside on the steps of the Supreme Court. That often happens when you're talking about a very important case like this one.

Pamela Brown is there for us.

Thank you all for being with us AT THIS HOUR.

BERMAN: The "LEGAL VIEW" with Ashleigh Banfield starts right after a quick break.

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