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At This Hour

Nancy Pelosi's Husband Violently Attacked In San Francisco Home; Police Make Arrest After Break-In At Katie Hobbs Campaign HQ; Obama, Biden And Harris Hit Campaign Trail Today. Aired 11-11:30a ET

Aired October 28, 2022 - 11:00   ET

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


[11:00:00]

ERICA HILL, CNN ANCHOR: There have been 36 drawings in a row with no grand prize winner. Why shouldn't it be you? The biggest Powerball jackpot of all time, of course was over $1.5 billion. That was since January of 2016. Good luck. I'm going to buy a ticket. But you know what else, I think there's a pretty good chance I'll see you back here Monday. Thanks so much for joining us all today. I'm Erica Hill. Stay tuned. At This Hour with Kate Bolduan starts right now.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone. I'm Kate Bolduan. We are following breaking news At This Hour. The husband of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was violently attacked early this morning by an intruder who broke into their San Francisco home. First word of this came from Pelosi spokesperson. Drew Hammill, a spokesperson for the speaker said that Paul Pelosi is in the hospital right now receiving treatment but is expected to make a full recovery. Speaker Pelosi was not at the home at the time of the attack. The suspect is in police custody, according to San Francisco police. CNN's Manu Raju is following these breaking details that are coming in from Capitol Hill. Manu, what's the very latest that you're hearing?

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, this is a scary and staggering situation that occurred according to San Francisco police at 2:27 a.m. this morning, that's when we are learning from law enforcement sources, an assailant broke into the home of the Pelosi's to the back of the house and attack Mr. Pelosi with a hammer. Now, according to the Speaker's office, Mr. Pelosi is in the hospital. He's receiving care and he's expected to make a full recovery.

They give a little bit more detail in the statement from Pelosi spokesperson saying early this morning, an assailant broke into the Pelosi residence in San Francisco and violently assaulted Mr. Pelosi, the assailant is in custody. And the motivation for the attack is under investigation. Mr. Pelosi was taken to the hospital where he is receiving excellent medical care and is expected to make a full recovery. The speaker was not in San Francisco at the time.

The speaker and her family are grateful to the first responders and medical professionals involved and request privacy at this time. Now that is an important note here that Pelosi, the Speaker, was not in Washington, because typically -- not in San Francisco, she was in Washington. And the reason why that's important is because she travels with security detail wherever she goes. The United States Capitol Police is around her.

Now that protection does not extend to the family members of the Speaker or other members of the leadership on the both the House and the side, the Senate side, among Democratic leaders and Republican leaders, so it's uncertain right now about what the exact security situation was at the Pelosi house. But we are expected to learn more from San Francisco police when they briefed the press later today. But clearly a scary situation, Paul Pelosi attacked by a hammer at his house as he's receiving medical care at a hospital.

BOLDUAN: Yes, we will. As you just mentioned money, we are expecting to learn more of the San Francisco Police Chief putting out that they will -- he will be briefing and updating, giving an update on the situation and the investigation a little later this morning. Manu, thank you so much for that.

Joining me right now for more on this because there is a ton of questions is CNN senior law enforcement analyst Andrew McCabe. He's the former deputy director of the FBI, and also CNN law enforcement analyst, Jonathan Wackrow. He's a former secret service agent. Andy, let me just start with you. What do you think of this?

ANDREW MCCABE, CNN SENIOR LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Well, it's an incredibly kind of scary sign of the times, in the least case, Kate. Now, you know, we should say that we don't know what this attacker's motivation was. So it's, you know, not prudent for us to start jumping to conclusions about why this attack took place. However, we do know that this attack on the maybe the highest profile member of Congress, occurs at a time when the threats toward political figures, political leaders have been off the charts.

We know that the Capitol Police is stretched incredibly thin. They're in the middle of a period of trying to augment their forces with additional resources for exactly reasons like this, because political figures have become the target of violent threats, vandalism at their homes and their residences, people showing up to where they live arm, things of that nature. So we really need to know more about what happened here.

BOLDUAN: Absolutely. And Jonathan, I mean, this is, as Andy is getting to, this is the husband of one of the most powerful people in the country. Manu was kind of ticking through the security detail and how it works and what it -- who it extends to, it does not extend to her family. But how does this happen?

JONATHAN WACKROW, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Well, listen, Kate, I mean, I just want to take a step back and just point something out that Andy had raised, you know, this could be a crime of opportunity. We don't know what the motivation is here of the perpetrator. But the stark reality is that, you know, millions of homes are burglarized every single year with about 30 percent of those incidents, having a member of the household present, while that crime is occurring.

[11:05:02]

So we -- this is going to boil down to one of two things, it's either going to be a crime of opportunity that law enforcement is faced with the challenge of trying to suppress in every major city around the United States, or it's going to be a directed targeted attack against the establishment, right, a political figure and or their family. And what we have seen time and time, again, is that family members now have political leaders are particularly vulnerable, because they represent a softer target.

You know, as, you know, a reporting was just a moment ago, Speaker Pelosi does have Capitol Police protecting her at all times. But that doesn't extend to members of her family. And this is a challenge that both Republicans and Democrats are facing across the country right now, as we lead into the midterm elections, threats, we'll take the path of least resistance and could this, if this is an active, targeted political violence, the path of least resistance here was Speaker Pelosi's husband. So there's a lot of questions that remain unanswered.

BOLDUAN: Absolutely. And Jonathan, just kind of to your point, and also just being very careful, again, no motivation for this is known yet really, at all. And we need to and want to and must be careful in the steps -- in any step that we take. So we don't know the motivation behind this attack. But it clearly is a question, and will be a question of investigators of the motivation. And if it is politically motivated, if it does turn out to be politically motivated, what changes, what needs to change, Jonathan?

WACKROW: Well, listen, I think, you know, the things that should have changed are stemming from January 6th, right? So we've had a lot of warnings about threats against, you know, political leadership, again, both on the Republican and Democrat side, since that day. Even earlier this year, DHS put out an intelligence memo warning specifically of political violence that could be directed towards members of Congress. So this is about two things. One, understanding the threat environment that our political leaders are operating every single day, and then putting the right control measures, putting a joint effort between the federal and local governments to protect our elected officials, you know, against these threats.

But again, we have to get better than this, right? We shouldn't be attacking our political leaders, we should be empowering our political leaders to invoke change, and actually address the, you know, criminal elements that are out there, you know, through prosecutorial consideration, better funding of law enforcement, again, there's things that we can do that can get better than political violence.

BOLDUAN: Yes. Andy, I mean, Nancy Pelosi has been a target of rhetoric ranging from harsh to extreme and violent for years. I mean, she is the person that, if not every most Republican is running against just listen to any of the midterm debates that have been out there. Is she unique in that sense?

MCCABE: I think she absolutely is, and again, not outside of the context of this particular attack, we know that Nancy Pelosi has attracted the ire the frustration and the anger of the political right for many, many years. Look, it's not a coincidence that, you know, her, well, let me rephrase that, not every Congress person had their office invaded and ransacked on January 6th, we've all seen the videos, we've heard the comments that that people were making on January 6th about dragging Nancy Pelosi out of the building and attacking her.

So she has been the target of an elevated threat for many years that gets worse every time a political figure, somebody running for office, or somebody who currently sits in one speaks about her in those sorts of violent targeted ways and casts her as, you know, an enemy rather than just someone you disagree with on political grounds. So yes, I think the political climate definitely adds to the threat that people like Nancy Pelosi and others face every day.

BOLDUAN: Absolutely. We just have also heard officially from the San Francisco Police, they'll be holding an update at 12:30 Eastern Time to give an update on the investigation. And we'll learn much more then, of course, we'll be bringing that to you. Jonathan is great to see you. Andy, thank you so much. It's great to see you guys.

We also have an important update coming out of Phoenix, police have made an arrest in connection with the breaking and burglary at the campaign headquarters of Katie Hobbs, a Democratic candidate for governor in Arizona, a break in that has become a new flashpoint between Hobbs and the Republican candidate that she's up against in this race. CNN's Kyung Lah has the very latest for us. Kyung, what are you hearing now?

KYUNG LAH, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, what Phoenix police are telling us is that they have made an arrest of a 36-year- old man. But at this point, this is a third degree burglary. There are a couple of burglaries associated with this person. What they are not saying is that this was politically motivated. Right now this appears to be a simple crime, a burglary of an office. Now that is not the assumption that the Katie Hobbs campaign was under when it put out a very strongly worded statement and they blamed heated political rhetoric. They named the Republican she is running against Kari Lake, when news of this arrest came out yesterday. Here's what Kari Lake said.

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[11:10:26]

KARI LAKE (R-AZ), GOV. CANDIDATE: She's willing to make a complete bogus story. She knew that I had nothing to do with that break in. And yet she perpetuated that lie.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LAH: Lake is not completely wrong here. But it is still true. The Hobbs campaign put out another statement. It is still true, Kate, that Lake is part of the heated political rhetoric that we are seeing in the midterms.

BOLDUAN: Absolutely. And Kyung, this weekend, you also have a new report coming out, I want to ask you about following, it was a 10 month investigation that you conducted into the growing threats to local officials like election workers. And it also, you know, extends beyond that, and also into the people driving that anger. What have you found?

LAH: Right, we're talking about all of this heated environment, right? It stems from rhetoric, and it has become threats, threats to people's lives. And so what we did was we spent a lot of time with victims, but we also spend time with the people who say, it should be a part of today's politics. I want you to meet Carlos Zapata.

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CARLOS ZAPATA, FORMER U.S. MARINE AND ACTIVIST: When I say these things about violence, and you know, civil uprising, it's not a threat, you know, this is a warning.

LAH: What do you mean by it could have been violent?

ZAPATA: Because I was getting where, hey, I have guns, were we meeting at? You know, I was like, the voice of reason, you know, I'm glad you have guns, stock up your ammo. But we're not there yet. So anybody that calls us violent, or insurrectionists, or, you know, outlaws, we're not.

LAH: But he did use threatening language.

ZAPATA: We also have people on the streets. We know where you live. We know who your family is. We know your dog's name. You don't vote your way out of socialism. Once it takes root, the only way to eradicate it is to fight with arms to have a violent, violent confrontation at blood in the streets.

LAH: Anger is OK, but this type of public anger

ZAPATA: I don't like to live my life as an angry person. But righteous anger has a place in human society.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LAH: We spent a lot of time with Carlos Zapata. We went to the East Coast as well as the Midwest to talk to the very local people, Kate, your neighbors who are being impacted by all of this. Kate?

BOLDUAN: Wow. Wow, Kyung, really looking forward to seeing this. Thank you so much. You can watch Kyung's special report Perilous Politics: America's Dangerous Divide Sunday night 8:00 p.m. Eastern only on CNN.

So in the midst of this final sprint of the midterms, Democrats are right now bringing out the big guns in key battleground states today. President Biden, Vice President Harris making a joint appearance in Pennsylvania, and former President Obama heading to Georgia, all in the hopes of trying to save the Democrats Senate majority of course. CNN's Eva McKend live in Atlanta with more on this. Eva, what's going to happen there?

EVA MCKEND, CNN NATIONAL POLITICS REPORTER: Well, Kate, we know that President Obama is expected to encourage Democrats to vote early, just about a week left to do so in this state. But really, he is in demand all across the country. He has proven to be an effective surrogate for swing state Democrats and it comes at a time when they badly need it when Democrats are facing a difficult midterm map. Nikema Williams, the Atlanta Congresswoman here, she actually says that many here still refer to President Obama as their forever president. So it makes a lot of sense for President Obama to be starting this tour right here in Atlanta.

He's done over a dozen commercials for candidates across the state and also taken a lot of interest in the races for Secretary of State. During his broader concern for what he characterizes as the erosion of our democracy, we're also getting some new polling data today a Monmouth poll, of course, two competitive races here both for Senate and the governor's race, the Senate contest between Herschel Walker and incumbent Democrat Raphael Warnock, the governor's race between incumbent Republican Governor Brian Kemp and Democrat Stacey Abrams.

Well, that poll shows that Governor Kemp is gaining support here in the final stretch. More than half of Georgia voters said they vote to reelect Kemp. That's up 10 points from September. But for Abrams part she has often said that polling is a snapshot and suggested it doesn't include voters of color and the broad coalition of voters that she has worked to turn out in recent years. Kate, back to you.

BOLDUAN: Eva, thank you so much for that. Joining me now for more on all of this is CNN chief national affairs correspondent Jeff Zeleny. So Jeff kind of looking at the broader context of the midterm elections especially when you're talking about the former President Obama and his impact, you have a great new piece out today reminding everyone of, well, among other things, one of the more famous lines from Obama, when it comes to midterm elections, let me play this for everybody.

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[11:15:19]

BARACK OBAMA, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I'm not recommending for every future president that they take a shellacking like they -- like I did last night.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: And as you remind everyone, at least in part midterms, midterms were rough for Obama. So what does that mean to everything that we're talking about in this midterm?

JEFF ZELENY, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Well, look, when he was serving in the White House, midterms were definitely not his strong suit. Of course, that is the same for virtually every other president in power with the one recent exception of George W. Bush in the wake of 9/11. He's the only recent president to not suffer big midterm election losses. But look, Democrats can see and feel these headwinds on the economy, on inflation, on crime. So there's obviously limited things that the former president can do. But one thing he can do, officials believe is try and really, you know, inspire and fire up and urge Democrats to vote. That's why he is doing his campaign swing this week. He's going to be here in Atlanta tonight, as Eva was saying, and they are really trying to get people out to early vote. But look, one thing that we've seen over the years for Barack Obama, his power has never. His popularity hasn't necessarily transferred to other candidates. We've seen that, of course, for most other presidents as well.

So yes, he can come and talk about democracy, which he will. He'll talk about abortion rights. And he really is deeply engaged. We spent some time looking at the ads that he filmed. And he filmed about two dozen ads or so for House, Senate, gubernatorial candidates and really doing different messages state by state. But again, limited things any sitting president can do or former president as well, but he is welcome virtually everywhere. And of course, President Biden with a lower approval rating is not as much.

BOLDUAN: I hope, he didn't fail, though, as well. I mean, one thing that people rarely get, but it seems we have this time is a candid assessment from the top political leaders on the state of the race in the midst of it, right? We got that from Chuck Schumer overheard on the tarmac giving an insight briefing to Biden on his view on the on the midterms, his take on Pennsylvania, Nevada, and Georgia. I'm going to play for everyone some of what was caught on camera.

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SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER (D-NY): The state where we're going downhill is Georgia. It's hard to believe that they will go for Herschel Walker. It looks like the debate didn't hurt us too much in Pennsylvania, so that's good.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: Jeff, if that's where Schumer's head is, what should people take from that?

ZELENY: Look, and this is not just some pungent, you know, delivering his opinion, this is the Majority Leader of the Senate who's very position is on the line here. And the words were going downhill in Georgia is not something that Democrats wanted to see. But that's also related to the governor's race here in Georgia, as Eva was saying earlier, Brian Kemp, the sitting governor is well ahead, at least at this point of Stacey Abrams, so all these races are interconnected.

And in terms of Pennsylvania, it is pretty early to say if that debate earlier this week between John Fetterman and Mehmet Oz is going to have an effect or not. Senator Schumer is saying it's not going to have an effect telling the President. We'll see about that. That's very much an open question. But look, the reality here is, most Democrats believe the House is likely to slip away from them, only a five seat majority. But the Senate remains the big question here. And that was not a very, very rosy assessment from Senator Schumer.

BOLDUAN: Again, as you said, we will see and we will see very soon. It's good to see Jeff. Thank you.

[11:18:45]

So a key piece of data that we know that Fed watches most closely just came in. The impact this latest read on consumer prices will have on the Feds next moves. That's next.

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BOLDUAN: There are even more signs this morning that inflation isn't going anywhere anytime soon. The Federal Reserve's favorite inflation gauge if you will, was just released. And it shows consumer prices rose 6.2 percent last month, compared to a year ago. And the Fed is meeting next week as it's weighing another interest rate hike. CNN's Matt Egan is at the New York Stock Exchange for us at this hour with more. Matt, what do these numbers mean?

MATT EGAN, CNN REPORTER: Well, Kate, these numbers show that inflation is proving to be stubborn, really stubborn like a car door that just won't shut. We keep waiting for improvement. And it just doesn't arrive some context around the 6.2 percent year over your gain for consumer prices. That is exactly the same as in August no better, no worse. And it is really only a slight improvement from the 40-year high of 7 percent that was set in June.

And we can't just blame this on prices at the grocery store or at the gas station because core inflation which strips out food and energy, that actually got worse last month and it rose to a six month high. Now the good news of this report is that Americans keep shopping, consumer spending rose more than expected. As long as people keep shopping, this economy can keep growing, but spending went up by more than income people have to dip into savings and that is just not sustainable. Now, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen she was asked to weigh in on this whole risk of a recession in an interview with our colleague Phil Mattingly, listen to what you have to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JANET YELLEN, TREASURY SECRETARY: We are against full employment economy. It's very natural, the growth would slow and it has over the first three quarters of this year. But it continues to be OK, we have a very strong labor market I don't see signs of recession in this economy at this point.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[11:25:06]

EGAN: But today's numbers are going to be unsettling to the Federal Reserve. They have been slamming the brakes on the economy with these supersized interest rate hikes. They've done a lot already. They're going to do more next week. The question, Kate, is whether or not they get inflation under control, before they raise rates so much that they end up causing a recession.

BOLDUAN: It's great to see you, Matt, thank you for the update. So it is also official after months of back and forth and a wild legal roller coaster. Elon Musk now owns Twitter, completing a $44 billion acquisition of the social media platform. Minutes it seems after closing the deal, Musk fired the company's CEO as well as two other top executives. So let's get to CNN's Oliver Darcy, with the very latest on this. So Oliver, we know -- knew if he had bought it, we knew changes were coming changes are here and coming. What are these changes look like potentially?

OLIVER DARCY, CNN SENIOR MEDIA REPORTER: Well, one, Musk is going to need to name a new executive team because as you mentioned, he just fired the previous executive team. So I think that will give us a good indication of where things are going. But more broadly speaking, you know, this comes at a very pivotal time for the free speech debate in America. And Musk has said that he thinks Twitter has been too much on the side of censoring or banning people. He's not a big fan of the permanent ban. So I think we can expect people like the former president, Donald Trump to be permitted back on the platform. Unclear whether like far right figures like Alex Jones will be allowed back on the platform.

And I think we can see some of these rules that were put into place over the last few years to curb misinformation, to curb hate speech. I think you can see some of those potentially rolled back as well now that Musk is in control here.

BOLDUAN: Is there a timeline for that people should expect with this, like when they're going to see all these changes? I mean, it's Elon Musk's world, apparently.

DARCY: Yes. I think no one knows exactly what's going on, right? People at Twitter are in the dark. They haven't even been communicated. Last night, you know, they fired these people but they weren't sent a memo or talk to you there hasn't been an employee meeting. And so I think everyone is wondering, what is Elon Musk going to do next, including the Twitter people?

BOLDUAN: Twitter people that are now his employees. We stand by to stand by, it's going to see you Oliver. Thank you very much for the update.

[11:27:18]

So Russia is sending more troops to the frontlines trying to hold on to a key city in Ukraine. We're going to take you there next.

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