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The Lead with Jake Tapper

Riot Charges?; Major ISIS Arrest; 2016 Surprise; Family of ISIS Leader Detained; Kenyan President Vows to Fight Islamic Militants

Aired December 02, 2014 - 16:00   ET

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

JAKE TAPPER, CNN ANCHOR: It turns out the tragedy of Ferguson may in fact lead to a high-profile arrest of a member of Michael Brown's family.

I'm Jake Tapper. This is THE LEAD.

The national lead. Moments after the grand jury's decision was revealed, he stood in the midst of an already emotional crowd and he told them to burn the place down. Now could Michael Brown's stepfather be about to face charges for inciting a riot?

The world lead. One of the wives of ISIS mastermind al-Baghdadi is now in custody. She could be privy to a treasure trove of secrets. Could this be a major breakthrough in tracking down the elusive terrorist leader?

And the politics lead. Who will be the leader of the Republican pack for 2016? Well, a brand-new poll is out, and you might be surprised when you hear the name of one of the emerging front-runners.

Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to THE LEAD. I'm Jake Tapper.

We are going to begin today with the national lead and a new call today for charges in Ferguson, not against officer Darren Wilson for the shooting death of Michael Brown, but for Brown's stepfather, Louis Head. Head was seen on camera last week consoling his wife, Brown's mother, in the moments after it was announced that officer Wilson would not be indicted in her son's death. But what was also caught on tape was this emotional outburst directed squarely at this huge crowd of protesters.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LOUIS HEAD, HUSBAND OF LESLEY MCSPADDEN: Burn this mother (EXPLETIVE DELETED) down. Burn this bitch down. Burn this bitch down. Burn this bitch down.

(SHOUTING)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: In the hours that followed, businesses and police cars in two areas of Ferguson were in fact torched and trashed. Store owners arrived the next morning, only to find that their livelihoods had been reduced to piles of ashes. When I spoke with Saint Louis Alderman Antonio French the day after

the riots, French acknowledged a noticeable shift in the mood of the crowd after Head said that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANTONIO FRENCH, SAINT LOUIS ALDERMAN: So I was there when that happened. And I think he was expressing a sentiment that a lot of folks in that crowd felt.

And when he said those words, though, the mood did change, and things got a little bit out of control.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: So far, no charges have been filed against Louis Head. But among those who think he should be punished is Missouri Lieutenant Governor Peter Kinder. Listen to what he told conservative radio talk show host Laura Ingraham.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

LAURA INGRAHAM, RADIO TALK SHOW HOST: You hear that sound bite from the stepfather of Michael Brown, what's your reaction?

LT. GOV. PETER KINDER (R), MISSOURI: That he should be arrested and charged with inciting to riot.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

TAPPER: Right now, multiple law enforcement agencies are weighing that very decision. Should Michael Brown's stepfather be arrested?

CNN correspondent George Howell joins us now live in Ferguson, Missouri.

George, what is the latest on this investigation?

GEORGE HOWELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Jake, look behind me. You see these businesses. You remember this scene here on Florissant. The businesses are boarded up. These business owners have lost a great deal of their livelihood.

The question now, was there a singular moment, a singular voice that helped incite the rioting, the looting that we saw here in Ferguson? That's the question that we understand police Chief Tom Jackson with the Ferguson Police Department, that he's looking into.

Also, Saint Louis County police are looking into this situation. They are interviewing people who know Mr. Head. And we understand that they also plan to interview Mr. Head himself, but you will remember, we have heard from Michael Brown's attorneys. We have heard also from Michael Brown's mother. All basically say that this was a moment of great frustration, of outrage in the moment, and what we heard Mr. Head say was simply out of frustration.

That's what we're hearing from them. But, again, an investigation is under way, Jake.

TAPPER: All right, George Howell, thank you so much.

That video of Michael Brown's stepfather could play a major role in the decision by the police whether to charge him or not. But there are of course other factors to consider.

Jeff Roorda joins me now from Saint Louis. He is the business manager for the Saint Louis Police Officers Association. He's also a Missouri state representative.

Jeff, good to see you, as always.

What else must police consider when deciding whether or not to charge anyone with incitement to riot? I know you can't specifically talk about this case. You're not investigating it. But what are the other things besides the tape that police will be looking at?

JEFF ROORDA (D), MISSOURI STATE REPRESENTATIVE: Well, I think, Jake, the standard at law is whether their actions actually resulted in rioting behavior, unlawful behavior.

And, as you pointed out, there's law enforcement authorities and prosecutors looking at this case, it sounds like, as we speak.

TAPPER: Does it matter if Mr. Head had intent to cause a riot or is that irrelevant?

ROORDA: I think there is a requirement under the law that they intend to cause it.

I don't think that -- I don't think the standard is so strict that merely saying something in anger or frustration would result in a criminal charge. And I hesitate to criticize Mr. Head. He has to be responsible for his own statements.

But I do understand that that family is mourning and that he may say things in the emotion of that mourning that he regrets. But, remember, there's people in the crowd that decided to burn down those buildings, and I'm not so sure that they wouldn't have burned down those buildings without urging from Mr. Head or others.

TAPPER: Tensions are so high in Ferguson. Do you think community relations are something for police to consider in deciding whether or not to charge the stepfather?

ROORDA: No, I think you have to look at the letter of the law. But I think that the standard of proof that is required in prosecuting this case would dictate whether an emotional response is different than the planned course of action.

TAPPER: Let's turn to another subject on the matter of tensions in Ferguson and Saint Louis. You and other police officers were upset after that hands up, don't shoot demonstration on Sunday by five Saint Louis Rams football players right before the game. This led to a very public dispute between Saint Louis police and the

Rams. In fact, you were scheduled to be on our show yesterday, but you had to cancel at the last minute because you were in a meeting with executives of the Saint Louis Rams. What happened in that meeting?

ROORDA: Well, we thought it was very constructive.

We had a good, but very preliminary dialogue with the Rams. And we are scheduled to meet with them again tomorrow or the next day. And we're just hopeful that they understand our perspective. And that is that this hands up, don't shoot gesture to law enforcement means something very different than it does to protesters.

And that is, it furthers this narrative that Michael Brown was gunned down in cold blood in the streets by Darren Wilson.

TAPPER: And just to settle it, there was no apology, necessarily, it was just a preliminary discussion?

ROORDA: Yes.

What the Rams' management said was they were -- that they regret that this offended police officers and that they wanted to make it right with us. How they make it right, if that's possible at all, I guess, is what the conversations will center on going forward.

TAPPER: And this has all gotten so heated, in fact, your background as a Saint Louis police officer has been attacked, including on the show yesterday.

What exactly -- I know you want to set the record straight and talk about why you left the Saint Louis police. I want to give you a chance to respond.

ROORDA: Yes. It was actually one of the suburban departments in Saint Louis.

And I reported criminal misconduct by the police chief. He fired me for filing a false police report about his conduct and then was subsequently fired himself for that very same conduct I reported.

But the big problem is that one of your correspondents chose to attack me for having the gall to question Michael Brown's status as a folk hero and to question the actions of the Rams players that police officers found offensive.

(CROSSTALK)

TAPPER: Well, thanks for coming on the show and correcting the record, giving your side of things. And thanks for answering our questions, Jeff Roorda, as always.

ROORDA: Thanks, Jake.

TAPPER: He cleared his schedule to focus on Ferguson, but just what did President Obama say in those closed-door meetings at the White House? I will ask one activist who was there coming up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: Welcome back to THE LEAD. I'm Jake Tapper.

We're going to continue with our national lead. We're learning today what President Obama said in those closed-door meetings on the Ferguson fallout, where he weighed in on many controversial subjects, including racial profiling and pushing for police to wear body cameras.

We're joining now by one of the select few invited to meet with the president, Brittany Packnett, a member of the Ferguson Commission, who created an online campaign called Don't Shoot. She joins us live from Ferguson.

Brittany, thanks so much for joining us.

Tell us about the meeting yesterday. Did the president express solidarity with protesters? What did he have to say?

BRITTANY PACKNETT, MEMBER, FERGUSON COMMISSION: Well, I certainly think that he expressed the desire and willingness to listen.

He was certainly open to what we had to say, but the conversation was very much geared towards systemic change, which is going to require a lot of work from a lot of different people in a lot of different spaces.

TAPPER: Some of your fellow advocates had a list of demands, including requiring independent investigations into future police shootings or defunding police departments that use excessive force, defunding police forces that racially profile.

What did the president have to say to those issues?

PACKNETT: I mean, we did talk about a number of those things. We also talked about some additional requests.

And, as I said, he was open to those things. But I think, for me, the real primary responsibility in there was making sure that the truth of what has been happening in Ferguson and in disenfranchised communities around the country was being told to the highest office in the land.

Yesterday was actually the 59th anniversary of Rosa Parks sitting down on that bus in Montgomery, Alabama. And so we recognized the responsibility that we had in that space, not only just to push for certain things and make requests of the president, but to leave that room and to continue to push for those things that we care about in our communities from every aspect that we possibly can.

TAPPER: What is this truth? What exactly did -- were you telling the president about the experiences of people who live in Ferguson and similar areas?

PACKNETT: Well, I certainly talked a lot about the 24,000 students we serve here through Teach for America St. Louis which I lead. I talked about students that I taught in D.C., all of whom were children of color, all of whom are low income and who we know disproportionately suffer from the systemic injustices that we've seen play out here in Ferguson. And so, the taxation in light of poverty, inequitable housing and education and health care have all certainly been -- have come to the surface here in Ferguson.

We want to make sure that we're not just addressing the symptom that we've seen in Ferguson but the root causes. And so, I really want to make sure that I'm ensuring their truth and ensuring that their voices were heard.

TAPPER: You saw what happened last Monday night, the shops destroyed in your home town. What do you think of these reports that the police are investigating whether Michael Brown's stepfather incited a riot?

PACKNETT: You know, I don't -- I don't really know much about that investigation or those comments. I will share, though, that I'm a student and former teacher of history, and one of the most often forgotten quotations from Dr. Martin Luther King is what he actually told to Mike Wallace when he said that riots are the language of the unheard and what America has not been hearing is the state that black Americans have been living in, and impoverished Americans have been living in for decades now.

And so, really, we need to ask, how can we heal those rifts to make sure we don't end up here again and how do we make sure that we are listening intensively and intently so that we can build common solutions that will provide equity in this region.

TAPPER: What was your response when you saw the members of the St. Louis Rams holding up their hands in the "hands up, don't shoot" stance before the game on Sunday?

PACKNETT: My response is the same response I had when I saw students saying young activists and young leaders emerged doing the same thing on the streets of Ferguson in meetings and also putting their hands up and having important conversations to make sure that their voices are heard in multiple ways and multiple avenues.

And I think that it was a way for those players to express themselves and I think that in America, we need to preserve those rights of First Amendment, freedom of speech.

TAPPER: All right. Brittany Packnett, thank you so much for joining me.

PACKNETT: Thank you so much.

TAPPER: Coming up, a woman and her child captured trying to leave Syria with fake IDs. Could she hold key information about the terrorist group ISIS and the location of its leader? That's next.

Plus, brand new CNN/ORC polls on the race for the White House 2016 put a little-known candidate who has never been elected to anything surprise everyone. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: Welcome back to THE LEAD. I'm Jake Tapper. In our world lead today, is the U.S. learning more about the leader of the terrorist group ISIS?

For months, the mysterious reclusive Abu Bakr al Baghdadi has evaded capture and survived attempts at airstrikes. But now, intelligence officials in Lebanon say they have a vital new source of information on the terrorist leader, his wife and his child, the two were detained by Lebanon security services in the last few days near the Syrian border as they tried to cross into Lebanon.

CNN chief national security correspondent Jim Sciutto is here with what could be a treasure trove of information about the terrorist groups' inner workings -- Jim.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Jake, I was told just moments ago that this woman, Saja Hamid al-Dulaimi, that she was in fact a target of this raid. That she's actually the former wife of the ISIS leader Abu Bakr al Baghdadi, but the mother of his child, and Lebanese officials say possibly with a significant role within the ISIS organization.

Together, those things make her potentially a valuable source of information, not just on the organization ISIS but its leadership and their whereabouts.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SCIUTTO (voice-over): She's a former wife of the feared ISIS leader Abu Bakr al Baghdadi. Lebanese sources tell CNN, the woman reportedly identified as Saja Hamid al-Dulaimi and seen here during a prisoner exchange in March, had a potentially significant role in the terror group.

REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D), CALIFORNIA: We will gain some intelligence from her. We may get some information from her. We may get insights into al Baghdadi's movement, who he surrounds himself with, whether he was injured and the degree of his injuries.

SCIUTTO: Her capture, along with one of al Baghdadi's children, took place as he was trying to enter Lebanon from Syria, using a fake ID card and followed weeks of planning, say Lebanese authorities.

ADM. JOHN KIRBY, PENTAGON PRESS SECRETARY: I'm not going to speak about a Lebanese military operation. We've long said that he's the recognized leader of ISIL. Command and control of the organization which stems from leadership. This makes him valid in our minds, from the targeting perspective.

SCIUTTO: The capture deals a potential blow to ISIS as Iraqi and Kurdish leaders reached a landmark agreement to join forces to fight the group together. Iraq's Shiite-dominated government in Baghdad striking a far reaching deal with Kurdish forces in the north. They will send $1 billion in arms to the Kurdish fighters, ease the flow of American supplied arms to the Kurds through Baghdad, and crucially share oil revenue between Kurdish areas and the south.

SCHIFF: The Kurds will be much better provisioned with the salaries to help maintain their fighting force, but also that they can get more sophisticated weapons, weapons that we've wanted to provide them but haven't wanted to if it threatened to divide or rupture the country.

SCIUTTO: It's a significant achievement for the new Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al Abadi, narrowing a deep divide just three months into his term in office, that his predecessors could not or would not reach for years before him.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SCIUTTO: This agreement brings the Iraqi government to the one step closer to the more inclusive government that President Obama has said is necessary to truly defeat ISIS earlier today. The national security adviser Susan Rice said that this fight must be owned and maintained by local forces. That, of course, Jake, is still an open question as to whether those local forces can truly stand up to ISIS fighters on the ground.

TAPPER: All right. Jim Sciutto at the Pentagon, thank you so much.

In other world news, a gruesome massacre in Kenya with the hands of the Somali-based terrorist group al Shabaab. Thirty-six Christian workers were rounded up, ordered to lay on the ground and executed by terrorists in the Kenyan city of Kormey. At least two people were beheaded. Al Shabaab said the attack was in retaliation for raids on mosques conducted by Kenyan security forces and vowed to continue their fight.

CNN's Nima Elbagir is in London with the latest.

Nima, what is the Kenyan government saying about this attack?

NIMA ELBAGIR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, the Kenyan government said that it believes that al Shabaab is responsible for this attack, and very much is in keeping with the M.O. that we've seen from the organization and an attack at the beginning of last week with a very similarly also divided people along Christian and Muslim lines and executed those who couldn't pronounce these Islamic jihad, one of the basic tenets of the Muslim faith.

This seems to be how they want to be seen moving forward, is on the side of Muslims even within Kenya.

Kenya's president has acknowledged that there were some severe shortcomings that allowed the security crisis in his country to unfold in this way. He's clearing deck. He's overhauling. He's pushed out the interior minister and the chief inspector of police, and he's promising that moving forward, Kenyans can and will feel safe. But for many, this is almost too little, too late, over a year after those Westgate attacks where so many people died, Jake.

TAPPER: All right. A horrific story.

Nima Elbagir in London, thank you so much.

Our politics lead, could a man who has never before held elective office have a shot at the Republican presidential nomination? Our brand-new CNN/ORC poll shows a surprise contender close to the top of the list. Plus, who is leading on the Democratic side if Hillary Clinton decides to not run. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)