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The Lead with Jake Tapper

Boehner Challenged But Reelected Speaker; Bin Laden "Shooter" Under NCIS Investigation; LBJ Portrayal Criticized In "Selma"; LBJ Portrayal Criticized In "Selma"; New Gadgets On Display At CES; Apple Patents Bendy Phone, Smart Glasses

Aired January 06, 2015 - 16:30   ET

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

JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: Speaker Boehner squashed his opposition. He was reelected speaker this afternoon. He's had trouble controlling House Republicans to say the least.

Do you think that they are more rebellious now than they were even during for instance in the government shutdown?

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: You know, perhaps in some ways. At the end of the day, there were 24 Republicans who actively voted against John Boehner. One Republican abstained. So, there were 25 effectively against him. And that was double what we saw two years ago when 12 Republicans voted against him for House speaker.

The difference is there are more Republicans now. It's a historic high, 246, highest Republican majority since 1928, I believe.

So, to answer your question -- yes, excuse me, they're a little bit unruly here. Yes, they probably do feel the ability to be more rebellious when they're trying to make the point that they don't think that the leadership has gone the way they want it, not so much because of his ideals but because of the process.

They don't feel like many of these conservatives feel like their voices have been heard. Having said that, as I said, the speaker has kind of more room to lose some of his Republicans and still be able to get things done because his majority is so big.

It was definitely not a welcome bit of drama for their House Republican leadership, to say the least. They came out of the House chamber and they were breathing a sigh of relief.

They would much rather have discussions about a unified message, a unified Republican caucus. So they're glad that that moment of unwanted drama is behind them -- Jake.

TAPPER: That's right. Dana Bash, 24 votes against, it doesn't sound like a lot, but 29 votes, and there would have been real trouble. Dana Bash on Capitol Hill, thank you so much.

This is the most diverse Congress in American history, more than 100 women in the House and Senate for the first time ever, 33 Hispanics, 12 Asian-Americans and 46 black members. Three of whom for the first time since just after the civil war are Republicans. Athena Jones has this report.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ATHENA JONES, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Congressman-elect Will Hurd arriving on Capitol Hill for New Members Orientation, a first time representative -- and the first black Republican Texas ever sent to Congress.

WILL HURD (R), TEXAS CONGRESSMAN-ELECT: My parents moved to San Antonio in 1970. There are houses that they weren't allowed to get because of the color of their skin. Now they have a son who's in Congress.

JONES: Hurd joins Utah's Mia Love, who becomes the first black Republican woman ever elected to Congress. Love, a Mormon, first made a splash at the Republican National Convention in 2012 and again on election night 2014.

MIA LOVE (R), UTAH CONGRESSWOMAN-ELECT: Many of the naysayers out there said that Utah would never elect a black Republican LDS woman to Congress.

JONES: And it isn't just Hurd and Love, South Carolina's appointed Senator Tim Scott was elected to that seat in November's GOP landslide making him the first black senator from the south since the 1880s.

A banner here for a party that believes expanding its appeal with minority voters is key to winning the presidency in 2016 and beyond. Will this new crop of black Republicans attract more black voters to the GOP, after all, these candidates ran on conservative platforms in red states.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We need the right tools to fix health care and Obamacare is not the right tool.

JONES: We took a closer look at the numbers in South Carolina where Scott and Lindsey Graham, a white Republican senator up for reelection, were both on the ballot.

KEATING HOLLAND, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: The 6 percent of African-Americans voted for Lindsey Graham, the white Republican, 10 percent of African- Americans in South Carolina voting for Tim Scott, the black Republican. That tells me that having a black Republican on the ballot gets a handful of votes.

JONES: So in the end, all three candidates won by attracting support from white voters, a fact not lost on Scott.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: People are aligning their votes with their values and they're voting for candidates who are simply not of their own complexion.

JONES: Analysts say the GOP will have to shift on policy matters to appeal to more blacks, but that's not the focus for these GOP freshmen. They say they're looking beyond race.

LOVE: All of the issues we face in this country, they're not black or white issues. They're not gender-specific. They're people issues.

HURD: To me, this is a victory for the voters in Texas and the voters in my district that have gotten beyond skin color.

JONES: Athena Jones, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

TAPPER: When all is said and done about the record-setting diversity of this Congress, we should point out that it is still more than 80 percent male and 80 percent white, not quite reflective of the diversity of this great nation.

In other national news, Robert O'Neil has quite acclaimed a fame, he killed the world's most wanted terrorist, Osama Bin Laden. But now O'Neil could be disciplined for talking about that.

A former member of the Navy's elite SEAL Team 6, O'Neal was one of the special operations forces that stormed Bin Laden's compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan in May, 2011. He's being investigated by the Naval Criminal Investigative Service or NCIS for short allegedly revealing classified information during interviews.

They're not specifying publicly what he may have revealed or when he may have revealed it. But we should mention, O'Neil did speak with THE LEAD in November as well as other media.

In a statement to CNN, the NCIS says, they quote, "Initiated an investigation to determine the merit of the allegations he had released information."

Joining me live from Dallas is Robert O'Neil. Mr. O'Neil, thanks again for being here. Do you think you did anything wrong here? Some of your critics say this is why Navy SEALs aren't supposed to come forward and talk publicly.

ROBERT O'NEIL, CLAIMS TO BE BIN LADEN'S SHOOTER: Jake, first of all, thanks for having me. It's great to be back. No, I don't think I did anything wrong. There are things that are classified that I agreed not to speak about.

And I haven't and I won't. The stuff I did now, it took me a few years to decide. I talked about a few things Navy SEALs do get in helicopters, Navy SEALs do go to houses full of terrorists and we capture and kill them. I talked about that with some of my teammates.

TAPPER: Do you have any idea what specific classified information you're alleged to have disclosed?

O'NEIL: No. I first heard about the investigation to the merit of a complaint from someone in the Navy. So I'm still waiting for the call from them. I haven't been contacted by anybody. But if the call comes, I'm willing to take it.

TAPPER: The Obama administration has sent people to prison for revealing classified information. Are you at all worried? O'NEIL: No, I'm not worried. It concerns me that someone is investigating potential wrongdoing. But I'm very confident that nothing classified was told, nothing that's not been told before has been told. I think it's a story that's very important for closure for 9/11 families and it's also important for American history.

TAPPER: Now a lot of your defenders say the Obama administration shared a lot of information about the OBL raid to be self-serving, most notably perhaps cooperating with the filmmakers of "Zero Dark Thirty." Does that bother you considering this investigation?

O'NEIL: That doesn't bother me. It didn't bother me the night we found out some information had been leaked. We were still in our uniforms when the name, S.E.A.L. Team 6 came out. I don't have a problem with that. There is nothing wrong with letting the world know that if they mess with us, we do have the capabilities to come get them.

As far as the Obama administration taking credit for it, they authorized the mission. So they should take their part of the credit, as should everyone involved all the way back to the American people, the first responders at Ground Zero.

TAPPER: Do you think that the purpose of the NCIS investigation and also the possible punishment for your fellow SEAL who wrote the book "No Easy Day" under the pen name Mark Owen, is being punished for not going through the proper channels. Do you think this to discourage other SEALs from coming forward and talking about their experiences?

O'NEIL: It could be something to discourage it and you know, they are doing their job. It has to be a difficult job investigating, trying to figure out what is and isn't classified. It would surprise a lot of people to find that most stuff isn't classified that you think is.

I wish that -- there's been two guys from the mission that spoke about the mission. And I don't want to be part of a place where we treat our heroes like villains and then we treat our villains like victims.

I think the author of "No Easy Day" got on a helicopter and risked his life, as did I. And I think that each one of our stories should be told as should everyone involved.

TAPPER: Do you feel like you're being treated at all like a villain or a victim?

O'NEIL: No, I don't feel like either. I would just hate to see that happen. Right now, I think people are doing due diligence to make sure everything was done the right way and I'm talking (inaudible).

TAPPER: Others in the SEAL community have argued that no one person can take credit for killing Bin Laden. Some say it violates the SEAL ethos to talk about classified missions. What do you say when you hear that?

O'NEIL: I respect all their opinions on what they think as far as the ethos and as far as taking credit, I'm not taking credit. I wanted to tell my part of a very important mission. That was my part of the mission. There were so many other moving parts involved, all I wanted to do was let the people of America know and for the families of the 9/11 victims to know what happened.

TAPPER: Robert O'Neil, thanks. We look forward to having you on the show again to talk about a lot of other issues other than this investigation.

O'NEIL: Thanks so much, Jake. I appreciate it.

TAPPER: Thanks. In our Pop Culture Lead today, a Hollywood director under fire for taking creative license with one of the most defining moments in U.S. history and at least one critic is saying "Selma" should be ruled out this awards season. How is the director responding? That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: Welcome back to THE LEAD. I'm Jake Tapper. Our Pop Culture Lead today, makers of the movie "Selma," which tells the story of the legendary civil rights march, are being criticized for taking some creative license with that historical event.

The Producers Guild is snubbing the film's creators including Oprah from its list of award nominees. This after critics went after the filmmaker's twisted history in particular the relationship between Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and President Lyndon Baines Johnson.

(VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: "Selma" tells the story of protests and grassroots activists to helped lead the way to the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Former White House staffers from that era say the movie doesn't portray LBJ inaccurately.

It makes him appear uninterested in working with Dr. King. "Selma's" director, Ava Duvernay, has told reporters that she was not interested in doing a, quote, "white savior movie," instead she says she wanted to create a movie centered on the people of "Selma" including Dr. King.

Let's bring in Gil Robertson. He is the president of the African- American Film Critics Association, and also let's bring in presidential historian, Douglas Brinkley, to try to sort all this out.

Gil, let me start with you. Millions of Americans will see "Selma" and they're going to believe that's what actually happened. Do you think the filmmakers who make historical movies have more of a responsibility to be accurate?

GIL ROBERTSON, PRESIDENT, AFRICAN-AMERICAN FILM CRITICS ASSOCIATION: Jake, I think that this film doesn't pretend to be a documentary. It's simply a cinematic experience that offers entertainment and also a look at events that led up to the "Selma" march which were very key to the Civil Rights Movement. I think that it's unfair to burden this film with those sets of expectations because it's movie, at the end of the day.

TAPPER: Doug, what do you think the practical effect is when those who make historical films get some details wrong for the sake of drama? I mean, what's the big deal?

DOUGLAS BRINKLEY, PRESIDENTIAL HISTORIAN: Well, really, all the movies do that. There's inaccuracies and compression in any movie that's claiming to be about history. But somebody like Steven Spielberg in "Saving Private Ryan" hired Steven Ambros as a consultant and Lincoln had Dorris Kerns Goodwin.

This movie maybe could have used somebody looking at the script a little bit more. I love "Selma." I think it's a brilliant film and the atmospherics are great. But when you boil down to that King/Johnson part of the film, it's a distortion and not a helpful one.

TAPPER: What is the truth as opposed to what the film captures, Douglas?

BRINKLEY: The truth is on the Johnson tapes where Lyndon Johnson is talking to Martin Luther King. We can hear it and you can play it on your show. And he's urging King to do a Selma, that we need it and even saying that civil rights act is not going to be my biggest achievement, the Voting Rights Act.

I think there's a tension that could have been built between King and Johnson. But the movie makes Johnson seem like George Wallace lite instead of really somebody who was an integral player in the Selma drama and pushed voting rights as hard as Dr. King in many ways.

But again, I don't think people should not see the film for that. It's a marvelous film and it's just a portrayal of Johnson that's very awkward. You can't blame Lyndon Johnson's followers and people that worked in the White House to saying that wasn't Lyndon Johnson on civil rights. It would only be human for them to protest a little bit.

TAPPER: Gil, I've heard some supporters of the film say that critics and historians are missing the point. This is what Selma looked like and felt like from the ground level, not from the corridors of power. Is that what you think?

GIL ROBERTSON, PRESIDENT, AFRICAN-AMERICAN FILM CRITICS ASSOCIATION: Absolutely. Absolutely. This film is unfortunately as relevant today in examining critical issues that impact African-Americans and the disenfranchised people as it was in the 1960s.

So, again, having seen the film twice, I didn't walk away from either experience thinking anything differently of LBJ. He was a busy man, a powerful man, who had a lot of things on his plate.

I didn't get from the actor's performance any type of negativity or any type of bad impression. So I'm not even sure where all of this is coming from, to be honest with you. But I would encourage people to go and see "Selma." It's certainly a film that I think is going to encourage people in this country to finally start having some real and honest talk about race and race relations. That hopefully will be the outcome of this film.

TAPPER: Doug, people criticizing it, a lot of them are people who used to work for Lyndon Johnson or historians. One Johnson aide went to "The Washington Post" and said that Selma was LBJ's idea. That's a little much, isn't it?

BRINKLEY: That's a little much. Look, Martin Luther King deserves all the credit. He brought the fight to Alabama, whether it's the Montgomery busboy situation or the fight in Birmingham, this is King's movie and King's show.

I think the controversy is that it makes LBJ, for example, seem like the one that's putting the FBI in the early '60s on King when it was Bobby Kennedy, the attorney general who did it. We're in a tough field in history looking for factual accuracy.

It seems to me with so much at stake in a wonderful film like this that some of that could have been corrected. You could go online and read 100 historical accuracies in the film. It's a Hollywood movie. Nobody's expecting it to be accurate.

But it's, in my view, blaming Lyndon Johnson for having a kind of bigoted attitude that he never had. And it certainly didn't have when he supported the Civil Rights Act of 1957 and he deserves a lot of credit, Johnson, for Selma. And Andrew Young has said exactly what I'm saying.

TAPPER: All right, Gil Robertson, Douglas Brinkley, thank you both. You both agree on one thing, see "Selma." You both enjoyed the movie and I guess that's fundamentally what Hollywood would want me to say.

Wolf Blitzer is here with a preview of "THE SITUATION ROOM." Wolf, you're today examining North Korea's military threats and you have the State Department's spokeswoman there.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST, "THE SITUATION ROOM": Marie Harfe is going to be joining us. A lot going on involving North Korea and the aftermath of the Sony Pictures hacking and what's going on. North Korea making some threats right now. The U.S. is responding sanctions and other steps as well.

This is a very, very tense Korean peninsula, the 30,000 American troops right along the DMZ so there is a lot going on. We're watching it very closely.

We'll talk about what's going on in Iraq right now. U.S. troops, not combat troops, but there are U.S. troops. They could potentially be in combat given what ISIS is up to. We'll get into that with her as well. By the way, I saw "Selma," I thought it was a powerful, compelling film.

TAPPER: Have you ever been to the DMZ? BLITZER: Yes.

TAPPER: It's terrifying.

BLITZER: I've been to Pyongyang, too. I was in North Korea four years ago.

TAPPER: Wolf Blitzer, thank you so much.

When we come back, the new must-have gadget that you haven't even heard of yet, from drones that follow you to lightbulbs that play music, we will show you the future of technology, next.

Plus, has Apple finally figured out a way to keep your iPhone from shattering? Why a new move by the company could revolutionize the smartphone industry.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: Welcome back to THE LEAD. I'm Jake Tapper. Our "Money Lead" now, a sneak peek into your future. Right now, some of the most innovative gadgets to take over your life are on a showroom floor.

The International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, to be specific, the same convention that debuted CDs and camcorders in 1981 or the VCR made popular by this convention in 1970. Today's new technology revolves around the internet.

CNN's Samuel Burke joins us live from Las Vegas. Samuel, show me the future.

SAMUEL BURKE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Jake, here every object, every action, every movement is subject to some type of connectivity. Even your golf swing is subject to this motion sensor. There's actually a big emphasis on cyber security as well. Some companies even think the selfie might be the key to your safety.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BURKE (voice-over): Right now in Las Vegas, the bright lights and high-dollar tables look a bit different because at the Annual Consumer Electronics Show, CES, it's less about showgirls and more about show gadgets flaunting their curves.

International CES offers a sneak peek at the must-have gadgets soon to flood the market with innovations on display from more than 140 countries, the excitement is inescapable. Even if you wanted to record your getaway attempt, high-flying technology isn't far behind.

(on camera): This is the type of drone that you do want following you around. You just let it take off and then it uses this wristband to follow you around right, left, up, down and record everything you're doing even across the Las Vegas desert. (voice-over): Back inside, tech companies are betting not just on a

full house but on a smart one. ISSIE LAPOWSKI, STAFF WRITER, "WIRED": Smartphones are really becoming our remote controls for the world and so why not use them to control our homes? It's working with these existing technologies and figuring out better ways that they can talk together.

BURKE: Right now, your house can communicate with you from the moment you wake up and activate your I-kettle brewing system.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No other I.P. camera has this much computation power --

BURKE: When you leave your house, you can use this Amarillo camera to detect and follow intruders. And when you get home, you can turn on this energy-saving fan or --

ANNOUNCER: Seamlessly control up to eight bulbs for smart lighting and surround sound in any room.

BURKE: You can even use these lightbulbs to play music. Like any other showroom in Vegas, security is also a top priority here.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How many of you went to see a great Sony movie this holiday?

BURKE: Not just for sales but for safety.

LAPOWSKI: That's what a lot of security experts are concern about, the fact that we're opening up not just our computers and our phones but our entire homes to hackers.

BURKE: And companies are lining up to help us face that risk with several new concepts.

(On camera): One of the apps that's caught our attention is called One You. And it allows you to replace your password with a selfie.

(voice-over): There's a lot of money to be made here, but introducing big new ideas is still a gamble with customers.

LAPOWSKI: These companies really want this future because this is a whole new line of products that they can sell. They're still trying to convince consumers they want those products. So that is a bit of the challenge there.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BURKE: And, Jake, anybody who watches THE LEAD knows that you're CNN's biggest baseball fan. This product, 150 bucks measures your swing, lets you compare yourself to some of your favorite pro players. I'll bring this one back home for you.

TAPPER: I'm afraid of what it will tell me. Samuel Burke in Las Vegas, thank you so much. Appreciate it.

Apple may have been on to something when people complained about those new iPhone 6 plus phones bending in their pockets. Now it has the exclusive rights to flexible technology. Apple was granted 28 licenses that could mean a new bendable phone from Apple one day with a flexible screen, battery and circuit board.

It also has technology to rival Google Glass, the company says. The patent calls it life stream that is meant to collect notes and recordings could mean raw video, facial recognition or even pupil dilation, and yes, all that information could end up, of course, on Facebook.

In the words of Star Trek's Captain Kirk, it has let us boldly go where no man has gone before for the past 25 years, the Hubble Telescope has given us images of space, asteroids, nebulas and stars we could only dream of before and now that the galaxy's pre-eminent paparazzo is turning a quarter century old, NASA decided to revisit some of its new technology.

This is a picture of the pillars of creation. Three giant columns of gas lit up by a cluster of stars. It's from 1995. Amazing and iconic, it found its way onto t-shirts and movies.

All of NASA's technological arsenal used to take new photos of the pillars, the results are something to behold. NASA says there are even newborn stars hiding in the hues of those columns.

Make sure to follow me on Twitter @jaketapper and also @theleadcnn. That's it for THE LEAD. I'm Jake Tapper. I now turn you over to Wolf Blitzer. He's next door in "THE SITUATION ROOM" -- Mr. Blitzer.