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The Lead with Jake Tapper

Interview With Rep. Will Hurd (R-TX); Trump Criticized Over Revealing Details Of ISIS Operation; Trump Shares Vivid Details Of Raid, ISIS Leader's Death On T.V.; Sixteen Fires Rage In CA, Thousands Evacuated, Millions Without Power; Full House To Vote This Week On Impeachment. Aired 4:30-5p ET

Aired October 28, 2019 - 16:30   ET

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

[16:30:02]

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: But even this dog, its mission was to bring justice to the families of so many hundreds, if not thousands, of people that suffered at the hands of Baghdadi's ISIS -- Jake.

JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: All right, Barbara Starr from the Pentagon, thank you so much.

Let's bring in Michael Leiter and Seth Frantzman to talk more about this.

Michael Leiter, you ran the National Counterterrorism Center under both President George W. Bush and President Obama.

Trump -- the president gave a lot of details when he spoke on Sunday, talking about the death of Baghdadi, describing the compound, the tunnels, a bit of the flight path, the confrontation with Baghdadi.

Now, look, I'm a journalist. I love as much information and detail as possible.

MICHAEL LEITER, FORMER DIRECTOR, NATIONAL COUNTERTERRORISM CENTER: Absolutely.

TAPPER: But as a former counterterrorism official, were you curious, were you -- were you grimacing at all? Were you worried about he was giving too much?

LEITER: Yes. Yes, I mean, he made me cringe in a couple of moments.

So all the detail is great. It's wonderful for TV. It's a wonderful show, but there really is that risk of disclosing too much.

And I'm not quite sure the president has a finely tuned ear for what is sensitive and what's not sensitive, because we're going to have to do this again, whether it's in Syria or other places in the world. And the tactics, techniques and procedures are ones that will have to be repeated. So we really have to protect that. In fairness to the president, we

had the same problem after the mission to kill Osama bin Laden. There was a significant amount of criticism that too much information was released.

The more information we release, the harder it is next time, the more vulnerable our people are to being hurt.

TAPPER: Oh, yes, I got a lot of information. It just wasn't by the president in front of a press conference. But there was a lot of information that came out.

LEITER: Absolutely.

TAPPER: Explain to me about this part about a Kurdish informant getting part of Baghdadi's underwear. How would that be even used?

LEITER: Well, that is probably used to get the DNA sample.

So as soon as you have that blood or body part, if there's any residue from the individual, then you use that to get the DNA sample. And then that DNA later on can be used to verify the identity, as it was reported was used in this situation.

TAPPER: So only after the death to verify, but not necessarily ahead of time?

LEITER: That's right, but it can also be used in other ways, because if you know, DNA, then you can also test other people to understand familial relationships.

TAPPER: Oh, OK.

LEITER: And that can also be used for sources and other efforts to get closer to that individual.

TAPPER: Seth, let me bring you in.

You have covered ISIS extensively. You're out with a new book. It's called "After ISIS: America, Iran and the Struggle for the Middle East."

First of all, I mean, obviously, big credit to the special operators, the intelligence operatives, and the secretary of defense and President Trump for this operation being such a success.

Put into perspective how big a blow the death of al-Baghdadi is and the death of his potential successor.

SETH FRANTZMAN, MIDDLE EAST CENTER FOR REPORTING AND ANALYSIS: Look, I mean, I think, symbolically it's very, very important that he's been killed. It's like the bin Laden raid.

We know that there's something like 14,000 ISIS fighters at large. So there's certainly a lot of ISIS people out there. And that means that, in Iraq and Syria, even if they're not swearing allegiance to Baghdadi or his successor or the next guy, they're still going to be they're, just like al Qaeda in Iraq became ISIS years ago.

So the problem and the threat is still there. I was in Iraq just last month. And we peered through binoculars with the Kurdish Peshmerga. And we could see two or three ISIS guys in a cave down there between the Peshmerga and Iraqi lines.

So these guys are out there, and they're plotting attacks. And I think the overall kind of cliched root causes has not been solved.

TAPPER: And, Michael, you were critical of President Trump for the withdraw of U.S. troops from Northern Syria and what the Kurds considered to be a stab in the back, a betrayal.

Do you think that they are not getting enough credit for whatever help they might have provided on this mission, the Kurds?

LEITER: Well, they were mentioned in the same breath as Syria and Russia. And I don't think they should be.

Unlike those two countries, the Kurds are allies, had been our allies. And, yes, their intelligence was critical here. And what is most important is, going forward, their intelligence will remain critical. But we are no longer in a position to collect that because of the movement out of Syria by both U.S. troops and the Turkish incursion into Northeast Syria.

So I think they deserve more credit and they deserve more loyalty going forward, because we need them to be our ongoing allies.

TAPPER: And, Seth, Baghdadi was holed up in Northwestern Syria, an area that's known really more as an al Qaeda stronghold, al Qaeda and ISIS not necessarily cooperative. Did his location surprise you at all? And what do you read into it?

FRANTZMAN: Yes, I think the location is very, very problematic.

It's just a few minutes or so from the Turkish border. It's an area that there's smuggling. It seems, according to reports, that some of Baghdadi's relatives had been smuggled through Turkey to get to him.

We know that large numbers of ISIS members not only came through Turkey, but then fled back to Turkey after Raqqa was destroyed in 2017. So I think there's a lot of question marks about why Baghdadi was found so close to Turkey. What did Turkey know?

If Turkey claims that it needs to go into Syria to create a safe zone, for instance, where the Kurds are, how come Turkey wasn't raiding this house? How come Turkey wasn't the one that had actually found him?

[16:35:07]

I think that raises a lot of question marks. And it also means, what was Baghdadi doing there in Idlib? Was he trying to recruit more people? What was his agenda?

TAPPER: All right, Seth and Michael, thanks so much for your time and your expertise.

For President Trump, it was all about the gruesome details as he takes a victory lap for the death of ISIS' leader, but his statement is raising questions.

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: The politics lead now: President Trump today taking something of a victory lap, after giving the green light to the successful U.S. Special Forces raid that led to the death of the head of ISIS.

CNN's Kaitlan Collins now reports from the White House.

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(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: It was a tremendous weekend.

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): After a successful nighttime raid took out the brutal leader of the Islamic State, President Trump took a victory lap today.

TRUMP: I want al-Baghdadi. Get him. And they got him.

COLLINS: Trump touted the death of one of the most wanted men in the world, one day after going into graphic detail about the operation.

TRUMP: He died after running into a dead-end tunnel, whimpering and crying and screaming all the way.

COLLINS: The president told reporters watching the raid was like seeing a movie. But there were questions about how a surveillance feed could show what was happening in an underground tunnel.

Today, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff couldn't confirm the president's details.

GEN. MARK MILLEY, U.S. ARMY CHIEF OF STAFF: But I don't know what the source of that was here, but I assume it was talking directly to unit members.

COLLINS: Typically, presidents have informed congressional leaders when moments like these happen. And while he has no obligation to do so, the president defended keeping Adam Schiff and Nancy Pelosi in the dark.

TRUMP: And the answer is because I think Adam Schiff is the biggest leaker in Washington.

COLLINS: Trump's made-for-TV moment came as he was facing intense criticism from his own party over his decision to largely withdraw U.S. troops from Syria. It's a decision Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said won't affect

intelligence-gathering that helped make raids like this one possible.

MIKE POMPEO, U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE: We will still have the information and the intelligence that we need so that we can continue to undertake this absolutely vital mission for American national security.

COLLINS: One day after one of the most significant foreign policy victories of his presidency, Trump received this welcome during a rare night out in Washington.

(BOOING)

COLLINS: His aides brushed off the chorus of boos today.

HOGAN GIDLEY, WHITE HOUSE DEPUTY PRESS SECRETARY: It's a pretty liberal town, but the president is a big baseball fan.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: Now, Jake, on another front, the White House is now responding to that news from Democrats that they are going to be holding those votes on an impeachment inquiry with a statement from the press secretary just now.

Stephanie Grisham says they won't be able to fully comment until they have actually seen the text of what's going to be in that resolution that our Hill reporters were laying out earlier.

But she said -- quote -- "Speaker Pelosi is finally admitting what the rest of America already knew, that Democrats were conducting an unauthorized impeachment proceeding. Refusing to give the president due process and their secret shady closed-door depositions are completely and irreversibly illegitimate."

Now, Jake, what that statement doesn't say is how this is going to change the White House's strategy, their approach to this, if the Democrats do move forward with that vote.

TAPPER: All right, Kaitlan Collins from the White House, thank you so much.

I want to bring in Republican Congressman Will Hurd. He's on the House Intelligence Committee. He was once a CIA officer.

Congressman, always good to see you.

First of all, I want to get your reaction to the announcement from Speaker Pelosi that Democrats and Republicans in the House are going to be voting on Thursday about a process forward that will have open hearings. You will be able to read the transcripts of the depositions. There will be due process for the president and his lawyer, and also a process to get the evidence to the House Judiciary Committee.

Obviously, the devil is in the details, but what's your initial response?

REP. WILL HURD (R-TX): Yes.

Look, I just found out about this recently myself. I agree with you. The devils are going to be in the details. I think even talking about an impeachment inquiry is a little premature, because I think we still have some oversight to do here in Congress, and we haven't exhausted all of those capabilities.

I want to hear from Rudy Giuliani. I want to hear from senior NSC staff. And I think that can be done through the current rules of the House and how -- and use those committee oversight before getting to that.

But I'm sure we will see the details in the next couple of days.

TAPPER: Let's talk about Baghdadi.

The president on Sunday shared a lot of details about the raid, including that al-Baghdadi was under surveillance for a couple of weeks, that eight helicopters involved and they flew identical routes. The raid team had Baghdadi's DNA and did a test on site.

Now, me, I loved all the details. I'm a reporter. I want all the information I can get. But for you, as a former CIA officer, did you have any concerns he was sharing too much information?

HURD: Well, I'm glad those details were shared after the raid, not before the raid.

And, ultimately, look, I think those kinds of details would eventually come out. And my broader concern is our larger strategy in Syria, and making sure that we have the capability to continue to conduct those kinds of raids.

ISIS is broken, but they're not done. You still have about 20,000 ISIS fighters throughout Syria and Iraq. And let me be clear. getting Baghdadi off the chessboard is significant. He was responsible for the loss of many lives. And this is a great victory for the men and women in our Special Forces, our intelligence community, and our allies.

And I think this is an operation that's an example of how you have to have allies and resources on the ground in order to get this done.

[16:45:00]

So I want to make sure that we are able to enjoy and celebrate these kinds of operations in the future. And that's why I think we have to change our policy because the decision to pull out of northern Syria, I think, is an incredibly bad decision. It's going to impact our allies.

Our allies are already questioning that whether they can trust us. The Iraqi President, I think, this weekend or yesterday said that he doesn't trust the U.S. and the coalition. You have the Japanese government not participating in a U.S. led effort to protect ships and waters in the Middle East. So this is -- this decision has long term implications.

TAPPER: So you agree with those who say that this mission, the success of this mission, undermines the argument that President Trump has been making about his policy in the Middle East, his new policy in the Middle East with regarding the Kurds and regarding U.S. servicemembers in northern Syria. You think that this shows, that's why we need to be there and that's why we need to be backing the Kurds?

HURD: For sure. I think that the fact there's going to be a replacement to Baghdadi, like I said, the military has estimated 20,000 ISIS fighters throughout the region. A lot of the -- we worked with our Kurdish allies to get this intelligence. Now let's imagine a scenario in which now we're going to have more Russian troops in Syria. That's going to prevent and have an impact on our ability to protect -- to project air power.

The fact that you also have the Turks and the region becomes complicated. If our Kurdish allies don't trust us, are they going to continue to share this kind of information with us?

TAPPER: Right.

HURD: So this further -- this further complicates an already complicated region. And we have to remember and go back to when you know ISIS was inspiring people even if they were 6000 miles away, they were sawing off people's heads, they were putting people on fire. That is what we were able to dismantle.

TAPPER: Right.

HURD: Getting ISIS to where they are now is a success but we can't let -- we can't let off the gas. And part of that is having a presence in that region.

TAPPER: So I want to ask you just one question in Ukraine. As Speaker Pelosi tweeted today, "it's been more than a month and Republicans in Washington still won't answer the simple question, is it appropriate for a president to pressure a foreign country to undermine our elections?"

I think that you've kind of suggested what you already think but I'll give you the opportunity here, yes or no. Is it appropriate for a president to pressure a foreign country to investigate his opponents?

HURD: I think most Republicans have said, you know, that that's not appropriate.

TAPPER: All right, Congressman Will Hurd, Republican on the House Intelligence Committee. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. Winds acting like jet fuel for a fire burning through neighborhoods around Los Angeles, destroying homes and forcing people to flee in the middle of the night. We're live on the ground. Stay with us.

[16:50:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: In our "NATIONAL LEAD" now, California is burning. Today there are 16 active fires across the state including along the 405 freeway in Los Angeles. Actor and former Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger tweeting, don't screw around, get out further north. In Sonoma County conditions or even worse, forcing 200,000 evacuations. And as CNN Stephanie Elam reports for us now, many had to leave their homes in the dark because nearly one million people are without power.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

STEPHANIE ELAM, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Thick smoke and fierce flames cover canyons in Southern California. As a new fire, the Getty fire burns furiously. Consuming more than 500 acres of hillside across the west side of Los Angeles, the fire forcing Highway Patrol to close parts of a major freeway, the 405.

More than 10,000 structures are under mandatory evacuation, including the campus of Mount St. Mary's University just north of the Getty Museum.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh my God.

ELAM: Students at that college running out of their dorm rooms in the middle of the night.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Look how close the fire is. It's literally right there.

ELAM: Officials warning of extreme shifts in weather that can happen in seconds.

ERIC GARCETTI (D), MAYOR OF LOS ANGELES: Don't think that you know just because of past experience how quickly a fire can move.

ELAM: In northern California, a similar scene playing out in Sonoma County, where crews are battling the Kincaid fire for the sixth day. More than 66,000 acres have already burned in wine country. Nearly 200,000 people forced to flee their homes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's on fire. The road is on fire. I'm getting -- I'm getting over.

ELAM: Official saying that Kincaid fire doubled in size Sunday, as winds gusted to hurricane force. Firefighters are taking advantage of a brief break and winds Monday, but forecasters warn it's temporary.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We've got a kind of a quiet 24-hour window right now and then we're going to go into another critical period Tuesday night into Wednesday.

ELAM: Those not forced to evacuate are dealing with power outages put in place for nearly one million people in the Bay Area by the local power company, all part of an effort to prevent the fire from spreading.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ELAM: And Jake, just to show you out here what is happening, behind these fire trucks, there are some homes that did Burn overnight. However, there were some hotspots inside that started to flare back up. And so because of that, firefighters back out here again and that is the fear with these winds that they could pick up some of those embers and throw them on to another house and you could have another house loss to this fire Jake.

[16:55:15]

TAPPER: All right, Stephanie Elam in California, thank you so much. A deeper look at what the future of ISIS might be without its leader. That's ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: House Republicans in the White House are now responding after House Democrats announced their plan vote on the process of the impeachment inquiry. That vote will come Thursday. We'll have much more of that coming right up.

You can follow me on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, @JAKETAPPER. You can tweet the show, @TheLeadCNN. Our coverage on CNN continues right now. Thanks for watching.