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Jury Selection Begins in Pittsburgh Synagogue Shooting Trial; Minnesota Police Officer Released From Prison; Biden Finalizing Plans to Announce Reelection Bid; Republican War Over Abortion; Sudan Evacuation. Aired 1-1:30p ET

Aired April 24, 2023 - 13:00   ET

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

[13:00:38]

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: A daring evacuation. The U.S. military carries out an operation to pull government personnel out of Sudan's capital, but thousands of Americans are still trapped in the country as it descends deeper into chaos, and the White House says it's not safe to get them out right now.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN HOST: The GOP's fight over abortion erupts over the weekend, political peril for the Republican Party, as the national battle over reproductive rights heats up.

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: And Kimberly Potter set free after serving only 16 months in prison for killing Daunte Wright. The former Minneapolis police officers spent fewer than two years behind bars for fatally shooting Wright while yelling "Taser."

Critics say the punishment didn't fit the crime. We're following these major developing stories and many more, all coming in right here to CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

KEILAR: Scrambling to get out of Sudan, as foreign powers rush to evacuate the war-torn country. The Biden administration says that U.S. Special Forces have carried out a daring rescue operation, safely getting U.S. Embassy staff out of the capital city of Khartoum.

This here you see is a photo of Secretary of State Tony Blinken watching this tense operation unfold. As fighting intensifies, the U.S. government is warning an estimated 16,000 Americans remaining, many of whom are dual citizens, that a large-scale operation to evacuate those who want to leave won't be happening anytime soon.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN KIRBY, NSC COORDINATOR FOR STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS: We have military forces still prepositioned nearby in the region. They're needed. But, quite frankly, the situation is not conducive and not safe to try to conduct some kind of a larger military evacuation of American citizens.

The violence is increasing. It's more dangerous today than it was just yesterday or the day before.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Jim, this was really an incredible rescue for those who did get out.

SCIUTTO: Listen, it's not easy, to call it a fast and clean mission, but there was danger here, the U.S. military swooping in to evacuate U.S. government personnel.

Let's break this down with someone who knows a thing or two about it, retired Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt.

Good to have you on, sir.

They say it's fast and clean, but this is not an easy operation. They were on the ground for less than an hour. There's a reason for that. There's also a reason why they sent members of SEAL Team Six. They wanted the most experienced.

What are the dangers in operation like this?

BRIG. GEN. MARK KIMMITT (RET.), FORMER U.S. CENTRAL COMMAND DEPUTY DIRECTOR FOR PLANS AND STRATEGY: Well, first of all, the key issue is, you don't know what's going to happen in the air.

Both parties said they would not give up airspace to allow any kind of operations. So there's that risk. You can get the helicopters shot down. Second, you don't know what's going to happen on the ground. Even if these are not forces that belong to the RSF, you could just have a couple of knuckleheads out there with weapons.

And, of course, you have always got the logistics challenges of coming a long distance, getting into the ground and getting the people out.

SCIUTTO: So, let's talk about that. They were flying from Djibouti. This is about 700 miles.

The range of the Chinook helicopter which they use -- this is one of those double-rotor heavy-lift helicopters -- is under 500 miles. So they had to -- they had to jump. They had to stop here in Ethiopia to refuel and then come to Khartoum, pick folks up, presumably refuel on the way back -- you got a heavier load -- before you get to get to safety here.

That's not exactly -- well, it's not easy, one. And there are some dangers involved in being in the air.

KIMMITT: Sure.

I mean, this goes back to the whole Iran hostage rescue back in 1979. That was knocked out primarily because of logistics problems. But I would also say, Jim, it's likely that, between Ethiopia, Khartoum, and back, they probably had to do an in-flight refuel as well.

SCIUTTO: Ah, OK. Fair enough.

So, some of this, struck me as I was watching this play out over the weekend, is informed by events in Benghazi a number of years ago, that you see now, when U.S. diplomats get in danger in war zones, there's not a lot of hemming and hawing. They move them out.

I saw this, for instance, when we were in Ukraine prior to the Russian invasion. They got those folks out quickly here. Is -- has -- I don't know if the policy has changed, but has the threshold changed for making a decision like this for the U.S. government since Benghazi?

KIMMITT: Well, it's not since Benghazi. It could very well be since Afghanistan.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

KIMMITT: If you take a look at the problems, the perception problems that happened on the evacuation in Afghanistan, you're sending in SEALs, you're sending in less than one hour on the ground, you're only bringing out the diplomats, that's a sense that there's a lot of sensitivity on the part of the administration that this cannot fail.

[13:05:08]

SCIUTTO: Yes.

The SEALs, listen, this is, of course, the team you entrusted with arguably the most difficult special operations mission in decades for the U.S....

KIMMITT: Yes.

SCIUTTO: ... the kill-or-capture mission against Osama bin Laden.

I mean, you do have a whole host of special teams units that are trained, are capable of this kind of thing.

KIMMITT: Sure. Right.

SCIUTTO: Is this one that you call into duty in the most difficult of circumstances?

KIMMITT: Don't know, because I don't think we really know what the situation was, in terms of force selection and threats on the ground.

But you can never go wrong sending your best troops.

SCIUTTO: Yes, understood, and, like we said, not the easiest distances involved here. You got a long distance. You got to stop on the way. You got to stop on the way out.

And all the time you're flying, I imagine, you're looking at the safety of those aircraft as well.

KIMMITT: And the threat.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

KIMMITT: Could be a threat on the ground. General Mark Kimmitt, always good to have you -- Brianna.

KEILAR: To the race now for the White House.

President Biden is expected to make it official tomorrow with a formal announcement that he is running for reelection. Biden spent the weekend huddling with advisers at Camp David as he finalized his plans, and he selected a manager to lead his 2024 campaign.

CNN's Phil Mattingly is at the White House following this story.

Phil, what are you learning ahead of this expected announcement?

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: You know, Brianna, behind the scenes for several months, the president's very close-knit group of advisers had been planning out the structure of a campaign, the expectation that one would have almost certainly been given the green light.

Now some of the details of that are starting to come out. Julie Chavez Rodriguez, this close White House adviser, a senior adviser here at the White House, is expected to become the campaign manager for the nascent campaign. Other personnel decisions are in the works as well.

And it's all driving towards the possibility of the president officially making it official on Tuesday morning via a campaign-style video. It'll be a pretty low-key, kind of slow burn start to a campaign that they know will be ramping up significantly over the course of the next 19 months.

The usual caveat, Brianna, as you know quite well, applies here. If the president hasn't officially signed off, it doesn't mean officially that it's going to happen. But that is certainly where everything has been leading up to this point. And it's a critical moment for this White House, for the president, for his political team.

While it has long been a foregone conclusion that the president was going to run for reelection, the realities of this moment, the challenges this president faces, his low approval ratings, the fact he's the oldest president in American history, the very real challenges that he entered office in his first term to try and calm down, to try and move away from, most notably, his predecessor, and the fact he's still leading the polls for the 2024 Republican nomination, are still very palpable, are still very present.

And all of those things combined underscore that this is not going to be an easy run for reelection. It's something White House advisers are critically aware of going into this moment, and it's something that's driving fund-raising plans, messaging, how the president's strategy will play out over the course of the next several months.

There's also the reality of, he's the incumbent president. You mentioned that weekend in Camp David. And, yes, it was scheduled to be an intensive weekend about the structure of his campaign, decisions that still needed to be made. But he was also focused on what you guys were talking about in the

lead of the show, Sudan and ordering the emergency evacuation of the embassy. Those will always be issues the president will be balancing throughout the course of the campaign, whether he launches tomorrow or some other time.

White House officials know that. The president is very aware of that as well. And this will all be part of the drive towards 2024. Expect to see, message-wise, much of what you have seen in these first couple of months in the weeks and months ahead.

White House officials acknowledge, they know they will have to be full go come the start of next year. They know the campaign will be extremely intense and difficult, Brianna.

KEILAR: I like how you put it. Tomorrow is about officially making it official.

(LAUGHTER)

KEILAR: We will be watching with you.

Phil Mattingly, thank you -- Boris.

SANCHEZ: As the 2024 election begins to take shape, candidates are facing increasing questions about where they stand on abortion, including the issue of access to medication abortion.

Right now, a federal appeals court is considering the fate of a widely used abortion pill. It's the most commonly used pill for abortion in the country. It's a decision that sets up the most consequential abortion-related disputes since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last summer.

And Republicans are now caught in the middle of a growing party divide. Today, Congresswoman Nancy Mace warned her Republican colleagues they could be headed for more election losses if they don't find a middle ground on this issue.

Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. NANCY MACE (R-SC): This is an issue where Republicans need to think about whether or not they want to continue losing elections to the left -- and some on the far left want abortion up until birth -- or if they want to moderate some of their extreme views and say, we can be pro-life and be pro-woman at the same time and talk about what we're doing to protect women who've been raped, girls who are victims of incest, what we're doing to improve OB-GYN access in rural areas, and contraception.

[13:10:03]

And people want to see solutions. They don't want to continue to see the far right extreme take over this conversation. (END VIDEO CLIP)

SANCHEZ: I want to bring in my colleague CNN's chief political correspondent and co-anchor of "STATE OF THE UNION," Dana Bash.

Dana, you got into this specific issue about where Republicans stand on this with South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham. It got a bit contentious.

And I want to play a clip for our viewers, so they can understand what I'm talking about.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: But my question is, is it a federal issue or a state...

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R-SC): The modern Democrat -- yes, it's a human rights issue. Does it really matter where you're conceived?

At 15 weeks, you have a developed heart and lungs. And to dismember a child at 15 weeks is a painful experience. It's barbaric.

BASH: Just for the record, Roe went up to viability.

But I just want to button this up. The...

(CROSSTALK)

GRAHAM: No, that's no -- no, no, quit covering for these guys.

No, no, no, you're -- media, you keep covering for these guys. They introduced legislation that allowed abortion demand with taxpayer- funded -- you paying for it, the taxpayer, up to the moment of birth. That was their position in Washington. That's the law they want to pass. And nobody in your business will talk about it.

It's barbaric.

BASH: Senator -- Senator, I'm not covering for anybody. And you know that.

GRAHAM: Yes. Yes.

BASH: And when I have Democrats on -- and I have had Democrats on -- I have asked...

GRAHAM: OK. Well, just report -- report the facts.

BASH: I have many -- all of them about their position where -- where they believe this issue should be.

My question for you, sir, is about...

GRAHAM: Well, I can tell you how they voted. BASH: My question for you, sir, is about President Trump, who you have endorsed to be president again. Is he right in saying that this issue should be a states' issue?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SANCHEZ: "Quit covering for these guys."

I admire you so much, because you were so much more gracious than I would have been in that scenario.

(LAUGHTER)

BASH: I don't believe that, Boris.

SANCHEZ: But you were asking a simple question. Is this a states' rights issue, as Republicans have laid out historically, or is this a federal issue?

And he really didn't answer the question.

BASH: No.

He is somebody who has sponsored a national ban. He did that legislative -- through a proposed legislation right before the midterm elections, but in the past has said it is a states' issue.

But I think the broader point here is, that is exhibit A of how much of a political problem this is for Republicans and how frustrated Republicans are about the fact that now that it is very much -- that abortion was something that was talked about, certainly, in an intense way on the Republican side for 50 years, but it was a hypothetical.

Now it's real. And what it is doing is, it is galvanizing the forces who tend to vote Democratic, and it is helping them in elections. It certainly helped them in 2022, even in some recent elections that are kind of local, like in Wisconsin.

SANCHEZ: Right.

BASH: He is -- his frustration was that he doesn't believe that Democrats are explaining their position in a fulsome enough way.

And, in some ways, and in some cases, he might be right. In the case of my interviews, and I know your interviews and others, when the topic is specifically about abortion, and it was in a big, big way leading up to the midterm elections, we do ask those questions. Sometimes, we don't get answers from Democrats. But that is abundantly clear when that happens to the viewers and to the voters.

SANCHEZ: You mentioned Republicans walking on perilous ground going into elections over this issue, specifically because they stake out a position that broadly is unpopular.

But, within primaries, it's a very different dynamic. So how do you think this will work out in a presidential primary versus a general election?

BASH: I think the way that we are going to see an answer to that question is with somebody like Governor Ron DeSantis. He hasn't declared yet.

Assuming he does declare that he is going to run, he's going to have to walk that line, because what he supports and what he signed into law in Florida was a ban on abortions after just six weeks of pregnancy. That is something that plays very well in the Republican base, not all of the base...

SANCHEZ: Right.

BASH: ... but in the people who he wants to get out and vote if he does, in fact, run for president.

It's a very different tactic. It's a very different dynamic, I should say, when you look at the broader electorate. So we're going to be able to see that play out if -- we would see it play out, I should say, if someone like Ron DeSantis were to run for president, get the nomination and be a general election candidate.

SANCHEZ: Ron DeSantis, who again today, even as he's traveling internationally in Tokyo, said: "I'm not a candidate yet."

BASH:

SANCHEZ: We will see if and when.

We've got to leave the conversation there. Dana Bash, always a pleasure.

BASH: Thanks, Boris.

SANCHEZ: Of course.

BASH: You too.

SANCHEZ: Jim.

SCIUTTO: The former Minnesota police officer who killed a man after she mistook her gun for a Taser is walking out of prison today. Hear what family members of the victim, Daunte Wright, are saying now.

Plus: A widow is suing Celebrity Cruises. She says the cruise line did not appropriately store her husband's body for days after he died on a ship.

[13:15:01]

Where she says they kept him -- those details coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SCIUTTO: Former Minnesota police officer Kim Potter ended her prison term early today. But the suffering, of course, has not ended for the mother of the black man she accidentally killed during a traffic stop. Daunte Wright was 20 years old when Potter mistook her gun for her Taser, shooting and killing Wright after he was pulled over for an expired tag, an air freshener as well.

A warning now: This clip from Potter's bodycam from April 2021 is jarring.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KIM POTTER, FORMER BROOKLYN CENTER, MINNESOTA, POLICE OFFICER: I will Tase you! Taser, Taser, Taser!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: To see that again, can't believe it's been two years.

Potter was convicted, you may remember, of manslaughter in December 2021. She walked out of the Minnesota Correctional Facility at 4:00 a.m. local time today.

And CNN's Adrienne Broaddus has been covering this story.

[13:20:01]

What happens now for Potter? Is she free and clear, in effect?

ADRIENNE BROADDUS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Not exactly free and clear, Jim.

Potter will be on supervised release for the remaining third of her sentence, which expires in December. And there are some conditions linked to this release. For example, she must refrain from purchasing or possessing a firearm, ammunition or any sort of dangerous weapon.

She has been approved to serve the remaining of her sentence in Wisconsin. And for those of you who may not remember, as Jim mentioned, Kim Potter is the former Brooklyn Center police officer who thought she was grabbing her Taser during a traffic stop, but, instead, she grabbed her gun, killing Daunte Wright.

He was initially pulled over for expired registration tags and something that looks like this, a car freshener. On that day, when he got pulled over, he called his mom.

And I spoke with his mom over the weekend and really over the past month or so leading up to the release of Kimberly Potter. And she told me her family has been unable to find peace. Following the trial, she suffered a stroke because of the stress, she says, and that stroke left her unable to read and her vision was blurred.

She's still undergoing rehab. Here's more of that conversation with her.

Katie Wright says: "Some say I should forgive to be at peace. But how can I? I am so angry. She," referring to Kim Potter, "is going to be able to watch her kids have kids and be able to touch them. The good," she says, "is that Kim Potter will never be able to hurt anybody as a police officer again."

And, Jim, there have been some changes in that city. For example, at the police department where Potter served -- she had 26 years of experience -- the department is now led by its first black police chief -- Jim.

SCIUTTO: Yes, remarkable to remember that detail, for an air freshener.

Adrienne Broaddus in Chicago, thanks so much -- Brianna.

KEILAR: Right now, jury selection is under way in the trial of the man accused of going on a deadly rampage at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh. Eleven people died in the 2018 massacre, and it was the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S. history.

CNN's Danny Freeman is live for us in Pittsburgh.

Danny, tell us what's been going on inside the courthouse, where you have been for much of the day.

DANNY FREEMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Brianna, so like you said, early this morning, jury selection began in this trial of the Tree of Life Synagogue massacre.

It's been going on all through the morning, and we actually just broke for recess within the past five minutes or so. And then jury selection will resume again this afternoon. And I just got to say, it's been a very emotional day already in court. We saw potential jurors in tears just weighing the possibility of having to rule on the death penalty.

And, of course, there are also members of family -- or other family members of victims of the synagogue shooting from four-and-a-half years ago who were in the courtroom today. So let's remind viewers exactly what we're talking about.

Again, four-and-a-half years ago is October 27, 2018, where prosecutors say Robert Bowers arrived at the Tree of Life Synagogue armed with multiple guns. And, remember, there are members of multiple different, three different Jewish congregations at the synagogue at the time.

And the criminal complaint says that Robert Bowers came in, started firing on the outside, and then firing indiscriminately on the inside. And part of those court documents say that Mr. Bowers said things like he wants to kill Jews while he was going on this shooting rampage.

And, also, prosecutors said that they found antisemitic postings online that have been attributed to Mr. Bowers as well. That brings us to today. Mr. Bowers, of course, is accused of killing 11 people, injuring many others. And he's facing 63 felony counts, including 22 potentially death penalty-related counts. And prosecutors in this case are seeking the death penalty. In fact, earlier today, the judge said to some of these potential jurors, you should be prepared to rule on a death -- on whether or not to give this man the death penalty if we get to that sentencing process, if he is determined guilty as well.

But I will say that Mr. Bowers, his defense attorney, one of his defense attorneys is actually a high-profile attorney who has defended other federal death penalty defendants in the past. Her name is Judy Clarke. She's defended folks like the Unabomber and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev from the Boston Marathon bombings.

They actually tried to present to course -- to court, rather, an offer of a guilty plea with life in prison, as long as they took the death penalty off the table. But, at this point, federal prosecutors are not budging on that death penalty ruling.

So, again, like I said, jurors have been told they should expect to rule on the death penalty if they continue on with this case. Jury selection is expected to pick up in the next couple hours, back when people get back from recess -- Brianna.

KEILAR: Sixty-three federal charges.

Danny, thank you for that report -- Jim.

[13:25:00]

SANCHEZ: I will pick it up, Brianna.

Ukrainian officials denying reports today that they plan to launch attacks deep inside Russia to mark the first anniversary of Vladimir Putin's invasion. We have details on that ahead.

Plus: a widow suing a cruise line after she claims that it stored her husband's deceased body in the wrong place for days. Wait until where she -- where they -- where she alleges that they were keeping it.

We'll be...

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