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Prosecutors: Man Went To Obama's D.C. Neighborhood After Trump Posted What He Claimed Was The Address; Biden Holds Oval Office Meeting With Swedish PM; WH Addresses Lab Tests Confirming Cocaine In West Wing. Aired 2:30-3p ET

Aired July 05, 2023 - 14:30   ET

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

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[14:31:10]

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN HOST: We have new details just did a CNN about a man arrested last week with weapons in the neighborhood of former President Barack Obama here in Washington D.C. Federal prosecutors say the suspect began live streaming in that area shortly after he reshared a social media post from the former President Donald Trump in which Trump posted what he claimed was Obama's address. CNN's Katelyn Polantz joins me now. Katelyn, so did the former president share something close to the Obama's address?

KATELYN POLANTZ, CNN SENIOR CRIME AND JUSTICE REPORTER: He reportedly shared an address that put this man inside the perimeter where the Secret Service was protecting in a neighborhood in Washington D.C. where the Obamas currently live.

SCIUTTO: So within a few blocks in other words?

POLANTZ: It appears to be in the neighborhood itself, according to the court documents. But what's so concerning about this is that that wasn't when this guy got on the radar of investigators or federal protection, the FBI, they had been monitoring him because he participated in January 6th allegedly. There are videos of him he was posting on YouTube about being an insurrectionists and then had a series of live streams in the month of June, where he's talking about January 6th, his participation, as well as saying threatening things like he wanted to blow up his car outside of a federal building the day before he goes to this neighborhood in Washington, D.C.

There was also another incident where he was live streaming himself talking about January 6th, inside of an elementary school in Maryland. And so all of this comes together and on a live stream. The feds watch him walk through the neighborhood. He's streaming. He's saying he has them surrounded presumably the Obamas. And then he takes off on foot, they finally arrest him in a wooded area very nearby.

SCIUTTO: OK. Hold that thought for a moment because I know you have new reporting as well on the indictment against former President Trump and that there might be a more detailed or less I should say, redacted version of that diamond coming out. POLANTZ: Yes, so we're waiting to see if there are more details about what we can learn about the investigation that led to this indictment. So back whenever the FBI did that search at Mar-a-Lago last year, they had to submit a pretty detailed affidavit in court saying this is why we believe we will find evidence inside Mar-a-Lago. After that search, we got a version of that court document that had a lot of redactions in it. But now that Trump has been indicted, CNN other media outlets went back to court and says, can you give us another version with fewer redactions now that we see the indictment. And so a judge has told the Justice Department, we are going to get to see another version of that paper.

SCIUTTO: OK. We'll learn more there. I do want to go back and bring in CNN national security analyst and former Assistant Secretary at the Department of Homeland Security, Juliette Kayyem on the question here of a former president sharing what turned out not to be the exact address of the Obamas here in Washington, but at least in the neighborhood, put this suspect in the in the neighborhood there. And the suspect considered enough of a threat that he was taken in by Secret Service protecting the former president. Is that a dangerous thing for a former president to do to share with his followers that information?

JULIETTE KAYYEM, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: When I heard this story, I was thinking about, you know, the moments after President Biden became president, he denied Donald Trump access to present national security briefings and now I think it was prescient. Forget at Mar-a-Lago and the classified information he took. Donald Trump, as I've been saying, for many years knows exactly what he is doing. He puts out what's allegedly an address or something close as Katelyn's describing is in the neighborhood that's close enough for me, and it will certainly will be close enough for the Secret Service.

[14:35:00]

He is not doing that for, you know, neighborly brotherhood. He is doing that because his followers will do something with it most will ignore it. Most Trump supporters do not support violence, but he knows that there's some group of them that will do something. And Trump can claim plausible deniability. He can claim, I was just putting this out there. Why is everyone taking everything so seriously. But we -- the -- that's -- we got seven years of evidence of him doing this. And yet he did it again against a former president, and not surprising that the person who took the bait is someone who also followed him on January 6th.

SCIUTTO: So let me ask you a bigger picture. So folks at home and you can understand the seriousness of this. There is a deep problem with right wing extremism in this country. In fact, the FBI not just under this administration, but the previous one has identified right wing extremism as the greatest domestic terror threat, outpacing even international terrorist groups. So you have a former president, sharing information that someone in one of those might groups might then use. If you were looking at this from your former perch of the Department of Homeland Security, would you consider that person in this case, the former president as aiding and abetting a threat by doing that?

KAYYEM: Any of that it would be hard, because I think Trump could say, you know, could say I wasn't directing them towards something. But what you could look to for Trump is a sense of sort of assisting this environment and the solution may not be a legal prosecution. That's different than say, January 6th, where there might be evidence of sort of a direct involvement with the violence in this case, what it takes from a sort of, you know, counterterrorism perspective, because I view this in that lens that you have someone who is inciting violence against Democratic institutions and against our democracy.

You do the things that are being done, these prosecutions are significant, even against the guys who were at January 6th, the low level guys, you put people in jail because it makes it harder for there to be recruitment, and fundraising, but also the thing that's not happening enough. And I've can't say it enough, which is there has to be a certain amount of shaming of what Trump is doing by his people. And that's what you don't see right now from the Republican Party. You see some of it, and it's important, that will go very far to say, as we've seen another instances where a party basically abandons a president, that this is not a sustainable, this is not reflective of who we are. And unfortunately, we're not seeing that enough.

SCIUTTO: Right. And what establishing here the degree of the former president's help here, as it were, no one seems to debate -- to be debating the degree to which the former president is discouraging this kind of anger and in this case, sharing information that someone with that kind of anger might use. Juliette Kayyem, I know we're going to continue this conversation. Sadly, it's good to have you on.

KAYYEM: Yes.

SCIUTTO: I do want to go now to the White House just moments ago, President Biden speaking with the Swedish Prime Minister, this, of course, an important meeting between the two leaders discussing the war in Ukraine, but also Sweden's possible accession to the NATO military alliance, something that this President and the U.S. administration supports. Have a look.

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Well, Mr. Prime Minister, it's great to see you. You're a valued, valued friend, and it's an honor to welcome you to the White House.

And Sweden is a capable and committed partner. Together, we're preparing our relationship for even further, including advancing the bilateral partnership agreement we're talking about.

But we're also prepared for the NATO Summit next week. And I want to reiterate, the United States fully, fully, fully supports Sweden's membership in NATO.

And the bottom line is simple, Sweden is going to make our Alliance stronger and has the same value set that we have in NATO. And I'm really looking, anxiously looking forward for your membership. And I know with that bilateral relationship, Sweden and the United States are taking on the challenges that matter most to our people, from taking on the climate crisis to preserving a free and open Indo- Pacific. So, across the board, we seem to be in agreement on almost everything.

And we're stepping up to protect our shared democratic values, including providing security and humanitarian assistance to the people of Ukraine. The generosity of the Swedish people has been extreme. You've done a great, great deal as the brave people of Ukraine defend themselves against Russia's brutality.

[14:40:15]

And together, our countries and companies are working in lockstep on emerging technology, including, I to want to thank you, Mr. Prime Minister, for your work to build a safe 5G and 5C network, 6G networks. And I want to thank you again for being here. We got a lot to cover. And I yield to you, Mr. Prime Minister.

ULF KRISTERSSON, PRIME MINISTER OF SWEDEN: Thank you so much, Mr. President. Thank you so much. I really do appreciate to be here. Thanks for the kind invitation to come here. It is highly valued for us.

I believe that Sweden and the U.S., we share so many values and priorities since long, but not least right now. That goes for how to handle the war in Ukraine.

I thank you for your leadership, the transatlantic unity that you have made so much to establish. That goes also to how to tackle the climate crisis, mitigating climate change. That goes for handling the transatlantic way, the challenges that China creates for democracies.

And I also would like to say that we highly appreciate your strong support for Sweden's NATO accession. That means a lot to us. We do seek common protection, but we also do think that we have things to contribute with to be a security provider for the whole of NATO.

BIDEN: That's clear.

KRISTERSSON: So I very much look forward to our talks here today. Thank you so much.

BIDEN: Well, I'm looking forward to this getting finished because you're an extremely valuable and capable partner.

KRISTERSSON: Thank you so much.

BIDEN: Thank you.

KRISTERSSON: Thank you.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. President, do you know how cocaine got into the White House?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Are you working on a prisoner swap, Mr. President? Are you working on a prisoner swap, sir?

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, how important is it for the U.S. and NATO to have Sweden as new members in the defense Alliance?

BIDEN: Very important.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Very important? And how confident are you that this is going to be a reality soon?

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much.

SCIUTTO: We've been watching there a tape from just moments ago in the White House President Biden meeting there with the Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson. Key at this point, because the U.S. supports Sweden's accession to the NATO military alliance. Turkey has still not made clear if and when it will remove its opposition or at least a slow rolling of Sweden secession. Hungary and other holdout has recently said that it will no longer stand in the way all this, Brianna, of course, in reaction to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the NATO alliance expanding already by one member of Finland, possibility of Sweden joining us.

Well, standby in fact, we're going to go back to the White House because they are discussing another story we've been fighting this morning, the discovery of cocaine in a visitor's area of the White House, let's have a listen.

KARINE JEAN-PIERRE, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: The President and the First Lady and their family were not here this weekend, as you all reported on this. And as you also know that they left on Friday, and returned just yesterday. Where this was discovered is a heavily traveled area where many White House West Wing I should be even more specific, West Wing visitors come through this particular area. I just don't have anything more to share. And it is under investigation by the Secret Service. This is in their purview.

And so we're going to go into allow certainly the investigation to continue. And we have confident that the Secret Service will get to the bottom of this. Go ahead.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The President says, hey, let's get to the bottom of what happened here.

JEAN-PIERRE: Well, I just said that we have confidence that the Secret Service is going to get to the bottom of this. As you all know, the president follows all the reporting here. And he certainly was briefed by his staff on everything that we know so far. But the Secret Service is investigating this, is investigating what happened over the weekend, and we have confidence that they will get to the bottom of this.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is there still a chance that Sweden will be approved by into NATO by the time in next week's summit?

JEAN-PIERRE: So this is something that the President as you know, the Swedish Prime Minister is here. They're currently meeting as we speak right now in the Oval Office as some of your colleagues may be yourself, Steve, was able to be in the Oval Office. So look I mean we've been very clear on this, we've encouraged Turkey and Hungary to approve Sweden's application for NATO membership as soon as possible.

[14:45:10]

And Sweden and I said this last week, I've said this many times as fulfill the commitments they made under the trilateral Memorandum of Agreement. They had agreed to win -- to two with Finland and Turkey on the margins of the NATO summit in Madrid, just last year, about a year ago. Sweden is a strong, capable defense partner that shares NATO's values and will strengthen the alliance and contribute to European security.

And so we believe that this should occur that their partnership into -- them to be committed members in NATO as soon as possible. And that's what you'll continue to hear from the President. I think, the Sweden Prime Minister being here today, having a meeting with the President certainly shows that commitment.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thanks, Karine. Just two quick follow ups, you said the President has been briefed on the cocaine that was found at the White House, is the White House conducting its own internal investigation?

JEAN-PIERRE: This is something that's under the purview of the Secret Service. They're the ones who handle this investigation. So it lives in their purview, in their world.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And then just a quick follow up on that this type of tour, can you explain to the American people who would have access to the West Wing on this type of tour and what kind of protocols are in place?

JEAN-PIERRE: So when it comes to security protocol, that's something that the Secret Service certainly is going to handle. And so that is a question for them. When it comes to visitors to the West Wing, they come for many reasons. Obviously, we do have West Wing tours that occur here on campus. They happen in this particular past a couple of days, they happen on Friday, they happen on Saturday, and Sunday, the times that they do not happen is when there's a federal holiday like yesterday, there was not a West Wing tour. And also when there's a White -- a large White House event.

So I don't have anything more to share on the particulars. Again, when it comes to security, when it comes to anything of those types of protocols, that is something that Secret Service handles.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thanks Karine.

JEAN-PIERRE: And congratulations.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thank you.

JEAN-PIERRE: Should I can you --

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I appreciate it. Sure.

JEAN-PIERRE: I was waiting. I was like, OK, that went over the head or gotten this.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's not my turn, I'm sorry.

JEAN-PIERRE: One President at a time. Incoming president, maybe.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I wonder if the cocaine episode has prompted the White House to ask the Secret Service to review its security protocol.

JEAN-PIERRE: I mean, so let them do their investigation. Again, this is under their purview. Let's see exactly what occurred and what happened. They're going to get to the bottom of this. They meaning the Secret Service, not going to get ahead of any changes in protocol or anything like that. Let's let the Secret Service do their job, which we believe and have all the confidence that they will get to the bottom of this.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Episode kind of shines a light on the fact that you can bring in illegal substances into the White House. So what's preventing a visitor from bringing in anthrax or something that's not magnetic into the White House?

JEAN-PIERRE: No, look, I totally understand the question, but it is under investigation. We're going to get to the bottom as to exactly what happened the Secret Service, will, not us. And so we're going to let the Secret Service do their job. We're just not going to get ahead of if or our whens or changes, we just have to let the Secret Service do their job, which they are. You're welcome.

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Thanks Karine, can you just tell us how the White House is assisting the Secret Service with this investigation? Have you made any White House officials available for interviews with law enforcement for example?

JEAN-PIERRE: Look, we're not assisting in anything. This is under the Secret Service purview. This is their kind of guidance and guideline, their world. And so we're going to let them do their job. We are not involved in this. This is something that the Secret Service handles under their protocol. And they're going to investigate and get to the bottom of what happened this weekend. And we appreciate that.

DIAMOND: And you noted that this is an area where visitors on tour groups often pass by so is that the working theory right now that it was likely a visitor? And are you confident that this was not a White House staff?

JEAN-PIERRE: There is investigation. They're going to get to the bottom of this. What I wanted to be very clear is that this is a heavily, heavily trafficked -- heavily traveled, to be more accurate, area of the campus of the White House. And it is where visitors from to the West Wing come through. This is the part where they come through when it comes to coming to the West Wing. I just don't have anything else. I'm not going to speculate on who it was. But just wanted to make that very clear and give you all a little bit more information. I believe the Secret Service is also sharing this as well.

DIAMOND: Thanks. And then on another topic, among the 12 Palestinians were killed in the Jenin operation carried out by Israel for were under the age of 18. Israel says that all the Palestinians who were killed were combatants with the White House having assessments of whether they were indeed all combatants or whether any civilians were killed.

[14:50:04]

JEAN-PIERRE: So here's what I'll say, you know, we, as you all know and we've said this many times we support certainly Israel's security, and right to defend its people against Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and other terrorist groups. It is imperative to take all possible steps to protect civilians from harm, and measures need to be taken to improve the humanitarian situation on the ground.

And we store critical services like electricity and water to the civilian population. And so don't have anything more to share beyond that, but certainly, we are -- certainly we are monitoring things very closely.

DIAMOND: Can you tell us about the level of engagement by U.S. officials to try and prevent a broader escalation. I mean, we've already seen rockets fired from Gaza. We've seen this attack that was carried out in Tel Aviv. What's the White House doing to prevent this from escalating?

JEAN-PIERRE: So, you know, Israel's a close ally and partner and we are in touch with the national security and certainly the defense officials. So don't have anything to read out on our conversation, but we are in regular contact. Let me go to --

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thanks Karine. I wanted to ask about this --

SCIUTTO: We're listening to a White House press briefing. They're addressing a number of topics, one including ongoing White House support for Sweden's accession to NATO. The President meeting with the Swedish Prime Minister, press there as well, about the number of children killed by the Israeli operation in Jenin in the West Bank in recent days. Finally, as well, Brianna, an update there on the investigation of the cocaine found on the White House, the Press Secretary saying that was found in a heavily traveled area, but they are leaving any discussion of increased security measures, et cetera to the Secret Service.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Yes. We'll have to wait and see what they find Jim. In the meantime, some really alarming findings in the search for answers surrounding a medical mystery in professional sports, scientists in Australia have diagnosed the world's first case of CTE in a professional female athlete. An autopsy on former Australian Football League player Heather Anderson found low stage signs of the degenerative brain disease, CTE. Anderson was just five years old when she started playing football. She went on to play contact sports for nearly two decades. And now these are findings that could help shed some light on one of the most underreported and largely undetected injuries in athletes.

Joining us now is Chris Nowinski. He's the CEO of the Concussion Legacy Foundation. He's also the co-founder of the Australian sports, Brain Bank, where this case was diagnosed. Chris, so tragic here too, because she passed away just last year, dying by suicide, which has been the case we've seen with some of the victims of CTE. And ultimately, this is something that is diagnosed posthumously. Can you tell us about what the Brain Bank found in the case of Heather Anderson and why these findings are so significant?

CHRIS NOWINSKI, CEO, CONCUSSION LEGACY FOUNDATION: Yes. Heather Anderson, the story is very tragic. But she'll leave remarkable legacy of opening up our eyes to what is also happening in women's sports. The Brain Bank team led by Dr. Michael Buckland identified multiple lesions throughout her brain that are CTE basically an abnormal form of tau protein in the brain.

And I hope this serves as a rallying cry, and a call to action for women's sports. They haven't really been part of the conversation about what we should do about this disease, because we haven't had somebody to talk about and somebody to focus on. And so hopefully, we can take this moment and start a conversation to start acknowledging that we've known for decades that men sports caused CTE. But now we know that some women's sports will cause CTE as well.

KEILAR: So she had at one point had a confirmed concussion, possibly several other concussions that were unconfirmed. And let's be clear, Aussie rules football is a very, very tough sport, perhaps no surprise with how much contact she had there. What I think is misunderstood, though, is that it doesn't necessarily take a concussion to cause damage. Can you explain that just this sort of repetitive, maybe sub concussion level impacts that can cause damage that leads to this?

NOWINSKI: That's a great question. So while this is the first case and the female athlete, our team at Boston University just published a study of 631 deceased American football players, and the most important finding that people need to recognize is that there was no correlation between whether or not they had CTE and the number of concussions they had. But there was an extraordinary correlation between the number of times we think they were hitting head and the strength of those impacts based on the positions they played.

And so I think we sort of, we no longer need to think about CTE as being caused by concussions, they contribute but they might contribute only in a very small way it's simply a sort of a math question sort of like smoking and lung cancer. It's how many cigarettes you smoke, and how much you know, cancer causing chemicals were in there. And that's your odds of developing a disease later on in life.

[14:55:19] KEILAR: Are we as a society taking this seriously enough? Are sports leagues taking this seriously enough? And I'm talking amateur professional, and also youth leagues.

NOWINSKI: Not at all. Unfortunately, many sports are still in denial that their sport causes CTE. And so while 20 years ago, we had to fight over recognizing concussions and now every sport has a concussion protocol. Right now, we're still fighting and trying to get sports to recognize their sport causes CTE, and then put in what we would suggest is a CTE prevention protocol.

We published the first one last month, preventing concussions or a concussion protocol will do nothing to prevent CTE, we need to limit the number of hits to the head, the strengths of hits to the head, both in games and in practices. And we need to start kids later getting hit in the head and getting exposed to potentially getting CTE. And most sports don't want to have this conversation. American football is still letting kids play tackle at age five, when we know that those hits in some of them, if they go on long enough will eventually cause CTE.

And even I was at a conference with all the American soccer organizations in May. And, you know, soccer is probably the number one sport in America, we have to worry about CTE for women, and they still don't recognize that their sport and all those thousands of headers, a soccer pro taking their life could cause CTE. So we have a lot of work to do if we don't want to continue to identify CTE in the brains of athletes, especially women.

KEILAR: Chris, it's so important for men and for women, for all athletes, for children, for grownups. And we really appreciate you sounding the alarm and talking with us about this today. Chris Nowinski, thanks.

NOWINSKI: Thank you.

KEILAR: Boris?

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: We're continuing to follow a developing story. The Defense Department says the U.S. Navy intervened to stop Iranian Navy ships from seizing two oil tankers in separate incidents in the Gulf of Oman. New details when we come back.

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