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Uvalde Families Demand Accountability For Failed Response; AR Garland Speaks To CNN After DOJ Probe Into Uvalde Response; Senate Passes Stopgap Bill To Avert Govt. Shutdown; E, Jean Carroll Wraps Testimony As She Seeks Damages From Trump; Police: Arrests Made In Assassination Of Ecuadorian Prosecutor. Aired 2:30-3p ET

Aired January 18, 2024 - 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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[14:33:26]

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN ANCHOR: The families of the Uvalde shooting victims are demanding accountability after the Justice Department released a scathing report into the law enforcement response to the massacre at Robb Elementary School.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: Yes. Let's go now to CNN's Evan Perez. He is on scene there in Uvalde, Texas. And Evan, you just sat down for an exclusive interview with Attorney General Merrick Garland, who was there unveiling this report. What did he say?

EVAN PEREZ, CNN SENIOR JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Brianna, Boris, you know, not a dry eye in that room as the attorney general spoke to us. You -- the family members were here for a press conference. And then we sat down with the attorney general to talk a little bit about his visit here in Uvalde and everything that he finally got to see with his own eyes.

Listen to him talk about this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PEREZ: You met with the families here in Uvalde last night. Tell us what you heard from them.

MERRICK GARLAND, ATTORNEY GENERAL: Look, of course, what I heard is enormous pain as any human being would express given what happened to their children and their loved ones. I don't want to talk about the details of what they said. You're totally free to talk to them about that.

I'll say that I began the day by going through the schoolhouse with a member of --

PEREZ: Robb Elementary?

GARLAND: Yes, with a member of the elementary -- with a member of the expert team. And I'll say it is considerably different. I had long ago read the entire report, but being there, seeing how small the two school rooms are and their attachment to each other, the holes in the wall left by the shooters, the places where the children tried to hide, it's just a different experience both in terms of understanding why tactics were wrong, but also in terms of understanding what happened.

[14:35:17]

We then went to the murals that are painted of each of the children who died, and we saw joyous figures. You know, they intentionally painted them to express the children's joy of life and enormous energy. And, you know, just think about the difference between that and what happened to them. And then after that we went and met with the families who, as I said, expressed pain, anger, and every human emotion that you would expect.

PEREZ: Does it anger you going through that school? I mean, it's not a sprawling place. And to know that there were 370 or so police officers standing outside while these children and these teachers were trapped with this shooter for so, so long, does it anger you to sort of just put yourself in that place?

GARLAND: Yes, it makes me angry that this event had to happen in the first place. The shooter could come in with a military grade weapon and kill students and teachers. And it angers me that the tactics used were the opposite of the tactics that were appropriate in an active shooter situation.

That's the reason we did this report, so that we could tell the community exactly what happened, but also so that we could prevent this kind of thing from happening again from the point of view of response by making sure that all police departments are well aware of the generally accepted tactic in this kind of situation.

PEREZ: One of the things, you know, reading this report on nearly 600 pages, you know, some of the things that stand out, you know, 45 rounds fired by this shooter while law enforcement is present. You know, families being told that their loved ones are alive when they were not.

You know, the false information that was coming from those press conferences, beginning with the one by Governor Abbott and then going through the Department of Public Safety, do you -- looking at what you see in this report, do you believe that anyone who was involved in that response still belongs serving in law enforcement right now?

GARLAND: Look, so the Justice Department doesn't have jurisdiction over these kind of personnel questions. What we can do, and what we've done in this report, is to identify minute by minute, sometimes second by second, what was happening, what the failures of leadership of law enforcement on the scene were, as well as the failures of preparation in advance.

And of the aftermath of the way things went afterwards, in terms of communications, in terms of medical assistance, and when it was provided and in terms of the misinformation thereafter. And I think it's now up to the community, the state and local officials to make the appropriate determinations.

PEREZ: This is a tiny police department here that was responding. Is it reasonable to think that departments that small, would have that kind of training, would have this kind of preparation that maybe bigger city police departments would have?

GARLAND: Yes. So, after Columbine, every police department should have had this kind of training. I would say, for myself and everybody else who's a leader in law enforcement today, 25 years later, Columbine is seared into our memories.

But, it is true that in all of these situations, a more regional response is required. There are -- there were a lot of law enforcement agencies on the scene. You said there were more than 300 responders from different agencies. And what's necessary is for them to all train together, not for the first time when the incident occurs. So that if everybody trains together and gets the equipment that the various different local agencies have, in the right place, at the right time, that's a way to protect ourselves in the future.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PEREZ: Brianna and Boris, it's clear from the attorney general today there were lives lost unnecessarily. Lives could have been saved if police had acted in a better fashion that day. One of the big questions obviously is the question of accountability. You know, his visit here has brought back the flooded -- flooding back the memories of what happened at Robb Elementary.

And so, one of the big questions is what happens with an investigation being led by the local district attorney who says that that investigation is still ongoing. That is not something the Justice Department is in charge of, and so we wait to see whether anything happens from that local investigation.

Boris and Brianna?

KEILAR: Yes, we'll see if this report has any effect on that.

Evan Perez, thank you so much for sharing that exclusive interview with us on scene there in Uvalde, Texas.

[14:40:03]

And E. Jean Carroll is off the stand after a day and a half of testimony in the damages trial against Donald Trump. So what happened in court as she says she is fighting to bring her reputation back?

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SANCHEZ: Some important news out of Capitol Hill just into CNN. The Senate has passed a stopgap funding bill that would keep the government open and avert a partial government shutdown that was set to kick in tomorrow night. The shutdown was one of two that were set up by a previous continuing resolution that was set up by Congress. The vote ultimately was 77 to 18. [14:45:03]

This now sets up a funding extension that would have a deadline on March 1st and March 8th. Of course, the House is set to take up the continuing resolution later this afternoon. They rushed this today essentially to avoid bad weather that's set to hit D.C. tomorrow.

Capitol Hill lawmakers in the House on recess next week, they wanted to avoid all that and get to recess early, and that's why they're holding that vote right now.

KEILAR: Not a lot of love for this deal with House Republicans, though.

SANCHEZ: Right.

KEILAR: So we'll see the path ahead here. In the meantime, E. Jean Carroll has finished on the stand, but her defamation damages trial against former President Trump is not over. A short time ago, an expert witness estimated 7 that it would take between $7.2 and $12.1 million to repair Carroll's reputation.

SANCHEZ: And last year, a federal civil jury found Trump sexually abused Carroll in the 1990s and then defamed her in 2022 when he said he did not rape her, did not know her, and said that she was not his type. This trial now determines how much Trump should actually pay her in damages.

CNN Chief Legal Affairs Correspondent Paula Reid has been following the case. Paula, Donald Trump not in court today. He's in Florida attending his mother-in-law's funeral. How did things proceed today? How are they proceeding so far?

PAULA REID, CNN CHIEF LEGAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: So, the highlight of the day so far has been E. Jean Carroll, of course, wrapping up her testimony, and a big focus of that was cross examination. So this is Trump's attorney asking her questions. It's something that's really significant in the course of a proceeding where you're talking about sexual abuse, right?

That was the core of the trial back in the spring. Now they're just talking about damages. But everything that she has said on the stand, no matter how difficult that has been for her, is now subject to cross examination by a defense attorney. So it's not always a very pleasant experience for the witness.

And the Trump defense is largely that while she is arguing she is owed damages because of what happened to her career and her reputation after he attacked her publicly, they're arguing that no, in fact, your career prospered. So, Alina Habba, Trump's attorney, asked her questions about how much money she was making at the height of her career. We learned she made about $400,000 in one year at her peak in the 1990s. A significant amount of money.

But they argue that by 2018, her career had dwindled. She was making about $60,000 through her work at Elle Magazine. And then in 2019, Habba points out that's when E. Jean Carroll decided to publish a book and talk about her allegations against Trump. So they're trying to insinuate, right, that she made these allegations to revive her career.

She also testified that she now makes about $100,000 from Substack, so her newsletter. And she also has a much larger social media following, but E. Jean Carroll also testified that even though she has a bigger profile, she would gladly return to the reputation that she had before he attacked her.

Now, going forward, we do expect here for some additional witnesses right now. They were hearing from a professor, an expert who testified at the trial in the spring about how much she should be owed in damages. They also expect to hear from Robbie Myers, Carroll's former boss, but the judge hasn't ruled on whether they will hear from other Trump accusers. So that's still an open question.

Now I also want to note, Carroll's lawyers also had a chance to do redirect and they brought up a clip of Trump's press availability. I won't call it a press conference because I was there and he didn't take any questions last night. And that's significant because one of the themes of the case is they're arguing that not only did he defame her in 2019 and then again in 2023, but he continues to do so as recently as yesterday.

So they played a portion of that statement, and clearly the goal of that statement was to attack the judge and cherry pick things that E. Jean Carroll had said to paint a very unflattering portrait of her.

SANCHEZ: And Paula, quickly, there's also another infamous tape that the plaintiffs may play in court.

REID: That's right. The Access Hollywood tape which was played in the trial back in the spring, but that could come up again. The judge may allow it just to show the jury, you know, how Trump views women and they use it to be relevant in this case. We'll see if they bring that back into the case this time on damages.

SANCHEZ: Paula Reid, thanks for keeping an eye on it for us. Appreciate it.

Still to come on CNN NEWS CENTRAL, another sign of just how dire the situation in Ecuador has become. The assassination of a prosecutor who was investigating a high profile attack in that country. We've got details after a quick break.

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[14:53:45]

KEILAR: Just a shocking wave of violence is taking over Ecuador. Today, Ecuadorian police announcing the arrests of two people in connection with the assassination of Cesar Suarez, a prosecutor in the city of Guayaquil, which is one of Ecuador's most dangerous cities. This prosecutor had been investigating the armed takeover of a local TV news station during a live broadcast. Some dramatic scenes that you may have seen previously here.

A state of emergency was declared by Ecuador's president following the prison escape of a notorious gang leader, which triggered a series of explosions, police kidnappings and even murders. CNN Senior National Correspondent David Culver is joining us now live from Guayaquil, Ecuador.

So David, we're just now learning details about a prison search. How is all of this connected?

DAVID CULVER, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Brianna, this is just coming in, and it happened just a short time ago. We know that the Armed Forces here in collaboration with the National Police went into one of the major prison complexes right here in Guayaquil, and they conducted what they're saying was, according to one source, a scheduled search, but they're essentially looking for prohibited items and trying to maintain control.

Now, the reason this is significant, especially when you look at that prison complex in particular, is a notorious gang leader known as Fito, is believed to have escaped from that complex a little more than a week ago. And that's what kicked off this whole unrest in this most recent state of emergency that's been declared.

[14:55:14]

Now, the reason I say believed to have escaped, Brianna, is because according to one top commander, they're not quite sure if he is still in there or if he's out of there, which makes it really clear that this is not under control. You know, this is a very dysfunctional system when it comes to how the prisons are run -- many of them are run by the gangs themselves that are in there, and we're talking about a capacity of five or so 1,000, but they're nearly 9,000 to 10,000.

So that's why what happened today just a short time ago is significant. Also we're wondering -- and we've asked the question, is it connected to that prosecutor's assassination yesterday? As of now, they're not drawing a link between the two. But it brings you into really the understanding of what this country is going through and President Noboa speaking to Christiane Amanpour earlier this week saying that this country needs the U.S.'s help.

And President Noboa is asking the U.S. for resources as far as gear for the military, intelligence to help in combating these terror groups. Of course, the U.S. has already spread very thin in the Middle East and in Ukraine, so that's going to be a drain.

But he says if this doesn't happen, Brianna, you're talking about a destabilized Ecuador, people here then would want to flee. Where would they go, Brianna? The U.S.

KEILAR: Yes, I can certainly see that.

David, thank you so much for that report from Ecuador.

Families in Uvalde demanded answers and today they are getting them. The DOJ releasing its report on the shooting that killed 19 children and two teachers. A damning report that cites the failure of law enforcement and names who should bear the blame. We'll have that next.

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