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New Report on Trump's First Assassination Attempt; Evacuations Underway in Florida; Chemical Leak in Ohio; Harris Speaks in Pittsburgh; Trump Speaks in North Carolina. Aired 9-9:30a ET

Aired September 25, 2024 - 09:00   ET

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

[09:00:00]

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: Spike strip to slow the bus down. It did eventually come to a stop. The suspect was arrested. And the driver then climbed from the window of the bus. A victim was found inside the bus with gunshot wounds. He was taken to the hospital where he later died. What a crazy ride there in Los Angeles.

All right, the Kentucky sheriff accused of killing a district court judge is scheduled to make his first court appearance this morning. That is happening 100 miles away because the courthouse where it normally would have been held is actually a crime scene. Forty-three- year-old Shawn Stines is expected to be arraigned, is accused of shooting Judge Kevin Mullins after an argument.

And a game-ending triple play sends the San Diego Padres to the playoffs. Manny Machado grabs the grounder, steps on third, fires it off to Jake Cronenworth at second for the out, who then turned it around to the first for the out, making the triple play there. The Padres stunned the Dodgers, boo, 4-2. Inside the Padres' clubhouse, the Padres let loose, celebrating the big play and even bigger outcome, a trip to the post-season. That's what we do here every morning when we finish our show.

A new hour of CNN NEWS CENTRAL starts right now.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, the new details in the new report on the first assassination attempt on Donald Trump. The chair of the Senate committee behind it just called it astonishing.

Happening now, evacuations ordered, school canceled, after a chemical leak from a rail car in Ohio.

And bracing for a major hurricane. Some Floridians told to get out. Landfall could come tomorrow.

I'm John Berman, with Kate Bolduan and Sara Sidner. This is CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Appalled and astonished. That is how one Democratic senator says Americans are going to react when they learned the details of the depth of security failures that led to the assassination attempt against Donald Trump back in July. It's a report authored by a bipartisan group of senators. It's an interim report. But it is already revealing, spelling out a breakdown in communication before and during the Trump rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. It also says that there was no sole decisionmaker, non-existent leadership when it came to the Secret Service. And also saying it was unclear who was responsible for what.

So, the Senate committee says that the issues that they have pointed out and found that they remain unaddressed by the Secret Service. The Secret Service is reacting to all of this, this morning and Donald Trump, just as a point of - a point of like how quickly this changes, he's planning to return to Butler just ten days from now for another rally.

CNN's Zach Cohen has the details for us. He's joining us right now.

Zach, what did senators lay out in this report?

ZACHARY COHEN, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY REPORTER: Yes, Kate, lawmakers say that this report details what they're calling a, quote, perfect storm of security failures that can largely be attributed to incompetence on the part of the U.S. Secret Service. And as you mentioned, one of the specific takeaways from senators who were investigating the security failures around Trump's Butler rally was the fact that of all the Secret Service witnesses that they interviewed, not a single one could tell them who was ultimately in charge that day, despite the fact that the Secret Service is the agency responsible for overseeing the security for Donald Trump's rallies.

Now, take a listen to what Senator Gary Peters said, he's the chairman of the committee that put together this report, what he said when they asked Secret Service officials about who was in charge that day.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. GARY PETERS (D-MI): That should be a very clear answer. And the problem is, there is no answer. That was astonishing to us, is the fact that we could not find one point of contact who said, this is the person in charge of making sure the plan was adequate and making sure there was supervision, that it was being implemented properly. So, we found a lot of finger-pointing, saying, well, it was a collaborative plan. Many people worked on it but no one individual.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COHEN: So, Senator Richard Blumenthal, who's also on this committee, also a Democrat, said that the answer has amounted to basically an Abbott and Costello bit of who's on first, right? Everybody that was involved in the security planning thought somebody else was taking care of things, like securing that building, that the shooter ultimately climbed up on the roof of and had a clear line of sight to fire those multiple rounds at Donald Trump. Things like there was no plan to secure that building that was put in place. And a lot of finger-pointing, as the senator said, in this report. Testimony from Secret Service agents pointing the finger at local officers. Local officers pointing the finger at Secret Service agents. So, a variety of shortcomings and failures here that the lawmakers are attributing directly to the Secret Service and saying have to be fixed and fixed in the short term.

BOLDUAN: Zach, what do lawmakers want to hear from the Secret Service? Now, obviously, they want it to be fixed, but what do they want to hear?

COHEN: A lot of them say that they want a complete overhaul of the Secret Service and how it protects people like Donald Trump and others who have an active threat against them, right?

[09:05:07]

And to stop being so reactive, but more proactive in terms of adjusting their protection based on the threat environment. That remains to be seen. The Secret Service is saying that they've already made some changes to the way that they protect Donald Trump based on those threats. But, ultimately, lawmakers say that more has to be done and done before the election because Donald Trump still faces threats from a numerous - numerous sources, both foreign and domestic.

BOLDUAN: And, Zach, this is an interim report. What does that mean really in terms of what more we're going to find?

COHEN: Yes, it means the Secret Service still is going to have to answer more questions from this Senate panel. And not just them, but there's also the House taskforce that's investigating both assassination attempts against Donald Trump.

So, acting director Ronald Rowe, again, he came out publicly last week and accepted responsibility for the failures and outlined some of the communication problems that happened that day. But, ultimately, he's going to have to show that he is making concrete changes to how this protection is handled going forward.

BOLDUAN: Zach Cohen, thanks for the reporting, as always, Zach.

Sara.

SIDNER: All right, joining us now is CNN's senior law enforcement analyst and former deputy director of the FBI, Andrew McCabe.

Foreseeable and preventable security failures. You're hearing this both - it's bipartisan, Democrats and Republicans alike, really concerned. What's your take on what you're hearing on this report?

ANDREW MCCABE, CNN SENIOR LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Yes, Sara, that conclusion is absolutely crushing. And then when you get into the details, as Zach has gone over for us, it just confirms why they see it that way. You know, every law enforcement operation comes down to two essential factors, leadership and communication. Everything we do in law enforcement in this day and age is a - it's a team sport. You have multiple agencies with different jurisdictions and different legal authorities. And if you're going to do a good job, you got to bring them all together and have them work together effectively. You cannot do that without absolutely laser clear leadership and the ability to communicate across those different agencies.

They didn't have either of those things here. And when that - when that stone is in place, failure is sure to be built. There is no way to avoid it. Everything else that comes - that's cited by this report can be attributed in some way back to those two kind of original sins.

You know, I was particularly struck by the most bold and glaring example of it is when they were talking to the counter sniper teams about their inability to communicate with their local colleagues because they never retrieved the radios they needed to do that. They said they could see the law enforcement officers, the local police, responding to an incident, running with their guns drawn. And they said, we didn't know what was happening, but it seemed pretty serious.

Yes, it was very serious. And the fact that they didn't know is just - you know, I - its inexplicable. There's no - there's no way beyond that.

SIDNER: I do want to ask you, when you hear this, I mean, is this a problem that's emblematic now that they're seeing this - this huge mistake, if you will, made, or mismanagement, if you will. Does this kind of tell you that this has been an ongoing problem that perhaps we hadn't seen until this moment where the president was almost killed?

MCCABE: It's certainly possible. You know, I don't want to convict the service based on things that, you know, we don't know happened. So, you've got to be sensitive about this.

But it's hard to imagine an environment in which this number of very serious flaws are allowed to take place in a - in a significant operation. That is - that can never be attributed just to a failure to resource them.

They have struggled with resources for years. They definitely need more resources and support from Congress. But it's almost impossible for me to imagine how you address these systemic failures without really rethinking the structure that the - that the service is operating under in terms of their leadership, their personnel, and more importantly maybe the way they do their business. Their methodologies for allocating resources to targets to people who are under their protection. I mean that's got to be done by the threat they focused, not by their title or their current activity in day-to- day life.

In this case the most - maybe one of the most significant threats President Trump faced on that day was the intelligence that the Iranians were out to kill him, and that was never even communicated to the people responsible for this event. So, they - they weren't capable of getting the right resources in place because they didn't - they didn't even know the threat. It's just - there needs to be a complete rethinking of how the Secret Service is doing their business.

[09:10:05]

BOLDUAN: Wow, that - coming from you that is a really big statement there. Andrew McCabe, thank you so much for walking us through all of that.

John.

BERMAN: All right, happening now, evacuations underway in Florida as they brace for what could be the most intense hurricane of the season, expected to make landfall tomorrow.

Evacuations in Ohio after a toxic and flammable chemical leaked from a train.

And Sean Combs facing a new lawsuit. This one from a woman who says Combs and his bodyguard drugged and assaulted her.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:15:14]

SIDNER: Happening now, preparations underway across Florida's Gulf Coast as residents brace for a major hurricane. This hour, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis expected to give an update on what is Tropical Storm Helene, although that is quickly changing. We will bring that to you live.

New video from Cancun shows conditions there worsening as the hurricane approaches.

CNN meteorologist Allison Chinchar is tracking the storm for us.

What are the main threats at this point? It is usually the wind, yes, but more so the rain that causes the big problem.

ALLISON CHINCHAR, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Yes. And one of the other components here is the sheer size of this storm, meaning it's going to impact a lot more people than saying some of the smaller storms that we've encountered so far this year.

So it is Tropical Storm Helene right now, but it is barely a tropical storm. Five mile per hour stronger winds, it would be a hurricane. And we anticipate it becomes a hurricane at some point today. Those sustained winds right now at 70 miles per hour. We have not one but two hurricane hunter planes kind of intercepting this particular storm right now, trying to gather up some more data. And that will help us determine exactly what it's going to do as it continues its trek into the Gulf of Mexico. The water is very warm there. That is fuel for these types of storms. So, we not only anticipate that it gets to a hurricane today, but a major hurricane by the time we get to Thursday. And it's expected to make landfall late Thursday into the big bend region of Florida, before finally spreading inland.

However, it's going to pick up speed. At the time it makes landfall, the landfall speed should be right around, say, 25 miles per hour, which, for a tropical system, is incredibly fast, especially in the Gulf of Mexico. That means it could make it pretty far inland before you really start to see it weaken. Areas of south and even central Georgia still likely to see hurricane force winds. Areas of north Georgia and even into Tennessee could see tropical storm force wind gusts in some of those areas.

Now, storm surge is going to be one of the bigger short-term concerns. You have some level of storm surge in effect basically up and down the entire west coast of the Florida peninsula. The highest, obviously, going to be right here through the big bend region where we're talking ten to 15 feet of storm surge.

We talked about, because it's moving so fast, once it makes landfall, a lot of that will spread inland. And that includes a lot of these wind gusts. You're going to see a lot of these places well away from the water that are dealing with wind gusts of 60, 70, even 80 miles per hour.

Rain is also going to be a factor. We have a cold front, but we also have Helene. And the combination between the two means an excessive amount of rain across much of this region of the southeast, the southern Appalachians, even the Tennessee Valley, widespread. A lot of these areas are looking at four to six inches. But there will be some spots that could pick up eight, ten, if not even as much as a foot of rain over the next several days.

SIDNER: Wow. And I just feel so bad seeing that Fort Myers, Fort Myers Beach in the potential path. And they're still cleaning up from Hurricane Ian.

Thank you so much for giving us a look at what could happen shortly. Allison Chinchar, thanks to you.

John.

BERMAN: All right, happening now, hundreds evacuated, schools closed, after a chemical leak from a rail car in Ohio.

Let's get the latest from CNN's Brynn Gingras.

I know they're trying to work on this as quickly as they can, Brynn. What's the latest you're hearing?

BRYNN GINGRAS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, John, I just checked in and they are still having those evacuation orders in place. Basically what emergency management officials there on the scene in Hamilton County, which is in a town - there's a town in there that's, you know, not far from Cincinnati, they're waiting for those water quality testings, air quality testing results to come in and determine if they then can lift those evacuation orders, get people back into their homes, open schools, though those schools will not be open today that were affected in this area.

So there's a little bit of a waiting period right now. We do expect an update from officials early this afternoon. So, we'll be looking for that.

But let me give you an update on exactly what happened here. You can see that video is extremely alarming. It was about 1:00 to 2:00 yesterday afternoon in this town. There was a rail car that was really shooting that gas up into the air. It is styrene. It's a gas that is used - or a chemical, rather, that is used to make plastics, to make rubber. It's colorless. It's odorless. But very toxic. It can cause nausea. It can cause headaches, respiratory issue, some long-term illnesses if possible. Right now there are no reports, according to officials, of people being affected just yet. But, of course, this just happened. So, everything is still sort of coming in at this moment.

But 200 homes were evacuated a half a mile radius of that leak. Officials, of course, there on the scene trying to take care of it. No more leak is happening, and there's no more risk of it actually causing an explosion at this point. But certainly an investigation is underway to figure out exactly what happened while those evacuation orders, again, are in place. And it's not really clear when those are going to be lifted. It could take quite a while.

[09:20:01]

BERMAN: Yes, you want to be sure that what you're breathing and drinking is safe.

GINGRAS: Yes.

BERMAN: Brynn Gingras, thank you so much. Keep us posted.

Kate.

BOLDUAN: Happening today, Vice President Kamala Harris is heading to Pennsylvania to give more detail on her economic plan, including her plans for the manufacturing industry. What is that going to mean, and what are voters going to say about it? We'll have that coming up.

And right now a global gathering of world leaders continues at the U.N. General Assembly, while the conflict in the Middle East is intensifying on multiple fronts, and Ukraine's president is about to speak and ask for more help in its fight against Russia.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:25:10]

BERMAN: All right, wanted to give you a sense of where Vice President Harris and Donald Trump will be today, because these campaign travels tell a story of what and where they are focused on.

Vice President Harris giving a speech, an economic speech, in Pittsburgh, right about there. Donald Trump giving a speech in Mint Hill, North Carolina, right about there.

Why are these places important? Let me tell you. Let me start with Vice President Harris first in Pennsylvania. I'm using the 2020 election map between Joe Biden and Donald Trump because that data helps us understand. You look at Pennsylvania here. Again, she's going to be in Pittsburgh, in Allegheny County. People often joke, James Carville I think was the first to say it, Pennsylvania's like the Philadelphia area and Pittsburgh with Alabama in-between. A whole lot of red in-between. So, you've got to do really well if you're a Democrat in Pittsburgh.

Joe Biden won by 20 points. Hillary Clinton, in 2016, she won, but only by about 17 - 16, 17 points. So, the Harris campaign wants to be much more like Joe Biden. Biden won Pennsylvania by 80,000 votes. Harris wants to do well in Allegheny County, the second most populous county in Pennsylvania.

Let's talk about where Donald Trump is going, North Carolina. North Carolina, a swing state. This was the closest margin for any state that Joe Biden lost. And where Donald Trump is going today is in Mecklenburg County. Mint Hill, which is right about there.

Now, I know you're looking at this and saying, Mecklenburg County, that's a Democratic county. You know, Joe Biden won by 35 points, 200,000 votes. Yes. It is a super important Democratic county. The most populous in the state. But while it's got Charlotte, it's also got some suburbs, which lean a little bit more Republican. And right next to two counties, which vote Republican, Cabarrus County right here. Donald Trump won that by nine. And down here, Union County, which he won by more than 23, got a lot of people there. So, he wants to run up the margins in these red counties and try to keep it closer if he can here in Mecklenburg.

So, let's talk about what the candidates will be doing in these two states today. First, let's focus on Harris, who will be in Pennsylvania. Let's get right to CNN's Priscilla Alvarez for what she will be talking about in Pittsburgh, in Allegheny County.

PRISCILLA ALVAREZ, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, John, you just laid out what my travel plans have been the last few weeks because the vice president has been to both Pennsylvania and North Carolina multiple times because of these close margins.

Now, look, today she's going to be focused on the economy. She's going to detail her economic agenda. Of course, this is a top issue for voters. Her advisers keenly aware of that. And their plan today is for the vice president to draw out her economic philosophy a little more. Perhaps her most substantial comments on this issue to date.

Now, we do have a preview of some of what she'll say. Let me read that to you. It says, quote, "for Donald Trump our economy works best if it works for those who own the big skyscrapers, not those who build them. Not those who wire them. Not those who mop the floors."

So, there you have it. That's a preview of what the vice president is going to say. Drawing that stark contrast with former President Donald Trump. And, of course, also talking about what she has framed as the opportunity economy. This is a message that she has repeated on the trail multiple times, talking about lowering costs for Americans and also acknowledging that they're not where voters want them yet, and that she is best suited, with her middle class background, to focus on the needs of voters in this particular issue area.

Of course, John, as you noted, the former president still holds a lead on her. One of her challenges is distinguishing herself from the Biden administration because there have been unpopular views about his economic agenda. So, all of this is going to be part of the task that she is tackling when in Pennsylvania later this afternoon.

BERMAN: All right, headed to Pittsburgh there. Priscilla, thank you very much.

Let's talk about Donald Trump and his travels today. Again, he is going to be here in Mecklenburg County. And I think Alayna Treene is already there waiting.

What are we going to hear from the former president today?

ALAYNA TREENE, CNN REPORTER: I am already here.

John, we are outside a manufacturing warehouse in Mint Hill, North Carolina. And really the goal as well for Donald Trump today is to talk about the economy.

Now, we heard him talk about it as well yesterday in Georgia. I'm told today he's going to focus even more specifically on buying American products, as well as a potential executive order if he were to be reelected where he would force federal agencies to buy more American parts.

Now, I think the important context here, just, you know, going off of what Priscilla just laid out, is the dueling economic visions that both Trump and Harris are presenting to Americans. And it really comes on the heels of this new CNN poll that we released yesterday that showed that Trump is still doing better with the majority of voters in this country when it comes to the handling of the economy. The CNN national poll has him at 50 percent of likely voters saying that they trust Donald Trump more on the economy than they do Harris.

[09:30:03]

So that's a big reason why I think you're seeing both of them out here today talk about it, but specifically Donald Trump here in North Carolina.