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Government Shutdown; Biker Mob Attack Suspects Charged

Aired October 07, 2013 - 15:00   ET

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

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, top of the hour now, I'm John Berman in for Brooke Baldwin. Just a short time ago, House Speaker John Boehner fired back at the president for blaming Republicans for an impending U.S. default. The speaker says he's willing to talk about raiding the so-called debt limit, but the president, he says, will not speak to him.

A senior White House staffer this morning said the president would rather default on our debt than to sit down and negotiate. Now, the American people expect when their leaders have differences and we're in a time of crisis, that we will sit down and at least have a conversation.

Now, about an hour before the speaker spoke, it was the president's turn at the microphone, and he said Congress routinely raises the so- called debt limit. The president said he's willing to talk to the speaker about anything at all, kind of sort of, but not in this context, where either he gives in or the government goes into default, which could trigger a catastrophe, and that happens just 10 days from now.

So a lot going on, the principles both talking within the last hour- and-a-half.

With us now from Washington to discuss this is CNN's chief political analyst, Gloria Borger, and senior White House correspondent Jim Acosta.

Jim, the White House has had less than an hour to respond to the speaker, but are they saying anything about his charge that the president would rather have the government go into default than negotiate with Republicans?

JIM ACOSTA, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Not specifically yet to what the speaker said on the floor, but we want to point out that House Republican aides have said now that John Boehner, the speaker of the House, when he made those comments, that he was not directly quoting Gene Sperling, who was a top economic adviser of the president. He was basically, I guess, sort of summing up what Gene Sperling was saying earlier this morning.

So aides are saying now that he was not quoting him verbatim there, John. I just want to point that out, but what the president has said and White House officials said earlier today, and specifically Jay Carney at the White House press briefing, is that it's up to the speaker to call the vote. If the vote were called in the House of Representatives, they believe, Democrats believe that there would be votes along with the Democrats in the minority, that would be a couple of dozen or so in the Republican majority to pass a spending bill that would get the government back open again, and basically, those same numbers also exist to raise the debt ceiling.

But, John, something else that we also want to point out at this hour is earlier this morning, we were reporting that the White House was showing some openness to a short-term raise in the nation's debt ceiling to give both sides some breathing room, perhaps to hash things out over the next several months rather than potentially going into default in October 17.

White House Press Secretary Jay Carney, I asked him about that during the briefing, and he did not knock it down, so that is a proposal that is in play right now. Here's what the press secretary had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAY CARNEY, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: No, I'm simply saying that we have never stated and we're not saying today the debt ceiling ought to be or can be some particular length of time. It is our view that a longer debt ceiling increase, a more substantial debt ceiling increase that then averts a kind of confrontation like this for a longer period of time is a good thing.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: So to sum up, they would be, I guess, more willing to support or they do support what some Senate Democrats are proposing. That's a one-year increase in the nation's debt ceiling, but they may not get that. That is an acknowledgement that they may not get that, and to get out of this jam that both sides are really in right now, John, they may have to go along with something that's a lot shorter, and that was an indication there from Jay Carney that they're willing to accept that.

One other thing I want to point out, I asked Jay Carney at that briefing what would a debt default look like? He said it would be bad, but he really didn't offer many specifics. That's a sign, John, that we would be on the dark side of the moon if we go into default on October 17 or later than that. They just don't know what would happen, which is kind of scary.

BERMAN: And economists seem to agree on that, Jim, to be sure.

Gloria, let me ask you. Jim talked about a little movement there from the White House. Amid the bluster from Speaker Boehner and President Obama, who both had their fair share today, they both said amid the bluster that they would be willing to talk, just not under the terms that the other side wants to talk under. But has there been a change in the shape of this conversation over the last 24 hours?

GLORIA BORGER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes, you know, I actually think there has. And, you know, people like us are covering every little nuance in this. But starting with Speaker Boehner over the weekend when he was on ABC, we heard him move a little bit beyond the Obamacare, Obamacare argument, and into the larger argument about a discussion he would like to have with the president about entitlement programs and entitlement spending, which is generally what raising the debt ceiling becomes.

That's what happened in 2011 when they had their debt ceiling argument. And we have heard the president say today that he is willing to have that discussion, but only after we get over these particular hurdles. One other thing, I talked to a senior House Republican over the weekend who was floating an idea of kind of a six- week temporary stopgap, whatever you want to call it, thing, to get you past the shutting down of the government and the debt ceiling so that they can negotiate about larger things without having these deadlines hanging over their heads.

Whether he could get his fellow House Republicans to sign on to that is a whole other story, but I do think you're right. There's been a shift in the discussion. I believe Republicans were not winning on the shutting down the government on Obamacare argument, and they moved to the argument on which they are on safer turf, which is the question of, how do you get federal spending under control?

BERMAN: The parameters of this discussion did seem to move today with Obamacare not at the center of it.

BORGER: Yes.

BERMAN: And maybe this stop gap thing, as you just named it, may be the area where they can talk over the coming days.

BORGER: Thing.

BERMAN: These inches definitely matter. Jim Acosta, Gloria Borger, thanks for laying it out for us. Appreciate it.

BORGER: Sure.

ACOSTA: You bet.

BERMAN: Other big news tell you about, two secret U.S. raids on international soil in Somalia and in Libya, two high-value targets. One, one was a textbook success, the other apparently not so much.

First, in Tripoli, in Libya, Abu Anas al-Libi, a suspected operative wanted for the deadly 1998 bombings of two U.S. embassies in Africa, he has been captured by Delta Force operatives. His wife speaking exclusively to CNN about what she saw.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UMM ABDUL RAHMAN, WIFE OF SUSPECT (through translator): We expected them to do anything. But they took us by surprise. This thing came all of a sudden. There was no longer any talk about him in the media. So he felt somewhat reassured. He even stopped taking his weapon or his sons with him or hiring private security. He was living his life normally. Everything happened rapidly. They grabbed him and shoved him in the car. I saw them doing this and saying, get in, but I wasn't sure it was my husband. The cars then sped off like a rocket.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: Al-Libi is now being held on a U.S. Navy ship, and an interrogation is under way.

Now to the less successful raid, some 3,000 miles away in Somalia in a town just outside of the capital of Mogadishu. Navy SEALs swam ashore, they ran across a beach, their aim, to capture a man named Ikrimah, who apparently is a key player in the al Qaeda-linked Al- Shabab movement. This is a group behind the terrorist attack on a shopping mall in Kenya last month.

The team in charge of this raid, you may have heard of them, SEAL Team 6. That's the same unit that killed al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in his Pakistan hideout in 2011. This time around in Somalia, it does not appear they were as successful. There was a firefight so intense they decided to withdraw without ever knowing if they got their man.

Chad Williams is a former Navy SEAL. He's the author of "Seal of God."

Chad, they left without confirming they had completed their mission. They did not apprehend this man. They're not sure if they killed this man. What do you think happened, because you say you don't think this was a total failure?

CHAD WILLIAMS, FORMER U.S. NAVY SEAL: Yes. I think what happened is once they got to the house where they were trying to capture this high-value individual, they want to go through the doors as quiet as possible. Ideally, this is a snatch and grab. You want to get a guy like this alive, but somewhere along the way, they must have ran into somebody.

They get into a gunfight, and, you know, SEALs are very calm, cool, and collected in the mix of these things. I have been in such a situation. And the assault leader is just going to make a call. He's going to start calling out some maneuvers and they're going to decide whether or not they want to stay on target or if it would be a better idea just to go back to the boats.

BERMAN: It's clear they wanted the possibility, at least, of getting him alive. If they hadn't wanted to try at least to get him alive, you may have seen a drone attack there or something. They did not get him alive clearly. They do not know if they killed him in that attack.

Lay out for us the over the beach assault. You called it an OTB. This is what SEALs do. They appear magically, almost, from the ocean often, and they conduct these raids. Lay out for us how they go down.

WILLIAMS: Sure. An OTB is really the bread and butter of the SEAL teams. There's a number of ways you could actually arrive at the beach. You could go from a submarine outside of torpedo chambers with a small inflatable boat or we have these very fast-moving assault watercrafts called Mark Vs that can get up to almost 75 miles per hour. They would drop these guys off kind of far off from the coast and then the guys are probably -- once they're in the water, they probably have a little afterthought like, hey, I wonder if this is some shark-infested water here that we're in right now and they continue on.

They make their way to shore, and they want to be as quiet as possible, and really the ideal is to make no noise until noise is absolutely necessary. So I don't doubt that they made it to that house quietly. They probably tried the doorknob to see if it was unlocked. If they needed to, they would blast the door down.

And then once all noise is made, noise is made. The gig is up, and they're going to be going after this guy as swiftly as possible.

BERMAN: And they made the decision to get out, as you say. Chad Williams, thanks so much for joining us.

You joked about shark-infested waters. You trained in shark-infested waters in Coronado, no doubt, so that would not be nothing strange to these SEALs who train for these incredibly intricate operations. Thanks so much, Chad.

WILLIAMS: You bet.

BERMAN: Three soldiers are under arrest in Lakewood, Washington, right now, facing murder charges in the stabbing death of a fellow soldier.

Police say 20-year-old Tevin Geike was walking with friends early Saturday morning when an argument began between them and soldiers who were in a car. The car allegedly stopped and then men got out. But once they discovered Geike and his friends were also active-duty soldiers, they started back for their car.

Police say that's when one of the suspects, Jeremiah Hill, appeared to bear hug the victim, pushed him to the ground. Geike had been stabbed and later died at the scene.

Joining me now to discuss it is Lakewood Police Department's public information officer, Lieutenant Chris Lawler.

Lieutenant, how were you finally able to make these arrests?

LT. CHRIS LAWLER, LAKEWOOD POLICE DEPARTMENT: We got a tip from somebody on JBLM, which is the military installation in our jurisdiction, who said that the main suspect, Jeremiah Hill, had actually gone to another soldier for medical aid for a cut on his hand that he admitted to the other soldier, this happened when I stabbed a guy to death over the weekend.

Of course, the soldier who was rendering aid didn't really believe it until other people pointed out that there had been a crime in Lakewood where someone had been stabbed to death. And it kind of unraveled from there. We were able to talk to his friend and figure out who the five people were in the car and bring them all in for interviews.

BERMAN: Any suspects still at large right now?

LAWLER: No, we got all -- the initial reports from the victims were that there were five males in the car. We identified all five. They all pointed fingers to each other and corroborated what they had told us and what they told each other. We don't feel like there's anyone else outstanding. We will tie up some loose ends with people they may have spoken to admitted some things too, but we have everybody in custody now.

BERMAN: There's been a great deal of attention on this case for the last 24 hours. One of the reasons there was the police force initially thought that race, race might have been a factor in the stabbing. Everyone in the car apparently was black. The three men walking on the street were white.

You now say, the police now say race was not a factor, you don't think. Has it been ruled out completely? And if so, why?

LAWLER: Well, it hasn't been ruled out completely, but we looked at it. It's part of what we're doing in the investigation, where we're looking to motive.

Like I explained early on, was here we do have five black males in a car and three white males, and there was a comment, nobody could remember exactly what it was, but how derogatory it was, but about something these guys had yelled to the victims about being white.

But once they got out of the car and started to talk, there was no more mention of race, very little discussion, as a matter of fact. Once the suspects figured out that these guys were active-duty soldiers, they actually said, we're done. Let's get out of here. These guys are -- they're cool. And for what reason that this Jeremiah Hill decided to stab Tevin Geike to death, we have no idea. He's chosen not to talk, which is his right, but he asked for an attorney. So we will never know exactly what his motive was.

BERMAN: No idea about a motive, no working theory right now?

LAWLER: No, you know, I think what it started out was is guys being guys and maybe popping off to each other, and the worst that would have happened maybe would have been a fight, some pushing and shoving, some punching and stuff like that.

That's probably what these guys all thought would happen. So I don't know that we will know why he felt it was necessary. There were no weapons in play, no other -- in fact, the soldier that was killed and the soldier that did the attack didn't speak to each other at all, according to the witnesses.

BERMAN: All right, a fight much worse than a fight. Lieutenant Chris Lawler, thank you for joining us. Appreciate it. LAWLER: You bet

BERMAN: So it is the video that has gone viral. A motorcycle gang surrounding and attacking a man inside an SUV. The man seen here beating the window with his helmet is one of the suspects at the center of the investigation. He sent a very strong message in court with a couple of fingers. He didn't open his mouth. It was the fingers doing the talking. We will explain.

And take a look at this live picture right now. A construction crane's load dangling over Manhattan, and get this, there's a tornado watch in effect for New York, which means some very strong winds are coming right by that crane over the next several hours. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: Welcome back, everyone. New York authorities arrest and charge two more people in a biker mob attack.

An attorney for one suspect admits his client bashed Alexian Lein's SUV window, but he simply overreacted to the situation and never beat Lein. Reggie Chance is the man caught on video using his helmet to smash the black Range Rover.

During his arraignment, the Brooklyn native defiantly turned to news cameras and he put up those middle fingers elevated at reporters right there. He's being held right now on $75,000 bond. He ha previous run-ins with the law as well.

CNN legal analysts Sunny Hostin and Danny Cevallos are here.

Sunny, what are the chances his prior record will play in right now?

SUNNY HOSTIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: I think it's going to certainly play in when the prosecutors are looking at this case, and they're looking at whether or not this is a guy that gets a plea deal. They're looking at sort of motive.

They're looking at a lot of things because this investigation is still ongoing and it has so many moving parts. I for one think while he may not have dragged the SUV driver out of the car, he certainly was one of those who sort of precipitated the attack. He's one of those that got these bikers access into the car.

I think his role in really, really important in terms of the criminal activity that took place.

BERMAN: You say investigators are looking at a lot of things. One of the things everyone on earth is looking at right now is this video, this video of him apparently smashing in the window of the SUV with the helmet.

Danny, as a defense attorney, what do you do with a video like this?

HOSTIN: Yes, what do you do, Danny? DANNY CEVALLOS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: This is interesting because -- let me start with I don't agree with the vigilantism of this, but from a defense perspective, if the argument is made that all he did was drive up and follow this car and ultimately only bash in the window and didn't injure anybody, other than the conspiracy charges, I don't know that will work as a defense for him, but it is interesting if he only followed and if he only bashed in the window and nothing else, unless they charge him with conspiracy, really, that's the only thing he did.

Citizens are permitted to give chase to a fleeing felon if they believe it's a fleeing felon. And maybe there's something to the argument they were just following him to prevent him from escaping. Believe me, do the police have a right to damage your car when they follow you? Absolutely. They can spike your tires, they can do a lot of things. But, ultimately, overall, this is probably a conspiracy charge.

BERMAN: Conspiracy. Why?

HOSTIN: They all acted together.

(CROSSTALK)

CEVALLOS: Right, because even if he didn't -- look, a biker gang, I mean, there's a good argument there for a conspiracy. But even if his argument is I only bashed in the window, was he part of an overall act that would result in the beating of this man?

HOSTIN: I think Danny is right on in that. If I were the prosecutor in this case, I be would looking at that.

Just because you were a piece of what was going on doesn't mean that you're not responsible for everything that went on. But for this particular person smashing the window, perhaps he would not have been dragged out. Perhaps the others wouldn't have gained access. Perhaps it wouldn't have gotten as aggressive.

So I think to say, oh, all he did was use his helmet in an aggressive fashion and bang a window in, it doesn't stop there.

BERMAN: Let me ask quickly about the undercover cop, the idea there was an undercover cop there who apparently did nothing to step in and stop this.

HOSTIN: I'm really troubled by it. When I was a prosecutor, of course I worked with undercover agents and of course I worked with officers.

There is a way to intervene. We saw that in this particular case, where you have a good samaritan step in and just place themselves between and say OK, let's calm down. Let's calm down. Why couldn't an undercover officer do that without blowing his or her cover? I'm very, very troubled to learn that there were police officers on -- not on duty, but on the scene, and they did nothing.

We should expect more from law enforcement. BERMAN: And now at least one of them has lawyered up. Sunny Hostin, Danny Cevallos, thank you so much for joining me to talk about that. Appreciate it.

HOSTIN: You bet.

BERMAN: A potentially dangerous situation unfolding live right now in New York City. Take a look at this picture. That is a crane. That is a load dangling over Manhattan. Police now are on the scene and there is growing concern about weather conditions. High winds are expected.

Plus, shocking allegations against the National Football League. A new book says the league spent more than 20 years trying to cover up research that showed a link between football and brain damage. Hear how the league is responding now.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: High anxiety in New York City right now over a crane dangling above a street. These are live pictures of that crane, the load swinging out over the street and high winds blowing into the area, even as we speak, and those winds could get stronger. The street below has been shut down. Emergency crews are on the scene.

At the same time, millions of people on the East Coast are all under a tornado watch.

(WEATHER UPDATE)

BERMAN: Coming up next, I'm going to speak live with a former FBI hostage negotiator who says the situation in Washington right now reminds him of a prison siege. Hear how he says a negotiator would handle the stalemate.

Plus, a monster truck driving right into the crowd. Find out how this ends, and one governor's explosive suggestion about the man behind the wheel.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)