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Worst Job Creation Since End of 2013; Deliberate Germanwings Crash; Israel: Iran Nuke Deal Threatens Our Survival; Feds: ISIS- Inspired Women Wanted to Bomb U.S. Aired 9-9:30a ET

Aired April 03, 2015 - 09:00   ET

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

[09:00:04] DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: Look. One of my favorite people. How are you doing, Michaela?

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: Hi, baby.

(LAUGHTER)

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: Too easy. Too easy. Too easy, Don.

LEMON: I would always do the right thing. Hey, great job this morning. Chris, great job with what's going on in Indiana. Been watching you a lot. Good stuff. Both of you.

CUOMO: Thank you very much, Don.

LEMON: Happy Easter to both of you.

PEREIRA: To you, as well, Don.

LEMON: All Right. NEWSROOM starts right now.

Happening right now in the CNN NEWSROOM, premeditated murder. The Germanwings black box now confirming that the co-pilot repeatedly sped up the plane before it smashed right into the alps.

Then part mad scientist, part ISIS worshippers. How two New York women got caught allegedly plotting to make powerful bombs.

Plus plucked from the sea after more than 60 days afloat and still strong enough to walk off the chopper. Check it out. Wait until you hear how this man describes how he survived.

Let's talk live now in the CNN NEWSROOM.

Good morning, everyone. I'm Don Lemon. Thank you so much for joining us. Carol is off today.

We're going to start with this hour with breaking news out of Washington and a blow to an economy in recovery. We learned just a short time ago that 126,000 jobs were added in March. Making it the worst month of jobs, support jobs since the end of 2013.

To discuss, we're joined now by CNN Money correspondent Cristina Alesci and CNN global affairs analyst and "TIME" assistant managing editor Rana Foroohar.

Good morning to both of you.

Cristina, walk us through these numbers.

CRISTINA ALESCI, CNN MONEY CORRESPONDENT: Yes. So let's start with that headline number. First off, way below consensus estimates of 244,000. To add insult to injury, we had revisions of the last two months downward. So this was a pretty abysmal report from the headline perspective.

Let me give you the positives because I'm feeling fairly optimistic this morning. The unemployment rate held fairly steady. Now you can read into it a bunch of things. But also, pretty positive -- yes, 5.5. Also pretty positive, recovery in certain sectors, it's not just the lower wage jobs that are growing. It's also those business and professional service job that are growing so that was good.

Also, something that I personally watch very closely and the Fed is watching very closely and that's wage growth, and that ticked up just a slight bit. 2.1 percent. That's the kind of thing we want to see. The Fed wants to see it more along the lines of 3 percent to 4 percent, so we're clearly not there but it was good to see that it at least held steady and ticked up a little.

LEMON: You're looking at positive earnings point, 3 percent, right, month-to-month, and then also rising 2.1 percent against prior -- the prior year.

ALESCI: That's right.

LEMON: So that's the good news in this.

ALESCI: That's the good news.

LEMON: But what about the bad? The not-so-good news?

ALESCI: Well --

LEMON: Should we have seen this coming?

RANA FOROOHAR, CNN GLOBAL ECONOMIC ANALYST: Well, you can't say that you should have seen it coming but in some ways it reflects what Janet Yellen, the Fed chair, has been saying all along. This really isn't a normal recovery. This is a weaker than usual recovery. If it had been a normal recovery and rate this low, as she told us just a couple of days ago, the economy should be booming. It's not.

ALESCI: And interest rate raised.

FOROOHAR: And they would have raised rates by now, so I think that what you're going to see is a slower takeoff for those rate hikes. We may be in a longer term lower interest rate environment.

ALESCI: What I'm going to be looking for today is what President Barack Obama actually says about this jobs report because we've seen him tweet now every single time these numbers come out and try and put a positive spin on it. Last month he said the unemployment rate dropped in every single state during 2014. The first time that's happened in 30 years.

LEMON: We've heard nothing yet. No tweeting so far?

ALESCI: Nothing yet.

LEMON: So speaking of Monday, then how are the markets going to react? Are they going to blow this off by Monday? Because they're closed today.

ALESCI: Wow. That is probably one of the toughest questions to answer. I think that they probably won't blow this off entirely because it was such a huge miss. You know? I think that the markets are going to have to re-evaluate.

We've had this steady recovery. That's the thing. Every month we've seen more than 200,000 jobs added to the economy so the markets have been fairly positive, reacting fairly positively way, but --

FOROOHAR: I think actually --

ALESCI: Tough to predict.

FOROOHAR: I think that the markets are not going to react as strongly as -- they should have, looking at the news from the real economy and that's in part because you've still got low interest rates, you've had the Fed dumping so much money into the economy over the last few years. The markets and the real economy are really separate now. They're telling two different stories. The markets are up here. Everybody else is down here.

And I would just add one more thing. There's are major divergence that -- and how different groups of people in the country are doing. So if you look at the African-American unemployment rate, it's still about 11 percent compared to 5.5 percent overall. I mean, that's a huge divergence but I hope that --

ALESCI: Exactly.

FOROOHAR: -- that's the sort of thing the president will address.

LEMON: So you think the markets should -- how should you take the markets? They should react more aggressively?

FOROOHAR: I think -- I think there's going to be a big correction at some point when the rates go up. I do think that eventually the rates are going to have to go up. And that there's going to be a fallout because right now the kind of underlying data that we see, the wage growth, which OK, it's a little better than it was but 2 percent is still not strong enough to really put more money in people's pockets and get them spending which is what we need to create that virtual cycle.

[09:05:26] ALESCI: Companies have actually been reacting to the fact that there is a little bit of wage growth, that's 2 percent. You know, Walmart has increased wages. McDonald's has increased wages. The problem with those wage increases is that it affects the workers that are coming into the work force. You're not addressing the middle part of the work force that really wants to see the wage growth happen.

FOROOHAR: It's from an incredibly low base, too. So when you're talking about rates --

ALESCI: That's what I want to say. The entry level, yes.

FOROOHAR: -- can collapse to, you know, $10 an hour, even $15 an hour.

LEMON: That's got to be it. Thank you very much. We appreciate you guiding us through this.

Cristina, Rana, thank you very much.

Turning now to the crash of Germanwings Flight 9525. According to French officials initial tests from the second and final black box reveal co-pilot Andreas Lubitz repeatedly and deliberately sped up the plane as it slammed into the French Alps. A premeditated attack that killed all 150 people on board.

The second black box, a flight data recorder, well, it was found yesterday buried eight inches below the surface driven into the ground by the impact and blackened in the explosion.

CNN's Will Ripley is following the story for us from Dusseldorf, Germany this morning.

Will, what other details have we learned?

WILL RIPLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: They're really chilling details. Just breaking this morning here in Germany, Don, because they further built the case that Andreas Lubitz deliberately flew that plane right into the French Alps. The initial analysis from this charred flight data recorder, which, as you described, it was burned, it was buried, it was embedded in the side of the French Alps due to the velocity of the impact.

Now it is clear that Andreas Lubitz, he set the autopilot controls to 100 feet which started that descent, that terrifying eight-minute descent towards the French Alps. He also increased the speed of the plane as it was moving closer and closer to the mountain range and he did that several times as the alarms were sounding, as his captain was banging on the doors, passengers were screaming. He was heard breathing normally up until the moment of impact. He was alive and he was conscious.

And to think of what his cockpit view was, Don, he probably had the most terrifying view of all and yet was heard on the other black box just breathing normally as everyone behind him was panicking up until the very end. It's just chilling.

LEMON: This is unbelievable, the more we learn about it.

Will Ripley, from Dusseldorf, thank you very much for your reporting.

I want to bring in now Paul Ginsberg, he's a forensic audio expert who has worked with agencies ranging from the CIA to the FBI and Homeland Security.

Good morning, Paul. What do you make of the information that Lubitz repeatedly reportedly sped up the plane into the mountainside?

PAUL GINSBERG, FORENSIC AUDIO EXPERT: Good morning, Don. Well, he obviously had this as a plan and that's corroborated by the fact that he had used on his tablet some Web sites to search as far as how difficult it is to secure the cockpit door and also methods of suicide. So we know that this was premeditated.

LEMON: Paul, how are these French agencies using what was on the first black box, which is a cockpit voice recorder, to match up with the flight data recorder?

GINSBERG: Well, in a standard investigation, we use all input. We use a cockpit voice recorder, the flight data recorder. We also use radar, weather, all inputs to get where we want to go.

This was a missing piece to the puzzle. Here we can see that the alarms were, of course, sounding in the cockpit as heard through the cockpit voice recorder and we can verify that from the flight data recorder by virtue of the attitude of the airplane and the control systems to see that he heard it, he knew what was going on and he just drove this plane into the ground, intentionally.

LEMON: Having done work like this hundreds if not thousands of times really, what are the next steps for investigators now that they have both data recorders in their possession, Paul?

GINSBERG: OK. Well, this is relatively easy one because it's not a mystery anymore. We're not looking for possible malfunctions of the plane or weather or any other external conditions. We can hear and we can verify the speed of the engines. We can see what the attitude was. We also have the input to the various different controls so now they will merge all the data precisely synchronize it and start analyzing in detail.

[09:10:05] But I must give credit to all parties involved in this particular one because the recovery was spectacular. It was just about immediate and the dissemination of information, as well. It was great.

LEMON: Paul, we appreciate that. Thank you, sir.

GINSBERG: Thank you.

LEMON: And still to come, Iran celebrates and Israel simmers. Why a top American ally is seething through nuclear talks and calls a tentative deal a historic mistake.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN Breaking News.

LEMON: Want to get you straight to that breaking news. Now we're following it, it's out of Kentucky. Here are the pictures, look at that. My goodness. That's courtesy of our affiliate WAV or Wave Television. Firefighters battling a massive four-alarm blaze. It's at the GE Appliance, I should say the GM. The GE appliance, or GM appliance parked in Louisville, Let me double check that. GE appliance park in Louisville, Kentucky. GE, General Electric.

Officials say the building has been evacuated not clear what the cost of that blaze is right now. So far no reports of interests but again a furlong fire reported at the GE appliance parked, it is in Louisville, Kentucky. The calls came in at 7:00 Eastern Time. It's been going for just two hours now. The size of that building. We'll continue to take a look at. But again, no reports of anyone trapped, nobody any injuries or anything right now.

[09:15:00] But man, it is up in flames and up in smoke. Look at that, the size of that building. It's hard to believe. No one was hurt, even now. We'll keep an eye on it.

We're going the move on and talk about America's closest ally in the Middle East. Israel railing against the breakthrough in the U.S.-led nuclear talks with Iran. Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu says a deal with this framework would threaten his country's very survival and, in fact, this morning he summoned Israeli's top security officials to a meeting.

Here's the terms hailed by President Obama as historic. The terms include this: Iran agrees to eliminate two thirds of its centrifuges, reducing its number to 6,000. It will also reduce its stockpile of enriched uranium, critical to making weapons and in exchange, the U.S. and European union will lift the sanction that is have crippled the country's economy.

Secretary of State Kerry who handled the negotiations bristles at the criticism.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ELISE LABOTT, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: When this is over in 15 years, Iran can, you know, pretty much do whatever it wants. So, this is a real --

JOHN KERRY, SECRETARY OF STATE: No, it can't.

LABOTT: This is a real political gamble, Mr. Secretary, that the regime is going to be different in 15 years.

KERRY: No. It is not a gamble on the regime being different. It is not a gamble. It is based on proof. There's no element of trusting here.

LABOTT: You don't trust the Iranians? KERRY: That's not the issue. In any negotiation about arms you can't

do it on words. You do it on actions and verifiability.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: CNN's Oren Liebermann is here to talk about the latest.

Oren, President Barack Obama calls it historic. Israeli officials call it a historic mistake. How damaging is this to the U.S./Israeli relations?

OREN LIEBERMANN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: (AUDIO GAP) have gone out of their way, Don, to point to the strength of U.S.-Israel relationship, and that's a deep and broad relationship. It includes security coordination, strategic coordination, financial aid.

So, both leaders have said that's strong but in terms of personal relationship between President Obama and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, that might be about as bad as it gets. We have said a number of times over the last few weeks, it's at an all-time low. And yet, it seems to keep getting lower.

These two leaders very much not on the same page with how to handle Iran. Obama wants a deal. Netanyahu doesn't. We have seen Netanyahu's words get stronger.

This is from an emergency cabinet meeting. You mentioned this. He called an emergency cabinet meeting this morning. Listen to some of these words. This rhetoric just getting stronger in the last few days, especially the last 24 hours.

First, he says his cabinet is, quote, "united in strongly opposing the proposed deal", and then a short time later, he says, quote, "it might very well spark a nuclear arms race throughout the Middle East and it would greatly increase the risks of terrible war." So, some very, very strong language coming from Netanyahu.

And it's interesting. Right at the end of the statement, Netanyahu says one more thing to see out of a finalized deal amongst the other requests and demands he's made for calling or consider a better deal. He says, "In addition, Israel demands any final agreement with Iran will include a clear and unambiguous Iranian recognition of Israel's right to exist." So, some very interesting, or very interesting new demand. I don't know that we have seen this before -- coming from Netanyahu's camp.

We had a chance earlier to speak with his spokesman, Mark Regev, who sort of reiterated some of the concerns about this nuclear deal.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARK REGEV, ISRAELI GOVERNMENT SPOKESMAN: It's only in the last two, three years that the United States ratcheted up the sanctions and the Iranians have actually been really feeling the pressure. And here we have to give, you think, a word of thanks to the administration and Congress for putting those very tough sanctions in place. Now, we think those sanctions should stay in place until the Iranians

actually take substantive steps to dismantle their nuclear program. Ultimately, if you take that away, what motivation do the Iranians have for making real concessions?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LIEBERMANN: And that's been one of Netanyahu's big points. He believes the lifting of sanctions, the relief of sanctions, should be directly linked to Iran pulling back its aggression in the region and now, we're seeing a back and forth between Netanyahu and Kerry. We saw it between Netanyahu and Obama. Now, this is Kerry perhaps responding although not directly to Netanyahu, directly addressing Netanyahu's concerns in a "Boston Globe" op-ed from this morning.

Here's what Kerry has to say, "I know that some will suggest the parameters are not sufficient but the burden will be on them to prescribe a specific and plausible alternative to a better outcome. The fact is we have reached an important milestone in our year's long effort to ensure that Iran's nuclear program is and remains wholly peaceful."

So, Don, some very strong words here going back and forth between the White House and Obama's administration and the Netanyahu administration here in Israel.

LEMON: All right. Oren, thanks.

[09:20:01] Plenty of critics of this plan, plenty of them here in the United States as well, from both parties really.

But the howling the loudest and most often are among the first. Some Republicans likely to make the presidential bid. Here they are. Let's take off a handful for you.

Jeb Bush calls it flawed while Marco Rubio dismisses the efforts as farcical. Rick Perry holds back just a little bit saying he's wary. Ted Cruz calls it a bad deal. Lindsey Graham says the consequences of a bad deal would be unimaginable.

Presumptive Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton was also quick to weigh in on this. Here's what she says, "There is much to do and much more to say in the months ahead. But for now, diplomacy deserves a chance to succeed."

We'll continue to follow.

Still to come, former roommates and self-proclaimed members of the Islamic State. Why authorities say two New York women wanted to carry out an attack that would make history.

CNN's Alexandra Field has more.

ALEXANDRA FIELD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Don.

They had no plans to travel overseas, every intention of carrying out that attack here at home. We'll talk about the plot and who inspired them, coming right up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: So, they wanted to make history by waging an ISIS-inspired attack and carrying out a bombing like the one at the Boston marathon. Now, two New York women behind bars after the feds foiled the plan. Their targets: police and members of the military.

Here's what we know right now. According to authorities: 28-year-old Noelle Velentzas and her former roommate, 31-year-old Asia Siddiqui, not only purchased ingredients for a bomb but expressed support for jihad, for violent jihad.

[09:25:07] Even more troubling, Siddiqui made repeated contact with members of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula or AQAP and once wrote a poem for a jihadi magazine, "Taste the truth through fists and slit throats."

According to court documents, Velentzas once asked, "Why can't we be some real bad bitches?" That's a quote, all right? Adding that she wanted the pair to be referred to as "citizens of the Islamic State."

I want to bring in now, CNN's Alexandra Field in New York.

Alexandra, what do you know?

FIELD: Hey there, Don.

They had purchased materials and they had done a whole lot of research. They were deeply inspired by plots. Authorities say that they had looked at fertilizer bombs, similar to what were used during the Oklahoma City bombs. They had looked at car bombs, like the one used at the World Trade Center back in 1993. They were inspired by the pressure cooker bombs, of course, at the marathon.

Siddiqui had stocked up on propane tanks, which she was keeping in her apartment in Queens. She is the one who we know had contact with members of AQAP, al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.

Her co-conspirator here, Velentzas, also doing the research alongside her, and apparently very inspired by Osama bin Laden himself and referring to him as a hero. She had a picture of him on the background on her cell phone, Osama holding an AK-47.

Investigators had their eyes on this pair, Don, for a couple of years, as far back as May of 2013. Of course, you have the neighborhood in Queens, neighbors certainly had no idea what was going on.

LEMON: That's how it usually is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She was a very friendly woman and would never expect that at all. They're lovely people. Yes, her daughter sometimes played with my daughter outside in the summertime and stuff like that. But I would not even expect that. It's so crazy living next to someone, you have no idea what they're up to. That is crazy. Oh my God.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: Hmm.

FIELD: The two have been apparently no interest in targeting civilians. Investigators in this case say they were certainly after law enforcement members apparently, Don. Very inspired by the shooting and killing of two police officers in Brooklyn this past wither. Also looking at images from the funerals of those officers where you saw just thousands and thousands of officers gathering and apparently inspired by that sort of collection, that mass of law enforcement representatives altogether in one place.

LEMON: I wonder -- do you think officials here think that these women may have valuable information on other terror plots?

FIELD: No public indication of that at this point, Don. But certainly it speaks to a larger trend of homegrown terrorism and a vast effort to try and intercept any potential attacks before they can happen here. Again, these are women who had the contacts with AQAP. But they were in Queens, they had no plans to travel abroad.

They were going to be self taught. They were trying to do the research, read the articles, learn how to use these materials to build bombs and then try and just simply carry out the attacks on their own here.

LEMON: Thank you, Alexandra Field. Appreciate that.

Meanwhile, another person with alleged ties to al Qaeda appeared in court on Thursday. Officials say 29-year-old citizen, U.S. citizen accused of conspiring to provide material support to terrorists. That's according to authorities. The suspect was deported from Pakistan and allegedly wanted to join the extremist fight.

So, let's bring in someone familiar with the cases, former CIA counterterrorism analyst, Mr. Buck Sexton. He's also the national security editor for TheBlaze.com.

Thanks for joining us.

Let's start with these two women. How much of a threat do you think they posed?

BUCK SEXTON, THEBLAZE.COM: Well, you know, their tactics were very sloppy and when you have someone, for example, who's reaching out directly to al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, as is alleged in this instance, I mean, that's going to catch the attention perhaps of authorities, the sorts of things that they were saying, the things they were saying to this informant shows that they clearly didn't really have any good sense of how to keep their plans relatively private.

This is usually how these cases end up being caught before they go operational. Except the people involved really want to talk about it, really want to share it n. So, in that regard, it is a familiar script. We've seen this before. Self radicalized individuals part of the cyber jihad and they get closer and closer to it, and then the authorities swoop in with enough evidence together.

But it has to be said that, for example, they're sort of obsessive fanatics of the jihad. They're interested in bin Laden, of course. They're interested in the Boston marathon bombing. You don't need to be well-trained, you don't need to be a hardened terrorist who spent time in camps and really knows what they're doing to create a mass casualty attack.

LEMON: We've seen that with the bombings, right?

SEXTON: The Boston bombing.

LEMON: These guys weren't professionals, they were amateurs. But they sure caused a whole of damage and death.

Let's talk about where they're getting the information from. They allegedly used "The Anarchist Cookbook" and al Qaeda magazine "Inspire". And I'm going to read something from -- this is from Dianne Feinstein saying, "I'm particularly struck that they made use of online bomb-making guides like 'The Anarchist Cookbook' and 'Inspire' magazine. The documents not protected by First Amendment and should be removed from the Internet."

What's your reaction about it?

SEXTON: You can't remove "Inspire" -- removing "Inspire" from the Internet would be counterproductive in the sense, because one, it gives us some ability to get a sense of where they're trying to attack and what their plans are.