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Kentucky Elects Republican Governor; New Poll Shows Trump, Carson in Dead Heat; Illinois Officer's Death Likely a Suicide; Mom of 9-Year-Old Victim Begs for Info; Search Area Expands for Russian Plane Wreckage. Aired 9-9:30a ET
Aired November 04, 2015 - 09:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[09:00:01] CUOMO: Look at him walking towards his dad.
PEREIRA: So proud, too.
CAMEROTA: Beautiful, Chris.
PEREIRA: You warned us. You did warn us.
CAMEROTA: You did warn us.
PEREIRA: You did warn us this time.
CAMEROTA: Thank you for showing us that.
CUOMO: They didn't put any of the practice sessions on Facebook because they wanted to surprise the father.
CAMEROTA: It's so nice,
PEREIRA: Yes. Well done. They did it. It's great.
CAMEROTA: All right. On that note, time for "NEWSROOM" with Carol Costello.
Good morning, Carol.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: That was a lovely moment. Thank you. Have a great day.
NEWSROOM starts now.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
COSTELLO: Happening now in the NEWSROOM, a rich Republican with outsider cred. No, not Donald Trump. Kentucky's governor-elect.
GOV. MATT BEVIN (R), KENTUCKY GOVERNOR-ELECT: This offers us an opportunity to change the tenor of what has become expected in the world of politics.
COSTELLO: Is his win signaling anything about 2016?
Also, his shooting death spurred a massive manhunt and now a shocking turn. Who investigators think pulled the trigger?
Plus could a rally against police brutality put Quentin Tarantino's new movie in jeopardy?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: One of them does. He's not what he says he is.
COSTELLO: Police threatening to boycott. As the director says he never implied cops are murderers.
Let's talk. Live in the CNN NEWSROOM.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COSTELLO: And good morning, I'm Carol Costello. Thank you so much for joining me.
The Donald Trump of Kentucky wins big after a stunning political comeback as Republicans sweep elections in the south. The big questions now, what does it mean for 2016 and will it change the way Democrats campaign?
Take a look at the map. All that red you're about to see. Those are the states with Republican governors. Kentucky now on that list after Tea Party favorite and political outsider Matt Bevin muscled his way to the top despite weeks of trailing behind in the polls.
Bevin who made his mark on the campaign trail by driving around in a gold Escalade challenged his supporters to unite, insisting that Kentucky will set the scene for 2016.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BEVIN: My challenge to you is do not fail to take the high road as we have done to this point, continue to take the high road because this is the opportunity for Kentucky to be a beacon to the nation. The values that we hold. The principles that we hold. The work ethic that we hold. The high road that we will take. This will change the tenor of what happens in the 2016 race.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: Joining me now to talk about this, WDRB media columnist, John David Dyche.
Welcome. Thanks for being with me.
JOHN DAVID DYCHE, WDRB MEDIA COLUMNIST: Thank you.
COSTELLO: Thank you. So you wrote this op-ed calling Mr. Bevin Kentucky's Donald Trump. You wrote this, quote, "The fact that Bevin and Trump are wildly inconsistent does not seem to bother those whose political instincts are akin to a sense of smell. They evidently don't care that their candidate is saying something directly opposite of what he has said in the past, as long as he is saying in an aggressive colorful way."
You're a conservative. You supported Senator Mitch McConnell. Do you really believe Kentucky voters elected Bevin on bluster?
DYCHE: Not just on bluster. Bevin does have some good ideas but the fact remains that he contradicted himself frequently on the campaign trail. And he did resemble Donald Trump in a lot of byes during the campaign.
COSTELLO: How did he resemble Donald Trump?
DYCHE: Well he operated without the establishment's endorsement or support. McConnell did back him. But Bevin never closely embraced the establishment. Held himself as an outsider. He didn't operate off the usual political script. He was saying things that would have been considered outrageous for more conventional candidates and he used a lot of his own money.
(LAUGHTER)
COSTELLO: OK. So he also talked a lot about against Obamacare. Did that also put him over the top in Kentucky?
DYCHE: Well, there is no doubt President Obama has alienated Kentuckians of both parties with Obamacare, with the coal issues and on social issues. A lot of people are experiencing premium increases under Obamacare. But then a lot of people obtained coverage under expanded Medicaid.
I think perhaps more importantly was the gay marriage issue, which was focused on Kentucky nationally. When Kim Davis, the clerk in Rowan County, refused to issue same-sex marriage licenses to same-sex couples and disobeyed a court order and went to jail, Bevin was quickly on the scene there to take her side.
COSTELLO: Interesting. So you do think, though, that Bevin's election is a sign of things to come in 2016?
DYCHE: It could be. It's tough to translate Kentucky nationally. We are a different place not necessarily representative of America. But on some of these campaign tactics and on some of these issues I think there could be some significance for the country as a whole from what happened in Kentucky last night.
[09:05:10] COSTELLO: Interesting. John David Dyche, thanks for your insight.
DYCHE: Thank you.
COSTELLO: You're welcome.
In the meantime the Republican race for the White House is heating up. A new Quinnipiac University poll shows Donald Trump and Ben Carson running neck-and-neck. Trump now leading Carson by just one point, making it a statistical dead heat.
This is the first national poll since last week's debate. Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz also seeing gains. Bad news for Jeb Bush, though. He's actually down six points since September. Earlier today Trump unleashed a new wave of attacks against his
rivals, especially Ben Carson.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Ben will not be able to deal with China. He will not be able to deal with Iran. He will not be able to deal with any of the countries that are really abusing our country.
CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: But what is the proof --
TRUMP: And they are abusing it.
CUOMO: But what is the proof that you could?
TRUMP: He will not be able to deal with Japan.
CUOMO: What is the proof that you could?
TRUMP: Because that's not his thing. And frankly when you talk about energy he's got lower energy than Jeb Bush.
CUOMO: But what does that mean low energy?
TRUMP: He's not going to do it. He's not going to do anything. And Ben --
(CROSSTALK)
CUOMO: But what does that mean, low energy?
TRUMP: I mean, I don't know where Ben comes from. But if Ben got in you would say, oh my god, we have ourselves a problem. OK.
CUOMO: But Ben Carson --
TRUMP: I will tell you that right now.
CUOMO: Here's what I'm saying, I'm not here to advocate for them.
TRUMP: You know, people -- and look, people can put them in. I have the ultimate -- my temperament is great. Ben Carson would have done "Saturday Night Live" in two seconds if they asked him. But they didn't ask him, they won't ask him most likely, maybe they will, who knows. But they probably won't ask him because it is ratings driven and he's not going to get ratings. And frankly if they asked him he would have done it in two seconds. So when I heard his statement about this is too serious, give me a break.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: All right. Joining me now to talk about all of this is co- founder and executive editor of RealClearPolitics.com, Tom Bevan.
Welcome, Tom. TOM BEVAN, CO-FOUNDER, REALCLEARPOLITICS.COM: Hi, Carol.
COSTELLO: Hi. So Donald Trump is now openly attacking Ben Carson. Ben Carson says hey, I'm a nice guy. I'm not going to attack anyone. Will this help Trump? Hurt him? What do you think?
BEVAN: Well, it hasn't hurt him so far when he's attacked other candidates. Ben Carson is a little bit different, though, because Ben Carson's support -- you know, Donald Trump when he lost the lead to Ben Carson in Iowa is when he attacked his faith, insulted Iowa's voters. And I don't think that's going to pay dividends for him. Now he's losing his lead nationally. You mentioned the Quinnipiac poll, he's down to one point. That's a seven-point loss from the September poll. He's now behind Ben Carson in our Real Clear Politics average for the first time.
So we're seeing sort of Trump decline here. And he's reacting to it the way he's reacted to it in the past which is to lash out at his closest competitors. But I just don't know if that's going to pay dividends for him this time.
COSTELLO: All right. So before we go on, I want to get this out of the way since it's blown up big online. Trump re-tweeted a tweet showing a Swastika next to the Bush family. We're going to put it up on the screen in just a second. And then there's another one, looks like a collage of images on this tweet. There's another one with Jeb Bush wearing a sombrero next to a cactus.
The Trump camp says this was re-tweeted by Mr. Trump like hundreds of others. He did not see the accompanying image and the re-tweet has since been deleted.
I can't really believe I'm talking about this. What's your thoughts?
BEVAN: I don't think this is a big deal. You know, it's a re-tweet. Donald Trump has re-tweeted other stuff. It's been seen as offensive and politically incorrectly. And I don't think -- they deleted the tweet so they said he didn't see the image. It's hard to really say. I mean, look, this just goes to show that Donald Trump is a master of manipulating the media and social media in particular. He's always on Twitter, he's always re-tweeting, you know, favorable comments, derogatory comments about other candidates. His latest poll numbers. So this is just one of thousands of tweets that he's done. I don't know that it's going to be -- amount to much in the end.
COSTELLO: OK. So let's go back to Donald Trump attacking his opponents. Namely Marco Rubio. Let's talk about Marco Rubio this time. He's now at 14 percent in that Quinnipiac poll. So Mr. Trump called Senator Rubio over rated and criticized his credit card debt. Here is how Rubio responded on "GMA."
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. MARCO RUBIO (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Ultimately I have one debt in the world. I have two debts in the world actually. The mortgage on my home and the fact that America, I owe so much to this country because of everything it's made possible for me and my family.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: OK. So in my mind that was a pretty good answer from Marco Rubio. But in this political season I'm -- who knows what's effective and what's not?
BEVAN: I agree. I think Rubio is -- he's been shown to be quick on his feet. He showed that at the last debate. He can parry these sports of attacks pretty effectively, I think. He did a good job this morning. But what I do think, though, is we are going to -- Marco Rubio is getting his close up now. He's up five points in that Quinnipiac poll we mentioned earlier. He's rising in polls nationally in some of these early states.
And so he is now drawing the attention not only of Donald Trump and some of his other competitors like Bush. But at the national media and there is a lot that they're going to sift through including this credit card issue that he had down in Florida and other things.
[09:10:07] So I think Marco is in for -- he's in for an interesting close-up here that's coming as he's been rising in these polls.
COSTELLO: All right. Tom Bevan, thanks for joining me. I appreciate it.
A stunning twist in the investigation into the shooting death of beloved Illinois police officer that sparked a massive manhunt. Officials tell CNN that the death of Lieutenant Joe Gliniewicz's was likely a suicide and not a homicide. Authorities will hold a news conference in less than two hours promising to reveal the, quote, "conclusive results of the investigation."
Deborah Feyerick has been following this story. And I was shocked.
DEBORAH FEYERICK, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes. I think a lot of people were shocked. And you have to remember the climate in which this happened. Just a week earlier a sheriff's deputy had been shot and killed at a gas station just outside of Houston. And so the fact that another police officer was down just days after that really sort of riled the nation, hundreds of officers swarming to Fox Lake to search for three men, three killers believed to have gunned down Lieutenant Joe Gliniewicz. Turns out that may not have been what happened. Lieutenant Gliniewicz shot two times wearing a bullet proof vest. No sign of a struggle.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
FEYERICK (voice-over): Breaking overnight. A bombshell development in the shooting death of Fox Lake Police Lieutenant Joe Gliniewicz, killed in early September. This morning Illinois law enforcement officials expected to announce they believe the 52-year-old officer committed suicide, dying from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. This a departure from the initial theory that the army veteran and father of four was gunned down by at least one of three male suspects after he chased them on foot. LT. JOE GLINIEWICZ, FOX LAKE POLICE: This is Lieutenant Gliniewicz.
I'm out near the old concrete plant checking out two male whites, male black.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: 10-4. Do you need a second unit?
GLINIEWICZ: Negative, dispatch. 6740. They took off toward the swamp.
FEYERICK: This is Lt. Gliniewicz's radio call from that fateful day. Minutes later he requests back up before radio communication drops off. The backup team later finding his body 50 yards from his squad car. Authorities say the 30-year veteran of the force was shot twice with his own service weapon.
Gliniewicz's death prompting a massive manhunt in northern Illinois. Hundreds of officer, dozens of K-9 units and a handful of aircraft combing the wooded area for weeks, leaving the small community stunned. No one was ever arrested. The coroner saying he can't rule out a homicide, suicide or accident.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FEYERICK: And the search had been suspended after just a new few days. The lieutenant buried. A big funeral. Thousands of law enforcement from around the country attending.
And, Carol, there were a couple of things that really complicated the investigation. First of all there was DNA that was found at the crime scene. They didn't know who it belonged to. It wasn't the lieutenant's, it wasn't anybody in the criminal database. So they were actually testing other officers to see whether in fact the crime scene had been contaminated.
Also there had been an internal investigation of the police department. The police department was really in turmoil. One of the chiefs had actually been put on paid administrative leave and then simply outright resigned and so they had new leadership. And this is all going on at the same time. And we do know that Gliniewicz actually met with the mayor just the day before his death asking him to continue a program he ran for teenager who wanted to get involved in law enforcement.
COSTELLO: So why would he allegedly commit suicide?
FEYERICK: Well, you know, his wife doesn't believe it. His wife doesn't believe it. She says he -- this was somebody who was making plans. He was eligible for retirement. He was retiring. He was looking for other jobs as police chiefs in other areas. And so she said, and we do have a sound from her, that this just wasn't in his character.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MELODIE GLINIEWICZ, LT. JOE GLINIEWICZ'S WIDOW: I wholeheartedly believe he was murdered. UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: And to say otherwise?
M. GLINIEWICZ: Is disrespectful. Hurtful. Irresponsible.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: The coroner said maybe it's a suicide. How did you take that?
M. GLINIEWICZ: There was a lot of anger.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FEYERICK: And you have to keep in mind that if it's a suicide, the widow will lose her husband's pension. She will not be eligible for death benefits. So there is really a lot at stake. We don't know what was going on but we do know there was a big internal investigation at the police department. So we're hoping to hear more later from officials and from the coroner as well, who has the final say.
COSTELLO: All right. Deborah Feyerick, we'll check back. Thank you.
Still to come in the NEWSROOM, a 9-year-old boy gunned down in a Chicago alley. Now a devastated family is pleading for answers.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Put the guns down, please. You're taking too many young lives. Please.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[09:18:59] COSTELLO: In Chicago, a heart-wrenching plea from a mother whose nine-year-old son was gunned down in an alley. Police say they'll work around the clock to try to find the killer of Tyshawn Lee. His mother is begging anyone with information to come forward.
CNN's Jason Carroll is here. He's following the story.
What can you say?
JASON CARROLL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: You know you look at his face there. It's really heartbreaking. And his face has really become a symbol for so much of the violence that's been plaguing the south side of Chicago.
His name was Tyshawn Lee. You can see him there in his yellow shirt as he was on his way to school. He was shot Monday late afternoon on Chicago south side, not far from his mother's home.
Area detectives, I can tell you, Carol, are basically working two possible theories. One was Tyshawn was walking down the alley at about 4:15, and came upon a fight or conflict and was simply in the wrong place or the wrong time. Or two, that he was the intended target. Police are not ruling out
the possibility that he was targeted due to some sort of alleged gang activity involving someone in his family.
[09:20:06] His mother as you can imagine devastated by the loss. Urging an end to the gun violence and urging anyone who knows anything at all about her only child to call police.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KARLE LEE, TYSHAWN LEE'S MOTHER: Please come forth and find whoever did this to my baby. Oh my God, I love my son. Oh my God. I'm going to miss him. He was supposed to play ball. That's what all he liked to do is play ball and play his video games. He ain't hurt nobody. I don't know why this had to happen to him.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CARROLL: It's very difficult to watch. It's just heart-wrenching. You know, she talked about he used to say, when he grew up, he was going the take care of her, take care of the family, how much he loved to play basketball.
Again, police asking anyone with anything to come here. And something that's interesting here -- the "Chicago Tribune" is actually been keeping track of how many people have been shot so far this year due to gun violence. It's really sobering. So far this year, according to the "Chicago Tribune", 2,578 have been shot so far this year in that city.
COSTELLO: Jason Carroll, thanks so much.
In light of that we have to talk about this some more. Let's bring in CNN law enforcement analyst Art Roderick. He's also a former assistant director of the U.S. Marshals Office. He joins from Washington.
Good morning.
ART RODERICK, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Good morning, Carol. How are you?
COSTELLO: You know, what kind of monster shoots a kid like that?
RODERICK: Obviously, our prayers and thoughts go out to Tyshawn's family. But if this is related to some type of gang violence, then a line has been crossed here. And that line generally is, you know, you don't harm children. You don't harm mothers and you don't harm grandmothers.
Now, if that line's been crossed, then this could be the beginning of some horrible violence that could escalate very easily in Chicago. And there are ways to stop this type of violence, some strategies that have been used in the past.
And as horrible as these murders are, and the numbers, as you look at them, as was stated earlier, this isn't the worst. It almost runs on 20 years cycles.
If you look at 1974, they had over 700 murders in Chicago. In 1994, they had over 900. So, although the numbers are lower here, when you hear cases, these anecdotes like this -- and of course this isn't the first child shot but it seems to me this child was targeted since he was shot multiple times.
COSTELLO: So, I'm going to ask you for answers, knowing there are no easy answers, is it a cultural problem? Is it a police problem? Is it a gun problem? What is it?
RODERICK: I think it is all of the above. In the '90s, when this was occurring not only in Chicago, not only in Chicago but in several other cities, to include D.C. federal law enforcement got together with state and local law enforcement at the behest of governors and mayors and we actually put together an operation in D.C. where we were able to shut down 300 crack houses and make several thousand arrests over period of about ten peeks.
Now, this operation cut the murder rate down in Washington D.C. by 21 percent during that time period. So, that type of strategy could work here and other cities around experiencing this rise in the homicide rate. But, obviously, it takes funding and it takes people to be able to look at proactive policing instead of reactive policing.
COSTELLO: Art Roderick, thanks for your insight.
RODERICK: Thanks.
COSTELLO: Still to come in THE NEWSROOM. More clues on that deadly Russian plane crash. How the injuries of those onboard could explain what happened.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[09:28:31] COSTELLO: And good morning. I'm Carol Costello. Thank you so much for joining me.
Investigators expanding the search area in the deadly commercial airliner crash in Egypt. This comes after reports that the plane's tail was found three miles from the rest of the wreckage. That same tale was repaired following a 2001 accident, prompting speculation it could've played a role in bringing the plane down.
In the meantime, forensic experts tell Russian newspapers that they have discovered two forms of injuries to the victim's bodies. Those in the front of the plane show trauma from the fall. While the passengers in the back show metal shrapnel in their bodies.
So, what does that mean?
Let's talk about that with CNN safety analyst and former FAA safety inspector, David Soucie.
Welcome, David.
DAVID SOUCIE, CNN SAFETY ANALYST: Good morning, Carol.
COSTELLO: So, what do those injuries mean?
SOUCIE: Well, it is pretty typical to see in an in-flight break up different types of injuries based on how the aircraft had come apart. But this is kind of interesting. There is some reports that there was metal inside the bodies. And that is pretty rare actually, other than specific injuries from shards of metal, that sort of thing.
So that is pretty specific information that we'll look forward to getting more details about. But a lot of clues with these bodies, that's for sure.
COSTELLO: So why would the people in the back have the shrapnel in their body and not in the front?
SOUCIE: Well, basically it tells us is where the break occurred in the fuselage itself. It could either be from some kind of bomb or something on board, but more likely it's from the shrapnel from the aircraft being torn apart.
