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Troops Begin Pullout from Syria; Colin Powell Speaks out about Republicans; No Deal in Sight as GM Strike Continues. Aired 9:30-10a ET

Aired October 07, 2019 - 09:30   ET

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

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[09:31:00]

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: There's a major shift in U.S. foreign policy this morning. A withdraw, this Trump administration has begun pulling U.S. troops from Syria's border with Turkey. Remember, that's where the U.S. has been fighting ISIS for years.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: The White House announced the withdraw late last night, clearing the way, essentially, for Turkish forces to invade the area. Turkey's target, Kurdish fighters, U.S. allies who worked side by side with our troops to defeat ISIS in the region. And I should note that Turkey views as terrorists. You can imagine how this will play out.

CNN Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr joins us now with more.

Barbara, you're learning U.S. commanders knew or at least thought this was coming?

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: They had really long anticipated that this moment might come, that U.S. troops might have to pack up and go because the Turks had been threatening to invade to conduct a military incursion across the border for months now. And it heated up. The president of the United States, Donald Trump, and the president of Turkey, Erdogan, spoke yesterday, and then the White House put out this statement saying the U.S. -- that the U.S. would be withdrawing its forces from this border region.

So there's a couple of things here. It would have been very difficult for U.S. troops to stay and support the Syrian fighters if they were fighting Turkey, a NATO ally, and not fighting ISIS. But deeper than that, there really is a nightmare scenario developing. These SDF Syrian fighters have been responsible for guarding -- safeguarding thousands of ISIS detainees inside Syria. If they now head north to fight Turkey, there is deep concern that ISIS detainees, tens of thousands of them, could be back out free in Syria. The region may become even more unsettled.

Poppy. Jim.

HARLOW: Wow. SCIUTTO: Barbara Starr, thanks very much.

Joining us now, Ambassador Richard Haass, who's former director of policy planning for the State Department and, of course, now the president of the Council on Foreign Relations. He's also author of the book, perhaps aptly titled, "A World in Disarray."

Ambassador Haass, thanks very much for coming on today.

I just wonder, where is U.S. credibility in the region with both its friends and its adversaries after abandoning the Kurds again? I mean they've done the bulk of the fighting against ISIS.

AMBASSADOR RICHARD HAASS, PRESIDENT, COUNCIL ON FOREIGN RELATIONS: This will reinforce, Jim, all sorts of doubt about American reliability, or the lack of it, the lack of an American response to the attack on Saudi Arabia, the lack of an American response when Iran shot down the missile, and now this.

What this is part and parcel of is what's seen as an American retreat from the Middle East and it didn't begin with the Trump administration, it began in some ways understand the previous administration when the United States didn't react to Syria crossing the red line of chemical weapons use. But adding all this together, the rest of the world is essentially saying, OK, Russia's involved in the Middle East, Iran's involved, but essentially now we don't really have to take American interests into account nearly as much as we used to.

HARLOW: This also comes after Turkey purchased Russian missiles, weapons, machinery, violating not only the NATO treaty, but, you know, violating U.S. interests, right? Is this essentially the Trump administration also saying, that's OK, we don't care, go ahead?

HAASS: Well, the Trump administration seems intent on selling Turkey advanced fighter aircraft.

HARLOW: Yes.

HAASS: But I don't understand, is I may -- I think what it tells you is a couple things. One is, Turkey really isn't an ally. Even if it's technically a NATO ally, they've got their own agenda. In this case it's an anti-Kurdish agenda. And even if that means that ISIS thrives, that's not their -- their priority. And this president and this administration are preoccupied with American exports. So if we can export some place, they're willing to set aside everything from humanitarian concerns to strategic interests.

SCIUTTO: Yes. It's remarkable.

And, listen, I want to talk about another topic, China.

An enormous reaction. An official with the Houston Rockets franchise tweets support for pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong and now he's got the weight of China coming down on him and against the NBA. Billions of dollars at stake here. [09:35:08]

I wonder -- and then, of course, he defeated -- he deleted, rather, that tweet.

HARLOW: Yes.

SCIUTTO: I wonder what you look at the reaction here, do you see American companies putting profits over values here once again when it comes to China?

HAASS: The short answer is yes. The NBA wants to expand internationally. China pushed back hard.

It also tells us just how sensitive Hong Kong is for China. How that plays out will have tremendous implications for the future of Taiwan, potentially even for the future of Xi Jinping's leadership. And the Chinese also know they can get away with this. They play hardball when American companies want access to this enormous market. They're more than willing to leverage that.

HARLOW: What does that tell the Chinese, as the Chinese delegation comes to the White House to renew these trade talks on October 10th? There is this, that Jim described, with China, and then there is also the president's call on China to investigate the Bidens last week when he made that on Thursday. So what are the Chinese walking into this time in the White House?

HAASS: My guess is they don't know. There's so many things coming at them they're having trouble figuring out what's the signal and what's the noise. If I were a betting man, which, of course, I'm not, but I would bet that ultimately, not now, but ultimately the United States and China will reach some kind of a trade deal, but it will be a narrow one. I won't resolve a lot -- all the basic problems between us, but it will get at a few of them.

SCIUTTO: Final question on North Korea, because you had talks fall apart again over the weekend, this after North Korea tested what appeared to be a missile capable of being launched from a submarine. This after a series of short-range missile tests, which the president has, in effect, okayed with his public comments here.

Where we stand after months of negotiations, three face-to-face summits between Kim and Trump, no progress on denuclearization, is it too early to call the president's approach here a failure?

HAASS: Well, I think it pretty much is a failure and, as you say, you've had several summits and we have we seen, the United States has put its exercises with South Korea on hold, its large exercises. North Korea continues to increase the size of its nuclear arsenal, improves the quality. It's testing its shorter range missiles from which it can learn all sorts of things. Sanctions are weakening. North Korea doesn't take any of our fire and fury threats seriously.

Essentially, I think they think that they've -- they've made it. They've achieved nuclear weapons status and they believe it's only a question of when, not if, the United States will accept it on a -- on a de facto basis.

SCIUTTO: That's a remarkable reality to identify there.

HARLOW: It's only Monday morning.

Ambassador Haass, we always appreciate your expertise. Thank you very much.

HAASS: Thank you. Pace yourselves.

HARLOW: Yes, here we go.

All right, only a handful of Republican lawmakers have been willing to stand up to the president over his recent behavior and conversations with foreign leaders. Former Secretary of State Colin Powell says his party needs to, quote, get a grip.

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[09:42:57]

SCIUTTO: The president's call for the People's Republic of China, an authoritarian state, to investigate the family of a former vice president, the response by some GOP members, he's not serious, meaning, you shouldn't take the president of the United States at his word.

HARLOW: Seriously. But at least one former cabinet member from the Bush administration, General Colin Powell, says his party needs to get a grip.

With us now, CNN legal and national security analyst Susan Hennessey, former NSA attorney, and Jackie Alemany, author of "The Washington Post's" "Power Up."

Good morning, you guys.

Let's listen to Colin Powell, if we could, for a moment. He had a great interview with Fareed Zakaria just yesterday.

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GEN. COLIN POWELL, FORMER SECRETARY OF STATE: The Republican leaders and members of the Congress, in both the Senate and the House, are holding back because they're terrified of what will happen to any one of them if they speak out. Will they lose a primary? I don't know why that's such a disaster, but will they lose a primary? And so they not -- they need to get a grip. And when they see things that are not right, they need to say something about it because our foreign policy is in shambles right now in my humble judgment.

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HARLOW: Jackie, he is on a sparsely populated island. His friends on that island, I guess you could call them Mitt Romney, Ben Sasse, Susan Collins, to an extent, but that's about it. Is that going to change? JACKIE ALEMANY, AUTHOR, "THE WASHINGTON POST'S" "POWER UP": I don't

even know if we can say that they're on that island yet.

HARLOW: Yes.

ALEMANY: I mean keyboard courage and the ability to put out a sound bite that's slightly critical of the president is a little different than actually eventually lodging a vote of impeachment against the president once that finally makes it to the Senate.

But Colin Powell's exactly right, there are -- the -- what you're seeing right now is GOP lawmakers taking into account strictly a political calculus. There is a fear that if they speak out, which they are fearful to do because of how much new -- how many new discoveries are being made on a consistent basis and how thin the White House talking points are, that they're really reluctant to parrot, that the president will then make them the subject of the Twitter tirade, the 60 plus tweets, one of the 60 plus tweets that we saw this weekend targeting those people, that, in turn, get picked up by conservative media and, you know, the right wing fringe and, you know, targeted towards Trump's base.

[09:45:18]

So we have yet to see a senator willing to potentially risk his political career in favor of -- of the truth or doing what might be, you know, morally right here.

SCIUTTO: Susan, help us out legally here because what Democrats are trying to do in the impeachment inquiry is lay out a legal argument by how this conversation with the Ukrainians -- and not just one conversation, but a series of things leading up to it, the delay in military aid, et cetera, amounted to an abuse of power here. Based on what we know so far, from a legal standpoint, how far along are they on that path? You know, because the president can claim, for instance, well, the two weren't tied --

HARLOW: Right.

SCIUTTO: Right, the aid and the help against the Bidens?

SUSAN HENNESSEY, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY AND LEGAL ANALYST: Yes, so I think the Democrats in the House have learned the lesson of sort of the Mueller investigation, which is to not get overly sort of focused on those very technical, statutory criminal elements. You know, of course a president can't be indicted. And that their fundamental task in whether or not the president has committed a high crime or a misdemeanor is something broader. They need to determine for themselves whether the president of the United States has abused his office and, yes, violated the law as part of that.

Now, there's a lot of focus on Republicans about whether or not the first whistleblower is -- you know, doesn't have firsthand testimony. What we do have now in terms of primary source documents is both that call memorandum or partial transcript that the White House released itself, shows Donald Trump clearly bringing up investigations of the Bidens, clearly linking it to some degree of support -- of American support for the Ukrainians.

Now, paired with that, we have these text messages that Kurt Volker has produced between various U.S. diplomats who, as this all was going on, were actually giving specific voice, saying things like, are we saying that a White House meeting is now conditioned on investigations? You know, saying that they -- these particular diplomats saying they thought it was crazy to condition U.S. support on -- U.S. support on the Ukrainians willing to provide political assistance.

And so already we really do have a very, very strong record, you know, not to support what we might think about as sort of a precise criminal charges, you know, but to support the basic claim that this is fundamentally bribery. This is the president of the United States asking a foreign party, a foreign country, to give him something in exchange for the execution of an official act, that he's doing so not as part of sort of a U.S. policy process, or doing it because he believes it's the right thing for the country, but instead on behalf of his own personal private interest.

And so I really do think that we already have a very, very strong record. One of the challenges that the House has to face right now is the record is so strong and yet there is also indication there might be even more. So whether or not they want to delay further or move ahead with the vote will be interesting to see.

SCIUTTO: And this White House and State Department stonewalling does it -- does it throw a monkey wrench into that very aggressive timeline prior --

HARLOW: Totally.

SCIUTTO: To get it all done by Thanksgiving.

Susan Hennessey, Jackie Alemany, thanks very much to both of you.

Striking GM workers now starting their fourth straight weeks on the picket lines instead of the assembly lines. And the union says talks are not looking good. There are a lot of big economic consequences to this. We're going to take you right to the scene.

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[09:53:12]

HARLOW: The GM strike is entering its fourth week. There is no end in sight.

SCIUTTO: This is significant. In a key swing state, lots of economic consequences. We're told negotiations between the UAW and General Motors took a turn for the worse this weekend.

CNN's Vanessa Yurkevich, she's in Detroit this morning.

Vanessa, they were pretty far apart at the start of this, right? So it sounds like they haven't made much progress. What are the key issues? VANESSA YURKEVICH, CNN BUSINESS AND POLITICS REPORTER: Well, hey, Jim

and Poppy.

They were hopeful that they may even come to a deal this past weekend, but negotiations completely fell apart this weekend, and that is not welcome news to these striking workers behind me.

We spoke to one woman, Jessie Kelly. She's a single mother. She was getting ready to close on her first home. She'd been saving up for it. And then this strike hits. Now her dream home is on hold. We spoke to her yesterday about how she's feeling.

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JESSIE KELLY, STRIKING GM WORKER: It's devastating. It's very hard. You just see your savings depleting every single day a little bit more and more.

The other day I had to go get a new rim on my car and I remember just that sinking feeling of, this is my whole strike check for this week is the cost of this rim.

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YURKEVICH: And these negotiations really fell apart this weekend because of one key issue, the union wanting to bring production back from Mexico to the United States. It's important because GM is slated to close four plants by the end of 2020, including this one here behind me. Also in 2020, the election. We know President Trump won Michigan in 2016, but we also know that autoworkers vote based on the economy and whether or not they have a job.

We spoke to many here behind me, Jim and Poppy, who say they're paying very close attention to these 2020 candidates, and they want someone who's willing to fight on their behalf and is also creating really important policy that they feel like will have their backs going forward.

[09:55:04]

Jim and Poppy.

HARLOW: Yes, and, look, the Trump administration is dealing with manufacturing job losses over the last year in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. That is not a narrative they need in Michigan, as well. But, of course, the focus is on the workers and what this all means for them each and every day.

Vanessa, thank you for bringing us their stories.

All right, so there is now a second whistleblower who says the president is abusing his power, and quickly the White House is dismissing that person.

SCIUTTO: CNN and "The New York Times" are hosting the fourth Democratic presidential debate. It's live from the battleground state of Ohio. That's next Tuesday night, October 15th, 8:00 Eastern, only here on CNN.

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