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Search Underway For Missing Tourist Helicopter; 12 Killed As Plane Crashes 19 Seconds After Takeoff Aired; Anti-Semitic Attacks In NYC. 2-2:30p ET

Aired December 27, 2019 - 14:00   ET

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

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: That is it for me. Our coverage continues on NEWSROOM with Jessica Dean and that starts right now.

[14:00:09]

JESSICA DEAN, CNN HOST: Hi, I'm Jessica Dean, in for Brooke Baldwin this afternoon. You're watching CNN. Thanks so much for joining us. A desperate search is underway right now in Hawaii. The U.S. Coast Guard is searching by air and sea for a missing tourist helicopter, it disappeared off the coast of the Hawaiian island of Kauai the day after Christmas.

And aboard that chopper, the pilot and six passengers including two children. The helicopter is equipped with an electronic locator, but so far rescue crews have not received any signals from it. And according to the Coast Guard, the weather there is not helping their efforts.

CNN's Dan Simon is following this for us. Dan, what do you know? What's the latest on this search?

DAN SIMON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, hi, Jessica. This one appears to be a real mystery at this point. We have no information in terms of where that helicopter may be. We know that search and rescue crews are out on the water also flying above trying to see if they can spot any wreckage.

We know that the last communication from this helicopter happened at 4:40 in the afternoon, Thursday, yesterday there in Hawaii. This is about 40 minutes before that helicopter was supposed to land. This was routine communication. It had been flying over a canyon.

Keep in mind, these are very routine trips. They do them every day, these touring companies, where they take people above the various canyons and you get to see all of the sights of the island.

In terms of what's happening now, again, boats, they're in the water trying to see if they can spot anything. As we said the weather may have been a factor yesterday. It got pretty stormy, blustery winds and there was some rain. So whether or not that was a factor remains to be seen -- Jessica.

DEAN: And Dan, what do we know about the company that owns the helicopter. And you said this is something they do all the time. SIMON: Right. This is a family-owned and operated business. They

are called Safari Helicopters based on the Island of Kauai. And they've been in business for about 30 years.

And according to its website, all of its -- or at least most of its full time pilots have military experience. And you know, if you look at the various travel review websites, I can tell you that most people speak very highly of this business -- Jessica.

DEAN: Wishing them good luck with that search. All right, Dan Simon for us. Thanks so much for the update.

Investigators are trying to determine if a possible pilot error or a technical malfunction caused a deadly plane crash in Kazakhstan in Central Asia. The Bek Air Flight with nearly a hundred people on board had just taken off from the airport in Kazakhstan's largest city when it lost altitude barely 19 seconds later. It went down tearing through a concrete fence and hitting a two-story building.

The country's Deputy Prime Minister says the plane's tail struck the runway twice before that crash. At least 12 people were killed in the crash, dozens more were injured. Kazakhstan's President tweeted, "All airlines and airports of the country will be thoroughly checked as part of the ongoing investigation."

We get more now on this from CNN's Hadas Gold.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

HADAS GOLD, CNN BUSINESS REPORTER (voice over): The first images from Kazakhstan show first responders picking through a field of debris in frigid conditions. From this vantage point, it's hard to imagine anyone could have survived.

The domestic flight bound for the Kazakh capital had nearly 100 passengers and crew on board when it took off from the Almaty Airport. It was in the air for only seconds before crashing back to Earth plowing through a concrete fence before hitting a two-story building. The pilot died on the scene.

So far, the death toll has reached double digits. Dozens more including some children survived with a wide range of injuries.

Amongst the wreckage, the plane's fuselage still remarkably intact. There was also no fire reported which boosted the chance of survival for those onboard.

The aircraft operated by Kazakh carrier Bek Air was 23 years old. In 2009, the airline was banned from operating in the European Union over serious safety or airline oversight deficiencies, but was reinstated three years ago.

Experts say although the Fokker 100 twin-engine plane was old, it had a good service record. It's too soon to say what went wrong. But on Twitter, the Kazakh President warned those responsible would face severe punishment in accordance with the law. Local aviation authorities announced that all Fokker 100 would be

grounded nationwide until the cause of the crash is determined.

Hadas Gold, CNN, London.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

DEAN: New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio is ramping up police presence in several Brooklyn neighborhoods where there have been a string of apparent anti-Semitic attacks.

He tweeted this morning quote, "Hate doesn't have a home in our city," adding, "Anyone who terrorizes our Jewish community will face justice."

[14:05:06]

DEAN: This all comes after at least five incidents targeting Jewish residents in New York this week, a week that also happens to be the week of Hanukkah, the Jewish festival of lights.

CNN's Polo Sandoval joins me now and Polo, tell us more about these incidents going on right in the middle of Hanukkah.

POLO SANDOVAL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: And that's maybe what makes us even more heinous, too, right? You have a community coming together in peace and now, many of them are subjected to this kind of behavior in and around New York.

And so what we're monitoring here are multiple incidents that have taken place in the last several days. The latest one early this morning, three women reporting being slapped. And then also another incident that took place here just yesterday, a 42-year-old used her bag to allegedly strike a 34-year-old Jewish mother who was with her child at the time.

And then look at the timeline here, too, Jessica. At least four other incidents this week in New York City, all of them being investigated here by NYPD's Hate Crimes Task Force as possible hate crimes. Two of them on Christmas Eve and one of them, a beverage was thrown at a young man in Brooklyn as well as racial slurs that were yelled at him.

A 56-year old man was also approached while walking in Brooklyn and punched by several people, and then on December 23rd, two men both in their 60s in separate incidents, also subjected to this.

One of them racial slurs were yelled at him and the other, a 67-year- old man with two children approached in the lobby of a residential building and attacked there and then you really sort of look broader at the statistics that NYPD keeps here, and they're reporting that anti-Semitic incidents make up over half of the hate crimes that are reported to the NYPD. So there certainly is an issue here.

You have multiple officials who are calling this out for what it is and that is pure hate, including of course, Mayor Bill de Blasio who tweeted as you just said a short while ago saying that hat does not have a home in our city.

DEAN: Yes, and of course, he is ramping up police presence, as we noted, but there has been some criticism of his response, too.

SANDOVAL: Americans Against Anti-Semitism have spoken out, saying that they are not confident that the Mayor is perhaps doing everything that he could. What they want is more than just condemning these kinds of incidents. They actually want action in the form of an emergency declaration that would potentially allow them to tackle this issue at its core here.

But I think what you're seeing are communities in and around New York, certainly coming together with help from the Police Department as well, providing that kind of protection that's unfortunately needed right now.

DEAN: Yes. And you're looking at the December 23rd, 24th, 25th, all these days in a row. This is also just unfortunately, a part of a larger thing that's going on nationwide, really. We're seeing more and more of these incidents and you're talking to different organizations and talking to authorities.

Do you get the sense that this is something that is happening more and more? People becoming more brazen seeing an attack and trying to copycat? What's your sense about it?

SANDOVAL: We certainly have been here before. There is a concern about copycats. We continue to get reports about more and more of these kinds of cases.

But I think for the last several years as we hear from experts, they do believe that you have many people, if you're more emboldened to be able to act on this kind of terrible sentiment.

So I think that what we're seeing now is officials really trying to take a stand here, and of course, the community itself as well saying that there is no place for this kind of behavior.

DEAN: Right, right. All right, well, Polo Sandoval. Thanks so much for the update. We appreciate it.

A New York teenager questioned in the stabbing death of a Barnard College student has been released from police custody without charges. The 14-year-old boy was taken into police custody in connection with the December 11th murder of freshman, Tessa Majors.

But authorities says charges against the young boy and another teenage suspect could still be filed and that the investigation remains very active.

You'll remember Majors was fatally stabbed at a park near her campus. A third teen has already been charged with second degree murder in this case, and he told police he and two other people went to the park to rob someone.

Meantime, Bernard sister school, Columbia University also in New York is investigating a series of racist robo calls sent to some faculty and staff. Administrators say those calls came from an unidentified white supremacist group and were related to the Tessa Majors case.

President Trump is headed into the New Year fuming. It seems he cannot get enough of Nancy Pelosi. He can't get her out of his head venting his fury, even as the rest of the country tries to take a Holiday break.

Plus the President's other targets include "Home Alone 2," his false claims about being cut out of that movie.

And the Holiday break is over for candidates on the 2020 campaign trail. How the Democrats are turning to a topic once off limits -- their personal lives.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:18:00]

DEAN: It's been exactly one week since President Trump went on vacation and for seven consecutive days, he has been taking swings at Democrats and the impeachment process on Twitter through Christmas Eve, Christmas Day.

Now, today comes this, the President quoting a commentator who accuses Democratic leaders of rigging the impeachment trial that's to come in the Senate.

The start date for that trial remains unknown since House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is delaying handing over the Articles of Impeachment to the Senate amid concerns Republicans will not oversee an impartial trial. But it could happen as early as the first full week in January.

On Tuesday, January 7th, the House will go back into session and members could vote on impeachment managers and then send the Articles of Impeachment over to begin a trial on Wednesday, January 8th. That could happen -- could.

Let's turn to CNN's Sarah Westwood. Sarah, the President begins now his second week at Mar-a-Lago and your hearing he has made some decisions on who would defend him once that trial date is established?

SARAH WESTWOOD, CNN WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: That's right, Jessica. That's something that the White House has been considering for weeks now and Pat Cipollone, the White House counsel, he has long been slated to take the lead role in presenting the President's defense.

But sources tell CNN that President Trump has been quizzing aides and advisers on whether they believe Cipollone is ready for the pressure of a televised trial. That's because President Trump, he is not just interested in being acquitted by the Senate, he wants to be vindicated.

He wants to have his symbolic day of court when it comes to that Senate trial. And so he is placing just as much a premium on the theatrics of that trial as the fact that he is likely to be acquitted by Senate Republicans.

Sources also tell CNN that President Trump is considering roles for some of his favorite conservative defenders in the House. People like Congressman Jim Jordan, Mark Meadows, some of those Republicans were at the White House just before the President left for Mar-a-Lago Meeting with Cipollone about that role. It would potentially involve them presenting a minority response to the Democrats.

[14:15:06]

WESTWOOD: The House managers who have yet to be named by Pelosi would present the Articles of Impeachment. Now, President Trump here at Mar-a-Lago is growing increasingly agitated about the uncertainty surrounding the details of the Senate trial. He is caught in a standoff between congressional Republicans and Democrats as Speaker Pelosi continues to withhold those Articles of Impeachment.

But as impatient as President Trump is, Jessica, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is showing no signs of buckling to Democratic demands, meaning that it's an indefinite wait until we see what the parameters of the Senate trial will be and just when it will start.

DEAN: Yes, we'll see how it all shakes out. Sarah Westwood for us. Thanks so much.

And let's open this up to conversation now. We have CNN presidential historian, Tim Naftali. He is an associate professor at NYU, Matt Wagner, Graduate School of Public Service, and CNN contributor Frank Bruni, also an op-ed columnist for "The New York Times." Guys, thanks for being with us.

Frank, let's start with you. Even if Nancy Pelosi hands over those Articles of Impeachment tomorrow, right now, Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell are at this impasse on how to run this trial. Do you see any chance of a Senate trial happening as soon as January 8th, like we were talking about a little bit ago?

FRANK BRUNI, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: I mean, we're all guessing here. I find that a little bit hard to believe. And, you know, we're all at a disadvantage, because this is the only third time the nation has gone down this route. This is only the third time we've had a trial like this, and so it's hard to kind of say, well, here's how it's gone before and so here's how it may go.

This is also turning out to be very different from the last time around when Bill Clinton was impeached and then tried in the Senate, and you had a rather quick and complete bipartisan agreement on the rules of procedure. We're in a very different place now, and so we don't know what's going to happen because there really isn't precedent for what we're seeing right now.

DEAN: Yes, it does -- it really reminds you just kind of how the territory is so uncharted at this point in so many ways. McConnell actually weighing moving ahead without the support of Chuck Schumer by just going to the floor on a rule that would be approved in by just a simple majority, 51 senators, and sources are saying McConnell prefers though to cut a bipartisan deal with Schumer that he would prefer to do that.

Tim, if McConnell did go ahead, though, without Democratic support, how unprecedented would that be?

TIM NAFTALI, CNN PRESIDENTIAL HISTORIAN (via Skype): Well, this is the first time that the -- that Congress has been divided between the parties in an impeachment crisis.

Each time before, the same party has controlled both Houses of Congress. This is one reason why we've never seen the Speaker of the House withhold the Articles of Impeachment to put pressure on the Senate to write better rules. So that's a huge difference. It's never happened before in U.S. history.

The second issue, the second difference is that the Republican Party is very different. Leader Trent Lott in 1998-1999 had real differences of opinion with the House managers. The House managers were Republican, but he did not want them to make a mockery of the Senate.

So he had an interest in working with Tom Daschle, who was the Democratic Minority Leader. Mitch McConnell seems to feel much more comfortable with the antics of House Republicans, which gives him one less reason to deal with Chuck Schumer. It would be unprecedented if he didn't deal with Chuck Schumer, but he might very well go back down that route.

DEAN: Yes, we'll see which way it goes. Obviously, though, that reporting that he would prefer to cut a bipartisan deal. McConnell has already rejected though Schumer's request to bring forth the Trump officials, the ones you see there to testify. But I'd like for you to listen to Republican Congressman Mike Johnson today. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. MIKE JOHNSON (R-LA): If we look at precedent in the procedure, what happened in 1999 in the Clinton impeachment trial, is that both sides put on their cases. They called them opening statements, but that was the rules agreed to 100 to zero.

They put on their cases. There were questions asked by the Senate and then they decided which witnesses to put on. We have to cross that bridge when we come to it, and I think that's what Leader McConnell is suggesting should happen. I'm not sure why Schumer would oppose it since he voted for that in 1999.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DEAN: And Frank, if they end up with no witnesses, not allowing witnesses, how do you think that impacts the credibility of the trial moving forward?

BRUNI: Well, I think it impacts it greatly, but I think we're at a moment in America right now, where almost everybody has made up their minds along politically tribal partisan lines.

And so I'm not sure how much credibility there ever was going to be, and I don't think you have an audience here, whether we're talking about the senators or whether we're talking about the American public, you don't have an audience with a lot of open minds.

I just want to say, though to the senator, the clip you just showed he is being quite disingenuous when he says that all McConnell was saying is let's agree on some general rules, and then we'll deal with the question of witnesses.

He is completely leaving out of the picture the fact that McConnell has said, I want to run this trial in coordination with the White House and it is essentially said, you know, I see this is a partisan procedure, and I'm on the White House's side. I'm not an impartial juror.

[14:20:00]

BRUNI: And so to kind of trust Mitch McConnell, who is a very different Senate Majority Leader than Trent Lott was back in the Clinton era, to trust Mitch McConnell to just kind of address a question honestly, a little bit down the line, if you can just let it go forward. That is quite disingenuous.

DEAN: Yes, it was interesting to hear from Lisa Murkowski earlier this week when she was saying that she was concerned about their coordination between the White House and Mitch McConnell.

And there's also been people speaking out on both sides of the aisle saying you all on both sides need to be impartial jurors before we get to this.

Tim, I'm interested just because of your history as a presidential historian, we know that advisers had expressed concern about all this free time that President Trump was going to have in Florida to talk to friends and formal advisers who are outside the White House, which is not something that applies just to President Trump.

A lot of staff or aides and their principals worry about when they start talking about people outside of their advisers. How have previous Presidents used their Holiday breaks, obviously, as I think has been the theme of our conversation today, we're just kind of in an unprecedented situation.

But how have previous Presidents use their Holiday breaks? How is that kind of differing from what President Trump is doing now and how he operates?

NAFTALI: Well, there are Holiday breaks and there are Holiday breaks. I mean, this is a Holiday break in the middle of an impeachment crisis.

DEAN: Right.

NAFTALI: And one of the things we've seen from past impeachment crises is that Presidents try to look very presidential. Bill Clinton got very busy with -- he was interested in the Middle East peace before. He got even busier.

Richard Nixon also went to the Middle East. Richard Nixon went to the Soviet Union, though it wasn't a Holiday break. So Presidents generally speaking during the impeachment crises become more presidential.

They want to show the American people that they're actually not distracted by the impeachment. President Trump has done the opposite.

DEAN: Yes. It is interesting -- and Frank, quickly before we go, your column right before Christmas, you did a riff kind of "On the Night before Christmas," and you wrote of President Trump, "So why then all his thrashing? His howls of dejection? It was just a performance for the next election."

And interesting to Tim's point there, so many other people during -- the other two during impeachment got more presidential. Do you think President Trump's actions around the impeachment talk and everything are all kind of a performance for the 2020 election?

BRUNI: A hundred percent. He is portraying himself as a martyr. He is going on and on. I mean, you saw it in the tweets about Nancy Pelosi just in the last 24 to 36 hours.

He is using this as another juncture, as another stage to say, I'm uniquely persecuted by the powers that be in Washington. I'm a disrupter, whom they don't want disrupting the system, and you are just now seeing like the kind of apotheosis of my persecution in Washington, and you should take careful note of it, he is saying to his base and to his voters, and you should punish these Democrats in the next election.

DEAN: Yes, it's going to be very interesting to see what 2020 brings. Frank Bruni and Tim Naftali, thanks so much for making time for us today. We appreciate it.

NAFTALI: Thank you.

DEAN: Thanks. Well, the scene lasted only seven seconds, but Donald Trump is speaking out about his "Home Alone 2" cameo hitting the cutting room floor on Canadian television.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KEVIN MCCALISTER, FICTIONAL CHARACTER, HOME ALONE: Excuse me, where's the lobb?

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Down the hall and to the left.

MCCALISTER: Thanks.

(END VIDEO CLIP) DEAN: The country's national public TV network, Canadian Broadcasting

Corporation recently aired an edited version of the 1992 hit Christmas movie and President Trump's cameo was nixed for time as were some other scenes in the movie.

But because it's 2019 and we're just going to have to, of course, this is how this has gone, the omission has caused quite the social media uproar.

CNN's Daniel Dale is here to explain the dust up and why Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's name is now being dragged into it. Daniel, how else to end 2019 but with this story.

DANIEL DALE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It is perfect, and I'm happy to help us as a resident Canadian.

DEAN: Thank you. Yes.

DALE: Here is what happened. CBC acquired the rights to this movie in 2014. It's about 120 minutes long. They decided to cut about eight minutes for time to fit in commercials. Seven seconds of that, as you said, was Mr. Trump's brief cameo.

People have been complaining since 2014 about CBC cutting various scenes from this movie unrelated to Trump, like hey, CBC, you got rid of the turtledove exchange. You got rid of Kevin going swimming.

So people have been unhappy about this. But it was only really this year that people started vociferously complaining about Trump being eliminated during a politicized climate. And some people were joking about this, but others took this very seriously.

For example, the President's son, Donald Trump, Jr. went on a rant about it on Instagram. He also tweeted about it, saying that it's crap. It's bias. It's an example of the left-wing media the Trump administration has to defeat.

And then it made its way to the President himself. And in the President's tweet, he suggested, he may have been joking, it's not exactly clear, but he suggested that Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau might have had something to do with this, that this edit might have been some kind of revenge for Trump going after Trudeau about trade and about NATO.

Now, I had to contact the Prime Minister's Office about this. They declined to comment, naturally. CBC though issued a statement saying, look, we cut movies. This movie was cut in 2014.

[14:25:10]

DALE: This cameo had nothing to do with the plot, and so this is a tempest about something that people didn't even notice when it first happened.

DEAN: Yes, I think you hit the nail on the head. We just live in such a partisan climate now that something that happened in 2014 for time can turn into something totally different and be read in different ways by different people.

What do -- any thoughts on what the President's reaction to all of this tells us about kind of where we are?

DALE: I think the fact that he mentioned it at all suggests, as we know that he cares about little slights. He is a person who has been sort of gleefully motivated by people mistreating him or in his view, mistreating him for years and years.

I'm hesitant to come to a conclusion now because it's not clear to me how tongue in cheek or how serious his tweets actually were.

DEAN: Right. Right. Well, here we all are talking about it. Daniel Dale, thank you for always fact checking for us. We appreciate it.

DALE: Thank you.

DEAN: 2020 candidates are back on the campaign trail after the Holiday break, and President Trump's team is also back at work. See what they're trying to do to win the Latino vote.

We're also going to go back to the Bahamas where months after being hit by Hurricane Dorian, the struggle there is far from over.

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[14:30:00]