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White House Denies Trump Called War Dead "Losers" and "Suckers"; U.S. Marshalls: Suspect in Fatal Portland Shooting Killed During Attempted Arrest; Aspiring American Writer Unwittingly Lured into Russian Plot; Facebook's Nick Clegg Discusses Facebook Working to Right Misinformation Ahead of November Elections. Aired 11:30a-12p ET

Aired September 04, 2020 - 11:30   ET

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

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[11:30:00]

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I came here to go to that ceremony and to the one that was the following day, which I did go to. I said I feel terribly. And that was the end of it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN KING, CNN ANCHOR: It sounds very persuasive when you listen to the president of the United States.

I want to read some of his words: "So I went and I called home. I spoke to my wife and I said I hate this."

His wife, the first lady of the United States, Melania Trump, was on the trip. She was not at home. She was with him in France. She was supposed to go with home to that cemetery.

So when the president says things, John, that are frankly not true, I should say, Admiral, that's, again, when you say something is up here.

REAR ADM. JOHN KIRBY, CNN MILITARY & DIPLOMATIC ANALYST: Yes, his story is very difficult to believe, not just based on prior lies that he has made about other things, but simply the voracity of it.

Look, if a commander-in-chief wants to go visit a cemetery for American war dead, there -- they are going to make that happen, however -- however it has to be, whether it's air or car. There's a way to make that happen. And other presidents have done it in difficult times as well.

But it's not just the lack of veracity in his word, John. It's the way that he's treated the military and Gold Star families since he's become president, the derision and disrespect, willingly using them for political purposes.

And then the way he's treated Gold Star families, in particular, the Kahn family, and others, with total almost contempt. That's what makes this so difficult to believe in terms of his

denials.

KING: Admiral Kirby, Francesca Chambers, appreciate it very much.

We'll continue to cover the story. Again, the president said it didn't happen. It would be really nice if we did here from General Kelly or General Dunford. They could clear it up in a nano second.

Thank you, both.

Still ahead for us, the suspect accused of killing a right-wing activist in Portland has himself been shot and killed by police. What he said in an interview that aired shortly before that encounter.

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[11:36:30]

KING: A man wanted for a fatal shooting during a Portland, Oregon, protest is now himself dead. The suspect killed by police as they tried to arrest him in Washington State.

CNN's Lucy Kafanov is there at the scene in Lacey, Washington.

Lucy, explain what happened.

LUCY KAFANOV, CNN REPORTER: John, 48-year-old Michael Reinoehl was allegedly involved in the shooting of Aaron J. Danielson last Saturday. Danielson was a supporter of the far-right group known as Patriot Prayer.

We know that Portland's police issued a warrant for Reinoehl's arrest on Thursday. Because he was either living or located in Washington, across state lines, they needed to get the U.S. Marshalls involved.

They sent a fugitive task force to try to apprehend him. They tried to do this peacefully when this incident took place.

Now, we just got a new statement from the Thurston County Sheriff's Office, who are leading the investigation. They said that Reinoehl tried to flee from officers from the apartment building behind me, actually.

They say -- and I'm going to quote from the statement -- "During the attempt to apprehend him, shots were fired at the suspect in the vehicle, and he fled from the police on foot."

The sheriff's office adds that, "Additional shots were fired at the suspect, and he was later pronounced dead at the scene."

Now, the timing of this is a little bit unusual because, as this arrest warrant was issued, as this team moved in to apprehend him, "Vice News" aired an interview with Reinoehl, where he appeared to take responsibility for the shooting of Danielson.

He said that he did this in self-defense because he and a friend were about to get stabbed.

Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MICHAEL REINOEHL, MURDER SUSPECT SHOT BY POLICE DURING ARREST ATTEMPT: I had no choice.

(GUNFIRE)

REINOEHL: I mean, I had a choice. I could have sat there and watched him kill a friend of mine of color. But I wasn't going to do that. You know, that was the straw that broke the camel's back.

Lots of lawyers suggest that I shouldn't even be saying anything. But I feel it's important that the world at least gets a little bit of what's really going on because there's been a lot of propaganda put out there.

UNIDENTIFIED VICE REPORTER: You feel that it was totally justified?

REINOEHL: Totally justified. Had I not acted, I am confident that my friend and I'm sure I would have been killed because I wasn't going to stand there and let something happen.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAFANOV: Now in that same interview, Reinoehl said he went down to downturn Portland to work, quote, "as security" after seeing the caravan of hundreds of President Trump supporters roll through the streets of downtown.

He says he is 100 percent anti-fascist but denies being a formal member of any such group.

The big concern now, John, is how folks are going to react to this. You have heightened tensions in Portland, heightened emotions on both sides, both the far right and far left.

Saturday marks the 100th day of protests in the wake of the killing of George Floyd. We've seen people on the streets nightly.

A lot of concern that this could lead to more tensions -- John?

KING: That's a very warranted concern.

Lucy Kafanov, very grateful to have the live reporting on the scene of this latest drama. Thank you so much.

[11:39:28]

Up next for us, how an aspiring American writer was unwittingly lured into a Russian plot.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) KING: It seemed like a miracle, or at least a piece of extraordinary good luck, an offer to write for a new online publication not long after losing his job because of the coronavirus.

Aspiring writer, Jack Delaney, jumped at the opportunity, not knowing he was being used, according to the FBI, in a new Russia propaganda operation aimed at interfering in the 2020 election.

CNN business reporter, Donie O'Sullivan, is here with the details.

It's literally feels like a spy novel.

DONIE O'SULLIVAN, CNN BUSINESS REPORTER: Hey, John. Yes, that's right, it does. Jack Delaney was over the moon when he heard from an editor from what looked like an independent and legitimate left-wing news Web site. But all was not what it appeared to be.

Have a listen.

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JACK DELANEY, FREELANCE JOURNALIST: The message was, you know, saying, hey, we like your work. We've seen your work before. Would you like to write for us? Would you like to be a part of our publication? We can offer you about 200, 250 per article.

And at that time I was like, sound like a food opportunity for me. I can make money, get my work published.

[11:45:01]

O'SULLIVAN: It must be quite surreal to hear about this and say, oh, my god, I'm -- am I part of a Russian disinformation campaign?

DELANEY: Yes. Totally surreal. I was completely unwittingly doing it. I had no idea they were linked to the Kremlin or anything.

You know, obviously, if I had known, wouldn't have done that. But, you know, I mean, it seemed like -- it seemed legitimate from what I saw.

I'm obviously no fan of Putin or Russian government. So it's -- it was concerning. Obviously, you know, I -- I don't want to have any association with an authoritarian regime.

So it was -- it was -- I can't put it in any other words, like it was one of the strangest experiences of my life.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O'SULLIVAN: And you might wonder, John, you know, why would Russia go to the trouble of doing this. It's all about adding fuel to the fire and inflaming existing divisions here in the United States, using real unwitting Americans to make it seem all the more credible.

This particular Web site, it was a left-wing Web site. And it was using the sort of tactics that we saw the Russian troll group use in 2016, which was essentially trying to split the Democratic vote, attacking Joe Biden, Kamala Harris from the left, accusing them being basically too conservative to be Democrats.

For its part, the people behind this Web site posted an anonymous post after Facebook and the FBI revealed this earlier this week denying that they were Russian trolls.

The Russian government has not yet responded to this.

But, John, as we know from U.S. intelligence officials here in Washington, Russia is trying to interfere in this year's election. And they are using social media to do it.

And this is just one of the examples of the tactics that they are using.

KING: Donie O'Sullivan, as always, grateful for the reporting. Very important that we keep reminding people of what's happening out there.

And Facebook says it's working harder this election cycle to identify foreign actors and remove or flag misleading information.

The CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, says the social media giant now also working to stop the spread of misinformation about the voting process and the integrity of that process. Because, with a surge in mail-in voting, it could take several days to fully count ballots.

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MARK ZUCKERBERG, CEO, FACEBOOK: There's, unfortunately, I think, a heightened risk of civil unrest in the period, you know, between -- between voting and a result being called or after that.

And I just think that we need to be doing everything that we can to reduce the chances of violence or civil unrest in the wake of this election.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Still, there are many critics who say Facebook simply isn't doing enough.

Joining us now is Nick Clegg, the vice president of global affairs and communications at Facebook.

Mr. Clegg, grateful for your time.

Let me pick up where Donie O'Sullivan was talking, first, about this tip from the FBI about this Russian group that was pretending to be a left-wing media site essentially.

Can you talk to me about -- without, you know, taking us too far behind the curtain. I know there's sensitive intelligence matters involved.

Is there communication with the FBI and other law enforcement officials about foreign interference, is it far superior now than it was four years ago?

NICK CLEGG, VICE PRESIDENT OF GLOBAL AFFAIRS & COMMUNICATIONS, FACEBOOK: Yes, I think it's transformed out of all recognition.

In 2016, Facebook didn't remove a single foreign network seeking to interfere in elections, both in the U.S. and elsewhere.

Over the last two to three years, we've removed about 100, about 12 of those related to Russian organizations, including the IRA, the one that was involved that was in Donie's piece earlier.

And we -- I think the -- the thing that is really equally transformative is that we work hand in glove with other -- with other tech companies in the same sector so we share intelligence, we share data.

And so -- because, you know, almost always these kinds of interference network don't play out on Facebook. They play out on Twitter as well and YouTube and so on.

And so the level of cooperation across the industry, the scale of things that we're blocking.

And just to give you an example of how we're getting better and better at getting these and identifying and removing these networks earlier, I think in the case of the network that was just described in your piece, the English-speaking page, I think had only about 200 followers.

So it had almost no meaningful impact whatsoever because we were able to get at it early.

But it doesn't mean, that, you know, we're complacent. And it doesn't mean that there aren't attempts being made that ourselves, intelligence services and other parts of the industry are not yet aware of.

But the level of cooperation and the amount of the resources going into it. I mean, Facebook is a company, over the last year or so, that now spends -- new invests billions of dollars into integrity security, not least to safeguard the integrity of our elections.

[11:50:01]

To the amount, the amount that is now invested, and that's about slightly more than the total revenues of the company when it was floated back in 2012. So that shows a huge shift in resources and technology, personnel and efforts to do a lot, lot better this time than happened in 2016.

KING: Let's try to go through some of this. We heard Mark Zuckerberg talking about the fear of civil unrest if we have a delay between Election Day and certified results.

A lot of that fear is a lot of people in the town I work in, Washington, is that the president of the United States will declare victory on election night if he's leading in the vote in some states but they haven't counted millions of mail-in ballots and it could be some time.

CLEGG: Right.

KING: If the president of the United States, if he is the one spreading misinformation, if he says, I have won the election, stop counting ballots, it is a rigged system, what will Facebook do?

CLEGG: So, firstly, what we are going to do is, starting very soon, at the top of the feed, millions of Americans will see on an almost daily basis huge amounts of very granular detail of the voter information center, not only explaining exactly the deadlines for mail-in ballots, when to fill them, when they have to send them, when they have to be received.

Because as you know, the rules differ from state to state and county to county.

But crucially, also, seeking to accustom American voters through the voter information center at the top of their feeds, in Instagram, as well, to the idea that they will not take the results soon. It might take weeks, days. It might take weeks.

But there is going to be a significant time lag --

(CROSSTALK)

KING: But will you --

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KING: Will you --

(CROSSTALK)

KING: Will you block the president?

(CROSSTALK)

KING: Will you block the president? Will you block the president? Take his content down, knock it down, forbid it, if it is wrong and misleading?

CLEGG: We'll do something very specific. If Donald Trump or anybody prematurely declares victory, we'll put a prominent label on the post, no one can miss it. You can't read the post without reading that label.

Saying that that's declaration is premature. And that we will provide people with the real result.

We're working with Reuters and others to make sure that our users, that our platform are not susceptible to people declaring victory without that being labeled and get the result when it's fully certified. KING: There's been -- there's a new policy announced that you can't

launch a political ad in the final week of a campaign. Facebook is not going to allow that because you know think there's enough time for people to fact-check it and the like.

But if I buy the ad 10 days before the campaign, it is OK. The current policy implies -- I'll call you a reform politician. You know how this works. You know what it's like to be on the end.

So if Nick Clegg is running for office, and he's a working-class guy, he's the candidate of the working people. If I, in the last week of a campaign, I buy an ad.

But 10 days out, I can buy an ad that says Nick Clegg is lying to you, he's on the take of the billionaires, he drives out to the countryside on the weekend and shoots bunny rabbits.

Why would that not be taken down as false, no matter when I buy it?

CLEGG: So, look, the reason we have put the guardrails in -- and by the way, they're part of a sort of bunch, about 10 ten extra measures, including a tightening of voter suppression policies that will lead to more posts being taken down.

We have taken, by the way, a number of posts down from the president himself, not least -- and just recently, last month, about a post about COVID, which we have taken down.

So we remove content when --

(CROSSTALK)

KING: But people see -- forgive me for interrupting. Forgive me for interrupting. But people see a double standard there actually. But you mentioned that point.

And good for Facebook. The president said something that's not true about COVID and children whether or not children --

(CROSSTALK)

KING: So you take down the medical information, which is good. But political junk can stay up. Why? Seems like a double standard. If it is not true, it is not true.

CLEGG: Let me explain. Let me explain. Let me try to explain why that's not a double standard. We take stuff down where we think there's a very clear and imminent harm to people.

Around COVID where we feel that information will lead to people being -- believing that COVID is not serious or a hoax.

Or in the case of voting, if there's a clear falsehood about where, when and how to vote, which will lead to people forfeiting their right to vote. What we do not eliminate, but in some cases, we do, if it is from

PACs, super-PACs. We fact-check it. Or in other cases, we will label a post from Donald Trump -- just yesterday, about mail-in voting.

In those other cases, we don't want to eliminate -- I don't think anyone wants us to -- eliminate legitimate, often aggressive, hyperbolic debate about different voting methods. That's happen -- it is as old as the hills in America and elsewhere.

We cannot, as a private company -- by the way, not a single tech company I'm aware of fact-checks or vets politician speech at scale with any precision. No one does for the simple reason, all politicians exaggerate their own virtues and exaggerate the vices of their own opponents. All politicians indulge in caricature, hyperbole, exaggerations and selective facts.

[11:55:09]

The idea that a private company can vet everything that comes out of a politician's mouth as absolutely gospel accuracy is not something that any tech company has tried.

We, on the other hand, have removed a huge amount of content where it poses real harm. We have 70 fact-checkers around the world who fact- check, not politicians themselves but a lot of political organizations.

And we put these new guardrails in place at the very end of the campaign so no one can run an ad which hijacks the whole campaign unchallenged at the very last minute.

KING: Nick Clegg, appreciate your time today. I hope you'll come back. This is going to be an issue obviously for the election. And a lot of people kicking the tires. And we'll give you a platform to explain it. And we may kick back a little bit, too, as we go through. But that is part of the process.

Appreciate your time, sir.

CLEGG: It is.

KING: Thank you.

CLEGG: Thank you.

KING: Thank you very much.

And before we go to break, more than one million people in Africa have been infected with the coronavirus. And experts warn that number might be much higher because of low testing and a struggling health care system.

Anderson Cooper tells us what three "CNN Heroes" are doing to slow the spread of the virus across Africa.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST (voice-over): These "CNN Heroes" are hard at work, temporarily transforming a business to provide and push for safety measures in Ethiopia.

UNIDENTIFIED "CNN HERO": We have produced over 50,000 clothes masks to help out the most vulnerable women and children in our community.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED "CNN HERO": And I speak out to the need to wear mask and social distance.

COOPER: Bringing medical care and crucial awareness to remote areas of Kenya.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED "CNN HERO": There's a lot of misinformation that it's a disease that's not going to come all the way to the rural areas. Information sharing is a number one key.

We set up all the billboards on the entry ways covering the messaging around COVID-19.

COOPER: And providing supplies and protective gear to those that need it most in Cameroon.

UNIDENTIFIED "CNN HERO": We focus today, International Express Coalition (ph), due to the crisis in Cameroon. We focus to orphanage. And I hope this will reduces the number of people that die due to coronavirus. That's my dream.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: That's remarkable work.

For more details on the work these heroes are doing, go to CNN heroes.com.

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