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Shocking New Video Shows Capitol Hill Chaos; State Capitols Brace for Possible Violence; Biden Team Outlines Plans for First 100 Days; Biden to Sign Executive Orders on First Day in Office; Washington D.C. a Fortress Ahead of Biden Inauguration; Russia Detains Kremlin Critic Alexey Navalny on Return to Moscow; Australian Open Tennis Players Frustrated by Quarantine. Aired 4:30-5a ET

Aired January 18, 2021 - 04:30   ET

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

[04:30:00]

ROSEMARY CHURCH, CNN ANCHOR: It is shocking in its chaos and rage. New video gives us a fresh insight into just how bad the riot on Capitol Hill was. A reporter from the "New Yorker" shot the images we were about to show you as rioters walked into the Senate chamber looking for elected officials. A warning that the video does contain profanity. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNKNOWN: Where the fuck are they? Where are they?

UNKNOWN: While we're here we might as well set up a government.

UNKNOWN: Hey, let's take a seat, people. Let's take a seat.

UNKNOWN: I don't see Nancy Pelosi.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHURCH: Security officials are desperate to avoid a repeat of scenes like those, both in Washington and across the country as inauguration day looms. Last week an FBI bulletin warned of possible armed protests at all 50 state capitols. CNN teams are on the scene at state capitols across the country. And as CNN's Josh Campbell reports from Michigan's capital, officials are taking no chances.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOSH CAMPBELL, CNN SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: What you see behind me are military personnel patrolling American streets. These are members of the Michigan National Guard. They are here outside the state capitol. That following this FBI warning that we've been reporting on about potential armed protests in all 50 states. They've left nothing to chance here, a massive security posture.

Let me show you what the capitol looks like now which is similar to what we saw earlier in the day. You can see not a soul in sight. Is a very desolate here, no protesters. There was a small group out here during the day, about 25 protesters including some self-described members of the so-called "boogaloo movement" that have been on the radar of law enforcement, but no violence, no instigators.

We talked to a police official about what went into the planning and why this perhaps ended without a massive presence? Take a listen.

FIRST LT. MICHAEL SHAW, MICHIGAN STATE POLICE: So we wanted to make sure what happened in Washington did not happen here in Michigan. So we put a lot more security outside, a lot more visible security than normally would be there. Naturally, we always have security here, so it's not like a big change. But we wanted to make sure that people that wanted to come out and exercise their first amendment, rights of that was their choosing, were able to do so peacefully.

CAMPBELL: Now when it comes to why they didn't see a large number of protesters, it's worth pointing out, that security officials are saying that it may be this large presence of personnel out here that served as a deterrent. Perhaps people didn't want to come out and engage in violence and then to get arrested by authorities.

It's also worth noting that this wide net that the FBI has cast across the country after the January 6th Capitol attack arresting so many people could have also served as a deterrent. The feds saying if you were part of instigating violence, they will be looking for you.

Finally we've also been reporting that prior to today there were messages on some of these online messaging boards that are frequented by extremist groups that were actually warning people to boycott protests today saying this may be a trap by law enforcement. They wanted people to come out so they could take them into custody.

A lot of theories out there as to why we didn't see these mass protests. But law enforcement tells us that doesn't mean this security posture is going away any time soon. A state official that we talked to said that they are continuing to conduct an intelligence assessment. That will then dictate how long we will see U.S. forces patrolling American streets, especially up to the inauguration of the new president, Joe Biden.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Martin Savidge at the Georgia State Capitol in Atlanta. There was an overwhelming show of force. You had armored vehicles and police cars parked right on the capitol steps. National Guard troops, capitol police, even state police all heavily armed. And streets nearby, not just closed but barricaded using dump trucks to protect from people ramming through. In the end, only a handful of protestors showed up. So the show of force clearly worked but the wide open question remains, what happens next?

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DAN SIMON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Dan Simon in Salem, Oregon. And aside from a few libertarians, who say they are neither pro-Trump nor pro-Biden, things remain quiet here at the state capitol. Although we should point out that the Governor Kate Brown has activated the National Guard really to be on standby in case things do get unruly.

[04:35:00]

We should also point out that in Portland which was the scene of unrest over the summer in the wake of George Floyd's death, the FBI has set up a command post there to field any intelligence or tips should things get out of control there. But from what we understand, things remain peaceful.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CHURCH: And Joe Biden won't be wasting any time of course once he's sworn in as president on Wednesday. A memo from his chief of staff indicates Biden will sign about a dozen executive orders on his first day alone. Those orders will include rejoining the Paris climate deal and ending the controversial travel ban on predominantly Muslim countries. He'll also move to halt evictions and student loan payments during the coronavirus pandemic.

And Biden has also outlined some ambitious aims for the first 100 days in office. For more let's bring in CNN's John Defterios. He joins us live from Dubai. Always good to see you John. So is there a risk here, the bar has been set too high by the president-elect due to the state of the pandemic?

JOHN DEFTERIOS, CNN BUSINESS EMERGING MARKETS EDITOR: Yes, I think so, Rosemary, both domestically and internationally. But Joe Biden did pledge during the campaign and then after elected with those results finalized, he'd be a man of action.

I think the priority list has to be, and let's take a look, that $1.9 trillion package here, stimulus package. I don't think it will remain that big by the end of the negotiations. But that is the ambition. It's still filled with a lot of COVID-19 measures, including 100 million vaccinations -- that is ambitious -- in the first 100 days. And then finally, $1,400 on the stimulus check added to the $600 in December -- it's something we've talked about in the past -- takes it to 2,000. Again, can he get the Senate Republicans to buy in? While at the same time Biden trying to appease the progressive side of his party.

There is a lot built into the package and this nuance of trying to keep the business community backing him as well. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and Business Roundtable like what Joe Biden has put forward so far, but they want to see it completed and pro-business. So this is a juggling act by Joe Biden.

Internationally you talked about it, Rosemary, the Paris climate agreement. It's worth bringing up again because of John Kerry's weight behind this as a special envoy and a member of the national security council. You know, the U.S. pulled out of it before and everybody was shocked as a result of it.

The Muslim travel ban was in place in early 2017, adjusted a few times. It'll be exed out by Biden. And from my standpoint in the business community, trade relations very important. The foreign minister of France said over the weekend, Biden should suspend the sanctions to the European Union. And you can't imagine life in the way it is today between the United States and China. The relationship in tatters, the tit-for-tat sanctions going forward. I can't imagine it will stay that way going forward.

And Rosemary, I didn't even bring up the World Health Organization or the Iran nuclear deal. Joe Biden will be extremely busy and has to measure this out as he goes forward.

CHURCH: Yes, multiple crises, multiple challenges. We'll see how he goes. John Defterios live for us from Dubai. Many thanks.

And we are joined now by Inderjeet Parmar. He is a professor of international politics at City University of London and a visiting professor at London School of Economics. Thank you so much for being with us.

INDERJEET PARMAR, PROFESSOR OF INTERNATIONAL POLITICS, CITY, UNIVERSITY OF LONDON: Good morning. Very happy to be here.

CHURCH: So the U.S. is a nation on edge, counting down the days to an unprecedented inauguration, embracing for what most of us hope will be a peaceful transfer of power after the storming of the Capitol, but once Joe Biden takes office, he will need to hit the ground running in the midst of multiple crises. So how will he be able to do that?

PARMAR: Well, it's going to be very, very difficult for him, of course. He is inheriting all these crises as the pandemic, which is the kind of mother lode. But there's also the interruption of political violence as we saw on the 6th of January. But there is also the protest which broke out last year in regard to police violence and so on.

So, he's inherited a very large number of crises. And I think the kind of program that he is putting forward, which in the big picture is very ambitious to deal with all of those kinds of areas, plus the shape of the global system, I think that an ambitious agenda, it's the only thing that is likely to work.

But I think there are also barriers to it or at least hindrances, which could be to do with the makeup of the party itself, the Democratic Party and it's kind of broadly neo-liberal ideology but also the sort of donors that they have. And it's that tension between the necessity for radical change along the lines of a plan of the 1930s new deal and the political forces which are related to the Democratic Party over the last 40 years or so.

CHURCH: And as you mentioned, Joe Biden's agenda is ambitious.

[04:40:00]

He runs the risk of over promising and under delivering at a time when the country faces a pandemic, divisions, high unemployment and hunger for so many Americans, which is just ridiculous for the superpower. So how much can Biden achieve through executive orders, because he does pose and hope to sign a number of those? PARMAR: Yes, I think in domestic and foreign policy, the executive order has become a kind of a move of choice. When you look at President Trump and he has actually more than doubled executive order usage in his four years than pretty much George W. Bush in his 8th and Barack Obama in his 8th, and Bill Clinton in his 8th. And that's partly been because of the makeup of the Senate and the House.

But I think the national emergency in addition to executive orders can also be a very powerful tool in dealing with the pandemic and so on. The executive order is probably more effective in foreign policy, and there, there is a number of very, very quick wins which President Biden could mobilize on Iran, on World Health Organization, climate change, Paris Accord, Saudi arms sales, the war in Yemen, Cuba, perhaps, as well the North Korea, and whether they want to move towards a peace treaty.

So, the executive order is going to be a fundamental tool. The presidential proclamation, which is related to that, but I would say the national emergency, I think that will be very, very important as well.

CHURCH: And how much of a destruction would you expect the impeachment trial of Donald Trump to be as Biden tries to fulfill this ambitious agenda?

PARMAR: I wouldn't frame it as a distraction because I think it's actually tackling one of the fundamental problems of American democracy, of a crisis of democracy at this time. The fact of the behavior of the last administration, President Trump, but also his broader political faction and so on.

We're not looking at a truth and reconciliation commission so much as a reckoning of what led to all of that crisis on the 6th of January.

CHURCH: Well, Russia's top dissident returns to the country five months after an attempt on his life. But Alexey Navalny was barely on the ground before police arrested him. CNN is in Moscow with details.

[04:45:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHURCH: Well Germany is joining the U.S. and EU leaders in calling for the immediate release of a jailed Kremlin critic. Alexey Navalny is being held by authorities outside Moscow right now after flying back to Russia. And CNN's Frederick Pleitgen is in Moscow for us. He joins us now live. Good to see you, Fred. So Fred, talk to us about the latest information you have on Navalny's situation. What happened when he hit the ground?

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, well, I'll tell you what, Rosemary, it is a very fast-moving situation surrounding Alexey Navalny after his return here to Moscow and his immediate detention before even making it across the border into officially Russian territory. That latest that we're hearing is that he's still inside a detention

facility there in Khimki, which is in the north of Moscow. What we're hearing from his camp, is they say that so far, a lawyer and no one else -- no lawyer and no one else has been able to visit him yet. So his people have not seen him yet. they've not managed to speak with him yet. He has not managed to consult or see a lawyer yet either.

The other really big thing that apparently is happening right now, is that there's a hearing going on that apparently the Russian authorities called at the last minute with barely any sort of notice, where they're determining how long he will remain in detention until there is a trial for a fraud case that he says was politically cooked up in 2014.

So obviously, things moving very, very quickly here after what was a remarkable Sunday as Alexey Navalny's plane was supposed to land here in Moscow and got diverted to a different airport before he finally made it onto the ground. Here's what we saw.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PLEITGEN (voice- over): A final kiss, a final hug with his wife Yulia, and then opposition leader Alexey Navalny is led away by Russian security forces, detained shortly after landing at Moscow's Sheremetyevo Airport, his first time back in Russia in five months since he was medevacked to Germany in a coma after he was poisoned by the chemical nerve agent Novichok.

Shortly before his detention, Navalny is saying he is not scared.

ALEXEY NAVALNY, RUSSIAN POLITICIAN: (SPEAKING IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE).

PLEITGEN (voice-over): Everyone is asking me if I'm scared, he says. I'm not afraid. I feel completely fine walking towards the border control. I know that I will leave and go home because I am right, and all the criminal cases against me are fabricated.

When Alexey Navalny boarded the plane hours earlier in Berlin, Germany, he was still joking when addressing reporter.

NAVALNY: (SPEAKING IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE).

PLEITGEN (voice-over): Me, arrested? That's impossible, he joked.

But the events that then unfolded were remarkable. As Navalny was in the air, hundreds of his supporters and many journalists gathered at the airport where his flight was initially supposed to land. Scuffles broke out and riot police arrested several people.

Minutes before landing, the flight was diverted to another airport. Navalny is saying he believes the move shows President Vladimir Putin was afraid of his return.

NAVALNY: (SPEAKING IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE).

PLEITGEN (voice-over): This is not just the power of some despicable crooks, he said, but the power of absolutely worthless people that are doing some nonsense. They are jeopardizing the air safety of a wonderful big city. Why? Just so Putin can say who needs him?

An exclusive CNN and Bellingcat investigation implicated Russia's intelligence service, the FSB, in the plot to poison Navalny. The Kremlin denied involvement.

CNN chief international correspondent Clarissa Ward even confronted one of the agents alleged to be behind the plot.

CLARISSA WARD, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: (SPEAKING IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE)

My name is Clarissa Ward. I work for CNN.

PLEITGEN (voice-over): After he recovered, Navalny said he wouldn't give Putin the satisfaction of keeping him out of Russia, and he decided to return, knowing the threat of arrest was real as Russian authorities said he violated the terms of his probation in the 2014 fraud case, which Navalny says is politically-motivated.

Alexey Navalny never made it out of the airport. He will now remain in custody until at least the end of January, Russian authorities say.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

[04:50:00]

PLEITGEN (on camera): And again, Rosemary, of course now things moving very quickly here in Moscow as that hearing is now underway to determine how long initially, he will remain in detention. We're just hearing from one of his allies as well who's saying that his camp only got about a minute's notice before that hearing began. That hearing is ongoing right now. Of course we will update as soon as we hear any sort of decision or any other sort of information coming out of that -- Rosemary.

CHURCH: Yes, we are watching this story very closely. Frederick Pleitgen joining us there with an update. Appreciate it.

Well tennis players are stuck in quarantine ahead of a major competition in Australia. When we come back, how some are still getting their training in from their hotel rooms.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHURCH: Well, instead of preparing for the Australian open, frustrated tennis players are having to exercise and train in their hotel rooms. At least 72 athletes are being confined to their rooms for two weeks after people on their chartered flights tested positive for coronavirus. Though players are concerned about having to compete after the quarantine, organizers say the event will go ahead next month.

[04:55:00] And for more on all of this, I'm joined now by journalist Angus Watson. He joins us live from Sydney. Good to see you, Angus. So what more are you learning about this? And how are players reacting to having to train in their hotel rooms?

ANGUS WATSON, JOURNALIST: Well, there's a lot of upset among the playing group, Rosemary, as you can imagine. Because there are over 100 tennis players who will join the first round of the Australian open when it begins on February 8th and just 72 of them, men and women, will be forced into this quarantine arrangement in hotels.

Now everyone has to quarantine, but the people who were potentially exposed to the virus on these charter flights won't be allowed to leave their hotel rooms at all during that 14-day quarantine process. Other players will be allowed to leave their rooms for five hours per day to practice ahead of the start of the big competition.

So it's created a bit of an uneven playing field. In players including Novak Djokovic who's currently in quarantine in Adelaide, have said that the Australian government should make separate rules for these tennis players ahead of the big tournament to make sure they're ready to go. And the Australian government and the Victorian State government has said that that's just not going to happen. That there's one rule for everybody.

Because you see the context to this is, Rosemary, that there are 38,000 also Australians around the world who want to get back into the country and they're not able to do so because of limited spots on flights coming into the country and limited availabilities in quarantine when they get here, Rosemary. So Australians are happy to have the tennis players, but it means they need to follow the same rules -- Rosemary.

CHURCH: Pretty hard to train in a hotel room for sure. Angus Watson joining us live from Sydney, many thanks.

And thank you for your company. I'm Rosemary Church. "EARLY START" is up next. You're watching CNN. Have yourselves a great day.

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