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Producer Price Index Jumps 11.2 Percent Over Past Year; Interview With Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) On Subway Shooting, Guns; Inflation; Kids Of Kremlin Leaders Living Lavishly In The West; NYPD Arrest NY Subway Shooting Suspect. Aired 1:30-2p ET

Aired April 13, 2022 - 13:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:31:08]

DANA BASH, CNN HOST: A key inflation measure just saw its biggest jump ever recorded.

CNN's Matt Egan is here now.

Matt, we've seen so many numbers, so many statistics coming at us. What everybody wants to know is, what does this mean for me, for my wallet, for how I pay for things?

MATT EGAN, CNN BUSINESS REPORTER: Yes, this report was really ugly, Dana, and it sums up just about everything that's wrong with this economy.

This measures prices that suppliers charge businesses. And for the fourth month in a row, prices were up by double digits. As you can see, that has never happened before in the history of this index, which started in 2010.

It's going basically straight up. And that's because weak demand -- I'm sorry -- weak supply due to COVID and the war has collided with really, really strong demand. And so prices have gone straight up.

For consumers, that means they're going to feel it. Businesses are passing on a chunk of these higher prices through everyday Americans. That means higher prices for energy, gas, heating, housing, the cost to rent, the cost to buy has gone up.

And food. We saw record price spikes on everything from chicken and salad dressing to baby food in the last 12 months. Really, really sharp numbers.

I asked Jamie Dimon, CEO of JPMorgan, if he's concerned about a downturn in the economy. He says he's not forecasting a recession, but it could absolutely happen.

He said he's concerned about three key things. High inflation, which we've been talking about. The Fed's efforts to cool off inflation. And of course, the war in Ukraine.

He said these are powerful forces. They will combine probably next year and no one really knows exactly how it's going to turn out.

BASH: We have all of this, which doesn't really add up to great news for consumers. There's a silver lining?

EGAN: The silver lining would be the fact that gas prices have cooled off, down two cents overnight, $4.08 a gallon. That is not cheap but it is moving in the right direction, down eight cents in the last week, down a quarter from a month ago. That's because they take -- gas prices take their cues from the oil market.

Now this is when the war started. You see oil prices shot up. But they have cooled down because the U.S. and its allies have released unprecedented amounts of oil from emergency reserves.

One key thing to watch is, in just the last few days, oil prices ticked back up. And we need to keep an eye on that. The higher oil prices go, the higher gas prices will go and the worse inflation will go.

BASH: Just real quick, why do we think that is?

EGAN: It's because China has started to relax some of their COVID lockdowns. And there's also more concern about Russia's supply of energy as Europe debates new sanctions.

BASH: Yes, a big raging debate.

Thank you so much. It's so important to explain what this all means to people.

EGAN: Thank you, Dana.

BASH: A lot of numbers.

[13:33:52]

A manhunt is under way right now for the suspect of the New York City subway shooting. And the attack is raising new concerns about mass transit systems across the country and just how vulnerable they may be. We'll discuss that next.

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[13:38:56]

BASH: U.S. Marshals are now joining the urgent manhunt for the New York City subway attacker.

And today, Mayor Eric Adams had this message for New Yorkers.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAYOR ERIC ADAMS (D-NEW YORK CITY): We're going to prosecute whoever is responsible for this crime. Yes, it is a threat. And we're telling New Yorkers, we want you to be vigilant. If you see him, notify your authorities. But be extremely vigilant as you move around your day to day. We want this person apprehended.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BASH: And 29 people were injured in the attack, including 10 who were shot.

Joining me now is Democratic congressman from New York, Jamaal Bowman.

Thank you so much for coming in and talking with me.

You were at the White House on Monday when President Biden announced the new nominee to head the ATF and also to talk about new regulations for so-called ghost guns.

So you have that. You, of course, have Congress stalled, not the House but the Senate, on a host of gun control measures.

[13:40:00]

What more can you do, given the realities of what's going on in Washington?

REP. JAMAAL BOWMAN (D-NY): You know, we need to continue to apply pressure on the Senate to pass H.R.-8. And it's the Senate Republicans holding up this piece of legislation. The House passed it over a year ago and it's been sitting in the Senate not moving for over a year.

This bill, H.R.-8, would dramatically help with gun trafficking. It would close loopholes in terms of online gun sales, in terms of gun shows. It would close loopholes.

And it would stop and close the Iron Pipeline. Guns are coming into New York traveling from all over the country and are contributing to the crime increases we're seeing in our cities.

So we have to pass H.R.-8. Republicans need to move on this bill. And they should be held accountable if we don't pass that piece of legislation.

BASH: Which is about broad discussion. And it has to do with a lot of crime that goes on not just in the city of New York but across the country.

There's no evidence the gunman, who is still on the loose, got a gun or got the gun that they've now found, through a gun show or that he didn't have a background check.

It's obviously even more than what you're trying to do legislatively. The problem is so much deeper.

BOWMAN: Absolutely. There's evidence that the gun did come from out of state. Obviously, there's going to be more investigation into that.

But the question I always ask, why are people picking up guns in the first place? Why are they making that decision? What's happening to our collective psychology, mental health and well-being that's leading to an increase in gun crime?

So this is --

BASH: How do you address that? You can't legislate that.

BOWMAN: Right? So this not just about --

(CROSSTALK)

BOWMAN: -- the horrible attack that took place on a train yesterday. That person needs to be held accountable. And then we need to move forward.

But it's not just him. These are kids being killed in places like the Bronx and Mount Vernon and all over my district and all over the city and all over the country.

There's a sense of hopelessness within our communities. And that is where the gun trafficking is happening. It is coming into vulnerable communities. It's getting into the hands of vulnerable people.

We have to deal with the vulnerability. We have to deal with the trauma. We have to deal with the poverty.

We have to deal with distress, especially considering a post-COVID country. People have been isolated. And they're dealing with so much over the past two years. So we have to deal with all of that as well.

BASH: It's a lot. It's obviously a multifaceted problem.

And you talked about the fact that this is not just obviously a one- off incident what happened in the subway yesterday. Even last night, in your district, which is not far from here, a 15-year-old girl was shot.

After you were elected, you told me that you wanted to see a, quote, "dramatic reduction in police," especially in poor communities. With the volume of crime that we've seen, even since we had that conversation less than two years ago, do you think that's appropriate?

BOWMAN: Police are one part of the solution. They are not the only part of the solution. Police cannot work in silos and in isolation. They have to work with clergy, with mental health professionals as well.

We have to do a better job of identifying young people who are at risk, people who are at risk, whether it's in the education system or whether it's through mental health or whether it's people who have been arrested for minor crime.

Once we identify and assess the needs of vulnerable people, how are we providing intervention? So we have to do a lot more when it comes to intervention and prevention.

Police respond often after the fact, after a crime has been committed. But what are we doing on the front end not just to stop gun trafficking but to deal with the issues that lead to someone picking up the gun in the first place?

I mentioned poverty. I mentioned trauma. I mentioned mental health. We still have an opioid epidemic happening in our country. So substance abuse is an issue.

It needs to be a holistic, systemic approach to what's happening in our community.

BASH: So you don't think that police forces should be reduced anymore? You're saying they should be redirected? How would you describe your position at this point, given where we are about police?

BOWMAN: So we often have police forces responding to mental health crises, right? And we often have police forces responding to things that are not violent crime.

There are other approaches to respond to mental health crises so someone doesn't end up dead when they shouldn't end up dead. There are other ways to respond to the variety of issues that are happening in our community.

So again, police are part of the problem. But they are not the entire conversation and they're not the entire solution to what is happening.

[13:44:57]

BASH: Before I let you go, in the last segment -- we talk every day about inflation and how it's affecting everyday people and in terms of the goods that they're trying to buy.

Based on what you're hearing from your constituents here in New York, what do you want President Biden to do more of?

BOWMAN: So we have to hold large corporations accountable because price gouging is a major part of inflation. We're seeing record profits happening not just with fossil fuel companies but with tech companies and many organizations --

(CROSSTALK)

BASH: You want more investigations?

BOWMAN: We want more accountability, right? That's why we introduced a bill, the Ending Corporate Greed Act, to hold corporations accountable for the price gouging that's happening.

And we're about to introduce another bill tomorrow to go at, not just large corporations but wealthy individuals who continue to profit off of COVID and what's happening with inflation.

BASH: Congressman Jamaal Bowman, thank you so much.

BOWMAN: Thank you so much for having me.

BASH: Nice to see you in person.

BOWMAN: Good to see you.

BASH: Thank you.

Up next, private jets, posh, Parisian apartments, designer fashion, these of the lifestyles of the kids of the Kremlin. Lifestyles that their parents claim to reject. A closer look next.

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[13:50:37]

BASH: It's a world of glitz, glamour, and world travel. The children of Putin and his top advisers are living lives of luxury in the West despite their parents modest salary. So how do the kids of civil servants live like millionaires?

CNN's Drew Griffin takes a look.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DREW GRIFFIN, CNN INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): As Putin's atrocities continue in Ukraine, he falsely blames the West and Europe for the war.

VLADIMIR PUTIN, RUSSIAN PRESIDENT (through translator): The whole planet is now paying for the West's ambitions and the West's attempts to maintain its elusive dominance.

GRIFFIN: Yet, his own adult daughters, sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury, both have reportedly owned property in the West, including this seaside mansion on the French coastal town of Biarritz.

JODI VITTORI, PROFESSOR, WALSH SCHOOL OF FOREIGN SERVICE, GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY: It's hypocritical to deride the West and their liberal values and then still rely on the West and their liberal values.

GRIFFIN: That hypocrisy -- criticizing the West while family members live in the West -- is shared by Putin's inner circle.

Kremlin press secretary Dmitry Peskov's unofficial role as Vladimir Putin's chief liar.

DMITRY PESKOV, KREMLIN PRESS SECRETARY: Russian military are not hitting civil aims, civil targets.

GRIFFIN: He spent his life in government jobs, official salary about $173,000 in 2020. Yet, has been spotted wearing a $600,000 watch, according to an anti-corruption group.

His socialite daughter, Lisa, went to a boarding school in France, interned at Louis Vuitton, and posted pictures of an enviable life in Paris, filled with fashion and glamour.

ELIZAVETA "LISA" PESKOVA, DMITRY PESKOV'S DAUGHTER (through translator): I consider myself a person of the world. I was born in Turkey, lived in France, studied in Russia and France. That is, I don't have any favorite country. I love each place in its own way.

GRIFFIN: So how does a family live like this on a Russian government salary? Lisa Peskova once wrote a tongue-in-cheek post, saying she's the daughter of the main billionaire and thief of the country.

The U.S. Treasury all but used the same language when they sanctioned her and other family members, saying they live luxurious lifestyles that are incongruous with Peskov's civil servant salary and are likely built on the ill-gotten wealth of Peskov's connection to Putin.

Peskova called the sanctions a "witch hunt" on Telegram, saying, "accusing family for enabling war in madness" and she's "proud to be Russian."

Jodi Vittori, Georgetown University professor, specializing in illicit state financing, says it boils down to Russia's current governmental system, kleptocracy.

VITTORI: A kleptocracy is merely a government that is ruled by thieves and where the policies and decisions made are on behalf of those thieves.

GRIFFIN: It's a similar story with Russia's foreign minister. Sergey Lavrov officially makes $142,000 a year. But the 27-year-old, who's been described as Lavrov's step-daughter by the British government, has been living a lavish lifestyle.

Her name is Polina Kovaleva. The anti-corruption foundation says she attended a British boarding school. Like Peskov's daughter, she's left a social media trail of exotic trips, filthy rich adventures, and high style across Europe and beyond.

And she reportedly owns a four million pound property in London, according to the U.K., where she's been sanctioned for "benefitting from association of those responsible for Russian aggression."

Though the accounting is almost impossible to trace, Russian anti- corruption investigator, Maria Pevchikh, is convinced the apartments, the mansions, lifestyles are the real salaries being paid to Putin's allies.

MARIA PEVCHIKH, HEAD OF INVESTIGATIONS, ANTI-CORRUPTION FOUNDATION: The system works in a way that's in order to keep those people that are willing to be the face of Putin's regime, like the ministers, they need to be incentivized. Their salary is not enough.

GRIFFIN: Georgetown's Jodi Vittori says the people in Putin's inner circle know it could all vanish in an instant.

VITTORI: He can turn on any of his regime at any time he so chooses. Your assets can be frozen. You can go to jail. Your family can go to jail. You could find yourself chased out.

So moving as much has you can out of the country also just makes sense. GRIFFIN (on camera): As for a response to this from the Kremlin, a spokesperson for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs tells us that neither Putin nor Lavrov have accounts in Britain or anywhere else abroad.

And as for the sanctions against Putin's daughters, a spokesperson told us this: "That Russia will respond without fail and will do so as it sees fit."

[13:55:05]

Drew Griffin, CNN, Atlanta.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

BASH: And some major breaking news just into CNN. Police have just arrested the New York City shooter.

CNN's Shimon Prokupecz is with us now.

Shimon is still doing reporting. Forgive me.

I'm going to go to Tom Verni, who is with us, our law enforcement analyst.

Tom Verni, this is just coming in. We don't have a lot of details except for the fact that we are told that this suspect has been apprehended.

What is your reaction? What are your thoughts as somebody who has done this kind of thing before?

TOM VERNI, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: It's a big sigh of relief if it's the guy we're looking for. But certainly, for the people of New York City, particularly those who ride the subway every day, to go about their daily lives.

People want to have a sense of security that they can ride the subway with relative safety and not have some maniac looking to slaughter them on their way to work or school.

BASH: Again, we are still waiting for details on how this went down.

Actually, Tom, stand by for one second. We're going to go to our reporter who has a lot of sources who can tell us what exactly went down and how this man was apprehended.

Shimon, if you can hear me, let me know what you're hearing --

SHIMON PROKUPECZ, CNN CRIME & JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I can hear you, Dana.

BASH: What you're hearing --

(CROSSTALK) PROKUPECZ: Right, Dana. So this happened just a short time ago in Manhattan in the St. Marks area. We're told by sources he was taken into custody by patrol officers.

These are officers just on regular patrol who saw him, a man fitting this description of Frank James, and they took him into custody. He is now being held at the precent there. And 1st Avenue is the information I'm receiving.

Just police officers who are on regular patrol seeing this individual and they took him into custody. I'm told they took him into custody without incident. There were no concerns.

So he's now in police custody, off the streets. And it is because of all of the information that has been out there that we in the media have been putting out there that has allowed the police and has assisted the police.

I can tell you that, this morning, there was a sighting of a man fitting this description.

Sorry, Dana, there's an ambulance going by.

But there was a man fitting the description of Frank James that someone saw. Took some photos of this individual not far from where police took him into custody.

So it seems that Frank James here was walking the streets freely. Almost nonchalantly. Maybe not realizing there was a manhunt for him.

So very good police officers on routine patrol see him, took him into custody and now he's over at the 9th precinct.

We're also waiting to hear from the police department. They were expected to have a 2:00 press conference. And obviously, now with this new information, this will likely get delayed.

But obviously, a huge sigh of relief for people here in New York City, for law enforcement, as they now believe they have the guy they've been looking for.

I can also tell you that, all through the night and into this morning, police officials from the U.S. Marshals, the FBI, other law enforcement officials were out scouring New York City.

They went to several locations to try and find him. They didn't find him. And he was just walking the streets like it was nothing and he was just taken into custody by these officers -- Dana?

BASH: Absolutely fascinating.

Thank you so much for that important report. A sigh of relief, indeed.

And, Tom, let me quickly get your reaction to what Shimon just said. That wasn't necessarily somebody in the public who was looking for that man because they saw the photos. It was police officers. And what does it tell you about the investigation, but maybe even more

importantly, the state of mind of this suspect?

VERNI: Well, you know, first of all, kudos to the officers for having a sharp eye. Clearly, this perpetrator's picture has been plastered all over the place and NYPD has been on heightened alert since this happened yesterday.

In a city like New York, where on any given day you have 8.5 million people that live here, you have another two to three million people that come in, that commute in for work as well as vacation here and they're here for business. So it's very easy to get lost in the mix of New York City, particularly in Manhattan.

[13:59:58]

You know, as Shimon was mentioning, the area that we're talking about is kind of the lower east side of Manhattan in the East Village, where St. Mark's Place is. That's a pretty populated area.