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"Unabomber" Ted Kaczynski Dead At Age 81; Trump Facing 37 Counts In Detailed Indictment; Trump Becomes The First Former President To Be Indicted; Cuba To Allow China Spy Facility On Island; Cuban Government Denying That China Is Placing Spy Base In Cuba; Trump On Campaign Trail As Indictment Unsealed; Trump Hits Trail As Indictment Roils 2024 Race; Widow Demands Answers; Says Police Did Not Respond To Her 911 Call Until After Her Husband Was Found Dead; Helping The Homeless Find Permanent Housing. Aired 2-3p ET

Aired June 10, 2023 - 14:00   ET

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

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[14:00:00]

FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN NEWSROOM ANCHOR: Hello again, everyone. Thank you so much for joining me. I'm Fredricka Whitfield.

And we have this breaking news. Ted Kaczynski, the man known as the Unabomber, has been found dead in his prison cell at the age of 81. CNN's Polo Sandoval is joining me right now with more details on this. Polo.

POLO SANDOVAL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: He had been recently transferred to a federal medical facility in mid-December, 2021 in Eastern North Carolina, the facility that houses prisoners with special medical needs. Though it's unclear the circumstances of the 81-year-old's death, he had been transferred there, again, in 2021, from Colorado's supermax where he was about two decades into serving eight life sentences after his 1998 guilty plea admitting to sending a series of mail bombs. Some 16 devices in all which killed three people, wounded 23. His reign of terror spanning about 17 years starting in 1978 up until his 1996 arrest.

In fact, it was his own writings which is what led to the FBI -- led the FBI to the bombmaker's door, if you can call it that. We all know very well that primitive cabin that was more like a shack in Rural Montana, that was actually on display in Washington, D.C. I had the opportunity to see that myself multiple times. We remember the very basic nature, no plumbing, no electricity.

The circumstances of his death, again, it's still unclear at this point. Though we do understand, as part of that transfer a couple of years ago, that he had been in poor health. We have reached out to the Federal Bureau of Prisons right now to try to learn a little bit more. But, again, we can at least confirm now that serial bomber -- convicted bomber, Ted Kaczynski, known as the Unabomber, dead at 81 years old. Fred.

WHITFIELD: All right. Polo Sandoval, thank you so much for that. Let's bring in now CNN senior law enforcement analyst and former deputy director of the FBI Andrew McCabe. Andrew, I mean, this is bringing up a whole lot of memories about, you know, how Ted Kaczynski actually ended up, you know, in custody.

I mean, it was a great mystery for a very long time who was responsible for these, you know, homemade bombs, these explosions, which led -- I mean, which were deadly explosions. And then, ultimately, how investigators were able to piece it together. I mean, it really was an extraordinary mystery.

ANDREW MCCABE, CNN SENIOR LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST AND FORMER DEPUTY DIRECTOR, FBI: It really was. It's one of those cases that will go down in the history of the FBI as one of the most challenging and arduous investigations we mounted, but ultimately successful in 1995.

You know, we learned, of course, once we located Mr. Kaczynski and taken him into custody and saw the primitive conditions under which he was living, that's what made it so hard to really develop any effective leads for all those years. You know, he was so completely off the grid, really leaving no trace of himself in any of the traditional ways that people do. But fortunately, with the publication of his manifesto we were able to develop the sort of information from the public and specifically from family members that helped us crack the case.

WHITFIELD: And let's try to unravel some of that because he was living in a cabin. I mean, it was -- I mean, he wanted to be off the grid. That was his ambition. But what -- at least one of the bombings took place as early as in the '70s at a Chicago university, and then you also -- and it was a great mystery who was responsible for all of this.

He was off the grid, in a cabin, but perhaps his abduction, you know, or his arrest came, it was self-inflicted. I mean, he authored this manifesto. He sent it right to the FBI. Perhaps he thought he would continue to be mysterious, but then they were able to piece together any relations and use this as evidence, publish it, and it was his brother who ultimately would help turn him in, right?

[14:05:00]

MCCABE: That's absolutely right. So, Kaczynski started in the late 1970s with what began as a primitive, low-tech mail bombing campaign directed predominantly at universities and airline industry representatives and different airline-related targets.

Of course, in '79 he was able to get a bomb on an American Airlines flight that fortunately did not detonate, but it let off a great degree of smoke which alerted the pilots, and they were able to effect an emergency landing. There's no doubt that had that bomb gone off it would have taken the plane down and taken all those lives with it.

So, an incredibly focused, determined, resilient adversary, right? And somebody who was motivated primarily by his extremist positions with respect to the environment. You know, people today, we think about domestic terrorism, we typically think about it in very different contexts.

In the '80s and 1990s, environmental terrorism was a major program that was being worked by the FBI because we had extremist activity around people who objected to environmental development, and Kaczynski was really kind of at the forefront of those thoughts, not that he was a member of a group, at the forefront of that ideology and he pursued this bombing campaign as a way of striking back against technological advancement, which he believed was damaging the environment in ways that needed to be stopped.

WHITFIELD: Are you able to share with us some of the concerns that the FBI, that the attorney general at the time, you know, Janet Reno, had about whether they share this manifesto with the public, whether it would be used as an instrument, you know, to further agitate, you know, threats against the U.S. domestic terrorism, and at the same time what they were contemplating as to how it could ultimately be a tool to help capture the Unabomber?

MCCABE: Sure. You know, I'm aware of those deliberations and concerns only from the same way that, you know, you and your viewers are, from understanding the history of it. I actually came into the bureau in 1996. It was right as the case was kind of coming to its close.

Nevertheless, having been in many high-level meetings with attorneys general and FBI directors around these things, you know, I can only imagine the way that each possible impact of the causes of action that they were considering was micro analyzed to understand, are we making this issue worse if we give this person a platform, if we allow him to put his ideology out there, if it has an inspirational effect on other like-minded people? We could actually essentially be doing his job for him.

On the other hand, and as I understand Attorney General Janet Reno argued pretty strenuously, that this was our best shot of kind of shaking the tree as it were to try to identify the author of the manifesto, and that, to her credit, is exactly how it worked out. Kaczynski's brother and his wife became aware of the manifesto. They had suspicions about Kaczynski before the manifesto, but it was the manifesto that really put Kaczynski's brother over the threshold and motivated him to contact the FBI and say that he thought he knew about -- he knew who the author was.

WHITFIELD: What more, if anything, can you tell us about kind of the evolution of this criminal profiling that was kind of born at this time?

MCCABE: So, that's become a mainstay of the FBI. As you know, it's frequently captured in lore about the bureau in movies and TV series, things like that. But it's become one of the most relied upon assets in these particularly hard cases, cold cases, you know, bombing campaign like this one, multiple homicide cases that you believe are linked to the same perpetrator.

When investigators have really expended their well of effective leads based on forensics and crime scene evidence and things like that, they often turn to the behavioral scientists, the folks at what we call BAU, the Behavioral Sciences Unit, to try to assist in guiding them towards, if not specific people, populations of people that they should consider as possibly being, you know, individuals or groups of people that are -- that would be -- could be involved in that sort of activity.

[14:10:00]

It is truly a dark science, not something that I ever did when I was in the bureau, but I have great respect for the men and women who do that every day. I would expect that those same sorts of assets are being utilized to try to figure out who was behind the two bombs left on Capitol Hill on January 6th. That's a crime that continues to be unsolved and one that causes great concern in law enforcement for many of the same reasons that we saw in the Unabomber investigation, right.

These folks who are inclined to lash out with bombs that are either placed or sent through the mail, they often start out in rudimentary ways, but their proficiency and technology develops over time. They very rarely ever just stop engaging in these sorts of bombing campaigns. They very frequently come back to them time and time again. So that is a case that I'm sure is taking a lot of FBI attention right now.

WHITFIELD: And is -- among the pattern of events, is it the case that over time there develops this sort of bravado, and almost like a yearning for attention without being identified, to be praised that they continue to be so mysterious and then, suddenly, a mistake is made, like in the case of this manifesto, it ended up backfiring whereas he may have felt like he wanted to elaborate on motivation, that, in the end, is how they ended up getting him in part.

MCCABE: It's very true. You know, many of these long, you know, extended investigations over so-called cold cases with repeat offenders they develop almost a sort of dialogue with the investigators through their criminal acts. They want to kind of stay -- maintain the attention of the investigators, they want to constantly kind of outdo themselves.

It's a real, you know, catch 22 for law enforcement and for investigators. Every time they reach out through making contact or communications or engage in another criminal act, you have the opportunity of developing the clue or investigative lead that could lead you to their apprehension. But of course, every time they do that, the public is also at great risk. So, there's immense pressure on the investigators to being that back and forth, to bring that criminal activity to a halt before, you know, additional folks are injured or killed.

WHITFIELD: So, still unclear the cause of death. But he was 81. He apparently was moved recently in the -- within the past year from a facility in Colorado, federal facility in Colorado, to North Carolina for health reasons. How important will it be to publicly reveal the ultimate cause of death?

MCCABE: I think it's always important for the government to be transparent about what happens in the detention facilities. You know, to my understanding, there's no reason to believe, from what little we know about this situation, that there's anything untoward involved here.

He's obviously exhibited some sort of health problems in the recent past. He was moved to the facility in North Carolina, likely Butner, the federal prison hospital in Butner, North Carolina, is a place where many federal prisoners end up who have significant health issues. Bernie Madoff, I believe, was at Butner when he passed, as well.

So, I think it's very important for transparency reasons to fully understand the circumstances around the death, but I would caution speculation at this point. We don't have any reason to believe anything untoward happened here just yet.

WHITFIELD: All right. Andy McCabe, great to see you. Thank you so much.

MCCABE: Thanks, Fred.

WHITFIELD: All right. Still ahead, Donald Trump set to speak publicly for the first time since the Justice Department unsealed its historic indictment against the former president. What the federal charges mean, next.

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[14:15:00]

WHITFIELD: All right. Moments from now, Former President Donald Trump will give his first public address since this historic federal indictment came down this week. You're looking at live pictures right now from the Georgia GOP Convention where Trump is set to speak this hour.

And it comes just one day after the Justice Department unveiled stunning new details in its case against him. 37 charges in all, including 31 counts of willful retention of national defense information. Special Counsel Jack Smith alleging the former president took classified materials to his Mar-a-Lago, Florida, home, and then resisted government attempts to get them back.

We're also seeing new never-before-seen photos of the many boxes stored at Trump's residence from -- in the bathroom to the ballroom. The DOJ says some of the documents inside held some of this nation's most sensitive secrets.

CNN's Zach Cohen joining us with more on all of this. Zach, lay it all out for us how serious does it appear these charges are against the former president?

ZACHARY COHEN, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY REPORTER: Yes. Fredricka, these are very serious charges. And the fact that they're being brought against a former president means the decision to bring them wouldn't have been made lightly by prosecutors. But when you read this indictment, you see in very clear detail why they did decide to move forward, and that they believe Donald Trump not only retained sensitive documents that he was not supposed to have in the first place, but why he also obstructed government efforts to recover those documents when the FBI and the Justice Department asked for them back.

[14:20:00]

Now, these documents, the first 31 counts of this 37-count indictment deal with what's called retention of national defense information, and in the case of Donald Trump and the box of documents found at Mar-a- Lago, that includes information about U.S. nuclear programs, defense and weapons capabilities, potential vulnerabilities that the U.S. has to a foreign attack and how they might respond should they be attacked.

And so, this information came from multiple intelligence agencies. And as you said in the intro, it contains some of the most sensitive secrets and the most highly guarded secrets that our country has. Now, the other thing that they're trying to highlight in this indictment is where Trump kept these documents at Mar-a-Lago. As you said earlier, these were kept everywhere from the ballroom to a bathroom to a storage closet, and there's even one picture where a highly sensitive intelligence document that is reserved only to be shared with some of the U.S.' closest allies is spilled out on the floor of a storage room.

So, really, prosecutors making their case, laying out their narrative as to why they believe these historic charges should be brought against the former president.

WHITFIELD: All right. Zach Cohen, thank you so much.

Let's talk further on all of this, with me now, CNN senior political analyst and former adviser to four presidents David Gergen.

David, great to see you. I mean, unprecedented, there isn't a stronger word here, right? I mean, that's just the way it is. No one's seen anything like this before. So, from your perspective, how big of a test is this for this country and for the Justice Department?

DAVID GERGEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST AND PRESIDENTIAL ADVISER TO NIXON, FORD, REAGAN, CLINTON: It's huge. It's absolutely huge. And this is something Donald Trump has brought on himself through his recklessness. And, you know, he's now got himself not only in hot water, but he's hurt the country.

What kind of countries overseas are going to trust the United States with information from spies with any information that might be very vital to our security? What country is going to share those secrets if they think they're going to be leaked out? You know, if Donald Trump ever becomes president, how is he ever going to get people's reputation to come and work for him and the CIA or the State Department or the Defense Department or in the many other national security? And I must say, Fredricka, what surprises me, it wasn't surprising with reckless getting in, what is surprising is how incompetent he is in trying to get out of this mess. You would have thought that he would have been -- that as the prosecutors moved in and worked with such great care and diligence that Trump would have had phalanx of top flight lawyers waiting the moment when the indictment dropped. Everybody knew it was coming.

WHITFIELD: Instead, there's like abandoning ship actually.

GERGEN: And they're abandoning ship. You hear no arguments, it's just a lot of ranting, which -- what we may get in Greensboro or in North Carolina with his speech. But you would have thought there would have been a lawyer there -- lawyers who could put forward defenses.

Let me give you an example. The "Wall Street Journal" argues in its editorial today, and they have not been that cool on Trump as a newspaper, but they argue about the Presidential Records Act, PRA. That act gives access to ex-presidents to see classified documents. And they argue -- that would be argued by the defense. Well, where are the defense people?

Another example and then I'll stop. And that is, you know, we've heard about all these documents, but you know, the number of documents they're talking about so far could easily fit in one of those boxes. And yet, there are dozens of those boxes. What in the world is in all those boxes? Are there a lot of unclassified documents, you know, are they unclassified documents being mixed with the classified? That would help to give us some answers to the riddles that we have. But the president, for whatever reason, as I think has done a lousy job trying to defend himself.

WHITFIELD: Yes. And adding to the riddle is, you know, why. Why would this former president have wanted all of this in the first place, that is still unclear? Perhaps DOJ investigators know that and that's part of their case. But you mentioned trust. You know, why would, you know, this nation's allies now trust, whether it be he if he were back in office or the United States in general, you know, if nothing, you know, more serious is to come of this?

But why even with this evidence -- and again, innocent until proven guilty -- but why would the GOP, members of the GOP be so quick to vociferously support him not knowing all of the material that the DOJ has? I mean, there was this support before we were all able to read this 49-page, you know, document. What is at stake for the GOP, members of the GOP to continue to support him given what the DOJ has?

GERGEN: An enormous amount of reliance now by Donald Trump and his allies, to the extent that he has allies, upon the wisdom of the GOP because, you know, the House members, the Republican Party, have just teed off in ways. You know, the McCarthy statement was very strong, it's well-written, but it only added fuel to the fire when you would think that they would want to calm things down and say, let's keep things in perspective and so forth and so on.

[14:25:00] But look at the Senate. The Senate -- the Republicans in the Senate have traditionally been quieter in things like this that arise, but they're almost silent now. And Mitch McConnell hasn't said anything. So, what they say in the next two, three, four days is going to be important. But very, very important now what does this do? Does this turn the race upside down for the presidency? Does it make a big difference or does -- you know, things stay -- remains static within the polls? We just don't know that yet.

So, that's why it's going to be interesting to see what kind of crowds turn out here in the next 24 hours and what kind of arguments he makes. But you're right, the Republican Party's doing itself no favors right now. It's a party in decline.

WHITFIELD: So, there was the McCarthy statement and then there was the statement on video, live, coming from the former vice president, Mike Pence. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MIKE PENCE, FORMER U.S. VICE PRESIDENT AND U.S. REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Today, I'm calling on the attorney general to stand before the American people and explain why this was necessary in his words. Attorney General Merrick Garland, stop hiding behind the Special Counsel and stand before the American people and explain why this indictment went forward.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: Why is this beneficial for Mike Pence?

GERGEN: Well, it's beneficial for Mike Pence in the narrow sense, and that is that he is running against Trump in many ways. So, for him to come out and be supportive or halfway supportive of Trump in that statement, it just may -- he's trying to sort of have it both ways. He wants to keep the Trump voters, if he can, and then enlarge that vote by some of his anti-Trump stuff. So, it's a balancing act on his part.

WHITFIELD: All right. We'll leave it there for now.

GERGEN: OK.

WHITFIELD: We'll probably have much more to talk about in the days to come --

GERGEN: I'm sure we will.

WHITFIELD: -- especially after Tuesday's arraignment in Miami. David Gergen, thank you so much.

GERGEN: Thank you, Fredricka.

WHITFIELD: All right. Still to come, the Cuban government denying that China is placing a spy base in Cuba after sources told CNN the country had agreed to allow the Chinese to build a facility that could allow eavesdropping on electronic communications across the southeastern U.S., that's next.

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[14:30:00]

WHITFIELD: All right. This alarming report, Cuba is allowing China to build a suspected spying facility on the island. A source familiar with the intelligence telling CNN the move could allow China to eavesdrop on communications across the U.S. Southeast. Cuban leaders deny the reports and accuse the U.S. of using it as a justification for reinforcing the economic blockade on Cuba.

If the facility were to go ahead, it could further inflame tensions between the U.S. and China. In two recent incidents, a Chinese warship cut in front of a U.S. ship in the Taiwan Strait, and a Chinese fighter jet made dangerously close maneuvers near a U.S. military jet.

Joining me now, Michael Pillsbury. He is a former defense official under Reagan and Bush, and a key adviser to Former President Trump on China. He's also a senior fellow for China Strategy at the Heritage Foundation and author of the book "The Hundred-Year Marathon."

So great to see you. So, let's start with this report that Cuba may allow China to build a spy facility. What are your concerns about that?

MICHAEL PILLSBURY, SENIOR FELLOW, CHINA STRATEGY, THE HERITAGE FOUNDATION AND AUTHOR, "THE HUNDRED-YEAR MARATHON": Well, my concern is that it's coming out at all. Usually, these kinds of things are secret between governments. China would secretly come into Cuba and make a deal, pay money, and then expand the eavesdropping operation. There had been press reports in the past couple of decades that China already does some intelligence collection from Cuba.

I tend to think that Admiral John Kirby's comments from the White House probably have some basis to them. This is not exactly what's happening, but something's going on. And frankly, it fits a wider pattern. The Chinese having a sense of anger or being aggrieved against the United States for what they perceive as our being more friendly in various ways toward Taiwan.

So, we see this global pressure from China to imply that the Americans have gone too far. We are getting prepared for a war, we're not afraid of you Americans, we can spy on you with our balloons if we want to or from Cuba. We can cross the path of your ships. It's a kind of assertiveness the Chinese seem to believe. They have a different concept of deterrence than we do.

They seem to believe if they act in this abrasive manner that somehow this will improve what we do on Taiwan. That's not happening. We're actually getting tougher, and the Biden administration's doing more to help Taiwan, I think because of these Chinese aggressive activities. So, it's not a good trajectory that we're on.

WHITFIELD: So, what would this tell you about Cuba if it is to agree to this kind of arrangement with China? PILLSBURY: Well, not to be too crude, but Cuba is always broke, and the Chinese pay, they pay in cash. They'll pay in dollars or gold for intelligence arrangements. So, you can see Cuba's interest in this is not necessarily geopolitical, it's just straight cash. Chinese interest is that a lot of things that they don't have access to, lot of communications in Washington, D.C., in our military commands along the East Coast, they'll be able much more to listen in on those conversations than before.

[14:35:00]

And as part of their fear that the U.S. is somehow getting ready for war with China and then, they claim -- in this other universe they live in, they claim that somehow their activities are not going to provoke an American war, they're going to deter it.

So, I think there's two different worlds here, the Washington, D.C., world, the Beijing world, and they don't seem to understand each other very well, or in these days, they don't have much contact anymore either.

WHITFIELD: All right. Now, I want to shift gears. I want to ask you briefly about the indictment against Former President Trump. What are your, you know, views on hearing the details in this 49-page indictment, and how do you believe this will be viewed by adversaries of the United States?

PILLSBURY: Well, to some degree those who were hurt by Trump in the past or who -- I don't know what to call it, squealed when Trump tried to negotiate tougher terms with them, they're going to be saying, well, he's getting what he deserves. But what I detect is happening, and there's a really excellent article in "The New York Times" just a few hours ago by Damian Cave.

What I detect is the sense that Trump somehow is going to win re- election. It's only 18 months away. So, he could be inaugurated in January 2025. So, this is not the time to start talking about Trump as a criminal and belongs in jail. A little bit of reaction has come like that, strangely enough, from German government commentators that Trump belongs in jail.

But generally speaking, there's a fear that somehow, he's going to come back and have a second term. So, this is not the time to really criticize Trump as a criminal, rather wait and see what happens.

WHITFIELD: Fascinating. All right. Michael Pillsbury, glad you could be with us. Thank you so much.

PILLSBURY: Thank you.

WHITFIELD: Still to come, Former President Donald Trump in Georgia today where he is set to make his first public comments since the federal indictment was unsealed, that's next.

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[14:40:00]

WHITFIELD: At any moment now, Donald Trump is expected to make his first public comments since the federal indictment against him was unsealed. The former president is returning to the campaign trail today. He will be speaking at the Georgia State Republican Convention soon before heading to North Carolina for another campaign event later on this evening.

With me now is talk about the political impact potentially of all this is Lisa Rayam. She is host of "Morning Edition" on Atlanta's NPR Station, WABE.

Lisa, great to see you as always. Of course, I love it when you're in studio. But we'll take this via remotely.

LISA RAYAM, HOST, WABE'S "MORNING EDITION: Yes. Thank you.

WHITFIELD: So -- yes.

RAYAM: Thank you.

WHITFIELD: So, give me your view here. You know, Trump, you know, narrowly lost Georgia in 2020. He's now under investigation by prosecutors for his efforts to overturn Georgia's results. And because of that, Trump has had a contentious relationship with Georgia's republican governor and secretary of state. But then, here he is being embraced in Georgia. You see the pictures just moments ago arriving there in Columbus, Georgia, and he has chosen Georgia because he feels like he can be embraced here. So, what's going on? Is there any real conflict within the GOP and Georgia?

RAYAM: Well, to give you better perspective, the Georgia GOP remains very, very divided. You have the governor, Kemp, who says he's not coming today, and he's not there. You have Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger who said he's not coming. He's not there today. So, that signals just how divided the state GOP really is.

Now, those there in attendance, the delegates, are embracing Trump today. I talked to one of our reporters who's on the ground there, Raul Valley (ph), who says, they are excited that Trump is there. They're excited that he is speaking today two days after he was indicted by the Department of Justice. But the real key is what is he going to say.

Now, we know Trump is in his prime. That he says what is on his mind, but will he say too much in a state where Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is investigating him for charges of election tampering and says those charges may come as soon as August. So, the real takeaway, and what I'm waiting to see is, after he speaks today -- and I'm told it's around 3:00 today, after he speaks today, how many of those in attendance today will walk away and say, hmm, Governor Brian Kemp may have it right, may have called it correctly here. We need to separate from this rhetoric if we are going to be successful with the presidential campaign.

So that's what I'm looking to see, just how many will change their mind, not necessarily, you know, turn against Trump, but realize how important it is to distance themselves from his rhetoric.

WHITFIELD: Interesting. So, there's this effort to distance themselves from his rhetoric now, but at the same time, in terms of in the field of Republicans, he's still considered to be, you know, the leader of the pack, you know, for the Republican nomination. Are there rumblings, concerns within the Georgia GOP that if he were to get the nomination that he could also be blamed for, you know, potentially jeopardizing other seats within the state?

RAYAM: Yes. There's always that potential fallout with Trump, right? And there is that concern. And like I said, moving forward, you know, it's not necessarily that they don't like governor -- I mean, Former President Trump, but they're really concerned about the messaging. And the messaging probably needs to change in 2024 for the Republican Party as a whole.

[14:45:00]

And you're right, Trump is polling as the top -- probably top Republican in the nation, but definitely the top Republican who's running, you know, in this presidential pool for the nomination. So, you know, it's anyone's guess at this point, but they're waiting anxiously. They're on edge to hear what he's going to say today, and just how far he will go.

Now, we know he's going to let loose, but the question is how far is he going to go, and is he going to take specific aim at Fani Willis?

WHITFIELD: Do we have any feeling as to how many people might be in Columbus, Georgia? Because, you know, he always likes to pride himself on having a large crowd number but then, we also know that in some recent rallies across the states the numbers weren't so impressive.

RAYAM: Yes. Now, what I'm hearing is he's really hoping for some television coverage, and it's my understanding CNN is not covering his speech live. That's what he was really hoping for because, what, it's free publicity. And it's interesting to see how that's not happening with Donald Trump so quickly this time around.

WHITFIELD: All right. Lisa Rayam, thank you so much. Great to see you.

RAYAM: Thank you. You too.

WHITFIELD: All right. Still ahead, a Colorado widow now demanding answers. She wants to know why police were so slow to respond when she called 911 to say her husband was possibly being held hostage. When police arrived, he was dead.

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[14:50:00]

WHITFIELD: All right. To Colorado Springs now where a widow is accusing police of failing to respond quickly to an alleged hostage situation leading to her husband's death. Tali'Ja Campbell says she called 911 last week after her husband, Qualin, texted her a picture of himself inside a car with another man she did not recognize. She says it appeared her husband was being held against his will. Qualin was found dead about an hour after his wife says she made the 911 call. The scene less than a mile away from the Colorado Springs Police Headquarters.

CNN's Camila Bernal is following this story for us. Camila, what are you learning?

CAMILA BERNAL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Fred. So, police saying this is an open and a very active investigation, but not really giving us many details. They say, yes, there was a 911 call that was made, but they don't want to comment on it because it is an active investigation. So, a lot of the information that we're learning is from the widow herself, and she is obviously heartbroken. She is planning a funeral, but took the time to go over the details of what happened.

She says on June 2nd, she got these text messages from her husband. And they also included the photo and the location to where he was. So, when she called 911, she was able to give a description of the man that you see on the screen because this is the text message that she received from her husband, and then she was able to give them the exact location of where he was. But she says that when she was talking to the dispatch operator, she didn't sense urgency in her voice, which is why she, too, decided to drive to the location to exactly where her husband was, and she says it took her about an hour to get to that location.

When she arrived, she says it was very notable that she did not see any officers on the scene. And so, unfortunately, what she did see was her husband's car, and he was slumped over the driver's seat. And so, she, of course, says she fell to her knees and was crying, but said she also needed to do more. Here's what she said about that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TALI'JA CAMPBELL, WIDOW OF MAN ALLEGEDLY KILLED IN HOSTAGE SITUATION: I wanted to check to see if he had a pulse. I opened the door and I put my fingers on his neck, I couldn't feel anything. I put my fingers on his wrist, I still couldn't feel anything. So, my uncle was the only one that was big enough to help pull him out of the car in a pool of blood. It was me that had to try to perform CPR on my husband in a pool of blood.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERNAL: She was, of course, very emotional and demanding answers. Here's a statement from the police department. They say, we are aware there is information circulating about this case, and we understand the concerns and questions that arise as a result. We will continue to gather all relevant details about Mr. Campbell's death and ensure the accuracy of our findings. They say this was a murder/suicide, but again, still a lot more to learn from this case, Fred.

WHITFIELD: Very confusing. All right. Camila Bernal, thank you so much.

BERNAL: Thank you.

WHITFIELD: All right. The State of Oregon is facing a crisis. Its homeless population has gone up by more than 20 percent in the last few years, and it has the country's highest percentage of unsheltered families with children living in tents, cars, or on the streets.

This week's CNN hero has dedicated her life to helping homeless families in Portland. It's a calling she found in college by accident. Meet Brandi Tuck.

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BRANDI TUCK, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, PATH HOME: All of my friends were going on these community service spring break trips, and I thought nobody's going to go to the beach with me? So, I reluctantly signed up. We volunteered for the whole week at different homeless shelters, and I realized that these women are just like my mom. And that completely changed my life.

[14:55:00]

Path Home empowers homeless families with children to get back into housing and stay there. We have the first shelter in Oregon with trauma informed design and architecture, and it helps them heal from that trauma of homelessness.

When a family gets their keys for the first time, it's just an amazing feeling. We then stay with them for as long as they need us. When I see families succeed, that's all that I need to continue doing this work.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: And to see Brandi's full story and her program that's getting results, go to cnnheroes.com, and you can also nominate your CNN hero.

All right. Thanks so much for being with me today. I'm Fredricka Whitfield. See you back here tomorrow. "Smerconish" is next.

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