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Police and Protesters Stand Off at University of Wisconsin; New Clashes Erupt on Multiple Campuses Overnight; Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) Announces Vote to Oust House Speaker Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA) Next Week. Aired 10-10:30a ET

Aired May 01, 2024 - 10:00   ET

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

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: It really is, and what a beautiful soul that you became so close with her and her family and the beautiful life that she was able to have thanks to what really became a miracle medicine for her, which is what she found in cannabis.

Sanjay, thank you so much for this work. Again, this is a proposed rule, public comment period, and then we'll see what happens with the administration. Dr. Sanjay Gupta, thank you, Sanjay.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right. Thank you all for being with us this morning, a lot of developments going on. We will continue to follow him throughout the day.

CNN Newsroom with Jim Acosta up next.

JIM ACOSTA, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning. You're live in the CNN Newsroom. I'm Jim Acosta in Washington.

We are following breaking news out of Madison, Wisconsin. This is the scene at the University of Wisconsin right now where police are clashing with protesters.

Let's show you what happened there just moments ago.

All right, let's bring in Chief Law Enforcement and Intelligence Analyst John Miller. John, your reaction to what we're looking at right now, we should show our viewers or point out to our viewers. You're looking at live pictures of what looks like protesters sort of locking arms outside the campus library. They're at the campus of the University of Wisconsin Madison. John, your sense of things as you're looking at all of this.

JOHN MILLER, CNN CHIEF LAW ENFORCEMENT AND INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: Well, I think the theme of the day seems to be emerging as the university fights back. We saw the police action last night in New York City, the retaking of a seized building at Columbia University, a couple of hundred arrests there and at City College.

And when you look at what's happening in Madison, it's a contrast to what occurred in Los Angeles, where students clashed with outsiders who came onto the campus. This seems to be colleges across the country saying, as we get closer to graduation, and we have people controlling different areas of our campuses, we're taking those back. And some of these pictures that we're seeing today, you know, obviously they don't look pretty. And this is, you know, part of the process where police have to plan what are we going to do, how are we going to do it and how do we minimize either the use of force or the number of injuries.

ACOSTA: Yes. And, John, when you see protesters locking arms like that, that typically means what that they're going to try to make it difficult for the police to haul them away?

MILLER: Well, typically, they're making a stand. And at this point in most places, and, you know, this would have been the rule in L.A. and New York, it's probably similar in Wisconsin, is you give the legal warning which is you're being ordered to disperse you are going to be arrested if you do not disperse and then you give them time to kind of suss out, do I want to actually get arrested today or is that my level of commitment to this, and then those people who remain after the order is given, you move in and you separate them.

And you know we've seen tactics. Locking arms is not a problem for the police. They'll separate them and arrest them for whatever the charges are going to be, likely criminal trespass or something like that. But there are sophisticated measures that have been used before, things like sleeping dragons where they chain themselves together requires more equipment and more time, but it certainly increases the amount of time it takes to clear an area.

ACOSTA: Yes. And, John, you know this terrain pretty well. I mean, what are usually the best practices when law enforcement gets involved in something like this? I mean, I suppose we've seen the gamut. I hear we're showing some video of what looks like Madison police officers clashing with protesters. Do you like seeing that typically? Is that something that you think is effective here, or does it just become necessary at some point? What's your sense of it?

MILLER: Well, when it comes to police tactics, disorder control is a perishable skill. If you're not practicing it all the time, if you are not training it all the time, if you're not using it all the time, it is one of those things that you might not be great at.

[10:05:01]

You know, you need to have strategies like forming a skirmish line, being able to move people back.

What you're seeing here is a lot of pushing and shoving as they try to separate those who are going to be arrested from those who are going to interfere with those arrests. To do this perfectly, which is hard because it's kind of controlled or uncontrolled chaos, it involves training and team tactics, which is figuring out who is going to take an arrest and then having the team focus on let's protect the officer making the arrest so that they can complete that so he's not trying to arrest one person and fighting with five others who are trying to pull that person away and that's some of what you're seeing here.

ACOSTA: All right. John Miller, I really appreciate it. I want to go now to Ben Newman. He's a senior there at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. He's on the phone with us now.

Ben, what do you know about what's going on right now?

BEN NEWMAN, SENIOR, UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN (voice over): Hi, Jim, thanks for having me.

ACOSTA: Yes.

NEWMAN (voice over): You know, I think it's been a challenging time for a Jewish student. We've heard people chants to globalize the Intifada, for Israel to go to hell, that Israel -- excuse me, the university has to enforce their rules they set on April 26 that there cannot be an encampment on Library Mall or shared space. And I'm watching the news along with you right now.

ACOSTA: And so, Ben, what have we been watching is that basically what just occurred that the police there cleared out this encampment and when they did that there were these clashes between some of the protesters and some of the police. And what do you know about are there folks coming in from the outside? Is that has that been a factor in all of this on your campus?

NEWMAN (voice over): I'm not entirely clear that some people have said that there are potentially outside agitators or outside protesters. What I know is that there are students involved, there are faculty involved, who have been at the encampment day and night and that they were warned to leave the encampment, that there would be consequences if they stayed in the encampment and that no protester should physically assault an officer or resist arrest under a lawful order.

ACOSTA: And, I mean, what are your thoughts on this when you see, you know, students and professors and police getting into it, pushing and shoving like this? I mean, it's got to be hard to watch when you're a student there right at the end of the semester. This is not the way you want the year to end.

NEWMAN (voice over): You know, I think that's challenging. I think many students have felt that this is not the way they wanted the year to end. I think more broadly, it shows the breakdown in civil dialogue, the group who puts out tents and makes -- they have their demands. They have an unreasonable set of six demands that goes from everything from the university divesting from Israel study abroad programs to police having to leave campus overall. Those are an unreasonable set of demands and are not in the spirit of civil dialogue.

So, it's no surprise that when confronted with the police that they behave in ways that are also physically uncivil.

ACOSTA: All right. Ben Newman, keep us posted. If anything comes up, let us know. We'll get back to you. Thanks a lot. I appreciate it.

NEWMAN (voice over): Thanks, Jim.

ACOSTA: All right, we're also following an explosion of violence overnight at UCLA.

That was the scene there just hours ago. Two dueling protest groups clashed on campus, pipes, tasers, pepper spray, all reportedly being used.

Let's go straight to CNN Correspondent Stephanie Elam at UCLA. Stephanie, I'm sure you've had a long night. I really appreciate it hanging in there for us. What are you seeing right now?

STEPHANIE ELAM, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, so if you were looking at that video, you were just showing, Jim, of what was going on, we're standing where we believe that was happening here. And if you take a look, you can see as there's been this barricade was here.

I was here all day yesterday. This barricade was up. That barricade on the other side was up too. And this was the place where they had this walkway and there was security overnight. This is where we think the barricade was broken down, where, from this side, it looked like they were trying to pull away at the barricade.

And when you look through here, I can tell you yesterday, this walkway was completely clear. There was nothing there. It was evenly lined up on that side. But now you can see that it's been torn apart in some places and some of the plywood put back up.

We saw fireworks being thrown from the side, projectiles being thrown from the side, and also looked like some sort of liquid or something being tossed from the other side over here.

[10:10:00]

All of this happening, deteriorating as darkness fell on campus last night.

And it was not until after 1:00 in the morning or so when law enforcement came onto the campus of UCLA, that's when Mayor Karen Bass said that what was happening here on campus was abhorrent. And also we heard from the chancellor last night saying that what was happening now on campus was unlawful and that students were being prohibited from moving around campus.

And, in fact, I walked around all of campus yesterday and I can tell you, most of campus, completely normal. Kids are outside, students are outside, studying, reading on the grass, preparing. It all looked very normal until you get to this area. But I did see some students who were turned away from one part of campus. That became a point of contention.

At this point, though, there are some students who are reporters from the Daily Bruin who put out an op-ed basically saying that UCLA is complicit in the violence because it took too long for law enforcement to be here on campus, even though they said they were increasing that presence yesterday.

And you can see now that you still have law enforcement out there now, Jim, as they are making their presence known, but obviously the timber of things, much calmer at this time of day now that the sun has come up.

ACOSTA: Yes, we hope things calm down there on the campus of UCLA. Stephanie Elam, thank you very much.

Let's head now to the other side of the country. Sarah Sidner joins us live from Columbia University in New York. It was a wild night there as well, Sara.

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, things calm this morning, although there is a much larger NYPD presence outside of Columbia as long. We're also seeing tons of barricades that have been put up that were not here, but that is because of what happened last night.

Police using really a shock and awe tactic here at Hamilton Hall, which you're seeing just to the right of me. In that hall is where some of these pro-Palestinian protesters broke in and occupied the space. It is a long tradition to use Hamilton Hall as a place where protesters go in and occupy it from the 1960s through to now. But they went in and put banners outside that said, Free Palestine, said Intifada.

And at some point this seems to have been the breaking point with the university who then sent a letter to NYPD and told them to come in and get rid of -- remove the protesters. They not only went in and shock and awe with dozens of officers all at once going into that building and taking out dozens of protesters, but they got rid of the encampment that has been here for almost two weeks now.

We also heard from the New York City mayor. The mayor, over and over and over again, although students refuted, but the mayor over and over again said, look, there was a -- yes, the majority of students that were in that hall and that were taking part in these protests, they were students at Columbia, but that there was a small group of people, potentially a smaller group that were from the outside, that were, as he called them, professional agitators.

And he spoke to them saying that they were the ones to influence these students and that the concern from the university became high enough for them to call police in, listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAYOR ERIC ADAMS (D-NEW YORK CITY, NY): There is a movement to radicalize young people and I'm not going to wait until it's done and all of a sudden acknowledge the existence of it. This is a global problem that young people are being influenced by those who are professionals at radicalizing our children. And I'm not going to allow that to happen as the mayor of the city of New York.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SIDNER: Now, I have talked to students who have been on campus, one in particular a graduate student who was part of the encampment, a Jewish student who said to me that he said this was student-led, it was grassroots-led, but the mayor saying there were some people there trying to be agents of chaos. I want to go now to my colleague, Gabe Cohen, who is over and closer to the university right now. There has been no class on campus. This has been a virtual class. What are you hearing from students who are coming to the gate every day trying to get in, as well as professors?

GABE COHEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Sara. There seems to be a lot of confusion this morning. I want to (INAUDIBLE) faculty who are trying to enter the campus. There's been a lot of confusion, though, where people don't seem to know if they're allowed on, which students are allowed in, which faculty are allowed in.

We're also seeing a lot of this, a lot of NYPD officers here. We know that the school has requested that assistance from the NYPD even after last night where officers are going to be here until May 17th after graduation.

And what you're looking at here is Hamilton Hall. This is the building that was really the focal point of this police operation last night, where we saw dozens of officers entering through a second floor window of this building.

[10:15:00]

They arrested protesters inside as well as dozens that were in the encampment right outside the building, more than 200 in all, as you mentioned.

And, look, I spoke with a student journalist on the campus who I'm actually going to try to grab now, as he happens to be walking by.

Meghnad, you were talking to me before. You're a grad student here, a journalism student at North -- or, excuse me, at Columbia you were covering the protests last night. You had some concerns about how the NYPD handled the student media who was there talk about that.

MEGHNAD BOSE, COLUMBIA STUDENT JOURNALIST: Yes, that's right, because I was inside -- right inside these gates of Amsterdam, covering the arrest that took place outside the gate of pro-Palestine protesters who were trying to block the NYPD from coming in.

Shortly after that, once the NYPD moved in, I tried to go to outside Hamilton Hall, where the police action was going to happen, but the police barricaded all of us, including student journalists, and denied us access anywhere close to Hamilton Hall.

What's more, there were several of my colleagues and fellow student journalists who were outside Hamilton Hall, even before the police came in. Unfortunately, most of these student journalists were pushed out of campus by the officials before the police action really happened.

So, they couldn't get to bear witness to the police action that happened in a sensitive environment, like a university campus, as a result of which the footage that we have from last night is very sparse, and that footage already raises some troubling questions about the NYPD's conduct on the campus. If we had more journalists there, student journalists there, we would have known much better what actually unfolded in front of Hamilton Hall.

COHEN: And based on what you were seeing last night, you think you could have kept a safe space away from the protest and still been able to witness and view it?

BOSE: Look, you've got footage of outside Hamilton Hall. There's a lawn right outside of Hamilton Hall at a short distance away. Student journalists could have been kept there. It was a fair distance away. It wouldn't have interfered in the police action that took place, but it would have still allowed them to capture, even from a slight distance away, what was going on. But, unfortunately, that wasn't allowed.

Apart from a couple of journalists that we saw, most of my colleagues and fellow student journalists were removed from the campus.

COHEN: Thank you so much, I really appreciate your time.

And, Sara, as you know, as a result of that, so many of the videos, the images that we're seeing were either captured by the NYPD and tweeted out or sent out by the police department or captured by the protesters who were involved in this. Of course, both sides have interests here, so a lot of concerns there.

I've also spoken with students here who have not been involved I spoke to a freshman who was leaving campus a little bit earlier trying to get food for the first time of the -- in the past 12 hours because of the lockdown on campus, and he was saying last night there was really concern on both sides from the students who he was surrounded by. Some did not want to see police on the campus. They were worried about the safety of the students who were involved in that protest. Others wanted to see the protest cleared away fearing for the Jewish students on campus and the fears those students have been feeling.

So, Sara, a lot of mixed emotions here on campus this morning as this quiet day continues.

SIDNER: Gabe, thank you so much for speaking to that student journalist. We are also hearing from a couple of my sources, two faculty members that have the same sentiment, very concerned. There was -- no one from the media was really allowed to witness what happened last night in Hamilton Hall. And we're only getting sort of short pieces of information and video from inside of that hall when police went in.

But we should also mention there's a lot of frustration for students who don't live on campus who can't get to their meal (ph) plans, who've had their time disrupted and they're in finals now. So, there's a lot going on on campuses across the country, especially here at Columbia University.

ACOSTA: All right, Sara Sidner. Yes, have to let those student reporters do their job. That is absolutely essential. Sara, thank you. And from the chaos on campus to chaos at the Capitol, Marjorie Taylor Greene says she is going to try to oust the House speaker, Mike Johnson, someone from her own party. We'll talk about that next.

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[10:20:00]

ACOSTA: We're following breaking news this morning. Unrest on college campuses across the country as protesters continue to clash with police during nationwide demonstrations over the Israel-Hamas War.

You're seeing video right now from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, where moments ago, one of those protests briefly turned violent as police moved in to clear a student encampment. We saw a lot of pushing and shoving there a few moments ago.

We're closely monitoring that situation will bring you the latest developments as they come in.

In the meantime, just last hour, up on Capitol Hill, Republican Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene said she will force a vote to oust the House speaker, Mike Johnson, as soon as next week.

Let's go live to CNN's Manu Raju, who is up on Capitol Hill for us. Manu, you were there at the press conference. I didn't see a whole lot of members of Congress standing around Marjorie Taylor Greene. Does she think she could pull this off?

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: There's virtually no chance she can pull this off because of the decision by the Democratic leaders, Hakeem Jeffries, announcing yesterday that they would support the effort to kill that resolution.

This is much different than what happened in the fall. Of course, at that time, this was led by Republicans to oust Kevin McCarthy. Eight Republicans voted to kick him out of the speakership. But then all Democrats did as well. But Democrats viewed this situation differently in the aftermath of Mike Johnson cutting some deals to keep the government open and then providing aid for Ukraine, $61 billion in aid to Ukraine, all of which say that there's no reason for them to kick out Johnson at this time.

But it's those same deals that have caused this anger among those far- right Republicans, like Marjorie Taylor Greene, who says that she does plan to call for this vote next week simply to put members on the record.

[10:25:07]

Now, one question is, why is she moving forward with this, because even despite Donald Trump suggesting he is not in favor of this at this time. I put that question to her at this press conference just moments ago.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) RAJU: If this goes fails next week, as is expected, will you continue to try to force a vote on this issue? And, two, former President Trump has said positive things about the speaker and has said he doesn't favor a motion to vacate. Aren't you defying the former president's wishes?

REP. MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE (R-GA): Absolutely not. I'm the biggest supporter of President Trump and that's why I proudly wear this MAGA hat. I fight for his agenda every single day and that's why I'm fighting here against my own Republican conference to fight harder against the Democrats.

Mike Johnson has fully funded the Department of Justice that wants to put President Trump in jail, giving him a death sentence.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

RAJU: And Mike Johnson just put out a statement saying, quote, this motion is wrong for the Republican conference, wrong for the institution and wrong for the country.

We do expect when this vote happens that Republican leaders are going to move pretty quickly to actually take this up, essentially kill it, to try to move on past this episode. And there really are no other major decisions coming down the pike that could put him in more hot water with his right flank. There is an effort that they would have to keep the government open, but that is not until the fall.

So, perhaps Mike Johnson could survive this threat because of the Democratic support and Republicans. Many Republicans don't want to go through that messy episode that happened last fall when McCarthy was ousted and there were about three weeks of no speaker. The Republicans are battling each other. They're hoping to move past this and focus on the election.

ACOSTA: All right, yes, she doesn't have a whole lot of support in her party, but she does have a red hat. All right, Manu Raju on Capitol Hill for us, thank you.

We're following breaking developments as protests continue on college campuses across the country, this at the University of Wisconsin, in Madison, just a short while ago with protesters confronting police. We're bringing the latest just ahead.

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