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CNN Live Saturday

Top Justice Department Officials Threatened to Resign Over Bribery Investigation; President Speaks at West Point Graduation; Huge Earthquake Rocks Indonesia

Aired May 27, 2006 - 17:00   ET

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

CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: Over our dead bodies -- why did two top officials in the Bush administration threaten to walk off the job? Well, we've got the inside scoop on this political and legal tug of war.
Also, 3,000 dead and thousands of others injured after a devastating quake in Indonesia. The very latest straight ahead.

And we're going to take you to a remote area of the Congo where women are routinely gang raped by men in uniform paid to protect them.

Hello and welcome to CNN LIVE SATURDAY.

I'm Carol Lin.

All that and more after this quick check of the headlines.

In Iraq, the search is on for two missing Marines. Their helicopter crashed in Iraq's dangerous Al-Anbar Province. The U.S. military says the chopper probably wasn't brought down by enemy attack.

Now, cnn.com's most popular story right now, our own investigation into the death of Army Ranger Pat Tillman. The Pentagon ordered a fourth inquiry into his case. The 27-year-old football player turned soldier was killed by friendly fire in Afghanistan.

The Indonesian government says more than 3,000 died from a early morning earthquake. That full report straight ahead.

And Poland extends a warm welcome to Pope Benedict XVI. He's on a four day tour of Pope John Paul II's homeland. Now today he says his predecessor will become a saint in the near future.

And families are flocking to the New Orleans Aquarium this Memorial Day weekend. The Big Easy big fish tank reopened yesterday, some nine months after Hurricane Katrina. Aquarium officials say roughly 3,000 people made the grand reopening.

First this hour, the bad blood in Washington from inside the highest ranks of the Bush administration. Three law enforcement officials were apparently ready to quit after the FBI raided a congressman's office.

CNN's Kathleen Koch is live from the White House -- Kathleen, what do you make of these threats?

KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Carol, they were ready to quit not because the office was raided, but because it appeared that documents seized during that raid might actually be returned to Louisiana Congressman William Jefferson. He is right now facing some possible bribery accusations. And congressional leaders protested the fact that those documents, those papers had been taken from his Capitol Hill office, saying that it was an unprecedented violation of separation of powers.

So multiple sources now tell CNN -- two senior administration officials, a senior government official and others tells CNN then when it appeared that that material might, indeed, have to be returned to the congressman, Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez, Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty and the FBI director himself, Robert Mueller, all threatened to resign.

One senior government official says: "They were all ready to walk."

The two senior administration officials who we spoke with said that the threats were relayed to the White House midweek. But a source familiar with the negotiations says the threats were never made directly to the president, but instead came in the midst of conversations and negotiations and were more framed as hypothetical.

One senior administration official actually tells CNN that Vice President Dick Cheney met with President Bush on this whole issue, on the debate, and made the case that critics of that raid on Jefferson's office actually did have points that needed to be considered.

Now, one political observer says that Republicans caught up in this face-off were actually missing an opportunity.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KEN RUDIN, NPR POLITICAL EDITOR: We have allegations. We have, apparently we have the videotaping of a member of Congress taking bribes. It looks like it could be a clear, an open and shut case. And yet somehow the Republicans are getting rid of any advantages they may have had by having this dispute over themselves, where the administration is overreaching, whether they are violating the separation of powers, whether the FBI is going too far.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KOCH: Now, those documents were sealed by President Bush, by his order, Thursday afternoon, sealed for 45 days. And so the FBI has no access to them, nor does the congressman's office. And White House Spokesman Tony Snow yesterday said that that 45 day cooling off period, the White House hopes, will be sufficient to focus people's attention on reaching a solution to this face-off -- back to you.

LIN: Kathleen, thank you so much.

KOCH: You bet. Now, joining us from Los Angeles, we want to get some clarity, Bill Schneider, our senior political analyst out there -- Bill, clarify for us why the difference, the fact that it's a congressman in his office. I mean if it were my house or your house and we were suspected of a crime, there was a subpoena, this wouldn't be an issue.

WILLIAM SCHNEIDER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Because his office was raided by authorities in the executive branch of government, which is supposed to be coequal to Congress. Congress claims its rights were violated. The executive branch can't search a congressional office. Those offices are privileged.

But you know what? Most Americans are just as mystified as you are. This congressman, they found $90,000 in, shall we say, cold cash in his freezer. There was good reason to believe that there might be incriminating evidence in his office. They had a search warrant. He had been subpoenaed. They had someone monitoring the search.

But yet members of Congress were saying this was a violation of their constitutional prerogatives. It doesn't make common sense to most Americans.

LIN: Well, at FBI -- the FBI says that they have been talking with the congressman and his representatives for some eight months now to try to get access to the papers that they were looking for, the items that they were looking for.

SCHNEIDER: Yes.

LIN: So thanks for clarifying this whole issue of separation of powers.

But is there any precedent for this, the threat of the attorney general, his deputy and the FBI director, for quitting?

SCHNEIDER: Not precisely...

LIN: I mean for making that threat, rather?

SCHNEIDER: Well, there's no precise parallel to this case. But you've got to remember back in 1973 -- I remember that -- the Saturday night massacre during Watergate when the president demanded that the attorney general, Eliot Richardson, fire the special prosecutor, Archibald Cox, who was demanding the White House Oval Office tapes that eventually destroyed Richard Nixon's presidency.

Cox demanded those tapes. A court backed him up and Nixon demanded that his attorney general fire Cox. The attorney general refused. He resigned. His deputy was fired and there was a whole wall of outrage from Congress that eventually led to Richard Nixon's impeachment.

So, yes, you've had an attorney general and his deputy resign in protest in the past.

LIN: So, clearly President Bush had a lot of incentive for calling for this 45 day cooling off period, hoping that the parties can make some kind of accommodation or deal?

SCHNEIDER: Well, one important thing to remember, why are the Republicans demanding that they get -- keep hands off a Democratic congressman's office? They should be wanting to -- for this investigation to proceed.

The answer is for them it's kind of a proxy fight. They're very worried that the Justice Department can go into other members' of Congress, look in their offices, who are being investigated as a result of the Abramoff investigation and the Cunningham investigation. And those are likely to be Republican offices.

So the principle they are defending has a lot of partisanship behind it.

LIN: You know, and it is an election year.

SCHNEIDER: Yes.

LIN: We're going to bring Bill back for some terrific research that he ahs done on how far Congress may go to get your votes.

SCHNEIDER: All right.

LIN: All right, thanks, Bill.

SCHNEIDER: Sure.

(VIDEOTAPE OF CEREMONY AT ARLINGTON NATIONAL CEMETERY)

LIN: Such a poignant sight. After riding for 10 days cross country, about 200,000 bikers, many of them veterans, laid a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldiers in Arlington National Cemetery. Now, tomorrow they ride to the Vietnam War Memorial in a caravan known as the "Rolling Thunder Parade."

In another part of the cemetery, another wreath laying service. Members of the World War II veterans group, the "Flying Tigers," honored their fallen comrades.

And words of praise for military graduates at West Point, courtesy of their commander-in-chief. President Bush delivered the commencement speech to the class of 2006. And he told graduates Islamic radicalism will be their biggest challenge.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: On September the 11th, 2001, we saw that problems originating in a failed and oppressive state 7,000 miles away could bring murder and destruction to our country. And we learned an important lesson -- decades of excusing and accommodating the lack of freedom in the Middle East did nothing to make us safe.

(END VIDEO CLIP) LIN: Well, it is the first class to enter West Point after the 9/11 attacks and the first since Vietnam to spend all four years training during a time of war.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MICHAEL MILLER, WEST POINT GRADUATE: It's definitely a distinct honor. It kind of sets us apart from a lot of the other classes. It's going to be an amazing day either way, but now that we kind of have something that makes us a little bit more unique, it's an unreal feeling.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LIN: And on the other side of the law, Pentagon sources tell CNN several Camp Pendleton Marines might face charges in the killing of Iraqi civilians.

Jamie McIntyre reports that charges could include murder, which, under military law, could be punishable by death.

And we want to warn you, some of the content of this report may be disturbing.

(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)

JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It's evidence like this, provided to CNN by an Iraqi human rights group, that Pentagon sources say is building a case against U.S. Marines suspected of killing as many as 24 civilians in a rampage in Haditha last November.

This 12-year-old girl told the Hammurabi human rights organization she survived an attack that killed all eight members of her family by pretending to be dead.

SAFA YOUNIS, ALLEGED WITNESS (THROUGH TRANSLATOR): First they knocked on the door. My father went to answer the door. When he reached the door, they sprayed the door with bullets. But when he opened the door, they shot him again. Then they entered the bathroom and they set off a grenade. We went into the kitchen and found my father already dead. Then we sat down. Then the Americans started shooting at us.

MCINTYRE: Pentagon sources say the investigation is now wrapping up and that the evidence is very incriminating. The Marines will not confirm any findings of the investigation so far. But congressional sources say the 24 victims included seven women and three children, some shot in their beds. Five unarmed men were also allegedly shot when their taxi cab was stopped by Marines.

One official told CNN the mass killing is far worse than the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal, which President Bush just identified as America's biggest mistake in Iraq so far.

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATS: We've been paying for that for a long period of time.

MCINTYRE: None of the abused prisoners at Abu Ghraib died, but if the allegations at Haditha are substantiated, the civilian deaths would qualify as a massacre, which could undermine support for the United States both in Iraq and around the world.

Members of Congress have been warned to brace for the worst.

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: Apparently it's true. We don't know the details. It saddens you enormously. It reemphasizes the absolute requirement for discipline in the military.

MCINTYRE: The Marine Corps' top general, Commandant Michael Hagee, is in Iraq meeting privately with Marines to stress the importance of protecting noncombatants on the battlefield, another sign of the gravity of the allegations.

(on camera): At Camp Pendleton in California, several Marines are waiting to hear if they'll be court-martialed, and sources say some could face murder charges. Meanwhile, a second group of Marines has been placed in pre-trial confinement on the basis of evidence indicating they may have killed a single Iraqi civilian last month.

Jamie McIntyre, CNN, the Pentagon.

(END VIDEO TAPE)

LIN: Misery in Indonesia -- a massive earthquake strikes at dawn and more than 3,000 people are killed. Now, medical teams struggle to cope with thousands of injured.

CNN's Dan Rivers has that story.

(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)

DAN RIVERS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Amidst the dust and rubble of a shaken island, the bodies are being recovered in their thousands. This earthquake struck just before dawn, when most people were asleep. Many were entombed in their beds.

The corpses are being carefully freed from the debris one by one. They're loaded onto trucks. This is a slow, traumatic process. Distraught relatives still numb with shock.

Makeshift morgues are being set up. The hospitals are already overwhelmed. There are thousands of injured, many in a life- threatening condition. The hospital staff are struggling to cope, inundated with so many severely wounded survivors. Many are being treated where they're found, first aid administered amidst the ruins.

The earthquake measured 6.3 magnitude, not that strong compared to the near 9.3 quake that triggered the tsunami on neighboring Sumatra. But the devastation here in Java is still considerable.

This woman says she was cooking in the kitchen when the earthquake struck. "The house was shaking. I fell and some of the roof collapsed. This is a biggest earthquake that has ever happened here."

The epicenter was close to Mount Merapi, the volcano which the Javanese consider holy. It's been threatening to explode for weeks. The volcanologists trying to assess if this quake will precipitate a full explosion. The aid effort is being hampered by the closing of Jakarta's main airport after the terminal building was damaged and cracks were discovered in the runway.

Many survivors have erected makeshift shelters amidst the devastation, facing their first night outside, waiting for help to arrive, struggling to comprehend what's happened.

(on camera): Indonesia is a country sadly used to natural disasters. But this earthquake, coming just a year-and-a-half after the tsunami, has taken many here by surprise and has once again left this huge nation mourning an incomprehensible loss of life.

Dan River, CNN, Jakarta, Indonesia.

(END VIDEO TAPE)

LIN: This story is far from over. You can log onto cnn.com for the latest information about that earthquake. And we're going to have complete coverage throughout the night.

Now, buyer beware -- a new study shows you may be, well, shown only houses where realtors think you fit in. A closer look at racism in the housing market.

And paying homage to his predecessor. Pope Benedict's Pope John Paul -- says Pope John Paul will soon be a saint. We're going to tell you along his pilgrimage to Poland.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP FROM "NOT READY TO MAKE NICE," COURTESY COLUMBIA RECORDS)

DIXIE CHICKS: And it's hell in (UNINTELLIGIBLE) you're going round and round and around. It's too late...

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LIN: Do you remember these gals? Well, they're still singing and they're still angry about the way they were treated. Are the Dixie Chicks's fans ready to forgive and forget?

But first on this Memorial Day weekend, we are going to pause to remember our fallen heroes. The story now of Army Captain James Adamowski, as told by his father.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FRANK ADAMOWSKI: Well, it'll take a while to talk about Jimmy because he was one of those ideal children. When he was young, he was the one who always went to bed on time, always took his bath before he went to bed. When he got into school, he always did his homework after he came home from school, before he went out to play. Jimmy was also a planner. I once asked him when was it, Jim, that you decided you wanted to go to West Point? And he said well, dad, he said, I think I was in the fourth grade. He just did so many really neat things. When he was stationed in Germany, there were some avalanches in Austria and Switzerland and he flew his helicopter in an avalanche rescue down there. I was so proud of him for that.

He just never seemed to do anything wrong. He was always right. I get kind of emotional when I talk about him because he really was such a great kid. He could talk to the pope or he could talk to a bum in the street and be equally at ease. Jimmy was the type of individual that would have made a great politician, and his goal was to become a U.S. senator. And nobody in this family or anybody who knew him ever doubted that he would be able to do that.

In Jimmy's case, did he believe in what he was doing? Certainly. He was totally convinced that taking a suppressive regime out of the world order was the right thing to do.

I had two individuals call me on the telephone and say, sir, you don't know me, but I knew your son in Germany. He inspired me to go back to college. And both of them said I'm graduating this month and I owe it to your son. And so there were -- there were things like that that went on that were so emotional, really. To find out that he made such a difference in the lives of so many people during a very short life of only 29 years. And I think he did more in these 29 years than a lot of people do in 100. And we love him for that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LIN: Other headlines making news across America now.

A Colorado detention officer is behind bars. She is charged with locking her 13-year-old grandson in a dog kennel when she went to work. Investigators say the abuse had been going on for three years.

Now, here's a look at a Dallas robbery that you might say didn't quite work out. The surveillance tape pretty much shows it. The clerk realizing that the robber's gun-is a fake, so there you go. He lets him have it, and by it, I don't mean the money.

Now, a good thing -- Martha Stewart has put up her estate in Westport, Connecticut on the market. She's asking for $9 million. The domestic diva also owns places in Bedford, New York and Easthampton, Long Island, Manhattan and Maine.

Buyer beware -- a new report finds an astonishing number of real estate agents steer clients to neighborhoods based on their race.

CNN's Brianna Keilar tells us how it's done.

(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It's called racial steering. If a realtor shows clients homes in neighborhoods that match their racial background and "steers them away" from communities that don't.

SHANNA SMITH, NATIONAL FAIR HOUSING ALLIANCE: When they choose to steer, it's an intentional action on their part and it's a clear violation of the Fair Housing Act.

KEILAR: The Fair Housing Act prohibits racial and other types of discrimination in the sale, rental and financing of homes. In a study released last month, the non-profit National Fair Housing Alliance reported racial steering occurred in 87 percent of realtor guided home shopping trips in its study, which was funded in part by the federal government.

The Alliance sent undercover teams from 2003 to 2005 to house hunt in 12 cities -- one team white, the other black or Latino. The blacks and Latinos posing as buyers with better financial qualifications than their white counterparts.

The Alliance alleges realtors often used descriptions of schools in a neighborhood as code for the area's racial composition.

SMITH: For whites, they would say things like you might want to check out the schools or come right out and say we don't think the schools are good. These schools are actually bad, they would say. But for the African-American or Latinos looking in the exact same neighborhood, they'd say the schools are good or they wouldn't mention the schools at all.

KEILAR (on camera): By law, realtors cannot volunteer information about the racial or religious makeup of a neighborhood. The National Fair Housing Alliance says agents also steer homebuyers away from certain areas simply by not showing them homes there.

(voice-over): The testers we spoke with asked us not to identify them so they can participate in future studies.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I wouldn't say I felt steered because in almost all of my interactions with those agents, I thought that what they were showing me was what was available.

KEILAR: A white tester said one realtor was less subtle.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: One agent said to me that the neighborhood was a little dark and that he would -- and he was not talking about street lights.

KEILAR: The National Association of Realtors would not give us an interview, but a spokesman told the "Washington Post": "We agree there is still work to be done in fair housing."

The CEO of the Michigan Realtors Association says the industry is aware of the problem, but that it's not widespread.

BILL MARTIN, CEO, MICHIGAN REALTORS ASSOCIATION: A couple of bad apples is a couple too many. So we're working hard to make sure not even that exists. Residents across the country can have great confidence in realtors and their training and commitment to fair housing. It's not something new for us. Our code of ethics is our foundation and fair housing and the principles behind that are ever prevalent, I think, in our day to day communications with the public.

KEILAR: But the Fair Housing Alliance has filed several complaints against companies it says broke the law and the Department of Housing and Urban Development is now investigating those claims.

Brianna Keilar, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEO TAPE)

LIN: One of the most shocking stories of our time -- hundreds of thousands of women being abused and absolutely nothing is being done to stop it.

Plus, are these just the tricks of the trade or blatant political pandering? A look at the top five gimmicks to get your votes.

And the controversial Dixie Chicks -- are they now singing a new tune, next on CNN LIVE SATURDAY.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP FROM "NOT READY TO MAKE NICE," COURTESY COLUMBIA RECORDS)

DIXIE CHICKS: Hell, and I don't have time to go around and around and around. It's too late to make it right.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LIN: The Dixie Chicks -- they're out with a new album. But their feud with country music fans may not be over. In fact, many country music radio stations still refuse to play their music after Natalie Maines, the lead singer, said she was ashamed of the president a couple of years ago.

Here's CNN's Sibila Vargas.

(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP FROM "NOT READY TO MAKE NICE," COURTESY COLUMBIA RECORDS)

DIXIE CHICKS: I'm not ready to make nice. I'm not ready to back down.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SIBILA VARGAS, CNN ENTERTAINMENT CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Those may be fighting words, but any political message in the new Dixie Chicks's album is between the lines.

CHRIS WILLMAN, AUTHOR, "REDNECKS & BLUENECKS": It's not a political album, but it's political by inference in that they're directly or indirectly addressing their own situation, and through being defensive and defiant about it. And through that, I think you can read into the fact that they still feel the same way, or worse, about Bush and the war and all the things that got them into the trouble they are talking about on the album.

VARGAS: "Taking the Long Way" is the Texas trio's first CD since 2003, since before the U.S. invasion of Iraq, when lead singer Natalie Maines told London concert-goers she was, "embarrassed to be from the same state as George Bush."

NATALIE MAINES, LEAD SINGER, DIXIE CHICKS: My apology was for the words that I used, but not for the motivation behind the words and for my beliefs.

VARGAS: Despite that semi-apology, fallout in the conservative country community was immediate. Some called the Chicks unpatriotic, treasonous even. People picketed their shows.

UNIDENTIFIED RADIO TALK SHOW HOST: Of course she was wrong for what she said.

VARGAS: And radio stations refused to play their music.

But with the president's approval rating at an all-time low, some are rethinking Nashville's harsh treatment of the Dixie Chicks.

VINCE GILL, RECORDING ARTIST: I have a big problem with what they did to The Dixie Chicks. You know, I don't think that their political stance should in any way have their career taken away from them. You know, that was just wrong.

VARGAS: Sony Music isn't taking any chances with the new release. Wal-Mart, Amazon.com and iTunes are all selling the disc at a discount. Throw in high profile TV appearances, and the Chicks could end up with a number one album, despite a whole new batch of strong opinions from Maines in a "Time" magazine cover story.

WILLMAN: She said, "I don't respect Bush." It's part of her so- called apology was that you have to respect the office, no matter who's in it. Now she's saying that doesn't matter, I don't respect him at all.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP FROM "NOT READY TO MAKE NICE," COURTESY COLUMBIA RECORDS)

DIXIE CHICKS: I'm still mad as hell and I don't have time to go around and around and around.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VARGAS: The Dixie Chicks's opinions might have lost them a lot of their old fans, but just may gain them a lot of new ones.

COURTESY COLUMBIA RECORDS)

DIXIE CHICKS: Time heals everything, but I'm still waiting.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VARGAS: Sibila Vargas, CNN, Hollywood.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LIN: Make sure to catch LARRY KING LIVE on Wednesday because the Dixie Chicks are going to give him their first prime time interview, live. That's Wednesday, 9:00 Eastern, 6:00 Pacific.

Well, they smile and they're singing, but these women are living in hell -- abused and raped. It's a story too many people have turned their backs on, but one we think you must see.

And paying tribute to his predecessor, the latest from Poland, where Pope Benedict visits the hometown of Pope John Paul II.

For complete coverage of breaking news and today's top stories, stay with CNN, the most trusted name in news.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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