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CNN This Morning
Vigils Begin for Victims of Louisville Bank Shooting; Nashville Council Votes to Reinstate Expelled Lawmaker Justin Jones; Biden to Visit Northern Ireland to Mark Good Friday Agreement Anniversary; DOJ Asks Appeals Court to Pause Texas Judge's Abortion Pill Ruling; Pentagon Seeks Sources of Classified Docs Breach; Ukraine: Moscow Switching to 'Scorched Earth' Tactics in Bakhmut. Aired 6-6:30a ET
Aired April 11, 2023 - 06:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[06:00:18]
CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: All right. Thanks for joining me. I'm Christine romans. CNN THIS MORNING starts right now.
DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: It was good, but --
POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, everyone.
We are glad you're with us.
LEMON: And we were talking.
HARLOW: It came fast. Let's get started with five things to know for this Tuesday, April the 11th.
Louisville this morning, mourning the lives of five people murdered in a mass shooting at a bank. Police say the gunman used to be an employee there.
LEMON: The Tennessee Three closer to being made whole. State Representative Justin Jones officially reinstated after being expelled last week. His colleague Justin Pearson faces a vote tomorrow to get his job back.
Federal appeals court weighing a decision on a widely-used abortion pill. The DOJ has asked the court to stop a Texas judge's ruling that would suspend the use of mifepristone.
KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: Also, President Biden departing for Northern Ireland this morning. He is going to be there tomorrow, 25 years since the Good Friday Accords ended years of violence.
And say hello to Mayor Taylor Swift. The city of Tampa has now given the singer the honorary title and a key to the city, ahead of her concert there this week.
CNN THIS MORNING starts right now.
HARLOW: Another day, another mass shooting in America. LEMON: Oh, boy.
COLLINS: This broke right after we got off the air yesterday.
HARLOW: That's right.
COLLINS: And it's just -- it's one of those moments where you're just waiting to see, you know, what's next? What are the details.
LEMON: Again, near it, another shooting.
HARLOW: That's right.
LEMON: In the same city.
HARLOW: That's right.
COLLINS: Around the same time.
LEMON: Around the same time. It's just nuts, and something has to be -- We say it every time. But let's hope this time. It's just hoping and hoping and hoping, but we'll see.
HARLOW: We'll talk to Senator Chris Murphy later in the show, who keeps reintroducing this universal background check bill; keeps trying, keeps trying, keeps trying.
And look, one of the -- I mean, one of the victims, 63-year-old Tommy Elliott, was a good friend of Governor Andy Beshear.
And you just read about these people. Another one, Juliana Farmer, just 45 years old, just posted on Facebook, welcoming a new grandchild who is about to come. These are their lives.
LEMON: You know, everyone has a personal story. We're talking about, like, Louisville, we said, Well, there's a shooting here, and there's a shooting there.
I just sort of did a random search of our hometowns or just home states: Louisiana, Alabama, Minnesota. And just -- you find similar stories almost in every single place that --
HARLOW: That's right.
LEMON: -- the incidences of gun violence, although random, very personal, and everyone has a connection.
HARLOW: You're right.
LEMON: It's just crazy.
HARLOW: That's right? And so this morning, the country is once again mourning and reeling from another mass shooting. We're now learning that the gunman who killed five co-workers at a bank in Louisville, Kentucky, recently found out he was going to be fired, a bank manager tells CNN. The employee opened up fire in a conference room during a morning
meeting yesterday. Can you imagine that? Going to work, and that happens?
Police say the shooter livestreamed this bloody rampage on social media before police officers killed him in a shootout.
And investigators say a rookie police officer was shot in the head and is fighting for his life this morning in the hospital. He just graduated from the police academy less than two weeks ago.
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(MUSIC: "AMAZING GRACE")
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HARLOW: That is just hours after the shooting. The Louisville community began mourning the dead. This was a church service for Josh Barrick, a father of two. He was a senior vice president at the bank and a volunteer basketball coach for young kids at the church.
Adrienne Broaddus is live, covering this for us in Louisville this morning. What can you tell us?
ADRIENNE BROADDUS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Poppy, that shooter killed five of the people he worked with. That father of two was the youngest among the deceased.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
(GUNSHOTS)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Active shooter at the bank!
BROADDUS (voice-over): The search for motive begins in Louisville, Kentucky, after police say a 25-year-old bank employees shot his co- workers, leaving at least five dead.
INTERIM CHIEF JACQUELYN GWINN-VILLAROEL, LOUISVILLE METRO POLICE: The suspect shot at officers. We then returned fire and stopped that threat.
BROADDUS (voice-over): Police shot and killed the gunman, Connor Sturgeon. Investigators say he was still firing his AR-15 style rifle when officers arrived.
The shooter had worked at Old National Bank for more than a year, but a law enforcement source says Sturgeon was recently told he would be fired.
The source says Sturgeon wrote a note to his parents and a friend, indicating he was going to carry out a shooting at the bank. It's not clear when the note was found.
[06:05:07] CALEB GOODLETT, WIFE WORKS AT OLD NATIONAL BANK: I got a call from my wife, panicking that she was locked in the vault.
BROADDUS (voice-over): Police say the shooter livestreamed the attack to Instagram. It was also streamed to a Monday morning bank meeting Rebecca Buchheit-Sims, a manager at the bank, tells CNN.
Sims says she watched from her computer as her co-workers were gunned down in the conference room. She says she didn't work directly with the alleged shooter but knew him to be, quote, "extremely intelligent, with a low-key temperament."
SWAT teams raided the gunman's home Monday afternoon as officials praised the quick action of first responders.
GOV. ANDY BESHEAR (D-KY): It's got to be about them and the heroic actions of everybody who responded.
BROADDUS (voice-over): One of the officers who ran into the gunfire was rookie cop Nicholas Wilt, who was shot in the head and is in critical condition.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're all praying and supporting him. It was just a week and a half ago that I gave him, along with the chief, his graduation diploma from the academy.
BROADDUS (voice-over): One of the five victims, a senior vice president at the bank, was a close friend of the governor.
BESHEAR: Tommy Elliott helped me build my law career, helped me become governor, gave me advice on being a good dad.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BROADDUS (on camera): And some of the officers who responded to this shooting also responded to another shooting that happened around the same time, less than two miles away from here.
The interim chief, when she addressed members of law enforcement, she thanked her officers for showing up. And during that address, she said, "If we don't do it, who will?"
So much bravery displayed yesterday. When I was on scene, I spoke with an officer who said it was his father who reminded him why he does what he does, and that's to help people.
HARLOW: Running right into the danger. We are all praying for rookie cop Nicholas Wilt this morning and all those families. Adrienne, thank you.
Ahead in our seven o'clock hour, the mayor and interim police chief of Louisville will join CNN THIS MORNING live.
LEMON: Yes, looking forward to that, to see what he has to say.
Now to Nashville, where expelled Tennessee state lawmaker Justin Jones has now been reinstated.
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(CHEERING)
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LEMON: That was a dramatic moment, among many dramatic moments last night. Thirty-six city council members voting unanimously Monday to return Jones to his seat after he was removed last week by Republicans for protesting gun violence on the House floor.
The Democratic lawmaker was sworn in on the steps of the state capital, surrounded by a crowd of supporters.
Fellow ousted Democrat Justin Pearson could also be reinstated tomorrow. So we look for forward to that.
CNN's Isabel Rosales is live for us in Nashville with more this morning. Good morning, Isabel. What has the reaction been to Jones's reinstatement?
ISABEL ROSALES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you, Don.
I think that Nashville has spoken loud and clear by handing Justin Jones his seat back. And now nearly 70,000 people in his district have representation again in the statehouse.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. Speaker, I want to welcome our newest member to the House chambers, State Representative Justin Jones.
ROSALES (voice-over): Reinstated. Democrat Justin Jones walking back into the Tennessee House of Representatives to the sound of cheers, four days after being expelled by the state's Republican majority.
REP. JUSTIN JONES (D), TENNESSEE STATE REPRESENTATIVE: I want to welcome democracy back to the people's House.
ROSALES (voice-over): In a unanimous vote, the Nashville Metropolitan Council reappointing Jones as an interim representative from Nashville's House District 52.
Late Monday, Jones spoke from the steps of the capitol, thanking supporters while calling for the resignation of Tennessee speaker of the House.
JONES: Today, we're sending a resounding message that democracy will not be killed in the comfort of silence. Today, we send a clear message to Speaker Cameron Sexton that the people will not allow his -- his crimes against democracy to happen without challenge.
ROSALES (voice-over): Republicans expelled Jones and his colleague, Justin Pearson --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No justice, no peace!
ROSALES (voice-over): -- for violating rules of decorum during a protest last week on gun reform in the wake of the shooting at the Covenant School in Nashville last month.
REP. JEREMY FAISON (R), CAUCUS CHAIR, TENNESSEE STATE HOUSE: This is a sacred place that belongs to everybody and literally start looking up into the gallery with a bullhorn, getting the protesters worked up into a frenzy. That is incumbent on us to say, you've gone a step too far.
JUSTIN PEARSON (D), OUSTED FROM TENNESSEE STATE HOUSE: Sometimes rules have to be broken in order for the voices that have been marginalized and told that they are voiceless to be heard.
ROSALES (voice-over): As for Pearson, he says he's hopeful his vacant Memphis district seat will also be addressed during a special meeting tomorrow.
PEARSON: If it is the will of God and the people in Shelby County for me to serve, I promise to continue to do so, and I'm going to do what I believe with all of the people who continue to show up for us in this moment who are saying it's enough. And now is the time for us to create change in this state.
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[06:10:11]
ROSALES (on camera): And over in Memphis, political tensions have been rising, with the chairman of the Tennessee Democratic Party claiming that they, Memphis and Shelby County, have faced political threats of losing state funding for key projects, should they reinstate Justin Pearson -- Don.
LEMON: Again, we will be watching. Thank you, Isabel Rosales, joining us very early in Nashville there, Central Time, 5 a.m., 5:10.
Next hour, we're going to be joined by Representative Gloria Johnson, who survived her expulsion vote. We're going to get her reaction to Justin Jones being reinstated.
COLLINS: Yes. Can't wait to see that.
Also this morning, we're tracking a development out of the White House, as President Biden is set to depart shortly for Northern Ireland. He's going to mark the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement. That's the peace deal that was brokered in part by the United States and helped bring an end to decades of sectarian violence.
But ahead of the president's high-profile visit, masked men were seen thrown -- seen throwing Molotov cocktails at police during a pro-Irish march on Monday.
CNN's Nic Robertson is live in Belfast for us. Nic, obviously any time a president goes anywhere, there are heightened security concerns. You can see it on the ground days before he even gets there. He's set to leave this morning. What are you seeing on the ground? And what is it like in Belfast right now?
NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Yes, I think there's a mood of expectation. The president's coming. Some streets locked down already there. An additional 300 police officers have come over from mainland U.K. just in the past few weeks.
The terror threat level here was raised from substantial to severe, meaning an attack went from being likely to being highly likely.
And I think the president's message here is going to be about moving forward that Good Friday peace agreement.
One of the signature things that it did was not just bring peace. It brought into place a power-sharing government, but that power-sharing government has stalled over disagreements about Brexit. But of course, underlying Brexit, it's all about business.
So when the president does his ribbon-cutting ceremony at the university here in the center of Belfast -- a huge investment there in the future, potential education and the needs of the business community here -- that will be, I think, underscoring his message that -- develop business, improve the economy. And then all those kids that we saw yesterday, throwing those petrol bombs in those economically deprived areas. Those whole communities get an uplift.
That's the success of business, and that would be moving the situation here forward.
COLLINS: Yes. And it's his first visit there as president since taking office.
Nic Robertson, we'll stay with you for all the developments. Thank you.
HARLOW: A huge legal battle over abortion and medication abortions, specifically, continues, women across the nation could lose access just days from now. The Justice Department is now stepping in.
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HARLOW: The fate of mifepristone, a widely-used abortion pill, is now in the hands of a federal appeals court in the Fifth Circuit. Just yesterday, the Department of Justice asked that court to pause a Texas judge's ruling that would suspend the FDA's approval of the pill. effectively banning it nationwide.
The maker of mifepristone also filed a similar request to the Fifth Circuit. It calls for allowing people to continue using this drug while this appeals process plays out.
If the appeals court does not stay the Texas ruling, this all happens Friday at midnight.
Let's bring in CNN Supreme Court reporter Ariane de Vogue, and good morning to you. OK, so I thought it was interesting in the appeal is they also put forward doctors to talk about the adverse impact on their patients.
Because, remember, this is not just a pill used for abortion. This is a pill used for miscarriages. Women who are enduring the physical and emotional pain of a miscarriage also use this to complete the process. About a million women a year go through miscarriages.
So these doctors were part of it, as well.
ARIANE DE VOGUE, CNN SUPREME COURT CORRESPONDENT: Right. That's what's interesting here, is its healthcare workers and also the drugmakers. They came in here and said, basically, that this judge, this lower court judge, was trying to act like a doctor, and he rejected decades and decades of this -- safety recommendations. This drug has been on the market for some 20 years.
And one of the doctors actually filed this sworn declaration with the court, and here is what she said. She said, "Restricted access to this safe therapeutic threatens the health of real people -- people who are mothers, sisters, daughters, wives and friends of our country."
But also Poppy, the drugmakers themselves are weighing in, because they think that this lower court decision actually might destabilize how all drugs are regulated. That is what they're worried about.
And it's very rare to see them all come together. So you've got the healthcare workers. You've got the doctors, and you've got this -- the drug companies, too, all very concerned and all on this very tight timeline.
HARLOW: Yes, just a few days until this would take effect, Friday at midnight. Ariane, thank you for the reporting very much.
DE VOGUE: Thanks.
LEMON: Straight ahead, the latest on how the Pentagon is investigating the scope and scale behind a classified documents leak.
COLLINS: Plus, scorched earth. We are live on the ground in Ukraine with a new breakdown of Russia's tactics in Eastern Ukraine. That's next.
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COLLINS: This morning, the Pentagon is scrambling to determine the scope and the scale of the classified documents leak that was uncovered last week.
The documents now include secret information on the war in Ukraine, as well as insights into the extent that the U.S. spies on its enemies and its allies.
New "Washington Post" reporting this morning also says that the documents reveal Egypt was secretly planning to produce 40,000 rockets for Russia.
CNN's Natasha Bertrand is live at the Pentagon.
Natasha, I know that there have been some questions about what information in here is accurate. We've heard that from officials who seem very frustrated.
But I was so struck by the idea that they can't even say, you know, whether or not this is going to get worse; whether or not this leak has actually been contained at this point.
NATASHA BERTRAND, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: That is the big question, Kaitlan, that the Pentagon is grappling right now. Just how big is this leak? They simply do not know at this point.
That is part of what they're investigating, and they have stood up interagency effort to do a damage assessment, as well as to investigate whether there are any more classified documents out there that they simply have not recovered yet.
So just to remind viewers: these documents have been sitting online on this Discord server for at least a month. And the secretary of defense was not actually briefed on their existence until just last Thursday.
But a senior Pentagon official who briefed reporters yesterday said that they are really -- it's all hands on deck at this point to try to figure out just how bad this leak is, and whether it could jeopardize sensitive sources and methods.
Here's what he said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHRIS MEAGHER, SECRETARY OF DEFENSE FOR PUBLIC AFFAIRS (via phone): The Department of Defense is working around the clock to look at the scope and scale of the distribution, the assessed impact, and our mitigation measures.
We're still investigating how this happened, as well as the scope of the issue.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BERTRAND: Now we know, according to our sources, that many of these documents, if not all of them, do appear authentic. But some of them -- or at least one, I should say -- does appear to have been altered. And that is a document that lists Russian and Ukrainian casualties in the war in Ukraine.
[06:25:08]
An altered document appears to show those Russian casualties as being a lot lower than what the Pentagon has actually assessed.
But by and large, the Department of Defense, as well as the Justice Department, which is investigating this as a criminal matter, do seem to think that these are real and that they could pose a serious risk to national security -- Kaitlan.
COLLINS: Yes. The trove of information and just how recent it is, is stunning.
Natasha Bertrand, keep us updated on what you learn from the Pentagon.
LEMON: A Ukrainian commander says Russian forces have switched their tactics to a scorched-earth policy on the Eastern front. Watch this.
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(TANK MOVING QUICKLY THROWN TOWN)
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LEMON: The commander says Russia is destroying buildings and defensive positions with airstrikes and artillery fire.
Residents in Bakhmut, a city which has already been reduced to ruin, are now taking shelter in nearby Chasiv Yar.
CNN's Nick Paton Walsh joins us now, live from central Ukraine with more on this.
Good morning to you, Nick.
The question is how much of Bakhmut do Russians have control over?
NICK PATON WALSH, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, they say -- and I say "they," a separatist leader who visited over the weekend posted a video in which he claimed 75 percent was under Russian control.
Now, that may not be massively distant from the truth, but we're talking percentage fluctuations over the past months.
The street-by-street fighting has occurred. Now, certainly, Russia has more than it would probably a month ago. Absolutely. They are certainly fighting hard for the central parts of that city: the railway station, the central square, as well. That's where some of those videos over the weekend were posted from.
But those scorch-earth tactics are leaving a city of questionable strategic value but now massive symbolic value, with very little left of it, frankly to conquer.
And that brings to mind the essential question about what Russia's tactics really are. If they're seeking, in their warped view, to save Ukrainian citizens from their government here, then how are they destroying so much of the country they're claiming to be here to try and rescue? And also, too, strategically, what do they have left to try and defend or even get covered in, if so much of these towns they're trying to take are, in fact, destroyed?
But there are still Ukrainian forces in the West, holding on quite persistently, frankly.
This fight for Bakhmut, though as I say, of questionable strategic value, becoming more of a sideshow as the noise grows around Ukraine's counteroffensive, long planned by their allies -- with the assistance of allies in the West, U.S. and NATO. A lot of equipment coming in.
Those leaks Natasha were talking about, frankly shocking to me to see so much potentially very pertinent information emerge at the exact time when people are trying to work out which side knows what about the other's preparation.
This offensive, a decisive moment, certainly, and one, I think, that's being shaken in the days, possibly ahead of its beginning by this leak -- Don.
LEMON: Nick Paton Walsh.
WALSH: Thanks.
LEMON: Thank you very much. Appreciate it.
HARLOW: Well, part homecoming, part diplomacy. In just a few hours, President Biden will fly to his ancestral homeland, and our Donie O'Sullivan is live in Belfast.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They're coming to the mic in a minute.
HARLOW: Hi, Donie.
DONIE O'SULLIVAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Poppy. Yes, we're live here in Belfast, Northern Ireland, ahead of the president's visit here. That's coming up next after the break.
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