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96 Killed in Maui Fires with 3 Percent of Disaster Area Searched; Trump Facing Possible Fourth Indictment as George D.A. Prepares to Present Election Case to a Grand Jury; Woman Shares Story of Her Race from Flames in Maui. Aired 7-7:30a ET

Aired August 14, 2023 - 07:00   ET

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

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[07:00:00]

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, everyone. Thank you for starting your day with us, and let's get started with five things to know for this Monday, August 14th. Breaking overnight, 96 people are dead in the Hawaii wildfires, and only 3 percent of the disaster area has even been searched. The governor calling it a fire hurricane that spread faster than a mile a minute. And now a new lawsuit gets the state's main electric provider.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: Hours from now, the Fulton County district attorney set to begin presenting her case to a grand jury in the Georgia election subversion case. This means a potential fourth indictment looms over former President Trump, as CNN exclusively learns about key evidence obtained by prosecutors.

And a home explodes outside of Pittsburgh killing five people. Gas systems were operating as designed, according to officials. They say it could take months or maybe years to figure out why.

MATTINGLY: The raid of a newspaper head quarters in Kansas is raising serious concerns over First Amendment rights, police seizing everything, from computers to servers, to cell phones of reporters and editors.

HARLOW: Also, the LAPD says a mob of people stole $100,000 worth of merchandise during a daytime robbery. We'll show you what was caught on camera.

CNN This Morning starts right now.

MATTINGLY: Well, good morning. Good morning, Poppy. Thank you for joining us. There's a lot of news, but we're starting with the devastation that continues to roll out in Hawaii. 96 people now confirmed dead in those wildfires with only 3 percent of the disaster area searched this morning. Hawaii's governor says FEMA crews are discovering other tragedies, quote, in an ongoing fashion. He says more search and rescue crews are on the way along with 20 cadaver dogs. Authorities are asking family members to provide DNA to help identify those who have died. HARLOW: There are also so many new questions this morning about how this continued with the response. Was it fast enough?

The power company, Hawaiian Electric, is also facing a new lawsuit this morning for not cutting off electricity when forecasters warned about such powerful wind gusts. The New York Times is reporting this morning that firefighters had to cope with hydrants that were running dry. An official says backup generators maintained the supply, but water spewed out of melting pipes leading to low pressure. Listen to the governor of Hawaii.

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GOV. JOSH GREEN (D-HI): When the winds rose up, winds gusting as high as 81 miles per hour, fire spread rapidly. We believe between 60 miles per hour and 80 miles per hour across that part of the island. And that meant that fire traveled one mile every minute. That level of destruction and fire hurricane is something new to us in this age of global warming was the ultimate reason that so many people perished.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTINGLY: Now, you could hear the governor calling this a, quote, fire hurricane, something new to them, the flames spreading a mile per minute. Keep in mind, that's faster than anyone can run.

If you're driving, here's a sense of what that was like.

That's devastating video. We should note, those people are safe. They ended up taking shelter on rocks. Other survivors now struggling with what to do next as many line up to get back into Lahaina.

Here is CNN's Mike Valerio.

MIKE VALERIO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Poppy and Phil, aloha, good morning. Just after 1:00 A.M. here in Hawaii. And we're standing at the only way to get into the Lahaina disaster zone. This is a check point that is manned, guarded 24/7 because, of course, behind where we're standing, a highly sensitive area.

But this checkpoint is also a profoundly emotional juncture for people as they return perhaps into their homes for the first time. In fact, a few hours ago, we met a man, Blake, who, in the spirit of ohana, the spirit of family, extended family, said that he knows that his house is gone, but went back in to help his ohana.

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Listen to what he told us.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: My home burned down. I live right in Lahaina. So, I lost pretty much everything except what I could grab on my way out. It was so fast. It was unbelievable. So, I'm not going to go look at my home or anything. I have seen the videos. There's nothing left. So, I just have a truckload of gas and I have a lot of friends that are stuck over there. So, I'm just going to check in with them all and make sure everybody is okay.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VALERIO: But we certainly do have good news to report and it concerns the ease of access into the disaster zone. If you're a family trying to see what, if anything, has survived.

Earlier in the weekend, it was best described as organized chaos, a time lapse that we took on the southern shores of Western Maui showing a mile-long line, a queue with trucks, family, some of them sleeping overnight to try to see what has survived.

That has gotten to be a more organized system, with this checkpoint behind us being the only way in. There was confusion about where to go in, where to go out and who could access.

So, if we show you the map, there's a counterclockwise way of getting from this checkpoint towards into the disaster zone of Lahaina. The burn zone is still off limits. But now, as you can tell in this early hour of the day, it is now a trickle most people have seen what is left as they begin a new chapter of how to move forward. Poppy and Phil, back to you.

MATTINGLY: Mike Valerio, thank you. We're going to keep following this story throughout the course of this morning. Stay with us.

HARLOW: Yes, we absolutely will.

Also this, this morning, Donald Trump facing a possible fourth indictment as the district attorney in Fulton County, Georgia, gets ready to present her case to the grand jury. As soon as today, Fani Willis is expected to start presenting that evidence in her sprawling investigation of the alleged scheme to overturn Joe Biden's 2020 election victory in that state.

MATTINGLY: And CNN has exclusively learned that prosecutors have text messages and emails that show Trump's lawyers were behind the breach of a voting system in Georgia. Over the weekend, Trump continued to insist he did nothing wrong.

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REPORTER: Is there any chance for you take a plea deal in Georgia?

DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: We did nothing wrong. We don't take plea deals. That's a wise guy question. Mr. Wise Guy, we don't take plea deals because I did nothing wrong. It's called election interference. You know what that is? These indictments are brought out by Biden, who can't even put two sentences together.

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MATTINGLY: Well, Sara Murray is live for us outside the Fulton County courthouse in Atlanta. Sara, there are a lot of different threads here. You have been reporting on this extensively over the course of months now. Take a step back. What do people need to know as we enter this moment in this case?

SARA MURRAY, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDEDNT: Well, yes, Phil, it's not just months. The Fulton County district attorney has been working on this case for two and a half years. And this is, many ways, the culmination. She's likely to begin today presenting this case before a grand jury. And sources say she's going to seek charges against more than a dozen individuals. And this comes as we're learning about new evidence prosecutors have swept up in the course of this investigation.

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MURRAY (voice over): Security precautions already underway at the courthouse in Atlanta, as Fulton County District Fani Willis is expected to begin her grand jury presentation this week on former President Donald Trump and his allies' alleged attempts to overturn the 2020 election results in Georgia.

FANI WILLIS, FULTON COUNTY DISTRICT ATTORNEY: We've been working for 2.5 years. We're ready to go.

MURRAY: It's the clearest sign she intends to seek charges this week, as the widespread investigation into election interference comes to a head. Geoff Duncan, Georgia's former lieutenant governor and CNN contributor, confirming he has been summoned to appear before the grand jury.

GEOFF DUNCAN, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: I did just receive notification to appear on Tuesday morning. I will certainly answer whatever questions are put in front of me.

MURRAY: Independent Journalist George Chidi posted on social media, he's also been called to testify Tuesday. Chidi said he walked in on a group of shadow electors gathered to sign an illegitimate certification for then-President Trump in December 2020.

GEORGE CHIDI, INDEPENDENT JOURNALIST: They all but frog-marched me out of the room and then they posted somebody out front to make sure nobody else went in.

MURRAY: In addition to putting forward fake electors and the infamous phone call from President Trump to Georgia's secretary of state --

TRUMP: I just want to find 11,780 votes.

MURRAY: -- the breach of voting systems in rural Republican Coffee County is part of the probe. Sources tell CNN investigators have long suspected the breach was a top-down effort by Trump's team rather than an organic effort by Trump backers.

[07:10:00]

And sources say they have text messages and emails that directly connect members of Trump's legal team to that breach. Did you have any sense that this was sort of tied to other operatives in the Trump campaign, that it was anything beyond sort of lower level people in Coffee County?

SECRETARY OF STATE BRAD RAFFENSPERGER (R-GA): Not initially, but there were allegations and then, as you dig down deep, more is revealed. And then we realize that that wasn't truthful.

MURRAY: Surveillance video previously obtained by CNN shows a local election official escorting a team of pro-Trump operatives in to examine the machines on January 7th, 2021. The group included Scott Hall, an Atlanta bail bondsman and Fulton County Republican poll watcher.

SCOTT HALL, ATLANTA BAIL BONDSMAN AND FULTON COUNTY REPUBLICAN POLL WATCHER: I'm the guy that chartered the jet to go down to Coffee County to have them inspect all of those computers. They scanned all the equipment, imaged all the hard drives and scanned every single ballot.

MURRAY: According to text messages obtained by CNN, former Elections Official Misty Hampton offered a written invitation six days prior to examine machines. That invitation shared with attorneys working with Trump and others hunting for election fraud on behalf of Trump's then lawyer, Rudy Giuliani.

Just landed back in D.C. with the mayor, huge things starting to come together, an employee for the firm hired to access voting machines wrote in one text in an apparent reference to former New York Mayor Giuliani. We were just granted access by written invitation to Coffee County systems, yay, another message reads.

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MURRAY (on camera): When I spoke to Rudy Giuliani's lawyer, he insisted his client had nothing to do with the breach in Coffee County and pointed the finger at Sidney Powell, who was another member Trump's post-election legal team, saying you can't hold Rudy Giuliani accountable for what Sidney Powell was up to. Guys?

MATTINGLY: All right. Sara Murray live for us down in Atlanta, thank you.

HARLOW: Joining us now two journalists on the ground covering this also in Georgia, Tamar Hallerman, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution senior reporter, and Patricia Murphy, political columnist also at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Ladies, thanks so much for being with us.

Tamar, let me just ask you what is so critical about the procedure of how this is going to unfold and if you could also speak to Trump's team wanting to see this thing, if he is indicted here, it's a state case, which matters for a whole host of reasons, they want it in federal court.

TAMAR HALLERMAN, SENIOR REPORTER, THE ATLANTA JOURNAL-CONSTITUTION: So, we're expecting this presentation from Fulton County D.A. Willis and her team to take about two days. That's how long previous racketeering cases have taken her office. And this grand jury only meets on Mondays and Tuesdays. So, we're not expecting the D.A. to want this to extend another week.

You showed in the segment before with Sara Murray, that former Lieutenant Governor Duncan and other witnesses have confirmed they are going to be coming in Tuesday morning. And we're expecting some other people as well to come in and inform this grand jury of why they believe there's probable cause, that it was more likely than not that the former president and other allies committed a whole host of different crimes in Georgia, including racketeering.

You mentioned that the former president and his team likely wanting to move this case to federal court. We're expecting his legal team to make that move or to at least initiate that shortly after the former president is indicted, if he is indicted here. That would get him presumably a more conservative jury pool.

MATTINGLY: Patricia, for those who maybe haven't been following this on a granular level like you two have, like Sara Murray has, the significance of the two witnesses that we know are coming in, the journalist and the former lieutenant governor. What does that tell you about this moment, this case?

PATRICIA MURPHY, POLITICAL COLUMNIST, THE ATLANTA JOURNAL- CONSTITUTION: Yes. So, we can start with George Chidi, who is the independent journalist. He stumbled upon the meeting of the alternate electors or fake electors, whenever we want to call them, on December 14th in the state Capitol. We heard him speak there on the package earlier. And that tells us that certainly this is a situation that Fulton County D.A. Fani Willis wants to put in the grand jury, that fake elector scheme, including the level of secrecy that was involved.

GOP officials later said, no, this was a completely open meeting. There was nothing that we're trying to hide from the public, but George Chidi said, no, indeed, I was marched out and he was filming that on his iPhone at the time when it happened.

And for Geoff Duncan, he was one of the rare Republicans here in Georgia who would have been privy to a lot of the inner workings of what Trump and his team were telling GOP officials, but he was no longer at that point loyal to Donald Trump. He was speaking out at the time in real-time saying that this election was not stolen.

So, he will be somebody who is not seen as somebody who is a partisan Democratic actor coming after Donald Trump.

[07:15:04]

He was a Republican at the time and simply saw the facts differently and would have been on the inside of a lot of those calls and decisions being made at the time.

HARLOW: Tamar, can you speak to the importance of the exclusive reporting our colleague, Sara Murray, got with Zach Cohen? Prosecutors in this probe have these text messages and emails directly connecting members of Trump's legal team to the breach of voting systems in Coffee County. That is a wildly pro-Trump county, like 70 percent Trump, and like 10,000 votes here. So, why would officials be so concerned there and want to go down there?

HALLERMAN: Well, Fulton D.A. Fani Willis' jurisdiction is only Fulton County, of course, but she can pull in other evidence from counties outside of Fulton and even outside of Georgia if it can help her prove that there was a broader conspiracy, a broader scheme.

And so these text messages are able to help show that, just like Sara said, this wasn't some organic effort on the ground, but this, in fact, can be tied to members of former President Trump's inner circle, folks like Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell, who were already under investigation as part of this case.

MATTINGLY: Patricia, it seems like an inevitability at this point. Obviously, the reporting about the 12 individuals facing indictments, is there any chance the former president is not one of those individuals based on who you have been talking to?

MURPHY: Well, of course, we don't know exactly because it hasn't happened yet. But --

MATTINGLY: It looks like we just lost Patricia. Actually, Tamar, can you address that? Oh, wait, Patricia, are you back? You froze for a little bit.

Oh, Tamar we want to ask you --

MURPHY: I'm here. I'm sorry.

MATTINGLY: No, it's fine. Tamar, real quick, before we let you guys go, your thoughts on kind of what Patricia was answering there?

HALLERMAN: At this point, I think it's all but certain that the former president is indicted here in Fulton County. He has admitted as much in recent days while on the campaign trail. And I think the fact that the D.A. has sent letters to local law enforcement in recent months, telling them to get ready, telling them that her indictment decision is likely to incite a lot of anger and emotion, that's not the kind of letter you send if you don't plan on pursuing an indictment against a former president.

HARLOW: We appreciate it. Thank you, ladies, both. You know this inside and out working down there. We'll have you back soon. Thanks very much.

All right, look at this. What you're going to see on the left was our next guest's home, condo, before the deadly wildfires swept through Maui. What you see on the right is what is left of it, completely destroyed. She joins us next with her story.

MATTINGLY: And later, $100,000 worth of merchandise stolen from a Los Angeles mall in the latest smash and grab attack. We're going to have that coming up ahead. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There's a fire over there.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, my God. There's a fire starting right there.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MATTINGLY: The death toll from Hawaii's wildfire is growing now to 96. This morning, Hawaii's governor calling it 1,000-degree fire hurricane. It spread faster than a mile a minute.

Our next guest was out getting ice at the store with her boyfriend on Tuesday when smoke became heavy and fires erupted all around them. Emilie says it felt like a horror movie, black smoke coming closer and closer to them. That's about when they received the first alert on the radio.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Maui Emergency Management Agency has issued an evacuation order on Maui Island for (INAUDIBLE) subdivision due to a brush fire.

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MATTINGLY: Emily and her boyfriend made it back to her condo where shrubs and palm trees were now on fire. She rescued her two cats. Grab some water. They all eventually made it to safety. But what they left behind, that's now gone.

This is what remains of her condo, which she bought two years ago and renovated. Emelie is back with family in Wisconsin, now plans to return to Maui in the next ten days.

And Emilie Jorns-Frisque joins us now. Thank you for your time.

Just the experience itself, I was struck by the fact that the first real alert you got was via radio. Did that surprise you? Why didn't you get or hear about anything else before then?

EMILIE JORNS-FRISQUE, MAUI FIRE SURVIVOR: Yes. So, I guess there are sirens in place and warnings in place for hurricanes and tsunamis. I don't know if those warnings are typically used for other natural disasters, but they weren't in this case. We certainly weren't hearing any sirens or being warned in any sort of way that there was something this large happening. I'm told that we were sent texts. However, we didn't have cell service for at least a couple of hours at this point.

I want to say most of the island on the west side had lost cell service around noon, 1:00. So, by the time that the storms were really hitting around 4:00, no one had any service. So, no one had any idea what was going on.

MATTINGLY: How did you guys -- again, maybe this is obvious by sight and just kind of the feeling or sound or smell of things. How did you guys know it was time you were in bad shape, it was time to leave?

JORNS-FRISQUE: So, we -- yes, we were getting ice. We were stuck in traffic, in standstill traffic in his Jeep. We had the Jeep loaded full of ice so that we realized we didn't have power. We were going to try to keep the fridge cool overnight, to try to keep things lasting as long as possible.

And then it was when we were stuck in traffic, it was probably around 4:00. We had maybe been in traffic for about a half an hour at this point and. And we had gotten the warning. The smoke had just started to get darker and darker, and it was just surrounding us, just like a nightmare.

And the winds were so strong, it was blowing debris everywhere. There were almost like fire tornadoes and debris tornadoes and then little fires were just starting everywhere. There were embers just starting fires on the ground. Trees were falling and branches were starting on fire. Power lines were falling down. And it just got to a point where we kind of started to panic. We were just surrounded.

MATTINGLY: Are you in touch with neighbors and friends? Do you know how they're doing at this point?

JORNS-FRISQUE: Yes. I am very, very lucky. I feel like I'm one of the few people that all of my people are accounted for and okay. So, I feel very fortunate. However, there are at least 1,000 people still missing. And I do know of people who have people who are missing, and it's absolutely horrible.

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MATTINGLY: Can you just say before I let you go, the community itself? You've made the point. I think you bought your condo two years ago and renovated it. We've seen the pictures of it and its destruction. But the community itself is very close knit, has almost been completely destroyed. What drew you to the community?

JORNS-FRISQUE: So, I originally moved out to Lahaina because of the whales that we get in the wintertime from the whale migration, the humpbacks. So, I came out there kind of following that, working in animal conservation, and it just became clearer and clearer the longer that I was in Maui that the community was so close knit. And I think that's why I've stayed so long was because I've just felt so welcome with open arms.

And I think going off of that point, it is really important to point out that the community has really stepped up for each other and helping each other out in this crisis. And I think that they are very disappointed in the lack of help that they're receiving federally and at a state level.

And at the end of the day, I think if anyone is looking to help, that it's important to know that monetary donations are very helpful, making sure that you're doing your research into looking into where these donations are actually going, making sure that they're legitimate before you're sending money. But those donations are really helpful so that the community can allocate them accordingly.

I know we're needing camping supplies and means of power, such as generators and solar power. And at the end of the day, I think it's really important to reiterate that tourists need to stay home right now. We need your help elsewhere. But we have such limited resources that we need people to stay home right now.

MATTINGLY: Emilie Jorns-Frisque, an important message, thank you for sharing what had to have been terrifying experience. We appreciate it.

JORNS-FRISQUE: Thank you.

MATTINGLY: And as Emilie was noting, for more information of how you can help via wildfire victims, go to cnn.com impact or text Hawaii to 707070 to donate.

HARLOW: Remember when President Biden said this about New York Congressman Mike Lawler?

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JOE BIDEN, U.S. PRESIDENT: Mike is the kind of guy that when was in the Congress, they were the kind of Republican I was used to dealing with. But he's not one of these MAGA Republicans.

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HARLOW: Now, as the balance of power is very much up for grabs in November, one of the Democrats trying to unseat Lawler is saying people were, quote, horrified by those comments.

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