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Early Start with John Berman and Zoraida Sambolin

South Carolina Votes to Remove Confederate Flag; Chaos on Wall Street; Donald Trump: On the Attack. Aired 4-4:30a ET

Aired July 09, 2015 - 04:00   ET

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

[04:00:16] JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Breaking news this morning: take it down. A new day for South Carolina. The final vote to remove the Confederate flag from statehouse grounds.

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: Just chaos on Wall Street. The New York Stock Exchange shutdown, there's a selloff in China, and a bailout bid from Greece, all creating panic for investors around the world. Team coverage tracking markets this morning, ahead.

BERMAN: And Donald Trump unplugged. Does it even come in a plug version? The CNN interview that made so much news, Hillary Clinton, Jeb Bush and a whole lot more.

Good morning, everyone. Welcome to EARLY START. I'm John Berman.

ROMANS: Nice to see you this morning, John.

I'm Christine Romans. It is Thursday, July 9th. It is 4:00 a.m. in the East.

BERMAN: And we do have breaking news for you this morning. A historic vote just a short time ago, the South Carolina House passed a bill that orders the removal of the Confederate battle flag in the grounds of the capitol in Columbia. The final vote came in the wee hours of the morning. It was 94-20. Governor Nikki Haley will sign that measure. The debate lasted for 13 hours.

It featured impassioned pleas by lawmakers to make the Confederate emblem a thing of their past.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JENNY HORNE (R), SOUTH CAROLINA STATE HOUSE: Any of these votes to amend, you are ensuring this flag will fly beyond Friday. And for the widow of Senator Pinckney and his two young daughters, that would be adding insult to injury and I will not be a part of it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: This debate lasted late, late into the night, really into the early morning hours. You can see the emotions were high.

The renewed discussion of the flag sparked by the death -- the murder of nine people at an African-American church last month. Governor Nikki Haley is expected to sign the bill into law as soon as today, as soon as this morning. The flag, it will come down at the capitol as soon as perhaps tomorrow.

State police there are investigating numerous death threats against South Carolina lawmakers that were received during this emotional debate.

ROMANS: All right. Turmoil around the globe this morning. Glitches freezing up the New York Stock Exchange. The United Airlines, even "The Wall Street Journal", the Chinese stock market plunging despite the government's struggle to break its fall. And now, this morning, the Chinese stock market trying to recover.

And then you got Greece. You got Greece looking for another bailout, just days away, just days away from falling out of the euro. All as the Federal Reserve will believe it will hurt the U.S. economy. We have live coverage this morning from Hong Kong, and Athens.

But, first, a look at the latest in the markets. Asian stocks rebounding. And it has been a wild day. The Shanghai Composite dropped 3 percent, another 3 percent at the open, and then turned higher, climbing almost 6 percent. Why? This is a bubble that's popping and the Chinese government doing everything it can to prop up the markets, trying to stop the bubble from popping. But it's not stopping the huge, huge, violent swings.

European stocks are also up. They are up on hopes of agreement in Greece's debt crisis. U.S. stock futures are recovering from chaos yesterday.

At 11:30 a.m., the New York Stock Exchange suspended trading. The exchange says it experiencing an internal technical issue, not a cyber breach. But it raises serious questions and concerns about the system's vulnerability, just like 2010's flash crash which wiped a trillion dollars in equity in a matter of seconds.

Now, amid all this, United Airlines also had its own glitch. United Airlines grounded its entire fleet worldwide, was not flying. United says it was a failure of equipment, a router that went bad. It fixed the router, but it disrupted travel all day. And those travel disruptions, folks, will ripple into this morning.

And then "The Wall Street Journal", "The Wall Street Journal" web site had this 504 error message greeting costumers to or visitors to "Journal's" home page. None of these glitches appear to be related, just a risk of I guess doing business in a digital era.

All of these -- all of these breaks in the system happening all at the same time. Amid all the chaos, the Dow fell 261 points yesterday. It was fears about China's market collapse, Greece's debt crisis and that glitch that all did not help investor confidence.

BERMAN: So, in China, the market crashed followed by the epic fluctuations causing really some outright investor panic in many places. Over the last year, millions of people in China rushed to get into the market as it shot up. And over the last several days, they've been watching helplessly as the market plummeted by more than a third, swinging wildly along the way.

[04:05:00] ROMANS: The government is trying everything it can do to stop that, to stem the tide, and so far, without much success.

I want to bring in CNN's Ivan Watson in Shanghai.

And, Ivan, for a year, stocks in China were a miracle. And they were going up, up, up. And, finally, mom and pop investors started to get in. And now, it has turned on them and has had a dramatic crash. What's happening this morning?

IVAN WATSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, it's turned on them as a vengeance, because we're talking about losses since June 12 of more than $3 trillion. I mean, that is so that highlights the fact that China is truly the world's second largest economy when things happen here, they happen big.

In today's trading, well, it's been schizophrenic. We went from a selloff in the Chinese stock markets on Wednesday with the Shanghai Stock Exchange plunging some 6 percent to jumping back almost 6 percent today. So, you probably got people swinging from despair to euphoria.

And we've been talking to people. A lot of them calling on the government to do more, asking for help, and, of course, frightened about the possibility that their savings have been basically an annihilated in this loss of wealth.

And the Chinese government has been making daily announcement. That's because it plays a big role in the stock market. It's not like the U.S. -- the New York Stock Exchange.

Here, the government plays a big role. The Chinese government has announced interest rate cuts. It suspended IPOs. It has announced around $60 billion in all said of buying up of Chinese shares.

It also imposed restrictions. If you own more than 5 percent of a stake in any Chinese company, you are not allowed to sell anymore stocks for the next six months. These are some draconian measures.

And though we've seen some improvement today, it will make some people happier. You still have roughly half of all companies listed on the Chinese stock exchange have suspended their trading.

Imagine if that happened there in New York. That is not a sign of confidence. So, we'll have to watch closely to see what happens in coming days. Can the Chinese government with these big measures win back the confidence and support of investors who feel really burned right now and might not necessarily know all of the intricacies of the stock market -- Christine and John.

ROMANS: Yes. OK, Ivan Watson, thank you for that.

You know, we should point that U.S. investors have basically been shut out of that market. It's a closed market. The government controls who can be in that market. So, these are Chinese investors we're talking about, by and large.

BERMAN: But millions of them.

ROMANS: But millions, and it is a very important market. So, when you are talking about fear and contagion, you know that's something that's very important. You can definitely impact the rest of the world.

Let's turn go to Greece now, because fear is growing in Greece where people are worried the government there will not be able to reach a deal with European creditors. The Greek prime minster's official request for a three-year bailout getting a cool reception I think you can say from Eurozone leaders.

BERMAN: Here in the United States, the Fed is increasingly concerned that the Greek crisis could spill over into the economy here in the U.S.

CNN's Isa Soares joins us now from Athens with the latest.

Good morning, Isa.

ISA SOARES, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you, John. Good morning to you, Christine.

I know that many people probably have deadline fatigue, but this -- we've been told -- this is it. Greece has until the end of the day today. Midnight in Athens today to put through its proposals, proposals that need to be serious, we've been told, and need to be credible. It needs to include spending cuts, as well as questions -- proposals on its reform pension system. That's what they need to do.

Now, we know that Greece yesterday put through a request for its third bailout, the third bailout in six years, John. We don't know how much they are asking, but we know from the IMF, that the country needs 50 billion euro for it to survive for the next few years. As well as we know from the Greek government, that they have put up a first time formal request for debt relief.

But this comes down to the wire. Greece has to show that it's serious, that it wants to stay in the euro, like 75 percent of people here, want to stay in the euro. And now, it's up to the Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras.

Yesterday, speaking in European Parliament, it was made clear to him he really needs to show that he is serious about this, put his financial house in order, or get out. There was a lot of division there from European parliament leaders, but I think he got the message. Still, though, it seems to me he is being confident and some are worried here that perhaps he won't budge too much.

And if he doesn't, concern is that come Monday, banks will be close, come Monday, there will be no money on ATMs and then, that's the concern. Will people, will they have to issue IOUs? [04:10:02] Will they then have to cut -- have a hair cut on deposits?

These are all concerns with people here in Greece. They want to avoid that. So, today, they will be here on the streets just behind me in Syntagma Square, protesting, rallying to show Europe they are serious and they want to stay in it -- John.

BERMAN: To show they're serious, but there is growing concern that their prime minister may have pushed things too far.

Isa Soares for us in Athens, thanks so much.

ROMANS: Wow.

BERMAN: All right. New this morning, Donald Trump lashing out on his rivals one by one. In an interview with Anderson Cooper that first aired overnight, he took aim at Hillary Clinton.

The former secretary of state had told CNN she was very disappointed in Trump's description of Mexican immigrants as drug dealers and rapist. So, Trump accused her of dodging media questions about her e- mails.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: She has a lot to hide. She doesn't want to talk to the press. Look, she was the worst secretary of state in the history of the United States.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: Not one for hyperbole Donald Trump.

Also new this morning, a Republican source tells CNN the Republican chairman, Reince Priebus, called Donald Trump to voice concerns that he is hurting the party. Priebus said he has, quote, "spent four years trying to make inroads with the Hispanic community." And on top of all of this, there is a growing controversy over a Trump hotel project that according to "The Washington Post" has undocumented immigrants working at the construction site.

CNN's Joe Johns has that.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOE JOHNS, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: John and Christine, a rare moment of uncertainty for Donald Trump. The billionaire presidential candidate who is known for speaking his mind and so decisively about a whole range of issues. It's about Trump's construction projects, including one going up in Washington, D.C., where he has hired a top project management company to oversee the job. And questions have been raised about whether any of the workers on the site are undocumented immigrants.

It's become a real issue, especially in light of Trump's highly controversial comments at his campaign kickoff about Mexican immigrants who crossed the border into the U.S.

In a revealing interview with CNN's Anderson Cooper, Trump gave an honest answer about employees working on his construction projects in general, admitting that he cannot say for certain there are no illegal immigrants on any of the jobs.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Can you guarantee that you don't have illegal or undocumented workers working for you in hotel projects or various projects?

TRUMP: I can't guarantee it. How can I -- how can anyone? We have 34 million in the country. I used to hear 11. Now, I hear 34 million. I can't guarantee anything.

But I can say this, we work he very hard to make sure that everybody is legal as opposed to illegal.

JOHNS: And there was more controversy surrounding the Washington, D.C. hotel that is supposed to open at the end of this year or some time in 2016. The celebrated chef and entrepreneur Jose Andres became the latest Trump partner to drop out of a venture with him due to his controversial comments about immigrants. Andres had planned to put a new restaurant inside the hotel -- John and Christine.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROMANS: All right. Joe Johns, thanks for that.

Now, Donald Trump is also making it clear, he stands by a retweet on his page that took a personal jab at presidential rival Jeb Bush. The retweet said Jeb Bush has to like Mexican illegals because of his wife.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: If my wife were from Mexico, I think I would have a soft spot for people from Mexico. I can understand it.

COOPER: You think that influences his position on illegal immigration?

TRUMP: I think it could. I mean, maybe it should.

JEB BUSH (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: My wife is from Mexico. I love her dearly. You can love the Mexican culture and love your Mexican- American wife and also believe you need to control the border.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: Bush's border control plan called for putting border patrol agents closer to the border and fixing the E-Verify system to make it more reliable. The E-Verify system, folks, is something you use when you hire a worker to verify they are in the country legally, they have a valid Social Security number.

BERMAN: What you see there is Donald Trump driving the Republican primary discussion right now. You see him commenting, doing interviews, you see the other candidates now on the stump responding, on both the Democratic and the Republican side. So, there.

ROMANS: Originally they did not respond to him I think because some of them did not want to elevate him to an actual candidate.

BERMAN: Too late.

ROMANS: Now, he is getting all of the oxygen in the room is being either expelled or consumed by Donald Trump.

BERMAN: Or both.

Quarter past the hour right now. Baltimore's top cop is out of a job, fired in the wake of surging crime there, in the aftermath of the riots.

ROMANS: Plus, panic on board a Southwest Airlines flight overnight. We've got the video for you.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[04:17:43] BERMAN: We have breaking news overnight out of Chicago. A Southwest Airlines flight bound for Boston was forced to abort takeoff at Midway Airport because of mechanical problems. One of the 143 passengers recorded video that shows sparks coming from a wing. Yes, the wing is not supposed to do that.

A fire department spokesman says the engine caught fire. Wow. Wow.

Southwest says no one was hurt. Now, the plane is being inspected. The passengers were being put on another plane to Boston.

ROMANS: Glad they are all right.

This afternoon, family and friends of Kate Steinle will say their final good-byes at a memorial service for the woman fatally shot on a San Francisco pier. New details emerging about the apparently random killing and how the suspect, who had been deported five times, managed to get his hands on a murder weapon -- a gun stolen from a federal law enforcement officer.

Let's get more this morning from CNN's Kyung Lah in San Francisco.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KYUNG LAH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: John and Christine, we are learning much more about the weapon and how this began. This started with the break in of a car. That car belonged to a law enforcement officer with the Bureau of Land Management. Inside that vehicle was his government issued handgun.

That .40 caliber gun ended up here at the pier. It's not clear though exactly who broke into the vehicle. What we do know is that this suspect, Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez, found it, wrapped in a t-shirt, he says to an interview with a local television, and then, that gun went off.

We also heard for the first time since the murders happened from the mayor of San Francisco. He says that Lopez-Sanchez should not have been released. He put the blame squarely on the sheriff.

And we are anticipating that the sheriff will be holding a news conference later today to respond to that allegation -- John, Christine.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROMANS: All right. Kyung Lah, thank you.

Baltimore's embattled police chief is out. Mayor Stephanie Rawlings- Blake announced the removal of Commissioner Anthony Batts Wednesday saying, quote, "The people of Baltimore deserve better."

Batts was widely criticized for his response to the riots that erupted after the death of Freddie Gray. Earlier, a police union report criticized his leadership, saying officers received confusing orders during those riots.

The mayor says she is responding not to the union report, but to the dramatic spike in homicides.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

[04:20:05] MAYOR STEPHANIE RAWLINGS-BLAKE (D), BALTIMORE: Too many continue to die on our streets, including three just last night and one lost earlier today. Families are tired of feeling this pain and so am I. Recent events have placed an intense focus on our police leadership, distracting many from what needs to be our main focus: the fight against crime.

So, we need a change. This was not an easy decision, but it is one that is in the best interest of the people of Baltimore.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: Deputy Police Commissioner Kevin Davis was named interim commissioner.

BERMAN: All right. A key Bill Cosby accuser is now asking a judge to release all of the testimony from the 2005 lawsuit against the comedian. What else could be in these court documents? That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROMANS: All right. More bombshell revelations about Bill Cosby could drop any day now. Earlier this week, we learned that the TV icon admitted under oath that he gave sedatives to women he wanted to have sex with. But more details from that 10-year-old case could be coming. The accuser in that case wants the full deposition to be released.

Our Jean Casarez has the details. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

[04:25:00] JEAN CASAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: John and Christine, Andrea Constand who settled a sexual assault civil suit against Bill Cosby in 2006 is now asking the court in Pennsylvania to release the entire deposition transcripts from the case, which would include the entire sworn testimony of Bill Cosby. The case resulted in a confidentiality settlement agreement in 2006 for an undisclosed sum, which sealed the depositions, as well stopping any of the parties from ever talking about the case.

Constand, who was an employee at Temple University in 2004, alleged in the complaint sexual assault by Cosby after the television star gave her three blue pills to relax. Constand through her attorney Dolores Troiani alleged that Cosby and his representatives have breached the confidentiality agreement in the last eight months by responding to recent allegations of molestation by over 25 women who have come forward.

On Monday, excerpts of Cosby's deposition were released by a district court judge in Pennsylvania, with questions and answers like this: "When you got the Quaaludes, was it in your mind that you were going to use these Quaaludes for young women that you wanted to have sex with him?" Cosby, answer, "Yes". "Did you give them to the women the Quaaludes without their knowledge?" Lawyer objects. Cosby didn't answer the question.

Now, at the time, Constand's attorney then asked the judge to force Cosby to answer all those questions. Well, the judge agreed. So, there may be even more answers from Cosby if the full document is unsealed.

Also, in the unreleased deposition, the 13 Jane Does, the alleged victims of Cosby, and potential witnesses in the suit are named. The motion states that nine of the 13 have been contacted. None had voiced any objection to release of their name or Cosby's answers to questions about them.

Cosby's defense is expected to file a response -- John, Christine.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BERMAN: Ooh, this will be interesting.

ROMANS: Sure will. Thanks, Jean.

BERMAN: All right. Breaking news this morning: the Confederate flag in South Carolina, it will come down. A vote in the wee hours of the morning essentially making this final. We'll give you the dramatic story, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)