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Early Start with John Berman and Zoraida Sambolin
CNN Republican Debate Tomorrow Night; San Bernardino Massacre Investigation; Two Mosques Vandalized in California; Geneva Terror Arrests; Aired 4-4:30a ET
Aired December 14, 2015 - 04:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[04:00:15] CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: A big shake-up in the polls just one day before the CNN Republican presidential debate. Which candidate is now becoming the focus of his competitors?
ALISON KOSIK, CNN ANCHOR: President Obama trying to reassure the public in the war against ISIS, meeting with military leaders this morning. Is the president's strategy working?
Good morning and welcome to EARLY START. I'm Alison Kosik. Happy Monday.
ROMANS: Happy Monday. Good morning. I'm Christine Romans. It is Monday, December 14th. It's 4:00 a.m. in the East, it is 1:00 a.m. in Las Vegas.
Nine candidates converged on the Venetian Theater in Las Vegas tomorrow for the fifth Republican debate right here on CNN. It's the last debate of the year with only 48 days left until voting begins at the Iowa caucuses. The focus sure to be on national security in the wake of the Paris and San Bernardino terror attacks. And with Donald Trump still taking fire over his Muslim exclusion plan.
CNN's Athena Jones is in Las Vegas for us with the latest.
ATHENA JONES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm coming to you from the Venetian Theater right here on the Las Vegas Strip. This is where it will all go down on Tuesday night. And we're in the middle of rehearsals right now but you can see here the main stage has been set. We now know the nine candidates who made the cut for the primetime debate. They are, in order, John Kasich, Carly Fiorina, Marco Rubio, Ben Carson, Donald Trump, Ted Cruz, Jeb Bush, Chris Christie and Rand Paul.
Trump is center stage once again. He is still the frontrunner nationally but his frontrunner status is being challenged by Cruz in the state of Iowa. Three new polls now showing the Texas senator leading there.
Now CNN's Wolf Blitzer and Dana Bash, along with Salem Radio's Hugh Hewitt, are spending a lot of time over the next several days in the cone of silence, finalizing debate questions for this huge production. There will be 17 cameras and an invite-only audience of about 1400 people filling this theater on Tuesday night. Of course this will be the last debate of the year. The last chance for these candidates to make a strong impression with voters heading into the holiday season. Millions will be watching. So the big question, will Donald Trump
attack Ted Cruz? Will Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz get into it? Will Ben Carson and Jeb Bush and others have breakout performances that can boost their poll numbers? We'll be watching to see what happens.
ROMANS: We sure will and analyzing every minute of it. Thank you for that.
Four Republicans in the undercard debate. They are George Pataki, Mike Huckabee, Rick Santorum and Lindsey Graham. The undercard begins at 6:00 Eastern here on CNN.
KOSIK: And Donald Trump might called a huge shakeup in the Republican race. As Athena mentioned, Ted Cruz is suddenly soaring in Iowa leaving Trump in his wake. The latest "Des Moines Register"-Bloomberg poll has Cruz at 31 percent with Trump 10 points behind and Carson and Rubio barely breaking double digits.
And in a new national poll, Cruz is surging into second place. Five points behind Trump. The NBC News/"Wall Street Journal" poll has Ben Carson sinking to fourth place.
The reconfigured race leading to more than a little sniping all aimed at Cruz. Trump hitting the new Iowa frontrunner on his temperament. Rubio criticizing his national security cred and Carson comparing his life-or-death calls in the operating room to Cruz's Senate fundraising prowess.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DR. BEN CARSON (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Well, you know, we've all had different types of experiences. There's no question that I haven't spent a lot of time smoozing and asking for big money and going to cocktail parties. But I've spent many a night in the operating room, cold stirrups placed with a little child's life on the line, working hard to preserve that. You know, that's a very different kind of experience.
SEN. MARCO RUBIO (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: He talks tough on some of these issues. For example, he's going to carpet bomb ISIS. But the only budget he's ever voted for in this time in the Senate is a budget that cut Defense spending by more than Barack Obama proposes. We've had it.
DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I don't think he's qualified to be president.
CHRIS WALLACE, FOX NEWS CHANNEL: Why not?
TRUMP: Because I don't think he has the right temperament. I don't think he's got the right judgment.
WALLACE: What's wrong with his temperament?
TRUMP: Well, you look at the way he's dealt with the Senate, where he goes in there like a -- you know, frankly like a little bit of a maniac. You're never going to get things done that way.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KOSIK: The put-downs continued on Twitter with Trump writing, "I was disappointed that Ted Cruz would speak behind my back, get caught and then deny it. Well, welcome to the wonderful world of politics." Cruz tweeted back, actually a link to the song "Maniac" from "Flashdance" with the caption, "In honor of my friend Donald Trump and good-hearted maniacs everywhere."
ROMANS: That's so funny.
KOSIK: Starts getting so down and dirty and they're doing this back and forth on Twitter, I mean, it's amusing to the voters, possibly, but this is serious business. But it is fun to laugh.
[04:05:01] ROMANS: It is fun to laugh. And Ted Cruz also not hitting back really. He is sparring, but not hitting back or insulting back. Interestingly.
All right. Happening today, President Obama dropping by the Pentagon for a progress report on the war against ISIS. The White House says he'll meet with his national security team for an update. No major policy announcement there expected. But the president will following the meeting with some public remarks as the next phase in his campaign to reassure a nervous American public that his counterterrorism strategy is working. In his weekly media address, the president highlighted the killing of two ISIS leaders by U.S. drone strikes.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Our airstrikes are hitting ISIL harder than ever in Iraq and Syria. We're taking out more of their fighters and leaders, their weapons, their oil tankers. Our special operations forces are on the ground because we are going to hunt down these terrorists wherever they try to hide.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROMANS: The next stop for the president's reassurance campaign is a visit to the National Counterterrorism Center on Thursday.
KOSIK: Secretary of State John Kerry in Europe meeting with world leaders to secure a peace deal in Libya and stop the spread of ISIS there. Representatives of 17 nations, including Libya's two rival governments expected to sign an agreement Wednesday in Morocco. The Libyans will then have 40 days to form a unity government. Kerry heads to Moscow Wednesday. There he's going to be meeting with President Vladimir Putin to discuss the crisis in Syria and Russia's military buildup in Ukraine.
A new week brings another threat of a government shutdown. A short- term extension signed by the president is keeping the money flowing but only until Wednesday night. Most of the $1.1 trillion deal is done, but the two parties, they're still haggling over add-ons to the spending bill like measures requiring more vetting of Iraqi and Syrian refugees and provisions for cleaning up the air and water.
ROMANS: All right. It's a huge week for your money, folks. European shares are higher this morning. U.S. stock futures higher, too. The big marquee event, the Federal Reserve's big interest rate decision this week. Unless the Fed surprises everyone, higher interest rates are finally coming this week. But it hasn't been smooth sailing leading up to the expected first rate hike in a decade.
The Dow finished down 3.3 percent last week. The Dow and the S&P 500 are down for the year. And the reason is not about rates. The reason is oil. Oil prices have been hammered in recent weeks. Oil, a barrel of crude, around $35 a barrel this morning. That's near a seven-year low. Supply is still booming at the same time global demand is weakening.
So interest rates are going to rise gradually. It will be a small move this week.
A lot of discussion for now about how rapid the pace of increase will be next year.
KOSIK: And how much those increases -- each increase will be as well.
ROMANS: That's right. That's right. Yes.
KOSIK: Investigators combing a lake for clues in the California terror attacks. We've got new developments next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[04:12:00] KOSIK: FBI dive teams wrapping up a three-day search at the bottom of a lake just north of San Bernardino, California. They were looking for evidence that might have been dumped where -- there by Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik, the radicalized couple who murdered 14 people earlier this month. But investigators recovered nothing related to the investigation.
We get more now from CNN's Ana Cabrera in San Bernardino.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ANA CABRERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Christine and Alison, we are here at the makeshift memorial set up near where the shooting happened. This is a tribute to the 14 people who lost their lives. Their funerals have begun and many of them have been laid to rest now.
This as the Department of Environmental Health where many of them worked is set to reopen today. And as the community moves forward and tries to heal, the investigation continues. Over the weekend, investigators wrapped up their search of a murky lake near the crime scene and we learned it yielded no evidence that was connected to this but they aren't giving up finding that missing hard drive or the data that was on it. In fact they will now be working with Internet providers to try to pull some of the records connected to the killers' IP addresses. Now we're also learning more about their online communications. The
"New York Times" reporting American law enforcement sources have found social media postings made by Tashfeen Malik, one of the killers, prior to her even coming into the U.S. Now according to the "New York Times" these postings talk about violent jihad that she supports and even wants to be part of it.
And they are saying she made no effort to conceal here views yet it wasn't caught through the background checks that she had prior to getting her visa when she came here in 2014. And why was that the case? Because they weren't checking social media. U.S. officials say that just wasn't part of the screening process. She had three background checks that did not look at social media.
Since that time, we have learned that U.S. officials are looking at social media as part of their screening process for visas for applicants of specific countries. It just wasn't happening at that time. And now the Obama administration has ordered a thorough review of the visa application process -- Christine, Alison.
ROMANS: Ana, thank you for that. Ana Cabrera for us this morning.
Two mosques vandalized in Hawthorne, California. The name "Jesus" and the words "Jesus is the way" spray-painted outside those buildings. Investigators also finding a fake hand grenade at one of the sites. The FBI clarifying the case as a hate crime, something that had to do too often this year.
We get more from CNN's Polo Sandoval.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
POLO SANDOVAL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Christine and Alison, good morning. 2015 will likely to see the most anti-Muslim incidents in the U.S. since the 9/11 terrorist attacks. That's according to some experts.
Over the weekend we caught up with one of them, Afaf Nasher. She is the president of the New York chapter of the Council on American- Islamic Relations or CAIR. Well, the group's data shows that mosques and Islamic centers have been targeted by vandals at least 63 times this year. And that number could actually be higher since the Department of Justice says that hate crimes often go unreported.
[04:15:08] One of the most recent cases left the worshipers to pray on the sidewalk in Coachella, California. Their mosque was set on fire Friday. 23-year-old Carl James Dial was arrested in that case and charged with a hate crime.
Another case got the attention of the FBI in Philadelphia. Surveillance cameras there show a severed pig's head being thrown out of a truck at a mosque. This too being investigated as a hate crime by the FBI this morning. Practicing Muslims are prohibited from eating pork or pork byproducts. And in Florida, the owner of a gun shop is selling these signs declaring Muslim-free zones.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) ANDREW HALLINAN, GUN SHOP OWNER: We don't know who their ties are. We don't know who these people are.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SANDOVAL: Andrew Hallinan calls the signs novelties and, quote, "something humorous." Critics like Nasher however believed that these are just some of the actions that are fueling Islamaphobia in the U.S. They say the damage goes far beyond any material losses. People are getting hurt.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
AFAF NASHER, PRESIDENT, CAIR NEW YORK CHAPTER: Some store owner was attacked violently. He was sent to the -- he got to the hospital. And we were talking about coming together as a nation. What stops that attack? Or was actually customer coming in and acted as a Good Samaritan. So if not for that Samaritan, perhaps this would have been much different.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SANDOVAL: And this morning, Nasher is joining the chorus of Muslims condemning attacks around the world that have been carried out in the name of Islam. They said the violence really has no place in her faith. She hopes that people of all denomination, of all faiths, also do the same.
Christine and Alison, back to you.
KOSIK: All right, Polo, thanks for that.
And a deadly shooting in California triggering a heated debate over the use of police force. A Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department says surveillance pictures show 28-year-old Nicholas Robertson was shot and killed by officers in Lynnwood after he fired six or seven shots into the air and began waving a handgun erratically as officers approached. The two deputies at the scene fired a total of 33 shots. The L.A. County D.A. and the sheriff's office will be opening an investigation.
ROMANS: Closing arguments begin later this morning in the trial of William Porter, the first of six Baltimore police officers facing charges in the death of Freddie Gray. Prosecutors claimed Porter cared so little for Gray's well-being he ignored his pleas for help and left him to die in the back of a police van. The defense argues Porter went above and beyond most officers would do. They blame two other officers claiming they failed to act when Porter told them Gray needed medical help.
All right, 17 minutes past the hour. It's beginning to feel a lot like, not Christmas, but going to the beach.
KOSIK: In fact, I'm wearing flip flops right now. You can't see it.
(LAUGHTER) ROMANS: Warm weather will be hanging on in the East. Let's bring in meteorologist Pedram Javaheri for that.
(WEATHER REPORT)
ROMANS: I'm worried the crocus are going to come up. I really feel like the northeast, they think it's spring. We never got a hard freeze. I made that one up.
KOSIK: Yes.
ROMANS: Yes.
KOSIK: The winter is still young.
ROMANS: Unbelievable.
KOSIK: Two arrests in a Switzerland terror plot. The -- the country, rather, on high alert this morning. What investigators are revealing next.
[04:19:10]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KOSIK: The Egyptian panel investigating the crash of a Russian jetliner in the Sinai desert says it's so far found no evidence of terrorism. A preliminary report says the technical investigation committee has not found anything indicating the crash that killed all 224 on board was an act of terror. Russia has said it found evidence a bomb caused the crash and ISIS has claimed responsibility for downing the plane.
ROMANS: Two people with Syrian passports now arrested and traces of potential bomb-making chemicals found in a car in the Geneva area. The search for more radicalized suspects still going on as security there remains tight. But are these latest arrests linked to the Paris terror attacks?
I want to bring in CNN's international diplomatic editor Nic Robertson, joining us live from Geneva.
Clearly the city is still on high alert here even after these arrests. What do we know?
NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Well, they're still looking at those possible links to the Paris terror attacks. And prior to these two men being arrested, there was an already heightened terror threat here. Some information from U.S. counterterrorism officials picked up from ISIS chatter and also the possibility that some associates of those Paris attackers were here in Switzerland. And it was during that heightened alert as they were searching for those elements of a potential plot that these men with what Swiss officials are appear to be authentic Syrian passports were picked up. Traces of explosives found in their vehicle according to a Geneva prosecutor. A European security source said this is traces of precursor chemicals,
the source of household products that could be used to make a bomb. The men have said that they only recently bought the vehicle. So this is where the investigation is at the moment. Two parallel investigations. Investigating these men, the possible explosives, their ties to terrorist organization, plus the already ongoing investigation here into full potential ISIS plotters targeting either here in Geneva, Toronto or Chicago. So all of these threats ongoing. And that concern, the links to the Paris terror attack as well -- Christine.
ROMANS: All right. Nic Robertson, thank you for that, for us this morning in Geneva.
KOSIK: Another confrontation between Turkey and Russia. A Russian warship firing warning shots at a Turkish fishing boat. Officials in Moscow say the vessel came within 1600 feet of their warship and failed to heed calls to change course. Russia had summoned the Turkish military attache to discuss the incident. The Russian warship is in the area supporting Moscow's military intervention in Syria.
ROMANS: A historic election in Saudi Arabia. For the first time in its history, women have been allowed to vote in an election and to run for office as well. Saudi officials report at least 17 women candidates won their races for local government offices in both small villages and big cities. And most had to run their campaigns online because men and women aren't allowed to interact in public.
KOSIK: A big shakeup in the polls causing a new feud among Republicans running for president just one day ahead of CNN's debate. We're breaking it all down next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
