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Major Russian Hacking Revelation; Who Pays For The Wall?; Hate Crime Charges Filed in Torture Video Case. Aired 5:30-6a ET

Aired January 06, 2017 - 05:30   ET

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

[05:30:45] MIGUEL MARQUEZ, CNN HOST: The key link in the election hacking scheme revealed. A U.S. intelligence report identifies people it says provided hacked Democratic emails to WikiLeaks from the Russian government. All this ahead of President-elect Trump's big sit-down with the intelligence committee -- community. Complete coverage ahead.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENT-ELECT: Who is going to pay for the wall?

RALLYGOERS: Mexico.

TRUMP: Who?

RALLYGOERS: Mexico.

TRUMP: By the way, 100 percent.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN HOST: A stunning reversal of a big campaign pledge. Donald Trump's team now wants Congress to fund the wall with Mexico in an effort to speed up the job. Details on this flip ahead.

MARQUEZ: And the Republicans now setting their sights on defunding Planned Parenthood while also dismantling Obamacare, but could doing both at once keep either of them from getting done? Welcome back to EARLY START. I'm Miguel Marquez.

ROMANS: Good morning, nice to see you this Friday morning.

MARQUEZ: Good morning. Happy Friday.

ROMANS: I'm Christine Romans. Thirty-one minutes past the hour this Friday morning. I'll say it two or three times here. Big developments overnight. A new intelligence report given to President Obama names the go-betweens who officials now believe Russia used to ferry hacked Democratic emails to WikiLeaks before the election. This, as U.S. officials tell CNN intelligence agencies got new information after the election that has increased their confidence it was Russia that carried out the hack.

MARQUEZ: And it did it, in part, because Moscow wanted to help Donald Trump win. All this ahead of the president-elect's top-level intelligence briefing on the hack, expected sometime today. What is Mr. Trump saying about all of this? We'll get more on that in a moment, but we start with justice correspondent Pamela Brown and the latest on the new intelligence.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PAMELA BROWN, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Miguel and Christine. We're learning more about what is in that comprehensive review that was presented to President Obama and will be presented to President-elect Trump. We've learned that it contains the identities of the go-between people that the Russian government used to hand over those stolen documents to WikiLeaks.

You'll recall this week that Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, said that the Russians did not hand over those documents, but we've learned from our sources that the Russian government used a third party and apparently the identities of those people are now in that report.

Also, we've learned about these intercepted communications after the election of Russian government officials celebrating and congratulating each other on Donald Trump's win. We're told there's no smoking gun intercepted communication but this is just one piece of the puzzle of many pieces, we're told, that has built this picture of Russia being behind the hack and the why -- the motivations.

Also included in this report, we know that the leader of the DNI will be leading this briefing with Donald Trump in New York, in Trump Tower, along with other leaders of the intelligence community. Of course, this will be watched very closely. Back to you, Christine and Miguel.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MARQUEZ: Pamela, thank you very much for that. James Clapper, the national intelligence chief, telling members of the Senate foreign counterparts -- foreign counterparts are worried the president-elect disparaging the U.S. intelligence community could damage public confidence in the spy agency. As we mentioned, today, Clapper and other intelligence agency heads are set to brief Trump on the hack in person. CNN's Jim Acosta has a quick preview.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JIM ACOSTA, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Later today, Donald Trump will be meeting with top intelligence community officials to go over their findings that Russia was hacking into the November election. Expected at this meeting will be the outgoing director of National Intelligence, James Clapper, as well as Michael Flynn, the incoming National Security adviser for the president-elect.

Yesterday, up on Capitol Hill, those intelligence community leaders were reiterating their findings that Russia was involved in hacking into the election, but Trump, in a series of tweets last night, continued to raise doubts about that assessment. Meanwhile, he has named retiring Indiana Sen. Dan Coats as his new director of National Intelligence, but I'm told by a transition official that Coats will not be at that meeting later on today.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROMANS: All right. Jim Acosta, thanks. The FBI and the DNC -- different versions this morning of the same event -- whether the Bureau ever asked to access the party's computer servers after the initial hack. The DNC told "BuzzFeed News" the FBI never asked to access their servers but a senior law enforcement official told CNN last night the DNC rebuffed an FBI request and delayed the overall investigation.

[05:35:13] Donald Trump latching onto that with these tweets Jim Acosta mentioned, trying to sow doubt about intelligence on Russia he disagrees with. He writes, "The Democratic National Committee would not allow the FBI to study or see its computer info after it was supposedly hacked by Russia, so how and why are they so sure about hacking if they never even requested an examination of the computer servers? What is going on?"

MARQUEZ: As for senior members of the Russian government apparently celebrating Donald Trump's victory, how are those officials reacting this morning to all those new revelations? CNN's senior international correspondent Fred Pleitgen is in Moscow for us -- Fred.

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hey, good morning, Miguel. Yes, and they certainly are angry and a little frustrated at some of the things that they've been hearing at the Senate Armed Services Committee hearing. One news network here, the "Sputnik" news, which is one of the state-run agencies, highlighting some of those Donald Trump tweets, calling into question some of the things that have been said -- some of the information that's been coming out.

And I personally got a message from the spokesman for Vladimir Putin, actually, as the hearings were still going on, so he was very quick to reply. And he said, "We have suggested cooperation on combating cyber threats numerous times. It was rejected. We are sick and tired of those irresponsibly blaming everything on our country. If there is a need for an enemy why not try someone else." So the Russians sticking by their line that it wasn't them.

One of the other things, Miguel, by the way, that angered them a lot was the DNI -- James Clapper coming out and saying that Russia was also spreading fake news. There's a senior Russian lawmaker who came out and accused America of spreading more fake news than anyone else, so we can see that the tone continues to sour, Miguel.

MARQUEZ: It will be interesting to see how the relationship between the U.S. and Russia continues when Donald Trump takes office. Fred Pleitgen for us in Moscow. Thank you.

Now, so much to discuss ahead of the president-elect's debrief from intelligence officials today. We'll bring back CNN's Eugene Scott and Tal Kopan, next.

ROMANS: And the final jobs report of President Obama's tenure released this morning. We're going to show you the positives it added to his legacy and the negatives that Donald Trump has promised to fix.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[05:41:00] MARQUEZ: A new classified intelligence report identifies go-betweens who carried hacked emails from Russia to WikiLeaks, which then released them to the public. Helping us get through all this,this morning, is -- on this big, big story -- CNN's politics reporter Tal Kopan in D.C. and Eugene Scott, who's right here to my right in New York City.

Tal, I want to start with you. The -- I mean, huge, huge pushback from the intel community yesterday in D.C. Trump getting briefed today by the heads of the intelligence agency. How is all of this being received?

TAL KOPAN, CNN POLITICS REPORTER: Well, the question is sort of by whom and in some cases in this -- in this instance, Donald Trump and his inner circle stand alone. You know, I've been on the Hill all this week talking to members of Congress.

There is definitely a concern among some of the Republican Party about any perception that this information that Russia was the one to hack the Democratic political groups, as we know, and new information that we may have more evidence about how that information was then handed off to a third party, who handed it off to WikiLeaks for release. There's concern that that information could be used to try to undermine Donald Trump's election.But aside from that, there is near unanimous consensus on the Hill that we should trust the intelligence community --

ROMANS: Right.

KOPAN: -- and what they're telling us. Whereas, the Trump transition continues to cast doubt on this intelligence and ask questions.

ROMANS: And it's almost, you know -- it almost looks as though they just don't want anything to cast doubt on the legitimacy of that presidency so they refuse to take a look at -- may not -- look, the hacking may not have changed the election. The fact that people are hacking in the election -- the American electoral process -- is a concern for everyone regardless of what party you're in.

Let's talk a little bit about Julian Assange because he was on "FOX" this weekend -- had an interview on "FOX" this week, right? And I want to listen to exactly how he talked about who gave WikiLeaks this information.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEAN HANNITY, HOST, FOX "THE SEAN HANNITY SHOW": Can you tell the American people 1,000 percent you did not get it from Russia --

JULIAN ASSANGE, FOUNDER, WIKILEAKS: Yes.

HANNITY: -- or anybody associated with Russia? ASSANGE: Look, we can say and we have said repeatedly over the last two months that our source is not the Russian government and it is not the state party.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: He doesn't answer the follow-up. It's not the Russian government or a state party. That doesn't say it's not a go-between, Tal, and that we know -- when you talk about cyber espionage there are often go-betweens.

KOPAN: Yes, absolutely. I mean, keep in mind there's a lot of different ways that cyber criminals and cyber actors cover their tracks, right? So it's also an instance, you know -- in the technical analysis there are ways that hackers sort of jump through different internet points so they can kind of make it difficult to follow them. You know, the people that investigate this are very familiar with that.

When you're talking about distributing it to an entity like WikiLeaks, of course, in any sort of espionage there's going to be attempts to cover their tracks. And there's always, you know, the desire for plausible deniability on the side of who's receiving the information. So, yes, there was a little bit of lawyering, as we said before, from Julian Assange about what exactly he received and from whom. And there's -- you know, the question, to me, of how much WikiLeaks even wants to know about its sources because their --

ROMANS: Right.

KOPAN: -- message is transparency --

ROMANS: Right.

KOPAN: -- and bringing down governments. So I don't know why they would really investigate very deeply where they're getting this information from.

MARQUEZ: All right. Switching gears from hacks to bricks. I'm going to start this question off with a face plant. The wall -- the wall that Donald Trump said what, once, twice, 500 times during the campaign --

ROMANS: Mexico's going to pay for it.

EUGENE SCOTT, CNN POLITICS REPORTER: Yes.

MARQUEZ: -- and Mexico's going to pay for it. They're going to build the way. He now says nope, let's go through appropriations and get it going faster. How's this going to be received?

SCOTT: Well, it's not going to be received well from anyone. Even though Donald Trump was often criticized for suggesting that Mexico would build the wall, something that no one really involved in immigration policy thought was possible, no one really expected that he was going to have American taxpayers support this idea. The majority of Republicans who voted for Donald Trump didn't support a wall being built, period, much less of them paying for it themselves.

[05:45:10] So the pushback that he's about to get is probably far more significant than he suggested or that he could have expected.

ROMANS: A CEO of aconglomerate, a couple of weeks ago, who also owns some concrete companies told me, you know, the wall's good for business, you know, for the big construction. Who's going to build it? You'd have to have a foreign guest worker program to get the labor at 4.7 percent unemployment. I think that was kind of a joke but it just shows you there are going to be some issues -- eminent domain issues along the border.

MARQUEZ: But is he really going to spend political capital on this when you've got health care, tax reform --

ROMANS: Tax reform.

MARQUEZ: -- this giant transportation bill that they want to get through? I -- it's just -- it just seems like he's biting off way too much.

ROMANS: Well, and it looks like House Republicans are going to say infrastructure is not going to be in the first 100 days now. They're going to wait --

SCOTT: Right.

ROMANS: -- on the infrastructure thing. Let me ask you one quick thing, Tal, about Obamacare and the effort to gut Obamacare and now tying defunding Planned Parenthood. It would seem that could slow the process for both.

KOPAN: Oh, absolutely. And, you know, keep in mind the House and the Senate both have to pass things. The House looks like it wants to add defunding Planned Parenthood to their bill, but in the Senate there's a very, very narrow majority for Republicans. They cannot lose three votes. That is how narrow the margin is.

And right now there is already one senator, Rand Paul, who is voting against the vehicle for appealing Obamacare because he's concerned about deficit spending. And there are two female senators who are against measures to defund Planned Parenthood so already, that's not enough votes. So if the House moves forward with this you're going to have a serious standoff between Senate and House Republicans over how they can possibly move forward, and we might not see it move forward at all if it proceeds down this track.

ROMANS: I will say the news flow is really moving quickly.

MARQUEZ: Yes.

ROMANS: There's just a lot of developments every few hours, so there's a lot to talk about as this all starts to take shape. You guys, thank you so much. Happy Friday.

MARQUEZ: Happy Friday. KOPAN: Have a nice weekend.

ROMANS: It is Friday -- it's jobs Friday. The final jobs report of President Obama's tenure is due later this morning. Here's the forecast. One hundred and seventy-two thousand new jobs. The jobless rate, 4.7 percent. That would be a small rise probably because a strong jobs market is encouraging Americans to come off the sidelines and look for work again.

Wages are forecast to rise 2.8 percent, still below the Feds target of 3.5 percent. It's been one of the big criticisms of the so-called Obama economy. The wage growth has not been more robust. On the flip side, since Obama took office, 11 million net new jobs have been created.

MARQUEZ: Now let's take a look at what's coming up on "NEW DAY". Alisyn "thank God it's Friday" Camerota joins us now live. Hello.

ROMANS: "TGIF Camerota".

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN HOST: How did you know that's on my birth certificate?

MARQUEZ: I knew it.

CAMEROTA: Great to see you guys. We have a lot coming up on "NEW DAY". So, as you have been reporting, Donald Trump is now -- has a new plan for how to pay for the border wall with Mexico and it is not what he promised during the campaign. So we will have Kellyanne Conway on our program. She's the incoming counselor to the president. She will be explaining this new payment method.

Also, there is this poignant new documentary about Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher. It was supposed to come out in March but it has been moved up because of their untimely deaths. It's called "Bright Lights". So we are going to be showing you some pieces of that documentary and just talking about their incredible life and their incredible mother-daughter relationship. So all that when we see you at the top of the hour.

ROMANS: I've been hearing a lot about -- a lot of good things about that documentary, so I'm interested to hear --

CAMEROTA: Me, too.

ROMANS: -- that interview. All right.

MARQUEZ: Yes. What lives -- amazing.

ROMANS: Thanks. Nice to see you.

CAMEROTA: Nice to see you.

ROMANS: Forty-eight minutes past the hour. Four people facing hate crime charges after a video of them torturing a mentally challenged teenager was streamed online. The victim's family, President Obama, really the whole country now weighing in. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[05:52:00] ROMANS: All right. The two frontrunners for the NBAMVP going head-to-head last night in Houston.

MARQUEZ: Andy Scholes has more from CES in Las Vegas in this morning's Bleacher Report. Good morning, Andy.

ANDY SCHOLES, CNN SPORTS CORRESPONDENT: Hey, good morning, guys. You know, the Rockets' James Harden and Thunder's Russell Westbrook, I mean they're both just having incredible seasons thus far and if they voted for MVP right now it really would be a toss-up between these two. And they were going head-to-head last night and the Rockets' James Harden, he had them rolling early in this game.

The Rockets opening up an 18-point lead in the third quarter. But Westbrook, he would lead the Thunder back. He had eight three- pointers in this game, on his way to 49 points. The game was tied in the closing seconds when Harden's going to find Nene. He gets fouled and he would knock down those free throws. The Rockets would squeak by the Thunder in this one, 118-116.

Now, "INSIDE THE NBA, the entire crew -- they were out here doing their show live at CES in Las Vegas and they were having some fun trying out all the gadgets out here. The funny moment -- Ernie Johnson put this device on his head. It's supposed to help grow hair, so if we see Ernie next week with a full head of hair we will know why.

Now, one of the coolest things I've been able to try out here in Las Vegas is all the new virtual reality products. You know, NextVR, it's an amazing new way you can watch sporting events. It puts you right there in the action. Right now, they broadcast one NBA game a week in virtual reality. And I sat down with NBA commissioner Adam Silver yesterday and he's really excited about the future of this technology.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ADAM SILVER, COMMISSIONER, NBA: This is the closest thing to being live in an arena and, of course, when you have global games like ours only a tiny fraction of our fans will probably ever be in the United States, let alone be in an NBA arena. And, therefore, we can replicate that experience, especially that courtside experience. Talk to fans on your left, talk to fans on your right, hear what the players are saying out on the floor, move around the arena. I think those are the kinds of things we're very focused on.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCHOLES: And NextVR is also in works with the NFL, providing highlights from some of their games, and they hope to do more in the future. And guys, don't forget, NFL playoffs -- they start tomorrow. You've got the Lions at the Seahawks and then in the "no one has a quarterback bowl" you've got the Texans hosting the Raiders.

ROMANS: Oh.

MARQUEZ: Andy, $20 on red for me, $20 on red.

SCHOLES: Twenty on red. All right, I'll do that, Miguel.

MARQUEZ: Thank you.

ROMANS: Thanks. Nice to see you, Andy.

MARQUEZ: Now, four suspects will appear in a Chicago courtroom today charged with a hate crime following that gruesome beating of a special needs teenager streamed lived on Facebook. Police say this wasn't a premeditated attack, but the culmination of a weekend hangout gone terribly wrong. They say one of the suspects, Jordan Hill, was friends with the victim. Hill apparently drove the victim to Chicago in a stolen van where they met with the other suspects. That's when a day of roughhousing turned into abuse. The victim's family is absolutely stunned.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DAVID BOYD, TORTURED VICTIM'S BROTHER-IN-LAW: We're overwhelmed and surprised. We're happy that everyone's concerned and yes, this should never have happened.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[05:55:10] MARQUEZ: President Obama now weighing in, following the hate crime charges, saying race relations, in general, have not gotten worse, they're just getting more attention now thanks to social media.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We see visuals of racial tensions, violence, and so forth because of smartphones and the internet and the media. What we've seen is surfacing. I think a lot of the problems that have been there a long time, whether it's tensions between police and communities, whether it's hate crimes of the despicable sort that has just now recently surfaced on Facebook.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MARQUEZ: And on the video you can hear the suspects yelling anti- white and anti-Trump comments. Police say the suspects have not shown any signs of remorse. As for the victim, he is back home with his family this morning.

ROMANS: It's hard to watch. All right, 56 minutes past the hour. Let's get a check on CNN Money Stream. A look at stock markets around the world right now. On pins and needles this morning ahead of the final jobs reports of the Obama presidency. It comes at 8:30 Eastern Time. Looking for a strong report -- 172,000 net new jobs. Eleven million jobs overall created from start to finish in the Obama tenure.

New this morning, gutting key parts of Obamacare could cost millions of jobs. That's according to the Commonwealth Fund and George Washington University. Researchers assume that Congress will kill two key provisions of the Affordable Care Act. First, the subsidies that help low- and middle-income people pay for coverage. And second, a Medicaid expansion. That covers the poor.

The federal government funds those two key programs, so if they disappear and Congress doesn't put in a replacement, this report says 2.6 million jobs wiped out in 2019, three million by 2021. Republicans are split on how to move forward here but a repeal vote could be stalled until some sort of replacement is put in place. That could avoid those job cuts and prevent enrollees from losing coverage.

The best job in America for 2017 -- drum roll, please -- mobile app developer. That's according to this new list from "CNN MONEY" and our friends at Payscale. Risk management director is number two. This is someone who prepares a company for all kinds of risks from natural disasters to cyber attacks. Landman --

MARQUEZ: Landman.

ROMANS: -- is number three. It's basically a liaison between energy companies, private property owners, and the federal government. Number four, product analyst. They use data and research to improve online customer experiences. Number five, information assurance analyst. They run security programs to protect hardware and software systems. We've got a whole 100 jobs. You can see if your job made the cut at "CNN MONEY".

Those are the best jobs. How about the first job? "CNN MONEY" asked some big names how they got started, including Dolly Parton, Sean Combs, Dan Rather. You can see that at cnnmoney.com. I worked at a pizza place. That was my first job.

MARQUEZ: Yes, and mine was --

ROMANS: You painted --

MARQUEZ: -- painting trash cans at the New Mexico State Fair.

ROMANS: The glamour.

MARQUEZ: The glamour. The absolute glamour. Yellow -- some pink and blue trash cans. Very sad.

ROMANS: Happy goes the -- may I help you?

MARQUEZ: Can I --

ROMANS: That's what I was saying.

MARQUEZ: And I -- I'm going to call myself a landman from now on. Is that all right?

ROMANS: Landman. You're a landman.

MARQUEZ: I like -- I like it. I love the name.

ROMANS: All right. Thanks for joining us this morning. I'm Christine Romans.

MARQUEZ: And I'm Miguel Marquez. Donald Trump getting ready for his intelligence briefing on the Russia hack. "NEW DAY" starts right now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAMES CLAPPER, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: I don't think that we've ever encountered a more direct campaign to interfere in our election process.

REP. PAUL RYAN (R), HOUSE SPEAKER: There are attempts to try and delegitimize this election.

JOSEPH BIDEN, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Grow up, Donald. Grow up.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There is no truth to the idea of restructuring the intelligence community.

TRUMP: We will build the wall. Mexico is going to pay for the wall.

ROMANS: Trump's team now wants Congress to fund the border wall.

RYAN: Planned Parenthood legislation will be in our reconciliation bill.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What they're trying to do will drive up the rate of unintended pregnancies.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This video is very disturbing.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We've sought hate crime charges.

OBAMA: What we've seen is surfacing. The problems that have been there a long time.

BOYD: We ask for continued prayers.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Chris Cuomo and Alisyn Camerota.

CAMEROTA: We want to welcome our viewers in the United States and around the world. This is NEW DAY. It is Friday, January 6th, 6:00 here in New York. Up first, this morning U.S. intelligence chiefs will take their case against Russia directly to President-elect Donald Trump. The face-to-face meeting comes after the top spies told Congress that Russia's intervention went well beyond hacked emails and so-called fake news.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN HOST: It was a big day. GOP lawmakers, some of whom were very skeptical, sat in rapt attention. No one pushed back on the intel chiefs in any real way. There are also more details coming out this morning about what is in this classified report being presented to Trump today, that they have even detail. The question is, will the president-elect now tell us what other knowledge he has about the hacks or will he accept the reality?

And think, we're just two weeks away from Inauguration Day.