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Early Start with John Berman and Zoraida Sambolin

Trump Jr. Subpoenaed By GOP-Led Senate; Mourning A Hero: Kendrick Castillo; Another Launch from North Korea; 1,000 Guns Seized in Los Angeles; Kevin Durant Hurt in Warriors' Victory Over Rockets. Aired 5-5:30a ET

Aired May 09, 2019 - 05:00   ET

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

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: -- among teenagers.

[05:00:01] The change comes after the FDA warned several retailers they were violating rules against selling tobacco products to minors. The agency also labeled the use of e-cigarettes by young people an epidemic. It takes effect at All American, Walmart and Sam's Club locations.

DAVE BRIGGS, CNN ANCHOR: Twelve states have raised the age to 21. Mitch McConnell expected to introduce legislation to make it federal.

EARLY START continues right now.

(MUSIC)

ROMANS: A subpoena for Donald Trump Jr., the Republican-led Senate wants to bring him in, but why?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MOTHER OF STEM SCHOOL HIGHLANDS RANCH STUDENT: If it had not been for him, I wouldn't have my baby today.

NATE HOLLEY, SIXTH GRADER, STEM SCHOOL HIGHLANDS RANCH, HIGHLANDS RANCH, COLORADO: I was going to go down fighting if I was going to go down.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRIGGS: Shock and grief in Colorado as a community mourns a hero who took down a school shooter.

ROMANS: Breaking overnight, the second launch in a week by North Korea, why now? We're going to go live to Seoul.

BRIGGS: And more than a thousand weapons seized by the feds, guns and ammo tracked down at one home in Los Angeles.

Good morning, everyone. Welcome to EARLY START. I'm Dave Briggs.

ROMANS: I'm Christine Romans. It is Thursday, May 9th. You keep calling it Friday eve. BRIGGS: I like almost Friday. It just makes me feel better for a

moment.

ROMANS: It is 5:01 a.m. in the East. We'll let you have that, Briggs.

All right. The Senate Intelligence Committee wants another round with Donald Trump Jr. But will the president's son comply?

The subpoena for Don Jr. comes from a committee led by Republicans. Discussions over his testimony began before the release of special counsel Robert Mueller's report. Don Jr.'s team resisted in part they say because Mueller's findings were still secret.

BRIGGS: The subpoena, a sign the committee is escalating its probe into Russian election interference raises two major questions. Why do senators want to speak with Don Jr.? And will he show up?

Phil Mattingly has more from Capitol Hill.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Christine and Dave, case closed was the message from Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. It appears, at least in the Senate, including the Republican-led Senate -- the Republican-led Intelligence Committee -- the case is not quite yet closed.

Why do we know that? Well, we have now discovered, according to sources, that a number of weeks ago the Republican-led committee issued a subpoena to Donald Trump, Jr. As far as we know this is the first subpoena issued by anybody on Capitol Hill related to any of the president's children.

Now, the issues here, while still not totally clear, appear to really run through two different tracks. And these were comments that Donald Trump, Jr. made related to June 2016 Trump Tower meeting with Russian individuals who were claiming they had dirt on Hillary Clinton, as well as discussions he may or may not have had with Michael Cohen related to a potential Trump Tower in Moscow.

Now, both of those issues were issues that Donald Trump, Jr. testified about previously. He's testified in front of three committees for dozens of hours.

And we know, right now, that will the committee has subpoenaed Donald Trump, Jr., there is currently a standoff. Donald Trump, Jr. is not planning on coming to Capitol Hill. The considerations are either pleading the fifth or not showing up at all.

And based on the statements that sources close to Donald Trump, Jr. have released attacking the Republican chairman of the committee, Richard Burr, making clear that in their eyes this was a P.R. stunt, it doesn't look like this standstill is going to change anytime soon.

Basically, things aren't actually over. The case not quite closed -- guys.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROMANS: All right, not quite closed. Phil, thank you for that.

The next subpoena could have Bob Mueller's name on it. Democrats are determined to hear from the special counsel, but President Trump is trying to block his testimony by invoking executive privilege over the entire Mueller report and its underlying evidence, a dramatic step considering the president recently suggested he didn't mind the report being released at all.

House Judiciary Chairman Jerry Nadler dismissing the administration's stonewalling.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. JERRY NADLER (D-NY): I certainly hope that we will hear from Mueller. And eventually -- by the way, yes -- eventually we will hear from Mueller because we will -- if we have to -- we will subpoena him if we have to. And the nonsense claim of executive privilege will be pierced by the court and he'll be ordered to testify.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRIGGS: The full house will take up whether to hold Attorney General Barr in contempt for refusing to hand over the unredacted Mueller report. The Judiciary Committee voted to advance the measure. Chairman Nadler says we are now in a constitutional crisis.

The matter appears headed for a courtroom showdown between House Democrats and the Justice Department.

ROMANS: Overnight, a vigil to honor an 18-year-old student killed in a gun attack at a high school in suburban Denver. At least 2,000 people packed the gym at STEM School Highlands Ranch to pay tribute to Kendrick Castillo who tried to stop one of the suspects from firing.

CNN spoke to his father who as you can imagine is heartbroken.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

[05:05:05] JOHN CASTILLO, FATHER OF VICTIM: And one of the kids told me that like a flash, he jumped up. She said, "You know, he's a hero. He saved me."

They said he jumped up and ran. They said you couldn't even see how fast he was running out the door and after this person.

There's another part of you that wishes he would have just turned and ran, retreated, hid -- you know, did something to put himself out harm's way if that was possible.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRIGGS: Other students and families remembering Kendrick Castillo as they come to terms with their own grief.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE STUDENT, STEM SCHOOL HIGHLANDS RANCH, HIGHLANDS RANCH, COLORADO: Kendrick lunged at him to try and subdue him. As soon he said "Don't you move," Kendrick lunged, giving all of us enough time to hide under our desks.

NYKI GIASOLLI. MOTHER OF STEM SCHOOL HIGHLANDS RANCH STUDENT: If it had not been for him I wouldn't have my baby today and I can't imagine that I will never able to thank him.

NATE HOLLEY, STUDENT: I was hiding in the corner and they were right outside the door. I had my hand on a metal baseball bat just in case because I was going to go down fighting if I was going to go down.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: Why does this have to be a choice in American schools?

BRIGGS: It's unthinkable.

ROMANS: The choice between fight or flight. This cannot be acceptable in modern American society.

BRIGGS: Kendrick is part of a tragic new trend in American schools looking out for a shooter, then sacrificing yourself to save your classmates. Last week, it was Riley Howell killed as he tackled a shooter at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.

Here's what his parents told CNN last night.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NATALIE HENRY-HOWELL, MOTHER OF RILEY HOWELL: It is just terrible that more families and communities are going through this. And while I'm angry and I feel embattled, I think at the same time we have to instead of just lionize, we have to galvanize. There just has to be some dialogue from people all around so that we can never ever, ever let a community have to go through this again.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: Authorities have identified both shooters, one authorities say is an 18-year-old male, the other is a 16-year-old. Police initially said the second suspect was a girl, but he identifies as male. Both are due back in court to be formally charged Friday.

BRIGGS: The vigil last night actually turned into a demonstration. Some people walked out after Senator Michael Bennet and Congressman Jason Crow spoke.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CROWD: Mental health! Mental health! Mental health!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRIGGS: Mental health. They said they didn't want politics and the media taking advantage of the shooting pushing an agenda chanting as you can hear mental health.

If you'd like to help the Castillo family, a donation account has been set up with Wells Fargo. You can go into any branch and ask to donate to the Kendrick Castillo memorial fund.

It would be nice if the courage of these young kids was matched by some politician, any politician step forward and make this your platform. How about someone running for president in 2020, make this your platform? I would think this would be a receptive message.

ROMANS: Cory Booker this week had a policy --

BRIGGS: He did.

ROMANS: -- have a proposal on guns this week, and you know, look, and there have been several members who came in in the midterm elections who came in on their gun violence initiatives, at least part of their background. But I think what those kids are so unhappy about and what I've heard other children say who have been honestly suffering from PTSD after one of these school shootings is that they don't trust politicians to be serious about this. They have empty words, thoughts and prayers, and I think young people are very upset.

BRIGGS: The mental health aspect of it is equally as important as guns.

ROMANS: Absolutely. We'll be discussing this more unfortunately.

Eight minutes past the hour. Breaking in the last hour, North Korea launches an unidentified projectile, the second launch in a week.

CNN's Paula Hancocks live in Seoul.

What's going on here, Paula?

PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Christine, what we know at this point from the Joint Chiefs of Staff is at least one projectile was fired at about 3:30 a.m. Eastern Time. Now, it was believed to have been fired from the western, northwestern points of the country in the vicinity of the Sino-ri missile base.

Now, this is a missile base that hasn't been declared by North Korea, but it's one we all know about because it's been picked up on satellite imagery. It's one where they have fired short and medium range missiles from in the past.

What we know about this projectile or projectiles is it was fired in an easterly direction, so potentially going over North Korea and then potentially landing in the waters of the East Coast.

But we don't have much more clarification on that. We know there are a lot of meetings going on. Right now the national security adviser meeting with the defense ministry and also the JCS, trying analyze and get more information.

But it comes less than a week after those launches on Saturday morning local time Friday night Eastern, which North Korea claimed was a routine drill, even though there are indications that one of those could well have been a short range ballistic missile.

[05:10:07] But it has been downplayed by the U.S. and South Korea, at least last week's launches. We heard the U.S. president Donald Trump saying that he is with Kim Jong-un in a tweet and also saying deal will happen. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo also saying it's the ICBMs that concern them, the longer range.

ROMANS: All right. We'll see what the language is today from the White House. Thank you so much for that, Paula. Nice to see you this morning.

China says "I see your new tariffs and I raise you". President Trump has threatened it hike tariffs on Chinese goods tomorrow and the Chinese vowed to retaliate. China's commerce ministry said late Wednesday Beijing will be imposing counter measures of its own if the U.S. jacks up tariffs to 25 percent on $200 billion worth of Chinese goods Friday, adding an escalation in bilateral trade frictions is not in the interests of both peoples or that of the whole world.

All this as the 11th round of negotiations begins today. On Wednesday, the president suggested the Chinese were trying to run out the clock on his administration saying they want to negotiate with Joe Biden or another weak Democrat, and the president said he's happy with tariffs filling American coffers calling them great for the U.S., not good for China.

Remember, China does not pay tariffs. The bill does not go to the Chinese government. The bill at the port of entry goes to the American companies importing those goods. A lot of companies have absorbed the first 10 percent round of tariffs, and they say 25 percent, that's going to be too hard. They're going to pass that on to consumers. You're going to find it in your shopping cart.

Hours before China's warning, the press secretary Sarah Sanders said this to reporters.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SARAH HUCKABEE SANDERS, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Look, we've got an indication that they want to make a deal. Our teams are in continued negotiations.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: The White House declined to comment again after China's threat of retaliatory tariffs. And we don't even know, that counter measures, they might not have new tariffs they can put on. It might be things like certain kind of registration at ports that can delay American products from coming in. It could be paperwork and licensing that could make it difficult for American companies.

We already know that soybeans and soybean farmers have really suffered under the retaliation from China. What else could they do?

BRIGGS: We'll be watching midnight tonight, the deadline.

All right. Ahead, a 3-year-old with leukemia, his parents don't want chemo, his doctors do. What does a judge say?

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[05:17:20] BRIGGS: Authorities seizing a cache of more than a thousand weapons from one home in an upscale Los Angeles neighborhood Holmby Hills. Federal agents and the LAPD served a search warrant early Wednesday while investigating the suspected manufacture and sale of illegal firearms. You can see stacks of hundreds of rifles and handguns along with thousands of rounds of ammunition all laid out across the driveway of the large home. One man has been arrested on weapons charges.

ROMANS: A judge has ordered chemotherapy treatments to resume for a 3-year-old Florida boy with leukemia over the objection of his parents. Noah McAdams was diagnosed on April 4th. He did receive two rounds of chemo before his parents doctors they wanted to seek alternative treatments. A judge ruled Noah must complete the first phase of chemo. The judge is also allowing the boy's parents to explore options like medical cannabis.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TAYLOR BLAND BALL, NOAH'S MOTHER: We are disappointed with the fact that they're moving forward with chemotherapy considering all the side effects.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: The judge will evaluate the little boy's condition before ruling on the next two phases of chemo for Noah.

BRIGGS: All right. Ahead, the Golden State Warriors one win away from advancing to the western conference finals, but they may have to get there without one of the biggest stars on planet. Coy Wire has the latest on this huge injury next the "Bleacher Report".

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[05:23:43] BRIGGS: The Golden State Warriors pushed the Rockets to the brink of elimination, but they might have to do it without one of the biggest stars.

Coy Wire has the story in the "Bleacher Report."

This did not look good, my friend. Good morning.

COY WIRE, CNN SPORTS CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Dave. This series was tied at two. Golden State still has their core three on the floor who's won championship, but losing Kevin Durant, arguably the best all around player in the game, that's going to hurt. Durant, you can see him hit a jumper here late in the third. You'll

actually see him look back like somebody hit him with a pebble. He ends up limping into the locker room. The team says it's a calf strain. KD scheduled for an MRI later today.

Steph Curry and Klay Thompson stepped up in his absence, combined 52 points. Warriors win 104-99, taking a 3-2 series lead. Coach Kerr says he highly doubts Durant will be ready for game six tomorrow in Houston.

The top team in the East, Milwaukee, are soaring into the Eastern Conference finals for the first time since 2001. They sent the Celtics packing with a 116-91 rout, winning the series 4-1. Boston making history in a bad way. The first team in NBA history to win their first five games in the post season and lose the next four. Next up for the Bucks is the winner of the Raptors-Sixers series.

[05:25:00] No one's more fired up than Packers offensive tackle David Bakhtiari, check him out. He outdoes himself. He doesn't chug one beer on the jumbotron. He chugs two of them while his QB Aaron Rodgers looks on and smiles.

All sorts of love for the O line. The 49ers offensive line all hyped up for game 7 between the Sharks and Avalanche. San Jose got their heartbeat back. He missed the first six games of this series after going down with a gruesome head injury. It was like he was never gone. That first opening score of the game off a deflection.

San Jose holds on to win 3-2. They advance to the Western Conference Finals against the Blues. Next game is on Saturday.

All right. You could make a strong argument that the pair of champions league semifinals was the most exciting ever in any sport. A day after Liverpool pulled off a miracle to advance to the Champion's League Final, Tottenham pulled off another in their semifinal matchup with Ajax. The Spurs were down in the second half, three goals to advance, but then the unbelievable happened, you never count out the will of Lucas Moura. Tottenham needed a win to advance, and Moura delivers a hat trick, three goals including one with just seconds remaining in extra time.

The roller coaster of emotions for fans tells the story. Elation thinking they'd be heading to the final and then absolute heartbreak when they weren't. An all England final when the Tottenham making their first ever appearance. Liverpool looking to add to its storied history.

Not sure if you saw any of that, but my goodness, jaw dropping action on the field.

BRIGGS: I saw Liverpool come back, and I thought it the greatest I'd ever seen in any sport. A lot of pressure in the finals to deliver.

Coy Wire, thank you, my friend.

Romans, what's coming up? ROMANS: All right, Dave. The Senate majority leader said it himself.

(INAUDIBLE)

ROMANS: It's not over, maybe not, it's not over. Donald Trump Jr. subpoenaed by the Republican-led Senate Intel Committee.

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END