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Rand Paul to Announce Presidential Candidacy; Presidential Candidacy of Rand Paul Assessed; Three Students Reportedly Die in Saudi Arabian Airstrikes in Yemen; Verdict in Tsarnaev Trial Could Come Back Today; Closing Arguments in Aaron Hernandez Trial. Aired 8- 8:30a ET

Aired April 07, 2015 - 08:00   ET

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

[08:00:00] UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We overcame too much just to lay down.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They proved it here tonight. Unbelievable.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is NEW DAY with Chris Cuomo, Alisyn Camerota, and Michaela Pereira.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning. Welcome to your NEW DAY. It is Tuesday, April 7th, 8:00 in the east. It is a big day. All eyes on Louisville, Kentucky. In just a few hours a man will enter the race for president, and he could win. Rand Paul, the Kentucky senator known for bucking the establishment says it is time for someone who doesn't fit the mold. Do you agree?

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Anticipation building ahead of Paul's announcement. It will happen at noon today. But can a libertarian get enough GOP support to win the nomination? CNN chief congressional correspondent Dana Bash has a preview of Paul's announcement from Louisville. What do we know, Dana?

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: We know that Rand Paul is obviously trying to separate himself. One thing that makes it easy for him to do is that he is coming out onto the scene with a huge grassroots support network from his father, Ron Paul, who ran for president just four years ago. But some of Ron Paul's fringe views are unwanted baggage. So his father will be on the stage later today to support his son, but he's going to be doing that as part of the family. He's not going to have any speaking role. It shows the delicate balance that Rand Paul is trying to strike.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SEN. RAND PAUL, (R) KENTUCKY: It's time for a new president.

BASH: In this preview video, Rand Paul unveiled the new tag line for his emerging presidential campaign. Standing up to the Washington machine put Paul on the political map five years ago when the first- time candidate snatched his Senate seat from the GOP establishment. PAUL: There's a Tea Party tidal wave.

BASH: The libertarian Kentucky senator quickly bucked the president and his own Republican leadership grabbing the headlines with a 13-hour filibuster protesting the U.S. drone policy.

PAUL: I will speak as long as it takes.

BASH: Paul argues he's more electable than other presidential party candidates like Ted Cruz, citing his work reaching out to minorities.

PAUL: The biggest mistake we've made in the last several decades is we haven't gone into the African-American community.

BASH: The Senate is his first elected post, but Paul has politics in his blood.

PAUL: Ron Paul believes in the constitution, that there are checks and balances.

BASH: Spending years campaigning for his father, former Congressman and presidential candidate Ron Paul. Rand Paul is inheriting legions of his father's young anti-government supporters for his own White House run now.

The phone records of law abiding citizens are none of their damn business.

(APPLAUSE)

BASH: But his father's appeal had limits. For Paul to win he knows he has to move more mainstream, especially on foreign policy. Paul used to sound isolationist, calling for broad cuts in military spending and all foreign aid.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST, "THE SITUATION ROOM": Including the foreign aid to Israel as well, is that right?

PAUL: Yes.

BASH: But with ISIS and other emerging threats, GOP primary voters want a more muscular foreign policy, and Paul has been inching that way.

PAUL: Stronger, better, more agile military.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BASH: Now not all Republicans are buying Rand Paul's evolution on foreign policy. In fact, the group, at least the man who was at the head of the group that ran those infamous "swift boat" ads against John Kerry, they have a new ad that they're going to run in all four primary and caucus states that Rand Paul is actually going to be traveling to. This ad accuses Paul of basically being equivalent to President Obama on the issue of Iran, opposing sanctions and supporting negotiations. And Alisyn, that is anathema to many GOP hawkish primary voters.

CAMEROTA: Absolutely. It will be interesting to watch him thread that needle.

All right, Dana, we have a key race alert. As you just heard from Dana, CNN has learned Rand Paul's father, former Congressman and presidential candidate himself, Ron Paul, will be in attendance at his son's presidential announcement in Louisville. He's not expected to have a speaking role. One of Rand Paul's campaign challenges will be to harness the base of support his dad had while showing he's his own man with this ability to appeal to Republican voters. So let's turn to our CNN commentators for all of this.

CUOMO: We need experts and we have them. Paul Begala, Democratic strategist and co-chair of a pro Hillary Clinton super PAC and longtime adviser to President Clinton in the 90s, not to date him, and Ana Navarro, Republican strategist, a supporter of Jeb Bush and adviser to other GOP candidates. Hello, my friends. Thank you for joining us here. Ana, make the case for Rand Paul and then we'll get to the fact why he does or does not scare your friend, Jeb Bush.

ANA NAVARRO, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: The case for Rand Paul. The case for Rand Paul is that he goes to where Republicans don't feel comfortable going. He pushes the envelope. He shows up at places like Howard University. He does speak about issues like justice reform.

Frankly, the only path I see for Rand Paul, though, because I think Dana's piece was right on the money, he's got to thread a very fine needle.

[08:05:05] And I think the only path for him is if the rest of the vote is very divided, and he can somehow coalesce the libertarian base of his father and build on that. And on the right he's got a divided vote. And on the center he's got a divided vote. And he's got that path all to himself. It is a very narrow window for him to try to sneak through.

CAMEROTA: Paul, you have never met a bunch of more passionate group of supporters than Ron Paul supporters. Oh, my goodness, the e- mails that they send, the rallies that they have. So if he can harness that, what do you think his path forward is?

PAUL BEGALA, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: Well, I think you're right. First off, there's a ton of passion in the libertarian wing of the Republican Party. That seems to me where the energy is, where the passion is. Ana is probably right it's not where the majority of the vote is even in the Republican Party yet, maybe about 20 percent of the Republican Party. But they are energized, and that forms a good base. Can he grow from that? That will be his challenge. He has positioned himself to do so, whereas, his father seemed to be happy taking very extreme, what some would say a principled libertarian stance, Rand Paul, Senator Paul wants to grow that. He's making more moderate sounds.

It will be interesting today to hear what he says to the other factions of his party, to the Christian conservatives, to the establishment pro-business who are the majority of that party, interesting to see how he speaks to them.

CUOMO: Ana, is it really true that you can't get through the primaries without swaying the far right of the party?

NAVARRO: I think there's going to be some people who try. I think, look, what's the point of getting through a primary and then not being able to win a general? Then it becomes a futile exercise. And I think if anything has been learned from the last election is that people need to remain authentic, whether you are Jeb Bush, whether you are Marco Rubio, whether you're Ted Cruz or whether you're Rand Paul.

And I think that's what one of the challenges is going to be for Rand Paul because he really defined himself when he first came out in the Senate as an isolationist. And he's now -- you know, the world changed around him. All of a sudden Americans started seeing other Americans being beheaded, and, you know, we changed. We're not the war weary, you know, people that don't want to engage with the world that we were in 2008. This is a different world order.

And I think that's why you're going to see him do things like, for example, he's going to go give a speech in his announcement for when he heads to South Carolina at the USS Yorktown. And he's been doing things like calling for an increase in military spending. The question is will he be able to do that and still hold on to his libertarian base of voters. It is a -- it is not an easy fete.

Paul, let's talk about some other potential candidates. Jeb Bush is in a bit of a "non-troversy," to quote Chris, about did he check the wrong box on a voter form, he identified himself as Hispanic is that a big deal.

(LAUGHTER)

BEGALA: Of course, I just finished, as you know, recently I was working on a campaign in Israel, and so I decided to become a Hasidic merchant. It's just goofy. I don't think it disqualifies him, but it's really embarrassing. It's really --

CAMEROTA: What if it were just a mistake?

CUOMO: Not really. Why is it so embarrassing? He marked the wrong box.

BEGALA: OK. We're going to give him a button to blow up the world. He's going to have a nuclear code.

CUOMO: Give me a break.

BEGALA: He can't even check -- by the way, he happened to check the box that -- of course he's got his children who are wonderful, impressive. But you know, that's just weird. It's weird. And I think it's going to be a little bit of a speed bump for him to try to explain. Everybody checks that box at some point. Maybe you're up for jury duty or something. Everybody at some point or other has to say I'm Anglo, I'm Hispanic, I'm Native American. It's weird. It's not a disqualifier but it's just a little weird.

NAVARRO: Listen, Paul, it might be a little weird for you because of course you are one of the whitest men in the world, you know.

(LAUGHTER)

NAVARRO: Let's just -- you know, I mean, Jeb Bush is not fluorescent white. He obviously does not have Hispanic heritage. I would argue he's got Hispanic identity. And let me tell you this, I'm part of a bicultural household, right? I'm part of a bicultural couple. More than once I have filled out forms back to back for Gene and for me. And either he ends up Hispanic or I end up Anglo, hell, sometimes he ends up female.

(LAUGHTER)

NAVARRO: I go to my automatic mode. So if you want to have the argument of whether Jeb Bush has some Hispanic identity, nada. Make me dia. That's a great argument to have, because I can tell you this, Paul, if I give Jeb Bush a pop quiz today and I give a lot of those Democrats in the congressional Hispanic caucus a pop quiz on Spanish grammar and reading and comprehension and Latin American history and culture, my money is on Jeb Bush.

[08:10:18] CAMEROTA: Ana, Paul, I think we're going to leave it there with all the ethnicity gender-bending that we've just done.

NAVARRO: Let me tell you, Alisyn, Chris, Chris could pass, OK? You know, Chris would make it.

CUOMO: Gracias.

(LAUGHTER)

CAMEROTA: That's fantastic.

CUOMO: I am gringo.

CAMEROTA: You're encouraging him. You're creating a monster. She leaves that, and we now have to deal with it.

CUOMO: Mucho.

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: Nada.

All right, moving on to some other news now breaking this morning. Three students, we understand they're school-aged children, have been killed in a Saudi airstrike in Yemen. That airstrike was targeting Houthi rebels. The ramped up violence is creating a severe humanitarian crisis there in Yemen. CNN senior international correspondent Nic Robertson is live right on the Yemeni-Saudi border, taking us inside that battle. Nic? NIC ROBERTSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes,

Michaela, this was an airstrike that was targeting a military structure, a military base, the assessment was Houthis were using it to move weapons out of. There were six Saudi strikes on that base. But apparently the school is about 500 yards away. The children were just coming out of lunchtime. The school got hit as well, so six children injured and three killed in that strike.

This is an area where the Houthis are fighting Al Qaeda. The tribes are fighting the Houthis as well. It's part of this complex and shifting battle front that's going on the city of Aden in the south, that important port city. Down there we heard earlier today that fighting had subsided from yesterday and it was the first time the residents have been able to get out of their homes to try to get some food and water that they're in much need of. And that followed on after a night of Saudi airstrikes on Houthi positions there, and of course that leading to calm in the city of Aden, allowing residents to get some food and water.

Right now I can tell you that just across the border here in Saudi Arabia the U.S. ambassador to Yemen, the U.S. ambassador to Yemen is here having a meeting with Saudi officials. We are told that the meeting he was in was something that had been preplanned for months in advance and that culture officials from the U.S. embassy in Saudi were attending that, but the U.S. ambassador to Yemen right here down on the border. Alisyn?

CAMEROTA: All right, Nic, they need to figure out what is happening there and they have to fix it. Thanks so much for that reporting.

Well, "Rolling Stone" facing legal action over it's now discredited and retracted UVA gang rape cover story. Fraternity Phi Kappa Psi announcing the lawsuit, claiming the magazine's, quote, "reckless reporting" damaged the frat's reputation. This comes after Columbia University found huge gaps in the magazine's article which described a vicious sexual assault inside the chapter's house on the University of Virginia's campus.

PEREIRA: A fourth man from New York City indicted in the plot to support ISIS. Authorities say in one instance the man raised $1,600 to help another suspect travel overseas to join the terrorist group. They say electronic messages also showed that the 26-year-old encouraged others to take place in violent jihad. Three other suspects charged in the plot have all pleaded not guilty.

CUOMO: An amazing story out of Australia for you. An autistic boy was missing four days in the outback and he's been found alive. There he is. Ground and air teams were searching for Luke Shambrook since he wandered away from a campsite late last week. The 11-year- old is now being treated for dehydration and hypothermia. But he's going to be OK. And his survival is just a miracle given the time and where he was.

PEREIRA: The outback, you hear stories about how desolate it can be there. My goodness. CAMEROTA: Thank goodness.

Well, two big trials to tell you about. They're coming to a close in Massachusetts, including the Boston bombing trial. No one refutes that Dzhokhar Tsarnaev participated in this heinous attack, but was he manipulated by his older brother, and does that matter?

CUOMO: The other trial is for former New England Patriot Aaron Hernandez. The defense rests in no time at all. Why such a short case? We'll tell you the strategy.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:17:57] CUOMO: Not one but two big trials wrapping up this week in Massachusetts. First, the fate of the surviving Boston bomber now in the hands of a jury. There is little question that this man is guilty. Jurors now have to decide whether or not he will die for his crimes.

CNN's Alexandra Field is live for us in Boston -- Alexandra.

ALEXANDRA FIELD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Chris.

For five weeks now, jurors have heard the evidence. In just about an hour, they will begin to deliberate. There were a lot of tears in the courtroom as they made their closing arguments on both sides of the case -- survivors reliving the retelling of the horror they experienced. Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the defendant himself, sitting there, expressing no visible emotion at all.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

FIELD (voice-over): The last Richard family photos, Martin is 8. Dzhokhar Tsarnaev is standing behind him, before --

(EXPLOSION)

FIELD: -- after. Martin's entire body shattered, broken, eviscerated, burned.

Lingzi Lu didn't plan to be there. It's her last day.

Krystle Campbell lives less than a minute.

The defense doesn't deny that it's the defendant you see here on Boylston Street dropping his backpack in front of the Forum Restaurant, running away with the crowd. It was him star attorney Judy Clarke acknowledges in opening statements and it's him shopping for milk at Whole Foods 20 minutes later.

But Clarke argues in the plot to leave a path of destruction, Tamerlan leads, Dzhokhar follows. Tamerlan heads toward the first line, then the first blast.

Twelve seconds later, heads turn, the second blast.

Two months before the bombing, prosecutors say Dzhokhar borrows a gun from his friends, the same .9 millimeter Ruger used to kill Officer Sean Collier.

DISPATCHER: Officer down! Officer down! All units.

FIELD: Surveillance video captures two men on the MIT campus approaching his squad car and taking off. The gun is used later that night prosecutors say when 56 shots are fired at Watertown police.

[08:20:05] The firefight ends with Tamerlan dropping his gun, heading into a hail of bullets. Dzhokhar driving over his brother's body before abandoning the Mercedes and hiding out in a dry docked boat. The words he etched, "Stop killing our innocent people and we will stop." The note he wrote, blood stained, bullet riddled, "We Muslims are one body. You hurt one, you hurt us all." Proof, according to prosecutors, that they felt they were soldiers. They were mujahedeen, and Boston was their target.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FIELD: The defense has never denied that Dzhokhar Tsarnaev participated in the attacks, but they used their closing argument to underscore the point that they believe that it's Tamerlan had been involved, none of this would have happened.

Look, Alisyn, today, when the jury begins to deliberate, they're tasked with questions about whether or not Dzhokhar participated, whether or not he was involved. Questions of why or who influenced him are important but they'll weigh in really during the sentencing phase of this trial, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: And our legal experts think these deliberations are going to happen very quickly. So, we'll see what unfolds this morning.

Alexandra, thanks so much for that.

Also this morning, jurors hear closing arguments in the murder trial of Aaron Hernandez. They could begin deliberating the fate of the former New England Patriot by this afternoon.

CNN's Susan Candiotti is live in Fall River, Massachusetts with the latest.

What do we know, Susan?

SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Alisyn.

Prosecutors and defense attorneys summarizing their case, making their very best arguments to this jury. The defense will go first. They will try to humanize Aaron Hernandez, saying that he was a rising football star, a $40 million contract, a baby, and a fiance, that he was planning his future and not the murder of Odin Lloyd who was dating his fiancee's sister.

Prosecutors will say that Lloyd was killed because Hernandez was angry at Odin Lloyd over something that happened two nights before his death at a nightclub, but the motive is very murky. What will the jury think of that? Jurors like to hear what a motive is.

And the key evidence, it includes videotape of Odin Lloyd getting into a car with Aaron Hernandez and two of his friends and cell phones being tracked to an industrial park and then a few minutes later back at his house, Aaron Hernandez holding a black object in his hand. Was that, indeed, a Glock as prosecutors say? The murder weapon was never found. Defense lawyers say it wasn't a gun, it was perhaps just an iPad or a soft pellet gun.

But in the end, jurors will have to decide did prosecutors meet their burden of proof? Alisyn?

CAMEROTA: Susan, thank you for all of that background.

PEREIRA: The thing that I keep struggling with on that one, I was watching and listening so much to Susan's report is this motive. I mean, you'd struggle to always understand why one human kills another. But in this case, what kind of beef would the two have that one of them would end up dead?

CAMEROTA: A murky motive as Susan just said and no murder weapon. That makes that case harder obviously to decide.

CUOMO: The weapon does. The prosecution does not have to prove motive. They can help massage a jury, but they just have to show intent and the intentionality comes from the actions. The curiosity of why can remain that, curiosity.

CAMEROTA: The outcome of that does seem less clear. The outcome of the Dzhokhar Tsarnaev trial where all of this video evidence exists placing him right at the scene of the carnage. You know, I'm sure that there's a feeling in Boston of why did we have to reopen these wounds. Why did we have to relive? Could he just pleaded guilty?

CUOMO: Defense strategy.

I don't think he has to -- I think he could have pled guilty, pleaded guilty even though it's a death penalty case. Alisyn and I were talking about that, whether he has to plead not guilty.

I think he could have pleaded guilty, but then you would have lost shots at appeals and you would have not given the jury a sense of catharsis before making this ultimate decision and maybe making that decision as to whether or not he's guilty may help going into that.

This woman, Ms. Clarke, his attorney knows these cases. Jared Loughner, Susan Smith, the mother who drowned her kids, Ted Kaczynski, the Unabomber, she represented all of them. They got life sentences.

PEREIRA: Well, and the fact is, as cathartic as it might be for the jury, maybe there's some catharsis healing for the people of Boston and certainly those families.

CAMEROTA: I hope so.

PEREIRA: This is a horrendous story.

All right. A quick programming note be sure you just tuned in. Susan Candiotti has a special CNN report tonight, "Downward Spiral: Inside the Case Against Aaron Hernandez". It airs at 9:00 p.m. right here on CNN.

CUOMO: Rand Paul, the Kentucky senator now following in his father's footsteps announcing the bid for the White House. Joining him on stage will be one of the few black Republicans to ever serve on Capitol Hill. Question: why is J.C. Watts endorsing the senator? He's going to give you the answer himself right here on NEW DAY, coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:28:58] PEREIRA: Here we go with the five things you need to know for your NEW DAY.

Number one, Rand Paul is set to launch his candidacy for the White House. He'll become the second Republican to officially enter the race, with others expected to declare soon.

Jurors are going to decide Boston marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev's fate today. Tsarnaev may face the death penalty for working with his brother Tamerlan to set off those bombs at 2013 event.

Meanwhile, the jury in the Aaron Hernandez murder trial will likely be handed the case today. Deliberations are expected to begin after this morning's closing arguments.

In Chicago, Mayor Rahm Emmanuel going into today's mayoral runoff with the solid lead over his challenger, Jesus "Joey" Garcia. Meanwhile, in Ferguson, Missouri, voters there have an opportunity to make history. They have a chance to put three African-Americans on the city council.

Celebrations on the campus of Duke University. The blue devils nailed down another NCAA championship last night 68-63 over Wisconsin. Tyus Jones named the final four's most outstanding player. Congratulations to them.

For more on the five things to know be sure to visit NewDayCNN.com for the latest -- Alisyn.