Return to Transcripts main page

New Day

Curfew Restores Order In Baltimore; What's Next for Baltimore?; Brooke Baldwin Apologizes. Aired 7:30-8a ET

Aired April 29, 2015 - 07:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: Better. That is the word that I think you have to use about Baltimore this morning. Overnight a curfew came into effect 10:00 p.m. to 5:00 a.m. and it certainly made a difference as did the thousands of police officers and national guardsmen that were standing at the ready as well. We hear from police only ten arrests were made.

You will see in social media this morning there's discussion of those arrests and how they were done. We did not see anything where we were last night that would be sparking any controversy. But that conversation will continue.

There is less of a threat on the streets so school doors are reopening this morning. They had been closed for a day, however, a very odd situation with the Orioles. I know you think sports doesn't matter, but there's a metaphor here.

There will be a game today, but there will be no fans. That's for the first time in Major League Baseball history. No fans in attendance because of safety concerns. There's also a huge day coming on Friday, cannot underestimate its significance, but why?

The police are going to present their preliminary investigative findings to the prosecutor's office on Friday. Does that mean you're going to see a perp walk? Does that mean you're going to hear that nothing's going to be done?

In all likelihood no and we're going to discuss that right now with Bob Maloney. He is the director of Emergency Management for the city of Baltimore. And we're happy to have you here especially because we know how busy you've been all through the night.

BOB MALONEY, DIRECTOR, EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT FOR BALTIMORE: Good morning, thank you.

CUOMO: Let's start with the immediate and then go to the eventual.

MALONEY: All right.

CUOMO: What worked last night that made it so different than the previous?

MALONEY: You know, I think we sensed after the last fire was put out that, you know, immediately people wanted to get back to normal. We had the first buses running and, you know, people out helping us sweep. And it just took on.

[07:35:06] And then through the course of the day I think what we saw is, you know, the true Baltimore where people came out and worked with the city workers and, you know --

CUOMO: Curfew necessary? Having the guys in the line last night, the way you did it, do you think that was the minimum standard of force necessary to achieve the effect?

MALONEY: I think, you know, we needed to calculate things and, you know, we didn't want to meet violence with violence. And I think it worked out well and I think the results show that.

CUOMO: The canisters last night, were those tear gas or just flash bangs and distracting smoke?

MALONEY: I'm not sure. I think the term utilizes pepper spray. But, you know, just to --

CUOMO: Was there a range of things used? We know those pellets were pepper pellets that they were shooting, but the canisters --

MALONEY: What I saw from my vantage point was pepper.

CUOMO: OK, but no tear gas used last night as far as you know and the arrests that were done, there is some drama online going on about how men were taken into custody. As far as you know, did anybody get hurt last night while being arrested?

MALONEY: No.

CUOMO: Do you have anybody who needed any medical attention?

MALONEY: No.

CUOMO: So that's a good sign.

MALONEY: That's a great sign.

CUOMO: Do you believe you will need to stay this way? You'll have to keep a curfew in effect for an extended period that you'll have to have the streets shut down. You'll have to have the National Guard come into play?

MALONEY: Look, I think, you know, those decisions will be, you know, made and in a calculated way. And I think what we have to understand is we're going to have a lot of people in the city as we have for the protesters, as we had for Ferguson.

And, you know, getting ready for people who are demonstrating large crowds is difficulty enough. And when you have the threat that it's going to erupt in what we saw Monday night, you know, we have to be prepared. But, you know, I think yesterday was a great day. And we'll build on that and we'll keep moving forward as a city. CUOMO: Number of cops anonymously obviously they got to worry about doing their job keeping their heads down said they let us do their job tonight. They didn't let us do our job the other night.

MALONEY: I haven't really heard those internal conversations like that.

CUOMO: Do you share that? That last night was different in terms of what the rules of engagement were and how much you were allowed to be on the street?

MALONEY: Well, you know, the curfew dictated how long people were allowed to be on the street. But, you know, clearly the officers have had tolls and authority to do what is necessary under their command.

And I think, you know, the majority of officers will tell you that. And what we've done is try to do everything we can to support the police as the lead agency.

Keep the hospitals going, answer the 911 calls, make sure that we clean up debris as necessary, function as a city, you know, we have major universities and institutions and all that has to keep going. And that's what we're trying to do.

CUOMO: Friday has been set up as the big day by the police commissioner. What is your expectation for Friday? Does this end one way or the other on Friday or is this just one more step in the process of the administration of justice?

MALONEY: Yes. I think as far as the activity goes in getting back to, you know, where we're not having peaceful demonstrations, things like that, I think we all expect that that's going to continue. I think Friday is a milestone and that will happen.

And then I think we have some major organizational marches planned on Saturday. And I think what we all want, what every citizen wants and every city worker is for things to be peaceful.

And, you know, we're Americans, right? And we want -- this is how we do things. And I think people from Baltimore will tell you, you know, we're a special group of people here. It's a very diverse city. And, you know, very close-knit community based and what we saw Monday night is not us.

CUOMO: It was just one night and there's a reason that Baltimore's called charm city. Bob Maloney --

MALONEY: Thanks a lot.

CUOMO: Thank you very much. I hope that your work becomes less necessary each night as we go.

MALONEY: Thank you very much. I appreciate that.

CUOMO: All right, so Baltimore police, they were using what Bob was saying may have been pepper spray, there was certainly smoke and flash bangs being used. And it made a difference last night in terms of keeping the streets quiet. What will happen next here in Baltimore, we'll tell you when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:43:25]

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Back to our top story. It's calm in Baltimore this hour after a markedly more quiet night than Monday. Some 3,000 police officers and National Guard keeping the peace so what happens next?

We're joined by Harry Houck, he is a retired NYPD detective, and Marc Lamont Hill is a CNN political commentator and a host at "Huffpost Live." Gentlemen, thanks so much for being here. Harry, what did you see last night in Baltimore?

HARRY HOUCK, RETIRED NYPD DETECTIVE: Last night, I was so happy about the measured response by the police department. What happened last night with the police department, the National Guard, other law enforcement officers coming in and the community shows you what can be done in the event something like this happens. It should be a model of what happened last night.

CAMEROTA: Meaning that you always bring in 3,000 officers if you sense any unrest?

HOUCK: Well, you should have an overwhelming force in the event of something like this happens. Maybe if we had acted this way in the beginning, all right, maybe we would not have had the violence that night. But all being said and done, all right, we now have a model for whatever occurs in any other city in this country that we can go by.

CAMEROTA: Marc, what did you think of the relative calm?

MARC LAMONT HILL, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I thought it was a testimony to a range of factors. But one factor that Harry didn't mention that I think is important as well is the community engagement.

Community also helped police itself, community activists, community organizers, even gang members all came out and said we're not here for violence. We're here to organize our community and fight for justice.

A few days ago, I said other gang members were coming together and calling truces and doing good work together and some people said that was crazy. But we saw it just yesterday, and Don Lemon did a great package on this last night. We saw that's exactly what happened.

[07:45:03] We saw mothers pulling their children out of the street. I'm not just talking about that spectacle going around on the internet, everyday mothers and fathers who did work to keep their children in safe places.

And the people who took out the one or two sort of rouge people and put them in a different space. I think all of that is a testimony. Community matters. Nation of Islam was involved. Everybody was involved. It was a beautiful sight.

CAMEROTA: Marc, how about what we saw at the Empowerment Church with Reverend Jamal Bryant. I mean, he basically invited young people and sort of taught them civil disobedience and what peaceful protest looks like. I mean, you know, Harry, you're right. He is talking about a model from the police perspective, but what about this model from the community perspective?

HILL: Yes, I thought it was beautiful. Jamal Bryant has done an amazing job for the last week and really for decades now organizing and working with young people. I think sit-ins. Nonviolent approaches are an important tactic.

I don't think they should be our only philosophy. I think they can't be the only game in town, but I think sit-ins and march-ins and things like that are a big part of the work that needed to be done.

And so many people have ignored young people. Jamal Bryant actually reached out and engaged young people and that's why it worked.

HOUCK: I agree with you, Marc, fully on this 100 percent, which is odd for you and I. But the fact is that, you know, I did forget to mention the community that came, you know, came in to work with the police here. That's a very important factor.

CAMEROTA: They were working in tandem together.

HOUCK: Right.

CAMEROTA: Last night.

HOUCK: It was amazing to me how that people came out and wanted to take their city back from the thugs that ran through the night before.

CAMEROTA: I see. So you mean the love line that protesters set up you think was working with the police.

HOUCK: Right. I'm sure that they coordinated with the police before -- sometime before 10:00.

CAMEROTA: Do you think that's right, Marc? Do you think the protesters were working with the police?

HILL: I think some were and I think some simply organized themselves and did the work. I think both might be true. But I think it's important for us to think about this not just in terms of what happened last night and what might happen tonight and this weekend, but also to think about it as a model for how we engage going forward.

If people perceive the police purely as an occupying force and a group of people who only engage at the level of protest and when we're responding to an act of police violence, we don't get anywhere.

But imagine if we had a model where people actually engaged with communities, people actually asked questions and people actually knew who lived in neighborhoods. That would be an entirely different circumstance. We can't see community members as the enemy of police work. That's oftentimes how it's framed.

HOUCK: Exactly. Last night was about as close to perfection as you can get as far as I'm concerned from what I saw. We're going to have to go back now. Here we're knocking the Baltimore Police Department and the city for not acting correctly in the beginning. But now this has evolved into where this will be a model.

CAMEROTA: Police can stop the looting. They can stop cars from being lit on fire. But how do they get to the underlying issue, which is that color -- communities of color don't trust the police to do right by them?

HOUCK: Well, that's why we have to after all this is over or even while it's going on now that we've got to reach out to the community. But you've got to remember it's a two-way street. The community's got to reach out to the police also.

CAMEROTA: Yes, but shouldn't the police start? I mean, the police have the guns.

HOUCK: I agree. The police should start, would reach out first. Get together with all the clerics and meet with the people out there. We need to get back to the beat cop because police officers are driving around in police cars and answering calls. They don't get to know the police officer.

CAMEROTA: Yes, great point. Harry Houck, Marc Lamont Hill, thanks so much guys for your perspective, great to talk to you.

All right, we'll have much more from Chris, who is on the streets in Baltimore. He's going to speak with a pastor about his role in keeping the protests peaceful. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:52:15]

CUOMO: What we are seeing here in Baltimore is a process. We took a good step yesterday, any way you want to look at it, the curfew helped, having the authorities, all the cops and the thousands of National Guard seemed to help.

And there's a learning curve involved here for all of us as the police figure out what works, the community figures out what works, and we figure out what works.

We've been down here at CNN in big numbers as always. My colleague, Brooke Baldwin, has been reporting from here and you jumped into it yesterday morning while it was going 100 miles per hour and there was a learning curve for you as well.

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: There is, and I just wanted to make sure I came on first this morning and just told everyone I made a mistake yesterday. We were in the middle of live TV and I was talking to a member of Congress and I was recounting a conversation I had referring to police. And I absolutely misspoke, and I in-artfully chose my words 100 percent, and I just wish, speaking to all of you this morning, I wholeheartedly retract what I said and I thought tremendously about this.

And two of the nation's veterans, to you, I want to speak to you. I have the utmost respect to our men and women in uniform. To awful you, I owe you a tremendous apology, I am truly sorry.

CUOMO: Let's leave it as that.

The story is going to keep going. We need you here, and everything that happens, you learn as you go, and this kind of situation is like that for all of us, and it's good to have you and we all need you on the team.

And I know how it's to do that and I have done it a lot more than you have. Let's focus on what matters most. I can't tell you how often things in the moment wind up not thinking what they are, and part of the skill is to know when to go back and make things right.

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: Metaphor forgiveness that all of us need to remember, right, give her a hug from us here on the set as well. Thanks, Chris.

As you see there, a sense of quiet is back in Baltimore, is it going to last? Could emotions boil over again? We hope not. We are live on the ground after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:58:21]

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Leave the officers alone.

CUOMO: They're putting out flash bangs right now.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's somewhat of a standoff.

CUOMO: They are shifting over there now, which is where they are getting the bottles from.

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Senseless violence and destruction. That is not a protest.

GOVERNOR LARRY HOGAN: Protecting innocent lives and property is our number one priority.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That's my only son. At the end of the day, I don't want him to be a Freddie Gray.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And nobody hears them. When I see them, I see me.

(END VIDEOTAPE) CUOMO: You are watching NEW DAY. It's Wednesday, April 29th, 8:00 in the east. Alisyn and Mick are in New York and we are in Baltimore. The kids are back in school. There was an overnight curfew. It did help restore order in a city that needs it very much.

The streets overnight were very quiet, largely in part because of thousands of police and National Guard, but also because of community resolve. You are seeing the worst of it, smoke canisters and maybe pepper spray and bottles being thrown.

This was after the curfew time, but eventually the streets quieted. Several people were arrested. There was drama online about how they were arrested, but we did not see anything and there have been no reports of any type of injuries that were sustained during the night.

That was a big change in the night before, yet the frustration in Baltimore is real and we seeing it here and elsewhere, Ferguson, Missouri, demonstrators throwing rocks at police.

Two people shot as a result of what happened there. We did not see any of that here.

One of the oddities that betray the reality here is that the Orioles are going to play a baseball game, but the stadium will be empty.

[08:00:04] Camden Yards will be tens of thousands free because of what they say is a public safety concern.

Now the big day is not yesterday, is not today - Friday. And the question is should that be the expectation? That's when you're going to have the police hand to the prosecutors the findings of their preliminary investigation.