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New Day

Protests Continue in Baltimore; President Condemns Violence in Baltimore; Interview with Baltimore Pastor; Interview with U.S. Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired April 29, 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] CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: -- as a result of what happened there. We didn't see any of that here. One of the oddities that betray the reality here is that the Orioles are going to play the baseball game but the stadium will be empty. 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, not today -- Friday. And the question is should that be the expectation. That's why you're going to have the police hand to the prosecutors the finding of their preliminary investigation. What will happen on that day, what won't happen. We have every angle of this story covered, and here is a look for you of what happened last night.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

COMMISSIONER ANTHONY BATTS, BALTIMORE POLICE: Tonight I think the biggest thing is that citizens are safe, the city is stable.

CUOMO: Big crowds return to the streets on Tuesday night, but this time joining them were more than 1,000 police and some 2,000 National Guardsman.

STEPHANIE RAWLINGS-BLAKE, (D) BALTIMORE MAYOR: Nobody needs to get arrested today. We all want you to go home.

CUOMO: As the clock nears the 10:00 p.m. curfew, the mayor's voice over the loudspeaker, Stephanie Rawlings-Black, pleading with people to go home.

RAWLINGS-BLAKE: And we promised that we would be off the streets at 10:00, so please go home.

CUOMO: Locals determined to encourage others to heed the call, but they are staying put.

There are no real bullets hitting anybody here now.

And 10:00 p.m. comes and goes, but it is not until a few bottles fly --

See the area of concentration which is where they are getting the bottles from. -- that the police start a slow advance.

You can see the flash bangs. This is not tear-gas.

Restraint rules the day for both sides, no bottles and pepper bullets fly. Smoke canisters to push people off streets sometimes come back. Tense moments tick by, but only those challenging the line disappear into a wall of shields, a handful of arrests, progress compared to the hundreds cuffed for looting and assault on officers just 24 hours before.

On this day less water is thrown, a little bit instead offering water to police. Many agree it was the community who brought peace. As today's Baltimore Orioles game is closed to the public for the first time in Major League history, fear of violence remains, but many here say there could be a better way.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I connect my faith with your faith.

CUOMO: An amazing gathering of thousands at Empowerment Temple Church. Hundreds of mixed clergy promising to make nonviolence the way of showing they will not be silent in the face of oppression.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Everybody can be met with love.

CUOMO: Creating a love line between police and protesters, hoping their voices and presence are enough to get the change and justice they demand.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We need help. We're asking, we're begging you for help.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's a big systematic problem that we've got to deal with.

CUOMO: Rival gangs, the Bloods, Crips, and the Black Guerilla gang, calling a truce for the first time in Baltimore history according to gang members. The real problem, they say, decades of poverty and police brutality.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It started with Freddie Gray. Now we going to take it to the next level.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: At the end of the day, you need to do what you need to do to take care of your kids.

CUOMO: Baltimore mothers also coming together to calm their kids, standing up in defense of the mom caught on camera trying to stop her son from becoming part of a riot.

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

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CUOMO: Church bells ring here in Baltimore telling us what time it is, but also kind of marking a moment. It has been ten days since Freddie Gray's death. Tension has been building here ever since. You don't need me to tell you that.

A big reason why is the underlying factors that don't get talked about enough, but also that they are waiting, they are waiting for Friday because they have been told about the police commissioner and others that that will be the day.

It's certainly the day the police will hand out their findings of their preliminary investigation to the prosecutor's office, which is doing its own investigation, and is that the day that they are going to be charges? Is that the day we see a perp walk? Probably not because of how the process works. CNN's Athena Jones has more on that. And are we right to assume there are a set of expectations that may not be satisfied?

ATHENA JONES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning. You are right, Chris, there has been a lot of talk about Friday, May 1st, as being some big day, but in fact it's just one more step. It's a big step you could call it of many in a long process. This is just a part of the way to getting to the point where maybe the state's attorney office will be able to file charges. But that is not going to come on Friday and it may not even come next week. There is a lot that still has to be determined through autopsy reports, et cetera, to figure out what happened to Freddie Gray and what should happen next.

But this is a city that is trying to get back to normal. We're outside of the CVS, this is the CVS that was burned and looted on Monday night. It's now being guarded by state police. This time yesterday it was not boarded up. Now it's boarded up.

[08:05:02] The area around us is largely cleared of debris, and police while on one side to keep the situation calm here, they are also turning how to track down the people responsible for the violence on Monday night. They are using police videos, they are using camera footage to track down the perpetrators who set police cars on fire and damaged other vehicles, looted stores and burned them. So they are working on two fronts now, making sure that things remain calm and they track down the people who were responsible for the unrest. Chris?

CUOMO: All right, Athena, thank you very much. We're going to have to obviously follow the events and what comes as a result. President Obama weighing in, once again condemning looting and rioting following Freddie Gray's death in a new interview with radio host Steve Harvey. CNN's senior White House correspondent Jim Acosta is live at the White House. With the president's latest comments, Jim, there is no question there has been a hunger for leadership here on the ground by the elected. The president always in a tricky spot when it comes to race, being pushed to do more once again, and now we have this.

JIM ACOSTA, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: That's right Chris. After staying silent on this subject for weeks, President Obama is offering up some straight talk and urging the nation to do some soul searching on this issue of police brutality, making his first remarks about the violence in Baltimore yesterday. The president described those rioters has thugs and criminals and he continued some of that message on the Steve Harvey radio show earlier this morning. And while he did complete the criticism that looting is not activism, the president also called on police departments to do more to crack down on abusive police officers. Here's what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARACK OBAMA, (D) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Police departments themselves need to understand that if they want to be successful and create a safer environment for their officers then they have got to build more trust, and it's in their interest to root out folks who aren't doing the right thing, to hold people accountable when they do something wrong.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: Now, the president went on to say that the country has to deal with these deep rooted issues that are behind these flare ups between police departments and minority communities. The president noted his past as a community organizer. He said that absentee fathers and economic inequality are also part of the equation here. And while the president was staying away from the subject of police brutality over the last several weeks, a senior administration official told me Mr. Obama had been thinking about this issue for some time, and that is why he had that six point statement that he delivered in the Rose Garden yesterday.

But earlier this morning the president was venting some frustrations on this radio program, saying that too many Americans will likely forget about Baltimore once the fires are out and the cars are flipped back on their right side. He said many Americans will just go back to their reality TV shows. It's hard to disagree with him, and the president did say while he may not go to Baltimore in the near future, he's not ruling it out down the road. He said once things calm down, he may go up there. Back to you.

CUOMO: All right, Jim, that may be him right now calling you right now to say he changed his minds. There's no question that we need more presence of leadership on the ground. It's always true in these situations. The president always held to the highest standard. Thank you for the reporting.

So what actually happened here last night? Was it just because of the police presence? Was that why things were better? I would submit to you, no, that the community changed as well last night, and a big part of it was coming from the faith community.

So let's bring in somebody who is very much been motivating that kind of change. His name is Reverend Jamal Bryant. He is the pastor of the Empowerment Temple Church. He held a town hall here in Baltimore last night. We were at it, and I would submit, reverend -- thank you coming with us this morning -- that it was a lot more than that. Before you had the thousands of people there airing their grievances, many of them heart rending, and you coaching through strategic changes. There was a meeting of clergy, and I heard someone there who had been here their whole lives saying haven't seen riots like this since the '60s, haven't seen something like this since then either. What was "this"?

REV. JAMAL BRYANT, PASTOR, EMPOWERMENT TEMPLE CHURCH: It is coming together to have almost 500 leaders of faith, not just pastors, rabbis, imams, priests coming together under a common banner that we are going to build one Baltimore. It doesn't matter --

CUOMO: Not just a hash tag.

BRYANT: No, not just a hash-tag. From PhD to GED, we've got to help rebuild and come out of the ashes.

CUOMO: So what happened on the streets last night that was different other than the police presence? What did the community do to help take back control of what you want the dynamic to be?

BRYANT: Outside of the false narrative that was released by the police, we got assistance actually from gang members who signed a truce, the Bloods, the Crips, and the Black Guerilla Family, who went out on the streets with men from both the mosques and the Christian church telling our young people to go back. And so I am very pleased that the community is standing on the front line saying this is not going to be the record of what Baltimore has written for.

CUOMO: So you have taken by proxy and by purpose a leadership role. So engage the frustration on both sides. You'll have when you left that meeting, there were young people there, a lot of young people that came because they were not in school, to teach nonviolence, but there are many more of them. And they say I don't want to hear it. Forget about the fact that I don't want to hear about your god. Don't tell me not to be angry when they are trying to kill me and you are basically saying pray it away. What do you say?

[08:10:16] BRYANT: Well, one of the things that is so significant is that many times the church at the end say the doors of the church is open waiting for somebody to come in. I think in this hour, the doors of the church are open and the church has to go out to the community. And so all day today I am going to visit different high schools to share with them what is at stake, what is the main focus of this drive.

CUOMO: And they are saying, I am not going to be another Freddie Gray. I'm not going to tell them when to be on my streets. These are my streets, not their streets. They want to fight. Let's go.

BRYANT: Yes, power concedes nothing without a demand is what Frederick Douglas said, one of the great abolitionists of this country. And I am going to say to them in no uncertain terms we are not going to show them not only is the mayor wrong but the president of the United States are wrong. These are not thugs. These are upset and frustrated children. It's amazing you don't call six police officers who kill a man without probable cause thugs, but children who are frustrated and don't have an outlet, you call them thugs? Thugs is the 21st century for the "n" world. It is repulsive and it is offensive to every person who is a parent trying to raise their children interpreting what's taking place in this hour. CUOMO: I hear you. A different perspective would be, no, you attack

your own. You're violent. You attack cops. You are what you do. And you say you don't like violence. That's fine, but now you've become violence, and we dismiss your leverage. You have no high ground. You are as bad as the problems you say you don't like.

BRYANT: That's for those who believe that broken glass is a higher premium than broken spines. Where is the priority? I think that humans are a greater commodity than property, and America is looking at it through the wrong lens.

Why did the president wait for outpouring of children to be upset before he spoke, but not in the death of this innocent young black man? Last week when in effect somebody was killed in an antiterrorism move within hours the president called. But within hours the president has not called the parents of Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown, or even Tamir Rice. And I think that there has to be an equity, and these children are seeing it and don't feel like their lives matter. And that's what the banner has been over the last 18 months. Our lives do matter.

CUOMO: Friday, people are looking for resolution. In all likelihood they do not get it. How do you manage expectations?

BRYANT: I think Friday the report is going to come back, but it won't be announced. Sunday we are coming right here to city hall, thousands within the faith community are going to converge to show, number one, the world what a peaceful demonstration is supposed to look like and to set the record straight. We are not going to be distracted by what happened earlier in the week. We still need police reform. We still need the officers bill of rights to be modified. And I am so glad the governor has moved here so now we don't have to go all the way to Annapolis for address our grievances. We can go right to his office.

CUOMO: He wasn't out there last night, though, the mayor wasn't out there. We heard a voice, and I know you can't be everywhere at once, but the question was, were they anywhere? You had Elijah Cummings out there, he was surrounded like a rock star because that's his hood where he was, and he was saying I have to be here for these people. Where are your electeds? One of the things that you heard in your own church, Baltimore is different because you have so many black electeds here. Where is that collective leadership?

BRYANT: Yes, I think what we are finding is there is a clear difference between a public servant and a public celebrity. And what our children and those who are frustrated are looking to see what are you doing in this hour? I think this is a great time for a wake-up call, because in one year we are going to have a critical election where our mayor is at stake, the president of city council is at stake, U.S. Senate, and the presidency, and these young people are going to be poised and in position not just to be elected, but also to run.

CUOMO: You said something that was purposeful, it's not going to be popular, last night. You said, you know what, the cops are showing restraint and they are doing what they have to do. It seems to be a minimum way. There's a lot of drama online about the arrests were savage, they pulled them down and they beat them down. I didn't see it but there is that complaint.

It's going to play to this balance. You are saying the people, we have to fight for change and we have to have our voices heard. The other said, don't fight the cops so much, don't run away all the time, and then if you don't resist arrest, if you don't run away, you don't have these altercations with the police. Is there truth in that?

BRYANT: Absolutely not. One, I want to say again, the police did show restraint, but if we in fact use the Freddie Gray case as an exemplar, is why in the world, even with running, you don't have a charge, in the police report there's no charge, why in the world is he even put in the police vehicle. You are taking him to the station to ask him, what? And the question still abounds if those six officers cannot testify, where is the precinct captain and why has the precinct captain not given any accountability for those in his unit?

CUOMO: Does the running matter?

BRYANT: The running, you have to ask, why did you run? And why were you being pursued when you hadn't done anything?

[08:15:00] CUOMO: Well, that's what the cops say, too. They make the same exact arguments --

BRYANT: Yes.

CUOMO: -- just constructively for a different purpose. They say, that's why I was chasing you, I want to find out why you're running. You give me reasonable suspicion, because may be they'll say, they know that Freddie Gray wasn't often an innocent on these corners, he had a rap sheet. I'm just chasing what the cops may say.

BRYANT: Right.

CUOMO: You ran, I have reasonable suspicion, I chase you. Is that a fair analysis?

BRYANT: Reasonable suspicion is what is at question, which really is a cloaked word for prejudice. If in fact --

CUOMO: Always?

BRYANT: In this instance, if you are going by that community, why would they be running? Why would they be targeting?

And again, look at the gray level of arrogance that I'm going to rush you in broad daylight, 8:48 in the morning, around an entire community when I know you have not been charged because I feel like I'm above the law. You want us to be accountable to the law, but the police at the same time can act as if they cannot govern by the same law they want to hold the citizens too.

CUOMO: These are conflict situations. I appreciate you in letting me engage you about what is being said about this situation on two different sides.

BRYANT: Thank you for the opportunity.

CUOMO: Reverend, and thank you for letting us broadcast from inside the meeting. That was unusual, but it was helpful for us to allow people to see what that dynamic was.

BRYANT: I want the world to see one Baltimore and see us rebuild. I don't want the stain in people's memory to be rioting and looting but I want to see a city focused and committed to making radical change.

CUOMO: And we look forward to following the progress of one Baltimore today and going forward.

BRYANT: Thank you.

CUOMO: Thank you, Reverend.

All right. Alisyn, back to you.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: You're so right, Chris. That video from inside the meeting was really compelling. Thanks for that. We'll get back to you in a moment.

Well, the death tool in the Nepal earthquake now reaching more than 5,000 victims. This as dramatic video surfaces of this 27-year-old man was stuck under the rubble for 80 hours. We are told he banged relentlessly on the debris around him until he was found.

Meanwhile, rough weather making it hard for crews to deliver humanitarian aide to the millions of victims.

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: Almost four days, amazing, amazing.

CAMEROTA: Yes, it is.

PEREIRA: Other news here, U.S. military officials monitoring the situation in the Strait of Hormuz, following Iran seizure of a Maersk cargo ship. A naval destroyer has been ordered to one region. Iranian patrol ships fired warning shots across the bow before boarding that cargo vessel. No Americans are believed to be among the crew members. According to Iran's news agency, the ship was trespassing in Iranian waters.

CAMEROTA: A seemingly divided Supreme Court on same sex marriage. The court hearing historic oral arguments Tuesday, challenging laws in four states that banned same sex marriage. The justices will issue a ruling in June that could make same-sex marriage legal across the entire country. The key vote could come from Justice Anthony Kennedy who expressed doubt about whether the high court should even intervene.

PEREIRA: Freddie Gray's death is the latest to provoke the question, why don't all police wear body cameras? Could one provide answers in the Baltimore case? We're going to speak with somebody ahead trying to bring body cameras to police nationwide. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:21:38] CAMEROTA: The protests over the death of Freddie Gray coming on the heels of a different high profile police incident, the shooting death of Walter Scott in South Carolina. You recall this video of Scott being shot at eight times as he ran from police.

Senator Tim Scott grew up in North Charleston, South Carolina, where Walter Scott was killed and he is now pressing on body cameras on officers. And Senator Scott joins us now.

Good morning, Senator.

SEN. TIM SCOTT (R), SOUTH CAROLINA: Good morning. Thanks for having me, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: How would a police body camera have changed what happened to Freddie Gray in Baltimore?

SCOTT: I think substantially. Obviously, if you had six officers with six different police cameras, six different angles, we would know exactly what happened as much as possible. I think what happens is we should always have as much evidence from the scene as possible, and body cameras provides us opportunity to gather that information real time end of story, to use it in criminal investigations. And I think today, we would have a different outcome.

What we have seen from studies in body cameras is a 90 percent drop in the complaints against law enforcement officers and a 60 percent drop in the use of force. So, I believe body cameras will help keep more people alive and will help to restore confidence that communities have in law enforcement officers.

CAMEROTA: Senator, is it so interesting, because at first flush you would think that body cameras might serve to hamstring the police somehow, that they would have to check their own level of aggression. And so, you can imagine why it would curtail excessive force, but what you are saying, that it actually also curtains complaints against police officers.

How does that work?

SCOTT: Absolutely. What we have learned is that when you're on film, your behavior changes. I think it makes your officers safer and it makes your communities safer, and that's a good thing. And study after study shows that when people are on film and they know they are being filmed, everybody's behavior, it just tamps down a couple levels and allows for a more peaceful conversations, even in a midst of high tension situations, and that's what we find so often on the streets.

CAMEROTA: The Baltimore City Council a bill for body cameras last November. Do you know where the mayor of Baltimore vetoed that?

SCOTT: I do not, honestly. I will tell you, however, that in North Charleston, our mayor and police chief ordered 101 cameras, and there was 150 more coming so that every officer on the streets of North Charleston would have body cameras.

I think it's a critical piece of equipment. We should view it as 100 percent necessary when having interactions of the public.

CAMEROTA: What's confusing about what's going on in Baltimore, in terms of body cameras is that the mayor, Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, vetoed the city council bill, but then she proposed her own bill. She said she didn't like the funding that the city council bill was proposing and she also didn't think the city council should have authority over the police. So, she proposed her own bill and she did that in February.

So, now she, the mayor, wants body cameras and the city council wants body cameras, and yet the police don't have body cameras.

SCOTT: I am sure they will figure out how to get body cameras faster than ever before. Ultimately, what I hope happens that we have a national conversation, because this is not simply Ferguson, North Charleston, and/or Baltimore. This should be a conversation nationwide about how do we make sure that our law enforcement officers, a vast majority of whom are doing their job with the highest level of integrity are safe, and for those bad apples who re not doing their jobs right are caught and punished.

[08:25:11] CAMEROTA: You know, one of the interesting things about these cases, Freddie Gray and Walter Scott from your hometown, is that they actually both were caught on camera, both of these incidents were caught on camera by, as you know, a bypasser in one case, and then some surveillance cameras in other case, but both of them miss critical points that would really help complete the story.

With Freddie Gray we missed the moment, we think, of when his spine might have been so severely injured. And today, that would make all the difference in this case, wouldn't it?

SCOTT: It obviously seems like it would have made the biggest difference, and we would have been able to see what happened with Mr. Gray. And the second part I think is very important as well.

Whenever I get into mini taxis now, I will tell you that very often in taxis, there is a camera pointing back at the passenger, and just imagine if we were able to see what happened inside the officer cars as well, and I think it's important to restore trust and to heal communities, and we are going to have to look at the next step which is making sure we understand what happened because we saw it and not because we heard it.

CAMEROTA: Senator, very quickly, what do you think is going to happen in Baltimore on Friday when the police have to turnover the findings of their investigation to the state's attorney?

SCOTT: It's difficult to tell. I certainly hope that justice is done, and I hope that we have more illumination on the issue and that we understand the entire process that we don't understand today. It's very difficult to predict the future, but I am looking forward to hopefully the police turning over every bit of single information important that is important in this case.

CAMEROTA: And Senator Tim Scott, we will see if your calls for body cameras on police nationwide are heeded after an incident like this. Thanks so much for being on NEW DAY today.

SCOTT: Yes, ma'am.

CAMEROTA: Let's go out to Chris on the streets of Baltimore.

CUOMO: All right, Alisyn. When you are talking about heated responses, we got one for you here. This mom was praised for her heated response to the protests in Baltimore, but that was before the city descended into riots.

Remember the mom that took on her own son, we're going to talk about that, and we're going to talk about the politics here as well. Did the mayor deal with this the right way? What does the former mayor think? All of this ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)