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Officials: Russian Passenger Jet Broke Apart in Mid-Air; Ground Troops in Syria; Paul Ryan on Speakership. Aired 6:30-7a ET

Aired November 02, 2015 - 06:30   ET

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

[06:30:01] MARK PRESTON, CNN POLITICS EXECUTIVE EDITOR: Can they win the nomination?

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: Right. And, Dylan, not to be in great defense of FOX, but most of these things as you pointed out are things that will probably be included in the FOX debate and all the others.

(CROSSTALK)

CUOMO: Other than this opening statement thing which people do or don't, you know, on their way own there.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: But let's talk about why free- wheeling debates are important, because sometimes things come out and candidates end up tripping themselves up. You know, voters like to see that. They like a little window into that. And this very thing happened with Carly Fiorina. In the CNBC debate, she used a statistic, said that 92 percent of the jobs lost during Barack Obama's first term were women. We challenged her about that on NEW DAY. She shot back and then this weekend, she had to correct herself.

So, let me show you the history of what happened with Carly Fiorina since the debate.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIPS)

CAMEROTA: According to "Washington Post" fact checker, that is a recycled talking point from the Mitt Romney campaign that they deemed as false. They say you were using a narrow moment in time when unemployment among women has spiked but since then the numbers have changed and it's a much rosier picture for women.

What's your response?

CARLY FIORINA (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: This is the same conversation we had after the last debate. Everybody came out and said I was using wrong data. No. I'm not using wrong data. The liberal media doesn't like the data. Perhaps the liberal media doesn't like the facts. The facts are clear.

In this particular case, the fact checkers are correct. The 92 percent, it turns out was the first 3 1/2 years of Barack Obama's term and in the final six months of his term, things improved.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: So, Mark, just one example there, but isn't the that the point of debates, to see --

CUOMO: It's two examples because you nailed her on this point and others went after her, too. She attacked you for asking the question. This same thing happened about Planned Parenthood. No, she cited something that was put in there by the producers of the film, and she should have known that.

Two in a row, Mark. What's the penalty?

PRESTON: Well, two in a row, what's the penalty? Let's just go back to 2011 when we saw Rick Perry trip up on stage, and he can't, you know, the three cabinet agencies that he would shot down. Look, part of the debate -- it's a debate. This is isn't a discussion.

Ben Carson's decision to come out and say that he wanted to give long speeches, and everybody should get two questions and kumbaya -- well, guess what? This is politics. This is rough and tumble. You need to be able to thinking and acting quick on your feet.

And I think what is important, though, as much as Dylan and I are saying to you that these demands aren't overt -- well, what is overt is the candidates try to dictate editorial control over the debates while some folks were leaning that way, there were enough grown-ups in the room to understand that they can't push this too far. You can only push it so far to get what you want. Having said that, if they push it too far, they know that they'll get in trouble.

CAMEROTA: Yes, look, the whole point is, you can't have it so tightly controlled, so tightly scripted that you don't give them the opportunity for the viewers to hear them, possibly make a mistake or whatever is going to happen.

CUOMO: Or score points, distinguish themselves. Alisyn takes an issue I start off on, she does a better job. That's how you wind up separating the field.

CAMEROTA: Yes, you want something spontaneous to be able to happen.

Mark Preston, Dylan Byers, thanks so much for all of the background on this meeting. Great to talk to you guys.

PRESTON: Thanks.

CAMEROTA: Michaela?

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: Well, the White House is sending U.S. ground forces into Syria. Despite what officials say, could this evolve into a combat role? We'll ask a military expert, ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:37:16] PEREIRA: Investigators believe a Russian passenger jet that crashed in the Sinai peninsula more than likely broke apart in midair. They cannot explain why that happened. And they are still not ruling out the possibility of terrorism. The airline says the flight was inspected before the accident and the crew never issued warnings or communications during the final moments of that flight. All 224 people on board were killed. More than half the bodies have been recovered and flown back to St. Petersburg for burial.

CAMEROTA: A U.S. Navy search team believes they have found the remains of the cargo ship El Faro 15,000 feet under water each of the Bahamas. The ship vanished a month ago during Hurricane Joaquin. Twenty-eight American crew members, five Polish engineers on board all presumed dead. A big challenge will be recovering the vessel's data recorder and any human remains. Another issue: lawsuits developing between the owners of El Faro and the families of those on board.

CUOMO: The officiating crew from this weekend's Miami/Duke football game has been suspended for a blown call to what may have been the wildest ending to a game.

PEREIRA: We set (ph) this up.

CUOMO: Miami, lateral the ball eight times in the last second kickoff that went 91 yards for the winning touchdown. But it turns out, the refs actually missed a few things. Like a runner being down. A Miami player running off the bench before the play ended, and a couple others, too. Atlantic coast conference officials say the result will stand but the entire crew and replay officials involved have been suspended.

PEREIRA: Is that unusual? Is that highly unusual?

CUOMO: Very, very -- suspended for two games for miss a call?

PEREIRA: That doesn't happen very often?

CUOMO: Nope.

PEREIRA: Wow.

Very interesting. You have to miss a lot to miss all that.

CUOMO: It was a heck of a play. Remember, it's not one person or two people. There's a whole team of officials.

PEREIRA: There's a whole team of them, that's right.

All right. The White House escalating the war on ISIS in Syria, sending dozens of Special Ops into the region. U.S. officials are insisting that they're on the ground to assist and advise rebel fighters. But what is the reality? We'll look at that, ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:43:11] CUOMO: The fight against ISIS in Syria is turning a corner. Let's put that in quotes because it's a questionable suggestion, right? The White House is announcing it is going to deploy U.S. troops. There will be Special Forces into northern Syria, no more than 50, we're told, right? The number is an early assessment. What are they going to do? Advise and assist rebel forces but not fight.

Is that even possible? Let us discuss.

CNN military analyst and former commanding general of the U.S. Army in Europe, Lieutenant General Mark Hertling.

Congratulations on being a grandfather.

LT. GEN. MARK HERTLING (RET), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Thank you, Chris.

CUOMO: Good to have you with us. God bless to the family.

HERTLING: Thank you.

CUOMO: This man, you don't have to be a general to know all these different colors designating areas of control or a problem in controlling this situation. What do we see?

HERTLING: Well, it's certainly a quilt. And what you're talking about is the changes in the colors between the ISIS-controlled area and what we say is the rebel controlled areas and then the areas controlled by Mr. Assad and his Syrian forces. What you're talking about with the deployment of these forces, is attempting to get after the ISIS capital in Raqqa. And I think you'll see that some of the -- what we now are calling the Syrian democratic front are pulling together as various tribes and in conjunction with the Kurdish forces, they could make some inroads if led correctly and consolidated.

CUOMO: The problem with leadership is, of course, presence. So, now, you're on the ground. Now, you're in close quarters. Now, you're at a forward operating base. Now you're out in the field. Now you're at the point of contact.

You know, what's the chance that a U.S. fighting man or woman doesn't wind up in the mix?

HERTLING: It's a very good chance. Their job is not to get into the mix. Their job is to help others. And in this case, it's not only a training and assisting, that's the mantra of the mission but it's also coordination.

[06:45:01] They're going to be able to talk to other special operators, special forces with other groups and consolidate and coordinate the activity of these various organization. That's the important thing.

These disparate Muslim tribes, Arab tribes, Kurdish forces have been doing their own thing for a very long time. It's taken us a while to get into this and say, who do we link with, who do we coordinate with?

Remember, Chris, this was something that the president wanted to do early on. But until you have the connections, you can't do it.

CUOMO: Well, he's had to fight politics on both sides, right?

HERTLING: Right.

CUOMO: When that big attack on civilians was done and everybody believed it was Assad, the president was slow on that. Then once the assessment came in, he went to Congress and wanted to bomb. It's gone back and forth, politically, always overshadowed by the fact, General, as you know, we do not want to see people like you put in harm's way unless you absolutely have to be. This seems like you're going to be put in harm's way.

HERTLING: That's the key piece. I mean, this has been -- American forces can fight here, certainly. Do we want to? The American people do not want us here. The Congress of the United States doesn't want us here, as a whole. They've not voted on it and the president has rightfully said we don't want to get involved in another country's politics again when it's so messed up. That's what's happening.

But the American people also want to fight ISIS. That's what we're doing.

CUOMO: Incirlik, the Turkish base, they're supposed to be approximate to that. That gives you some safety that they can get back to a safer place. Also there's some big equipment put in there, some planes, helicopters. What does that mean that you're moving that type of infrastructure in?

HERTLING: Well, just last week, the commander of the European command, General Breedlove, reinforced Incirlik with more A-10s, more F-15s. They've had those there for a couple of weeks now based on the Turkish vote saying we could put people there.

But what you're going to see when you put special operators in this area, an Incirlik is just over the border, if you've got eyes on target, observation of enemy activity, you can delineate who are the bad guys, who are the good guys. You sort of mitigate collateral damage so you can strike more targets and you become much more effective. You don't have that many planes going back to Incirlik with their bomb load still on board.

CUOMO: What's your big concern. You've got the Chinese on the ground, you've got Russians on the ground. You have the disparate rebel groups and, of course, you have the Assad forces there as well. For the men and women that are going to be put on the ground there, no matter how many, there are three dozens, four dozens, ten dozens, what's your concern?

HERTLING: The map shows it, Chris. In the orange area, you have the rebel forces. That's who the Russians are going after to help Mr. Assad form a defensive area. He's trying to pull everything in the Homs, Damascus, Hama and Aleppo area back to the Syrian government. The Russians are very interested in the one key place up there, Latakia and also the port of Tartus. That gives the Russians access to the Mediterranean, and they see those two ports as very important.

Just south of Damascus last week, the Russians bombed an old Soviet communications site within range of the Golan Heights. They are -- the Russians along with the Syrians are going to stay on the western coast of Syria. We are focused more in the red zone, if you will, where the ISIS terrorists are. That's who we're going to help, where we're going to help the Kurds and the various tribes go after ISIS.

CUOMO: One very smart person who's working at the Pentagon I've known for a long time said to me, the big Russian advantages -- they know exactly what they want. They know why they're there. They know what they want to do.

The United States does not have that advantage at this --

HERTLING: I'm not sure that's true. The Russians certainly want to protect their bases in the area and they want to prop up the government so they can protect those bases.

We know what we want. We want to destroy ISIS. The problem is, that's very difficult when they're intermingled with the population.

This is another unfortunate guerrilla war that we're talking about in this part of the world not supported by the government and we don't have the fighters to help us. The Russians have the advantage of having the government behind them.

CUOMO: General, thank you very much. Appreciate it.

HERTLING: Thank you, Chris. Appreciate it.

CUOMO: God bless the family.

HERTLING: Thank you.

CUOMO: Mick?

PEREIRA: All right, Chris.

It is a NEW DAY in the House of Representatives. Paul Ryan is now wielding the speaker's gavel. Will he be able to unite a divided party? What he told our Dana Bash, that's ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:53:12] PEREIRA: Paul Ryan is ready to hit the ground running as new speaker of the House. It is a job that he initially didn't want, but he now says as speaker, he can work to unify an extremely divided Congress. Ryan sat down with our Dana Bash to discuss his decision to take the job and the demands he had for taking it.

Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: You sparked a national debate when you said one of the reasons you didn't want to take this job is because of the work/family balance. I have to say that when I was reporting on that, I got more response on Twitter, on Facebook, from, you know, friends and family all over the country saying, you know, wow, this is interesting that he's talking about this, but what's he going to do about it?

REP. PAUL RYAN (R-WI), SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: I don't think that sticking up for being a person with balance in your life for wanting to spend your weekends in your home with your family, which I work with constituents and my family throughout the weekends, I don't think -- I don't think that means, therefore, you should sign up for some unfunded mandate.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PEREIRA: Chief political correspondent Dana Bash joins us now.

It's so interesting, Dana, you and I both know so many women professionally have had to deal with this struggle. So interesting to hear him talk about it, but he's talked about this for a long time. This is something he's very adamant about it.

BASH: He is, when it comes to spending time with his children. After the interview, he said men in our generation, he's like, I've changed diapers, I make bottles. You know, I've done the things that maybe men in previous generations didn't do as much of.

But the point of my question there, of course, was about the fact that now he's in a position to affect policy and, you know, the United States is way far behind when it comes to mandatory paid leave for women and men, but he made clear there that he doesn't want the government to have a mandate on that kind of thing.

[06:55:01] He was pretty adamant about that, even as our exchange continued.

But, you know, Michaela, as we go forward, his job is going to be not easy, to say the least. But even in the near term because, yes, there's a big budget deal that we reported on last week, but they still have to fund the government by December 11th. And there are a lot of conservatives who still want to defund Planned Parenthood as part of that. So, I asked what he's going to do about that. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BASH: Defunding Planned Parenthood, will it happen?

RYAN: I don't think Planned Parenthood should get a red cent from the taxpayer. I've always believed that. I voted that way before these disgusting videos came out. But I believe we need to do our oversight. We're just beginning to start a committee to investigate Planned Parenthood. That's important. So, the special committee on Planned Parenthood I think should be in the driver's seat of overseeing this process.

BASH: But what will you do about --

RYAN: Let me get you there, Dana. Hold on a second.

BASH: OK.

RYAN: Are we going to let Congress work its will and have amendments come to the process and have regular order of where we have conference committees? Yes. By not controlling the process so tightly held here, the speakership, by letting it go forward, I don't know what the outcome is going to be.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BASH: So, just to translate that into, you know, maybe from legislative speak to English, what that means, Michaela, is that he's going to let the process work with a huge Republican majority in the House, most of them, maybe all of them, want to defund Planned Parenthood. It's hard to see that not being the outcome when you see this sort of funding bill out of the House.

So, it's going to be a dicey situation, again, potentially for Congress as we're reaching that December 11th deadline over something so, so, so viscerally partisan, I think now. The whole idea of funding Planned Parenthood.

We could see the December 11th deadline coming and questions about whether the government once again is going to shut down.

PEREIRA: Well, that's the key question is, so many are wondering how he is going to unite this really divided party. And it's going to be in the meat and potatoes of things like this that we see how he is going to effectively going to try and do that.

BASH: Precisely. Yes.

PEREIRA: All right, Dana. Thanks so much for that great conversation. So glad you could join us on NEW DAY.

BASH: Thanks for having me.

PEREIRA: Certainly following a lot of news this morning on a Monday. Let's get right to it.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CAMEROTA: Russian officials say the plane broke apart in midair.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Pieces scattered everywhere.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: More than half of the bodies have been recovered at this stage.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There are a number of issues that could have affected this plane.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Smaller groups on the stage, better questions and let us all be heard from equally.

JEB BUSH (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: This is the process. I totally understand it and I'm more than prepared to fight on.

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I don't want the Republicans to look weak.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In the past, the campaigns themselves have negotiated with the TV networks.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The lasting impression of how she thinks scientology operates.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Being critical of Tom Cruise is being critical of scientology itself.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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

CAMEROTA: Good morning, everyone. Welcome back to your NEW DAY.

Are investigators any closer to determining what caused that Russian passenger jet to break apart in flight at 31,000 feet over the Sinai Peninsula? This morning, the airline blaming, quote, "external factors". Does that mean it was a terrorist attack?

CUOMO: Egyptian and Russian investigators are canvassing the eight square mile debris field for clues, examining the plane's black boxes that are said to be in good condition. This morning, the bodies of more than half of those 224 victims have now been flown back to St. Petersburg.

We have CNN's Arwa Damon live in Cairo with the latest.

You've said, Arwa, that the more you learn, the less you know. What does today bring?

ARWA DAMON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Chris, CNN just spoke to an Egyptian medic who has been in charge of helping process the bodies. And according to him, and he's seen 175 of the bodies so far. He said that most of them were intact, some had dismembered limbs but that their core remained intact. Significant, perhaps, in these particular cases at least it does not seem as if they suffered from any sort of burns, according to this medic.

But, yes, the more information that's coming out, the more statements that are being made, the more mysterious the circumstances of this crash appear.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DAMON (voice-over): MetroJet Airlines holding a press conference in Moscow this morning, saying Russian passenger jet Flight 9268 could not have broken apart in midair by itself.

This amid new reports the passenger jet broke into pieces as it flew over the remote Egyptian countryside, the fuselage disintegrating around 20 minutes into the flight. from an Egyptian resort town to St. Petersburg Saturday, according to Russian aviation officials. The airline company says the only explanation would be an external influence.

Overnight, nearly 150 of the 224 passengers killed on board arriving in Russia. Mourners of the mostly Russian victims gathering at St. Petersburg airport where the air jet was supposed to end its journey.