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Peshmerga Takes City of Sinjar; "Jihadi John" Targeted by Drone Attack; Donald Trump Gives Speech Criticizing Ben Carson; Trump Defends Plan to Deport Undocumented Immigrants. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired November 13, 2015 - 08:00   ET

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

[08:00:03] ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: This coming just hours after the U.S. launched an air strike to take out the masked ISIS executioner known as "Jihadi John." Let's get right to CNN senior international correspondent Nick Paton Walsh is live on the outskirts of Sinjar. Nick?

NICK PATON WALSH, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Alisyn, actually just in the last few moments a black smoke cloud has risen behind us which does give you the idea that the statement that the city is entirely in their hands isn't premature but doesn't take into account the complexities of what's on the ground there.

We've just come out ourselves about two hours ago. There are hundreds of Peshmerga inside that town. They still face some ISIS hiding out in certain buildings. One bullet flew over our head. They believe there was a sniper hiding in some of those buildings. And one of their people we saw carried away injured. A lot of gunfire retaliation from them. So it is still volatile in there.

And in fact one Swedish volunteer we talked to called Tony, he's fighting alongside by his own choice the Peshmerga in there, said there was a tunnel network under the city and in fact one place said there were a bunch of barrels containing explosives laid as the booby trap. The entire city feels mined, frankly. Wherever you look there is a booby trap here or there making the roads unsafe, making the buildings hard to reclaim.

And in fact you could even see the little elements of tranquility ISIS tried to impose in there ruptured by the violence that's taken out so many buildings. The air strikes, the suicide bombs, even the Sharia court that ISIS put together is covered in rubble, a tidy lull with huge bits of brick scattered amongst it. That is the scale of the challenge here, the rebuilding. They have to clear the remaining pockets of ISIS out first.

You just heard there and you could see the smoke possibly behind me. There are people still resisting the Peshmerga. They are dominantly in control without a doubt, but the speed of this offensive success perhaps heralds the potential for better news when it comes to attacking ISIS' other stronghold of Mosul in northern Iraq. Could this cooperation between the coalition and Peshmerga on the ground herald a new chapter of momentum against ISIS? We'll have to wait and see, but a very vast pocket of success right here. MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: Nick, your reporting really paints a

picture for us of how hard fought that battle was. Thank you so much for that. Meanwhile, overnight the U.S. launching a drone strike to try and eliminate the man who has beheaded ISIS hostages, taunted the world in videos. So was Jihadi John eliminated? Barbara Starr broke this story overnight and she joins us with new details on just how they tracked him down, Barbara.

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Michaela. CNN has learned that the U.S. was watched jihadi John from a drone and aircraft overhead since Wednesday. They had a beat on where he was located. They watched him move around. And yesterday when he stepped out of a building into a car in Syria they took the shot.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

STARR: Breaking overnight, the Pentagon confirming U.S. special operations forced launched a drone strike targeting the masked ISIS executioner known as Jihadi John. A U.S. official says after tracking him for days authorities are confident the drone strike killed the Kuwaiti born British citizen identified as Mohammed Emwazi. But still they are awaiting final confirmation.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Certainly it's a symbolic victory for the United States, the coalition, and our partners, and it does bring closer to those families.

STARR: The U.S. official says authorities knew it was Emwazi when they took the shot. Another U.S. official tells CNN Emwazi was in a vehicle at the time of the strike, near Raqqa, ISIS' de facto capital in Syria.

Emwazi appeared in a series of horrific ISIS beheading videos documenting the murder of several American, British, and Japanese hostages. He was often seen wielding a knife, only his eyes and hands exposed, taunting U.S. and British leaders.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We'll continue to strike the necks of your people.

STARR: This morning the U.K. government saying Britain was working hand in glove with America over the Jihadi John drone strike.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This was an act of self-defense. It was the right thing to do.

STARR: Emwazi, who is in his mid-twenties grew up in London and graduated with a degree in computer programming before becoming radicalized.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And if this strike was successful -- and we still await confirmation of that -- it will be a strike at the heart of ISIL.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

STARR: The drone strike was carried out by the U.S. military's joint special operations command out of Fort Bragg, North Carolina, the very same organization that helped plan and carry out the mission to kill Usama bin Laden. Chris?

CUOMO: All right, Barbara, important developments. Let's figure out what they mean in the big picture.

[08:05:00] Mike Rogers, CNN national security commentator with us, also former chair of the House Intelligence Committee. Mike, good to have you. The president was speaking on topic not long ago. Here is what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARACK OBAMA, (D) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I don't think they are gaining strength. What is true is that from the start our goal has been first to contain. And we have contained them. They have not gained ground in Iraq. And in Syria it -- they will come in, they will leave. But you don't see this systematic march by ISIL across the terrain. What we have not yet been able to do is to completely decapitate their command and control structures. We've made some progress in trying to reduce the flow of foreign fighters.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: So let's put that in context for us, Mike. A lot of people believe they actually are established in Syria and that is where their capital is and they don't just go in and out. What do you make of that and what do you make of the news of this major victory of the Peshmerga in Sinjar?

MIKE ROGERS, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY COMMENTATOR: Yes. And we have to be careful. We've had other good movements, military movements on the edges of ISIS where they have taken cities and lost cities. In Sinjar, you have to be careful. This is going take some time in that city. Many believe and if you talk to any analyst they will tell you that thing is mined to the teeth with booby traps of all sorts. So the city itself isn't necessarily important. It's trying to cut off the logistical lines between Raqqa and Mosul that is so important. And if that is a sustained effort and continues to move either back towards Mosul, this is really, really significant.

On the ISIS part, I disagree with the president a little. They have expanded their operations. We find them in northern Africa. We've seen them do attacks in Afghanistan. So to say that they have been contained I just don't think is accurate. They have an expanded territorial holding in Iraq, but that is not containing ISIS. Now we've also seen they took credit for the bombings in Lebanon. So they are trying to push out their sphere of influence and have been successful at doing that. The first phase of this attack that many have been waiting for I think is critically important, but it must be sustained. You can't just walk away from it now.

CUOMO: And the idea that they are itinerant when it comes to Syria, that they are not there with a significant presence, that is very different than what I've been hearing all along, that Raqqa is the presumptive capital for ISIS, that they do have big tent pegs down in the ground there. What do you say?

ROGERS: Absolutely. That was a little confusing to me. All of the intelligence showed that they had a well-established command and control structures in eastern Syria. As a matter of fact that is where they grew. That is where they developed. Most of the folks that left the prison after the U.S. withdraw, including Baghdadi, went to eastern Syria to develop, train, give safe haven, free space. And that is where it generated from. So to say that they're not there and not well-seeded there, I just don't believe that is accurate.

CUOMO: And now the head line about Jihadi John, the murderous ISIS guy from the videos with the British accent. What do you hear about whether or not they got him? We know that they were targeting him. They believe that they got him, but there is no confirmation. And what does it really matter?

ROGERS: Well, it's a psychological blow to ISIS for sure. It is starting to show that you can reach out and touch them even in what they believe is their safe haven in and around Raqqa. That is really critical for the morale, for actually starting to get people to defect and do other things. That was I think a very, very important kill.

As far as the combat structure not much, but that psychological blow because he is such a visible figure and promoter of ISIS and he was the guy that was doing the beheadings, and he had that huge following, for that reason it was important.

It will take some days, Chris. What they will do is through signals chatter, they will call it. That is how they will be able to confirm over a period of time, so they will have sources that they can work with in signals intelligence that will confirm for sure that it is him. But I guarantee if they took that shot that there was a very high probability that it was him.

ROGERS: Yesterday ISIS released a video and audio statement threatening to attack Russia very soon. Do you think that Russia is going to because of the optics now having the sense in the war in that competitive sense, and what happened with the Metrojet flight, do you think that we are going to see them going at ISIS heavy and hard as a preemptive strike?

ROGERS: Well, I think that the Russia will in fact. Their first priority is going to make sure that Assad is OK in that zone. They will use that opportunity, their safe haven if you will, for Assad and his troops, his government troops, which is what you have seen. That is why they were doing the bombs. They were making sure that they developed some safe haven ground or some territorial ground from which they could operate, so the freedom to breathe here.

[08:10:00] Then they will take it to ISIS. I have no doubt that they will do that. It is in their own self-interest to do that and that is exactly why they will do it, because it is in their own self-interest.

CUOMO: And then they will wind up becoming unlikely bedfellows with that U.S. led coalition. We'll see what happens with that. Mike Rogers, thank you very much for the perspective, appreciate it. Have a good weekend. Alisyn?

CAMEROTA: OK, Chris, Donald Trump taking his stump speech up a level with a 95 minute tirade blasting everyone and calling some Iowa voters stupid. CNN's Athena Jones is live in Des Moines for us. What happened last night, Athena?

ATHENA JONES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Alisyn. It was really a sight to behold at that speech last night. It was one of the longest and most eyebrow raising tirades from Trump yet, full of insults against his GOP rivals, Democratic leaders, and the media, and more tough talk for ISIS.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I would bomb the -- out of them.

JONES: Cursing and mocking chief rival Dr. Ben Carson.

TRUMP: How stupid are the people of Iowa?

JONES: Unleashing his most aggressive attacks yet in what amounted to an hour and a half long rant in Iowa.

TRUMP: How stupid are the people of the country to believe this crap?

JONES: The billionaire gunning for Carson. The two are virtually neck in neck in recent polls. After the retired neurosurgeon wrote in his autobiography that as a teen he tried to stab a friend only to have it stopped by a belt buckle.

TRUMP: I have a belt. Somebody hits me with a belt it is going in because the belt moves this way. It moves this way. It moves that way. He hit the belt buckle. Anybody have a knife? Do you want to try it on me?

(LAUGHTER)

TRUMP: Believe me, it ain't going to work.

JONES: Trump comparing Carson's self-described pathological temper to an incurable disease.

TRUMP: I don't want a person that's got a pathological disease. If you are a child molester -- a sick puppy, you are a child molester, there is no cure for that.

JONES: A theme of attack he used earlier in the night on CNN, prompting Carly Fiorina to jump to Carson's defense, writing in a Facebook post "All the money in the world won't make you as smart as Ben Carson." During his tirade Trump also attacking Hillary Clinton.

TRUMP: And she's playing the woman card. That is all she has. Honestly, outside of the woman's card she's got nothing going, believe me. JONES: The one time clear frontrunner also claiming to know more

about the terrorist group ISIS than U.S. military generals, saying he would bomb areas controlled by ISIS that are rich in oil.

TRUMP: I would just bomb those suckers. And that is right. I'd blow up the pipes. I'd blow up the -- I'd blow up every single inch. There would be nothing left. And I'd take the oil.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

JONES: Now in response to Trump's attack, a top Carson campaign aide says the doctor said to pray for Trump. The aide also called Trump's rant, embarrassing, immature, and said to see Trump, quote, "imploding before our very eyes is just sad to watch." Michaela?

PEREIRA: And I'm sure in the course of the day we'll hear more reaction to that. Athena, all right, thanks.

More aircraft facing laser attacks overnight. A news chopper for KTLA in California, my former station, targeted several times. A 15-year- old boy was arrested and then released to his parents in that case. More incidents in Dallas, a Southwest flight, two private airplanes both hit. No arrests have been made in those. More than twenty aircraft were struck by lasers Wednesday. This is not funny. It is a crime. You will go to jail if you are caught.

CUOMO: True, true.

A surprise verdict at the so called "Goodfellas trial" in New York. Alleged former mob boss Vincent Asaro cleared of all counts in connection with the historic Lufthansa Airlines heist at Idlewild, later JFK airport, 1978. The 80-year-old Asaro faced life in prison if convicted. The Lufthansa heist was this huge plot point of the film "Goodfellas," and now he feels vindicated.

CAMEROTA: If you have been struggling to have children, listen up. There is a potential game changer for women struggling with infertility. Surgeons at the Cleveland Clinic will become the first in the U.S. to transplant a uterus into a woman, which could allow infertile women to have children. Recipients will be women who were born without a uterus or had it removed or have uterine damage. This is being called a true medical breakthrough.

PEREIRA: And after the women is done having children they would remove it again and then they would have to go off all of those drugs, the antirejection drugs, et cetera, et cetera.

CAMEROTA: As I think you both know, I work with couples with infertility. I have for a long time, and it is just great when there is a game changer. It will give a lot of people hope.

PEREIRA: This will make it a high risk pregnancy, but it doesn't mean it's not --

CUOMO: What is the downside?

CAMEROTA: Just that you would be on a lot of drugs, a lot of the transplant patient drugs take a toll on your system.

[08:15:00] PEREIRA: It's a risky pregnancy.

CAMEROTA: And it's risky. But it is still a glimmer of hope for people who didn't have it.

[08:15:01] PEREIRA: Sure is. Fascinating.

CUOMO: So, I guess we could say as the Trump head line, Donald doubles down.

CAMEROTA: Or quadruples down.

CUOMO: Quadruples down, I'll take it.

He says his immigration policy will work. And he will tell you how. The question is, do you accept? The CNN interview you do not want to his, ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CAMEROTA: Well, before he lit into Ben Carson at a campaign stop in Iowa, Donald Trump was blasting critics of his immigration policy who say it won't work.

CNN's Erin Burnett sat down with Trump to set the record straight.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ERIN BURNETT, CNN ANCHOR: So I want to ask you about the immigration (INAUDIBLE) that's going on out there. You obviously put immigration front and center in the GOP conversation.

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: You wouldn't even be talking about immigration if it wasn't for me.

BURNETT: You have put it on the table and now, of course, you were criticized heavily at the debate, right? Kasich, Jeb Bush saying that your proposals were --

TRUMP: Well, they are weak people. No, no, excuse me. They're weak people. I watched Jeb today. They are weak people.

And Kasich made a fool out of himself in the debate. I mean, what he said it was ridiculous. Actually, everybody was pretty much uniform in the fact that Kasich did a bad job with the debate.

BURNETT: How though -- on this one point though of deporting 11 million people, even Marco Rubio today said it can't be done.

TRUMP: What do you mean even Marco Rubio? Marco Rubio is in favor of amnesty, he was a member of the gang of eight.

He was always in favor of amnesty. He was in favor of people pouring into the country.

[08:20:00] And then what happened is when people found that out, he sank like a rock in the water.

BURNETT: He says for anyone with a criminal record, people like that deported --

TRUMP: OK. Now, he's saying things different.

BURNETT: -- which is something that you would support.

TRUMP: Erin, Erin, he is much different now than he was in the past. OK? So --

BURNETT: The question I'm asking though is how do you take 11 million people and make them leave?

TRUMP: You do it through a process, you do in humane manner.

BURNETT: But they are not going to want to leave. You're going to have to hire a lot of people to find them and get them deported, right?

TRUMP: First of all, they are here illegally. If a person comes across the border and you send them right back, the border patrol sends them right back, there is not a big court session. They send them back. They're here illegally.

BURNETT: Yes, but what about the guy already living in Detroit?

TRUMP: Excuse me. What is the difference from somebody coming over the border for two days he gets caught and you brick him back and somebody that comes over the border, he's here for a year and you bring them back? There is no difference. What I'm saying is --

BURNETT: But, logistically, there's a difference in terms of finding them and getting them to go. That's what would cost you money --

TRUMP: Well, you have to find them.

BURNETT: That's what cost you money and you have to have the people. That's how I'm trying to understand what you do.

TRUMP: Well, you can also do E-verify, you do know that. You can do E-verify where the employers aren't going to be hiring them and then everyone is going to go back. That's one way of doing it so that you don't have the problem. You do E-verify where an employer has a big problem if he hires these people and they are all going to go back on their own volition and that's one way.

BURNETT: I'm sure you'll say you can do it cheaper, but the number is big. To get all these out of the country --

TRUMP: These are people that don't know what they are talking about.

BURNETT: So, to get them. There's been -- which you've seen, right? I'm sure you'll say you can do it cheaper but the number is big. To get all these out of the country --

TRUMP: These are people that don't know what they are talking about.

BURNETT: They say $600 billion.

TRUMP: They also say --

BURNETT: That's bigger than the Department of Defense contract.

TRUMP: Excuse me, excuse me. They also say it's $15 billion to build a wall that I'll do for six.

(CROSSTALK)

TRUMP: And, by the way, my wall will be bigger and better and stronger and more powerful.

Let me just explain something. Illegal immigration each year costs us between $200 billion and $300 billion. I don't know if anybody gives those numbers, probably not.

But -- when you include crimes and other problems, it's more than that. So you're talking about between $200 billion and $300 billion, the way it is now. All right?

BURNETT: But they pay in taxes, they pay $24 billion in taxes.

TRUMP: Who pays in taxes? Do you really believe they pay in taxes? They pay a very little.

BURNETT: They pay Social Security, state and local.

TRUMP: Yes. What percentage of them? Ten percent?

BURNETT: It's $24 billion a year --

TRUMP: Excuse me. Excuse me. Do you know how few pay taxes, Erin? Don't be naive.

Do you think that in a legal immigrant getting money is going to be paying taxes? OK. Sure, some probably do only because the employers are insisting on it. OK?

But there's very little -- percentagewise, there's very little. Probably 5 percent, 10 percent, it's a very small amount pay taxes, Erin.

Look, they are here illegally. They are not paying taxes, OK? I've heard this one before. Do I hear them all?

What I do is I get things better. I make things really good. I fix things.

And, you know, I'm a real fixer of things, not Jeb Bush. OK? I'm a real fixer. I can really do things.

One of the reasons that the wall never got built, they couldn't get their environmental impact statement if you can believe it. Because something was on the way, they couldn't get their environmental impact statement.

So, here's the thing, between E-verify, which will take care of a big portion of them, can go back. And you know what, if they can't get a job, they are going back anyway. Would have I to knock on doors?

BURNETT: So, on this point about humanity about, are you going to be sending in officers --

TRUMP: We're going to be sending people in a very nice way --

BURNETT: -- a force of people into people's home to get them out?

TRUMP: We're going to be giving notice. We're going to be saying, we have to go back to wherever the country is. I mean, it's going to be countries, all different countries. It's not just one country.

Back to the country. We'll take them back to those countries. We're going to do it in a very humane way.

But between E-verify and other modern systems, a lot of that will happen automatically. And don't forget, we're taking tremendous numbers of jobs from people who were born in this country and you understand that because when you look at the roads, you have 100 million people that potentially want to work and they can't find jobs.

BURNETT: They don't want to pick grapes, though.

TRUMP: Maybe not. And you know what, we're going to have -- we can solve that with work visas, where they come in and they work legally. They pay taxes and then they go out.

I'm all for that. I think that's true. Because I agree with you, they might not want to pick grapes. Not their thing. I mean, you know, they don't want to do that. And that's OK.

But we'll have a work visa where they can come in, work and then at the right time they have to go back, Erin.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PEREIRA: For his part, President Obama is not buying Donald Trump's immigration plan. In fact, he's slamming the Republican candidate's proposal going as far as calling it un-American. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: First of all, I have no idea where Mr. Trump thinks is money is going to come from. It would cost us hundreds of billions of dollars to execute that. Imagine the images on the screen flashed around the world as we were dragging parents away from their children and putting them in detention centers and then systematically sending them out. Nobody thinks that that is realistic. But more importantly, that's not who we are as Americans.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: I mean, you know, Donald Trump has talked about the money. He would make Mexico pay for the wall he says and because his economic plan would be so robust, that is where all the new money would come from.

PEREIRA: Yes, the imagery is troubling for so many people, right? The images that we've seen before, people being rounded up. I mean, it is hard to get past that.

[08:25:01] CUOMO: It is the land of inclusion.

PEREIRA: We're the land of immigration.

CUOMO: It is a real question, who we are and what we are. I think it is the big thing that is driving this election.

I think there is real anger. I think Trump is certainly the face of it. But there are real questions and I think that's the president's opinion and may be what the country was. But what are we today? What are we going to be tomorrow? It's an open question.

CAMEROTA: Well, then, you are going to like the next segment. How is all this playing in the Republican Party? You might remember the interesting interview we have last week with former Governor John Sununu.

PEREIRA: We do remember that.

CAMEROTA: Yes, right. Well, he's back with his unique perspective on this race.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CAMEROTA: A moment ago, you heard Donald Trump explaining his immigration plan to Erin Burnett on CNN. So, what do leaders in his party think?

Let's bring in former New Hampshire Governor John Sununu. He's also former chief of staff to President George H.W. Bush.

Good morning, Governor. How are you doing this morning?

JOHN SUNUNU (R), FORMER NEW HAMPSHIRE GOVERNOR: Good morning. How are you?

CAMEROTA: Doing well.

Thanks so much for being here. I know that you like to have policy discussions. So let's do that. Let's start with immigration policy. I don't know if you had a chance to hear the interview?

SUNUNU: I did.

CAMEROTA: Good.