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Obama Vows to 'Overcome' Evolving Terror Threat; Will U.S. Strategy Against ISIS Shift?; Terrorist's Father: Son Supported ISIS. Aired 7-7:30a ET

Aired December 07, 2015 - 07:00   ET

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

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We should not be drawn once more into a long and costly ground war. That's what groups like ISIL want.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This was a "stay the course" speech.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Will that convince the American public that we're safer?

SEN. MARCO RUBIO (R-FL), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: The same strategy that has brought us to this point is the strategy he is going to continue with.

JOE JOHNS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Donald Trump tweeting, "Is that all there is?"

RUBIO: The refusal to call this for what it is, a war on radical Islam. Not only did the president not make things better tonight; I fear he may have made things worse.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The central question for investigators is how this husband and wife became radicalized.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Relatives in Pakistan tell CNN that they were increasingly becoming concerned about the shift in character.

(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.

President Obama trying to calm a jittery nation. In a rare primetime address from the Oval Office he pledged a, quote, "smart and relentless campaign to defeat ISIS."

CUOMO: But his critics are pouncing, saying there was a lack of specifics in the president's address. So let's get more on where the war on ISIS goes from here.

CNN senior Washington correspondent Joe Johns live at the White House with more -- Joe.

JOHNS: Good morning, Chris.

A relatively short Sunday night address from the president of the United States, confirming that the attacks in San Bernardino were, in fact, acts of terror. The president, in the process, firing up his critics who say the administration is not doing enough.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

OBAMA: The threat from terrorism is real, but we will overcome it.

JOHNS: President Obama speaking passionately to millions in a rare Oval Office address late Sunday, strongly condemning ISIS and calling Wednesday's mass shooting in San Bernardino a terrorist attack.

OBAMA: It is clear that the two of them had gone down the dark path of radicalization. So this was an act of terrorism.

JOHNS: Obama doubling down on his four-point strategy to defeat the terrorist group.

OBAMA: The strategy that we are using now: airstrikes, Special Forces and working with local forces who are fighting to regain control of their own country -- and it won't require us sending a new generation of Americans overseas to fight and die for another decade on foreign soil.

JOHNS: At home, Obama putting stronger screenings on people arriving in the U.S. without a visa and insisting on more gun control.

OBAMA: Congress should act to make sure no one on a no-fly list is able to buy a gun.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What would you do as president to prevent the mass shootings?

JOHNS: The policy GOP presidential hopefuls are calling insufficient to tackle the evolving threat. Donald Trump tweeting, "Is that all there is?" And retweeting, "He needs to stop all visas, not look at them."

Jeb Bush proposing his own more aggressive strategy and calling the fight against ISIS the war of our time.

OBAMA: It's a real problem that Muslims must confront without excuse.

JOHNS: President Obama ending his 13-minute speech with an appeal to Muslims to root out extremist ideology while also calling on Americans to reject discrimination.

OBAMA: Muslim-Americans are our friends and our neighbors, our co- workers, our sports heroes. And yes, they are our men and women in uniform who are willing to die in defense of our country.

SEN. MARCO RUBIO (R-FL), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: The cynicism... JOHNS: Senator Marco Rubio pushing back.

RUBIO: Where is there widespread evidence that we have a problem in America with discrimination against Muslims? And the refusal to call this for what it is: a war on radical Islams. Not only did the president not make things better tonight; I fear he may have made things worse.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

JOHNS: Next week, the international approach to extremist groups will get a second look when the finance ministers of U.N. Security Council countries get together to discuss streamlining the ways to cut off the cash -- Michaela.

PEREIRA: All right. Joe, thank you.

In his speech, President Obama was adamant about not repeating what he called "the mistaken mass deployment of U.S. ground troops on foreign soil." But will there be a shift in military strategy in the war on ISIS?

CNN's Barbara Starr live at the Pentagon with more for us.

Good morning, Barbara.

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Michaela.

Maybe not a mass deployment of ground troops, but make no mistake, there will be ground troops. Now the Pentagon preparing to send dozens of Special Forces into Iraq, possibly into Syria, as well.

It's all about now getting those Special Forces on the ground, essentially right next to ISIS, an acknowledgement this is the best way to find out what ISIS is up to, where they are, what they are doing.

These Special Forces, with their support, could number upwards of 200 troops. They will be having the task of conducting raids. We've seen that before. Gathering intelligence. We've seen that.

But a very fundamental difference now. There will be an emphasis on trying to capture top ISIS operatives. And that means if they can capture them, they feel they can get better intelligence through interrogation. That means the U.S. military, in a very small way.

But back in the business of detaining and interrogating terrorist suspects overseas. That will be a very significant change.

[07:05:14] Now, you know, all of this may take some time. U.S. officials are telling us it could be several weeks before this whole operation is on the ground and up and running -- Chris.

CUOMO: And Barbara, as we remember, the tactic was seen as very effective against al Qaeda. We'll see what happens here. Let's break down the president's address. We have Fareed Zakaria,

host of CNN's "FAREED ZAKARIA GPS," and John King, CNN's chief national correspondent and host of "INSIDE POLITICS." Gentlemen, good to have you here.

So last night, how do you define what he needed to do and what he got done in terms of the president's speech?

STARR: I think this was clearly a speech where he wanted to use the Oval Office, the pulpit to try to explain what the United States was doing to defeat ISIS.

And I think he's been watching a lot of politicians, a lot of Republican candidates use this crisis, use the terrorist attack, to play with the fears of American people, to play with fire in a sense. And I think he saw his job as almost being the fireman, to douse those fires, to calm people down, to put this in perspective.

Probably the most important, honest thing he said was he talked about the evolution of the terrorist threat and pointed out we have been pretty successful everywhere around the world at stopping the terrorist attacks at big symbolic targets which kill hundreds of...

CAMEROTA: The 9/11-style attack.

ZAKARIA: Yes, the 9/11-style attack. What -- as a result, the terrorists have decided they're going to go underground and they're going to try and inspire these lone-wolf attacks, which are against, essentially, defenseless targets and targets that can't be defended. How could you defend every cafe in Paris? How could you defend every community center in the United States?

And in doing that, I think he was trying to have an adult conversation with the American people that these are things -- you know, you cannot protect every one of these places. And I want you to understand.

The reiteration of the strategy, of course, is the strategy against ISIS. And what is interesting is, while you did hear a lot of Republican candidates attack him, none of them proposed any significant change in that strategy.

CAMEROTA: John, let's talk about the politics of this speech, because obviously, a Sunday night address from the Oval Office suggests a momentous announcement of some kind. And his critics say that it didn't live up to that. What's the political reaction?

JOHN KING, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, the instant political reaction is there's nothing the president said that scared the Republicans away from what Fareed was just talking about.

From the all the Republican presidential candidates and from the leading Republican voices in Congress on foreign policy, you had condemnation of the speech, politicians saying things like "His head is in the clouds. He still doesn't get this threat. He's in denial about what it takes." Fareed's exactly right. With the exception of Lindsey Graham -- Jeb

Bush has touched on this a little bit -- you don't have the other politicians saying, "Here's what I would do differently" in a major way, saying ground troops, for example.

What they mostly say is that the president has failed to grasp the scope of the problem, hasn't explained it in an urgent way. They say he's wrong not to call it radical Islam terrorism, not that ISIS would lay down their arms if the president spent all 12 minutes last night doing that.

But they say it's a failure of leadership. They would lead a better coalition. They would somehow get the Arabs to fight. Maybe they would somehow get Assad to step aside. Maybe they would get the Russians to behave better. Maybe they would get Turkey to seal its border.

Where's the proof in that? Well, that's why we have campaigns, I guess.

But the challenge for the president, the political challenge for the president is look at the calendar. He's got 400 days left in his administration. This is a time where many presidents drift into what we rightly or wrongly call lame duck territory.

And the president went into this speech with two-thirds of the American people, saying they didn't think he had a clear strategy. He decided -- and this is his approach -- he thinks his approach is right -- not to give much new last night.

The American people just watched people mowed down at a holiday party. You know, last night was the first night of Hanukkah. We're two weeks from Christmas. The American people clearly want more from their president.

The question is, could he convince them last night, at least the down payment on convincing them, "I get this. I know the politicians -- the Republicans are telling you I don't get this. I do get this. Trust me."

That's what he was trying to tell people.

CUOMO: The what to call it thing, Fareed, comes and goes in terms of its metaphorical significance. It has come once again. And there's a lot of emphasis on the idea of not ever connecting the idea of what's happening with Islam. Do you think it's a mistake by the president to play nuance?

The defense they use is, well, it doesn't -- the Muslim community doesn't like it. That's not going to wash. We also hear it abroad from member states, saying, "You say you want us to help you, and then you call us all bad." What is the back and forth?

ZAKARIA: Well, you put it exactly right. The big problem: the reason I think they haven't done it, is that people like the King of Jordan, you know, the Turks say, "Please don't call this radical Islam, because it makes it -- It legitimizes them."

Look, I probably think it is -- you know, people have got hung up on, look, if we could have called it radical Islam, we weren't going to drop one more bomb or one less bomb on ISIS. We're not going to do one more or one less special op. I don't really understand how the strategy would be different.

[07:10:06] Obama did give an entire speech at the United Nations last year, calling what was going on in the world of Islam a cancer and talking about how Muslims needed to root it out. He talked about it again here. But it's fair to say that his critics have found, you know, a weakness, you know, a place where they have leverage and they can keep pressing...

CUOMO: How can you fight something you won't even identify?

ZAKARIA: Right. Even though he does call it a cancer, he does talk about how Muslims have to confront the reality that it exists within the -- within their community.

CUOMO: There's the Trump suite -- tweet, you know. He hits the hammer on this.

ZAKARIA: Right. Exactly.

And, you know, in a way, I'm -- I wonder if they could go back, what's the difference between calling it a cancer or violence within the Muslim world and radical Islam? I'm not sure. But they have found a useful rhetorical ploy.

Here's the part, though, that I thought he said which was important, which is if you're going to identify would-be terrorists, you need to have good relations within these communities between the law enforcement officials.

And you talk to Ray Kelly, you talk to Bill Bratton, you talk to anyone who has maintained peace, and they will tell you the single best sources of intel are those communities.

And so it is worth asking yourself, you know, how would they respond to this? And the president at the end of the day seems to be me to be willing to take the political hit, because he knows he's going to take a political hit. He knows that the talking heads are all going to say he didn't announce a big new policy. He's not going to invade Syria.

He's taking that political hit, because he thinks this is the right thing. And I think only time will judge. But in a sense, it's an act of political boldness.

CAMEROTA: John, part of the stated goal of last night was to sort of quell the anxiety that has gripped America since Paris and since San Bernardino that we have polls suggesting that Americans feel anxious and that they are not happy with how the president has been handling ISIS so far. Only 33 percent approve. Thirty -- 64 percent disapprove of how the president has handled it. So last night, did that -- is that mission accomplished? I mean, do

you think that Americans are less anxious after hearing the president last night?

KING: We'll see what the data shows us in five to seven days, what the American people think. The president understands the moment, and he understands the political climate we've been talking about, which is why you heard him say, "I get this. Every morning I get my intelligence brief. Trust me, I understand the threat."

And he talks about being a parent of two young daughters and how that struck him, especially to see those people killed at a holiday reception. So that's the point he was trying to make to people, that "I get this." But he was trying to do it in a trademark Obama way: kind of cool, calm, collected. And very nuanced.

Can he sell that to the American people at a time that maybe some of them want more anger and more urgency out of their president? I think that is the defining test.

And because we're in this political environment, it makes it harder for the president.

On the question Fareed was just talking about, you have a very nuanced, balanced president. He says you cannot deny there's extremism in the Muslim communities here in America, and we have to root it out. And we need help rooting it out.

But Americans must not blanket discriminate against Muslims. There's your balance the president is seeking in nuance, in a political environment in which Donald Trump says, "Don't let Syrian refugees in. Kick them out. Have a database. Surveillance on the mosques."

So you have a -- the president is trying to break through in this political environment where the campaign under way to replace him is a lot louder. And look: it's a lot easier to run for president than it is to be president.

So can the president break through? Or have, because of where he is in his presidency, because of people's disappointment in the effectiveness of his strategy so far, can he break through and get them to listen? I think we have to watch that play out.

It reminds me very much of late in the George W. Bush administration when people were so mad about the Iraq War. Maybe Katrina frustration came in on top of that. And they just stopped listening to their president.

One thing that's interesting this morning is what did Hillary Clinton think of the president's speech? We don't know, because she said nothing. If the president loses Democrats at this moment, he's in trouble.

CAMEROTA: John King, Fareed Zakaria, great to have both of you and your insight. Thanks so much -- Michaela. PEREIRA: The father of the San Bernardino shooter speaking out,

saying his son backed ISIS and was obsessed over Israel. This as new details surface linking that 24- -- 28-year-old to terrorist organizations.

CNN's Dan Simon is live in San Bernardino with the very latest for us -- Dan.

DAN SIMON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, good morning, Michaela. The central question this morning is how this young husband and wife became radicalized, and was there a turning down that ultimately led to the shooting?

One of the big headlines here is that Syed Farook actually reached out to some terrorist organizations at some point, al Qaeda-linked terrorist organizations.

And we're also getting some more insight from Syed Farook's own father. He spoke to the Italian newspaper, "La Stampa," and what he said, among other things, is that his son shared the ideology of al- Baghdadi, the leader of ISIS, to create an Islamic State, and that he was fixated on Israel.

It's worth pointing out that the father did not know his own daughter- in-law. But we do know that investigators are looking into the wife's past. Tashfeen Malik, she lived in both Pakistan and Saudi Arabia before coming to the U.S. on a fiance visa.

[07:15:11] One of the working theories here, according to a law enforcement source, is that she was radicalized prior to meeting her husband. A law enforcement source says that, in terrorism sort of circles, when they look at these kind of things, this has sort of been a male-dominated industry. But ISIS seems to be uprooting those conventions.

Finally, we should point out that authorities are trying to recover a lot of electronic evidence, but because of those destroyed phones and destroyed hard drives, they're apparently having a hard time doing so -- Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: OK. OK, Dan. Thanks so much for the latest on the investigation.

Meanwhile, British authorities charging a terror suspect with attempted murder after allegedly stabbing two people at a train station in East London. You can see here the cell phone video. It shows the suspect pacing around with a knife before British police take him down with a stun gun, which you'll see shortly. Authorities -- there you go -- looking into reports that he was shouting, "This is for Syria" during the attack. One victim suffered serious injuries.

CUOMO: Voters in France throwing support behind the country's far right national party in the country's first regional election since the Paris attacks. The center right Republicans Party, led by former president Nicolas Sarkozy, is in second right now, but another round of voting set for next week. Now, analysts say the voters are taking their terror jitters to the

polls, favoring the hardline party that's calling for greater restrictions on immigrants.

PEREIRA: Well, U-2 making good on its promise to Paris. They returned to the City of Light last night for the first time since the terror attacks forced them to reschedule several of their shows. At one point, Bono wrapped himself in the French flag. He said the band stands together with the families of those that were killed in terror attacks.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BONO, LEAD SINGER, U-2: We have few words to speak to the loss that you are feeling in this city tonight. Even if we think we know a little something about grief, I guess grief is like a wound that never fully closes.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PEREIRA: U-2 plays another show in Paris tonight.

CAMEROTA: And aren't the Eagles of Death Metal playing with them? I think that they announced that they're going to play shows if they haven't already.

PEREIRA: Wow.

CAMEROTA: That they're going to go back to Paris and open for U-2.

CUOMO: That was the band that was at the Bataclan when the massacre...

PEREIRA: Beautiful stand of unity.

CAMEROTA: Right.

Well, it did not take long for critics, like Donald Trump, to jump on President Obama for his speech on ISIS last night. New York City's mayor is defending the president. What does Bill de Blasio say about the response to the president's speech and the speech itself? He joins us live, next.

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[07:21:37] CAMEROTA: President Obama using a primetime address to the nation to make his case for his strategy against ISIS. New York City, of course, is among the U.S. cities threatened by ISIS.

Here to talk about the president's speech and so much more, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio.

Mr. Mayor, thanks so much for being here.

BILL DE BLASIO, MAYOR OF NEW YORK CITY: You're welcome. CAMEROTA: So the president last night tried to quell the anxieties of

Americans. Americans are very nervous about what they've seen in Paris and San Bernardino, as are New Yorkers. We feel as though not only are we a target, but people are living here already that mean to do us harm. Did the president successfully quell those anxieties?

DE BLASIO: I think he laid out a very clear plan. I think he spoke a lot of truth that needed to be spoken, as well.

He made clear that ISIS wants to see internal division in this country, wants to see a negative attitude wards the Muslim community in this country. And that kind of division actually making us less safe.

The president pointed out, we need to be muscular in our approach to ISIS overseas. We need to disrupt and ultimately destroy them, but we need to keep our internal cohesion. We can't have Americans turning against Americans, because then we're doing ISIS's bidding.

CAMEROTA: In terms of his strategy, the plan that you say he successfully laid out, I mean, after Paris and San Bernardino, among other things, it doesn't feel as though ISIS is contained.

And in fact, a new intelligence assessment delivered to the White House, commissioned by the White House and delivered to them before San Bernardino says that they predict ISIS will spread throughout the globe. It doesn't feel contained. So how is his strategy working?

DE BLASIO: I don't think any of us would say they are, quote, unquote, "contained" at this point. I think there's a lot of work...

CAMEROTA: The president has said that.

DE BLASIO: In the past. And he obviously has made clearer now that there's work to do and that they must be totally defeated. I couldn't agree with that more. They must be totally defeated, and I think we have the tools to do it.

But it will take a global coalition. It will take working closely with Muslim Americans here and Muslims all over the world who don't believe in ISIS's terror any more than anybody else does.

So there's a game plan there that I think makes a lot of sense. Very muscular elements, but remembering at the same time, that we have to keep a clear connection to Muslim-American communities and Muslims all over the world.

CAMEROTA: Did he spell out well enough how to work with Muslim communities in terms of fighting extremism?

DE BLASIO: It was a beginning. Obviously, it was a very basic speech. But I think the point was clear. Don't fall into the pattern of demagoguery and division, because we need the alliance on the ground in those communities to work.

I was at a mosque on Friday night here in New York City. And what did I see? Hundreds of Muslim-Americans speaking about their appreciation for our police who keep them safe, their appreciation for this nation, and their desire to be allies in the fight against terror. That's what we have to foster more and more.

CAMEROTA: Gun control. Is the president right to make this San Bernardino case an example of the need for more gun control?

DE BLASIO: Absolutely. These pieces go together. We have terrorists who on a no-fly list who are -- are not allowed on airplanes, but they can walk into a gun shop and buy a gun legally in America. The guns used in California were legally purchased, which is why we need to divest in gun manufacturers.

Public sector pension funds all over the country put investments into the very gun manufacturers who then market assault weapons that are available on the open market.

And terrorists and criminals and people with mental health problems buy them all the time. Not just for acts of terror, like we saw in San Bernardino; for these horrible campus shooting, as well. It's time for public pension funds, which ultimately are controlled by the people, to divest in those gun manufacturers and teach them a lesson using the power of the wallet.

[07:25:17] CAMEROTA: But California has the strictest gun control laws in the nation. These terrorists in San Bernardino had a bomb- making -- a pipe-bomb-making factory in their house. How does any of that apply -- how does gun control apply to the terror that we saw in San Bernardino?

DE BLASIO: They used Smith and Wesson assault weapons and other weapons. Those, for example, are -- that's a public corporation that pension funds all over the country invest in. Therefore, we're all made party to it in one way or another.

As opposed to what I propose, and New York City has begun to do to our pension funds: get our money out of there. We've seen plenty examples in the past where pension funds acted and it really had a big impact on the market.

Get our public money out of those companies. Change their behavior. Convince them, you know the only people they should be making assault weapons for? Our military and law enforcement. And if we can change the behavior of those companies, and those guns are not on the market, let's go to the root of the problem. Then you have a chance to deal with these issues much more effectively.

Law enforcement should not have to come up against terrorists with that kind of weaponry. It's as simple as that.

CAMEROTA: Can we talk about your beef, your ongoing squabble with Donald Trump? He has said unkind things about you. He tweets things about you being a horrible mayor. What is this based on?

DE BLASIO: Look, I don't care what he says about me. Here's what I'm concerned about. He goes before a Republican Jewish group the other day and starts using age-old horrible stereotypes of Jewish people out loud. And the kinds of stereotypes that have undercut the Jewish community for centuries.

He says Muslims should be put on a list. We don't put people on a list. We don't put whole populations of people on a list in the United States of America, in a democracy.

What he's saying is corrosive to our democratic values. It's dangerous. And I'll call him out. And I think more and more people are saying, you know what? It used to be, to some people, entertaining. It's not entertaining anymore; it's dangerous.

CAMEROTA: You know, the Anti-Defamation League looked at the things that he was saying, the stereotypical things that he was saying in front of the Jewish crowd, and here's what they said. "After having carefully reviewed the speech, we do not believe that it was Donald Trump's intention to evoke anti-Semitic stereotypes. He has made similar comments about spending his own money on the campaign and not asking for money from donors to many other groups."

Why do you think that people give Donald Trump, are willing to give him a pass on some of the things that you're not willing to give him a pass on?

DE BLASIO: I can't speak for other people. It was unmistakable. The coding in that language was unmistakable. And it's not the first time he's done it. And I think ultimately, the American people will reject it.

I think some people get worried about taking on a political leader who seems to be ascendant. But history tells us, you've got to stand up, if someone's undercutting American values, if someone's trying to divide. He's clearly trying to divide. Let's not mince words about it. He is clearly trying to divide.

You know, some of the analysis lately about how much of his language is "us versus them," talking about our fellow Americans. That doesn't make us stronger; that doesn't make us more cohesive.

So it's time to say that, in fact, what Donald Trump is doing, in one way or another, is doing the bidding of our enemies, because we -- there are enemies, in particular, ISIS, wants to see the American people divided, for example, against the Muslim-American community. That's the ISIS game plan. And what Trump is saying is falling right into that game plan.

CAMEROTA: Mr. Mayor, great to see you.

DE BLASIO: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: Thanks so much for coming into NEW DAY. Always a pleasure.

Let's get over to Chris.

CUOMO: All right. More on this. This was a big moment, President Obama's speech. Or at least it was supposed to be. Now it's getting scrutinized from every political corner. Is it what we need to do to take down ISIS? Do we know that this strategy is working?

Let's test it with a former CIA undercover officer and a Texas congressman. What is his political solution? Ahead.

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