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Donald Trump Defends Call For Muslim Travel Ban; Report: ISIS Foreign Fighters Doubled In Last 18 Months. Aired 7:30-8a ET

Aired December 08, 2015 - 07:30   ET

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

[07:30:00] CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: I didn't call them masterminds by the way.

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE (via telephone): You wonder why kids want to go into ISIS. The fact is until our people can do something about these horrible people that want to do damage to our country, real damage to our country, then I think it stays in place. It's temporary until we can figure that out.

CUOMO: But you have just about all of your rivals except Rand Paul, and even that's qualified, they all reject this notion. Your party leaders reject this notion.

TRUMP: I don't care about them. Look, look, look --

CUOMO: Who do you care about?

TRUMP: I've been a politician for six months.

TRUMP: Do you have to impress anybody but yourself with these ideas?

TRUMP: I'm doing what's right.

CUOMO: How do you know what's right to exempt an entire class of people, an entire religion?

TRUMP: Excuse, Chris, can I talk for a few seconds?

CUOMO: Please, go ahead, but I want you to tell me why it's right in America?

TRUMP: Can I talk for 2 seconds, Chris?

CUOMO: Go ahead, please.

TRUMP: We have people out there that want to do great destruction to our country, whether it's 25 percent or 10 percent or 5 percent. It's too much. We have people out there that want to do great -- they want our buildings to come down. They want our cities to be crushed.

They are living within our country and many of them want to come from outside of our country. I am saying that until we figure this out, we should have a ban. It's very simple. It's very simple.

Now, if you look at FDR. I watched Jeffrey Lord this morning. I thought he was fantastic by the way. If you look at him, the presidential proclamations, 2525, 2526 and 2527, it was very -- that was very, very stringent, very, very stringent. I thought Jeffrey Lord did a fantastic job explaining it this morning on your show.

CUOMO: OK, here's my question to you. I heard Jeffrey Lord. We're always happy to have him on the show. He makes your case well, no question about that.

TRUMP: He makes his own case well, in all fairness. It wasn't my case.

CUOMO: Fine. He certainly owns it.

TRUMP: To be honest with you what Franklin Delano Roosevelt did was worse.

CUOMO: Here's the distinction. One, the United States was at war. He was targeting sovereigns he was at war against. The second thing was it was wrong then, it was wrong with the Japanese --

TRUMP: Excuse me, you don't think we're at war.

CUOMO: We are at war but not with all of Islam.

TRUMP: We don't have a president that knows what it is -- we don't have a president that can use the term.

CUOMO: That's fine criticism. You can criticize him. The reason he won't say Islamic terrorism --

TRUMP: He's an incompetent president.

CUOMO: The reason he says it --

TRUMP: We are at war. Get it through your head.

CUOMO: I understand what you're saying, believe me. I live it. We go to these places. We cover these things. We understand the threat very well and you know that because you get a lot of your information from us as you tell us.

TRUMP: Why do we insist on destroying our country?

CUOMO: What destroys America?

TRUMP: We don't know where they are, where they're coming from. There's no documentation, no paperwork. Why do we insist on destroying our country?

CUOMO: Make the system better, but what tears at America's fabric more than rejecting an entire faith in the land of religious freedom?

TRUMP: You have a large portion of people from Syria that are Christian. Why aren't we allowing the Christians in? We only allow the Muslims in.

CUOMO: That's not true.

TRUMP: Why aren't we allowing the Christians?

CUOMO: It's not true. Does it matter to you that it's not true.

TRUMP: It is largely true because the percentage is massively in favor of the Muslims.

CUOMO: You have a massive Muslim population.

TRUMP: Excuse me, Chris, the ones that are in the bigger danger are Christians.

CUOMO: They are being allowed into the refugee program.

TRUMP: We are not allowing the Christians into anywhere near the extent that we should be.

CUOMO: Because people like you say Syrian refugees shouldn't come into the country. How can you say let the Syrian Christians in, but you don't want to let Syrian refugees in?

TRUMP: We should not let them in. We don't know if they're ISIS or a Trojan horse.

CUOMO: So you care about the Syrian Christians but not enough to let them in.

TRUMP: If we are letting in, why are we letting the Christians or Muslims in?

CUOMO: You tell me. You are saying no. Why are we letting them in?

TRUMP: I guess Obama set a policy or something.

CUOMO: He didn't set a policy. He is letting them in.

TRUMP: There was a policy set by somebody in the administration.

CUOMO: That's just not true.

TRUMP: If you happen to be a Christian in Syria, it's almost impossible to come into this country. If you're a Muslim, you can get in. Why is that, Chris?

CUOMO: I'll explain it to you. The refugee process is onerous. They have to go through the ONHCR first. You're making the case for refugee vetting, which many people will appreciate that. It takes a long time, it's very exhaustive.

However, what we're dealing in the country right now, is ignoring what you just stated as fact, which is it's very tough to get through the refugee program and saying even still we have to keep all of them out.

TRUMP: It's tough if you're a Christian. If you're a Christian from Syria it's almost impossible to come into our country.

CUOMO: Let me ask you this, Mr. Trump. We've had a couple of conversations on and off camera about the GOP being fair to you. That you're not going to do a third party thing. You're going to stay true to your pledge as long as they're fair.

Can you blame the GOP for moving against you after saying something like this? Can you accuse of them being unfair if they say, listen, we can't have our nominee be someone who's tearing at the fabric of what America is.

[07:35:09]We have to do something against you with the convention or whatever they come up with. Would you still hold to the pledge because you've created your own problem?

TRUMP: There's no problem. I'm just doing the right thing, Chris. I'm just doing the right thing. I could have very well rested on my poll number which is you just released and they're phenomenal. I'm leading everyone.

I could rest on them nicely and there's no problem. They go up, they go down. I have to do the right thing. I am talking about a measure that ends. It's not a measure that's in stone. We have to find out what we're doing.

We're letting people into our country. We don't know who they are. We have people here right now that are getting $28,000 miraculously over the last little while deposited in their account that they're using for sinister purposes.

There are, like this husband and wife, this horrendous, horrible husband and wife, you have many other people like that in this country. You have many other people that are having checks deposited in their accounts to do destruction.

We have to find out what we're doing. If the Republican Party likes it, that's fine. If they don't like it, that's fine also. I'm leading in every single -- virtually every single poll. You came out one yesterday in Iowa.

I'm crushing it in Iowa, doing great with the people of Iowa who I love. I have thousands of people, you had your reporters there, I had thousands of people last night, right, at an event last night in South Carolina, a great place. Thousands of people couldn't get in.

We got standing ovations as soon as I mentioned it. I hadn't even finished the sentence. Now, what I also said, and it was very important, I made the statement. It's a shut down until our country's representatives can figure out what is going on. That's important because that doesn't mean it's permanent. It's temporary.

CUOMO: But I'll tell you what --

TRUMP: We have to get our arms around it and we don't want to be like Paris where you can't go into the city or sections where there are police. Their police are afraid to go into certain sections of Paris. They are petrified.

CUOMO: That is a mythology. They're doing operations by the hundreds. They're getting a handle on the situation. Most importantly, they're staying together. I think your poll data actually reflects a responsibility on you, Mr. Trump because people are listening to you and America is great because it is united. Our diversity is our greatest strength --

TRUMP: I have common sense.

CUOMO: This doesn't sound like common sense to a lot of people.

TRUMP: I have common sense. I know what has to be done. We don't want have a situation like Paris or World Trade Center. They tried to knock it down twice. The first time they were unsuccessful. We don't want that, Chris. We need intelligence, a certain toughness in this country or we'll end up like a lot of other places and we're not going to have a country left.

CUOMO: The fear is real, no question about it. Mr. Trump, thank you for coming on NEW DAY as always to make the case. We know you're fighting with your throat. Thank you for making the effort. Appreciate it. The best to you.

TRUMP: Thank you.

CUOMO: Donald Trump, ladies and gentlemen, making the case. What are the pluses, what are the minuses? We have Alisyn Camerota. We have Michael Smerconish. We have John King. Take it away.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: We have a lot to talk about, Gentlemen. Michael, I know you were listening with rapt attention. What did you hear Donald Trump say?

MICHAEL SMERCONISH, CNN HOST, "SMERCONISH": Nothing of consequence. I hope he's still watching.

CUOMO: Thanks, Michael.

SMERCONISH: The man has no decency. He has no decency. It's all sound bites that are intended to appeal to the lowest common denominator. He's begging Republican voters to abandon his campaign and sooner or later, I hope they'll give him his wish.

CAMEROTA: John, you know, what Donald Trump just said, I think at the very end, does really fasten on what his appeal is. I've interviewed many Trump supporters. They believe he speaks common sense. He doesn't have pretense. He says it like he is. He says it like he feels it, like they feel it. Is that what you heard more of today?

JOHN KING, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes. This is a man who knows his target audience. I associate myself with my friend, Michael Smerconish, in what he said about this. It was nice of Chris to try to put facts into the conversation. Nice try.

But listen, listen to what Donald Trump said. There is no doubt, there is no choice. We are totally out of control. This is so dangerous. We need to be strong. The president made a fool of himself.

Donald Trump wants to be the anti-Obama for a slice of the Republican Party that does not like this president, that does not really care for nuance right now, that does not want a balanced approach.

The president the other night, remember, we cannot deny there was some radicalization in the Muslim community. That's nuance. Donald Trump doesn't do nuance. He comes straight at you. He comes straight at you.

To Chris's point about French, the French people, yes, the people of Paris have gone about their lives. Look at what happened in the French elections.

[07:40:05]The far right national party won nearly 30 percent of the vote nationally and is in the lead in some of the regional elections. So after the Paris attacks, anti-immigration, far right strident party is having success in France. Mr. Trump thinks he can do it here.

CUOMO: One of the first things Francois Hollande did coming out of the Paris attacks was to reaffirm the commitment to letting in refugees and I think he kept using the word common sense and he has a gift for that. There is no question about it.

Here's the thing. I don't know about this one. I think that policies you can dispute, but the idea of excluding an entire religion is real anathema to what America is all about.

When we see it happen anywhere around the world, it's one of the first moments Americans say, we have to do something about all of that. I wonder what the push back is. You can't say he's wrong. You have to make the case for what America is, Michael. My question to you is who makes that case? How should it be made?

SMERCONISH: Well, I think it should be made by all of us and by all of his opponents. I think it should be made by those who have platforms, frankly, to point out not only is it anathema to what we represent, unconstitutional by virtue of the 14th Amendment, but it's also, Chris, illogical.

Returning Muslims in our military, do they get in? If you're a French or British student studying at a university of the United States and you're a Muslim --

CUOMO: I'm not impressed by the practicalities or the constitutionality and the legality. Here's why. I think this is bigger than that. When you get to a how you would do this, that cheapens the situation, frankly, John.

This is just a very overarching, fundamental, core value of what America is or is not. The practicality of how to do it, the legal basis for it, those are secondary and tertiary concerns. The real ones are who are you and what do you believe? KING: Who are the voters who Mr. Trump is targeting? What is their mood right now? What is their perception of reality? You're trying to get facts on the table.

If you go to Iowa, to a conservative gathering, don't tell them that the number of migrants coming across the border is down. They won't believe you.

We went to community centers, you have the elderly, going to Tea Party meetings, they would tell you ISIS is Mexico injecting illegal immigrants with Ebola and sending them into the United States to terrorize America.

It's a small slice, a minority, but in a crowded Republican race, the front national in Paris, France, won about 30 percent of the national vote. If Donald Trump can win 30 percent, he wins Iowa and New Hampshire. Can he win a national election? That's not his concern right now. His focus is on the Republican primary.

CAMEROTA: My point is, it is all of our responsibility to point out the facts. That is what the platform that we have as Michael has said, talk about the facts. What Donald Trump does so effectively, Michael, he takes a germ of an idea or a fact and turns it and makes it his own.

Such as with this -- he's basing all of this on this poll. And the poll that he's talking about is wildly flawed. As Chris told him, we would never use this poll in journalism. It's an online poll, not a representative sample.

CUOMO: Who did the poll also?

CAMEROTA: Frank Gaffney who has been rejected from conservative circles because he was a conspiracy theorist. He's a known Islamophobe. He fastens on something about how there are -- there is a -- he also talked about the Pew poll.

This is a Pew poll that interviewed Muslims in 39 countries and did find a fraction of them believed that using suicide bombings is sometimes OK to get their point across. So he fastens on that. It's not how he described it but that's enough for some of his followers, Michael.

SMERCONISH: But in every one of these circumstance, there's something to be said in response. For example, to this poll, this poll talks about Americans, Muslims who are already in this country.

So this cockamamie idea of his would do nothing about the very people who we're supposedly questioned in that internet poll. You carry things to their logical conclusion and they fall off the cliff.

He talked this week about the need to kill the members of families of ISIS. By logical extension, I imagine we would be decapitating the 6-month-old who was dropped off by the San Bernardino killers. That's the kind of issue that he just won't confront.

CUOMO: The powers, the fear, though, Michael Smerconish, thank you very much. John king as always, good to have you with us.

[07:45:03]What do you think? Tweet us. You already are. Use #newdaycnn or post your comment on facebook.com/newday.

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: The long tentacles of ISIS stretching even further. Disturbing report on the number of foreign fighters joining the terror ranks. How many and why? We'll bring you a unique perspective, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CUOMO: We have new information about the threat that we're facing here in America. The number of foreign fighters joining ISIS in Syria and in Iraq, more than doubling in just 18 months. Why and where are they coming from? And what is the motivation to join and to stop them?

Joining us is Ali Soufan, a former FBI agent and CEO of the Sufon Group, which published the report. Give me the headlines.

[07:50:06]ALI SOUFAN, CEO, THE SOUFAN GROUP: We were one of the first entities to study the phenomena of foreign fighters before ISIS became a caliphate, and the number at that time was 12,000. That was in May 2014. We decided to do an update for our report and we found out that the number, as you correctly mentioned more than doubled. It is now between 27,000 to 31,000 foreign fighters.

CUOMO: How do you know?

SOUFAN: We had few ways we're looking to the number. First of all, we try to use official data as much as we -- as much as it is available. A lot of countries they do study asks and keep track of foreign fighters and some other places where we didn't have data. We had to check other sources to refute our own sources.

CUOMO: So you feel fairly confident.

SOUFAN: So we feel very confident about the numbers so it ranges between 27,000 to 37,000 people.

CUOMO: Why? Why are they doing it?

SOUFAN: It's interesting. First of all, we found that there is -- the reason of joining the Islamic State is mostly based on personalities, on emotions, and not necessarily on religion or even politics. People want a new beginning.

People want to feel that they belong to something bigger than them and we see the numbers more than doubled from western countries and the former Soviet republics. If you look at the former Soviet republics, caucus, Russia, Central Asia in general, the number went up more than 300 percent. If you look at Europe --

CUOMO: But you have the predisposition for violence and wanting to kill people in order to join, right? SOUFAN: Sure. For example look at the United States, the numbers have not doubled. The numbers literally stayed flat. We had about 150 people from the United States, why, because the United States recruitment is mostly done through social media.

So we don't have a specific profile for a person who will go and fight in Syria. They are from every age, from big cities like New York to small little towns, you know, in Middle America.

CUOMO: What is your concern about what the idea of banning all many Muslims will mean to this?

SOUFAN: You have covered Paris and you've seen how the identity issue, the alienation can cause problems.

CUOMO: It is a big problem there.

SOUFAN: In France, they have about 1,700 foreign fighters, 1700 and look at the population of France compared to the population of the United States. In United States we have 150, why, because people are integrating well.

For example I read data American Muslims, 0.5 percent of the mass shooters in the United States, but they provide 10 percent of the doctors even though they are only 3 percent of the population.

So this is actually phenomenal data and phenomenal statistics, talks like this is going to make a problem in the United States down the road.

Alienating Muslim community is going to be really easy for ISIS and other terrorist groups like al Qaeda to find more recruits to come from this country. It's a crazy talk.

CUOMO: What do you say to people who are afraid? The people want to chop my heads off. They are almost all Muslim. So I maybe against radical Muslims, but still Muslims --

SOUFAN: But these people chopping heads off are chopping heads off Muslims also over there. Most of the victims are all Muslims so we have to put the threat into context. And as you correctly mentioned when you talked to Mr. Trump earlier, we have the best law enforcement intelligence in the world.

We have been able to disrupt almost every terrorist attack that happened or was being planned to take place. And guess what? More than 50 percent of all the plots that was disrupted. It was disrupted because law enforcement and the FBI were working closely with the Muslim community.

So now you want to isolate the Muslim community and good luck then. You are going to have a fertile ground for people like ISIS and like al Qaeda to recruit in America like they are doing in Europe.

CUOMO: Ali Soufan, thank you very much for that reporting and the perspective of what we are dealing with right now -- Mich. PEREIRA: Perspective is always good, in fact reflection also good. It is hard to believe that it has been 35 years today since John Lennon was gunned down. He was shot by mark David Chapman who's dark path to murder is explored in a new CNN special report "Killing John Lennon." Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Before he left he put a display in the hotel and it had his passport. It had photographs from when he had worked at the YMCA. It had other mementoes of his life.

UNIDENTIFIED CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A display that would make it easy to identify him as Lennon's killer.

[07:55:01]UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was like his way of saying look at me I'm important.

UNIDENTIFIED CORRESPONDENT: Once the scene was set, Chapman left to stake out the Dakota again. He first saw Sean Lennon and his nanny.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Chapman came from behind her and reached around and then he commented to her, he's a beautiful little boy, isn't he?

UNIDENTIFIED CORRESPONDENT: While Sean was outside the Dakota, inside his father was getting ready for his last interview ever.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He was so real. He was so incredibly real. He wasn't a rock star.

UNIDENTIFIED CORRESPONDENT: Lorie Kaye produced the six-hour interview.

(on camera): So you arrive at the Dakota, what was your first impression? Where did he sit?

UNIDENTIFIED CORRESPONDENT: But right on the love seat next to me. So for the next several hours he's looking at me through his John Lennon glasses.

UNIDENTIFIED CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): And for the moment she says she will never forget.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: When we were talking about him and Yoko, and he said I hope to god they die before Yoko because I don't know what I would do if she left before I did. In other words he couldn't continue without her and --

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PEREIRA: You got some incredible access. Not just the audio tapes, but some firsthand video and also talking to some of these people.

KYRA PHILIPS, CNN INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT: What's amazing, 35 years later, each person I interviewed, they all were brought to tears, the doctor who had to pronounce him dead. The police officer who saw Lennon was bleeding out and knew the balance wasn't going to make it and threw him over his shoulder it. Still affects so many people.

PEREIRA: You go to Central Park, Strawberry Fields and you see the Dakota where he died and where they lived. It is a place that draws people. What do you think it is after all this time?

PHILIPS: John Lennon was so many things to this world. He was an amazing musician. He was raw. He was honest. He was transparent. He was an advocate. He fought for women's rights. I mean, this was a man who advocated peace and he died because a man got his hands on a gun that shouldn't have one.

PEREIRA: And speaking of that boy, doesn't that tie to what we have in this country right now. Have we learned anything? Is there a lesson to be gleaned?

PHILIPS: We still have a lot to do. We saw -- I also got access to Mark David Chapman's journal and his calendar. And months before the murder it got more chaotic and it was crazy and he was crossing things out and making all of these notes, that he needed to get to the library and pay bills and get money.

But there were a lot of things crossed out up to the day of the murder to where everything was blank. His journal, he had schematics of these committees. These little people that told him what to do and make decisions and he wrote down three vices he had after he killed John Lennon.

Taking vitamin C, eating junk food and having sexual deviant pleasures, clearly a man that was troubled.

PEREIRA: Kyra, this is exceptional. Be sure to tune in tonight, it airs 9:00 Eastern right here on CNN. It is incredible. Thanks so much.

All right, we're following a lot of news. Let's get right to it.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TRUMP: Donald J. Trump is calling for a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States.

(via telephone): I have no doubt that we have no choice but to do exactly what I said until we figure this out, we should have a ban. We are at war with radical Islamic terrorism.

CUOMO: Right. Not all Islam.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He's particularly playing to a piece of the Republican Party that he knows well.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think this is closer to the racial laws imposed by the Nazis.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Donald Trump sounds more like the leader of a lynch mob than a great nation.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Both subjects were radicalized and have been for quite some time.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Nineteen pipe bombs that could have been used in a larger attack.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Just days before that massacre.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CUOMO: Good morning. Welcome to your NEW DAY. It is Tuesday, December 8th, 8:00 in the east. Here's the proposition, America should ban all Muslims until leaders figure out what's going on. Donald Trump came on NEW DAY to make the case for excluding an entire religion from the land of religious freedom.

He calls it common sense, but his fellow party leaders and candidates roundly reject him. Still he's made gains by bucking the norm in the past. Will it happen this time?