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New Day

Tense Standoff Over Hijacked EgyptAir Plane; Trump Defends Attacks on Rival Ted Cruz. Aired 6-6:30a ET

Aired March 29, 2016 - 06:00   ET

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

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

[05:59:25] ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, everyone. Welcome to your NEW DAY. It is Tuesday, March 29, 6 a.m. in the East. Chris is off this morning. Don Lemon joins us. Great to have you.

We do begin with breaking news for you. There is a hostage situation at this hour in Cyprus. A man claiming to have an explosive belt hijacked an EgyptAir flight with more than 80 passengers and crew on board.

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: Here's what an official in Cyprus is saying, that the subject is an Egyptian national who hijacked the plane over his ex-wife. Seven people are said to still be on board that plane, the incident raising serious questions once again about airport security overseas.

We're going to begin our international coverage this morning with CNN's Ian Lee, joining us now live from Cairo. What's the latest, Ian?

IAN LEE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Don, just to sum up this morning, the plane took off at 6:50 from Alexandria, Egypt. This is a flight that was coming here to Cairo. It's about a 45-minute flight. But right after it took off, the hijacker told the pilot that he had an explosive belt on him and demanded that the plane be diverted to Europe or possibly Istanbul.

The pilot said that they did not have enough fuel. That's why the plane landed Larnaca in Cyprus. We saw, shortly after that, a number of the passengers being released. These are predominately Egyptian nationals who are being released right now, though. We know that there are seven people who are currently being held hostage, a number of foreigners as well as crew members.

What we're hearing from Cyprian officials, they are saying that this is not an incident of terrorism. They are saying that this -- the motive behind this is -- has to do with an ex-wife. Egyptian officials also saying -- or casting doubt over whether or not this bomb is actually real. But officials aren't taking any chances this morning.

In the past hour, we have seen more hostages being released. And when you see them being released, they aren't fleeing from the plane running as if they feel that their -- their lives are under immediate threat. Although officials, again, aren't taking any chances -- Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: OK, Ian. Stay with us, if you would. We also want to bring in David Soucie. He's our CNN aviation analyst and former FAA accident investigator and inspector; also, CNN law enforcement analyst, former FBI special agent and former air marshal, Jonathan Gilliam. Great to have all of you with us.

Jonathan, as a former air marshal, I want to start with you. How do you know when someone claims that they have an explosive belt whether it's true or false and a threat to be taken seriously?

JONATHAN GILLIAM, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: You don't know, so you have to take it seriously. And that's the case in situations like this. You have to treat it as though it's the real deal. Because if you treat it like it's not and it ends up having to -- he ends up having a bomb and he is mentally unstable, which it sounds like in this case, that can go bad.

I think this is a very interesting thing, especially for the American people to see, because we can see now that the same type of tactics can be used by somebody who might be criminal insane or emotionally disturbed. But their goal is -- their end goal is not the same which it would be in the use of terrorism.

CAMEROTA: Not total destruction. He allegedly wanted to have some sort of meeting with his estranged wife. He didn't want to kill everyone on board, though he said things that were very alarming.

GILLIAM: That's correct. We have to remember what the definition of terrorism is. The use of fear and intimidation in order to coerce a political belief. That's not really what's going on here. This individual appears to have a beef with somebody, or he's got marital problems. And this is what it's gotten to.

CAMEROTA: David, officials were quick to say that they didn't think that it was necessarily true that he had a real explosive belt on. What is the security like at the Sharm el-Sheikh Airport?

DAVID SOUCIE, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: As you know, a night flight 9281, back in October of last year is when the Russian airplane was -- someone had put a bomb on it. Now, they brought in a company called Control Risk to look at the risk, to assess it, to see if their security is satisfactory. We haven't heard anything back from them. They said it would take about three months. It's been longer than that.

We haven't heard anything back from them, what they found and what they did. So there's still some vulnerabilities there, namely, those with the employee screening of the employees coming into that airport

CAMEROTA: There they go. They left from Alexandria, not Cairo. So how were -- how were Egyptian officials so quick to conclude that this wasn't terrorism?

Hold on, David. I want to talk -- hold on. Let me ask Ian. Hold on. Go ahead, Ian.

LEE: Egyptian officials did say, you know, they said that this wasn't a terrorism incident, because they say security has been stepped up since the incident you were just discussing where the bombing took place last October, that they have increased security, and they showed me measures that they took to increase the security, although that was Sharm el-Sheikh Airport. This happened at the airport in Alexandria.

I've traveled out of that airport before, as well. There are levels of security that you go through. And so if this was an actual bomb, and it does seem to be a domestic issue where he's trying to reach his ex-wife, the question is going to be how he was able to sneak it past layers of security. Layers of security where they actually pat you down almost every time.

So these are the big questions. And the question also is are the officials that are looking through baggage at these airports competent? Do they know what they're looking for? But officials here say they do. They have implemented new security measures. And that's why they're saying that they are certain that they -- or at least right now they believe that it's not a real bomb. Although, again, they're taking this very seriously.

CAMEROTA: OK, David, back to you for a second. Are you confident that they have, in fact, increased security?

SOUCIE: I know that they have as far as passenger screening. Yes, they've done a lot of passenger screening. The vulnerability, however, which was disclosed with 9281, was that of employee security. They do background checks. They see what the mentality of it is. And when you first hire someone, they go through some screening. But the day-to-day routine -- people moving on and in and out of that airport -- are -- is still the same processes which was in place both at Sharm el-Sheikh and in this airport. They are the same processes which they had before. It's costly to do so, but they need to do something more for employees to make sure they're screened before they come to the airport.

CAMEROTA: Jonathan, four passengers still on -- no. Maybe as many as seven people still on board. Four of them believed to be passengers. We don't know their nationalities. What does law enforcement do to defuse a situation like this?

GILLIAM: Well, I think now that we have, apparently, have a motive, and it's not terrorism, in this type of case you're going to try to use negotiations with this individual, because I think it's apparent that he doesn't want to kill everybody, and he wants to get to a final destination. So now you're going to work with that individual.

Differentiate that from terrorism, where we know now that if somebody hijacks an airplane for -- as an act of terror with one of these primarily Islamic groups that we've seen, their end goal is going to be death and destruction. So the reaction to that would be swift and very aggressive just by law enforcement. In this case it's probably best to step back and negotiate it out.

CAMEROTA: Jonathan, wasn't it interesting to hear Ian say that, as the passengers were coming off, they weren't running for their lives?

GILLIAM: Right.

CAMEROTA: They -- it looked to be a more collected, calm situation than we've obviously seen with other terrorists.

GILLIAM: Right.

CAMEROTA: So that suggests on board they don't think that he really does have a weapon.

GILLIAM: Well, I'm not sure what that suggests. But it looks as though they -- he may have -- I know that if an individual is telling everybody on the plane that I was on that "I'm not here to kill everybody. I want to get to see my wife," people are going to see things a little bit differently.

I'm just actually surprised that somebody, anybody didn't go after this guy on this airplane, which has been the case over recent times.

CAMEROTA: Absolutely. David, we've seen that. Often passengers will take down another passenger who seems to be making threats or unhinged somehow.

SOUCIE: That's becoming more and more common. But again, if it was the case, if he pleaded his case, what was going on, he'll disarm the passengers. But again, that can be a technique used by people that are trying to commandeer an a aircraft, as well, to calm the passengers so that they can take control of the aircraft. So it's not to be taken lightly with your passengers when this sort of thing happened. Be cautious. It's not to be disarmed.

And remember, terrorism definition, by the fact that it's how they respond does not mean that this wasn't a terrifying event for those people on board the airport, because it was. And it was treated that way, which it should be.

CAMEROTA: Ian, have airport officials moved all media away from the site of this? Is there any way to monitor what's happening on that plane?

LEE: At this point officials have just had a press conference, called...

CAMEROTA: Go ahead, Ian.

LEE: Egyptian officials just told us that they're trying to keep as little information about what is going on around that airplane getting out as possible. They want to kind of keep a bit of sort of shroud around it, not to alert the hijacker. We have heard that the police have been asking people not to send a live signal of the situation around the plane.

And they have been giving us few details about how the negotiations are going or what are the plans moving forward, because they don't want to tip off the hijacker. And they want to make sure that this ends peacefully.

CAMEROTA: Makes perfect sense. Obviously, Ian, please bring us anything as soon as you have it. David, Jonathan, thank you. Stick around. We'll bring our viewers developments as they happen throughout the program.

To Michaela.

PEREIRA: All right. We turn now to politics. We are just hours away from tonight's Republican town hall in Milwaukee live here on CNN. And the final three GOP candidates facing tough questions a week before the Wisconsin primary. Clearly, there's a little bit of bad blood between Donald Trump and Ted Cruz. How will things play out tonight?

Our Phil Mattingly is live in Milwaukee, looking into his crystal ball. Oh, you didn't bring your crystal ball.

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It's over -- it's over to the side. I'll just pull a thread over.

No, Michaela, look: red-hot political rhetoric, increased personal attacks. This last week has been particularly nasty for this campaign. On the stage behind me, really the first opportunity for all three Republican candidates to address a tone and tenor in a race that is headed South very quickly.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

[06:10:18] MATTINGLY (voice-over): All three GOP delegates converging on the battleground state, Wisconsin, for tonight's CNN town hall, a week before voters head to the polls in the high-stakes primary. Republican front-runner Donald Trump receiving a hostile reception Monday, protesters demanding Trump cancel a rally later today, saying, to quote, "Keep hate out of our state."

Popular Wisconsin conservative radio host Charlie Sykes, who has endorsed Ted Cruz, also giving Trump the cold shoulder.

CHARLIE SYKES, CONSERVATIVE RADIO HOST: Mr. Trump, before you called into my show, did you know that I'm a #NeverTrump guy?

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: That, I didn't know.

MATTINGLY: An opening act for a state with 42 delegates at stake and a strong anti-Trump movement here in Wisconsin.

SYKES: Here in Wisconsin we value things like civility, decency and actual conservative principles. So let's possibly make some news.

MATTINGLY: Trump continuing to defend his campaign's attacks on Ted Cruz and his wife, Heidi, again blaming Cruz for a super PAC ad in Utah that featured Trump's wife, Melania.

TRUMP (via phone): He owes me an apology because what he did was wrong. He sent out a picture to people in Utah.

SYKES: Well, actually, he didn't, and you know that he didn't. You know that it was a super PAC.

TRUMP: I know that he knew about it.

MATTINGLY: In an interview with CNN's Sunlen Serfaty, Cruz laying down another challenge to Trump.

SUNLEN SERFATY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We have heard that you wanted to meet Donald Trump one on one.

SEN. TED CRUZ (R-TX), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Yes.

SERFATY: Why?

CRUZ: CNN has two town halls back to back. An hour with me, an hour with Donald Trump. The exact same location. We should make it a debate. Let's make it a two-hour debate. Let's combine our events.

MATTINGLY: And Ohio Governor John Kasich attacking both of his opponents on their foreign policy positions.

GOV. JOHN KASICH (R-OH), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We've got one guy saying we should patrol Muslim neighborhoods, and the other one says we should have a religious test. It's not good foreign policy.

MATTINGLY: All while Trump The state Trump won but Cruz can could walk away with more delegates. The Texas senator rushing off litigation threats.

CRUZ: Who cares? He can threaten whoever he likes.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MATTINGLY: And another element of intrigue to watch here tonight. John Kasich's campaign trailing badly has been working behind the scenes trying to get in touch with Ted Cruz's campaign to work jointly to try and block Donald Trump in states that are advantageous to one or the other in the weeks and months ahead.

Included in those efforts, according to John Weaver, John Kasich's chief strategist, was reaching out to Mitt Romney, 2012 nominee, having him try and broker a meeting with Ted Cruz's campaign and their campaign manager. Up to this point Ted Cruz's campaign has rejected those entreaties. In Ted Cruz's campaign's mind, Jeff Roe's mind, John Kasich is just a spoiler. He needs to get out of the race. There will be no cooperation or coordination. At least not yet, Don.

LEMON: We have this to look forward to until November. Thank you very much. Appreciate that.

You just heard part of that really tense interview between Donald Trump and conservative radio host Charlie Sykes, who happens to a member, as he said, of the "Never Trump" movement. It's something Trump was not alerted to ahead of time. That interview creating a really awkward exchange ahead of the Wisconsin primary one week from today. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SYKES: Last week you tweeted out a threat to spill the beans on the wife of Ted Cruz, Heidi Cruz. You followed that up by a tweeting out a picture that insulted her looks. You know, wouldn't it be a good way to start off your Wisconsin campaign by saying that wives should be off-limits and that you apologize for mocking her looks?

TRUMP (via phone): Well, by the way, I think it's true, actually, Charlie, but you know, if you remember, Melania was -- my wife was a very, very big successful model. And she did a cover shoot for "GQ" magazine. And it was, you know, a little provocative. It was "GQ," but what they did was -- and Ted Cruz totally knew about it. And he says he didn't know about it. He totally knew about it. And they sent that out to the people of Salt Lake City, or the people of Utah, and it was with a very nasty statement on it. So he totally knew about that. If he didn't know about it, it would be a whole different thing. But he totally knew about it. It was done by people that he knows very well.

SYKES: It was not Ted Cruz or his campaign. So if your standard is...

TRUMP: No, no. I'm just telling you he knew. He knew these people did it. He totally knew they did it.

SYKES: Is this your standard that, if a supporter of another candidate does something despicable, that it's OK for you, personally, a candidate for president of the United States, to behave in that same way? I expect that from a 12-year-old bully on the playground, not somebody who wants the office held by Abraham Lincoln.

TRUMP: Well, I did a retweet, and it was a retweet by somebody else, because I have a lot of support, a tremendous amount of very fervent supporters. I know they were angry about what they did, you know, sending out this photograph, which was frankly fine. It was an artistic picture, actually. It was the cover of "GQ," which is not a big deal.

SYKES: Your wife is a beautiful, classy woman. Why can't you say the same about Ted Cruz's wife.

TRUMP: I don't know Ted Cruz's wife. I'm sure she's excellent. I just don't know her. But all this was, was a response to what he did. And by the way, Charlie, it was a very minor response to what he did. It was a picture. I didn't even know it was necessarily a very bad picture of her versus Melania.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CAMEROTA: All right. So don't forget: tonight on CNN it's going to be a very interesting night. Ted Cruz, John Kasich and Donald Trump will take place in a GOP town hall in Wisconsin. So voters will get to ask him directly. This prime-time event moderated by Anderson Cooper at 8 p.m. Eastern, right here on CNN.

LEMON: I'm in for the cage match. I think they should all just get -- we should just have this CNN GOP cage match.

PEREIRA: Wait for it. There's still time, my dear.

LEMON: We'll see.

CAMEROTA: I'm not saying you won't work out up to that.

All right. So we are also following breaking news of this hijacking of EgyptAir flight. There are still passengers and crew on board. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:20:19] LEMON: We are following breaking news this morning, an ongoing hostage standoff after an EgyptAir flight was hijacked en route from Alexandria to Cairo, the plane landing in Cyprus, where most passengers were freed. But some remain on board, along with crew members. I believe about seven people still on board that plane. We're still getting new information.

So let's discuss now, get some reaction from CNN contributor Michael Weiss, also a senior editor at "The Daily Beast"; and CNN military analyst Lieutenant General Mark Hertling.

Good morning to both of you. I'm going to start with your reaction to, Michael Weiss. Don't know for sure if he had an explosive belt on, as he said.

MICHAEL WEISS, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Right.

LEMON: But officials are treating it as they did. They had no other choice at this point.

WEISS: Yes. I think after the Metrojet bombing, it's stupid to proceed as if you can't get a bomb aboard a plane, particularly coming out of Egypt. I mean, that particular case was an IED, a soda can, according to ISIS propaganda, which ended up blowing the whole plane up and all 200-plus passengers on board.

Security in Egypt has been infiltrated before. So they have to take threats like very seriously. From what I can tell and what has been reported, it doesn't seem like this has anything to do with terrorism. The guy apparently had a grievance with his ex-wife, wanted to get a message to her. And Egyptian security officials quoted already, saying he's not a terrorist; he's an idiot.

So, but again, we don't know. And I think they're right to be taking every precaution.

LEMON: Nerves are clearly on edge now, General, clearly on the edge because of this and because of the ISIS attack. General Hertling, you fought in Iraq. You see what the military is doing. U.S. calculates that ISIS has lost 40 percent of territory that it controlled in Syria -- in Syria and Iraq. How is the military currently handling the fight against ISIS?

LT. GEN. MARK HERTLING, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: They're continuing to go along with the plan that we talked about for over a year, Don. You know, there's multiple aspects of this campaign. There is the campaign plan of the bombing from the air. There's the advise and assist with the military. There's the attempt at diplomacy of getting more people to join in. There's the attempt at stopping fighters from flying across the borders. And there's the attempt at continuing to affect ISIS economically.

So all of those things are continuing on pattern. As we said for over a year, this is a multi-generational fight. This will occur for a while until there is better government in both Iraq and Syria. Now as ISIS expands, as Michael well knows, as ISIS expands into other countries, you can look at the places where they are going and trying to increase terror. And it is places where the governments are bad. And there's challenges between various sects of tribes or religions in those governments.

LEMON: Go ahead, Michaela.

WEISS: I mean, broadly speaking, I agree. They are losing territory. They're being salami sliced in Syria. My concern at this point is that -- what I would call the long-unintended consequence. Is the cure going to be worse than the disease in the long term?

By that, I mean we are giving rise to these competitive, sectarian, nationalisms which will replace ISIS in the region of Syria and Iraq in the event that they are ultimately expelled or defeated.

And the problem with this, Don, is that I think you're seeing the dissolution of the modern nation states of the contemporary Middle East. I don't think you can put that genie back in the bottle again.

And I asked a senior ranking member of the Senate Intelligence Committee recently, does the U.S. have, like, a long-term plan to reckon with this new dawning reality? And the answer I got was no. So this is what worries me, you know. ISIS is now going to create all these epi (ph) phenomenon in the region, leaving aside the rise of foreign terrorist operations which now we're seeing at this very rapid pace.

LEMON: Despite all these setbacks, though, General, that we're talking about, we're still seeing recruiting in foreign -- of foreign fighters. Even the Department of Defense just said 30,000 to 35,000 foreign fighters are with ISIS. If they're facing such setbacks that we have been discussing, shouldn't followers feel like they are losing right now?

HERTLING: Well, that's part of it, Don. And in fact, many of them do. We are also getting intelligence reports of massive numbers of defections inside specifically Iraq. Not as much in Syria. Because they're just being destroyed by Mr. Assad and by his Russian supporters.

But inside of Iraq, you're starting to see more of a dependence on the government, a growing government. And also the fact that many of their leaders specifically in Iraq have been killed. So you're seeing many turn away and a lack of support in some of the major cities they once occupied.

So there is a good and a bad. I'm certainly not going to throw up my hands and say, "Hey, we're doing great. And we're definitely decimating this organization." But it seems that in some spaces it is being affected, not defeated but affected in a positive way.

LEMON: Michael, you and I have discussed this. I find it fascinating that you have recently been speaking with ISIS defectors. Do you get the sense from them that they think ISIS is struggling?

WEISS: Yes. The morale is very low. Airstrikes have taken a toll. But also, the people who are being lorded over ISIS, the most important thing, don't want to be ruled by ISIS. They have opted into this devil's bargain, if you like, because they see a lack of alternatives. They don't want Assad coming back in. In Syria and in Iraq, they don't want Iranian proxy groups or Shia militias to lord over them if they're Sunni, particularly Sunni Arab tribes.

So I mean, they feel like ISIS is, as awful as it may be, the only viable choice at the moment. But you know, one of the guys, a defector from their spy service told me in Aleppo suburb, the town of Albaab (ph) -- again it's where they had their foreign intelligence fighters -- everybody there is really against ISIS. And they're just waiting for, you know, that moment when resistance internally can become a kind of grassroots uprising against them. But they need help.

LEMON: Michael, General, thank you very much.

WEISS: Thank you, Don.

LEMON: Michaela, over to you.

PEREIRA: Thank you, Don.

Stay with CNN for continuing coverage of the hijacking of EgyptAir Flight 181. We know at least seven people are still being held hostage. They are on board that plane on the tarmac in Cyprus at this hour. We'll bring you updates.

CAMEROTA: We'll also bring you the latest on that Capitol Hill shooting yesterday. What we've learned about the gunman and his last run-in with police.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)