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New Day

84 Killed in France Terror Attack; Trump Picks Mike Pence as V.P. Aired 6-6:30a ET

Aired July 15, 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.

[05:58:08] CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: All right. We want to welcome our viewers in the United States and around the world. This is NEW DAY. And terror has struck France again. A man firing into a crowd, then plowing a truck through people celebrating Bastille Day in Nice. At least 84 are dead. And as you just heard, among them, two Americans in this mile-long rampage along the city's famed promenade.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: A horrifying scene captured on video by hundreds and hundreds of eyewitnesses as they ran for their lives. French President Francois Hollande, calling it clearly an act of terror.

We have the global resources of CNN covering this breaking story this morning. Let's start with our senior international correspondent, Clarissa Ward, live in Nice.

Good morning, Clarissa.

CLARISSA WARD, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Poppy.

Well, behind me you can see police have actually blocked off the Promenade des Anglais. It's one of the main tourist attractions here in the city of Nice, which is beloved not just to so many French people but to people of nationalities from all over the world.

Last night, this area would have been packed with thousands of people, who would have been gathering here to watch the fireworks to celebrate France's independence day, Bastille Day. And that is when the attack began. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

WARD (voice-over): A scene of horrifying carnage. Bodies strewn along Nice's famed seaside promenade after this truck plows through a crowd of hundreds watching Bastille Day fireworks.

A witness says the driver first started shooting into the crowd from inside the truck right after the fireworks ended.

DOMINIQUE MOLINA, EYEWITNESS (via phone): I wondered if that was fireworks? But it was definitely not fireworks. And you heard screaming and then you just see masses of people fleeing. WARD: Another eyewitness capturing this video, the truck slowly

approaching people on the promenade before the driver accelerates, hitting one after another.

INGA, EYEWITNESS (via phone): It was complete chaos. People were running away. One lady fell on the ground, and everybody was running right over her.

PAUL DELANE, EYEWITNESS (via phone): The music was so loud that we couldn't hear anything. I didn't really see a truck but just people running and screaming and crying, and people carrying their children.

WARD: Those who survived the attack describing the chaos and confusion.

MARYAM VIOLET, EYEWITNESS (via phone): I was walking amongst bodies, dead bodies and wounded people and families of those people just gathering around the bodies.

WARD: The truck's path of destruction over a mile long before finally stopping in front of this witness.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He was nervous. He was moving inside like this, like this. And I saw he was like holding something like a cell phone.

WARD: Police circling the truck, ending the carnage by shooting and killing the driver.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They shoot gun until they killed him already, and his head was out the window.

WARD: Survivors desperate for help.

ERIC DRATTELL, EYEWITNESS (via phone): I wasn't sure what it was and tried calling the police. The lines were completely jammed.

VIOLET: I think it took 10, 15 minutes until, you know, there were first signs of ambulance.

WARD: Police say they found a handgun and several fake rifles and fake grenades.

French President Francois Hollande raced back to Paris after the attacks, telling the world that France is strong and will always be stronger than those who want to attack the country.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WARD: Now, investigators found in the truck an I.D. card belonging to a 31-year-old French-Tunisian. This man had a criminal record, not any involvement with Islamist extremism activities, but mostly for petty crimes. We don't yet know for sure that, in fact, the I.D. card belongs to the man who was driving the truck. But French media is reporting that there have been several raids

at the house of the man whose I.D. card was found in that truck. We are also hearing from French media that, among the many injured, there are more than 50 children. And of course, as you said earlier in the show, we are now learning from the American statesman that two Americans were also among the dead, a father and son who had gathered here for the festivities -- Poppy.

HARLOW: Unbelievable. Let's remember that state of emergency, as you know, still in place in France, which means you can do those raids without any prior authorization from a judge.

Meantime, this Bastille Day attack in Nice marks the third major terror attack in France in just the last 18 months. The question so many people are waking up this morning and asking is, why does this keep happening in France? Our Will Ripley is in Nice with more on that -- Will.

WILL RIPLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Poppy, the third major attack and the second deadliest in the last 16 months, but if you look at the list of times that Paris has been targeted over the last year and a half, it really is stunning, unparalleled in modern European history.

And by all indications, it appears that terror groups such as ISIS and others have put France in their bull's eye for a number of reasons. No. 1, this country is considered the epicenter of Europe. It is secular. It epitomizes many of the western and European values that jihadists so despise.

And while the United Kingdom or the United States might be more preferable targets because they are taking the biggest roles in the coalition to defeat the terror group ISIS. The U.S. is quite far away. The U.K. is on an island. It's more difficult to access.

But here in Paris with the freedom of movement throughout Europe, it is essentially a soft target. And that is the definition of what you saw here in Nice, where there were thousands of people out celebrating July 14, Bastille Day. They were enjoying the lovely beachside promenade, the fireworks display.

Even though France has been in a state of alert and people have been fearful of attending large public gatherings over the last year and a half, it is clear that people were not expecting anything like this. This is truly a horrific attack, taking terrorism to a new level, using a truck in this way to kill so many people, something that hasn't yet been seen, which is why you see so many world leaders speaking out in condemnation and sympathy.

A line has been crossed here, and the fear is that the terrorists will then take these attacks to even greater levels, which means more vigilance throughout Paris, throughout France, and throughout Europe -- Poppy.

HARLOW: No question. What an absolute tragedy. Thank you so much, Will Ripley -- Chris. CUOMO: All right. Let's discuss what's going on here and what

the response will be. We have Clarissa Ward; and CNN terrorism analyst and editor in chief of the anti-terror publication "CTC Sentinel," Paul Cruickshank on the scene there. We also have CNN counterterrorism analyst and former CIA counterterrorism official Phil Mudd here with me in New York.

Clarissa, in one way, this is taking it to a new level, but in a practical sense, this is the lowest level. No need for explosives, no team involved. Just a vehicle that's easy enough to get and using the opportunity of what's the equivalent of Fourth of July there. People in a high state of celebration. This is the most impact for the least investment for the bad guys here. Fair appraisal?

WARD: That's exactly right. I mean, it's obviously, Chris, a very symbolic today, a symbolic target. Also of course, a soft target, a bunch of civilians gathered to watch the fireworks. Many of them children, as we know now, more than 50 children hospitalized.

But we also know that this is exactly the type of attack that ISIS has been encouraging. It was just over a year ago that we heard from ISIS's spokesman, encouraging people to take whatever they could, whatever blunt instrument. He said, if you have a knife, use it to stab people. If you have a car, use it to run people over.

We've also seen al Qaeda, even before ISIS emerged encouraging people to improvise essentially, to use what they can. A heavy truck, as we saw so terribly last night, can do an awful lot of damage. But what is really striking, I think, Chris, as well, is hearing from France's prime minister today, and he's saying, of course, we mourn the dead, but essentially normal. There will be more events like this. And there is a very real sense here in Europe that terrorism, unfortunately, is here to stay.

CUOMO: In terms of what happens today, Phil Mudd, I remember 2010, I think the alert came from homeland security about watch for vehicles being used. And there was a guidance about them being in places they shouldn't be, driven erratically. But I mean, it's almost impossible to figure anything out on that level. So what do you do on a day like today?

PHIL MUDD, CNN COUNTERTERRORISM ANALYST: There's a rhythm. You almost have a routine that you have to go through on both sides of the Atlantic. In America, there's a basic question at the bureau and CIA this morning. I want every bit of data about the driver. You've got to prove a negative. Has he ever e-mailed, phoned, traveled to the United States? Is there any indication that there's connectivity here? Likelihood of that is near zero, but you can't assume that today.

On the other side of the Atlantic, in Paris, you've got to go through almost a checklist process. Documents, money, acquisition of the vehicle, acquisition of weapons and explosives. Go down that list of not only who the co-conspirators were, but was there a web around him that allowed him to acquire things like the weapons and explosives, the fake material in the back that might be used to support another op.

CUOMO: Why was it fake?

MUDD: I'm looking at this today. I've got a couple problems with this.

First, we apply a rational actor model. Somebody goes in and conducts this operation. Let me -- let me determine what I would do in this circumstance. I don't know. My guess is he might have been considering a broader operation that included the use of these to suggest it was a bigger attack than it was, but I'm not sure we're ever going to know, Chris.

CUOMO: Paul Cruickshank, the paperwork on this guy suggests a French-Tunisian, North African. What's the significance to you of that?

PAUL CRUICKSHANK, CNN TERRORISM ANALYST: Well, we've seen people of North African descent get involved in terrorist plots before in France. There's been a real problem of integration. There's a sense of alienation, of frustration amongst the second and third generations of this immigrant community.

The ISIS message has also resonated amongst some of these people. But so far, what we're hearing from our sources is this person was not on the radar screen of French counterterrorism services. He was on the radar screen of French police for some petty crime, but there was no surveillance file opened into him by French security services.

There are 11,000 French nationals and residents who they have opened these surveillance files for. So the fact that he was not on the radar screen will be very disquieting for French authorities. We're obviously still trying to figure out the motive. We haven't had official confirmation yet from French authorities. We still don't know whether this was a lone wolf attack or whether it might have been instigated by ISIS or even directed by ISIS.

In the French Riviera, we have seen a significant amount of radicalization over the last several years. Some of those people have been people of North African descent who have struggled to integrate. And we've seen people travel over here from Syria and Iraq in quite significant numbers. And even just a couple years ago, there was a French ISIS operative who came back and was arrested just a few kilometers away from here. And he had, actually, TAT devices that he put inside cola bottles to launch a bomb attack very near here in France.

[06:10:15] So this has been a long time coming, Chris.

CUOMO: Clarissa, in terms of what they can do, every time I speak with you and Paul about the situation there, they're overwhelmed with possibilities. The sheer population they're dealing with, it's either sympathetic or radicalized, traveling back, is huge.

They made a big move there by French standards in putting into effect this state of emergency. We just heard it's going to be extended another three months. What will this give in terms of additional capabilities, or does it just ensure the status quo in terms of their investigative capabilities?

WARD: Well, essentially, Chris, it's just going to continue the status quo. It will allow them to keep bringing people in for questioning, keep launching those raids.

But the question Paul really touched on here is how on earth do French authorities get to grips with the depths of this problem when the man in question, who is likely, possibly responsible for this attack had no real terrorist background or extremist background that authorities knew of?

He was involved, however, with petty criminality. And this is something, Chris, you and I have discussed so many times in Paris and Brussels. I've gone blue in the face talking about it. But this is the new reality of terrorism that authorities are now grappling to deal with. It's a sort of hybrid between somebody who may be a petty criminal, who knows how to organize a safe house, who knows where to get weapons, who knows how to lock into networks of the criminal underground, but who also then becomes radicalized and imbued with that zealotry, which then makes a petty criminal and an incredibly, incredibly dangerous proposition.

And so for authorities, what can they really do about this? Because what we're seeing here, Chris, as the caliphate, or so-called caliphate, is getting squeezed physically in Syria and Iraq, it's expanding online. We're seeing the emergence of a virtual caliphate. And I just have no idea how you begin to police that.

CUOMO: Phil Mudd, quickly here, what makes a thug, a low-level criminal, be susceptible to zealotry or radicalization?

MUDD: First of all, he can access ideology. Fifteen years ago he couldn't. Today, get on the Internet, look at videos, look at speeches.

Second and finally, you look at cultural issues. We talk about politics, French intervention in a place like Syria. You've been to Belgium. You've been to France. There are these neighborhoods on the periphery of major cities like Paris and Brussels where you have immigrants who do not have economic opportunities.

I don't want to suggest that that's an excuse. I want to tell you people like this don't believe that they have a place in society, and that's one of the drivers.

CUOMO: Phil Mudd, then on the scene, Paul Cruickshank and, of course, Clarissa Ward. Thank you very much. We'll be checking back with you throughout the morning -- Poppy.

HARLOW: Chris, we have much, much more of our continuing coverage on the horrific attack in France. Next, you'll hear from someone who witnessed the horror on Nice's promenade as it all played out last night as that truck mowed people down that were out there with their families celebrating Bastille Day. What he and his wife did when they heard those shots ring out, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:17:24] HARLOW: Welcome back to NEW DAY as we continue to follow the horrific, horrific terror attack in France.

I want to show you some pictures of Nice airport. That is where French President Francois Hollande will be arriving at any moment. He cut his trip short. He returned to Paris last night for emergency meetings with his cabinet. And at any moment, he is stepping off the plane right now in Nice, France, addressing what is the third major terror attack in his nation in just the last 18 months.

I want to go to Melissa Bell from France-24, correspondent. She's live for us in Paris. As we look at these pictures of Hollande arriving, speak to me about the state of your country, your nation right now. It is hard to wrap your head around the third major attack in 18 months.

MELISSA BELL, CORRESPONDENT, FRANCE-24: A nation very much waking up in shock. And with the death toll already at 84, 18 people still in critical condition, and also much more about the numbers of children that have been admitted to the local hospital over the course of the night. More than 50 with two of them who have -- are believed to have died in the early hours of them this morning. So a death toll that is expected to continue to rise. And a nation in shock.

Here in Paris, people are only really just recovering from the attacks eight months ago that claimed the lives of 130 people, and now this.

With this change in the tactics, we heard from the head of France's internal security just a few weeks ago, speaking in front of a parliamentary commission, that so far we'd seen knife attacks; we'd see Kalashnikovs used. We'd seen suicide belts used. And that what we could expect is weapons being used, vehicles being used as weapons against large crowds of people in order to cause maximum casualties.

And this is, of course, exactly what we saw last night in Nice. Francois Hollande arriving in Nice. He's to go to the local police station. After that, he'll go and visit the survivors in hospital. He's a tired French president who's had to deal with the fallout of three major terrorist attacks now over the course of the last 18 months. And the night's been a long one for him. He addressed the French people at about half past 3 in the middle of the night, promising to take on Islamist terrorism and naming this act as a terror act very early on, just a few hours after it had taken place.

Now he will go and seek to soothe those who are trying to recover from what they witnessed or what they went through last night. Also keeping an eye on this investigation, which is in its beginning. French media are beginning to report the name of the man who drove that truck across a mile of that sidewalk, that boardwalk last night, causing all those casualties, a man who's believed to be a Tunisian, who's been positively identified now from fingerprints in his truck. [06:20:16] The big question that remains, and this is something

we should hear about over the next few hours, was he acting alone or in coordination with others?

Melissa, for people that don't know this promenade well, just explain to our viewers what this is like, especially on French independence day, especially on Bastille Day, at the height of the summer season. It is absolutely packed.

BELL: There were 100,000 people watching this fireworks display last night in Nice. Nice, like all the other French cities, people come out after nightfall, which is just after 10 p.m. in midsummer here in France, to watch those firework displays. It's very much like the Fourth of July, families, children. Hence the chilling number of children who are now known to have been taken into French hospitals and those who are believed to have been among the 84 kills.

Families who had gone out to watch this firework display, it had just come to an end on the boardwalk of Nice. The fireworks had just come to an end when the truck came careening towards the crowds. Quite a large truck that was rented a couple of days ago, killing 84 people, and causing scenes that have been described by eyewitnesses as scenes of war.

I think what people who survived witnessed last night is something they'll never forget and will take an awful long time to get over. The sounds of what they heard, I think in particular, have stuck in the mind of eyewitnesses who have been speaking to us over the course of the night.

HARLOW: It's so chilling to watch this video as we speak, because as I watch it, it reminds me exactly of the video we saw after the attack eight months ago in November, the video from the Bataclan. People rushing out, desperately, desperately trying to save others and their lives.

For Francois Hollande right now as he grapples with this, Melissa, there's also a state of the unknown, because the intelligence sharing, the increased security, the state of emergency hasn't worked.

BELL: It hasn't worked. Now, one of the first things Francois Hollande did overnight was announce that that state of emergency that's been in effect since those 13th of November attacks in which 130 died here in Paris is to be extended.

Ironically, he'd only announced yesterday they would be brought to an end on the 26th of July, imaging that France had come out of the worst of it. He's now extended that.

But as you say, this did nothing to prevent this man from renting this vehicle and using it as a weapon, this new method that we hadn't seen used in France before and that was used with such tragic circumstances, taking such a huge number of lives.

Now, the question is, was this a man acting alone? Was this a man acting in coordination? In September 2014, the Islamic state group put out a call to the Muslims in France, saying make sure that you take as many French lives as you can, and if you don't have weapons at your disposal, then use vehicles.

Was this a man heeding that particular call, a deranged man? What we do know, according to sources close to the investigation, that he was not known to the intelligence services. This was a petty criminal. So that could be the sort of profile we're looking at. That will be one of the big questions for the investigation as it continues over the coming hours.

HARLOW: And by the way, that is a profile we've seen play out in Paris and Brussels. And increasingly, Melissa Bell, live for us in France this morning. Thank you, Chris.

CUOMO: French authorities will say if not for the state of emergency, they don't know how many more attacks they would have had. They said they've been very productive under this new set of abilities.

Let's take a quick break. When we come back, the impact of terror on the presidential race here in the U.S. Donald Trump making his V.P. pick, but then postponing the official announcement because of it. We have a live report next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:27:57] CUOMO: Donald Trump postponing his V.P. announcement due to the terror attack in France. CNN has learned the pick is in. Sources telling us Donald Trump has chosen Indiana Governor Mike Pence as his running mate.

CNN's Sara Murray live at Trump Tower in New York with more. I mean, this does make sense. Donald Trump wants to get as much currency out of this announcement as possible. On a day like today, he would not.

SARA MURRAY, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, that's absolutely right, Chris. And I'm actually at the Hilton in midtown Manhattan, which is where Donald Trump was expected to make his announcement today. Of course, I am here and he is not, because he decided to delay it in the wake of these terror attacks in Nice.

Now CNN has confirmed that he did call Indiana Governor Mike Pence yesterday. He made the offer. Mike Pence accepted, but in spite of all that, Donald Trump was still playing coy last night on FOX News.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESUMPTIVE PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE (via phone): I think Newt is a fantastic person. I think Chris Christie is a fantastic person, been a friend of mine for 15 years. Just a fantastic person. And -- and this Mike, Mike has done a great job as governor of Indiana. You look at the number, it's been great. He's done really a fantastic job. So you know, but I haven't made a final, final decision. (END VIDEO CLIP)

MURRAY: And even though Trump says there he hasn't made a final, final pick, he was a little bit more forthcoming at his California fundraiser last night. A source tells us that he told donors in that fundraiser that he has made his pick, and he is ready to announce. We still do expect it to be Indiana Governor Mike Pence.

But I imagine this is a very stressful situation for Pence today. He does have to decide by this afternoon whether he is going to pull his name from the re-election fight in Indiana. And that's going to happen even though Donald Trump is not coming out publicly and made the announcement.

Now, we are expecting to hear more from the Trump campaign today about when they're going to reschedule this. Of course, we'll bring you the latest as soon as we hear -- Poppy.

HARLOW: That's just what Chris and I were talking about. Noon is that deadline for him to withdraw from the governor's race in his home state.

Sara Murray, thank you so much, live for us in New York this morning.

And Donald Trump said months ago he wanted a political insider as his No. 2. Mike Pence certainly fits that description. He's the former current governor and also former congressman. He's got a lot of experience and connections in Washington...