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Fifth Boy Rescued in Thailand; Giuliani Says Show Suspicion of Crime; North Korea Slams U.S. Aired 6:30-7a ET

Aired July 09, 2018 - 06:30   ET

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

[06:30:00] MATT RIVERS, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: That's the hospital there over my left shoulder. That's the emergency room where those first four boys were put in. And that's what we're expecting the fifth boy to see happen as well.

Now, when that boy gets to the hospital, we've got some details in terms of what the hospital is doing to prepare for this. An eighth floor ward has been turned into a specialized sterilized isolation unit. That's where all of these boys are going to be put in. And they're going to be kept in isolation for one to two days. Anyone who wants to visit them has to wear a protective suit and they have to stay two meters away from the boys physically. There's a certain that their immune systems have weakened. They don't want them to catch any diseases. And they also don't know what illnesses the boys might have come out of that cave with. So an abundance of caution here at the hospital. And we expect the boys to have to say in the hospital for somewhere between five to seven days for observation.

But, still, John, this is miraculous progress. Yes, there are still boys and their coach trapped in that cave. But just a couple of days ago, none of this was guaranteed. This is an incredibly dangerous rescue mission and so we're going to hopefully see these -- oh, and you know what, we are hearing, over my left shoulder right now, a helicopter coming in. We can't see it quite yet, but we do hear a helicopter. So we assume that's going to be the boy and hopefully getting him down to that hospital as swiftly as possible.

Erica.

ERICA HILL, CNN ANCHOR: Thank you.

And just to clarify one thing. I know you -- we've touched on this, but just to remind people at home, while the boys may be in the hospital, the parents don't know which of these boys has made it out. And the parents had said that they wanted to say together in solidarity over there at the site, correct?

RIVERS: Yes. yes, and that's correct. We've been at the hospital now for well over 24 hours. No parent, according to our sources, have come here. And it's, at this point, it doesn't appear clear that the parents even know which boys were taken out. Even -- there's a lot of conflicting reports at this point. We've heard some names. We're not ready to report those names at all.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Right.

HILL: Yes.

RIVERS: So that -- you can't imagine that some of those names might have trickled back to the parents. But what we do know is that these parents have made the decision, they've gone through this horrific event together as a group so far and it looks like they're going to stick it out as a group in a show of solidarity that when one boy comes out, it's not good enough. They want all of them to come out safely.

BERMAN: Matt Rivers, you had told us that you heard a helicopter overhead. Has that helicopter landed? Can you see it from your vantage point?

RIVERS: We couldn't see it. Now, if it took the same flight path as yesterday, where it literally flew right overhead, as of now we're not seeing that helicopter any more. So whether it took a different flight path, went -- I think it went to the left of where we are right now. But we do know the helicopter, the area where it would land, would be south of here. But it didn't take the same flight path as it did yesterday, otherwise we would have been able to see it.

BERMAN: All right, Matt Rivers by the hospital in northern Thailand, where these children, who have been rescued from the cave, are being taken, including, we believe, this fifth child rescued from that cave just one hour ago.

Matt, please keep us posted as to what you see.

HILL: As we continue to follow those developments out of Thailand, a lot happening back here at home as well. Rudy Giuliani with some new demands. What would it take for the president to sit down with Robert Mueller? That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:37:02] (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RUDY GIULIANI, ATTORNEY FOR PRESIDENT TRUMP: I didn't say they have to prove a crime. What I said was, they have to give us a factual basis, meaning some suspicion of a crime. For example, I can't initiate an investigation of my neighbor just because I don't like him, or just because he's politically different than me, which is a -- which is really what happened here.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HILL: President Trump's attorney, Rudy Giuliani, clarifying a report that the president's legal team wanted a special council to prove it has evidence of Mr. Trump committing a crime before agreeing to an interview.

Let's discuss with CNN law enforcement analyst John Campbell and CNN legal analyst Laura Coates. Laura, look, there's a large part of this, too, that is -- it would seem, not necessarily a legal strategy, but perhaps a public relations strategy in terms of pushing this narrative of the president that we have heard for so long of his view of what this investigation is and why it was started. That being said, how much of an impact do you think is this having, Laura?

LAURA COATES, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Well, I think the largest share of all of Giuliani's statements is about the publicity campaign. It has very little foundation in the legal realities here, Erica, because in reality speaking, the president of the United States, or any person being interviewed, does not need to have the proof in the pudding by the prosecutors or an investigative unit before they actually have to be interviewed. In fact, that's never been the standard at all. Probable cause is one for search warrants. It's not one for an investigation. And a lot of the proof that he's looking for has already been meted out in the form of different guilty plea, people who have been a part of the Trump campaign, including Paul Manafort and Rick Gates, Michael Flynn as well and about their own involvement. So I think that Giuliani is looking for one last straw, one last life line here in order to say this is all part of a witch hunt and he need not comply. But that's far from reality.

BERMAN: No, I think we're doing a disservice to the concept of logic by saying that there's a cogent (ph) argument here being made by Rudy Giuliani.

COATES: Right.

BERMAN: I think the fact of the matter is, and this is just my opinion, they've decided not to have the president sit down for an interview, at least not willingly. So everything else that's happening is just words spoken out loud to delay or muddy the waters in that process, Josh.

And I think another sign that this is the case is that Giuliani, who's ostensibly the president's lawyer here, is saying things that don't actually help his case, like the issue with James Comey. Did the president ask James Comey to back off in the investigation of Michael Flynn. The president had said, no, that never happened when he'd been asked about. And Rudy Giuliani, well, let's listen to what he said, because he said, yes.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS, ABC NEWS: The joint defense agreement that Cohen had with the president's legal team, that is no longer operable?

RUDY GIULIANI, ATTORNEY FOR PRESIDENT TRUMP: I'm not really allowed to talk about that, but it wouldn't matter whether it was or it wasn't. We -- we I think we know everything we need to know at this point.

STEPHANOPOULOS: And the president's legal defense fund is no longer paying Michael Cohen's legal bills?

GIULIANI: Again, that's not something I'm not allowed to comment on, but it wouldn't matter one way or the other. We want -- we want Michael to handle this in a way that's most helpful to him. Michael's not going to lie. He's going to tell the truth. As long as he does that, we have nothing to fear.

[06:40:00] He didn't direct him to do that. What he said to him was, can you -- can you give him a break.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Comey says he took it as direction.

GIULIANI: Well, that's OK. I mean taking it that way, I mean, by that time he had been fired and said a lot of other things, some of which have turned out to be untrue. The reality is, as a prosecutor, I was told that many times, can you give the man a break, either by his lawyers, by his relatives, by friends. You take that into consideration but, you know, that doesn't determine the -- not going forward to it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: So, Josh, we just gave you a tour there of the words said out loud by Rudy Giuliani. What do you make of it all?

JOSH CAMPBELL, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: So it is not against the law to lie to the American people in the United States. If that were the case, the jails would be full, especially in this city.

But what's interesting is that we now see the mayor now playing cleanup, which has kind of become his role. So the reason this is so important is because he's talked about the legal strategy and he's talked about the public opinion strategy. And he said himself essentially that this is more of a public relations issue. So it's not a, you know, against the law to lie and to come out and say, well, the president said this but let me say that.

The pattern here is, if you think back to, you know, Stormy Daniels and that payment where the president said on Air Force One that, you know, I had no knowledge of this, I wasn't involved, and then, you know, Rudy came in to do clean up and said, actually, you know, he did, but what he meant was this. That's the same case -- appears to be here with Jim Comey where Comey said that he felt pressured and, you know, the president said it never happened, and now Rudy is saying actually it did but it's not as bad as you make it.

What's interesting here -- and we talk about these, you know, linguistic, you know, leaps in logic here. It's interesting, when you talk about the relationship or the format that Rudy is operating in here when he talks about what it actually meant, it wasn't saying, hey, I want you to pressure. He says saying, hey, you know, let's give the guy a break. It's interesting because we're talking about a subordinate and someone who is working for him, which is important in this case.

So this isn't just anyone coming and saying --

JOHN AVLON, CNN ANCHOR: Yes. Yes. CAMPBELL: Hey, we need you to come and say this. You know, borrow a phrase from John Avlon slightly, this is more along the lines of, hey, that's a nice career you've got there, it would be really bad is something happened to that.

AVLON: Yes, I mean, that parallel that Rudy was trying to draw, it just doesn't work because it's the president of the United States. And Rudy knows that. I mean with regard to the Comey, you know, line he floated out that seems to contradict the president's, this may be filed, what, under the Clinton defense team back in the 1990s called telling the truth slowly. The president took out a position. It may not be true. We'll sort of get the new reality out there.

But at the end of the day, Rudy is playing squarely to the court of public opinion. He's trying to give the impression that the Trump team has much more leverage than they do. And on the issue of Michael Cohen, what you heard there was -- was sort of the Alfred E. Newman strategy, you know, what, us worry? Not at all.

CAMPBELL: Yes.

AVLON: But it is a lot of bluster. And, at the end of the day, there isn't that much they can do if a subpoena comes down, unless they have to have that fight. But this is about the court of public opinion.

CAMPBELL: Can I say just -- yes, and just on that, John, sorry to interrupt. But I think on the -- on the public opinion side it's so important that our viewers understand that. And let me just say, kind of full disclosure, you know, when we talked about Comey, I served a stint as his assistant. So it's important that viewers know that.

AVLON: Yes.

CAMPBELL: But with respect to, you know, Rudy getting a peak at what's, you know, behind the curtain here before they decide to sit down, that is not how the justice system works in the United States. When I heard him make those comments, I thought about all of the interviews and interrogations I've done and wondered how I would respond if one of those subjects said, you know what, I'll sit down, I'll talk with you, but first I need a little peak at your files to see what we're dealing with here.

AVLON: Right.

CAMPBELL: I would have laughed them out of the room.

AVLON: Right.

CAMPBELL: And, you know, in fact, it's actually more telling if someone actually comes and says, well, I want to know what you're talking about here, what you're dealing with, rather than full cooperation, which we expect from our leaders.

BERMAN: So, Laura, subpoena fight. Do you think Mueller will push this? Do you think Mueller will take this to court if, or as I think when, you definitively hear from the president he will not sit down willingly for an interview?

COATES: I think he certainly should do so. It has not been, you know, laid down in the law definitively whether or not you can subpoena a president or whether you cannot subpoena a president. Remember, Ken Starr infamously did try to do so for Bill Clinton. And the only reason he did not pursue it further is because there was then a voluntary agreement to cooperate and speak freely. And so I think you have -- he has in his power to do so. And certainly the person who is the head of the executive branch of government, under which the Department of Justice falls, where we routinely give subpoenas to people to say, we want you to be a part of an investigation, even if you, yourself, are not the target or subject of the investigation. It behooves the president of the United States to adhere to that principle, otherwise, what is the purpose of the Department of Justice and their power to give a subpoena if the president can thumb his nose at it.

BERMAN: All right, Laura Coates, Josh Campbell, thanks very much. Good discussion.

You know who doesn't think the president should sit down for interviews in general in a criminal investigation? Brett Kavanaugh. He's written extensively about this.

HILL: Yes.

BERMAN: One of the possible nominees for the Supreme Court.

AVLON: After serving on the Starr investigation.

BERMAN: Might he have to decide on something like this ultimately if he's nominated?

HILL: Well, it will be absolutely be interesting to see.

BERMAN: Stay tuned.

All right, an extraordinary meeting between Mike Pompeo, the secretary of state, and North Korean leaders over the weekend. Many people saw this as a make or break moment. So which one was it?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:48:45] BERMAN: Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in North Korea offering starkly different views of talks this weekend. The secretary of state called the meetings productive and in good faith. North Korea called them regrettable and said that the U.S. was making gangster- like demands.

Want to bring in CNN global affairs analyst Max Boot and "Daily Beast" columnist and author of "Nuclear Showdown: North Korea Takes on the World," Gordon Chang.

Gordon, I want to start with you because you sat here with us last Friday and told us this was a make or break meeting for the secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, in terms of the goal of denuclearizing on the Korean peninsula. What was it, make or break?

GORDON CHANG, AUTHOR, "NUCLEAR SHOWDOWN: NORTH KOREA TAKES ON THE WORLD: It certainly was break. You had, you know, Pompeo say, oh, look, we've made a lot of progress. North Koreans then intentionally went out to embarrass, even humiliate him. So it shows that Kim Jong- un is not negotiating in good faith.

Remember that Trump policy is based on the assumption that Kim made a strategic decision to give up his nukes. Obviously he hasn't. he's ramped up production of fissile material. And he's not negotiating well. So I don't think we can say that this was a make meeting by any sense.

HILL: It --

AVLON: Not even a little bit.

HILL: No, not even a little bit.

The big question, of course, has been, what happens now? Not only how do you massage this in terms of the public relations aspect of it, but can you walk away? I'm sure President Trump does not want to do that, but would it be the smart thing to do?

[06:50:03] MAX BOOT, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: Well, I think walking away would be justified at this point because I agree with Gordon that there's no evidence that -- that North Korea's interested in actually giving up their nuclear arsenal. But it's not so easy to walk away because, of course, Donald Trump would have to admit this has all been a massive failure. And, remember, just a month ago he was actually saying the North Korea nuclear problem is solved. So it would --

BERMAN: Yes.

BOOT: It would be quite a significant concession if he were to concede that it hasn't been solved. And the problem is that now his options are really limited because the maximum pressure policy of putting sanctions on North Korea is now effectively the minimum pressure policy because China is not enforcing the sanctions. And it will be very hard for Trump to convince China to start reinforcing the sanctions, especially because now we're in a trade war with China, a very badly timed trade war that Donald Trump has launched. So why would Beijing want to do any favors for Donald Trump?

CHANG: Well, because we've got leverage on China right now because of the trade war. You know, people say, well, if you want China to do something, you be nice to them. No, that's exactly the wrong way. We've been doing that for two decades and gotten really bad results. The way you get China to do something is give them no choice but to do what you want, which is to impose costs. And I think the costs that we can impose with regard to North Korea are just taking their big banks, all four of their big four have been handling money for North Korea. That's money laundering. That means we can disconnect them from the global system. That gives us a lot of leverage, Max.

AVLON: And that's a -- that's a -- the important point there is not only you're proposing a solution, which seems to be lacking, but the action that the Trump administration seemed to have gotten was by being tough on North Korea. That's what they seem to respond to. The sunshine and the light, you know, build a condo in Pyongyang one day strategy doesn't seem to have worked terribly well. But I think Trump will be in a -- his instinct is going to be an extended denial dance until the midterms about this. But the maximum pressure is what they should probably return to.

BERMAN: Well -- but -- and Mike Pompeo used the words for the first time again over the weekend, after this unsuccessful meeting. The question is, will he -- will he repeat them, Gordon? Do you think he'll go back to maximum pressure? And do you think that maximum pressure is even possible any more now that they have backed off of it?

CHANG: Well, yes, of course we've backed off, but maximum pressure is possible because, for instance, we could go back to designating their front companies. The administration declined to do that at the end of May. And that is effectively hollowing out sanctions because North Korea changes its front companies all the time. If you don't designate the new ones, you're effectively giving sanctions relief.

And the secretary of the state, by the way, has not been candid with the American people because he says, oh, we got -- we're keeping our pressure on. Well, no, we're not. We're giving them a free pass. And also, we're not imposing costs on the Chinese and Russians for violating sanctions. So this has been open season on sanctions.

HILL: And there's a lot to come. I mean this week alone, as we -- we're following developments out of North Korea. But if we look at just the calendar of what's coming up this week, of course with NATO, and all of this leading up to the president sitting down, as we're told, one on one in Helsinki with Vladimir Putin. This has -- you can't ignore the fact that this is going to have an impact on not only what's happening in that meeting but the way it's perceived globally now.

BOOT: Right. I mean Vladimir Putin has to be licking his chops at this point because he's seen the way that Kim Jong-un, this young, untested dictator, has really fleeced Donald Trump. This has been a master class in self-deception the way that Donald Trump convinced himself that North Korea wants to disarm and so far he's not willing to receive any evidence to the contrary. And so you have to wonder, you know, how does -- how does this play going into this meeting with Putin, who is a -- remember, in the case of Kim Jong-un, Donald Trump was castigating him only a few months ago as little rocket man and all this other stuff, whereas with Putin, he's had nothing but kind and wonderful things to say about him throughout the course of his life. And so he is just ready to be fleeced here by Vladimir Putin. And Putin is ready to take advantage of this moment.

So I think there's real cause for concern for anybody who cares about the future of the west alliance, about what happens in -- first in this meeting with NATO and then with this meeting with Putin.

BERMAN: Let's talk about the western alliance because there are a lot of NATO leaders and officials from these NATO countries who are very, very nervous right now about what the U.S. intentions are in Europe. What do you see, Max?

BOOT: Well, I think there is cause to be very nervous because, you know, of what happened a few weeks ago at the G-7 summit in Quebec where Donald -- it was basically the G-6 versus G-1, where Donald Trump was at odds with all of our allies, he insulted the Prime Minister of Canada. He talked about inviting Russia back in. And so this sets up a very ominous meeting.

Now, right now what you see in Europe is that the Europeans themselves are divided. Britain is distracted by the Brexit controversy. In Italy and in Hungary you have right-wing pro-Russian governments. You have an authoritarian government in Poland. So Europe really needs some leadership here to take on Russia. And under any other president, the U.S. would provide it. But the concern here is that instead of trying to unite the Europeans against Russia, Donald Trump will do the opposite, that he will divide the Europeans and make huge concessions to Russia and put another nail into the coffin of the western alliance. That's the real concern here.

BERMAN: Max Boot, Gordon Chang, thanks so much for being with us. Appreciate it.

BOOT: Thanks.

CHANG: Thank you.

[06:55:04] HILL: Still to come, a fifth boy rescued from that cave in Thailand. The rescue operation for the other boys who remain trapped with their coach is underway. We have a live update for you, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

BERMAN: Good morning. Welcome to your NEW DAY. Erica Hill in for Alisyn this morning.

And the breaking news is out of Thailand. A fifth boy has been rescued from the flooded cave there, pulled about an hour and a half ago from inside. He arrived at the hospital just moments ago. There are pictures of that caravan arriving there in northern Thailand.

HILL: As he and four others are being treated, we know that rescuers are still frantically trying to save the remaining seven boys and their soccer coach, who remain trapped underground. They have now been there for 17 days. Oxygen levels are falling as water levels threaten to rise.

We begin our breaking news coverage with CNN's Ivan Watson, who is live in northern Thailand.

[07:00:01] Ivan.

IVAN WATSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Erica.

That's right, within the last hour and 40 minutes, CNN has learned that a fifth boy was rescued from deep inside the mountain and the cave system behind me.