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New Day

Michael Fanone is Interviewed about the January 6th Committee; Death Toll Rises in Condo Collapse; Trump Comments about Hitler; Terrified Republicans Change their Tune; Spears Legal Drama Intensifies. Aired 8:30-9a ET

Aired July 07, 2021 - 08:30   ET

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


[08:30:00]

MICHAEL FANONE, DC METROPOLITAN POLICE OFFICER: By the, you know, head of our executive branch, the president at the time, Donald Trump, and his coworkers. I mean it needs to stop.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: You implored McCarthy to take an investigation, really a commission, which isn't going to happen, of what happened on January 6th seriously. What were your conversations with him like?

FANONE: I mean, I felt like it was very noncommittal. You know, I had specific requests. Again, I asked Kevin to denounce the 21 House Republicans that voted against the Gold Medal bill. I asked him to denounce Representative Clyde's diminutive statements regarding the January 6th insurrection and any other coworkers or colleagues of his who have made similar statements. I asked him to denounce the baseless theory that somehow the FBI was behind or inspired the January 6th insurrection because that type of rhetoric is incredibly dangerous. And I also asked him to take the select committee seriously because that is, you know, in my mind, at this point, the only mechanism that we have for investigating the root causes of that day.

KEILAR: Will you testify? Is that something that you would welcome the opportunity to have?

FANONE: Oh, yes, I'm looking forward to it.

KEILAR: What would you say?

FANONE: I mean, I would tell the truth. Talk about my experiences that day. How brutal it was. You know, what I saw firsthand.

KEILAR: Do you think Republicans are interested in hearing that from you? Is that something that you were asked by McCarthy or by other Republicans you've been able to meet with?

FANONE: I mean, unfortunately, there hasn't been a lot of outreach. You know, the Republicans that did reach out to me coincidentally were the Republicans that voted to impeach Donald Trump. I mean it's unfortunate. I see a -- kind of an interesting narrative starting to come about

from, you know, people on the right is that, you know, we support law enforcement, but we don't support those law enforcement officers because they're failures, and their actions that day were a disgrace. And that's been a hard pill to swallow. You know, again, you see individuals putting their own political careers ahead of truth.

KEILAR: We have some reporting from court documents that there has been an arrest of someone involved in a group that this person allegedly participated in the January 6th attack. They also have surveilled the Capitol since then.

Are you worried that there could be another attack?

FANONE: I think as long as, you know, our political leaders continue to perpetuate lies, lies that fueled the January 6th insurrection, and then lies regarding the January 6th insurrection, there's always that possibility.

KEILAR: Mike, I'm really sorry for, you know, what you're dealing with in the aftermath here. We are six months out. It kind of feels like it just happened yesterday. But we certainly appreciate your voice on this. Thank you for talking with us.

FANONE: Thank you.

KEILAR: Up next, the race against time at the condo collapsed site. CNN will get access to this collapsed building.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: And new developments in the Britney Spears saga. Her manager and lawyer now abruptly quitting.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:37:47]

BERMAN: The search continues for dozens of people still unaccounted for in the Surfside condo collapse. Rescue crews are finding more victims after the remaining portion of the building was demolished. Thirty-six people now confirmed dead, and now workers are battling these strong winds and rain brought on by now Tropical Storm Elsa, which did complicate their search efforts.

CNN's Leyla Santiago did get a firsthand account. She got access to the collapsed site and joins us now.

Leyla, what did you see there?

LEYLA SANTIAGO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You know, John, you realize when you get closer to that pile, the magnitude of it. The fact that the ocean is just on the other side and you can't see it but you see a bunch of concrete and twisted wire that is piled up. And, of course, it is what is underneath that has torn this family apart.

I just spoke to a task member this morning who tells me they are very much still in search and rescue mode and they are aware that they represent hope for these families. So the harder they work, they believe the closer they can bring these families to hope for closure.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SANTIAGO (voice over): A race against the clock as crews try to dig through the rubble of the Surfside building collapse as Elsa nears Florida. The turbulent weather delaying the efforts Tuesday.

MAYOR DANIELLA LEVINE CAVA, MIAMI-DADE COUNTY, FLORIDA: They were forced to pause for a little bit, about two hours, earlier this afternoon because of the lightning, which is mandatory to not work during lightning. And also some gusts of winds that did go above 30 miles per hour.

SANTIAGO: New search video released curtsey of the Florida Task Force II Search and Rescue Team is providing an up-close look at the pool deck of the building, as well as a closer look at the debris left by the building. Rescue workers seen here trying to break through the rubble with power tools and heavy excavation equipment.

SANTIAGO (on camera): This is as close as we've been able to get. And just being here, so up close, you see the twisted metal, the pile so high of concrete. You can't even see the ocean and it's on the other side.

But, of course, it's what's underneath that has torn apart this community.

[08:40:01]

SANTIAGO (voice over): Workers painstakingly dig through the debris by hand or with shovels, searching for any of the unaccounted for residents. Canine units also assisting the search, seen on top of the huge mound of rubble.

CHIEF ALAN COMINSKY, MIAMI=DADE COUNTY FIRE: Unfortunately, we're not seeing anything positive that continues in that sense. You know, the key things we were looking for all throughout in regards to void space, livable spaces, you know, we're not coming across that. So we're, you know, actively searching as aggressively as we can.

SANTIAGO: As Elsa approaches the state's west coast, the investigation is ramping up. On Tuesday, more federal partners arrived on-site to investigate the building collapse. As task force members searched through the debris, all distinguishable items found at the site are transported by police to another site for further investigation.

CAVA: This is all evidentiary debris. It's been sorted on-site and any objects that can be distinguished are put in certain bins and labelled as to their exact location.

DIRECTOR ALFREDO RAMIREZ, MIAMI-DADE POLICE: It's in the custody of the Miami-Dade Police Department where we're securing a site and we are cataloging and documenting all evidence as being sorted.

(END VIDEOTAPE) SANTIAGO: And, you know, John, where I'm standing, you see the building collapse site right behind me. I can hear the heavy equipment at work. But it is only about half a block away from where a memorial site has been established with photos and flowers. This morning we have been hearing a man playing the tin whistle, and he says that he's playing in hopes that anyone who may still be alive under that rubble can hear him. Every single person I have spoken to says they are still holding on to a lot of hope, but feel like this is just one bad dream.

BERMAN: Now two weeks in almost at this point, Leyla, and I know you were there right from the beginning. And that memorial wall is so deeply moving. Thank you so much for being there for us. Appreciate it.

KEILAR: And up next, a new book claims that former President Trump complimented Adolf Hitler.

BERMAN: And new details on the fate of Britney Spears. Is the pop star getting ready to retire amid all the legal drama?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: Stunning new revelations this morning from a new book. Author Michael Bender claims former President Trump once told General John Kelly, then his chief of staff, quote, that Adolf Hitler did a lot of good things. Let me repeat that. He said Adolf Hitler did a lot of good things.

Bender says Trump made the remark during a trip to Europe in 2018 to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the end of World War I. This is the excerpt from Bender's book called, "Frankly, We Did Win this Election." And it says, quote, well, Hitler did a lot of good things, Trump told Kelly. When I asked Trump about the remark, he claimed the conversation ever happened and he denied praising Hitler. But others said the remark stunned Kelly.

[08:45:03]

Joining us now, CNN political director David Chalian.

Wow, question mark?

DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: Yes, I mean, very fine people on both sides, right? I mean, yes, wow, question mark, that Donald Trump if -- you know, I know he denies that this conversation ever took place. But if you take Bender's reporting at face value, that Donald Trump doesn't have the political antenna to understand what John Kelly, General Kelly, is trying to explain to him, which is that you just simply can't say something positive like that about Adolf Hitler's leadership.

I mean this gets to, a, Donald Trump's fundamental misunderstanding of history. There's no doubt about that. But words have power, John, right? I mean this is -- this is not disconnected from members of Congress using Hitler comparisons or Nazi comparisons to make political points, which is just absurd. Political lesson number one is, don't make any comparisons to Hitler or to Nazism because there are no comparisons.

BERMAN: Yes.

CHALIAN: And yet, here Donald Trump is, of course, trying to find some positive light in this, you know, evil piece of world history.

BERMAN: And acolyte Marjorie Taylor Greene doing it once again today, talking about brown shirts again even after she went to the Holocaust Museum.

There's sort of a -- even a higher level macro thing here, which is that if you think about the type of politics that Donald Trump and his supporters like to espouse, it's sort of the Hughley Long, all the kings men theory, which, you know, doesn't really matter who you are inside, it's what you do. You have to, you know, break some eggs to make an omelet. It's just sort of this strong-man theory of governance that he seems to embrace.

CHALIAN: Yes, but, I mean, how does that make any sense when you're talking about somebody who oversaw a genocide? I mean it -- they -- that is just not the way any American president, I think, has ever referred to Hitler before. And, again, Donald Trump showing he's unlike every prior American president.

BERMAN: Yes, he doesn't care clearly.

KEILAR: Yes, and who's influencing him to -- where he would get this kind of information and somehow purport that it is the truth?

But I also want to ask you, David, about a tape that -- a purported tape of Republican Congressman Chip Roy saying that it is the GOP's job to obstruct everything until after next year's midterm elections.

Now, we should note that this tape did come from an activist. We reached out to Roy's office for comment. We have not heard back. But he did retweet the video himself. Let's watch a short clip of it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. CHIP ROY (R-TX): Hey, look, you're seeing it happen right now on transportation and infrastructure, right? Pelosi, is just tacking hard to the left and AOC and company. You saw them pull (ph) this whole Pelosi, Schumer, Biden's a -- you know, thing on infrastructure. We have no idea what they are. So it's going to be dependent on the Senate.

And what Senator Scott is able to work out with whatever coalition he can get to get to 60, as long as 60 is the number, which is obviously something in question. I mean, honestly, right now, for the next 18 months, our job is to do everything we can to slow that down and get to December of 2022 and then get in -- get in here and lead (ph).

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: I think perhaps the surprising part is that we actually hear this on tape. What do you think, David? CHALIAN: Yes, well, Brianna, I don't think it will surprise anyone

that Chip Roy, a really conservative congressman, is not supportive of the Pelosi agenda in the house and would not like to see much of it go forward.

But I think, speaking this way to your constituents, it is, I think, emblematic of our broken politics, which is that there just is no governing period any more in American politics. It is pure partisan camps and it is all looking to the next election for victory. And so here you see somebody putting forth a member of Congress, a full-on political strategy to say, stop everything, then hopefully Republicans win the house according to his take, and they can put in the policies that they want.

But if you think that voters might be interested in members of -- Republican and Democratic members of Congress working together to actually benefit something from them, that theory is not present in anything Chip Roy is supposedly saying.

KEILAR: Does he have any, you think, political liability in this? I mean is this something that constituents in his district will hold against him or will they be happy that he said this?

CHALIAN: Yes, I mean, I would imagine his supporters will certainly be happy. The question is, of course, in voters in the middle. Chip Roy comes from a pretty reliable district. So I don't -- I don't think that there's going to be a huge political blowback.

In fact, you know, it reminds me back at the beginning of the Obama era, right, when Mitch McConnell said, we want to make him a one-term president. Obviously, that didn't happen. But, you know, in the Obama years, Mitch McConnell did indeed win control of the Senate. So I don't think this kind of full polarization partisan hardened stances don't work together, just fight for the next victory, I don't think we've seen the voters say, hey, that doesn't work for us.

[08:50:09]

They say it in polls perhaps, but not necessarily at the ballot box.

KEILAR: A very good point.

David Chalian, great to see you.

CHALIAN: Sure.

KEILAR: Quote like cultural heroin. That is just one of the things that author J.D. Vance called Donald Trump back in 2016. Well, now that Vance wants an Ohio Senate seat, he's taking everything he said back and he is far from the only Republican who is doing that, as John Avlon explains in our "Reality Check."

JOHN AVLON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: That's right.

No apology used to be a conservative catch phrase. Well, that's old and busted. The new hotness is being all apologies. And not in the Nirvana sense. I'm talking about the self-flagellation that's apparently the price of entry for a future in Republican politics.

The latest example comes from J.D. Vance, bestselling author of "Hillbilly Elegy" and a very wealthy venture capitalist now running for Senate in Ohio.

CNN's K-file uncovered a boatload of deleted tweets where he slammed Trump in 2016 and 2017, saying things like I find him reprehensible, announcing he was voting for Evan McMullen instead and saying, in four years I hope people remember that it was those of us who empathized with Trump's voters who fought him most aggressively.

Not exactly. Because here we are, and J.D. Vance is beginning his campaign with an apology tour.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

J.D. VANCE: And I ask folks not to judge me based on what I said in 2016 because I've been very open about the fact that I did say those critical things, and I regret them. And I regret being wrong about the guy. I think that he was a good president.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

AVLON: J.D. Vance is a smart guy. He cares about the community he came from. Went to Yale Law and became partner at a V.C. fund cofounded by President Biden's chief of staff, Ron Klain. But, obviously, that's not going to help him in a GOP primary where candidates are all trying to out-Trump each other. And so he's making the same calculation that a lot of ambitious young Republicans are making when they decide that the pursuit of power is more important than principles, even when it involved pesky things like inciting insurrection.

But he's far from alone. This how low can you go limbo has been parlayed into power in Republican leadership by Elise Stefanik. Back in 2016, she slammed Trump's comments about women, gold star families and Muslims, saying, this is not who we are as a country. She opposed his plan to build the wall, as well as his general coziness with all things Kremlin. But she voted to contest the election after the attack on our Capitol and saw an opening when Liz Cheney condemned the big lie, remaking herself into a MAGA talking point machine. Those principled criticisms apparently a but a big misunderstanding.

But, hey, at least Trump didn't go after her family because that would probably be a deal breaker, right? Unless you're George P. Bush in Texas, or Ted Cruz. Now, it's worth remembering that he once called Trump out with surgical precision.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. TED CRUZ (R-TX): This man is a pathological liar.

A narcissist at a level I don't think this country has ever seen.

The man is utterly amoral. Morality does not exist for him.

(END VIDEO CLIP) AVLON: But then Trump won and Ted Cruz turned himself into a cheerleader for all things Donald, forgiving him for all the attacks on his family, becoming a charter member of the sedition caucus because, hey, he might want to run for president some day and up there on the hustings will be other former Trump critics turn apologists from Nikki Haley to Mike Pompeo and on and on.

Look, it doesn't take a genius to figure out which time those folks were telling the truth. But the prospect of power and money has a way of changing moral calculations because while Trump is deeply unpopular with the American people as a whole, he's still very popular with the Republican base. And you can't get any nomination without them.

A new republic -- a new "Washington Post" analysis shows how deep the rot has gotten. Get this, it found that nearly of third of Republicans who filed to run for the House or Senate next year have backed the big lie. That's the new litmus test for the GOP. And so if you had the moral clarity and cojones to try to stand up to Trump once, you've got to apologize. Who knew that self-flagellation was a symptom of Stockholm syndrome, or as J.D. Vance once tweeted, fellow Christians, everyone is watching us when we apologize for this man. Lord help us.

Indeed.

And that's your "Reality Check."

KEILAR: A very good one.

John Avlon, thank you.

Tens of thousands are now without power because Tropical Storm Elsa is approaching landfall in Florida. We'll have live coverage of this just ahead.

BERMAN: But first, the Britney Spears shake-up. Her manager and lawyer both quit as the legal battle over her life and her huge fortune intensifies.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:57:00]

KEILAR: New developments this morning in Britney Spears' legal battle to free herself from the conservatorship that has controlled her life for more than a decade, and that she says is abusive. Samuel Ingham (ph), who is her court-appointed conservatorship lawyer, is asking to resign from the role. He has represented the popstar since the court- ordered arrangement began in 2008. And this request comes a day after Spears' long-time manager, Larry Rudolph, quit. He claims he became aware that Britney was getting ready to officially retire.

BERMAN: So as the legal drama intensifies, the business of Britney remains strong, as it has been all along.

CNN chief business correspondent Christine Romans, also the co-anchor of "EARLY START," joins us now with that. Romans.

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, John. Spears has been on hiatus from performing and her millions of fans are hanging on every whisper of a potential retirement, of course. But what is clear, Britney is a talented performer and a money maker.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ROMANS (voice over): For 13 years a court has deemed Britney Spears unable to take care of her own finances. During that time she has recorded four studio albums, headlined the $131 million global circuits tour and staged a four-year residency in Las Vegas that Caesars Entrainment says grossed more than $137 million.

At the age of 39, she has been working and making money more than two- thirds of her life. She told a judge last month, all I want is to own my money. That money feeds a small army of lawyers, managers, agents, publicists, to say nothing of dancers and back-up singers, arrangers and producers.

Journalist Ronan Farrow sets the scene in "The New Yorker." Every Thursday at noon, about ten people responsible for managing Spears' legal and business affairs, public relations and social media met to discuss business deals, song license requests and Spears' posts to Instagram and Twitter.

The conservatorship began in 2008 after a series of personal issues that played out publicly for the singer. A third of her life now has been spent under this conservatorship and she has continued to make money. She has complained that she needs permission to spend that money, even to change the color of her kitchen cabinets according to court records obtained by "The New York Times."

Perhaps the most troubling of her claims, during the recent hearing she told a judge of the IUD birth control she uses. This so-called team won't let me go to the doctor to take it out because they don't want me to have any more children.

Spears' father has called for an investigation into the claims she made in court.

Forbes estimates her net worth at $60 million. At the tail end of a powerful list of popstars, Rihanna is worth $600 million. Beyonce, $420 million. Taylor Swift, $365 million. Jennifer Lopez, $150 million, and Jessica Simpson, $110 million.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ROMANS: These empires built on more than just singing and dancing, John, but lucrative footwear and cosmetics deals. For Spears, there's certainly plenty more earning potential should she regroup and come back from her hiatus, John.

[09:00:03] BERMAN: Yes, obviously, money at serious play here in all this drama.

Christine Romans, thank you so much for that.