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Will Supreme Court Take Up Trump's Executive Privilege Case?; Christie: "Undeniable" Trump Gave me COVID Last Year; Trump Rails Against One-Time Ally Netanyahu: "F*** Him"; Retailers Ask Congress for Help on "Smash and Grab" Attacks; Police Captain: "It's Worse than a War Zone Around Here". Aired 7-7:30a ET

Aired December 10, 2021 - 07:00   ET

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

[07:00:00]

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ALEXANDRA FIELD, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): For those stores left, the holiday displays are even more meaningful.

JOHN KLIMKOWSKI, SENIOR DIRECTOR, VISUAL MERCHANDISING, BLOOMINGDALES: When there's lots of us that makes our job more important to keep people shopping and visiting the store.

FIELD: At Bloomingdales, nostalgia shines over Lexington Avenue. Each window inspired by a designer's childhood memory, a favorite toy dinosaur, sweaters knit by mom, a twirling jewelry box ballerina.

KLIMKOWSKI: Everybody wants to forget. And just let them some go for a moment. And you know that's our job is to provide that little relief so that everyone can get themselves into that holiday spirit that they're yearning for.

FIELD: And perhaps the most storied windows of all, Macy's.

MANY URQUIZO, NATIONAL WINDOWS DIRECTOR, MACY'S: These windows are Macy's gift to the city.

FIELD: The flagship store has been delighting New York City for more than a century.

URQUIZO: And we are carrying that tradition of enchanting our customers and our New Yorkers.

FIELD: Last year, the famous Herald Square windows paid tribute to frontline workers. Now, a return to the traditional as shoppers come back to the city.

COVID-19 and its variants are still here.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When you're still got to wear your mask and do your things and get your vaccines and stuff. But it's nice to be out again seeing people, enjoying things. It's great to start over again.

FIELD: But a dose of holiday cheer is making the season a little brighter.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FIELD (on camera): All right. So, all of that is really just to say that New York does the holidays best.

But really, you have to look back and think about where we were last year. We were just starting to see shots going into arms. We are now talking about some 200 million Americans who are vaccinated.

So, this is real cause for celebration for so many families. And I think a lot of people are going to be happy to put up with the travel headaches, the family drama, however you celebrate just to be able to celebrate.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: It's nice to see those smiles. It was really nice to see all those smiles in that piece. Thanks so much.

"NEW DAY" continues right now.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: Hello. I'm Brianna Keilar with John Berman.

On this "NEW DAY," overnight a Florida college student is in custody after allegedly plotting to shoot up his campus. We'll have the disturbing new details.

BERMAN: And former President Trump souring on one of his closest international allies, telling one reporter, F him. What's behind the fallout.

KEILAR: And CEOs from some of America's largest retailers are begging Congress for help as crime hits record levels across several major cities.

BERMAN: And Chris Christie says it's undeniable that Trump gave him COVID and that Mark Meadows, his silence was inexcusable.

KEILAR: Welcome to our viewers in the United States and around the world. It is Friday, December 10th. I'm Brianna Keilar with John Berman.

BERMAN: And it has been a roller coaster week for the group of lawmakers investigating the January 6th insurrection.

New this morning, Donald Trump's efforts to keep records secret involving his administration's response to the riots rejected by an appeals court.

Next stop, the Supreme Court. If the justices will take the case, more on that in just a moment.

Also, this week, the committee getting a hold of communications involving former Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, communications that Congresswoman Liz Cheney calls very interesting. Communications that detail Trump's actions during those hours. The committee also deposed several key players, including coup memo author John Eastman. Chris Krebs, a key Homeland Security official and an organizer behind the "Stop the Steal" rally. And former Defense Department official Kash Patel.

On the other hand, Meadows did reverse course by abruptly stopping his cooperation with the committee, if he was really cooperating at all. He is now suing the members, along with Speaker Pelosi.

More of Trump's allies, including Roger Stone, have signaled they will plead the Fifth. And as the committee threatens to hold more of Trump's allies in contempt for not cooperating, a judge has set a trial date for Steve Bannon's contempt charges in July. That's a pretty long time to wait.

Liz Cheney says the committee will not let Trump hide what happened or obstruct the investigation. She says, quote, "The investigation is firing on all cylinders."

Brianna?

KEILAR: Joining me now is CNN contributor Steve Vladeck. He is a professor at the University of Texas School of Law.

Steve, good morning to you.

Is it a foregone conclusion that this case will go to the Supreme Court?

STEVE VLADECK, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Hey, Brianna.

I mean I think it's a foregone conclusion that President Trump will ask the Supreme Court to step in. Basically, yesterday's ruling by the federal appeals court in Washington gives Trump 14 more days. So, until December 23rd to ask the Supreme Court to continue to prevent the turning over of documents from his administration to the January 6th committee.

[07:05:02]

If he doesn't file, then as of December 23rd, those documents will be handed over. So, I think Brianna, it's certainly likely that he will ask the justices to continue the pause and to take up his appeal. I'm much less certain that the justices are going to respond favorably.

KEILAR: These judges at the appeals court level, they weren't impressed by the arguments that Trump's lawyers were making. Did Trump's lawyers make any arguments that the Supreme Court might take seriously?

VLADECK: Yeah. You know, I mean I think it is certainly the case, Brianna, that there are some arguments about executive privilege lingering in this case that might appeal to two or three of the justices. But I think part of why we saw the appeals court do what it did. If you remember, back in November, they froze the expected handover of documents. They expedited oral arguments. They wrote this 68-page opinion that we got yesterday in 10 days.

I think part of why that all happened was to basically convince the justices that there's really nothing to see here. That this is actually a pretty outlandish claim by the former president and his lawyers. That where you have Congress and the sitting president agreeing as to what kinds of materials can and cannot be handed over, it would really be a remarkable precedent to allow someone who is no longer in the Oval Office to come in and prevent that from going forward.

So, you know I think there are one or two justices, maybe even three justices who would be interested in this. But, Brianna, in the posture the case is in, former President Trump is going to need five of them to agree to keep the document turnover on hold and to rule pretty quickly. That's why I think we're going to have a decision on this one way or the other by pretty early in January.

KEILAR: All right. We'll be watching.

Steve, thank you for that.

BERMAN: So, in a new interview, Former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie is responding to the revelation that former -- the former President Trump had tested positive for COVID several days earlier than was publicly known and that former Chief of Staff Mark Meadows didn't tell anyone. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHRIS CHRISTIE (R), FORMER NEW JERSEY GOVERNOR: If Mark Meadows knew that somebody that I was sitting across from for four days had popped a positive test, he, as the White House chief of staff, put aside the president for a second. Obviously, the president as my friend should have looked at me and told me that. That's obvious. But I think what's less obvious is that Mark Meadows saved this for his book.

MARGARET HOOVER, HOST, "FIRING LINE WITH MARGARET HOOVER": Yeah.

CHRISTIE: He saved it for a book. He didn't tell us. I went into the hospital in the intensive care unit. He didn't call and tell me. So, I think that's inexcusable.

HOOVER: You had always suspected that you got it from the president. Is that right?

CHRISTIE: Well, the only reason I suspected it was because he was the only person who I didn't know his testing regimen that was I was in close contact with. All the other people, we spoke about --

HOOVER: So, did this confirm for you that you did, in fact, get it from the president?

CHRISTIE: I think it's undeniable. HOOVER: And I mean, you were very sick, you could have died.

CHRISTIE: Sure. So, could he.

HOOVER: And the president knowingly walked in to work with you for four days without a mask and exposed you to COVID. And then he went and met with Gold Star families.

CHRISTIE: Right. No, look, I'm not excusing any of it, but it's all brand new information to me and I'm giving you what our raw reaction was. I was as close to him as you and I are to each other right now. I was playing Joe Biden. I was sitting right across from him and we had some very spirited disagreements.

HOOVER: Which you write about in the book.

CHRISTIE: During the - during the debate prep.

So, saliva was flying back and forth between the two of us.

HOOVER: Particles. COVID particles were going everywhere.

CHRISTIE: As it turned out, I didn't know that because I didn't have any COVID particles. And the reason I know is because I was tested every day before I went in. And by the way, six of the seven of us in that room got it.

HOOVER: Yeah.

CHRISTIE: Hope Hicks, Bill Stepien, Kellyanne Conway, me, Stephen Miller and Donald Trump, all wound up with COVID in that room.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: Joining me now is CNN political commentator and the host of "Firing Line" on PBS, the show where Chris Christie made those comments, Margaret Hoover.

This is a really good interview. And it's really interesting how you pressed him. We didn't see it just there. But you started asking him a really interesting line of questions. It was given this all this, given that you think it is undeniable that Trump gave you COVID, you still refer to him as your friend?

HOOVER: And Chris Christie said, well, that comment about him being a friend is more of a historical reference. We've been friends for 20 years. And he is apt, drive his book and all the time to say, oh, Donald Trump and I are friends. Chris Christie's definition of friend is maybe a little loose than you and I as might be, John.

But I mean he is really clear that he feels betrayed.

BERMAN: Yeah.

HOOVER: And he understands the phone call that president made to him when he was in the hospital very differently now than he did at the time.

[07:10:03]

Of course, President Trump called him to say you're not going to tell anyone you got COVID from me. And Chris Christie said, well, why would I do that? Well, now he understands full well that the president knew he had given it to him and knew full well that he was potentially exposing those six that were in the debate prep meetings with him. Let alone the Gold Star families he met with right afterwards.

BERMAN: And Chris Christie was in a bad way, which you keep on pointing out to him, which he acknowledges. He was in a bad way in intensive care.

HOOVER: He could have died. And he says very early on, this was touch and go at the beginning. Could have gone either way. And he's most angry at Mark Meadows.

BERMAN: Right.

HOOVER: The president's chief of staff. But by the way, the White House doctor also knew. I mean there were many people who are complicit in the fact that the president knowingly exposed his key and top staffers.

BERMAN: It was really interesting. He listed those specifically. He was -- he's mad at Trump, too. You know he was mad at -- very mad at Meadows. Like - but I'm not sure he ever really liked Mark Meadows. But really mad at Meadows. He's mad at you. He really is mad at Trump and also Sean Conley. He thinks Sean Conley had a responsibility to tell the people in those room, that room.

HOOVER: He absolutely did. The best part is, it's CNN's Dana Bash who is the one who actually let Chris Christie know that he had potentially been exposed. If you ever doubt that she is one of the best sourced reporters of that White House, she was the one who texted him and said how are feeling.

BERMAN: She may have saved his life. I mean he may have gotten him to go in and get tested more quickly or get him checked out much more quickly.

HOOVER: And then they got him straight to emergency, the emergency care.

BERMAN: I want to ask you about a development overnight that gets to the personality, and I also think may have driven this episode between COVID and Christie and everything else. And this has to do with Benjamin Netanyahu, the former prime minister of Israel.

Trump did an interview with "Axios" journalist Barak Ravid for a book that Ravid is doing on the peace process or the various accomplishments that he says that Trump had toward Middle East peace. But in the process of talking to Trump, he got Trump to reveal he's really angry at Netanyahu, like extremely angry for the fact that Netanyahu ever called to congratulate Biden on his election win. Listen to these quotes about the timing of Netanyahu's call.

Trump says, quote, "It was early, OK. Let's put it this way. He greeted him very early. Earlier than most world leaders. I've not spoken to him since. F him. There was no one who did more for Netanyahu than me. There was no one who did for Israel more than I did. And the first person to run to greet Joe Biden was Netanyahu."

HOOVER: Donald Trump views the fact that Netanyahu had the audacity to congratulate. By the way, after 12 hours, right? He did - I mean he was not like he picked up the phone as soon as Arizona was called. He waited 12 hours. Then he did what every world leader in his right mind does, you call and congratulate the new president of the United States.

He views that as the ultimate betrayal of him personally and of their friendship, which is consistent with how Chris Christie is being treated by Donald Trump. How Donald Trump treats everyone. I mean Donald Trump said in that same statement, well Bolsonaro believes that it was a lie. Vladimir Putin believes that it was a lie. So, Donald Trump's friendships are about who is going to reinforce his own untrue world view that he still won the election.

BERMAN: He was - he says, Putin waited. Putin waited. How come Netanyahu couldn't wait.

HOOVER: Why wouldn't Netanyahu be on Putin's side with me. I mean it's outrageous on its face. But - I mean that one - to bring it back to Chris Christie. That's one of the things that distinguishes Chris Christie from any other Republican who is potentially looking at 2024.

Chris Christie is running on the platform that Donald Trump lost the election and is lying about it and has to stop the conspiracy theories, which is refreshing to have someone from the right calling out Trump for his lies and his vanity.

BERMAN: It's not just enough to have it be a Republican conspiracy theory or domestic conspiracy. He wants Netanyahu. He wants it to be a global conspiracy theory on this. But the idea that, oh, Putin waited, why didn't you.

But also, the idea you say it's always about Trump here. And that's the case with Christie. He didn't care about who he infected. He didn't care about maybe spreading COVID being patient zero. He only cared about himself.

But you know whatever progress was made in the Middle East, it doesn't seem Trump truly cares about that for what it was, which is maybe progress in the Middle East. He cares about what it means for him personally.

HOOVER: All -- everything that happened on his watch is only relevant to the extent that it perpetuates his legacy, perpetuates his good name, perpetuates his reputation. It is all about Trump. And it always has been in a way that we've just never seen before in the American presidency. BERMAN: I do wonder how Netanyahu responds to this and Netanyahu wants to get back into politics or is still in politics in Israel. It's not just similar to being a Republican in the United States, right? It's hard to do it without Donald Trump. Can Netanyahu become prime minister again in Israel without Trump at his back?

HOOVER: As he is fighting corruption charges. And with Trump, Trump is enormously popular in Israel still. Enormously popular. So, I look forward to how he plays it.

BERMAN: Margaret Hoover, it's great to see you in person.

[07:15:01]

HOOVER: Thanks for having me.

BERMAN: It was - it's a terrific interview. Everyone should go watch all of it because you get -- Christie talks a lot. But you get him to talk in ways that he doesn't normally.

HOOVER: Thanks. 8:30 tonight.

BERMAN: All right. Excellent.

Next, the murder rate in major U.S. cities reaching all-time records. We're going to speak to a police chief who calls it worse than a war zone in his city.

Plus, how two students may have headed off a mass shooting on a Florida college campus.

KEILAR: And CNN goes inside a Michigan hospital once again swamped with COVID patients.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Now they're here with a mask on their face, teary eyed, staring at me asking me if they're going to live or not.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

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[07:20:00]

KEILAR: A wave of brazen store robberies has CEOs pleading with Congress for help. San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Chicago are among the cities that have seen these "smash and grab" mob attacks targeting retailers. And that's why the CEOs of Target, Best Buy, Home Depot and CVS are among more than 20 retail leaders who sent a letter to Congress yesterday urging lawmakers to pass what's called the INFORM act. That's an acronym. INFORM stands for Integrity, Notification and Fairness in Online Retail Marketplaces. And this is a measure that would make it easier for consumers to identify who they're buying from and harder for criminals to sell stolen merchandise online. The idea being that if they can't sell it, they're not going to steal it. BERMAN: So, three weeks still left to go in 2021. At least 12 major U.S. cities are hitting an all-time high in their murder rates. This is coming after 2020 which saw the largest single year increase in homicides in more than a century.

One of those cities is Rochester, New York. It broke a 30-year record for the bloodiest and deadliest year with 79 murders to date.

Joining me now is Captain Frank Umbrino of the Rochester police department.

Captain, thank you for being with us this morning.

Look, you said Rochester is like a war zone. How so?

CAPTAIN FRANK UMBRINO, ROCHESTER POLICE: Just the amount of violence and gunfire that we've been seeing lately has just been through the roof. Over the weekend, you know we had one incident on 9:00 in the morning, we got over 40 gunshots fired on you know one of the main streets that we have here in the city. You know we have innocent people going to buy Christmas trees you know that -- that got shot. You know it's just -- it's been very challenging year for us here in Rochester.

BERMAN: And this is something that's new?

UMBRINO: Well, you know, probably within the last 18 months. If you go back to, you know, 2017, 2018, 2019, we were averaging about 30 homicides a year. Now granted, you know one person getting killed is too many. Unfortunately, we don't live in a utopian society and we're going to have you know some level of crime. So, you know we go from you know an average of 30 homicides a year in 2017, 2018, 2019, to where we are today at - at you know almost 80 homicides for the year so far.

BERMAN: So, what do you think changed?

UMBRINO: Well, you know, it's like the perfect storm. And the question that we always get asked is you know, why is crime through the roof. And there is no one single factor as to why crime is the way it is today. You know I could list off 10 different reasons in my opinion based upon you know my experiences on why crime is out of control.

You know obviously it starts at home. At what point in a child's life do they learn that it is OK to pull a trigger and to shoot somebody or go steal something. You have kids having kids. You have poor family structure at home. You know you have failing school systems.

We currently have a juvenile justice system that does nothing to help these children when they're getting in trouble at an early age. Let's face it, John. It is not uncommon for kids to go astray. So, what are we doing to help our children when they go astray? You got a 14-year- old kid that maybe gets caught stealing a candy bar today, he's stealing a car tomorrow, he's doing a carjacking next week. and by the time he's 17 years old, you know unfortunately we are arresting him for a murder. We need to be able to intervene with these children who are going astray at an early age.

BERMAN: But is that different in 2021? Is that different in 2021 than it was in 2017 and 2018?

UMBRINO: Yes. You know we've come up with you know raise the age programs here in New York where you know anybody under 18 is considered a juvenile. And you know you go back several years. And we had all kinds of programs. You know whether they be you know shock boot camps or stuff like that.

You know we love our children. And we want our children to succeed. And you know what we are doing now, you know I can give you an example here in Rochester earlier this year. We had a 14-year-old kid who had been arrested three times within the last year. The fourth time we arrested him it was for lighting a man on fire who was sitting in his chair in his living room.

We failed that kid. We did nothing to get him to counseling and the services that he needed. And unfortunately, sometimes, you know, you may need to put these kids into a home, a kid jail, if you will. We are failing our kids by not intervening and not stepping in and simply giving them, you know a parent's tickets and asking them to show up in court in two days.

BERMAN: I've heard you. And you put - put a lot of the blame or some of the blame on political leadership in the state. But you know if you were a chief, you could wave a magic wand and change two things, what would those two things be?

UMBRINO: I would get rid of the partisanship that currently exists when we talk about crime. Crime is not a partisan issue. We all have the same goal. We want to be safe. We want our families to be safe.

You know you talk about some reforms that have come in. Sure, you always need to evaluate systems, right, to see if you can make them better.

[07:25:00]

But when you do that evaluation and you make changes, you need to bring people to the table that have the expertise. If you're doing something like you know a bail reform, you have to bring the district attorneys in, you have to bring the police in, you have to bring people from probation and parole in. Nobody was consulted during any of these changes.

Again, we all have the same goals. We want to be safe. We want to be able to protect people. Let's come down - let's sit down, let's find some common ground and let's have adult discussions on how to solve the problems.

BERMAN: Captain Frank Umbrino, I hope you have a safe and peaceful holiday. I appreciate you being with us.

UMBRINO: Thank you, John. I appreciate it.

BERMAN: All right. The parents suing a Michigan school for not preventing last week's deadly shooting. Their lawyer joins us live.

KEILAR: First anguish among staffers in a Michigan hospital where patients are dying of COVID at a rate never seen before.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I've gone home a few days and had days where I just cry. And as a mom, it's really hard because my kids are then challenged to see that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

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