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New Day
Ten Killed in Racist Massacre at Grocery Store in Buffalo; Replacement Theory Driving Gunmen Creeps Into Mainstream; Key Primary Races in North Carolina, Pennsylvania Tomorrow. Aired 7-7:30a ET
Aired May 16, 2022 - 07:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[07:00:00]
JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Andy Scholes, thank you very much.
And New Day continues right now.
Good morning to our viewers here in the United States and all around the world, it is Monday, May 16th, I'm John Berman, Brianna is off, Chief White House Correspondent Kaitlan Collins here with me this morning.
And we do have new information coming in on the terror attack in America, on Americans. Ten Americans killed in Buffalo, their ages range from 32 to 86. Six of the victims were older than 60 and the evidence clearly suggests they were murdered because they were shopping and they were black.
This morning, we are getting new perspective on the victims and we will speak to a number of people who knew and loved them. Police say the 18-year-old white suspect traveled three hours from a different county. We have new details this morning about how he planned the massacre, for how long. This morning, the police commissioner says he had plans to kill even more African-Americans after leaving the supermarket.
Also, we're learning about a previous incident where he was on the radar of law enforcement, making a chilling comment last spring. And we have learned that President Biden tomorrow will visit Buffalo to meet with the victims' families.
KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: We're also learning new details this morning about a deadly shooting in Southern California where four people were having lunch inside a church after services when a gunman entered and opened fire, killing one of them and critically wounding four others. The Taiwanese congregation was there at the time and authorities say that they are still investigating the motive and whether they were targeted.
The suspect is in custody after being stopped by members of the congregation who overpowered him and hog tied him.
But we begin this morning in Buffalo where I want to bring in CNN's Victor Blackwell. Victor, what are you hearing as this community is still reeling from this attack that happened on Saturday?
VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN ANCHOR AND CORRESPONDENT: Well, listen, this community is looking for some comfort here and some answers. The answers we have now are about the people who were killed, the victims here, and really the stories of why they were there, the routine kind of mundane things that we all do highlight how terrorizing this is for this community.
The victims, as John said, between the ages of 32 and 86. We've learned of Lieutenant Aaron Salter, retired Buffalo police lieutenant who was working as a security guard here after police say this shooter shot four people in the parking lot, inside that store Salter fired shots at him but police say the body armor protected the attacker, they say the attacker then killed Salter.
Also we've learned about the mother of a retired fire commissioner here who was on her way to see her husband at a nursing home, as she did every day, stopped to get some groceries. She died here. We don't know if her husband has been informed of what happened to his wife.
Also the mayor told us of a man who was here buying cupcakes for his son's birthday, one of the victims, he also did not make it obviously to that son's birthday celebration.
We know of one of the survivors, a 20-year-old who was shot in the neck, the bullet exited through the back. Of course, was taken to the hospital, has since been released.
Let's talk now about the investigation including that 180-page manifesto in which CNN has obtained it. The author claims to be Payton Gendron, confesses to the attack. Here is what the New York attorney general, Letitia James, told me about that manifesto and part of the investigation moving forward.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LETITIA JAMES, NEW YORK ATTORNEY GENERAL: It was a 180-page manifesto which specifically focused on targeting communities of color.
Clearly, he was bent on hate, he was focused on a replacement theory, this theory that white individuals will be replaced by immigrants and people of color and Jewish individuals.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLACKWELL: Yes, certainly that will be part of the investigation. The author claims to be a white supremacist, anti-Semite, a fascist as well.
I spoke with the Erie County district attorney, John Flynn, who says he's already in grand jury mode. The accused here has said that he is not guilty of the one count of first degree murder of which he has been charged. The D.A. says that more charges will be coming likely, terrorism-related charges and related to the gun. The governor says it was purchased legally but the adaptations to it, also that extended magazine, could bring more charges. [07:05:00]
John, Kaitlan?
COLLINS: Yes. It just adds a new twist of cruelty when you hear what these people were doing, just these run-of-the-mill activities, buying cupcakes for his son, you know, going to get something to eat.
Victor Blackwell, we will stay with you, of course, this morning on all of this, and we will also speak with the district attorney coming up on New Day.
BERMAN: We do have a story of survival this morning. Zaire Goodman was working at Tops Friendly Markets at the time of the shooting. He says he saw the gunman get out of his car. He was one of the first to be shot. He did survive.
His mother, Zaneta Everhart (ph), works as the director of diversity and inclusion for State Senator Tim Kennedy. She called the senator personally when her son was shot.
And joining us now is the Democratic state senator from New York, Tim Kennedy. Senator, thanks so much for being with us this morning.
Do you have information on how Zaire is doing this morning?
STATE SEN. TIM KENNEDY (D-NY): I visited Zaire and Zaneta at their home yesterday. He is recovering well. He is bandaged up. He is visiting with family and he's taking care of himself and his incredible mother is taking care of her son.
BERMAN: What did he tell you about what happened?
KENNEDY: We didn't get into details. I mean, I visited them just to show love, and Buffalo needs our love right now. I think our community is healing in the process of grieving. I think what we need is prayer. We need our country to come together for Buffalo to recognize that this moment of hate should never define the great city of good neighbors who we are as a community.
Buffalo is a rising city in our nation and we have so much to offer in diversity, in love, in friendship. And someone from outside of our community, a white supremacist, preaching hate and evil comes into our community, into the heart of our community and begins firing indiscriminately, aiming specifically for black people to create a moment of carnage. And he left in his wake a lot of pain and a lot of suffering.
And our community really is coming together right now and we really need our country to recognize this as a point of clarity that we have to do better as a country and this is unacceptable anywhere, but especially here in the United States of America.
And those ten souls that were lost that will never see another day, we have to remember, but we have to do better and take this grief and put it into action at every level of government, but in every single community and speak out against hate and evil everywhere we see it.
BERMAN: Senator, the police commissioner there is saying this morning that the alleged killer had plans to target even more black people if he made it out of the supermarket. What do you think about that?
KENNEDY: This is a white supremacist. He came into our community, just like white supremacists have gone into other communities, and perpetrated evil. It is unacceptable. And this is what happens when evil and white supremacy goes unchecked. And this individual came into Buffalo, the city of good neighbors, and took ten lives with the expectation of taking more.
Thank God law enforcement came in and subdued this individual, but do you know what, there are ten grieving families and an expanded community that is suffering because of what this individual did in Buffalo. And it is unacceptable. And we should never forget those ten people whose lives were lost.
You know, Zaire Goodman, my staff member, my head of diversity and inclusion, Zaneta Everhart, her 20-year-old son who will turn 21 a week from today, he was shot through the neck. He was the only individual, the only black individual that was spared that day. There was divine protection in his mother's words. There is no question in my mind that God was with us that day and spared Zaire to see his 21st birthday. We will have a great celebration next week.
But do you know what, there were ten people that will never see their families again and we have to remember that and we have to hold this individual accountable, but we need to do better than that even. We need to hold each other accountable. We need to call out hate when we see it. We need to root out this evil that we are perpetrating on the internet. We need to make sure that we are holding each other accountable and we are stopping this hate in its tracks.
[07:10:05]
BERMAN: Senator, we do appreciate you being with us. If you can send a message for us, please let Zaire know we are thinking about him and Zaneta (ph) as well. Obviously, you can see the love --
KENNEDY: I certainly will.
BERMAN: You can see the love they hold for each other in that photo. And just imagine the pain that so many others, as you say, are feeling in your community this morning. Senator, thank you.
KENNEDY: And I would just ask our country to continue to pray for Buffalo and think about us and we have got to do better. Thank you.
BERMAN: Thank you, Senator.
COLLINS: And it's not just Buffalo. Just hours after that horror, Americans experienced at least two more mass shootings in two other cities. So far this year, there have been 201 mass shootings and it's only May. CNN and the Gun Violence Archive define a mass shooting as one that injuries or kills four or more people. As a reminder that gun violence spares no state, city or town, these are the places where they've happened in 2022. Buffalo twice, Milwaukee four times, Hot Springs, Arkansas, Chicago nine times, St. Louis twice, Indianapolis, twice as well. Patterson, New Jersey, Baltimore six times, Philadelphia five times.
BERMAN: Brookshire, Texas, Detroit, Tuscaloosa, Clarkson, Georgia, Lexington, Kentucky, Garland, Texas, Miami five times, Fairfield, Ohio, New Orleans three times, Sunny Side, Washington, Baton Rouge three times.
COLLINS: Kelly, Kansas, Beaumont, Texas, Lafayette, Louisiana, Springfield, Ohio, Tarpon Springs, Florida, North Charleston twice, Atlanta four times, Jackson, Mississippi, twice, Jackson, Tennessee, Laurel, Mississippi, Bessemer, Alabama, Opelousas, Louisiana.
BERMAN: Biloxi, San Antonio four times, Phoenix twice, Birmingham, Myrtle Beach, Lafayette Indiana, Rocky Mountain, North Carolina, San Bernardino, Petersburg, Virginia, Cincinnati, Washington, D.C. three times. Mountain View, Arkansas, Duluth, Portland three times, Furman, South Carolina, Sacramento, Pittsburgh, Baldwin, Louisiana, Columbia, South Carolina, North Las Vegas, Danger Field, Texas, Syracuse, Stockton, California, twice, Brooklyn twice, the Bronx.
COLLINS: Cedar Rapids, Elgin, Illinois, Willow Brook, California, Covington, Hartford, San Francisco, Dallas twice. Shelby, North Carolina, Monroe, Louisiana twice, Colorado Springs three times, Shreveport, Walterboro, South Carolina, Hollister, California, Cleveland.
BERMAN: Waterbury, Connecticut, Houston three times, Austin, Norfolk, Fayetteville, Dumas, Arkansas, Madison Heights, Virginia, Fort Worth, New Iberia, Lansing, Fort Lauderdale twice. Irvington, New Jersey, Ozark, Redding, Rochester, Autaugaville, Alabama, Columbus, Aurora, Jacksonville, Knoxville twice.
COLLINS: And we are not done. Minneapolis, Hazleton, Lewisville, Lubbock, Chester, Glendale, Vegas twice, Alexandria, Okaloosa, St. Paul, Omaha, Des Moines, McComb, Mississippi, Durham, Charleston, Missouri, Turlock, California, Temple Hills, Maryland, Joliet, Illinois.
BERMAN: Racine, West Hollywood, Murphy's Bureau, Little Rock, Springfield, Romeoville, Fresno twice, Wilmington, Las Cruses, Corsicana, Texas, twice, Blacksburg, Oroville, Raleigh, Winter Haven, Augusta, Bakersfield, Inglewood, Savannah, Brunswick, Eugene.
COLLINS: L.A., Montgomery, Columbia, Kenosha, Peoria, Dillon, South Carolina, South Bend, Denver. 201 mass shootings in America this year and, unfortunately, still counting.
BERMAN: Can't fit them on the screen. It's basically everywhere.
Up next, this conspiracy theory that drove, it seems, this shooter in Buffalo and where else you are hearing things just like it. We have a Reality Check.
COLLINS: It's also primary eve in Pennsylvania and North Carolina, and there is a lot on the line for former President Trump. We have live reports in both places just ahead.
BERMAN: And this morning, parents scrambling to find baby formula, what is being done to alleviate this shortage. The FDA commissioner facing tough questions, he will be here on New Day.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[07:15:00]
COLLINS: We're learning more details this morning about the ten people who were killed in Buffalo this weekend and what investigators are calling unquestionably a racist attack, the suspect's alleged manifesto citing fears of ethnic and cultural replacement of white people.
So, how did such conspiracies make it into the American mainstream and sometimes all the way to Capitol Hill? John Avalon has our Reality Check.
JOHN AVLON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: The Saturday afternoon massacre at a Buffalo supermarket is more than just 198th mass shooting in America this year. It was, according to an online manifesto, attributed to the suspect a terror attack, a hate crime rooted in something called great replacement theory, which has spurred multiple slaughters in recent years.
Now, it's become a sickeningly predictable script. The 18-year-old's alleged online radicalization began in the recesses of the internet moving, according to the posting, further to the right, to the point that he became a self-described fascist, white supremacist and anti- Semite, embracing the conspiracy that white people are being systematically replaced in America, alleging it's part of a Jewish- backed plot involving immigration, intermarriage and violence.
And he got so high on hate that at some point he drove from his 90 percent white hometown targeting a black neighborhood in Buffalo more than 200 miles away armed with a weapon of war, livestreaming as police say he killed ten people.
This is not a lone wolf case but a copycat killing, echoing the young white man who's charged of driving hundreds of miles to a Walmart in El Paso to kill 23 people, mostly Latinos, in 2019, to the man accused of slaughtering 11 worshippers at Pittsburgh's Tree of Life synagogue in 2018.
Now, they've all pled not guilty and are awaiting trial, but like the self-described fascist who murdered 51 people at a mosque in New Zealand, they cited replacement theory or immigration invasion or fears of white genocide.
It's an old anxiety about multiracial democracy dressed up in new fatigues, an extension of the race panic pushed by the KKK, the kind of racist bile pushed by the likes of Mississippi Senator Theodore Bilbo, served as a populist Democrat who defended racism in tone's like 1947's take your choice separation or mongrelization. A more contemporary connection comes from a French book hailed by white nationalists.
But you probably didn't notice the proliferation until you heard tiki torch-wielding white nationalists shouting at the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Jews will not replace us.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
AVLON: Now, I want to be clear. Only the alleged shooter is responsible for his actions, but this 18-year-old did not invent the ideas that supposedly influenced him. He was indoctrinated and, unfortunately, this conspiracy is not nearly as fringe as we might like to think.
Now, take this AP-NORC poll showing that last December nearly half of Republicans agreed to at least some extent with the idea that there is a deliberate intent to replace native born Americans with immigrants. How in the hell did that get in the groundwater?
Well, here is one tributary, New York Times analysis finding that more than 400 episodes of Tucker Carlson's prime time Fox show amplified the idea that a cabal of elites want to force demographic change through immigration, like this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TUCKER CARLSON, FOX NEWS HOST: I know that the left and all the little gatekeepers on Twitter become literally historical if you use the term, replacement, if you suggest that the Democratic Party is trying to replace the current electorate, the voters now casting ballots with new people more obedient voters from the third world.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
AVLON: Now, he's not the only one, that poll found that belief in replacement theory is most likely if folks get their news far-right cable channels, like OAN or Newsmax followed by Fox.
Partisan media is more than the gateway drop (ph). It increasingly gives talking points to politicians as part of their play to the base. Take New York Representative Elise Stefanik, the number three House Republican, put out a Facebook ad in September that invoked replacement theory, saying that Democrats wanted a permanent election insurrection through amnesty for undocumented immigrants. Trump-backed Ohio GOP Senate Nominee J.D. Vance has also trotted out similar appeals. Florida Congressman Matt Gaetz has defended replacement theory while calling the ADL racist. And the recently subpoenaed big lie back in Congress with Scott Perry brought replacement theory to a House hearing. Look, we can have vibrant debates about the right levels of immigration and assimilation in America, but let's be clear, invoking the great replacement is not part of that. It's not intended to be. It's a dog whistle that everyone should be able to hear by now, because there's a growing body count behind it, more evidence of violent resistance to multiracial democracy in America. And that's your Reality Check.
COLLINS: John Avlon, thank you.
A sitting senator and a leading senate candidate are both hospitalized this weekend for strokes. We are going to speak to a leading neurologist about the details on both cases.
BERMAN: And Congressman Madison Cawthorn about to face North Carolina primary voters amid a slew of damaging headlines. Can he withstand the onslaught from senior members of his own party?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[07:25:00]
BERMAN: It is the eve of some key high-profile primary races, all kinds of drama and late surges, and new questions about the strength of influence of Donald Trump. Voters go to the polls tomorrow in Kentucky, Idaho, Oregon, North carolina and Pennsylvania.
CNN's Kristen Holmes live in Middletown, Pennsylvania, and CNN's Eva McKend Winston-Salem, North Carolina.
Kristen, I guess you first.
KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good Morning, John. Well, yes, I'm here for you, so let's start with that Senate Republican primary because, right now, it is anyone's game. I mean, and as you mentioned, Donald Trump is front and center here.
When you look back for the last several weeks, it has essentially been a two-man race. On one side, you had celebrity Dr. Mehmet Oz who was endorsed by Donald Trump. On the other, you had CEO David McCormick, someone who had jockeyed for Donald Trump's support but, again, did not successfully do that.
Now, in the last several days, we have seen the emergence of a third candidate. This is Kathy Barnette. She is a political novice and she's somewhat of an ultra MAGA candidate. And, really, the three are locked for first place. I have seen a number of polls, John, and not one of them says the exact same thing.
[07:30:00]
And you can tell that Donald Trump is watching this closely. He is out there. He is Bashing Barnette. He is bashing McCormick. This is a very important race.
