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New Day Saturday

France Confirms Smoke Alerts Minutes Before Crash; Families Meet With French Foreign Minister; France Ramps Up Airport Security; Trump's False Claims On Clinton And Guns; First Images of Egyptian Plane Debris; Dems Divided Over Sanders and Clinton; Chief Resigns Hours After Fatal Police Shooting. Aired 6-7a ET

Aired May 21, 2016 - 06:00   ET

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

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VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN ANCHOR: NEW DAY starts right now.

CHRISTI PAUL, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, everybody. We're so grateful to have your company as always. I'm Christi Paul.

BLACKWELL: I'm Victor Blackwell. Good to be with you.

New evidence, new clues, but still no concrete answers about what caused a flight from Paris to Cairo to crash off the coast of Egypt.

PAUL: Yes, just in this morning French officials are confirming smoke alerts did indeed go off just moments before the plane plunged into the Mediterranean Sea with 66 people on board.

Now U.S. and Egyptian officials suspect it was the result of a terrorist act. So far though there is no claim of responsibility. Today U.S. Navy planes will continue to help comb an area that's 180 miles off the coast of Alexandria for more debris.

BLACKWELL: We are covering this like only CNN can. Our international diplomatic editor, Nic Robertson is at an airbase in Greece. CNN's senior European correspondent, Jim Bittermann is live in France at Charles de Gaulle Airport. CNN's Ian Lee is live at Cairo International Airport.

Now also in the Weather Center, we have meteorologist, Allison Chinchar tracking the underwater search for clues. Let's start with Ian Lee live for us in Cairo. Let's talk about the investigation and where is -- on what is the focus rig now, Ian?

IAN LEE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: As you guys just point out, we do have that new information coming from the French about the ACAR system, which basically sends information about the plane down to the ground.

This is information we got last night as well. Now we're hearing it for the first time from authorities that there was smoke aboard this plane minutes before it crashed. This is going to be crucial to the investigation. But right now Egyptian officials, the military with their international partners, are scouring for the remains of the plane. They have found luggage. They've found seats. They've even found body parts.

But they do need to find these black boxes and more of the plane to really piece together what exactly happened. Those black boxes will be crucial in determining what was the cause? Was this terrorism? Was this mechanical? So right now that is the main focus of this investigation.

PAUL: All right, Ian Lee, we appreciate it. Thank you so much.

Want to check in now with CNN senior international correspondent, Jim Bittermann at Paris' Charles de Gaulle Airport. I know some of the families, Jim, of these victims were briefed by the French foreign minister there. Do we know what else he may have said to those families specifically?

JIM BITTERMANN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, not specifically. I don't think we are going to hear very much. He's going to perhaps meet the press somewhere in this hour to talk about this meeting with the families. About 70 family members were at that meeting this morning, 50 French and 20 from other nationalities that were involved.

In fact they brought in not only the foreign minister, but also a representative of the BEA, which is the main accident investigating authority, as well as someone from the prosecutor's office.

Immediately after the crash was confirmed in fact a criminal investigation was launched by the prosecutor's office, as it is almost automatically whenever a French citizen dies overseas.

So there is that aspect of it. Basically it was an attempt to brief the families, bring them up to speed and reassure them that everything is being done that can be done to bring them news about their relatives.

PAUL: We know of course what they really want to know is why and we don't have any information obviously on that just yet. But did they -- do we know if they gave any timeline? Are they looking forward, Jim -- a lot of people are talking about this -- at several international events coming up, the French Open, the Tour de France. What is being done to reassure the folks that travel through France's airport is indeed secure?

BITTERMANN: That's a big concern for the French government. The whole image problem that goes with this crash that kind of shown the spotlight on the security operations here at Charles de Gaulle airport, which have over the last year or so been investigated pretty thoroughly.

They've changed some things around. They lifted the badges of more than 80 employees because they felt they had been involved in radicalization efforts. [06:05:03]And it is the kind of thing that sends a chill down the spine of anyone who might be planning to come for the Roland Garros tennis tournament which is coming up.

We have the Euro 2016 soccer tournament, which is going to bring millions of people to France and later on in the summer the Tour de France bicycle race. All these things coming up, as well as the normal tourism season.

This kind of thing, if anything casts doubt upon the security operations here at the airport or elsewhere in France, it could really have a damaging effect from a tourist standpoint. So I think the French are doing a lot to try to show that they're doing everything they can in terms of security.

PAUL: No doubt about it. Jim Bittermann, we appreciate it so much. Thank you.

Sajjan Gohel with us now. He is a terrorism expert and the international security director at the Asia Pacific Foundation. Sajjan, thank you so much.

One of the things that stands out here today is that no terror group has come forward to claim responsibility. Because of that, do you believe that terror is at fault here?

SAJJAN GOHEL, TERRORISM EXPERT: This is going to be one of the key issues in this whole investigation. Just because no terrorist group has claimed -- has not claimed responsibility, that doesn't mean that there is no act of terrorism.

We know that some terrorist groups prefer to lie low, keep the advantage to themselves, that if they accept responsibility, the focus will be on them, there will be more scrutiny.

And also some terrorist groups may not want to reveal their hand too early in case they have more nefarious activities in mind. So it is something that we need to wait and see ultimately the forensic investigation will be a key decider.

We may have terrorist groups claiming responsibility and they may prove to be false. So there's going to be a lot of speculation, I'm afraid. That will continue for some days.

PAUL: A lot of people are watching this and they are thinking, how safe is my travel this summer? What do you have to say to them?

GOHEL: Keep in mind that countries like France have really elevated their own security personnel at airports and other logistical hubs. They've withdrawn the security credentials of people working air side at various airports in Paris over the last year.

We don't know that this is an act of terrorism as yet and that's very important to point out. But we also know that terrorists, if they can't achieve their primary goal, which is to maim and kill, it is to cause major disruptions especially at airports and other centers where people are traveling.

It is also designed to impact in the way we feel and think about our safety and security. But we mustn't allow them to deter us because these are incidents that unfortunately will happen now and again. And again, we have to keep pointing out with that asterisk that we don't know this is terrorism here.

PAUL: We just talked to -- yes, and I was going to say that we do not know that terrorism is the culprit here. There are a lot of things that obviously they are looking at.

I'm wondering when you hear what Jim was just talking about, about what's happening at the airports, as you were just mentioning, and the transparency of Egypt and its ability to lead this investigation.

Peter Goelz, an aviation analyst and a former NTSB managing director had said the Egyptian authorities certainly are capable. They have the technical savvy and the ability in concert with the French and the U.K. to lead this investigation but transparency to him is an issue.

Is that an issue overall and what do you make of the fact that Egypt officials came out very early on here saying that they do believe this to be terrorism?

GOHEL: Well, this is a very important question that you raise. The Egyptians in the past have a very bad track record for their transparency. It goes all the way back to 1999 when EgyptAir 990 crash off Nantucket Island in the Atlantic Ocean.

The Egyptians worked very hard to prevent the full investigation from coming out. The fact that the pilot was suicidal and perhaps even more nefarious agenda in mind.

Then with the Metrojet Airline bombing, the Russian plane, seven months ago, the Egyptians totally downplayed the role of terrorism until it was impossible to deny.

The fact that they've come out so quickly this time to suggest it could be terrorism, it might be, because this plane did not come from Egypt. It came from France.

So therefore, it's almost like they're palming the blame on to the French in case something bad had actually happened. So we'll have to wait and see.

The Egyptians don't have the best track record for transparency, but hopefully in this investigation they might be more willing to provide more information as it comes through.

PAUL: I only have a second here, Sajjan, but because of what you just said, because it came from France, of course, it was still at the end of the day EgyptAir. And because of the track record of Egyptian authorities and their transparency or not in these cases, does that make them more vulnerable to terrorist attack?

[06:10:04]GOHEL: Well, certainly, we know that terrorist groups are trying to hit Egypt politically, economically, socially, and by going after the aviation industry, that is the soft underbelly of Egypt's economy and it would hurt their tourism industry, which is a real mess right now.

PAUL: All right, Sajjan Gohel, we appreciate your insight. Thanks for being here.

GOHEL: A pleasure.

BLACKWELL: Still so many questions, the answers can be found in the flight data recorder, the digital voice recorder, those black boxes that are sitting at the bottom of the sea somewhere. What are the challenges searching for the plane's black in the water? Our meteorologist, Allison Chinchar has a preview -- Allison.

ALLISON CHINCHAR, AMS METEOROLOGIST: That's right. We've got a storm system coming that's bringing a lot of clouds hindering a helicopter rescue, but it's also impacting the rescue that would be under the water as well. We'll take a closer look underwater at what impacts they're going to have to deal with.

PAUL: I know that you are sitting here watching the news this morning wondering how safe are U.S. airports against terrorism as we head into the busy summer travel months? An ex-CIA chief shares insight on how vulnerable we are and what we need to stay safe.

BLACKWELL: "Shark Tank" host, Barbara Corcoran weighs in on the presidential race, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.

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BARBARA CORCORAN, HOST, "SHARK TANK": Whatever he is saying, you can bet your life on fact he will probably not come through.

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BLACKWELL: Wait until you hear her prediction on who she thinks will win the general election.

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BLACKWELL: A live look here. This is the French foreign minister, Jean-Marc Ayrault, speaking after a meeting with relatives of the passengers on that EgyptAir Flight 804 giving them a bit of an update on the investigation.

[06:15:09]Of course, sharing condolences of the French government. We are monitoring this to determine if there is anything coming out of this. Let's listen for a couple of seconds here.

JEAN-MARC AYRAULT, FRENCH FOREIGN MINISTER (through translator): As we said again this morning, I'm saying again as I said this morning to the families acting in transparency. And I commit myself to France paying account as things become known about the different procedures which are put at the service of truth. With this regard again I'd like to emphasize as I did yesterday and the day before that the information, sometimes contradictory information, and too often what appears to be definitive misinterpretations.

And so I am very careful about this because this puts the families in a tense and painful situation. I want to express myself to you about this. The best response of this information, this partial information, this piecemeal information is that it takes place in the best --

BLACKWELL: All right, so that again is the French foreign minister, Jean-Marc Ayrault, who just spoke with the families of some of the passengers onboard EgyptAir 804. There were again 15 French citizens on board that plane.

We know that representatives from EgyptAir and the Egyptian ambassador to France were in on that meeting this morning. So we're going to monitor this news conference from the French foreign minister and bring you any highlights that come out of that.

Now let's back to the search because the search for clues and answers in this mysterious crash, it is now going on underwater.

PAUL: Recovery teams from several countries including our U.S. Navy are making several discoveries by the hour including reports of an oil slick in that area where Flight 804 is believed to have disappeared.

CNN meteorologist, Allison Chinchar is here to walk through what investigators face in this underwater search. Good morning, Allison.

CHINCHAR: Good morning to both of you. So lets' take a look. Beneath me is the exact spot in which where we believe most of the debris would end up being. This red line being the last known flight path that it took.

Now going in to today we do expect an increase in stormy weather. This is a look at the last 24 hours, again you can kind of see a lot of these clouds beginning to roll in.

That will hinder a lot of the helicopter rescue efforts, but we're now concerned about the stuff below because those stormy skies above also have an impact below.

Number one, most important, being the choppy seas because that storm will really start to make that sea incredibly choppy, which makes it very difficult for them to not only retrieve debris, but also searching for the black box which will likely be underwater.

Now the average depth at this point is about 8,000 to 11,000 feet deep. Again, it varies a little bit but overall, relatively flat space. That plays in their favor because it makes it a little bit easier to find the pinger.

The thing is, the pinger will work at depths up to around 20,000 feet. But, as those seas get a little choppier throughout the day, it can distort some of the sounds that you hear.

We have not only stormy conditions coming in, but we also expect rainy conditions, very stormy. Wind is going to pick up incredibly as we go through the day as well.

So again, Victor and Christi, those are going to be the concerns going forward and it is not just one, it is numerous weather concerns that they'll have to deal with.

PAUL: All right, Allison Chinchar, thank you so much for the update.

BLACKWELL: Donald Trump goes after Hillary Clinton on guns with a questionable claim about your second amendment rights.

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WHITFIELD: "Shark Tank" host, Barbara Corcoran has known Donald Trump for decades and says he hasn't changed one bit since they met. She says Trump is an extraordinary salesman who makes promises he won't keep. She has a prediction though about the general election result. Here's what she said.

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CORCORAN: Whatever he's saying, you can bet your life on the fact he will probably not come through and that's a tremendous characteristic that is sorely need in the president. That is mind boggling. I don't believe you could really listen to anything he says and really believe that he will actually do it.

ERIN BURNETT, CNN HOST, "OUTFRONT": So what's the bottom line? Who do you actually think will win?

CORCORAN: Oh, who will win? Donald Trump will win.

BURNETT: Donald Trump.

CORCORAN: Not a doubt in my mind.

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BLACKWELL: Well, Trump picks up what he says was an unexpected endorsement from the NRA that happened last evening. He also promised the crowd that he would lead the fight to defend the second amendment. Watch.

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DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: The second amendment is under a threat like never before. Crooked Hillary Clinton is the most anti-gun, anti-second amendment candidate ever to run for office, and as I said before, she wants to abolish the second amendment. See wants to take your guns away. She wants to abolish. Just remember.

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BLACKWELL: Errol Louis joins us now, CNN political commentator and political anchor for Time Warner Cable News. Errol, good morning to you.

ERROL LOUIS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Good morning, Victor.

BLACKWELL: So you heard there Donald Trump repeat the claim that Hillary Clinton wants to abolish the second amendment. We know that is not true, but we also know it worked inside the room. Does it work? Is it as potent outside of that room?

LOUIS: Well, you're exactly right, Victor. He was -- Donald Trump was using the rhetoric that comes from the NRA leadership and you know, they just kind of cut to the chase and say, anybody who's in favor of sensible gun control wants to take your guns away be, wants to abolish the second amendment.

Of course, you know, you give it a moment's thought and you start to realize that's just not possible given Supreme Court rulings and given what it takes to actually amend or change the constitution.

So outside of the room? Hard to say where it will work. I tend to think just looking at the political map that this is Donald Trump trying to appeal to some voters and make sure that he can energize and motivate some already conservative voters in states like Ohio, Pennsylvania, swing states that he's going to need to carry in November if he wants to win.

[06:25:14]BLACKWELL: Let's stay in that region. First, Hillary Clinton of course has never said she wanted to ban the second amendment. She did disagree with the Supreme Court on -- have the recording of it at a private fundraiser. Let's play it and talk about that part of the country afterward.

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HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Here again the Supreme Court is wrong on the second amendment and I am going to make that case every chance I get.

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BLACKWELL: And immediately after Trump's NRA speech she tweeted this. Let's put it up, "You're wrong, Donald Trump. We can uphold second amendment rights while preventing senseless gun violence."

So here's the question -- does Hillary Clinton want to have this fight in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, in this area where she has a bit of a weakness and it looks like Donald Trump has some unexpected strength?

LOUIS: Well, my guess is that she's going to need to have that fight and that she's going to welcome that fight, frankly because this is a race that is shaping up to be polarized and polarizing.

What that means is you try and get your base out because you're on some level giving up on pulling voters away from the other guy. In this case somebody who is a solid Trump voter.

It is not clear what Hillary Clinton would have to do to get an NRA member who was a Trump supporter to come over to her side. Her strategy would then logically have to be to get as many, say, mothers out there, as many people concerned about gun violence out there as possible.

They tend to cluster around the cities. She's going to try and get her base out there. She's going to have to live up to the pledge that she just played, that she's going to contest the Supreme Court's ruling.

That doesn't mean she's going to ignore or try to overturn the second amendment. But it does mean she's going to make the case that what the amendment does allow, by the way, is local levels of gun control. She's going to make the case that those are needed.

BLACKWELL: And you mention that Hillary Clinton, as you say, will have to speak and be with groups of mothers who are fighting for gun control. She's expected to speak or scheduled to speak at a dinner organized by the Trayvon Martin Foundation tonight. So Errol Louis, we'll continue this conversation. Thanks so much.

LOUIS: OK, thank you.

PAUL: Stay with us because we have been getting now our very first images of the debris that has been collected from the site where it is believed EgyptAir 804 plummeted into the sea. We have those images for you for the first time this morning. That's on the other side of this break. Stay close.

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[06:31:19] PAUL: Breaking news. We have new pictures just in. What you are looking at there, what we can discern, a life vest right there. Parts possibly of the plane.

This is our first look at debris from Egypt Air flight 804. This has been pulled from the Mediterranean Sea. Mangled pieces of the plane as you see there. The life jacket you saw.

We want to go straight to international diplomatic editor Nic Robertson. He's live at a military airbase in Greece.

Obviously, these are the things that investigators have gotten their hands on.

Nic, you made a very good point to us during the break. And again, this is something that we're just -- we're putting together. We do not know for certain. But the fact that that life vest was unpacked, that it was open out of its wrapper, that may -- that may possibly indicate something, yes?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: It's possible. I mean, it's just too soon to say. I mean, some of the things we can say here, these pieces of debris are very small and that tells us how hard the search is. We know that the search radius is over. It's about 40 miles radius which gives you an area of about 5,000 square miles out at sea to search so we can get a sense of how tough it is.

But when you look at these pieces of debris, there are possibly things that you can infer, that these will be early indicators. And it's not fair if any of this can be conclusive.

But it does would give an indication potentially if the life vest is opened, out, as we see it there. That it is no longer wrapped and put away as it would have been under a seat on the aircraft that potentially the passengers were told to prepare to put on their life vests, that there potentially were moments of time during this catastrophic event in the plane.

We know the ACAR (INAUDIBLE) came from the plane, although none of this conclusive or proof of anything. It appears the sign of period of about three minutes, so it is possible therefore that life vests could have been deployed on the plane, passengers could have been told. It's too soon to say.

What we can say with certainty right now, you might see it here, the wind, the conditions have changed substantially for the search and recovery today. It is much windier. The sea is really choppy. The Greek C-130 behind me, they've got two of those. They are on stand-by today.

There is a U.S. Air Force Orion P-3 aircraft in the skies, but it's going to be much, much harder to spot debris particularly of the size that we are seeing in those pictures, in these much rougher conditions today. And, of course, there's still a lot of searching to be done.

Christi?

PAUL: All right, very good to know.

Nic Robertson, thank you so much.

Nic is going to be with us all morning as we continue to get update. We'll go out to him and bring them to you as soon as we get them, of course.

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN ANCHOR: All right. So as the physical investigation in the search for clues and parts of this plane continues, there is of course the intelligence investigation.

And officials in Europe are racing to determine what happened on board flight 804. Travelers in the U.S., though, are wondering just how safe they are in the country's airports.

We're joined now to discuss that by James Woolsey. He is a former director of the CIA and our national security expert.

Mr. Woolsey, good morning to you.

JAMES WOOLSEY, FORMER CIA DIRECTOR: Good to be with you. BLACKWELL: First, I wonder if you saw those photographs and pairing that with what we're hearing, the new information since you were last on CNN about the ACAR system and the alerts of the smoke in the cabin.

If you have adjusted your hypothesis at all that this is likely terror, possibly an inside job?

[06:35:00]WOOLSEY: Well, I think it is still quite possible that someone inside the system, someone who had access to hangars, access to maintenance, either in Egypt or in France, or in any of the other places that it stopped, the aircraft stopped, could have placed something small.

And some of these bombs can be as small as a coke can. In the aircraft, it may be just a mechanical failure, in which case I said early on, I thought about 80 percent-20 percent it was likely to be terrorism. So that would be the 20 percent.

On the other hand, what we've seen is not necessarily inconsistent with it being an intentional interference and a terrorist act of some kind.

BLACKWELL: Does the time period, that going on into several days now, without a claim of responsibility, does that impact your belief that this could likely be the result of terror?

I'd say it's a slight down tick that might suggest it's not a terrorist group. Sometimes they jump in promptly and take credit, sometimes they wait a while. It's not a rigid rule.

BLACKWELL: There were dozens of airport workers in Paris there who were dismissed after the discovery that they possibly were radicalized, or in some part of that scale or spectrum.

What would it take to indefinitely vet and monitor all the people who have access to an airplane, and is there any appetite for that type of endeavour in the U.S.?

WOOLSEY: Well, it would take a lot of work, but I think it's probably worth the work. Because if you run the recruiting in such a way as the big company -- European company does that supplies a lot of the workers on some contracts for cleaning and so forth in American airports, and the same way that they've been running the labor situation in Brussels and elsewhere. You end up with a large number of people from the Middle East, some of whom -- many of whom, I'm sure, are just regular folks who want a job.

But when you see, as has been the case in one case in the U.S., scrawled Jihadi graffiti on the inside of a hangar. When you have the events such as occurred in Minneapolis a couple of years ago involving a Jihadi who worked in government buildings. You have to pay attention to that even if you don't want to. Even if it is hard.

BLACKWELL: The question has always been of resources, not intent or desire. Let me ask you very quickly because I know I am running out of time. Do you have any concerns -- would you fly your family to and from Charles De Gaulle?

WOOLSEY: I think I'd think twice about it. But -- especially during the forthcoming soccer championships. I think I'd be worried about it. I might still decide to do it. I just got back from flying to Europe not long ago. But it's something that people should start thinking about.

BLACKWELL: All right, former CIA director there. I think make news that you would think twice about flying your family to and from Charles De Gaulle.

Thanks so much for being with us on NEW DAY.

WOOLSEY: Thank you. Good to be with you.

BLACKWELL: Sure.

PAUL: Well, moving to the political arena here, in-fighting amongst Democrats is heating up after Bernie Sanders makes a bold claim against his own party saying the contests are basically rigged against him.

And the White House goes into lockdown as a man approaches a secret service checkpoint with a gun. We'll walk you through it.

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[06:42:24] BLACKWELL: All right, in just the last few minutes, we've received these pictures from the Egyptian Armed Forces. The first images of debris collected from the Mediterranean after the crash of Egypt Air flight 804.

You saw there a life vest in one of those shots. Some of this -- this is not clear what it is, but this, this fabric matches the upholstery inside this fuselage. Of course the fuselage still has not yet been found.

But, again, the first images of the debris found after the crash of Egypt Air flight 804.

We will continue to bring you more images as we receive them and speak with our experts and analysts about what they can conclude or derive from these photographs.

PAUL: And as we continue to follow that story, let's go to the political arena together here.

Senator Bernie Sanders is racing against the clock to pull off an upset against Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. The Vermont senator is crisscrossing New Mexico and California today ahead of the June 7th primary, and vowing to keep fighting until that national convention in July. It's his rhetoric on the campaign trail though that really amplifies or highlights the party is deeply divided here. Sanders is blasting Democratic leaders, accusing them of rigging the contest in favor of Hillary Clinton.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BERNIE SANDERS (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: But it is a bad -- not only a bad idea from a Democratic perspective, the idea that a party would, in a significant way, determine who the candidate is before people got involved in the political process.

Hillary Clinton is not the Democratic candidate most likely to defeat Donald Trump.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PAUL: So let's put this in perspective and get you the numbers here.

As it stands now, Sanders lags behind Clinton by more than 700 total delegates. That number does include superdelegates who have not yet voted, we want to point out.

Secretary Clinton is just ninety delegates from winning the nomination before the July national convention.

CNN political commentator and Democratic strategist Maria Cardona. She is a Hillary Clinton supporter and political strategist Jonathan Tasini. He is the author of, "The Essential Bernie Sanders and his Vision for American."

Thank you both for being with us. We appreciate it.

Good morning, Christi.

PAUL: Good morning.

JONATHAN TASINI, BERNIE SANDERS SUPPORTER: Good morning.

PAUL: I want to start with you, if I could. I know that you have a problem with the delegate count, but the fact is, the rules are the rules the way they are. So, mathematically, why does he stay in this race?

[06:45:00]TASINI: Well, first of all, yes, the rules are rules and that is -- but respectfully, you have it wrong. You're right about the pledged delegate difference is about 280 or 285 delegates. And it is not true, respectfully, that Hillary Clinton will clinch the nomination as 90 delegates to go.

That will not happen until the superdelegates vote at the convention. I just debated Governor Ed Rendell this past couple of days ago on NPR, and he agreed with me that we will not know who wins the nomination until the convention because nobody will have enough pledged delegates prior to the convention.

So let me go to your question.

Look, Bernie has acknowledged and I think everybody who supports Bernie acknowledges that it's a steep hill. We have to win on the pledged delegate side, probably about two-thirds of the delegates in California, New Jersey, New Mexico, the last place that votes is on the 14th of June, District of Columbia.

And then we have to make the argument to the superdelegates that Bernie is the best candidate to face Donald Trump, which all the polls show he is a stronger candidate to Donald Trump. And we'll see where that falls out.

PAUL: OK. And, Maria, I want to go to you with that. Let's listen here to what Donald Trump -- or to what Bernie Sanders said about that very issue about the numbers showing that he would beat Donald Trump as opposed to Hillary Clinton. He says not being able to do so and he says it's because of these superdelegates.

Let's listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SANDERS: As all of you know, superdelegates receive those designations because they're elected officials, they're in the Congress, they're governors, whatever they may be. But they don't get those votes by having or seeing people elect them, or not getting those votes in response to puppy love elections.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PAUL: So first of all, Maria, is there a threat or a risk that because of these latest polls -- and I want to put one up here. "CBS/New York Times" poll of registered voters showing that Sanders is 51 percent to Trump 38 percent if there was a general election held right now.

Is there a chance as superdelegates watch these numbers come in that they may switch their votes and their allegiance to Hillary Clinton?

MARIA CARDONA, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I highly doubt it, Christi, for a couple of reasons. The first one is, anybody worth their salt in politics knows that polls six months out of the general election mean nothing.

Let's just ask President Mitt Romney if those polls actually mean what they said six months prior to the election.

PAUL: In all honesty, people do, I mean, they tout polls. Every candidate out there, if the poll is in their favor, they tout them. If they're not, they say --

(CROSSTALK)

CARDONA: Of course they do. Of course they do. But this far out they mean nothing, period. I mean, that's just what we've seen. This far out of the election, Christi, in 2012, Mitt Romney was beating Obama by several points and look what happened.

Anything can happen in an election. Number one. Number two, the reason why I believe that Senator Sanders' numbers are so strong, not to take away anything from his campaign, he's run a terrific campaign. I have always said it. It's been great for the party. It's been great for the debate. It's been great for the country.

He has not been tested against the Republican attack machine. He has never been the focus of extended and continued eviscerating attacks by Republicans. Hillary Clinton has been that target for 30 years. And she is still standing.

And that's why I think you see a lot of people saying that she actually is the strongest candidate to go against Trump. Let me just say -- let me just say something about superdelegates.

Hang on, Jonathan. You had your chance. Superdelegates have never overturned the will of the people. And they're not going to do so now. When you get to the convention, the person that has the most pledged delegates -- OK, not counting the unpledged delegates or the superdelegates. The person who has the most pledged delegates is the one who's going to get the nomination. Period.

PAUL: OK. Jonathan, go ahead.

TASINI: Yes, couple of quick points. The first thing is that we have very little experience to go on superdelegates. Maybe, you know, a few times when superdelegates have been in place. So it's not true that -- I mean it is hard to say --

CARDONA: They've been in place since 1984.

TASINI: Yes, but in most -- in a number of cases, there were incumbents running. And in a number of cases, when the -- actually, candidates like Walter Mondale had already clinched the nomination based on pledged delegates.

And the point now to the poll is, we're in a very, very different situation in this country. We have the potential that someone like Donald Trump could be in the White House and essentially destroy the fabric of our country. And I think the poll you showed...

(CROSSTALK)

CARDONA: I agree.

TASINI: ...is very, very indicative. And the number you didn't show, Christi, not a criticism, but here's the fundamental thing. Hillary Clinton's high negatives compared to Bernie's authenticity and his positive ratings, that's very important when you have to confront attacks.

(CROSSTALK)

CARDONA: He's never been attacked.

[06:50:14]PAUL: We haven't seen necessarily -- I haven't seen the numbers for Bernie's positives. We have here --

TASINI: Very high. Very high.

(CROSSTALK)

PAUL: It is not just for Hillary Clinton, but also for Donald Trump.

And, Maria, I think everybody can agree with you that, really both of you who says anything can happen at this point.

Maria Cardona, Jonathan Tasini, we appreciate your voices in this. Thank you.

CARDONA: Thanks so much, Christi. Sure.

BLACKWELL: The fatal police shooting of an unarmed woman in San Francisco lead hours later to the police chief's resignation.

We'll take a look at his scandal-plagued tenure.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PAUL: All right. Take a look at some of these new pictures that we are getting in. This is breaking news. Some of the debris that has been found in the Mediterranean Sea in the area where authorities believe Egypt Air 804 plummeted into the water there.

I don't know if we can pull that life vest back up. We believe that to be some of the upholstery from a seat. But look at this life vest. You see there on the top left-hand corner of that life vest, the tab there? It does say, we believe Egypt Air.

So, again, we do have search crews there from France, from the UK. We've got this investigation that has Egypt and Greece, everyone involved here. And we will continue to bring you the updates as we get more information.

But, again, these brand-new pictures of what they have found thus far in the Mediterranean.

[06:55:00] BLACKWELL: All right. Back in the U.S. now, the San Francisco police chief, his job is not his anymore. He's out of a job. He resigned just hours after the fatal police shooting of an unarmed black woman.

The mayor called for the chief's resignation after months of scandal and controversy within the department.

PAUL: Yes. Our Dan Simon has more on what led up to the chief's sudden resignation, and what this means for the department from this point on.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DAN SIMON, CNN CORRESPONDENT (on-camera): Well, from racist text messages to questionable officer-involved shootings, the San Francisco Police Department has been boiled in controversy and now under enormous pressure, the chief of the department has stepped down.

Chief Greg Suhr resigning at the request of the city's mayor, Ed Lee. It comes after a 27-year-old African-American woman was shot and killed Thursday by a San Francisco police sergeant in what was described as a stolen vehicle.

Now there was no indication that the woman was armed or posed a deadly threat to officers, and it marked the third time that a suspect had been shot and killed by San Francisco officers in just the past six months.

One of those shootings involved Mario Woods. That infamous incident captured on cell phone video in December. Woods was armed with a knife but critics say he was just too far away from officers to pose a deadly threat.

Mayor Ed Lee explaining the challenges facing the department.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAYOR ED LEE: The men and women of the San Francisco Police Department put themselves in harm's way literally every day. We owe it to them to restore the community's trust in their department in their work. As we embark on a new chapter for the police, we aim to restore this trust.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SIMON: And the mayor has appointed 26-year SFPD veteran Toney Chaplin as acting chief. No word if it will be a permanent post. Chaplin says his main priority will be to implement reforms already under way, including de-escalation techniques and anti-bias training for officers.

Dan Simon, CNN, San Francisco.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BLACKWELL: Dan, thanks.

And, of course, we'll have more on the breaking news at the top of the hour. Those new images of debris collected by Egyptian military officials from EgyptAir Flight 804. Analysis in just a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)