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New Day Sunday

New Video Shows Deadly Attack on Mosque; U.S. Forces Pull Out of Yemen; Suspect Had Smoke Bombs, Molotov Cocktails; Obama: "Evaluate Other Options" in Middle East; Race for the White House 2016. Aired 7- 7:30a ET

Aired March 22, 2015 - 07:00   ET

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

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[07:00:10] VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN ANCHOR: New video from inside a mosque during a suicide bombing. The violent escalating in Yemen so quickly, the U.S. is now pulling out the last of its military forces.

CHRISTI PAUL, CNN ANCHOR: New information about the machete attack in the New Orleans airport. The weapons the suspect had hidden that he didn't even get to.

BLACKWELL: And a Republican senator about to make it official. He's getting into the race in 2016. When Ted Cruz is expected to announce his run for the White House.

PAUL: That means that we are officially into the race.

BLACKWELL: We are in it.

PAUL: This close.

Good morning, everybody. So glad to have you company as always. I'm Christi Paul.

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

PAUL: Yes. I want to let you know, we're getting a better picture this morning of the exact moment that terror broke out inside the Yemen mosque that killed dozens of people.

(VIDEO CLIP PLAYS)

BLACKWELL: That's new video coming to us from inside the mosque. This was one of the twin bomb attacks on two mosques Friday, 137 people were killed in all. More than 350 wounded. The situation so perilous there, the U.S. has pulled its remaining military forces out of Yemen.

PAUL: The State Department saying all U.S. personnel in Yemen have been temporarily relocated, but it insists Washington will continual to actively monitor terrorist threats emanating from Yemen and to take action to disrupt continuing, imminent threats from Yemen.

CNN's Jomana Karadsheh is with us from Baghdad right now.

The big concern, Jomana, obviously, is how ISIS and al Qaeda in Yemen may exploit the chaos there, particularly when, we think, there aren't as many people there to monitor what's happening. Help us understand what that challenge is.

JOMANA KARADSHEH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, absolutely. That is the main concern, Christi, you are right. The situation in Yemen has been steadily deteriorating. As you mentioned, these are the last of the U.S. forces that were based there, special operation forces. Prior to that last month, the U.S. embassy shutting down and pulling out all personnel.

So, there has been this concern about this limited, nonexistent perhaps U.S. presence on the ground there. How it's going to impact the fight against terrorism there in Yemen, and also counterterrorism operations and intelligence gathering that is very important as the U.S. is pointing out that it will continue to monitor this situation and it does have the capabilities, it says, in the area, ready to respond to any terror threat. This country has been home for one of al Qaeda's top and most dangerous franchises in the world, al Qaeda and Arabian Peninsula, AQAP.

And now, there are concerns that ISIS may be gaining ground in that country. So, a lot of concerns, especially also with the U.S., Christi, losing its main ally there. The government of President Hadi, that was in Sana'a, it was ousted by the Shia Houthi rebels who pushed him out the in the past few months.

And really, there is no government that controls Yemen right now and this is the concern, this is the perfect environment, as we have seen extremist groups and jihadi groups in other countries, exploiting this sort of vacuum, this sort of political instability to gain more ground. And, of course, now rising concerns and fears of the possibility of a civil war in that country -- Christi.

PAUL: Jomana Karadsheh, thank you so much.

BLACKWELL: Tunisia's president says a third attacker took part in Wednesday's deadly attack on foreign tourists, that the country's national museum and is on the run. The president insists he will now get far.

PAUL: We have new surveillance video to show you inside that museum. You see two gunmen there. At one point, here they are -- a man walking down the stairs and bumps into them almost and they let him go. They then killed other 23 people.

"The Wall Street Journal" reporting the gunman fended off an elite squad of anti-terrorism police for nearly two hours and they were finally killed when one of their grenades failed to explode and the police were able to shoot them.

BLACKWELL: All right. Joining us now, CNN military analyst, retired Lieutenant General Mark Hertling.

General, let's start with talking about Tunisia here. Last night, the Tunisian president suggested in an interview with a French magazine that there were as many as 10,000 young jihadists in Tunisia, and they have stopped 5,000 to 6,000 of them from leaving.

Is it even reasonable to expect that the government would be able to surveil or monitor 5,000 to 6,000 people?

[07:05:04] LT. GEN. MARK HERTLING (RET), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: No expectation at all, Victor. That's impossible to do, especially with the size of security forces in Tunisia. And this is more of a political action by the members of the government of Tunisia to try and get calm back in the country.

As you know, this is a terrific country for tourists. For anyone who has been there, it is a beautiful country. And he's just trying to show folks that they have got this under control. They have arrested 20 people, mostly relatives of some of the ones that conducted the assault the other day, and I think they are trying to show that the security forces are trying to maintain calm in this country under this threat.

BLACKWELL: Is there a threat of this government, like we have seen in Yemen, we have seen in Libya being overtaken as there is a battle between these jihadist groups?

HERTLING: Not in Tunisia, Victor. I think this is a pretty stable government from all of the sources I had when I was commanding in Europe, they were the most advanced in terms of bringing about a constitutional regime. In fact, their constitutional republic is one of the strongest in all of Africa. They have a thing called the code of personal status which gives a great deal of leeway in terms of freedoms. And that's one of the things that many of these jihadists may be fighting against as trying to re-instill Sharia law and the kind of Islamic state we have seen in other countries.

So, this is a democratic reforming government. It's very advanced and I don't think you're going to see the same kind of failure that you're seeing in some of the other countries like Yemen.

BLACKWELL: OK. Let's talk about Yemen now that you brought it up. The State Department saying, and I think we have the statement to put on the screen, if not read part of it, that they are continuing to actively monitor the terrorist threats there. The U.S. staff temporarily relocated and monitor threats emanating from Yemen and take action to disrupt continuing imminent threats to the U.S.

Now, with the evacuated U.S. embassy in Yemen and with the last of the military forces out, how does that happen? How do they continue to monitor and how can they effectively respond?

HERTLING: It doesn't happen very well, Victor. What you have, when you have a State Department and an embassy team in a country, you have elements of that team that the military coordinates with called the country king. There's not only actions driven by military intelligence, the collection of data, the collection of information, human intelligence, signals intelligence, but also source intelligence within a country -- some of that comes from the country team within the embassy and some of it comes from the military.

When the embassy left, they took that country team with them. The military is blind. We don't have a government to deal with and, of course, when President Hadi was in office we were dealing with members of his cabinet to get additional information. When he departed, there is no government to work with.

So, it's very difficult to get intelligence that is needed to strike targets. So, yes, we are monitoring, but, truthfully you're now monitoring information that is coming in in very low sources, very dribs and drabs, and nothing like the coordinated fusion that you would get when you had a normal intelligence operation. It would drive special operation attacks.

BLACKWELL: All right. Lots of challenges moving forward. General Mark Hertling, thank you so much.

HERTLING: Thank you, Victor.

PAUL: Back at home, you know, it turns out the attacker at New Orleans airport Friday night was armed with more than just a machete.

BLACKWELL: Investigators now say the suspect Richard White was carrying a bagful of Molotov cocktails, also have smoke bombs in his car. Officials also say he suffered from some type of mental illness.

PAUL: White died yesterday as a result of bullet wounds that he suffered in that onslaught.

CNN law enforcement analyst Tom Fuentes joining us now.

So, Tom, we know that he had some mental issues. You look at the story and you know anyone with a right mind wouldn't go into an airport with a machete and think that he's going to come out and get more ammunition that he had left in his car.

What is the takeaway from this whole thing for you?

TOM FUENTES, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: I think, Christi, the takeaway is just how severe his mental illness was, and, you know, we have these checkpoints in airports for a reason and in a way, they worked. Even though the TSA guards are not armed, there are armed police officers right at the end of all of these checkpoints who can respond.

We had this in the Los Angeles airport a couple of years ago where a L.A. police officer shot the person trying to -- that had already shot TSA guards and run through the checkpoint. Now, you have this guy run through the checkpoint with a machete. But, again, a uniformed police officer saves the day and stops him from getting any further or from actually using the machete against the one female TSA guard that he was chasing.

PAUL: Do you think that or people who are not in uniform should also be armed?

[07:10:07] Maybe there should be officers who are not in close sight, in proximity there as well?

FUENTES: Now, that's a good question how many police officers they have and it should be a police officer. Police officers get the right kind of training in firearms in shoot/don't shoot decision- making and judgment. It's not feasible or practical in any way to try to arm the tens of thousands of TSA individuals and you have the possibility that a mentally deranged person could wrestle the gun away from one of them. And even though arriving at the airport unarmed, then becomes armed.

So, you know, you have that issue. Yes, possibly having more police officers, plain clothes and uniform at airport checkpoints or nearby -- very nearby checkpoints, you know, is probably a great idea.

PAUL: The good thing in this case is that they all did their job and saved lives for sure.

Tom Fuentes, always appreciate your perspective. Thank you.

FUENTES: You're welcome.

BLACKWELL: So, the term flip-flop, it's used in politics a lot but usually between Democrats and Republicans going back across that line. Now, President Obama is accusing Benjamin Netanyahu of flip- flopping on his view on Palestinian statehood.

PAUL: Plus, could the GOP be cruising in 2016?

BLACKWELL: Hmm, good play at words there.

PAUL: You know, somehow, I see a campaign that might be around this. We're talking about Ted Cruz, of course, planning to make his run for the White House official in an announcement tomorrow. Oh, what are we starting here?

BLACKWELL: Starting the run toward the White House.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:15:05] BLACKWELL: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will remain in power after his Likud Party captured the most seats in Tuesday's parliamentary election. Now, we are hearing President Obama's thoughts about that for the first time.

PAUL: In an interview with the "Huffington Post", the president pointed out that Netanyahu said he was against the two-state solution while he was campaigning, but since his party's victory, he's flip- flopped, saying he believes in Palestinian statehood now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Well, we take him at his word when he said that it wouldn't happen during his prime ministership. And so, that's why we've got to evaluate what other options are available to make sure that we don't see a chaotic situation in the region.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLACKWELL: All right. Joining us now from the White House, CNN correspondent Erin McPike.

Erin, a frosty relationship getting even icy here, Mr. Obama called into question whether the prime minister was being true to Israeli's ideals.

ERIN MCPIKE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Victor, that's right.

But President Obama did speak to Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday and he explained more about that conversation in his interview with the "Huffington Post". Listen here.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: We indicated that that kind of rhetoric was contrary to what is the best of Israeli's traditions, that although Israeli was founded based on the historic Jewish home land and the need to have a Jewish home land, Israeli democracy has been premised on everybody in the country being treated equally and fairly. I think that is what is best about Israeli democracy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MCPIKE: And part of that rhetoric he referring to there is that before the election, Netanyahu had expressed some worry about Arab Israelis going to the polls in droves. And the president indicated that that was overly negative as well, Victor.

BLACKWELL: So, Erin, the White House reassessing this relationship. Any indication this reassessment will result in substantive shift for the relationship?

MCPIKE: Victor, that's hard to say. Obviously, the president's relationship with Netanyahu has really been affected by these Iran nuclear negotiations, but you see the Republicans in Congress are really backing Netanyahu on this one. They also say that this deal with Iran could be a very bad deal, but the president, obviously, President Obama, is forging ahead with this and they really hope they can get something done even though Netanyahu was trying to stand in the way of it.

BLACKWELL: All right. Erin McPike, at the White House for us -- Erin, thank you.

PAUL: Well, the Middle East will be just one of the pressing issues for whomever takes over for Barack Obama 22 months from now. And tomorrow, we expect to have our first official contender for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination. "The Houston Chronicle" reporting Senator Ted Cruz will formally announce his candidacy at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia.

The most recent CNN/ORC poll shows Cruz with a 4 percent in hypothetical GOP primary. Former Florida Governor Jeb Bush is leading that poll with 16 percent.

And First Lady Michelle Obama has wrapped up a 5-day trip to Asia, in Cambodia today, in fact. Her mission, to promote an education initiative called Let Girls Learn. In a speech, the country's capital, she urged students to finish school and speak up for freedom and equality.

Mrs. Obama did not address Cambodia's history of human abuses, or the current government which has been criticized by human rights for brutally cracking down on dissent.

BLACKWELL: Listen to this, a 12-year-old girl is in police custody this morning for attempting to kill her mother, twice. The reason for doing it even more shocking.

Stay with us. We'll tell you why.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:22:30] BLACKWELL: Twenty-two minutes after the hour now.

And there are conflicting new details in a case of a University of Virginia student's bloody arrest. The pub owner who turned Martese Johnson away says that Johnson was, quote, "cordial and respectful" at the time. He did not allow him early in the bar on Wednesday because his ID was questionable.

PAUL: But shortly after Johnson left, this viral video shows Virginia Alcoholic Beverage Control agents arresting him as blood is dripping from his face. Johnson, an African-American student, claims police brutality and racism.

BLACKWELL: Now, arrest papers characterized him as agitated and belligerent. But listen to this -- the statement issued by the pub's management says comments calling Johnson belligerent are, quote, "patently untrue". Police, as we know, are still investigating this case.

OK. Let's take a look at other stories developing now.

The world of Mexican wrestling is in mourning after the tragic death of a star fighter. We want to warn you the video you're about to see is pretty disturbing.

PAUL: Yes, just want to give a heads-up here. The fighter whose real name was Pedro Aguayo Jr. died in the hospital yesterday after being kicked in the ring. In the video, you're going to see him here slumped against the ropes after the kick. The fighter was rushed to a nearby hospital but doctors were not able to revive him. The cause of death apparently was whiplash and he was just 35 years old.

BLACKWELL: Wow.

A 12-year-old girl in Colorado, she's accused of trying to poison her mother, twice, after the mother took the daughter's cell phone away, took her iPhone. Authorities say during both incidents, the girl poured bleach into her mother's drink. The girl is in custody for two counts of attempted murder at a juvenile facility. The district attorney will reportedly determine if she faces adult or juvenile charges.

PAUL: A ski lift malfunctioned in Maine injures seven. Four of whom were hospitalized, by the way. This all happened when a chairlift started rolling backwards at Sugar Loaf Mountain. A total of 204 people were evacuated from that lift. Official say the four victims that were taken to the hospital have nonlife-threatening injuries. No word, yet, though, on what may have caused that malfunction.

And police are expected to reveal some new information in a case of an alleged gang rape at the University of Virginia.

BLACKWELL: What the ramifications could be for the alleged victim and the magazine who first published her story.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:28:28] PAUL: Tomorrow, police are releasing their findings in a criminal investigation of an alleged gang rape at the University of Virginia. Now, a student known as Jackie, remember, told "Rolling Stone" magazine she was attacked at a fraternity party. Discrepancies in her story emerged and caused "Rolling Stone" to apologize for the article.

Here is Sara Ganim who is following this.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SARA GANIM, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Victor and Christi, we may finally learn what really happened to the woman named Jackie whose story in "Rolling Stone" caught attention last fall.

Charlottesville police are holding a news conference tomorrow to announce the findings of their investigation. Now, in the article, a University of Virginia student named Jackie claimed that she was brutally raped by seven men during a fraternity party. University officials who acknowledge that they did know some of the details of Jackie's story months before "Rolling Stone" article published, they asked the police to launch an criminal investigation.

Now, long before the criminal investigation concluded, a few important things happened. First, "Rolling Stone" apologized for its reporting when it became clear there were discrepancies in the woman's account. Second, friends of Jackie told CNN that they were with her that night and she told a different story of what happened. They also showed us e-mails and text messages that appeared to show that Jackie had fabricated the man who she said orchestrated her rape. And police cleared the fraternity where Jackie said the alleged rape had happened.

But police have always left open this possibility that Jackie was raped somewhere else or on different night.