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NEW DAY

Small Plane Slams Into Hangar; Father Pleads For Information; BP Back In Court; Veronica's Adoptive Parents Want Help; Government Shutdown At Midnight; Amanda Knox On Trial Again; Obamacare 101

Aired September 30, 2013 - 07:30   ET

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


(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back to NEW DAY, everyone. It is Monday, September 30th. Let's go straight to Michaela for the top news right now.

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: We are watching that clock count down the minutes, but right now we want to bring you up to date. A business jet going off the runway at California's Santa Monica Airport Sunday, slamming into a hangar and then bursting into flames. The hangar, itself, then collapsed preventing firefighters gaining access for more than two hours. Right now, we do not know how many people were inside, but the plane does carry anywhere from seven to nine passengers.

The father of a man stabbed to death near San Francisco's AT&T Park wants answers. He is pleading for witnesses to come forward. Jonathan Denver was killed last week just a few blocks from the park after police say the Dodgers' fan got into an altercation with a group of Giants fans. A suspect, Michael Montgomery, claims self-defense. He was released from jail over the weekend. The D.A. is now asking police to investigate further.

Litigation over the 2010 BP oil spill is continuing in court today with a focus on how the oil giant capped the well in the Gulf of Mexico. Attorneys for the plaintiff say the well could have been capped quicker if BP didn't ignore warnings about a deep water blowout. BP says it was prepared to respond the blowout presented unforeseen challenges. It took BP 86 days to stop that spill.

Some new information about the couple who won back custody of their adopted daughter, Veronica, they want the girl's biological father and the Cherokee Nation to pay their legal expenses. The biological father used the Indian Child Welfare Act to help get custody, but a court ordered Veronica return to her adoptive parents. The two sides bitterly fought for more than two years.

Alex Rodriguez begins the appeal of his 211-game suspension today. He'll go before an arbitrator arguing he doesn't deserve the record suspension for doping. Yankee's third baseman was given the suspension for allegedly using a Florida drug clinic, recruiting other players and lying about it. A-Rod was led to finish the season with the Yankees when he filed his appeal. That's your headlines at this hour. Kate, over to you. BOLDUAN: All right, Michaela, thanks so much. So the countdown to midnight is on less than 17 hours now until a potential government shutdown so can it by avoided? Here to breakdown both sides of the debate, host of "Huff Post Live," Marc Lamont Hill on the left and Ana Navarro, CNN political commentator and Republican strategist on the right.

Good morning, we were joking, we have about 5 minutes to fix this whole problem so here we go. So Ana, there is a lot of blame to go around in Washington, but if you take a look at CNN's latest poll that we released this morning. Most Americans will still blame Republicans more than the president if the government shuts down. So what do Republicans need to do to avoid the blame if we can't avoid a shutdown?

ANA NAVARRO, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I think they all need to start it by sitting down in a room, which has not happened, incredibly, you haven't had the House leadership, the Senate leadership and the president of the United States sit down in one room, and negotiate this and talk about --

BOLDUAN: Why don't they see a benefit of sitting down the one room anymore?

NAVARRO: Well, apparently, Harry Reid told President Obama that he should play hard ball and that there should be no negotiation. So I think they just, you know, well, maybe a photo op. It's crazy. You wouldn't sell a house this way. I have never negotiated a budget, but I have bought and sold several houses, I tell you, I wouldn't hire these people to be my real estate agents.

When you are negotiating a house purchase, you put all offers back and forth. You don't sit and say, no negotiation. You know what happens? Your house sits on the market and you don't sell it if you don't start doing back and forth negotiations. I just think it's ridiculous. Can this be avoided? Yes.

You know, if a couple of them put their golf clubs down. The other one comes back from Nevada and maybe they get -- you know, there is will to get it resolved, yes, they could easily pass something like a continuing resolution, a clean one today for a week or something while they work it out. But there's got to be a will to work it out.

BOLDUAN: Marc, what can Democrats do? It's really easy for the Democrats and the president to say, we don't need to do anything because we can just watch the Republicans fight this out within their own party. That might be fun for Democrats to watch. We're at crunch time now. We're about to see the government shutdown, what more can Democrats do to avoid the shutdown?

MARC LAMONT HILL, HOST, "HUFFPOST LIVE": I'm not sure there is anything the Democrats can do. I am very much open to compromise, but at some point, you have to act knowledge certain things are non- starters. Repealing the president's signature legislative accomplishment is not going to happen. So that's a non-starter -- BOLDUAN: Let me ask you, I'm continuing to answer with this in mind because this is another part of our poll that we just released. It shows that the president's health care law continues to be unpopular. You have to be careful when you look at those numbers, when you look at those numbers, the number in the country, it shows the country is the pretty closer to more evenly split between opposing because it goes too far and because between supporting. So you see the country is more evenly split there --

HILL: Absolutely.

NAVARRO: Nobody is talking about repealing Obamacare right now. What they are talking about is delaying it --

HILL: Delaying it --

BOLDUAN: We not have that conversation now.

HILL: I think that becomes a fawn starter, not just because exchanges begin tomorrow, but because millions of Americans health and economic possibilities would be compromised. It's not a reasonable place to start. You are saying if you were negotiating, if the starting point was, you have to include your grandmother in the house, you'd say no -- fair enough, I don't.

NAVARRO: But Republicans are saying, does this sound out of completely irrational? Republicans are saying let's delay a program, which we all know has its problems. It is not ready for takeoff by six months, by a year. Let's eliminate the device the medical device packs. Would it be unreasonable for somebody to come back and say, let's delay Obamacare for six months and cut the vice tacks by half? That's what reasonable people do when they're negotiating.

HILL: First of all, the Republican Party has done nothing particularly in the House to suggest that they would be willing to be reasonable over the next year. Their goal is to destroy Obamacare. This is one last ditch attempt to do so. I have no reason to believe that over the next 12 months, they would act in good faith because they haven't acted in good faith anywhere.

Even Ted Cruz is evidence that they don't act in good faith. The other thing here is that ultimately the president has said, I'm willing to negotiate on pieces of this, if you come to the table with ideas, we can do that. The only non-starter is taking Obamacare off the table and many of them seemed prepared to do that. That's problematic.

BOLDUAN: So let me ask this, let's work in reality, not on principle or ideology. What is the end game for Republicans? What do you think Republicans will eventually be able to accept?

NAVARRO: I think there is going to have to be some delay of Obamacare. I think the country is not prepared for it right now. If you take a look, there is really the Democrats the administration has done a terrible job explaining and selling Obamacare. Most people don't have no idea what it is that's beginning tomorrow. So would some delay be in the works? They keep delaying it themselves. They don't want to delay the Republicans --

HILL: I'm going to send you an e-mail in a few days once this goes through without any revisions to Obamacare because that's absolutely untrue. The Democrats don't have to do anything. They don't have to accept a delay. A clean bill is going to come through. Ultimately the House is going to have to accept it. That's reality. We have enough votes in the House to suggest that they can when this. Democrats are going to win this battle. Even if Democrats are wrong --

NAVARRO: The fight will roll right into the debt ceiling. It's a long October, my friend.

BOLDUAN: For everyone there.

HILL: That's the ugly one.

BOLDUAN: That is absolutely. If you don't think this is ugly, give us a few weeks.

NAVARRO: It's only September 30th.

BOLDUAN: That's a good point.

All right, Ana Navarro, I think you guys are probably negotiating this out. There you go. Ana Navarro, Marc Lamont Hill, always great to see you, thank you, guys.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: The commentary on the people who decide to get in the government versus those who stay out. Why are the ones that stay out much more reasonable?

Coming up on NEW DAY, Italy takes another shot at Amanda Knox. She is not going back for her trial, but could she one day be forced to return to Italy? We'll tell you why that could be a yes.

And a 25-year-old takes a break from work for good. There she is. She quit. We have the full story for you behind what may be the coolest resignation letter to date. Not a bad dance move. Reminds me of someone I know.

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CUOMO: Welcome back to NEW DAY. Amanda Knox is back on trial for murder, but this time, she is nowhere near the courthouse. The Seattle native will not return to Italy as her retrial in the 2007 murder of her roommate get underway right now. Knox was acquitted, you'll remember, two years ago, but that was overturned by Italy's highest court. What's the latest?

CNN's Erin McLaughlin is in London with what's going on right now. Good morning, Erin.

ERIN MCLAUGHLIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Chris. Well, today's hearing is largely procedural. They have not yet begun to examine evidence in this case. As for what this is all about, well, two years after their acquittal at least in the eyes of the Italian prosecutors, both Amanda Knox and her former boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, stand responsible for the grisly murder of 21-year-old Meredith Kercher.

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MCLAUGHLIN (voice-over): The latest chapter in Amanda Knox's long legal battle begins today in Florence, Italy, with a new appeals trial for the 2007 murder of his British roommate, Meredith Kercher. Knox will not be in court for the retrial, concerned about returning to the country where she spent four years behind bars.

AMANDA KNOX, MURDER CONVICTION OVERTURNED: I'm afraid to go back there. I don't want to go back into prison. I don't want them to all of a sudden do a court order when I'm there just respecting the court and going there and the prosecution ask could I be put in preventative detention again. I mean, I was there four years.

MCLAUGHLIN: At 22-years-old, Knox was convicted of brutally killing Kercher in the villa they shared in a small Italian town of Perugia. That ruling was overturned in 2011 due to lack of evidence and she returned home to Seattle.

KNOX: Thank you to everyone who has believed in me.

MCLAUGHIN: Bu those cries of relief in no way signal the end of the legal ordeal. In March, Italy's highest court ordered the acquittal overturned saying significant evidence was neglected, evidence that supported the prosecutor's theory that Knox and her then boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito killed Kercher in a twisted sex game gone wrong.

RICARDO MONTANA, LECTURER AT CITY UNIVERSITY: What happened with Supreme Court send the case back to the Courts of Appeal may be interpreted by the American authorities as double jeopardy twice tried for the same fact, the same case. In Italy, it is not locate this. This is still the same trial.

MCLAUGHLIN: If convicted, Knox will be ordered to return to Italy. If she refuses, Italy could request her extradition from the United States. While she won't be in court, Knox says she'd be willing to take a lie detector test.

KNOX: I'd do anything to prove my innocence. I don't think that's necessary, but, like I said, I'm doing everything I can to prove my innocence. I just think that it's very sad that that is what it has come to.

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MCLAUGHLIN: Amanda Knox is not the only one watching this trial from afar. Her former boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, tells CNN that he is currently in the Dominican Republic for a friend. As for Meredith Kercher's family, well, they remain here in the United Kingdom. You can only imagine how painful this all must be for them -- Chris and Kate. CUOMO: All right, Erin, thank you for the reporting. Obviously, a different situation for Sollecito because he's an Italian citizen, but there was a very important point there made in the piece. Double jeopardy, you only get tried once for things, whatever happens, happens. The U.S. does not avail its citizens to extradition treaty where double jeopardy is not respected. However, as the legal professor pointed out, the Italian system is different for better or worse. They don't see this as double jeopardy because you have these standards of review all the up like four, five levels.

BOLDUAN: So it's not as unusual as it appears here over there.

CUOMO: Legal experts say they don't believe in this situation that the U.S. would send Amanda Knox back, but it is not a done deal. That's why there is so much anxiety from her, her family and those who care about her because, you know, she doesn't know what her future holds.

BOLDUAN: She's not going anywhere near that country. She can do anything about it. That's for sure.

Coming up next on NEW DAY, we're on the eve of the rollout of Obamacare. What you need to know before signing up.

CUOMO: Signs of a thawing relationship between the U.S. and Iran seemed to have Israel on edge. President Obama meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, we are going to tell you what he will say to ease the fears of our allies.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I just wish the people that we elected in office would do their job. It seems like it's a lot of grandstanding for the people they are trying to win votes rather than what's best for the country.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think it's another scheme to get us citizens worried and try to get us on board with an agenda we don't want. I think its politicians' efforts to really just put their agendas through and not get their work done.

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BOLDUAN: Welcome back to NEW DAY. We are getting reaction, you heard there from everyday Americans, as the countdown to the government shutdown approaches, and it's coming quickly as midnight ticks closer and closer.

As we near that deadline another is around the corner, the start of the president's health care law the so-called insurance marketplaces that you've been hearing about, that were set to tomorrow. Questions remain, who is eligible and how does it all really work?

Well, CNN's Tom Foreman is digging in to try to get you some answers. TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Chris. Hi, Kate. After all those monumental talk about changes to health care, now that if you already have insurance you may not see much change, because it's really about these 48 million people who are uninsured about half of whom will buy insurance through the health care marketplaces, including about 7 million of them by the end of the year, and so how can we imagine these marketplaces?

Well, imagine a store where you can buy one of four different insurance plans, bronze, silver, gold for platinum. Here's the difference. If you buy at the lowest level what you would pay is a fairly low premium, but high fees when you go to the doctor's office. Fairly high premium but low fees when you go to the office for platinum.

This will not be the same state to state to state because local providers are involved. This part however will be the same. You should have no higher premiums if you get sick no matter where you live. You should have no denial of coverage if you're already sick and no fees for preventative care, your kids get a vaccination, you get a mammogram, husband gets a general physical you shouldn't pay for that.

This is still nonetheless expensive and the federal government is trying to help people paying for it. If you make $46,000 as a year as an individual, $94,000 a year as a family of four or less, they're going to give you a refund to help pay for this. Everybody is going to be involved. Doesn't matter that you might live in one of these dozens of states that have decided they want nothing to do with Obamacare.

That doesn't mean you're not involved. It just means your state won't administer it. The federal government will run these health care marketplaces in your state and will you still have to get involved. If you don't, you're going to be fined, that's how it works and that's why it is decision time for people coast to coast -- Chris, Kate.

CUOMO: There are some people who will choose to pay the fine especially younger, healthy people instead of having to get insurance because it's cheaper over time, that's part of the complaint also.

BOLDUAN: Part of the calculation you need to consider.

CUOMO: Many are shouting what's happening in D.C. is a travesty of a sham or mockery or traveshamockery.

BOLDUAN: That's what I was going to say.

CUOMO: Coming up on NEW DAY, this is an interesting issue going on, aside from the shutdown, you're looking at it right there. This is called history. Why? Short phone call between President Obama and Iran's president broke more than 30 years of ice between the two countries. Israel's leader says Washington needs to slow down. Why? More on that.

BOLDUAN: Also ahead a typed up notice just wasn't enough. We're going to show you how one woman said she's out, to her boss, and danced right out the door.

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BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Republicans in the House have been more concerned with appeasing an extreme faction of their party than working to pass a budget.

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CUOMO: On the brink, the clock is ticking and Congress isn't budging. If a deal isn't struck within hours, the government will shut down tonight. We're tracking it all for you this morning. We're tracking it all for you this morning.

BOLDUAN: What it means, hundreds of thousands to go without pay, military families affected, national parks to close, and the stock market already sinking.

Plus President Obama has a tense meeting today with Israel's prime minister, his recent overture to Iran likely to be discussed and Amanda Knox back on trial in Italy at this hour. We'll have the latest.

CUOMO: Your NEW DAY continues right now.

BOLDUAN: Good morning and welcome back to NEW DAY, everyone. It's Monday, September 30th, 8:00 in the east, that means it's less than 16 hours from the United States government shutting down. If that happens there would be serious consequences for everyday Americans from federal workers facing furloughs to military families who could be getting paid late.

And forget visiting national parks and monuments, sites like the statue of liberty, the Smithsonian and the Washington Monument, they would be closed if the shutdown happened and even the threat of a shutdown has people on edge much more.

COUMO: Just a little bit of a window into what could happen with the debt ceiling. The markets are already hurting. You're looking at the Dow futures right there and this is just for the shutdown. Imagine if they do this with the nation's credit, might be unfixable by our friends down in Washington.

According to this new CNN poll, 68 percent of Americans think it will be a bad thing, understatement, if the government shuts down even if it's only for a few days. The majority of Americans think the president and Congress are definitely not acting like adults. Is there any way to avoid this looming disaster?

That is the question we're going to cover, answered by every angle we can. Let's start with White House correspondent, Brianna Keilar. Brianna, the Senate is expected to shoot down a spending bill this afternoon that delays Obamacare. Then what? BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Chris. The Senate is expected to take up that bill the House passed and then promptly dismantle it and here's the issue. Barring some unexpected agreement here, we are on a fast track to government shutdown --