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Defense Chief: "Iraqi Forces Showed No Will to Fight"; Bomb Squad Destroys Pressure Cooker Near Capitol; Flash Flood Watched in Oklahoma & Northern Texas; NYT: DOJ Finds Criminal Wrongdoing by GM; Senate Blocks NSA Surveillance Bill. Aired 6:30-7a ET

Aired May 25, 2015 - 06:30   ET

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


(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:31:17] ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Fallout this morning after stunning comments from Defense Secretary Ash Carter telling CNN that Iraqi forces showed no will to fight ISIS in Ramadi. Iraq's prime minister pushing back saying Carter was fed wrong information and the Iraqi military will soon reclaim Ramadi. The U.S. reportedly expedited shipments of weapons to the Iraqi military to help stop the ISIS advance.

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: One person has been arrested after police found a pressure cooker in an abandoned car in D.C. officials say during routine patrol a suspicious vehicle was spotted on the National Mall. They approached the car. They found that pressure cooker. They smelled gasoline. You can see a bomb squad was called and they safely destroyed it.

This all happened as thousands of people are said to attend a Memorial Day concert in front of the Capitol building.

CAMEROTA: Terrifying.

Well, Juan Pablo Montoya, now a two-time winner of the Indianapolis 500. I have Michaela's attention. His last win was as a rookie in 2000. His win, Michaela, was clouded by this scary moment from the race, a passing car flipped a car and hit two crew members. Both were taken to the hospital. One of the men suffered an ankle injury. And other was checked out and released.

PEREIRA: If only we could have him here to talk about this.

CAMEROTA: I have good news for you.

PEREIRA: What's that?

CAMEROTA: In the next hour, we will talk to the Indy 500 winner himself, Michaela considers him dreamy.

PEREIRA: I love this. Do you know he won, this is his second win -- the last time was in 2000. To have a 15-year span and have a victory again, I love it. CAMEROTA: Great story.

PEREIRA: He will be here, so excited.

CAMEROTA: Yay!

PEREIRA: All right. Well, weather is a big concern right now. The threat of strong storms and flooding, it is not over for parts of Texas and Oklahoma. More than 350 homes have been wiped away outside of Austin. At least three people died due to the record setting rain.

Look at the video. Look at that, tossing cars around like toys. Incredibly the man in that vehicle, he survived.

CAMEROTA: Goodness.

PEREIRA: I want to turn to meteorologist Chad Myers for a look at the forecast.

It is looking dire in that area.

CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: And more rain today. Not right now. It has died off for the nighttime into the morning hours, but things will pop up again this afternoon. A couple showers across the upper mid-west, all the way up into Ontario and Quebec.

But look at this rainfall. This is just the past seven days. Many areas here in excess of 10 inches of rainfall in seven days, flood watches, flood warnings, all across from Memphis, all the way back down into parts of Texas and the potential for tornado today as well.

And then, look at the radar. This is the future radar. This is what's going to happen today in the flooded areas, the hill country, Austin, San Marcos, San Antonio, more rainfall coming down. It could be a couple of inches. There's no place to put it. It absolutely has to run off. It can't soak in now.

So, here's the story for the rest of the country. Ohio valley, going to be a couple showers this afternoon. I think you can still squeeze a picnic in between a shower or two. The heaviest rainfall by morning, down across the Gulf Coast and into the Northeast for tomorrow night and into Wednesday as well.

Heavy rainfall, though, through Wednesday. Still more showers and thundershowers if you are in a flooded area or even a flood watch, you need to watch out for sure, especially in the nighttime hours. It's so hard to see flooding at night. New York City, though, for you guys -- hey, warming up, hot day today, hot tomorrow, up into the middle '80s. Looks like picnic weather to me.

Back to you.

PEREIRA: It does, indeed. But, boy, we have to keep our friends and neighbors down in Texas in our thoughts. Those are 350 families, it sounds like a statistic. Those are 350 families whose lives have been inextricably shaken.

CAMEROTA: Yes. Thanks for keeping an eye on it for us, Chad. We'll check back in.

A big update now on General Motors for you. The auto giant could be held criminally responsible for more than 100 deaths linked to faulty ignition switches.

[06:35:02] A record settlement may be brewing. We will tell you if you can be affected.

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CAMEROTA: More trouble for General Motors. A "New York Times" report says that the Justice Department has identified criminal wrongdoing in G.M.'s failure to disclose an ignition switch defect. That malfunction led to at least 100 deaths.

According to report, G.M. is negotiating what could be a record settlement with the government. G.M. has responded only by saying, quote, "We are cooperating fully with all requests. We are unable to comment on the status of the investigation."

Joining us now to discuss is HLN legal analyst and criminal defense attorney Joey Jackson, and CNN legal analyst and criminal defense attorney Danny Cevallos.

[06:40:03] Gentlemen, great to see you this morning.

JOEY JACKSON, HLN LEGAL ANALYST: Good morning, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: Joey, what makes this criminal rather than just a terrible unfortunate malfunction?

JACKSON: Well, that will depend upon ultimately whether they turned up. And remember what they did here, they being the U.S. attorney's office in Manhattan with their investigators. What they did is they interviewed former employees and oftentimes they will give you queen for a day status. What does that mean, Alisyn?

It means you as a former employee, you come in, you talk to me about what you do and when you do it. You get a limited immunity, telling them the truth that day and, of course, you don't tell the truth, that becomes problematic.

CAMEROTA: But you say limited immunity, meaning then you can't be prosecuted ever or at that moment?

JACKSON: Well, you know what? It depends upon the nature you tell them, how forthcoming you are, what you know. And so, usually what happens is they can still prosecute you in the event you change your story from what you said that day. It can't be used in their case in chief against you, but should you testify and you tell something different from that, it becomes problematic. And so, there was a lot gleaned from that. And the last thing before you get to Danny is, remember the

Valukas report, a former federal prosecutor, who put together a 325- page report and gave the government a blue print who they should look, who they should look for, who knew when, and who knew what and when they knew it.

CAMEROTA: And, Danny, one of the things that came out in that 325-page report is that what they found was that there was a corporate culture at G.M. that was more comfortable with, quote, "looking away than taking action." Is that criminal?

DANNY CEVALLOS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: It depends on what the DOJ says. Now, it's important to take a step back and look at the DOJ's history in prosecuting or allowing these companies to enter into deferred prosecution agreements.

Since Arthur Anderson went down back in 2002, the DOJ has been very concerned about bringing criminal prosecutions against companies because you could potentially lose thousands of jobs. But in 2014, the DOJ has indicated that the pendulum is swinging back and they will hold corporations criminally accountable, and part of that appears to be, they will ask these corporations to disclose additional information and potentially go after individual defendants.

And the consequences of that are massive, under a deferred prosecution agreement, a corporation could avoid all of the trouble of the lost money.

CAMEROTA: Meaning that a deferred prosecution agreement, that means a settlement?

CEVALLOS: Yes. You know, I'm glad you say that, because this is technically a criminal prosecution, it really, when you prosecute a company, you can't put a company in jail. So, the only thing the DOJ really can do is fine them and make them do things and monitor them.

So, yes, when you think of a deferred prosecution agreement, it's very much like going to an individual in a civil lawsuit and saying, hey, we got you dead to rights and into this agreement, we'll monitor you. You pay a gazillion dollars and we'll move on. You don't have to defend yourself in criminal or civil court.

But they will be defending themselves in civil court, that's what makes it different.

JACKSON: And when Danny says gazillion dollars, remember, Toyota paid $1.2 billion. And that's certainly significant in terms of deterring other corporations from engaging in many misbehavior.

CAMEROTA: I want to talk about these charges that we just put on the screen, because the possible charges are: charge General Motors, but as you say it's not a person, charge individuals who work or worked at General Motors, G.M. could enter into a deferred prosecution agreement which you just talked about.

So, what about the individuals? I mean, why not be however high up this goes, might they go to jail?

CEVALLOS: Absolutely. And absolutely, because the DOJ has expressed that they are going to start going after individuals and request that or demand that the company disclose information about those individuals. It's a new direction the DOJ is going in, to not only require these companies to plead guilty instead of offering them the more appealing deferred prosecution agreement and secondarily to disclose information about individuals who may be responsible.

CAMEROTA: Joey, jobs versus justice as Danny just laid out.

JACKSON: Sure.

CAMEROTA: Are they mutually justice? Can't you find justice somehow without sort of hurting G.M. so badly that thousands of jobs are lost?

JACKSON: It's tough to do, Alisyn, because if you want accountability, you have to get that by way of doing something that has teeth in it. You know General Motors certainly employs a lot of people, but should we allow them to be putting ignition switches into machinery that people operate, should 100 or more people be dying as a result of that, if they knew and if engineers knew it and they didn't disclose it or if they did disclose it as a company, but didn't disclose the full extent of the problem to what extent, do you hold them accountable?

And so, what do you want to do here? Do you want other companies to know that the federal government, because they value jobs, because they value economic opportunities and people working, they're going to take light on you. You're going to pay a fine and you're going to go home.

Make no mistake about it, the families of those who died here and those who significantly injured, they see justice in the form of being prosecuted and held accountable.

CAMEROTA: I'm glad that you're talking about the victims, because just to remind everyone what these faulty ignition switches did was that as you are cruising along the highway at 65 miles per hour, the power steering went out.

[06:45:01] And then the power brakes went out, and then the airbags didn't work. So, it was this perfect storm of, you know, deadly circumstances and 100 people at least were killed. I mean, every single one of those people has a story, has a family. So, what's going to happen? Is every one of them going to be able to get something out of G.M., or are we just talking about justice?

CEVALLOS: Not necessarily everyone, because I believe a bankruptcy court determined there were time baring issue with some of the claims. But these plaintiffs and their attorneys are watching closely what the DOJ does because they can always benefit from the discovery that the government does for them to use in their case or claims against G.M. JACKSON: And the final point to this piece of it if terms of the

individuals is remember even though there may be some time bar or legal issue, Alisyn, there is nothing that would establish the company from establishing a pot of money, which they did to their credit, and doling out in terms of doing the right thing for families who lost, because there is also a public relations issue here. And if you know the company is not going to really make whole those people who are injured or died because of what you did, that becomes problematic. People don't like it. Consumers don't like it, and it damages the company.

CAMEROTA: Joey, Danny, thanks so much for explaining it to us. Nice to see you.

JACKSON: Thank you, Alisyn.

CEVALLOS: Thank you. Thank you.

CAMEROTA: Here's Michaela.

PEREIRA: All right. Well, time is almost up for the NSA's phone under surveillance program with Republican presidential hopeful Rand Paul leading the opposition. We're going to take a look at the future of homeland security as we look ahead to that 2016 race.

Also, we are showing you a live look now at Arlington National Cemetery on this Memorial Day. Remember our fallen service members. We'll have much more at the top of the hour.

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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

[06:50:46] SEN. RAND PAUL (R), KENTUCKY: We've entered into a momentous debate. This is a debate about whether or not a warrant with a single name of a single company can be used to collect all the records, all of the phone records of all of the people in our country with a single warrant. Our forefathers would be aghast.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PEREIRA: The future of the NSA's phone under surveillance program remains in limbo this morning after the Senate blocked measures that would have extended or replaced the law with presidential hopeful, Senator Rand Paul, leading the opposition.

CAMEROTA: Let's break all this down with CNN political commentator and host of "The Ben Ferguson Show", Ben Ferguson, and former executive director of the Congressional Black Caucus and CEO of the political strategy firm Impact Strategies, Angela Rye.

Great to see both of you.

BEN FERGUSON, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Good morning.

ANGELA RYE, IMPACT STRATEGIES: Good morning. CAMEROTA: Ben, did Rand Paul effectively kill the NSA's phone

collection program?

FERGUSON: No, but he certainly made for an incredible debate on both sides. I mean, this is one of those an issue where you don't have a consensus on the GOP side and you also don't have a consensus on the Democratic side as well. And that is a good thing in Washington, because you're seeing that there is going to be a grand debate over this.

And Rand has been very consistent if saying that he does not like this program and how it works and I'll give him full credit for that. But ultimately, I think you are probably going to see some sort of compromise on this issue to kind of rewrite some of what people said went too far with the NSA and with freedoms that -- decisions that are supposed to keep us safe, but people were saying, I don't know if I want all my data being watched and collected by the government and show me the proof where this has actually worked to help save American lives.

PEREIRA: Well, on the flip side, Angela, show me the proof you hear that. But I want you to listen to what Chris Christie released his statement over the weekend, saying this -- I think I can pull up still that I can pull up.

"The Senate's failure to extend the Patriot Act is a failure of the U.S. government to perform its most important function: protecting its citizens from harm." It goes on to say, "This is an unfortunate result of misguided ideologues who have no real world experience in fighting terrorism, putting their uninformed beliefs above the safety and security of our citizens." Quite a shot across the bow of obviously Rand Pau.

But to his point -- is this right time, Angela, when we are facing a global threat of terror around the world, is this the right time to let this program stop?

RYE: Sure. I think there are a couple things to examine here. One is that Section 215 of the Patriot Act is one thing, the USA Freedom Act is totally different thing . The USA Freedom Act is one that had broad bipartisan support in the United States House of Representatives and passed overwhelmingly in a bipartisan way with well over 330 votes.

I think the challenge comes in when Rand Paul, who is used to grandstanding on the Senate floor doesn't offer a compromise. You heard that language a lot also during Obamacare. The Republicans talked often about repeal and replace. We never saw that replace.

Well, there is a replacement here. It's the USA Freedom Act. And if Senator Paul has some provisions that he would like to see included there, I think there are reasonable minds there who may be willing to consider that.

But not having anything I think is off the table. Eighty percent of Americans do agree with Rand Paul, of course. But I think that they want to see something there for our protection.

CAMEROTA: You know, Ben, you hit on the confounding divide that the Republicans and Democrats can't even agree on whether or not the phone collection program worked to thwart terrorist acts. I mean, we have Mike Rogers on one side, who was the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, now a CNN contributor, who says that it thwarted 54 terror plots world wide.

Then you have people like presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee who say this over the weekend.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MIKE HUCKABEE (R), FORMER ARKANSAS GOVERNOR: Two hundred and twenty-five different terrorists plot over the past year since 9/11, and so far, not one of them has been tied directly to the NSA's collection of metadata. So, if this is so effective, how come it hasn't resulted in the foiled terrorist plots?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[06:55:00] CAMEROTA: Some people say not a single one tied to the metadata. Other people say 54 broken up. So, I mean that, even that.

FERGUSON: I think people are, you got to look at this from two different perspectives. I think what you see, Huckabee is saying show me a direct attack that was stop because of metadata. Others would say, timeout, that's not the intent of what this is doing. This is to help connect dots to other possible terrorist networks and terrorism networks and people that are talking to one another so we can figure out who these people are, when we do find one that shows up on our list, then to be able to connect the dots from that person to other individuals.

So, I think what you see from Mike Rogers' perspective is, you got to look at what the intent of the program is about. It is about helping us find the people that are talking to a possible suspect. We can't do that if we don't have the data to go back and look at when we do get a good number, when we do get someone that shows up on a list.

And when we find that person, we want to go back in time and we want to see what they have been doing and who they have been talking to.

So, do I think it's going to directly stop a terrorist attack in real time? Probably not exactly the intent of this. It was more about when we do find that suspect --

CAMEROTA: Yes.

FERGUSON: -- do we know who they talk to and can we connect those dots quickly instead of having it go to a judge and then look only forward at what they're doing in the future.

PEREIRA: All right. Ben, Angela, a great conversation with the two of you. We have to leave it there.

So many other days for us to talk about all of this going forward. Thanks so much for joining us this morning on this Memorial Day.

We are certainly following a whole lot of news today, so let's get right to it.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CAMEROTA: Iraqi fighters could have done much more.

ASH CARTER, DEFENSE SECRETARY: It happened in Ramadi was a failure Iraqi forces.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm surprised why he said that as they support Iraq.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The local police officer was acquitted of two voluntary manslaughter cardinals.

CROWD: We want justice!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is Cleveland. Not Baltimore, not Ferguson.

LEBRON JAMES, CLEVELAND CAVALIERS: Violence is not the answer and it's all about trying to find a solution.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Water at one point was flowing over the highways.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh my God! Oh my God!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This flood is the largest I've seen in 25 years.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And the winner of the Indianapolis 500 is Juan Pablo Montoya.

CAMEROTA: The Indy 500 winner joins us live on NEW DAY.

ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Chris Cuomo, Alisyn Camerota and Michaela Pereira.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PEREIRA: Good morning. And welcome back to your NEW DAY. We wish you all a safe and happy Memorial Day. Chris Cuomo is off for today.

We have big questions about U.S. policy on ISIS this morning, following very direct criticism from Defense Secretary Ash Carter, telling CNN exclusively that Iraqi fighters abandoned efforts last week to hold onto the key city of Ramadi, which is now in ISIS control. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CARTER: The Iraqi forces just showed no will to fight. They were not outnumbered. In fact, they vastly outnumbered the opposing force. And yet, they failed to fight, they withdrew from the site and that says to me and I think to most of us that we have an issue with the will of the Iraqis.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Well, the Iraqi prime minister quickly pushed back on Carter's comments. We will tell you about those in a moment.

But where does the fight against ISIS stand this morning?

Our coverage begins with CNN's senior White House correspondent Jim Acosta. He is at the White House.

Jim, what are you hearing?

JIM ACOSTA, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Alisyn.

As President Obama is set to remember the nation's fallen soldiers on this Memorial Day, his plan for dealing ISIS is coming under increasing scrutiny. Asked about Defense Secretary Ash Carter's very candid comments, a White House official pointed out that the president also said just last week that the Iraqis have to fight for their own security, and that the U.S. cannot do that for them.

Not only are Republicans criticizing the president's strategy, a few Democrats have also said the White House needs to rethink it's approach. House Democrat Tulsi Gabbard, she was on "STATE OF THE UNION" yesterday, she was also echoing Defense Secretary Carter's concern that the Iraqis just don't have the will to fight, saying you can't train that into them.

And keep in mind, relying on those Iraqi forces on the ground while the U.S. provides air power support has been a key part of the president's plan. I talked to two former top national security officials under President Obama yesterday. The under secretary of defense, Michelle Flournoy, under President Obama and his first term, she told me now is the time to do more. The former National Counterterrorism Center director, Michael Leiter, said the administration has underestimated ISIS in its ability to seize territory.

And so, we will be listening to hear what the president has to say about this battle against ISIS as he lays a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldiers at Arlington National Cemetery later on this morning.

Alisyn, we do expect him to make some remarks. We will see if he has anything to say about this battle against ISIS -- Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: OK. And we'll be talking to our military experts on NEW DAY about this topic as well, Jim. Thank you for that.

Well, the Iraqis are responding this morning to Secretary Carter's comments, this as Iraqi forces prepare to try to retake Ramadi.