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CNN NEWSROOM

North Korea and South Korea Exchange Military Fire; Dozens Wounded by Car Bomb in Cairo; St. Louis Protests Grow Violent; Former President Carter Discusses Cancer; Trump and Bush Trade Shots at Town Halls; Accuser Testifies, "I Said No, No, No". Aired 9-9:30a ET

Aired August 20, 2015 - 09:00   ET

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


[09:00:05] CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: NEWSROOM starts now.

Happening now on the NEWSROOM, shots fired, tensions rise, North and South Korea exchange fire over the border just days after the North Korean government threatened to attack America.

Also --

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Police are driving down the street shooting tear gas where kids are.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: A St. Louis neighborhood erupts, bricks and bottles thrown at police. Tear gas fired after officers shoot and killed a black teenager who allegedly aimed a gun at them.

Plus candid talk from Jimmy Carter. Next hour the former president speaks out about his cancer diagnosis.

Let's talk. Live in the CNN NEWSROOM.

And good morning, I'm Carol Costello. Thank you so much for joining me.

North Korea fires what appears to be a small rocket at South Korea and the South fires back. This is all taking place along heavily fortified border area known as the Demilitarized Zone or the DMZ, where hundreds of American troops could be in the line of fire.

And it comes just days after North Korea threatened to attack America if we didn't stop military drills with South Korea. But right now the North seems focused on this.

South Korean loud speakers like the ones you just saw blaring propaganda across the border. CNN's Kathy Novak in Seoul this morning to tell us more.

Hi, Kathy.

KATHY NOVAK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Carol. The South Korean military is on high alert tonight. The president chaired a meeting of the National Security Council. She told the military to sternly take action against North Korean provocation.

Now the latest Defense Ministry update tells us there were actually two rounds of shells coming from North Korea and South Korea responded with shelling of its own. As you explained, this all seems to be in retaliation for the resumption of psychological warfare. That is the use of those propaganda speakers along the border.

Now that dates back to last week. What happened then was South Korea called a press conference blaming North Korea for laying landmines on its side of the DMZ, the border that you referred to. Those landmines exploded, they badly injured two South Korean soldiers. North Korea says it did not plant them but in retaliation South Korea resumed this psychological warfare.

That's something it hasn't done in more than 10 years. It is something that makes North Korea very angry. That is because the regime of Kim Jong-Un keeps a tight control on all communication to its citizens with North Korea. So having these anti-North Korean messages being blared across the border is something that it is refusing to put up with. And in fact it has issued an ultimatum. It says that if South Korea does not stop broadcasting by 5:00 p.m. on Saturday local time it will take military action -- Carol.

COSTELLO: Wow. All right. Kathy Novak, we'll get back to you. Thanks so much.

We're also following the aftermath of a powerful car bomb in Cairo, Egypt. ISIS has claimed responsibility for that blast which wounded dozens of people outside the National Security building. It happened before dawn and could be heard for miles.

CNN's senior international correspondent Nick Paton Walsh is covering this for us.

Hi, Nick.

NICK PATON WALSH, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Carol, imagine the force of a blast that in the dead of night, 2:00 in morning, leaves an enormous crater and blows out windows and blocks all around. In fact waking up people across the capital of Egypt. ISIS have claimed responsibility for this attack against the National Security building there. And they say it's in revenge for the death of six militants linked to a raid early on back in May.

Now people think when you hear that statement from ISIS that perhaps it's linked to their command and control in Syria and Iran. That's unlikely. It's more likely it's locally based Egyptians in the province of Sinai, which is sort of heading right down towards the southeast of the country. They've been at war with the security structures for quite some time, most intensely in the past months, and they have pledged allegiance to ISIS. So mostly taking outside branding into a longer-term fight.

The Security Services, troublingly saying actually this attack occurred when an attacker drove a car up, perhaps using the dead of night. Maybe there's less security around there. Drove a car outside the building, got out and then quickly got on the back of a motorbike that had been following that car and arrived at the scene. Clear planning here and above all a blow to President Sisi of Egypt who is being very hardlined against military and frankly all oppositions since he came to power.

And many are seeing the increased radicalization of those militants and attacks like this in the very heart of what should be very safe parts of the capitol as a sign that that policy instigated by a key U.S. ally simply isn't working -- Carol.

[09:05:04] COSTELLO: Nick Paton Walsh, reporting live for us this morning. Thank you.

In China where the government frequently downplays health concerns a startling announcement. Poisonous sodium cyanide is at mind boggling levels at the site of last week's explosion. Those levels, according to government officials, are sky high, more than 350 times the safe limits.

The blast at a chemical storage plant killing at least 114 people and damaging or destroying 17,000 homes. A top health official with the United Nations issued scathing criticism of China's government saying it withheld information that may have prevented the blast and its tightlipped handling of the aftermath has only increased the number of victims.

Tensions are high on the streets of St. Louis this morning. Overnight police facing off with protesters who were furious following the shooting death of an 18-year-old man by police. Police were forced to use tear gas as the crowd hurled rocks and bottles at officers. One group of people even set a car on fire while another burned an American flag.

The unrest started after police shot and killed 18-year-old Mansur Ball-Bey while executing a search warrant. Officials say Ball-Bey pointed a gun at them, forcing the officers to open fire.

Ryan Young is live outside of police headquarters this morning.

Good morning, Ryan.

RYAN YOUNG, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol. How much can this community take? Of course, that's the question. They only stopped burning that flag or that car, apparently moved on to a building that was vacant, they burned that down overnight as well. People in the community want to know when will this all end.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

YOUNG (voice-over): Overnight, a car set on fire.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Something is on fire down there.

YOUNG: And a house ablaze in the midst of a heated protest in St. Louis. Police say amid the demonstrations some businesses were burglarized.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Nine individuals ranging from charges from impeding flow of traffic to resisting arrests are now in our custody.

YOUNG: The anger beginning hours earlier when officers shot and killed 18-year-old Mansur Ball-Bey as he run down an alleyway. The grass left stained with his blood. Officials say the suspect pointed a gun at officers after they tried to execute a search warrant. Soon after demonstrators, incensed by the death, blocked a main street.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Police are driving down the street shooting tear gas where kids are.

YOUNG: Police say after multiple requests to disperse, they began shooting tear gas into the crowd.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: These people are actually standing here not doing a thing and they are shooting this into where their cars are and kids are taking shelter.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: As officers approached them to ask them to leave the intersection, glass bottles started to be thrown at officers, bricks started to be thrown at officers. Officers had to use shields to protect themselves from the objects that were being thrown at them.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

YOUNG: And, Carol, to give you perspective, police said they found three stolen guns near that 18-year-old. There's a second suspect that's on the loose. They believe he is armed as well. So this is far from over. Police said they will have more information later on this afternoon.

COSTELLO: All right. Ryan Young reporting live from St. Louis. Thanks so much.

A fast-moving wildfire kills three firefighters in Washington state. They were battling the Twisp Fire when their vehicle had an accident. The crew was then overcome from flames. Four others injured. The Twisp Fire has burned 1500 acres and threatened dozens of homes. The state's governor says all residents are obeying evacuation orders.

At the top of the next hour, a news conference that could be as emotional as it is extraordinary. Former U.S. president Jimmy Carter will publicly discuss for the first time the cancer diagnosis that he revealed just last week.

It's a poignant conversation, likely to resonate with millions of American families who face their own battles with the deadly disease.

CNN's chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta will be on hand for Jimmy Carter's speech.

Good morning, Sanjay.

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol. And I think you said it right. This could be a very extraordinary thing. We haven't heard from a president quite like this perhaps ever. You know, remember, former President Clinton, when he had his heart operation, he had heart surgery quite quickly. So he didn't have a chance to sort of talk to people like President Carter is going to now.

All we know really for certain, Carol, is that back on August 3rd he had an operation to remove a small mass on his liver. At that time he said look, the operation went well, the prognosis was good. But as you mentioned just last week he came out and said -- he released a statement and he said that recent liver operation revealed that I now have cancer which is now in other parts of my body. I'm going to rearrange any schedule as necessary.

He did talk at that time about the fact that he's going to pursue treatment here at Emory Health Care here in Atlanta. But we haven't heard anything since, Carol. So what we're expecting to hear from President Carter is exactly how he's feeling, how he's doing, but also what type of cancer this is and what specifically he's planning on doing if anything.

[09:10:11] COSTELLO: All right. Sanjay, thanks so much.

And a reminder, we'll carry live former President Carter and the discussion of his cancer diagnosis that will happen at the top of the hour. It's actually scheduled to begin at 10:00 a.m. Eastern Time.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: Donald Trump's pledge to make America great again has thousands of voters fed up with Washington flocking to hear him speak those words in person. The latest example, Trump's first-ever town hall in New Hampshire last night where the Republican frontrunner took aim at the man who used to hold that title -- Jeb Bush. But Bush got in some jabs of his own during a similar event in a nearby town.

CNN political reporter Sara Murray joins us now with more.

Good morning, Sara.

SARA MURRAY, CNN POLITICAL REPORTER: Good morning, Carol.

Part of the reason last night was such a fiery event, in addition to being just 15 miles apart, was because Jeb Bush is taking on a new strategy and being much more aggressive in his attacks on Donald Trump.

[09:15:09] Let's take a look at what went down last night.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MURRAY (voice-over): Step aside Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather --

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Thank you. Thank you.

JEB BUSH (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Thank you. Thanks.

MURRAY: -- Donald Trump and Jeb Bush are taking over the ring.

In a night of dueling town halls in New Hampshire, just 15 miles apart and within an hour of each other, both Republican presidential candidates threw jabs.

TRUMP: I don't see how he's electable. Jeb Bush is a low energy person. For him to get things done is hard. He's very low energy.

BUSH: Mr. Trump doesn't have a proven conservative record. He was a Democrat longer in the last decade than he was a Republican.

MURRAY: Though Bush sat the date first, his crowd about 200 got walloped by Trump's 1,200.

TRUMP: You know, we have a lot of people outside, hundreds and hundreds of people standing outside.

MURRAY: Some even spilling into an overflow room to see the candidate in his first official town hall.

TRUMP: You know what's happening to Jeb's crowd, as you know, right down the street? They're sleeping.

He was supposed to do well in New Hampshire. He's gone down like a rock.

MURRAY: Though he dubbed himself a joyful tortoise, it seems Wednesday was the night Bush came out of his shell, throwing this punch at Trump's immigration policy.

BUSH: Hundreds of billions of dollars of cost to implement his plans is not a conservative plan.

MURRAY: A blow the GOP front runner blocked, telling reporters --

TRUMP: The only thing constant is Trump. All of them change on the bottom. They're going up and down like yoyos. I'm not going anywhere, folks. I'm not doing this for my health. I'm doing this to make America great again.

MURRAY: Florida's former governor doesn't think that's enough to win the fight.

BUSH: People are going to want someone sitting behind the big desk that they know their compass points north, that they have the integrity to act on what they say they'll do and they have the leadership skills to make it so. That's it.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MURRAY: Now, Jeb Bush and Donald Trump going their separate ways today. Jeb Bush is continuing to barn storm through New Hampshire with two other stops here today. Meanwhile, Donald Trump is looking ahead to Friday where he's holding

a pep rally in Alabama. The campaign tells me they already have 35,000 RSVPs for that event. So, they've upgraded the venue. Now it's at a football stadium.

Back to you, Carol.

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Oh my gosh! OK.

So, Sara, stay with us because after his town hall Trump sat down with Chris Cuomo and took Hillary Clinton to task over the email controversy that hangs over her campaign.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I think it's devastating for the election. But I think her bigger problem is not the election. I think her bigger problem is going to be the criminal problem.

CUOMO: Really? You really think this could turn out to be a criminal situation for Hillary Clinton? Because there's no reference of that from the investigators right now.

TRUMP: I don't think I'm the only one. I mean, the FBI is involved. They only do criminal. I don't think I'm the only one. Now, maybe it's somebody on her staff.

But, look, it's either criminal or incompetent. It's one or the other. It's either gross incompetence or criminal, and neither is acceptable to be president.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: All right. Sara Murray is back with me. I also want to bring in Jason Johnson, a political analyst and political science professor at Hiram College.

Sara, I want to ask you the first question. According to Quinnipiac, they did a swing state poll, Clinton does poorly in Ohio, Florida and Pennsylvania in favorability ratings. Now, Clinton has dismissed Trump as entertainment. But should she push back hard on Trump at this moment?

MURRAY: The interesting thing that I heard from voters, it's not that they want Clinton to push back against Trump. It's that they want a better answer on this e-mail question. I was talking to one voter who said she's split between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, if you could believe it. And when I asked her what her reservations are about Hillary Clinton, she said I just don't understand what's going on with these emails. And she didn't like that Clinton keeps making jokes about it. She didn't like that she's not dealing with the question head on and explaining why she got all these e-mails sent to her personal account and whether there was anything that should have been more sensitive sent there.

And I think that's the bigger challenge for Hillary Clinton right now is coming up with a better explanation for this e-mail controversy, rather than trying to take on Donald Trump head on.

COSTELLO: Yes. OK. Let's talk about Donald Trump, because he continues to be on this incredible roll, right? He's on the cover of "TIME" magazine this week with a headline, "Deal With It." I believe we have pictures.

Inside the magazine, he's pictured with an American eagle. A few unimportant tidbits to share with you about the "TIME" magazine spread. The eagle is 27 years old and is named Uncle Sam.

As for Trump, the "TIME" magazine photographer said he's very difficult to photograph. If you ask Trump to look up a bit, he says no or he just doesn't do it. He literally has one angle. If I ask him to smile, he puts on a big grin and goes back to his Zoolander blue steel look.

[09:20:04] And the blue steel stays for as long -- for as ever long as it takes to get the photograph.

So, Jason, everyone says, oh, Donald Trump is a natural. But, really, he's far from it, because it seems that his every move is really orchestrated.

JASON JOHNSON, POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, it's orchestrated and clearly he's a TV guy. I mean, this dueling banjos thing he had in New Hampshire, isn't that brilliant counter programming. Like he knew Bush was going to be there, so that's why he showed up.

Donald Trump knows how to be good on television, Donald Trump knows how to engage a crowd. Donald Trump knows how to get attention. The question remains, are any of his plans that he's promoting actually practical? Can they be done? And can he get people willing to really work for him in Iowa? And that's what we're going to see in a couple of months, no matter how well he does in the polls.

COSTELLO: Sara, does he have to talk about issues? Can he just continue to run on what he's running on right now, surface issues and tough alpha male talk?

MURRAY: Well, he did get some questions at his town hall last night about his policies. So, I do think voters do want to see a little bit of substance. Donald Trump would disagree with me on this by the way, he says only the press cares about policies, not voters.

I don't think that's true especially in a place like Iowa and New Hampshire where these voters are really used to seeing candidates up close. They're used to being able to vet them personally and vet their policies. So, I think, ultimately, he's going to have to put out a little bit more substance that he has already. And his campaign says they're prepared to do that, that in the coming weeks they'll be rolling out more policy proposals.

So, we'll have to see if they stay true to their word and then how voters feel about those policies once they're out.

COSTELLO: OK. So, Jason, Republicans seem worried still about Donald Trump even though he's not laying out much policy. Should Democrats be worried about him too?

JOHNSON: I don't think any Democrats should be worried. Really we're talking about Hillary Clinton. Hillary Clinton's got her own problems, not just with the e-mail., not just with her favorability, but even her ability to galvanize crowds. I think Hillary Clinton needs to work on establishing herself more than worrying about Trump.

If we see any Democrats attacking Trump right now, that's punching up, I guess that work for you if you're Lincoln Chafee or Martin O'Malley. But they haven't even secured their own positions yet. So I don't think any Democrats should be worried about him, at least not in August.

COSTELLO: Maybe Hillary Clinton should pose with a giant American eagle named Uncle Sam.

JOHNSON: Might help.

COSTELLO: Sara Murray, Jason Johnson, many thanks to both of you.

Still to come in THE NEWSROOM: more testimony from the teenage girl who says this prep school senior rapes her. What she told juries as she broke down sobbing on the stand, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:26:45] COSTELLO: This morning, a convicted killer who escaped from prison and was on the run for weeks will go before a judge. CNN was there as David Sweat was led into the courtroom for his first appearance, shackled and surrounded by officers. His arm is still bandaged. It's still in a sling. Another inmate led police on a three-week manhunt after breaking out of a facility in upstate New York. He was killed. A prison worker has already pleaded guilty to helping both men escape.

We turn now to the prep school student on trial for rape. Owen Labrie listening as his accuser took the stand. The alleged victim crying as she detailed a school tradition that she says turn to rape.

The accuser says she willingly went to the roof of St. Paul's with Labrie and they began kissing. But what happened next she says was unwanted. Supposedly, and this is according to her, Labrie unlocked the door to this darkened closet, pushed her inside. And that's when he began touching her below her waist.

In her own words, quote, "I said, no, no, no, keep it up here. I wanted not to cause a conflict. I felt like I was frozen."

The teenager said she kept it all a secret at first. She says Labrie was one of the most popular boys on campus. She said, quote, "I didn't want to come off as an inexperienced little girl, I didn't want him to laugh at me, I didn't want to offend him."

She will retake the stand today to face cross examination.

"The New York Times" now reporting that Labrie himself is expected to take the stand and testify as to what happened that night.

CNN legal analyst and criminal defense attorney Danny Cevallos is here with me now to talk about this case.

You know, her testimony, it was just difficult to listen to. It was difficult to read about. There are mostly men who make up the jury in this case. How do you suppose -- how do you suppose her testimony affected them? How did they take it?

DANNY CEVALLOS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Making broad assumptions about particular jurors based on stereotypes is really a form of astrology. The best role is to take each juror as an individual. I will say there are studies that tend to show different things. Possibly that older females maybe don't view rape cases as seriously as younger females on a jury.

But, ultimately, all those studies are mere bunk. It all comes down to what that individual male juror feels about this particular case and whether or not he or she has a connection with the defendant or has a connection with the alleged victim. I think that's what it comes down to more than anything in these sexual assault type cases.

COSTELLO: Well, it might be difficult to defend this young girl, you know, because she said she didn't want to disrespect him. She didn't quite know how to tell him a definitive no, right? Because he was popular and she was afraid.

But that would send a conflicting message to this boy, right?

CEVALLOS: Well, it's no secret that young victims of sexual abuse often blame themselves. And it's often -- we've heard this many times before. That's why they don't immediately report it.

That presents a special problem in the prostitution of sexual assault cases, especially those against children, because they frequently don't report it until long after there is any potential forensic evidence in a case. And that always presents a problem in these cases, no matter what.