Return to Transcripts main page

CNN NEWSROOM

Donald Trump Takes Aim at Clinton During Rally; Ted Cruz Closes in on Trump in New GOP Poll; Vegas Strip Driver Faces Murder Charge; Six U.S. Service Members Killed in Afghanistan; ISIS Uses Radio Broadcast for Recruiting; Aired 9-9:30a ET

Aired December 22, 2015 - 09:00   ET

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


[09:00:02] CAMEROTA: All the time.

CUOMO: Even when they have a lot of money they're still good people.

CAMEROTA: There you go.

CUOMO: We seem to be forgetting that these days.

CAMEROTA: Well done, Chris. Thank you for that.

Time now for 'NEWSROOM" with Carol Costello.

CUOMO: Another good person.

(LAUGHTER)

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Thank you very much for that. I appreciate it. I was just laughing at your exchange. It was lovely, though. Have a great day.

NEWSROOM starts now.

And good morning. I'm Carol Costello. Thank you so much for joining me. The Republican battle for the White House and a new Quinnipiac poll that shows Ted Cruz and Donald Trump are running neck-and-neck. Trump is at 28 percent, Cruz 24 percent. The poll released after another ruckus Trump rally. But this time on what protesters than ever made their presence known.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: With all of the money they gave, it's massive. Yes? Thank you.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Donald Trump.

TRUMP: Yes, darling. Yes. Why, she doesn't sound very tough, huh. That's a very weak voice. Still a little louder. We can't hear you, darling. Wow. That is not a protester prime, right? Look at these people. Boy, what a bunch of losers, I'll tell you. You are a loser. You really are a loser. Now get him out.

(END VIDEO CLIP) COSTELLO: CNN's Joe Johns joins me now with more on the Trump rally in Michigan. Good morning.

JOE JOHNS, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol. Trump is famous for his one-liners and his insults directed at his opponents but even for him some of the comments he made last night leveled at Hillary Clinton are surprisingly personal, ratcheting up the feud between the two candidates from the respective parties who are leading in the polls right now.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TRUMP: And you see Hillary, I mean, did you watch that -- what happened to her? She's terrible.

JOHNS (voice-over): Donald Trump unleashing yet another tirade against Democratic frontrunner Hillary Clinton at a rally in Michigan.

TRUMP: Hillary, that's not a president.

JOHNS: The billionaire coming under fire for using an R-rated derogatory term when referring to her 2008 defeat by Barack Obama.

TRUMP: She was favored to win, and she got schlonged. She lost. I mean, she lost.

JOHNS: And weighing in on her much discussed bathroom break from Saturday's debate.

TRUMP: I know where she went. It's disgusting. I don't want to talk about it. No, it's too disgusting. Don't say it. It's disgusting.

JOHNS: Trump then going after Clinton's claim that ISIS is propagandizing the GOP frontrunner.

TRUMP: Donald Trump is on video, and ISIS is using him on the video to recruit. And it turned out to be a lie. She's a liar.

JOHNS: Clinton's press secretary doubling down.

BRIAN FALLON, CLINTON CAMPAIGN PRESS SECRETARY: It is a confirmed fact that the footage of Donald Trump making those hateful comments earlier this month was played all across the Middle East.

JOHNS: Trump also discussing the controversy over Vladimir Putin's praise and allegations that the Russian president has ordered the killing of journalists.

TRUMP: They said, oh, Trump should have been much nastier. That's terrible. And then they said, you know, he's killed reporters. And I don't like that. I'm totally against that.

JOHNS: The GOP frontrunner then reconsidering.

TRUMP: I would never kill them. I would never do that. Ah, let's see. No, I wouldn't. But I do hate them. And some of them are such lying, disgusting people.

JOHNS: Trump continues leading in the latest national poll, but Texas Senator Ted Cruz is closing in. The rest of the GOP field making the rounds in the battleground state of New Hampshire, where Trump rival Jeb Bush again went on the attack.

JEB BUSH (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: This is not a serious man that has serious plans.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

JOHNS: And a little bit more about people being kicked out. As, you know, Carol, it has happened at other Trump events during this campaign. Between 10 and 12 people were interrupting Trump and removed from the venue by security guards.

COSTELLO: All right. Joe Johns reporting live from Washington. Thank you.

That Quinnipiac poll is not at all a bed of roses, especially for Donald Trump. Let's take closer look at these numbers. Fifty percent of American voters told Quinnipiac that they would be embarrassed to have Trump as the face of the United States. Just 23 percent would be proud to have Trump as president.

And it makes this headline in the "Washington Times" resonate. "Obama, Clinton may be setting up Trump to win the Republican nomination? What's that about?"

Let's talk about that and more. With me now CNN political commentator and "New York Times" columnist Ross Douthat, and Andy Smith, director of the University of New Hampshire Survey Center.

Thanks to both of you.

ANDY SMITH, DIRECTOR, UNIVERSITY OF NEW HAMPSHIRE SURVEY CENTER: Good morning.

COSTELLO: Good morning. So, Ross, before we get into campaign conspiracy theories, let's talk terminology.

[09:05:04] This was actually a headline in the "Washington Post." Let's put it up there because we didn't hear it earlier but Donald Trump did indeed say this about Hillary Clinton's alleged losing at the Democratic debate. He used the term -- I'm not allowed to say it on television or my bosses would be mad. But this is the headline in the "Washington Post." Donald Trump's blank, a linguistic investigation. The "Post" calls the term sexists, experts call them malaprop. I haven't actually used it since I was in 7th grade and it made me giggle. But this word has made it into the political landscape.

Ross, thoughts?

(LAUGHTER)

ROSS DOUTHAT, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Am I allowed to say the word?

COSTELLO: Sure, go ahead.

DOUTHAT: No, no, this is a family broadcast. So, look, again, the key to understanding Donald Trump's political strategy is that it is a combination of whatever pops into his head at a given moment and whatever will keep him dominating the news, particularly cable news like he's dominating our discussion right now. So everything he does, from not apologizing for Putin praising him and sort of speculating about whether journalists are the worst human beings in the world to making sexist, derogatory comment about Hillary Clinton is all best understood through a kind of reality television prism.

Donald Trump wants ratings. Ratings keep him in the news and it keeps his poll numbers roughly where they are. I think that there's a ceiling on his poll numbers, which you can probably see showing up a little bit in that Quinnipiac poll. I don't think he can get to 40 or 50 percent of the Republican primary vote which is what he needs to win. But right now he's just trying to hold what he has. And the way to hold what you have is to keep generating controversy so that no other candidate can get any oxygen.

COSTELLO: So, Andy, it might be a bad strategy when all is said and done because of the embarrassment factor. I showed you that number, 50 percent of voters in that Quinnipiac poll said they would embarrassed if Trump were president. Can you get elected with that number?

SMITH: Well, it would be very difficult in the general election but we have to remember that Trump is worried about the primary nomination battle first. And I think this is where he runs into trouble by getting into some of these discussions particularly in a state like Iowa where he had been leading but now we're seeing that Cruz has come up.

Iowa has a very heavily evangelical population there. They're not used to New York slang. And I think comments like this may be off- putting to a lot of Iowa voters which make him more -- make them more attracted to a guy like Ted Cruz. So if you think about the sequential process that he goes through, if Trump has problems there and then probably in New Hampshire it really doesn't matter where -- how many people feel embarrassed about it because he won't be the nominee.

COSTELLO: OK. So here are more disturbing numbers, Ross, and we'll parse these. These are disturbing numbers for Trump, I should say. In a head-to-head match-up Clinton tops him. Senator Bernie Sanders hammers him and Senator Ted Cruz is snapping at his heels.

So what does that say about whether Trump could -- because, you know, primary voters do pay attention to these numbers, right?

DOUTHAT: Well, look, Trump -- what Trump has done is put together a very unusual coalition in Republican politics. He's put together a coalition that combines a lot of very conservative voters who are particularly attracted to him because of his stand on immigration with a lot of sort of moderate to liberal working class voters who are also attracted to his stand in immigration but just generally like his kind of hitch that, you know, the elites of both parties have messed things up in Washington.

They like his protectionist rhetoric on trade. They like his lack of political correctness in many cases. And that's -- that coalition again looks like it's about between 20 percent and 30 percent of Republican electorate. And I think he's going to hold on to it and that lets him be competitive across the early states. But it means that if and when he gets into what seems likely to be a three-way race with him, Ted Cruz and probably Marco Rubio in more conservative states Cruz should be able to beat him and presumably in bluer states like New Hampshire if Rubio could consolidate the establishment vote, the center right vote, he would probably beat Trump as well.

So that seems like the state of the political landscape. But you just don't know. I mean, after Paris and San Bernardino, Trump's numbers went up a bit. You don't know what events could intervene to get Trump up a little bit and make him more of a factor for the long term in the race.

COSTELLO: Interesting. So I want to bring in Ted Cruz for just a second before we go, because, Andy, as we said Ted Cruz is neck and neck with Trump now. Cruz and Clinton, if, you know, they are pitted against each other in a general election, actually tie in this poll. So what does that tell you?

[09:10:03] SMITH: Well, I think what you're seeing in the national polls in the head-to-head match-up is just the partisanship and the indication that it's going to be a close general election in November, no matter who the candidate is, other than Donald Trump. Trump does less well against either Sanders or Clinton than does either Rubio or Cruz who are tested in this race.

Cruz and Rubio are almost identical to one another. So I think what we're seeing there is just the natural partisanship of the electorate playing out. But Donald Trump is more polarizing. He currently would drive some Republicans away from voting for him rather than attract more independents to come to him. So I think that if you look at Cruz and Rubio, I think it's more of an indication that they are not as well known and you're just getting the partisanship of the electorate.

COSTELLO: All right. I have to leave it there. Andy Smith, Ross Douthat, thanks to both of you.

A Texas grand jury has decided not to indict anyone in Sandra Bland's death. The 28-year-old's death in police custody raised questions about excessive force and the role of race. Bland was found dead in her jail cell in July three days after she was arrested for allegedly failing to use a turn signal. Police say she hanged herself with a plastic bag. A family is now questioning that and calls the grand jury process flawed.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SHARON COOPER, SANDRA BLAND'S SISTER: I feel that the grand jury process and the secretiveness of it is reflective of our experience with Waller County officials to date in terms of what has been furnished to us. The fact that five months after Sandy's passing we don't have that report that gives us cause for concern.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: Darrell Jordan, the special prosecutor handling the case, insists the grand jury process has been thorough, though.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DARRELL JORDAN, SPECIAL PROSECUTOR IN BLAND CASE: We have left no rock unturned. And the grand jury, anything that they've asked for, we've done our best to get it to them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: Jordan also says the case is still open and the grand jury will reconvene in January to consider other indictments.

Still to come in the NEWSROOM, charges filed in that deadly Vegas hit and run. The surprising things we're learning about the driver's past. Next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:15:38] COSTELLO: This morning we're learning more about the women struck and killed by a car on the Las Vegas strip. She's 32-year-old Jessica Valenzuela from Arizona. Police say Jessica or Valenzuela was struck along with 37 others after a car jumped the sidewalk at least three or four times. Behind the wheel, 24-year-old Lakeisha Holloway now facing a murder charge. Judge deciding as early as today whether to proceed with the case against her.

Ryan Young live in Las Vegas with more Good morning.

RYAN YOUNG, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol. So many questions about this case. In fact people want to know what was going through Lakeisha Holloway's mind as she started ramming the people on the sidewalk. We do know three people are in critical condition. One person, as you said, died during this.

Now what the sheriff believes is that she was homeless in the city for about a week and she was kicked off several different properties by security. At some point turning to Las Vegas and then directed her car towards the people on the sidewalk.

We do know we found a video overnight from her from 2012 from a Portland center that helped disadvantaged teens and this is what Lakeisha Holloway had to say back then.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LAKEISHA HOLLOWAY, SUSPECT: My mom always tried to do what was best for my sister and I. As a single parent with an 8th grade education it was all a struggle for her. And later down the line it became all too hard for her. She drank more and cared less.

Today I am not the same scared girl I used to be. I am a mature young woman who has broken a cycle many generational cycle about those before me hadn't. Being homeless and on my own taught me how to stand on my own two feet. Not only did I manage to beat working dead-end jobs that I had seen our mother struggle with, then I managed to land a federal job at 21. Now that is what I call living the grand life.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

YOUNG: That was actually from the Portland Opportunities Industrialization Center. Here you hear a young woman who sounds like she had her entire life ahead of her. The sheriff tells us they believe that a dispute with the father of her child was one of the reasons why she was upset. They don't believe she was under the influence of alcohol.

The 3-year-old that was inside the car, her daughter we're told, is in protective custody right now. But obviously a lot of people wondering what exactly happened that could set this woman off and put her on that dangerous path down the sidewalk with so many people enjoying this Las Vegas trip. Something that a lot of people want the answers for, of course. And just a lot of questions about what may have set her off that put her down this way -- Carol.

COSTELLO: All right. Ryan Young reporting live from Las Vegas this morning, thank you.

Checking some other top stories for you at 18 minutes past. The Baltimore police officer who's trial on the death of Freddie Gray ended in a hung jury will be retried. William Porter in court this morning where a judge is expected to approve a retrial date for June 13th. Porter was the first of six officers to be tried in connection with Gray's death. He's accused of failing to buckle Gray into a police van which may have led to the 25-year-old's deadly spinal injury.

Bill Cosby is fighting back against sexual assault claims, hitting another of his accuser with a defamation lawsuit. This time the comedian is targeting supermodel Beverly Johnson. The model claims Cosby drugged and tried to rape her back in the '80s but Cosby says Johnson joined the dozens of women making -- dozens of other women making accusations against him to promote her career and sell her memoir.

The CDC is investigating a second e. Coli outbreak linked to chipotle. Officials say five people got sick after eating at locations in Kansas and Oklahoma. Investigators believed these cases may be separate from a larger outbreak that started back in October. That one sickened 53 people in nine states.

Still to come in the NEWSROOM, the fight for Ramadi. Now ISIS fighters are using civilians as human shields. The latest for you, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [09:22:52] COSTELLO: Iraqi troops are now fighting ISIS forces trying to retake the city of Ramadi. Defense Ministry sources say they're having trouble stopping ISIS because ISIS is using civilians in the city as human shields. The Iraqi Military says counterterrorism forces moved in this morning backed by Iraqi and coalition air power. They're trying to clear ISIS fighters from the center of the city after it settled in back in May. Iraqi military leaders say around 250 to 350 ISIS militants have dug into fight them.

There is a fight for territory in Afghanistan, too. Local forces in a standoff with the Taliban from the Helmand Province. Police saying they're running out of weapons and supplies and will be killed if they are captured. In the meantime on the other side of the country, near Bagram airfield, the U.S. military mourns the death of six American troops in a Taliban suicide attack. One of them, Staff Sergeant Joseph Lemm, a 15-year veteran of the NYPD and a member of the Air National Guard. He was deployed to the Middle East three times. He recently surprised his family in West Harrison, New York, when he came home after 10 months away.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHRISTINE LEMM, VICTIM'S WIFE: I'm shaking right now. I can't even believe that daddy is home and I have my family back and -- I'm speechless. I'm sorry. I'm just speechless.

STAFF SGT. JOSEPH LEMM, U.S. ARMY: Spending time with the family of course. The little guy, you got a little baby or what have you. Can't wait for a pizza and a nice burger. American burger? Can't go wrong with that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr joins us now from Washington with more. Good morning.

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol. Just one of the names, faces in the lives and families of the fallen in Afghanistan. Detective Joseph Lemm was honored already in a statement by NYPD police commissioner William Bratton. Commissioner Bratton saying in part, and let me read this to everyone.

"Detective Joseph Lemm epitomized the selflessness we can only strive for. Putting his country and city first. Detective Lemm not only served New Yorkers as a member of this department, but served his country as a member of the U.S. Air National Guard." He was only recently promoted to detective. He served with the Bronx Squad.

[09:25:05] Again, we are awaiting the Pentagon's release of the names of the five other fallen. Their families learning about their lives as well. Two other U.S. service members injured in this attack in Afghanistan -- Carol.

COSTELLO: Barbara Starr reporting live from the Pentagon this morning. As Taliban and ISIS forces fight for more territory in the Middle

East, they're also fighting each other for recruits. We're learning ISIS forces are using radiobroadcasts to win new fighters.

So let's talk about that with CNN military analysts, Colonel Cedric Leighton.

Good morning.

COL. CEDRIC LEIGHTON (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Good morning, Carol.

COSTELLO: So these radio broadcasts in Afghanistan. Are they effective?

LEIGHTON: Well, it looks like they are, Carol. And they're using a transmitter that apparently moves locations quite a bit. They're calling it the voice of the caliphate and what the voice of the caliphate is doing is it's basically telling the disaffected youths of provinces like Nandahar Province which is in the eastern part of the country that it's time for them to join ISIS. They are basically saying this is the way to salvation. This is the way in which they can affect change in their lives. This is the way they can actually better themselves. And they are really appealing to their Islamic roots, they're appealing to their religious tenets, and they're believing that they can actually affect the way in which these people come into their forces that they're having some success with it.

COSTELLO: So the danger here is -- and I don't know how else to describe it, is that Taliban and ISIS are fighting one another for recruits? So in Afghanistan we could see a battle between the two or a joining of the two? What do you think will happen?

LEIGHTON: Well, that's going to be interesting to see. I think that you could -- you could see either one of those. What's more likely? I think that, you know, at some point in time they're going to be fighting each other because in the final analysis it's all about power. And the Taliban are the traditional power brokers that are not part of the government in Kabul. And of course before 2001 they had their own government in Afghanistan as we all know.

So they're used to coming into power, they want to come into power, and they believe that the ISIS folks are basically intruders on their turf and there is going to be a turf battle there. It's probably the most likely scenario. Maybe a temporary alliance. But that alliance is going to go away, you know, after a few years at most, at most.

COSTELLO: OK. So ISIS is trying to recruit within Afghanistan. There is a fight for the Helmand Province, right? All of these battles are going on all over the place and the majority of young people in Afghanistan are unemployed which makes them more likely to join a terrorist group, right? Yet the Afghan president, Ashraf Ghani, left Afghanistan today for a planned trip to as Azerbaijan.

LEIGHTON: Well, you know, sometimes --

COSTELLO: What?

LEIGHTON: Yes. Sometimes, people in power have a tendency to do things that they think mean something but they really don't. So, you know, if you're going to Azerbaijan that's nice but I'd save that trip if I were the president of Afghanistan. Save that trip for a time when my country and my government is much more secure. It's certainly not the case --

COSTELLO: And add that to the list. The deputy governor of the Helmand Province, you know, where the Taliban is trying to take over, the deputy governor of the Helmand Province posted on open letter on Facebook asking the Afghan president for help and the Afghan president goes to Azerbaijan?

LEIGHTON: Right. And you know what it really shows is, you know, you see this open letter from the deputy governor in Helmand saying we need help. We're not going to be able to hold this territory. It was a frank assessment of what's really going on in that province. And it really shows the weakness of the central government in Kabul. Basically what you see is the house of cards that is the Kabul government is beginning to fall apart. And this is a very dangerous time. Not only for the Afghan people but also for the coalition forces and the U.S. forces that are in Afghanistan right now and that is really the sad underpinning of this story right now.

COSTELLO: Colonel Leighton, thanks for your insight.

LEIGHTON: You bet, Carol.

COSTELLO: You're welcome.

An arraignment gets under way soon for Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl at the Fort Brag Army base in North Carolina. The former Taliban captive is being court martialed for deserting his unit and for misbehavior before the enemy. If convicted he could spend the rest of his life in prison.

The most serious charge against Bergdahl is that misbehavior before the enemy. It means endangering the safety of the command.

Nick Valencia is currently inside the hearing. And when he has information to pass along of course I will pass it along to you.

Still to come in the NEWSROOM, we know refugees are flooding Europe and now we have a number. The staggering stat and what President Obama is planning to do about it.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)