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Poll: Most Think Trump Lied, Obstructed, But Oppose Impeachment; Trump Attacks Biden Under Belief He's Biggest Threat in 2020; Trump Defends Charlottesville Comments after Biden Slams Them; Trump Golfs with Japanese P.M. Before Campaign Rally; NRA President Oliver North Steps Down Amid Feud with CEO Wayne LaPierre; Police Charge Driver with Intentionally Hitting Group of Pedestrians He Believed Were Muslims; 10 Civilians Killed in Explosions, Shootout at Raided Home in Sri Lanka; Trump Continues Stonewalling on Slew of Congressional Investigations; Trump Contradicts McGahn on Efforts to Fire Mueller; San Diego Sheriff's Office: Shooting at California Synagogue. Aired 3-4p ET

Aired April 27, 2019 - 15:00   ET

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


(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:00:09] ANA CABRERA, CNN ANCHOR: NRA showdown. Claims of humiliation and extortion sending the organization's president heading for the door.

Religious attack. A driver in California is accused of plowing into a group of pedestrians, because he thought they were Muslims.

Controversial ruling. He had a stockpile of guns and what prosecutors say is a hit list of prominent politicians and journalists. But a judge says he has no choice but to release this Coast Guard officer.

You're live in the CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Ana Cabrera in New York. Thanks so much for being here.

New polling today has some good news and bad news for President Trump in the wake of the Mueller report. The good news for the president, most Americans do not favor going down the impeachment path right now. Just 37 percent are for it. And that number is even down a little bit from last month. And 56 percent surveyed say it is not where Congress should go.

Here's the bad news for the president. This "Washington Post"/ABC News poll shows the majority, that he has a major credibility problem. And 58 percent think the president has lied to the American people about issues investigated by the special counsel, and just 31 percent of respondents think he has been truthful.

CNN's Sarah Westwood joins us from Green Bay, Wisconsin, where the president will headline some counter programming to tonight's White House Correspondents' Dinner, right?

SARAH WESTWOOD, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Ana. This is the third year in a row that the president will be hosting a rally rather than attend the Correspondents' Dinner like many of his predecessors have done. And he has been holding these counter programming rallies in states that were very important to his 2016 victory. That first year of his presidency, he held a rally in Pennsylvania, instead of attending the dinner. Last year, he held one in Michigan. And this year, he will be holding his rally right here in Wisconsin. There are people lined up to see him.

And we can expect to hear more of the same topics he's been venting about on Twitter this week, whether that's the Russia investigation, whether it's immigration. The president has been returning to his favorite themes as often as possible. And this, of course, comes against a backdrop of renewed efforts from House Democrats to get documents and testimony from his White House now that the Mueller investigation has concluded. You can expect to hear a lot about that tonight, here in Green Bay -- Ana?

CABRERA: We also talked a little bit about the poll numbers, on the Mueller report, and impeachment questions. How much do you think the president will talk about that tonight?

WESTWOOD: Well, certainly, the president has been working to frame the conclusion of the Mueller report to his benefit. For example, he's been focusing on how the Russia investigation began, more so than how it ended up. He has been attacking the people who started the investigation, under the Obama administration, claiming, without evidence, that it was biased against him. And of course, the president managed to bring that up in the NRA event that he attended yesterday in Indianapolis. He even found a way to work it into a speech he gave in Atlanta at an opioid abuse conference earlier this week. So it is something he is clearly eager to talk about. This will be the kind of friendly audience that will be receptive to that kind of message -- Ana?

CABRERA: All right, the countdown is on.

Thank you very much, Sarah Westwood, in Green Bay, Wisconsin.

Let's discuss further with CNN political analyst and White House reporter for "Politico," Eliana Johnson, and CNN political analyst and White House correspondent for "The Guardian," Sabrina Siddiqui.

Eliana, the majority of Americans do not believe Congress should start impeachment proceedings. Is that a clear enough sign to Democrats maybe try to rethink how to spend the next year and a half?

ELIANA JOHNSON, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: I think that's precisely why you had Democratic leadership, most visibly Nancy Pelosi, pushing back on the cries from the far left of the Democratic caucus for impeachment. What is so interesting about the poll number, they really do show that voters are following the news, but they're capable of holding two opposing ideas in their minds at the same time. They realize that President Trump often hasn't told the truth about the Mueller report, or about a host of other things. At the same time, they don't really like the idea of impeachment. And I suspect the numbers about the Clinton impeachment were very similar, where voters acknowledged that the president had lied to them but they simply don't like the politics of impeachment. And the politics of impeachment were bad for Republicans back then and bad for Democrats now. And the Democrat leaders acknowledge it and that's why you see their candidates on the campaign trial reluctant to talk about the Mueller probe. The want to talk about issues that affect voter's lives.

CABRERA: But the Democrats do have several ongoing investigation into the president, into his administration.

Sabrina, how do they toe the line of holding him accountable and listening to what the majority of the Americans believe is the best path forward for the party?

[15:04:53] SABRINA SIDDIQUI, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: I think Democratic leaders like to tell reporters that they can walk and chew gum at the same time and they have to strike that balance between investigating as well as legislating. When it comes to the Mueller report itself, this is precisely the concern that Democratic leaders have had all along, that impeachment could well be a politically unpopular proposal or move to push forward with. And if you look at the dynamics in Congress, a Republican-led Senate is certainly not going to vote to convict, to actually remove the president from office. So if the House Democrats did go along with impeachment, it would be purely symbolic.

Now, at the same time, because of the extent of what was laid out in the Mueller report, multiple occasions in which, at a minimum, the president sought to obstruct justice, based on the testimony of his own former White House staffer and others in his administration, Democrats also don't want to normalize the behavior that was laid out in that report. So I think what you're going to see them do is have hearings that may not be related to impeachment, but other forms of oversight that begins with having Don McGahn, the White House -- former chief counsel to the White House, come in and testify, as well as Attorney General William Barr, and as we know, perhaps Robert Mueller himself.

CABRERA: Another number that stands out from this poll is 39 percent is the president's approval rating. This, as former Vice President Joe Biden officially jumps into the race this week. The president wasted no time in attacking him.

And you have some reporting, Eliana, that this is fueled by his belief that Biden could win. Why would the president see him as maybe his biggest threat?

JOHNSON: Well, Biden has a lot of the same strengths that Trump has. He's popular among the same sort of blue collar, noncollege educated, midwestern voters, from Pennsylvania to Michigan to Wisconsin, who carried Trump to victory in 2016. So I think that's why President Trump sees him as a threat. He's somebody who could eat into the Trump coalition. And he showed some not-great approval numbers for, you showed some not great approval number force President Trump. And the president has succeeded by dragging his opponents down with him and that's what he is trying to do to Biden, by saying he is too old and not energetic enough. And these are things we saw him do very successfully in the Republican primary and, again, in the matchup with Hillary Clinton. CABRERA: Sabrina, the former vice president is coming after President

Trump by driving home this narrative that the country is in a moral crisis. How can the president counter that message?

SADDIQUI: Well, I think that he's likely going to sell a Biden presidency as a third Obama term. And you know, the challenge is going to be, whether or not Biden makes this entire election about President Trump, or whether he campaigns more so on some of the policy issues that you see other Democratic candidates wanting to talk about. There are some Democrats who don't think that candidates should take the bait and really get into the mud with the president because that hasn't worked for others before. But at the same time, the former vice president is someone who has been around the block. He comes with decades of experience. He has certainly run a national campaign before. So I really do think that you see Biden making the moral argument, because even as this high-minded policy debate is happening in 2020 Democratic field, they want to play into the concerns of a lot of Americans out there, who feel like the world is on fire. And they don't want to be having some of those more nuanced conversations. They want an alternative to the current occupant of the Oval Office. Whether that is actually a message that's going to swing the Independents, who helped propel the president into the White House in 2016, that's the question that really remains to be seen. And that's why you do see the vice president already trying to tap into his working-class roots, holding his first rally in Pittsburgh, on Monday.

CABRERA: But again, when it comes to this moral issue, I think it is really interesting that Biden is making the president have to revisit what he said about Charlottesville. He is sort of driving this narrative. Charlottesville was not a good moment for the president.

JOHNSON: Oh, absolutely. He's bringing, his announcement video, which was released on Thursday, which was hitting the president at one of his most vulnerable spots. Trump knows that this was one of the most controversial moments of his presidency. And Biden sought to relitigate that. What I think was tough for Biden was that the conversation very quickly turned back to Biden's record. And it is one of the disadvantages of experience. Biden has been in politics since he was 29. And on the same day he released his announcement video, Anita Hill told the "New York Times" she was not satisfied by an apology that Biden had offered her. And I think it was very telling that in Biden's appearance on "The View" he spent far more time apologizing or explaining for his long record than taking it on the offensive to President Trump. So I think the challenge for Biden is going to be, will he be allowed to go on the offensive against Trump, as he wants to do, or will his Democratic primary opponents pull him back in to talk about his long record as a legislator in Washington.

[15:10:05] CABRERA: Eliana, before I let you both go, I want to come back to you, because you have the reporting about the Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has been really working to court this president. We know the two were golfing earlier today. And Abe knows how much he likes golf, right? He gave him a gold-plated golf club, at some point? JOHNSON: Yes, before Trump was even sworn in as president, Abe was

the first world leader to visit him at Trump Tower, not something that normally happens, delivered him a gold-plated golf club that cost over $3,000. And Abe, you have to remember, he and Japan campaigned before President Trump came on the political scene, on strengthening Japanese ties and keeping that alliance. That is something that he committed to, even as Trump won, something that came as much of a surprise to Abe as it did to other world leaders. This is something he's really trying to do, knowing that Trump values personal relationships above all. And while it might be slightly embarrassing to Abe to be kissing up to the president this much, he has really maintained the belief that the policy payoffs and simply maintaining a strong relationship with Trump are worth it.

CABRERA: Eliana Johnson, Sabrina Siddiqui -- Sabrina, I owe you the first question next go around.

SIDDIQUE: Thanks.

CABRERA: Thank you both for being here.

JOHNSON: Thank you.

CABRERA: Showdown at the National Rifle Association in a power struggle over who will lead the country's most powerful gun lobby. Oliver North, best known for his role in the Iran-Contra affair, is out as NRA president amid allegations of extortion. It is a post he held for less than a year. And the dust settling a short time ago as the group's convention in Indianapolis. Long-time CEO, Wayne LaPierre, it seems, emerges victorious.

CNN's national correspondent, Ryan Young, is following this very public internal struggle.

Ryan, what is going on at the NRA?

RYAN YOUNG, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, you know, Ana, this is a real drama playing out at the convention. Oliver North has been asked to step down. Now, of course, we have been told that Oliver North was a real fighter over the money and it seems that potentially money has been mismanaged. For example, the "Wall Street Journal" reported that North had previously sent a letter to the board's executive committee accusing LaPierre of charging an NRA vendor more than $200,000 in wardrobe purchases. The internal power struggle over funds has boiled over within the organization, leading to North being told he was no longer wanted.

North stepped down today. But before leaving, North wanted a letter read out loud. The letter, which in part, reads, "This is a clear crisis that needs to be dealt with immediately and responsibly, so the NRA can continue to focus on protecting our Second Amendment. I have been on the NRA board for more than two decades. It was a great privilege to serve as your president this past year, an honor second only to serving our country as a U.S. Marine in combat. So if you ever need me in the future, just call." Oliver North even says, if this money situation isn't looked at, that

the group's nonprofit status, it could be in jeopardy. So you can see there are some big things in jeopardy at this point.

CABRERA: What has been LaPierre's response to these allegations of mishandling money?

YOUNG: Well, you know, it is all about that wardrobe expense, that also some of the money spent with that vendor. He's basically said, no, that is not the case. And there was an internal struggle there as well. And there was a chance he was going to lose his position. But in seems like, in this case, he was the bigger man inside the organization. He won out, North is out. But it will be interesting to see how this plays out, especially with all of the fans of Oliver North.

CABRERA: Ryan Young, thank you for that reporting.

A car plows into a group of pedestrians, targeted allegedly because of their faith.

And a late-night raid in Sri Lanka leaves 10 civilians dead as police search for suspects still connected to that Easter Sunday bombing. New details, next.

You're live in the CNN NEWSROOM.

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[15:17:30] CABRERA: There's new evidence that an attack near San Jose, California, may have been fueled by hate. Sunnyvale police say a suspect who deliberately crashed into a group of pedestrians this week targeted them because he thought they were Muslim. Isaiah Joel Peoples is facing eight counts of attempted murder and more charges can be coming.

CNN national correspondent, Sara Sidner, joins us with more on this.

Sara, what have you learned?

SARA SIDNER, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: So, we are hearing from the police chief, who was there, watching in court, when there was an arraignment on Friday, where Isaiah Peoples went. He was expected to make a plea. He didn't actually make a plea. His attorney not making a plea for him. His own attorney saying that he does not believe that this was an intentional act, the running over of people, eight people exactly, who have some very severe injuries. But indeed, his attorney is saying that this was because Isaiah Peoples, the suspect in this case, had a mental disorder. That is from the perspective of his defense attorney.

The perspective of police is that they actually say they have found more evidence in this case, not just charging him then with eight counts of murder by the district attorney, but they're now looking into whether or not there could be possibly a hate crime announcement -- sorry -- enhancement. Because police say that they now believe, from the evidence that they have gathered, that, indeed, Peoples was actually trying to target Muslims when he decided to ram his car into several people, several pedestrians just minding their business and trying to enjoy their day on Friday.

One of the eight people who was struck is a 13-year-old girl. We understand now that she is in a coma. She had such a severe head injury that her brain began to swell and they had to remove part of her skull in order to alleviate the swelling there.

So you're looking at a situation where the police have now said they have found more evidence. They do believe it was absolutely intentional, and not only intentional, but that he was trying to target people because of their religion -- Ana?

CABRERA: Wow. Sara, if convicted, what does the punishment look like, what kind of time could he face?

SIDNER: Yes, so we looked at some of the charges, and they're all attempted murder charges, all eight of them. Up to 16 years potential prison time if he is convicted. But that doesn't include the hate crime enhancement, if, indeed, the district attorney's office finds that there's enough evidence to charge him with that as well. That could be one or eight or more. So that could very much change the number of years that he could be facing. And again, that is if he is convicted. Again, his attorney saying that he believes this was not an intentional act, that his client says that he is praying for the victims.

[15:20:21] But we also heard from a witness, who said that, after this happened, the suspect rammed into all of these people, and then said, "Thank you, Jesus." In other words, you know, thanking the person that he believes was telling him that this was a good thing. And we heard that from a witness as well. We do not know if that is what police are basing some of their decisions on at this point, believing that he was targeting Muslims, but they certainly said they had more evidence that they found as they investigated this horrific attack -- Ana?

CABRERA: No doubt about it.

Sara Sidner, thank you for that report.

We continue to monitor events unfolding in Sri Lanka following the deadly Easter Sunday suicide bombings that killed more than 250 people. There are still suspected terrorists on the run. Today, police in the Eastern part of the country raided a suspected terrorist hideout. And authorities say the shootout that followed left 10 civilians dead, including six children, along with six terror suspects. Police are now searching for at least two more suspects.

CNN's senior international correspondent, Sam Kiley, is in Eastern Sri Lanka -- Sam?

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SAM KILEY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: This has been a very dramatic 24 hours in the continuing operations to try to round up all of those extra terrorist elements that the Sri Lankans fear and believe were involved in the Easter Day massacre of over 250 people.

So, in the last 18 hours, there's been a raid on what they believe is a weapons factory and storage facility with an astronomical amount of the materials for the manufacture of gel ignites, of the precursor materials for the manufacture of bombs, 100,000 ball bearings to make those bombs that much more lethal.

Information from there, backed up by community, Muslim community, coming to the police and saying, they identified a suspicious group, led to a raid on a house. That raid resulted in a short gun battle in which one terrorist was killed and three large exposes destroyed that house. Burning to death inside it, the five other alleged terrorists. But also nine civilians, three women, and six children.

Now, CNN has spoken very recently to the sister of the spiritual leader of this terrorist group, who himself died as a suicide bomber on Sunday. And she said that she feared that seven members, young members of her family, extended family were missing. Six children were killed in that blast and one survived. Seven members of this terrorist family is missing.

Sam Kiley, CNN, Batticaloa.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CABRERA: President Trump digging in his heels when it comes to a slew of investigations. The president's stonewall strategy, next.

You're live in the CNN NEWSROOM.

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[15:26:56] CABRERA: This week, President Trump insisted he's an open book. Really.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I have been the most transparent president and administration in the history of our country, by far.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: Yet, the president has spent the last week trying to hold off House efforts to dig in on everything from his finances to staff security clearances to questions on the upcoming census. The president fumed on Twitter that, "Congress has no time to legislate. They only want to continue the witch hunt, which I have already won."

It is not clear how anyone wins a witch hunt.

But CNN's John Avlon says he knows why the president continues to dig in his heels.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOHN AVLON, CNN ANCHOR & SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Donald Trump is definitely building a wall. But this one, seems to be around his administration. Yes, one week after the redacted Mueller report was released, it's become clear that stonewalling is Donald Trump's strategy for dealing with Democrats going forward.

In the past week, alone, Trump has sued to stop the release of his financial record, tried to block the testimony of his former White House counsel, Don McGahn, prevent a White House security director from testifying about why some 25 staffers were given security clearances despite earlier denials, including Jared Kushner. And his Justice Department even ordered the head of the Civil Rights Division to refuse a subpoena on the census citizenship question, one day after the case went to the Supreme Court.

Trump has refused a flurry of subpoenas. And the president's lawyers have tried to justify the move by saying Democrats have declared all- out war against the president. So it looks like total obstruction will be the way forward until Election Day 2020. Congratulations, everybody.

It's an extension of Trump's advice from his old mentor, Roy Cohn, who was a lawyer for Joe McCarthy and the mob. Always attack, never defend. But Trump likes his attacks to come with a victim card. So this is very clear, quote, "Never happened before, unlimited presidential harassment, Republicans never did this to President Obama." Huh?

About that one, so we all know history is not the president's things, but this is really recent history. The last six years of Obama's term, there were at least five congressional investigations conducted over 10 different committee: Solyndra Solar Company, the gun trackings, Fast and Furious, the bias at the IRS, the Benghazi hearings, and the very big rollout of the healthcare.gov Web site. All these were pumped up on conservative media but none of them were to save the universe as a hostel foreign power interfering with an election to help a particular candidate.

Yes, it's true that Republicans never had to sue to get President Barack Obama's tax information but that is because he turned it over like every other president since Nixon, except Trump.

There's at least one Republican victory from those years that is directly relevant. During the Fast and Furious hearing, the Obama Justice Department decided not to give subpoenas for documents, citing executive privilege. They went to court and Judge Amy Berman Jackson, who is overseeing the Roger Stone case, denied the Obama administration's claims.

Situational ethics are the way of Washington. But it didn't always used to be this way. The unilateral subpoena powers that House Democrats are using today were first put in effect by, you guessed it, Republicans during the Clinton era.

[15:30:00] That's when Republican Dan Burton weaponized the House Oversight Committee to go after Clinton issuing more than 1000 unilateral subpoenas over five years. In 2015, Republicans expanded the unilateral subpoena power. Now 14 committee chairmen can do it.

Keep in mind, after those investigations, when President Obama left office, one of the only administrations in the last 50 years to have no senior members of the staff indicted or convicted of a crime.

Facts matter. Perspective is needed. And we are being set up with an epic clash between the balance of powers. Donald Trump's stonewalling strategy may meet defeat in courts but, in the meantime, his hope is to stall for time and claiming presidential harassment, and hope that if he wins re-election, the statute of limitations for any possible crimes will run out of time by the time he walks out of the White House.

And that's your "REALITY CHECK."

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANA CABRERA, CNN ANCHOR: Now we have CNN legal analyst, Anne Milgram, joining us with more on President Trump's efforts to stonewall investigations.

And John talked about the president trying to run out the statute of limitations. I want to pick up on that. Is one of those crimes including attempted obstruction? And what are the statute of limitations on that?

ANNE MILGRAM, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: It is possible. And also the campaign finance violation in the southern district, the one that Michael Cohen pleaded to, where Trump was named in the indictment, that's a five-year statute. And most of the federal crimes are five- year statute of limitations. So if the president's reelected in 2020, then he would not be able to be charged. And so it raises a question of strategy.

I also agree with John very much that what we're seeing is an effort to try to block any oversight by Congress, which is absolutely one of Congress's constitutional functions. This, whether one or two of them get sort of negotiated out, this is still -- it's on a collision path for the courts and for the courts to rule. I believe that the White House has to comply with legitimate congressional subpoenas.

CABRERA: You're right. They're stonewalling everything. The president said as much. No documents. No staffers, who are former or current staffers, will go before the committees. How long can they delay this? Because if delay is the strategy, couldn't this go past 2020 as well?

MILGRAM: Well what is unprecedented about this is, in some instances, they haven't even responded. And usually, what you see is that the White House will respond, and they try to narrow what the conversation will be about. So they try to say, well, we don't want to talk about those 10 things that you have asked for, we will talk about these three, and then they go back and forth and try to negotiate it. They're not even doing that here. They're not responding in many instances, which is really unprecedented. What the Democrats haven't done yet is force their hand. And this is a situation where I think in order for the Congress, whether it's the Democrats now or the Republicans down the road, to keep their legitimate oversight authority, they are going to have to force the White House's hand. They are going to have to issue contempt citations. They're going to have to end up in court over these things. Otherwise, it will drag on. And the court process could even be lengthy. But I don't think it will drag on to 2020.

CABRERA: One of the people, Democrats in particular, want to talk to is Don McGahn, the former White House counsel. And the Mueller report gave us details like this about his involvement and his conversations with the president. "McGahn's clear recollection was that the president directed him to tell Rosenstein not only that conflicts existed but also that Mueller has to go. McGahn is a credible witness. No motive to lie or exaggerate given the position he held in the White House."

And now President Trump is essentially calling McGahn a liar. Does that now make it more difficult for the president to prevent McGahn from testifying?

MILGRAM: Well, you have to sort of ask the question of, why is the president trying to prevent McGahn and all of these other folks from testifying. It feels like he's afraid of what they will say. And McGahn has come out and said, I stand by everything I told the special counsel's office. Not just what you just read, but also after it was reported in the "New York Times," that part of the Mueller report talks about how the president tried to get McGahn to walk back what he had said, to basically -- you know, Trump saying, I never told you to go do that, and McGahn saying I have my recollection, and my notes. And so you know, I think, again, we're on a collision course for the House of Representatives to get this information, and really, to get the witnesses that they want to have testify.

CABRERA: Quickly if you will -- we only have 30 seconds -- what are the key questions you want to hear Congress members ask Barr in his upcoming testimony?

MILGRAM: There are a lot of questions for Barr? First and foremost is, what was he doing with the four-page summary and all of the questions surrounding that. And also focusing in on, he said that there was -- that Mueller was not influenced by the OLC opinion, which is a direct contradiction to what Mueller wrote. So there are probably 10 areas where I think Barr is directly contradicted by Mueller's report. I would go through all of them one by one.

CABRERA: Anne Milgram, always good to have you with us.

MILGRAM: Thank you.

CABRERA: Thank you very much.

[15:34:35] He is accused of planning a terrorist attack. Authorities say they found a stockpile of deadly weapons and a hit list. And yet, he's about to be released. Details on the judge's controversial decision, live, in the CNN NEWSROOM.

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ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

CABRERA: Breaking news just into CNN, the sheriff's office in San Diego County has confirmed one man has been detained for questioning in connection with a shooting incident at a synagogue. Again, this is in San Diego County. We've confirmed that at least one person has been transported to the hospital, at the Palomar Medical Center in Poway. We also understand that this took place at the Chabad of Poway Synagogue, according to the San Diego County Sheriff's Office.

I want to bring in James Gagliano, a CNN law enforcement analyst.

James, we have very little information obviously at this point but what stands out to all of us is the fact that this is yet another violent shooting incident at a place of worship.

[15:40:05] JAMES GAGLIANO, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST (via telephone): Yes, you really got to be careful, we always do, in the immediate aftermath of events like this to make sure we wait until we get all of the facts in. But, gosh, to your point, it just seems like there has been a proliferation of this, in the last few months, if not in the last few years, where places of worship, whether it's mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, or the Christian churches last weekend in Sri Lanka, and now, here we are in San Diego with something similar. Now, again, very early, too early to tell right now. Police have not released any details. This could be anything. It could be a domestic dispute. It could be anything. So we've got to be real careful before we label anything. But we just hope that -- I think, four people were taken to the hospital right now. We hope that there aren't any more fatalities.

CABRERA: Obviously, as the investigation is just getting going, what do you think law enforcement is working on right now?

GAGLIANO: Well, remember, the first thing is, is you want to make sure that you interdict the bad guy, so whoever did this, obviously, taken into custody, and make certain that there are no accomplices. That is first and foremost. We want to do that before anything else. The investigation, the potential prosecution down the road, those are all things we do in the aftermath. The first thing is to make sure that there are no more viable threats out there. So if the person is taken into custody, it is to question them, and to find out if there are any devices, if there's any more weapons out there, any more accomplices, people providing aid or material support. That's what police want to do initially.

Beyond that, then it comes piecing together what exactly happened. And obviously, in the 21st century, there's so much out there to look at, from social media to all different types of technological or digital footprints that human beings have right now. We can't walk out of our house and open up a cell phone without it being tracked or triggered somewhere. So I'm sure that police are doing that.

Again, the first thing they want to do is make sure that there's no more ongoing threat, and then from there, move into the process of figuring out who did this and the motivation. That's so key in these law enforcement events like this, is to determine what the motivation is, and whether or not there's any other potential threat going forward.

CABRERA: Stand by.

I want to bring back Ryan Young now. He's a CNN national correspondent, working to gather more details.

What have you learned, Ryan?

RYAN YOUNG, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: We're absolutely trying to see what is going on here. We do know this is Poway, about 35 minutes outside of San Diego, in the foothills. What we know so far is police have detained one person for questioning. But I think it goes beyond to say, like, exactly what the last person was saying is, they are going to obviously be looking in the area to make sure that the area is clear first. You see the fact that this has popped up in a synagogue. I was actually talking to some sources earlier this afternoon on another story, and they were telling me, they were really worried about some of the chatter they have been hearing across the country, in terms of things that may be happening, in terms of white supremacy, some other sort of goals across the country. And I was actually given a warning today from a source that just said, hey, be on the lookout for any kind of strange situations. Not saying that this is connected at all. But this, when you look at it, the fact that some people could have been shot at the synagogue, 35 miles outside of San Diego, you understand the law enforcement going there in large numbers. I've been trying to get into contact with some friends who I know in California who work in the law enforcement, just to see what they have learned so far from the federal level to see if they're going to be assisting in the next 25 minutes or so.

CABRERA: I do have a tweet I want to share with our viewers. This is from local law enforcement in this area: "Confirming a man has been detained for questioning in connection with the shooting incident at the Chabad of Poway Synagogue. Deputies were called there just before 11:30. There were injuries." They call this a developing situation. We're working to gather more information for all of you at home.

Ryan Young, thank you.

As well as James Gagliano.

Please stay with us as we take a quick break and work on breaking details. Much more on breaking news as CNN continues.

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[15:47:40] CABRERA: We're back with our breaking news. The sheriff's office in San Diego County confirming one man is detained right now for questioning in connection with a shooting incident at synagogue in Poway. The sheriff's office confirms there are injuries. One local hospital has been told to expect as many as four patients.

Josh Campbell, CNN's law enforcement analyst, former FBI special agent, is with us now.

Josh, your take in terms of the information that we have?

JOSH CAMPBELL, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Well, still early right now. And the notion that authorities have detained someone obviously is good news. We haven't heard from them, yet, that they believe this person is the actual suspect. We don't know if this is one people or more people. Obviously hoping this is localized.

What you mentioned at the hospital is standard procedure in these incidents as hospitals are very much involved in the training for active-shooter situations. And when a call comes that there's a person with a gun, they go on alert and prepare to receive patients. Right now, we're hearing four. Again, we don't yet know if that number will go up or the status of the patients but, obviously, we will continue to check our sources on that -- Ana?

CABRERA: And we don't know, again, the motivation of this shooting, only confirming that law enforcement was called to report initially a man with a gun. We also understand that the first call came in around 11:30 there, local time, obviously, not very long ago. It is unclear right now if this is an ongoing type of threat. However, they do call it a developing situation, Josh.

CAMPBELL: They do, indeed. And again, we're waiting for that final word from law enforcement that they have someone in custody that they believe was responsible. And again, lost on no one is the nature of the location here, this being a house of worship. Obviously, we've had a number of incidents in recent memory involving hatred, involving people acting with violence, based on their own beliefs. We don't yet know what the full circumstances are here but, again, we can't lose sight of the fact that this is the location, a house of worship.

We can also expect to hear from authorities if they believe that there's someone that might be on the run. And this is standard operating procedure as well. If they detain someone, if they determine that this isn't someone that is a suspect, that means that there may be someone still at large, in which case, they will try to crowd source, use the larger public to try to gather information on where this person might be. Again, we're still in the early stages right now. We don't yet have that information. But obviously, we're awaiting updates from authorities.

CABRERA: They are asking people to stay clear of the area in one of the tweets that were sent out. So if they are on the ground doing their checks and balances and making sure that the area is locked down and that there is an ongoing threat, Josh, walk me through what law enforcement on the ground is doing right now.

[15:50:13] CAMPBELL: Yes, so law enforcement will own the scene as they show and they will establish a large enough perimeter that they believe they need to conduct the investigation. Again, there are a lot of factors that are there. If there's an ongoing threat, they will keep a wide perimeter. They don't want to endanger others who might be in the vicinity. But also there's a large-scale investigation that will have to take place. Inside a house of worship, if you have people that are there, witnesses, law enforcement officers need to talk to, they need to talk to every single person that was there to try to figure out what they saw, did they know the person. Again, is the person that they have detained actually the person responsible for the shooting? All of that will be taking place. So this place we can expect that it will be in a state of lockdown for the foreseeable future as law enforcement assets are on scene trying to go through, look at not only the forensic examination of any shell casings, for example, trying to determine what they are dealing with, but then also go through the witnesses, talk to each one and gather as much information as they can.

CABRERA: OK. Again, latest information we have, one man detained. At least one person has been transported to the hospital. Perhaps as many as four, local hospital officials have been advised, could be on the way.

Again, sheriff's office confirming now that there was a report of a man with a gun. Officers responded around 11:30 this morning, local time. So a little over an hour and a half ago, I suppose. And what we're learning, this is happening at the Chabad of Poway Synagogue. That's just outside of San Diego. We'll bring you more information and bring it to you just as soon as we have it.

Another quick break. We'll be right back.

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[15:55:41] CABRERA: Breaking news we're following, a shooting at another place of worship. This one happening near San Diego at the Chabad of Poway Synagogue. Local officials there in San Diego County telling us that they had calls about 11:30 this morning, a report of a man with a gun. They responded. And now they confirm there are injuries. The extent of the injuries, we don't know. The number of victims, we just don't know. But police do confirm they have one person currently in custody for questioning about this incident. They have blocked off some of the area. We understand this is still a developing situation. We're working to gather more information. But again, this is a shooting at a synagogue in California, currently under investigation. Much more when we return here in the CNN NEWSROOM. Stay with us.

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[16:00:05] ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

CABRERA: It is 4:00 Eastern, 1:00 in the afternoon out west. You're live in the CNN NEWSROOM.