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LEGAL VIEW WITH ASHLEIGH BANFIELD

President Obama to Make Statement on Iraq and Ferguson; Missouri Governor Speaks

Aired August 14, 2014 - 12:30   ET

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


(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ASHLEIGH BANFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back to LEGAL VIEW. We're still watching two moving parts that we're expecting live, and that is the president of the United States is going to come out and speak live while on this working vacation in Martha's Vineyard.

And also the governor of Missouri was expected to speak right off the top of the hour, and we have just been given word that he's changed his live conference to 3:00 Eastern time.

So we're going to continue to watch what's been happening in Missouri, yet another violence, Molotov cocktails reportedly being thrown from protesters and stun grenades and flash grenades being sent back from riot police, arrests of reporters, arrests of protesters, and, yet again, a fifth night of a big problem that's developed in Missouri of the shooting of an unarmed 18-year-old young black man named Michael Brown.

Our senior legal analyst, Jeffrey Toobin, joins me live now to talk a little bit more about this. Jeff, there's just so much ground to cover here.

I'm not sure whether so much of this is being shaped because of what happened over the Trayvon Martin case -- there's so many shadows that are so similar in this particular case -- or whether this is truly sort of a bad confluence of a number of different departments that don't know what the other is doing and perhaps a leadership that's not directing them the way they might direct them so as not to get this kind of coverage and these kind of events.

JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: All we can know is the result, and the result has been appalling. This has been a disastrous effort by the local police outside St. Louis, and it is not over.

And when you combine the lack of information that's been provided and the information that has been provided, which has been very much slanted in a way to try to make the police look good, combined with efforts at crowd control that seem more like something out of East Germany than out of the United States of America -- rubber bullets, stun grenades, stuff we just don't see in the United States because most police departments are trained better to deal with protesters in a way that diffuses conflict rather than escalate it is, but hat's what we have seen here. Last night was perhaps the worst night ever, worst night so far, and we'll see if the governor of Missouri, who has been basically missing in action, Jay Nixon, and the president of the United States, who appears to be on the vacation from hell, what either of them are going to do about it.

BANFIELD: And then we don't often see the arrest of a "Washington Post" reporter who is at work at a laptop in a McDonald's.

TOOBIN: I left that out.

BANFIELD: On fire. I mean, this has been troubling, especially for us. We're members of the press. We do these jobs every day and we very rarely have this sort of thing.

Look, we have all been roughed up in circumstances where we could have swept up with the action, but this was a very unusual circumstance.

I just want to move you towards the facts, because that's been a big problem all along. Loads of people getting on television suggesting they know exactly what happened at that police cruiser.

But I want to get from you the critical information we have been getting from the witnesses so far that have spoken on television, and that is that so far, at least two of them who say they saw what happened have extremely similar accounts.

Talk to me about the importance of the consistency of those two witnesses.

TOOBIN: Well, I think we need to draw a distinction here. The criminal investigation, which is being led by the FBI -- and don't kid yourself, there are others involved, but the FBI is going to be in charge here -- that is going to have to be slow and meticulous. That is not going to be resolved this week, next week, or even perhaps next month.

The other point, though, is the release of basic information about who was the police officer, how many shots were fired, what was the cause of death, what was the time of death, that sort of basic information hasn't been released, although the local police department in Ferguson has said, oh, the police officer was hit in the face.

That's the kind of distorted, one-sided information that doesn't give anyone confidence in Ferguson or anywhere else.

BANFIELD: Jeffrey, standby if you would. You mentioned that the FBI is going to be doing a slow and meticulous -- if I can use your words -- a slow and meticulous, and it should be slow and meticulous, job.

I actually want to talk to Shawn Henry, a former executive assistant director of the FBI. Mr. Henry, thanks for taking the time to join me, especially at this very moment.

You just heard what Jeff Toobin said, that the investigation of the FBI should be slow and meticulous. My guess is that you know a lot -- well, that the FBI would know a lot of the answers that the crowd is demanding -- the name of the officer, the number of shots, the cause of death, the time of death.

But when should that information start being made public, especially in the circumstance we're seeing develop in Missouri?

SHAWN HENRY, FORMER EXECUTIVE ASSISTANT DIRECTOR, FBI: Ashleigh, you know, in a case like this, I think you have to maintain the integrity of the investigation in terms of if there is going to be potential charges or some type of a trial.

Typically in an investigation where there is a shooting, especially if there's a death, it's presented to a grand jury and there ultimately might be a trial if the grand jury determines there's enough evidence there to charge somebody.

If that's the case, you don't want this tried in the media. You want to maintain the integrity of the investigation so that when it goes forward you have the ability to go through a thorough prosecution.

BANFIELD: Mr. Henry, I have so many other questions for you, and unfortunately we're awaiting the president. He's competing with you on the right-hand side of the screen, so hopefully you and I'll get another chance to talk at length about what's happening in Missouri.

In the meantime, I ju8st want to let our audience know that he's expected to arrive at the podium in just a few moments.

I'm going to squeeze in a quick break. When we come back, my colleague, Wolf Blitzer, will join me, and hopefully the president will be up, speaking live.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR, "THE SITUATION ROOM": Welcome back. I'm Wolf Blitzer in Washington

We're waiting for the president of the United States, momentarily. He'll be making a statement, we're told. He will speak about the situation in Iraq as well as the situation outside of St. Louis, Missouri, in Ferguson, after the aftermath of the police shooting death of an 18-year-old Michael Brown.

The president will be speaking on both of those subjects. We don't know if he will answer reporters' questions.

Jim Sciutto is with me, our chief national security correspondent. I assume the president will open up on Iraq. Give us the latest on what's going on and make the turn to Ferguson.

The latest in Iraq, at least on one level, seems to be improving. The refugees who were stranding on top of that mountain.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: It's in a pretty dramatic change. We were talking about this last night when we were expecting an announcement, impending announcement, of a major U.S. evacuation because of the crisis, the way the crisis was described by administration officials. Even the president talked about an impending genocide.

And then after these special forces got off Mount Sinjar last night, they came back with the news that, one, there are fewer refugees there in need. Two, they are getting the food they need. In fact, there were pallets that hadn't been touched, the humanitarian aid. And, three, that they were finding other ways to get off the mountain with the help of Kurdish fighters, et cetera.

That's a pretty dramatic turn in 24 hours from impending genocide to the siege just broken. And I was speaking to our Ivan Watson, who, as you know, is on the ground there, and I asked him, Are folks really getting off the mountain that quickly? The Pentagon has said about a thousand a day.

He said, yes, they are, but for many of them that journey is killing them. The old and the young, they're being injured. It's not an easy way off the mountain.

So how did that change so quickly is one question. The other is, and the administration hasn't provided detail on what next steps are. What happens if other minorities, the Christians, come under threat, and what help is the U.S. going to offer the new Iraqi government to push back ISIS? Those are open questions.

BLITZER: And there's now reports ISIS is moving closer to Baghdad. They may be pulling a little bit away from that mountain, but they are moving elsewhere.

SCIUTTO: They are, and not just toward Baghdad but also to other sides of Kurdistan, because you picture Kurdistan up in northern Iraq.

You know, we have been focusing on their attacks here on the western side, but you speak to Kurdish officials, they are also attacking down here. And it just gives you a reminder that ISIS controls a lot of territory in Iraq, and they have a number of places they can poke you.

So even if the air strikes are working here, what do you do next?

BLITZER: Hold on. The Missouri governor, Jay Nixon, is speaking right now. Let's listen in as we await the president.