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Bush: Lynch Deserves A Vote; Bush Takes Jab At Clinton; Ramadi On Brink Of Falling To ISIS; Verizon Launches Flexible TV Plans. Aired 7:30-8a ET

Aired April 17, 2015 - 07:30   ET

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


[07:30:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

JOHN BERMAN, CNN GUEST ANCHOR: The anger is reaching a boiling point 160 days after Loretta Lynch was nominated to be the next attorney general, that's longer than the last seven nominees combined and the fight over the delay really heating up.

The Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid says he will force a vote if it is delayed any longer. Now, some hope though may be on the horizon there could be a deal brokered within the next week.

Here to weigh in on all this CNN chief national correspondent, John King, for this morning's edition of "Inside Politics," which went outside the beltway today and right here on to the NEW DAY set.

JOHN KING, CNN HOST, "INSIDE POLITICS": Right here.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN GUEST ANCHOR: Welcome to the party.

KING: Thank you very much. I thought you needed some help.

HARLOW: With these two?

BERMAN: An interesting entry into discussion on Loretta Lynch, they're fighting about it in Washington, the minority leader, the majority leader, the White House all fighting. But Jeb Bush, who wants to be the next president even though he hasn't outright said it yet, campaigning in New Hampshire says there should be a vote. Listen to what he says.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JEB BUSH (R), FORMER GOVERNOR OF FLORIDA: I think presidents have the right to pick their team in general. The longer it takes to confirm her, the longer Eric Holder stays as attorney general. Look at it that way.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: So he covers both bases there. The last part, the longer you wait to vote for her, the longer Eric Holder stays because the Republican base doesn't like Eric Holder. They've been fighting with Eric Holder since day one.

So he covers his conservative hide, if you will, but that's the reflex of, A, a governor, a chief executive who says I should get my team. Number two, his brother and dad were president. They've been through this.

George W. Bush went through this with the Democrats. Remember, this is not new. Democrats have done this to Republicans and now Republicans are saying you were jerks to us, we're going to be bigger jerks to you.

Well, that's not the way to run Washington especially with this job. I'm not delineating between cabinet jobs, the president should get his team, fight over taxes, health care, ISIS, anything you want, but this is the nation's number one law enforcement officer.

At a time when we have whether it's Ferguson or Tulsa, or anywhere else, all this big conversation about police and the minority community. There's a task force set up. The attorney general, whoever he or she is, has a pretty big job. Why are you fighting over this?

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: How is it hurting though?

KING: Well, that's the question. There are two Republican parties right now. If you're Mitch Mcconnell or John Boehner on different issues, this is the Mitch McConnell issue in the Senate.

They make the base happy because they're sticking it to Obama. The base loves it. If you're Jeb Bush or any Republicans want to be president, look at the demographics of this country. We had this conversation about Wayne Lapierre the other day.

She would be the first female African-American attorney general. The Republicans can't win a presidential election if they don't get more African-American votes and more Latino votes and more college-educated women than they have in the last two elections.

So you have two Republican parties. If they want to stay a congressional party, then keep doing this. But the big house at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue gets a lot harder to win.

HARLOW: So Harry Reid said that if he -- you know, within maybe days or a week that he will force the hand here. That he will use the technical ability that he has to force the hand here. Tell us about the tactic, would it work and how unprecedented would it be to use this to force a vote?

KING: On an attorney general nomination, it's probably unprecedented. He has parliamentary skills where he can bring it up when they want to vote on something, he can step up and force the Republicans to block him.

He probably can't get her confirmed, but he can get the Republicans to vote no to bring her up. What he's said is you guys won the election, you know, -- and Mitch Mcconnell has to Harry Reid on some issues has negotiated and they've tried to be nice and they've tried to have a relationship.

He's been the leader. He respects McConnell to do this, but now he says I'm fed up. That's a great point for the liberal base, why hasn't he done it beforehand.

BERMAN: It's Senate tradition.

KING: It is Senate tradition you let the party in power run the Senate and so protocol. But the issue here in part is that Chuck Grassley is the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, he's up in 2016.

Now can Democrats find a viable candidate? I give you Senator Joni Earnst who ran a good campaign last time. The Democrats had a hard time finding a candidate in 2014. Who knows if they can find one in 2016?

But it will be a presidential year. Iowa has gone blue in recent presidential elections. Now the White House and Harry Reid are essentially threatening Chuck Grassley.

But isn't Chuck Grassley's decision. Chuck Grassley is doing what his leader, Mitch McConnell, tells him what to do who has said we're going to wait until we do this trafficking bill. It's this trade off --

CUOMO: They're going to pay a price though. If they're not paying a price, it's not going to happen. Look at the AUMF, the Authorization for Use Of Military Force. The world is falling apart. That's not an exaggeration right now. They're not debating it, but there's no real penalty so why act?

[07:35:10] HARLOW: Let's listen to what the White House had to say to Grassley. Let's play that sound.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JEB BUSH (R), FORMER GOVERNOR OF FLORIDA: I have to prove that I'm not running for president if I go beyond the consideration of this to be an active candidate trying to break the tie --

JOSH EARNEST, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: That in my mind is an astounding display of duplicity. The sad part, I think, is that Senator Grassley particularly in his home state of Iowa has cultivated a reputation as somebody who is true to his word.

And I think the only conclusion I can draw from this astounding exchange is that it's possible that Senator Grassley's been in Washington for too long.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: See there that's Josh Earnest bringing 2016 and Chuck Grassley into the equation at the end here. We're seeing more and more of that from the White House podium them talking about the next election coming up as President Obama goes out and promising to use their power. Grassley did say, remember, Eric Holder said he was going to resign before the 2014 election and there was a thought the president might hurry. Name somebody while the Democrats are still in charge in the lame duck session before the end of the year.

And Chuck Grassley did say at the time please wait, that's not right, Senate protocol. We're going to be in the majority, let us do the nomination, we'll do it quickly. Now he says why didn't you do it when you had the Democratic power? What are you complaining about?

The White House is right to call him out, but if that's what we're going to do every day find this aha, aha, aha, let's have a government. But to your point the American people decided several years ago Washington doesn't work.

So part of it is politicians on both sides are not paying attention and the American people don't think that this matters because they think Washington is broken. That's a problem.

BERMAN: We give you a quick little teaser right there of Jeb Bush talking about the idea of political dynasties. It's a question he's going to have to answer almost every day that he's on the campaign trail for the next 500 days. He was asked about dynasties. Let's listen quickly to what he said about that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BUSH: I have to prove that I'm not running for president if I go beyond a consideration of this to be an active candidate trying to break the tie between the Adams family and the Bush family. That's not my -- really isn't my motivation.

But I have to prove that. First and foremost I have to show my heart. Secondly, I have to show I have ideas that make it possible for America to rise up again. And third, I have to show that I have the leadership skills not just to yap about it but to do it.

And if I do that, then the Bush dynasty thing and the Clinton-Bush deal all that stuff subsides. That's my plan. If you got a better one let me know.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: Yes, it's a high bar but yes.

KING: He's looking for the other plan. He'd like another way around this, but it is what it is. The name Bush -- first he has to become the Republican nominee. The name Bush among conservative activists, forgive me, it is a four-letter word to some degree.

Because his dad broke the no new taxes pledge and a lot of conservatives do remember that. George W. Bush, a lot of Republicans he mismanaged the Iraq war, Medicare Part B. He was for no child left behind, a big government conservative.

So Jeb Bush has the legacy of his family to worry about in the Republican primary before he can worry about convincing a general electorate whether you need, you know, another Bush in the White House. Humor is probably the best way to go at it and raise a boat load of dimes and hope you can win the nomination.

BERMAN: John King, thanks so much. You can get more of this on "INSIDE POLITICS" with John King this weekend. That's Sunday 8:30 a.m. Eastern Time. Do not miss it.

HARLOW: ISIS in Iraq, al Qaeda in Yemen, what can the international community do to stop rampaging terrorists? We are going to talk one- on-one with the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Samantha Power, here with us in studio next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:42:36]

CUOMO: So this morning reinforcements are arriving to try to stop ISIS advances in Ramadi and a lot of other places. But officials on the ground say it's not nearly enough and security forces could give up the fight at any time, could give up the fight. Those are the words.

New images this morning of families fleeing the city for their lives all choked by traffic and really nowhere to go. They're on their way to Baghdad. So let's discuss the crisis in Yemen, conflict in Syria, what's going on really in so many hot spots with Samantha Power.

She is the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. Did you ever imagine that the job would become as complex and as fraught with problems as it is?

SAMANTHA POWER, U.S. AMBASSADOR TO THE UNITED NATIONS: We're missing the locusts. It's a question when the locusts will arrive.

CUOMO: Right?

POWER: No. It's a time of turmoil, it's a fluid time, but particularly as it relates to ISIS we're in a much stronger position than we were in a year ago. We're chipping away.

CUOMO: We need confidence in that, Ambassador, because people looking at the maps and watching the show, they're moving all over the place, the Iraqis need our help and we can't help and where's the coalition? Where do you see the progress?

POWER: Well, the biggest challenge, of course, is this weak states that are very decentralized and don't have the security institutions required to fend off these terrorists on their own. It is a long-term investment.

We've made it over the course of the last decade with the Iraqi forces and it wasn't enough. So now we're trying different models, National Guard, much more decentralized models where Sunni tribes again will protect their own communities in a way that would then make ISIL also less appealing to them because of course ISIL actually got some support at the start of this whole effort.

If you look in Iraq at the population centers that ISIL controls when this campaign started back in July when the president ordered trainers and advisers to go. ISIL now controls 25 percent fewer or 25 percent less territory than they did back then.

So there will be back and forth, and there will be incidents and ISIL is so monstrous that they will gather headlines around the world. But as the president said from the beginning this is a multi-year campaign.

And it really does rely over time on the Iraqis stepping up and being able to do this for itself. You will see instances where they move into retreat, but elsewhere in Iraq, you see them on the offense and ISIL, the ones in their caravans heading out.

CUOMO: That becomes the consideration. Are you reducing the threat or moving the threat? Feel free to put up the map as we discuss, you don't need to see our faces the whole time, the situation in Ramadi.

[07:45:05] We hear General Dempsey say we'd rather them not take it. We have to get it back. This is a big city, what is it 70 miles outside Baghdad, 150,000. That's a real population center.

And now they're going to take it. It kind of speaks to is this the U.S.' fault? No, but people are criticizing you both ways. You didn't do enough last time and you let this lay by itself for too long this time. Fair criticism?

POWER: I don't think so. I think what we did was we trained the Iraqis. We supported them over the course of a decade. They assured us that their security preparation was sufficient. And then ISIL gathered more momentum more quickly I think than a lot of people anticipated.

So now again I think the important thing is to focus on the future. The revenues that ISIL had access to a year ago have been obliterated. The oil installations and so forth, they were just trading. That's gone.

The flow of foreign terrorist fighters to Iraq and Syria we are curbing. It is a slow process. We need to do much more, of course, in social media and people within these communities need to be the ones again contesting this horrific --

CUOMO: Not the U.S. You don't see it more likely that you wind up having men and women on the ground fighting with U.S. ground troops?

POWER: No, I think that the way this works over time, and I stress it will take time, is that the communities that are every bit as horrified, more horrified because it's their women and children who are being enslaved or raped or their men who are being beheaded or unearthed in mass graves, those are the people repulsed by this ideology. And those are the people going to step up. And we need to ensure that they have the resources and capabilities to do so.

CUOMO: Thus far that seems to be a very strained effort.

POWER: Slow.

CUOMO: I know you want to ask for the allies to come together to help with your move. One of the -- it's really become like a small city, right? It was a refugee camp largely Palestinian. They're getting horrible things done to them largely by ISIS. You're asking for a coalition to get in there and help. But who can use diplomacy with ISIS? How is that going to help, Ambassador?

POWER: Well, just to focus on -- I'm very glad you raised it because it's maybe not getting enough attention internationally. Here you have more than 10,000 Palestinian refugees who have lived in Syria, this used to be a camp of hundreds of thousands. And by camp it's really a small community. Looks almost like a town.

And it's being barrel bombed by the regime. It's being starved. And, yes, now ISIL has a foothold. It just underscores in Syria beyond the ISIL threat how important it is to get a political solution.

So that state institutions, reformed and purged of some of these individuals who have gassed their own people and fired barrel bombs regularly on civilians, can team up with some of the moderate opposition to go after terrorists. But, yes, you can't negotiate with ISIL.

CUOMO: It's not about asking a resolution to condemn it. I guess you'd have to be saying we need to get people together to go there and fight them and deal with what's going on in Syria and of course, like six different places.

POWER: I mean, the model is similar in Iraq and Syria with one critical difference. It's similar in so far as it's going to be local people who take the fight and put their troops on the ground. Again, it's going to take time for those forces to congeal, but they are the ones going to need to win this fight and there needs to be a military component.

The critical difference is in Iraq we're working with the national government, Prime Minister Abadi, was just in Washington strengthening national forces in Syria. Assad is the reason ISIL was able to establish the foothold it did.

Every day that he's in power more people flow to Syria in order to take up the fight, he's a recruiting mine field for ISIL. And so it requires actually building out opposition forces. And that's why the president has initiated this train and equip program, which again over time will ensure that there are forces on the ground to fight ISIL in those places.

CUOMO: What is your thought about Congress not debating, not moving on the AUMF, the Authorization for the Use of Military Force at this time? When the strategy is what it is, it does not seem to be a productive world environment. What is your message to them about getting together and debating what we're doing and finding out what works and finding out what doesn't and coming to a vote? POWER: Well, I think as President Obama has the legal authority he needs to carry out the mission that we're embarked upon. But we are always stronger as a country when we can show all parts of our government in a bipartisan manner are supporting our troops and our trainers and so forth throughout in the field.

So we're still hopeful people can come together. There are different polls to the debate, but there is a sort of center of people and we would hope it would get to be a critical mass of people who can come around some version of the bill that the president put forward.

[07:50:05] CUOMO: You are very even keel. People who don't know you personally, that's how you are, but when you look at the world environment that the United States and others are trying to help control, has it been worse in recent history than it is right now?

POWER: I think, again, if we were talking about during the cold war and our kids were being trained and kind of duck into their basements, that would have felt intense and out of control as well.

What is different now is the defuseness of the threat, and that's what makes people feel overwhelmed, and this is where this -- if you go back to the president's West Point speech, it's really important.

And it's going to take time, we strengthen national capabilities, border security, cooperation on financing so that these movements can't keep proliferating and taking advantage of these illicit networks --

CUOMO: Conceptionally, I get it, but do you see any proof that it's paying off?

POWER: I do, absolutely. I think you see some of the recruitment we are doing for the Syria training, and people flocking to that because they want to be part of ISIL. Iraq, it's again taking time because some of the sectarian divisions that got exacerbated by the last government. And it's an important piece to stress, there has to be a governance component any effort to defeat terrorism because --

CUOMO: A lot of these states are very weak.

POWER: And a lot of the citizens are very alienated. So again I know it's not simple or soothing the moment we are in right now, but I think we have the strategy in place and it's a question moving out on the humanitarian, on the governance, military, on the training and finance, and a lot of elements that have to be brought to bear at once.

CUOMO: And will take a long time. Ambassador Power, you got a lot of work to do. Thank you for coming to NEW DAY and help us understand the mission.

POWER: Thank you.

CUOMO: All right, so Americans are changing the way they watch TV, you know that. They are also saving money while they do it. Really, how? We got the answer.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:54:25]

HARLOW: You know what that means, it's time for CNN money, your money, chief business correspondent, Christine Romans is in our money center. Good morning, Christine.

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Poppy. How you are paying for TV is changing? Verizon offering Fios customers a new way to watch TV, starting Sunday for 55 bucks a month, Fios customers can buy a base package of channels that include the major broadcasters like ABC and Fox and CNN then add groups of extra channels, sort of genres like sports or kid shows, or pop culture.

Americans want flexibility when watching TV. According to Nielsen, most Americans are only watching 17 channels on their televisions and millennials, they don't talk about what's on TV. They want to know what is on Netflix. They are really changing.

[07:55:06] The streaming service, Netflix added an unbelievable 5 million new subscribers in just three months. Looks like that gamble of original programming there like "House of Cards" paying off. That stock up 18 percent yesterday, $562 a share and you have Wall Street predicting Netflix shares could double by next year -- John.

ROMANS: This Netflix take off. Thanks, Christine. The showdown intensifying over Loretta Lynch's confirmation vote or lack thereof, the attorney general nomination has been in limbo for months. Now the Senate's leading Democrat is threatening to force a vote. Will this work? We will take you live to Washington.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Purgatory for Loretta Lynch.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST, "THE SITUATION ROOM": Confirming Loretta Lynch as the nation's first African-American female attorney general.

BUSH: This should not always be partisan. Presidents have the right to pick their team.

BLITZER: Another U.S. citizen charged with aiding terrorist.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The 23-year-old from Columbus, Ohio.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He left the United States last year to go and join the fighting in Syria.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The fighting for Aden continues.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, mostly unopposed. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They have taken the third largest airport in Yemen.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Guilty of murder in the first degree.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They are wrong.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST, "AC360": The jury speaks out.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You have to make the decision to either put him away or let him go.

(END VIDEOTAPE)