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New Iraq War Report Critical Of Tony Blair; Anger Follows Latest U.S. Police Shooting; Mother: Blair Heard "What He Wanted To Listen To"; U.S. Sanctions Kim Jong Un Over Human Rights Abuses; U.S., Brazil Search For Missing Detainee; Outrage Over Death Of Black Man By White Officer; Clinton Goes after Trump as E-mail Probe Ends; FOX CEO Sued for Sexual Harassment; Gunmen Open Fire on Dhaka Pray Congregation. Aired 1-2a ET

Aired July 7, 2016 - 01:00   ET

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


[01:00:09] JOHN VAUSE, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everybody. This is CNN NEWSROOM, live from Los Angeles.

ISHA SESAY, CNN ANCHOR: Ahead this hour, former Prime Minister, Tony Blair, is back on the defensive after a very public takedown of British decision to invade Iraq.

VAUSE: New protests in the United States after a video captures another African-American man being shot and killed by police.

SESAY: And later, the head of Fox News is accused of sexual harassment by one of the cable channel's former news anchors.

VAUSE: Great to have you with us. I'm John Vause.

SESAY: And I'm Isha Sesay. NEWSROOM L.A. starts right now.

A newly released British report says the 2003 invasion of Iraq was unnecessary and came at a time when Saddam Hussein posed no real threat.

VAUSE: The Chilcot report is especially critical of former Prime Minister Tony Blair. CNN's Phil Black has the details.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PHIL BLACK, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Everyone knew at the time they were tight. Now, the Iraq inquiry has ruled they were too tight, that Tony Blair was too worried about Britain's special bond with the United States. It says he was wrong to think breaking with the U.S. on Iraq would break the relationship, and wrong to believe he could guide President George Bush's thinking.

JOHN CHILCOT, IRAQ INQUIRY CHAIRMAN: Mr. Blair overestimated his ability to influence U.S. decisions on Iraq.

TONY BLAIR, FORMER PRIME MINISTER OF THE UNITED KINGDOM: I took the decision after 9/11 we should be America's closest ally. Again, you can disagree with that. I personally think, when you're fighting this terrorism in the world today, it would be better if Britain today had a really strong, tight relationship with the United States.

BLACK: The report says Tony Blair often failed to consult widely across his own cabinet of ministers, that too few senior people were aware of big policy decisions. An example, it quotes from a long personal letter Blair wrote to George Bush in July, 2002, in which the British Prime Minister told the U.S. President, I will be with you, whatever. Senior ministers didn't see it. The report says they should have. It gives other examples, too.

CHILCOT: Despite promises that the cabinet would discuss the military contribution, it did not discuss the military options or their implications.

BLACK: Blair is criticized strongly for not pressing the U.S. on his concerns about managing the Iraq after the invasion. It says he knew the significance of the post-conflict phase, but didn't rethink Britain's involvement or make it contingent on having a strong plan ready to go when the fighting stopped. Tony Blair has often said, the huge security problems which developed through outside actors trying to tear the country apart couldn't have been predicted. The inquiry disagreed.

CHILCOT: The risks of internal strife in Iraq, active Iranian pursuit of its interests, regional instability, and al-Qaeda activity in Iraq were each explicitly identified before the invasion.

BLACK: Little surprise the report found the war was justified using faulty intelligence. Of course, there were no weapons of mass destruction, but a crucial point for Blair -- it says there's nothing to indicate his people exaggerated or created information to help sell their case for war.

BLAIR: Please stop saying I was lying or --

BLACK: The report says it doesn't question Blair's belief, but it found his assessment of the threat posed by Saddam Hussein went too far ahead of the available intelligence. For that, (ph) Valerie O'Neil says she'll never forgive him. Her youngest son, Chris, was killed by a roadside bomb in Basra in 2007.

VALERIE O'NEIL: He didn't listen to the intelligence. He listened to what he wanted to listen to. No matter what anybody said to him, Tony Blair was going to war with George Bush.

BLACK: The report doesn't say explicitly the decision to invade Iraq was a mistake, but it comes close.

CHILCOT: Intervention which went badly wrong, with consequences to this day --

BLACK: Tony Blair responded at length, passionately declaring his sorrow and accepting responsibility while insisting he acted for the right reasons and the world is still better off without Saddam Hussein.

BLAIR: I mean, I don't regret taking the decision. BLACK: He's been arguing that difficult and highly unpopular case for

more than 13 years. Now, the Iraq's inquiry's definitive account of a war it says was unnecessary can only damage Blair's determined efforts to resurrect his legacy. Phil Black, CNN, London.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VAUSE: And CNN senior international correspondent, Ben Wedeman, has reported extensively on the war and its aftermath.

SESAY: He says people in Iraq today don't think the country is much better off than it was under Saddam Hussein.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

[01:05:02] BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: The Chilcot report is finally out. It describes a well executed invasion of Iraq by coalition forces, although it is critical of the U.K.'s decision to rush into Iraq in the first place.

What followed the invasion, however, was a chaotic, bloody day after, an occupation ill-prepared and underequipped and undermanned. I remember reporting from the city of Kirkuk in the days after the fall of the regime. There was just a handful of U.S. special forces there. The city was in chaos. Looting was rampant. Angry mobs burned down government buildings, scenes played out in Baghdad and other Iraqi cities. This was not the regime change Bush and Blair had called for. It was state obliteration.

In the months after the fall of Saddam, we traveled around Iraq following confused and overwhelmed American and British forces who didn't have a clear idea what their mission was. In one town, we watched as a column of American troops drove up to the courthouse, a young army lawyer announcing through a translator to the stunned employees that she had come to revamp their legal system. This in a town where the people were desperate for the restoration of electricity, water, law, and order. The Chilcot report faulted the British government for assigning too few troops too much responsibility over a vast area of Southern Iraq, and that certainly was true. With minimal forces on the ground, the British, and to a lesser extent, the Americans, left a vacuum, a vacuum into which rushed Shia militias and Sunni extremists, including al-Qaeda, which eventually morphed into ISIS.

And Iraqis are now fighting and dying every day in the war against ISIS. Basic public services like electricity and water are still unreliable. The country is one of the most corrupt on Earth. Law and order are in short supply. Millions of people have been made homeless, and what passes for democracy in Iraq is dangerously unstable. This is the Iraq Tony Blair insists is better off than it was under Saddam Hussein. Ben Wedeman, CNN, Baghdad.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VAUSE: More than 4,400 U.S. soldiers, 179 British soldiers were killed during the war in Iraq. Other nations lost 137 men and women. The organization, Iraq Body Count, says at least 160,000 Iraqi civilians were killed since 2003, but those estimates vary widely.

SESAY: They certainly do. Now the field of potential candidates running to be Britain's next prime minister will be down to two on Thursday.

VAUSE: Home Secretary, Theresa May, on the left here, and Junior Energy Minister, Andrea Leadsom, are the two frontrunners. Justice Secretary, Michael Gove, is in third place. Ultimately, 150,000 Conservative Party members will decide who will replace David Cameron. That vote will happen in September.

SESAY: U.S. President Barack Obama is leaving 3,000 more troops in Afghanistan than he originally planned.

VAUSE: Mr. Obama says the security situation remains precarious and so the U.S. will now leave 8,400 troops in country by the end of his term.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARACK OBAMA (D), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Good morning, everybody. The narrow missions assigned to our forces will not change. They remain focused on supporting Afghan forces and going after terrorists. But maintaining our forces at this specific level, based on our assessment of the security conditions and the strength of Afghan forces, will allow us to continue to provide tailored support to help Afghan forces continue to improve.

SESAY: Well, currently, there are about 9,800 American troops in Afghanistan. Future plans to America's longest war will fall to President Obama's successor.

For the first time ever, the U.S. is imposing sanctions directly on the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un. U.S. officials put him and ten of his top officials on a blacklist, (inaudible) any property they might have in U.S. jurisdiction.

VAUSE: The Obama administration says they're responsible for widespread human rights abuses, including forced labor. The U.S. and U.N. have sanctioned North Korea heavily before because of its nuclear weapons program.

SESAY: Well, a super-typhoon is barreling towards Taiwan right now. It's set to make landfall late Thursday local time.

VAUSE: Taiwan's military is preparing for the threat of flash floods as well as landslides. Meteorologist Pedram Javaheri joins us now with more on the super-typhoon, its path, and when it's going to hit and where. Hey, Pedram.

PEDRAM JAVAHERI, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Hey, good seeing you guys. Yes, this is a pretty menacing storm, guys. We have touched on this the last couple of days, and when you take a look at it on satellite imagery, the presentation on satellite imagery, frankly, is astonishing. It's literally flawless in every aspect, when you dissect the storm, look at every single quadrant, very little as far as weakening with this storm, very little as far as the band beginning to flail out and fall apart. And the winds with this sitting just shy of 300 kilometers per hour.

[01:10:00] To give you perspective, that is faster than what a commercial jet speed is at takeoff. So again, incredibly powerful winds coming ashore across this region of Taiwan. We think landfall is somewhere across South-Central Taiwan close to midnight local time tonight. Then it reemerges after passing through the Central Taiwan Mountains over the Taiwan straight. We think a second landfall somewhere near (ph) Fuzhou, population there, 7 million people. Now, it will be a shell of its former self by the time it gets there on Friday night, but Taiwan is going to be in line here for what is potentially catastrophic damage. In the United States, the National Hurricane Center categorizes such storms, would give it a category 5, catastrophic damage would be considered with this. They would say, anytime you have any storms with such winds, most of these areas would be uninhabitable for weeks, if not months.

We know, of course, the rainfall going to be torrential. Could get easily a half a meter, some areas could pick up upwards of a meter of rainfall over this region. I want to lay the land for you, because as you go in for a close perspective, people are often surprised to learn, when it comes to the island of Taiwan, it has the highest density of tall mountains of any place on Earth. About 300 mountains here that rise to over 3,000 meters high. But you go in towards the coastal communities, that's where the concern is.

I calculated about 75,000 people that live on the immediate coast across this region. Again, it is sparsely populated, but if you're in places like Chenggong, we know some of these communities need to be evacuated immediately because of the storm surge, the heavy rainfall, the serious winds with the storm are going to be life threatening. John and Isha --

VAUSE: Pedram, thank you. It's been a pretty quiet typhoon season until now. I guess it's time to brace. Thanks, Pedram.

JAVAHERI: Very true.

SESAY: Thank you. Time for a break. Next on NEWSROOM L.A., as a community remembers a black man killed by police, CNN has obtained new video of his death.

VAUSE: Also, Donald Trump hits the road with Newt Gingrich. Later, we'll have his glowing (inaudible) the former speaker of the house.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

AMARA WALKER, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone. I'm Amara Walker and this is your ROAD TO RIO update. U.S. and Brazilian authorities are hunting for a former Guantanamo Bay detainee who disappeared from Uruguay. 44-year-old Abu Wa'el Dhiab, a Syrian national, went off radar several weeks ago. Dhiab has settled in Uruguay after being released in 2014. A South American airline issued a warning saying he may try to use a fake passport to enter Brazil ahead of the Olympic Games next month. Brazil's Justice Minister says that the country is prepared for a

terror attack if one should occur during the Olympics. Government officials say they will deploy about 22,000 troops to cover security during the games.

The U.S. Olympic rowing team will appear in special seamless uni-suits when they hit the water for the Olympics. Knitted with anti-microbial material, the innovative suits will provide much needed protection against exposure to bacteria in the polluted lagoon.

[01:14:58] China's national gymnastics and weight lifting teams held open training sessions in Beijing Wednesday. The gymnasts are preparing to leave for Sao Paulo on July 22 before going to Rio. China topped the weight lifting and gymnastics competitions at the 2012 London games with five gold medals in each sport. That's your ROAD TO RIO update. I'm Amara Walker.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VAUSE: Welcome back, everybody. The U.S. Justice Department is investigating the deadly shooting of a black man by a white police officer.

SESAY: A band played at a vigil in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Wednesday night for Alton Sterling who was killed Tuesday outside a convenience store there. In just a moment, we're going to share some extremely graphic video of his death. Here's Nick Valencia in Louisiana.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NICK VALENCIA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: What occurs on this graphic cell phone video is now the subject of a civil rights investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice. Two police officers tackle 37-year-old Alton Sterling outside the triple S food mart in Baton Rouge and pin him down. Someone calls out that they see a gun.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He's got a gun!

VALENCIA: Soon after, the officers shoot sterling multiple times, killing him. Alton Sterling's teen son stood at his mother's side today.

QUINYETTA MCMILLON, MOTHER OF STERLING'S OLDEST SON: He had to watch this as this was put all over the outlets.

VALENCIA: Inconsolable as community leaders call for justice.

MICHAEL MCCLANAHAN, PRESIDENT, BATON ROUGE NAACP: What we're going to do today is root out the one percent of bad police officers that go around becoming the judge, the jury, and the executioner.

VALENCIA: Residents say Sterling was well known in the community, often selling CDs outside of the store.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This is a good person. What, for what? VALENCIA: The officers on scene that night had seven years combined service on the force and are now on administrative leave. An anonymous 911 call may offer clues as to why they approached Sterling.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (via telephone): -- selling CDs on a corner, gun in his pocket. He pulled a gun on the complainant and told him he couldn't be around there.

VALENCIA: Local officials, including the chief of police, the Governor, and the Mayor, addressed the fatal shooting ahead of a protests this evening.

KIP HOLDEN, MAYOR OF BATON ROUGE: We believe that justice will be served. It's not like we need to be handheld and spoon-fed when it comes down to doing what's right.

VALENCIA: Sterling's family lawyer says police quickly confiscated surveillance video from the convenience store owner.

EDMOND JORDAN, STERLING'S FAMILY ATTORNEY: Mr. (ph) Abdullah said that they had him in his car, did not present him with a search warrant, but went in and took his system.

VALENCIA: As for the officers' body cameras --

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I was told by the chief of police that both body cams fell off in the tussle. Let's outfit our police officers in body cams that don't fall off!

VALENCIA: The chief of police says no stone will be left unturned, while Sterling's loved ones vow to hold officials to that promise.

MCMILLON: I, for one, will not rest or not allow him to be swept in the dirt.

VALENCIA: A source with knowledge of the investigation tells CNN that those two officers involved in the shooting death of Alton Sterling were interviewed Tuesday night by local investigators at the request of the district attorney. Two police troopers were present to monitor the interview. Nick Valencia, CNN, Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SESAY: Joining us now, CNN law enforcement contributor, Steve Moore, and civil rights attorney, Areva Martin. Thank you both for staying with us. Before we get into the conversation, I think it's important to see the shooting of Alton Sterling from a different angle. There is other video that we want to share that is also graphic and it's important for us to share and discuss.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

(bleep)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He's got a gun!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hey, bro! (gunshots)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: OK. So the deal is that the video doesn't tell the whole story, but this is what we have got at the moment. When you look at that and you hear from the police officers say that they thought that -- they feared for their life, what they did was justified -- can you tell that is correct by looking at the video at this stage?

STEVE MOORE, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT CONTRIBUTOR: No, I can't. I can't tell if it's correct, I can't tell if it's incorrect. I can tell you that they have to explain exactly what happened. They need to be able to articulate it.

[01:19:56] I can tell you though that I've had a gun pulled on me from closer quarters than that, even, and it gets really confusing and your blood pressure goes up and a lot of things happen in a space of a minute. So, yes, they have to explain what happened carefully and completely. And if they can't explain it, then there's some serious issues.

SESAY: And Areva, you say, OK, we might not know what led up to it, we only have these images, but the images we have point to some troubling things.

AREVA MARTIN, CIVIL RIGHTS ATTORNEY: Even the Governor of the State of Louisiana said this video is very troubling. And one thing I should point out, from a legal standpoint, in all of these cases -- and I've been trying civil rights cases for two decades now -- you will hear the officers say they felt like they were in imminent danger, their lives were in imminent danger. That's a standard thing that we hear in these police cases, because there is a Supreme Court case that says, if an officer feels like his life is in danger, he can use a level of force. But the real question becomes, from a legal standpoint, is that reasonable? Was that force excessive? And I think when we look at this video, the reaction has been -- it's hard to see where that conduct would have been reasonable given that you have two officers on top of a man that is pinned down and we know the gun wasn't drawn and wasn't even found until after he was shot by the officer.

VAUSE: Steve, one thing we don't see in that video are the police officers giving aid to the man who was shot.

MOORE: No, you don't.

VAUSE: Why is that?

MOORE: I don't know.

VAUSE: Is that something they should have done?

SESAY: Yes, exactly. To that point, and to build on that, what are police officers taught in terms of how they respond to a situation where they get a call with an allegation that a man is brandishing a gun and they turn up on the scene? MOORE: There are so many parameters. If you approach -- if this is

the guy with the gun? You don't know if you have the right guy. He may have put the gun in the pocket. If he was laying down on the ground after he failed to comply, and that's fairly obvious, he wouldn't comply with orders -- then you think, well, why isn't he complying? Then you get him on the ground, I don't know where his right arm is. Hypothetically, if he was reaching towards a gun, then it could be considered, a reasonable person would fear for their lives. I don't know if that's true. It could be something horrific, but what I'm hoping now to do is go through this, and I realize it is tough, because there have been so many of these and there is such a distrust. That is why the Justice Department needs to look at this.

VAUSE: OK. One of the questions is about the gun. Did he have a gun? The 911 call said that he was brandishing a gun, not necessarily pointing it at anyone. A witness says Sterling was not holding a gun at the time.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDETNFIED MALE: Was the gun visible when they shot him?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Not at all.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And so, when did the gun become visible?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: After the cop had went inside his pocket to pull it out.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So the cop went in his pocket, pulled out the --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Pulled out the gun and went into his car and threw it on top of the seat.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: Areva, from a legal point of view, gun in hand, gun in pocket, is there much of a difference? The fact is, he had a gun.

MARTIN: Yes, it's going to be a big difference. Because Louisiana is a concealed and carry state, which means that you can carry a gun. The question is going to become, did he have this gun legally? And it doesn't really matter so much what the police knew, because what we do know is that they were never told about his legal status or whether he could carry a gun, but where was that gun, and was he able to access that gun and did he go for that gun? And that witness does is he tells a very different story. He says that Alton Sterling was not aggressive, that he didn't charge at the police, and that he was simply trying to understand what was happening.

So Steve talks about the split second or the moment that the cop has -- you also have a very frightened man who is being charged at by two police officers, who doesn't understand, and police don't feel that they need to tell you very much about what they're doing. And I understand that you should comply with police, but at the same time, police have to do their jobs in a constitutional manner. They are not allowed to simply act without the parameters of the Constitution. And when I look at that videotape, I can't help but think of Eric Garner, Michael Brown, Trayvon Martin, Walter Scott. So many African-American men who we've witnessed in this country be shot by police officers. And yes, we're happy that justice has stepped in and they're doing an investigation, but under Loretta Lynch, there's only been one federal indictment of a cop for shooting an African-American man and that was in the case of Walter Scott. So there's not at lot of trust even in the community, the African-American community, with respect to the Justice Department getting involved, because we don't see cops being indicted, we don't see them being convicted, and we don't see them being held accountable for what we saw on those videotapes.

[01:24:52] SESAY: And to that point, Areva, name checks, the men who have died at the hands of white police officers. The conversation in the black community is that things escalate very, very quickly when blacks males are involved in a way that we don't see it escalate when white individuals are involved. So what is the conversation amongst law enforcement? What is the conversation that is had? That is what I'm interested in.

MOORE: The conversation basically, at least among the people that I -- I was in the FBI. And so when we went into a situation, it really -- we really didn't care who -- whether the skin of the person who was complying or not complying, we didn't care about the color of the skin. And it -- I'm not denying that that happens in departments and I'm not denying that this is a huge national problem, but -- and I -- I really recognize what you're saying. But if I were investigating this case for the Department of Justice, I wouldn't refer back to the Scott case. I wouldn't refer to the Ferguson case. Not because they are not relevant socially, but because it has nothing to do with that shooting.

VAUSE: OK. Civil rights leader, Jessie Jackson, he tweeted this out. The shooting of Alton Sterling in Baton Rouge is a legal lynching. Justice must prevail. #Outrage. Clearly, emotions are raw right now. But Areva, calling this a legal lynching, that just seems to inflame emotions right now.

MARTIN: That's the sentiment of the community. When you see these videotapes over and over again, people -- and Jesse Jackson being on the forefront of this, having been at so many of these funerals, been in so many of these communities, have been a part of these protests, we feel as if nothing changes. I can think back a year ago, two years ago, sitting in this studio or studios like this, having the same conversation, and it looks like we make a little progress but not very much because I can't imagine for the life of me, again, why there weren't more efforts to de-escalate. Now of course there were things happening before the videotape started to roll that we don't know. But we do know that in a very short period of time, officers are tackling Alton Sterling. We don't see them talking to him. We don't see them trying to get back up, to try to de-escalate the situation. And until police stop acting like warriors and that they're in some military combat situation, I think we're going to see these deaths over and over and over again, and that's the sad part.

SESAY: Areva and Steve, I want to thank you for the honest conversation.

VAUSE: We appreciate your points of view.

SESAY: Thank you guys.

VAUSE: Well, next here on NEWSROOM L.A., Donald Trump not backing down from one of his controversial tweets which many considered anti- Semitic. Now he is using the Disney defense.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[01:31:09] SESAY: Hello, everyone. You're watching CNN NEWSROOM, live from Los Angeles. I'm Isha Sesay.

VAUSE: Great to have you with us. I'm John Vause.

The headlines this hour --

(HEADLINES)

SESAY: The director of the FBI will testify before a congressional committee Thursday. He is expected to explain his recommendation that no criminal charges be filed against Hillary Clinton in relation to her e-mails. The attorney general has accepted that recommendation and closed the case.

VAUSE: So far, the presumptive Democratic nominee has said nothing publically about the decision but has had plenty to say about her opponent, slamming Donald Trump and his business record.

Brianna Keilar has the details.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(CHEERING)

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): As Hillary Clinton tries to highlight Donald Trump's business failures in New Jersey --

HILLARY CLINTON, (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE & FORMER SECRETARY OF STATE: What he did in Atlantic City is exactly what he will do if he wins in November.

KEILAR: -- she is still facing criticism over her e-mail practices despite the FBI's recommendation not to prosecute.

The GOP is on the defensive.

SEN. PAUL RYAN, (R-WI), SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: Director Comey's presentation shredded the claims that Secretary Clinton made throughout the year with respect to this issue.

The DNI Clapper should deny Hillary Clinton access to classified information during this campaign.

KEILAR: The Republican National Committee calling out Clinton's initial inaccurate statement with a new web video.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CLINTON: I did not e-mail any classified material to anyone on my e- mail.

JAMES COMEY, FBI DIRECTOR: 110 e-mails in 52 e-mail chains have been determined by the owning agency to contain classified information.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: And House Republicans have called James Comey to testify to explain why the government isn't charging Clinton.

Donald Trump --

DONALD TRUMP, (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE & CEO, TRUMP ORGANIZATION: She lied!

KEILAR: -- is hitting Clinton from the trail as she tries to shift the focus back to his record in Atlantic City where three of Trump's four bankruptcies affected businesses.

CLINTON: Contractors, many of them small businesses, took heavy losses, and many, themselves, went bust. But Donald Trump, he walked away with millions. And here's what he says about the whole experience. He actually brags about it.

KEILAR: Her campaign is unveiling an online video about how his companies and bankruptcies hurt small businesses.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A lot of the people who helped built the Taj were stiffed.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: These were small businesses. So if you don't pay a $100,000 bill, it puts them out of business.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Trump responded on Twitter blaming local Democratic leaders saying, "Even the once great Caesars is bankrupt in A.C. Others to follow. Ask the Democrat city council what happened in Atlantic City."

Brianna Keilar, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VAUSE: CNN's senior political analyst, Ron Brownstein, is here with us for more.

Trump had a rally a couple hours ago.

RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes. VAUSE: When it came to Clinton's e-mail scandal, he was pretty much on message. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

[01:35:16] TRUMP: These are all lies. We say lie, lie, lie, lie.

(CHEERING)

TRUMP: Lie! Dirty, rotten liar!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: I think he picked up on something. Simple but effective.

BROWNSTEIN: But is it possible to be on message --

(LAUGHTER)

-- and raising questions about yourself at the same time? I think Hillary Clinton has suffered enormous damage from the beginning. It has raised questions about her judgment and truthfulness. The FBI director's statement, while not a criminal indictment, was certainly a political indictment and will provide fodder for Republicans all the way through. Paul Ryan's suggestion that he be denied access to classified information is not likely to be followed. But it will likely be followed by many more efforts by Republicans to keep this in the headlines. I think it is going to be a headache for her all the way through.

I believe day, after the FBI announcement, is likely we get to Election Day and a majority of Americans have an unfavorable opinion of both candidates in the exit poll in November, which has never happened before.

SESAY: Can she turn it around? Given the numbers are as high as they are with trustworthiness, have you seen -- we've never seen a candidate with such high numbers, but at least claw it back?

BROWNSTEIN: Bill Clinton, in 1992, he did -- he came out of the primaries --

VAUSE: The other Bill Clinton.

BROWNSTEIN: -- bruised and battered, accused, known as someone accused by Jennifer Flowers of having an affair, known as someone who maneuvered to avoid the draft. They went to what they called at the time the Manhattan Project, to try to rehabilitate his image. It is the first time we saw the candidate use popular culture. He went on MTV. He went on Arsenio Hall. It culminated as the event speech, pretty much by CNN contributor, Paul Begala, in which he reintroduced himself as a man called hope. That was a shallow impression though. He was just being introduced to the public. Hillary Clinton has been a public figure for over 20 years. It will be difficult for her to change her own image in this campaign. She might improve it a little. But what she has to work with is there are bigger doubts about her opponent, Donald Trump.

VAUSE: We saw that, today. She really went after Trump outside one of his failed casinos and taking what is a strength, the perception he is a successful businessman, good at making money, and trying to turn that into one of his weaknesses.

BROWNSTEIN: Yeah, talking about the consultants of the past. This is like Karl Rove from 2004 when they went at John Kerry's war record in the George W. Bush re-election campaign. You have to go after your opponent's core strength and rattle those foundations. Clinton was going after two strengths. One, that this is a successful business person who has private-sector expertise that he can bring to make the economy work better. She certainly attacked that. But the second one was just as important, because Trump, despite being a billionaire, has portrayed himself as a voice of the common person against the elite. And what she said is this is someone who got rich by rolling over small businesses and not paying his bills and enriching himself at the expense of others. So this was a two-fer for him in terms of attacking Trump's strengths.

SESAY: A two-fer, going after what part of the electorate?

BROWNSTEIN: Yeah. I think on the second one, going more after the blue collar white working class that is the core of Trump's strength from the beginning. Saying this is not someone who has your interest in mind. He is really about himself. That is going to be tough. The attraction to Trump from those voters is less on economic grounds than on cultural grounds, his views about the changing of America, and the threat he presents from Mexican and Muslim immigrants. That's going to be hard for her. But Hillary Clinton, as we talked about before, in most national polls, is now leading among college educated whites. No presidential candidate in the history of polling has ever won most college educated whites. And despite her own abundant negatives among her group, and that shows how many doubts there are about Donald Trump in different portions of the electorate.

VAUSE: It was interesting, at the Trump rally tonight, he went after Clinton about the e-mails but he was having a hard time seeming to focus. He was rambling. He went after the media, and he brought up the controversy over the anti-Semitic tweet with the Star of David. It seems like he can't move on from it. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: All of a sudden, it turned out to be in the minds of the press only, because it could have been a sheriff's star, it could have been a regular star. My boy comes home from school, Baron. He draws stars all over the place. I never said that's the Star of David, Baron, don't --

(LAUGHTER)

TRUMP: So, it's a star. Have you all seen this? It's a star. And it looks like a sheriff's star. But I don't know. And behind it they had money. Oh, but there's money behind it. So actually, they are racially profiling. They're profiling. Not us. Because why are they bringing this up?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[01:40:10] VAUSE: Ron, he also tweeted this out, "Where is the outrage for this Disney book? Is this the Star of David also? Dishonest media, #frozen." It just seems he doesn't understand what he's done.

BROWNSTEIN: The point about this image is it's not just the star. The entire image, the star, the money, the picture, all were lifted directly - directly replicated an image that appeared on a white supremacist source originally. As "The Washington Post" reported, this is the fifth time that he has tweeted out language or imagery that has white supremacist sources. What he was saying tonight is similar to the David Duke language. There is a repeated pattern of using racially and ethnically charged language and trying to back off. And so many Republican leaders are hesitant on how close they will get to him. It was immediately after Paul Ryan, after hesitating, finally endorsed Donald Trump that the judge episode unfolded and Paul Ryan, in an unprecedented moment, was forced to say this was a textbook definition of racism. Again, this week, Paul Ryan forced to repudiate what Donald Trump did here. With that here, one burned, twice burned --

VAUSE: Five times burned.

BROWNSTEIN: Five times burned. Republican leaders, you will see, you are going the see a surrogate dearth for Donald Trump because, as tonight demonstrated, they do not know what is going to come out of his mouth next.

VAUSE: Be interesting to see who turns up to the convention.

SESAY: It certainly will.

BROWNSTEIN: Yes. We may know tomorrow actually.

VAUSE: Yeah.

Ron Brownstein --

SESAY: Ron, thank you.

VAUSE: -- thank you.

SESAY: Time for a quick break. A former FOX News anchor says she lost her job because she refused sexual advances from her boss. And she is suing the CEO of the network.

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[01:45:08] SESAY: Hello, everyone. A prominent former FOX News anchor is suing the network's CEO. Gretchen Carlson claims she lost her job for refusing sexual advances from her boss. Carlson related Ailes told her, quote, "I think you and I should have had a sexual relationship a long time ago and then you would be good and better and I would be good and better."

VAUSE: Ailes said that the allegations are false. Quote, "This lawsuit is not only offensive it is wholly without merit and will be defended vigorously.

SESAY: Let us discuss this with Ashley Cullins, a staff reporter for the "Hollywood Reporter."

Ashley, to put this in context for our viewers, FOX News employees are known for being remarkably loyal. To have this moment where we are looking at a lawsuit involving Roger Ailes, the all powerful, is remarkable indeed.

ASHLEY CULLINS, STAFF REPORTER, HOLLYWOOD REPORTER: It is, and it is raising a lot of questions. Now people are coming out of the woodwork saying this happened to them, too. Her attorney said within hours after this news broke today they had several e-mails from women across the country saying I had a similar experience with him.

VAUSE: Do we know what evidence Carlson might have?

CULLINS: She is playing her cards close to the vest right now but I think it is substantial. I ask if they were going to be deposing FOX employees and she said we will but we have everything we need.

SESAY: Did she explain the strategy and they went after Ailes and not the parent company?

CULLINS: It seems they are giving FOX a chance to take her side publicly or say this behavior is not OK. The conversation we had earlier today was along the lines that Carlson doesn't have any reason to believe that FOX knew he was treating her this way and until we hear differently it's just Ailes for now.

VAUSE: It is interesting you say they are giving the parent company breathing room here. They are starting an investigation of their own. Maybe that process could be down the road some.

CULLINS: Yeah, And there is an interesting dichotomy between what Ailes himself said and what his bosses at the FOX parent company said. He is saying she is lying, none of this is true, and she is mad she was fired. And the parent company is saying there is enough to look into it. It will be interesting to see if there is tension there as this plays out.

VAUSE: And one thing we have to look at is Ailes, who is super guru of the cable world, this is a guy who has ruled supreme for years and years. He has a multiyear contract with FOX and deals directly with Murdoch. This is groundbreaking stuff. I mean, He is 76 years old as well.

CULLINS: It is not something good for him to be dealing with at the end of his career. The court of public opinion is vicious. So even if it turns out that this didn't go down exactly Ms. Carlson said it did, it is not good for him at this stage in his career. They may see him as a liability. VAUSE: Yeah.

SESAY: Yeah. Absolutely. The other thing I want to get your thoughts on. Gretchen Carlson wrote a piece and talked about sexual harassment and what happens to women who come out about what happened to them. Will there be repercussions for her?

CULLINS: It sounds like there already have been. If what she is saying is accurate, she has been fired for standing up for herself. And even if that's the case, or she was fired for other reasons or not renewed, to put it a little bit more softly, this is going to make people think twice about hiring her. Do we want to hire someone who is willing to sue us if she is unhappy with the way things work?

VAUSE: Ashley, thanks.

(CROSSTALK)

VAUSE: Yeah, it's going to be an interesting one to follow.

Ashley, thanks for coming it. Appreciate it.

SESAY: Thank you.

CULLINS: Thank you.

[01:49:30] VAUSE: We'll take a short break. Back in a moment.

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(RIO REPORT)

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SESAY: Hello, everyone. News just in from Bangladesh. Police say gunmen opened fire on a prayer congregation where about 100,000 people are marking a Muslim holiday.

VAUSE: It is happening in a district northeast of the capitol, Dhaka.

Alexandra Field joins us live from Dhaka.

Alexandra, bring us up to date. What do we know at this point?

ALEXANDRA FIELD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: John, police are telling us this is an active situation, that attackers launched their attack at the security check point where congregants would have to pass through. At least 100,000 people would have to pass through there. Details still coming in about how many attackers were involved but the preliminary reports are that one police officer has been killed and one attacker has been killed. We're being told by police officers in Dhaka that more police are injured. It's not clear how many.

Also, multiple reports of the kind of attack that is being unleashed on this congregation. First, we are told that the attackers focused on the security check point, the point that congregants have to pass through to get to the prayers and celebration on the other side of that. Mixed reports from officer who are in contact with people on the ground about whether or not explosives have been involved or whether or not simply shots fired. It could be a mix of the two. That's what we're hearing now. The police in Dhaka are telling us that the attackers have been cornered but no word on how many attackers may have gathered there about 100 kilometers in the city northeast of Dhaka, which is the city wherein we had this deadly, hideous attack back on Friday during the Ramadan period. 23 people were killed when a group of attackers stormed into a restaurant firing shots and lobbing explosives -- John?

[01:55:18] VAUSE: And, Alexandra, as the situation continues to play out, the -- the government last time one of these incidents happened imposed a media blackout because they were concerned about information, that kind of stuff. How is the government handling this in terms of the media coverage and what other details are they releasing?

FIELD: Look, word of this began to spread quickly. There were reports of some kind of attack going on at a congregation. This is the kind of thing people in this country have been on heavy alert for. We know ISIS has called for attacks throughout Ramadan. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack in Dhaka. People were very much on alert, concerned they could see another attack here today.

I spent the morning with an EID congregation today. The congregants said there was heavy security in place and they were confident they could carry out this day that is supposed to be a celebration. At the same time, we heard these about the attack 100 kilometers northeast of here. And there is information coming in from a lot of police sources. But we know, John, in these situations, it is chaotic and it will take time to sort out who has been injured and who the attackers are and what weapons they could be using.

VAUSE: Alexandra, thank you.

Alexandria Field, live, with more on that story live as it develops.

You've been watching NEWSROOM, L.A. I'm John Vause.

SESAY: I'm Isha Sesay.

More news right after this.

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