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EARLY START

President Trump Says He's "Set The Stage" For Taking Action On Border Wall And Hints He'll Declare National Emergency; Donald Trump, Jr.'s Mysterious Calls About Trump Tower Meeting Weren't With His Father; The Icy Grip On The Midwest Is Easing, Now Comes Erratic Temperatures; Early Start At The Super Bowl As Patriots And Rams Square Off Sunday Night. Aired 5:30-6a ET

Aired February 1, 2019 - 05:30   ET

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


(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[05:30:11] (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I have set the stage for doing what I'm going to do.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DAVE BRIGGS, CNN ANCHOR: "I've set the stage." President Trump fed up with negotiations on border security. He hints he'll declare a national emergency.

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: Suspicions that Donald Trump, Jr. called his dad after that infamous Trump Tower meeting were wrong. The blocked number Don, Jr. called was not his father.

BRIGGS: One more day of brutal cold today before a weekend warm-up, relative speaking,

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TOM BRADY, QUARTERBACK, NEW ENGLAND PATRIOTS: After football, I'm going to play baseball. And after baseball, I'm going to play Hamlet. Alas, poor Yorick. I knew him, Horatio.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: Oh, yes, it's almost time to play football. Excitement building ahead of Super Bowl LIII on Sunday. And guess who is there?

Welcome back to EARLY START, everyone. I'm here -- Christine Romans in New York.

BRIGGS: Playing through the sickness. Good job, Christine.

I'm Dave Briggs live in Atlanta for Super Bowl LIII.

Good to see Tom Brady still has a sense of humor.

ROMANS: Oh, yes.

BRIGGS: Not Shakespeare, not any playwright could have imagined the career of Tom Brady at 41, still on top of his game.

As for that game, Rams and Patriots hopefully getting a good night's sleep last night. For L.A., this is a very new routine. Only four players have Super Bowl experience.

The Patriots, very different. They're here for the fourth time in five years -- third straight year -- and 36 guys have Super Bowl experience. One of them, of course, Tom Brady. A mind-boggling ninth Super Bowl.

And that Hamlet impression is something he has never been asked to do in all those years. We'll play more of that for you ahead.

We also will hear a discussion I had with Von Miller, who was your Super Bowl L MVP. And he talked about the key question in this game, which is how do you sack Tom Brady? Von Miller did it 2 1/2 times in the AFC Championship before the Broncos won a Super Bowl, so he knows how to get it done.

And there, we're practicing our sack dance. Von Miller is the king of the sack dance. He says he doesn't plan them ahead of time. He wasn't taken by bait on the Fortnite "Take the L" dance.

It should be a great game. We'll have more preview and also discuss our Super Bowl special, which is Saturday, 2:30 Eastern time.

Hines Ward, a Super Bowl MVP, joining us. Coy Wire, Andy Scholes, J.J. Watt, a former defensive player of the year. And, Patrick Mahomes, the Kansas City Chiefs quarterback and the story of this NFL season, arguably.

Christine, back to you.

ROMANS: All right. Good Fortnite moves, Dave. Can't wait to see some more of that.

BRIGGS: I'm trying. A lot of practice.

ROMANS: Yes, exactly. All right, thanks, Dave.

President Trump apparently fed up with congressional talks on border security that have hardly begun. The president, on Thursday, called the bipartisan negotiations to avoid another shutdown, quote, "a waste of time." And he strongly hinted he will simply bypass them to fund his border wall.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I think I've set the table very nicely. I've set the stage for doing what I'm going to do.

REPORTER: And you'll wait out for the 21 days before you take any action? TRUMP: Yes, I'm going to wait until the 15th. I think it's a waste of time.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: The president would not directly say he plans to declare a national emergency at the southern border, but he said he is, quote, "not concerned by possible legal challenges."

BRIGGS: The president also suggested he will no longer work with Nancy Pelosi, accusing the Democratic House Speaker of doing a tremendous disservice to the country.

Pelosi, again, declared the House will not put up any wall money but expressed openness to some kind of physical barrier. She was asked about enhanced fencing.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA), SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: If the president wants to call that a wall, he can call it a wall. He's referencing it. We already have almost 700 miles of wall.

So, again, is there a place for enhanced fencing? Normandy fencing would work. Let them have that discussion.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRIGGS: Stopgap government funding runs out in two weeks. The House and Senate would have to vote on any deal, so that gives negotiators until February eighth or we will see shutdown part two, Christine.

ROMANS: All right, let's bring in "Washington Post" correspondent Toluse Olorunnipa. Good morning.

Let's talk about the border wall here first and, sort of -- I mean, the president seems to say that he would -- he would -- he would declare a national emergency. But at the same time, he says the discussions right now are just a waste of time, but he'll wait.

Where are we on the border wall?

OLORUNNIPA: Yes, this is all sort of the president saying that everything that he's been doing for the last several weeks has been setting the stage for this big national emergency that he hopes to announce, probably shortly after February 15th.

[05:35:00] The president is basically saying Congress doesn't matter in this process. He's saying they're wasting their time -- all these congressional leaders that are meeting together in a bipartisan basis trying to come up with some sort of deal to avert the next government shutdown.

The president is basically saying we don't have to have a second government shutdown. We also don't have to have a bipartisan deal. I can just make this a national emergency and find the money to build the wall on my own.

So the president is really setting the stage and --

BRIGGS: Yes.

OLORUNNIPA: -- making sure that people know that this is what's coming. And that once Congress comes up with a deal he's likely to reject it and go ahead and go -- and do this on his own, which a lot of Republicans are not too happy about.

ROMANS: Yes.

OLORUNNIPA: They want to make sure that they're asserting themselves as a coequal branch of government and the branch of government that has the power over the purse strings --

BRIGGS: Yes.

OLORUNNIPA: -- but the president is saying that he can do this on his own.

BRIGGS: Yes, totally absent, those discussions as presidential leadership. Yes, the president is saying we are already building the border wall, we don't have to call it a wall. But then, tweeting that it does have to be called a wall. It's just muddying the waters entirely.

But as for that declaring a national emergency, what do you think would be the impact? Would that be held up in the courts, and what type of precedent would that set down the road for Democrats to say declare a climate crisis national emergency?

OLORUNNIPA: Yes, that's the big challenge that a number of Republicans are seeing with this strategy. They think it won't actually lead to the wall getting built because there will be an immediate lawsuit that is filed.

Congress does have the power over the purse strings so there's going to be a fight over whether or not the president's constitutional powers override the constitutional powers of the Congress. There's going to be a clash there in the courts that could take months, if not years, to work out, and the president may not actually end up getting his border wall.

And also, Republicans are worried that Democrats could, when they get back in power, use this precedent to declare a national emergency on the climate change issue or on gun control or on other areas of immigration where they think they need to make changes that are more successful on the left side -- on the Democratic side.

So, this is a precedent that could be set that a number of Republicans are worried about and that's part of the reason why you're not seeing many Republicans come out and support the president on this national emergency issue.

ROMANS: So let's talk a little bit about this chasm between the White House and the Intel chiefs over some of the most important threats against the United States.

The president, we know from multiple reporting at news agencies, was very unhappy with how that threat assessment was characterized in the media, showing again all the differences between what the president says and thinks and what the Intel Community is telling him in their threat assessments.

And the president was asked yesterday if he has faith in his top leaders -- listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REPORTER: Do you still have confidence in Gina Haspel and Dan Coats to give you good advice?

TRUMP: No, I disagree with certain things that they said. I think I'm right but time will prove that. Time will prove me right, probably.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: So, some of the things he disagrees with but time will prove him right.

And then he sort of went on to reframe the whole thing as fake news, when everything was on the record -- listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: He has said that they were totally misquoted and they were totally -- it was taken out of context. So what I'd do is I'd suggest that you call them. They said it was fake news.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: This is the master Trump branding to take what is on the record, on camera, in black and white and say that it's fake news. He just doesn't like the way this was characterized.

OLORUNNIPA: Yes, that's exactly right.

This wasn't an interview that these Intelligence chiefs did with a news outlet that was sort of selectively edited. This was testimony before Congress. This was a report that was submitted to Congress and many of the things that were said were directly in contrast to what the president has said on North Korea, on Iran, on ISIS where the president says everything's fine, I'm doing a great job.

A lot of these Intelligence chiefs were saying actually, we have a big problem with a number of these areas and the Trump administration's line is not necessarily backed up by the facts.

So, the president sort of tried to spin this and say oh, this is just fake news and the media selectively editing things. But this was all publicly aired on television for the world to see in black and white. The Intelligence chiefs were directly contrasting what the president has said.

And it's going to continue to play out -- this sort of debate the president has said in the past, I know more than the generals, I know more than the Intelligence Community. They need to go back to school.

And they're saying actually, we have years of history in these areas --

ROMANS: Yes.

OLORUNNIPA: -- where the president is a bit of a novice. And they're saying this is what's actually happening on the ground and this is why the Trump administration policies are not necessarily working in some of these areas.

BRIGGS: Yes, and you can't help but think what happens in time of a national security crisis when the president does not trust information from his own Intel chiefs.

But I want to ask you, quickly, about a good story if you are the president, and that's that Don, Jr. apparently did not call his father about that Trump Tower meeting. Those blocked calls were to some business associates, according to CNN's reporting and information comes from the Senate Intelligence Committee.

How significant is that for the president and Don, Jr. given their narrative?

OLORUNNIPA: Yes, the president needed some good news on the Russia front and this is a piece of good news.

[05:40:00] We've seen so many different people around the president who have lied to Congress. This is an area where a lot of Democrats were saying maybe the president's son lied to Congress by saying I did not call my father after having this meeting with this Russian lawyer. It turns out that that was actually the truth, according to this new information that's come out of the Senate Intelligence community -- the Senate Intelligence Committee.

And it's one piece of positive news for the president that Democrats continue to look for this smoking gun. It's been elusive so far. There's a lot of smoke around this Russia investigation but they haven't been able to tie everything together to the collusion narrative and make it something that is directly linked to the president.

So this is one other issue where Democrats are still looking for that direct link to the president to show that there was wrongdoing --

BRIGGS: Yes.

OLORUNNIPA: -- and collusion during the campaign and they haven't been able to find it yet. So, score this one for the president and he's still in the clear, at least on that front.

ROMANS: All right, great discussion. Thanks for being here Toluse Olorunnipa. I said it right. I've got a cold.

Thanks -- nice to meet you. Have a great weekend.

OLORUNNIPA: Thanks.

ROMANS: Dave --

BRIGGS: All right, thanks, Christine.

We're almost, folks -- almost out of that deep freeze -- the one that has gripped the Upper Midwest, the Great Lakes, out to the mid- Atlantic, and the Northeast.

At least 16 deaths have been attributed to the cold and winter storms in Iowa, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Indiana.

One Chicago hospital has seen nearly 50 frostbite cases. Here's another sign of how cold it was.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

Light post shivering.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRIGGS: Michigan State Police say this light post shivered all by itself in a snow-covered parking lot.

And, this is what a firefighter looks like after battling a blaze in a wind chill of 50 below.

ROMANS: Tough job.

Nearly 7,000 flights canceled in total this week.

There's just one more day of bitter cold ahead before the desperately needed warm-up begins.

With more on that, meteorologist Ivan Cabrera is in the CNN Weather Center -- Ivan.

IVAN CABRERA, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yes, Christine, good morning.

This is the coldest temperatures that we're going to have and the coldest wind chills for quite some time. This is the last day, last morning.

Temperatures right now feeling like they're anywhere from five below to 15 below, so we still have wind chill advisories that continue through the morning. And in some cases, up to 30 below across portions of Michigan.

A little snow as well to throw that into the mix up through the Ohio Valley. It won't amount to much. It's going to be about one to three inches. But we do have winter weather advisories as a result of that.

It will be a quick mover, so by the time we get into tonight, we're going to be done.

And improvement already. I know this is cold, but this is better than we have been over the last several days. And you can see the warm temperatures down to the south. That's going to continue to push to the north.

So we're going to go from 40 record lows on Thursday morning to temperatures that are going to be above average during the morning over the next several days. In fact, a potentially 70-plus record warm temperatures heading into the early part of next week.

Case in point here, Chicago -- minus 23. Coldest temp since 1994 -- remember that? That happened on Wednesday, you'll remember for quite some time.

We're going to jump a good 70 degrees to around 50 by mid-next week. And then, we'll get into the 50s in New York as well.

So it is going to feel fantastic. It's going to feel like spring. We're talking about summer almost here.

All right, Mercedes-Benz. Here's the forecast -- looking fantastic, guys. Near 60 degrees Dave.

You could even shave the beard. You won't have a problem. I'm just kidding you. I just can't grow one and I'm jealous.

But it's going to look great, so enjoy that. Enjoy the first weekend of February in the 60s here.

BRIGGS: Still a little chilly here right now, Ivan. Thank you.

Twenty-nine degrees here in Atlanta. If that temperature holds, though, they could open that roof at game time, which would be a cool site to see.

Coming up, though, a 40-year-old cold case cracked in Portland. We'll tell you how.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[05:47:54] ROMANS: All right.

Members of one of America's richest families reaped more than $4 billion in profit while their company sold both opioids and the drugs that treat opioid addiction.

A newly unredacted lawsuit says the giant drugmaker Purdue Pharma secretly pursued a plan it called "Project Tango." The suit says Purdue and its owners, the Sackler family, pushed the painkiller OxyContin on doctors and patients.

It claims for more than a decade, they publicly denied what they privately knew -- the highly-addictive drug was leading to overdoses and deaths. A Purdue spokesman says the release of the unredacted complaint was

aimed at singling out the company to blame it for the entire opioid crisis. In 2017, the U.S. saw more than 47,000 deaths linked to opioids.

BRIGGS: Sexual assaults at military academies are on the rise. According to the Pentagon, they're up nearly 50 percent since 2016. Defense officials using an anonymous survey of cadets and midshipmen at three military academies to draw their conclusions.

According to the findings, 15.8 percent of all female cadets and midshipmen have experienced unwanted sexual contact, along with 2.4 percent of men. According to the report, the climates at the academies have yet to, quote, "inspire the moral courage for students to reject and combat the problem."

ROMANS: All right.

Portland homicide detectives, using DNA, have cracked a 40-year-old cold case. Twenty-year-old Anna Marie Hlvaka was killed in a Portland apartment back in 1979.

An unknown male DNA profile was discovered in 2011. Seven years later, detectives began researching unidentified DNA profiles taken from other homicide scenes which ultimately led to the killer, identified as Jerry Walter McFadden. McFadden, a convicted murderer, was executed in Texas in 1999.

BRIGGS: An intense prison hostage drama all caught on surveillance video. Maximum custody inmate Timothy Monk using a prison-made blade to take a male librarian hostage last month at Buckeye Prison in Tucson, Arizona.

[05:50:09] After a 2-hour standoff, heavily armed corrections officers stormed the library using a stun grenade, pepper balls, and bean bags. The librarian made it out safely.

Monk, already serving 97 years for violent crimes, is facing an extension of that sentence.

Back here in Atlanta, outside Mercedes-Benz Stadium, another Super Bowl preview when you come back. How do you beat the New England Patriots? Super Bowl L MVP Von Miller tells us how when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BRIGGS: We're back here in Atlanta with a live look at the $1.5 billion Mercedes-Benz Stadium.

[05:55:00] One of the beautiful things about that stadium -- inside, $2.00 hot dogs, $2.00 refillable soft drinks, and $5.00 beers. Yes, even on Super Bowl Sunday. So if you can afford a $2,500 ticket --

ROMANS: Right.

BRIGGS: -- it maybe takes the sting off of that. Christine Romans back in New York.

We're looking ahead to this game and the question of how do you beat the New England Patriots.

It's actually relatively simple in theory. You sack Tom Brady. But not many people can do it. No one has sacked him this post-season even though he's thrown it 90 times.

I talked to Super Bowl L MVP Von Miller about how to get to Brady. He knows how to do it. He's done it plenty of times.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BRIGGS: How do you get to Tom Brady? How do you do it?

VON MILLER, LINEBACKER, DENVER BRONCOS, MVP, SUPER BOWL L: You've just got to be relentless.

And as a pass rusher, we kind of pick and choose our rushes to rush and kind of look at the formation and the situation. And kind of look at it and say this is the rush where we need the rush. This is Tom.

And you can't really do that with Tom Brady. Every single play has got to be balls out. Every single play you got to play like it's your last one. You never know when an opportunity will present itself and if you play like that you'll be ready to go.

BRIGGS: He's 40-plus years old. Why is it hard to get to that dude?

MILLER: Forty years old has nothing to do with the raw emotion, it has nothing to do with vision. It has -- it has nothing to do with putting spin and drop on the ball, and it has nothing to do with mental toughness. So he's a master at all of those things and he still has a lot of football left.

BRIGGS: What do you make of all the Tom Brady hater nation out there and the Patriots haters?

MILLER: It's just purely hate. That's all -- that's all it could be. You know, it's just purely hate.

Sometimes people don't like success, you know. Sometimes people don't like winners, and they've definitely had a lot of wins and a lot of success and that's just how humanity is. Sometimes people just don't like that.

You know, for me, I'm inspired by that and if I could take anything from the Patriots' story and what they have been able to do up in Foxborough, I'm going to take it and try to apply it to my teammates and what we're doing in Dove Valley.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BRIGGS: What I'm finding here from the fans is you're either from New England or you are a Patriots hater. That's really how it breaks down. But you really should stand back and just appreciate the greatness of Tom Brady. We'll never see anything like this ever again in any sport.

Brady gave Stephen Colbert a glimpse of what he might do if and when this football career ever ends.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you have any plans for your life after football?

BRADY: Yes. After football, I'm going to play baseball. And after baseball, I'm going to play Hamlet. Alas, poor Yorick. I knew him, Horatio -- a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Are you worried some woman will only love you because you're a famous muscular athlete?

TREY FLOWERS, DEFENSIVE END, NEW ENGLAND PATRIOTS: That's fine with me.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What is the hardest part of your job?

JASON MCCOURTY, CORNERBACK, NEW ENGLAND PATRIOTS: Trying to figure out which end of the football is the front and which end is the back. I mean, look at this thing.

DEVIN MCCOURTY, SAFETY, NEW ENGLAND PATRIOTS: This is the front.

J. MCCOURTY: What makes that the front?

D. MCCOURTY: Because this is the back.

BRADY: To be or not to be, that is the question. Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune or to take arms against a sea of troubles, and by opposing, end them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BRIGGS: Outrageous fortune. What did you think of his Hamlet, Romans?

ROMANS: I thought it was pretty good.

Look, what I -- the one thing I love about Tom Brady, and I tell my kids, in the 2000 draft he was -- like, there were six quarterbacks picked before him, right? It's just a -- it's a real good reminder --

BRIGGS: He was a sixth-round draft pick, yes.

ROMANS: Gosh, it's just a reminder to your kids that you've got to work hard and you can really do anything. It's not where you start, it's what you do with it, right, Dave?

BRIGGS: It is all about the hard work Tom Brady puts in 24/7. A reminder, a Super Bowl special here on CNN, 2:30 on Saturday. Super

Bowl MVP Hines Ward, Coy Wire, Andy Scholes, and the Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes. Also, J.J. Watt. It should be great stuff, Christine.

Back to you, my friend.

ROMANS: All right, thanks for joining us, everybody. I hope you have a really great rest of your day. I'm Christine Romans.

BRIGGS: I'm Dave Briggs, live in Atlanta for Super Bowl coverage. "NEW DAY" starts right now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: He told the attorneys that I'm not a subject, I'm not a target.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The president was emphatic that he did not speak with Roger Stone about WikiLeaks.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Those phone calls are not to his father. That doesn't mean that there wasn't communication.

PELOSI: There's not going to be any wall money in the legislation.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I feel optimistic that if there's no outside interference, like the White House, we can work this out.

TRUMP: I think it's a waste of time. I've set the stage for doing what I'm going to do.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Alisyn Camerota and John Berman.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome to our viewers in the United States and all around the world. This is NEW DAY. It's Friday, February first, 6:00 here in New York.

Alisyn is off. Erica Hill joins us.

You know you're in trouble when your coanchor asks you right before you go to air, is happy hour at 9:00?

ERICA HILL, CNN ANCHOR: I just wanted to be clear if it was 9:00 or 9:05. Like, what was appropriate?

BERMAN: I can see where this going to go.

END