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Police Suspect In Custody, Found Hiding Under Desk; Reporter: Newsroom "Was Like A War Zone"; E.U. Reaches Agreement On How To Handle Migrants; Trump Ignores Reporter Questions About Attack; White House No Room For Violence In Our Country; Intel Report: Russia Meddled In 2016 U.S. Election; Five Killed, Two Wounded in Targeted Attack; Hannity Links Rep. Waters' Rhetoric to Annapolis Shooting; Prince William Visits Jerusalem Holy Sites. Aired 12-1a ET

Aired June 29, 2018 - 00:00   ET

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


(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[00:00:18]

JOHN VAUSE, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Hello. Thank for joining us. I'm John Vause and this is NEWSROOM L.A.

Breaking news this hour from Brussels, after meeting through the night, European Union leaders have reached agreement on how to deal with the migrant crisis. European Council President Donald Tusk broke the announcement with a tweet, "It's a promising development after deep divisions among members at the E.U. Summit."

And earlier, Italy's new prime minister had threatened not to sign off on the summit's conclusions unless other European countries committed to do more to help ease the crisis. We'll have more on this story throughout the hour.

But now to the other top story. According to one reporter at the "Capital Gazette" in Annapolis, Maryland, the newsroom was like a war zone. A man burst into the newspaper's office on Thursday and opened fire killing five people, including the editor.

One reported tweeted this, "There's nothing more terrifying than hearing multiple get shot or you're under your desk and then hearing the gunman reload." Here is how another witness described the scene.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I saw a guy. I saw a guy holding a gun. The door of the "Capital Gazette" had been blown to pieces. This guy was holding what looked like a big shotgun and moving across the entrance of the "Capital Gazette" office, pointing the gun deeper into the office, like he was targeting people.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: Authorities were on the scene within a minute and evacuated about 170 people from the building. Police say the suspect was armed with a shotgun as well as smoke grenades. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DEPUTY POLICE CHIEF BILL KRAMPF, ANNA ARUNDEL COUNTY, MARYLAND: This person was prepared today to come in. This person was prepared to shoot people. His intent was to cause harm.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: Law enforcement sources say the gunman is named Jared Ramos of Laurel, Maryland. One official says police found him hiding under a desk. CNN's Rene Marsh has more.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RENE MARSH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: He does have a connection to the newspaper. He filed a defamation claim in 2012, but that claim was dismissed. The paper, according to police, this newspaper was actually targeted. They say that he walked through the doors and he picked out his victims.

They say also that this newspaper faced threats, specifically social media threats. Some of those threats coming as recently as the day of the shooting. Now, as far as how many people were killed in this shooting, we know according to police five people were killed. Two people injured.

That is the latest count at last check. But, again, they are now saying that this was a targeted shooting. The shooter is in custody. Police, they have been able to question him and this newspaper they say had received threats via social media before this shooting happened on Thursday. Reporting in Annapolis, Rene Marsh, CNN.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: The five people killed in the shooting have now been identified. According to "The Baltimore Sun," Wendy Winters was a special publications editor. The mother of four joined "The Gazette" full time in 2013. She covered local news. She wrote home of the week and teen of week columns.

The 61-year-old Gerald Fischman was the editorial page editor. One colleague described him as a great writer, very smart guy, tried out for "Jeopardy" twice. John McNamara was a staff writer at "The Gazette" for nearly 24 years. His passion is sports.

A fellow reporter says McNamara had a razor-sharp wit that came in bursts like a social media post. The 39-year-old Robert Hiaasen was an assistant editor and columnist. One colleague says he especially loved helping young writers at "The Gazette. The Florida native had just celebrated his 33rd wedding anniversary last week.

The 34-year-old Rebecca Smith was recently hired as a sales assistant. Her boss says she made sure the office is running smoothly (inaudible) she described herself as a dog mom, softball fiance and (inaudible) mom to a best kid ever. Joining me now from Cambridge, Massachusetts, CNN national security analyst, Juliette Kayyem. Juliette, it's a sad story. Obviously, this is a tough one to talk about, but if we look at what happened in this newsroom, it's on the first floor. There is a receptionist out front. It's an open space office.

The paper's police report tweeted this, "Gunman shot through the glass door to the office and opened fire on multiple employees. Can't say much more. Don't want to claim anyone dead but it's bad."

This is such a soft target like so many other small newsrooms around the country. They're all soft targets. In this environment, that really means trouble and danger ahead.

[00:05:05] JULIETTE KAYYEM, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: That's exactly right. In some ways, the smaller newspapers, community newspapers need to be soft targets in the sense that they're accessible to the community. They are part of the community in the way that maybe CNN isn't.

They know the softball coach. They know the person who just had a baby. This is what this newspaper was like. So, they're accessible to the public in a way that maybe some of the larger institutions are not and that makes them soft targets.

They were, as is clear now, they were sort of facing threats, you know, by this particular assailant, but, you know, did that rise to the level of sort of having an armed guard or more security?

We just don't know at this stage whether, you know, what the evaluation should have been. But, you know, one of the aspects of a free press is that it's accessible to society. That's going to be -- that's what I think is so disconcerting right now, is how community- based these reporters and this newspaper was.

VAUSE: The acting police chief talked about those threats, which have been coming from social media, directed at the newspaper. This is what he said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KRAMPF: We know that there were threats sent to "The Gazette" through social media. We're trying to confirm what account that was and we're trying to confirm who actually sent them. To my knowledge, those threats were as early as today.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: I mean, you know, the logical conclusion is that this came from the shooter. But something that came just today, is that a red flag that was missed? Level of hostility towards the media these days, is that part of the background noise here of the Trump administration?

KAYYEM: I think, unfortunately, it's part of the background noise. I'm like a mere analyst for CNN. I'm not even an employee. The amount of stuff I get compared to what I used to get two years ago, what I view as basic analysis. Imagine if you're a reporter, you're covering crime, lawsuits, divorces, whatever else it is.

You know, people are sort of emboldened to sort of attack. And I think that the sort of focus on the media and statements towards the media that come from the president himself, that's -- I can't say -- that didn't lead to today, but whether today happened or not, it's completely irresponsible talk.

This is the First Amendment. You need reporters to feel safe and to be part of the communities. So, whatever triggered him today it's hard to know. We shouldn't lose sight of the fact that we should not be vilifying reporters, analysts, columnists, photographers, whoever else in a free society.

VAUSE: You know, there are some reports out there that the shooter, Jared Ramos, was identified with facial recognition software, apparently caused some damage to his fingerprints. He was found under a desk. The weapon was away from him. No exchange of fire between him and police. He said not to be cooperating with investigators. Put it all together, what does it say to you?

KAYYEM: If it's true about the fingerprints, I put everything together. He clearly had thought it through. Maybe he thought he would be killed. Discussions of some sort of explosive materials. He thought he would, you know, sort of be a martyr, so to speak and get killed and they would be able to identify, at least not immediately.

It looks like he chickened out, as often these guys do. He is hiding. There is no fire fight and he's taken. Now, he's not speaking. Not even clear how much they need to know from him. They're going to have access to his computer, to whether he was the one you were saying had been on social media today.

Who else he might have communicated with? He will be a criminal defendant and he has a right not to, you know, not to self- incriminate, but nonetheless this is someone who clearly had thought it out and clearly had thought about his own identity and whether he could protect it through this process.

VAUSE: I just want to finish up here with the response here by police and the first responders. On the scene in less than 60 seconds, they managed to get almost 200 people out of the building. Clearly, they saved lives here and it should be applauded. It also seems to indicate to me this is a process that has been polished and fine-tuned with way too much firsthand experience. It's reflected with the mass shootings in this country.

KAYYEM: We have to remember there was another mass shooting in the United States today, right? One too many, let alone 100 too many. Many people died. An unforgiveable number of people died. But I do, unfortunately, you know, part of what we need to do as first responders and people in Homeland Security is begin -- is train and exercise for these active shooter cases.

[00:10:01] According to the mayor, there was a training just yesterday. This does save lives because we have to accept the reality since we can't stop all bad things from happening, maybe we can measure success on the other side, right?

In terms of how my people might have died but for the activities of the first responders. It's not a great place to be but, you know, at least there weren't more than five fatalities today.

VAUSE: I guess it's come to that. Juliette, thanks so much. Good to see you.

KAYYEM: Thank you so much.

VAUSE: Let's turn now to our top story, E.U. leaders have reached a deal on the migrant crisis and how it should be handled.

CNN's Nina dos Santos on the line with the very latest. So, Nina, we heard from the German chancellor, Angela Merkel. She said the agreement is a good thing. Specifically, what have they agreed to?

NINA DOS SANTOS, CNN MONEY EUROPE EDITOR (via telephone): Hi, John. It seems they've agreed to what we thought they might to agree to, some temporary stopgap measures to try to stem the flow of migrants to Europe.

And also, potentially, they've agreed towards looking forward at the government system by which the asylum seekers are processed inside the European Union. The system seems to have broken down obviously over the last few months with the new firebrand Italian government turning back migrant ships from its borders.

They recognized in the statement that they've issued within the last half hour that the Dublin system does need reform. There needs to be a far more substantive discussion further down the line for European Union states as to whether or not they will be able to spread the burden of migrants from countries like Italy and Greece and Spain that obviously are frontier countries and received large numbers of migrants to other countries across the European Union.

That has been a very, very contentious topic at this particular summit, indeed for about nine hours of these talks, negotiations. Italy essentially it seems at one point was blocking any discussion on other issues until they had the major concessions that they wanted on the issue of migration.

Some of the other measures that we know they've agreed on this issue. Aside from the fact that they're going to continue to talk about spreading the migrant load from here on. They're going to be talking about creating disembarkation centers.

So, this is an idea that the United Nations ACR has also floated in the past, the idea of processing asylum claims outside of the European Union territory to prevent this issue of a bottle neck in the asylum system, if you like, when people claim asylum in one particular European country.

The question again becoming whether or not they stay in that country or move to another country. So, expect negotiations from here on with certain North African countries to create this disembarkation platform system outside of the European Union.

They've also pledged more support for countries like Turkey that are hosting millions of Syrian refugees and also more money for the border policing system in the Mediterranean. That's something that the Italians are very much for.

And also, more money for countries like Italy as well to help with their migrant situation. Also, in this communique, what they do stress is that, yes, migration is a huge issue at the moment.

But the numbers are still nowhere near the levels of 2015 when we saw thousands of people taking to the Mediterranean and disembarking, particularly in Greece, every single day. The numbers have actually fallen about 95 percent.

So, there is some room for hope in that in this particular statement here. They're also talking about trying to raise the number of repatriation for the economic migrants, who are trying to claim asylum but aren't necessarily refugees.

That currently only stands at about 36 percent. They want to try to increase those kinds of numbers this is what they have in the statement so far on that contentious issue of migration -- John.

VAUSE: Nina, thank you. We appreciate the update. Talk to you soon.

We'll take a short break. When we come back, so how did President Trump react to the shooting at a newspaper in the U.S. state of Maryland? When we come back, we'll tell you what he did and did not say.

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[00:16:53]

VAUSE: Welcome back, everybody. After the deadly mass shooting at a Maryland newspaper, the U.S. president who has waged an unrelenting war on the media tweeted this, "Prior to departing Wisconsin, I was briefed on the shooting at "Capital Gazette" in Annapolis, Maryland. My thoughts and prayers are with the victims and their families. Thank you to all of the first responders currently on the scene."

As he arrived at the White House, the president ignored questions from waiting reporters.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, can you react to the shooting in Annapolis?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. President --

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. President, will you keep talking about enemies of the people? UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Why are you walking away?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Why won't you come and talk to us about that?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: Ron Brownstein is a CNN senior political analyst and also senior editor at "The Atlantic." We're grateful you're with us, Ron. Thanks for coming in. The mass shooting at "The Gazette" was part of a longstanding grievance the shooter had with the paper.

Given how Donald Trump has vilified the media and raised the hostility over the last year, two years. Is he likely to tone it down or too useful to attack the media as a political tactic for Donald Trump?

RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: I'd be surprised if he tones it down. I mean, first of all, it's another horrible event. One reason he didn't answer the questions is because he doesn't want to talk about gun violence in general, but, of course, there is the second issue of the unprecedented way that President Trump has talked about the media as the enemy of the people, you know, we saw the behavior at the rallies this week.

We've had kind of at moments a kabuki feel to it. There is nonetheless his overall rhetoric and the way he positions, you know, the way he describes the media in American society, there is no precedent for that. I think he was quiet because he felt vulnerable.

VAUSE: Right.

BROWNSTEIN: I think he was quiet because he felt vulnerable and he did not yet know that this was someone with a personal grievance against the newspaper.

VAUSE: Clearly, the president and what he said is not responsible for this guy going in and shooting up a newspaper, but in the past when somebody wouldn't say something, they feel empowered to say something now. When they wouldn't use profanities or abuse before -- it seems to up the ante.

BROWNSTEIN: It's not only the media. What's unique about President Trump, there have often been cases in America, I think especially in the last 34 years, where the losing side of the presidential election believes that the president is indifferent to their concern. It's been an almost benign neglect.

President Trump is different. He actively sees blue America all of the institutions as a useful foil for him. You know, he can't tone this down because it is a feature not a bug of his presidency to have these kind of constant fights -- to tell his audience there are all these institutions and forces trying to keep you down and I alone can protect you.

VAUSE: Which is interesting because attacking the media has been very effective in a lot of cases, especially when it comes to any reporting on the Russia investigation. Take a listen. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: The Russia story is a total fabrication. It's such an excuse for the greatest loss in the history of American politics.

[00:20:10] This Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made-up story.

The entire thing has been a witch hunt.

Look, there has been no obstruction. There has been no collusion.

As far hacking, I think it was Russia, but I think we also get hacked by other countries and other people.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: You know, attacking the media or it's a witch hunt.

BROWNSTEIN: Right.

VAUSE: It's really having an impact. It's effective.

BROWNSTEIN: Yes, you know, I sometimes wonder whether the people who -- the Republican partisans who now say they don't believe Mueller is objective or they don't believe there is a legitimate issue to investigate here really believe that or it's just, you know, they're getting what they want from a policy perspective out of the Trump administration.

VAUSE: So, they're playing along.

BROWNSTEIN: And they're working backwards from that. Look, I -- it doesn't matter one way or the other. What you're seeing -- which one of those explanations is true. What you're seeing is the president is creating a set of conditions in which it will be many Republicans in Congress, most, maybe all, virtually all will conclude that it is dangerous for them to act even if Mueller comes back with a very damning report. If we think about potential impeachment as the jury, it is a kind of --

VAUSE: Jury pool.

BROWNSTEIN: -- changing the jury pool. That is what he is systematically doing and it's working. I don't know if it's working because the quality of his argument is so good or because he cut taxes, he's appointing conservative justices and people want to, as Bruce Springsteen said, a reason to believe in this.

VAUSE: With that in mind, there was this incredible exchange in Congress between Republican Trey Gowdy and the deputy attorney general, Rod Rosenstein. Here it is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REPRESENTATIVE TREY GOWDY (R), SOUTH CAROLINA: If you have evidence of wrongdoing by any member of the Trump campaign, present it to the damn grand jury. If you have evidence that this president acted inappropriately, present it to the American people. Whatever you got. Finish it the hell up.

ROD ROSENSTEIN, DEPUTY ATTORNEY GENERAL: So, your statement that I'm personally keeping information from you, trying to conceal information --

REPRESENTATIVE JIM JORDAN (R), OHIO: You're the boss, Mr. Rosenstein.

ROSENSTEIN: That is correct. My job is to make sure we respond to your concerns. You used this to attack me personally, it's deeply wrong.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JONES: The last exchange was Jim Jordan, another Trump ally, another Republican. Rosenstein is a Trump appointment and a registered Republican. That meant nothing.

BROWNSTEIN: The first thing is that Trey Gowdy spent a lot more time investigating Benghazi to no effect and no result than Robert Mueller has spent investigating President Trump. When I saw the passion and the fire of these hearings, I thought back to all of the hearings over the last two weeks of the treatment of separated children at the border that House Republicans have convened, and, of course, there hasn't been any.

That has been the kind of, you know, the general trajectory, particularly in the House has been to move from some position of independence and skepticism and sometimes agreeing with Trump towards one of circling the wagons.

They have not performed any meaningful oversight in any of the areas of the administration that they could, instead they've turned themselves into a battering ram against this investigation. I think it is, you know, that question of whether they are willing to perform any meaningful oversight is a central question for the November election.

VAUSE: Well, earlier in the day, the president went after the special counsel in the Russia investigation, Robert Mueller. He did it in a tweet. When is Bob Mueller going to list of -- his conflicts of interest. Will they be listed at the top of his $220 million report? Goes on and on and on.

This is the same day he goes after Mueller, the president also defends Russian President Vladimir Putin, tweeting this. Russia continues to say they had nothing to do with meddling in our election. Where is the DNC server?

He goes on about shady James Comey and Hillary Clinton and all this kind of stuff. Apart from the fact the tweet ignores the conclusions of the 2016 report by the U.S. intelligence that Putin ordered an influence campaign in 2016 into the U.S. presidential election, it seems incredible to attack Mueller by name at the same time as defending Vladimir Putin.

BROWNSTEIN: Yes, I mean, look, he's wrapping us around -- the country around the axle. He said, well, maybe I kind of accept the conclusion. Then he reverts back to Russia says they didn't do it. Russia says they didn't do a lot of things, including invading Ukraine and Crimea. There is -- the idea because Putin says so, so it must we so is --

VAUSE: Is a very strange one.

BROWNSTEIN: But again, I go back to this -- I don't think that he is putting all of this out as a means of persuading people who are unpersuaded. I think he is putting all of this out as a means of providing talking points to Republican partisans and even more to the conservative kind of media infrastructure that is designed to put pressure on congressional Republicans not to act against him.

[00:25:07] Time is an enemy for Mueller. I mean, regardless of anything that Trump is doing, the length of the investigation does, I think, tend to erode public support for it, but he is, you know, he has been -- you know he knows what -- he is a skilled, experienced, determined investigator, and I think he will produce his report when he is ready to produce his report.

VAUSE: All of this is happening, 18 days away now I think the summit between Putin and Trump. It will happen in Helsinki just before the NATO Summit. I want to get back to the summit that Donald Trump had with North Korea's Kim Jong-Un. The conservative magazine "National Review" wrote this about the U.S. North Korea summit.

"With a single stroke in Singapore, Kim Jong-Un apparently defamed President Donald Trump, North Korea's most formidable American opponent in a post-Cold War era. Positioned North Korea to reap even greater gains from its high tension long-term game plan in the months and years ahead.

The Singapore summit, in other words looks to have been a single step towards making the world safer for Kim Jong-un and his regime. That is a scathing criticism and why so many people worry about this upcoming summit.

BROWNSTEIN: You do not hear it from congressional and Senate Republicans. You really see this week, John, I think the implicit trade that the Republican Party that was there before Donald Trump has accepted. He won. Because he won, they are getting probably two Supreme Court justices.

They got a big tax cut. They an unrolling a vast amount of environmental, climate and other regulation. In return for that, he is basically saying, you have to accept my &1sular, my economic nationalism, my racially infused nationalism on trade.

Where they would be in full revolt against a Democratic president on many areas of foreign policy. Not only the kind of strange summit between President Trump and Kim Jong-un, but also the way he's dealt with the allies. The reports today he is trying to undermine the European Union --

VAUSE: Secial deals on the side.

BROWNSTEIN: Again, so much of this behavior would be -- would be triggering kind of defcon reaction from Republicans if it was a Democratic president, but they recognize, and I think he is not shy about reminding them that it is the price of getting what you want.

By and large, not only Republican elected officials but a large number of Republican voters are essentially saying, we will take all of this other stuff, the attacks on the rule of law, the endless Twitter fights. The openly racist language he uses, infest and invade, if we get this.

What that means to Democrats is they can't expect a vast majority of the Republican coalition to sheer off. They're going to have to mobilize their own coalition more than they normally do in a midterm.

VAUSE: Today we have not seen a scrap of evidence that's what they're doing on the Democratic side.

BROWNSTEIN: The turnout has been high in the primaries, California was 80 percent higher than 2014. So, Democrats are coming out to vote but Republicans are coming out to vote, too.

VAUSE: What you're not seeing from the party is convincing those counties that were Obama counties, convincing them why they need to come back. Most of them are in rust belt states, manufacturing areas.

BROWNSTEIN: That's true. The white collar suburban threat to the Republicans is very real. That and the losses there could be very significant. By the way, the Supreme Court fight, Republican (inaudible) will help them in the Senate, it will compound the problem in the House where their biggest single problem is the energy and movement away from Trump amongst suburban white women. The threat to roe moves that even further.

VAUSE: We have another hour to catch up. We will talk about Justice Kennedy and more coming up. Good to see you. Thank you.

A short break. When we come back, an attack on a local newspaper in Maryland. What does it say about the state of civility in the United States?

[00:30:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VAUSE: Welcome back, everybody, you're watching CNN NEWSROOM, live from Los Angeles, I'm John Vause. We'll check the headlines, this hour. European leaders meeting in Brussels have reached an agreement on the migrant crisis, following all-night negotiations after Italy threatened not to sign on to the group's joint statement. Most other E.U. countries agreed to take in more migrants.

Five people are dead in one investigators call a targeted attack on a newspaper office in Annapolis, Maryland. Police say the suspect opened fire with a shotgun at the Capital Gazette. He's now in custody. Authorities are looking into social media threats which were made against the paper. USA Department has put its annual report on global human trafficking. First Daughter, Ivanka Trump was among those presenting awards to those who fight human trafficking around the world.

And for the situation at the U.S. border of Mexico, the reporters were careful to differentiate between trafficking and smuggling. As news of the Maryland shooting was breaking, security was stepped up in news outlet across the country. In New York, police moved extra personnel to the headquarters of all major news outlets as well as local stations. Brian Stelter is CNN's Senior Media Correspondent and host of "Reliable Sources" he joins us now from Aspen.

Brian, thanks for being with us. You know, when you get the big news organizations like CNN, New York Times, you know, they already have a fairly big security operation, making ids, there are metal detectors, sometimes there are armed guards. But, you know, Capital Gazette, it's a small outlet, it's a typical newsroom around the country, in small towns, there's not at a lot of security.

And it doesn't need to have a lot of security, because that's what they do. They interact with the community. But now, after this shooting, even though there's a vendetta against the paper, would you expect to see that these small operations have no other choice but to scale up in security?

BRIAN STELTER, CNN INTERNATIONAL SENIOR MEDIA CORRESPONDENT: You know, I think it would be unfortunate if we see some newsrooms, lock the doors and become less accessible to the public, because as you said, John, you know, the beauty of local news and community newspapers is, that they are open. They are transparent to the public. You can just drop by.

Readers of the Capital Gazette can just drop by the office, drop off a letter to the editor or an advertisement and that was one of the things that made the papers so special. I think we are going to see a re-evaluation of security policies, in the same way we did three years ago, when there was a shooting of a T.V. news crew in Virginia. That calls a lot of concerned newsrooms as well.

This, of course, is even more severe, even more disturbing. Just taking a look at the data, this is the single deadliest day for journalists in the United States since 9/11. We've not seen a day like this where four editors and an ad sales woman were all killed in their office and nothing quite like it in modern times in America, but definitely not since 9/11.

We've seen a death toll this high, involving members of the news media. We are used to these stories and other countries, but not in the U.S., and that's why this has caused such a chill all across the country.

VAUSE: You know, as this news was breaking, no one really knew what the motive here or, you know, why this guy had opened the fire the newspaper. The conservative commentator, Sean Hannity, he was on his radio show, he decided to call out Democratic Congresswoman Maxine Waters because as she (INAUDIBLE) early this week. You know, she called for protestors, push back, anytime they saw someone from the Trump administration to get in their face. Here's what Sean Hannity said, just as this news was breaking.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEAN HANNITY, HOST, SEAN HANNITY SHOW: I've been saying now for days that something horrible was going to happen because of the rhetoric. Really, Maxine? You want people to create -- call your friends, get in their faces, and Obama said that too. Get in their faces, call them out, call your friends, you know, get protesters, follow them into restaurants and shopping malls, and wherever else she said.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[00:35:05] VAUSE: OK. We now know, you know, that this shooting was basically because the guy had a vendetta over, you know, alleged defamation. But, even knowing that, it just seems like an incredible stretch to even (INAUDIBLE) I should say, he seemed to stretch to playing the congresswoman.

STELTER: Hannity is not a journalist, we know that. If he was a journalist, he wouldn't have engaged in such a reckless speculation or reckless connecting of the dots, where the dots don't connect. It's unfortunate that he engaged in that behavior. But, you know, he's also a guy who promotes the idea that the news is fake and you can't believe anything you read. He's a form of anti-journalist. He promotes the idea. The journalism is out to get the public. You know, the converse, of course, is true.

I was talking the other day with Marty Baron, editor of Washington Post, one of the biggest editors in the country. He said, we need to do a better job explaining how we help people, how the news may actually help people, and smaller papers are the Capital of Gazette. Those papers actually do that in daily basis, whether it's covering a local soccer match or covering what's going on at the Maryland State House. We need more of that, not less. But the Hannitys of the world try to tear it down into some (INAUDIBLE)

VAUSE: Yes. I mean, these are people who, you know, like -- they're in there, long hours, they turn in a lot of money, but they dedicate it to their community and that is so typical assuming on the papers. I just want to stick with this to the conservative side of things because there was Milo Yiannopoulos, you know, his star burned brightly for a very brief period of time. He was asked about the shooting. He told one reporter, I can't wait for the vigilantes quads to start gunning journalists down on site.

The right-wing nationalist told the Observer over text message. Now, according to the paper, this is in response to a longer feature which is on the development about a restaurant which he apparently goes to a lot. Later on Facebook, Yiannopoulos said it was just a way of telling a reporter to -- in his words F off. It was just a joke.

So, on one hand, Sean Hannity believes it's the rhetoric of Congresswoman Waters, which is to blame, but then when he's fellow conservative, you know, Milo Yiannopoulos talks about vigilante death squads to gun down reporters, that's just a joke.

STELTER: Yes. I don't even want to say Milo's name because I don't think he deserves the oxygen. But what he represents is a real strain of media hatred or journalism hatred in the U.S. that's been enabled by people in power. Now, obviously, what happened today, in Annapolis, is not, as we know so far, connected to the fake news rhetoric that we've heard from politicians.

But, this broader sense of journalist or the enemy, they're out to get you. That's what Milo was promoting by going so far as to encourage people to be hurt. He may regret that now. He had lots of excuses for what he said, but there should be no room in public discourse for this kind of language. We should be able to cherish this ability for journalists to do their job safely.

VAUSE: You know, we should -- we should know, though, that, you know, the hostility and -- so the anguish towards journalists have been building for a long time.

STELTER: Yes.

VAUSE: Long before Donald Trump announced his candidacy and before he became president. But what has happened over the last year and a half, is that the temperature, you know, has been turned up considerably and people here before may not have said anything, feeling bold to say something now, people who may have not been abusive before, I think feeling bolder to be abusive now.

STELTER: I know that's why so many journalists fear that this day could come in the United States. You know, we are used to covering horrible stories involving journalists killed in other countries. Charlie Hebdo massacre comes to bide in Paris, security was ramped up in the U.S. and newsrooms after that massacre. More recently, 10 dead in the bombing in Kabul, 10 journalists dead, in one day. in Kabul, Afghanistan. We are used to those stories outside the U.S.

We are not used to those stories within the United States. And this climate of media hostility of this rise in threats recently, this rise in physical assault against journalists, it's all pointing in a very dark direction. Today, there were very specific set of circumstances that may have led to this mad man to go and shoot up this newsroom. But more probably, these rise in threats and hostility, is something that has to be reckoned with and has to be confronted.

VAUSE: Brian, thank you so much for being with us. We appreciate it.

STELTER: Thank you.

VAUSE: As we go in a break here, we want to show the front page of the Maryland newspaper, the Capital Gazette, they've got an edition out, it will be the Friday edition despite what happened at their office on Thursday, back in a moment.

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VAUSE: Prince William has wrapped up his trip to the Middle East, touring holy sites in Jerusalem. On the last leg of his visit, the British royal also got a chance to make a very personal visit. CNN's Oren Liebermann has details.

OREN LIEBERMANN: Prince William has the most sensitive part of his visit for the end, a visit to the holiest sites in the old city of Jerusalem. He began the day visiting the grave of his great grandmother, Princess Alice, who's buried on the Mount of Olives, near the Old City, at the church of Mary Magdalene. It was a very private and personal visit there as he paid his respects. From there, he went to Haram esh-Sharif, the Temple Mount, where he visited the Al-Aqsa Mosque in the Dome of the Rock.

He strolled around the stunning complex and learned about the significance of the sites there, before making his way to the Western Wall. He spent about 10 minutes at the Wall, as his standard, he placed a small piece of paper with a prayer on it, in the cracks of the Western Wall and he signed the guestbook. The Duke of Cambridge didn't make any big public statements or proclamations, perhaps knowing how easy it is to misspeak about such sensitive sites, holy to Christians, Muslims, and Jews.

One wrong word here could be a diplomatic disaster for the royal family. But just his presence at these sites was enough of a statement about their sanctity and their holiness.. After a short visit at the Western Wall, Prince William walked the church of the Holy Sepulchre, one of the holiest sites in Christianity.

This visit to the Old City wrapped up Prince William's time here, during which he met with Israeli and Palestinian leaders, spent time with children from both communities and strengthen the ties between England and the Israelis and Palestinians. From that perspective, this trip was very much a success for Prince William. Oren Liebermann, CNN, Jerusalem.

VAUSE: Oren, thank you. And thank you for watching CNN NEWSROOM, live from Los Angeles, I'm John Vause. World Sport starts after the break.

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