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W.H. Vows Dems Will "Never" See Trump's Tax Returns After Request; Mulvaney: W.H. Will Release Health Care Plan Ahead Of Election; Rep. Suzan DelBene (D-WA) Is Interviewed About President Trump's Tax Returns; Abducted American Tourist Rescued; Trump Claims Anti-Semitism Has Taken Root In Democratic Party; Beto O'Rourke: Netanyahu Does Not Represent True Will Of Israeli People; Government: It Could Take 2 Years To Identify Migrant Families. Aired 3-4p ET

Aired April 7, 2019 - 15:00   ET

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


(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

[15:00:00] REP. JERRY NADLER (D-NY): You can commit complete betrayals to the public interest without committing impeachable acts. And if you did that, the public want to know that too.

MICK MULVANEY, ACTING WHITE HOUSE CHIEF OF STAFF: The face of the Democrat Parties infested with what we call Trump derangement syndrome. They still cannot accept the fact that he won the election.

REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D-CA): I don't regret calling out this President for what I consider deeply unethical and improper conduct, not a bit.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: "CNN Newsroom" starts now.

Hello again, everyone. Thanks so much for being with me. I'm Fredricka Whitfield.

All right, the fight over President's tax returns intensifying and now the White House is vowing Democrats will never see the documents. This comes after the Democrats unprecedented request to the IRS for six years of Trump's personal tax returns. Here is how acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney is reacting to that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MULVANEY: Keep in mind, they knew they were -- they're not going to get these taxes. They know what the law is. They know that one of the fundamental principles of the IRS is to protect the confidentiality of you and me and everybody else who files taxes.

BILL HEMMER, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: To be clear, you believe Democrats will never see the President's tax returns?

MULVANEY: Oh, no, never, nor should they. That is not going to happen and they know it. This is a political stunt by my former colleagues.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: Never is a big shift from this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: If I decide to run for office, I'll produce my tax returns, absolutely.

I'm releasing when we're finished with the audit.

I will release my tax returns against my lawyer's wishes when she releases her 33,000 e-mails.

I'll release them when the audit is completed.

As soon as that's finished, whenever that may be, and hopefully it's going to be before the election, I'm fine with t.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: President Trump's attorney is also weighing in saying Democrats are trying to use the IRS as a political weapon.

Let's check in with CNN's White House Correspondent Boris Sanchez. So tell us more about this escalating fight.

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Fred, the President and his allies describing this as an illegitimate political stunt. Democrats opening up yet another front in their battle against this White House, the House Ways and Means Committee, seeking transparency, six years of the President's tax returns and tax returns related to some of his business interests.

We should point out, the White House had been preparing for this, according to sources, for some time. They immediately took a defensive posture. And the argument that we heard from the acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney is that the American people didn't need to see President Trump's tax returns to elect him. They're essentially suggesting that Democrats are trying to target them politically, and they are going to fight this tooth-and-nail.

A senior administration official telling CNN they are prepared to fight this all the way to the Supreme Court if they have to, to keep the President's tax returns private and away from the eyes of the American people, Fred.

WHITFIELD: And Boris, Mick Mulvaney also discussed at meeting he held at Camp David this weekend to talk about healthcare. What do we know came from that?

SANCHEZ: That's right, yes. The acting chief of staff hosting White House officials as well as cabinet members to talk about a plan for moving healthcare forward. This comes, of course, after the White House had to backpedal when President Trump said that they would be presenting a plan to Congress this year to repeal and replace Obamacare. It would be their third attempt to do so.

The acting chief of staff sort of said that we would be seeing one soon. He did commit to a plan before the 2020 election. Listen to more of what he said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MULVANEY: We spend the time this weekend saying, "OK, what have we done? What can we talk about that's a success? What do we need to work on going forward?" We talked about the individual marketplace. We talked about how we're protecting Medicare. We're talking about getting drug prices down. And I do think you'll see a plan here fairly shortly.

HEMMER: Will you see it before the 2020 elections?

MULVANEY: Oh, yes. You know, we want to run on this. We're firm believers that you can't beat something with nothing. We have -- Republicans have better ideas than Democrats. We should not be afraid to talk about that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SANCHEZ: You can't beat something with nothing. Mulvaney clearly heeding the words of President Trump last week when he blatantly told Republicans that they would not win in 2020 unless they came up with an alternative to Obamacare, something the President has made an initiative. You'll recall, Fred, he told people publicly that he believed Republicans should be the party of healthcare.

WHITFIELD: All right. Boris Sanchez, thanks so much at the White House.

All right, joining me right now, Washington state Democratic Congresswoman Suzan DelBene. She's on the Ways and Means Committee that sent the request for Trump's tax returns. Congresswoman, good to see you. So, your reaction to what Mick Mulvaney is saying that Democrats will never see those tax returns.

REP. SUZAN DELBENE (D-WA): Well, I think the law is very clear on this that Chairman Neal, chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, has clear legal authority to request those returns he did in his letter to the IRS commissioner.

And the commissioner based on that statute, shall, should he needs to provide those tax returns to the chairman so that he can look at those returns so we can understand if they're being audited appropriately.

[15:05:07] WHITFIELD: And what if the White House leverages its authority over the treasury secretary, the IRS, and you still never see those returns, then what?

DELBENE: Well, the -- in the letter that Chairman Neal sent, he was clear that the returns need to be provided by April 10th. So, we will know soon whether or not they will comply with that request. They should. We expect them to because the law is very clear. And if that doesn't happen, then the chairman will take appropriate steps going forward to make sure that we, again, have -- are able to make sure those returns are given to the chairman and the committee.

WHITFIELD: So this is what Trump's attorney, Jay Sekulow, had to say about your committee's request.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAY SEKULOW, ATTORNEY FOR PRESIDENT TRUMP: This President decided not to because he has an ongoing IRS audit. This idea that you can use the IRS as a political weapon, which is what's happening here, is in correct both as a matter of statutory law and constitutionally.

We should not be in a situation where individuals -- individual private tax returns are used for political purposes. As you just said, George, what stops another party from doing the same thing?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: So what do you say to his accusation that this request is being made by -- you know, because of a political, you know, purposes? And if not that, then what is the goal?

DELBENE: Well, first of all, we have long-standing precedent for -- candidates for president to release their tax returns because these are important in the public interest, and this President has said many times in the past that he would release them, he never has.

There is clear authority that the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee has to request those returns. The law is clearly on his side on this one. And we are a co-equal branch of government.

Oversight is a key part of our responsibility, and we are talking about the President. We need to make sure that the public interest is always top of mind, not self-interests, and oversight is an important role that we play to make sure that that public interest is the top priority.

WHITFIELD: And what do you believe those tax returns could potentially reveal?

DELBENE: I don't think it's clear what they may or may not reveal. I think it's important that we have those tax returns so that the chairman and staff of the committee are able to make sure, again, that public interest is top of mind versus self-interest.

And to understand if the IRS is doing what has been their commonplace effort to audit tax returns from the president and the vice president to make sure the public interest is top of mind, and we aren't sure if that is happening.

And so that's another important piece of information that we will understand when that information is provided to the chairman.

WHITFIELD: And so you hear this, you know, expressed resistance coming from the acting chief of staff to, you know, the President's attorney. So do you see that this fight is likely to go all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court?

DELBENE: Well, it could. It shouldn't. The law is very clear. The IRS commissioner should be handing the tax returns over, that would be our expectation given the clarity and strength of the law.

But we have yet to hear back from the commissioner or from the secretary of the treasury, and hopefully we will hear soon this coming week because April 10th is the date that the chairman requested to receive those returns.

WHITFIELD: OK, so that's a couple days away. Meantime, today, it's World Health Day and we know that Mick Mulvaney, you know, had this meeting at Camp David and the White House plans to release some sort of healthcare plan, maybe even to use as a campaign point even though the President says no vote.

He wouldn't pursue any kind of vote before the 2020 election. So what do you think about this potential alternative to Obamacare if indeed the President succeeds in eradicating it all together?

DELBENE: Every person in the United States should have affordable quality healthcare, period. The Trump administration and Republicans have over and over tried to undermine this Affordable Care Act and the access that has been given to many, many Americans to affordable quality healthcare, millions of Americans since the Affordable Care Act went into place.

It is terrible that they continue to undermine our efforts to make sure folks have affordable quality healthcare. They are threatening people with pre-existing conditions and removing coverage from them, and now taking away coverage from millions of Americans by trying to legally attack the Affordable Care Act. It is their -- if there was another plan in place, Republicans haven't stated it, they could have brought that forward years ago.

[15:10:06] So, we should be working on strengthening access to healthcare, affordable -- the affordability of healthcare for every single American. That's top priority. That's what we're working on as Democrats and have had clear plans going forward. I haven't seen a clear plan and I think the President wants to wait until 2020 because I don't think he has a clear plan either.

WHITFIELD: All right. Congresswoman Suzan DelBene, thanks so much for your time. Appreciate it.

DELBENE: Thank you.

WHITFIELD: All, still ahead, an American kidnapped while on a safari Uganda and held for ransom is rescued. Details in a live report. Plus, President Trump taking new digs at Democrats.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Democrats have even allowed the terrible scourge of anti- Semitism to take root in their party and in their country.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:15:04] WHITFIELD: We're following breaking news now. The American tourist rescued after being kidnapped in Uganda has been identified. She is Kimberly Sue Endicott. Officials say Endicott and her guide were abducted by an armed gang from a national park five days ago. Her capturers then demanded a $500,000 ransom.

I want to get right to journalist Robyn Kriel in Ethiopia. So, Robyn, what are you learning about all the circumstances and sequence of events?

ROBYN KRIEL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Fredricka, we do have some breaking news out of Uganda. I've just been chatting with a spokesperson for Wild Frontiers, the tourism company that was responsible for Ms. Endicott and her guide. And they told me -- but first of all, that she is healthy. The guide is healthy.

They said that the exchange went over quietly and peacefully. They said it's been an extremely distressing week. They asserts also within the situation told us that a ransom was paid.

So, the attackers -- the kidnappers demanding a half a million dollar of ransom, and we do understand that a ransom was paid. We're not sure how much. The police describing it, Fredricka, as a rescue operation.

Here's a tweet earlier from the Ugandan police force. They said, "Police and its sister security agencies have today rescued Ms. Kimberly Sue, an American tourist together with her guide who were kidnapped while on an evening game drive at Queen Elizabeth National Park. The duo are in good health hand in the safe hands of a joint security team."

So the question now is who was part of that so-called rescue operation? Were American agencies involved? Were American -- was the American military involved? We do know that Africa command does have a go base really in Djibouti that could respond to situations like this. Was she targeted because she was American?

Fredricka, we know that four other people were picked up with her and her guide and later freed. We know now that she was in good health. We do not know the identities of the kidnappers.

The spokesperson for Wild Frontiers Tour Company telling us that they did not know if these were terrorists or bandits than it would be speculation at this point. We do know that there are terrorist groups operating in the DRC, but obviously we have no idea who was behind this kidnapping.

WHITFIELD: All right. Robyn Kriel, thank you so much for that.

All right, let's bring in CNN Pentagon Reporter Ryan Browne from Washington. So, Ryan, any word from U.S. officials in what capacity, what information they have about, you know, this rescue?

RYAN BROWNE, CNN PENTAGON REPORTER: Well, Fred, no word as of yet from any official U.S. government sources about this rescue operation and the successful recovery of the U.S. citizen. We've reached out to the State Department, the White House, the Africa command, the U.S. military organization in Africa, and we have yet to hear anything back.

Of course the U.S. was tracking the situation. We know the State Department earlier issuing a warning to all U.S. citizens to stay away from that area, that border region between Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda citing criminal activity and citing the Ugandan security forces rescue operation there.

So the U.S. State Department was tracking the issue closely aware of the operation to attempt to recover one of its U.S. citizens. However, we've yet to hear anything about the successful recovery and, of course, now reports that a ransom was paid.

The U.S. government itself does not pay ransoms to kidnappers. However, it does -- it is not able to stop individuals or companies, insurance companies from paying said ransoms, especially if it's to a criminal gang as opposed to some kind of terrorist group, but yet no official word from the U.S. government as to the successful recovery operation of the American citizen. Fred?

WHITFIELD: All right. Any indication when Kimberly, you know, Sue Endicott would return to the U.S., you know, anything about her travels? Would that be, you know, an occasion in which the U.S. government would be involved in returning her home?

BROWNE: Well, sometimes in these situations they do defer to the family of the hostage or something along those lines in terms of how much information they release. But in this situation, yes, it's likely that the State Department would facilitate a return back to the United States if that's what they desired, Fred.

WHITFIELD: All right. Ryan Browne, thanks so much.

BROWNE: You bet.

WHITFIELD: All right. President Trump sharpening his attacks on Democrats saying they're to blame for a rise in anti-Semitism. The reaction from a U.S. lawmaker who is Jewish, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:24:10] WHITFIELD: President Trump lobbing insults again towards Democrats as he spoke this weekend to a meeting of Jewish Republicans in Las Vegas.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Democrats have even allowed the terrible scourge of anti- Semitism to take root in their party and in their country. They have allowed that. They have allowed that. House Democrats recently blocked legislation to confront the anti-Semitic movement to boycott and sanction Israel. Nobody could believe it, right? Nobody. You couldn't believe it. Republicans believe that we must never ignore the vile poison of anti-Semitism.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: Trump also launched a barrage of criticism on Democrats last month after a House vote broadly condemned hatred and not specifically condemning a Muslim congresswoman accused of -- accused by some of making anti-Semitic comments.

[15:25:08] I want to bring in Margaret Talev, she is the Senior White House Correspondent for Bloomberg News. Good to see you, Margaret. So, you know, is Trump trying to paint Democrats as anti-Semitic, you know, a winning issue for this President?

MARGARET TALEV, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, he certainly doesn't get losing issue and he think that it potentially could help him on two fronts. I think the President is looking at a strategy where he is forcing the Democrats to play defense on an issue they've basically never had to play defense on. He's trying to exploit this crack and try to turn it into a wedge.

But I think he's looking at a couple of other factors also, which is that he may need to sure up his support in places like Ohio, Pennsylvania and Michigan and to solidify his ability to win Florida again as part of a path to 2020.

And even though Jewish-American voter are pretty small proportion of the U.S. populations, like maybe around 2 percent of the American population are Jews, they make a larger disproportionately important impact in some of those key states. It's also a huge with the evangelical vote. So, he sees this as kind of you can't lose and maybe can you gain a little ground and maybe that ground will matter.

WHITFIELD: Democratic Congressman Adam Schiff, you know, responding to Trump's comments telling CNN that Trump needs to examine his own behavior.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCHIFF: Look, it's not the Democratic Party that believes that there are good people on both sides of a Nazi rally. There's just one party and one party leader who believes that and that's Donald Trump.

I think the President needs to look inward when it comes to the rise of anti-Semitism in the country and his own actions and his own word and how that may fuel some of the rise and hate that we see not just in the form of anti-Semitism, but the rise in acts of hate of all kinds.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: So, you know, as Schiff just said, is, you know, the President in a rather strange position, not just because of the good people on both sides comment but, you know, he wouldn't even more recently acknowledge, you know, a rise in white nationalism.

TALEV: Yes. And I think it is that more recent issue that you're talking about that a lot of folks are talking about. Now, the question for the President though is really like he spent the last couple of years trying to make it beyond -- you know, beyond any question his support for the state of Israel. That's different than American-Jewish voters.

And when you look at traditionally American-Jewish voters, I think by almost three out of four votes went to Hillary Clinton in the last election. That's pretty consistent with what it's been over time. So President Trump's support from American-Jewish voters has been in the minority certainly and it appears to remain to be.

But on some of these key issues that are -- for the state of Israel, which is what the President has been hammering home with his move of the embassy, the Golan Heights, he's hoping both to solidify the Republican Jewish vote and the evangelical white vote and also perhaps to pick up some Democratic Jewish voters. But, again, that has always been kind of a long shot strategy.

WHITFIELD: And then Israel has elections coming up on Tuesday. While the President, you know, says he's unaware of the specifics of the election, you know, he also made some moves that appeared to support Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's re-election bid. Here's what President Trump actually said last night.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I stood with your prime minister at the White House to recognize Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights. The Golan Heights is something I've been hearing about for a long time.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: OK. So, you know, Trump even, you know, calling or saying, you know, towards the audience, you know, Netanyahu, your prime minister, to the gathering. I mean, what is this underscore?

TALEV: Right. So he appears to mean that affectionately. The President has certainly been putting his thumb on the scale trying to show his support for Bibi ahead of this crucial election in Israel.

Bibi, of course, has been under the gun because of corruption investigation that's been ongoing and maybe close in. It's interesting that he chose to call him your prime minister because, again, this underscore -- these are American voters.

WHITFIELD: Yes, this is what you've been talking about.

TALEV: Right.

WHITFIELD: These are American voters.

TALEV: Right. These are American voters, so obviously Prime Minister Netanyahu is not their prime minister in the literal sense. And on the other side, in the Democratic Party we were talking about Representative Omar and kind of conflating criticism of Israel policies toward Palestinians with criticisms of Jews.

So, I think the President is not being ultra specific with his words and probably doesn't see what he said as anything comparable to what she said. But it is, again, taking American voters and suggested that they have an allegiance to ahead of, you know, the political system in a different country, so, yes.

WHITFIELD: Yes. All right, Margaret Talev, thank you so much. Appreciate it.

[15:30:04] All right, coming up, 2020 presidential hopefuls are back on the campaign trail and hitting back at President Trump's claims that windmills cause cancer.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WHITFIELD: All right, in a sea of 17 presidential hopefuls, Democrats are pulling out all the stops to stand out. Several of them are back on the trail today, including South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg who headline an LGBTQ advocacy event.

He spoke about finding the courage to come out. And when asked if America is ready for a gay president, he answered, "There is only one way to find out." Buttigieg joins a number of 2020 contenders who are going after President Trump by name.

CNN's Ryan Nobles is on the campaign trail in Iowa. So, Ryan, we're starting to hear the candidates are getting a little bit more bold with their messaging.

[15:35:06] RYAN NOBLES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Fred, that's a good way to put it. And we're here in Malcom, Iowa, which is right down the road from Des Moines off of I-80. And it's pretty remarkable as you make that trip on that long straight highway, you see all kinds of windmills all over the plains of Iowa, that's a big part of the energy generation here in this state, something the state takes a lot of pride in.

And there's a lot of people raising their eyebrows about what President Trump had to say about wind energy, specifically that the sound makes and potentially causes cancer. And you're absolutely right about these Democratic candidates finding ways to kind of poke at Donald Trump, spending a lot of time poking at Donald Trump than they are, the fellow primary opponents that are running in Democratic primary.

Bernie Sanders is about to hold a town hall here in Malcom. He took an opportunity to kind of marry those two issues, the wind turbines and the opposition to Donald Trump, and this is what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (D-I), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We were hesitating coming here to Iowa because President Trump after a great deal of study has determined that wind turbines cause cancer. Have you all heard that? And I said, jeez. And I said, here we are coming to Iowa and you've got 35 percent of your electricity from wind. You've got a lot of wind turbines, and I'm worried. You know, am I going to come down with cancer spending a few days in the state?

BETO O'ROURKE (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I don't think wind turbines cause cancer. In fact, I think they cause jobs.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

NOBLES: You also heard Beto O'Rourke there talking about this wind turbine issue. And to be clear, none of these Democrats are making this issue of wind turbines their primary pitch to Democratic voters here in Iowa, but it's a way to draw these distinctions, and that opens the door to talking about healthcare, to talking about economic inequality, to talking about all of those things that they believe make them different than Donald Trump, and then hopefully trying to find a way to kind of push themselves ahead of these very crowded field.

Fred, Bernie Sanders attempting to do that here in just a few minutes in this crowd here behind me, a big crowd for this small room in the small town hoping to fire a few questions at the guy that many consider to be the front-runner right now at least in terms of where he stands in the polls and the amount of money that he's raised. He's expected to get a few tough questions here in Malcom in the next few hours. Fred?

WHITFIELD: All right. Ryan Nobles, keep us posted. Thank you so much.

All right, let's bring in Matt Lewis, he is a senior columnist at "The Daily Beast," and Maria Cardona is a former communications director for the Democratic National Committee. Good to see you both.

MARIA CARDONA, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Hey, Fred.

WHITFIELD: All right, hello. All right, so, Maria, you first. You know, for a long time it seems like all of these candidates were avoiding using the name Trump. They would make reference to him has the President, but now they're outright, you know, calling him out saying President Trump. Is that a winning strategy or is there a real strategy behind that even?

CARDONA: I actually do think it's a winning strategy, Fred, because at the end of the day, whoever the nominee is, that's who they are going to have to go after and win if we're going to take the White House in 2020.

And part of what the Democratic voters are going to have to figure out is who is going to be able to do that well, who is going to be able to really point out the differences between themselves and Trump, calling out Trump by name without making themselves look bad.

We know this didn't look bad for many of the Republicans who went up against him in 2016, so that's a good lesson for Democrats. But I also think it's important to do because a lot of -- not his base, we know that his base will at least up until now, never leave him, but those critical independent voters, voters who sort of held their nose to vote for Trump.

He has done so many things and said so many things that underscore what many Democrats knew from the beginning, which is that he is just -- not just unqualified to be president, but unfit to be president. And so these digs that the Democratic candidates are using.

I think go to continue to underscore that while then talking about really serious issues that voters care about that also go to differentiate how the Democrats and the Democratic candidates actually know these issues, have studied these issues, have science behind these issues, as opposed to just spewing lies, junk and idiocies every time they open their mouth, which is what Trump does.

WHITFIELD: All right. So, Matt, a clever strategy?

MATT LEWIS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes. Look, I think first of all if you go after the sitting president, that's a way to make a name for yourself. Remember, Howard Dean did that back in 2004. Everybody was trying to be nice to George W. Bush because he was so popular after 9/11.

Howard Dean decided, "No, I'm going to attack him and represent the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party," and it worked. And then everybody replicated that and everybody else started piling on. It actually ended up hurting Bush. So I think it's smart.

But, look, I think there are two -- there's a lot of litmus tests that Democrats are trying to check off on their way to the nomination, but I think the two of the most important are, can you win the electoral college, and can you stand up to Donald Trump without him destroying you, and that's part of what this is about.

[15:40:09] WHITFIELD: Standing out is, you know, what all of these candidates now that you've got 17 Democrats, you know, in the race. Beto O'Rouke, he is trying to stand out. In fact, he, you know, took a stand today and he took a direct hit at Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu just a couple of days before, you know, elections in Israel. And he flat out, O'Rourke flat out, calling Netanyahu a racist, saying he, "doesn't represent the true will of the Israeli people," listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

O'ROURKE: The U.S.-Israel relationship is one of the most important relationships that we have on the planet. And that relationship, if it is to be successful, must transcend partisanship in the United States and it must be able to transcend a prime minister who is racist as he warns about Arabs coming to the polls who wants to defy any prospect for peace, as he threatens to annex the west bank and who has sided with a far right racist party in order to maintain his hold on power.

I don't think that Benjamin Netanyahu represents the true will of the Israeli people or the best interests of the U.S.-Israel relationship or any path to peace for the people of the Palestinian authority, the Gaza strip and the state of Israel.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WHITFIELD: So Maria, how will he or other Democrats, you know, strike a real balance between being critical of Netanyahu and at the same time, you know, showing loyalty, you know, to a key ally of Israel?

CARDONA: I actually think Beto did it well, because he very much differentiated the criticism that he was laying out against the prime minister of Israel and differentiated that and took that aside and said that has nothing to do with the historic and close alliance that the United States has with Israel.

And actually, I think him doing that at this point, I mean, there's a reason why Netanyahu I think came to the United States to try to get help from Donald Trump because he's in trouble. He's in trouble because his numbers are really bad, and frankly it looks like a lot of people in Israel feel the same way that Beto was expressing.

And so I think that what Democrats need to do moving forward, especially to inoculate themselves from these ridiculous criticisms that are coming down from Trump, you had a segment about this earlier in terms of trying to paint the whole party as anti-Semitism because they want to conflate any criticism that we may have towards the prime minister of Israel or Netanyahu himself to paint us as being anti- Semitic and that -- or anti-Israel, and that is absolutely the furthest thing from the truth that there is, and Beto did a very good job of differentiating those two.

WHITFIELD: Matt, how do you see it?

LEWIS: Look, I see it a little differently actually. I think that Beto O'Rouke could -- he could be the sort of nice optimistic hopeful Barack Obama sort of candidate. And instead -- and I think he's being outmaneuvered now by Pete Buttigieg.

I think that here you see Beto lurching leftward trying to be with the social justice left woke group. I think it undermines the likeability that Beto used to have. He used to be seen as temperamentally moderate and likable, and I don't think this is a good look actually.

WHITFIELD: Maria --

(CROSSTALK)

CARDONA: I don't agree from that at all. I think he was -- he is still actually very likeable, but yet being able to talk the truth. You've got to be able to speak truth to power.

LEWIS: He's calling our ally a racist. The prime minister of Israel is calling him a racist.

CARDONA: OK. See now, you're doing exactly what I said, you're conflating Israel with the prime minister. (CROSSTALK)

LEWIS: He is the leader -- he is the leader of Israel for right now.

CARDONA: OK. But does that mean that we can't criticize --

(CROSSTALK)

WHITFIELD: People have used the same language about the President of the United States, but does that paint the picture of all of the United States?

CARDONA: That's right.

WHITFIELD: Because that would be the parallel.

LEWIS: Look, as a patriotic American --

CARDONA: You're doing exactly what Trump does.

LEWIS: As a patriotic American I wouldn't want somebody calling my president name, even if it was a Democrats, I wouldn't like it. Let alone.

CARDONA: Well, you know, like I said, sometimes you have to speak truth to power, especially when we are in some insane times when our own President likes to take the side of Putin and other autocrats and dictators and sometimes against our own country. So, you want to talk --

LEWIS: I'm just saying I think Beto --

CARDONA: You want to talk about being patriotic, you should defend American values as opposed to whoever is in the White House and whoever is in the White House is completely going against those values.

WHITFIELD: All right, quickly, Matt, finalize your thought on that.

LEWIS: I was going to say, I think Beto has this lane of being the hope and change temperamentally moderate likable guy, and I think this is him going off. But I think Mayor Pete Buttigieg is out maneuvering him and sort of taking this lane from him.

[15:45:04] CARDONA: I don't think so. But, again, we'll see. That's what Democratic votes --

WHITFIELD: More to come.

CARDONA: -- that's what primaries are for.

WHITFIELD: More to come. All right, Matt Lewis, Maria Cardona, thanks to both of you. Appreciate it.

CARDONA: Thanks, Fred. WHITFIELD: All right, up next, thousands of families separated at southern border, and now the U.S. government says it could take years to reunite all of the children with their parents.

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WHITFIELD: Welcome back. The U.S. government is now saying it could take up to two years to identify thousands of immigrant families who were separated at the southern border.

[15:50:04] The government's proposed strategy came in a court filing detailing its plan to comb through thousands of records to find these people, but this comes with challenges. The children from these groups of families have already been released from government custody and separated families were not tracked before April of 2018. And the nearly 50,000 case files could be overwhelming to review.

I'm joined now by attorney and "USA Today" Contributor Raul Reyes. And he writes about immigration issues. Good to see you, Raul.

RAUL REYES, ATTORNEY: Hi, Fredricka.

WHITFIELD: So two years to reunite these families. What's your reaction to this kind of detailing about the data collective, the lack thereof, the separation, release and now trying to bring people together?

REYES: This is no matter how you look at it and honestly, I think regardless of your political affiliation, this is a horrific situation to anyone who's a parent, to anyone who has a nephew or godchild or a niece, imagine being separated from that young child for up to two years.

And all of this stems from not just the family separation policy and the subsequent lawsuit by the ACLU, most of those children who we heard so much about last year have been reunited.

The groups of children we're talking about now, these are children who were actually separated from their parents or family members before the family separation policy officially went into place. So --

WHITFIELD: That includes children who were unable to verbally communicate because they're so young.

REYES: Exactly. We have infants, we have children who maybe did not speak Spanish because they spoke indigenous languages, and our government at the direction of Department of Homeland Security, separated them without any type of identification, without any type of tracking number and this amounts to really a form of child abuse or kidnapping on a gross scale.

And this -- honestly, this is the type of event that were it happening anywhere else in the world. Under a different administration, the United States would likely be calling out this country for gross abuses of human rights.

WHITFIELD: Last month a U.S. district judge revealed that the government had been separating families as far back as 2017.

REYES: Right.

WHITFIELD: But U.S. Customs and Border Protection didn't actually start tracking families as, you know, data until April 2018. So how serious a challenge do you believe this is going to present?

REYES: It is a huge logistical challenge, but the bottom line as Judge Sikora (ph) has said numerous times, it is a logistical challenge. But he -- as he pointed out, number one, it is of the government's own making. And number two, it can be done.

Many of the children that have been reunited with their parents so far, it has been thanks to the work of many nonprofit groups and groups like the ACLU. But there is time for our government to step up because this is beyond a national tragedy.

This represents an enormous political or substantive failure on behalf of the Trump administration and it's time for DHS to own it, to more forcefully begin the process of reuniting the children, stop dragging their heels and to offer some type of consistent plan on how they propose to do so because thus far, we've seen in the court filings, they have been dragging their heels.

They even disputed when and where the family separations have been taking place. And each day that goes on, the longer this process takes, this has devastating impact on the development of these children.

And any child expert, you know, doctors or psychologists, psychiatrists say that this type of mistreatment and abuse that they're suffering now, not only will it impact them throughout their lives, it will impact their children as well. So this system -- this crisis needs to be fixed and this administration must be held accountable.

WHITFIELD: Raul Reyes, thank you so much. Appreciate it. Good to see you.

REYES: Thank you, Fredricka.

WHITFIELD: All right, tonight, don't miss an all-new episode of the CNN Original Series "Tricky Dick." It's tonight, 9:00 Eastern only on CNN.

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[15:58:32] WHITFIELD: Checking our top stories. An investigation is under way into the tragic death of a longtime Coachella employee. Police say he died after falling off a roof while setting up for the Music and Arts festival in California.

Extremely dangerous and disappointing, that's how the city of Lubbock, Texas describes the chaos that broke out after Texas Tech beat Michigan State in last night's final four NCAA game. Celebrating students flooded the streets and some actually flipped cars over, starting fires and vandalizing the property. Police in riot gear used tear gas to break up the rowdy crowds.

And a disturbing story out of South Africa, a suspected poacher gets the ultimate payback by the wild. Park authorities from Kruger National Park say a skull and despair pants was all that was left behind on a suspected poacher who was killed by an elephant and eaten by lions. It's believed that man went to the park with four others last week to hunt rhinos illegally. Remains were found a couple of days later. The four other alleged poachers have been arrested.

All right, hello again and thank you so much for being with me this Sunday. I'm Fredricka Whitfield.

The fight over President Trump's tax returns is intensifying. Now the White House is vowing Democrats will never see the documents. This follows Democrats' unprecedented request to the IRS for six years of Trump's personal tax returns. Here is how acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney is responding to that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MULVANEY: Keep in mind, they knew they were --