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Baltimore Police Commissioner Replaced; Massive Computer Failures Cripple Flights, Stock Market; Aired 5-6p ET

Aired July 08, 2015 - 17:00   ET

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

[17:00:12] BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: Happening now, commissioner fired. Baltimore's mayor suddenly ousts the man in charge of the embattled police force amid widespread criticism of his response to the riots that erupted after the death in custody of Freddie Gray.

Meltdown: a major computer failure halts trading on the New York Stock Exchange for hours on the same day that a major airline is grounded. What is behind these massive breakdowns?

And dark web: a warning from the FBI that ISIS is using encrypted messaging, going dark in the uncharted reaches of the Internet to pose a direct threat to the U.S. homeland. We have new information about Syria's plots.

And Subway symbol Jared. The pitchman for the restaurant chain may have dropped 245 pounds by eating sandwiches, but now Subway is suddenly dropping him. What's it all about?

Wolf Blitzer is off. I'm Brianna Keilar. You're in THE SITUATION ROOM.

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

KEILAR: We are following breaking news in Baltimore, where the mayor just announced she's replacing the city's police commissioner, Anthony Batts. He was in charge during the years of tough police tactics. Finally, he was in charge during the Baltimore riots.

And also developing, two vital parts of the U.S. economy struggling to recover from massive computer problems. One failure grounded United Airlines passengers from coast to coast. Then another computer breakdown caused the New York Stock Exchange to halt trading for nearly 3 1/2 hours today. Are these really separate, unrelated problems? Or are they a cyberattack?

And it came just as Congress was getting a dire warning about a new threat posed by ISIS, using encrypted communication to give would-be U.S. terrorists orders to kill. Listen to this startling admission by the FBI director.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAMES COMEY, FBI DIRECTOR: We have disrupted just in the last few weeks very serious efforts to kill people in the United States. I know I'm giving information to bad people. We cannot break strong encryption.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Our correspondents, analysts and guests are standing by with full coverage of all the top stories developing right now.

And I want to begin the breaking news in Baltimore. We have CNN justice reporter Evan Perez. He covered the Baltimore riots. He's joining us in THE SITUATION ROOM, along with national correspondent Suzanne Malveaux, who is in Baltimore today.

And Evan, the mayor of Baltimore just spoke out. What did he -- what did she say?

EVAN PEREZ, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Brianna, there's a breakdown in order. That's simply what has been happening in Baltimore. And Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, the mayor of Baltimore, said that there was too much focus being put on the leadership. Murders have been spiking and violence has been spiking in the city, as well as arrests have been going down.

Here's how the mayor put it in making the change today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEPHANIE RAWLINGS-BLAKE, MAYOR OF BALTIMORE: Too many continue to die on our streets, including three just last night and one earlier today. Families are tired of feeling this pain, and so am I. Recent events have placed an intense focus on our police leadership, distracting many from what needs to be our main focus, the fight against crime.

So we need a change. This was not an easy decision, but it is one that is in the best interests of the people of Baltimore.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PEREZ: And Brianna, 147 murders so far this year, the number of arrests down dramatically in the last couple of months. In May there were 1,952; 3,200 in April, and 3,100 in March.

It goes to show you that beyond the disorder, the murders, the shootings that are pretty much a fixture of Baltimore life, there's also been a slowdown, frankly, in the number of arrests being made by police. And so the question has been, you know, what can Anthony Batts, the commissioner there, do about it? So far it has not worked, whatever -- whatever prescriptions he's offered have not worked. And so that's the reason for the change. She's appointing Kevin Davis, who is the deputy commissioner there, to lead the police department to help fix things.

Not clear whether or not he's going to keep the job permanently. We had heard last week that the mayor, the office here down in Baltimore, had actually reached out to some potential candidates, so we had an inkling that this news was coming. We didn't know it was coming today. But we certainly expected that there was going to be change made.

KEILAR: All right. Thanks, Evan.

And Suzanne, you were actually reporting on the ground there in Baltimore today. Members of the police union have their say. What's their role in all of this?

[17:05:08] SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN CORRESPONDENT: And you know, it's incredible how this happened today, because we were in Baltimore earlier. And there was this report that they issued, 31 pages. It's a scathing record, Brianna, of like how the police department handled the unrest, the civil unrest going that turned into the riots in April after the death and funeral of Freddie Gray.

And what it says is it blames the commissioner point-blank and also blames the mayor, as well. Saying that it was not handled, that the safety of the citizens and police were at risk, that they were vulnerable. There are incidents where the police say, through their own accounts that night, that they had their helmets and were told not to use their issued helmets; that they were told to stand down. We've heard those stories before. And that they were to pull back and simply watch the looters and the rioters and what took place on that night and into the morning.

And so the -- I asked the president of the FOP today, is it time for the commissioner to go? And he said, "Well, this is not the time to step down but rather step up."

The mayor, she saw this report, as well, earlier today, and she blasted this report. And she said this is political; it is baseless. Nevertheless, over the last couple of hours before that press conference is when everything changed.

KEILAR: And there is certainly a reaction to this coming from the folks who are being criticized by the union, right?

PEREZ: That's right. You know, the -- you know, the commissioner there, Anthony Batts, in an interview with me just right after the disturbances addressed some of these, and said he was -- it was clear that these police did not have enough training. There were officers there who never had any kind of riot training before.

I asked him at the time, you know, "You've been there long enough. Why didn't you change that? Isn't this on your watch that some of this has happened?"

He acknowledged that some of the changes that he was trying to make weren't happening quickly enough. He clearly has run out of time.

But you know, it's clear also, though, Brianna -- and Suzanne points to the fact that, you know, this police department. It doesn't matter who's at the top. If the officers don't want to do what is supposed to be done, you know, if the union is saying that there's some other greater issue, then that's something that the city has to deal with. And they continue to have officers who decide that they don't want to carry out certain arrests because of concern over the legalities of what's going on there, arrests of those officers in Freddie Gray, that then, you know, there's really not much more that they can do.

MALVEAUX: And we heard this from Councilman Carl Stokes, as well. He was one of the people that was very vocal, said there was a lot of pressure for the mayor to step up here. And she has been defending the commissioner for time and time again, every time she's asked. And then it simply got to be too much of an attraction.

KEILAR: All right, Suzanne, Evan, thank you so much.

And I want to talk now with Billy Murphy is the attorney of the family of Freddie Gray. He's joining us now on the phone.

Mr. Murphy, thanks so much for being with us, and I know that -- I'm hoping that you've spoken with Freddie Gray's family since this announcement. Have you been able to? Have they reacted?

BILLY MURPHY, ATTORNEY FOR FAMILY OF FREDDIE GRAY (via phone): No, it only came to our camp two minutes ago. So I don't have any word from them.

KEILAR: What does this mean from your perspective? What does this mean from the vantage point of what they want to see done?

MURPHY: Well, as the commissioner failed to reform Baltimore's extraordinarily racist police culture and its corrupt blue wall of silence that makes good cops scared to police bad cops. And because this racist culture is as old as Baltimore itself, it will take much more than a new commissioner to grapple with it and eliminate it.

KEILAR: So what is...

MURPHY: And we see this every day. Because we can complain after complain after complain in the wake of Freddie Gray's death. About people who are still dealing with the same old kind of policing that existed here before -- before Mr. Gray's death.

So very little has changed from the perspective of what is happening on the streets of Baltimore and how police who have been in the department for years continue to act in the old way.

KEILAR: So what do you think, Mr. Murphy? What do you think needs to be done beyond top leadership being replaced?

MURPHY: Well, it's a matter not just the top leadership. It's a matter of just analyzing the department from top to bottom and getting rid of some of these old racist cops that are unwilling to change, and set an example for -- in terms of disciplining these officers who keep doing it the old racist way.

And where the federal government has been involved with Baltimore for the past year or so, to try to get the -- a different culture, but you know, when you have the same people who are committed to the old culture, who you're now trying to tell to change, that just doesn't work.

[17:10:16] KEILAR: All right. Billy Murphy, the attorney for the family of Freddie Gray, thanks so much.

And joining me now is Justin Fenton. He is a reporter for "The Baltimore Sun." He has covered the police there in Baltimore for years.

What's the reaction, Justin, to this news that has just broken that the top police official in Baltimore is gone?

JUSTIN FENTON, REPORTER, "THE BALTIMORE SUN" (via phone): Well, certainly, he's been under fire for several months now, but there was a sense that he was -- he and the mayor were going to try to weather this. He had held many events where he was trying to show how much the police were engaged and were trying to keep focused on fighting crime and solving cases, but the murder rate has continued to climb.

I would say that I would agree with your correspondents, that the timing of it was certainly a surprise. There was a prominent community group today that called for him to step down. They, too, cited the street violenceand the crime rate. And then the FOP report came out.

But when the mayor issued such a stinging rebuke of that report, it seemed like, you know, the agency was going to continue along with its review. And in fact, Commissioner Batts had scheduled a press conference for 4 p.m. to talk about that outside review that the agency was doing, and his firing was announced at about 3:45, cancelling that.

KEILAR: What do you think, Justin, precipitated this? Why then, what appears to be, certainly, a change in how you thought things might be going, that he and the mayor would weather this together?

FENTON: He's certainly a reform-minded commissioner in terms of just putting in place so many different task forces and independent studies. And they had a consultant report that recommended changes in just about every aspect of the agency.

They had trouble with buy-in on that. And the rank and file said that they felt that he was distracted, that he was going to, whatever the complaint of the day was. And I think that what the mayor said was that, you know, the officers, it's just become too distracting. There's too much going on, and we need a change so we can settle this police department and get the ship righted.

KEILAR: What about the rank and file? You just heard from the lawyer of Freddie Gray's family, and they feel that the rank and file are part of the problem here, that they're part of the issue that the community has with police. Do you expect that any changes will be made there?

FENTON: That was certainly a struggle that he had from day one. He -- Commissioner Batts came here from California. Almost from the start, people were skeptical of him within the agency. There was -- there was a period where it seemed like, you know, things were humming along, but there continued to be, I would say scandal, after scandal here, quite frankly, constantly putting out fires. And I think that the events of the past couple months really caused things to boil over.

KEILAR: Justin Fenton with "The Baltimore Sun," really appreciate your insight there, having reported on the Baltimore Police.

And I want to bring in CNN law enforcement analyst, and former FBI assistant director Tom Fuentes now to talk about this.

Tom, we know that there had been intense criticism of the police commissioner for some time. And it sounded like, as well, he was being criticized from the get-go by the rank and file, and then certainly criticized in the wake of what we saw go down in Baltimore following the death of Freddie Gray. Was this just inevitable? Did you ever think he had a chance of weathering this?

TOM FUENTES, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: No, I don't think he did. You know, if you look back to what he was trying to do, and he tried some community policing initiatives before the death of Freddie Gray. It just didn't really seem to take. He never really got community buy-in.

Then after the death of Freddie Gray, when you had those riots, when his principal spokesman go -- went in front of the media that day, and said, "Well, we had a choice between protecting property and protecting people, and we chose people," that was the most absurd statement I have ever heard a senior official say. You're there to protect both. And if you couldn't do it, that's why we have backups. That's why we have mutual assistance. They could have had all the police agencies in the county and the state, even as far away as Washington, D.C., one hour drive away, to come help. And they didn't even call for it.

KEILAR: Do you think some of this is an issue? Do you think part of the problem is an issue with the culture within the rank and file and not just in the top leadership?

FUENTES: I don't think it's just the culture. I think the culture is going to reflect senior management, executive management and the political will.

KEILAR: It's all one and the same you think?

FUENTES: Well, I think it's one and the same. There's been such a lack of leadership, from the mayor, the city council on down, criticized the police for being too aggressive, and using stop and frisk and aggressive tactics to take weapons off the street, try to bring the murder rate down, and then turn around and then criticize them for that, even bring criminal charges, as we saw happen.

And so the police are now in the position where they don't really want to take a proactive measure, because that's profiling. They want to wait and get a 911 call. Then they'll go respond to it.

And you've seen what happened. When the police aren't there, it's not the community leaders. It's not the clergy. It's not the educators that are on the street at midnight keeping these individuals from gunning each other down. It's the cops. And if they're not back, and if people don't wake up and realize that we need the police to do their job, and exactly, we don't want them to be racist. We don't want them to be biased. We don't want racial profiling.

But we need them to step up and go face-to-face with these young gangsters and take those guns out of their hands. And unless the cops do it, nobody else is.

KEILAR: All right. Tom Fuentes. Stay with me, because we'll be talking much more about this in the minutes ahead. The top police official for Baltimore police gone. He has left the department.

And up next, we will also be talking about two big computer meltdowns today, shutting down the New York Stock Exchange, and United Airline flights. We've got that ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:20:18] KEILAR: This is developing right now. Officials at United Airlines and the New York Stock Exchange are trying to figure out what caused today's massive computer failures. United flights were grounded worldwide. The stock exchange was forced to halt trading for more than three hours. Two massive computer failures on the same day. Was this a mere coincidence or not?

CNN aviation correspondent Rene Marsh has been working her sources. What are you finding?

RENE MARSH, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: Well, we have three major U.S. operations essentially brought to a standstill today because of computer glitches.

Right now the companies say this was not the work of hackers. The New York Stock Exchange calling it a technical issue, United Airlines blaming a faulty router.

With the confluence of tech failures in one day within hours of each other, a bizarre coincidence, to say the least.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARSH (voice-over): For nearly four hours, the New York Stock Exchange was at a halt. A technical computer glitch forcing the suspension of trades on the big board. It's unclear this hour how much money may have been lost, but in the end, the Dow was down over 200 points. And in the travel world, from California to Chicago, a backlog of passengers stuck on long airport lines, while all of United Airlines' flights were grounded.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: United 1258, when you say it's going to be a long wait, how long does that mean?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, they have a system-wide ground stop due to a computer outage.

MARSH: A system-wide failure shut down operations for the major U.S. carrier for hours, as well. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We were checking in, and basically was told that

the flight was canceled, so they started rerouting us.

I mean, we're just, you know, taking it as it goes.

MARSH: More than 800 flights delayed, another 59 canceled. Agents were forced to issue handwritten tickets.

SETH KAPLAN, AIRLINE ANALYST: The problem is that when it happens at a giant airline like United, you can get chaos, the kind that we saw this morning. Passengers just have a matter of minutes to make their connecting flights. When you have flights that are held sometimes not for minutes, but even hours, that can cascade through the entire system.

MARSH: But government officials quickly tried to assure the public that these were not malicious attacks.

JEH JOHNSON, HOMELAND SECURITY SECRETARY: The malfunctions at United and the stock exchange were not the result of any nefarious actor.

JOSH EARNEST, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: There's no indication that malicious actors were involved in these technology issues.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MARSH: While we don't have any hard numbers on how many trades were lost. Looking at the volumes of trades today, there were about 200 million fewer trades than you'd usually see.

President Obama is being kept abreast of the situation. And on the airline front, passengers, Brianna, still dealing with that ripple effect, the delays. You were one of the passengers earlier today.

KEILAR: I was. That's right.

MARSH: Now you're here. But this mess will continue throughout the day and possibly even into tomorrow.

KEILAR: I woke up in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, and went to get on my United flight, and they ended up having to put me through manually. And then when I got on the plane, all of the passengers, we had our names written down, and that was the manifest.

MARSH: Old school.

KEILAR: It's really old school. That's what they called it.

All right. Rene Marsh, thanks so much.

So far, though, no indication that today's massive outages were cyberattacks. CNN chief national security correspondent Jim Sciutto has been working his sources. What are you hearing, Jim?

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, Brianna, the DHS, the Department of Homeland Security, told me very quickly that there were, quote, "no signs of malicious activity." The FBI springing into action immediately to investigate it as it was happening. But I'm told, as Rene was reporting, the NYSE knew very quickly what this issue was. It was not a cyberattack. Same for United.

Still, when you look at these targets, you can understand why the suspicions were there earlier. A key company, United. The nation's stock exchange, a major media outlet. And the forensics investigation of what led to all these happen on the same day. Even if it was just coincidence, that forensic investigation is still under way.

But today on the Hill we heard testimony on another threat that is certainly very real. It's an existing threat. And that is encrypted communications used by terrorists. This is something repeated to me by every intel and counterterror official I speak with. And to highlight how immediate that threat is, and remember the concern we are reporting about before the July 4 weekend, here's what the FBI director, James Comey, said just a short time ago.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAMES COMEY, FBI DIRECTOR: We have hundreds of these investigations. Every single state. We have disrupted just in the last few weeks very serious efforts to kill people in the United States.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: Very serious efforts to kill people in the United States. That gives you a clear indication of just how immediate the threat is. And the FBI's ability to intercept and disrupt attacks like this, greatly reduced by an increased use of encryption by terrorists, suspected terrorists and others.

[17:25:09] These are widely available apps and messaging services, things called Kick and Surespot. And the way they work, basically, is the users send messages to each other. The receiver gets a key to decode that message. The FBI director made it clear that it has no secret way to counter this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

COMEY: We have investigations in all 50 states of people who are consuming this stuff. It's buzzing in their pocket all day long. And they're trying to seek meaning in some sick way. And they are responding to this, and then they disappear and move over to mobile messaging apps. This is an enormous problem.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: And they have no way to counteract this. So what they're asking for is for legislation to allow them to use a search warrant, in effect, to break encryption. But I'll tell you, Brianna, that there's a group of technical and security experts who came out with their own report, tying to Director Comey's testimony today, saying this would not work. And one thing they say is this. This is interesting in the light of

all these hacks we've seen recently -- OPM, for instance -- they say that if you give the government the keys to decrypt these messages, you can't trust the government with them. Because they could very well be hacked, and then everyone would have them out there. In effect you can't trust the government with this kind of security information.

Listen, you know, based on the kinds of hacks we've seen, and today these were not hacks, so says at the DHS. But we saw the OPM hack and many other recently. Based on that, you can understand that argument.

KEILAR: That's right. The Office of Personnel Management, which essentially deals, essentially, as HR for so many government employees.

SCIUTTO: Millions of people, and the most secure information about millions of federal employees released in a hack. So that shows you, if they can do that, they can easily get these keys for encryption. It's a real debate going on.

KEILAR: It is a real concern. Jim Sciutto, thank you so much.

And joining me now to talk more about this, Kevin Mandia. He's the president of the computer security firm FireEye. And we have former House Intelligence chairman, CNN national security commutator Mike Rogers.

So Kevin, explain to us exactly what encryption is and also why ISIS appears to be so much better at this, and why ISIS is really stumping the U.S. and allies?

KEVIN MANDIA, PRESIDENT, FIREEYE: Well, whenever it comes to espionage, there's always been a little Spy vs. Spy. Every new technology, if it can allow surreptitious communications, it's going to be adopted by bad guys.

So there's a whole bunch of advocates out there saying it's important to have privacy. We need encryption that's unbreakable. But for the 10 percent or 5 percent or how many people, innately bad people or innately evil or innately ideologically opposed to what America stands for, obviously, encryption can be used to have surreptitious communications. If we just can't pierce anonymity behind these people, nor can we be privy to their movements or their intentions. So it's just another tool in the tool bag.

KEILAR: It is another tool. All right, Congressman, you were chairman of the House intel committee. You know a lot about this. Put this into context for us. How much does ISIS's use of encryption hinder the intel gathering that's so essential for the U.S.?

MIKE ROGERS, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY COMMENTATOR: Well, it's not just ISIS. It's all of the bad actors that our intelligence community and law enforcement track. And it's getting more and more serious.

We debated this, Brianna, for years about this notion of going dark. And it's been very difficult to get policy makers caught up with what the real threat is.

I was encouraged to see Director Comey today, laying it out in very clear terms. This is a big and growing problem.

So you have tech companies who are making, rightly so, the case about privacy. This is about privacy. At the same time they're creating a system that would not allow law enforcement or intelligence to stop violent acts either of terrorism or of criminal acts here in the United States and around the world.

This is a debate we're going to have to have. And it is having serious consequences. They call it going dark. And that's exactly what they're seeing happen and I think why you saw the director of the FBI so concerned today.

KEILAR: Kevin, I want to ask you about these two giant computer failures, these meltdowns that we saw in United Airlines, the New York Stock Exchange. We're being told by the U.S. government nothing nefarious here, but how can they be so sure? Might it take some time to determine that positively?

MANDIA: And your goal is to triage that very, very quickly, it could be all three mixed there going down it but at the end of the day, just observing this from the outside. I think it was just a coincidence that these things happened on the same day.

Every day there are companies going down by accident with a hardware or software glitch. But these are just very prominent organizations that went off the grid today.

KEILAR: All right. Kevin Mandia; congressman Mike Rogers. A so also our CNN contributor. Thanks so much to both of you for giving us some for giving us context here.

[17:30:00] Coming up, with U.S. help, Iraqi forces are planning an operation to recapture an ISIS-held city and reverse a humiliating defeat. We have new information on that.

And Jared, the pitchman that you know for the restaurant chain, he may have dropped 245 pounds by eating Subway sandwiches, but now Subway is dropping him. What's going on there. Big day?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KEILAR: Two months ago, Iraqi troops fled from the major city of Ramadi, basically handing it over to ISIS. And now with the U.S. assistance, a campaign is in the works to reverse that humiliating defeat. And the stakes couldn't be higher. CNN Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr has new information on this.

Barbara, what are you learning?

[17:35:10] BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Brianna, this is one of the most critical developments in the U.S. war against ISIS, a development that may be coming very soon.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

STARR (voice-over): CNN has learned Iraqi troops may soon begin combat operations to retake Ramadi from ISIS control, a town they lost to ISIS in May when they abandoned their posts in the face of an ISIS offensive. A U.S. officials tells CNN that the U.S. has been helping the Iraqis put together an assault plan that could be ready to go within the next two to three weeks.

ASHTON CARTER, U.S. DEFENSE SECRETARY: This will be a test of the competence of the Iraqi security forces. And it's a test that they must past.

STARR: Just weeks ago, the defense secretary furious when Iraqis ran from Ramadi, the second largest city in the ISIS stronghold of Anbar province.

CARTER: What apparently happened was that the Iraqi forces just showed no will to fight.

STARR: The joint chiefs chairman laying out new battle plan details.

GEN. MARTIN DEMPSEY, JOINT CHIEFS CHAIRMAN: The Ramadi campaign, which about a month ago was about to be executed precipitously, has actually been, with our help, is now a very deliberate campaign, first to isolate it, and then to go back and recapture it.

STARR: Iraqi forces would begin by moving west towards Ramadi from Takata Air Base. Already, Shia militia units are on the outskirts to isolate ISIS inside the city. At the same time other Iraqi forces would move east towards Fallujah to ensure ISIS forces there don't stage an attack from the rear.

But there are thousands of ISIS fighters inside Ramadi. It's a huge challenge to get them out and hold onto the city.

LT. GEN. MARK HERTLING (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: It's tough to even go in and clear houses, clear rooms, because as soon as you open a door, you're going to find an explosive device.

STARR: The battlefield is changing in Syria, as well. In the region, growing concern that Bashar al-Assad's regime is on the verge of collapse, the joint chiefs chairman struggling to predict what the day after would look like.

DEMPSEY: I won't sit here today and tell you that I have the answer to that, but I will tell you that we're in consultations, even as I sit here, with the Turks, the Israelis, and the Jordanians about that scenario.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

STARR: Now those Iraqi secure forces have a tall order ahead of them. If, in fact, they can kick ISIS out of the Ramadi -- and that will be very difficult -- but if they can, their next step is to convince the people of Ramadi to trust the government in Baghdad and trust those Iraqi forces -- Brianna. KEILAR: Might be even more difficult, the second thing there, Barbara. Thanks so much. Barbara Starr at the Pentagon.

And coming up, another deadline comes and goes, but the U.S. and other world powers are still negotiating with Iran on a nuclear deal. Will they reach the finish line? I'll be asking State Department senior advisor Marie Harf.

And Donald Trump is talking to CNN's Anderson Cooper. You've heard his shocking comments on immigration. Wait until you hear what he has to say next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:43:01] KEILAR: A deadline came and went this week, but the United States and other world powers are still negotiating with Iran on a nuclear deal. There's been enough progress, and there's so much at stake that the parties just may keep talking.

And joining me now to talk more about what's going on, State Department senior advisor Marie Harf.

Marie, thanks for being with us. And just tell us: is there an actual hard deadline for the deal at this point?

MARIE HARF, SENIOR ADVISOR, STATE DEPARTMENT: Well, Brianna, we're really taking these talks day by day at this point. I think one of my colleagues referred to this, used a baseball analogy of going into extra innings. And that's really where we are right now.

You know, we've always been more focused a getting a really good agreement and the quality of that agreement than on any date on a calendar. Certainly, we've heard Democrats and Republicans say they want us to keep talking if that means getting a better deal, and that's exactly what we're focused on right now.

KEILAR: What is the holdup here? I know that we've been hearing from government officials like yourself this is all very technical, but tell us what the general sticking points are here. Is it breakout time? Is it sanctions? What is it?

HARF: Well, there's not just one sticking point. You know, when you get such a complicated technical agreement, every single piece has to come together at the end. And we always knew at the end of these talks these would be the toughest issues. That's sort of how these negotiations work, that the toughest issues often come down to the very end.

So on our side, we have to be assured that the nuclear steps Iran is taking gets to a year breakout time, cuts off their four pathways to a nuclear weapon. And the Iranians need to have the kind of assurances they need on the sanctions side. So every single word of these texts and these annexes is being pored over right now by our experts in the hotel behind me. And that just takes a lot of time, and there are some big sticking points that remain. KEILAR: But if this is so open-ended, and it appears, as you've said,

that there is no hard and fast deadline, that this is in extra innings at this point, we're hearing concerns even from top Democrats, the No. 2 Democrat in the House, saying he's worried that the U.S. is getting rope-a-doped by Iran. What assurances can you give, can the secretary give that's not happening?

HARF: Well, Brianna, the reason we are still here talking and we haven't signed on to an agreement yesterday is we don't have an agreement that's good enough yet. It doesn't have all the assurances we need. It doesn't meet our bottom line, so we are taking more time.

You know, I've heard, as I said, Republicans and Democrats come out and say if the secretary and this team need some more time, they should keep taking it and they should keep pushing the Iranians to get what we need.

But, you know, these decisions also don't get harder -- or don't get easier, excuse me, with time, they get harder because there are political decisions that both the Iranians and others have to take here. So we are seeing if we can finish this in this round. Nobody is talking about staying for months or months here. We all want to get home and we're going to see if we can get this done.

KEILAR: But -- so what is the time then when you say -- when the U.S. says it's time to walk away?

HARF: Well, that's a great question. At this point we really are taking it day to day. Our team, including Secretary Kerry, are still up. It's almost midnight here, meeting behind me with the Iranians, with our other partners, seeing if we can keep pushing and keep making progress. And we really don't know how these next days will play out. I'm sure we'll know more, as they do, about what the future holds, but we're closer than we've ever been, but we're not there yet.

KEILAR: But if you don't have a line of when you should walk away, how do you rebuff this criticism that perhaps the secretary and the president are just too eager to get a deal?

HARF: Well, I would counter that by saying, you know, we've been negotiating for 18 months here. And if we were too eager to get a deal, we would have taken one a long time ago. We wouldn't have had our experts here for the last time -- sorry, it's a little windy here in Vienna tonight. We wouldn't have had our experts here for over a month now hashing out every single detail with the Iranians and with our other partners. We are going to stay at the table until we get a good deal and until the decisions are made to get us there.

KEILAR: All right, Marie Harf, in Vienna, thanks so much for joining us. I know we'll be talking to you in the days to come.

And coming up, he was the symbol for Subway for more than a decade, famous for dropping more than 200 pounds, eating sandwiches, but now amid controversy, Subway is dropping Jared Fogle.

And Donald Trump talks with CNN's Anderson Cooper. Will he double down on his shocking remarks about immigrants? Hear what he had to say.

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DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Some from the Middle East. We don't know where they're coming from. We check on that building probably --

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[17:51:51] KEILAR: The abrupt dismissal of one of the country's most well-known pitchmen is raising lots of questions tonight. Jared Fogle was the face of Subway sandwich shops for years. You know him.

CNN's Brian Todd has been looking into what changed here -- Brian.

BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Brianna, what changed was Jared Fogle's image very suddenly. All it took was the optics of federal agents swarming his house, removing computers and documents. Tonight Fogle's lawyer tells us he's not been arrested, not been charged with anything. But this story has layers that have made the Subway chain very uncomfortable.

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JARED FOGLE: Hi, I'm Jared the Subway guy. And this is my story.

TODD (voice-over): He was among the most famous pitchmen in fast food.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hey, Jared.

FOGLE: Hey, guys.

TODD: But tonight, Jared Fogle is no longer a spokesman for the Subway restaurant chain and he's at the center of law enforcement activity that's raising a lot of questions. Federal and state law enforcement agents have raided Fogle's home, cordoned off computers and other electronics and left neighbors bewildered.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The only thing I ever see around their home are the happy people, doing their yard, waving. So I'm shocked and upset, of course, and saddened.

TODD: Also shocked the Subway chain which immediately suspended its relationship with Fogle and issued a statement saying they believe it is related to a prior investigation of a former Jared Foundation employee.

Subway didn't name the employee but in May, Russell Taylor who worked for Fogle's anti-obesity foundation was charged with seven counts of producing and possessing child pornography. According to the charging document, two thumb drives found in Taylor's home which had child pornography on them also had references to Taylor's employer. Taylor's attorneys are not commenting. Jared Fogle's lawyer tells CNN

Fogle has not been arrested or charged with any crime and is cooperating with law enforcement.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is he upset? How is he handling all of this?

RONALD ELBERGER, JARED FOGLE'S ATTORNEY: I think quite well.

TODD: The partnership between Jared Fogle and Subway has been a resounding success for 15 years. The chain found out about the young man who had once weighed more than 400 pound and inhaled fast food, then claimed he'd lost more than 200 pounds by eating Subway sandwiches and exercising.

FOGLE: You got to believe this face. You know. Come on.

TODD: Subway's sales skyrocketed immediately after Fogle's ad started airing and he is reported to now have a net worth of $15 million.

Dan McGinn, a crisis and branding expert who's advised several companies, says that all may all come crashing down.

DAN MCGINN, CRISIS AND BRANDING EXPERT: Even without confirmation, facts, there've been no charges filed here, it is absolutely devastating to his career and his brand standing. His identity is so narrow. It's just one thing with one company with one issue. And this is going to stick to him.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

TODD: Dan McGinn points our Subway had been reducing Fogle's role in recent years even before this. And he says Subway's brand was already in trouble. Sales have been down. Competition from chains like Panera and Quiznos has been a real threat to Subway and they absolutely cannot afford to associate themselves with Jared Fogle right at this moment. Subway did not return our calls or e-mails. Seeking comment on that -- Brianna.

KEILAR: Brian, thanks so much for the reporting.

Coming up, Baltimore's mayor suddenly fires the police commissioner amid widespread criticism of his response to the riots that erupted after the death in custody of Freddie Gray.

[17:55:10] And Donald Trump is talking to CNN. He's not backing down on his shocking comments about immigrants. But what about the immigrants he employs?

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ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: They're talking about the building we are sitting in right now. They're saying Trump Tower was built --

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(COMMERCIAL BREAK) KEILAR: Happening now. Breaking news, police chief fired in the aftermath of the Baltimore riots and Freddie Gray's death. The city's top cop has just been ousted. What will it mean for racial tensions and violent crimes?

[18:00:01] Cyber failures. Computer meltdowns paralyze America's biggest stock exchange and a major airline. Their connection here and who's to blame.