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Chicago Teacher Explains Strike; Jobs the Number One Priority for Both Campaigns; Iraqi V.P. Sentenced; Over 90 Killed in Iraqi Violence; Obama Sees Bounce in Polls, Cash; O.J. Trial Evidence Tampering Claim; Wells Fargo Forecloses on Wrong House.

Aired September 10, 2012 - 11:00   ET

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

CASEY WIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's the big question, Ashleigh. We're at a school where parents are allowed to drop their children off for from 8:30 to 12:30 local time this morning. It's one of 144 schools that the district has set up to provide some temporary child care for those parents who don't have any other alternative.

There are only a handful of children inside this school and one of the reasons why you can see behind me, right there. You've got several teachers who teach at this school manning a picket line and my stance is that a lot of parents probably do not want their children to have to cross that picket line and have to against, if you will, their own teachers.

There are churches in Chicago. There are parks in Chicago that have also set up temporary spaces, facilities for the children to go to. Some of them operate four hours. Some of them are all day. But, for many parents, we've seen kinds wandering around in the street in this neighborhood who obviously should be in school. That's clearly a big concern for a lot of parents.

The teachers say they are very concerned about job issues, specifically job security. There's a new teacher evaluation system being put into place that relies on test scores. The teachers don't like that. They also don't want any changes to their health benefits. The school district for its part says it has made the most generous offer it can to these teachers, a 16 percent raise over four years for the average teacher. Here's what the school district had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DAVID VITALE, PRESIDENT, CHICAGO BOARD OF EDUCATION: The mayor said last night that this was a strike of choice, choice by the teachers, the teachers union, that it was avoidable and it was.

For the last several days, we've been negotiating intensely. We've made over 20 proposals to improve this offer and, apparently, we were making proposals at the time they were out walking out on strike.

So, the mayor believes that this was totally unavoidable, that this can, in fact, be concluded because we are very close and he has been intimately involved in our negotiations through me.

(END VIDEO CLIP) WIAN: One of the biggest things that parents I've spoken with this morning are concerned about, believe it or not, is the prospect of violence, especially when you deal with older students.

Chicago, as it's been well reported, is in a violent -- it's been a violent year here. The murder rate is up 32 percent, 360 murders in this city so far this year. One week in August there were 14 murders in seven days. Parents very worried about their kids out on the street given the violent climate that has been in this city for most of this year, Ashleigh.

ASHLEIGH BANFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Casey Wian, 25 years since this happened in that city. Let's hope it doesn't last as long as it did the last time. How many days did it last, last time, Casey?

WIAN: You know, I believe it was -- if my memory serves me correctly, I believe it was 19 days. Don't hold me to that. It was a long time. No one wants it to be longer than a day or two here.

BANFIELD: Right. Actually, our graphics department got that. Our crack team got that up right away.

All right, Casey, stand by, if you will for a minute. Thank you.

There's something else that you should know about, lost in all of this, the thousands of kids who do sports. High school football, soccer, all those other things that kids really, really depend on, those are also officially supposed to be shut down. The Chicago school system has been petitioning the state to allow the games to go on, but we don't know. Apparently, later on today, we should get a decision on that.

Joining me right now, live, is Jay Rehak who's a veteran Chicago public school teacher. He's also an executive board member of the Chicago teachers' union.

Jay, thanks very much for being with me. Let me start with this. As I understand it, some of the most difficult points between the union and the school is the standardized testing and how it affects pay and how it affects job security. Tell me if I'm right or wrong and tell me how you're going to get beyond this.

JAY C. REHAK, VETERAN CHICAGO PUBLIC SCHOOLS TEACHER: Well, it is a fundamental problem, Ashleigh, and thank you for having me on the show. It's beyond just merit-pay ideas. It actually is job security. Currently, the plan is to use the standardized test score for a significant amount of teacher evaluation. And, clearly, clearly to anyone who thinks about this for five seconds, we realize that children go into school with different learning capacities, different levels of educational preparedness.

I work at a magnet school, so, of course, if they decided that they were going to give merit pay, they might give me a tremendous raise, but my neighborhood colleagues in the schools that work and do the really difficult work of working in schools with tremendous socioeconomic conditions, those people would be considered failures. They have been considered failures.

This school system continues to close schools because they call the school a failure, even though these kids are working and teachers are working and children are learning in very, very difficult conditions. It's completely unfair.

BANFIELD: But notwithstanding, I think that point is well-taken, Jay, that, you know, clearly, some kids in some neighborhoods are just set up to fail and other kids aren't. They don't face those same challenges and, therefore, standardized testing can be very difficult in terms of assessing what the teachers are like.

REHAK: Somehow you're going to measure people, you're going to close schools based on that? You know, fire people for this?

BANFIELD: So that's my next point.

REHAK: That's the fundamental issue right now is that you cannot be firing people for that.

BANFIELD: How else do you evaluate? Because, listen, you know, a lot of parents -- I'm one of them. I want to know how good those teachers are and, if standardized testing isn't the way to do it, what other way can we find out who the bad apples are and get rid of them?

REHAK: Well, Ashleigh, I've got a little bit of bad news for the world. The actual answer to that problem is you have to do a significant amount of time looking in the classroom, having significant classroom observation. That is the only way it can be done. Everything else is a certain sense of data-driven madness, the idea that somehow you can measure me by my student's test scores when we don't know exactly where they're coming from and what their backgrounds are, et cetera.

I work in a magnet school, as I said, so everyone would think I'm the greatest teacher in the world. When I worked on the west side of Chicago in some of the most difficult conditions, people would say, oh, you're a failure. What a lousy teacher you are.

So, you have to move beyond it. We have to get to a point where people actually spend a significant amount of time in the classroom ...

BANFIELD: I agree. You know, I do my best.

REHAK: ... observing, but unfortunately, these principals don't have the time to do it.

BANFIELD: You're right. That's it, exactly. I have a good job and I have good pay and I have good help at home to get me through this, but I tell you what. I try to get into that classroom as often as I can to see what's going on. I do my due diligence, but I know a lot of people out there who are working two jobs and they can barely make ends meet getting sleep at night, let alone checking in with the classroom, going and visiting and trying to do that, so it is hard. Have you lost -- if you lost Rahm Emanuel and if he came in at the top of his term as mayor and started making these extraordinary, fiscally conservative maneuvers, he's a Democrat and this is the land of Democrats. This is where Obama's campaign is based. If you've lost these guys, do you have hope?

REHAK: Well, he's definitely been a disappointment not only to the teachers, but to the policemen in this town, to the civil servants in this town, the firemen. He has been a huge disappointment. He has disrespected virtually every middle-class person in this city. I don't exactly understand why he did that. We can't understand why he has precipitated this strike. We don't know.

We ask ourselves, why is he insisting on disrespecting the teachers who serve this community? We don't understand it. We agree with you. We wonder what kind of a Democrat is he.

BANFIELD: Well, you've got to understand it because, look, you know, Democrats and Republicans love their kids equally and everybody is frustrated with how much life costs these days. And we all want to cut back and we all want the best services. And someone's got to give and both sides have to give equally.

Are you giving equally and are you being fair to Rahm Emanuel, who has always professed these ideals and is trying to make ends meet with what he's got?

REHAK: Well, he's got to walk the walk. He just can't talk the talk. He's -- again, he came in and disrespected the teachers in this city. We had a contract from the previous mayor, which he abrogated. He basically said, you're not going to get the raise that we were actually contractually given. Then he turn around and said, however, we don't have the money for that, but we do have 2-percent if you work longer.

Well, you can't really have it both ways. You either don't have the money or you do.

So, he's, again, throughout his entire term -- and we don't know why. We don't understand it. We don't understand why he would disrespect not only the teachers in this town, but the firemen, the police, and every civil servant in this town has been disrespected by this man and we don't understand why.

BANFIELD: I tell you what I don't understand. I never thought I'd see Rahm Emanuel battling with the unions. But, listen, Mr. Rehak, for the sake of all those kids in your town, I hope you all can figure this one out and I welcome you back on the program as hopefully this doesn't go on long, but as we try to come to some resolution.

REHAK: We all hope it ends soon, too, Ashleigh.

BANFIELD: Jay Rehak, joining us live, thank you and best of luck to both sides in this particular story. We are back right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) BANFIELD: Hey, do you think the 112th Congress doesn't have much to show for itself? And a lot of Americans think just that, judging from these polls. You may expect a burst of activity in the pre-election session that gets underway today. Lawmakers tackling a year's worth of unfinished business, rested and refreshed after five weeks of recess. Allow me to burst your bubble. Time is short, ambitions are low and Dana Bash is live.

All right, Dana Bash, the latest poll has Congress at 10-percent approval rating. Who are the 10 percent, for starters? I'm not going to -- that's rhetorical, but more importantly ...

DANA BASH, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I will tell you John McCain likes to joke that it's blood relatives and pets, so there you go.

BANFIELD: All right, what are we going to actually get? What do we know for sure is going to get accomplished?

BASH: Well, we know for sure, as sure as we know anything around here, that neither party wants the government to shut down before the election. So, if you look at a list and, again, I'm not really sure you can call it a list if it's just one thing, there, you have it. Congress will pass -- at least, the House is going to start this week to pass a piece of legislation to fund the government at current spending levels through -- for six months.

Now, I should tell you that this isn't necessarily an accomplishment, Ashleigh, because they're supposed to do their job, which is pass about a dozen spending bills and they haven't done that at all, so this is a stop-gap measure.

BANFIELD: Are they going to have a banner that says, you know, welcome back mission unaccomplished? It's so frustrating for those of us out here who are hoping for the best, expecting very little, and are likely to come out with nothing.

Memories are short, but last year at around this time, we were talking about a deadline on the sequestration. If you can't get a budget deal in place, these automatic, extraordinarily austere measures are going to come into effect and, now, we're getting close to that actual date.

Can anything be done to stop what's coming at this point?

BASH: With regard to between now and the election, the answer is no. There is a long list of things that Congress has on its plate that it will not likely get done. Actually, won't get done, really, before the election. Before the end of the year, it's a different story.

But the first and most important thing is what you just talked about, the fiscal cliff. That is when -- at the end of the year when the Bush-era tax cuts expire and when, if Congress does nothing, $100 billion in spending cuts go into effect, automatically, and economists across the board say, if those two things happen, then it could sink our economy into another recession, so that would be a very, very bad news. Then you have a list of other things and those are just a few of the things. Cyber-security, violence against women and postal reform, those are a few things that are in a long list of legislative items that are not likely to get done.

BANFIELD: Dana Bash, with all your spare time as a working mother, would you please find me that 10 percent so I can interview them here, live, on the air and find out ...

BASH: I'm sure I'll actually find them here because they're mostly probably here.

BANFIELD: I'll bet they are. Dana Bash, live in D.C. for us this morning, thank you, ma'am.

And, by the way, both chambers are going to get down to business, officially, right there, on a beautiful sunny day with just a few clouds hanging. Isn't that just a metaphor right there? Just a few clouds hanging over them.

It all gets underway a little less than three hours from now. We're going to watch it live.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BANFIELD: Issue 2012, I always smile when Christine Romans joins me because -- I say, always. She gets me off the ledge. I'm not sure you can get me off the ledge on Friday's jobs number, though. I've been having nightmares, all weekend long, about jobs, jobs, jobs and I can only assume that the candidates are, too.

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Well, look, this is the most vexing problem in the economy right now, quite frankly. It means these are two candidates with very different philosophies on how to fix the jobs crisis.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ROMANS: Over 8 percent unemployment, 5 million without work for six months or longer, more than 8 million only working part-time, if there's one thing Mitt Romney and Barack Obama can agree on, the economy and, more specifically, the jobs crisis in America is the issue of this race.

Mitt Romney's philosophy, let the private sector create new jobs. President Obama agrees, but thinks the federal government must play a larger role by investing in programs that may pay off in the future.

MITT ROMNEY, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I have a plan to create 12 million new jobs.

ROMANS: Romney advisers also claim their plans will add another 7 million jobs over the decade.

ROMNEY: Government doesn't create jobs. It's the private sector that creates jobs. ROMANS: So, what's in this Romney plan? First, Romney wants to overhaul the tax code by cutting marginal tax rates 20 percent across the board. He argues that people will have more money in their pocket to buy things and, in turn, more jobs will be created to meet the demand for those goods and services.

Romney also claims that regulations cost private business about $1.75 trillion a year, so he says he'll repeal Obamacare and Dodd-Frank financial regulation, much of which is still yet to be implemented. He also plans to reform the regulatory system to make sure it balances the benefit to society with the cost to business.

Finally, by balancing the budget, Romney plans to inject confidence into the business environment. However, capping federal spending means hundreds of thousands fewer government jobs at the federal, state and local levels.

Supporters of Romney's plan say it will create 12 million jobs, conservatively, but no president has accomplished it in a single term since the data was first collected in the 1940s.

Now, for President Obama's plan to get more Americans back to work ...

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Jobs must be our number one focus in 2010, and that's why I'm calling for a new jobs bill tonight.

ROMNEY: Well, that jobs bill never panned out and neither did the $477 billion effort he promoted last year, both essentially blocked by Congress. So, what does Mr. Obama want to do moving forward? Similar to what he's proposed to the past.

OBAMA: We need to create more jobs, faster. We need to fill the hole left by this recession, faster. We need to come out of this crisis, stronger.

ROMANS: He wants to create jobs in manufacturing and green energy through tax incentives and investment. More spending on infrastructure, the President signed a more than $100 billion transportation bill in July. It extends mostly current programs through 2014. And the President also proposed spending $35 billion for school, police and fire department payrolls, along with another $130 billion to shore-up state budgets. This was in his failed jobs plan last year.

Yet to be seen, if he's re-elected, whether those plans would have more success than they've had in the last three years. Both candidates say they want to cut the corporate tax rate, expand energy jobs in the U.S. and support small business.

Whoever is elected will probably have to do all that and much more to get us out of the jobs hole.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BANFIELD: Twelve million jobs sounds like a lot of jobs, especially in one term, even in two terms. Is it possible?

ROMANS: It's been done before. I mean, it's been done before under, let's see, Clinton, Reagan and FDR, but you had growth rates that were much higher then. Right now, we have like 1.7 percent economic growth.

Look, it's not ...

BANFIELD: But we've got 1.7?

ROMANS: Right. And maybe next year we could see -- I guess the average is like 2.5 percent.

BANFIELD: So, those are the comparisons there?

ROMANS: Right, those are the comparisons there, so if 3.9 percent was the average GDP growth, averaged out over the Bill Clinton duration, GDP growth for Ronald Reagan, 3.4 percent. For FDR it was 8.4 percent.

These were very different times, though, and they were very different job markets, all of them. You think even back to the Bill Clinton- era, that was really the very early innings of globalization and a very different labor market.

I will say, however, there are those who say we could have 12 million jobs created no matter who is the president because you've seen ...

BANFIELD: Why?

ROMANS: Larry Summers even said this, this morning on "STARTING POINT." You know, the former treasury secretary, he said the cliff was so steep that, when the economy starts to rev up and come back, there's going to be a lot of demand to add jobs. There are those others who say, no, those golden days of adding a lot of jobs may be over because companies will add jobs at the very last moment and they will add them overseas when they come up.

BANFIELD: Is Larry summer suggesting that the harder you fall, the bigger you bounce?

ROMANS: Apparently, yeah.

BANFIELD: And is there history, precedent for this?

ROMANS: Well, it depends. Again, everything is pre-globalization. When you look at these other big painful periods. Yeah, so, we won't know until the history books are written about who had the better idea and whether it worked or not.

BANFIELD: Soup bowls and porridge bowls. Christine Romans, thank you. Well, you've got -- all week long, you're going to be doing -- focusing on this?

ROMANS: Oh, yeah. That's all we're doing this week.

BANFIELD: That's why I love you. Thank you so much.

And, as you probably know, the August jobs numbers are out and they're not pretty. Alison Kosik is here. She's at the New York Stock Exchange with a couple of times on how you, if you're out there with your economy of one -- as Christine always says -- can make ends meet in this tough job market. Alison?

ALISON KOSIK, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, how to find a job and get yourself to stand out, especially after, Ashleigh, the August jobs report was a just such a big letdown, only 96,000 jobs added to the economy, falling short of expectations.

The unemployment rate, sure, it fell to 8.1 percent, but that's just a sign that more people are getting frustrated and leaving the workforce and 5 million people have been unemployed for at least 27 weeks. So, yes, how can you give yourself an edge in this tough jobs market? JB Trading Solutions President Brad Carr says you have to show employers your skills are still sharp. His suggestion? Take a class, visit a community college or technical school or take an online class. There are also plenty of places you can learn for free.

And look at this -- these websites here are a place to start. Brushing up on your Excel skills or maintaining a certification shows employers you're ready to hit the ground running.

Another great idea? Volunteer. If you want to make a career switch or develop skills like marketing or program development, get some on- the-job training at a local nonprofit. Now, you won't make any money, but it could pay off in many other ways. And, while you're at it, do a little networking. Training is always helpful, but 46 percent of job seekers in a recent survey said they landed their new gig through networking. Work on making connections at places you'd like to work through friends, through family, your social networks, too.

And you know this, Ashleigh. A good word to the hiring manager from a person in one of those networks can really make all the difference in moving that resume at least to the top of that pile sitting on that hiring manager's desk.

Ashleigh?

BANFIELD: Right. And maybe, first and foremost, don't get discouraged, because, man, is it ever discouraging every time you hear no.

KOSIK: Easier said than done.

BANFIELD: Thank you. You're absolutely right. Alison Kosik, thank you, my friend. Appreciate it.

KOSIK: Sure. A quick note for everybody, as well. If you're just heading out the door, you can take us with you. Continue watching CNN from your mobile phone. It's very cool. You can also watch us from your live desktop. Just go to CNN.com/TV and all the instructions are there.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BANFIELD: Mixing religion and politics is a lot like throwing gas on a fire and nowhere is that truer right now than in Iraq. The Iraqi vice president, Tariq al-Hashemi, has been sentenced to death on charges of running death squads. This is the current one, not Saddam's, the current one.

Now, he, in turn, is accusing the prime minister, the current one, Nouri al-Maliki, of carrying out a political vendetta. The vice president is a prominent Sunni Muslim. Al-Maliki is a Shiite. I think you get the picture here.

That V.P. is now in exile in Turkey. He was tried in absentia and, today, he declared his innocence.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TARIQ AL-HASHEMI, VICE PRESIDENT, IRAQ: I totally reject and will never recognize the unfair, the unjust, the politically motivated verdict, which was expected from the outset of the phony trial.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: Coinciding with the verdict, a wave of bombings. Look at pictures. They are becoming familiar elsewhere. They were up familiar at one time. This time, more than 90 people wounded -- 90 people killed and 300 wounded across the country. Sunni insurgents belonging to Al Qaeda in Iraq claiming responsibility. You might sum this up in one word -- mess.

Ivan Watson is monitoring the developments from Istanbul.

Ivan, last I checked, the Americans spent over $80 billion and a lot of blood in trying to ensure that Iraq was somewhat stable. Is this headed towards complete loss and a waste of our time and energy?

IVAN WATSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, it certainly doesn't look good. Sunday's bombings killing 94 people at least, more than 300 wounded last summer as a result of similar bombings, the worst violence and death toll in nearly two years. And the country is locked in political paralysis as well. Not only is the vice president a fugitive living in exile here in Turkey and facing a death penalty, but also the government has been unable to come up with a deal between the rival sectarian factions and political parties to appoint the top three security posts -- the defense minister, the interior minister and the head of the secret police and the intelligence agency as well. It does not bode well. There were efforts to get the parties around the table to work out an agreement. But this death sentence on one of the most prominent Sunni Muslim politicians appears to have thrown oil -- fuel onto an already simmering and bloody fire in Iraq --Ashleigh?

BANFIELD: Another assignment that we will get lots of updates on.

Ivan Watson, live for us in Istanbul, Turkey. Ivan, thank you for that.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BANFIELD: Money and polls, polls and money. If you're running for president or just about anything else, you need both of those things to go your way, and right now at least for this moment both of those things are favoring President Obama.

Wolf Blitzer joins us live from Washington, D.C.

I've been missing you because you've been very, very busy doing other things all day long and all night long, meaning two conventions. I'm happy to have you back --

WOLF BLITZER, HOST, "THE SITUATION ROOM": Thank you.

BANFIELD: -- particularly when it comes to the bounce. Can you bounce the coming out of the RNC versus the bounce out of the DNC.

BLITZER: A Gallup poll shows there was a nice bounce for the President of the United States. Right now, according to this new Gallup poll that came out, 49 percent say registered voters across the United States say they'd vote for President Obama, another four years for President Obama. Another 44 percent would vote for Mitt Romney. There was only a one-point spread after the Republican convention. That would indicate a nice bounce for the President coming out of the Democratic convention.

We have a brand-new CNN/ORC poll we will release 4:00 Eastern later today. We'll see if that's consistent with Gallup, if it deviates a little bit. I have an indication already of what's going on, but I'm not going to share it because I can't until 4:00. To put it mildly, everyone is interested to see if the President does get a significant or modest bounce out of his Democratic convention.

BANFIELD: All right. We do call that officially in the business the embargo, and it's an honest and true thing. It's not just a plug for everyone to watch your show at 4:00 p.m., because you're live and have that information at that time.

BLITZER: Yes.

BANFIELD: Let me move to -- we should also mention that the RNC, with all the aggregates of polling, didn't get as much of a bounce, depending on the poll you were looking at. Sometimes it was a one point or two points, but definitely outpointed by the DNC.

BLITZER: Right.

BANFIELD: Let me move to money. It was a good august for President Obama where money's concerned.

BLITZER: Very good August, because he had been losing campaign to campaign -- Romney campaign, Obama campaign -- over the past few months, the last three months. In the last month, the Obama campaign raised $114 million and the Romney campaign raised $11 million. Basically even. It's encouraging for the Obama campaign because at least they're slightly ahead. Let's put it this way. 1.1 million donors to the Obama campaign in August, $317,000 first-time donors. The average donation is $58 to the Obama campaign. All pretty encouraging.

The downside, though, as far as money is concerned, is that the pro- Republican super PACs are way, way out-raising the pro-Democratic super PACs. So the Republicans have a lot more money in the final two months than the Democrats will because the Republicans do better in the super PACs than the Democrats do. They're more organized and stronger as far as the fat cats are concerned. They're giving big- time to the Republican super PACs. The Democratic not giving so much.

BANFIELD: Yes, the downside for the Democrats but the upside for Republicans.

The last item for fun, Wolf Blitzer. Talk about a young man by the name of Scott van Duzer from Big Apple Pizza and Pasta, in Fort Pierce, Florida. I don't think I've seen a president get that kind of treatment from a large man. Explain.

BLITZER: He was obviously very happy to see the President of the United States. Watch. If you haven't seen the video yet, you'll see what happens. He's not only so happy to see the President, he's giving him fist bumps and all that stuff. He gives him a little bear hug over there.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: Are you a power lifter or what?

SCOTT VAN DUZER, OBAMA SUPPORTER: That's just great.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(CROSSTALK)

BLITZER: Guess who is going to be in the Situation Room during the 4:00 p.m. Eastern hour today?

BANFIELD: You got him! Blitzer.

BLITZER: Stop.

BANFIELD: Quickly, I thought I would hear a chorus of, "oh my gosh," in slow motion from all the secret service that do the advance around there. They had to have known this was coming. There's no way that could have happened.

BLITZER: Yes, they did.

BANFIELD: They did. They did know?

BLITZER: They had advance word. They gave the green light. The President -- everybody knew that this was going to happen. But it happened. It's a nice picture. We'll talk to Scott, and it will be fun. Get a little reaction from Scott to see how he bear hugs the President. We have other -- Ashleigh, get excited right now. You're a regular viewer of "The Situation Room," isn't that right?

BANFIELD: OK. Yes.

(CROSSTALK)

BANFIELD: I pop the popcorn at 3:55 every day.

BANFIELD: We have big surprises for viewers. Some exciting new developments, not just the poll, that we're going to release at 4:00 p.m., you'll see it in "THE SITUATION ROOM." I'm not going to tell our viewers right now what it is. You'll be happy when you see it.

BANFIELD: Oh, Wolf, you had me at "hello." By the way, next time I see you, bear hug.

BLITZER: Yes, bear hug.

OK. You will be especially -- Ashleigh, give our viewers a little hint. You personally, Ashleigh Banfield, will be excited when you see one development in "THE SITUATION ROOM" today. Enough said. Just watch at 4:00 p.m. Eastern.

BANFIELD: I am on the edge of my table.

All right, Wolf Blitzer, thank you very much.

(LAUGHTER)

And I'll give an additional plug. 4:00 p.m. Eastern, "SITUATION ROOM." The man to my -- well, on your TV would be to my right.

Anyway, Wolf, good to see you.

BLITZER: Thank you.

BANFIELD: I missed you the last two weeks. I'm glad to see you back in the chair. And hope you're with me every day.

BLITZER: Thank you, Ashleigh.

BANFIELD: Also, mark your calendar for Wednesday, October 3rd. That's debate night in America, and I call it date night. There's nothing like a good debate for date night. First head-to-head match- up between President Obama and Mitt Romney. We'll bring it to you live from University of Denver, Wednesday, October 3rd, 7:00 p.m. sharp Eastern, right here on CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BANFIELD: It was called the trial of the century. Now a damning accusation is leveled at a lawyer. An accusation that the late Johnnie Cochran may have tampered with the most famous piece of evidence from the trial, the bloody glove. Christopher Darden, a prosecutor in the case, according to Rutgers News Service, says O.J.'s lead attorney somehow manipulated that glove before the football star famously struggled in court to try it on. Now, Cochran was part of Simpson's dream team, a collection of high-priced lawyers that successfully fought that case.

Allen Derschowitz was on that dream team, and he's now a Harvard law professor and author of "America on Trial." And he's live with me now on the telephone.

Professor Derschowitz, thanks for being with me. I can't imagine you were too happy hearing that accusation from Mr. Darden.

ALLEN DERSCHOWITZ, ATTORNEY (voice-over): It wasn't a matter of happy or unhappy. It's a blatant lie. It's an effort to cover up the greatest legal blunder in the 20th century, asking Simpson to try on the gloves in front of the jury without asking him to try it on outside the presence of the jury which he was entitled to do under California law. He was the goat of the trial. People were upset at the trail should be upset at him for blowing it.

So now 17 years later, he blames it on the dead man. The problem is he has his chronology wrong. No piece of evidence is given to the defense before it's submitted to the court under the supervision by a bailiff or supervision by the judge. Johnnie Cochran only got a hold of the glove after Darden had him try it on. I know. I was there. After the glove was tried on and didn't fit, then the judge gave Cochran permission to take the glove back. And we did, in fact, at that point try it on Cochran without the latex gloves after it was tried on in court and it was done under the supervision of the bailiff.

There's no conceivable possibility Cochran had access to the glove before it was tried on. Darden is making it up. He's lying to cover up his own incompetent.

BANFIELD: We reached out to Mr. Darden to get a comment on this, as well as Marcia Clark, his co-counsel in the case. We couldn't get them to come on the air. Marcia Clark said she didn't have a comment on this.

Christopher Darden is suggesting somehow Johnnie Cochran -- former colleague at "Court TV," he needs no introduction -- that he somehow may have ripped or manipulated the ling of that glove, and I believe although I was not on the panel where you both were seated last week at Pace University, but I believe he was alluding to the fact you may have been in an interview room off of a court and would have had access to that piece of evidence. I have never seen evidence introduced in court that you can sequester in a room off to the side. If what you're saying is true, there has been to be court record that clears this up 100 percent.

DERSCHOWITZ: Of course. There are court records.

What happened is after he tried it on, we got permission from the court to take the glove back and try it on again, because we feared that they might ask him to try it on without the latex gloves. I was the person that tried it on him, but it happened after, not before. It would be utter incompetent on part of a prosecutor or judge to ever allow the defendant, the person on trial to have access to a piece of evidence before it was introduced in court and without supervision by the court or some bailiff. It's unheard of. I have practiced law 48 years. I've never heard a suggestion like this made. It is absurd. It is a desperate attempt to cover up his own failure.

BANFIELD: That was a nine-month-long trial. For me to go over the court record and transcripts would take me until, I don't know, December. I haven't checked all of that record. But I want to ask you this. If someone there's a glitch and there is no record of, say, I don't know, 15 or 20 minutes of where that piece of evidence was before it was tried on live in court, wouldn't Mr. Darden have a duty to prosecute Johnnie Cochran for tampering with evidence? If that's the case, why wouldn't he, and what are the ramifications for not having done that?

DERSCHOWITZ: Not only that, he should have objected to it and brought it to the attention of the judge. When he was interviewed a day ago about that, he said he didn't want to be a snitch. He didn't want to be a whiny snitch. Instead of bringing it to the attention of the court while Johnnie Cochran was alive and defended himself, he's become the worst kind of snitch. He's snitching on the dead man, blaming it on the dead man, and not giving the dead man an opportunity to prove conclusively it couldn't have happened.

There's simply no way in which a defendant --

BANFIELD: Let me ask you one last question.

DERSCHOWITZ: -- would ever be given access to a piece of evidence in the way that Darden suggested it happened. It would be Darden's fault. Darden had control of the evidence.

BANFIELD: Can Johnnie Cochran's estate sue for libel or slander in this case?

DERSCHOWITZ: No. Under American law, a dead person cannot sue for libel and slander. I hope Darden will make the accusation against me, because I was in the room with O.J. Simpson and, in that, of course, I will own his home and everything valuable to him, because I will prove conclusively that he's lying and making up the whole story. And I will contribute all the money that I win to charity.

BANFIELD: Professor Derschowitz, thanks for being with us.

A reminder to our viewers, we did reach out to Christopher Darden and Marcia Clark. Mr. Darden has not responded to us reaching out to us yet.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BANFIELD: Talk about a screw-up. In California, the wrong house was foreclosed on twice. Crews for the bank Wells Fargo first locked the place up, and then another crew came by and completely raided the place. Take a look at the condition this house is in -- boarded up windows, all the valuables taken. Three generations of memories gone. Alvin Tjosaas built this home with his father back in 1961 and later used it as a vacation home with his wife and kids, and never had a mortgage. And now they are furious.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ALVIN TJOSAAS, HOMEOWNER: You put your heart into something. That's like -- it makes me real sad. I'm just glad I have my sweetheart. We've been together a long time.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BANFIELD: So they lost all their things, and they can't get them back.

Criminal defense attorney, Jill Davis, joins me now to tell me how big a wheelbarrow the bank needs to buy to deliver the money in any kind of settlement or civil case that they can file against the bank.

Hi, Jill.

JILL DAVIS, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Hi, Ashleigh. How are you?

BANFIELD: Good. Man, I could not believe this could happen. And it's not the only case. It happens a lot.

DAVIS: Oh, isn't this terrible? I mean, not once, but twice. And Wells Fargo, if they -- you said wheel barrow -- I agree. I thought when I read about this that if they don't come up and write a big old fat check, can you imagine what a P.R. nightmare this is going to be even going forward. I can't believe it came to this already. These poor people had to call them a couple of times, and it's -- we're not -- I mean, the choices are get your stuff back or write them a check. I mean, the dilemma is in this, what do you do when I think it was his grandfather's World War I uniform. Personal memories and mementos that you can't -- you can't put a dollar amount on those, but the problem, I mean -- the option is you have to. I mean, they're going to have to.

BANFIELD: Well, and the pain and suffering and punitive and all the other things that I can think makes the pot even bigger if you are going to have to go as far to file civil action. I should just mention, Jill, that this is all a big mistake. Apparently there was a home nearby, and it was supposed to be the target. This was just a stupid mistake, and I'm going to tell you what the bank is saying. They've released this statement, and there's a heck of a mea culpa here. They say, "We are deeply sorry for the deep losses that the family suffered as a result of the home being mistakenly secured. I have never heard of a situation like this before. We're going to work to resolve this. Obviously, we would never want it to happen. We're going to do what with need to do to rectify it."

Here's the thing, banks have to protect the properties that they foreclose on or else they overgrow and they can become disasters in their own right, and they hire subcontractors to do that, so now is the bank and the subcontractor both liable for what happened? DAVIS: Yes. I would think so. In this particular case, there was vandalism, where even though they hired people to take care and protect the property, like you were talking about, there have been whether it be kids or vagrants who had broken into the home, because they found bongs, beer bottles. so, I mean, even though -- it does look like and sound like Wells Fargo had done and obeyed and complied with the laws with regard to taking care of the property that they foreclose on. It still happens. So the contractors that came in and had their workers, if they -- there was damage or liability we had, then they both can be liable. And I think they're coming with hat in hand in this particular case, as they should.

BANFIELD: I think you're right.

Jill Davis, great to see you. Let's do this again sometime.

DAVIS: OK.

BANFIELD: Thanks. Live from Houston. Thank you, ma'am.

And, by the way, despite the destruction of the home, Alvin's wife of 56 years is keeping her head up about this, pointing out that the family will always have their real memories and not the physical ones.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BANFIELD: I'm Ashley Banfield. Thanks for watching, everyone. NEWSROOM INTERNATIONAL with Suanne Malveaux starts now.