[Kyra Phillips, Co-host:] Hello, everyone. I'm Kyra Phillips at the CNN World Headquarters in Atlanta.
[Don Lemon, Co-host:] And I'm Don Lemon.
[Phillips:] Al Qaeda calls him Azzam the American. Now CNN has learned he's being charged with treason. Where is Adam Gadahn, and what has he done?
[Lemon:] More than 600,000 Iraqis killed in the war. The numbers in a new study are shocking. But are they legit?
[Phillips:] He says he's a cop; then he rapes his victims, 12 of them children. A task force now tracking a serial rapist on an Arizona reservation. We're talking to the deputy director. You're live in the CNN NEWSROOM. Adam Gadahn, a.k.a., Azzam the American, the first American in more than 50 years to be charged with treason. It's a developing story that we're following in the NEWSROOM. CNN has learned indictments are coming against coming down, rather, against a California native who's acted as a spokesperson for al Qaeda. Let's get the latest from justice correspondent Kelli Arena Kelli.
[Kelli Arena, Cnn Correspondent:] Kyra, federal sources tell CNN that Adam Gadahn, a U.S. citizen and self-proclaimed al Qaeda member, will be charged with treason. As you said this is the first time in more than 50 years that a U.S. citizen will face a treason charge. Gadahn was first put on the FBI's alert list in 2004, saying that he was sought in connection with possible terror threats against the United States. He is described by the FBI director as an al Qaeda spokesman. In fact, he's appeared in five al Qaeda messages. In one, he calls for the world to convert to Islam. He's praised the September 11 hijackers. Gadahn is from California. He's 28 years old. Officials believe that he is living in Pakistan. CNN tried to get comment from his family on the charges, but they refused. And federal sources have told us that Gadahn has already been charged in a sealed indictment with material support of terrorism. Now, this new charge of treason will come as part of a superseding indictment. We're expecting that sometime this afternoon, Kyra.
[Phillips:] Kelli, do we know anything more about how he got connected to al Qaeda, his background, why he decided to do this?
[Arena:] Well, we know that he was he converted in the mid- '90s, in 1995. He hooked up with a man who sort of perverted those views for him, and he became more and more extreme. He left the United States. Exactly how he ended up in the position he's in now, you know, not very clear. But he he's been very, very public here. He's been a concern for a long time. He's out there speaking in English on those tapes. And so, you know, whether or not he'd be involved with any, you know, terror threat coming to the U.S., because he's so publicly known, has sort of been discounted by U.S. officials. But he is right in there. You saw him with Ayman al-Zawahiri, the second in command of al Qaeda, on one tape. So he's right where they are.
[Phillips:] All right. We'll follow the case. Kelli Arena, thanks.
[Arena:] You're welcome.
[Lemon:] From North Korea to Iraq to Mark Foley to next month's election, President Bush has something to say about all of it at a White House press conference, and hopefully you saw it live right here on CNN. Our very own Suzanne Malveaux had a front-row seat to this very wide-ranging press conference Suzanne.
[Suzanne Malveaux, Cnn Correspondent:] You know, it really was all about staying on the offense, getting back on the offense. We're talking about four weeks away from the midterm, congressional midterm elections. President Bush and the White House really trying to focus on the message that they have been emphasizing for the past couple months. That is national security. So what you heard President Bush do was, yes, he addressed the Foley scandal. He addressed North Korea, defending the U.N. policy to push forward the U.N. Security Council members towards tough sanctions. And he did talk about the Iraq situation, really saying that we are on the offense, that we are moving forward. But we've heard time and time again from the president in the press conference, saying the stakes are high here. And he believes, or at least he hopes, that voters are paying attention to two things: the state of the economy, which is good, and also national security.
[George W. Bush, President Of The United States:] It's serious business. Look, the American people want to know, can we win. That's what we want to know. And do we have a plan to win? There are some who say get out, it's not worth it. And those are some of the voices, by the way, in the Democrat Party. Certainly not all Democrat, but some of the loud voices in the party say get out. And so no question this is an issue, but so's the economy.
[Malveaux:] So it was also notable in the press conference is two points that he was making. I asked him about this report that came out from American and Iraqi health officials today, quoting, saying that about 655,000 Iraqis have died since the Iraq war, up until this point. That is 20 times the number that President Bush cited back in December, when he said it was 30,000, pressed him on that. He discredited this report, saying the methodology was not useful, not accurate, but he would not back that 30,000 number. So it begs the question whether or not that, in fact, is a much higher number now. Also, the president painted this picture, as we've heard before, of this ideological struggle that he believes the Bush administration, the White House, is involved in, one in which he said that Islamic extremists would use oil as a weapon, as well as possibly a nuclear weapon, essentially to to stamp out western culture. So that is what the president was trying to argue today. But simply, Don, Kyra, he is talking about the issues that he believes the American people want to hear and also the ones that Republicans really show strength in the polls.
[Lemon:] Suzanne, you mentioned that report. I happened to be watching the press conference. You actually posed that question to him, about the Iraqi deaths in Baghdad. He didn't spend much time on it, appears to me, unless I missed something.
[Malveaux:] Well, he kind of brushed aside that study. He dismissed it. He said it was it was not discredited from the Pentagon as well. But he did not actually go for that number. He didn't talk about Iraqi casualties. And it's very rare that the administration does. You wonder what that number is now. And of course, that wouldn't work in the administration's favor. They don't want to talk about the necessarily the casualties. But they want to talk about this broad brush-stroke picture of this war on terror. They believe that that is the issue that the Republicans are going to win and keep those majorities four weeks from now.
[Lemon:] All right. Suzanne Malveaux at the White House, thank you.
[Phillips:] The future of the fight for Iraq. I'm talking 2010. We hear today that the Pentagon is planning to keep the current number of U.S. troops in Iraq for years to come. Let's get details from CNN Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr.
[Barbara Starr, Cnn Correspondent:] Well, Kyra, it really might not come as a surprise to an awful lot of people, but the Army now has what they call a planning scenario that would keep the current number of U.S. troops in Iraq through the year 2010. Let's explain to everybody. You know, the situation could get better. The troops could come home. But the Army doesn't plan that way. What they have to do, of course is keep enough troops ready, trained and equipped to go into combat and what the chief of staff of the U.S. Army, General Peter Schoomaker, told reporters this morning is that his his plan now is to be ready through the year 2010 to keep the current force levels on the ground. That's somewhere, give or take, between 140,000 and 150,000 U.S. troops on the ground in Iraq. So it's not a definite. It's only a plan. But that's the plan right now, Kyra.
[Phillips:] Can we expect to hear from Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld in about two hours; he's going to hold a briefing?
[Starr:] Right, Secretary Rumsfeld, along with General George Casey, who's actually here in Washington today, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, they're going to hold a press conference at 3 p.m. East Coast Time. I suspect they are going to get asked about that study that Suzanne was referring to, about the mortality rate in in Iraq. Whether they answer or not or simply stand by what President Bush said, that he doesn't view the study as credible, remains to be seen. But in looking at that study, there is a fairly significant margin, wide margin, of error in this study, which simply is a statistical analysis, rather than an actual conclusion. In fact in looking at the study, the error rate is so significant that even people who briefed reporters on it this morning said the deaths could actually be anywhere between 400,000 Iraqis and 900,000 Iraqis, Though their public estimate now is something around 655,000. So just a note of growing caution about this study and what it really means Kyra.
[Phillips:] We'll be talking a lot more about it, especially those numbers. Barbara, thanks. And as Barbara mentioned today, 3 p.m. Eastern, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and multinational force commander George Casey at the Pentagon. We're going to bring you that briefing live as soon as it happens.
[Lemon:] You heard Barbara Starr and Suzanne Malveaux, the numbers they said the numbers are staggering, the conclusion sobering. But are the methods sound? As we mentioned, a new study estimates almost 655,000 Iraqis have died since the war started. The vast majority died violently. Let's get the details from CNN's Arwa Damon, live in Baghdad Arwa.
[Arwa Damon, Cnn Correspondent:] Hey, Don, that's right. Now let's first explain how this survey happens, how it works. Basically, this group went around and spoke to about 1,800 families that's about 13,000 Iraqis about their experience of the war. Based on that number, they took a calculation, based on the entire population of Iraqis, did the math, extrapolated it, came out with this number of 655,000 Iraqis that have died in this conflict thus far. This is a number that is far greater than any other number we have heard in the past by at least half a million civilian deaths. The highest number we heard before was from the Iraqi death count. That was numbered about 50,000. Other numbers from not so reliable sources have gone as high as 100,000. But again this recent number, over 600,000 Iraqis died in this war, really is quite staggering. Now, right now, it is just an estimate. But this methodology has proven to be accurate in the past, if we lock at conflicts in Kosovo or even in Africa. And for many Iraqis here it does come as a shocking number, when you speak to them on the street. Some of them guessed a number that was a lot lower. Some of them guessed a number of civilian deaths that was a lot higher. Of course, for those that were guessing a lower number, this figure came as quite a shock. But the reality is, as history has proven time and time again, we're not going to actually know what the true cost, the civilian cost, of this war was for many years to come.
[Lemon:] Well, we know there, now, that violence is really the reality. Thank you very much for that, Arwa.
[Phillips:] Democrats are gaining ground on Iraq. In a CNN poll done by Opinion Research Corporation, 51 percent of Americans say that Democrats would manage the war better than Republicans. That's up from 47 percent in September. Just about a third say the GOP is handling the war better than Democrats would. And last month, that figure was eight points higher. Now Dems have an edge in the terror question, too by a margin of 5 percent points. The CNN poll shows that Americans now think Democrats would do a better job handling the war on terror. Last month, Republicans were favored by six points. And more than half of Americans say the Democrats would do a better job on the economy. That's up slightly from just last month. Just over a third say that Republicans would do that better.
[Lemon:] Who said what and when? That question looms in the scandal surrounding former Republican congressman, Mark Foley, and several of his former colleagues. Here's what we know at this hour. Depending on who's talking, Foley's explicit Internet exchanges with male congressional pages became known to Speaker Hastert, Dennis Hastert's office in 2002, 2003 or 2005. Tomorrow, Foley's former chief of staff, Kirk Fordham, testifies before the House Ethics Committee. Fordham says he warned Hastert's office about Foley three years ago. Hastert denies it. Another key player, former clerk of the House, Jeff Trandahl. Former Republican Congressman Jim Kolbe of Arizona, says he passed the former page's complaint about Foley to Trandahl five or six years ago. Trandahl hasn't commented to Kolbe's claim but says he'll cooperate with investigators. North Korea, did they or didn't they?
[Phillips:] That nuclear explosion still not confirmed. But does it matter at this point? A world body aims its harshest language at North Korea, standing without a friend today. The latest from the NEWSROOM, coming up.
[Lemon:] Ambushed by scandal with elections around the corner. A key New York congressman finds himself in the toughest race of his career. That's ahead in the CNN NEWSROOM.