Justice Department May Investigate Entire Baltimore Police Department; Candidates Court Super PACs for Big Campaign Donors
BLITZER: The U.S. Justice Department could soon take a closer look at the entire Baltimore police force in the wake of the death of Freddie Gray and charges being filed against six Baltimore police officers. The attorney general, Loretta Lynch, was on Capitol Hill just a little while ago and spoke about that possible investigation.</s>LORETTA LYNCH, U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: We're currently in the process of considering the request from city officials and community and police leaders for an investigation into whether the Baltimore City Police Department engaged in a pattern or practice of civil rights violations. And I intend to have a decision in the coming days.</s>BLITZER: The Justice Department is already conducting their own investigation into Freddie Gray's death and the possible violation of his civil rights. We'll see if they take on a broader investigation into the entire Baltimore police department. We'll know in the coming days. Other news, Hillary Clinton is ready to rake in some big-time money for her White House bid. She's courting donors for a super PAC supporting her candidacy and her allies have an ambitious goal, $300 million. It's just a preview of what could be the most expensive presidential race in history. Let's bring in our senior Washington correspondent, Jeff Zeleny; and our senior Washington reporter, Nia-Malika Henderson. Jeff, in the past, candidates have been reluctant to go out, openly endorse these super PACs but I guess that's history, right?</s>JEFF ZELENY, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Somewhat reluctantly. President Obama was the biggest idea. He talked for years about how he didn't like the super PACs then suddenly game in. in 2011. I remember it very well when he decided to start speaking out for them. Hillary Clinton's been campaigning since the very beginning over the last month saying we need to limit the amount of money in politics but now she is, in fact, speaking out, urging these wealthy donor to give to her. She's in Los Angeles today for three big fund-raisers. She'll be talking to some of those big donors.</s>BLITZER: Explain for viewers who don't know what a super PAC is.</s>ZELENY: It allows you to write as big of a check as you want to fund, to help elect the candidate. You can't work with the campaign. It's sort of like a big brother to help you on the side to kind of help all the efforts so they can't work in coordination but they work separately. It's a very murky law. It has been around for -- this is the second presidential election cycle, and she's not alone, Republicans are out there doing this in huge numbers. It's all because of that Citizens United Supreme Court decision a few years ago.</s>BLITZER: If you're a billionaire, you can give as much money as you want?</s>NIA-MALIKA HENDERSON, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON REPORTER: That's right.</s>BLITZER: You can give $100 million if you wanted to do it, if you want.</s>ZELENY: If you want.</s>BLITZER: Because there's no limit. And that's one of the reasons we're told why Jeb Bush, the Republican -- arguably, the front-runner, maybe not the front-runner.</s>HENDERSON: Maybe he's not the front-runner.</s>BLITZER: -- why he's delaying his official announcement, because --</s>HENDERSON: Yes, because he can raise this unlimited amount of money until he gets in. They've set a figure, Hillary Clinton, $300 million, they feel like they can raise $100 million --</s>BLITZER: For Jeb Bush's team?</s>HENDERSON: -- for Jeb Bush's team, in advance of him getting into this thing, could be June, could be July. They want to wait as long as they can because they want to get these unlimited funds. If you're a grassroots donor or activist on the ground, you might feel like, hey, why's this guy sitting on the sideline, why isn't he in this thing? In some ways, Hillary Clinton ran into this problem as well, donors saying, we want to see her out there, we want to see what the product looks like before we put some big money in. But for now, he's waiting. He's going to be able to rake in huge amounts of money but also people like Marco Rubio who are in the race are able to say, listen, I'm not waiting on the sidelines, I'm a sure thing right now, why don't you invest in my candidacy.</s>BLITZER: Vermont Senator Sanders announced he's running against Clinton for the Democratic presidential nomination. He was here with me last week right after his announcement. He said he's not going to play that game, he's not going to support -- want any money from those super PACs. He doesn't want any of those billionaires. He's got a strong position against that kind of fund-raising. But impressively, he's raised $3 million over the last few days alone.</s>ZELENY: It is impressive, without question. He is speaking to what the left side of this Democratic Party wants. He's filling in a vacuum that's sort of been created by Elizabeth Warren and he's done very well in online fundraising. It's surprised the Clinton folks. This is coming in, in small dollar increments, average of $43. So that is going to take him a long way. It reminds me of another Vermont presidential candidate, Howard Dean. In 2004, he did very well with these small-dollar contributions. Of course there's a limit to that. He can't ever raise as much as her. He's had a great week ever since he appeared on your show.</s>BLITZER: A lot of these candidates they say they tonight want to unilaterally disarm. If they're opponents, their rivals are raising these kinds of funds -- we used to hear Bill Clinton say that as well and others and President Obama when he was raising unlimited funds basically. They don't want to unilaterally disarm.</s>HENDERSON: That's right. That was the argument in 2011 that maybe we don't like the rules, maybe we want to so the law changed. But in the meantime, now that these are the rules, we're going to play by the rules and benefit from the rules to even the playing field because Republicans certainly don't play by the rules, have been able to raise hundreds of millions of dollars for these super PACs.</s>BLITZER: A lot of very rich people with a lot of money. I asked Bernie Sanders if George Soros, for example, who's a left wing fund- raiser, if he were to come up with a huge sum of money, would you take that, he said no. He's got a principle position. See if it stays like that. All right, guys, thanks very much. Still ahead, there's breaking news coming into CNN from Yemen. We've got the details when we come back.