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American Morning

Judge Samuel Alito Nominated to Supreme Court; Nine Weeks After Katrina

Aired October 31, 2005 - 09:30   ET

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

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Miles is in New Orleans this morning. How are you, Miles?
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, Soledad. I'm sorry, I was...

S. O'BRIEN: Don't let us get in the way of your coffee, Miles. That's OK. You want some more time?

M. O'BRIEN: I hate to make it sound like more product placement, but to me, this is the start of civilization returning to New Orleans right here, a hot Starbucks. A couple of weeks ago when I was here, it was a warm Red Bull. So that's improvement, but there's still a lot to do here. That's kind of making light of a very serious situation here -- Soledad.

S. O'BRIEN: Right, small steps, right. I guess that's the way it will have to be in New Orleans for a little while.

Miles, thanks. We'll check back with you in just a little bit.

M. O'BRIEN: Back to our top story, though, first, Judge Samuel Alito nominated to the Supreme Court just about an hour and a half ago. Both sides already moving right into the spin cycle. Senior political correspondent Candy Crowley live in Washington for us this morning.

Candy, what are you hearing on both sides? Good morning.

CANDY CROWLEY, CNN SR. POL. CORRESPONDENT: Good morning. You know, what's interesting is, you can sort of see already where these two sides are going, not that it takes a prophet to figure this out. But starting with the president, the person who starts the big rollout, what is very clear is when we first started talking about Harriet Miers, when the president introduced her, it was all about who she was as a person, but as you hear in this brief sound bite from the president's introduction, this is all about what Judge Alito has done and what's on his resume.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I'm confident that the United States Senate will be impressed by judge Alito's distinguished record, his measured judicial temperament and his tremendous personal integrity. And I urge the Senate to act promptly on this important nomination so that an up-or-down vote is held before the end of this year. (END VIDEO CLIP)

CROWLEY: A little bit of code going here, Soledad. An up or down vote means don't filibuster. Certainly on the Democratic side, they have not started to talk about that yet, but we are beginning to see the formation of the skepticism, if you will. Senator Schumer from New York, no one fully expected that he would embrace the president's nominee, but said -- called this nomination controversial, said it would make the court less diverse, far more conservative and needs very careful scrutiny. And much the same thing from Senator Reid who is, of course, the leader of the Democrats in the Senate, who said President Bush would leave the supreme court looking less like America and more like an old boy's club.

So what you have here is a White House determined to say, look, this is a man with credentials, there is no doubt that he is qualified for this job, and you have the Democrats sort of going at a slightly different way, saying, well, is this what we need on the Supreme Court? And of course what no one has said yet and has talked about yet or any of those rulings, particularly the rulings on some of the social issues that conservatives are so interested about. We will get into is that later, I'm sure, but right now there's a slight push-back from Democrats saying, geez, we really wanted a more diverse court, is this really what we need? And the White House saying, hey, he's qualified and he deserves an up or down vote.

S. O'BRIEN: Only 90 minutes in, though, right, so we're certainly going to hear...

CROWLEY: Yes, all right, Candy Crowley for us this morning. Candy, thanks a lot.

Let's take you, if we can, to get some shots inside the capital. Do we have that, you guys. There we go. You're looking at the Russell Rotunda, and there you can see the coffin where Rosa Parks -- oh, I'm sorry, that's the Capitol Rotunda, forgive me -- where Rosa Parks is lying. She is being honored, and will lie in honor until her memorial service, which will take place, I believe, in Washington on Wednesday, and she will then be buried in Detroit.

We're going to see Senator Bill Frist apparently escorting the brand new Supreme Court nominee through the Capitol, and this will be one of their stops. They will walk through, and I guess essentially it will be the second photo opportunity for the brand new Supreme Court nominee as he is ushered in this high-profile way by the Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist. It will be interesting to see if, in fact, it is Senator Frist who will be the man who is ushering through this nominee. As you well know, the nominees are essentially assigned someone who makes their passage through all of the meetings and goings on in the Senate an easier process. Obviously that was something that failed quite spectacularly with regards to Harriet Miers, but we will see it again, starting as Senator Bill Frist will escort Samuel Alito.

Here we go. And in fact there it is, as we thought. There they are walking in together, not only a walk-through the Russell Rotunda, where they are really, in a way, doing a photo opportunity, a chance for people to get to see the Supreme Court nominee as he makes his way very briefly there in that shot through the Russell Rotunda. We got a little glimpse of him.

Ed Henry is our congressional correspondent, and he is on Capitol Hill for us this morning. Ed, you know, I know it's all supposed to be posed as a very comfortable, we're just two guys chatting and going to pay our respects to Rosa Parks, but it's way more than that, right?

ED HENRY, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Oh, absolutely. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist clearly trying to get the last episode behind them. He realizes the fact it clearly did not go well with Harriet Miers. I can tell you, I was standing in about the same spot in the Russell Rotunda the day that Harriet Miers was actually escorted in by Senator Frist, and we saw the same smiles all around. Harriet Miers was the picture of excitement, if you will, and that all came crashing down very quickly.

I also remember the first meeting between Senator Frist, senator Specter, the Judiciary chairman, and Harriet Miers, you know, within moments of arriving on the Hill, smiles all around, talk about a great nominee, and the president's picked someone highly qualified. Again, that all came crashing down.

Another thing to watch clearly, that first day when Harriet Miers was on the Hill, Senator Democratic leader Harry Reid surprised a lot of people in both parties by coming out and saying some very positive, favorable things right out of the box about Harriet Miers.

This time, as you know, even before the nomination was made official, Senator Reid came out very hard against this nominee, not saying he's going to against him per se, but just saying he's disappointed. As you heard Candy Crowley a moment ago, saying that this would make the high court look more like an old boy's club instead of more like America, the kind of words that seem to be laying the groundwork for a possible filibuster. They're not quite using the filibuster word yet. But clearly, a much different approach from the Democrats this time around, Soledad.

S. O'BRIEN: Yes, and only 90 minutes in. I mean, no one's really even gotten their game together, so to speak. You know, I guess, as long as the Democrats are engaged in that battle, it kind of shifts the focus off the White House in a lot of ways. You're not talking about Scooter Libby for one thing, and also you're not talking about Harriet Miers to a large degree anymore. You're really setting up a fight between the left and the right.

HENRY: This may be exactly what the president needs right now. We've all heard about his low poll numbers, reaching about 39 percent in approval ratings, one problem after another from the Scooter Libby indictment to the Harriet Miers misfire, as well as the 2,000 deaths in Iraq being confirmed last week by the Pentagon, U.S. military deaths in Iraq. All of that creating this perfect political storm that has hurt the president, brought his numbers low. This may be the fight, the battle he needs to pick right now, get the conservative base back behind him and be fighting for the Ted Kennedeys of the world, instead of fighting with fellow conservatives in his own party -- Soledad.

S. O'BRIEN: Ed, we're take a look at a live picture inside the Capitol Rotunda, and as you can see, there's a long line of people, including, we saw, Senator Levin and Senator Sessions just a moment ago, in line to pay their respects. Inside that coffin, the body of Rosa Parks, who will be honored on Wednesday when flags fly at half staff as the president has ordered.

In just a few minutes, we're going to see Senator Bill Frist escorting the brand new Supreme Court nominee through, as we saw a moment ago, the Russell Rotunda, and then into this area. Will Frist be, do you know, Ed, the guy, you know, the point person, who is as we see in each nominee sort of has a handler to bring him through the process? Do we know?

HENRY: No, I think it's much more likely that Frist will not be the actual handler. He as Senate majority leader wants to oversee the entire process, not get tied to any one specific nominee. They're also political concerns, of course. He's looking ahead to 2008, a possible presidential run. You saw in the Harriet Miers nomination, Bill Frist did not want to get too far out in front on that. Since she was from Texas, instead saw Texas Senators like John Cornyn ushering her around. And as it turned out, since that nomination fell flat, if Bill Frist had gone far out on a limb for her it would have really possibly hurt him politically. So you're not going to see him go too far on this nominee either. I think there's going to be a wait and see. I think he'll obviously have positive words for Judge Alito, but you're going to see other rank-and-file lawmakers be the ones to actually escort them around.

I think there's also a political message here. Obviously honoring the memory of Rosa Parks is something that people in both parties want to do. But you're going to see today, as I mentioned, liberals like Ted Kennedy, Chuck Schumer. You're going to the liberal interest groups, civil rights groups perhaps even come out today and have some very harsh remarks about Judge Alito, saying that he's far out of the mainstream.

This picture, getting Judge Alito immediately with the Senate majority leader right past the coffin of Rosa Parks. That's something the White House wants to do, that Senate Republican leaders want to do to counter that image that he's far out of the mainstream.

S. O'BRIEN: The old picture speaks 1,000 words. All right, Ed Henry on Capitol Hill for us. Ed, thanks. We'll check in with you again.

Let's get back to New Orleans, though, before we do that and get an update from Miles. Hey, Miles.

M. O'BRIEN: Hello, Soledad. Canal Street is our location. We're standing right where the streetcars, newly refurbished streetcars, will be coming down the tracks hopefully before too long, as this city tries to get back on mend.

Nine weeks now since Katrina. There's still an awful lot of open questions. We're here still here with the city council president Oliver Thomas to talk about that.

You know, Oliver, I was walking through the neighborhood the other day, yesterday, and one of the issues that comes to mind here, that's a real key issue, is the lack of certainty. People don't know if their neighborhood is going to be protected with a category-five levee, and so they don't know whether they should rebuild. They're really caught between a rock and a hard place right now. How are you going to get the city beyond that?

OLIVER THOMAS, PRESIDENT, NEW ORLEANS CITY COUNCIL: Well, you know, hopefully, one of the things we're trying to do as the commission, as well as the city council, is work with FEMA and the Corps is come up with definitive answers about what can, will and should happen in certain neighborhoods, and especially the neighborhoods where people are displaced. You know, one of the things we're finding out now is that all of the houses don't have to be demolished. Some of them are structurally sound. We're also finding out that if your home is structurally sound, then you can start to rebuild and repair.

M. O'BRIEN: But if you're homeowner, you got to ask questions, right?

THOMAS: The question from the homeowner is, will the levee be repaired? Will I get some insurance? Hopefully at our next couple of meetings, the counsel will have the Corps and have FEMA say exactly what their plans are for the New Orleans East, Lower Ninth Ward, Lakeview and another communities where people are displaced.

Look, people are tired of hearing wait until the plan comes out. It's been nine weeks. They want to know whether they can come home, engage their property and engage their community and start rebuilding their lives. You're absolutely right, Miles.

M. O'BRIEN: It's an epic storm. But nine weeks is an awful lot of time, too. Don't you think it's high time there was some definitive plan at the federal, state and city level.

THOMAS: Well, let me say this, in the greatest country and the richest nation in the world, nine weeks is too long for Americans to suffer in this part of the country, and they've been suffering for nine weeks. A lot of people died, were displaced. The least we can do is come up with the kind of information that allows them to come back home and come back home to a better community.

The only thing stopping the federal government from saying that the levees will be repaired all the way category five is money. Well, guess what, how many foreign government do we bail out every year with billions and trillions of dollars that never repay us, that never repay us.

M. O'BRIEN: I can see your point.

THOMAS: So what about Southern Louisiana? What about East Texas? What about Florida? I mean, you know, what about Alabama and Mississippi? If we can give trillions of dollars to foreign nations that never repay us, surely we can take care of Americans in this region.

M. O'BRIEN: There's been a crisis of leadership here, and that may have a lot do with why we haven't seen those dates certain, which people need. What can we do about that at this point?

THOMAS: Well, as president of the council, and I know all seven members of our team, we're going to start asking for definitive answers. If not, we're talking about going to the White House, to try to do something so we can tell people in the Ninth Ward, New Orleans East, Lakeview other and displaced communities, hey, look, this is when you can start to rebuild, this is going to be the conditions of the levees in your community.

Look, if it's never going to be, if the federal government is never going to give us the money for a category five, they needed to tell us yesterday. If the federal government is not going to clean up our communities when they start doing the demolition, then they need to tell us yesterday. If the Corps and FEMA are not going to allow us to be protected the way they protect some of the foreign nations with money, they need to tell us yesterday, and we're going to start demanding those answers.

M. O'BRIEN: Oliver Thomas, president of the New Orleans City Council, thanks for your time.

THOMAS: I'll walk a mile with Miles any time.

M. O'BRIEN: Thank you very much, Oliver. He's on my campaign committee, Soledad, I think.

S. O'BRIEN: Another punster, just what we need in this world. Tell him it's nice to see him. That's right.

M. O'BRIEN It's pun-day on AMERICAN MORNING.

S. O'BRIEN: How exciting. I'm so happy to hear that, Miles. That's the best.

M. O'BRIEN: Welcome back.

S. O'BRIEN: Thanks.

Let's take you back to the Capitol Rotunda, if you we can. There you go. You can see here just some of the people who have come to pay their final respects to Rosa Parks. Rosa Parks will be honored until 10:00 this morning, and they shut down this line and prepare for the memorial service that's taking place today in Washington D.C. That happens at 1:00 in the afternoon Eastern Time. She's going to be buried in Detroit on Wednesday, and the president has ordered that flags will fly at half staff on government building to honor her as well.

We're going to see here in just a few moments coming through this line, Senator Bill Frist escorting the brand new Supreme Court nominee Judge Samuel Alito. We're monitoring this picture.

A short break and we're back in just a moment. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

M. O'BRIEN: Welcome back. Live in the city of New Orleans, we are on Canal Street headed southeast right into the sun. Take a look at Google map and I'll give you a sense of where we are. If you take a look at the Crescent City zooming down on to Canal Street, it's really like Main Street for the city of New Orleans. The French Quarter is right off of the downtown, lots of key places.

Nine weeks ago, this place was flooded. By the way, it's called Canal Street, because there is, in fact, an underground canal beneath us, some hundred miles of underground canals, all part of the Rube Goldberg (ph) system designed to keep this city dry, which, of course, in the face of Katrina was unable to do the job.

And I'm trying to fight over this siren here. I'm joined by our executive producer and New Orleans native Kim Bondy now.

And, Kim, you talk about this street almost in reverence all of the time, because this means a lot if you're from New Orleans, doesn't it?

KIM BONDY, V.P., CNN MORNING PROGRAMMING: I love this street. I love the history of this street, what it used to represent, Miles. This street is about 200 years old, and it was created, oddly enough to -- and we're fighting over a siren.

M. O'BRIEN: We'll let him pass by.

And as we point this out, you notice there's a fair amount of traffic here. A little bit deceiving. A lot of it is just contractors, and cleanup crews and so forth. The city isn't quite back to normal. As you were saying about this city, about this street...

BONDY: Well, the French, the Creoles lived on the French Quarter side, the east side, and when the Americans came in, after the Louisiana Purchase, they created Canal Street as a neutral ground to keep the Americans, the nasty, uncultured Americans, over here, on the west side of the street. But it was the center and the hub of amazing retail here in New Orleans, which is not reflected that way anymore, but stores like D.H. Holmes and Maison Blanche.

You know, my grandmother was the first African-American female retail salesperson here on Canal Street. So my brother and I, my entire family spent a lot of time in some of these stores.

This store over here, (INAUDIBLE) which is now the Canestra (ph) Hotel, used to be D.H. Holmes, and we used to go there all of the time to have lunch with my grandmother, and where there was a Footlocker, used to be an elegant department store called Krugers, where my grandmother worked, and where this ATM Mardi Gras shop was, was a store called Imperial, where I bought -- we had to buy our shoes there. So I love this street a lot, and what it used to represent. M. O'BRIEN: Well and let's hope it gets -- it's hard to see it, I know, now, and hopefully it will get back to where it was. There are lots of signs here, Soledad, of them pulling it back together. The workers and the construction and -- but along with everything else, there's boarded up places. We are told in many cases the landlords are insisting on back rent, and a lot of these retailers just can't afford to pay it right now, and so they're going to remain boarded for some time -- Soledad.

S. O'BRIEN: Yes, it's all about the money.

All right, Miles, thanks. I can listen to Kim go on about what she loves about New Orleans forever. Thank you, guys.

More about New Orleans in fact. Take a look at this 10-year-old guy. Let's see, do we have him here? There he is. This handsome guy has just gotten a big honor and a brand new trumpet, too. We're talk to him and meet his family just ahead on AMERICAN MORNING. He's got a great story. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

S. O'BRIEN: Welcome back, everybody.

There you go. Just moments ago we caught Senator Bill Frist escorting the brand new Supreme Court Nominee judge Samuel Alito to the Capitol Rotunda where they are both paying their respects to Rosa Parks. Rosa parks will be honored for really joust about seven more minutes or so there, and then they prepare for her memorial service, which takes place today in Washington D.C. today at 1:00 p.m. Flags will be flown, as the president ordered, at half staff in memory of Rosa Parks and her incredible work in civil rights.

Back here, though, in New York, we have got some good news. As a grand marshal of the New York City Halloween Parade, Glenn Haul III is the man, and he's 10 years old, and he has got a cool story.

Thanks for joining us. Welcome.

Your family lost a lot in Hurricane Katrina, didn't you?

GLENN HAUL III, NYC HALLOWEEN PARADE: Yes.

S. O'BRIEN: And one of those important things, I would guess, for you was losing your trumpet, and your clarinet and your keyboard because you're a pretty well-known trumpet player, right?

Tell me a little bit about what that was like when you realized you escaped with your life, but not with anything you needed to play.

HAUL: Well, I feel bad, because I know I couldn't practice the days that I didn't have my instruments, and I really wanted to play and practice at the same time.

S. O'BRIEN: Well, guess what, you're are getting to play and practice in one of the biggest Halloween parades there is in the entire country. What was it like when they told you that?

HAUL: I was excited. I was...

S. O'BRIEN: Yes?

HAUL: Shocked.

S. O'BRIEN: But here was the problem, of course. You need a trumpet to be able to lead the parade as the grand marshal, and I know the folks at the Jazz Foundation of America came through in a big way for you. What did they do?

HAUL: Well, they gave me this trumpet.

S. O'BRIEN: That's a pretty special trumpet.

HAUL: And they gave me a keyboard. And they really helped me out.

S. O'BRIEN: Now your family is where now? Memphis?

HAUL: Yes, they're in Memphis, Tennessee.

S. O'BRIEN: And how has that been, relocating?

HAUL: It's been okay. But I really miss home. There's nothing like home.

S. O'BRIEN: Yes. Everyone from New Orleans tells me that. You guys -- everybody wants to go right back home. You have a little sister. Do you know what the plan is going to be? Are you going to stay in Memphis?

HAUL: Well, we're going to stay in Memphis until the end of the school year, and we might go back, because my daddy's going to be back and forth to fix the houses.

S. O'BRIEN: You got a lot of work to do. Your house was in Gentilly and it was pretty badly damaged.

I'm going to ask a favor, if I may. I know you're related to the jazz greats, James Andrews and Troy Andrews, and I know you're going to be playing "When the Saint Goes Marching In" as you lead the parade today in your tuxedo, right? Can you do me a favor and give us a little early version of it? Just go right to that microphone we set up for you. I want to hear this.

(MUSIC PLAYING)

S. O'BRIEN: Glenn Haul III. Keep playing for us as we head to break. He is going to be leading New York City's Halloween parade. The grand marshal is here.

(MUSIC PLAYING)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O'BRIEN: There you go, that is the chief justice of the Supreme Court, John Roberts there, taking the Supreme Court class photo. In fact, this videotape -- or I guess they took the actual official photo just about half an hour ago.

If we widen out here, you can see there's Sandra Day O'Connor. She's in the shot, and of course she is stepping down from the court, and the chief justice, as you can see there. They're focusing on the two of them, because they've been the two newsmakers. John Roberts making his photographic debut, as they do the Supreme Court class photo every single year.

Before we wrap up for the day, let's get right back to Miles in New Orleans -- Miles.

M. O'BRIEN: Soledad, thanks very much. We are pretty much out of time here. We're at the Walgreens. Take a look inside. They've been working here for a week and a half now. They say it will be a couple of months before they're back open, just one shop, one sign of the recovery in the city of New Orleans.

Big story today, of course, is Supreme Court nominee. Up next, Wolf Blitzer and "THE SITUATION ROOM."

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