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American Morning

Wildfires Racing Through Texas; The Gulf A Year Later; The "Maternity Tourism" Business; Inspiration Around the World

Aired April 19, 2011 - 08:00   ET

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


KIRAN CHETRY, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning. I'm Kiran Chetry.

Dozens of fires, high winds, dry air -- a very, very difficult scene in Texas as thousands of firefighters try to save them from the so called "perfect firestorm" in Texas.

ALI VELSHI, CNN ANCHOR: I'm Ali Velshi.

More embarrassment for the FAA. Two air traffic controllers suspended, this time in Cleveland. They weren't snoozing. Instead, they were watching a movie on the job. We'll tell you the unusual that the two got caught.

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: I'm Christine Romans.

For the first time, a top credit agency is seriously hinting the United States might not be able to pay its debts. The White House response -- on this AMERICAN MORNING.

(MUSIC)

CHETRY: And welcome this morning. So glad you are with us on this Tuesday. It is April 19th.

(CROSSTALK)

ROMANS: We've got airstrikes right now happening in Libya, in three different cities. So, we are following developments there and in the Middle East. And an awful lot of news going on in Texas as well, where a lot of the state is on fire.

VELSHI: It's a good place to start actually. Thousands of firefighters are battling the elements and fatigue. Close to 250 homes have now been reduced to piles of ash across Texas. Another 8,000 are in danger. Flames race across most of the states this morning. One firefighter has died and they are running out of resources.

Right now, the flames are within 100 miles of Dallas-Fort Worth.

Ed Lavandera is live for us in Strawn, Texas.

Ed, what's the situation?

ED LAVANDERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Ali, to kind of put things in perspective here, we're on the southern edge of one of the biggest fires that's raging right now in Texas. And to give you a sense of just how massive this fire, it's near what's called Possum Kingdom Lake.

And essentially what it is, it's a series of various wildfires. But because of the winds and how fast the winds have been blowing here, a lot of these fires are getting pushed together -- so, it kind of turning it into one big giant wild fire. It spreads and touches four different counties west of Fort Worth. So, it already has burned more than 50,000 acres. And just this morning, officials are now telling us they have only been able to contain 30 percent of it. They had it at 25 percent yesterday.

But just to give you a sense of how difficult this is to get under control, they have only been able to contain an extra 5 percent in the last 24 hours. And, really, what firefighters at this point are trying to do is salvage and protect communities that could be ravaged by these wildfires. So, out in the hinterlands out there and the wide open spaces, they are essentially letting these fires burn and playing more defense.

Really, it's a question of resources. There just aren't enough resources to battle all of the fires that are raging across the state. They are bringing in more. They brought in aerial support, air force C-130 aircraft that dumped fire suppressant on top of these wildfires to try to get things here under control.

But if it's another day of high winds and high temperatures and low humidity, we could be in for another very long day -- Ali.

VELSHI: All right. Ed, thanks very much. We'll stay on top of that story with you.

The fires are raging into all but two Texas counties right now. It's becoming quite a problem.

ROMANS: Just unbelievable how all of the conditions are ripe for this. And it drops a little bit at night because the humidity goes up. And the next --

CHETRY: Yes. And they say that they need a long period of rain. They need it to just rain a lot. It hasn't happened.

ROMANS: Praying for rain, literally praying for rain.

All right. The South is facing a huge cleanup after killer tornadoes there. And they are covering up what's left because they are in the danger zone again. Take a look at this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Wow! Holy crap!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ROMANS: This amateur video out of Mississippi was taken last Friday as a lightning bolt hit a store sign and blew a transformer. The blast almost knocked these guys over.

CHETRY: Amazing video and more of the same in store for some parts of the country. Jacqui Jeras is following all of this from the extreme weather center.

Hi, Jacqui.

JACQUI JERAS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Hey, guys.

Yes, we do expect another severe weather outbreak today. Not on the same level as what we had over the weekend in terms of the number of tornadoes. But we could see a very significant wind event developing later on tonight.

The radar picture is showing you the storm system in the nation's midsection. It brings snow on the northern tier and extreme thunderstorms on the southern tier. We've got a severe thunderstorm watch, which is in effect for parts of Missouri, as well as to central Illinois.

Severe thunderstorms are just ripping through the St. Louis metro area right now. It's out of the city but north and south, big hail stones can be expected here in the next, say, 15 or 20 minutes as we take a look at the convective outlook today, as we call it.

That dark red area, that's the area we're most concerned about for widespread severe weather. And we think things will develop this afternoon across parts of Oklahoma into Arkansas, as well as Missouri and then spread into the middle of Mississippi and Ohio River Valley.

So, watching out for that extreme threat once again today, guys. And, fortunately, you know, this is spring type weather and that's what we're going to expect every couple of days, we have a chance for seeing these strong storms.

ROMANS: All right. Jacqui -- thank you so much, Jacqui.

New concerns this morning in Japan as they still struggle to get a clear grasp of what's going on inside those reactors that have been crippled at the Daiichi nuclear power plant. So, remote- controlled robots went in and found sauna-like conditions inside the number two reactor. The humidity fogged up the lens of the robot's camera. So, officials were forced to pull the robots out only after a few minutes.

So, still, a very dangerous situation still, even hard for robots to figure out what's happening inside of there.

VELSHI: And Christine was saying earlier, right now in Libya, NATO warplanes are launching fresh airstrikes on the capitol of Tripoli, also, al-Aziziyah and Moammar Gadhafi's hometown of Sirte to the east.

And new reports of horror in the war-torn city of Misrata. Moammar Gadhafi's forces re shelling that city, as they have been for weeks now. Many civilian areas are being targeted. Witnesses say 24 people have died in the past two days.

Great Britain now says it helped get 5,000 people out of the city who are now trapped there.

CHETRY: Well, an air traffic controller and his manager suspended for watching a movie while on the clock. The latest incident happened in Cleveland, Ohio. You can tack it on to the growing list of suspensions across the country.

The two were watching the movie, "The Cleaner," on the DVD and didn't realize that their radio mike was open. That meant that they broadcast the movie's soundtrack to cockpits until a military pilot called and said, "You guys, we can hear you. We can hear this movie."

Earlier on AMERICAN MORNING, former FAA chief of staff, Michael Goldfarb, weighed in on why he thinks these problems keep happening.

(BEGIN VIDEO LCIP)

MICHAEL GOLDFARB, FMR. FAA CHIEF OF STAFF: I think that highly operational people who perform missions where there's precision involved, have a harder time when there's not a lot of traffic. It's harder for a controller who has five or six planes from midnight or 11:00 p.m. until 6:00 a.m., quite frankly, to stay awake and focused on the job. That's they knew they needed two controllers at all of the 27 critical facilities.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHETRY: The FAA released this statement, quote, "The controller and front lineman manager have been suspended from operational duties pending an investigation. FAA policy prohibits the use of portable DVD players and other devices from being used on the floor of the radar room."

ROMANS: OK. Popular dating Web site, Match.com, is amping up it's pre-screening policies. It will begin checking members against the national sex offender registry. This comes after a California woman filed a lawsuit against the company last week. She claimed she was raped by a man she met on Match.com.

According to the suit, the man was convicted in six separate sex assault cases.

VELSHI: And Facebook is launching a new safety center for teens. Parents and teachers are also invited to get involved.

How are those updates going to protect kids? I'm going to talk to Facebook chief privacy officer at 8:30 a.m. Eastern.

CHETRY: All right. Still ahead, just a year after the deadly rig explosion and disastrous oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, so, what has changed? How many of those areas in the region come along. We are examining the damage done to the environment and how people along the coast are coping today.

VELSHI: Plus, a webcam may have captured the murder of a 23- year-old student -- this is quite something -- while she was chatting online with a friend overseas. We'll have that shocking story for you, next.

ROMANS: And a little later, maternity tourism. Mothers-to-be are coming to the U.S. from all over the world, paying big bucks so they can give birth here on U.S. soil. And that means their babies are automatically American citizens. It's legal for now.

Both sides of the debate a little later in the morning.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELSHI: A witness to murder online. Police say in Toronto, a 23-year-old exchange student was found dead in her apartment three hours after a friend in China watched her being attacked on a webcam. Police say the suspect knocked on her door while she was in the midst of a conversation with this person in China, asking to use the phone. The online witness saw a struggle before the attacker turned her lap tap off. Police later arrived and found her dead.

ROMANS: It was a case that raised issues of class and race and dominated the headlines. Now, the woman who accused three Duke University lacrosse players of rape is facing murder charges herself. Police in Durham, North Carolina, say Crystal Mangum -- she stabbed her boyfriend to death during an argument. She accused the Duke players of raping her back in 2006 while performing as a stripper at a party. The attorney general later dropped the charges over a lack of evidence.

CHETRY: Well, police say that a pitcher for the Cincinnati Reds was caught stealing. Twenty-three-year-old Mike Leake is accused of shoplifting six American Rag t-shirts from a Macy's department store yesterday. He was reportedly caught on their surveillance cameras removing security tags from the shirts. They were worth less than 60 bucks altogether. Leake's 2011 salary with the Reds was $425,000.

VELSHI: And he was forced to fly back from Afghanistan to resign if you recall. But, now, the Pentagon says the former top commander in Afghanistan didn't do anything wrong. The Department of Defense inspector ruled that General Stanley McChrystal and his aides did not violate military policy over an article in "Rolling Stone" magazine.

In the article, McChrystal's aides mocked top officials, including Vice President Biden. Last week, the White House appointed McChrystal as a head of new advisory board to support military families.

CHETRY: Well, a controversial bill is blocked in Arizona. Governor Jan Brewer actually vetoed what was -- well, there's two different bills. One was the one that would have allowed guns on parts of public college campuses, calling it, quote, "poorly written." The governor said that the decision to veto came because she thinks the bill didn't clearly explain what was considered a public right-of- way and that this bill could have eventually been interpreted to allow guns at high schools as well.

ROMANS: Meanwhile, Brewer derailed the so-called birther bill yesterday. It would have required President Obama and other presidential candidates to prove they were born in the U.S. before they could take a spot on the state ballot. Brewer says the bill simply goes too far and could promote politically motivated decisions.

VELSHI: All right. Still ahead, this is a discussion I'm very interested in. It is about kids on Facebook. Facebook is making some changes to help keep kids safe, including preventing underage kids from being on Facebook and giving parents tools to monitor what their kids are doing.

We're going to have that in about 15 minutes.

CHETRY: Also, just a year after the gulf spill, Rob Marciano back on the Gulf Coast. How are the beaches doing? How are the animals doing? Many of them were recued but unfortunately, some others died because of that. Up next, the damage done to the environment, to the livelihoods and where cleanup efforts stand right now.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK0

CHETRY: Seventeen minutes past the hour now.

Tomorrow marks a year since the deadly rig explosion in the Gulf of Mexico that triggered the worst oil spill in U.S. history. Eleven people died in that tragedy.

And over the past year, countless lives and livelihoods have been disrupted or destroyed, hundreds of coastline still stained by crude oil. Marshlands affected as well. Cleanup continues. But meantime, thousands of birds, dolphins and turtles have died. And the long-term impact of many wildlife species is still unclear.

We want to take a look, though, at where things stand today, the Gulf one year later. When you take a look at the BP fund, $20 billion is how much that oil company set aside to pay out victims. As of now, though, only $3.8 billion has actually been paid out. And the complaints are pouring in about just how slow and cumbersome the process is.

Now, one of the big players, Halliburton -- that is the company that designed the faulty cement seal that they say may have actually triggered the disaster. Well, they had a heck of a year in 2010. They raked in $1.8 billion in profits. That's up 60 percent. And First quarter profits this year are set to be higher.

Now, let's take a look at BP's cleanup response. At the height of the oil spill, the giant had 48,000 people working in the water and along the coastline trying to clean up the mess. Today, that number has dwindled now to 2,000.

And the other interesting thing that we were talking about when this first happened -- this was a year ago that this happened -- we didn't realize just how the magnitude would be. They couldn't get the thing closed. The blow-up preventer failed.

VELSHI: Yes.

CHETRY: Eighty-six days we follow that oil spewing into the Gulf.

VELSHI: The world followed, America followed this thing. We had no idea why on day one that that was going to be how it was going to turn out.

Our special coverage, CNN's in-depth coverage, "The Gulf a Year Later," continues with Rob Marciano. He's live in New Orleans this morning -- a place where he spent a lot of time a year ago.

ROMANS: That's right. Rob was among our team of CNN reporters on the ground.

You know, Rob, you focused on the wildlife quite a bit in your reporting. What's changed since you were there last?

ROB MARCIANO, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Well, there's no more of those MASH-like triage units that were cleaning and rehabilitating birds. They have long since gone. But they are still treating dolphins and turtles that still come in. That have been affected by this oil spill.

So, that is ongoing. Certainly, a year ago, just days after the actual explosion of the rig, and we saw the pictures of those birds that were coated in oil and beamed across the world. Wildlife organizations just converged on this area to help rescue and rehabilitate those animals. And thousands were helped. But the fact of the matter is, that thousands more were killed.

Now, a year later, they are assessing the damage. What they are trying to do is carefully collect evidence and build a case against BP. You mentioned the BP funds, the money that's available. Well, there's the Oil Pollution Act, there's the Endangered Species Act, the Clean Water Act -- these are all meant to punish perpetrators that commit these crimes and pay out.

And what they are hoping to do is collect enough money to restore the Gulf back to the way it was, maybe even better, because it was kind of a system that that was teetering on the brink. You know, we were losing wetlands year after year after year. So, they are hoping to get it back to the way it was.

That is going to take some time. And that's the effort that's happening now -- aside from still some cleanup that's going on in the marshlands because there's still oil to be there to be cleaned up -- guys.

CHETRY: That is going to prove to be key if they can get those marshlands and they can really make that effort. And it's going to be very costly.

The other interesting thing when you're down there -- and you remember this, too, Ali -- is you'd see oil rigs and fishing boats, oil rigs and fishing boats.

VELSHI: Right.

CHETRY: Oil and fishing, both a way of life down there. Some families were fishermen.

(CROSSTALK)

CHETRY: So, how do people feel? Have their feelings about offshore drilling changed in this last year?

MARCIANO: Well, I think across America -- and we have a CNN poll that highlights this. You know, folks are starting to support it again. You know, our memories are short, of course, with the price of gasoline climbing throughout the year, that will get you to say, OK, yes, maybe we will allow more drilling out there.

But the folks who live down here, certainly, it's a way of life -- like you mentioned. There's fisherman that live right next to guys that work on the oil rig. So, it's not something they want to get rid of.

I can tell this -- what folks have told me on the ground is there hasn't been enough policy change in D.C. They want lawmakers to make it safer and more regulated to go out there and drill and drill in a more responsible way. But 12 months later, they feel that hasn't been done quite enough, not yet at least.

ROMANS: All right. Rob Marciano -- thanks so much, Rob.

CHETRY: And, tonight, be sure to watch "IN THE ARENA," at 8:00, "PIERS MORGAN" at 9:00, and "A.C. 360" at 10:00, they're going to continue our special CNN in depth, a year in the Gulf, talking to guest such as Philippe Cousteau in the environment, and also Ken Feinberg, he's the man who's overseeing that $20 billion BP claims fund.

VELSHI: That's all beginning 8:00 Eastern on CNN.

Coming up next, a safer environment for Facebook for its more than half a billion users. What exactly is the social networking site doing to improve your kids privacy, their safety online, and your ability to understand what they are doing online. There are some real changes. And we are going to talk about in eight minutes.

ROMANS: And, yes, presidents, just like the rest of us, they have to pay and file tax return. We got it. We got the tax return. It looks like the Obamas took a big pay cut last year, but they still made a whole lot more money than most people will ever make. We're going to have that for you.

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CHETRY: Twenty-five minutes past the hour. We're starting up this morning, taking a look at Central Park and the New York City's skyline, where it's 50 right now. A little bit later, as usual, guys, showers.

(CROSSTALK)

ROMANS: There is flooding in northern Jersey. They have just been swamped. And in Texas, they are praying for rain.

VELSHI: Yes, they do. They'd take any rain they could get. They got an inch since January.

Minding your business now -- markets are mixed overseas, by the way. And that's important to note because yesterday was a rough day on U.S. markets because S&P, one of the major credit agencies, cut its outlook for U.S. debt from stable to negative. Now, just be clear on that -- that's not the same as cutting the credit rating. This means they might cut the credit rating two years from now.

The leading rating agency said it was concerned about the ballooning U.S. deficit and lawmakers' inability to agreement to reduce it. But we are at a time right now where everybody is sort of polarized about this discussion. So, when you go out today and people say, hey, they cut the credit rating on the U.S., they didn't.

ROMANS: No, they didn't. And some of you are also writing into us and saying, hey, why are we supposed to trust these anyway?

VELSHI: Right.

ROMANS: They didn't say that all of those derivatives were perfectly fine, and they were and you're right.

But this time -- this time, we are watching because we do know that the U.S. is running in an awful lot of red ink.

All right. The first family releasing its tax returns, and the Obamas earned $1.7 million last year, most of that from the president's book sales. That's down big from $5.5 million the year before. The Obamas paid $453,000 in federal taxes, donated 14 percent of their income to charities. The president likes to say, "Hey, I don't need another tax break." You can see he paid $453,000 in taxes last year.

CHETRY: Well, today is the day that McDonald's plans to hire 50,000 people, the so-called McJobs includes full and part-time crew and management positions. By the way, a restaurant manager can make up to $50,000 a year.

VELSHI: And BlackBerry's answer to the iPad goes on sale today. BlackBerry tablet sells for between $500 and $600. Currently, only Wi-Fi versions are available. A 3G model which can be used anywhere will be available later this year. It got some mixed reviews.

CHETRY: It is something that fits in your pocket.

VELSHI: Remember, we tried to fit into my pocket.

CHETRY: It could fit in your fit.

VELSHI: If I had a bigger pocket.

CHETRY: OK. That's so small.

VELSHI: Why do you have to talk about my pocket? I'm teasing.

ROMANS: All right.

CHETRY: I store my hair bands in his pocket as well. You know, you need a ponytail holder.

VELSHI: That's what I am.

ROMANS: For the guy with no hair.

OK. Crossing the top hour now, some top stories to get you up to speed on.

Right now in Libya, NATO warplanes are launching fresh air strikes on the capital of Tripoli, also Aziziyah and Moammar Gadhafi's home of Sirte to the east.

Dozens of wildfires spreading out of control in Texas. Small fires now combining to form one massive blaze, within 100 miles of the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Fires have now burned 1.5 million acres in Texas and destroyed close to 250 homes.

And extreme weather of a different kind -- the South and parts of the Midwest facing another tornado threat today.

Another air traffic controller has been suspended, along with his manager, for watching a movie instead of the skies while on the job in Cleveland Sunday. He accidentally left his mike open and the film he was watching -- in case you're wondering -- "The Cleaner" was broadcast over the airwaves.

A popular dating Web site is making your quest for love a little safer. Match.com announcing its new screening policies. It will now check all members against the national sex offender registry. The move came after a California woman filed a lawsuit against the company last week. She claims she was raped by a man she met on Match who was reportedly a six-time convicted sex offender.

VELSHI: And that's a good move on Match.com's place.

Safety on the Internet is a big issue for us continuously.

Today, Facebook has announced a new section devoted to keeping the youngest users of Facebook safe when they are online, including a free downloadable guide on social media safety for teachers, which is an interesting issue -- and expansion of the social reporting feature that allows users to report abuse of content.

Joining us now in a CNN exclusive: Facebook's chief security officer, Joe Sullivan. Joe, thanks for being with us.

Joe, thanks for being with us.

Let me just pare this down for our viewers. There are three areas I think are major developments here. One is greater monitoring of your underage users and trying to boot some of them off; parents' ability to monitor what their kids are doing online; and reporting of cyber bullies or abuse or things that shouldn't be happening.

Let's start with parents. For the parents watching us right now -- what have you changed that allows them to monitor what their kids are doing online more closely?

JOE SULLIVAN, CHIEF SECURITY OFFICER, FACEBOOK: Well, thanks for the opportunity to be here.

The first thing we have launched today is a new family safety center. And the goal there is to put together in one place for parents all of the exciting educational material we have been able to gather from a number of different sources. We have the safety advisory board made up of many of the leading safety experts.

VELSHI: Let's cut to the chase. What have you done to make it simple for parents to track what their kids are doing on Facebook?

SULLIVAN: First off, we have talked to parents about some of the key issues that they have, like should I be friends with my kid on Facebook? Should I require their password? How should I talk to them about Facebook, how can we engage one another?

When we think about safety online, we don't think about it starting the day they get the Facebook account. We think about it starting a whole lot earlier. So, in the same way when a parent has a teen that gets a driver's license, you didn't start talking to them about safety on the road when they got the license. You started talking about it when they started crawling out towards the street. And so we have designed the safety center to get educational material for parents so that they can think about the dialogue over time.

We have also built into the site some new social reporting features. When you think about Facebook, you think about the joy of a positive experience with your friends. Well, we want to do the same thing when someone has a bad experience. We want to take the social experience of Facebook and make that social experience uplifting for that bad thing.

So in most Web sites if you see something bad happening, you just report it to the Web site and then life goes on and the Web site will remove it. What we are doing now is two different things we are very excited about. First, when you report something, you don't have the option to just report it to Facebook. You can also report it to a family member or a mentor of some other kind. So you can start that conversation. As a parent, I wish my kids would have that easy way to say I saw something online that hurt me that one of my friends did.

CHETRY: So you are changing the infrastructure of how this works. On nearly every page, there is a link to easily report offensive or inappropriate content, not just to Facebook but a parent or trusted adult. The one thing you clearly have challenges with is that you set the level at 13 years or older. You have to be 13 years of age before you can get a Facebook account.

The Pew research group found that 40 percent of 12-year-olds admit to using social networks like Facebook. How to you reinforce this when so many kids are on Facebook that aren't 13?

SULLIVAN: That's a great question. That takes it back to a core point, what are we as a service and as a community member doing to make our part of the internet safe for kids. We start with some very special rules. So, for example, if you are under 18, your experience on Facebook is different than your experience as an adult. We lock down your information so that you can't share it with the entire internet even if you want too.

And then we do have that rule if you are under 13, we don't want you to use the service. We start with a set of rules, but then we also build technology and try to make the experience such that no one regardless of their age has something bad.

CHETRY: How can you enforce for a 13-year-old? They can just lie and put in a different birth year?

SULLIVAN: I think that study you cited and some other recent studies highlighted that there is no one perfect solution for stopping lying. What we can do is we can start that dialogue with parents. We can make sure that parents are involved.

And so we can also do our part behind the scenes to engage parents, to implement technology. We will remove them and disable the account and delete the information. We also want to have that engagement with parents so they know what the children are doing on the internet and have a supervisory role.

VELSHI: And Joe, what is the best way? If a parent says, my kid is on Facebook, I have no idea what they are doing on Facebook. They say they are chatting with friends and posting stuff. Is there a way a parent can monitor their kid's Facebook account that's different or do you just have to know the password and log in as your kid?

SULLIVAN: I think that there are as many different approaches as there are parenting styles in general. I think an important approach a parent should take is to try and have the dialogue.

And maybe a suggestion I have is a parent could ask their teen, help me set up my account. If your goal as a parent is to have that dialogue and to have your teen open about what they are doing on Facebook, there is no better way than asking that teen help you set up your account. If you said to your kid, help me customize my privacy setting, you would have an awesome dialogue about privacy setting on Facebook. We know from statistics, over 80 percent of the parents and kids that are on Facebook, are Facebook friends, and those kids all know how to customize the privacy settings to make it the right one for them. From a parents' standpoint, it could be heartwarming to have that dialogue.

VELSHI: Joe Sullivan is the chief security officer at Facebook. Thanks for joining us.

ROMANS: What I am hearing is that it is still the parents' responsibility. He's telling you that parents have to have a supervisory role and know what's going on.

CHETRY: They have changed them. The kids can change their privacy settings.

VELSHI: And one thing they're doing is they are putting a safety channel about Facebook, so they are putting all these videos together so a parent can sit there and understand what the kids do on Facebook so you can have a conversation with your kid saying, are you doing this, are you doing that? Can I see your password?

CHETRY: I also thought this was interesting. If you can get the law the right way and there are applicable laws that apply where you can get information about your kids' account, you can submit a form and have to do some notarizing, and you can actually get information if you want to know who they're talking to if they're underage.

ROMANS: There's another story we want to talk about, a bizarre new travel trend here in the USA called maternity tourism. It's where wealthy, pregnant women fly in from overseas, pay up to $35,000 to spend a few months here to have their babies born as U.S. citizens. All around the world, there are travel agencies that specialize in this. Should this be outlawed? We'll get both sides of the debate next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROMANS: This has become a controversial business, pregnant tourists paying thousands of dollars, tens of thousands of dollars in many cases, to have their babies born in the U.S. Now, this is part of the overall story on birth right citizenship. It is an issue that according to a CNN Opinion Research Corporation poll taken last year shows the American public pretty much split on this.

CHETRY: Basically, it is literally almost split down the middle when it comes to whether or not people who are born in America, if their parents are illegal immigrants, should they be automatic citizens.

Joining us to talk more about new laws that would ban the practice, Marshall Fitz, director of immigration policies at the Center for American Progress, and also Mark Krikorian, the director for the Center for Immigration Studies which advocates for tougher immigration control.

Let's start with you, Mark. How big of a problem this birth tourism is, how often is this happening?

MARK KRIKORIAN, CENTER FOR IMMIGRATION STUDIES: Well, we are not exactly sure. There is sort of a range. There is something like 7,000 or so people each year who have their birth certificates mailed to a foreign address. But a lot of the birth tourists stay here long enough to get the kid's new birth certificate and passport. The whole point is to get a passport of convenience.

So our guesstimate might be 30,000 something or more a year. And there are other kinds of birth tourism to add to that. It could be as much as 200,000 a year, though probably it is not quite that big.

ROMANS: Marshall, I want to ask you how big of a thing you think this is? It is getting wrapped up in the overall discuss of birthrights. On the surface, it seems outrageous. It is just a part of the overall birthright citizenship story, right?

MARSHALL FITZ, CENTER FOR AMERICAN PROGRESS: Yes. I think probably most people would agree this is deeply objectionable practice, the idea that you can buy citizenship offends the spirit of generosity that really animates our welcoming nations of immigrants tradition.

So I think this is an issue that should be investigated further. It is important that Mark is and Mark has done a little bit of work in trying to figure out how many people are using this. I think it is something we should take a closer look at and try to shut down.

Unfortunately it is getting sensationalized and connected to concepts and phrases like "terror babies" that are being used to try to bootstrap the issue into the debate about birthright citizenship more generally.

CHETRY: First, I want to ask you, Marshall, because you are for the right to be a citizen if you are born here regardless of your parents' citizenship status. We are one of the few countries that allow for this and actually the largest of the many countries that do it. Only about a handful, 30 of the 194 world countries allow for automatic birthright citizenship.

ROMANS: Ireland just revoked it. Some countries are tightening up on this.

CHETRY: Is it for a reason that there are many other countries that just don't allow this?

FITZ: All I can say is that, frankly, I think this is one of the reasons that America is such a great country. It is part of our exceptionalism. We have decided that the core principles of equality and opportunity that inform the essence of this country should not be subject to the political whims of shifting majorities.

CHETRY: Is it a political whim? It's our 14th Amendment. "All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof are citizens of the United States." Mark, what is your interpretation of that?

KRIKORIAN: Clearly that amendment was needed right after the Civil War because the point of it was to make sure that the southern states newly brought back into the union didn't strip the newly freed slaves of their citizenship.

The quote is, in an era of modern transportations and communications where the world has shrunk, is this sustainable? More and more countries are answering no. The United States and Canada are the only two immigration countries that still do it.

My concern about changing it now is we have millions of illegal immigrants here having kids. I think this is something that needs to be revisited, but I would actually like to shrink the illegal population, deal with that problem, and then reassess citizenship rules.

ROMANS: So that's a -- that's a big broader kind of issue and I guess I spoke to you for this birthright citizenship part of the story. That's something that maybe could be handled through visa -- through visa laws or something.

I mean, people have to get a visa from many, many of these countries to come here first. Is there a way, Mark or -- we start with you first Marshall, quickly both of you, is there a way to use the visa system to -- to maybe regulate this?

FITZ: You mean the maternal tourism question?

ROMANS: Yes.

FITZ: Yes. The kind of birth tourism.

ROMANS: Sure.

FITZ: Yes, absolutely, I think that you can figure out ways to ensure -- I mean, frankly, right now, if you are asked by a visa officer what your intention is to come to the United States and -- and your intention is, in fact, to -- to come to give birth to a U.S. citizen child and you don't say that, you say that your intention is to come for some other reason, you are committing fraud.

And that, in and of itself, should be enough to prevent you from getting the visa and -- or to be prosecuted --

(CROSSTALK)

CHETRY: Right.

FITZ: -- prosecuted for it later but there is also the -- the kind of receiving end of this, right? I mean, it's -- it's kind of like employers hiring undocumented workers. It's -- you should also focus on some of these agencies that are promoting this and -- and try to shut them down. I think there are definitely ways that -- that we can do that without invoking the broader question about the 14th Amendment.

CHETRY: And just let me give Mark the last word as well. Mark, do you think that this needs to actually be a constitutional amendment or do you think it can be handled through the visa process?

KRIKORIAN: Well, for the birth tourism thing, I think we can start small. Like Marshall said, deal with the visa side of it first. We, at some point, are probably going to have to relook at this interpretation of the 14th Amendment.

But just for birth tourism, I think we should start with the smaller, easier steps, make it prohibit people coming here when they apply for their visa. So they essentially would have to lie if they were coming to have their kids here which now they don't have to do. They don't have to lie. They can be honest about it.

CHETRY: Right.

KRIKORIAN: And we don't turn them down.

ROMANS: Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies a firm that is -- lobbies for stricter immigration levels of all kinds; and Marshall Fitz, director of Immigration Policy at the Center for American Progress. Gentlemen, thank you.

FITZ: Thanks for having me.

KRIKORIAN: Thank you.

(CROSSTALK)

VELSHI: All right, a severe thunderstorm could bring tornadoes, strong winds and large hail to the middle of the country. We're going to have an update for you on the national weather picture right after this. Jacqui has got it.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELSHI: A lot going on this morning. Here is what you need to know to start your day.

Fresh air strikes in Tripoli this morning. NATO is saying it's targeting Gadhafi's command and control facilities in and around Tripoli and also his hometown of Sirte.

Sauna-like conditions inside one of the reactors at Japan's crippled nuclear plant preventing a robot from examining the damage. Officials say, the robot was pulled out after its camera fogged up. Workers are now also pumping radioactive water out of that unit's basement.

Dozens of wildfires spreading out of control in Texas; close to 250 homes have burned. Flames are now within 100 miles of the Dallas Fort Worth area. The lawsuit claiming Taco Bell's seasoned beef was only 35 percent seasoned beef has been dropped. A statement from Taco Bell says the company did not make changes to its product or its advertising because of the suit.

You're caught up on the day's headlines. AMERICAN MORNING is back after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

JERAS: (AUDIO GAP) -- wildfires burning across the state of Texas at this hour. And it's really -- the fire danger here is unprecedented. We have seven large fires burning across the state after a wet 2010 and extremely dry 2011; record dry for the month of March. We have never seen the threat across Texas really this extreme.

There you can see a satellite signature. This is from NASA so you can see these fires from space. And just the direction of that smoke gives you an idea of how strong those winds have been. They are going to be strong once again today. Very dry weather in addition to hot temperatures keeping that threat very, very high today.

In addition to that, we will be watching for severe thunderstorms this afternoon and even continuing through the overnight hours tonight across the nation's midsection. Tornadoes along with damaging winds can be expected.

We do have some severe thunderstorms that have been moving across parts of Missouri, as well as into Illinois this morning. Most of these have been hail makers. On the northern tier of this, we have been dealing with wintry weather. Yes, that's right. Snow for you across parts of the north; that watch in effect, by the way until 11:00 local time.

For you travelers, we've got major delays for you in Chicago, almost three hours; 45-minute delays getting into San Francisco; and Providence, Rhode Island looking at departure delays on the range of around 30 minutes.

That's a look at your forecast. AMERICAN MORNING will be back right after this.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ZACH ANNER, TV TALK SHOW HOST: I come from a very creative family. My mother is a playwright. My dad made videos too. So it was a great place to be.

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: When he was growing up, Zach Anner always knew he wanted to work in film.

ANNER: It was always like, whatever you wanted to do, we can find a way to do it.

GUPTA: Now, at 26, he lives in Austin and spends his days writing, editing and brain storming with his production and support team, his friends.

A year ago, Austin and really the rest of the country didn't know who Zach was. And then he decided to enter a contest to become Oprah Winfrey's next TV talk show star.

OPRAH WINFREY, TV TALK SHOW HOST: How old were you when you figured out that you were different than the other kids?

ANNER: I knew that I had a wheelchair, obviously. They didn't shield that from me.

As a result of the contest, Oprah gave Zach his own travel show scheduled to air later this year.

ANNER: Taking life as it comes and whatever you run into, you just learn to roll with it.

GUPTA: And rolling with life's obstacles, well, that's just what Zach does. Zach has cerebral palsy. It's a neurological disease that affects the brain's ability to control body movements. But having CP never stopped him from doing what he wants to do.

ANNER: Everybody has problems I always say. And like, mine are no bigger than anyone else's. And I think that's the message that I want to get across.

What I've got to deal with is really small in the scheme of things.

GUPTA: Zach gives his family a lot of credit for not dwelling on his disability. He hopes someday to be an inspiration to others but says he is not there yet and has this advice.

ANNER: I would say to anybody who feels really like they are bogged down by their obstacles, just really think of who you are without those. And imagine yourself doing what you love to do because that will drive you to do things you never thought you were capable of.

Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN, reporting.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ROMANS: That's going to do it for us.

VELSHI: We're out of time. We sort of (INAUDIBLE) went a little extra time.

CHETRY: Yes, the 100 and -- what do we have 190 minutes -- that was it.

VELSHI: Well, you know what? We'll continue. CNN stays on the air.

ROMANS: Well, you can talk to Carol now.

(CROSSTALK)

VELSHI: Carol, can you handle it for a while?

CHETRY: Hi, Carol.