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Exxon Mobil Sued over Pipeline Oil Spill; More Severe Weather Expected Today; Rupert Murdoch Files for Divorce; Eleven-Year-Old Delivers Anthem Encore
Aired June 14, 2013 - 10:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: Hi there. Welcome back. I'm Brianna Keilar. And checking in our "Top Stories" now, fire fighters in Central Colorado have found the bodies of two people who were apparently trying to escape that massive wildfire. More than 41,000 people are under orders to evacuate. At last count nearly 400 homes were destroyed.
And the search is on to figure out why a packed Miami area sports bar deck collapsed Thursday night without warning sending dozens of people in the Biscayne Bay. Inspectors are now taking photographs of what's left of the deck. Nearly two dozen people were hurt when it gave way.
And HGTV is apologizing after suggesting the American flag be used as a table cloth. This was part of an online article for Fourth of July decorations and that article got a whole lot of criticism. On its Facebook page HGTV now says it was a regrettable use of our flag and never should have happened.
And in Wisconsin, a college student was about to be appointed to the University of Wisconsin's Board of Regents but then the governor's office realized Joshua Inglett signed the recall petition against Governor Scott Walker last year, so his appointment to the board was revoked. Governor Walker refused to say exactly why.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GOV. SCOTT WALKER (R), WISCONSIN: I wasn't involved in that directly. I just say that in the interest of not pulling him through the details on this, we just -- we withdrew the nomination and we'll be submitting another name.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Was it because he signed the petition?
WALKER: As I said before, I'm not going to comment one way or the other.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KEILAR: Now Inglett says he told the Governor's office that he had signed the recall petition. State law says no partisan test of any kind are allowed when appointing someone to that position. Exxon Mobil is now being sued by the U.S. Department of Justice and the State of Arkansas. You may remember when this happened in March outside of Little Rock. An underground pipeline ruptured and an estimated 5,000 barrels of oil spewed all over this suburban neighborhood. Homes were evacuated; 22 homes contaminated. This is a pipeline that carries Canadian oil from Illinois to Texas. And it has been shut down ever since.
Arkansas Attorney General Dustin McDaniel joining me now live from Little Rock, Arkansas. Dustin thanks for being with us.
DUSTIN MCDANIEL, ARKANSAS ATTORNEY GENERAL: Good morning.
KEILAR: And tell me about this lawsuit, because it's not just about the spill. It's also about the disposal of the waste here.
MCDANIEL: That's true. What we have is a really good example of the state and the United States government working together, the Department of Justice and the AG's office, to bring an action for enforcement of our environmental laws. And it's not just about the spill or the damages caused to our water, air and soil, but it's also about amazingly enough violations of state law in the course of the clean-up itself.
KEILAR: And how much money is Arkansas hoping to get over this? Is there a chance that the homeowners -- we saw that oil right in front of their houses -- is there a chance that they see compensation?
MCDANIEL: Well, it's important to know that the state action is really about our environmental law penalty provisions. This does not impact one way or the other the private causes of action by the homeowners. My consumer division is working diligently to try and assist the homeowners, including on trying to put pressure on Exxon with regard to their homeowner compensation plan that they've offered, which I have publicly said is way inadequate for what these people have experienced. No one who has been evacuated from their homes are back in their homes yet today.
But this is really about environmental law enforcement by the state and federal government. So this is a very narrow window and it still leaves open other causes of action, both public and private in the future.
KEILAR: And we're seeing in these pictures I think we're getting a better sense of some of the damage that this caused; the repercussions of this -- of this oil spill, but give us a -- give us a broader sense of the damage and also, I know that there's a nearby lake, Lake Conway. What kind of damage was done to the lake?
MCDANIEL: Well, we're talking about the first oil spill in a residential neighborhood in American history. And so as far as we know, this is the first time this has happened. So the future is very uncertain for these homeowners who had oil running through their yards, their driveways, their homes.
But it also went into a creek and into Lake Conway, which also feeds into the Arkansas River. I'm really proud of the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission, which acted within hours to try and sequester the oil's flow to a certain area of the lake. We feel confident that the majority of the oil was contained in a certain area of the lake but the damage to aquatic life, the damage to the water itself and we know certainly within the soil.
And also the -- the improper storage of the -- the waste that was removed is part of this litigation. You know, they did not seek a permit, and they started transporting tons of concrete, soil, wood, wood chips, water and petroleum mixtures without a proper permit to a storage site that they happen to own for their gas -- natural gas subsidiary only a few miles away. They were ordered to remove that as early as the end of April and early May, and it's still there. So we have also added violations of the Hazardous Waste Act to this litigation.
KEILAR: And we know there will be ramifications from this as well when it comes to other oil spills in the future that we certainly would expect, as there are so many pipelines in the U.S.
Arkansas Attorney General, Dustin McDaniel, thanks for taking the time.
MCDANIEL: Thank you. Have a great day.
KEILAR: You too.
Now from Iowa to the nation's capital, powerful thunderstorms wreaking havoc across the nation. Now more storms could be headed your way? We'll have an update, next.
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KEILAR: Parts of the country could see more severe weather today following yesterday's chaotic weather and storm damage. Check out the dark ominous clouds that rolled over the nation's capital -- kind of scary here yesterday. A tornado was actually spotted touching down just outside of Washington D.C., and there were water spouts that were seen in Chesapeake Bay -- over the bay there.
Across the eastern third of the country hundreds of thousands of people spent the night in the dark after storms knocked out power.
And check this out, here in Maryland winds ripped out that 400-year- old tree just straight out of the ground. It barely missed hitting a house, thank goodness.
And in Richmond, Virginia, though a 4-year-old boy was killed when a tree fell over; the boy and his father were hit by the tree as they evacuated a nature center.
Meteorologist Chad Myers is joining me now from Atlanta. Atlanta had some bad weather too -- Chad?
CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Sure did. At about 5:00, 6:00 last night, the storms started around Chattanooga and dropped right down I- 75, right through the city. Trees are down everywhere. Powers lines were all over the place in Atlanta. At least -- most to the commuters got to work this morning I don't know if that's good or bad depending on your point of view.
New York City is seeing some rain showers right now but it does get bumpy today farther out to the west. Look at this, yesterday and we we're talking about the tornado here not that far from Rockville and Laurel, Maryland that's one little circle under there all those blue things, all those little symbols, those are wind reports of wind damage; 645 wind damage reports yesterday. The damaging wind and the hail, maybe even a tornado or two around Lincoln, Omaha, Nebraska maybe as far east as Des Moines. Here's the radar coming right through Omaha, right about 4:00 or 5:00 o'clock that is exactly the time you don't want things to fire up, that's the heat of the day.
Later on tonight, it cools down over Des Moines and then we could see some more showers a little bit farther to the east for tomorrow afternoon. There will be some heavy rain, I'll tell you what, anywhere in Nebraska and Kansas will take any rain you can get sometimes it has to come down as a severe thunderstorms in some spots but the rain is a welcome blessing here in a very dry part of the country that needs an awful lot more rain where that came from.
Denver all the way down south here's I-25 looking right here in the fire zone, not a red flag warning today, but I do suspect we will have winds at about 20 miles per hour. We'll keep you advised and those winds and also the relative humidity's around Colorado Springs, those fire fighters still battling that Black Forest fire -- Brianna.
KEILAR: And that's not what they want, the low humidity.
MYERS: I know.
KEILAR: And the warmth. If you've covered a fire -- a wildfire, you know that's exactly the opposite of what they want.
MYERS: Yes.
KEILAR: Chad Myers thank you for that.
MYERS: Thank you Brianna.
KEILAR: Now they are practically defined as the power couple, but now Rupert Murdoch and Wendi Deng are calling it quits. And there's potentially billions of dollars on the line.
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KEILAR: So back in 2011, Wendi Deng stood by her man, Rupert Murdoch. You remember this. She fought off a pie-wielding attacker who came at him during a British court hearing. But nearly two years later, this power couple is calling it quits. Murdoch, the CEO of News Corp has revealed that he's filing for divorce from his much younger and highly accomplished wife.
Alina Cho is following this story from New York. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ALINA CHO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The marriage of Rupert Murdoch and Wendi Deng was a partnership in every sense of the worse. He, the 82- year-old chairman and CEO of News Corp with holdings that include Fox News and the "Wall Street Journal", one of the richest men in the world. She, age 44, nearly half his age, a glamorous third wife with a taste for high fashion and high-powered friends.
But this is what made Wendi Murdoch internationally famous. 2011, smacking a protester who tried to throw a shaving cream pie at her husband as the media tycoon testified before Britain's parliament about his newspaper's practice of phone hacking. The video went viral earning her the nickname "tiger wife".
Now their divorce first reported by deadline.com is front page news. This is Rupert and Wendi Murdoch in happier times, talking to our Piers Morgan at this year's Academy Awards.
PIERS MORGAN, CNN HOST: How do you feel about CNN doing so well against Fox at the moment?
RUPERT MURDOCH, CEO, NEWS CORP: I think we're okay.
CHO: The Murdochs met in 1997 at a News Corp party in Hong Kong, where the Yale-educated Wendi worked at Murdoch property Star TV. Two years later the couple married on his yacht in New York Harbor. They have two young daughters and all the benefits that come with being super rich.
No word on what Wendi could walk away with, but Murdoch, worth $11.2 billion paid his last wife a reported $1.7 billion in what was billed as the most expensive divorce settlement in history.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHO: $1.7 billion, including, Brianna, $110 million in cash. How about that? Now, those who know the Murdochs say Wendi was a huge influence on her husband -- everything from his friends to politics, even down to his clothes. Those friends also say that they do believe Rupert Murdoch genuinely loved Wendi, and to quote one, "everyone is now wondering what went wrong" -- Brianna?
KEILAR: So everything from who's going to pick his tie are kind of the questions now that we have.
CHO: That's right.
KEILAR: Alina Cho for us in New York. Thank you very much.
CHO: You bet.
KEILAR: Well, how much would you pay for a guaranteed parking spot? Sometimes I would pay a lot -- I'll admit this, maybe $100, maybe a thousand? You will not believe what one woman paid for two parking spots that you see right there. They were auctioned off in Boston. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KEILAR: Checking top stories:
In Colorado, the most destructive wildfire in the state's history is expected to grow even bigger today. The Black Forest northeast of Colorado Springs already has claimed two lives. This fire has forced 41,000 people to evacuate. And so far 379 homes have been destroyed.
MySpace is all new for your smartphone or tablet. The social network just took the wraps off a new app. It's a complete redesign with just a few pieces from the original web experience. Right now it's only available for Apple's ios devices.
So a really good parking spot can be priceless in some cities like Boston, except for these two, right there. That is a pair of parking spots that just sold for $560,000, that's right -- more than half a million. The two were sold at an IRS auction. Bidding went in the hundreds of thousands of dollars within minutes. And the buyer says she wanted them, because she owns the building next door.
Online bullies couldn't keep this little boy from stealing the spotlight before another NBA playoff game. Sebastian de la Cruz' encore performance, after the break.
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KEILAR: The 11-year-old boy with the golden voice came back for an encore. Sebastien de la Cruz sang the national anthem before last night's NBA playoff game in San Antonio. He was invited back after his performance on Tuesday made him the target of online hecklers who mocked his Mexican heritage.
Our Mark McKay has the story.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MAYOR JULIAN CASTRO (D), SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS: Please help me give a great welcome --
MARK MCKAY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: After being introduced by San Antonio mayor, Julian Castro ahead of Game 4 at the NBA finals on Thursday, Sebastien de la Cruz did what he does best.
(Sebastien de la Cruz singing "Star-Spangled Banner")
MCKAY: It's rare that the same performer sings the national anthem in back-to-back playoff games. The Spurs didn't hesitate in extending another invitation to this talented 11-year-old.
SEBASTIEN DE LA CRUZ, SANG THE NATIONAL ANTHEM: When they first told me I was going to be doing the national anthem and my father told me, I was like, "Yes, another chance to show San Antonio what I have to give them."
MCKAY: De la Cruz's first appearance this week before Game 3 of the series saw him targeted with taunts, not from the crowd, but on social media. "Why they got a Mexican kid singing the national anthem?" Daniel Gilmore tweeted. "How are you singing the national anthem looking like an illegal immigrant," tweeted Andre Lacey of Augusta, Georgia. Matt Cyrus added, "Who let this illegal alien sing our national anthem?"
A popular social media blog highlighted more than two dozen other hateful tweets. De la Cruz, who was born in San Antonio, was not going to let the negativity get him down.
DE LA CRUZ: I think that the people were talking bad because of what I was wearing, and it's not my fault. It's what I love. And I'm just proud to be a mariachi singer. It's their opinion, actually, and if they don't like mariachi, that's their problem. But I love it.
MCKAY: It was an encore that brought down the house, followed by congratulatory handshakes from the two head coaches. All of this for a young man who sent out his own tweet this week, telling the world "I am an American living the American dream."
Mark McKay, CNN.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KEILAR: A great job he did.
Thank you so much for joining us today. "CNN NEWSROOM" continues right after a short break.
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