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Americans Possibly Exposed to Ebola Headed to U.S.; Police and Protesters Meet Face to Face; ISIS "Aggressively" Recruiting from Minnesota

Aired March 14, 2015 - 19:00   ET

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

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: You're in the CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Poppy Harlow, joining you from New York, 7:00 Eastern. And a lot to get to this hour.

A new Ebola scare involving American aide workers. That is where we begin because the CDC says a group of 10 aid workers being flown out of Sierra Leone will be monitored for 21 days as soon as they land here in the United States. This comes one day after another American aid worker already diagnosed with the Ebola virus arrived in the U.S. for treatment. This brings the total number of people treated in the U.S. for Ebola up to 11.

Let's bring in Dr. Alexander Garza. He joins me on the phone. And he is the former chief medical officer for the Department of Homeland Security.

Thank you for being with me, Doctor.

First question that comes to my mind is 10 seems like a pretty big number.

DR. ALEXANDER GARZA, FORMER MEDICAL OFFICER, DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY (via telephone): Yes. That is a significant number. And I think it just goes to show that the disease is still very prevalent in Sierra Leone, as well as Guinea, and the patient that's being brought back that was treated at NIH was quite sick. So, the CDC, I believe out of an abundance of caution, is taking a very proactive step to bring these ten people exposed to the virus back for monitoring to make sure none of them are going to get any more ill.

HARLOW: We know that some of these experimental drugs including one called ZMapp were used in treating some of the other patients in the United States, and ZMapp in particular may have indeed worked. We don't know for sure because it hasn't gone through all those clinical trials, but I just wonder if some of these people that are coming back, if they do indeed have the Ebola virus, are they going to be able to be treated with those experimental drugs?

GARZA: Well, it's possible, although there was not quite -- there was not a very large supply of ZMapp ready at the time. It took quite a bit to get those drugs up and running. So, there's any of a variety of treatments they could receive,

including plasma from people who have survived Ebola. But the one thing we have learned from treating patients here in the United States is that early aggressive therapy does improve survival.

And so, I think that'll be the mainstay of therapy, but there's always options open for some of these experimental treatments, including ZMapp.

HARLOW: You know, this brings us right back to what should be the focus, right, and that's West Africa, where they've had thousands upon thousands of deaths from Ebola. And experts have said, look, if you do not contain this in West Africa, eventually, it's going to come to the United States again. Should this be a stark reminder for all of us of that?

GARZA: Absolutely. That's the point to drive home, is that this has not gone away in West Africa, although Liberia has taken significant steps forward. It's still prevalent in Sierra Leone. That doesn't make it any less dangerous.

And to draw an analogy from a sports team, if you are in the final minutes of the game, you still want to keep your foot on the gas. We still need to being very aggressive to take care of this virus and eliminate it.

HARLOW: But I think Liberia has shown us it can indeed be fought successfully in West Africa, but they need a lot more resources and help to do that.

Thank you very much. Appreciate it, Doctor.

GARZA: No problem. Thanks, Poppy.

HARLOW: Of course.

To Ferguson, Missouri, now, where police are working around the clock. They are trying to find out who shot two of their own officers late on Wednesday night. Investigators say so far they've come up short in this manhunt. They are pursuing several leads, though, and the reward for this information now sits at $10,000. The mayor of Ferguson, one of the only city officials still in his post has said he will not be stepping down.

It's a face-to-face meeting far different from some that we saw in the wake of the shooting death of Michael Brown. Police and protesters quietly meeting on Friday night in Ferguson, realizing they have maybe a lot more in common than they thought.

Here's our Sonia Moghe.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I respect what's happening here. This is what needs to happen, this dialogue. SONIA MOGHE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It's late Friday night,

and just outside of the Ferguson Police Department, a group of protesters and two St. Louis County police officers come face-to-face.

Tonight, instead of tension between the groups, there are handshakes and even hugs.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She always says come stand out here with us. Well, easier said than done, but I would say that --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What you got to do is take that off.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But the fact of the matter is I can wear there this and still agree with some of the things you're saying. I don't agree with all of them.

MOGHE: While St. Louis County Police Lieutenant Jerry Lohr is often standing on the opposite side of South Florissant Road from these protesters, he knows many of them by name.

LT. JERRY LOHR, ST. LOUIS COUNTY, MISSOURI POLICE: One of the things that's worked for me is getting to know people out here. That obviously helps when situations get these. It's easier to defuse it if they know who I am and I know who they are.

MOGHE: But there is also real talk.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The reason we step and took the streets because we've seen one of our young brothers gunned down at the hands of police. And we don't want that.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's one of the biggest issues that got us out here. If I commit a crime, don't treat me different than another man that commit a crime that's my Caucasian counterpart.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HARLOW: Well, it's good to see police and protesters talking civilly like you just saw side by side in Ferguson.

I want to bring in now, David Klinger. He's a professor of criminology and criminal justice at the University of Missouri. He's also a former LAPD police officer.

Thanks for being with me. I appreciate it.

DAVID KLINGER, FORMER LOS ANGELES POLICE OFFICER: Thanks for having me. I also just want to point out, I also worked for city of Redmond after I worked for the city of Los Angeles.

HARLOW: Got it. Good to know.

Sir, what -- just your reaction to what you just saw. I know you might not have been able to see it, but you could hear what it was, really civil discourse between police and some of the protesters. KLINGER: Absolutely. And, in fact, that's the model that police have

been working for, for basically a generation, and since the riots of the '60s and '70s, police have tried to negotiate with protesters and set up the parameters so that peaceful protesters can exercise their First Amendment rights and officers are trained to honor those First Amendment rights.

So, that's a very positive step and it is absolutely consistent with how American policing has been trying to work protesters for the last few decades. It doesn't always work out, obviously, but that's the goal.

HARLOW: Right.

So, there was a community event, business owners expressing their support for the mayor of Ferguson. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEVE MOORE, OWNER, CELEBRITY SOUL FOOD RESTAURANT: We're here to support our leader of Ferguson, which is the mayor of Ferguson. We stand behind him 150 percent. And I'm asking everybody before we rush to judgment, when all of the situation that have gone on in the city for Ferguson, for us to give him the opportunity and a chance to see where he'd take the city.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: You're there on ground, David. Is there a difference between the way we're seeing, a lot of people are seeing Ferguson portrayed on the media and things like that?

KLINGER: I think so. The university I working, University of Missouri, St. Louis, is just literally a stone's throw away from here, so just across the interstate. What I can say from having been here many years is that we've got a concentrated area of protests and we have a great deal of concern that's spread out from there.

But for my money, the bottom line is there's been an awful lot of shift, an awful lot of change in the city government, those are appointed officials. The mayor is elected official and as long as he still has support, and unless and until he gets voted out of office or somehow impeached, whatever the process will be here in Ferguson, it strikes me that he needs to stay in his position. He's been elected.

HARLOW: I want to ask you a question. There is a course that is coming up at Emory University in Atlanta, offering what is called is a Ferguson movement, power, politics and protest. Obviously, we don't have the full syllabus but they said their aim is to really think broadly about the impact of all that's happened in Ferguson on contemporary society. Is it a good idea?

KLINGER: I think so. I think anytime that there is something that a professor can look to, to illuminate broader issues for his students or her students, that's a very good thing. I hope that whoever it is that is teaching us this has a solid understanding of what really has gone on in Ferguson and is able to give a is good survey of all the different elements involved, because this is a very complicated situation.

HARLOW: Sure, sure, no question about it.

David, appreciate you joining me. Thanks so much.

KLINGER: Thank you.

HARLOW: Well, coming up next, coming up next, we're going to talk about why terrorists, we're talking about ISIS and al Shabaab, why are they targeting young people in Minneapolis, Minnesota, to try to get them to come overseas and fight with them? We'll explore that, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARLOW: Well, millions of dollars from the CIA ended up somehow in al Qaeda's pocket. That is according to a new report today from "The New York Times." It was not a direct payment to al Qaeda. In fact, U.S. officials probably didn't know about it. It was a ransom paid by the government of Afghanistan to al Qaeda using U.S. cash given to Afghanistan for internal projects.

Details of the deal emerged this week as evidence in a terror trial right here in New York City. The CIA has not responded to our request for comment.

Meantime, the U.S. State Department wants all U.S. citizens in Saudi Arabia to be very cautious this weekend. This warning doesn't elaborate on the reason for why they're saying that, but U.S. embassies and consulates in the capital of Riyadh and two other cities will indeed be closed for the next few days over what the State Department calls security concerns.

And now to the multinational war against ISIS, and just how successful that terror group has been at convincing people from all over the world to join them. The numbers are stunning, 3,400 Westerners from 90 countries have left their homes to fight with ISIS in Syria and Iraq. Nearly 200 of them are Americans.

It's clear the recruitment efforts are working and one place they're targeting in particular, Minnesota, home to the largest Somali immigration population in the United States.

We went to Minneapolis to speak with community members there who are trying to fight those efforts right alongside the FBI.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

HARLOW (voice-over): Far from the deserts of Syria and Iraq, ISIS terrorists are eyeing vulnerable young men and women here.

(on camera): Is ISIS targeting the Somali community in Minnesota?

ANDREW LUGER, U.S. ATTORNEY, DISTRICT OF MINNESOTA: Yes.

HARLOW: No question?

LUGER: No question.

HARLOW: How aggressively?

LUGER: Aggressively. They're recruiting Westerners but they are recruiting here.

HARLOW (voice over): Through online propaganda, their efforts are working. For a Somali community in Minneapolis, it is a chilling replay of the recent past.

(on camera): In 2007, more than 20 Somali Minnesotans left to go fight with al Shabaab. Now, a second wave, but this time, it's ISIS recruiting them. Approximately 15 people have left Minnesota to fight with ISIS.

RICHARD THORNTON, FBI SPECIAL AGENT IN CHARGE: We've had a number of people travel from the Twin Cities, we've had a number of people attempt to travel, and as we speak, there are people making preparations to travel.

HARLOW: It's still going on.

THORNTON: Ongoing.

HARLOW (voice-over): The most vulnerable are also some of the community's youngest, like Hamza Ahmed, arrested in February.

(on camera): What was he like?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Good kid. I never picture him, I can't believe what I'm hearing now.

HARLOW: Authorities say 19-year-old Hamza Ahmed and three companions took a bus from here in downtown Minneapolis to New York's JFK Airport in November. His destination, Istanbul. But he never made it. Instead, he's here in jail awaiting trial charged with attempting to provide material support to ISIS.

He's a 19-year-old kid.

LUGER: That's who they're recruiting -- 18 to 20-year-olds is the focus -- that's the focus of the recruiting by ISIS right now.

HARLOW (voice-over): Others recruited Douglas McCain who is killed fighting with ISIS in Syria this summer. His friend Troy Kastigar (ph) was recruited by al Shabaab.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's a real Disneyland. Come here and join us.

HARLOW: He died fighting with them in 2009. His mother spoke to CNN last year.

JULIE BOADA, SON RECRUITED BY AL-SHABAAB: I had no clue that he was going into a dangerous situation in that way. I think they were manipulated and I don't think they knew fully what they were part of.

HARLOW: Ask people why this is happening, some will say a feeling of isolation, disenfranchisement. Others say a lack of opportunity. Many just don't know. But all we talk to say it must stop.

Among them, Mulki Hussein, a mother of six.

MULKI HUSSEIN, MOTHER OF SIX: Every mother thinking about oh my God, this could happen to me.

HARLOW (on camera): Is this fight becoming even harder?

HUSSEIN: It's a silent killer. You don't see it and boom, it happens.

HARLOW: And your child is gone.

HUSSEIN: Your child is gone.

HARLOW (voice-over): A silent killer that took Abdirizak Bihi's nephew. He was recruited by al Shabaab when he was just 17.

(on camera): What was your nephew like? Tell me about him.

ABDIRIZAK BIHI, NEPHEW RECRUITED BY AL-SHABAAB: God, he's the kind of nephew everyone would wish for. Nice. No crime, A-student, high hopes of going to Harvard.

HARLOW: You think your nephew was looking far better life?

BIHI: Yes, a lot of kids are looking for a better life. Sure, 99 percent of these cases were not aware of what the reality on the ground is.

HARLOW (voice-over): And he believes the threat from ISIS is greater than that posed by al Shabaab.

BIHI: What's different with ISIS is they're not only targeting the Somali community. So, it's something now we have to work together and worry about.

HARLOW: The FBI calls Minnesota the most impacted by this threat.

(on camera): As special agent in charge, what do you say to terrorists overseas using this as a recruitment ground?

THORNTON: That we are going to use the entire weight of the United States government to prevent you from recruiting our youth to travel overseas to fight and die.

LUGER: The imams and religious leaders want this to stop. This is not about religion. This is about terror recruiting. We're doing everything we can to turn it around. We have a problem, we're addressing it. That's what Minnesotans do.

HARLOW (voice-over): A problem that now has the attention of and funding from the White House. U.S. attorney Andrew Luger is spearheading the effort in Minneapolis.

(on camera): If you were to boil down the solution, how you're attacking this, how would you describe it?

LUGER: The way the community described it to me. They wanted more community engagement by law enforcement, more mentoring through more job opportunities, after-school programs, in-school programs, early intervention teams that grow out of the community working together at the early signs of radicalization.

HARLOW (voice-over): It's precisely what cartoonist Mohamed Ahmed is doing.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Extremists thinking, especially Islamic State, out.

HARLOW (on camera): You created a cartoon series basically to try to fight ISIS propaganda.

MOHAMED AHMED, CREATOR, AVERAGE MOHAMED: Correct. The goal is to fight not only ISIS but al Shabaab, Boko Haram. They all eat from the same plate of ideology. You go after one ideology, you're going after all of them. The objective is to get kids between the age of 8 and 16, and get them to look at this before they go on YouTube and Facebook and see extremist videos.

HARLOW: You say it takes an idea to destroy an idea.

AHMED: Yes, it does. We go after their recruitment process at the point of inception and we fight it the way I'm fighting it. That way, we dry up this recruitment process.

HARLOW (voice-over): But those recruited are just a tiny fraction of the Somali community here, something we're reminded of at every turn.

ROBLEH JMA, CONCERNED CITIZEN: Somali Americans, they're not terrorists. We're not extremists. We love our cities and people.

HARLOW: Citizens who left war in their homeland now fighting a battle to save their children here.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HARLOW: We'll keep an eye on that story for you on this program.

Coming up next, a deadly storm slams into one of the world's most fragile island chains. How will Vanuatu cope after the cyclone? That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARLOW: It is one of the strongest storms ever to hit the South Pacific. Right now emergency teams are struggle to reach the remote islands of Vanuatu after tropical Cyclone Pam made land first of all with a force equivalent of a category 5 hurricane. The monster storm caused, as you can see, complete devastation after veering off of its expected course.

Our meteorologist Tom Sater joins me now from CNN severe weather center.

It's pretty unreal to see those images and that's lust just part of the devastation. Where is the storm now?

TOM SATER, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Oh, it's dropping southward toward New Zealand, but it's getting into colder waters. Most of my time here at CNN and with CNN International, we've been covering the storm for a week

Just to give you an idea, here's Hawaii, we got to South Pacific. We knew it was going to be a monster. Think of the damage from Superstorm Sandy. Think of hurricane Katrina. Think of Hurricane Andrew down in Florida or Isaac.

This one is much stronger on a very vulnerable area. Here's Australia. We get in toward the islands, South Pacific. We've been watching four cyclones move in this area, and cyclones, hurricanes, typhoons are all the same.

But one of this magnitude, a category 5 making a direct hit on an area where many islands do not have one cinderblock or one brick. They're in thatched huts. This is what we've been watching, a well-defined eye over this area. There's 82 islands, 60 are inhabited. There's a quarter of a million people here in survival mode right now. Port Vila, a direct hit, capital city, 50,000. But there's another 100,000 to the south of them and we can't get any information. Storm surge, 26 feet, that's incredible. Winds over 200 miles per hour.

It's going to take days the if not weeks to find the death toll which will most likely rise exponentially in the days ahead. We know flights with aid are coming in from Australia and New Zealand. That's going to be a long go there, without power, without water, and without a big need as far as medical supplies.

HARLOW: No question about it. Thank you so much, Tom. We appreciate you putting it in perspective for us.

If you want to help the people of Vanuatu, just go to CNN.com/impact. You can donate there.

Coming up next, the future king and queen of Britain in an exclusive interview with our own Max Foster. Charles and Camilla, that's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARLOW: Next on CNN, our very own Max Foster sat down were an exclusive interview with Britain's Prince Charles, ahead of his visit to the United States next week. They discussed a lot of things, including how his wife, Camilla, has come to define her public role.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MAX FOSTER, CNN ROYAL CORRESPONDENT: When they did get married, Camilla was incredibly unpopular, I think particularly actually in the United States. They're sort of aware of that and they're heading to the U.S. next week.

You know, she's up against Diana. She was the other woman. She broke up that marriage, Diana said.

So, so many people looked up to Diana as the biggest star in the world. But over the last ten years, Camilla has tried to just be herself. When you meet her, she's very charming, charismatic, doesn't always come across on TV. I think the strategy has been to allow her to get on with the things she enjoys doing. People get to know her, they get to like her.

Actually, British people have warmed toward her and it will be interesting to see whether Americans feel the same way.

HARLOW: I know that he also spoke about being a grandparent.

FOSTER: He did. Very excited about the imminent arrival of another grandchild, number two after Prince George, of course. Yes, he enjoys on getting on his knees and sort of getting down with the young kids, he likes having them around, he says.

There's been some reporting here that he doesn't see enough of Prince George. And the Middletons see a lot of Prince George. But when I spoke to him, there's no sense of that at all. They seem very close.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HARLOW: All right, our line-up begins tonight with Max's exclusive "CNN Spotlight: Charles and Camilla." I'm Poppy Harlow. Thanks so much for spending part of your evening with me. We'll see you back here tomorrow.