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U.S. Pull Special Forces out of Yemen; New Orleans Airport Personnel Attacked; Terrorists Attack Tunisian Museum; U.S. Government Warns of Terrorists at Tourist Destinations in Caribbean; Seven Children Perish by Fire in Bedrooms in Brooklyn; Effects of Terrorist Attacks on Tourism in Tunisia Assessed; Potential Political Fallout from Hillary Clinton's Private Email Server Scandal Examined; CNN Hero Provides Access to Eye Care for Children. Aired 10-11:00a ET

Aired March 21, 2015 - 10:00   ET

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

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[10:00:19] MICHAEL SMERCONISH, CNN HOST: Thank you so much for joining me. Don't forget, you can follow me on Twitter if you can spell "Smerconish." See you next week.

CHRISTI PAUL, CNN ANCHOR: New this morning, seven children from the same family die in a horrible house fire.

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN ANCHOR: An airport in chaos, a man armed with a machete and bug spray attacks TSA officers at New Orleans International Airport before being taken down.

PAUL: And cruise ship dangers. How great is the threat of ISIS to your next cruise ship vacation in Europe and the Caribbean?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is CNN breaking news.

PAUL: We're going to get to all those stories in a moment. But first we need to start with this breaking news. Good morning. I'm Christi Paul.

BLACKWELL: I'm Victor Blackwell. Good to be with you. The U.S. is evacuating about 100 Special Forces from an air base in Yemen. Sources tell CNN it's due to the deteriorating security situation in that country.

PAUL: CNN's senior international correspondent Nick Paton Walsh joining us by phone right now. So Nick, is this the last of the American troops stationed there?

NICK PATON WALSH, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (via telephone): That is said to be the case, yes. And obviously many of the U.S. operations in Yemen have been shrouded in secrecy to the nature of what they are, advanced counterterror operations, using drone aircraft to attack Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula's leadership.

But ever since the U.S. embassy was closed back in January and starting possibly February, as a result of the deteriorating security situation in Yemen, that counterterror mission has been severely in jeopardy. Yes, Pentagon officials suggested they would be able to condition much of what they could do remotely or from other locations, but lacking an embassy was a significant blow to that operation.

Now the remaining 100 Special Forces, U.S. Special Forces, in Yemen, have been or are in the process of being evacuated. We are told, my colleague Barbara Starr is told, that is because in the area where they were on Thursday and Friday, two apparent possible prison breaks in which Al Qaeda prisoners may have left detention facilities. That of course may have tipped the balance. Obviously Special Forces can only protect themselves so much in a hostile environment like that.

But it has been clear for some time that while the Houthis are not overtly anti-American in their behavior, one of their slogans is "Death to America." The Houthis are the movement that have swept to power in that country. They've taken over the capital of Sana'a. They were the targets, though, of the blast on Friday that ripped through the two mosques in the central capital. But I think the turmoil of their rise to power and collapse of the government as a result of that has certainly made the Pentagon have to reassess its ability to keep troops and personnel in the country and now it appears they've made a pretty final decision. Victor, Christi?

BLACKWELL: So the latest terror attacks in Yemen, this country falling into chaos. It sounds like the narrative, Nick, that we heard about Libya a couple months ago. The civilians, U.S. civilians, out closing the embassy there, and now this fertile ground for terror in Libya, does it seem that that's the path that Yemen is taking as well?

WALSH: Well, Yemen has been in chaos and been a ground for terror for years now. Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula has been very heavily based there, the target of those U.S. drone strikes. The question we face now is whether this could be an even more significant worsening of the current crisis.

Yemen's had a faltering government for years but now it doesn't appear to have much of a government at all. Those in control of the capital, or the Houthi movements, and the president still internationally recognized in the fallen city of Aden trying to cobble together what he can, retaining his hand possibly on the levers of infrastructure in the country. But he's severely compromised.

The question now is given that ISIS claimed responsibility for that blast on Friday -- we don't know if they did, but they say they did -- and the other potential main suspect, Al Qaeda, said they didn't do it, so the balance of credibility lends toward the ISIS, that marks a grave departure for Yemen because ISIS is never been thought to have significant presence in that country. If they were behind those blasts that's troubling, because it suggests that a new player, a more troubling player even than Al Qaeda in Yemen, but on top of that, too, it does suggest perhaps there is an active agent now trying to ferment sectarian violence in Yemen. These were Shia worshippers targeted in the mosque and Al Qaeda and ISIS are Sunni extremists. And the fear potentially is that Yemen already racked by corruption, anarchy, chaos, faltering government, tribal warfare, may now have the worrying sectarian violence, that Sunni on Shia violence we've seen across the Middle East replicating itself now in Yemen. Victor, Christi?

[10:05:13] BLACKWELL: All right, Nick Paton Walsh, joining us by phone with the breaking news this morning. Nick, thank you so much. And let's bring in Lieutenant Colonel Rick Francona, CNN military analyst, former U.S. military attache in Syria. Colonel, good to have you.

LT. COL. RICK FRANCONA, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Good morning.

BLACKWELL: First, your reaction to the breaking news this morning, sources telling CNN that the military is pulling out the last 100 Special Forces out of Yemen?

FRANCONA: Yes. After that excellent rundown by Nick, it's easy to see that we are fast losing any capability we've had on the ground in Yemen. After the loss of the embassy, which was a severe blow, we were able to at least keep these 100 Special Forces there. That was deeply shrouded in secrecy. They were still able to do some operations and work very closely with their Yemeni counterparts. That capability has gone and we've got zero presence on the ground. This really complicates our efforts to go after Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.

And as we all know, this is one of the more capable Al Qaeda affiliates. They've actually mounted attacks against the United States. Fortunately none of them have succeeded, but they have the intent and the capability to do that. So this really hurts our posture in the area. And hopefully we'll be able to replicate some of that, maybe from ships, maybe from other facilities in the area, but this is a serious blow, and I think it underscores our lessening capabilities as ISIS seems it to grow, as Al Qaeda seems to grow.

BLACKWELL: You know, lieutenant colonel, what we heard from the president was that Yemen was a success. He held it up in that area that region of the world as a success. And it's falling apart. We heard from Secretary General Ban Ki-moon back in February at the U.N. that Yemen is collapsing before our eyes. We cannot stand by and watch. What can be dup now?

FRANCONA: You bring up an excellent point, and I heard your conversation where you referenced the situation in Libya and the parallels that we see there. When the president made those remarks of course Yemen was fairly stable, but there was so much internal turmoil in the country that it finally boiled over. So I suspect that we're going to see this continued deterioration if not an all-out civil war. So this is, you know, something we need to be watching.

BLACKWELL: All right, Lieutenant Colonel Rick Francona with us for the breaking news, sources telling CNN the military is pulling out those last 100 Special Forces out of Yemen. Thank you very much.

FRANCONA: Sure thing.

PAUL: Meanwhile, mayhem at the New Orleans airport last night. Police were forced to shoot a man after he attacked TSA agents with a machete and bug spray. Now this is how a traveler described the scene.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I heard he was coming with a machete, and then somebody was loose and they started shooting him. I just hear gunshots. I hear pow! I was like, oh, snap.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You just heard it?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I heard them shooting and then I hear people screaming. All of a sudden like so many cops just start coming by. Crazy, crazy Friday at the airport.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PAUL: The suspect is a man you see on that gurney. He was taken to the local hospital, we know. He underwent surgery. I want to bring in Colonel John Fortanato. He is the public information officer for the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office. Colonel, thank you for being with us. What can you tell us, one, about the suspect Richard White's condition, and the condition of the TSA agent, or perhaps maybe one of your agents, sorry, that was also hurt in that?

COL. JOHN FORTANATO, PIO, JEFFERSON PARISH SHERIFF'S OFFICE: Right. Thank you for having me this morning. Richard White, his condition was upgraded this morning around 8:00 to serious at University Hospital here in New Orleans. The officer that was involved in the incident, she's doing fine. She was treated and released as well as the TSA agent that sustained a gunshot wound to her arm, she also was treated and released at a local hospital.

PAUL: Have you gotten any information or indication as to motive?

FORTANATO: No, we have yet to determine a motive. We just don't -- we can't determine at this point what Mr. White's intentions were, but obviously he created quite a bit of a scare at Louis Armstrong last night.

PAUL: How is everybody doing after all of this?

FORTANATO: Everybody is, you know -- the airport was back to -- we had to shut the concourse down for a short period of time. The regular portion of the airport was back up and running 20 minutes later. This morning everything is fine and everybody is going about their regular travels.

PAUL: All right, Colonel John Fortanato, we a appreciate so much you giving us an update and glad that everybody really at the end of the day is OK. Thank you so much.

[10:10:00] Meanwhile, other news this morning, that has really been hard to take in. Seven children ages five to 15, found dead in their bedrooms. Flames and smoke tore through their home, and now authorities believe they know what caused that fire that killed all those kids. BLACKWELL: And it's the time of year when people start to plan their

vacations, maybe a cruise. Well, a top U.S. general is sharing strong concerns about ISIS in the Caribbean, including tourist destinations like Venezuela, Jamaica, Trinidad, and Tobago. We'll talk about that in a moment.

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PAUL: You know something that happened overnight it's hard to take in for all of us, and you can imagine how hard it is for first responders we're hearing too.

BLACKWELL: Yes. This morning seven children found dead in their bedrooms. They were killed when a fire tore through their home, this home is in Brooklyn. Their mother and a teenager managed to escape, but they are in critical condition.

PAUL: CNN's Shasta Darlington is in New York. She's covering this for us. So Shasta New York's fire commissioner I understand spoke about the tragedy this morning, and he was close to tears.

SHASTA DARLINGTON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Christi. I mean, this was a tragic, tragic accident. And when firefighters rushed in to the family home here in Brooklyn, there were eight children who had lived in the home, those who were still trapped in the house were between the ages of seven and 15 -- five and 15, excuse me, and they hoped to carry them out alive. So in the end when the commissioner came out to talk to journalists he said this was a tragedy not only for the family and the tight knit Jewish community but for the entire city. Listen to what he said.

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[10:15:06] DANIEL NIGRO, NEW YORK FIRE COMMISSIONER: Firefighters forced their way in, extinguished fire on the first floor which had started in the kitchen, pushed upstairs, and found the children in their bedrooms in the back of the home. This is the largest tragedy by fire that this city has had in seven years. It's difficult to find one child in a room during a search. To find a house full of children that can't be revived, I'm sure this will take its toll on our members for quite some time.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DARLINGTON: Now what we also learned from the commissioner is that the fire started in the kitchen. It was a malfunctioning hot plate which is commonly used on Sabbath to keep food warm. It quickly spread to the second story. The mother and the teenage daughter were able to escape by jumping out of a window on the second story. The other children were killed by the blaze. One was declared dead right here on the scene, the other in the regional hospitals. The commissioner also said that so far they haven't found any evidence of there being smoke detectors on the first or second floor of the house. They haven't been able to reach the father.

And it's just very difficult for the community here. Many people, this is an Orthodox Jewish community, haven't had their televisions on, they haven't been looking at the computers, so on the way to the synagogue they're finding out about this accident. We spoke to one neighbor who said the mother has been living in the same house since see was a child, Christi.

PAUL: Oh, my goodness. Shasta Darlington, thank you so much for the update, and certainly thoughts going to that family and the first responders today.

BLACKWELL: Still ahead, backlash brewing over Starbucks' new "Race Together" campaign. The CEO is now speaking with it to CNN and giving more details, more about his reasoning behind this initiative. You'll hear from him next.

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[10:20:48] BLACKWELL: It's 20 minutes after the hour. Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz is not backing down after taking some, well, let's not say some, a lot of criticism over a new initiative by the coffee company.

PAUL: Yes. The initiative calls for Starbucks baristas to write the words "Race Together" on coffee cups. This is, he says, is to help spark a dialog on race.

BLACKWELL: Now, the response has been mixed at best, including some backlash on social media. But now Schultz is speaking out again. He spoke with CNN's Poppy Harlow about the move and reasoning behind it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HOWARD SCHULTZ, CEO, STARBUCKS: I'm not coming at this because something happened to me. I'm coming at this because I'm looking at the landscape of the country, the outrage that is going on in cities across the country. Ferguson is not an outlier. This is happening in many places. And how much are we going to absorb and take before we take some steps as citizens, as businesses, as newscasters, to do something that is positive, as opposed to being reactive and saying this is the way things are? I don't think this is the way things have to be, and I'm trying to use the assets we have to make a positive difference.

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BLACKWELL: And Schultz has a lot more to say. If you want to see the rest of the interview with Starbucks' CEO Howard Schultz watch it starting at 3:00 p.m. right here on CNN.

PAUL: You might be wondering, how safe is it to travel this spring and summer given the fact that half of the people massacred in this week's Tunisian terrorist attacks were tourists? We're going to take a closer look at that.

Plus, more fallout to the Hillary Clinton e-mail controversy. Now the House committee investigating Benghazi has some demands. BLACKWELL: But first, this week's "Ones to Watch" series explores the

world of sculpture. We take you inside the studio of British sculptor Antony Gormley to discover how his greatest works take shape. Here it is.

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ANTONY GORMLEY, SCULPTOR: If you go down 3,000 kilometers straight down, you will find liquid iron at about 1,400 degrees, and that is exactly the material that I use to make these evocations of the body.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Antony Gormley's obsession with the human form and the space it occupies has led him to create over 2,000 sculptures based on his own body, arguably the greatest of which is the Angel of the North which towers over the British landscape. His work is exhibited in public spaces around the world and he has received prestigious international arts awards, including Britain's Turner Prize and Japan's Praemium Imperiale. Today he's in his studio in London giving three dimensions to a new idea.

GORMLEY: You don't get good work without good ideas, but the ideas come from the work. Sculpture of all the arts is perhaps the most silent. And learning to listen to the work that you've already made is really where all the core ideas come from. One work is another of the next.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BLACKWELL: Check out the full show a CNN.com/OnesToWatch.

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[10:27:27] This is CNN breaking news.

PAUL: It's 27 minutes past the hour. The breaking news right now on the terror attack in Tunisia is that Reuters reporting Tunisian authorities have arrested more than 20 suspected militants now. Gunmen opened fire at the Bardo Museum killing numerous tourists, 23 people in total, and that led to a nationwide security crackdown there. Earlier, though, officials had said two of the suspects did receive weapons training at camps in Libya. And in a new audio message ISIS is claiming responsibility for the attack. And we need to point out CNN cannot independently confirm the authenticity of the message, but certainly most people say yes, it is troubling.

CNN's Phil Black is in Tunisia. And Phil, just wondering what you've learned this morning about the new arrests?

PHIL BLACK, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Christi, as you say, this is coming from Reuters, but citing the Tunisian interior ministry, 20 arrests in total, 10 of which are said to be directly linked to the attack which took place here on Wednesday, presumably the other 10 more of an association with individuals or that particular group.

According to the interior ministry it is part of a wider campaign against extremism in this country. Now the government here has said that the two gunmen who took part in the attack received training across the border in Libya, that fracturing country where ISIS affiliated groups are really gaining a foothold. They haven't said what sort of training they believe these men received, but we spoke to a witness to the attacks, a man who watched one of these gunmen up close as he carried out this horrendous terror attack. His assessment is interesting. His view is that this is someone who has not received much training, someone who has little experience in handling a weapon. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BLACK: These are the panicked scenes as security forces arrived at the Bardo Museum. By that time the gunman had already killed many people and moved deeper inside the complex.

WASSEL BOUZID, WITNESS: I was terrified.

BLACK: Wassel Bouzid witnessed the start of the massacre.

BOUZID: The moment when they started to shoot everybody, with no mercy, the blood and innocent people laying down.

BLACK: Bouzid, a tourist guide had been waiting by a bus for his tour group to return to the museum when he saw a man that didn't look like a terrorist.

BOUZID: Men.

BLACK: In civilian clothes?

BOUZID: In civilian clothes.

BLACK: Not military uniform?

[10:30:00] BOUZID: Not military at all. Civilian -- blue jeans, Nike shoes, blue jacket, and shaved. And he did not pronounce any words.

BLACK: Bouzid says the man then pulled what looked like a gun, a Kalashnikov, from his bag, but didn't know how to use it.

BOUZID: At that moment I thought he was one of the guests, one of the clients, one of the tourists playing with a plastic gun.

BLACK: He got it working just as crowds were leaving the museum.

BOUZID: Around 60 or 70 guests, and he start to shoot everybody in front of him.

BLACK: Bouzid fled as security forces quickly arrived in bigger numbers. After killing the gunmen they were cheered as heroes.

(CHEERS)

BLACK: One of the attackers lived here. His family is confused, grieving, and angry. His uncle Abdel Malik says "It's true, he carried out this terrorist attack. He was killed. We don't have his body back. He is also the victim of terrorism." The family says the morning of the attack he drank coffee with them like any other day.

Families in Tunisia and across the globe are now struggling to understand why that normal ritual was followed hours later by horrific violence.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BLACK: That witness we spoke to almost lost his life, but he is now most concerned about losing his livelihood, because he is a tour guide. He relies upon tourism. He and pretty much everyone else here believes that this brutal, simple attack was designed to damage the Tunisian economy, its political stability, but destroying its tourism industry. And the fear is that in the short term this attack at least will prove to be successful in that regard, Christi.

PAUL: All right, Phil Black, thank you so much.

BLACKWELL: Let's bring in Philip Mudd, CNN counterterrorism analyst and former CIA counterterrorism official. Phil, let's first get your reaction to the breaking news this morning from Reuters, 20 arrests. Thursday we were reporting nine and now 20. What's your take?

PHILIP MUDD, CNN COUNTERTERRORISM ANALYST: When you look at a counterterrorism investigation you want to think of a few stages. Let me give you three in particular. For the first few hours after the event there's almost an information vacuum. People like me in my old life at the FBI and the CIA are waiting for the initial information.

Then you go into stage two, which is I think where we are now. The aperture opens tons of information coming in, people involved in the plot were arrested, people at the periphery of the plot, you're getting cell phones, hard drives from computers when you're raiding houses. So what we're seeing now at the initial stage of the investigation is the aperture of information and suspects is coming in. It's going to be a few days or maybe weeks before that aperture starts to close. You interrogate these suspects and start to get a clear picture of what actually happened here and what the extent of the conspiracy is.

BLACKWELL: So you'd expect that number to grow still?

MUDD: It might grow. I would expect some of these people probably are at the far periphery, maybe even uninvolved. Security services in these situations view this as an opportunity to pick up anybody and everybody, sort of the rules about who you pick up are out the window. So they may be picking up people. It might get smaller is what I'm saying because they may be picking up people because they have vague suspicions and they'll realize very quickly some of these folks probably weren't closely involved.

BLACKWELL: Then they'll narrow that down.

MUDD: That's right. BLACKWELL: Guys in the control room, grab the foreign fighter map so we can put the numbers up while we talk about Tunisia. Tunisia was seen as one of the successes of the Arab Spring. But if you look at the numbers, and I think we have them here, the greatest number of foreign fighters traveling to Iraq and Syria come from this tiny country, 3,000, from Tunisia. How do you explain that, Phil?

MUDD: I wish -- as an analyst I'm supposed to have an answer to everything. I don't. This is a schizophrenic society. That is you have a country that is one -- about the only one that's transitioned well in the so called Arab Spring since 2011. Everybody else, Syria, Yemen, Egypt, Libya, has undergone great problems. I think their transformation will continue pretty steadily.

Why they're 3,000 people going, and this probably goes back at least 10 years, this is not a new phenomenon, I can't explain. There is one recent phenomenon I think will worry that Tunisians that will help explain this, and that is after the revolution the information explosion, open society, people allowed to preach whatever they want in mosques, I think there will be questions about whether open society means there's more information, more ability for extremists to radicalize. And I think that will be a question you'll see come up in Tunisia in the coming weeks and months.

BLACKWELL: The other breaking news at the top of the hour was the report, sources telling CNN the U.S. military pulling out 100 Special Forces out of Yemen. We reported not too long ago we saw the same thing out of Libya and the closing of the embassy there. What's the significance of what we're seeing in Yemen now?

MUDD: This is hugely significant. When you are running counterterrorism operations you need an idea of what's going on the ground in very difficult societies for a westerner to understand. You want to have a pulse of the tribes. You want to have a pulse of the countryside where people like me can't reach. That pulse is provided by the local security service, and the liaison with that security service gets a lot tougher when you're not on the ground talking to them.

[10:35:15] You can continue counterterrorism operations. The U.S. government operates all the time in areas that are inaccessible, places like Somalia. But the ability to build a partnership with a sister security service who has access in the remote areas where Al Qaeda and ISIS can operate is really critical. And obviously when you lose that human interaction it makes life a lot tougher.

BLACKWELL: One more quickly before we go.

MUDD: Yes.

BLACKWELL: What we've heard this week was that two of the attackers in Tunis actually got training in Libya and we're hearing from the Libyan army chief there, that if ISIS is not stopped in Libya, they're going to move on to Europe. Is that just rhetoric from this army chief or do you believe if they could now move into creating some strongholds in Europe? MUDD: The way you understand terror groups is pretty basic. Let me

look at two characteristics in particular that we're seeing in Libya. In short, I agree with what she's saying. The two characteristics you need to focus on is what is the leadership of the organization and what do they want to do? In this case the leadership of ISIS and Al Qaeda has said we want to go to the west, we want to make them hurt for intervening in the Islamic world, for intervene in Afghanistan, for intervening in Iraq. So we know what intent is for people in the extremist circles in Libya.

We also know what capability is. They've shown in Paris, they've shown in New York what they want to do. So if you give that leadership with the stated intent of going and attacking the west enough safe haven, time to organize, they will come after us. They've told us they'll do it and they'll -- I think if we give them time and space to do it they'll be here.

BLACKWELL: All right, counterterrorism analyst Philip Mudd, some sobering analysis for us this morning. Thank you so much.

MUDD: Thank you. Take care.

PAUL: So with this week's deadly terror attacks there are strong concerns about ISIS in the Caribbean. You haven't heard that before, have you? We're talking about tourist destinations like Jamaica, Venezuela, Trinidad, and Tobago. We're taking a closer with look with you at the dangers of traveling to those areas next.

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[10:40:51] BLACKWELL: Half the victims this week in the Tunis massacres were tourists, highlighting of course the vulnerability of travelers, American and otherwise, around the world. Some cruise lines have even canceled their trips to Tunisia. On Facebook, MSC Cruises wrote that they're canceling, quote, all remaining summer, 2015, calls in Tunisia, and Costa Cruises, which is owned by Carnival, said that all next calls in Tunisia for the upcoming cruises in 2015 will be suspended.

Let's talk more about this. Joining me, maritime lawyer and expert in this industry Jim Walker. Jim, it's good to have you with us because this is not the first time there has been a concern about safety, especially for cruise travelers in the Mediterranean region.

JIM WALKER, MARITIME LAWYER: No. I'm a history major, and if you go back over the past 20 or 30 years you see a trend of violence against cruise passengers. You know, two years ago CNN did a really, really good story in which they uncovered a captive Al Qaeda operative who had encrypted information. And the information once it was deciphered indicated that Al Qaeda had a plan to hijack a cruise ship, to seize the passengers, hopefully American passengers, and they wanted to put them in orange jump suits, execute them in front of video cameras. This would be similar to the Achille Lauro attack which was back in the 1980s.

So there are a number of anecdotal stories that I could tell you about cruise ships being targeted. The threat is there. Tunis was a likely place for something like this to break out. You know, we've heard it was the model state from the Arab Spring. But that's a relative concept. I mean, to its east, immediately to its east in Libya, Libya is in chaos, so the threat is there, and unfortunately we've seen cruise passengers killed.

BLACKWELL: Well, let's talk about a different area of the world where many people would consider thinking something like that could happen. We head from a top U.S. general talk about ISIS recruiting roughly 100 people in the Caribbean, and he named Jamaica, he named Trinidad and Tobago, parts of South America as well, and he had questions about the governments, their inability to monitor them once they return. Let's listen to what he said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARINE CORPS GEN. JOHN KELLY, COMMANDER, U.S. SOUTHERN COMMAND: You take it back to some of these countries that I have described, it's pretty easy for them to move around. And 100 certainly doesn't seem like a lot, and it's not, but the little countries that they come from with a total inability to really deal with it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLACKWELL: Should people who are listening to the news and they say, well, I'm not going to the Mediterranean, but Trinidad and Tobago is safe, Jamaica is safe, shouldn't they be concerned when they go off into some of the excursions there might be people there who the government is just not aware of?

WALKER: Oh, absolutely. First of all if you cruise to Jamaica or if you go to any Caribbean port, there's dangers there that most cruise passengers aren't aware of. I mean, the homicide rate in the United States is five people per 100,000. In the Caribbean, the Bahamas, for example, it's 30 people per 100,000. Down in Honduras it's 90 per 100,000. So we're not talking about terrorism. We're talking about criminals targeting busloads of passengers. We've seen busses of passengers --

BLACKWELL: Yes.

WALKER: -- attacked in mass.

BLACKWELL: So people --

WALKER: So, you know --

BLACKWELL: -- have to do that research. Hate to cut you off there. They have to do that research before they pick that location. But some startling revelations from that top U.S. general. Jim Walker, we're going to have to leave it there. But I thank you so much for your expertise.

WALKER: Great. Thank you so much.

BLACKWELL: All right. Christi? PAUL: The House committee investigating the Benghazi attacks wants

Hillary Clinton's e-mail server. The big question is, will she turn it over? And how damaging might it be for her if she says no? We have got Maria and Lisa coming up next.

[10:45:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PAUL: The controversy over Hillary Clinton's e-mail is heating up again. The House committee investigating the deadly attacks in Benghazi wants Clinton to turn over her private e-mail server to the State Department's inspector general or another neutral third party. Let's bring in CNN political commentator and Democratic strategist Maria Cardona. Also joining us, Republican strategist and Black Rock Group senior director Lisa Boothe. Ladies, thank you so much for being with us.

LISA BOOTHE, SENIOR DIRECTOR, BLACK ROCK GROUP: Hi, Christi.

PAUL: Let's remember, before this request came in, Clinton had said she would not turn over her private e-mail server. She has said "I will turn over all e-mails that are work related, but beyond that, no." Why is it so important, Maria, do you think, for them, or maybe I should ask this of Lisa, why do you think, Lisa, that it's so important for them to try to get -- I mean, who decides what's private and what's not?

BOOTHE: Well, exactly. Look, all the Benghazi committee is asking for is for her to turn over the server so a third party group like a former judge or inspector general can review the server to make sure that it's within compliance of open record laws. I don't think that's so much to ask.

And look, it's Congress' job to provide oversight. And what the reality is with the rise of ISIS in the Middle East and North Africa and across the world, I think it's Congress' duty to determine what went wrong with Benghazi, how we can prevent future attacks just like that.

[10:50:03] And the reality is that there are several months of an e- mail train that's missing from State Department records that have been turned over. We know that Hillary Clinton has deleted tens of thousands of e-mails for her convenience. We also know that the Obama administration just six weeks before the 2012 presidential election went to great lengths to convince the American public that the terrorist attack with Benghazi resulted from an Internet video rather than a terrorist attack which it actually was.

PAUL: So Maria, is there anything politically damaging, do you think, to Clinton if she does not turn these over?

MARIA CARDONA, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: I don't think so, Christi. And in fact the damage could reflect on Republicans. Let's keep a couple things in mind. Chairman Gowdy himself said a couple days ago that he doesn't have the authority to demand the private e-mail server. So clearly this is a naked political move to try to pin something on Secretary Clinton that 10 committees, Christi, have not been able to do. There have been no less than 10 investigations investigating the Benghazi incident, and she and the State Department have been cleared of everything.

So I think the Republicans really need to be careful here because going back to what Cummings, who is the ranking member on the same committee said, this is unprecedented. When Henry Waxman was chair of the oversight committee and he was investigating an e-mail scandal under the Bush administration with RNC e-mails, he essentially worked with the RNC and Republicans to get all of the e-mails that they said were all work-related and were a part of the investigation, turned over. They didn't demand any servers. They don't have the ability to demand any servers. So right now what it's looking at is a complete overreach by Republicans that frankly their obsession with Hillary is bordering on the creepy.

PAUL: But a lot of people do wonder if it would hurt her politically in some fashion and, in fact, let's listen to this clip from Jimmy Fallon.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JIMMY FALLON, HOST, "THE TONIGHT SHOW": There's rumors that former Maryland governor Martin O'Malley may enter the race and challenge Hillary for the Democratic nomination. Hillary is not worried. I mean, who's going to go from totally unknown to beating her for the presidency. How would that ever happen?

(LAUGHTER)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PAUL: Maria, you have to chuckle, yes?

CARDONA: Yes, absolutely. And you know what, right now if anybody else wants to get into the race, by all means, go ahead and do it. But I don't really see anybody right now who is going to challenge her, to be a viable challenger for this -- for the Democratic nomination. Look at the recent CNN poll that just came out, Christi. She has an overwhelming number of supporters. And this was after the whole e-mail issue had come out and after her press conference. And 89 percent of Democrats support her. And 57 percent of the American people overall, Christi, said they would be proud to see her as president of the United States. I think those are numbers, frankly, that are scaring the Republicans into desperate acts like this one.

PAUL: Lisa, you have the last word here.

BOOTHE: Well, there's no desperate acts in the sense that Hillary Clinton went to great lengths to deceive the American people by using a private server. That is unprecedented. So that shows not only a lack of judgment by Hillary Clinton but also shows, you know, a question of can we trust Hillary Clinton? The fact of the matter, Democrats are having a real problem with Hillary Clinton because this coronation that was expected to happen they are going to have problems with. David Axelrod put it best in his memoir when he pointed out the flaws with Hillary Clinton. He said that not only was she a polarizing figure but he also pointed out the fact she has a real problem representing the future when she actually represents the past. And those problems that Democrats had with Hillary Clinton and Hillary Clinton had in 2008 are starting to come to fruition again.

CARDONA: So why is she heads and shoulders above any other Republican?

BOOTHE: Because people know Hillary Clinton, they know the name Hillary Clinton. It's also very early in the cycle.

CARDONA: They know her and they support her.

BOOTHE: But I honestly think that Hillary Clinton --

(CROSSTALK)

PAUL: I'll just let you all keep talking during the break.

(LAUGHTER)

CARDONA: Thank you, Christi.

PAUL: Thank you, both, ladies, so much. We always love having you here, appreciate your perspectives. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:58:22] BLACKWELL: Children in several states around the country are at risk for blindness because some of their schools, they are missing a policy requiring those schools to test eyesight early.

PAUL: And this week's CNN Hero is fighting for those kids.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHELSEA ELLIOT, CNN HERO: I was a very active child. Anything I could see, I grabbed. I was barely four when I lost my vision in my left eye. The following years I was so angry. This was an irreversible change. And 25 percent of children ages five to 17 have a vision problem, 25 percent. How can you fully embrace all the opportunities available if you can't see them? Our program provides free vision screenings to all school-aged children.

All done. Thank you.

We actually use advanced technology which allows us to test in seconds. Had this device been around when I was four-years-old, could have saved my vision. After the screening we deliver referral reports to the school health aide, and for low-income families we provide access to an eye care professional and financial assistance to cover the cost of corrective wear.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The castle was sparkling clean.

My daughter loves books. We never thought something was wrong. So when I got the letter we were caught off guard.

ELLIOT: Reilly reminded me a lot of myself. We both turned out to have pretty severe conditions.

[11:00:03] UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Just seeing her even today with glasses knowing that her vision is going to be completely fine because we caught it, that's what we do.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN HOST: And if you know someone who should be a CNN hero, let us know. Just go to CNNheros.com.

CHRISTI PAUL, CNN HOST: So thank you so much for spending your morning with us. We hope you make great memories today.

BLACKWELL: There's a lot more in the next hour of CNN NEWSROOM. We hand it over now to our colleague, Fredricka Whitfield.

FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: All right. Thank you so much. Good to see you guys. Have a great day.

BLACKWELL: Ok. You, too.

PAUL: You too.