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ESPN Reporter Suspended After Tirade; Actress Geena Davis Talks Hillary Clinton; Convicted Atlanta Educators Speak Out; Muslins Kill Christians on Boat. Aired 3:30-4p ET

Aired April 17, 2015 - 15:30   ET

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


(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:34:49] BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: An ESPN sideline reporter is now off the air after she went on this verbal rampage. It was caught by surveillance video. Even though she was warned she was on video, and you see her at one point looking up at the camera, Britt McHenry ripped into this towing clerk at a company as she was paying to get her car out. McHenry unleashes on the woman's job, her education, her weight, her teeth. The video first showed up on Live Leak.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BRITT MCHENRY, ESPN REPORTER: Do you feel good about your job? So I could be a college dropout and do the same thing? Is that why I have a brain and you don't? Maybe if I was missing some teeth they would hire me, huh?

UNIDENTIFIED TOW TRUCK DRIVER: (INAUDIBLE)

MCHENRY: (INAUDIBLE)

UNIDENTIFIED TOW TRUCK DRIVER: (INAUDIBLE)

MCHENRY: Oh, like yours? (INAUDIBLE)

(CROSSTALK)

MCHENRY: Because I'm on television and you're in a (EXPLETIVE DELETED) trailer. Lose some weight, baby girl.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Whoo. With me now, CNN political commentator, Michael Smerconish.

I saw this immediately after my show yesterday. Somebody pulled me in their office and said, you got to see this. It's like you just don't believe -- it's like you're watching it in slow-mo. You can't believe she's saying this.

MICHAEL SMERCONISH, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR & CNN HOST, SMERCONISH: The irony is that someone so beautiful was so ugly, right?

BALDWIN: So ugly. SMERCONISH: So ugly. Indefensible.

BALDWIN: She's been yanked off air for a week.

SMERCONISH: Right. Slap on the wrist.

BALDWIN: You think -- you've been on the radio. You're a listener saying --

SMERCONISH: Get rid of her.

BALDWIN: -- get her out of there?

SMERCONISH: ESPN needs to fire her. That was the consensus. It's hard for me because I like to present telephone calls that run the gamut of opinion. I had to go searching for those who think she should not be fired.

BALDWIN: You tweeted about it.

SMERCONISH: I did. Yeah.

BALDWIN: For those of you, we'll get to her apology in a minute. But in a "Washington Post" column, Michael Bair, he wrote this piece essentially saying, you know, we're all complicit. He talks about the video isn't an isolated incident. It's a pathology of viewing others, including foreign immigrants, high school dropouts, et cetera, showing how people are less than, that we all need to take a look at ourselves as we all sit and judge her.

SMERCONISH: I don't buy that.

BALDWIN: You don't buy that at all?

SMERCONISH: No. No way. Look, towing operators rank with telemarketers. We've all been there. We've all had those high-stress moments. Then there's this. If she had dropped a couple "F" bomb, I'd be very forgiving. That's not what went on here. The commentary about the really worth of the individual who was, I guess, through a cage and was accepting her money --

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: That's who I want to hear from, this tow truck --

(CROSSTALK)

SMERCONISH: Brooke, I've gone looking for information about this. Turns out, someone who works on my radio program lives in a condominium complex where this is the tow operator of choice. You always see the sign, if your car gets towed, these are the -- and they have no friends out there. People talk about how they only accept cash, they won't make change. So they really have you over a barrel. I get all that.

Still, this was so reprehensible. And I would argue it's in her best interest that she be fired. Because in the world in which we live, this tape will follow her forever. So it can either follow her and she still has her job, or it follows her, but she was disciplined to the point she was actually fired for it. Then I think we'll be more forgiving if we understand there was some level of justice meted. But not a week.

BALDWIN: People aren't forgiving at all. If you look at her Instagram --

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: -- is wiped. But they're vicious.

SMERCONISH: Yeah, they're sick.

BALDWIN: And they're vicious --

SMERCONISH: I know.

BALDWIN: -- upon her viciousness.

SMERCONISH: Right.

BALDWIN: Which, that's an entire conversation that we had in our morning editorial meeting.

But hang on. Let me back up. Let me read her apology. This is what she tweeted. "In an intense and stressful moment, I allowed my emotions to get the best of me and said some insulting and regrettable things. As frustrated as I was, I should always choose to be respectful and take the high road. I'm so sorry for my actions and will learn from this mistake."

Have you ever had your car towed?

SMERCONISH: Absolutely.

BALDWIN: I've had my car towed.

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: It's stressful, but you would never --

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: -- but you would never, you know --

SMERCONISH: There's something missing. She didn't apologize to the woman. I think the woman's name is Gina.

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: She didn't apologize to her.

SMERCONISH: Yeah. "Let me begin by apologizing to Gina, the woman to whom I was unbelievably rude and offensive. It's indefensible what I said to you."

BALDWIN: Here's my hypothetical for you. What do you think would have happened pre-Internet, pre all these tools and trolls writing all this vicious stuff about her, warranted or not? It's ugly stuff. What do you think would have happened to her pre-Internet versus now?

SMERCONISH: Pre-Internet, we wouldn't know about it. And I've been thinking about this --

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: You don't think it would be on TV?

SMERCONISH: It's the cameras and the technology revolution generally that has brought to light so much bad behavior. Where would we be with the South Carolina police shooting but for that individual who stopped and captured it on all video? So much bad behavior went unpunished in the pre-Internet world. And to those trolls, I don't know why media outlets allow anonymous blogging. That's a subject maybe for another day.

(CROSSTALK)

SMERCONISH: But, frankly, and they all deserve each other. It's probably three people with feet in their pajamas sitting in front of a keyboard.

BALDWIN: It's disgusting. We'll have that discussion, I have a feeling. And I also have a feeling at some point she's going to be marching herself to apologize to that woman, whether it was her idea or not.

Michael Smerconish, thank you very, very much.

SMERCONISH: Thank you.

[15:40:07] BALDWIN: I know you're going to be all over this on the show this weekend.

Don't miss "Smerconish" tomorrow Morning, 9:00 a.m. eastern here on CNN. New Hampshire, the place to be this weekend, at least if you're a

Republican thinking about running for president next year. Florida Senator Marco Rubio is there. So is Texas Governor Rick Perry, as well as Jeb Bush. Here he is. Others will be there as well. They're all coming for the first-in-the-nation Republican leadership summit. It kicked off today. It is the first can't-miss event for the 2016 Republican field in a state that holds the first-in-the-nation presidential primary.

And while some of those Republican hopefuls swing through New Hampshire, so will Hillary Clinton, who is set to meet with activists, students, and business leaders there next week, part of her bid to become the nation's first woman president.

That's something Academy Award-winning actress, Geena Davis, knowing a little bit about. She played the nation's first female president in the ABC drama "Commander in Chief." And it wasn't the first time Davis showed that women can dominate the screen. Remember this?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED ACTRESS: I think he's going to apologize.

GEENA DAVIS, ACTRESS: Nah, I don't think so.

(GUNFIRE)

(SHOUTING)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: Can you believe it's been 24 years since "Thelma and Louise"? Since then, Geena Davis has been working with her organization, the Geena Davis Institute on Gender and Media, to make inroads on how women are portrayed in film and TV, hoping it will bolster women off screen.

I talked to Geena Davis about Hillary Clinton and why she says it's time for fiction to become reality. Here's a piece of our conversation.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BALDWIN: Geena Davis is joining me now.

Geena Davis, it is so wonderful to see you. Welcome.

DAVIS: Thank you very much.

BALDWIN: So, of course, just coming out of that, we're talking about Hillary Clinton's announcement that, yes, indeed, it's official, she'll be running for president. You played a commander-in-chief on television. In real life, let me ask you this, you surprise it hasn't happened yet?

DAVIS: Well, I'm not surprised, let's say, but I am frustrated by how long it's taken. I remember when I was doing this show, every interview I did, the interviewer would eventually say, do you think we'll ever see a female president in our lifetime? I'd be like, what century do you live in? Yes. We not only need to have the first one, we need to have it absolutely as likely that it'll be a woman as a man right away, immediately. We can't wait around anymore for this to happen. You know, if we add women to Congress at the rate we have been, it'll take 500 years to achieve parody. No, it has to happen right away.

BALDWIN: When I look at you, I think of "A League of Their Own," I could recite the whole song for you. I think of "Thelma and Louise." You play this badass woman. I don't know if I can say that, but I did.

(LAUGHTER) I guess my question to you would be, what other women, characters, actresses, directors do you think right now are contributing to the shift in portraying women in stronger roles on screen?

DAVIS: The ratio has been pretty much exactly the same of male to female characters in films since 1946.

BALDWIN: Yikes.

DAVIS: So we can't say it's different now or certain people are changing it. We always like to assume that when a movie comes out like "Hunger Games" or something, then now everything has changed. But that happened when "Mama Mia" and "Sex in the City" came out. So we never have really got the momentum going yet.

BALDWIN: I actually spent my Valentine's weekend, I don't know, now two years ago, with my 7-year-old best friend. She showed me this movie "Frozen." I think I was really impressed by -- I'm like, go Disney. Because you think in the movie she's going to be saved by the guy. I forget the character. In the end, it's her sister, right.

DAVIS: Right. Absolutely. I have to say, of anybody, Disney has -- is really stepping up to the plate. I mean, they have "Brave" and "Frozen" and "Maleficent." "Tangled" was another instance where they were re-creating what we expect a female character to be, even re- creating their own characters.

BALDWIN: When you think of stereotypes 20, 30 years ago of women on screen, I think of housewives or secretaries. I'm wondering here in 2015 what stereotypes still exist.

DAVIS: The hyper-sexualization of female characters is something that has progressively gotten worse and worse as time goes on. In G-rated animated movies, the female characters wear the same amount of sexually revealing clothing as the female characters in R-rated movies. So there's a tremendous amount of hyper-sexualization, and also valuing and judging the female characters by how attractive or how appealing they are.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

[15:45:31] BALDWIN: Geena Davis, thank you very much.

By the way, Geena is behind the Bentonville Film Festival that will showcase women and minority film makers and guarantee the winners distribution of the work.

Still ahead, they're the educators-turned-cheaters, convicted of inflating students' test scores. Moments ago, those Atlanta educators spoke out about what happened, telling their side of the story. Do not miss this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: Times are changing.

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ANNOUNCER: One night, one network, one ground-breaking event.

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ANNOUNCER: So grab your favorite munchies and get ready for a night you wouldn't expect on CNN, the premieres of "Weed 3" and "High Profits" starting at 9:00.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Every day should be like this.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:50:35] BALDWIN: Just three days after sentenced to prison in one of the nation's biggest cheating scandals ever, eight former Atlanta educators are speaking out with their attorneys sitting by their sides, telling reporters today why they refused a plea deal even after a jury convicted them in a scheme to inflate student test scores to earn bonuses or keep their jobs.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TAMIRA COLEMAN, CONVICTED ATLANTA EDUCATOR: I would not be able to take a deal that would require me to perjure myself. When you are completely innocent and asked to stand up and say you're guilty, I believe that's still perjury and I wasn't willing to compromise my integrity and say I did something I did not do. In addition to that I really believe in the judicial process. And I have the constitutional right to file an appeal, and in order for me to take that deal I would have had to negotiate away my rights to appeal, and I just wasn't willing to do that.

DANA EVANS, CONVICTED ATLANTA EDUCATOR: Oh, my gosh. It has been an overwhelming burden. When it first happened I just was immobilized with the, the notion that not just a few people thought we hurt children, but it felt like the whole world was against us. And it was huge. So it is taking a strong emotional toll, financial, intellectual. I don't feel as smart as I used to, but spiritually I'm stronger.

MICHAEL PITTS, CONVICTED ATLANTA EDUCATOR: You got fine educators here. The educators who are back in the schools who cheated and came and said that we made them cheat because they were scared of us, they're back their teaching your kids. Be afraid, be very afraid.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BALDWIN: All eight former educators have been sentenced to serve anywhere from one to seven years in prison. They all plan to appeal.

Now to what police are describing as a heinous crime and sea. 15 Muslim men suspected of murder after they allegedly threw 12 fellow migrants over the side of this boat because they were Christians. This boat headed from war-torn Libya across the Mediterranean to Italy.

CNN contributor, Barbie Nadeau, has more on all of this.

Barbie, what happened?

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BARBIE NADEAU, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: Brooke, the situation in the waters between Libya and Italy is quickly deteriorating into chaos. We've heard report after report of violent situations out at sea. One including a situation where 12 Christians were thrown overboard by people on their boat because they were praying to God. 15 Muslim men were arrested when they made landfall there. We've also heard reports from the shores of Libya, where these boats are taking off. A gas canister exploded in an area where the migrants were waiting to get on a boat. Several of them, including a 6-month-old child were burned badly. They were forced to get on the boat and make the voyage anyway. They spent two days at sea before they were rescued. There are also shots being fired by the human traffickers against European Union border control and against the Italian coast forward.

We expect the situation to get worse. There have been 11,000 people who have arrived in the last week. And the Italian Coast Guard and the Italian navy say there are many more boats on the horizon -- Brooke?

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BALDWIN: Barbie Nadeau, thank you very much.

Coming up, a deadly car bomb outside the U.S. consulate in Erbil in Iraq. All of this coming as a top lieutenant of Saddam Hussein's is killed in that country, but how does ISIS fit into all of this?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:58:38] BALDWIN: Nearly 12 million parents in the United States are raising kids on their own. But when a single parent gets cancer, everyday responsibilities like cleaning and cooking can become nearly impossible. That's where this week's "CNN Hero" steps in.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I was diagnosed with stage-four breast cancer just about a month after my daughter's dad and I split up. All I could think about was, oh, my god, my daughter, I can't do this to you. UNIDENTIFIED GIRL: Here I go, Mom.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: With chemotherapy there's a lot of fatigue. When you can't really do much, and you're looking at the dirt on the floor, it's like, one more level of stress.

JODY FARLEY-BERENS, CNN HERO: My friend, Michelle, was a single mother of four. When she was diagnosed, she struggled with just day to day. When she passed away, we realized other people like her need help.

CHILDREN: Good morning.

FARLEY-BERENS: Singleton Moms provides practical support for single parents battling cancer.

You have these people that don't know you, and you're going to help me with -- clean my house?

We help them pay a couple bills, and then we provide day-to-day needs for their house. This is what we should be doing for one another.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

[14:54:00] BALDWIN: Each year, CNN honors people making a difference in his or her communities. We would love you to nominate someone. Just go to CNN.com/heroes.

That does it for me. I'm Brooke Baldwin. Have a wonderful weekend. Stay right here. "The Lead" with Jake Tapper starts right now.