Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

Train Gunman May Had Ties to ISIS Fighters; Campaigns Diverted By "Anchor Babies" Debate; Emails Hunt Clinton As Biden Ponders Race; Train Gunman May Have Had Ties to ISIS Fighters; What's Behind the Stock Market's Big Fall?. Aired 5-6p ET

Aired August 22, 2015 - 17:00   ET

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


[17:00:00] ALISON KOSIK, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: This one trader telling me, look, the S&P 500, a broader indicator of the market --

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: Yes.

KOSIK: That's yet to hit correction territory. Two percent to go on that. Glass half empty, watch the Asian markets on Sunday night.

HARLOW: Right.

KOSIK: That could be a precursor of how we do Monday.

HARLOW: We will. We will all be watching come Sunday night. Thanks, Alison.

KOSIK: You got to, Poppy.

HARLOW: We appreciate it.

Next hour of NEWSROOM starts right now.

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

HARLOW: I'm Poppy Harlow. Five o'clock Eastern. Thank you so much for being with me.

We begin with breaking news this hour. Just in to us at CNN, the man who opened fire on that train overseas and was tackled by three Americans has been identified as Ayoub el-Khazzani. And now, we now know where he is from. These three Americans, two of them U.S. service members, being hailed as heroes around the world after they took down the gunman, they restrained him and they delivered him to French authorities.

Nic Robertson joins me live in France. What do we know about this man? We know his name. Do we know his motivation, who he was with, what drove this?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Counterterrorism officials across Europe from Spain through France to Belgium all have reasons to believe that he is connected with radical Islamists. As recently as May this year he went off to Turkey, he is believed to have joined or connected with a French ISIS group there in Turkey before coming back to Europe in July this year. So, two months in Turkey. Question is, did he get into ISIS, to join ISIS in Syria. That's not clear.

But the concern is, the same French ISIS group that he met with in Turkey is the same group that directed an Algerian living in France to attack a church in April this year. That attack was thwarted but not before he killed somebody else. So this group has a track record and they seem to have directed this man to attack from the train. That is sort of one of the starting places for the investigation here at the moment into this man. So a man with a lot of weapons on the train taken down by some heroic Americans. And we have seen amazing support from the streets for these three men today here -- Poppy.

HARLOW: Yes. Well, let's talk about that. I mean, they are Nic being treated like rock stars in France. Thanked by everyone that has come into contact with them. President Obama calling them.

ROBERTSON: Yes, the President Obama calling them, congratulating them, thanking them for the disaster that they averted, driving out of the police station here, Sadler and Skarlatos, both being driven away in a French police convoy. But as they came out of the police station, the French people will on the side of the road here were cheering them, cheering them. You don't see that here very often. That was quite an amazing thing to witness and get that emotion.

But on Monday along with our friend Stone, they are going to meet the French president at the French president's palace. That is pretty cool too. But it's not just the president.

It's the prime minister, the foreign minister, the interior minister, the minister of transport as well. So, it goes from the French man on the street here all the way up to the president. We even had a woman and a daughter walk past, we've been working (INAUDIBLE) today thanking us, thanking the police, thanking them for everything they have done. They really could not have captured the support and the good wishes of the French people any better than they have -- Poppy.

HARLOW: Yes. You always ask yourself what would I have done in that moment. They did exactly what we would all hope we do. Nic Robertson, thank you very much.

Now, let's talk more about the gunman. French officials trying to find out how closely tied he may be to radical Islam and whether he carried out the attack as part of a larger plan or if this was an isolated event.

Let's go straight to Bob Baer, international intelligence and security analyst, also a former CIA operative. So, I know the information is relatively thin right now but now we know his name and we know that he was likely meeting with ISIS supporters in Turkey. Does this tell you that this is a lone wolf?

ROBERT BAER, CNN INTELLIGENCE AND SECURITY ANALYST: I think it's probably a lone wolf in the sense that there was just one gunman. If it was the Islamic State, you know, carrying out a concerted attack, there would have been two gunmen, they would have been better positioned, they wouldn't have been grabbed as they were. I think the fact that he went to Turkey, he's from Moroccan and the rest of it, he sounds like somebody who wanted to join but did never got the weapons training that some might.

HARLOW: What about the fact though that this appears, he appears to have met likely with French ISIS fighters in Turkey and the fact that there is growing concern about Turkey being a hotbed for this, not just a conduit for travel into Syria, but potentially a place for Europeans who have been radicalized or Americans who have been radicalized are turned around and said go carry out an attack in your home country?

BAER: Well, Poppy, you don't actually need to get into Syria or Iraq to join the Islamic State.

HARLOW: Right.

BAER: They've got offices of sorts all across Turkey. They have a lot of sympathizers. They have got a lot of allied groups you could go find, it would be fairly easy to get to them in Turkey, to get instructions to go back, attack people in the west. You know, Kalashnikov, you cannot buy, of course, in Belgium or France. So you would have to have somebody, a supplier there, whether it's an Albanian organized, you know, criminal group, it doesn't really matter. So, there was some organization in this. And the Islamic State has gone out and said just attack a western target. It doesn't matter what. So you know, things are bad in Europe.

[17:05:35] HARLOW: Yes. No question. What about how these Americans and this British man took down the gunman? Can you talk to us about how hard tactically it is to carry off what they successfully carried off?

BAER: You know, Poppy, there is no other way to describe this as heroic. Most people when faced with an automatic weapon freeze. I have been in a run of gunfire and that's my first reaction, just not move. The fact these guys organized and went after him and by the way, Poppy, this isn't something you learn, the average guy in the military, how to disarm somebody and you're not armed. That's not just not part of the training. So these guys had incredible presence of mind.

HARLOW: Yes.

BAER: They acted in concert, disarmed this guy, a pistol and a Kalashnikov, it's just amazing. I have had this training before. And I always wondered whether I could actually make the correct moves to disarm somebody and these guys actually did it. I really do applaud them.

HARLOW: Yes. We all do. Wait for the welcome they get when they do come home. Bob Baer, thank you as always, my friend.

Coming up, we turn to politics and the debate over this term you probably heard a lot this week. Anchor babies. Is it a serious conversation, an important one to have or a campaign diversion and how insulting is it? We will talk about this. Ben Ferguson, Marc Lamont Hill, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:10:20] HARLOW: The term "anchor baby" is the focus of a heated debate in the race for the White House right now. It's a term used to describe children born in the U.S. whose parents are not citizens. The children automatically become citizens, of course, according to the 14th amendment.

Let's talk about the debate over this term with our political commentators, Marc Lamont Hill, professor of Morehouse College and Ben Ferguson, host of "The Ben Ferguson" radio show. Guys, set the stage. The whole controversy began when Donald Trump used the word which a lot of people find very offensive. Others call that criticism another example of being too politically correct. Trump got people talking, later Jeb Bush jumps in, he uses the term, then tries to clarify. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: A lot of people think that it is absolutely in terms of anchor babies, that it is not covered. So, we will going to find out. But look, here's the story. Here's what happens. Wait a minute. Wait, wait, wait. Here's what's happening. A woman is going to have a baby. They wait on the border. Just before the baby they come over the border, they have the baby in the United States. We now take care of that baby, Social Security, Medicare, education. Give me a break. It doesn't work that way. The parents have to come in legally.

JEB BUSH (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: What I said was it's commonly referred to that. That's what I said. I didn't use it as my own language. What we ought to do is protect the 14th, you want to get to the policy for a second? I think that people born in this country ought to be American citizens.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: Marc, to you first. We also heard this week from republican candidate Ted Cruz, calling this whole debate political correct nonsense. Is it that or is it more?

MARC LAMONT HILL, PROFESSOR, MOREHOUSE COLLEGE: It's definitely more. First of all, Jeb Bush has had a fairly humane stance on immigration. I don't agree with him on everything but he's been reasonable. Just like his brother, former President Bush, was reasonable on it. He wrote a book in 2013, never used the word anchor baby. Why? Because he was reasonable. Suddenly once you enter a mainstream republican primaries, now all of a sudden you're trying to appeal to their extreme wing of the party and you know that a term like anchor baby ticks off the left. And so you defend it not because you believe in it but because you don't want to seem too politically correct or sensitive. You don't want to alienate yourself from the Trump base. So, this is really a game of political maneuvering for Jeb Bush and Donald Trump is just being Donald Trump. HARLOW: Yes. And you know, we're not talking about the issue, the

actual sort of substantive issues on immigration reform, what you would do, what you wouldn't do. Ben, I do want you to listen to what Pat Buchanan, who ran for president multiple times --

BEN FERGUSON, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Sure.

HARLOW: -- '92, '96, 2000, what he said today to our Michael Smerconish.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PAT BUCHANAN (R), FORMER PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: He has got a valid point. It's a tremendous issue. People are really upset by it. And the media are saying, why did you use those two words, why don't you get another two words? What is the matter with this country given the crises we are in, people are running around asking if the verbiage is politically right or not.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: Does he have a point, Ben?

FERGUSON: Yes, he does. I mean, if you look at this whole entire conversation over the last year, you can't say the word illegal immigrant because people say that that's a terrible thing to call someone. Now you can't say that people have anchor babies when in reality, that's exactly what they do. The Feds busted multiple hotels and apartment complexes earlier this year in California in a sting. They went into 19 different places where women from all over the world, not just across the border, come into this country specifically to have an anchor baby. They went in and busted them.

The FBI was involved, the IRS was involved, hospitals were involved because these people were saying that they didn't have any money so they couldn't pay the hospitals and they went back to their country and they also had an American citizen child that would helped them get back into this country. So, this is the reality we are living in. And the fact that we are arguing over anchor baby or saying someone is an illegal immigrant instead of undocumented worker, now we want to call them dreamers to make it sound better, this is political correctness and it's run amok and it's exhausted.

HARLOW: Have we gone Marc too far with this debate? Look what happened in France yesterday. This gunman is thought to be tied to ISIS. You've got the market absolutely tanking. You've got Iran and the negotiations there, will this deal pass and this is what's getting a lot of coverage.

HILL: Well, I think we should be talking about all those issues. I mean, the great thing about a place like America and the great thing about the modern media landscape is that we can deal with multiple issues simultaneously. To Ben's point, Ben is saying the anchor baby is okay because of all these realities of FBI raids and people having, you know, exploiting birthright citizenship, et cetera. The argument isn't that people don't have babies that are allowed to stay in the country.

That's not in dispute. That becomes a straw man. We all agree that there's a circumstance where people are taking advantage of birthright citizenship. The question is, are we able to have a healthy conversation if instead of talking about them as people, we talk about them as anchors. The question is, can we be humane in the discourse and still have a productive conversation.

[17:15:22] FERGUSON: This is where I would say, I don't think when people use the terminology anchor baby they are talking about the child. They are talking about what the parent is doing. The parent is trying to put an anchor in this country by having a child here that does in fact have citizenship. I'm not saying that child shouldn't have citizenship. I condemn the comments from Donald Trump. If you're born in this country, no matter who your parents are or how they got here to have you, you're an American citizen. I'm not talking about the child. I'm talking about the act of the parent who has purposely put an anchor in this country. It's toward the parent, not the child. And this is where again the semantics of political correctness has run amok.

HILL: But Ben, you can't say, you are calling someone an anchor baby and say you are not talking about the baby. Anchor baby refers to the baby, not the parent. That might not be your underlining -- hold on.

FERGUSON: It's what the parent's intent was, which was to have an anchor in this country.

HILL: I understand the etymology of the word. What I'm saying is, when we say the word anchor baby, we are talking about the baby. That is actually axiomatic, that is self-evident. The problem is, is that that by calling them anchors instead of people, we lose sight of their humanity and it makes it easier to have inhumane public policy. That's my problem.

HARLOW: Gentlemen --

FERGUSON: They are American citizens. So, they have all the rights you and I have. I'm not worried about them at all.

HILL: Tell that to Donald Trump.

HARLOW: Stay with me. Stay with me. I have to leave it there. We have to get a quick break.

And coming up next, we will going to talk with Ben and Marc about the e-mail controversy that continues to surround Hillary Clinton. Another democrat now might step into the race. Is Joe Biden getting ready for a run?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:20:36] HARLOW: As Hillary Clinton's campaign weathers the storm surrounding her use of a private e-mail server as secretary of state, a woman that Clinton once described as her second daughter has now been thrust into the spotlight. CNN senior Washington correspondent Jeff Zeleny has more on Clinton's

confidant Huma Abedin.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

HUMA ABEDIN, POLITICAL STAFFER: Anybody else. Anybody?

JEFF ZELENY, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): She is never far from Hillary Clinton's side.

HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: To my extraordinary staff.

ZELENY: Huma Abedin, her loyal confidant for nearly 20 years. Now at the center of Clinton's second bid for the presidency. The latest controversy weighing down the campaign goes back to e-mail messages like this. From Abedin to Clinton, on that private server she used as secretary of state. Few people are closer to Clinton.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: -- It looks like a piece of your hair or something.

CLINTON: Okay. Okay.

ZELENY: And just as this interview in Afghanistan ends, she hands Clinton a Blackberry with a startling message.

CLINTON: Wow. Unconfirmed reports about Gadhafi being captured.

ABEDIN: Have a great morning. It's beautiful today.

ZELENY: Abedin is 39, born in Michigan, raised in Saudi Arabia. She is the nucleus of Clinton's orbit. Around the world and on the campaign trail. She met Clinton as an intern in the First Lady's office in 1996. Often seen but seldom heard.

ANTHONY WEINER, FORMER CONGRESSMAN: My amazing wife, Huma Abedin.

ZELENY: Until she stepped into a firestorm of her own.

ABEDIN: This is the first time I have spoken at a press conference and you'll have to bear with me. Because I'm very nervous.

ZELENY: There she was standing by her man, former New York Congressman Anthony Weiner.

ABEDIN: I love him. I have forgiven him. I believe in him. And as we have said from the beginning, we are moving forward.

ZELENY: Moving forward to a second presidential campaign. Once again, Clinton's right hand. But now, new questions about her transition as a State Department employee to a consultant for the Clinton Foundation and other companies.

SEN. CHUCK GRASSLEY (R), IOWA: The American people still do not know all the facts. ZELENY: Senator Chuck Grassley, chairman of the Judiciary Committee,

asked how Abedin became a special government employee, allowed to work for Clinton and the private sector. Abedin said she worked in her personal capacity to help prepare for her transition from public service. No stranger to controversy --

ABEDIN: Our marriage like many others has had its ups and its downs. It took a lot of work appear and a whole lot of therapy to get to a place where I could forgive Anthony.

ZELENY: In this campaign, she is no longer in the shadows but weathering her own challenges too. As vice chairwoman of Hillary for America.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ZELENY: The questions about Abedin's e-mails are part of what the Clinton campaign believes is a pure partisan witch-hunt but in a federal courtroom on Thursday afternoon, a judge said that he expects all documents from Abedin to be turned over by next week to the State Department. Part of another sign that she is at the center of another Clinton campaign controversy. Jeff Zeleny, CNN, Washington.

HARLOW: All right. CNN political commentators Ben Ferguson, Marc Lamont Hill are back. You just heard it from Jeff. You have the Clinton camp saying this is partisan witch-hunt. You have also got, you know, the latest developments coming from a federal judge. So, Marc, let me begin with you. Is this a partisan witch-hunt?

HILL: No. Not yet. I think that reasonable questions are being asked and Hillary Clinton should provide the answers. So far she has been cooperative. It doesn't mean she has been running to the media and answering every question that people want. But she's answered the questions at the appropriate time. In the past week we've heard a lot more disclosure from this former secretary of state. And I think it's a legitimate eyebrow raiser. I don't think it's a witch-hunt yet. But I suspect after Hillary Clinton has answered all questions, people will still be after her on the campaign trail and they will try to make this Benghazi part two.

My gut says that, and based on the evidence I've seen, Hillary Clinton did not break the law. Might she have bent a rule or might she have done something that's improper or at least undesirable, perhaps. We have seen it from other people like Colin Powell though in the past. He wrote his memoir that he did the same thing. I don't think she broke the law. The Clinton are too careful for that. But I think this will be a dark cloud that hangs over her for the next year and a half.

HARLOW: Ben, how dark a cloud?

FERGUSON: I mean, it's going to be a big one. I think it's obvious how big it is just because of the fact you have Joe Biden looking at possibly running against her.

HARLOW: Right. FERGUSON: And you see Bernie Sanders surging in many places. I mean, Hillary Clinton, let's be clear, she has not been cooperative. She basically had so much heat on her about her e-mail server for such a long period of time, it became such a political distraction from her campaign messaging, they were forced into this. And she said that she did not have top secret e-mails. We now know in fact there were top secret e-mails. And she said that she wiped the server. Now we know that there may be a lot of backups there. So, I think this is far from being a witch-hunt. This is about did Hillary Clinton do something improper and purposely delete things that the American people should know about while she was spending time as a taxpayers' employee. And the answer looks like yes.

[17:25:40] HARLOW: Marc, is this what has opened the door perhaps wider for Joe Biden, who by the way, is polling better against Trump, the GOP leader, in key swing states, you see him right there, Florida, Ohio, Pennsylvania, than Hillary Clinton is?

HILL: I don't think it's this per se. I think it's the fact that Hillary hasn't taken a strangle hold on the polls the way people expected. Bernie Sanders sort of a surprise surge to some, suggests there's a group of voters, it's a bloc of voters that are looking for an alternative. And while they may not pick Bernie at the end game, they are choosing Bernie right now, suggesting that they want someone other than Hillary Clinton. That opens the door. The e-mail scandal means that she may have a struggle in the general, it may mean that there might be some blood or some mud as she goes along. And so, that makes Joe Biden and maybe even Al Gore, who knows, say, hey, I want to jump in this race. But I don't think people are saying oh, my God, Hillary's going to jail or oh my God, Hillary violated the law. I think they're just saying, hey, maybe people want an alternative.

HARLOW: Ben, this new CNN/ORC poll finds 53 percent of Democrats want to see a Joe Biden challenge to Hillary Clinton.

FERGUSON: Yes.

HARLOW: And also, there is this Quinnipiac poll that as I said, you have got Biden doing better in a head-to-head matchup with Trump than Hillary Clinton doing. How likely is a Biden run right now?

FERGUSON: I think it comes down to a trust issue. I think there are a lot of people that look at Hillary Clinton and they have a hard time trusting her. And I think Joe Biden in many ways, people kind of like him. They feel comfortable with him. They have seen him for, you know, basically the last seven years in the White House. They feel like he's not having --

HARLOW: But are they excited by him? Are they excited by him?

FERGUSON: I think they certainly are, otherwise he wouldn't be polling where he is when he hasn't announced he's going to run. In fact, he's kind of been pulled into it through others who have said look, you have to take a look at this. There is a big opening here. People are not obsessed with Hillary Clinton the way that we thought they were going to be. And I think that a lot of people really like Joe Biden as a person.

HILL: First of all, Joe Biden ran for president in 1988. He ran again in 2008 --

FERGUSON: Long time ago.

HILL: You didn't have to make Joe Biden run for president. He didn't get drafted. He wanted to be president the entire time. He has been sizing the drapes since he got into the White House.

FERGUSON: I'm not disputing that. But notice how this time he's waited this long. It was not -- I think he didn't want to lose again. And now there's a chance he may not lose. In fact, he could win.

HILL: And that right there is the point. And I don't think that people are excited. I don't think he's getting into the race because voters are excited about Joe Biden. What people are excited about is keeping the presidency on their side of the aisle. And the truth is, if they thought Hillary could win they would prefer Hillary. But this e-mail stuff, the Bernie Sanders surge, the Donald Trump mania, all of this stuff is making people say, hey, I want a competitor. And one more thing, don't think that just because people want a challenge to Hillary Clinton that it means that they don't want Hillary to win. They don't want to see a coronation. They want to see the issues laid out and ultimately I still think Hillary wins this thing.

HARLOW: Ben, Marc, thank you both. Stay with me. Also for all of you watching, do not forget CNN hosts our first republican debate live from the Reagan presidential library, that is Wednesday, September 16th, only right here on CNN.

Coming up next, an update on our top story today. Three American heroes taking down a gunman on a French train. More on who this fast- thinking young men are.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:32:03] HARLOW: Tragedy averted on a train bound for Paris, thanks to three Americans and a British passenger who jumped in to subdue a gunman. Those Americans, an airman from the U.S. Air Force, the national guardsman and civilian are being hailed as heroes today for taking down the shooter who emerged from the bathroom shirtless with a rifle slung over his shoulder.

The gunman now identified as Ayoub el Khazzani. A source telling CNN that el Khazzani may have traveled to Turkey to join a French ISIS group.

CNN's Polo Sandoval with me now.

What incredible bravery they showed.

POLO SANDOVAL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Poppy, I think you and I consider this true heroism.

HARLOW: Yes. SANDOVAL: But then you hear from these men and their families and they call it basic instinct, something that in their words, anybody would do. But call it what you want, the fact is that had these men not taken these actions, we'd be discussing a truly tragic ending right now.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I tried to shoot him.

SANDOVAL (voice-over): That's Spencer Stone, injured on board this French train after he and two fellow Americans stopped a would-be terrorist armed with guns and a box cutter. Stone, a U.S. airman, is credited with leading the charge along with Alek Skarlatos and Anthony Sadler.

ANTHONY SADLER, STUDENT: Really proud of my friend that he just reacted so quickly and so bravely. He was really the first one over there. Even after being injured himself, he went to go help the other man who was bleeding.

SANDOVAL: The three childhood friends were traveling together aboard the high speed train when they sprang into action. Stone bloodied yet determined to stop a massacre from happening. The young man had help from British passenger Chris Norman who used his necktie to hogtie the gunman.

CHRIS NORMAN, WITNESS: We have seen enough of these kinds of attacks to understand that they will kill everybody once they get started. I said to myself, OK, maybe I have a chance if I get up and I help as well.

SANDOVAL: Praise now pouring in from all over the world, but no one prouder than the friends' parents.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's well within his character. He's a quick thinker. Quick decision maker.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Deep down inside, I felt really, really proud. I told them that. But I didn't tell him as much as I should have. Gosh, I am so proud of both of them, so much. The fact that they saved all those lives and had that instinct and the guts to just do what they did.

SANDOVAL: The three friends left for Europe as tourists and will return to the U.S. as heroes.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SANDOVAL: You can add international to that title of hero.

We are also now learning about more key players in this story here. We are being told by the French interior minister that there was a French passenger who made the initial contact with this gunman. In their words he tried to overpower him. When that didn't work, the gunman fled into the next train coach which is where these three men and the British citizen were sitting, had they not taken these actions the consensus, Poppy, is we would be discussing a very different outcome right now.

HARLOW: Absolutely. Just immediate.

SANDOVAL: What would we do?

HARLOW: That's what you always ask yourself. Polo, thank you, as always.

SANDOVAL: You bet.

HARLOW: Coming up next, a horrifying accident in the United Kingdom. An air show crash leaving seven dead. A live report ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:38:48] HARLOW: It was meant to be a day of fun but an air show in England turned tragic. This historic military plane was performing a loop when as you will see, it suddenly nose-dives. The plane crashed into a major road. It hit cars. Seven people are now dead, 15 more are injured.

CNN's Ian Lee is making his way to the crash site. He joins me on the phone as we look at this tragic, extraordinary video.

Ian, what happened?

IAN LEE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (via telephone): Poppy, this was the beginning of the routine for this aircraft. It was taking off, it was doing a loop and it was coming down and it just pulled up and that's when it hit this major highway here in the south of England. We just arrived to the airfield where the show was taking place. There are emergency teams here. It is quite a somber atmosphere right now as they try to piece together exactly what happened. We are starting to learn a little bit more about the moment right when it happened.

[17:40:00] We are hearing that miraculously, the pilot was able, was pulled from the burning wreckage. He is in critical condition but he did survive the initial crash.

HARLOW: Wow.

LEE: Fourteen other people also, what we're hearing that their condition is better than the pilot. They are expected to survive, but a very sad and tragic day. This is an air team that has already been mourning. Just earlier this month, another pilot was killed in an airplane crash. His funeral was just two days ago.

So, this is really an air team, air show in mourning now.

HARLOW: Yes. And we know that Sussex police are tweeting that no one post videos of the crash online, instead turn them over to investigators, right?

LEE: That's right. They have asked people to turn those, hold on to those videos, turn them over because they're going to be using them to determine exactly what happened, why this aircraft which has been really the pride and joy of these air shows, this aircraft has been around for 60 years, it's been doing air shows for quite awhile.

Last year, it was here as well, and so they're going to be trying to figure out, especially as a veteran pilot, these pilots, veteran pilots, you know, they know what they're doing. They will be trying to figure out what really went wrong.

HARLOW: Absolutely. Ian Lee reporting for us, thank you very much for that.

Coming up next, tensions on Wall Street. The Dow plunging 530 points yesterday alone. A miserable week on Wall Street. What's ahead for Monday? We will talk about that.

But, first, our CNN hero.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

COLLETTE CARROLL, CNN HERO: What I do doesn't give a lot of people the warm fuzzies.

Good morning, guys.

A lot of people don't understand why I do what I do. The reality is, any life is worth helping.

Today we're going to be doing relationships.

I run a pre and post-release program at San Quentin State Prison where the men in our program learn to understand what they did, why they did it, where they need to go and how to stay the course.

So we're going to start with healthy relationships, right?

It is a minimum of 24 months of hard work.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: People that want to change the way we've chosen to change.

CARROLL: Supportive people, yes?

They start to care about themselves. They start to care about the people they hurt. And then we move forward with life skills and setting them up to succeed.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Driving away from San Quentin. That's amazing. OK.

Hi.

CARROLL: Hi. Welcome home!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Welcome home.

CARROLL: When they get out, we follow them with support and assistance in reentering society.

We have to get you a California ID.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm a new man with new thoughts, new beliefs, new goals. This is my second chance. I want to be part of the world.

CARROLL: The hard work paid off, my friend.

If they come out and they're successful, society is safer. If they stayed in touch with us, we've actually had nobody go back to prison. And I like to think that it will continue that way.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:47:47] HARLOW: The worst week on Wall Street in four years. The Dow lost more than 1,000 points this week alone, leaving a lot of people wondering what is going on. I cannot think of anyone better to help us sort it out, Andy Serwer, former managing editor of "Fortune Magazine", now editor in chief of Yahoo Finance.

I saw a lot of tweets, people not happy with us, with the media coverage, saying this isn't Lehman all over again. You're over- blowing this.

What do you think? How nervous should people be?

ANDY SERWER, EDITOR IN CHIEF, YAHOO FINANCE: I think they should be a little nervous because we are sort of heading into unknown territory here, particularly with regards to China. I mean, China is the proximate cause. The economy, the growth there is slowing. The Chinese government is trying to rein in the stock market.

And so far, they have been unsuccessful. They are discovering that one party rule can't tame animal spirits.

HARLOW: Right.

SERWER: Meanwhile, oil is crashing. That's not particularly good. At first, it seems like a good thing because it means cheap gas but think about all the countries that produce oil. That's bad for those economies.

HARLOW: That's more domestic jobs in oil-producing states.

SERWER: That's absolutely right.

And then the third thing people don't talk about so much is that the stock market in the United States was fully valued, meaning stocks were at record highs. So, maybe it's not so surprising that we have come back to earth a little bit.

HARLOW: What about the jobs? Because here's the thing. Companies are reflective of two things, psychology and the performance -- stocks are reflective of psychology and how companies are doing. When companies feel really good, they are hiring.

SERWER: Right.

HARLOW: When you're nervous and don't feel good, doesn't matter if they have had record earnings, they're going to pull back from hiring. Should jobs be a concern here?

SERWER: Well, not yet, because of course, the U.S. economy ironically continues to improve, and has been for months and months and months. We know that. You see the jobs reports coming in.

And profits are continuing to go up but now at a slower rate. I think you're right when you talk about jobs with regard to oil, though, because oil is definitely getting hit hard here. We are talking about big states like Texas, California, Oklahoma, the Dakotas, Louisiana.

You know, they are really going to feel a pinch here. These are places that rely on the oil and gas business for jobs, for their economy and that's not a great thing for them.

HARLOW: For people at home, as they're watching this -- a lot of people don't know what to do.

[17:50:02] SERWER: Yes.

HARLOW: Are we going to fall further? Even if we do, couldn't it be argued it's a good thing to get the market back to reality if it was indeed overblown?

SERWER: That's true. That's hard to swallow if you're sitting there and watching your portfolio going down.

HARLOW: We haven't had a correction since the bull market started in 2009.

SERWER: You know, I think you're absolutely right, Poppy. Again, remember that only a few weeks ago, we had record highs. And you didn't hear people saying, well, I'm really scared while the market's going up so much. They were saying, this is really great, I want it to continue. Of course, it's always a dance between fear and greed. We had a little bit of greed for the past couple years, and we're hitting the fear button.

HARLOW: What does it mean for my money? What do I do come Monday morning?

SERWER: I mean, you really have to sit tight. I know that doesn't sound so great. I'm not going to tell you to sell stocks right now. I don't think that's a right to do. You know, the U.S. economy is in, I would I say pretty good shape, pretty good to very good shape.

So, why would you sell stocks? Stocks may have been too expensive a couple weeks ago, now they're getting accurately priced.

HARLOW: You saw the selloff from big losers in Microsoft, Apple, Goldman Sachs, it was very broad base. We're not talking about a particular sector.

Stay with me, Andy, I want to bring in our political commentators as well, Ben Ferguson and Marc Lamont Hill, because this all comes down in an election cycle -- the economy, the economy, the economy.

BEN FERGUSON, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Sure.

HARLOW: I do want you guys to list what John McCain said about the economy in 2008 that hurt him so much.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: You know that there's been tremendous turmoil in our financial markets and Wall Street, and it is, people are frightened by these events. Our economy I think, still, the fundamentals of our economy are strong, but these are very, very difficult times. I promise you, we will never put America in this position again.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: The fundamentals of our economy are strong. That was such a different time, gentlemen, than it is right now. However, you heard Donald Trump bring up the market selloff last night in that stadium in Alabama.

You know, what is the right political move when you do see shakiness in some uncertainty about the economy and frankly, China and our ties to it in terms of products and trade? Ben, to you first, and, Marc.

FERGUSON: Two things. One, don't overreact and don't oversell something. Remember, for the last eight months, we've been hitting record high after record high after record high, to the point where it almost felt like it was just normal, 100-point gains was not a big shock.

So, we've had a correction here, I think a lot of this does come down to the global economy. When you see what's happening in Shanghai, with manufacturing specifically in China, that's going to affect the rest of the world. You look at oil, that also, being in Texas, I've seen the ripple effects of how there have been a lot of things that have been put on hold, or pause or been layoffs or furloughs when it comes to drilling there. So, you're going to have these.

But, I also think a lot of this was just flat out overconfidence. When you see places like Tuesday morning and fresh market drop 30 percent, the stock market on Friday, that tells you there were some big, big stock gains that maybe weren't exactly correct or accurate, and maybe shouldn't have been there. And so, now, people are taking a look, and that's going to be OK.

HARLOW: So, Marc, we haven't heard really anything from the candidates about this yet. Now, if you're a Democrat, if you're a Republican candidate, how do you address this, because now, there will be fear among, you know, your voters?

MARC LAMONT HILL, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, first, I'm not sure they know much. That's why they haven't said much.

(LAUGHTER)

HILL: I think most financial experts will have to agree with that claim. So, I think what many people tried to do is score political points about having the proper analysis. What you want to do, if anything, is instill a sense of certainty in voters, but more importantly in the market.

The questions about the Fed and interest rates of September are one of the things that produce the uncertainty more so than a hike or a drop in the interest rate that actually makes the markets act the way they do. So, ultimately, it's about projecting to voters the sense of confidence, having some sense of control over the situation and having a global sensibility. We can't blame this on the United States. While I agree with Ben's analysis of manufacturing in China, and really the overall economy slowing down, probably even more than the 7 percent they suggested.

Despite all of that, there's a bigger global problem that comes with oil prices, crude oil prices drop. Everybody's scared. You have to instill confidence in the market. This is going to scare me, Poppy, but this is probably playing to Donald Trump's strength.

HARLOW: I was going to say.

Andy, to you, final word. Does this help a Donald Trump, a Carly Fiorina, who are going to say, oh, we know business?

SERWER: Yes. Well, fear would help fear mongering, that's right, Poppy. You know, you can play the China card, you could talk about countries that produce oil that are there to harm us. I mean, there's a lot of things you could do that are potentially negative when it comes to real politics.

HARLOW: All right. Andy, Ben, Mark, thank you all Appreciate it.

FERGUSON: Thanks.

HARLOW: Also this, we're following mandatory evacuations in Washington state. The situation there growing more dire as thousands of firefighters try to gain control of the blaze, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:58:31] HARLOW: In Washington state, more towns now under a mandatory evacuation order as wildfires continue to explode in size. Take a look at these numbers, 390,000 acres are on fire. More than 100 buildings destroyed and 3,000 firefighters and 26 planes are battling the blaze.

President Obama has signed an emergency declaration to get more federal aid to the state. Crews are asking for volunteers to jump in and help. Many of whom will put their lives in the same danger that killed three firefighters earlier this week. Officials say winds have died down a bit today, providing some much

needed relief to those crews battling the blaze. We will update you with more as we have it.

And as I say goodbye, tonight, this just in to us at CNN, a panda cub has been born at the National Zoo, it happened just a few minutes ago. You can see mom Mei Xiang live. It's hard to see the panda cub because they're usually about the size of a stick of butter when they're born. Congratulations to them.

Remember, you can get all the latest breaking news on CNN.com. I will be back at 7:00 Eastern, one hour's time. But stay with us right here, because "SMERCONISH" starts now.