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Recovery Efforts Underway in South Carolina; Turkey Condemns Russia for Violating Air Space; Israel's Netanyahu Condemns Wave of Terror; U.S. Strike Hits Hospital in Afghanistan; The TPP After 12 Years; The Right to Die; Hillary Clinton Speaks out Against Gun Violence; Yemeni Hotel Hit By Grenade. Aired 1-2a ET

Aired October 06, 2015 - 01:00   ET

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

[01:00:08] ISHA SESAY, CNN ANCHOR: This is CNN NEWSROOM live from Los Angeles.

(HEADLINES)

SESAY: Hello. And welcome to our viewers in the United States and around the world. I am Isha Sesay.

JOHN VAUSE, CNN ANCHOR: Great to have you with us. I'm John Vause. NEWSROOM L.A. begins right now.

Our top story this hour, recovery efforts are underway in South Carolina after days of unrelenting rain across the state. Historic flooding has caused 11 deaths. Two others were killed in North Carolina.

SESAY: At least one dam has overflowed leading to mandatory evacuation. Officials say so far 18 dams have breached or failed.

CNN's Martin Savidge reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Desperate days. A man in Columbia clings to a tree as floodwaters rivet his waist and threaten to wash him away.

In South Carolina, the rain may be easing but not the danger. In many areas, the water continues to rise and so does the death toll. Many of those who have been killed died trying to cross through rushing water.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, they just made a mistake.

SAVIDGE: This man nearly met the same fate when raising waters threaten to carry him and his truck away. It would become one of many dramatic rescues.

Just outside Charleston, a mother and her 15-month-old baby had to be rescued by a Coast Guard helicopter after floodwater surrounded their home.

Officials say there have been so many rescues like these, they've lost count.

South Carolina's governor is warning people not to let down their guard as waters recede.

GOV. NIKKI HALEY, (R) SOUTH CAROLINA: This is not over. Just because the rain stops does not mean that we are out of the woods. We very much still have a vulnerable situation that's out there. I'm still going to ask citizens to please stay inside.

SAVIDGE: The greatest danger is south of Columbia whereas much as two feet of rain has fallen since Friday. Several area dams are overflowing or giving way.

WYATT COLEMAN, CHIEF WEST COLUMBIA FIRE DEPARTMENT: We have probably about 10 dams that broke in Lexington County yesterday.

SAVIDGE: Late this afternoon, a CNN crew and a National Guard helicopter flew above Overcreek Dam shortly after it breached. Warnings of the breach sent reporters and emergency crews rushing to get out of the water's potential path.

Meanwhile, some 1300 National Guard troops have been called in to help hundreds of troopers and state workers. Residents are being asked to stay off the roads to allow emergency crews through but it's still not easy.

More than 500 roads have been closed due to high water or damage, including 100 bridges in and around the state capital.

In most areas, it's too early to begin assessing the damage but many residents already know the cost is high.

ANGELA WILLIAMS, FLOOD VICTIM: What I've got on my body is what we have. Pretty much everybody on that hill has lost everything this morning, our vehicles, our clothes, our everything. But the best thing is that we still have our lives. We still have our lives.

SAVIDGE: Martin Savidge, CNN, Columbia, South Carolina.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VAUSE: In just three days the city of Charleston received almost a half year's worth of rain. At one point, tens of thousands were without electricity and hundreds of others were evacuated from their homes. And while the situation there is bad, it's not as bad as it was just 24 hours ago.

Mark Wilbert is the director of Charleston's Department of Emergency Management. He joins us now on the line.

So, Mark, there is still trouble ahead. What is your biggest concern now in the coming days?

MARK WILBERT, DIRECTOR, CHARLESTON'S DEPARTMENT OF EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT: Well, I think the biggest concern in the coming days is to begin to understand what we don't currently know. As the water recedes we'll begin to get an understanding of what kind of damage may have been done to infrastructure, roads, and then we'll get first real good looks at what happened to people's houses as we begin to deploy our damage assessment teams and they begin to actually get out and survey the damage.

VAUSE: How long before schools and government services all return to normal?

WILBERT: Well that's a good question. Schools here in the county are closed again tomorrow. And a lot of that is because many of the neighborhoods throughout the county, the schools -- the buses it's just not safe for them to go in. There's a lot of standing water left. They do need to get in and survey all the schools to make sure that the schools are safe for the students to go to the schools.

[01:04:59] VAUSE: And Mark, you've had these amounts of rain which have fallen over the past...

WILBERT: Just did not want to stop.

VAUSE: OK, Mark, good to speak to you. Mark Wilbert, there on the line from Charleston Department of Emergency Management. Thanks for being with us.

WILBERT: Thank you.

SESAY: Our meteorologist Pedram Javaheri is following this for us.

Pedram, the hope now is of course that the residents of South Carolina are over the worst of all this rain. How's it looking?

PEDRAM JAVAHERI, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yes, it looks like the rain should be all done in the next couple of hours. We did get sunny skies across the region so good news there. But you see some of these images come out of the state of South Carolina, the capital of city there, Columbia, and just incredible to compare the before and after perspective when it comes to what transpired over this region.

Well, I can see, you only need 30 centimeters, about 1 foot of moving water upon the order of about six miles per hour to give about 500 pounds of lateral force. It does not take much water to cause substantial damage.

And want to lay the land across the state of South Carolina, show you what you're dealing with here across the Palmetto State because we know the northern portion of the state, we have the Appalachian mountains, rise up to about 3500 feet. We go farther to the south, you bring in the hundreds of rivers, there are tributaries, you get to the low country you have the marsh land here. All of this water and rain up stream but will eventually come down into the Atlantic Ocean downstream.

Now we know about a dozen or so dams have been jeopardized over this region and levees as well. And you look at the situation when it comes to dams and the amount of stress that is involved, and in the United States typically 30 percent of dam failures are because of over topping that occurs over this region.

So of course you get extra water that goes over the banks of the dam itself that causes problems what we saw across the state of South Carolina in the Columbia area in past several hours.

You also have failures that take place where fractures occur because of tremendous amount of stress on the water. And about 90 percent of dams and 2,400 dams across the state of South Carolina, but you look at the numbers, the vast majority of them are all privately owned.

So certainly some of them been outdated, some of them not having the regulations in place that would be able to withstand historic events that take place, one that you would see one in a thousand years. And that's why we get problems that come down with tremendous rainfall in place.

But again drying in the forecast. Look at the long term, guys. We look at where Joaquin and its remnants are slated to go. Western Europe could get in on awesome heavy rainfall in the upcoming weekend. So a story we're still following over that region as well.

SESAY: Pedram, appreciate it. Thank you so much for the update.

JAVAHERI: Thanks, guys.

VAUSE: OK. Thanks, Pedram.

We move on now. Turkey's Foreign Ministry is condemning Russia over a weekend airspace violation. Turkey says a Russian warplane flew over a southern province on Saturday and air force jets intercepted the plane. The Russian jet continued into Syria where it went on to conduct airstrikes.

SESAY: Well, Turkey says there was another violation on Sunday. Turkey and Russia don't see eye to eye over Syria. Russian officials say there is nothing corrupt about what happened.

(BEGIN VIDEOCLIP)

IGOR KONASHENKOV, SPOKESMAN, RUSSIAN DEFENSE MINISTRY (THROUGH TRANSLATOR): The following incident was caused by unfavorable weather conditions in this region. Don't look for any conspiratorial reasons here. Regarding the information about the incident with the following of a Turkish jet on Sunday by an unidentified Mig-29 fighter, it had nothing to do with the Russian air group. There are no planes of this type at the Khmeimim air base.

(END VIDEOCLIP)

SESAY: Well, top NATO official says the airspace violation is unacceptable.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says he will do whatever it takes to end what he calls a wave of terror. On Monday, he lifted restrictions on the Israel Defense Forces which he says will allow soldiers to protect themselves and civilians. VAUSE: The IDF says it fired on people throwing rocks on Monday in a West Bank refugee camp killing a Palestinian. One man there says a 13 -- his 13-year-old nephew was shot and killed. But the IDF has the not commented on the deceased's identity and is promising to investigate.

Mr. Netanyahu says Israel is now struggling with -- it's a difficult struggle but rather will win.

(BEGIN VIDEOCLIP)

BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, ISRAELI PRIME MINISTER (THROUGH TRANSLATOR): We are acting with a strong hand against terrorism and against insiders. We are operating on all fronts.

The police are going deeply into the Arab neighborhoods which has not been done in the past. We will demolish terrorists' homes. We are allowing our forces to take strong action against those who throw rocks and firebombs. This is necessary in order to safe guard the security of Israeli citizens.

(END VIDEOCLIP)

VAUSE: To Afghanistan now where the commander of U.S. forces is clarifying what led to the air strikes on a hospital in Kunduz on Saturday. Twelve medical staff and at least 10 patients at the Doctors Without Borders Hospital were killed.

SESAY: Three separate investigations are under way to determine what went wrong.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEN. JOHN CAMPBELL, COMMANDER, RESOLUTE SUPPORT MISSION: We have now learned that on October 3rd, Afghan forces advised they were taking fire from enemy positions and asked for air support from U.S. forces. An airstrike was then called to eliminate the Taliban threat and several civilians were accidentally struck.

This is different from initial reports which indicated that U.S. forces were threatened and that the airstrike was called on their behalf.

As has been reported I have ordered a thorough investigation into this tragic incident. And the investigation is ongoing.

[01:10:00] The Afghans had ordered the same. If errors were committed we will acknowledge them. We will hold those responsible accountable. And we will take steps to ensure mistakes are not repeated.

(END VIDEOCLIP)

SESAY: Well, Nic Robertson joins us now from Kabul with more in all of this.

Nic, U.S. officials now saying the Afghans asked for air support because they were taking fire. But then unanswered question remains, what rules where the U.S. operating under?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, the U.S. general in charge, John Campbell, you just heard him speaking there, was asked the question. Precisely what, you know, when you are calling in helicopter air support, or an aircraft air support, that had heavy machine guns on the AC-130 compared to calling in a fighter jet with a bomb or a drone, with a guided munition on it. What different rules of engagement are coming into play there?

He said he didn't want to get into those kinds of details until the investigation is carried out. But what we do know from U.S. officials, they say, whether or not air support is called for by U.S. forces under fire or Afghan forces under fire. It goes through a very strict vetting procedure. There are target, there are buildings, rather, or locations, such as the hospital, where the coordinates are known. That would be off-limits.

The explanation that -- of what happened here absolutely isn't clear at the moment. But what we understand there's rules of engagement would require buildings like this hospital to be placed off-limits.

SESAY: MSF, Nic, as you well know strenuously rejecting the Afghan claims that Taliban fighters were on the hospital grounds which takes us to the heart of one of the key issues here, the reliability of the Afghan side in this counterterrorism fight?

ROBERTSON: That has been called into question before over the years. And again, the U.S. checking before they conduct airstrikes is part of that process to make sure that every piece of information they get is reliable. And that they can be held to account on it later.

There have been instances where questions have been raised over what the government says has transpired and what we later find out has been transpired. But at the moment we're not hearing criticism from the United States or from the special forces on the ground, saying that they were -- that they were given erroneous information.

That's not what's being presented at the moment. But certainly that has been a question in the past and certainly one can imagine investigators will look very closely at those kinds of details in the situation.

SESAY: Indeed. Nic Robertson, joining us there from Kabul, Afghanistan. Nic, appreciate it. Thank you.

VAUSE: You are watching NEWSROOM L.A. When we come back, California's governor signs a landmark right-to-die legislation.

And coming up we will speak with a terminally ill woman who celebrated the news.

SESAY: Plus 12 countries and years of negotiation have paved the way for a trade agreement that could affect the prices of things you use and eat every day. The details are just ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [01:15:48] (WORLD SPORTS)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SESAY: Welcome back, everyone. After years of negotiations, 12 nations have agreed on a deal that will account for 40 percent of the world's economy.

VAUSE: The Trans Pacific Partnership is the agreement reached between the U.S., Japan and 10 other countries around the Pacific rim.

Details now from Lynda Kinkade.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

LYNDA KINKADE, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR (voice-over): It's the biggest trade deal in history, 12 countries representing 40 percent of the world's economy.

It's taken more than five years of intense negotiations to seal the Trans Pacific Partnership.

MIKE FROMAN, UNITED STATES TRADE REPRESENTATIVE: We have come to an agreement that will support jobs, drive sustainable growth, foster inclusive development and promote innovation across the Asia Pacific region.

KINKADE: The deal could affect all sorts of products from the price of cheese to the cost of a car. Even the sale of cancer drugs and the expectations are high.

FROMAN: We expect this historic agreement to promote economic growth, support higher paying jobs, enhanced innovation productivity and competitiveness, rise living standards, reduced poverty in our countries and to promote transparency, good governance and strong labor and environmental protections.

KINKADE: Industries like automobile manufacturing, pharmaceutical and agriculture will see huge changes. Japan would be required to let in more American farm goods, although it's argued for exceptions to protect some farmers.

SHINZO ABE, JAPANESE PRIME MINISTER (THROUGH TRANSLATOR): We were also able to get exceptions to demands that we abolish tariffs on rice, beef, pork, and dairy products.

KINKADE: Overall thousands of tariffs and taxes will be scrapped, many to be phased out over the coming years. The one major economy not included in the deal?

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: China. In China. Our goal with China.

KINKADE: The deal will create an economic bloc challenging China's influence at a time when the communist country is asserting more economic and military posture. Lynda Kinkade, CNN.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VAUSE: Here in California Governor Jerry Brown has signed a landmark right-to-die bill into law. The measure would allow terminally ill patients to voluntarily end their lives using prescription drugs. In a letter addressed to lawmakers, Brown explained that this controversial decision was very personal to him.

He wrote, "I do not know what I would do if I were dying in prolonged and excruciating pain. I am certain however that it would be a comfort to be able to consider the options afforded by this bill and I wouldn't deny that right to others."

SESAY: Well, Brown also says he was inspired in part by pleas from Brittany Maynard's family. Maynard was the terminally ill young woman who left California for another state so she could end her life.

[01:20:09] We're joined now by Christy O'Donnell, a cancer patient, who has been a strong advocate for the passing of this bill.

Christy, thank you so much for joining us. Some supporters of this bill that's now become law have described today as a bittersweet moment. How are you feeling? What does it mean to you?

CHRISTY O'DONNELL, RIGHT TO DIE ADVOCATE: After this long journey today really has been just the culmination of so many people for so many years. You know, and then ending with Brittany Maynard's family, both her husband Dan, her mother Debbie that I'm dear friends with, being involved with this. Being terminally ill, today is, truly a bittersweet moment both for my daughter Bailey and myself.

VAUSE: Christy, I want to share some of the details of, you know, your condition right now because you have lung cancer.

O'DONNELL: Yes.

VAUSE: It spread to the brain, the liver. And, the chemotherapy, though, it's stopping the spread at the moment, is that correct?

O'DONNELL: No, the chemotherapy stalled it for a short period of time.

VAUSE: Yes.

O'DONNELL: But I didn't have any more chemotherapy left and the cancer has already spread to my liver, my rib, my spine, so the cancer is pretty much everywhere at this point. There is no more chemotherapy I can have.

VAUSE: So what happens next?

O'DONNELL: Well, what happens next is that I am willing to try a new FDA procedure with immunotherapy, new direction in cancer treatments. But given the fact I have been a nonsmoker my whole life, the irony is that the immunotherapy is less likely to work. So for someone like me, you know, I've got a prognosis perhaps of two, maybe three months left so while this bill has passed today, when my daughter and I decided to speak out, we always knew that it was highly unlikely that I would personally be able to see the benefit of it. But for thousands of terminally ill in California and then across the country today really is just a landmark for them.

VAUSE: There are critics. And I'd like to read what some of them have said. Governor Brown was clear in his statement that this was based on his personal background. As someone of wealth and access to the world's best medical care and doctors the governor's background is very different than that of millions of Californians living in health care poverty without the same access. These are the people and the families potentially hurt by giving doctors the power to prescribe lethal overdoses to patients.

I mean, we're looking at these arguments that this is giving too much power to doctors. But if you're poor, if you're disabled they will decide who lives, who dies. They will decide to what life is worth. What do you say?

O'DONNELL: I would tell them that after spending a decade as a civil rights attorney in Los Angeles, fighting for the rights of the disabled, if I thought for one second that this law was going to harm them in any way, I would not be here today speaking out for it. Given the fact that insurance companies are there to make money, if the opposition to this act took language at the bill itself, the language of the bill provides that insurance companies are not supposed to discriminate that way.

And, you know, the bill is not passed now. And yet in my treatment I've had several medical treatments recommended by a doctor already denied by the insurance company.

This act is not going to change the way insurance companies treat their patients.

SESAY: So let me ask you this, this issue of assisted dying, assisted suicide is one that has been debated by Californians for more than two decades.

O'DONNELL: Correct.

SESAY: Why do you think it crossed the line now? What was different about now?

O'DONNELL: I believe that what was different about now is because, you know, with social media and given the fact that you have someone as young as Brittany was, at 29-years-old deciding to speak out. You know, the conversation people are now talking about the way in which they're going to die at their dinner tables. You know they're talking about it at different age groups. They're talking about it on social media which never happened before.

This is a conversation that's so important for everyone across America and in all countries to have. And it's happening now. VAUSE: So we're talking about the other concerns of potential abuse here. The Right to Die, assisted suicide, has been law in many European countries for a very long time, it's been in Oregon, too.

SESAY: Yes.

VAUSE: As well as a few other states here in the U.S., is there any examples out there that it has been abused in any way as the critics have been arguing?

O'DONNELL: I am about as anal a lawyer as you are ever going to find. And before the first word that ever came out of my mouth advocating for this end of life options bill in California, I read everything I could get my hands on. And I, to this day, have not been able to substantiate or find any evidence whatsoever of abuse.

[01:25:00] SESAY: Do you see this moment here in California providing a momentum for other states?

O'DONNELL: Absolutely. Not only do other states look to California to set these types of civil rights movement issues. But other countries look to California as well. I absolutely hope that the decision by the governor today and all of his hard work is going to create a domino effect across America. And then to continue to these other nations that don't have this law.

VAUSE: Christy, we know that you have three months left? And we so appreciate you spending your valuable time with us.

SESAY: We so appreciate you.

O'DONNELL: Thank you.

VAUSE: Thank you.

SESAY: Our thoughts and prayers are with you and your family.

O'DONNELL: Thank you so much.

SESAY: And thank you for spending time with us.

O'DONNELL: Thank you. Appreciate it. Thank you.

VAUSE: And we'll take a short break, back in a minute.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VAUSE: Welcome back, everybody. Wherever you are, you're watching CNN NEWSROOM live from Los Angeles. I'm John Vause.

SESAY: And I am Isha Sesay. The headlines this hour.

(HEADLINES)

SESAY: Israel's prime minister had promised strong action against what he calls a wave of terror. This comes after a rise in deadly violence in Jerusalem and the West Bank.

[01:30:03] This past week, the prime minister says the Israeli defense forces no longer face restrictions when it comes to dealing with people believed to be terrorists.

VAUSE: More than 50 people are dead after three separate suicide bombings in Iraq. ISIS claimed responsibility for a car bombing in Al Zubair. But that killed nine and wounded 22. There were other bomb attacks at a crowded marketplace in the other province killing 45. Two people were killed in a car bomb in Baghdad.

SESAY: U.S. President Barack Obama is scheduled to visit Roseburg, Oregon, on Friday. That's the city where a gunman killed nine people at a community college last week.

VAUSE: And while the president's visit may help many there to try and heal from this tragedy, many others in Roseburg just want to be out of the national spotlight.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

VAUSE (voice-over): With his relation hills and tree-lined valleys, Roseburg sits in a beautiful part of the middle of nowhere.

For many, a drive through on the way to somewhere else, and that's how they liked it here.

But when a shooter opened fire last Thursday, this community joined the long and growing list of places, including many small towns, shattered by gun violence.

VAUSE: Roseburg, Sandy Hook, Columbine, Plattsburg, Jonesboro. The list goes on. And now you're on the list.

JAMALI (ph) WILSON, ROSEBURG RESIDENT: We don't want to be on that list. We don't want to be known for that.

VAUSE: What do you want to be known for?

WILSON: How we loved each other so well. How everyone jump into action.

VAUSE (voice-over): Jamali (ph) Wilson has lived here for 25 years. She's a mother who blogs about faith and hope, and wants everyone to know what this town was like before the shooting.

WILSON: Photographs of the injured being rolled into the hospital doesn't tell the whole story either. Most of our babies have been born at Mercy and lives are saved there every day.

(SINGING)

VAUSE: For days, they've held vigils and prayed.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're not saying there's not any pain but we're saying there's hope. There's light at the end of the tunnel. VAUSE: Gathered in parks to raise money for survivors.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This is an amazing town. And the people who live here are full of love and joy and what happened here is not going to break us.

VAUSE: And as they come together to cope and to grieve, Jamali (ph) says she forgives the shooter but can't help but wonder why he never asked anyone for help.

WILSON: This was caused by someone who was living among us who was living in our town, who anyone would have helped out, who anyone would have reached out to.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VAUSE: Plus in the wake of the shooting, a lot of focus on gun laws. But many people in Roseburg they want to keep their guns and they don't want those laws to be in top of that.

SESAY: No, they certainly don't.

Well, one U.S. presidential candidate has announced her plans to stop gun violence in the wake of those deadly shootings.

Democratic candidate, Hillary Clinton, has been outspoken on gun control throughout her campaign. She stepped up her calls for stricter gun laws after last week's events.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HILLARY CLINTON, (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: How much longer will we just shrug, oh, my gosh, something else terrible hand, whether it's in your neighborhood, Erin, or at a community college or the murder of children in their classrooms.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: Some of the highlights of Clinton's plan, closing loopholes on background checks, allowing victims to sue gun manufactures, and prohibiting domestic abusers from getting their hands on guns.

SESAY: Let's bring in CNN's senior political analyst, Ron Brownstein, to discuss.

Ron, good to have you with us.

Looking at these proposals put forward by Hillary Clinton, how politically risky is this move for her?

RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: This is the most, without a doubt, the most ambitious gun control agenda by a first tier Democratic candidate since Al Gore in 2000. You know, when Gore lost that very narrow presidential race in 2000, he lost states that have been voting Democratic previously like Arkansas and Tennessee, there were blue collar, rural and with a strong gun culture. And that I think really had a lasting, kind of chilling effect on Democrats. Neither John Kerry in 2004 nor Barack Obama in 2008 or 2012 really emphasize gun control proposals.

But the democratic coalition has evolved. And for the voters, they can actually win now. Gun control is still a relatively popular proposition. It's most unpopular among people they've been losing anyway, most of these blue collar and rural whites. And you see from President Obama now to Clinton, a growing confidence to re-engage this issue in a way we haven't seen in years.

VAUSE: OK, interesting you should bring up the past and what happened, because let's go back to 1968. Let's go back to 1968, back to Robert Kennedy because this issue has been talked about and debated in this country for a very long time. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

[01:35:05] ROBERT KENNEDY, FORMER U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: Does that make any sense that you'd put rifles and guns in the hands of people who have long criminal records, of people who are insane or people mentally incompetent or people so young they don't know how to handle rifles or guns?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: Do you know where he was when he says that? Roseburg, Oregon, in 1968.

(CROSSTALK)

VAUSE: The irony, the coincidence, whatever you want to call it. It gets to this bigger point. This has been talked about and debated for a very, very long time. And talk about Hillary Clinton's measures being the most ambitious of a...

(CROSSTALK)

VAUSE: You know, and they don't seem to be that ambitious in the grand scheme of things.

BROWNSTEIN: Yeah, you know, but look, I mean it has been a very incremental process. It's not like nothing has happened since 1968. I mean under Bill Clinton, they did passed the Brady Bill, which required a background check. They passed the assault weapon ban which then expired under George W. Bush.

VAUSE: Expired, yeah.

BROWNSTEIN: Who, by the way, ran on supporting it in 2000, but did not really lift a finger when House Republicans let it die, congressional Republicans in his early presidency.

It is a very fraud issue in the U.S., it is very closely divided overall on public opinion. And it really is has a symbolic kind of cultural resonance that goes way beyond the immediate practical impact. You know, for a lot of rural America. It is as seen as kind of an attack on their values. By urban in America, whereas in urban America, it is seen as an attack on communities and what you have is really in many ways, so this is kind of James Madison's revenge.

I mean, you know, in the U.S. system, every state, regardless of size, gets two senators. And the last time the senate voted on a major gun control bill, 2013, this universal background check that they're talking about, 55 senators voted for the bill, 45 senator voted against the bill.

If you assign half of each state's population, Senators representing 194 million people voted for the bill. Those opposing it represented 118 million people. But because of the filibuster, those 118 were able to block the 194.

So it is very difficult to move forward legislatively. But the politics of the presidential level may be changing. And I think you saw that in Hillary Clinton's very ambitious at least in the U.S. -- agenda today.

SESAY: And this move is not just about separating her from her Republican opponents. It's also about the sharp contrast with Bernie Sanders. This is considered to be an Achilles heel for him.

BROWNSTEIN: Right, especially in the Bernie Sanders, you know, he was a senator from Vermont, he opposed the Brady Bill which we mentioned in 1993, which opposed the background checks. He -- the Vermont is one of those states without a rural hunting culture.

And he has been a friend of the NRA. He's moved away from that position over time. He's likely to put out a much more liberal gun control plan as he's promising in the next few days himself. But his core constituency in the Democratic primary are college educated white liberals. And they are strongly pro gun control. And that is one issue where Hillary Clinton can go to his left and maybe peel away some of those voters who are now gravitating towards him.

VAUSE: Because if you look at the crowds...

(CROSSTALK)

VAUSE: -- if you look away from the gun issue just for a moment. He got 20,000 at that rally in Boston. Barack Obama in 2008 got 10,000 at same rally.

So are we now at this point where Bernie Sanders where we had to still say Bernie Sanders is running a really good campaign but he can't win, or we should say Bernie Sanders running a really good campaign.

BROWNSTEIN: He running a really good campaign but he has to do one more thing before you could say he win, OK, which is if you think about the Democratic primary electorate it divides almost exactly in thirds between the socially liberal white collar whites, where he's doing very well. Blue collar whites where Hillary Clinton was much stronger in 2008.

And what really at the moment is her trump card minorities, Hispanics and African-Americans. And so far Bernie Sanders like candidates like him before has not shown much appeal to those voters. Until he shows he can attract African-Americans and Hispanics a meaningful numbers is going to be very hard for him to get out beyond places like New Hampshire, Connecticut, Oregon, Vermont, where there are a lot of white liberals.

SESAY: Fascinating conversation.

VAUSE: A really interesting horse race if nothing else.

BROWNSTEIN: Absolutely.

SESAY: Ron Brownstein, always a pleasure.

BROWNSTEIN: Glad to be here.

SESAY: Thank you. Thank you.

VAUSE: And the sheriff now leading the investigation into the Oregon campus shooting he's facing tough questions about some of his very controversial social media postings.

SESAY: One post casts doubt on whether the Sandy Hook shooting in Connecticut ever happened.

CNN's Kyung Lah has more.

KYUNG LAH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, John and Isha, as the investigation in Oregon is winding its course, there's new scrutiny on the man leading the investigation and calls for him to step down.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

LAH (voice-over): Douglas County Sheriff John Hanlin, heading the mass shooting investigation that killed nine people at Umpqua Community College, denying to CNN he posted a controversial video on Facebook.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You didn't post it?

JOHN HANLIN, SHERIFF, DOUGLAS COUNTY SHERIFF'S DEPARTMENT: No, no.

HANLIN: I know what you're referring to. No, that's not a conspiracy theory belief that I have.

LAH: That belief is spouted on this viral video produced by conspiracy theorists. It ludicrously claims that Sandy Hook is a hoax, cooked up by the government to take citizens' guns away. The video, viewed 11 million times on YouTube, calls the victims' families actors. It even claims the murdered first graders are still alive.

[01:40:06] On the sheriff's Facebook page, this post, now removed, linking to the YouTube video with this comment. "This makes me wonder who we can trust anymore. Watch, listen and keep an open mind."

While he says he didn't post it, it was on his personal Facebook page since 2013. DAN GROSS, PRESIDENT, BRADY CAMPAIGN TO PREVENT GUN VIOLENCE: The idea of having this man, it's beyond hypocrisy, to have this man charged with leading the investigation?

LAH: The Brady campaign, citing the Facebook conspiracy post, called for the sheriff to step down.

GROSS: He's a delusional conspiracy theorists who has been put in a position to try and lead an unbiased investigation into this tragedy and think about the things that we can do to prevent future tragedies like this from happening.

And so to the extent that wearing a badge keeps him in that position, no, he does not deserve to be wearing a badge.

LAH: The campaign also points to this letter posted on the department's Facebook page that the sheriff sent to Vice President Biden after the Sandy Hook School massacre. The sheriff writes, "Gun control is not the answer to preventing heinous crimes like school shootings." He tells the vice president, "Federal restriction on the Second Amendment shall not be enforced by me or by my deputies," even pledging to stop any federal agents from doing so in his county. The letter is dated one month after Sandy Hook.

On the heel of county's own tragedy, he tells CNN this.

HANLIN: This isn't the time and this isn't the place to have the conversation about my position, political or not, on gun control.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LAH: We tried to contact the sheriff today through e-mail, through multiple phone calls. All of them went unanswered.

We did manage to reach the Oregon governor's office, the governor's office that clashed with the sheriff over a new state law requiring background checks and private sales of guns. The governor's office saying that the sheriff is an elected official, the people of his county are the ones who will hold him accountable. John, Isha?

VAUSE: And thank you for that, Kyung.

And we should also say, he has a lot of support.

SESAY: He does, indeed.

But those questions are going to keep coming.

VAUSE: Yes.

SESAY: Edward Snowden says he's made an offer to U.S. authorities to be able to come home.

The details from the NSA leaker's latest interview ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [01:45:58] VAUSE: Welcome back everybody. The U.S. Coast Guard says it's focusing on the search for survivors from a cargo ship that went missing near the Bahamas. Searchers found debris from the vessel, including a life boat and unidentified human remains.

SESAY: Thirty-three crew members were on board when the "El Faro" lost contact last week in the midst of Hurricane Joaquin. The coast guard says it is no longer looking for the ship itself.

Now, Edward Snowden, the man who revealed NSA spying, says he offered to serve prison time as part of a plea deal.

VAUSE: Snowden fled the United States after exposing details of the U.S. National Security Agency surveillance programs. And he spoke with a BBC program "Panorama."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

EDWARD SNOWDEN, REVEALED NSA SPYING: I've volunteered to go to prison with the government many times. What I won't do is I won't serve as a deterrent to people trying to do the right thing.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What would you be looking to from them for you to return?

SNOWDEN: Well, so far, they've said they won't torture me, which is a start, I think. But we haven't gotten much further than that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: Snowden tells the BBC he and his lawyers are still waiting for U.S. Officials to call them back.

SESAY: An American Airlines pilot died in his cockpit during an overnight flight from Phoenix to Boston. Air traffic controllers diverted the plane to upstate New York after the co-pilot declared an emergency. Firefighters there responded to an unconscious person on the plane.

Passengers eventually made it to Boston, just four hours after their scheduled arrival time. The medical examiner says the pilot died of natural causes.

And in France, angry protesters rip the shirts off Air France executives after learning about layoffs. Monday's protests turned violent when the airline announced plans to cut nearly 3,000 jobs, including ground staff, flight attendants and cockpit crew.

VAUSE: Demonstrators tore the shirt off the executive vice president and the director of Human Resources. They had to be escorted away by security. The CEO of Air France was also targeted in the attack.

An unusual fight in the front yard, when we come back, two male moose, mooses, duke it out to impress some chick. We'll show you how it ended.

(LAUGHTER)

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(WEATHER REPORT)

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[01:51:40] SESAY: Welcome back everyone, this just in to us at CNN NEWSROOM L.A. Officials in Yemen say at least a dozen people were killed after a hotel was hit by a rocket propelled grenade. The attack happened at the al-Qasr hotel in the southern city of Aden.

VAUSE: The hotel is used by government officials. The Yemeni prime minister lives there but it is unclear if he was in the building at the time. Still not clear who was behind the attack.

We move on to China now where a biotech company has tweaked the genes of pigs to make them really tiny and they'll sell them as pets.

SESAY: From Beijing Genomics Institute says these micro pigs will only ever grow to the size of a medium dog around 15 kilograms or 33 pounds. That's about one-third the size of the breed of micro pig they're cloned from.

Are you going to get one?

VAUSE: I need to eat, because the bacon would be awesome.

Scientists at the institute managed to snip out a gene that make of the growth hormone, speaks (ph) never receive that, so they say little, little piglets for about with great tasty bacon because this is more nice pork chop.

SESAY: The EDI originally created them for research purposes John as models for human disease. Bu t it's now planning to put them on sale as pets.

VAUSE: Itty bitty pork chops.

SESAY: For $1,500 each.

VAUSE: Tasty pork chops?

SESAY: You are awful, right now, just awful.

VAUSE: OK, they would taste very nice.

From mini pigs to giant moose fighting in an Alaska family's front yard.

SESAY: It's called rutting season...

VAUSE: Of course it is.

SESAY: When male moose try to impress the ladies.

(CROSSTALK)

SESAY: Jeanne Moos has the play by play.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEANNE MOOS, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Put up your dukes. Make that your antlers. A fight over a female in mating season spilled on to the streets of suburban anchorage, Alaska, recorded by a father and son hiding behind a car.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was crazy.

MOOS: When the moose brawl got too close for comfort.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get back, get back.

MOOS: The driver of the car fled and Bill and Josh Tyler had to head for higher ground.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I filmed a lot of that video from about right here.

MOOS: ... where they had front row seats.

At least these two weren't as dumb as the Colorado moose that tried to mate with a bronze moose statue.

Not since two kangaroos faced off near Sydney, Australia, have we seen such a wild kingdom Donny Brook in a suburban setting.

The guy who shot this set it to "Nutcracker"

(MUSIC)

MOOS: Which made sense since that's where many of the kicks were aimed using both legs, weight resting on their tails.

Back at the moose fight, the struggle intensified.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: One was just like carrying the other one all the way across the street.

MOOS: And that's pretty much how it ended, with the alpha moose giving the evil eye as his rival hightailed it away. They left behind scattered moose hair.

The two did manage to bang into the Subaru parked in the driveway, leaving a dent or two.

Have no fear, insurance agents assure us that as long as the motorist has comprehensive coverage, moose damage will be covered.

But when the top moose went to claim his prize after all that work, what did the female do? She va-moosed.

[01:55:07] Jeanne Moos, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(LAUGHTER)

SESAY: And that is rutting season.

VAUSE: Do you want to know the political equivalent of that is in Washington?

Donald Trump and Marco Rubio going for it in a political sense, of course, you know, both men running for the Republican nomination for president.

SESAY: Yes, indeed. They took a break from campaigning to play a prank on party rival Marco Rubio that is Donald Trump of course. Trump sent a special care package to Rubio's Washington office that included a case of water with the billionaire's face on it and towels with the Trump slogan, "Make America great again."

VAUSE: Make American great again.

OK, you may remember that special moment when Rubio frantically grabbed for a bottle of water, there it is, gulped it down that is when he was giving a reply to the State of the Union. The Rubio campaign has not yet commented on Trump's special delivery.

And Donald Trump is the greatest political troll this company is -- country has ever seen.

(LAUGHTER)

VAUSE: OK.

SESAY: And that is CNN NEWSROOM, live from Los Angeles. Everyone, I'm Isha Sesay.

VAUSE: I'm John Vause.

Please stay with us. Rosemary Church and Errol Barnett will be back after a short break.

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