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Tornado watch remains in place for parts of Texas, Arkansas, and Louisiana; Iraqi government forces are claiming that ISIS militants have fled a central government compound in Ramadi; Chicago police officer kills a mother of five. The police department says it was an accident; 5-6p ET
Aired December 27, 2015 - 17:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[17:00:43] POPPY HARLOW, CNN HOST: 5:00 eastern, 2:00 pacific. I'm Poppy Harlow in New York with you this Sunday evening.
We have breaking news on deadly weather in the south. Dozens of families losing everything just two days after Christmas. Eleven people are confirm dead, 15 others injured as deadly twisters devour hundreds of homes, blowing entire neighborhoods to pieces. Treasured belongings and photographs of loved ones scattered across miles and miles of debris. A man who lost his home talked about why he still feels grateful.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's the Grace of god how he works. I'm really grateful, you know, my wife works not far from here. If I didn't call her, she would be here and now my kids would be here right now so -- a lot of thanks.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I looked at the twister.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE REPORTER: OK, describe it for me.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, it was just a dark funnel and it was just a big roar. It was really scary. It scared me. I mean, I don't scare that easy but I was scared.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HARLOW: Right now, rescue crews are going door to door searching for survivors, anyone possibly trapped in the rubble. Just a short time ago the governor of Texas warned of a new danger likely coming in just days.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GOV. GREG ABBOTT, TEXAS: There will be an ongoing problem for next 24 hours, especially but really for another several days about rising waters. We have seen already this year many instances of rising waters causing people to be swept away.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HARLOW: Our Nick Valencia is on ground in Garland, Texas.
Nick, if you can hear me, we have seen the pictures. They never tell the whole story. What is it like to be on ground tonight?
NICK VALENCIA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (on the phone): Well, the weather is just relentless here in Garland, Texas. That severe weather threat has not left this area at all. It was quite an ordeal for us to get there. Lots of travel delays and flights being canceled into and out of the Dallas area. We just got the closest we have been allowed to get to so far to the damage. We are looking at a little subdivision right now, a row of houses, Poppy, with the roofs just ripped off the top of the homes.
About a half mile away from it was where I'm standing the authorities are still going door to door, just trying to do the rescue and recovery mission, still making sure that everyone is accounted for. This storm has taken the life of at least 11 people so far and they are concerned that that death toll could go up as authorities go door to door. We understand the national weather service has a team here assessing the damage and we're getting the first glimpse from our perspective here of the damage that EF-4 tornado, a very violent storm that ripped through here leaving debris and pieces of wood and pieces of the home that I'm looking at here, just strewn across the parking lot in a neighboring hotel.
The interstate, it's just backed up. It is clogged. Interstate 30 is just backed up for miles and miles and miles. And as I mentioned here, the rain is just persistent. It continues to pour down causing a still very stressful situation for all of the residents in this area, Poppy.
HARLOW: All right. Nick Valencia, on the ground for us in Garland tonight.
Nick, thank you very much.
I want to go straight to Pedro Barineau. He is a police lieutenant with the Garland police department.
Sir, thank you for being with me. I'm so sorry about what has happened there. You have 11 people dead, 15 more injured. The governor, Governor Abbott, just declaring a state of disaster. What do you need most right now?
LT. PEDRO BARINEAU, GARLAND, TEXAS, POLICE DEPARTMENT (on the phone): We're getting it from all of our surrounding agencies from our intercity department. The support that we are getting is just amazing. Everyone is working together as a team. It is a tragedy that this occurred in Garland but Garland will resilient. We will recover from this. It is just an ongoing thing. We want to make sure that we make contact with every single person out there to make sure that no one is left unaccounted.
HARLOW: When we look at these images, there are complete homes and what looks to me to be complete blocks that are completely ripped apart. How much warning did the residents have to get out?
BARINEAU: Well, I know that the sirens went off multiple times, but when you have a tornado this magnitude coming through your city, it's just devastating. The meteorologist are talking about wind speeds up to 200 miles per hour. It's just a horrible event that could happen to anybody. And so, the warning sirens are out there, but the fact people are driving in cars and highways, they don't have those sirens because they are driving so quickly. And all of a sudden a tornado comes out of nowhere and takes them out.
[17:05:35] HARLOW: Absolutely. And as Nick was reporting, this dangerous, deadly weather not over yet. On the back side of this storm system you've got potential snow and very cold temperatures. How is that going to impact the recovery efforts here?
BARINEAU: It's definitely going to delay the recovery effort because we want to make sure that we don't miss and the inclement weather can cause a situation to where things could be overlooked if we move too quickly. So we need so slow things down and make sure we don't miss anything in our rescue and search efforts.
HARLOW: I know that your crews are still going door to door. Are you getting any reports of missing people?
BARINEAU: As of right now we're not getting any more reports of missing people. Our -- checking in with our search and rescue crews and they have reported back that as of right now, everyone is accounted for. Other than the eight confirmed fatalities that we had last night when the tornado hit Garland. So that's good news that we have not heard anything negative -- anything else negative about other victims.
HARLOW: Absolutely it is. Pedro Barineau with the Garland police department. Thank you for taking the time. We wish you all the best. What an incredibly difficult situation. Thank you, sir.
BARINEAU: Thank you.
HARLOW: These are dangerous conditions and extending across the southwest. You've got snow falling in Texas now, just a few hundred miles away from where the deadly tornadoes struck, New Mexico's governor declaring a state of emergency there, roads snarled across the state because snow has dumped down there as well.
Karen Maginnis is in the CNN severe weather center.
What is the impetus for this? I mean, when you were with us last night, we were talking about this touchdown of a tornado near Dallas and it just seems like so much havoc was created overnight.
KAREN MAGINNIS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: It was because this was such a dynamic system. It had so many components to it. There is this broad area of moisture laden air ahead of it we've got warm air coming in from the Gulf of Mexico, Poppy. But on back side of this, the winds not coming up from the south anymore. They are coming out of the north and blizzard conditions. There's an area of low pressure in the upper levels of the atmosphere this kind of in place. And we also have a surface area of low pressure. These two are really working off of each other.
There are wind gusts as high as 60 miles an hour. I will point out Amarillo, Texas here, Lubbock, Texas here, major interstate through Amarillo. They are saying roads are treacherous. They are getting calls into their service centers and emergency centers saying we need help. The roads are almost impassable in a number of areas, not just around Lubbock or Amarillo but all across the panhandle.
I want to tell you about Oklahoma City. You're ready to see some video of the icy conditions. It doesn't look like much. Just a thin layer. But look at this. I want you to listen to this as well. It is absolutely terrifying for people because the layer of ice is about a half inch thick. It is expected to get worse.
But there's another component I want to tell you about. And that is we are currently seeing what has been a cell located to the south of Hope, Arkansas, that is the birth place of President Bill Clinton. But just to the south of Hope, Arkansas, there has been a report of a tornado that is associated with a cell that has been indicated. They are under a tornado warning and that goes for about the next five minutes. As I'm on the air, we'll continue to update you on that. But we could see in some isolated areas, Poppy, in west Texas, up to two feet of snowfall.
HARLOW: That just can't get any relief.
All right, Karen Maginnis, please do keep us posted. Thank you so much.
Also, this just in to us here at CNN, authorities say six people have died after flash floods in rural roads in Pulaski County, Missouri. That is in the central part of the state. The sheriff there telling CNN a car with two people was carried away by rising flood waters and today a second car with at least four people also swept up in the flood. One person remains missing there in Missouri. We will bring you the latest as we have it.
Ahead this hour, a lot to get to.
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[17:10:06] UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Somebody needs to do something about this. This is ridiculous.
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HARLOW: Chicago police today admitting they accidentally shot and killed a grandmother when officers responded to a house call. The emotional plea from her family is ahead.
Also retaking Ramadi, Iraqi forces are close to wrestling control back from ISIS militants. So what does this mean for President Obama and his administration's larger fight against the terror group? And later, for one Jesuit priest, no crime is too horrendous not to be
forgiven. His decades long work to give former gang members a second chance at life, all ahead this hour.
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[17:13:29] HARLOW: Outrage and tears today in Chicago, loved ones and activists holding a news conference after officers in the Chicago police department killed two people the day after Christmas. We are told 55-year-old Bettie Jones was the mother of five. 19-year-old Quintorio Legreer (ph) was a student at Northern Illinois University.
Officers were responding to a call about Lagreer (ph) when they shot Jones. Police officials admit her death was a mistake, issuing a statement reading quote upon arrival officers were confronted by combative subject resulting in the discharging of the officer's weapon which fatally wounded two individuals. The 55-year-old female victim was accidentally struck and tragically killed. The department extend its deepest condolences to the victim's family and friends.
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JACQUELINE WALKER, FRIEND OF SHOOTING VICTIM: It hurt my heart to see that. And it hurts me all over to know the family -- this tragic danger thing going on, police shooting without asking. Why you got to shoot first and ask questions later? It's ridiculous. Somebody needs to do something about this. This is ridiculous. What about the tasers? Taser him down, don't shoot people, innocent people!
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HARLOW: CNN's Ryan Young is there. He joins me now.
And Ryan, we know that this 19-year-old Legreer, his mother also spoke at the news conference today. We will hear from her in a minute. But just walk us back through the events, we know the specifics about from yesterday it was Legreer's father who did call police, right?
[17:15:11] RYAN YOUNG, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's absolutely right. And of course, you can feel the pain that is here in this community. Hundreds of people gathered here to talk about this incident because they are very upset about it. But talking about the father did call 911 because they thought that he was having a mental episode. He had an aluminum bat in his hand and apparently he was at the doorway.
Now, something that we just learned from one of the family attorneys here is the fact that they believe the officer fired his gun from a location over here. In fact, they believe those shots were fired from here and that the young man's body was right over there. So they are really upset about the idea of what was the confrontation like? People want to know about a body cam, whether or not there was any dash cam video of the incident. People want to know why a taser wasn't used with a young man with a bat.
When those shots were fired and they believe the man was hit seven times. One of the bullets went through the door here. If you look back in this direction, you can actually see some green markings on the doorway up there. They believe those are the evidence markings for where the bullets went through this building hitting that 55-year- old mother of five and grandmother.
You can see what her family has decided to do. You see the candles here and the flowers and this teddy bear that has just been placed here and the great big picture of her has been wrapped around this tree. Community members have been gather here throughout the afternoon. Obviously, very upset about another incident involving Chicago police.
HARLOW: And Ryan --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JANET COOKSEY, MOTHER OF SHOOTING VICTIM: Seven times my son was shot and one in the buttocks. That show that he was turning away. He was turning away. But I got to turn today for him and I have to be there. This needs to stop. No mother should have to bury her child. No mother. No mother should have to bury her child. And especially under these circumstances. You call for help. The police are supposed to service and protect us and yet they take the lives. What's wrong with that picture? It's a badge to kill? I mean, where do we get our help?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
YOUNG: Poppy, that 19-year-old was a college student. His mother said he was studying engineering and he planned to go on and have a successful life. The community here wants to know why a young man with a bat has to be met with such force by the police department and with them opening fire. Of course, the family of the woman here now on this tree is upset because she was standing waiting at the door for the police department to arrive. So I mean, there's a lot of questions about this, especially after the Laquan McDonald shooting. People want to know what can be done inside Chicago to help this police department out because there is a lot of break of trust at this point.
HARLOW: Absolutely. And look, there's still a lot we still need to know, including was there any video, as you said, any dash cam video, any body camera video. And you are looking at a mayor, Mayor Rahm Emanuel, of Chicago who had said that the city quote "needs a painful and honest reckoning into what went wrong around that Laquan McDonald's shooting and subsequent shooting. Let us know when we have more information.
Ryan Young, live for us tonight in Chicago. Thank you very much.
Coming up next, we turn to politics, Donald Trump has taken his feud with fellow front-runner Hillary Clinton to a new level.
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DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: She is playing that woman's card, left and right and women are more upset about it than anybody else.
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The heated attacks that he is launching on television and online, including the shock he took at her famous former president husband. We'll discuss next.
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[17:21:40] HARLOW: Now to the race for the White House and the latest from Donald Trump and what has become an increasingly bitter feud with Hillary Clinton. This time Trump is calling out her husband for having extra marital affairs. Trump tweeted last night quote "Hillary Clinton has announced that she is letting her husband out to campaign but he's demonstrated a penchant for sexism, so inappropriate. When asked about that on FOX News this morning, here's what he said.
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TRUMP: She's playing the woman's card and it is like, give me a break. And I have had so many women come up to me and say, you have got to keep her out. She is just terrible. She is playing that woman's card left and right and women are more upset about it than anybody else including most men.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HARLOW: Trump was referring to an interview, a recent one that Hillary Clinton did and when she attacked him for using off-color slang to describe her 2008 loss in the primary.
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TRUMP: She was going to beat Obama. I don't know who would be worse. I don't know. How does it get worse? But she was going to beat -- she was favored to win and she got slanged. She lost.
HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Just not the first time he has demonstrated a penchant for sexism. And so, I'm not sure, again, anybody is surprised. He keeps pushing the envelope.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HARLOW: Joining me now is Kate Bohner, she co-authored "Trump, the art of the comeback" with Donald Trump.
And when you look at this, before all of this, he claimed that he hadn't really gone after Clinton. But I want you to look at this. This is how he is hitting her now. He tweeted, Hillary, when you complain about a penchant for sexism, who are you referring to? I have great respect for women. Be careful.
I love your take as someone who knows Donald Trump, who has worked with him extensively on this book on those words be careful. And now saying that Clinton is paying the woman card. What do you make of be careful? KATE BOHNER, CO-AUTHOR, TRUMP, THE ART OF THE COMEBACK: That to me is
what he is probably saying to himself knowing Donald Trump as I do. Again, we worked together quite a long time ago. But knowing that, Mrs. Clinton is putting her former -- her husband, former president Clinton on the trail with her, is definitely going to terrify him as it would anyone.
HARLOW: Terrify?
BOHNER: I mean, I tell you why. I worked in finance, big banking with one percenters and many of whom are Democrats but they always -- so many of them say among -- he's among the best presidents ever. Bill Clinton is intensely popular in this country.
HARLOW: Many who are Republican say that Clinton was one of the best presidents?
BOHNER: Exactly. And so, just a notion I think from Mr. Trump that he is going out on the trail as a big threat. And I think we know enough about Trump to know that when he gets threatened, he really goes for, you know, the jugular.
HARLOW: I think it is interesting. Let's look at these numbers, right. This is a recent CNN/ORC poll match-up between Clinton and Trump in a hypothetical general election. You got Clinton just edging him out there at 49 percent. For either of them to win, one thing is clear, they need the backing of female voters. And you heard Trump say on FOX News this morning, women are more upset than anyone about what Hillary Clinton is doing, saying she is playing the Trump card left and right. What's your take on that?
[17:25:07] BOHNER: first of all, I don't know that to be true. I haven't heard that from an independent source, that women are terribly upset about Mrs. Clinton. What I do think is again, I'll go back to my original point, that President Clinton, he plays very well with women. He plays very well with voters and this is -- sometimes with Mr. Trump I think it has less almost to do with the exact comment, with the content. It has more to do with how (INAUDIBLE) the remark is. And in this case, I was surprise, and I'm not usually surprised by anything he says truly, but I was surprised that he brought this up and went for the jugular in such a fashion.
HARLOW: He was asked on FOX this morning, is this fair? And he said, yes, it's fair, indicating that we're going to keep doing this as a camp. Is that a smart strategy, do you think?
BOHNER: Here's the thing. Mr. Trump built his multibillion dollar organization with certain character traits, right, that are acceptable in Wall Street. They are acceptable on big banking. I mean, I see that every day on Wall Street. Now I think he's employing the same tactics, the same strategies as he did to build the Trump organization, again, a multibillion dollar company in political life. And I don't think people are used to it.
Very few people -- not the majority certainly, work in big banking and big finance. So they don't often hear or see about what goes on behind closed doors, which is vicious, which is ruthless and now all of those traits that allowed him to be so successful in the business realm, he is employing in the political sphere and there are a lot of people watching.
HARLOW: Let's not forget the famous photograph of the Clintons at Donald Trump's wedding.
BOHNER: Yes.
HARLOW: To his current wife, that famous photo and look what has transpired.
All right. I have breaking news to get to. Kate Bohner, thank you very much.
BOHNER: Thank you.
ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.
HARLOW: All right. Breaking news just into us here. I want to go straight to Karen Maginnis.
Karen, what are we learning?
MAGINNIS: We are learning a tornado has been sighted in south central sections of Arkansas. They are currently under a tornado watch. But now we are starting to see these discreet cells, those little isolated cells just kind of pop up across Arkansas because they are still in the warm sector of the system. A sheriff department said they saw a tornado on the ground in the vicinity of Hampton and this is just to the south-southwest of Pine Bluff in Arkansas.
There are about 4600 people who could be affected by this. There is a tornado warning. It goes into effect until 5:00 p.m. central time. So that's about another 30 minutes. But we will continue to monitor this. We are seeing the atmosphere just ripe for continuation of these tornado warnings, which means it could be Doppler radar indicated. They could be spotted by the public or by an officiating body such as the sheriff's department or police department. But this is in the vicinity of south central Arkansas, a tornado warning, a tornado sighted on the ground in the vicinity of Hampton.
Poppy, back to you.
HARLOW: All right. Thank you so much for that. We'll keep a very close eye on this. Again, it's a very active situation. Tornado spotted on the ground in Arkansas.
Quick break. We are back in a moment.
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[17:31:44] HARLOW: Major development in the war against ISIS, Iraqi security forces say they now have full control of a government compound in heart of Ramadi. The compound was previously held for months by ISIS fighters. The entire city, you will recall, fell to ISIS back in May. A spokesperson for Iraq's military says to us here at CNN that government forces have not yet entered the compound. They are advancing slowly because they believe that ISIS has left explosives strewn all over the place. Iraqi military does expect they say to have full control of Ramadi in just a matter of days.
Let's bring in Jim Acosta. He is traveling with President Obama in Honolulu. That's where the president is spending the holidays.
And Jim, the White House, this is a huge win for them obviously, putting their confidence in these Iraqi forces. You have got now days away from they think retaking all of Ramadi. What is the White House saying?
JIM ACOSTA, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, we already have reaction from the president's envoy for the counter ISIL campaign, Brett McGurk. We can put that up on screen. They certainly view this as a very positive development. Here's what Brett McGurk said in a tweet a few hours ago. It says our air coalition is proud to support brave Iraqi troops as they defeat ISIL in Ramadi. Support will continue until all areas are liberated.
And Poppy, keep in mind, Ramadi is the area that you'll recall is earlier this year when secretary of defense Ash Carter questioned whether or not the Iraqi security forces had the will to fight when they lost that city to ISIS. And so, the fact that these Iraqi security forces were able to go back in and take this city or it appears they are on the verge of taking this city, they seized this government complex there, they do view that as a very significant development inside this administration. And the main reason why is that they will view this as a justification for the overall strategy.
Remember, President Obama's strategy is not to go in with a large ground force of U.S. troops into Syria, into Iraq with the U.S. strategy at this point is to support local forces on ground with air cover, that's precisely what happened in the battle to retake Ramadi. And so, I think you will see in addition to what Brett McGurk is saying in his tweet earlier today, you will have other administration officials and potentially the president in the coming days, perhaps not on camera from the president, perhaps it will be a paper statement, but also congratulating the Iraqi forces on this significant victory.
HARLOW: And Jim, quickly, before I let you go, bigger picture here in the fight against ISIS. There was news today that the president in the last week told his top military officials at the Pentagon that they need to do a better job of communicating the quote/unquote "narrative" of the war on ISIS. What more do we know about that?
ACOSTA: Right. You know, Poppy, I mean, talking to senior administration officials for weeks, they said privately that they would like to get their story out. They feel like the story of the counter ISIL campaign has sort of been drowned out and perhaps you know, it was -- it's justified, justifiably so because of terror attacks in Paris and San Bernardino.
But what the president feels and you heard him say that - this in the NPR interview last week and what you are now seeing in this order from the White House to administration officials across the administration, they want to make sure that high level senior administration officials are not only touting what they called the narrative of this campaign and significant developments like you are seeing in Ramadi. They also want to talk a little bit more clearly about the strategy for going after ISIS and that may be something you see more of in the coming week, Poppy, after this operation apparently successful operation to retake Ramadi. It is exactly what the president has in mind when it comes to defeating ISIS. The question whether or not, though, and we've seen this before, Iraqi security forces, now that they have cleared this town, now that they have cleared this city, can they hold it. And I suspect that will be the big question going forward -- Poppy.
[17:35:39] HARLOW: No doubt about it.
Jim Acosta, live for us there in Honolulu, thank you very much.
Coming up next, we are going to talk with Peter Beinart about this fight and the way that the president fundamentally views ISIS as a terror organization and their threat to this country. That's ahead.
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[17:39:10] HARLOW: As we were just reporting, Iraqi troops say they have pushed ISIS out of a government compound in the key city of Ramadi. They expect to retake control of the entire city in the next few days. That is critical considering Ramadi fell back in May to ISIS. What does this means in bigger picture?
I want to bring in CNN political commentator Peter Beinart. He is also contributing editor for the Atlantic.
You wrote extensively about this and especially about President Obama and his view of this war on terror. Let's talk about the narrative here. The president has said and told his top military advisers at the Pentagon, they need to do a better job of communicating the narrative of this fight against is. Here's what he said on NPR earlier this month.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: You know, ISIL combines viciousness with very savvy media operations. And as a consequence, if you've been watching television for the last month, all you've been seeing and all you've been hearing about is these guys with masks or black flags who are potentially coming to get you.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[17:40:18] HARLOW: Do you read that as only seeing this as a communications failure or do you think he sees what the majority of Americans say they see and that is a lack of confidence in his strategy?
PETER BEINART, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I think he has confidence in his strategy. I think he has a strategy and I think he thinks it is working. And the evidence that he will point to is the fact that the control -- the size of the territory that ISIS control has been shrinking. And now, the most dramatic evidence is this loss of Ramadi, a very significant city in Iraq's Sunni heartland.
So he thinks their strategy of air power and trying to work with various different Kurdish proxies and building up some Sunni proxies especially and having some Special Forces on the ground, and trying to incentivize America's allies in the region, they think that it slowly is making some progress.
HARLOW: I want to read a quote from this interesting article you wrote about this for the Atlantic. You wrote this, in Obama's view, I suspect democratic capitalism is real ideological adversary is not the radical Islam of ISIS. It's the authoritarian state managed capitalism of China. You went onto say while Republican thinks ISIS is strong and growing stronger, Obama thinks it's weak and growing weaker.
When you look at that in this race for the White House and how Hillary Clinton is different than the president, what's your take?
BEINART: Yes, I think she is different. I think she thinks the threat is greater and requires more aggressive American power. I think Obama thinks, remember, George W. Bush said radical Jihadism was the equivalent of Nazism and communism. That's what he said after 9/11.
I don't think Barack Obama believes that because Nazism and communism at their height in the 1930s convinced a lot of people they could bring prosperity. Nobody believes that the path of ISIS is the path to bring prosperity. I think Obama believes in this what to be argue famously, that the only potential alternative form of government that anyone believes can bring prosperity is the authoritarian capitalism of China. That's why China has kind of global reach that the jihadist really don't. They can kill people and they can make -- but if you look after September 11th, it is also worth noting that we have not had another attack on the scale of September 11th in the United States in 15 years, let alone a 9/11 plots.
HARLOW: But, is Obama going to be successful? Is the president going to be successful trying to win over the minds and hearts of Americans on an ideological front?
BEINART: I think that Obama doesn't want Americans to overreact. And he is going to try to prevent an overreaction that does us harm. He sees Trump's response as an overreaction that helps ISIS by demonizing Muslims. He saw the Iraq war as an overreaction that hurt the United Stated. He recognizes that this may hurt him politically a bit because the Republicans will say, he doesn't take this seriously enough. But he genuinely believes that we have more cards at our disposal than ISIS does. And if we don't overplay our hand and do self-destructive things, either by sending ground forces into the Middle East and to play into ISIS' hands or turning on Muslims at home with playing to ISIS' hands that gradually things will move our way. HARLOW: There is no question if they were able retake Ramadi in the
next few days. It is a huge win for the Iraqi people but also for this White House.
BEINART: Right.
HARLOW: We will be watching.
Peter Beinart, thank you as always.
BEINART: Thank you.
HARLOW: Fascinating cover story, by the way, in the "Atlantic." Appreciate it.
Straight ahead, his mission is one of compassion, this Jesuit priest believes everyone deserves something more than just a second chance.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This place begs the question, what if we were to invest in these folks rather than endlessly futilely trying to incarcerate our way out of this problem.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HARLOW: An uplifting story this holiday weekend in our American opportunity next.
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[17:47:06] HARLOW: In tonight's American opportunity as homicides rise in major cities across America, a gray haired Jesuit priest has been on a 30-year mission, a mission to curb violence, to not only save lives but to turn them around.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
HARLOW (voice-over): They call him Pops and Father G.
FR. GREG BOYLE, FOUNDER, HOMEBOY INDUSTRIES: This is a portrait of me from a guy on death row.
HARLOW: And this --
BOYLE: I'll see you. I promise.
HARLOW: Is his church.
BOYLE: I have seen folks completely despondent and can't conjure up an image of what tomorrow is going to look like. But I never met a monster. I never met an evil person, never.
HARLOW: This Jesuit priest has buried more than 200 people, many of them under 18 years old lost to gang violence.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You know, (INAUDIBLE). I have been shot on two different occasions for the record.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was a cycle of violence, cycle of being in the neighborhood.
HARLOW: Why do you do this?
BOYLE: Scripture has this thing about the widow orphan and the stranger and these are the folks that you are supposed to have a preferential love for. These are folks at the margin with folks who are -- whose dignity has been denied and folks who are demonized.
HARLOW: You call it boundless compassion. What is that?
BOYLE: Well, it's a way of kind of making room for all of these folks, you know, no matter what, to kind of know that everybody is a whole lot more than the worst things they have ever done.
HARLOW: In the city of angels and gang life and drive byes not just the stuff of Hollywood tales, L.A. has 450 gangs with membership over 45,000 according to the LAPD. You will hear Father Greg Boyle talk about infusing hope in those to whom hope is foreign.
You call gang involvement the lethal absence of hope.
BOYLE: Yes.
HARLOW: What is that?
BOYLE: You know, not all choices are created equal. I wasn't supposed to poverty or violence or people running up to cars or selling drugs or shooting. Everybody here has been exposed to that, many times over.
HARLOW: The luck he was born with drove Father Boyle nearly 30 years ago to create Homeboy Industries, pulling gang members out of the often deadly track they are on, helping them clean up their lives and giving them jobs.
Who gets to come here?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's pretty much like the opposite of your typical job interview. We are looking for those people that have multiple felonies. We are looking for those people that are probably the hardest to serve as far as coming out of the gang life and coming out of those type of situations. Having served prison time doesn't hurt either. And the more tattoos you have, probably the better chance you have of being part of home boy industries.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I came in to remove my tattoo.
[17:50:00] HARLOW: They help them remove the symbols of their formal life, taking off tattoos define them.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I feel like a different person.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: As you can see, I'm trying to be a better father figure. Just live for a whole different life now.
HARLOW: We have people who have killed people.
JOSE OSUNA, DIRECTOR OF EXTERNAL AFFAIRS, HOMEBOY INDUSTRIES: Right.
HARLOW: Who carried out heinous crimes. Why does each person who walks through this door getting a second chance matter?
OSUNA: I think that answer is as diverse as humanity is, right. And I think we have to live by one of Father Greg says that you're not as bad as the worst thing that you've ever done.
HARLOW: About a thousand former gang members and men and women who have just been released from prison walk through this door each month. For many of them, it's a choice between life and death. And the way they see it here, nothing stops a bullet like a job.
For Steve, Angela, Janet, Carlos, and Lami, all former gang members, the uphill battle has been tremendous.
How old were you when you joined the gang?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sixteen.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thirteen.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Ten.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thirteen.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Nineteen.
HARLOW: Did you think you would live to see age 50 in raise your hand. Any of you. No? Now do you think you'll live to see age 50? Every one?
Angela has lost custody of her four children.
ANGELA NAJERA, TRAINEE, HOMEBOY INDUSTRIES: You feel like every day is like you just have a -- I know as long as I keep one foot in front of the other and I keep doing the right thing and I don't fight like, it's going to be OK, you know.
HARLOW: Janet has spent three years in prison. Carlos has served 13 and Lami served eight. Steve was sentenced to life but was released after 17 years.
The gang life, what is it that drew you in?
NAJERA: Just the feeling of being welcomed and being Latino, it's like a bunch of brothers and sisters I didn't have.
HARLOW: So, it is like another family?
NAJERA: Yes, like a family. STEVE AVALOS, SENIOR NAVIGATOR, HOMEBOY INDUSTRIES: My whole life is
pretty much family members being killed or imprisoned. Same thing like the gang was just a way of life. It was just -- I don't really feel like I chose that lifestyle. That lifestyle in a way chose me.
NAJERA: Homeboy for me is like a second chance. It's a chance at life that I didn't know I had. Come here and it's great to see this as a normal human being and then some, you know. He sees us as equals.
HARLOW: Were you ever scared of relapsing, of falling back into jail?
LAMI GLENN, TRAINEE, HOMEBOY INDUSTRIES: Yes. Very much so. Very much so. Because what kind of drove me into the gang culture was making money. It started with the money make the drugs, you know, selling drugs.
CARLOS LICEAGA, TRAINEE, HOMEBOY INDUSTRIES: I mean, after a while, you come to realize that you do need a change. You can't be out there your whole life not doing anything for yourself.
HARLOW: Why do you think this works?
JANET CONTRERAS, SENIOR NAVIGATOR, HOMEBOY INDUSTRIES: I think it works because people come in wanting that change. We don't look for them. We don't advertise it. It's on you, you know. You want to come here, you come willingly.
HARLOW: More than 30,000 former gang members have come through Homeboy and for those completing a special 18-month program, Boyle says only 30 percent return to prison. That's compared to more than 60 percent across California and close to 70 percent nationwide. Just three years after they are released.
Why are your numbers so much better?
BOYLE: Well, I think a lot of times we have a menu and list of services to deliver and then we become the DMV, you know. It's like now serving number 43. So what do you need? So you need counseling? OK. Parenting, good. Anger management. And we sort of dispatch people. We don't do that here.
HARLOW: What they do at Homeboy is job placement, mental health counseling, legal aid, solar panel installation training and much more.
BOYLE: And then a bond develops stronger than even their family and certainly stronger than their game.
HARLOW: Homeboy says it only gets two percent of the its funding from the government and admits it's hard to raise money from many.
BOYLE: We are a tougher sell because they are human beings who have been to prison and who are gang members. This place begs the question, you know, what if we were to invest in these folks rather than endlessly futilely trying to incarcerate our way out of this problem.
HARLOW: Jose Osuna sees this through their eyes like few others can. Why do you help them?
OSUNA: I help them because that's the world I came from. I served 13 years of my life in prison myself. Eight years ago, my 17-year-old son was shot in front of my house. I don't want any other parent to experience that type of pain.
HARLOW: What is the most profound thing that has happened to you here?
OSUNA: I jumped a guy into a gang when he was nine years old. And when he was 18, he received three life sentences. And all three life sentences were for crimes that he didn't commit. Eventually, through the appeal process, he was released. It took 18 years for that to happen. And last December, he walked through the door of my office and asked me to help him. And I felt that my life had gone complete circle, because I had helped bring this individual into such a violent and negative lifestyle. And now I've been able to help him re-enter society and start the process of finding himself. Because I love him. I have always loved him. That's what he was seeking from me, when he was eight, nine, 10 years old and I didn't know how to love him then and so I'm just grateful that I know how to love him now. Father Greg taught me that.
HARLOW: It's a gift so great, repayment is nearly impossible.
Is there anyone that you have not been able to find grace in somewhere?
BOYLE: Never. Never.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HARLOW: Our thanks to Father Boyle for all he and his team do.
Up next, more on the deadly tornadoes and rising floodwaters and frigid temperatures and snow dumping across the south. We will tell you what states are in the most danger.
Next, also, Chicago shocked, horrified by another shooting. A police- involved shooting. The police department apologizing for what they call an accidental shooting that killed a 55-year-old grandmother. Ahead, you'll hear from the victim's nephew who spoke earlier today about the tragedy.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: My wife's aunt, Bettie Jones, was shot and killed by Chicago police officer on the morning after Christmas and while I attempted to feel hate for all of Chicago police officers right now, I know this is a time where a -- a difficult time we have to get past in our city. I think we have to show the police officers and the families a lot of compassion. This is not the time for hatred in our city, it's not the time for violence. (END VIDEO CLIP)
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