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Iraqi Mourns After Worst Attack in Years; Terror in Bangladesh; Five Candidates Vying to Replace Cameron; Trump Says Media is Fueling Anti-Semitism Charges; Juno Space Probe Enters Jupiter's Orbit; Rio Faces Superbug Concerns Ahead of Olympics; L.A. Among Cities Vying to Host 2024 Olympics. Aired 12-1a ET

Aired July 05, 2016 - 00:00   ET

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


[00:00:10] ISHA SESAY, CNN ANCHOR: This is CNN NEWSROOM, live from Los Angeles.

Ahead this hour, Iraqis struggle to come to grips with the worst attack the country has seen since 2003.

Plus new concerns about the threat lurking in the waters off Rio de Janeiro, the danger it could pose at next month's Olympic Games.

And a mission accomplished for a NASA space craft after a three- billion kilometer journey it arrived at Jupiter and will get closer to the giant planet than ever before.

Hello. And thank you for joining us. I'm Isha Sesay. NEWSROOM L.A. starts right now.

The scope of the suicide bombing in Baghdad Saturday night is becoming clearer. New images of the rubble left behind and the toll is simply staggering.

An Iraqi official says at least 215 people were killed when a suicide bomber drove a truck through a crowded shopping district in the Karrada neighborhood. It's the worst bombing in Iraq in 30 years. Families are burying their loved ones while searchers look for more possible victims. Is claimed responsibility for the attack and promised more would follow.

Ben Wedeman has more on a devastated community.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Body after body the toll of the dead from Saturday's truck bombing in Baghdad mounts. Over the years, Iraqis have seen and suffered through a nightmare of bloodshed. But familiarity with death doesn't make it any easier.

This woman is searching for her 29-year-old son, Issam, who came here to buy clothing for the holiday at the end of Ramadan. "I looked in the hospitals, nothing," she says. "I looked in the morgues, nothing."

The still warm ashes yield body parts collected in bags and sheets. Closure, however, eludes those seeking news of missing loved ones.

Sammy is looking for five relatives. "There are only charred pieces of flesh," he says. "We can't recognize anyone."

The truck bomb claimed by ISIS represents the deadliest single attack in Iraq since 2003. Yet again, the fresh young faces of the dead adorn the walls. While grief mixes with anger at a government many accused of letting down its guard again.

"Where is the interior minister?" asks (inaudible). "Where is the defense minister? Are they asleep?"

After Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al Abadi was driven away by an angry crowd, officials have stayed away. Once more the people of Iraq mourn alone.

Ben Wedeman -- CNN Baghdad.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SESAY: Well, a wave of suicide bombings hit three cities in Saudi Arabia. One of those blasts killed four people. The country's interior ministry has now identified one of the bombers as a 34-year- old Jeddah resident who moved from Pakistan 12 years ago.

Nic Robertson has more on what happened.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Three suicide attacks in one day in Saudi Arabia, highly unusual. The most deadly coming in Medina when a suicide bomber targeted a Saudi security checkpoint there, several of the security officers killed, more injured in that blast. Flames could be seen billowing out of a vehicle there.

Right around the same time just as dusk was falling to the east of the country in the city of Katif, a mostly Shia city a suicide bomber there tried to get into a Shia mosque and detonated his explosives. He was stopped before he got in. He detonated his explosives, no one injured there.

And in the early hours of the day a suicide bomber was spotted by police at about 3:00 a.m. in the morning in the city of Jeddah just outside the U.S. consulate there in a car park at the local hospital. Police saw the man behaving in a strange way, approached him. He detonated his suicide explosives there and killing himself, injuring lightly two of the police officers.

When the police investigated further they found a vehicle that the suicide bomber had been using had three more explosives in it. A bomb disposal team was called in. They remotely detonated those other three explosives.

It could have been far worse if the whole car had exploded. That didn't happen. But what this is potentially concerning for is a number of reasons. One the fact that there were three blasts in one day. It also indicates that perhaps western targets may become more on the target list of terrorists inside Saudi Arabia.

[00:05:12] No claim of responsibility so far but we know in the past that ISIS has targeted Saudi security forces and have also tried to target and have targeted Shias in their mosques as well. So at the moment, no claim of responsibility for these three attacks in Saudi Arabia.

Nic Robertson -- CNN London.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SESAY: Now, the bodies of seven Japanese victims killed in the terror attack on the Bangladesh cafe have returned home. Immediately after the plane landed a silent tribute was held for the victims. The Japanese foreign minister and Bangladeshi ambassador to Japan laid flowers next to the coffins. 22 people were killed in the attack.

Sumnima Udas joins me now from New Delhi with the latest. Sumnima, a devastating time for the families of the victims and I understand the funeral for 19-year-old Tarishi Jain was held on Monday.

SUMNIMA UDAS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right. Indian citizen Tarishi Jain, she was a sophomore at the University of California at Berkley and she was in Dhaka. She just started her internship at a bank there. She was visiting her father, who is a textile merchant there.

And we were actually there for the memorial service and the funeral. And it was just heartbreaking to see. The mother was absolutely inconsolable. She was just hugging the glass coffin for what seemed like hours, not letting go.

The family members understandably didn't want to talk to anyone but you could overhear them talking amongst each other and they were saying how Tarishi had called her father when she was hiding inside with her friend saying that they are killing everyone, I don't think I'm going to survive either while he father was outside the restaurant helpless unable to do anything.

And everyone was just saying how she had so much going for her. She was such a wonderful person and that is the story you keep hearing about all the victims, really.

She was there with a friend from Emory University Farhaz (ph) who is a Bangladeshi citizen, a Muslim. And he was actually told by the terrorists at one point that he could leave and he said, well what about my friends? I don't want to leave them behind. And they said well, they can't go. So he stayed back and he was killed.

So, incredible stories emerging from there. And it's really heartbreaking to see the family members having to deal with it right now.

SESAY: Yes, the pictures are truly, truly heartbreaking. Sumnima, what are we hearing now from resources about the investigation? What is the latest on that front?

UDAS: Well the only surviving attacker, gunman. He is still in no condition to talk. He has been critically injured. There is also another suspect we have been told by authorities who was inside that restaurant. We don't know who that man is and whether they have been able to question him.

What the authorities are really relying on at the moment is just going through the forensic evidence, combing through the site, talking to the 13 people who were rescued to see if they can piece together anything from that.

But for the moment, what the government is saying they are maintaining that ISIS is not behind this even though ISIS has claimed responsibility. They think it is most likely the work of a local militant group called JMB which is a jihadist group that has been banned. They see no clear links with ISIS although analysts have pointed out that JMB does have some sort of ideological affiliation with ISIS.

So not much coming from the authorities at the moment, they're still very much looking into this investigation as ongoing -- Isha.

SESAY: We shall continue to follow it very closely. Sumnima Udas, joining us there from New Delhi -- appreciate it. Thank you.

From the Leave campaign Nigel Farage is resigning as the leader of the U.K. Independence Party. He says now that Britain has voted to break with the European Union, he's accomplished what he set out to do.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NIGEL FARAGE, U.K. INDEPENDENCE PARTY: I now feel that I've done my bit. I couldn't possibly achieve more than we managed to get in that referendum. I feel that it's right that I should now stand aside as leader of UKIP.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SESAY: Farage has led the party since 2010. He's also a member of the European parliament.

[00:09:58] Farage is just the latest in a long line of politicians who have resigned in the wake of the Brexit vote including Prime Minister David Cameron.

There are five candidates vying five candidates vying for his position. Isa Soares has the latest details.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ISA SOARES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Another week starts here in Westminster with another ambitious contender emerging. From the Leave campaign Andrea Leadsom set out her intentions today. Her message -- let's get on with it and leave.

ANDREA LEADSOM, TORY LEADERSHIP CONTENDER: Not everything needs to be negotiated before Article 50 is triggered and the exit process is concluded.

SOARES: One of her key policies new restrictions in the rights of E.U. nationals to live and work in the U.K. insisting there will not be bargaining chips in negotiations.

LEADSOM: The United Kingdom will leave the European Union. Freedom of movement will end and the British parliament will decide how many people enter our country each year to live, work, and contribute to our national life.

SOARES: Meanwhile, her rival frontrunner Theresa May has suggested that those nationals could be used in the bargaining over British trade agreements with E.U.

British foreign secretary Philip Hammond, a May ally unwilling to take a concrete plan of action in a radio interview.

PHILIP HAMMOND, BRITISH FOREIGN SECRETARY: When you go into a negotiation all the parts are moving. All the parts are on the table and it would be absurd to make a unilateral commitment about E.U. nationals living in the U.K. without at the very least getting a similar commitment from the European Union about British nationals living in the E.U.

SOARES: the U.K. Conservative Party is split due to Brexit with each contender now jockeying for position. Theresa May currently out front is favorite, Andrea Leadsom running second. Justice Secretary Michael Gove has been licking his wounds bloodied after his battle with former Mayor of London Boris Johnson. Meanwhile Stephen Crabb and Liam Fox are struggling to build support for their bids.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SOARES: Members of Parliament will vote on Tuesday on who they think should lead the party negotiations in Brussels. And what is becoming increasingly likely is that Britain could have its second female prime minister sitting at that very table.

Isa Soares -- CNN London.

SESAY: Australia is in political limbo right now with votes being counted in a super tight federal election. Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull's Conservative coalition is in danger of losing its majority and could say it's a hung parliament.

The Labor Party leader is calling on Mr. Turnbull to step down and says Saturday's vote was a rejection of his economic agenda. We will let you know as election results are announced.

In the U.S. presidential race the latest poll shows Republican Donald Trump narrowing the gap over Hillary Clinton. The "USA Today"/Suffolk University poll has Clinton around 45 percent and Trump at 40 percent. The same poll showed Clinton up by 11 points just two months ago.

A Twitter post slamming Clinton has backfired mightily on the Trump campaign. It triggered a storm of anti-Semitism charges against Trump who now blames the media for stoking the accusations.

CNN's Sara Murray reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SARA MURRAY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Today Donald Trump is standing by this tweet that ignited a firestorm. On Saturday Trump blasted out the graphic declaring Hillary Clinton the most corrupt candidate ever over a six-pointed star and dollar bills. The imagery evoking anti- Semitic stereo types and it appeared 10 days earlier on a white supremacist message board.

But the presumptive GOP nominee is making no move to apologize today tweeting "Dishonest media is trying their absolute best to depict a star and a tweet as the Star of David rather than a Sheriff's star or a plain star." But that doesn't explain why amid the brewing backlash, the campaign deleted the tweet replacing it with this image attempting to cover the star with a circle. Some are seizing on it as a sign of a troubling pattern.

JONATHAN GREENBLATT: Now it's hard to call it anything other than a pattern. And it's a pattern that to us is perplexing, troubling and we think wrong.

MURRAY: And today, the Clinton campaign's director of Jewish outreach piled on saying "Donald Trump's use of a blatantly anti-Semitic image from racist Web sites to promote his campaign would be disturbing enough but the fact that it is part of a pattern should give voters major cause for concern."

Trump's allies quickly sprang to his defense.

ED BROOKOVER, TRUMP CAMPAIGN ADVISER: Who knows how this came to our attention. And I don't know. But what I do know is that there is nothing anti-Semitic about our campaign; certainly nothing anti- Semitic about Mr. Trump.

COREY LEWANDOWSKI, FORMER TRUMP CAMPAIGN MANAGER: It's the same star that sheriff's departments across the country use all over the place to represent law enforcement.

MURRAY: But it's not the first time Trump fired off tweets with nefarious undertones. He has previously retweeted apparent neo-Nazi supporters. In another case he blasted out inaccurate and racially- charged crime statistics. And he faced an avalanche of criticism after failing to denounce white nationalist David Duke in this interview with Jake Tapper.

[00:15:11] JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: Ok, I mean I'm just talking about David Duke and the Ku Klux Klan here.

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I don't know -- honestly I don't know David Duke. I don't believe I've ever met him. I'm pretty sure I didn't meet him. And I just don't know anything about him.

MURRAY: Now Trump is looking to change the conversation. And gin up speculation about the veep stakes tweeting his pleasure at meeting Indiana Governor Mike Pence this weekend and announcing his meeting with Iowa Senator Joni Ernst today.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

MURRAY: Now, Donald Trump eventually did disavow David Duke and the KKK. He is still not disavowing that tweet. He put out a statement clarifying a little bit but mostly just trying to turn things around on Hillary Clinton saying "These false attacks by Hillary Clinton trying to link the Star of David with a basic star often used by sheriffs who deal with criminals and criminal behavior showing an inscription that says 'Crooked Hillary is the most corrupt candidate ever' with anti-Semitism is ridiculous. Clinton, through her surrogates is just trying to divert attention from the dishonest behavior of herself and her husband."

Of course, that still doesn't answer the question of how an image that originated -- appears to have originated on a white supremacist Web site eventually ended up on Donald Trump's Twitter feed.

Sara Murray -- CNN Washington.

SESAY: Well, more twists and turns ahead for "Top Gear" fans. Why a co-host of the popular car show is walking.

Plus NASA scientists break into cheers after their Juno spacecraft reaches Jupiter, plans to orbit around the giant planet is no easy task.

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

RICHARD QUEST, CNN HOST: I'm Richard Quest and these are the top business headlines.

Bangladesh's garment industry is trying to reassure a foreign fashion brand the company's safe in the wake of last weekend's brutal terror attack in Dhaka. A majority of the 20 people murdered were foreigners. The owner of Uniqlo, Fast Retailing, has suspended all unnecessary business travel by the company to Bangladesh.

Seven of Spain's top football teams have been ordered to repay millions of dollars worth of illegal state aid. The European Commission says the Spanish government broke tax and loan rules. Speaking to CNN, the E.U.'s competition commissioner says it's unfair on the fans.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARGRETHE VESTAGER, E.U. COMMISSIONER FOR COMPETITION: -- to me is that state support has been given. Because I think for any fan it is painful because football is a passion sport to see if your team is losing on the playing field. But to know that it may be losing to a team who has been given taxpayers money, maybe your money, I think that is double painful.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

QUEST: Chris Evans has resigned as host of "Top Gear" after only one season. It follows meager report of tensions with the co-host Matt LeBlanc and disappointing ratings. The series averages four million viewers per episode compared to more than six million before Evans took charge.

[00:20:08] You're up to date. There're the headlines. I'm Richard Quest in London.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SESAY: Hello everyone.

NASA's Juno spacecraft has just accomplished something extraordinary. It entered the orbit around Jupiter and will get closer to the giant planet than ever before. The folks at NASA certainly have reason to celebrate as you see them doing there. This journey has taken almost five years.

CNN's Paul Vercammen reports on what scientists are hoping to learn.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PAUL VERCAMMEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Juno will be exposed to a barrage of Jupiter's radiation said to be stronger than 100 million dental x- rays. Mission leaders are crossing fingers and lucky stars that orbiting rocks or even something as small as a dust particle hit and damage the spacecraft.

DR. SCOTT BOLTON, JUNO PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR, JPL: It's hard to describe. I'm torn with the incredible excitement and anticipation with oh, my god we're going in. It's really happening. And it's -- I know it's challenging.

VERCAMMEN: Juno will dip as low as 2,600 miles from Jupiter's mysterious cloud tops.

RICK NYBAKKEN, JUNO PROJECT MANAGER, JPL: Some of the challenges are, we're going into the most treacherous places in the entire solar system. Radiation fields that are really intense. But we focus on how to respond to that and make the spacecraft relatively immune.

VERCAMMEN: This vault is designed to protect Juno's most sensitive electronics, its brain and heart from Jupiter's enormous blasts of radiation. The titanium-armored vault will cut down the impact of Jupiter's radiation.

Perhaps Jupiter is best described as our solar system's super freak. It's so big more than 1,000 earths would fit inside. It spins so fast days are ten hours long. Its gravity is so strong a person weighing 100 pounds on earth would weigh 240 on Jupiter. It's so old scientists say it was the first planet formed in our solar system.

NYBAKKEN: Jupiter though still maintains its ancient record sufficient that when we study it really close we think we can understand how Jupiter formed and how our solar system formed.

VERCAMMEN: Proving it seems scientists have humor three Lego figurines are hitching a ride aboard, the god Jupiter, his wife Juno and the astronomer Galileo. And no plastic or paint, this trio is made of the finest space-grade aluminum.

Paul Vercammen -- CNN Pasadena, California.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SESAY: Retired NASA astronaut Leroy Chiao joins us now from Houston, Texas. Thanks so much for joining us -- Leroy.

This is an incredibly complex mission which required careful choreography due to Jupiter's radiation and rings of debris and dust. Give us some perspective on what NASA has accomplished here with Juno.

LEROY CHIAO, FORMER NASA ASTRONAUT: Sure with Juno, just getting it to where it is now is pretty amazing. I mean it was traveling through space for almost five years and at the end there, the gravity from Jupiter accelerated the vehicle to over 167,000 miles an hour.

And then this braking pulse had to be done correctly. It had to be done at the right time, slowing the spacecraft down just enough to get it into the proper orbit. And if it had been an under burn it would have skipped off and would not have entered orbit. If it's an over burn it could have burrowed too deeply towards the planet. So it looks like right now, it looks like everything went perfectly and it is entering this orbit.

As you mentioned the radiation environment is quite harsh. Jupiter has a very strong set of magnetic field lines that captures the sun's ration and other cosmic radiation and the space craft has to fly through those magnetic fields.

It's because of that that we've seen these awesome auroras -- these awesome pictures of aurora that are happening on Jupiter but it also provides quite a harsh environment for the spacecraft.

SESAY: Yes. As you lay out all the challenges that this mission has I can't help but wonder what it's like inside mission control right now -- just how stressful an environment that is. Can you give us some sense of how things are playing out in mission control right now?

CHIAO: Sure, I think there is a lot of celebration going on in mission control frankly because a lot of these people have been waiting five years to see if this probe is going to get into the right orbit. It has.

Of course, it is not out of the woods as we've been talking. It's going to have to pass through the radiation. It's going to have to survive. But I think I'm confident that it will because it was specifically designed for that environment.

And so I think the folks at mission control are breathing easy that it entered the right orbit and now we're just waiting to, you know, see how it goes as they go through this harsh environment and they start making their measurements.

[00:25:08] SESAY: So let's talk about that. Let's talk about the images the data that the scientists are waiting from Juno. What are the expectations here?

CHIAO: Well, Juno is going to give us an unprecedented look at Jupiter. It's got an amazing array of sensors (inaudible) to study the atmosphere and, you know, peer down below the clouds. It will give us an idea of how much water and therefore how much oxygen is involved in the composition of the planet.

It's going to give us some clues as to whether or not it has a rocky core. There's some ideas that it does, some ideas that it doesn't. And so it is going to be, you know, studying both the gravitational, as well as these intense magnetic field lines and the radiation involved inside of them.

So it's really going to give us a great look that we haven't had or about kind of the biggest planet and the biggest mystery of the planet that we have in our solar system.

SESAY: And Leroy at a price tag of over $1 billion, I've got to ask you do Juno's potential findings have any real-world applications? I mean in other words what difference will it make? I think that's a question a lot of people at home have.

CHIAO: Well sure. I mean missions like this, you can't correlate it exactly like saying it's going to bring down the cost of your electricity or anything like that but it will further certainly humanity's knowledge of the solar system just like New Horizon did, you know, earlier -- last year, late last year where it gave us those stunning images of Pluto and showed us things about the planet that we didn't understand.

So this mission, like the other ones, will give us more understanding about our solar system and about the universe which will help us understand our own planet a little bit more. So there will be some indirect ways that this mission might benefit the common person here on the earth. But otherwise it is all part of the exploration that is part of what we are, you know, part of who we are as a species of human beings of our curiosity of understanding our environment including what goes on well past the boundaries of earth's atmosphere.

SESAY: Truly fascinating.

Leroy Chiao joining us there from Houston, Texas. Appreciate this -- thank you so much.

CHIAO: Thank you.

SESAY: Time for a quick break now. Crime, pollution, Zika and now there's another new consider for the Olympics' host city -- something under water that could pose a health issue.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[00:30:57] SESAY: You are watching CNN NEWSROOM live from Los Angeles. I'm Isha Sesay. The headlines this hour.

NASA's Juno spacecraft has successfully entered orbit around Jupiter getting closer to our solar system, the largest planet than ever before. Juno will circle Jupiter 37 times over 20 months to study the planet. A big challenge will be dodging Jupiter's intense radiation field.

The death toll from Saturday night's suicide truck bombing in Baghdad has risen to 215. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack on a crowded shopping area in the Karrada neighborhood. It's the latest in a series of terror attacks during Ramadan and the worst bombing in Iraq since 2003.

Heavy rain has triggered deadly flooding in Eastern China. Official say 186 people have been killed and more than 1 million residents evacuated. Some areas have seen more than 450 millimeters of rain in the last four days.

Let's bring in meteorologist Pedram Javaheri who joins us with more.

Pedram Javaheri, the pictures are just staggering.

(WEATHER REPORT)

SESAY: All right, we're counting down to the Rio Olympics now just one month away. CNN will be following all the twists and turns leading up to the games. Here's what you can expect.

Brazil hosts more than 10,000 athletes from 206 countries. They will compete in more than 300 events across 42 sports and nearly 5,000 medals will be awarded.

Crime, pollution, and unfinished subway and the Zika virus are just some of the problems already plaguing the host city, Rio. And now there is a new concern to watch out for lurking in the city's water.

CNN's Shasta Darlington reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SHASTA DARLINGTON, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The marvelous city, stunning views and golden beaches. But you might think twice before you splash in. Lurking under Rio's waters, raw sewage and now what scientists describe as superbacteria. Researchers at the Rio Federal University tested the city's beaches for a year and discovered high levels of the dreaded superbug.

Drug-resistant bacteria that have been turning up in hospitals. RENATA PICAO, PROFESSOR, RIO FEDERAL UNIVERSITY: We believe that true hospital sewage, it goes to the municipal sewage and it gets through the Guanabara Bay or through other rivers. And it finally gets to the beaches.

[00:35:08] DARLINGTON: The highest levels of superbacteria found on the shores of Guanabara Bay, sight of the Olympic sailing event a month from now.

German Paralympic sailor Heiko Kroger says you can't be overcautious.

HEIKO KROGER, GERMAN PARALYMPIC SAILOR: It's a nice sailing area. But every time you get some water in your face, it feels like there's some alien enemy entering your face. So I keep my nose, my lips closed.

DARLINGTON: His colleague, Erik Heil, blamed the bacteria-infested waters for a skin infection he got while training.

Authorities, however, say athletes and visitors will be safe and the sailing arena has internationally acceptable levels of bacteria.

According to Rio's water utility, half the homes in Rio state are now connected to the sewage system, up from 11 percent.

EDIES FERNANDES DE OLIVERA, CEDAL WATER UTILITY: Of course, the wastewater treatment plants are not prepared for the superbacteria because it's brand new, something new.

DARLINGTON: And something the water utility says it will look into further. But scientists say the superbug is also washing up on some of Rio's touristy beaches which are already deemed too polluted to swim in by authorities a good third of the year.

(on-camera): This water right here isn't treated. It's supposed to be for rain runoff, but it often fills with garbage, it stinks of raw sewage and it dumps right here on the beach.

Another cloud overshadowing Rio's troubled Olympics.

Shasta Darlington, CNN, Rio de Janeiro.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SESAY: So many issues.

Well, several major cities are already looking ahead to the 2024 Olympic Games. The host contenders are Los Angeles, Paris, Rome, and Budapest. Amara Walker talks to the head of L.A.'s Olympic committee about what the city is doing to win the bid.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

AMARA WALKER, CNN ANCHOR: How do you convince the IOC that, hey, Los Angeles is the place to have the 2024 summer Olympics? GENE SYKES, CEO, L.A. 2024 OLYMPIC BID COMMITTEE: Well, it's a good question and that's what our job is for the next almost 15 months, because the IOC makes the decision in September of 2017 and our advantage is or our argument is that Los Angeles is a tremendous place for the Olympics for two or three reasons.

One is we have the Olympic DNA here in Los Angeles, having hosted the games in 1932 and 1984. They were both very successful games. But we don't want to sit on the legacy. Since 1984, Los Angeles has become a much more interesting city. It's really a multicultural city, perhaps the most multicultural city in the United States.

We have tremendous infrastructure here. So that we can actually host a no-risk very financially disciplined Olympics with all the existing infrastructure, arenas, stadium, et cetera that we already have here. And then finally, Los Angeles is really at the center of the confluence of content creativity. This is of course Hollywood as well as technology.

And that Silicon Valley has come to Hollywood as represented by so many of the things that have happened in the digital media economy in the past several years. And this is a place where that can serve the purposes of the Olympic Games.

WALKER: Well, but you do have some formidable competitors, right? I mean, Paris, Rome, and Budapest also bidding to get the summer Olympics. Although I was reading that Rome's new mayor has said that, you know, she is opposed to the candidacy because of cost issues.

But, in general, what do you think about your competition?

SYKES: I think it's very difficult and tough competition. All of these are great cities and they have great heritages. Rome and Paris have already hosted the Olympic Games in the past just as we have. They know what they're doing. They have tremendous leadership and we expect them to be very tough competition.

Budapest while it has never hosted the Olympics Games before is also a beautiful European city with a great heritage and great sponsorship by a committee of leaders who know what they're doing.

WALKER: And, lastly, you know, especially with the state of the world right now and concerns of terrorism and home-grown terrorism, how will Los Angeles be able to handle security in terms of resources and experience.

SYKES: Well, experience is maybe the right thing to point to. The 2002 games in Salt Lake City occurred within months after the 9/11 experience. And so the Department of Homeland Security was just created before those games.

The Department of Homeland Security led all of these security management at those games, and in fact, they would do the same at the games in Los Angeles if we win the games in 2024. And we are confident that in the United States at a major event here, given the experience that they've had and the experience we've had in Los Angeles that that is something that we could run.

WALKER: Well, we wish you all the luck. The voting is what, September 2017.

SYKES: Yes, it is.

WALKER: And we appreciate you coming in. Gene Sykes, and of course, we do hope that you continually come in to our studios to update us on the prospects.

SYKES: Thank you.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SESAY: A dazzling firework display lit up the sky in the U.S. Capital Monday evening for this years' Independence Day celebration. Hundreds of thousands of people gathered for the big show and concert on the west lawn of the Capitol Building.

And Macy's Fourth of July display didn't disappoint either. Pictures from New York there. Five barges were loaded with fireworks for New York's spectacular show. This is Macy's 40th year putting on this show.

Really pretty.

And let's bring you pictures from San Francisco. These are live images we're bringing you here. Live pics of the Independence Day celebrations from here on the West Coast. You see the night sky lit up by all the fireworks. A fun time for all.

All right. Well, after just one season as co-host of BBC's "Top Gear," Chris Evans says he is leaving the show. The BBC hired Evans and Matt LeBlanc to take the lead after former host Jeremy Clarkson was sucked in 2015. The latest news comes amid poll raising and reports of tension between the two new co-host. Evans tweeted, quote, "I gave it my best shot, but sometimes that's not enough."

Never has a true word been said.

You are watching CNN NEWSROOM live from Los Angeles. I'm Isha Sesay. I'll be back at the top of the hour with a look at today's top stories. But first "World Sport" starts after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(WORLD SPORT)