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Kim Arrives In Vietnam Ahead Of Summit; Cardinal Pell Found Guilty Of Child Sexual Abuse; Univision Journalists Briefly Detained In Venezuela; Race For The White House; U.S. Vice President Message To Maduro; Talked Of A Second Brexit Referendum; War In Afghanistan; A Bromance Is Born. Aired 3-4a ET
Aired February 26, 2019 - 03:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[03:00:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CYRIL VANIER, CNN ANCHOR: A red carpet welcome for Kim Jong-un. The North Korean leader has arrived in Vietnam for his upcoming meeting with President Donald Trump.
Western Australia jury finds one of the top leaders of the Catholic Church guilty of child sexual abuse.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Why is every room packed that I go to?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Trump. We want to get rid of Trump.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VANIER: The Democrats are packing campaign rallies showing how excited they are about next year's presidential election and the chance to win pack the White House.
Welcome to our viewers joining us from all around the world. I'm Cyril Vanier. You're watching CNN Newsroom.
So, U.S. President Donald Trump arrives in Hanoi later today for his second summit with Kim Jong-un. The North Korean leader made his way down a red carpet as he walks off the train that brought to Vietnam.
As Kim's motorcade travelled through Hanoi thousands lined the streets to watch. While denuclearization tops the agenda for the summit it's also Kim's first state visit to Vietnam. He is expected to see firsthand the economic benefits of making a peace deal with the Americans.
Will Ripley joins us now from Hanoi. Will, tell us a little bit about that, the setting of Vietnam and this theory that it should somehow incentivize the North Koreans to try and become a bit more like Vietnam if they would just abandon their nukes.
WILL RIPLEY, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes. There is certainly a lot of symbolism holding this summit here in Hanoi. The Vietnamese capital a one-party authoritarian state with a communist party that's fairly in control but an economy that has opened up and that is booming, that has enjoyed 7 percent growth last year as a result of normalized relations with the United States.
They had an embassy, the U.S. embassy here in Hanoi since 1985. And you know, you go around the city and you're surrounded, you know, by new construction. You see construction cranes, people are working, they have plenty to eat.
It's a nation that has a booming economy in large part because they were able to mend fences after the horrors of the Vietnam War and in relatively short order bring in private enterprise that has resulted in some pretty remarkable growth. It's been called the economic miracle here in Vietnam.
Certainly, that is the message that U.S. President Donald Trump and his team will be trying to deliver to North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and his team as they try to convince them to give up their nuclear weapons, because they say it will lead to a brighter future for the people of North Korea and will give them that economic growth that Kim Jong-un has promised his own people; and said that now is his primary focus after claiming that he completed the nuclear program which is arguably brought into the table and that the U.S. is trying to convince him to get rid of.
VANIER: Will, summit number one in Singapore yielded no measurable concrete progress. What, is there an argument to say that summit number two could be any different?
RIPLEY: Well, certainly, I think both sides are coming to the table here understanding that there needs to be more substance to the agreement that they signed here in Hanoi, to build upon what they signed in Singapore.
There is no arguing that tensions have been different fused because of actions taken by both sides. North Korea hasn't launched a missile or conducted a nuclear test in more than a year. They did hand over dozens of sets of U.S. service member remains from the Korean War which is one of the things that they pledged to do in Singapore.
They have also blown up the entrances to their tunnels at their Punggye-ri nuclear site, a move that many experts say is largely cosmetic and certainly not irreversible.
And then on the U.S. side President Trump has suspended joint military drills with South Korea and he has obviously continued to engage with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.
They have exchanged a number of letters. He says that they have a good relationship. And he is giving Kim the legitimacy of now a second sit down face-to-face meeting with a sitting U.S. president, something that previous U.S. presidents would have never even considered.
But of course, there is a lot of reassure on President Trump to come away from this with a deal that includes a specific plan, whether it be allowing inspectors into the country to look at nuclear sites, to disclose previously secret locations where North Korea is enriching uranium that's used to make nuclear weapons and other types of things.
Of course, there is also lots of information leaking out of South Korea with the Blue House saying just yesterday saying that the two countries may be prepared to announce an agreement to formally end the Korean War which then raises a whole lot of new questions including what happens to the 28,000 U.S. troops stationed in South Korea that President Trump has often complained about, the expense.
[03:05:05] But of course, what South Korea has relied upon for decades to provide defense in the event that things turn south when it comes to their dealings with the North.
VANIER: Wil Ripley reporting live from Hanoi. Thank you.
President Trump may lose out on some executive time this week. He'll be busy with the North Korea summit while House Democrats will have voted to block his national emergency declaration on the southern border.
A similar resolution may not be able to pass the Republican controlled Senate. On top of that, Mr. Trump's former lawyer Michael Cohen will be testifying to lawmakers about what he knows about the 2016 presidential campaign.
Richard Johnson joins us. He is a lecturer in U.S. politics and international relations at England's Lancaster University. So, talk to me about the national emergency first. Democrats are going to vote against it. But after that they don't have control. It goes to the Senate. They don't have majority there. How do you think this thing ends?
RICHARD JOHNSON, LECTURER IN U.S. POLITICS AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS, LANCASTER UNIVERSITY: Well, the National Emergencies Act of 1976 enables Congress to effectively revoke a national emergency declared by a president if Congress doesn't deem that to be a legitimate emergency.
So, there is congressional power here if Congress acted in a coordinated fashion but of course the nature of partisanship in America means a two-thirds majority is unlikely.
What you could see though, is that a bare majority in the Senate could support that the House bill already two Republican senators have said that they would support the Democrats on this. We could -- Tom Tillis, Susan Collins, people talk about Lisa Murkowski in Alaska as well.
They would need one more Republican senator to act. But then that would be a largely symbolic move because even if it did get to the president's desk, President Trump would veto it and without two-thirds action in Congress, then the national emergency stays in place.
VANIER: All right. So, reading between the lines of what you're saying, it's not a stretch to say as things stand now and with what we know now it is very unlikely that the national -- that Congress is going be able to cancel this national emergency; correct? JOHNSON: That's right. I think that the strategy which would than a
more viable strategy for those who want to block this national emergency move is to go through the courts. That's also not a sure- fire guarantee because the courts have been tipping in a more conservative direction.
President Trump has been very effective in installing his justices on the federal courts and, of course, famously he has appointed two new members to the U.S. Supreme Court. But there is a chance that Democrats and others who are concerned about this action could get the courts to block the president or force him to re-adjust the policy.
VANIER: Michael Cohen is talking to Congress this week. The president's former fixer, at least that is what he used to call himself, and his lawyer, apparently is trying to drive up ratings be he says the testimony will be, quote, "chilling." What kind of revelations do you think we might get?
JOHNSON: Well, from my understanding, the testimony that which he gives to the House oversight committee will not be pertaining directly to the Russian investigation. And so, what we'll likely hear is about concerns about campaign finance and the payments of women who are alleged to have had relations with Donald Trump.
And so, I think just the nature of the content which he is likely to be asked about is probably, you know, reasonably salacious and, therefore, you know, I think that it's going to attract some attention on that level.
It will be embarrassing for the White House and for the president. They will argue that Michael Cohen has already been accused of lying under oath to Congress about other matters. So, it is a credibility issue there. But certainly, this is not going to be welcomed testimony from the White House's perspective.
VANIER: It's really hard to overstate how important, how big a week this could be for the presidency, when you have Michael Cohen talking in public, or part of what he is going to be saying is going to be in public in an open hearing, and you have Donald Trump with his second meeting with Kim Jong-un.
Depending on where each of these stories go between now and the end of the week, you could have a very, very different look for the presidency in a few days' time.
JOHNSON: I think you're right. The stakes are high this week. And when the stakes are high, Donald Trump often surprises people. And I do wonder if this will put pressure on him to agree to say, a peace treaty with North Korea to officially end the Korean War which has only been on ceasefire since 1953.
[03:10:09] It's a symbolic move. It has been left as a final sort of final tool to get North Korea to move. I think people might think that the president will be moving prematurely if he backed this, but you could see that, you know, it would be great headlines if not necessarily good foreign policy and maybe with the stakes so high that's the kind of dramatic action that he takes this week.
VANIER: Richard Johnson in Lancaster, thank you so much.
JOHNSON: Thank you.
VANIER: While the summit happens in Hanoi you can keep up with that and anything that happens in Washington any time. You just go to our web site for that. That is of course, cnn.com.
Now a jury in Melbourne, Australia, has found one of the highest- ranking clergyman in the Roman Catholic Priest guilty of five counts child sexual abuse. Cardinal George Pell adamantly denies the charges and he has filed an appeal.
Pell was Vatican treasurer and a close adviser to Pope Francis. Jurors reached the verdict actually in December but a court order kept it secret until right now. The victim's attorney read a statement from her client.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
VIVIAN WALLER, ATTORNEY FOR ABUSE SURVIVOR: Thank you for your interest in this case.
Like many survivors, I have experienced shame, loneliness, depression and struggle. Like many survivors, it has taken me years to understand the impact on my life. At some point we realized that we trusted someone we should have feared and we feared those genuine relationships that we should trust.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VANIER: All right. Anna Coren is following the case. You've been up on this for the last two months while it was being kept secret, right, that the courts had to keep this secret from the public, but you know all the details of the case.
ANNA COREN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Cyril. We have been sitting on this story for more than two months. George Pell was convicted of child sexual abuse back in December, but we were not allowed to report it due to a suppression order. Now that suppression order was due to protect the second trial. That's what it was set up to do.
Well, that second trial collapsed today. There just was not enough evidence and the case was dismissed. So, suddenly the suppression order was lifted and the media was finally able to tell the world that Cardinal George Pell, the highest-ranking member of the church, has been convicted of child sexual abuse.
He is, of course, the Vatican treasurer, number three in the Vatican. This is extremely timely considering that the pope has just held a summit in Rome to discuss the scourge of child sexual abuse. He talked about it being an all-out battle and describes abusers as the tools of Satan. Well, it will be interesting on what he says to Cardinal George Pell.
Of course, he will be enjoying his last night of freedom this evening. Tomorrow he walks into Melbourne county court where he will be remanded and taken to prison. But he has had an illustrious career and now it's over.
It's news that will send shockwaves throughout the Roman Catholic Church. Cardinal George Pell, Vatican treasurer found guilty of child sex abuse. The most senior Vatican official ever convicted of child sex offences.
The verdict came down in December but legal restrictions meant it couldn't be reported in Australia until now.
Pell, the country's most powerful Catholic was on trial for assaulting two choir boys in the late 90s when he was archbishop of Melbourne, the prosecution's case hinged on the testimony of one of those boys. He told the court Pell assaulted them after mass, forced him to perform oral sex on him and committed an indecent act with his friend.
He also testified that a month later, Pell pushed him against a wall and groped him. He said, quote, "I didn't tell anyone at the time. I had no intention back then of telling anyone ever."
The other victim died of a drug overdose as an adult having never told his family of the abuse. The cardinal calls the allegations outrageous.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE PELL, VATICAN TREASURER: I'm innocent of these charges. They are false. The whole idea of sexual abuse is abhorrent to me.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COREN: He didn't take the stand during the trial. Instead, a video of his interview with Australian detectives was played to the court. He pleaded not guilty and his defense lawyer said the accusations were a fantasy.
[03:15:02] But a jury convicted Pell on all five charges, one of the sexual penetration of a child and four of an indecent act with or in the presence of a child.
It's a shocking fall from grace for one of the Vatican's top officials who has long been an influential divisive figure in Australia. He rose through the ranks of the church to become archbishop of Melbourne, then Sydney, then a cardinal before being appointed Vatican treasurer and a member of the pope's informal council of advisers.
But while his star rose in the Vatican, Pell came in for mounting criticism at home as the Australian church became the center of a global child abuse scandal.
A national inquiry into institutional responses to child sexual abuse found 7 percent of the country's Catholic priests were accused of abusing children between 1950 and 2010. It identified nearly 2,000 alleged perpetrators, including priests, brothers, lay people and religious sisters.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That the cardinal had given evidence.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COREN: When he appeared in front of the Royal Commission in 2016, Pell faced questions about whether he had done enough to weed out abuse and get justice for the victims.
Now the cardinal himself has been convicted and other survivors of clerical sexual abuse unrelated to the Pell case are elated.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PHIL NAGLE, CHILD ABUSE SURVIVOR: Justice is what I thought, justice for the victims. I think that should give everyone that's thinking about whether you will be believed or whether you will or won't win the fight, it should give you the courage to come forward and at least be heard.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COREN: Pell's conviction will hurt an organization already battling decades of revelations about pedophile priests. The pope removed Pell from his advisory council in December. But the damage to the church may be difficult to repair. Now this global crisis has reached the top of the Vatican.
Now the Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has issued a statement saying that this conviction proves that no one is above the law. We're expecting to hear from the Brisbane archbishop Mark Coleridge. He is in Rome. He attended the pope's summit and he is due to hold a press conference shortly.
He, of course, is the president of the Catholic Bishop's Conference here in Australia. This really, Cyril, is just a monumental day for so many survivors of clerical sexual abuse.
VANIER: Anna Coren reporting live from Melbourne. Thank you so much.
Jared Kushner's Middle East tour has begun. Donald Trump's son-in-law and senior adviser is pushing a Middle East peace plan and taking some shots at Iran along the way.
Plus, a surprise announcement from Iran's foreign minister is raising new questions about the future of his country's nuclear deal.
Stay with us.
[03:20:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VANIER: A White House senior adviser Jared Kushner is in the Middle East on a five-nation tour. He will be talking to U.S. allies, promoting the Trump administration's peace plan.
He told Sky News Arabia it's crucial to keep the details of the plan confidential but he says that it focuses on four key principles, freedom, respect, opportunity and security.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JARED KUSHNER, WHITE HOUSE SENIOR ADVISER: The situation that they're negotiating over hasn't really changed much in 25 years. And so, what we've tried to do is figure out what is realistic and what is a fair solution to the issues here in 2019 that can enable people to live better lives.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VANIER: Now Oren Liebermann is covering this for us. He joins us now live from Jerusalem. Oren?
OREN LIEBERMANN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, this is Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law and the man advocate of the trump administration's peace plan trying to begin to sell the plan itself. The plan consists of a few different parts. The political parts, which remains a secret, and that includes the security aspect of this, as well, and the economic part and that requires buy in. Buy in from the Arab states not only to contribute politically and diplomatically to pressure the Palestinians to take part but also buy in financially.
The Trump administration will rely on the Arab states to put money forward to incentivize the Palestinians to accept this deal or at the very least consider this deal.
But this remains a hard sell. Remember, the Palestinians haven't had any response or any interaction with the Trump administration now in over a year. And there is a growing sense that the economic part of this package is an attempt to buy off the Palestinians, to get them to essentially sell away their political demands.
So even if -- even as he is trying to sell this deal now or at least the economic part of the deal, it still has tremendous challenges. The political part which of course is the sensitive part remains a closely guarded secret. They fear that putting it out there means it will be leaked and that the leaks and the bits of information that do come out will destroy the chances of it succeeding.
Cyril, it still faces an incredibly difficult road ahead. What's the advantage that he is selling that Kushner is selling to the Arab states? Well, it's the strengthening of the sort of de facto alliance against Iran with Israel and the Sunni Arab states.
It remains however, the Trump administration's peace plans a hard sell. They have put it on hold until after the April 9 elections here to try to keep its sensitivity from impacting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as he seeks a fifth term in office.
VANIER: Oren Liebermann reporting live from Jerusalem. Thank you very much.
In an unexpected move, Iran's foreign minister has announced his resignation. Mohammad Javad Zarif was the key architect of the Iran nuclear deal in 2015.
Iran's state-run news agency reports that Zarif is asking ministry employees and diplomats not to resign over his announcement. He did give a reason for stepping down but he has faced a lot of criticism from Iran's hard liners, both for signing the nuclear deal and for the Trump administration pulling out of it.
Fred Pleitgen has the details.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
[03:24:54] FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: It is certainly one of the more uncommon resignations that we've seen in Iran. One of the things to one would think would happen in a high- profile resignation like this is that Javad Zarif maybe would have gone to Hassan Rouhani, to the country's president to formal hand in a letter of resignation or possibly even to the country's supreme leader.
Javad Zarif, however, went to his Instagram account and posted there saying that he was no longer able to serve.
Now one of the things that's no secret is Javad Zarif was certainly under fire at home. We speak a lot about how unpopular the nuclear agreement is in the Trump administration and President Trump obviously pulling the United States out of the nuclear agreement and putting sanctions back on Iran was pretty unpopular and is pretty unpopular among Iranian hard liners as well.
And they have been attacking Javad Zarif for it. Some of them even calling him a traitor. So, he certainly has been under a lot of fire. And the big question now is whether or not Iran will actually stay in the nuclear agreement or whether or not it might pull out.
There certainly are some forces, especially among the hard liners who want to do exactly that.
And one of the things that we've heard from Javad Zarif over the past couple of weeks the past couple of months is he wanted Iran and wants Iran to stay inside the nuclear agreement, but he does feel, for instance, that the Europeans need to do more to make that happen.
So, certainly, it's going to be some interesting times ahead for the Islamic republic of Iran to see whether they stay inside the nuclear agreement, and quite frankly, what their political course is going to be going forward.
Fred Pleitgen, CNN, Moscow.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VANIER: Overflowing crowds, excited candidates, how American Democrats are finding their energy again.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think that a lot of people do realize that we absolutely have to get this right.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VANIER: Why it is standing room only as Democrats find a common purpose in the 2020 presidential race.
Plus, new information from Chicago police on actor Jussie Smollett and his claim that he was attacked. We'll have that next.
[03:30:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CYRIL VANIER, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back to the CNN Newsroom. I'm Cyril Vanier. We've got the headlines this hour. Kim Jong-un is now in Hanoi and the U.S. president is on his way. The two are meeting in Vietnam for their second summit. The ultimate goal is denuclearization, but both sides say they won't rush it. Kim has brought a team of negotiators hoping a deal with the U.S. would create economic advantages for the North.
Vatican Treasurer, Cardinal George Pell is appealing his conviction on child sexual abuse charges. A jury in Melbourne, Australia, found him guilty back in December, but a court order kept the verdict secret until now. The charges against the 77-year-old Pell date back to the 1990's.
Univision anchor Jorge Ramos says his brief detention in Venezuela was a violation of human rights. He and his crew were in Caracas to interview President Nicolas Maduro on Monday, but when Maduro didn't like the questions, Ramos said, Maduro's aids took the journalist's phones and equipment and interrogated them. They were held for roughly three hours and they are now being expelled from the country.
He has only been in the U.S. presidential race for a week, but Bernie Sanders is already proving to be a mighty fund raiser. The New York Times reports, the Vermont Senator has already raised $10 million, making him a financial front runner in the crowded Democratic field. At a CNN town hall, Sanders answered wide ranging questions about his second run and outlined his policy positions. Ryan Nobles reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
RYAN NOBLES, CNN WASHINGON CORRESPONDENT: Senator Bernie Sanders spent more than an hour Monday night facing a lightning round of questions about a number of pressing issues confronting the candidate who is running for president a second time. Sanders discussed his plans for universal health coverage and conceded that it will mean private insurance will likely go away.
He also argued that Democratic socialism would institute policies that would benefit most Americans. And he pushed back on claims that he undermined Hillary Clinton's victory and promised that he has made important reforms in his campaign infrastructure that would prevent a sexual harassment issues that plagued his 2016 run.
Sanders also promised free college tuition among other things and said, they would be paid for by hiking taxes on the rich. And speaking of taxes, Sanders made a promise about his own taxes.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
WOLF BLITZER CNN CORRESPONDENT: Will you release 10 years of your tax returns? As you know, Elizabeth Warren has decided to do that.
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS, (I-VT), U.S. PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Yes.
BLITZER: What was the delay? Why haven't you done that so far?
SANDERS: Well, you know, the delay is -- it will bore our tax returns will bore you to death. It's simply -- nothing special about them. It just was a mechanical issue. We don't have accountants at home. My wife does most of it and we will get that stuff out.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NOBLES: And on four policy, Sanders actually give President Trump credit for opening up discussions with North Korea. And on Venezuela, he said, intervention there would be the wrong decision. He also would not go as far as calling Nicolas Maduro, the leader there, a dictator. Sanders wrapped things up by saying he believes he is the candidate best positioned to beat President Trump. He just needs Democratic voters to give him that shot. Ryan Nobles, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VANIER: Well, a list of U.S. Democrats running for president in 2020 continues to grow. So far the list includes 10 confirmed candidates in the expanding Democratic field and two more politicians are exploring a possible run.
For those confirmed candidates there seems to be no shortage of Americans willing to brave ice, snow, freezing temperatures even to come out and hear them. Our Kyung Lah, went to investigate, why so many U.S. Democrats feel that they can change the Washington landscape in 2020.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KYUNG LAH, SENIOR NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT, CNN: All right. Bye, don't slip.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Bye
LAH: We are going to there to (inaudible) to hear Kamala Harris.
An hour trek from Meghan Foster and her family. An Iowa Democrat sensing a shift for 2020.
There is something different in the energy this time around. You can see it in the crowd. In South Carolina Democrats packed town
halls for Harris. They climbed closed bleachers for a view and filled the second floor balconies.
Braving blistering cold, Iowans lined up for Harris' north of Des Moines. And in New Hampshire her town hall was so full, the fire marshal closed the doors. But it is not just Harris.
[03:35:00] SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN, (D), MASSACHUSETTS: It's not enough room for everybody to get inside.
LAH: It has been happening at Elizabeth Warren's campaign stops for weeks.
SEN. KIRSTEN GILLIBRAND, (D), NEW YORK: I think health care is a right.
LAH: And Kirsten Gillibrand perched here on a restaurant booth as she spoke to an overflowed crowd in Iowa. Cory Booker has jammed his House parties from New Hampshire to Iowa. And who can forget Amy Klobuchar's determined followers standing for hours braving Minnesota's winter.
Regardless of the candidate, it is standing room only.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.
LAH: Why is that?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think that there is just a lot of excitement and curiosity about these different candidates. I think that a lot of people do realize that we absolutely have to get this right.
LAH: Of course, crowds could be just that, a crowd and not a sign of things to come, but Democrats and aims Iowa believes this does mean something and have a theory about what's driving them.
Why is this room so packed? Why is every room packed that I go to?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Trump. We want to get rid of Trump.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm nervous, I mean, I'm obviously nervous, a little bit of PTSD sort of about what happened in 2016 and I think a lot of us are afraid that it is going to happen again.
LAH: All right.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm excited. This is great. I really can't wait. She is one of my favorite candidates.
LAH: A common purpose, an early unifier in this crowd.
What's happening so far as people being drawn to you and some of your other Democratic contenders? What is happening?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think what is happening is that the American public has rightly embraced the fact that this -- their government and its future is in their hands.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think, we're all very motivated. You know, it is very real to a lot of people. So, yes, I definitely think that we're all feeling this on a very personal level.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VANIER: Now, that's Kyung Lah reporting there. Now to Chicago where the police superintendent says, there's a lot more evidence that hasn't been presented yet in the case of actor Jussie Smollett. And Eddie Johnson said again, it doesn't support Smollett's story that he was the victim of a racist homophobic attack. Smollett faces a disorderly conduct charge for allegedly filing a false police report, but Johnson said, the empires star is innocent until proven guilty.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
EDDIE JOHNSON, CHICAGO POLICE DEPARTMENT: At the very beginning when he explained and gave his version of the events to us, he described it to us and we treated it like a hate crime. You know, one of the things that I think is important to recognize is although the two attackers were masked, he was able to say, he could see around their eyes that they were white skinned or at least the one guy was a white skin person. So, that's how we approached it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VANIER: Smollett is sticking by his version of events despite mounting evidence that he orchestrated the attack.
Robert Kraft, the owner of the NFL Super Bowl champion New England Patriots is now facing two counts of soliciting prostitution. The charges come as part of a month's long investigation in Florida where authorities have been staking out day spas and massage parlors for alleged sex trafficking.
Now Kraft denies paying for sex. Though investigators say they have video of the encounters, including one on January 20th, when the Patriots played for the AFC championship.
The U.S. vice president is back from Columbia at a meeting on a crisis in Venezuela. We will have his message for strongman Nicolas Maduro next. And with hardly more than a month to go before the U.K. leave the European Union, Britain's main opposition party is talking about a new Brexit vote. We will have more on that as well. Stay with us.
[03:40:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VANIER: Peace talks to end the conflict in Afghanistan are moving into high gear in Qatar. The U.S. envoy heading up the talks tweeted Monday that he met with one of the Taliban's founders, Zalmay Khalilzad wrote earlier that this could be a significant moment. Ultimately the talks could lead to a U.S. troop withdrawal, but there's still some roadblocks before that happens. The U.S. wants to know the Taliban will not harbor terrorist groups like al-Qaeda or ISIS. And the Taliban have also been hesitant to deal directly with the Afghan government which is back by the United States.
The U.S. vice president is warning if anything happens to Venezuela's opposition leader, President Nicolas Maduro will be held responsible. Mike Pence was in Columbia on Monday for talks with Juan Guaido and the 14 nation Lima group. Pence says the U.S. stands behind Guaido 100 percent and he announced new sanctions against the Maduro government.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MIKE PENCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: What brings this together today is the recognition by all the nations gathered here that Nicolas Maduro is a usurper with no legitimate claim to power and Nicolas Maduro must go.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VANIER: Pence urged other countries to freeze Venezuelan government assets and do more to confront the Maduro regime.
In Britain now, the opposition Labor Party is raising the stakes with Brexit saying it is prepared to back a second referendum to prevent a damaging no deal exit from the European Union. Meanwhile the prospect of a delayed Brexit looms over Theresa May as she prepares to address the House of Commons in the coming hours.
But the British Prime Minister says, it is still within their grasp to leave the E.U. on time and with a deal. In Brussels, European leader argued that a Brexit extension is the way to go. CNN's Erin McLaughlin joins us now from the Belgium capital and the European capital. So, where do we stand on this? So, is a delay to Brexit now becoming likely?
ERIN MCLAUGHLIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, I've been speaking to diplomats here in Brussels, Cyril, and they really are focusing on two potential outcomes at this point. The first possible outcome is that this impasse gets resolved, that British Prime Minister, Theresa May, is able to push a deal, whatever deal she's able to reach here in Brussels finally through the House of Commons and Brexit can happen on March 29 with according to diplomats I've been talking to, a technical extension in order to provide enough time for the ratification process.
That's the easy solution in the eyes of diplomats that I've been speaking to here. And there's growing pessimism that that is not the case, that she is not going to be able to pull this off, which brings us to the second area that they're sort of focusing on right now, which is that her deal does not get through Westminster and which case rather than the United Kingdom falling off the cliff edge, so to speak.
[03:45:19] A scenario that would be economically catastrophic for both sides of the channel, both the E.U. and the U.K. The E.U. is looking very seriously at the possibility of a longer extension. Diplomats telling me that they like that extension to be months. Numbers that we've been hearing here in Brussels anywhere from nine to 22 months in terms of that extension.
That would need to be requested by the United Kingdom and according to media reports there in London, the length of the extension that Theresa May is potentially looking at is in the realm of two months, which will not be music to the ears of Brussels. They want something much longer in order for the United Kingdom to come to some sort of political resolution, to get a strong direction in terms of where they want to go and Brexit to resolve the political crisis there in the United Kingdom. So, all eyes will be on Theresa May when she addresses the House of Commons later today.
VANIER: All right. Erin McLaughlin reporting live from Brussels. Thank you very much. We will be hearing from you throughout the day. Thanks.
The high winds flooding rain, heavy snow, power outages. You name it, it's all on the current U.S. weather map. We will be back with the forecast next. Plus, the best duets were not on the Academy Awards. They're about to happen in Hanoi. We will revisit the Donald Trump- Kim Jong-un bromance after the break.
[03:50:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VANIER: The weather is nasty in many parts of the U.S. right now. This here is upstate New York where heavy winds forced the rear closure of the port of Oswego on Lake Ontario. About half a million people and nearly dozens states lost power due to strong winds. And in the West, some areas are seeing heavy rain and record snow fall. So, guess whose back. Our meteorologist, Pedram Javaheri. Pedram?
PEDRAM JAVAHERI, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Always bearing the good news over here, right? We have some rough weather, at least to have had it for the past 24 so hours across parts of the north-east and finally going to see conditions begin to improve across this region.
But hundreds wind damage report around the Northeast and of course, as Cyril just alluded to, this all has led to major disruptions, not only across that state, some of the airports, but even across here, some of the communities there. Where power outages in the peak of it. About 600,000 were out of power across the area of the north-east and also portions of the West, down to less than 200,000.
So, at least seen some improvement, but as we go, one of those areas that Cyril talk about, 80 mile per hour wind gusts, that is category one hurricane equivalent there. And notice this particular region, all of it seems 60, 70 plus mile per hour gusts. Even some of the major airport. Newark Airport, La Guardia Airport, 58 mile per hour gust and of course, you put that in at some of these runways, you are going to have delays and big-time disruptions.
A thousand plus flights were cancelled, over five thousand were delayed, much of them across the Northeast, but even some impacted out of areas of the Western U.S. But we still have some residual snow over the next couple of hours, not a significant amount though. Some of the great lakes where they are familiar with heavy snow fall could see six to eight inches. But again, not a significant band over the next couple of days.
But we do have is very much significant cold air. In fact, international falls, the icebox of the U.S. still at this hour feels like minus 32 without the wind is minus 19 degrees. So, the cold air is absolutely bottled up across portions of the plains in the upper Mid-west.
Go towards the Western U.S., the reason San Francisco was one of the most impacted airports in the country, while the Pacific moisture, it is an atmospheric river pattern that dives in, what we often call, the pineapple effect here, the pineapple express as the moisture comes.
(Inaudible) light from the Hawaiian Islands and directly that kind a lines up with northern and central California. San Francisco into southern Oregon, even unto portions of the higher elevations in California there. Get up to Mount Shasta, 14,000 feet high, forecast models here indicates seven to 11 feet of snow from between Monday to at least Wednesday night.
Really speaks to the significance of how much moisture is being pumped into this region here. An incredible amount of snow coming down across the higher elevations. And of course, you take a look with it, tremendous gusts as well. San Francisco was in fact the number one impacted airport in the country even though all the action that you saw on the video on the Northeastern U.S. there, pretty impressive. San Francisco with the winds there really feeling the brunt of these and expecting to stay gusty for at least the next 24 hours. Cyril?
VANIER: All right. Pedram Javaheri, stay strong, everyone. Spring is in three weeks. Pedram, thank you.
JAVAHERI: Thank you.
VANIER: And if you watched the Oscars, you must have seen that lovey dovey duet between Lady Gaga and Bradly Cooper. Well, that may not be the sweetest duet that you will hear this week. Jeanne Moos explains.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JEANNE MOOS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: With everyone going Gaga over Lady Gaga and Bradly Cooper, not quite consummating their Oscar duet with a kiss, we got to think about another couple preparing for their close- ups.
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Now we have this great relationship and let's see what happens.
MOOS: All eyes fixed upon them as they take center stage.
TRUMP: We see eye to eye.
I like him and he likes me. He likes me, I like him. Who knows what is going to happen.
MOOS: Heart throbs in Hanoi, will the bromance, once again blossom? President Trump treats Chairman Kim almost like a diplomatic virgin. TRUMP: He has never had a relationship with anybody from this
country. He hasn't had lost of relationship anywhere, that I don't want to rush anybody --
MOOS: After all, look what happened.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you.
MOOS: When President Trump and French President Macron rushed their bromance.
TRUMP: I like him a lot.
MOOS: They couldn't keep their hands off each other, but then disagreements arose and then the next thing you know, President Trump was breaking up by tweet.
[03:55:02] The problem is that Emmanuel suffers from a very low approval rating in France, 26 percent, Make France Great Again.
Make bromance great again.
TRUMP: Donald Trump Kim Jong-un said some terrific things about me.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Great maybe he will sign your (BEEP).
MOOS: Will it turn out to be just a shallow relationship or is this something deep?
TRUMP: And then we fell in love, OK?
He wrote me beautiful letters and they are great letters.
But we have a special feeling.
MOOS: You can almost imagine President Trump and Kim Jong-un crooning their own diplomatic duet at the piano. The Lady Gaga may have bigger hands.
MOOS: Jeanne Moos, CNN --
TRUMP: We fell in love.
MOOS: New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VANIER: One more thing before we wrap this up. Do you remember Samuel L. Jackson in the movie snakes on a plane?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Enough is enough. I have had it with these (BEEP) snakes on this (BEEP) plane.
(END VIDEO CLIP) VANIER: OK. We have a pitch for the sequel. It could be called
serpent in a shoe. A Scottish woman found a python curled up in her shoe in her luggage. The snake was taken safely to an animal rescue center in Edinburgh. There is no word on where the passenger was taken.
All right. Thank you so much for joining us this hour. I'm Cyril Vanier. Early Start is next for viewers here in the U.S., for everyone else, stay tune, you've got more news with Hannah Vaughan Jones in London. Either way, you are in great hands. Have a good day.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
