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New Day

Charles Barkley Stirs Up Controversy; Hawaii Lava Flow Threatens Homes; Washington State Shooting Details Emerge

Aired October 28, 2014 - 08:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: All right, here we go with the five things you need to know for your new day.

At number one, Amber Vinson, the second Dallas nurse who contracted Ebola treating Thomas Eric Duncan, she will be released this afternoon from Emory University Hospital in Atlanta.

There are new details about the moments leading up to the Washington high school shooting emerging now. The county sheriff says Jaylen Fryberg sent text messages trying to lure his victims to sit at the same lunch table in the cafeteria, where they were ultimately shot.

Iraqi Peshmerga fighters will enter the besieged Syrian city of Kobani today or tomorrow, helping to battle ISIS. This after ISIS released this new video showing British hostage John Cantlie, claiming Kobani is now under the terror group's control.

Midterm elections just a week away. Troubling signs, though, for Democrat. A new CNN/ORC poll finds nearly seven in 10 Americans disapprove of the country's direction, and more than half disapprove of the president's performance.

And the wait is finally over. The NBA season tipping off tonight with the world champion San Antonio Spurs hosting the Dallas Mavericks. The Spurs will receive their championship rings in a ceremony right before the game.

We do update those five things to know. So be sure to visit newdaycnn.com.

Right now we want to turn to Hawaii. Lava flow from Kilauea volcano is now threatening dozens of homes on the big island. Residents have started evacuating homes and there has been reports of looting as that lava inches closer and closer, now within clear sight of some homes. Our Martin Savidge is in Hawaii with the very latest.

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It's the middle of the night here. And let me give you a point of reference. See that white building there? Just above it, if the camera could see it, is a slight orange glow and a plumb of smoke. That is the lava. It's maybe about 1,500 feet away. This is as close as we can safely get according to the authorities. The lava is actually within 70 feet of the nearest home and that is the road block which suggests the way the lava's flowing, right across this road, the main road in town.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SAVIDGE (voice-over): Lava on main street, in Pohoa, on the big island, a 2,000 degree river of molten rock is just a few hundred feet away from the town and there is no way to stop it. Residents are on a moment's notice to evacuate as the super-heated stone threatens the town of 950.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Everyone including myself is quite nervous. We can't see the future. The flow does what the flow does.

SAVIDGE: Hawaii's famous Kilauea volcano has continuously erupted since 1983. Usually the spectacular lava flows pour south, eventually reaching the sea. But in June, a new flow started heading the opposite way, to the northeast, the dark, oozing mass consuming everything in its path. And experts say the lava has picked up speed as it heads directly for Pahoa. Hawaii's governor signing a request asking for a presidential disaster declaration and for federal aid.

BILLY KENO, HAWAII ISLAND MAYOR: As it gets closer, the key is communication with the community, keeping people informed and everybody continue to work around the clock.

SAVIDGE: Officials going door to door warning residents as the flow inches dangerously close. Already some roads have been forced to close as the lava overtakes them. With many residents fearing they'll be cut off, Hawaii County is rebuilding alternate gravel roads around the expected path of the lava. People downwind from the smoke have been advised to stay indoors.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I have asthma myself and the smoke conditions, if they increase, are going to be hard on some people.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SAVIDGE: A slight bit of good news, the lava flow has slowed, but unless it either stops or changes direction, the same force of nature that created the Hawaiian Islands could very well destroy this town.

Back to you.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Incredible, incredible story. We'll watch that.

Also, there are startling, new details about the high school freshman who went on that deadly shooting spree in Washington state. We'll ask two officials from Marysville how the town is coming along on the heels of this tragedy.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: And Charles Barkley. Shocker, he said something controversial and about the black community? No! We have what he said and what members of the black community think about it coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) CAMEROTA: New details are coming to light about the high school freshman who opened fire inside his Washington state high school cafeteria, killing two students and critically wounding three others. Reportedly all the victims were asked by the shooter that morning to meet in the lunchroom. We're also hearing from family members about the courageous, young teacher who confronted the gunman.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONT HATCH JR., GRANDFATHER OF SHOOTING VICTIM NATE HATCH: A teacher was really a hero more than, you know, I think is being said. She did a lot -- intervene a lot at the end, towards the end. Everybody else run away. She ran to, and really made things happen. She's a hero's hero.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Joining us this morning from Marysville, Washington are Becky Berg, she's the superintendent of the Marysville School District, and Chief Rick Smith of the Marysville Police Department.

It's nice to see both of you this morning. We know this has been a heartbreaking week for your community there.

Chief, I want to start with you and just get any new information that you can share with us, including whether or not your department has learned anything about how the shooter tried to prearrange a meeting in the lunchroom of the victims.

CHIEF RICK SMITH, MARYSVILLE POLICE DEPARTMENT: At this point, I don't have any further information. The Snohomish Multi-Agency Response Team is doing the investigation. We are being kept up to speed with everything that you are as it's being released as well. We have the same information that you have at this time.

CAMEROTA: Superintendent Berg, can you tell us how the students in your school district are coping with this and when school might open again?

BECKY BERG, SUPERINTENDENT, MARYSVILLE SCHOOL DISTRICT: Certainly. We're grieving. This is a tragedy that kids shouldn't have to go through. And so we've pulled the high school kids together from Marysville-Pilchuck, beginning to support them with grief counseling and drop-in centers. And then school will be open again on Monday.

CAMEROTA: Superintendent Berg, it's always heart wrenching when we have to report on any school shooting, but this one in particular seems important to talk about because he doesn't fit the mold. He wasn't a loaner. He wasn't an outcast. He was the homecoming prince this year. He was a popular student. How do you make sense of what happened?

BERG: I can't make sense of what happened in any school shootings. There are answers that we may never know about this one and our job right now is to heal and to move forward as a community. CAMEROTA: Chief, it seems as though, from what we've read, that this

shooter was suffering from a breakup, a heartbreak of some kind. And, in fact, over the past two months, he sent out a series of tweets sort of suggesting that he was feeling emotional or depressed or in anguish somehow. Let me read some of those to you and to our viewers.

This -- the first one was from August 20th. It says, "you're going to piss me off and then some blanks going to go down and I don't think you'll like it." The next one, the same day, August 20th. He says, "I hate that I can't live without you." The next one is almost a month later in September, he asks, "did you forget she was my girlfriend?" And that same day he says "dude, she tells me everything and now I blanking hate you. You're no longer my bother."

Chief, this is sort of normal teenage stuff, but somehow this one became violent. What do you do as a police chief in the community to deal with regular teenage stuff and try to prevent something like this from ever happening?

SMITH: Well, I think one, in this particular case, we don't have all the facts. So there have been a number of things that have been put out there based on social media, and we understand that that's a part of the world that we live in now. I think for us, really looking back and seeing what we need to do now to move forward is working with the community, working with kids.

Dr. Berg and I have talked. There are several things that we're going to be looking at doing in the future in terms of working together. So it's about focusing our energy and our efforts on healing, on moving forward with this, on grieving. We have to grieve. You know, our community is physically tired, emotionally spent, but we are mentally focused and we're getting spiritually recharged. So those are the things where -- how we're trying to move forward as a community.

CAMEROTA: And, Dr. Berg, what can you ever do? Again, my point is, is that teenagers are impulsive. Teenagers do get their hearts broken. What will you - what can you do differently going forward?

BERG: We're looking at the all of that, but I think this is a good reminder that schools take care of the heart and mind, and we do the best we can to educate our kids but we need to be in relationship with them, and we need to understand them, and be able for them to be honest with us, and that part of schooling is vital.

CAMEROTA: That's such a great point. Dr. Berg, can you tell us about the teacher, the woman who is being hailed as a hero, Megan Silberberger and how she knew to do what she did?

BERG: I really don't know all the details about that. I do know that all of our staff and all of our teachers and cafeteria worker and custodians and para-educators really did exactly what they needed to do on that day. And they didn't go into this work to have to do that. They went into this work to support kids and their learning. But we are so proud of our staff, they saved so many lives.

CAMEROTA: Yes, the training and drilling that schools have, unfortunately, had to do does end up saving lives at the end of the day.

SMITH: Yes, it does.

CAMEROTA: Becky Berg and Chief Rick Smith, thanks so much for being with us. Our hearts are with you. Take care of the students out there.

BERG: Thanks. We will, Alisyn.

SMITH: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: Thank you.

Let's go over to Chris.

CUOMO: An important situation to stay on top of for sure.

So, here's another situation for you. Charles Barkley, never one to mince words, right? Sometimes he makes mincemeat of political correctness though and that seems to be what he's doing right now. What he said about the black community and why many are saying he went too far, even for him.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PEREIRA: Good to have you back with us here on NEW DAY.

Former NBA star Charles Barkley stirring up controversy once again. He has some harsh words for the African-American community in response to a report in the "Bleacher Report" in fact some black Seattle Seahawks players think that their quarterback Russell Wilson isn't quote, "black enough" leading to some tension developing in the locker room. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHARLES BARKLEY, FORMER NBA PLAYER: So it's a dirty, dark secret in the black community, one of the reasons we're never going to be successful as a whole because of other black people. And for some reason, we are brainwashed to think if you're not a thug or an idiot, you're not black enough. If you go to school, make good grades, speak intelligent and don't break the law, you're not a good black person.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PEREIRA: So, inflammatory rhetoric or an honest attempt to make a fair point?

Here to weigh in on Barkley's commentary, cultural critic and writer, Michaela Angela Davis. We have a couple of Michaelas here, this is going to be fun. And Van Jones, CNN political contributor -- Van thanks so much for joining the conversation as well.

This is nothing new, Michaela. This is nothing new at all but never going to be successful because of other blacks? What do you make of this?

MICHAELA ANN DAVIS, CULTURAL CRITIC AND WRITER: Yes, it's disappointing I think.

PEREIRA: You're disappointed.

DAVIS: I'm disappointed in him using such a powerful platform to have such a simplistic view and to kind of perpetuate these narrow tropes about black people being monolithic when we're such a diverse, you know, population. We're everything from Charles Thomas to Renee Cox.

PEREIRA: Fair point. But does he have a point about this notion of not being black enough? I know that you and I both have been accused of that on occasion.

DAVIS: Girl, look, I mean I literally get cause of not being literally black enough by a few people. I get far more support -- my journey is littered with black people who have helped me along, who inspire me, who encourage me, who have educated me. So what is disappointing and problematic is that he does not tell a mixed story -- right. And that it is very narrow in that it is easier to look at the failings of black people than to really look at the brutal history and the complicated systems that have failed them.

PEREIRA: You wanted more nuance.

DAVIS: Sure.

PEREIRA: Van, what about you? What did you make of all of this? Because it's a sort of reaction to a situation that is unrelated -- give me your thoughts.

VAN JONES, CNN POLITICAL CONTRIBUTOR: First of all, black people did not invent jealousy. That's a feature of every community. The idea that black on black jealousy is the reason that we are having the problems we have is ludicrous. It's ridiculous. I am a relatively successful guy at this point in my life.

PEREIRA: You're doing all right.

JONES: I'm doing all right, you know. Ivy League education, I'm doing pretty good. Everywhere I go, African-Americans come to me and say hey, we're proud of you, keep going, hang in there. I get so much support and affirmation from the African-American community and you have a couple of haters.

But you know what? We didn't invent that. Part of the problem is if you look at what he said, he said the reason that we're not successful is because of black on black jealousy, and that people want to go to jail. I think that is a horrific thing for any black person to say.

I went to Yale. I saw a lot of kids doing drugs at Yale. They didn't go to prison. They went to rehab. I saw kids four blocks away, same age group they went to prison because they were poor, because they were black. They couldn't afford to get lawyers. A lot of people commit crimes but the African-American community and other poor communities wind up doing time.

The problem when you say where people want to go, that is absolutely not true and we need to be very, very clear, our criminal justice system needs to be improved to be more fair. Don't start making it seem like it's something fashionable when it's not. It's not and it's a --

(CROSSTALK)

PEREIRA: I see Charles' picture above you and I know the thing that he would agree with, that you agree with Van and Michaela you agree and I agree with is we all want better for the black community. We want to do better as a black community. Is this -- you know, I look at Charles and think this is just Charles being Charles. Chris even said, we know he says controversial things.

DAVIS: But it's a little creepy that he said this is what I tell my white friends. That part was creepy to me. Like is it easier to, you know, use black shame to appease the guilt of his white friends? The way that he couched it was problematic and it didn't seem that he was as interested in inspiring young black people than shaming them. And I think that's the (inaudible) trope. This isn't a dirty dark secret. People have been telling young black people to pull up their pants and shame them and use their failings as a way to somehow talk about a very complicated system that is just outdated.

PEREIRA: Some say that shaming might motivate you.

DAVIS: Does shaming motivate you?

PEREIRA: It sure does not.

DAVIS: I mean really. And also if you're looking at people that have already been oppressed, why would you use the heavy -- lift them up, talk about all those young people in Ferguson showing up for social justice every day in the same sentence.

PEREIRA: Go ahead. I did want to put a football question in here. Go ahead. Go ahead.

JONES: Well, what I do want to point out is, if you do want to talk about young African Americans, 25 percent of all African-American men over the age of 21 are veterans. We never talk about that. My dad got out of the hood by joining the military. We have so many positive things you could say, why say that?

PEREIRA: Right. I want to sort of end on this, because what I am concerned about is that an issue in a ball club in a football club, an issue of whether this brother was down enough, was he down enough for the other black players on the team or was he too close to the guys in the head office, is what set off this chain of events.

DAVIS: So it's a class, power thing.

PEREIRA: It's a class power struggle, essentially, is it not?

DAVIS: Yes. I think often these are class issues -- right. The kinds of things that he says that people say often have been in a certain segment of the community. So I think the class and race issues are often conflated I feel and he's expressing that. You know what Van said was it doesn't just happen in the black community. We have a lot of the Tea Party talking about the elites.

PEREIRA: Sure.

DAVIS: We didn't write the book on shame and guilt and jealousy.

PEREIRA: No. But we wanted to talk about it here with two people that I like a whole lot. I love Charles Barkley, too.

Van Jones, good to have you, thanks for sticking around for this. Get rid of that bug in your throat.

Michaela, I love to be double Michaela on the set. This is a good day for me.

DAVIS: Lots of Michaelas.

PEREIRA: All right. I appreciate it.

DAVIS: Thank you.

PEREIRA: Great conversation, guys -- Chris.

CUOMO: I can't get enough Michaela.

CAMEROTA: You never have too much Michaela. No is the answer.

CUOMO: I also can't get enough of "The Good Stuff" and we have a good for you. A San Diego man takes his motorcycle to work, that's cool. He always uses a helmet cam. That's cool, too, but what he captured is cooler than cool not just ice cold, it is "The Good Stuff" coming up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CUOMO: Doesn't that get you going? You're an American.

All right. It is time for "The Good Stuff". Today's edition Rhino Hootin' -- I mean just by name alone, he's the good stuff. He always wears a helmet cam riding his motorcycle to work just in case he gets in an accident. I'm not sure how the helmet cam would help with that but it did capture this. An overturned car with a driver trapped inside. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When she was snared in that seat belt, that was wrapped around her upper body and just her suffocating was the one that I thought, because she was panicking, she couldn't get out.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: That's Rhino. Another driver who had also stopped to help was calling for a knife to cut her seatbelt because her weight was against the belt. See? So Hootin', of course, named Rhino has a knife on him, quickly frees the driver with a pocket knife, just as smoke starts coming from the car. Hootin's footage went viral -- 600,000 views. That's amazing. But for Hootin', he's not about the attention. He says that's a surprise.

What he says he did just came naturally.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's crazy. It's crazy and flattering. It's just being human, I suppose.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PEREIRA: We love humans like that.

CAMEROTA: We do.

CUOMO: He is the best of humanity.

PEREIRA: Yes.

CUOMO: And he's named Rhino. He is "The Good Stuff".

PEREIRA: Amen.

CUOMO: Thank you sir, Rhino.

A lot of news. Let's get you to the "NEWSROOM", Carol Costello -- nickname not "Rhino".