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At Least 19 Dead After Tornadoes Rip Through 4 States; Donald Trump Heckled And Booed At Libertarian Convention; Ground Stop Issued At Atlanta Airport Due To Severe Weather; Former "General Hospital" Actor Johnny Wactor Fatally Shot In L.A.; Tomorrow: Trump Attorneys To Begin Closing Arguments First. Aired 9-9:30a ET

Aired May 27, 2024 - 09:00   ET

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

[09:00:00]

LT. GEN. MARK HERTLING (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: -- a lot of veterans who come home from the wars think about when they're remembering their fallen comrades. It's not only an earning that, but it's making it matter, as I say, in an article that I wrote, a term that my boss, General Marty Dempsey used.

We have to make it matter that we've lived and that they've sacrificed. And we have to help them by not only remembering their memories and what great people they were, but also the families that over the last in my case, 20 years, 40 years, 50 years, whatever, the veteran died, it was 20 years for me, where you have to remember the families who have been without their loved ones over that period of time and how much they've mourned for him.

So it's making it matter for the nation, trying to bring our divisive society together and move forward, defending our democratic values.

BIANNA GOLODRYGA, CNN HOST: Such poignant words as we are thankful for and continue to think of those who sacrificed their lives in protecting this country and of course our gratitude to their families.

Lieutenant General Mark Hertling, thank you so much for your time.

A new hour of CNN News Central starts now.

RAHEL SOLOMON, CNN HOST: More than 120 million people in the path of severe weather today as dozens of communities across four states clean up after deadly storms, all of it amid life threatening heat.

After more than five weeks, it all comes down to this. Prosecutors and defense attorneys in Donald Trump's hush money trial are preparing to present their closing argument tomorrow.

And honoring those who served, the nation remembering America's fallen heroes on this Memorial Day.

I'm Rahel Solomon, along with Bianna Golodryga, and this is CNN News Central. This morning, millions of Americans are on alert this Memorial Day after a deadly tornado outbreak rips through America's heartland. The deaths told this morning now standing at 19. That's after violent storms devastated areas of Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, and Kentucky. This tornado near Eddyville, Kentucky caught on camera as it struck overnight. A state of emergency there now declared.

And the threat also not over. More than 120 million people could see severe storms today as the system tracks eats. Life-threatening heat also an issue.

Let's bring in CNN's Ed Lavandera who is standing by one of the hardest hit areas in Texas. Ed, I mean, it's the heat as we talked about and now the long road to recovery there.

ED LAVANDERA, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, and people still recovering. You know, there were seven people killed in this area near the city of Valley View in North Texas, north of Denton in the Dallas Fort Worth area. And we spoke with the brother of some of the victims.

And the Esparza (ph) family was in a trailer. You see those two trucks in the trees behind me. There was a family of four mother, father, two children. Their trailer was blown by the winds of this storm more than 100 yards and the cars and the remnants you see here is what is left of that trailer.

The mother and the two children were killed. We spoke with Benito Esparza (ph) just a short while ago. He was out here this morning looking for some of the belongings of his brother who has a broken hip and a broken leg, is in the hospital. It was another one of his children who broke the news to him yesterday that his wife and two children had been killed. It's just a simply devastating day for this family.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LAVANDERA: He says this is the remnants of his brother's family's home that was thrown more than 100 yards by this tornado. And this is where they ended up. And his brother was left over in this debris over here, and his sister-in-law and niece and nephew were left underneath this car.

He arrived here on the scene. The three of them were already dead. And he took his brother, loaded him up into his truck, and drove him out of this neighborhood to get him to the hospital.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LAVANDERA: You know, just the horror and the emotion. He says he's trying to be very strong for his brother and his family and hasn't let the kind of the emotion of all of this get to them. He said that Saturday night is this storm had hit in the darkness were held. He had raced out here from several miles away.

And then this is where he discovered his family. And as he told us there and described to us, there was -- it was just so chaotic and he was able -- when he arrived here on the scene, his sister-in-law and niece and nephew were gone. And he was trying to get his brother to the hospital where he still is recovering from those injuries. But you can imagine just the horror of what he saw when he pulled up here Saturday night.

[09:05:04]

SOLOMON: Yes, absolutely. And looking at these pictures, I mean, you see the personal belongings, you see even a box of cereal, just awful, just tragic.

Ed Lavandera live for us there in Texas. Thank you. Bianna?

GOLODRYGA: Chase Oliver won the Libertarian Party's nomination Sunday after seven rounds of voting at the party's convention in Washington, D.C. The 38-year-old candidate, who has run for Congress multiple times in Georgia, appealed to the voters by focusing on bringing Libertarian values to a broader audience.

Both Donald Trump and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. both spoke at the convention over the weekend, with Trump facing loud booing throughout his speech. While Trump attended and spoke, he didn't actually submit the paperwork needed to be considered as a nominee when it came time for the party to vote.

So joining me now is CNN Political Commentator Kate Bedingfield and Republican strategist Doug Heye. Welcome both of you. Great to see you. It's rare that we start a segment talking about the Libertarian Convention but yet here we are.

Doug, let me ask you first to respond to why Donald Trump felt the need to show up in the first place and the fact that he received such a negative welcome there from the booing. What does that tell you about a part of this country and the voters that he's looking to appeal and the fact that they want nothing to do with him?

DOUG HEYE, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, you know, so often, Bianna, we talk about politics being like football, a game of inches. And what Donald Trump is trying to do in this campaign is take an inch here and take an inch there. Take an inch from Michigan African American voters or Muslim voters, as his campaign just met with. Take an inch here or there with Libertarian voters.

And that could be a very successful strategy. If I'm a Democrat, I'm worried about that. Clearly, the ones who are the most committed who are in that room are not there for Donald Trump, they didn't like him, they didn't like his message, but there's a larger audience. And what he is saying is ultimately in a way what he said in 2016 when he said Hillary Clinton says I'm with her while I'm with you. That's a message that can resonate.

And again, when we're talking about a campaign that's a game of inches, that's where Democrats should be worried about Donald Trump right now.

GOLODRYGA: Kate, do you agree? I mean, this is a real concern here, not only for Republicans, but also Democrats, given how close this race appears to be. President Biden is the incumbent here. There's still, though, a lot of concern about what role Robert F. Kennedy Jr. could play in being the spoiler.

KATE BEDINGFIELD, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, I definitely agree that this is a game of inches, and this campaign is going to be very close. No question about it. I don't think that what the Trump campaign did in sending Trump to this convention was smart or strategic. To me, it was indicative of a campaign that's sort of flailing and a little desperate and a little concerned about where where they are and clearly very concerned about RFK Jr.

I mean, you just -- the fact of the matter is, you don't send your candidate into an audience where you know they're going to get booed and jeered for half an hour. And you saw Trump cut his speech short and walk off stage. I mean, he could tell that he wasn't getting the reception that he hoped he would get.

So, you know, from a campaign strategic perspective, this was an absolute flop. I am sure there's a lot of accountability going on, shall we say, today in accounting for how this all went down.

All that being said, yes, of course, Democrats should be concerned as should the Republicans about what we're seeing from Robert Kennedy Jr. and the numbers that he's been able to pull in some of these key states. Remember, Joe Biden won the election in 2020 by about 45,000 votes in Arizona, Wisconsin and Georgia. That is a thin margin. And I think both campaigns should be cognizant of what Kennedy could potentially do in some of these swing states.

GOLODRYGA: Kate, let me stick with you about the two most pressing issues that voters are concerned about right now, and that is the economy and that is immigration. Looking at the numbers, the economy appears to be doing rather well.

Unemployment is at 3.9 percent. There are 8.5 million job openings. But almost every single poll you look at, you see the president really struggling here. And for over a year and a half, despite the fact that we've started to see inflation, start to cool a bit. The messaging out of the White House has been, it's not yet time until we get closer to the election.

Then you're going to see voters really turn around. The president's going to be really focused on this issue and the attention and the praise that he receives from Democrats about his handling of the economy will finally be noticed. We're not there yet, Kate. So what needs to change?

BEDINGFIELD: Well, I think the president needs to lean into some of what he does best, which is empathy, which is an understanding a connection with what's going on in people's lives. Both of these things are true. The economy is stable. It is stronger than economists were forecasting two years ago that it was going to be at this point.

However, people aren't feeling it as intensely in their day to day lives in part because prices are high. And so what the president needs to do is lean into both an understanding of what people are feeling, which he's excellent at doing.

[09:10:01]

But he also needs to talk about how he's got their backs, how he's the fighter. You know, you hear him -- you heard him in the 2020 campaign really kind of set the contrast as you know, Main Street versus Park Avenue, Trenton versus Park Avenue.

GOLODRYGA: Yes.

BEDINGFIELD: And you've heard him do that a little bit in this campaign, Scranton versus Mar-a-Lago. So, the more he can frame this is not a referendum on what he's been able to do in terms of the economy, but the fact that he's a fighter, he cares about you, Donald Trump only cares about himself. That is a more successful economic frame, I think.

GOLODRYGA: And yet Doug, you continue to say that the economy itself is Biden's biggest deficit.

HEYE: Absolutely. You know, when we look at polling, you know, national polls don't really exist in presidential elections or don't mean anything. But when we look at specific issues, jobs and the economy and prices, Joe Biden is underwater massively. And, yes, you know, if you look at the jobs numbers and only the jobs numbers or the Dow, the economy is in a great place.

But then if you go and buy a sandwich, if you go to a grocery store, if you buy anything, not only do you realize that your economy, your personal economy is not in a great place, but you're angry about it, and you want to blame somebody. And this, I think, is ultimately the problem for Biden, is voters are mad anytime they spend money on anything, and Biden's not able to get out there the way that Kate talks about.

You know, in politics, often you want your candidate to be their best advocate, and so often we don't see Joe Biden out there. The best example of this, Bianna, was Super Bowl Sunday. The White House said, we're not going to put Joe Biden on a national interview because we don't want to politicize the day. OK, fine.

Nobody really wants to see the president on Super Bowl Sunday anyways. But instead, they put a canned video out there about Dorito equity.

GOLODRYGA: Yes.

HEYE: Voters are mad, and Joe Biden can't talk about these things the way he should.

GOLODRYGA: Well, listen, Kate, Doug, voters will have a chance to see both candidates duke it out right here on CNN in about a month to take up some of these issues we discussed today. Thank you so much.

Rahel?

HEYE: Thank you. BEDINGFIELD: Thank you.

SOLOMON: All right. Coming up, former "General Hospital" actor Johnny Wactor shot and killed in Los Angeles. What police are saying led up to the incident?

Plus, officials in Papua New Guinea continue to look for survivors after a massive landslide may have buried as many as 2,000 people.

And live pictures now of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C. Today, of course, is Memorial Day, a time to remember and honor the U.S. military members who paid and made the ultimate sacrifice while serving this country. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:17:14]

SOLOMON: Welcome back. If you're watching this and you have travel plans today, you might want to get an early start. Experts are predicting a record number of travelers on the road and in the sky this Memorial Day. AAA says that it could total nearly 44 million people during the all-time record.

The TSA announced that on Friday, it's screened nearly 3 million travelers at checkpoints nationwide, the most ever recorded in a single day. But today, many flights could be impacted by severe storms across the country. Up until a few minutes ago, Hartsfield-Jackson Airport in Atlanta was at a ground stop, potentially affecting thousands of travelers.

Let's bring in CNN's Pete Muntean, who is live for us at Reagan National Airport. Pete, what's the latest here? What are you seeing?

PETE MUNTEAN, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: Well, the storms could throw a bit of a wrench into this, Rahel, after this huge rush home following these gangbusters numbers we saw leading into this holiday weekend. The TSA record to beat was set the Sunday after Thanksgiving.

Thursday was a huge number. 2.9 million people screened by TSA at airports nationwide came shy of the record by only about 11,000 passengers. Then Friday, 2.95 million people screened at airports nationwide. That is the new number to beat for air travel nationwide really sort of goes into today.

2.7 million people expected to be screened at airports nationwide today. So not as big, a lot of people extending their holiday weekend into Tuesday and Wednesday if they have the flexibility. The real question now is how the air travel system will do this summer. And this really foreshadows a bubble that is showing no signs of bursting here.

I want you to listen now to Rebecca Spicer of Airlines for America. And the airline's big concern is that the air traffic control system is short about 3,000 air traffic controllers. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REBECCA SPIDER, AIRLINES FOR AMERICA: We do remain concerned about the staffing in the ATC system, and there are towers, especially here in the New York area that desperately need additional staff. The secretary himself has said that the towers are about 3,000 people short across the country, and we are hoping that there are solutions to get people hired and trained and into those towers quickly.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MUNTEAN: Of course, weather is always the X factor. You mentioned the departure delay that is still in place right now at Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport. The ground stop is over. So that's impacting flights leaving Atlanta. There is also the potential ground stops all up and down the east coast from Boston to Charlotte today. So we'll keep an eye on that as well, Rahel.

SOLOMON: All right. Pete Muntean at Reagan National Airport. Pete, thank you.

Bianna?

GOLODRYGA: This morning, police in Los Angeles are searching for the suspects involved in a shooting that killed a former "General Hospital" actor. Johnny Wactor was fatally shot early Saturday morning after police say he walked up on an attempted robbery.

[09:20:08]

CNN's Camila Bernal joins me now with the latest. What more are we hearing?

CAMILA BERNAL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Bianna, so what happens here is that three people were trying to steal his car's catalytic converter when he approached them and that's when he was shot. This happened at around 3:25 in the morning on Saturday. And his mother saying that he was actually leaving work, a rooftop bar in downtown L.A.

His mother spoke to our affiliate KBC saying that after he left work, he got to his car and thought that there were maybe people working on his car. He said maybe his car was getting towed. But as he approached these people to talk to them and try to figure out what was happening, the suspect looked up and shot him.

Authorities not confirming his death by name, but they did give some details into what happened here and specified that it was three people that were trying to steal that catalytic converter. He was shot and then taken to the hospital, and that's where he later was pronounced dead.

Now, as authorities continue this investigation and try to find the three people responsible, the soap opera community really coming together to remember him. He was just 37 years old. He is most known for being on "General Hospital" from 2020 to 2022. So more than 150 episodes of the show. And the show also releasing a statement saying this, "The entire "General Hospital" family is heartbroken to hear of Johnny Wactor's untimely passing. He was truly one of a kind and a pleasure to work with each and every day. Our thoughts and prayers go out to his loved ones during this difficult time."

Now, the actor -- actress who played his wife, also saying that she is heartbroken by this. The entire really acting community just shocked by what happened here, Bianna.

GOLODRYGA: Yes, another senseless shooting.

Camila Bernal, thank you.

Well, after six weeks of testimony, jurors in the former President Trump's criminal hush money case could begin deliberations as soon as tomorrow.

Plus, a man is in custody after allegedly stabbing four girls in a Massachusetts movie theater. Police believe he may be connected to a murder in another state. We're hearing from the mother of three of those girls straight ahead.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LISA DEMBOWSKI, MOTHER OF 3 GIRLS STABBED IN MASSACHUSETTS: I understand mental health. I'm a counselor. I understand it. I think it's a pretty sick individual to harm people.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:27:19]

SOLOMON: We welcome you back with a live look at Arlington National Cemetery this Memorial Day morning, where in just a few hours, President Biden will be laying a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. The president will then deliver remarks as Americans today pause to remember and honor those who died while serving our nation.

And tomorrow, prosecutors will make their final case in Donald Trump's criminal hush money trial. Closing arguments are said to get underway tomorrow morning with defense attorneys going first. When both sides finish, the judge will instruct the jury and jurors may begin deliberations as early as Wednesday.

Joining us now, CNN Legal Analyst and former U.S. Attorney Michael Moore. Michael, always good to see you. Michael, you have said that there is an art --

MICHAEL MOORE, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Good to see you.

SOLOMON: There is an art to telling the story, telling the story of your case. So let's imagine for a moment that you are the prosecution, lay out the case, lay out the closing argument. MOORE: Well, I've been a little negative on some of the case from the prosecution side all along. But I think if I were the prosecutor, I would start to talk about, you know, that you don't -- jurors don't leave their common sense at the door. And so, they're allowed to consider and you as a jury would be allowed to consider those things that start to fall into place and to not be distracted by these red herrings that the defense keeps throwing at.

So, for example, you have this mountain of paperwork and you have this sheet showing how the payments were to be broken down. You have about 20 witnesses coming before the court to tell the truth and swearing that this is what happened and how they saw Donald Trump signing checks and how they knew that he micromanaged his company.

And they all know that, the jury knows this. And so, I would talk about those strong points of the case while at the same time, reminded them not to be distracted by this claim about Michael Cohen, that he's just a piece, you know, and you can have a jigsaw puzzle that could be missing the corner piece.

But guess what? You could see what the puzzle is, even though that one piece may be frayed some water, bent somewhat on the ends, it doesn't change the whole picture. And I think at that point, the jury will start to understand that. And, you know, it's going to be important that they not talk too long.

You know, that's all of your calendar that came up just a moment ago, talking about how long the arguments might go. If they try to talk for a day or five hours or whatever it is each on each side, that's too long. This jury has been sitting there. They know the facts.

They've heard the testimony --

SOLOMON: Yes.

MOORE: -- they've seen the exhibits. And so now they just need warriors to tie it together on each side. They've got to sort of --

SOLOMON: Yes.

MOORE: -- use this to bring the corners together to make, you know, a solid package and explain and argue to them, actually make an argument about why pieces of evidence were important and why witness test was important, and that's going to make a difference.

SOLOMON: So you might argue that not only is it an art to telling your story, it's an art to knowing how much to say, how long to talk --