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Biden Set to Deliver Speech on Foreign Policy Legacy; Wind Speeds Increase in California. Aired 1-1:30p ET

Aired January 13, 2025 - 13:00   ET

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

[13:00:00]

M.J. LEE, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Keep in mind, he is going to argue that, when he came into office four years ago, the world was a different place then and that he really made a promise to the American people and to world leaders across the globe that he was going to restore American leadership.

And based on everything we had heard, he is going to argue that he has successfully done that over the last four years, Dana.

DANA BASH, CNN HOST: Thank you so much, M.J.

Thank you for joining INSIDE POLITICS on this very busy Monday.

"CNN NEWS CENTRAL" starts after the break.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: It's truly a critical day in the fight against the L.A. fires, officials warning that wins this week could give new life to the fires that have already caused so much devastation. Nearly 100,000 people are under evacuation orders, and Cal Fire is warning evacuees that it is still not safe to return to what is left of your home.

And in one of the final speeches of his presidency, Joe Biden will take stock of his achievements when it comes to foreign affairs, knowing that president-elect Donald Trump will certainly go his own way when he takes office. The inauguration is just one week from today.

OMAR JIMENEZ, CNN HOST: And Capitol Hill will be buzzing this week, as some of Trump's Cabinet picks face their first Senate confirmation hearings, dramatic showdowns that could decide their fate.

We're following these major developing stories and many more all coming in right here to CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

KEILAR: Breaking news in the battle to contain the catastrophic wildfires that are burning across Los Angeles County.

Right now, crews are racing to gain as much ground as possible, as dangerous winds pick up speed and threaten to reverse any progress that they have made, three major fires continuing to burn at this hour, including that Palisades Fire to the west and the Eaton Fire in the northeast. Both of these are among the most destructive in California's history.

And despite gradual advances on the fire lines, neither of these are even close to being fully contained. Just take a look at this before- and-after here, on the left, the community of Pacific Palisades before flames ripped through, on the right, what is left of it. Not much.

So far, we know that at least 24 people have died. There are dozens of people who are still missing. Countless homes have been destroyed, neighborhood after neighborhood wiped out.

Let's go live now to CNN's Stephanie Elam, who is in Malibu.

Stephanie, tell us what you're seeing there.

STEPHANIE ELAM, CNN CORRESPONDENT: For one thing, the winds are starting to pick up, because, like, five seconds before you came to me, my hat got blown off. So the winds are picking up here. And that is the concern here.

We have been watching here on the Pacific Coast Highway. They have these barricades out here. This is inside the evacuation zone. So there's not just people coming through here. But what we have been watching are the mutual aid really playing out in front of us.

We have seen fire trucks coming through here from Washington state, Oregon state. I have seen some people. Some fire trucks from Nevada and Northern California, where I grew up in Santa Clara County, came through here. We are seeing fire trucks from all over, as it's really an all-hands-on-deck situation here to deal with this fire.

And I just really want to point out that this fire has burned all the way through, through these mountain passes, all the way down to the Pacific Ocean, which is just across the highway here. And you think about how terrifying it is to be somewhere this somewhat remote and have a fire burn through here and all the way across the highway.

And that's what we're seeing here, burning out cars, burning out buildings. This was a motel back here, and it is just completely demolished. And this is just one small image to give you of what it's like out here. This is just one building, right? This is just one property.

But this is multiplied over and over again inside the Palisades Fire area, also on the Altadena side at the Eaton Fire. It's really unfathomable to see this much destruction and this much loss, and now to know that we have another wind event coming up this week, nothing like what we saw last week, but still concerning.

And so that is why you hear the mayor and you hear the fire chief talking about prepositioning crews in places where they think fire may spring up. Now, here's the thing. It could be someplace else. It may not just be the Palisades Fire, the Eaton Fire. That's the concern.

So they're looking to get prepared. They say they are prepared with their sources of water as well. The good news is that the evacuation number is now under 100,000. But, at the same time, officials are saying in their latest briefing that people need to be prepared to evacuate if they need to get out of there quickly.

If we have learned anything from these emergencies is that it's really important to have that preparation already laid out before the emergency actually hits you, because that could happen in just a matter of seconds.

[13:05:08]

So, here in Malibu, the schools remain closed. In Pasadena, the schools remain closed. LAUSD, the largest school district here, is going to open up schools today, except for nine schools that have been affected, and a lot of private schools also remaining closed today, but they're trying to give a sense of normalcy for people to get their kids at least back to doing something normal, as this is the most unusual and upsetting and disturbing set of circumstances here, Brianna.

KEILAR: Yes, probably in so many of their lives.

Stephanie Elam live for us from Malibu, thank you for that report -- Omar.

JIMENEZ: Well, she was talking about wind. And it could be a major factor coming up here.

Meanwhile, the Pentagon says U.S. military aircraft have dropped more than 16,000 gallons of fire suppressant on the wildfires over the weekend. And now we're getting a firsthand look at what it's like inside the cockpit of one of those aircraft. This is a C-130, and it can drop 3,000 gallons of fire retardant in less than five seconds.

But you can see their view there and how quickly they're moving through these canyons. And the plane can be refilled and back in the air in less than 12 minutes. These aircraft are especially crucial as winds pick up today.

I want to talk more about those winds with CNN's Allison Chinchar, who's in the CNN Weather Center for us.

So, Allison, I mean, what does the forecast look like at this point, especially in regards to wind?

ALLISON CHINCHAR, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Right.

So it looks like, Omar, we're going to start to see those winds begin to pick up later on today. And, really, the peak of these winds, at least this next event, is going to be Tuesday and Wednesday of this week, So you have the wind advisories in place. That is mostly for today, those wind gusts up around 50 to 55 miles per hour.

Then, starting at 4:00 a.m. tomorrow, you have this high-wind warning in that dark red color you see there. Now we're talking those wind gusts of 60 to 70 miles per hour in some of these areas, and that is concerning. Now, it's not just the wind, but it's also taking into account the very dry air. So, when you combine the two, they have issued these red flag warnings

for those. And, again, this is the concern again, not just the winds, but also the dry air. And embedded within that red flag warning,there are three highlighted, these black circles you see here. Those are considered particularly dangerous situations.

That's what the National Weather Service is calling them, especially in these particular areas. And you will notice all three of those fires are in the red flag warning, the pink color, but we even have a fire located within one of those particularly dangerous situation highlighted areas.

So that's going to be a big concern for those firefighters going forward is being able to combat a lot of these winds as they begin to tick back up, especially the Hurst Fire, which is in that PDS black- outlined area.

Now, one bit of good news is all three of these fires have been able to see their containment numbers go up in the last few days. They got a break in the winds, especially on Saturday, and they were really able to advance in some of those containment numbers. But it's kind of a twofold here.

It's not only the winds, but also just how dry this area is. Since October 1, which marks the beginning of the water year, the brand-new water year, the L.A. area has only had three-hundredths-of-an-inch of rain. They normally would have had more than 4.5 inches of rain by this point in time.

It's also rare just because it's January. January is typically the second wettest month of the year for this area. And they have had no measurable rain in the greater L.A. area. You go back a year, this is the map of what it looked like on January 9, 2024. No portion of California was in drought.

Now you fast-forward to a year. The tan color here, moderate drought, the orange color, severe drought. So you have got a lot of that area that isn't just dealing with the very strong winds, Omar, but they're also dealing with those incredibly dry conditions.

And that dry vegetation is the perfect fuel for these fires as they continue to rage on.

JIMENEZ: And for perspective, when these fires first broke out, we were seeing gusts of up to 100 miles per hour. The winds that we're seeing coming up here aren't quite as strong, but still very strong and could cause a lot of damage and make these firefighting efforts especially difficult.

Allison Chinchar, really appreciate it -- Brianna.

KEILAR: With me now to talk more about the impacts of these devastating fires is Lucy Sherriff. She is a climate reporter based in Los Angeles who lost her home to the Palisades Fire. You are joining us, I believe, from the inside of a car, which has been something that we have seen repeated from so many folks, Lucy, that we have been interviewing.

Walk us through the events of last Tuesday, when you saw smoke on a ridgeline near your home in the morning. Tell us how that unfolded.

LUCY SHERRIFF, CLIMATE REPORTER: Yes, so I saw the smoke. I saw small flames on the ridgeline of the Santa Monica Mountains, which are up above the Palisades, at about 10:45 in the morning.

I didn't -- I was monitoring it, but I didn't think I was in any immediate danger. And then, about 40 minutes later, I had a different viewpoint of the flames, and I could see that they were jumping over the ridges into communities. And I actually saw them begin to engulf houses up on the mountains.

[13:10:06]

And within an hour of me first spotting the flames, the entire town was in complete chaos. Sunset Boulevard, which is the main road in and out of the Palisades, was completely gridlocked.

People were trying to evacuate the village. And within another 30 minutes maybe, the entire sky was orange. There was ash falling from the sky. It was complete chaos. And I eventually evacuated when a mandatory evacuation order came in for the entire Palisades. And I think I left at about 2:30 or 3:00.

KEILAR: You left, though, as I understand it, went to friends, who were ultimately impacted not long after by the Eaton Fire and you had to evacuate again?

SHERRIFF: We were poised to evacuate. We never had to evacuate, thank goodness.

But we were hosing the house down. The sky was orange again. There was ash everywhere. And we were awaiting an evacuation order. So, yes, I was looking at having to be evacuated twice in about 12 hours, which was incredibly stressful.

KEILAR: Yes, I mean, it starts to feel like no place is safe at that point.

And you -- of course, you're a climate reporter with a focus on extreme weather. So, I wonder how that was informing your experience as you were going through this.

SHERRIFF: Yes, I think I had a bit more of an understanding about how destructive these fires could be, because I know how Santa Ana winds work. I know how hard it is to fight these fires when they're in these areas.

And there -- it's very difficult for firefighters to contain blazers when you're battling that kind of wind. The really disappointing part was finding out that there wasn't a lot of water in the fire hydrants. And I just -- honestly, even as a climate reporter, I did not think that it would tear through the Palisades in the way that it did. I went back the next day and it looked like a bomb had gone off. It

was so utterly heartbreaking. The whole village is gone. And even -- yes, even I couldn't ever expect that amount of damage to be caused.

KEILAR: Yes, it's unbelievable.

And, Lucy, I understand you are about to expand your family. You are expecting a baby soon. Not a safe place to be among so many fires, I have to say. And I know that you have gone out of town. You're also a renter and you are now going to be looking for housing in what has become an impossible rental market, quite frankly.

It was already incredibly expensive there. What do you do?

SHERRIFF: I don't know. Honestly, I have -- my partner and I really don't have a long-term plan. And we're trying to battle the traumatic experience that we have just had with the practicalities of, OK, we are expecting a baby. Where are we going to live?

I don't know if we're even going to be able to live back in L.A., because there's such a small housing market. There's already been price gouging. There's -- it's going to be a fight for what's left. And I don't know if, A, we're going to be able to afford it, or, B, if we're even going to be able to find housing.

So I actually don't know what we're going to do.

KEILAR: Well, Lucy, it is a tough time to be dealing with that, as you are looking -- you're about to expand your family. And thanks for sharing your story with us. And we're thinking of you as you're figuring this out. It's really difficult.

Thank you. Lucy Sherriff, we appreciate it.

And if you do want to help those impacted by these devastating wildfires, just visit CNN.com/Impact for more information.

Here, in the next hour, President Biden will be highlighting his foreign policy work in one of the final speeches of his presidency, including intense efforts to get a Gaza hostage cease-fire deal done, something the White House now says could happen this week.

Plus, president-elect Donald Trump's Cabinet picks facing Senate confirmation hearings this week -- first up, his secretary of defense pick, who has pushed for restoring the names of U.S. military bases to those of Confederate generals. How is that going to play on Capitol Hill?

Stay with CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:18:56]

JIMENEZ: All right, everyone, welcome back. Next hour, President Joe Biden kicks off his final week in office with

a speech from the State Department focusing on his foreign policy legacy. Now, a senior administration official tells us what Biden will highlight -- that Biden will highlight his work with U.S. allies, and that he will argue he's giving the next administration a -- quote -- "stronger hand" than he inherited.

Meanwhile, Biden officials are signaling growing optimism about a cease-fire-and-hostage deal in Gaza, now saying an agreement could be finalized in the coming days.

CNN's M.J. Lee joins us now from the White House.

So, M.J., I want to start with Biden's remarks from the State Department here. What are -- what else are expecting in this particular speech?

LEE: Well, Omar, this is obviously all about cementing and highlighting the Joe Biden legacy.

We are just one week away from President Biden leaving office. And, today, based on all of the previews that we have gotten from officials here at the White House, what the president is going to do is do his best to make the case that he did real work and that his administration did real work to restore Americans' place on the global stage.

[13:20:07]

He will, of course, point to things like America's defense of Israel. He will point to its staunch defense of Ukraine, as it has been attacked by Russia. He is going to make the broad case that he has, over the course of four years, strengthened America's various alliances across the world.

It's also just going to be interesting to see how he uses this speech to discuss some of the more tougher aspects of his foreign policy legacy, including, of course, that very chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.

Jake Sullivan, who was just briefing reporters in the White House Briefing Room, he essentially made the case that he believes a president can confidently stand here today and make the case that the U.S. is the most dynamic country right now after four years of him being in office and point to things like the American economic recovery and basically say that the incoming president is getting and inheriting a better hand than what he inherited four years ago, Omar.

JIMENEZ: You know, and one of the major aspects, obviously, of his foreign policy has had to do with Israel and Gaza.

And we're getting some reporting now that Biden officials are saying a cease-fire-and-hostage deal in Gaza could be finalized before Biden leaves office. Now, look, we have heard signs of optimism over previous efforts towards similar deals. What is the latest in this instance? And do you get a sense that this might be different than previous efforts?

LEE: Yes, I do get a sense that this time it might be different.

And I have been through many rounds of where there seemed to be optimism and then things just seem to fall apart. But what our sources are telling us as of this morning and today is that U.S. officials do currently believe that a deal for a Gaza cease-fire and hostages release, that that is in sight, and that it could actually end up coming together in these final days as President Biden is preparing to leave office.

And just to give you a sense of what these negotiations have been like, essentially, we have had the Biden team and the incoming Trump team working together on the ground, including folks like the current White House Middle East coordinator, Brett McGurk, who has been in the region for the last week or so, being joined by Trump's incoming Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff.

Those two men have been in meetings together, have been pushing to get through some of these final obstacles to get to a deal, and even had, I'm told, joint phone calls with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

But, Omar, I don't have to tell you how important of a deal this will be for President Biden, who has been unsuccessfully pushing for a cease-fire for the better -- a majority of the last year or so. Being able to say that this got done under his watch is going to be a huge deal for him.

He's got this farewell speech to the nation Wednesday, but I really would not underestimate the importance of a foreign policy-focused speech for President Biden, given how important that has been for the decades that he has been in public office -- Omar.

JIMENEZ: So, of course, we're going to be keeping an eye on updates for that, but also keeping an eye out for Biden's speech, again, expected next hour, foreign policy-focused, likely to include a lot of what M.J. Lee just laid out.

M.J., really appreciate it.

Coming up: In the meantime, investigators reportedly believe they may have found the site where the devastating Eaton Fire began. We're going to take you there live for an update next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:28:05]

KEILAR: Back now to our breaking news.

Firefighters in Los Angeles are in a critical battle trying to bring these deadly wildfires under control. There are dangerous wind conditions that are on the forecast to -- through Wednesday. Those are expected to fan the flames even further, and they're threatening to incinerate even more neighborhoods. Today, fire crews are making some progress. Officials say the Eaton

Fire, which is that one that's burning north of Pasadena, is now about 33 percent contained. That is up from 24 percent on Sunday.

That is welcome news, of course, for a community that has seen more than 7,000 structures destroyed or damaged in less than a week. The Eaton Fire has killed at least 16 people. And L.A. County sheriff says that that number even is likely going to rise.

CNN's Veronica Miracle is live there in one of the communities impacted so much by this fire, Altadena.

Veronica, tell us what it's like there today.

VERONICA MIRACLE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Brianna, it's really hard to understand the scope and the scale of what has been destroyed even when you're here, because you just look out and you see all of this devastation, and it's really hard to believe.

You can see some firefighters there in the back conducting their investigations amid all of this rubble. Home after home, we see a few walls, some fireplaces, and then we come upon cars like this, where you can see that it's a car, obviously, from the outline of it, but then, if you look inside here, there's nothing left. It's all been reduced to ash.

So this is really what we're coming upon. But also what is so just hard to imagine and believe as well is that just, right across the street, you're seeing homes that are still standing. And that's because of the precarious nature of these fires and the winds.

They're blowing in all different directions. When that wind event was happening, some homes were spared, and entire blocks are still standing. And that's why you have crews here right now working. I just spoke with one of the linemen, who's saying that they are repairing these power lines.