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Alabama's New Immigration Law; Firefighters Attempt To Contain Arizona Wildfire; Newt Gingrich Loses Much of Campaign Staff; Libyan Girl Loses Her Leg in the Fighting; Texas Governor Rick Perry Reportedly Contemplating Presidential Run in 2012

Aired June 10, 2011 - 15:00   ET

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

T.J. HOLMES, CNN ANCHOR: Hey there, everybody. Good afternoon to you. I'm T.J. Holmes, sitting in today for Brooke Baldwin. And we are going to start at the top of the hour with that tough new immigration law, what some are calling even tougher than the one in Arizona that really started a lot of this conversation.

This is the one we told you about, a new law just told you about 24 hours ago right after Alabama's governor signed it, already supporters and detractors are promising a battle that could go all of the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Just a couple of things in this new Alabama law, some of the mandates that are drawing criticism, it will be a crime in Alabama to knowingly give a ride to anyone who is in the state illegally. Also, public schools must now collect documentation to determine every student's legal status.

Now, on top of this, also, some of the provisions in other states, this also does allow police officers who make a lawful stop to check the immigration status of those people that they do stop, Alabama joining Arizona, Georgia, Utah, Indiana by enacting some tough, even harsh measures to crack down on illegal immigration.

We have got two guests for you right now, one of them a mayor who supports Alabama's new law, and an a Hispanic activist who says it will harm the state's economy.

But let me begin with Mayor Lindsey Lyons, the mayor of Albertville, Alabama, one town at the center of Alabama's immigration debate. He is joining me now.

Sir, we appreciate you being here.

So tell me, tell our viewers, what problem in Albertville, I guess, will be solved by this new law?

LINDSEY LYONS, MAYOR OF ALBERTVILLE, ALABAMA: T.J., thank you for having me on your show today.

HOLMES: Yes, sir.

LYONS: And when we talk about illegal immigration and the issues that come with it, T.J., there's numerous factors. And a lot of them deal with crime issues related to that.

We have an overburdened medical facilities, overwhelmed public facilities where we educate the children in our public schools. But the bill that has passed now that the governor has signed, I'm very proud of. I believe that we have got the toughest bill in the country now, with a lot of expertise and advice from a preeminent lawyer that deals with illegal immigration, Chris Kovac (ph). And I'm certainly proud of that.

HOLMES: Well, Mr. Mayor, let me ask you and back to kind of to my original question, I guess what problem would this bill help solve? Particularly, I just want to speak specifically to and your community, but you have about 24,000 people, population in your town. Of that number, how many do you believe -- I know it is hard to get numbers, but how many do you estimate are in your town illegally?

LYONS: Probably 5,000 to 6,000.

HOLMES: Five thousand to 6,000 of them. So again what problem are they creating in your community that you believe this bill will correct?

LYONS: Well, for one, number one, it will be a job creator, T.J. We have a diverse, wide array of industry here, but we have a lot of poultry industry here as well.

HOLMES: Yes, sir.

LYONS: And, over the years, what this has done, when they found the illegal immigrant work force, a cheap work force, the industry survived way before that, OK? And -- but what it enabled the industry to do was expand and more plants would put roots here in Albertville, Alabama, to -- because they knew they could get that work force.

OK, now, what is this bill going to do for us? It's going to have an impact crime issues related to drug trafficking, brothels. We have had six brothels here in the community that has come with this. We have had traffic congestion and lack of driving knowledge with these immigrants to where we have had numerous incidents of hit-and- run accidents.

(CROSSTALK)

HOLMES: And when you say immigrants here and these things you're referring to, you think this is totally attributable and you are blaming the illegal immigrant population? That's fair to say?

LYONS: Well, the vast majority of these traffic-related incidences are with people that are here illegally in the country.

HOLMES: And, sir, where do you get your number? You gave me the estimate there, about 5,000. I believe your population there about 8,000 population Hispanic in the community, but you're saying an overwhelming majority of those are there illegally? I guess where do you come up with that number?

LYONS: Well, I will tell you this. And that is a conservative number, T.J.

HOLMES: Yes, sir.

LYONS: But do I have from a reliable source in our public hospital here in Marshall County, we do know this. Over 50 percent of the births are attributed to immigrants. And of those births, over 95 percent of those are to illegal parents.

HOLMES: Now, sir, do you think that this illegal immigration population, again, up to at least 5,000, according to your number, do you think they actually bring any good to your community? Do you think they are contributing something in a positive way to your community at all?

LYONS: Well, listen, sure. You can't paint the whole population with a broad brush, OK?

And certainly there's some economic value and there's some value there to the immigrants that want to come into America and learn and get acclimated to our culture, our way of life, our social networks, and get the good education for their children, OK? So there is some positive effects for it.

But I see this and I hear the criticism and the detractors.

HOLMES: Yes, sir.

LYONS: And they have a right to say how they feel, but on the other hand, we have a right and moral responsibility to protect our citizens and our quality of life as well.

HOLMES: And, Mr. Mayor, I have to let you go on this. And I just want to ask because this kind of -- and like you say, this conversation can sometimes go in a nasty direction with two sides pitted against each other, but this was something that one of the poultry producers in your community was attributed to saying -- and I'm quoting here -- saying 'They would love to hire white people or anybody able to work, rather than Hispanics," and saying that white people have actually gotten too lazy to work.

Do you think there is any truth to that statement in that? You hear all the time -- oftentimes, people -- or the illegal immigrants are doing work that Americans won't do. Do you agree with any part of that statement from one of the poultry producers that maybe like -- I'm quoting -- white people have gotten too lazy to work and to do this kind of work?

LYONS: Well, believe that is a cop-out, and I don't agree with that statement. There might be a smidgen of truth to it, because you have lazy individuals in any -- any nationality, OK, but I don't agree with that.

HOLMES: All right.

Mayor Lyons, we appreciate you, sir. I'm pretty sure we will be following up with you. This bill is going to go -- a law now going to go into effect in September. So, sir, we will be talking to you again. I appreciate your time today, sir.

LYONS: Thank you, sir.

HOLMES: All right, I want to turn now to Isabel Rubio, the executive director of the Hispanic Interest Coalition of Alabama.

Ma'am, thank you as well for being here.

Does the mayor have a point at all if -- I'm not sure how familiar you are with Albertville there, but if he has 8,000 in his Hispanic population and 5,000 possibly there illegally, isn't that a problem?

ISABEL RUBIO, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, HISPANIC INTEREST COALITION OF ALABAMA: T.J., thank you for the opportunity to be with you today.

HOLMES: Yes, ma'am.

RUBIO: We have got an immigration problem in our state and in our nation, but this is not a problem that we can solve, that we are equipped to solve at the state level.

We need to use this effort and push this back to the federal government, where we have elected people to represent us there and to deal with this issue at that level. It is simple as that.

HOLMES: And I hear that often, but it -- and the next thing that comes out of my mouth usually is, well, the federal government has not done anything about it in quite some time, so why not? What are these states supposed to do? If they do believe that these illegal immigration populations, these pockets are -- not all are, but are causing some kind of a strain on their community, can they really afford to sit around and wait and wait and wait?

RUBIO: Well, the issue, T.J., is really can we afford at the state level to do something? In our state, we have severe budget issues like many other states. We are asking both law enforcement officials and education officials to take on added burdens, when we know that budgets in law enforcement departments are slashed left and right and we don't even have the capacity to do what they are supposed to do at the very basic level at this point, and also asking our school officials to take on this added responsibility, when it is not in their responsibility.

So I think that I understand the frustration, but at the end of the day, this is a federal issue that really must remain in Washington and not in the state capital, in state capitals around the country.

HOLMES: And, ma'am, is there I guess a point to be made as well? And I think you say it will hurt Alabama's agricultural industry, could take a money out of Alabama with a bill like this. Why do you say that vs. a lot of people who say, well, if you take out the illegal immigrant work force, that frees up the jobs -- job that a lot of people would need right now.

RUBIO: Well, I don't think that we are talking about just jobs that might become available.

I think that we have to look at the overall impact of the message we send about who Alabama is outside the state lines across the nation and across the world. And with the recent -- you know, we have a lot of automobile manufacturers in Alabama and a lot of second-tier industries who have come here to support that work.

Are we really going to be able to sustain recruiting people from across the globe to Alabama, when we are saying that we only want certain kinds of people in our state? This bill is regressive and it really slaps in the face of all of the work that has been done around civil rights over the last 50 years.

HOLMES: Now, ma'am, would you say this country, that state, Alabama, in particular, needs the illegal immigrant population?

RUBIO: I think that immigrants are an important part of the economy in all states.

HOLMES: What about illegal immigrants?

(CROSSTALK)

RUBIO: I'm not going to -- I don't distinguish between undocumented -- or illegal immigrants and people.

(CROSSTALK)

HOLMES: Well, there has to be a distinction between the folks who are here legally and those who are not, don't you agree?

RUBIO: I'm sorry. Could you repeat your question?

HOLMES: But don't we need to make a distinction between the people who are here legally and those who are here illegally?

RUBIO: I think that we need immigration reform, and that is a separate issue from the whole jobs issue.

If you look at jobs that are being done by immigrants, you know, we can't lay at the feet of the immigrant the fact that he might be working for less than somebody else, because that's not the fault of the immigrant. That responsibility lies at the person who hired him.

So, you know, when we think about who is taking jobs, it is really not so much who is taking jobs, but who is giving jobs away for a lower price. I think that that's a question that is not being asked enough. And, you know, if we look across our country, you know, I don't know if you saw the movie "A Day Without a Mexican," but let's try to go a day without the immigrant work force in our whole country and see what happens.

HOLMES: But I guess I keep trying to make the distinction -- it's not one you want to make -- between an immigrant work force and an illegal immigrant work force. It sounds like you don't want to make that distinction, ma'am. It -- and I'm running out of time here, but I appreciate you being here. I know I'm going to talk to you again at some point down the road, because this -- this story is not going anytime soon.

RUBIO: Certainly.

HOLMES: But, Isabel Rubio, ma'am, we appreciate you taking the time out. You have a good weekend.

RUBIO: It's a pleasure. Thank you.

HOLMES: All right.

Well, a lot more to drill down with this new law in Alabama. So we sent our Rafael Romo -- he's on our way now, one of our friends here on CNN Saturday and Sunday morning -- who will be joining us this weekend. We will be hitting this all weekend. Again, the bill was just signed into law this week, so a lot of reaction to get. So, make sure you come back here with us CNN Saturday and Sunday morning, as always, starting at 6:00 a.m. starting tomorrow.

But also coming up here, Casey Anthony breaking down in court once again. What made the mom who is accused of killing her 2-year- old daughter cry even harder today than she did yesterday?

And, of course, the drama outside the courtroom today, people lining up -- we are used to seeing people line up waiting to go see the latest "Harry Potter" movie. Maybe they want tickets to see Justin Bieber -- but people lining up to get into a murder trial? We will tell you why police had to be called in. That is next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HOLMES: All right. Well, the Casey Anthony murder trial reaching a new level of gruesome, as some might say.

Anthony appeared to sob and was comforted by a lawyer as one expert testified about the remains of her 2-year-old daughter, Caylee. A forensic anthropologist told the jury that animals had chewed on Caylee Anthony's bones. And this afternoon, the chief medical examiner testified that Caylee's death was no accident.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In this particular case, based upon everything that you have seen, the photographs, the skeleton itself, do you have an opinion as to the manner of death in this case?

DR. JAN GARAVAGLIA, CHIEF MEDICAL EXAMINER: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What is that opinion?

GARAVAGLIA: Homicide.

(END VIDEO CLIP) HOLMES: All right, meanwhile, look at this here. Courtroom spectators, they are looking up. They could not turn away from the monitors in the courtroom as they displayed pictures of the little girl's remains.

We have shown you the lines of people who show up for a chance to become one of those 50 or so spectators allowed in each day, but this morning, the fight for a seat kind of got out of control when some people tried to cut in line. Look at this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

(SHOUTING)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: All right. Authorities had to be called in. A few people were kicked out of line when they refused to cooperate.

Want to bring in a human behavior expert now, Wendy Walsh.

Wendy, you are a human behavior expert, so tell me, what is wrong with these folks? It seems kind of strange that they would line up and fight and be so aggressive about wanting to get in and be a part of this. What is going on?

WENDY WALSH, FAMILY THERAPIST: So morbid, so gruesome.

HOLMES: Yes.

WALSH: But it's no different than in the Middle Ages, when people rushed to the coliseum to see public hangings or the lion eat the Christians.

We have this inside us, an old hunter/gatherer/hunter that needs a place to put its aggression. And these people are following it. But there is another thing, T.J.

HOLMES: OK.

We live in a world where the media has become expansive and the world of reality television integrating with real life, is that everyone wants to star in their own reality show, even if it is just a flash of them running across the news to try to get a seat. And --

(CROSSTALK)

HOLMES: OK. Are you telling me this -- some of these people are there because they might get their 15 minutes of fame?

WALSH: They might get their 15 minutes of fame, but, more importantly, they will be witness to Casey Anthony's, you know, couple months of fame. And that makes them feel part of the story and integrated in a real way.

HOLMES: OK. When did we get to this point? You brought up that first point. Like you mentioned, they used to go to the coliseums and watch this stuff go down back in Rome, but when did we actually as a society get to this place?

We all remember how we all could not turn away from the TV and watch the O.J. trial, but was that any kind of a marker to get us to this place or is it just still the media has changed this thing in so much?

WALSH: Well, the media has definitely gotten bigger than ever, but it's still not as big as O.J.

Do you remember, T.J., it was wall-to-wall coverage for all the networks during the day. In fact, I covered it. I was a news anchor myself, and I covered every minute of that trial.

So, that was a little bigger because there was more fame involved. But, here, we have got all the ingredients. We have sex, a possibly promiscuous young mother. We have got lots of lies. We have got murder. We have got a dysfunctional family. People love to eat that up.

HOLMES: OK. And we all oftentimes -- and I think that I have a live picture that we're showing there -- guys, correct me if I'm wrong -- but the trial is going on right now. And we do have live coverage of it. So that's what people are seeing, a live picture of inside the courtroom.

But, Wendy, we all want to think, oh, wow, look at those people in line. Look at those people running to get a ticket. Look at those people. But is this, quite frankly, in us all?

WALSH: I think there is a piece of it in all of us.

Why do you think, when you log on to the Internet, they have these kind of salacious headlines that make you want to click right away? They know to grab that emotional charge from people, and it will make them hit their keyboard.

I have noticed another trend in the Casey Anthony trial, T.J. On Facebook, many people are changing their profile pictures to a picture of the slain toddler.

HOLMES: What?

WALSH: So -- as if to keep the memory alive? I don't know. I have been Facebook friended by a lot of people this week, and their picture is a picture of Caylee.

You know, people are really feeling -- this is a vulnerable thing. A child murdered? What are we really, but all innocent, vulnerable little children, but now wrapped up in adult bodies. So we feel great empathy for this little girl. It is a terrible tragedy and it brings fear up in us.

HOLMES: All right. Well, Wendy, we appreciate you giving us the perspective, as only you can. It is good talking to you on what, like you said, kind of a morbid story here.

WALSH: Good to see you.

HOLMES: But appreciate you. Good to see you. And you have a good weekend, all right?

WALSH: OK. You, too, T.J.

HOLMES: Well, also coming up, 4:00 Eastern, so just, what, about 40 minutes from now, I am going to be talking with one of those people that Wendy and I were just talking about, one of those folks who were in line, getting to get in line, got in line at about 3:45 in the morning to make sure she could get a seat inside, ask her why she wanted in there so badly. That is coming up, again about 40 minutes from now.

Also, want to you something. There they are. We have been waiting years for this, thousands of e-mails Sarah Palin sent and received as governor of Alaska. They were just released. We will tell you what they are saying. We are going to go through them.

But, first, take a listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh, God, just jitters. I just -- oh, it is just magnificent, I think.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: That is just one of the many people lining the streets today as that miracle on the Hudson plane made a final voyage -- to a museum this time, though. That is next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HOLMES: Well, want to get you caught up now on some of the stories making headlines. Sarah Palin's e-mail life right there, it is now public. Some 24,000 pages, you are looking at there.

That is CNN's Drew Griffin wheeling some of the six boxes of paperwork the state of Alaska released about two hours ago. He has been going through that mountain of information. He is looking through it all for us right now. He will join us in the next hour to give us some of the few tidbits of what he is finding already.

Also, bean sprouts from a farm in Germany caused that deadly E. coli outbreak in Europe. That is according to a top German health official who says, even though tests have yet to confirm the link, investigators who questioned those affected said they ate sprouts at restaurants that had received sprouts from this particular farm. The death toll, meanwhile, has now climbed to 31. Nearly 3,000 people have gotten sick.

And the miracle on the Hudson plane, it arrived at its final destination today, Carolina's Aviation Museum in Charlotte, North Carolina. Hundreds of people actually lined the streets as a truck hauled the fuselage south from New York. The rig supporting the 123- foot-long train required a specially constructed trailer for the weeklong journey.

Social media also got involved. The entire journey was documented by the museum on Twitter and Facebook.

Well, coming up next: He is on a roll. We will tell you who the outgoing defense secretary, Robert Gates, is criticizing now and why it is a big deal.

And then: a window of opportunity for firefighters in Arizona. They are fighting a fire right now that is bigger than Los Angeles.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HOLMES: Well, could this be the break firefighters have been hoping for, those erratic winds that have been spreading the flames from that massive fire dying down now? They are expected to be fairly calm for a while.

Is that right, Chad Myers?

CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: That is true, sir.

HOLMES: So this is the break they have been waiting a little while on. How much will this help?

MYERS: Well, even if you have 24 to 48 hours, the fire line is so large, the miles of fire that you have burning so large, they are up to 5 percent containment now out of 100 percent --

(CROSSTALK)

HOLMES: Yes.

MYERS: -- that was uncontained yesterday.

HOLMES: Right.

MYERS: So, they have a long way to go. And even if a day like today and a morning like today, the problem with this morning, it was so thick, it was -- and fires were still burning, but the winds weren't blowing at all. You could not get planes in there at all, because the smoke was right over the fire line, so planes were just basically sitting on the tarmac, going, yes, we can't fly in this. We can't even see the fire.

HOLMES: Wow.

MYERS: We can't see the smoke. This is in very tough terrain. We need to be able to see where every mountaintop is.

So the planes actually like to have a little bit of flame -- little bit of wind to blow the smoke away. Obviously, firefighters on the ground don't want any wind at all, because the wind is just oxygen blowing like a big billow.

HOLMES: OK. Have they essentially not been getting anywhere? With the winds the way they have been over the past several days, have they essentially been out there just trying to contain the damage vs. actually trying to, I don't know, get somewhere and contain the actual fire?

(CROSSTALK)

MYERS: They have been trying to stop structures from burning in Eagar, Springerville, and places around there. And they have been doing a fantastic job.

(CROSSTALK)

MYERS: They have been able to stop homes from burning. They have been able to stop this in a fire line into not getting into towns so far.

But trees -- this is a national forest. This is going to burn for a very long time. We may be sitting here a month from now still talking about maybe 65 percent, 75 percent containment by then.

HOLMES: Wow.

MYERS: The fire -- you have well over 300 miles of fire. And I don't care how many men and women you have on the line, but 300 miles of fire, you can't just put that out with a shovel.

HOLMES: How big is this window right now to have for the --

MYERS: It's 36 hours.

HOLMES: About 36 hours.

Chad, we appreciate you now.

And like Chad just said, it is 5 percent contained, but in addition to fighting the flames now, fire officials are handling another difficult task, telling some evacuated residents if their homes survived or not. They're telling us that it doesn't matter whether the home is a mansion or a modest home. The shock and pain people are dealing with is just the same.

Jim Spellman in Apache County for us today.

Jim, we were listening. I don't know if you were able to hear Chad Myers here talking about they have a window to try to get something done here. What are you seeing?

JIM SPELLMAN, CNN PRODUCER: Yes. They are taking full advantage of it, too, T.J.

They're out there with all the heavy equipment they can, bulldozers. They're setting these what they call backfires to try to starve the fire of fuel, so that, when it approaches these towns, it doesn't have anything to burn, and have a buffer zone.

Yesterday, the lower winds allowed them to use a DC-10 supertanker to drop three loads of retardant on the fire. Today, they're kind of doing a 180 on it. The lower winds today and some of the backfires they have created are allowing them to do aerial ignitions, which is fascinating. They have a helicopter packed with things about the size of a ping pong ball full of chemicals that will burn and swoop into a valley and drop a whole load of these things and create a fire there that will go back away from the towns and not towards the towns so that when mother nature brings the head of the fire towards the town, there is nothing there. So they can use the tools with winds lower and plus less things to feed the fire.

HOLMES: That is interesting they are using everything at their disposal and give me the update on evacuations, and structures they are trying to save and the update there.

SPELLMAN: Sure. The two main towns here Springerville, and eager are still evacuated and Greer, Arizona, two days ago the worst day for the fire and the fire got behind the firefighters and 22 homes there destroyed. It is a beautiful part of the country. Those people are being notified today, and it is off the job for any of the fire folks to have to go tell people their homes are lost, but right now.

We have a status update an hour ago and they are not going to let anybody back into the towns even though the lines are holding until they feel it is safe for them to come back in, because it will be through the weekend, T.J.

HOLMES: Jim Spellman, thank you so much. And Chad Myers, they are not expecting rain out there for --

MYERS: A month.

HOLMES: Thank you, Chad, and thank you to Jim Spellman as well.

And a woman caught in the crossfire with two siblings dead and she needs help with a new leg. We will introduce you to a feisty five-year-old.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HOLMES: Well, some strong words from outgoing Defense Secretary Robert Gates. After a farewell visit to Afghanistan he stopped at NATO headquarters and told the allies that the organization faced a dim if not dismal, end quote, future and even military irrelevance.

He singled out missions in Afghanistan and Libya as sore spots where other members of NATO were unwilling or unable to carry out the agreed missions. The problem, gates said, that some NATO countries want the benefits of membership but they don't want to share in the risks and the costs. Listen now to Gates speaking to a think-tank in Brussels.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) ROBERT GATES, DEFENSE SECRETARY: The blunt reality is that there is dwindling appetite and patience in the United States Congress and in the American body politic writ large. To expand precious funds on behalf of nations who are apparently unwilling to devote the necessary resources or make the necessary changes to be serious and capable partners in their own defense. Nations apparently willing and eager for American taxpayers to assume the growing security burden left by reductions in European defense budgets.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: Now, gates and his predecessors have struggled to get NATO partners to pony up for missions they have agreed to take on. But this is first time that a U.S. defense secretary has given a stark warning to NATO allies. Gates, of course, is retiring at the end of the month, and President Obama has nominated current CIA Director Leon Panetta to succeed gates.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SARA SIDNER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: So this was so disturbing to you that you could not actually do the procedure?

DR. AHMAD RADWAN, VASCULAR SURGEON: I couldn't do it. I couldn't do it for a kid. I did it for young guys and for rebels in the front line, but I couldn't do it to her.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: A doctor in Libya talking about amputating the leg of a five-year-old girl. We will hear from the spunky young girl who also lost two siblings. That is next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HOLMES: Well, a rocket attack in Misrata, Libya, the house all but destroyed, the story all too common in Libya's civil war. But there's a face of the story now that we really want you to see, the face of a five-year-old girl whose brother and sister were killed in the blast. She survived, but lost her right leg. I want you now to watch this from our Sara Sidner.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SARA SIDNER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Five-year-old girl is cranky, because she just woke up from a nap. "I used to be able to play and run around she says," but for her, life will never be the same again.

At the height of the siege of Misrata, a rocket almost certainly fired by pro Gadhafi forces blasted through her mother's bedroom wall and left this massive hole. Milac, her three-year-old brother and one-year-old sister were asleep inside. She says they had toys, and they are still there. Her brother and sister are gone forever.

"I lifted them up one after the other. I kept praying, god, give me patience. I found Milac alive, but Muhammad and Ridina looked dead. They were dead. They were wrapped in white sheets on the hospital floor as doctors tried to save Milac. Her left arm was broken and her right arm fractured, but the left leg was ripped to shreds from the knee to the thigh.

DR. AHMAD RADWAN, VASCULAR SURGEON: It was almost totally amputate and just some skin keeping it attached.

SIDNER: Dr. Ahmad Radwan made the decision to amputate, but he could not go through with it himself.

SIDNER (on camera): So this was so disturbing for you, that you could not do it?

RADWAN: Right. I did it for guys and rebels at the front line, but not to her.

SIDNER (voice-over): So he asked two other doctors to perform the amputation, and they all knew that even when Milac heals, the hospital does not have a prosthesis that would fit a child. Dr. Ahmad is in touch with a global relief fund to get her in touch with a country that will fit her for one.

For now, this once little active girl, who liked to play and climb and slide and giggle, is bound to a wheelchair after being bedridden in the hospital for weeks. Though she has grown attached to the staff there, she is sick and tired of living there. "I think that the hospital is bad and I want to leave," she says frustrated.

SIDNER (on camera): For the month she has been in the hospital she has been asking again and again to come to the beach, and she is getting the wish, but the parents and the doctors and the nurses have another dream for her, and they are hoping that she will be able to travel to a country to give her the best treatment ever so that she can run and play like she used to.

Sara Sidner, CNN, Misrata, Libya.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HOLMES: We are getting news just in here. It is about the TSA and dozens of screeners in trouble at a major airport that many of you will be going through this summer travel season. All of the details are next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HOLMES: Well, a number of TSA screeners are in trouble. I want to bring in our homeland security correspondent Jeanne Meserve, and these TSA screeners going to lose jobs?

JEANNE MESERVE, CNN HOMELAND SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: That is what it looks like. We reported in March that hundreds of bags at Honolulu International Airport were not screened properly and not screened 100 percent for possible explosives before they were loaded into the holds of passenger jets. The TSA has investigated and now says that 36 screeners and supervisors and managers may be fired as a result of their investigation. They say that this happened in one location at one shift at the airport. We know that they even were administering polygraph tests to some of the employees to get to the bottom of this.

They say they have now completed the investigation and as I say 36 people's jobs are in jeopardy. They are taking moves to fire them. TSA administrator John pistol made some remarks saying that we will not tolerate employees who in any way compromise the security of the traveling public. To my knowledge, T.J., this is the first mass firing of its kind in the history of TSA back to you.

HOLMES: Well, Jeanne Meserve with the update, and we will join you next hour on another story with a possible leaker making a deal with the federal government. And we will see you in a little bit.

Newt Gingrich says that the campaign staff left because they did not agree with his vision, but there is a lot of talk today that several staffers may join another potential candidate's. We will work that out next.

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HOLMES: Well, if Newt Gingrich's presidential dreams have evaporated, nobody has told him. Take a look at what Gingrich said to reporters this morning, the morning after his top campaign aides bolted for the door.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

NEWT GINGRICH, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I'll be back in New Hampshire on Monday. I'll be in California on Sunday. The fact is I'm prepared to go out and campaign very intensely. But I want to campaign on ideas and on solutions and I'm going to do it in a way that brings Americans together in a large movement.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: Now, Gingrich is set to appear in the presidential debate in New Hampshire. You can see that only right here on CNN. And you can see Gingrich clearly not ready to pack it in just yet. So why did his organization campaign implode? Strategic differences, at least according to Gingrich.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GINGRICH: We'll find out over the next year who is right. Gut I believe we live during a time when Americans are genuinely frightened for America's future and the country wants leadership that talks with them honestly and isn't automatically doing the old policies.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: So Newt Gingrich is not going anywhere, but another candidate could be getting into the race. Two aides who left the Gingrich campaign are high level confidants to Governor Rick Perry. Perry excited some Republican circles a couple weeks ago when he said this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: As far as running for president, governor, are you going to think about it?

RICK PERRY, (R) TEXAS GOVERNOR: Yes, sir, I will think about it. But I think about a lot of things.

(LAUGHTER)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: All right, Wayne Slater, senior political writer for the "Dallas Morning News," joins me now. What was the presidential buzz around Rick Perry before this mass exodus with Gingrich and what is that buzz like now?

WAYNE SLATER, SENIOR POLITICAL WRITER, "DALLAS MORNING NEWS": Yes, I think before the exodus, these two allies, really Perry's Karl Rove political confidant was maybe the governor will do it after this news I think there is a consensus here that he is seriously leaning towards wanting to run. Let me tell you, just because these guys left, it's not a signal, based on the reporting that I've done inside of the Perry camp. Not a signal that rick Perry is about to announce his running for president. What it does is make it a lot easier if he chooses to do so and he's leaning in that direction.

HOLMES: So how seriously is he thinking about this? I read somewhere where he's been overwhelmed by his reaction and people telling him to run. Is he being involved into this race in some way?

SLATER: You always hear this kind of stuff, when candidates want to talk about their prospects. The people are breaching and the truth is, the truth is, there are a number of Republicans who are unhappy with the shape of the Republican field right now. They think that no one in the field has both a combination of fiscal responsibility skills, the budget cutter, the kind of thing that can go against the Obama administration and Washington about, but also the appeal to religious and social conservatives.

They think Rick Perry does, so the truth is Perry has talked to many of his big money donor. His wife wants him to run, his kids want him to run.

HOLMES: How do we know that?

SLATER: I'm telling you, I'm getting that from inside the Rick Perry campaign. His office, close confidant to Perry told me that the governor's wife himself has said, I would like to you do this.

HOLMES: You talked about some of the things that he could bring to the race that maybe Republicans don't have in it, with the pool of candidates that they have. What about the personality of rick Perry? What would he bring personality-wise, which, as much as we may not like to admit it, that can work to a candidate's favor?

SLATER: Well, I think there's a plus and a minus here. He is a really charismatic figure. He's a dynamic speaker. He knows how to appeal to social conservatives, tea party voters, those that are going to be important on the issue of the economy. He's a good, good speaker.

The problem is that when he spoke recently at a Christian gathering in Washington, a number of people saw in his mannerisms and Texas swagger, aspects of George W. Bush. And that's the big problem for Rick Perry right now. Does America want another governor from Texas in the White House? And I think the jury is out.

HOLMES: Well, I'd like to say, that Texas swagger, or whatever it was, it worked for George W. Bush a couple of elections, didn't it? One other thing, does he still want Texas to secede from the union?

(LAUGHTER)

SLATER: The governor is trying to distance himself from that. He entertained the idea and made that all part of the anti-Washington message. Let me tell you, T.J., to the Republican primary voters in the Iowa caucus and the South Carolina primary, that kind of talk works.

HOLMES: That works. And also it's the day of prayer and fasting that is coming up later this summer that he's trying to put together?

SLATER: August 1st.

HOLMES: Does that appeal to people on a larger scale, though?

SLATER: That's the real problem. It's an appeal to the early primary voters in the Republican party and I think inside the Perry camp they say he has that kind of appeal to the evangelicals who are so important in the early primary.

But he would have to make a pivot, should he become the nominee, or vice president nominee, and talk more about his economic performance in Texas, the jobs friendly business climate and so forth. That's the kind of thing that general election voters are going to be swayed by, not this social conservative talk that he's talking about now.

HOLMES: Sir, good to talk to you. Enjoy your weekend.

SLATER: You too.

HOLMES: We want to end this hour with something that may leave you scratching your head. Do you see that right there? It's hot in Massachusetts right now. But what you are seeing is a big old pile of snow. Temperatures have been hovering in the 90s but this pile left over from winter has still yet to fully melt. It's 16 feet wide, eight feet long, three feet high. And because it's being insulated around all of that dirt, it could be around until next month sometime. So, yes, snow in June still there.