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Toronto Mayor's Violent Rant; Military Veterans Soar; Interview with Labor Secretary Thomas Perez;
Aired November 08, 2013 - 09:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning. I'm Carol Costello. Thanks so much for joining me.
The mayor of Toronto caught again on tape, and this time he was threatening to kill someone. This happened just days after admitting he smoked crack cocaine. The video released by "The Toronto Star." A warning for you, it contains some pretty vulgar language.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MAYOR ROB FORD, TORONTO: Cause I'm going to kill that (ph) (EXPLETIVE DELETED) guy. I'm telling you it's first degree murder.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mike Tyson.
FORD: But I'll fight him. I'll (INAUDIBLE).
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Give me the phone. I'll (INAUDIBLE).
FORD: No holds barred, brother. He dies or I die, brother. Brother, you've never seen me (EXPLETIVE DELETED) go. You think so, brother? But when he's down, I'll rip his (EXPLETIVE DELETED) throat out. I'll poke his eyes out. I will (EXPLETIVE DELETED) -- when he's dead, I'll make sure that mother (EXPLETIVE DELETED) is dead. I need (EXPLETIVE DELETED) ten minutes to make sure he's dead. It'll be over in five minutes, brother, if I'm done in 10 minutes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: After you win the bi-election.
FORD: It'll be a bad -- I am a sick mother (EXPLETIVE DELETED) dude. Like, no one's going to (EXPLETIVE DELETED) around with me. My brothers are, don't tell me we're liars, thieves, birds? It hurts. That little (EXPLETIVE DELETED) racist (EXPLETIVE DELETED), daddy.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE).
FORD: Eighty-year-old birds. This (EXPLETIVE DELETED), brother. I just need to go (EXPLETIVE DELETED) by myself, in my (EXPLETIVE DELETED) underwear. I want to go with this guy. I need 15 minutes. That's all I - no (EXPLETIVE DELETED) interference, brother. If I win, I will (EXPLETIVE DELETED) donate.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: These kids are pros, buddy.
FORD: Yes? No problem, bro. No problem. I need 15 minutes. I need 15 minutes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Too much time.
FORD: No.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Five minutes.
FORD: No, no, not going to do it for five. No, no, no, no, no. Not doing it in five. I'm gonna prepare for it. I will call it. And I will (EXPLETIVE DELETED) be in that ring.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: Birds? There's so much in there I really don't understand. I don't think anyone else does either, but I do know that Mayor Ford remains the mayor and I do know CNN's Paula Newton is in Ottawa with more on this story.
Good morning, Paula.
PAULA NEWTON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: And good morning, Carol.
I mean the problem here is that in terms of context, we don't really know exactly when that was shot. It was several months ago. The mayor himself does not know the context. At least if he does and if he remembers it, he's not saying. But, Carol, I want you to hear him say, in way of explanation but actually more of an apology. Let's hear from the mayor reaction just moments after that video was released.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MAYOR ROB FORD, TORONTO: I hope none of you have ever or will ever be in that state, and that's all I can say is -
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Can you tell us what it was about?
FORD: There's this - there's -
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Can you give us some context, mayor?
FORD: Obviously I was extremely, extremely inebriated.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NEWTON: Carol, this is from the man who said just a couple days ago when he confessed to having smoked crack cocaine that he had nothing more to hide. Many, including his family, were skeptical that that were true.
Now, at this point yesterday, his mother and his sister actually speaking out, very rarely speaking out and saying that they want their brother to do many things, but step down is not one of them. They denied that he's an addict. They do say that he needs a chauffeur, that he needs a breathalyzer in the car, that he needs to get counseling, that he needs to stop hanging out with quote/unquote "bad guys." Now having said that, despite any good intentions from the family, right now, Carol, that mayor remains in place. Many people around him, even his allies, saying it's time for you to step down. He's saying he is not stepping down. And now there are many more questions about whether or not the province really that regulates the laws around that city hall should maybe step in and throw him out.
Carol.
COSTELLO: Well, you know, when you step back, you start to feel sorry for him. I mean his family says he's not an addict, but he needs a driver and a breathalyzer? If you need those things, you have a problem.
NEWTON: Yes. Well, and that's the - that is the problem. Everyone around him seems to be in denial. And there are many people here coming out today and saying, look, his family needs to get on board here and they need to convince him that even if he doesn't want to quit as mayor, he needs help and he needs help right now. And that's for his own good, not necessarily the good of the city, if he thinks he's doing what he can for the city, but for his own good he needs to get off of whatever he has been on and he needs to take care of his personal health.
COSTELLO: CNN's Paula Newton reporting live this morning. Thank you.
Still to come in the NEWSROOM, Wal-Mart workers in Los Angeles shut down a major street fighting for better pay. Fifty people arrested here. We'll talk to President Obama's labor secretary about their protest, and the president's support to raise the federal minimum wage.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COSTELLO: Checking our top stories at 39 minutes past the hour.
Any minute now, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius will make an important announcement about mental health care in this country. New rules signed into law by President Bush four years ago will finally take effect requiring doctors and insurers to treat mental illnesses the same as physical illnesses.
Jedi warriors rejoice. Disney has announced the release date for the next movie in the "Star Wars" series. Episode seven will hit theaters on December 18, 2015. Yes, more than two years from now. I realize that. The announcement was made on starwars.com by Disney's CEO. Disney bought the rights to the franchise when it purchased Lucas Films for $4 billion last year.
In just a few hours, airports across the country will hold a moment of silence in honor of fallen TSA Officer Gerardo Hernandez. As you know, Hernandez was shot last week by a gunman at the Los Angeles Airport. The moment of silence will take place at 12:20 Eastern Time, 9:20 in the west, the very time Hernandez was shot.
In honor of Veterans Day, CNN photojournalists are turning their lens on the men and women who served their country. Photojournalist Gabe Ramirez introduces us to a group of wounded warriors in California who soar into the sky to help forget the physical and emotional trauma suffered on the battlefield.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DRE'AS SANCHEZ, U.S. NAVY CORPSMAN: My experience in Afghanistan is kind of a favorite question of people and, you know, sometimes I ask, do you really want to know, because sometimes it's not - it's not good stuff that goes on out there. And after my first deployment I had a couple of my close buddies, you know, they died and the corpsmen, too, there's nothing you can do.
And you feel really guilty. So I just held it in, you know, and -- usually I just like to stay here by myself, basically, and that's why the doctor said, hey, you go out and have some fun. So banding together with guys that have gone through the same things and, you know, just basically help us to just get back to normal.
CHRISTOPHER BENNETT, GENERAL MANAGER, SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA SOARING ACADEMY: Our program is the Wounded Service Members Soaring or Gliding Program. Once a month we take them up soaring. We basically put them in a glider and take them up flying.
SANCHEZ: Yeah! Woo! Being up there, you really - you honestly get to see God's landscape, like he painted it so beautiful up there. You appreciate everything and you should never take life for granted. I had no fear up there. We were all loved. Nothing to be scared of at all out there. To be honest, I haven't had my heart pumping that fast in a while. And it was cool. You know, we had a Vietnam fighter pilot and, you know, he went super aggressive.
COL. JOHN SHMOLDAS, U.S. AIR FORCE, RETIRED: I flew jets all my life, F-4s and F-5s. We had our own combat experiences and where we see these fine young men and gals coming back from Afghanistan and Iraq, we have a passion for flying sail planes and we wanted to share it with these guys and get their adrenaline running and show them something that maybe they'd never have an opportunity to do otherwise.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's different. It's just like kind of peace. It's sort of you feel free.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was sweet, man, it was sweet. I feel like crying almost. Let me stop.
SANCHEZ: You know I wouldn't be standing here talking to you about it right now. If you would have hit me up four or five months ago, I probably would have been in tears and just heartbroken. But, you know, the sunshine's out and I'm just -- I'm happy to be alive again and be just living.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COSTELLO: Make sure to tune in to CNN next Monday, Veterans Day, 2:30 Eastern for our special "Veterans In Focus: Service, Struggle and Success." NEWSROOM's back in a minute.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COSTELLO: Markets are heading higher following the surprise jump in the October jobs report. We learned 204,000 Americans got jobs last month but more than half of those people found work in low wage jobs like retail, hospitality services and restaurants.
And that has been a major criticism of this economic recovery, that those kinds of hourly jobs don't create the healthy middle class we really need to move the economy forward. So how do we create a middle class that has extra cash to spend.
Joining me now is U.S. Labor Secretary Thomas Perez. He joins us live from Washington.
Welcome, Secretary Perez.
THOMAS PEREZ, U.S. LABOR SECRETARY: It's always a pleasure to be with you.
COSTELLO: Thanks for being with us. We appreciate it.
In the "New York Times" opinion columnist Paul Krugman writes this, quote, "It turns out that by failing to address unemployment we have in fact we've been sacrificing the future, too. What passes these days for sound policy is in fact a form of economic self-mutilation which will cripple America for years to come."
In other words, since the country is fixated on belt tightening jobs are not being created and we're being hurt in the long-term. Now not many Americans think this will change with the current climate in Washington. So give Americans advice on what they can do without Washington's help?
PEREZ: Well the president's been working very hard on the strategy of growth and you see it reflected in these numbers, the economy continues to be resilient, notwithstanding the self-inflicted wounds from Congress. And you see again over 200,000 jobs created last month in the private sector, 44 consecutive months of private sector job growth.
You look in the manufacturing sector and you see remarkable growth there, and to those who say manufacturing is dead in America, I say you haven't looked at the data. Because we've seen since early 2010, over 500,000 jobs created there, which is more than any time since the late '90s. So --
COSTELLO: But still, Mr. Secretary --
PEREZ: We're -- we can always do more.
COSTELLO: Right.
PEREZ: There is no doubt about it. COSTELLO: But still --
PEREZ: And that's the frustration of this president because --
COSTELLO: Well, let me -- let me ask you this.
PEREZ: -- these self-inflicted wounds make life difficult.
COSTELLO: Most of the -- most of the job growth in the country is in retail or service jobs, hourly jobs that often pay minimum wage. I know the president now says he supports a $10 minimum wage. Senator Harry Reid says he wants to raise the minimum wage within the next two weeks, which sounds great. But isn't is a fuel gesture? Do you think it will really happen?
PEREZ: Well, first of all, I think your premise is not correct. You look at job growth in the last, you know, 44 consecutive months of private sector job growth and it's broad based. You look at the professional and service industry, you see growth. You look at the manufacturing industry, you see growth. You look at retail and you see growth. And so it's much broader based than what you've said.
On the issue of the minimum wage and -- and raising it, you know, I worked for Senator Kennedy in '96, that was a bipartisan effort to raise the minimum wage. Elizabeth Dole, one of my predecessors as secretary of labor, one of her signature achievements was working to secure an increase in the minimum wage.
You know, Henry Ford, you know, the icon, he did a radical thing. He almost double the wages of his employees because he said, that if people can afford to buy they're manufacturing, then they have more money in their pocket, they spend more. Retailers have to get more things on the shelf.
COSTELLO: But you know that --
PEREZ: The economy -- the economy grows.
COSTELLO: There aren't many Republicans coming forward in support of raising the minimum wage. They say it will actually hurt job growth because it'll put more of a burden on employers.
PEREZ: Well, I think you'll find that there's -- if you look at the history of efforts to raise the minimum wage, it's always been bipartisan. You look at the voters of New Jersey just this week. 61 percent of the voters approved an increase in the minimum wage. You look at what happened in California. You look at the history of the minimum wage in the United States Congress. It's always been bipartisan.
And so, I'm actually quite confident. And by the way, you know, the last -- one of the times that the minimum wage was increased was after a government shutdown, the Gingrich shutdown of '96 when, again, Congress came together on a bipartisan basis to do just that. So --
COSTELLO: Well, let me lay this by you. PEREZ: I think we can do it.
COSTELLO: Because there does seem to be simmering anger out there. You mentioned what happened in Los Angeles. Just last night we saw Wal-Mart workers shut down a major street in L.A. They are fighting for higher wages. As you mentioned, voters in (INAUDIBLE) in Washington state forced the issue by voting to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour. And as you said, New Jersey just voted to change its constitution, amend its constitution raising the minimum wage and they're going to keep raising it every year.
So is that what it really takes to put more money into people's pocket that people and individual states have to take matters in their own hand?
PEREZ: Well, you know, the -- here's the bottom line. You know, nobody who works a full-time job should have to live in poverty. I think there's bipartisan recognition of that fact. And in this issue, you see remarkable activity at a state and local level. As the president has said many times, you know, sometimes change doesn't initiate in Washington. Change comes to Washington.
I think we need to change the minimum wage on a national basis so that it doesn't depend on whether you're in Kansas or whether you're in California, that you can benefit from this. And the economy benefits when people have money in their pocket to spend. And we need to eliminate this inequality gap that is remarkably troubling. And that's why I wake up every morning asking, what steps can we take to help workers make ends meet, ensure that nobody who works a full-time job is living in poverty?
COSTELLO: Labor Secretary Thomas Perez, thank you so much for joining me this morning.
PEREZ: Always a pleasure.
COSTELLO: Thanks.
Here's what's all new in the next hour of NEWSROOM. Thirty-five feet underground, it has electricity, ventilation, even train tracks. Miguel Marquez takes us inside the tunnel made to ferry drugs from Mexico into the United States.
And a special look at the NFL next hour. The country's most popular sport dealing with lots and lots of problems. Ugly controversy. We'll talk about the bullying allegation in Miami.
And more. That's all new with the next hour of NEWSROOM.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COSTELLO: This is the last year that computers are going do decide who plays in college football's national championship. And as we've seen in the past, it can be a messy situation if they're a bunch of undefeated teams.
Andy Scholes of "Bleacher Report" joins us with more.
ANDY SCHOLES, BLEACHER REPORT: Hey, Carol. You know, coming into last night, we had Alabama, Florida State, Ohio State and Oregon as the top four unbeaten teams. Well, now we can scratch the ducks off that list because last night 5th ranked Stanford crushed Oregon's national title hopes. The Cardinals scored the first 23 points in the game. And they held on to hand a very sad Oregon team their first loss of the season.
Meanwhile down in Waco, Texas, the Saints ranked Baylor Bears. They continue to roll over their opponent. The crushed 10th ranked Oklahoma, 41-12. The Bears are a perfect 8-0. They remain in the hunt for a national title.
Well, turning on bleacherreport.com, today if had Adrian Peterson on your bench team, you're a pretty happy camper this morning. Check out Peterson last night, just running over the entire Redskins' defense. He finished with 74 yards and -- he is awesome. Two touchdowns in the game. The Vikings beat the Redskins 24-37 on Thursday night football.
All right. Big Papi's popularity in Boston is at an all-time high and it's so high that some fans want Ortiz to run the city.
COSTELLO: Oh come on.
(LAUGHTER)
SCHOLES: According to WGBHnews.org Ortiz got the third most votes in the Boston mayor's race this week and he wasn't even on the ballot, Carol. Of course fans just wrote his name in. While had a great showing, he still fell more than 71,000 votes short of mayor elect. Marty Walsh --
(CROSSTALK)
COSTELLO: (INAUDIBLE), all right?
SCHOLES: Who knows what would have happened if he was actually on the ballot.
(LAUGHTER)
All right. Tiger Woods is in Turkey this week. And that's where you'll find Rachel Nichols. She caught up to the world's best player and asked about golf, fatherhood and girlfriend Lindsey Vonn. You can see that interview tonight on "UNGUARDED" with Rachel Nichols. That's at 10:30 Eastern on CNN.
COSTELLO: Can't wait to see that. Andy Scholes, thanks so much. And you're going to join us in the next half hour because -- or in the next hour, I should say, 10:30 Eastern. And we're going to do a special --
SCHOLES: Lots of football.
COSTELLO: We're going to talk lots of football. The next hour of CNN NEWSROOM starts now.
Happening now in the NEWSROOM, it may be one of the strongest storms ever reported. Winds gusting at more than 200 miles per hour. Hundreds of thousands of people try to escape the storm.
Plus --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I am sorry that they, you know, are finding themselves in this situation based on assurances they got from me.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: Apologies from the president, not just for Obamacare and its website, but for other promises he made.
And the Toronto mayor is apologizing again. This time, for yet another drunken rant.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MAYOR ROB FORD, TORONTO: Think everybody has seen valid issues against me today. I wish I could come out --
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: And tough times for the NFL from concussions to bullying to murder charges. We'll take an inside look at the National Football League. What's happened to our favorite sport, anyway?
Second hour of NEWSROOM starts now.
And good morning. I'm Carol Costello. Thanks so much for joining me. We start this hour with reports of utter devastation as one of the strongest storms every recorded on the planet is roaring across the Philippines. Winds with gusts up to 235 miles per hour pounding the island. Take a look at this dramatic video of a shipwreck crew being pulled from the churning sea. And you can sheets of metal being ripped off roofs like in this pictures posted on Instagram.
Across the Philippines we're getting reports of flooding, power outages and landslides. The super typhoon has already killed at least three people.
