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Arizona Governor Mulls Bill as Anger Grows; Putin Orders Military Drills Near Ukraine; GM Adds to the List of Ignition Recall; Feds Investigate Coal Ash Pill; U.S. Fines Asiana Airlines $500,000

Aired February 26, 2014 - 09:00   ET

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

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: I envy that hand. I don't even want to go there. What am I thinking?

Have a great day. NEWSROOM starts now.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO: Happening now in the NEWSROOM, Brewer's battle. Gay rights and religious freedom on the national stage.

ANA CABRERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Do you think that the governor is getting the message?

COSTELLO: Big business and conservative leaders pleading the governor make this go away but it's not everyone.

RUSH LIMBAUGH, CONSERVATIVE RADIO TALK SHOW HOST: The governor of Arizona is being bullied. She's being bullied by the homosexual lobby in Arizona and elsewhere.

COSTELLO: Ahead, the fight. And the fallout.

Also wild shocker. An amazing glimpse of just what California looks like this morning. This picture from 2011. This from just last month.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I've been in this area all my life and I've never seen it this bad.

COSTELLO: And the fight against fat.

DR. THOMAS FRIEDEN, DIRECTOR, CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL: We're far from out of the woods.

COSTELLO: A major milestone, childhood obesity rates plummeting 43 percent and a new push to keep kids off sugary sweet drinks but politics quickly coming into play.

DARIN BAKST, THE HERITAGE FOUNDATION: It's no longer father knows best, mother knows best, it's what government knows best.

COSTELLO: You're live in the CNN NEWSROOM.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO: Good morning. I'm Carol Costello. Thank you so much for joining me.

In Arizona the deadline grows nearer, the angry grows louder.

The pressure building on Governor Jan Brewer to veto a bill that's become a lightning rod in the battle over gay rights. In effect that bill would allow businesses to cite religious beliefs and deny service to gay customers.

Brewer via Twitter says her decision will not be rushed. Quote, "I assure you, as always, I will do the right thing for the state of Arizona." In the meantime the list of national companies urging a veto just keeps on growing. Some of the latest additions, AT&T, Delta Airlines, Intel, PetSmart and Yelp. They joined the earliest opponents including American Airlines, Marriott and Apple.

CNN's Ana Cabrera is live in Phoenix this morning with more.

Good morning, Ana.

CABRERA: Good morning, Carol. All eyes are on the Arizona state capitol and the governor's office today as they wait to see what the governor is going to do with this bill that opponents say would allow businesses to discriminate.

The governor said she will make her decision after she hears from both sides of this controversial legislation and we do know she's planning to meet with state lawmakers as well as business groups today, many of which are now urging her to veto this bill.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CABRERA (voice-over): The voices are growing louder against a bill that would allow businesses in Arizona to refuse service to gays based on religious beliefs. The bill's faith now in the hands of Governor Jan Brewer.

GOV. JAN BREWER (R), ARIZONA: I don't rely a whole lot on my gut because I have to look at what it says and what the law says and take that information and do the right thing.

CABRERA: Brewer is staying out of the spotlight since her interview with CNN on Monday. But other high-profile politicians are weighing in as pressure mounts on the governor.

Mitt Romney tweeting, "Veto of SB-1062 is right." Big businesses including Apple, American Airlines, AT&T, and Intel vocally opposing the bill, and next year's Super Bowl also on the line.

(On camera): Do you think that the governor is getting the message?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She hasn't said a whole lot.

CABRERA (voice-over): Conservative lawmakers who helped pass the bill remain largely quiet. But one representative defended his vote by offering an example of what the bill is designed to prevent.

SONNY BORRELLI (R), ARIZONA STATE HOUSE: OK, what about this scenario? You have a gay person that owns a printing shop, OK. And somebody from the Westboro Baptist Church comes in there and demands that they print and sign that, obviously a printer is not going to agree with. Should that group, that religious group demand that that print shop print that thing?

CABRERA: Conservative radio host, Rush Limbaugh igniting the rhetoric by saying Brewer is being attacked.

LIMBAUGH: The governor of Arizona is being bullied. She's being bullied by the homosexual lobby in Arizona and elsewhere.

CABRERA: Protesters vowing to continue the fight.

LEONARD CLARK, RELIGIOUS FREEDOM BILL PROTESTER: We want the Super Bowl. We want Apple and we're really asking our governor please do the right thing and veto this SB-1062.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CABRERA: While nobody knows exactly what the governor is going to do, we do know she has vetoed other legislation similar to this. Just last year, in fact. We also know that she really prized herself in being a pro-business governor, in her words.

And we know that there's a lot of concern expressed by businesses about what this bill could mean for business in the state of Arizona from its potential impact to attracting new businesses to the state, its impact on the tourism industry, and yet we know also the governor has not shied away from signing other controversial legislation in the past.

So right now it's just a waiting game and state lawmakers who are close to the governor tell us probably going to be a while before she makes her decision -- Carol.

COSTELLO: All right. We'll check back.

Ana Cabrera, reporting live this morning.

We're also hearing from several state lawmakers who originally voted for the bill and are now asking the governor to kill it.

Here's Arizona State Republican Steve Pierce.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEVE PIERCE (R), ARIZONA STATE SENATOR: It went through really quick. No one really had anything telling me don't do it. We -- several of us talked. We thought, you know, this isn't good. It's not good for the state. But no one had said anything. And we thought well, we'll just -- we'll vote for it.

(END VIDEO CLIP) COSTELLO: Join us at the bottom of the hour for more from Arizona State Senator Pierce and his change of heart on this controversial bill.

Just in to CNN this morning, Russia's president is sending a message to the world, Cold War veteran Vladimir Putin has ordered surprise military exercises for his troops in an area bordering Ukraine. It comes amid high tensions with the West over the former Soviet Republic and the weakened ouster president who had recently aligned with Moscow.

And today in southern Ukraine, new scuffles are flaring between pro- Russian protesters and those seeking ties with the West.

CNN's Frederik Pleitgen is there. He joins us live.

Tell us more.

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Carol. Yes, we're on the scene here in Simferopol where you had pro-Ukrainian and pro-Russian protesters facing off against each other. One of the things that we have to say is that all of it, pretty much very peaceful. I think the protest is sort of coming to a close right now.

What happened was there was a lot of screaming, you had the Russian side screaming Russia, Russia, Crimea, which is this part of Ukraine is part of Russia. And then you had the pro-Ukrainian side screaming Crimea which is this part of Ukraine is not part of Russia, and again there wasn't a lot of screaming, there was a lot of pushing and shoving, but so far there hasn't been any violence.

But certainly there is a lot of tension here in this part of Ukraine. There are a lot of people of Russian heritage who feel that their heritage is under threat, who feel that the Russian language here in this country might be under threat, who feel that their culture might be under threat. And so therefore, right now there is simply a lot of tension in this country which is a very divided one -- Carol.

COSTELLO: Frederik Pleitgen reporting live from Ukraine for us this morning.

Back here at home a new study shows that the rate of obesity among young children fell sharply in the last decade, plummeting a whopping 43 percent among 2 to 5-year-olds. That's a good thing because separate studies said lifetime risk of obesity is established by age 5. It's also the fourth anniversary of First Lady Michele Obama's Let's Move initiative to combat childhood obesity.

She now wants new rules on food advertisements in schools. Later this hour I'll talk with a doctor who specializes in obesity prevention.

General Motors is expanding its recall over a deadly safety problem that can cause cars to abruptly shut off while they're being driven. The automaker says nearly 1.4 million vehicles may be affected and it's linking 13 deaths to that problem.

Christine Romans is in New York with more on this. Good morning.

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Carol, this is a much bigger recall than GM first announced, about double and, in fact, this was deadlier. This problem in this vehicle deadlier than GM first told us. Thirteen deaths directly linked to this ignition switch problem.

It could be something as simple as having a heavy key chain that as it jangles the ignition switch pops from run to accessory mode, the car stops and then there are these car crashes that ensue after that.

I want to put a list for you of what these compact car models are because there's some new models on the list. You can see them there. This is the Chevy Cobalt, you could see the Pontiac G5, the Pontiac Pursuit and some other names on those list as well.

General Motors is saying they are sorry. This is what the company is saying. "Ensuring our customers' safety is our first order of business. We're deeply sorry. We are working to address the issue as quickly as we can."

If you're driving one of these cars right now, Carol, you are instructed to take off the key chain, just use the key and to contact the company immediately. This recall is clearly going to cost them an awful lot of money because you've got an awful lot of lawsuits related to this as well and also investigators will be looking into the timeline here.

What GM knew and when the chronology here from when its own -- it's own engineers as early as 2005 noticed there was something amiss with this ignition switch -- Carol.

COSTELLO: So what do you -- you call your dealer, bring your car in and then they put in a new ignition switch in?

ROMANS: Take off -- take off the -- first take off the key chain and we're told from GM that they will contact you. The dealer knows who has these cars. The dealer will contact you.

My advice take off that key chain immediately and if you haven't heard from them contact GM.

COSTELLO: Christine Romans reporting live from New York this morning.

ROMANS: You're welcome.

COSTELLO: Still to come in the NEWSROOM, an urgent new warning for people living near that dangerous coal ash spill in North Carolina. Do not touch the river water and certainly do not eat the fish that comes out of the water.

CNN's investigative correspondent Drew Griffin is looking into this.

Good morning, Drew.

DREW GRIFFIN, CNN INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT: And a bit of breaking news this morning, Carol, with the governor of North Carolina telling his old bosses at Duke Energy clean up your mess. I'll have that after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: More than three weeks after one of the largest coal ash spills in U.S. history we're getting a better idea of just how much arsenic contaminated slop leaked into a North Carolina river.

Wake Forest Researchers say it was as much as 35 million gallons. That's enough to fill 53 Olympic size swimming pools with this toxic sludge. Officials today are warning residents to avoid contact with fish and water from the Dan River. Just the state regulators may force the company responsible Duke Energy, to move its waste water dump farther from the river.

In the meantime crowds of protesters are demanding answers.

Dozens of residents and environmentalists protested outside of Duke Energy yesterday and delivered a 9,000 -- and delivered 9,000 petition signatures demanding all coal ash pond be removed.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARY ANNE HITT, SIERRA CLUB: We definitely feel that Duke has plenty of money in the bank to not only pay to clean up this spill but to clean up all the other toxic coal ash sites that are threatening other communities.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: CNN investigative correspondent Drew Griffin was at that protest yesterday. He joins us this morning.

And you just broke some news early with the governor coming up and saying, hey, Duke Energy.

DREW GRIFFIN, CNN INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT: Right. It's a bit of -- you know, we're talking about the governor that used to work for Duke Energy for three decades, right? So, there's been a lot of suspicion about him.

But the governor, Pat McCrory, is telling Duke Energy, look, you got all these ash ponds, 30 some ash ponds, sitting next to our rivers, it's time to move them, move them away from the water. That's a, quote-unquote, "temporary" but environmentalists think it's a necessary position. What the protesters want yesterday is to get rid of that all together because there is really no safe depository for these coal ash sludge ponds that just, as you know, Carol, sit there and seep into the ground.

COSTELLO: Yes. And there's all sorts of chemicals in this coal ash that could seep into the ground and, of course, spill into the river that's dangerous for human consumption.

GRIFFIN: It is dangerous. The testing all shows that the drinking water, the drinking water in North Carolina is safe. This is a little bit different than Charleston, West Virginia.

But the fact is these poisons are in the water. It's been tested. It's in the ground water. That's the reason they have this kind of ongoing crisis before this crisis of the Dan River. There is toxic sludge seeping into ground water in North Carolina and there doesn't seem until now anybody pushing to fix that.

COSTELLO: And the reason that is there's no lining underneath these giant pits that hold all of this sludge, so it just seeps into the ground and, of course, the ground water is underneath.

GRIFFIN: And pit is kind of -- you know, you think of a pit as a hole. What these are back in the day when we decided we're going to create electricity out of coal, we're going to burn the coal and the ash will come out like your fireplace, only a coal plant it's huge and we'll shove it on to the ground, right, next to a river because that's where these steam energy plants need the water.

All they are is earth and berms. They just bulldozed it years ago and then started to throw the junk out there. Well, all that junk piles up, piles up with water and seeps down, seeps down. Well, where does the water go? It goes into the ground. It goes into the river.

COSTELLO: Right. OK, so the 35 million gallons that seeped into the Dan River, how did that happen?

GRIFFIN: Well, that happened because underneath one of these berms that I just talked about, there was an old, old storm drainage pipe not connected to the plant. It was an old corrugated metal pipe, well, after, I don't know how many, 30, 40 years, that corrugated pipe burst.

Well, imagine if you had a pipe going through your fish tank, all right? Well, the pipe in the fish tank bursts and all the water goes rushing in to the pipe and into the river. That's how it happens. And that's why it took so long to fix because they had to dig into that sludge to get to the pipe. It was a big mess.

COSTELLO: OK. So, now down the nitty-gritty. The governor says, Duke Energy, clean up your mess. The protesters say we don't want the coal ash ponds anywhere near our water supply or the waters of North Carolina.

So, what eventually will be done?

GRIFFIN: Well, it's hard to say. Duke Energy has been given to March 15th to come up with some kind of plan. The state is in a lawsuit. So, our environmental groups are trying to sue.

The environmental groups want to get rid of the coal all together. The problem is, Carol, that the coal ash is still there, all right? So something has to be done with all of this. It's tremendously expensive to move this stuff. Duke Energy is a big company, lot of money, they could do it. Let's see what they come up with.

But the question is, are we going to build huge safe depositories for all this coal ash, or is there going to be some other solution where we're just kind of doing what we're doing now, which is, eh, forget about it until there's a disaster?

COSTELLO: Well, I will add, other states are dealing with similar problems. Pennsylvania, right?

GRIFFIN: North Carolina is one of the lowest. We're talking about -- Illinois has a huge problem. Pennsylvania, huge problem. There's 1100 of these things across the country.

COSTELLO: Drew Griffin, thanks so much.

Still to come on the NEWSROOM: Asiana Airlines slapped with huge fine. The federal government says it took the carrier far too long to contact victims' families after last year's crash. We'll talk about that, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: Checking our top stories at 22 minutes past the hour.

Asiana Airlines has been slapped with a $500,000 fine for not helping (ph) victims' families fast enough after last year's deadly crash in San Francisco. The Department of Transportation says the Korean airline was slow to share a phone number for relatives and did not contact some families until five days after the crash.

The family of an Oklahoma man who died after an encounter with police has released a cell phone video that shows part of the incident. Forty-four Luis Rodriguez died shortly after officers pinned him down to the ground. Police say he refused to show them ID and then got combative. His wife is alleging police brutality. An investigation is under way.

How severe is California's drought. Well, the pictures tell the story. On the left, Folsom Lake in 2011. It was at 97 percent capacity. On the right, Folsom lake last month, 17 percent capacity.

NASA is now working with California to use new technology to better manage water resources.

Another massive arctic blast pushing temperatures 20 to 30 degrees below normal in the eastern two-thirds of the nation and millions of us will see more snow today.

Oh, yay, Indra Petersons.

INDRA PETERSONS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Absolutely, yay, right? We're talking about snow in New York City, D.C., Philly having about 30, 40- minute delays at the airport already and then, for you, down into the South, we are talking about rain.

Well, we know that's not the big story, it's how cold it is. I mean, look at this. These wind chills this morning. This is what it feels like right now if you go outside. Duluth feels like 32 below zero. Chicago, you wonder they're calling it Chiberia -- 14 below with the wind chill. And, unfortunately, as we go through the afternoon, it is still going to be miserable. We're talking about highs well below normal, 20, almost 30 below normal. Chicago, your high today of just 11 degrees.

And even to the South, we're talking about definitely well below. Tomorrow, it's going to feel worse than today. Yesterday was bad. Today is worse. Tomorrow, even worse. Not what anyone wants to hear.

Look at that -- Chicago, your high expected to be only 4, freezing temperatures for your highs into the Northeast, down through Atlanta about 52 degrees. So, it's getting better.

Keep in mind, everybody is asking, how long is this going to last, right? Well, couple of cold fronts making their way through. So, all that means reinforcing the cold, it is going to be staying, Carol. Sorry.

COSTELLO: Well, we're going to have you back in just a couple of minutes to talk about the misery index and because many of us are -- this is like the worst winter ever.

PETERSONS: Miserable?

COSTELLO: Miserable. Many of us are very miserable.

Thanks so much. We'll see you later, Indra.

Still to come in the NEWSROOM, Obamacare enrollment jumps but not in one critical area the White House is counting on. We'll talk about that, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: Good morning. I'm Carol Costello. Thanks for joining me.

Happening right now: Obamacare hits a new milestone, but the signature program may still be missing its target for one key group.

A big surprise for children's waist line. There's a major drop in childhood obesity rates but don't break out the ice cream and cake just yet.

And near record snowfall, bone chillingly cold temperatures. If you think it's been a miserable winter, you're right.

NEWSROOM continues now.