Return to Transcripts main page
CNN Newsroom
One-on-one with Presidential Candidate John Hickenlooper; Interviews, Letters Reveal Biden's Fight Against Busing. Aired 7-8p ET
Aired June 30, 2019 - 19:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[19:00:01] ANA CABRERA, CNN ANCHOR: You are live in the CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Ana Cabrera in New York. Thanks for being here.
The world is a different place right now than it was a few hours ago. President Trump and his penchant for extraordinary television moments unquestionably made one happen.
As he tells it, it was his idea. While at the Korean Demilitarized Zone, why not send a message to the leader of North Korea? A tweet to Kim Jong-un to join him for a handshake and a chat. Well, nobody knew if it would happen until it did. Kim Jong-un showed up.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KIM JONG-UN, SUPREME LEADER OF NORTH KOREA (through translator): Good afternoon.
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Good afternoon.
KIM (through translator): President, good to see you again. I never expected to meet you at this place.
(CROSSTALK)
TRUMP: -- treated.
KIM (through translator): If you take --
TRUMP: I don't --
(CROSSTALK)
KIM (through translator): -- a step forward, you will be the first U.S. president to cross over this line.
(CROSSTALK)
KIM (through translator): This is a great moment.
(SPEAKING IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, no, get out of the way. Move.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Move. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Move, move.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Clear.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Move. Move.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All of you.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hey, hey.
TRUMP: This is my honor. I didn't really expect it. We were in Japan for the G-20, we came over, and I said, hey, I'm over here. I want to call up Chairman Kim. And we got to meet and stepping across that line was a great honor. A lot of progress has been made.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CABRERA: Here again, that big moment, the sitting American president standing on North Korean soil.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
(INAUDIBLE)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CABRERA: Let's get CNN's Will Ripley in here. He's in Seoul, South Korea.
Will, just in the last few minutes, we're finding out how the people of North Korea are learning about this monumental moment that their leader, Kim Jong-un, has now met the American president for, now, the third time and in his territory. How are the North Koreans describing it?
WILL RIPLEY, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes. As usual, Ana, it was hours after the rest of the world watched the events unfold at the DMZ live. North Korean media always carefully edits the message.
But in this case, they're pretty much on the same page with how President Trump described the meeting, calling it amazing, historic, dramatic, and talking about the friendship between Mr. Kim and Mr. Trump, a friendship that allowed the notoriously rigid North Korean bureaucracy to work with the United States to pull together that extraordinary moment at the DMZ in around 24 hours after President Trump sent that tweet.
But while they may be on the same page about the significance of the event, itself, there are still huge differences between what North Korea wants and what the United States wants when it comes to denuclearization. North Korea has been calling for sanctions relief right away. The United States wants North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons or at least agree on a definition of denuclearization. And despite all of those feel-good moments at the Demilitarized Zone, those differences still remain, Ana, which doesn't bode well for the future of working-level talks. CABRERA: Yes. So what does the U.S. now get out of this?
RIPLEY: Well, what the United States gets is a restart of diplomacy after the North Koreans basically shut everything down when President Trump walked out of talks in February in Hanoi, Vietnam. A source told me, at that time, the North Koreans were actually told not to engage with the United States.
Obviously, the orders have changed. Kim Jong-un and Trump are now back on a friendly footing, and they have agreed, within the next couple of weeks, to form teams that will resume working-level talks. Secretary of State Pompeo says that will happen in mid-July.
But what the United States needs to get out of this, sooner rather than later, is an agreement from North Korea to take actual steps to denuclearize. And so far, the North Koreans have not agreed to do that, and it's not clear at this point if they're going to agree to do that.
CABRERA: All right. Will Ripley in Seoul, South Korea, for us. Thank you.
I'm joined now by Democratic presidential candidate and former Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper.
Governor, do you take issue with President Trump meeting Kim Jong-un at the DMZ and then stepping into North Korea?
JOHN HICKENLOOPER (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Well, you know, it's showboating. I mean, these are the highest stakes imaginable -- nuclear weapons, nuclear proliferation -- and they should not be negotiated by tweet. You know, out in Colorado, we refer to this sometimes as acting like -- you know, behaving like a cowboy. Although, in this case, I think both of them, it's all hat and no cattle.
CABRERA: Would you meet Kim, though, if you were president?
[19:04:54] HICKENLOOPER: Yes, but I wouldn't do it on a unilateral basis. Obviously, these are the kinds of negotiations that need to happen with our various allies in the region. And to make sure everyone is at the able. And you have to go cautiously forward.
I'm a big believer in constant engagement. That's what I'd call it. We should be engaging frequently with everyone because, you know, whether it's climate change or nuclear proliferation, the globe has become much smaller, and we need to have those relationships all the time. But to do it by tweet and go off and try and create a celebrity moment, I'm not sure I understand the benefit.
CABRERA: Let's talk about an issue closer to home. I want to ask you about the busing controversy that took center stage at night two of the debate. I know you were night one. This was this moment between Senator Kamala Harris, former Vice President Joe Biden.
Earlier today, here on CNN, Senator Harris' national press secretary revealed Harris supports busing today. Would you support busing to help further integrate schools if elected president?
HICKENLOOPER: Well, certainly, making sure that our education system is thoroughly integrated should be a goal for everyone. And in many places, busing is essential to making that happen. So, you know, within that framework, absolutely, I would support busing.
CABRERA: So you do support busing in the context of desegregation, right?
HICKENLOOPER: Exactly. I think that you --
CABRERA: OK.
HICKENLOOPER: -- you need to make -- be very clear on what your goals are and how you're going to get there.
CABRERA: Now, we're a couple of days out from the debates. The conversation, though, is still largely focused on this issue and comments from the past, rather than focusing on a vision for America in the future. Do you think this helps or hurts Democrats?
HICKENLOOPER: You know, I think this is an issue that helps Democrats. And I was on the second night on Thursday night, so I saw it up close and personal. And, you know, it was a very direct -- you know, they were both being very direct with each other in a way you don't always see in debates. Certainly, we didn't see it Wednesday night. But they were both, you know, making their points explicit, and there was no question about where each other stood.
CABRERA: I'm sure you've seen the attacks now about this tweet. A lot of other Democratic candidates have come forward, condemning the tweet from Don Junior that questioned whether Kamala Harris was a, quote, Black American or an American Black since her mother's from India, her father's from Jamaica. Senator Bernie Sanders went so far as to call Don Junior racist. What are your thoughts on this?
HICKENLOOPER: Well, I think it's another example -- you know, I tell people I'm running for president because we are in a crisis of division. And we've never been this divided since the Civil War, probably. And this is a classic case of the Trump family -- it's not just the President -- are trying to find every way they can to divide us because they really haven't delivered what they promised in 2016. And the only way they have any hope of re-election is, you know, divide, divide, divide.
CABRERA: You like to say you are the only scientist right now seeking the presidency since you're a former geologist. You've released a plan to tackle the climate crisis. But under your leadership, Colorado began producing more crude oil than ever before. You can see the jump shortly after you took office in 2011. How do you square a surge in oil production with environmental protection?
HICKENLOOPER: Well, so the surge in oil production was a function of prices and exploration. So that happens all over the world and, you know, governors don't have a big control net. What we did do is get the oil and gas industry to sit down with the
environmental community and create the first methane regulations in the history of America. Methane's 25 times more harmful to climate change than CO2 is, so no one had ever -- I mean, all the methane gets vented, was flared. We got the oil and gas industry to agree to pay for it. And in doing that, it was the equivalent of taking 320,000 automobiles a year off the streets of Colorado.
That's -- you know, if we're going to address climate change, we got to get everyone at the table, figure out what are the fastest ways to reduce these harmful emissions, and then go global. Back to that constant engagement, we got to get everyone on the world helping us.
CABRERA: You also kept a fracking ban off the ballot, though, in Colorado in 2014. You spoke out against a similar measure last year in 2018. I hear what you're saying about methane, but critics of fracking cite environmental and health concerns as well.
HICKENLOOPER: So we haven't had, in Colorado, the water contamination that people are so worried about. We just have never seen it. That is a real problem in parts of New York and Pennsylvania, and I recognize that. But that, in Colorado, we haven't had that same issue.
CABRERA: All right, Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper, 2020 candidate. Thank you so much for stopping by and taking the time.
HICKENLOOPER: Thank you, Ana.
CABRERA: It is the takedown seen by millions, the one that's earned Senator Kamala Harris millions in donations. But was Senator Harris right about Joe Biden's stance on busing? CNN has uncovered Biden's decades-old interviews and letters, next. You're live in the CNN NEWSROOM.
[19:10:14] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CABRERA: 2020 Democratic front-runner Joe Biden is still facing criticism after his debate performance. Senator Kamala Harris challenging Biden's record on race issues and specifically his stance on federal busing efforts to desegregate schools back in the 1970s. Biden insisting he did not oppose busing in America but rather he did oppose busing ordered by the federal government's Department of Education.
We wanted to know what exactly did Joe Biden say about busing decades ago as a young senator from Delaware. Here's what CNN's "KFILE" dug up. Watch this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. JOE BIDEN (D), DELAWARE: I happen to be one of those so-called people labeled as a liberal on civil rights but oppose busing, and I support the effort to curtail the ability of courts to bus.
(END VIDEO CLIP) CABRERA: Joining us now, CNN's "KFILE" senior editor, Andrew
Kaczynski. Andrew, that was, again, in 1981. What was the context in which Biden made those comments?
ANDREW KACZYNSKI, CNN KFILE SENIOR EDITOR: So Biden made these comments July 1981. What had been going on was there was basically this amendment that some senators were trying to add to a bill to make it to -- so courts could not order busing so the Justice Department could not.
[19:15:04] And Biden was very supportive of that effort, so he came on this program we had called "NEWSMAKERS" that we found in the archive. And he sort of explained his position at length, which was he -- you know, as we just heard, he was -- he's a liberal on civil rights but he opposed busing as a way to desegregate schools.
And he had a long history on this. In the 1970s, he had these legislative efforts that pretty -- that mostly failed where he worked with some segregationists, wrote them letters asking for their support, actually, to, you know, get -- to stop federal government efforts to bus.
CABRERA: And so I'm trying to understand, though, why. I think a lot of viewers at home are asking, you know, why didn't he want busing, for it to be court ordered? Do you --
KACZYNSKI: Yes.
CABRERA: Does he explain himself? What's the context about?
KACZYNSKI: So what's so interesting about this video -- and we posted the whole segment on CNN.com if people want to watch it -- is he explains his reasoning behind it. And he says he thinks busing makes sense when you have Black students and White students living on the same block to bus them to the same school.
What he was opposing -- and he had a lot of constituent pressure in the '70s and '80s back in Delaware. What he was arguing was that when you have people living long distances, it didn't make sense to bus them into the same school district. He said it raised all sorts of problems. And he said, for the issue of desegregation, he thought busing was the least effective way to do it.
CABRERA: And is there any evidence that you have uncovered that suggests his position on this has evolved?
KACZYNSKI: That's what's kind of interesting about this because at the debate, he sort of stood by his record, but the way in which he described it was a little bit misleading. He said I -- you know, I didn't oppose busing. I opposed, you know, the federal government busing. He said, I didn't oppose voluntary busing like the program that Senator Kamala Harris was a part of.
But in this interview, we can see that he basically -- he says that he thinks -- he doesn't really agree with the concept as a whole. Again, he called it the least effective way to desegregate. So he stood by his record, but the way in which he's sort of defended it is a little bit misleading.
CABRERA: All right. And we're going to ask a Biden surrogate, Symone Sanders, next, to see if she can provide some clarity on where he is today on this issue. Andrew Kaczynski, great reporting. Thank you very much for sharing it.
So what is the Biden campaign saying about all of this? I'll talk to his senior adviser, Symone Sanders, next live here in the CNN NEWSROOM.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:21:22] CABRERA: We're back, and I want to pick up again on what CNN's "KFILE" discovered about Joe Biden and his past response to the issue of forced busing.
In 1981, he said he thought it was the least effective remedy to integrate schools, and he supported limiting the court's power to order it. But last week's tense exchange over busing with his competitor Senator Kamala Harris shows that this issue still has political significance. How it could affect the 2020 presidential campaign, here's what White House hopeful Cory Booker has to say.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. CORY BOOKER (D-NJ), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Whoever our nominee is going to be, whoever the next president is going to be, really needs to be someone who can talk openly and honestly about race with vulnerability, because none of us are perfect, but really call this country to common ground, to reconciliation. I'm not sure if Vice President Biden is up to that task given the way these last three weeks have played out. And, frankly, I know whoever is that nominee needs to be able to pull this country together because we need to reconcile.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CABRERA: Symone Sanders is a senior adviser to the Biden campaign. Symone, why hasn't Biden come out and clearly stated where he stands on this issue today?
SYMONE SANDERS, SENIOR ADVISER, BIDEN FOR PRESIDENT: Thanks for having me, Ana. Vice President Biden did come out and clearly state where he stood on this issue today. Following the debate on Friday, this past Friday, Vice President Biden was at the Rainbow/PUSH coalition's labor luncheon -- he was the keynote speaker and joined Reverend Jesse Jackson -- where, at the beginning of his remarks, he spoke very frankly about it.
And what he said was, to be clear, he has always been a forceful, forceful supporter and champion of civil rights and the federal government's need to step in to protect the civil rights of all Americans. And he spoke to the exchange that he had with Senator Harris. He noted that he respected Senator Harris and he heard her and he listened to her. And what he wanted to make clear to the American people, and also the
people in that room at the Rainbow/PUSH labor luncheon, was that he did not believe that busing was basically a cure-all for the ills and issues that followed with segregation and to, frankly, address segregation and that he was a very forceful advocate combatting redlining, of rezoning school districts. He believes -- he was an advocate of making sure there are good neighborhood schools.
And what he believes now that he spoke about, again, at the Rainbow/PUSH labor luncheon, is that we have to have -- we have to put forth education policies and have policies that deal with what young people and schools are dealing with now and to ensure that they are able to have successful futures. That's why in his education policy, among other things, we tripled Title I funding.
And if folks aren't familiar with Title I funding, that is the funding that specifically -- federal funds that specifically go to schools with large populations of low-income students. We tripled that funding in our education policy.
CABRERA: OK.
SANDERS: Another tenet, frankly -- if I may, one more tenet of our education policy is universal pre-K because we believe that every child should have the same starting point. And universal pre-K allows folks to do that regardless of their ZIP Code. And so I just respectfully would like to push back on the idea that he and our campaign have not been clear on where we stand today.
I think, frankly, Ana, a lot of people want to have a conversation about the past, about 1960 and 1970, and I understand why it might be politically advantageous for them to do that. But, frankly, the American people want to have a conversation about the future because what we're dealing, particularly with Donald Trump in the White House, is far too important, far -- and the stakes are far too high for us to play games with the American people's future.
CABRERA: I hear what you're saying. I listened carefully to what Biden said at the debate. I listened carefully to what he said the next day in Chicago as well. And I heard him defend his record from the 1970s. It wasn't clear to me, as I listened to him, where he stands on the issue of busing today.
[19:25:02] And I think it is a conversation that's happening today. Senator Kamala Harris says she supports busing today. I just spoke with presidential candidate John Hickenlooper who says he, too, would support busing today to deal with the issues of segregation or re- segregation that Bernie Sanders said this morning. He, too, says that busing should be an option that's on the table in -- today --
SANDERS: So, Ana, I just want to be clear --
CABRERA: -- in 2019. So does Vice President Joe Biden believe busing should be a potential solution to -- if it's re-segregation but segregation issues of today? SANDERS: So, Ana, I just want to be clear for the people at home
listening. I think our press secretary, T.J. Ducklo, and the Harris campaign's press secretary were in a spirited Twitter exchange today where we asked, point-blank, did Senator Harris support busing in the case of de facto segregation?
And to be clear for folks at home, de facto segregation is segregation, frankly, in schools that just happens. And so meaning that, you know, it happens that some White people may end up living in an all-White neighborhood or Black folks or Latino folks will end up living in an all-Black or all-Latino neighborhood. And frankly, de facto segregation, if we want to be frank and break it down, that is what's happening across American places, all across the country, much so like where I'm from in Omaha, Nebraska.
And the Harris' campaign press secretary declined to answer the question. And so I'm not really sure where the Harris campaign stands. To --
CABRERA: But why aren't you answering the question?
SANDERS: Well, to be --
CABRERA: I mean, it should be an easy question.
SANDERS: To be clear -- to be clear, we --
CABRERA: You're here to represent the Vice President.
SANDERS: Hold on, Ana. Hold on, Ana. We have answered the question, and we have said that the Vice President does not believe that busing is, in fact, a cure-all. And if she -- and what we -- we posed the question to the Harris campaign because if, in fact, Senator Harris does not believe in de facto segregation as -- pardon me, in busing, as the remedy to de facto segregation --
CABRERA: Let me jump in here, though, for a second because --
SANDERS: -- then she has the same position --
CABRERA: -- I don't have a lot of time.
SANDERS: -- as Vice President Biden.
CABRERA: Hold on.
SANDERS: Vice President Biden has said -- so I just -- Ana, I want to be clear --
CABRERA: Hold on. So --
SANDERS: -- because I think people are conflating --
CABRERA: I want to be clear, too.
SANDERS: -- desegregation and busing. And I know we're throwing around a lot of terms, but I think it's important that we provide definitions and a little backstory for the folks at home.
CABRERA: So just to be clear, then, the Vice President has not changed his stance on this issue since the comments he made in the 1970s?
SANDERS: To be clear --
CABRERA: Correct?
SANDERS: -- just as the Vice President said at the Rainbow/PUSH coalition, that he believes, today, we have to deal with -- we have to deal with the issues and the issues that confront young people today, which means good neighborhood schools, which means injecting money into Title I funds.
CABRERA: OK.
SANDERS: Which means universal pre-K. That is what the Vice President believes.
CABRERA: OK.
SANDERS: But to be clear, he has always been a champion of civil rights. And so I think folks are conflating busing and segregation.
CABRERA: And that's fair enough. He has a record.
SANDERS: And I just want to be clear that he's never been against -- he's always been for integration. He has been a forceful, forceful advocate in the United States Congress as a --
CABRERA: OK.
SANDERS: -- United States senator, particularly when it comes to voting rights.
CABRERA: Symone, Biden's debate performance reviews were mixed. Critics said he seemed unprepared. He cut himself off saying, my time's up. What advice will you be giving him as he now prepares for the CNN debates next month?
SANDERS: Well, you know, I was part of Vice President Biden's prep, and I would say he absolutely prepped and was prepared for the debate. Look, we have 11 more debates. This is going to be a long primary, and our strategy for the debate last week was to go in there and Vice President Biden wanted to speak directly to the American people and communicate his vision.
I think he spoke very passionately about health care. We got into conversations about climate change. We touched a little bit on foreign policy. So as we prepare for the debates at the end of July, I think you can expect us, again, plan to speak directly to the American people about what Vice President Biden would plan to do as president and where he wants to take America next.
CABRERA: OK. Symone Sanders, I really appreciate you coming on. SANDERS: Thank you.
CABRERA: Thank you.
SANDERS: Thank you for having me.
CABRERA: President Trump taking a few steps and doing something his predecessors never did.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KIM (through translator): President, good to see you again. I never expected to meet you at this place.
TRUMP: I don't --
(CROSSTALK)
KIM (through translator): If you take a step forward, you will be the first U.S. president to cross over this line.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CABRERA: So no -- now that a sitting U.S. president has actually walked on North Korean soil, what happens next? Your weekend presidential brief is right after this.
[19:29:12] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:32:45] ANA CABRERA, CNN HOST: Happening right now, you are looking at live pictures right now of air force one at joint base Andrews. President just back from his historic visit to the DMZ. That included him meeting with Kim Jong-un and stepping onto North Korean soil. The first sitting U.S. President ever to do so.
That brings us to your weekend Presidential brief. A segment where we highlight the most pressing national security issues the President will face when he wakes up tomorrow.
With us now, CNN national security Analyst Sam Vinograd. She helped prepare the Presidential daily brief for President Obama.
So President Trump did make history by meeting Kim at the DMZ, walking into North Korea. Is this a net positive from a security perspective?
SAMANTHA VINOGRAD, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Well, Ana, it depends if we are playing the long game or short game. President Trump cross the line in North Korea. I'm not just talking about the military demarcation one. By stepping into North Korea, he cemented North Korea's status as a normalized nuclear power.
From a long-term perspective that has adverse implications for a nonproliferation agenda. Other countries may look at Kim's example and think there's great benefit in following in his now nuclear footsteps. In the short term the security situation has improved because of a
lull in testing short-range missiles and nuclear weapons. But if history is a guide here, this status quo may be tenuous. Over a decade ago Kim's father followed a similar pattern. There was a lull in testing while he waited to get concessions from the U.S., he didn't get them and he resumed testing. So it remains to be seen whether the short-term security gain has an expiration date.
CABRERA: So what does this meeting and handshake of peace send to Kim?
VINOGRAD: To be to be clear, we are not at peace to be clear, we're not at peace with North Korea. North Korea was launching cyber- attacks, malware attacks, against the United States as early as next month. So North Korea's still attacking us. What Trump's for it into North Korea messages to Kim Jong-un is that the status quo is good enough and means Kim is going to continue illicit activities that impact far beyond the Korean peninsula.
North Korea has one of the largest conventional militaries in the world. Over a million people. And we know North Korea in the past has sold ballistic missile technology to Iran, for example. We are in a direct confrontation with them. North Korea has a very large chemical weapons arsenal. We know that North Korea has used chemical weapons in Malaysia when Kim assassinated his half-brother. So even while we supposedly look forward to more denuclearization talks, we can expect Kim to continue to pursue these other lines of attack.
[19:35:19] CABRERA: And I think that is the million-dollar question. What's next?
VINOGRAD: Well, we know domestically, Kim is going to keep being Kim which means abusing his people. He got an invitation to the White House reportedly despite doing all of that and more.
With respect to denuclearization, the least bad option right now is a freeze for freeze. A freeze in North Korea's nuclear program in exchange for a freeze in U.S. sanctions. If that is agreed to, which would be a big step, we would expect Kim Jong-un to do something like let IAEA, international weapons experts into North Korea to do an audit of North Korean facilities. But the question is whether Trump is willing to put sanctions relief on the table b. It's something he said he wouldn't do unless North Korea fully denuclearized. If that's not an unrealistic goal at this point, he's going to need to adjust his own goal post.
CABRERA: Sam Vinograd, good info. Thank you.
VINOGRAD: Thanks, Ana.
CABRERA: Breaking news. Ten people are dead after a private plane crash. The details next. You are live in the CNN NEWSROOM.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:40:11] CABRERA: Just moments ago President Trump returning to joint Base Andrews. See him getting off air force one there. This was after he landed following his historic visit to the DMZ that included him meeting with Kim Jong-un in North Korea. The President says it was an honor to step foot on North Korean soil during his trip. And he and Kim have agreed to restart stalled nuclear talks.
Meantime, we have some breaking news out of Texas. Officials are confirming ten people are dead in a plane crash in Addison. That's right outside of Dallas. The private plane crashed into a hangar shortly after takeoff this morning and burst into flames. The FAA and NTSB are now investigating. Former FAA safety inspector David Soucie joined us last hour and talked about this specific airport.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DAVID SOUCIE, CNN AVIATION SAFETY ANALYST: This airport is used as a hub for several charter operations and some airlines, Ameristar jet, flight express, and a few others. It's unclear as to whether this is one of those operations or not at this point.
CABRERA: So now this investigation begins. Take us inside what investigators will be looking at.
SOUCIE: First thing they're going to be doing, of course, is identifying who was onboard the aircraft and taking care of those families and notifications. That will be step one. Of course, the on-site people have been handling the fire, putting the fire out. Fortunately, there was no one in the hangar that they ran into. It was empty at the time. So we don't know if there were other aircraft damaged or not. But that fire looks pretty significant. I'm sure if there was anything in there, it would be destroyed.
CABRERA: The plane was a beach craft king air 350. I understand you maintained that type of plane. What can you tell us about them?
SOUCIE: Well, not only did I maintain one but our corporate office, our family business, owned a 350 for many years and I probably got hundreds and hundreds of hours in that aircraft. It is the most reliable aircraft, in my opinion. It's something that every corporation should be using if they are not for any type of transportation of their important corporate leadership because of the fact that it has an incredible safety record. It's like the Cadillac of turboprops for corporations.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CABRERA: And ten people dead following a private plane crash in Addison, Texas. That investigation now getting under way.
Despite a loud outcry, Japan is resuming commercial whaling after 30 years.
(VIDEO CLIP PLAYING)
CABRERA: Coming up, we look at both sides of the debate surrounding the world's giant creatures.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:46:24] CABRERA: For the first time in more than 30 years japan is resuming commercial whaling despite an international outcry. Japan's last commercial hunt was back in 1986, but it never really ended. Whalers have killed hundreds of whales every year since then.
CNN's Ivan Watson reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
IVAN WATSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Two brothers on the hunt searching for the world's largest living creature, whales. Captain (INAUDIBLE) Maeda, age 73, and his younger 71-year-old brother, Saburo, lead a whale watch for Japanese tourists.
It's cold. It's windy, and it's wet, but people are paying money because they want to see these whales out in the wild.
They are delighted when we spot a minke whale. Here's the thing about the Maeda brothers. More than 30 years ago, they weren't whale watchers. They were whale hunters.
This is captain Maeda back in the 1960s when he worked with a team harpooning whales. That hunt came to an end in 1986 when the international whaling commission of which Japan was a member imposed a worldwide ban on commercial whaling.
That decision was unacceptable, he tells me, because suddenly we lost our jobs.
But, in fact, some Japanese whalers continued killing hundreds of whales every year mostly in the Antarctic under a special permit classifying the hunt as scientific research.
Animal rights groups and some western governments condemned the practice. Last year, Japan announced its abrupt withdrawal from the international whaling commission, declaring it would resume commercial whaling again within its own coastal waters starting July 1st.
KIYOSHI EJIMA, JAPANESE UPPER HOUSE MEMBER: I was waiting for the day, for the commercial whaling, restart again.
WATSON: Kiyoshi Ejima, a lawmaker and passionate supporter of the whaling industry, applauds the decision. It's a victory for you.
EJIMA: Well, I shouldn't say victory. It's a start-off, kickoff point.
WATSON: Do you eat whale? Meat?
EJIMA: Sure, of course.
WATSON: They are also celebrating the new whale hunt here at a Tokyo restaurant that specializes in dishes like whale sashimi, whale steak, and fried whale. The owner inherited this whale meat restaurant from his father. SHINTARO SATO TARUICHI OWNER (through translator): I hope the young
generation that did not eat whale meat will inherit this culture and learn to eat it again.
WATSON: After World War II, whale meat was a vital source of protein in Japan but government statistics show these days very few Japanese eat any whale meats at all.
PATRICK RAMAGE, INTERNATIONAL FUND FOR ANIMAL WELFARE: There are fragile whale populations around japan that cannot sustain commercial hunting. They cannot feed a meaningful Japanese market even if there were one for
WATSON: Japanese supporters of whaling argue that the hunt is an important part of Japanese culture. Those supporters include the captain Maeda, the whale hunter turned whale watcher.
MITSUHIKO MAEDA, ABASHIN NATURE CRUISE (through translator): Japan should continue whaling. I will continue whale watching tourist. But the whale hunters should catch the whales. I want both to coexist.
WATSON: One wonders how long these completely contradictory impulses can coexist in the waters around japan.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
[19:50:09] CABRERA: Ivan Watson joins us now live.
Ivan, you are at that departure ceremony for the first whale hunt. What are you seeing?
WATSON: Ana, we have a small fleet of Japanese whaling boats, about five of them. I will let you see right here. That are going out for the day. You have lawmakers, government officials, the mayor who are going to see them off.
In case you have never see a whaling boat before in Japan, the crow's nest is where the crew, hunters, spot whales in the water. And then the harpoon guns in front, the weapons, are currently covered up by tarps. And those will be used potentially to bring in prey this evening.
The Japanese government subsidizes whale hunting to the tune of around $50 million dollars a year. Some animal rights conservationists think this is a good thing because it may be a sign that the government will increasingly remove those subsidies and let Japanese whaling die a natural death the way other whaling industries for other countries around the world have over the last several decades -- Ana.
CABRERA: Very eye opening report. Ivan Watson, thank you for sharing it.
Now in the CNN special report "State of hate, the explosion of white supremacy," our Fareed Zakaria speaks Jared Taylor, a white nationalist, wildly known as the godfather of the alt right.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JARED TAYLOR, WHITE NATIONALIST: There are plenty of white people. They deserve a future. Not to be simply melted away in this multi- racial mishmash that they did not choose.
FAREED ZAKARIA, CNN HOST, FAREED ZAKARIA GPS (voice-over): Jared Taylor is a white nationalist, quite literally. He does not advocate violence, but he does want to create a white only version of America.
TAYLOR: I'm not at all talking about the entire United States becoming white. I'm talking about simply a portion of it becoming white.
ZAKARIA: The whites would --
TAYLOR: Perhaps. I can assure you that more and more white people agree with me all the time. They do not want to become a minority.
ZAKARIA: Repeatedly he voices the biggest fear of the white supremacy movement.
TAYLOR: Should I want my people to disappear? It's entire profoundly moral to resist that kind of replacement.
ZAKARIA: Replacement.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Jews will not replace us.
ZAKARIA: The word has become a call to arms.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CABRERA: Recently, I spoke to CNN's Fareed Zakaria about tonight's Special Report.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CABRERA: How do white supremacists like Jared Taylor justify their sense of superiority?
ZAKARIA: Well, he is a very learned and intelligent man. So he does it very cleverly and with sophistication. He talks about IQ scores and genetic clusters. But for most people, they are draw drawing on an old tradition. I mean, you have 250 years of slavery in this country. And in order to perpetuate those kind of different treatments for different people, we built up a whole ideology that says that whites were superior, more intelligent, more advanced, more civilized. And so in a strange sense, buried underneath, he's tapping into a much older, darker vein of white supremacy.
CABRERA: What's driving it?
ZAKARIA: it is very -- that is part of what we drive to get out in the program. There's some very deep-rooted fears that have to do really with replacement, with the trend lines that the census bureau has been reporting for 20 years. The increasing number of minorities who are becoming a larger and larger part of America. And one has to admit the election of a non-white President somehow focused all this. So Barack Obama became the sort of symbol for many people of what was going to happen to their world, a world in which they had always assumed the President was a white man because he had always been a white man. And that, you know, visual jolt combined with the sort of longer-term trend lines seem to have coalesced into a combustible mixture.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CABRERA: State of hate airs tonight at 8:00 here on CNN. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:58:01] CABRERA (through text): Hello. I'm Ana Cabrera and I'm running for president of the United States. Actually, that's not true. But I am speaking Spanish. So maybe?
Here's Jeannie Moos.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JEANNIE MOOS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): How would you rate the way Beto O'Rourke speaks Spanish? Let's just call it debatable.
BETO O'ROURKE (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: (SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: To hear my answer in English, press one.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He is running for embarrassing dad at a Mexican restaurant.
MOOS: Many said he dodged the question. Beto did not answer in English or in Spanish. But it might have been lost in translation if this hadn't happened.
O'ROURKE: (SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE)
MOOS: Cory booker's eyes were eyed by talk show audiences. And online when Beto was speaking Spanish, Cory Booker was speaking mean.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He is thinking, man, I was going to do that.
SEN. CORY BOOKER (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: (SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE)
MOOS: Cory Booker did it.
JULIAN CASTRO (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: (SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE)
MOOS: Julian Castro did it a little.
CASTRO: We will say adios to Donald Trump. MOOS: Say hello to t-shirts saying adios.
There's even a term for the practice of speaking Spanish to pander to Hispanic voters.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Stuff a little bit like pandering to me.
MOOS: Cory Booker says he doesn't remember what he was thinking when he gave his rival side eye.
BOOKER: I knew he laid a gauntlet down and I was talking a little bit with Castro. Both he and I knew as people who can speak Spanish that now we were going to bring it as well.
MOOS: When "the View" brought on Beto's Spanish speaking moment --
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I thought Trump was going to deport him.
MOOS: In 2015, when Jeb Bush answered a few questions in Spanish --.
JEB BUSH (R), FORMER PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: (SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE)
MOOS: Then candidate Trump gave him a hard time.
TRUMP: This is a country where we speak English, not Spanish.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
