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CNN This Morning

Rep. Jill Tokuda (D-HI), Is Interviewed About The Hawaii Wildfires; Judge Sets Rules For Handling Evidence In Trump Case; GOP Hopefuls Flocking To Iowa State Fairs; A Fifth Person Charged in Montgomery Alabama Riverside Brawl; Fed Officials Send Team to Assess Migrant Situation in New York; Perseid Meteor Shower to Light Up the Sky this Weekend. Aired 6-7a ET

Aired August 12, 2023 - 06:00   ET

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

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[06:00:37]

AMARA WALKER, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning everyone and welcome to CNN this morning. I'm Amara Walker into Saturday, 6 o'clock. I hope you are just waking up and starting your morning off calmly and slowly. Thank you so much for starting your morning with us.

So the death toll in Hawaii rises to at least 80 people after devastating wildfires in Lahaina. And as the grim reality sets in for survivors, some are questioning the state's response before and how much was done to warn residents to get out.

Plus, Hunter Biden's legal troubles heat up. The Justice Department elevates the U.S. Attorney investigating his case to Special Counsel after plea talks fall apart.

Republican presidential candidates descend on Iowa. Today, all eyes will be on the Iowa State Fair as former President Donald Trump and presidential candidate Ron DeSantis go head to head. We will have the latest as the candidates make their pitch to voters ahead of this crucial and critical Iowa caucuses and the first presidential debate.

And get ready for an out of this world show in the sky as a meteor shower is about to rain down. We will tell you when to look up.

All right, good morning, everyone. Rahel Solomon here with us. I'm glad you made it. Good to see you.

RAHEL SOLOMON, CNN ANCHOR: Good to be here.

WALKER: Well, we're going to begin with some grim news this morning from Hawaii, where those devastating wildfires have now claimed at least 80 lives. Officials warn the death toll will likely rise in the coming days. Crews have not yet searched the inside of most of the buildings and it's still unclear how many people are missing.

SOLOMON: And criticism is growing over how authorities handle things in the early stages. Many people say that they were unaware of just how bad things had gotten until it was too late to leave.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KEITH HUNTER, LAHAINA RESIDENT: I fought wildfires in California. And I've never -- and I was here yesterday when it flared up. I've never seen something ravaged so fast.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SOLOMON: And newly released video shows just the horror of the fires as people tried to escape. This video is from the Coast Guard. And what you're seeing here it shows the view of Lahaina, the fire there on Wednesday. Coast Guard crews were able to rescue 17 people who fled into the ocean to try to escape the spreading flames.

WALKER: And take a look at this TikTok video. It appears to show some of those desperate people in the water after they were forced to jump in to save themselves from the flames. Just imagine the panic that must have set in. Dense smoke and high winds created an incredibly chaotic and terrifying situation.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We got a walk somewhere over there by the beach. Oh -- MG, wrong turn, wrong turn. Oh -- no, no, no, no, no, no, no, not like this. Not like this. Not like this. No. God. The car. God.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SOLOMON: It's so hard to hear that.

WALKER: I can't even imagine what must have been going through these people's minds. CNN's Gloria Pazmino is in Honolulu this morning. Gloria, what is the latest? Are we talking about recovery efforts now switching from rescue to recovery?

GLORIA PAZMINO, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Amara, Rahel, it is absolutely devastating to hear those voices in that video. You can just feel the panic that people are feeling as they're fleeing for the lives. The images are absolutely devastating and the destruction in Lahaina just 80 miles to the west of here is finally coming into focus.

Now let's start with the latest. As you mentioned, crews that are equipped with cadaver dogs are in the process of searching many of the structures that have been destroyed. We know that a majority of the victims that have been found so far were found outside of many of these structures.

And officials have said that they've yet to search through every building that has been burned to the ground there in Lahaina. So we are expecting sadly that death toll to increase in the next several hours. Now the fire in Lahaina has been contained by about 85 percent. But that does not mean that the danger is completely over.

[06:05:09] In fact, overnight, there was another brush fire that took place on the western part of the island and that fire triggered evacuations overnight. We've heard just a short while ago that that fire has been completely contained and that evacuations are no longer mandatory. So some good news there, but it's certainly not what residents in Lahaina are trying to hear.

Now, yesterday, Lahaina opened up the only public road that is currently accessible in order to give residents there an opportunity to get back. They're anxious to assess the damage. They're anxious to figure out whether their home was completely lost to try to connect with family and loved ones who may still be there.

But people began to pile up. There was a big traffic jam. And officials were forced to close the road back up again. So right now, there's a lot of frustration. And really, people are losing patience. They are waiting for supplies and for help to arrive in the area.

Now, just to give you an idea of where I am, we are in Honolulu standing at the convention center, which is right here behind me. This has been operating as a support center for evacuees. More than 30,000 people were flown out of Maui since Wednesday. Some of them have arrived here in the last several days. And they have been trying to get to -- connect it to help to other flights to find accommodations as they get on their way.

But as I mentioned, frustration beginning to build in the area, especially for people who are in Maui in the western part of the island waiting for help. Now, we've heard from multiple witness reports that they did not get a notification. There was no alarm system that was deployed in the area. Sirens that usually are turned on when there is danger regarding the weather did not go up.

That has prompted an investigation by the Attorney General here in Hawaii who said that he is -- they are conducting a review of the decisions that officials made in the early hours just as the fire was beginning to burn. Amara, Rahel?

SOLOMON: Gloria, as you say, frustration builds but also questions continue to mount about how this all took place. Gloria Pazmino live for us there. Thank you, Gloria.

WALKER: And so many heartbreaking stories coming out of Hawaii. Take a look at these satellite images. They show before and after the wildfires, just entire neighborhoods, homes, businesses all destroyed. One Maui photographer describes how she lost her home in the wildfires. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RACHAEL ZIMMERMAN, LOST HOME IN FIRE: The wind is just howling. We're seeing roofs that are flying off and we're trying to just get the car. And people are just kind of standing around in my condo complex neighbors looking what do we do. And we heard it was a complete gridlock and we weren't going to be able to get out. But we knew we had to try. There were people jumping into the ocean, swimming to boats to try to escape the fire. There are people on the ground, crying, unsure where to go or not able to breathe because of the smoke. And we were minutes away from that potentially being us. And it's just unbelievable to know that so many people have been lost and we don't know where they are.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALKER: I mean, the fact that people had to resort to jumping into the ocean just underscores the fact that there was no time to respond for many of these survivors. So as you heard, Rahel say, there's been growing criticism and a lot of questions over how authorities handle the early moments of the wildfires as flames quickly spread across the island.

No warning signs were activated, which critics say cost untold lives. Joining me now is Hawaii Congresswoman Jill Tokuda. Congresswoman, really appreciate you joining us this morning. Let's talk about what we're hearing from survivors saying that there was no time for reaction. There were no outdoor warning sirens that they heard.

On CNN last night, the Hawaii Attorney General said that he is leading a comprehensive review about the decisions that were made before and after. We know that just south, Hurricane Dora was turning in the Pacific days before whipping up winds on the island, knocking out power. What is your reaction when you hear that there were no warning signs outdoors from state emergency management?

REP. JILL TOKUDA (D-HI): Well, I will tell you especially growing up here in Hawaii, anyone who lives here, every single month, the very first day at noon, we hear the warning sirens go off as a test. And if you don't hear him in your neighborhoods, you know that something's wrong with them and so they get fixed. And we rely on that emergency alert system to keep us safe from a number of things, you think tsunami, you think other types of, you know, emergencies like wildfires. That should have been our first line of defense.

[06:10:14]

Unfortunately, we know especially these days, the alerts come on our cell phones. But we also know that there was no cell phone coverage in the area. So any alerts that would have gone through that system were not received. We clearly did not plan for redundancies to keep people safe in this situation.

It's not like hurricane force winds are unknown to Hawaii, or dry brush or red flag conditions. We saw this before in Lane, we did not learn our lesson from Lane. That brush fires could erupt as a result of turning hurricane winds below us to the south. And I -- we underestimated the lethality, the quickness of fire. And in this situation, we have got to make sure that we do better. We learn from what happened here so that this never happens again.

WALKER: Do you think more lives could have been saved? Do you think someone or some people may have -- will be held liable for this? TOKUDA: You know, I think there's a lot of questions that need to be asked. I will tell you this, right now, my main concern is the fact that we literally have hundreds, if not thousands still unaccounted for. We have on one hand, the absolute duty to go in there. And, you know, we want to rescue. Rescue is the hope. But in many cases recover those who were casualties in this tragedy.

And there are tens of thousands that need to be supported by us right now. They don't have anything more than the clothes on the back if that was what they were able to even run out of the house with. They lost their homes. They lost loved ones. They lost businesses. They lost livelihoods. There's a lot of questions that need to be answered.

But right now there are so many families and individuals in dire need of help. You can sense the frustration, you see it in the videos, you hear it in their voices. We have to understand the urgency in which they expect actions. And we've got to provide them the help they need.

WALKER: What is the latest on the rescue slash recovery efforts right now? And the challenges are crews there on the ground are facing. And are they able to get inside the wreckage? Because I know that the last count in producers in the control room if you guys can correct me if I'm wrong, I think at least 80 people is the death toll is where we stand right now, obviously that number could rise.

But as I understand it that numbers only counting for those found outside of the buildings at what point will crews get inside or through the wreckage?

TOKUDA: You know, I'm going to be going out there tomorrow, visiting with FEMA Director and parts of other members of her team, the governor, U.S. Senator Hirono, to really see the situation firsthand. What's been difficult, as you heard is this fire is not 100 percent contained. So we do have hotspots that we have to be aware of. These structures literally did burn to the ground, but not completely. In many cases, these were old structures, wooden structures, in some cases, metal structures, so the integrity of the buildings also need to be considered for safety.

But that is the most concerning thing for us the fact that most of the casualties have been found outside. We have yet to go inside where we know for many individuals, they may not have been able to escape that quickly. This took place at night, with howling winds outside. You just can imagine the terror for many sheltering in place was probably what they thought was the best idea, and obviously was not.

We've also heard so many jumping into the water in absolute fear. Clearly, even the oceans around Lahaina are going to have to be dredged and look through again to make sure that every individual that is lost is found.

WALKER: That's frightening. Just quickly before we go, where are the evacuees being taken? Are you seeing some of them come to O'ahu where you are?

TOKUDA: You know, not as many as we thought on O'ahu, which I think is a good thing we have had the assistance of the airlines to have bigger planes coming in. Folks are leaving that we're here visiting the islands and they're getting back home. And, you know, we hope that they will heal and take care of themselves as well. We know this was a tragedy and a nightmare for every single one involved.

But we do have shelters on O'ahu. Every island has basically opened themselves up to take in those that have been displaced by this tragedy. We have shelters on island on Maui. I'm going to go out there and see folks tomorrow.

As you can hear though everyone wants to go home. And how can you blame them. They want to see what's left, what's lost, and we need to be there to help them as they rebuild back. It's going to take years generations.

WALKER: I'm sorry for what you're going through along with your constituents. Congresswoman Jill Tokuda, thank you for taking the time.

For more information about how you can help Hawaii wildfire victims, you can go to CNN.com/impact or use your phone to scan the QR code right there on your screen.

[06:15:04]

Well, Donald Trump now has some limits on what he can and cannot talk about when it comes to the 2020 election interference days.

WALKER: Yes. That's because yesterday a federal judge issued a protective order, barring the former president from publicly disclosing any sensitive information about the case. CNN's Jessica Schneider explains what exactly that means and what the judge said she will be watching for as Trump hits the campaign trail.

JESSICA SCHNEIDER, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Amara and Rahel, the case against Donald Trump in Washington, D.C. is moving rapidly. And the judge in this case is really being firm on what Trump and his legal team can and cannot disclose it out the case to the public. So Judge Tanya Chutkan, she issued a protective order. And it lays out that Trump cannot disclose any sensitive information that's given to him and his team during discovery.

So that includes material about the grand jury process or information from it, or search warrants. And she also issued several warnings to Trump. She noted that even though he's running a political campaign, he still in her words has to yield to the administration of justice. And she said if that means his political speech has to be somewhat limited, then that's the way it's going to be.

She says she is carefully scrutinizing any statements that Trump and his team make. She says that anything that they say that can be interpreted to be intimidating to witnesses or prejudicial to potential jurors could really threaten this whole process. So under all of these terms, prosecutors are saying they're prepared to begin handing over material immediately. This includes 11.6 million pages of documents. It includes hundreds of recordings of witness interviews, which Trump of course will be prohibited from disclosing publicly. And we'll see how quickly this case could go to trial. The prosecution wants it to start January 2nd. Trump's legal team has to propose their start date sometime next week. And they'll likely propose it after the election.

But really the rate that Judge Chutkan is moving here, she'll likely want to hew closer to the prosecution's proposed January date. So we'll see. Guys?

SOLOMON: After five years of investigating Hunter Biden, the federal prosecutor in that case has been given special counsel status.

WALKER: Yes, Attorney General Merrick Garland granted prosecutor David Weiss, the new authority after plea talks between the Justice Department and the President's son fell apart in recent days. CNN's Kara Scannell explains why a special counsel was needed in this case.

KARA SCANNELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning Amara and Rahel. Well, Attorney General Merrick Garland said the investigation into Hunter Biden had reached the stage where a special counsel was needed. Garland said David Weiss, the Trump appointed U.S. attorney who has been overseeing this investigation for five years, asked her the status on Tuesday.

He did not elaborate on what had changed. And the Justice Department has not commented. Now as Special Counsel Weiss will have expansive powers to bring charges anywhere in the U.S. and have a budget for staff. He won't be under the day to day supervision of the Justice Department, but he will write a report at the end of the investigation to explain his charging decisions. And Garland said that he will make as much of that public as possible.

And this appointment comes after a plea deal Biden reached with Weiss fell apart last month under scrutiny from a federal judge in Delaware. Biden had agreed to plead guilty to two tax misdemeanors and reached a diversion agreement on a gun possession charge. Prosecutor said they would recommend no jail time.

On Friday, Weiss's office then negotiations to amend the plea deal reached an impasse. And they were prepared to go to trial. Several House Republicans called the plea a sweetheart deal. They are investigating the Biden family business and the Justice Department's investigation into Hunter Biden.

The appointment of Weiss to special counsel status drew scrutiny from Republicans who pledged to continue their investigation, including calling Weiss to testify. Amara, Rahel?

SOLOMON: And still ahead for us this morning, just weeks away from the first GOP primary debate, front runners Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis are preparing to win over voters with, what else, jabs at each other during the visit to the Iowa State Fair.

[06:19:04] WALKER: And get ready for some shooting stars. How to watch this weekend's astronomical event?

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SOLOMON: Welcome back. Republican presidential hopefuls are flocking to Iowa this weekend courting voters at the Iowa State Fair. And it's of course a chance for the candidates to try to make their case and we talked with some voters who say their minds are already made up. Others say that they are concerned about the latest indictments of Donald Trump. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Like, because I know in my area, it's Trump country.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Are the indictments changing how you feel?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, because I do think a lot of that is for a fact.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A lot of those are trumped up.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don't find the charges against him being trumped up at all. That's my opinion.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SOLOMON: Joining me now to discuss is CNN political commentator, Errol Louis. He is a spectrum news political anchor and host of the You Decide Podcast. Errol, good morning. Good to see you. So the Iowa State Fair already attracting large crowds. Today we're going to see the leading candidates, DeSantis and Trump. So it could be perhaps the main event if you want to call it that. What are you going to be watching for?

ERROL LOUIS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Good morning, I'm going to be watching to see how the crowds react and whether or not the candidates talk in particular about abortion, Rahel. I mean, we've got an issue on the table that is a wedge issue for Republican candidates. And in one state after another when it's put up to a referendum, even conservative so called red states, the voters are telling the candidates by a six to four margin in almost every instance that they want abortion to be legal and available.

And all of these candidates have been sort of talking about what is in effect a national ban on abortion, not popular, not going to win, divides voters. And, you know, and yet they seem to cling to it because that's what the donor class and what a lot of the activist base wants.

[06:25:05]

I'd love to see if they're going to continue to do that in Iowa because it's really a losing issue. And yet, it's really what you have to do in order to win with the evangelical base in Iowa, perfect wedge issue, very much worth watching.

SOLOMON: Yes, I mean, Mike Pence has certainly been out front and pretty consistent about where he stands on the issue. Also happening at the Iowa State Fair today, we will see nine congressional Floridian Republicans who will be traveling with the former President Donald Trump, and not with the current Governor Ron DeSantis.

Errol, how do you interpret this? Is this just sort of political jabs and political mudslinging if you want to call it that to sort of get at DeSantis or do you think this actually provides some pause for Iowan voters?

LOUIS: Listen, Ron DeSantis's campaign is imploding anyway you look at it. He's raised a bunch of money. He spent a bunch of money, and he's going down in the polls, despite all of that spending. He has not attracted a single member of the Republican congressional delegation from Florida to support him, even though he spent three terms in Congress.

He doesn't have any members of Congress behind him. He doesn't have the support in the polls of any of the Republican bases in any of the states. So you can't find the state that he's supposed to win until almost, you know, halfway through the season. He's in really, really tough shape. And that's why he has shaken up his campaign twice now.

It's not looking good for him. And, you know, if he can turn it around in Iowa, I don't know if this weekend is going to be the time that he does it, or if even that is enough to save his campaign. But that's what we're going to be watching for.

SOLOMON: Yes, certainly a lot to watch today. You know, one thing is that we've seen in the last few weeks is DeSantis sort of spar with V.P. Kamala Harris. And Errol, I'm curious, a bit of a pivot here. We have seen the Vice President take a more focal role in the last few weeks in terms of the campaign.

But when you look at her approval ratings, they're pretty consistent with the President. I mean, there are certain blocks where she's a bit more popular independent of black voters. Do you think that this is a winning strategy with the Biden campaign to sort of elevate Kamala Harris in this way?

LOUIS: Well, look, the Biden campaign knows that they cannot win without black women. That is who and what Kamala Harris represents on the test -- on the ticket. She is supposed to go out and get those votes. And so they're going to need to put her forward in order to do it.

There's also this sort of defensive maneuver that they're going to have to engage in, which is that because of the age of the President, oldest president we've ever had, he'll be 86 at the time that he leaves office, if he gets reelected. The question of his vice president and whether or not she's prepared to step in, is just out there.

The Republicans have really made an issue of it rather than let them try and define the issue. It is sensible for Democrats to put Kamala Harris out there and ever define herself, and make it clear that she's either quite capable, or at least not egregiously offensive to the majority. And so she's going to have to play a more prominent role than vice presidential running mates usually play on the ticket.

SOLOMON: Errol Louis, great to see you this morning. Thanks for being with us.

[06:28:19]

WALKER: A drug shortage has created a crisis for hospitals. What a new survey reveals about how pharmacists are rationing medicine for patients.

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[06:30:00]

WALKER: All right, take a look now at your other top stories this morning. A fifth person has now been charged in Alabama after that Montgomery riverside brawl last weekend. Police say 42-year-old Reggie Ray turned himself in, he is charged with a misdemeanor count of disorderly conduct.

Four others were charged with assault, Richard Roberts, Zachary Shipman, Allen Todd and Mary Todd. The charges stem from the brawl that was caught on cell phone video that went viral, showing a group of white people attacking the black co-captain of a boat after he asked them to move their boat from a ducking spot reserve for the river boat.

SOLOMON: The FDA warning this morning, consumers to stop using one brand of tests for pregnancy, ovulation and urinary tract infections. So, officials say that California-base universal medi-tech incorporated or UMI has stopped all operations and recalled tests that have not been sold.

Consumers are advised not to purchase the tests any more, and to throw away any that they may already have because they could be unreliable or unsafe. And a new survey of hospital pharmacists shows the recent drug shortages in the U.S. are negatively impacting patient care.

WALKER: A third of those survey say those impacts are critical and they're leading to rationing, delaying or canceling treatments and procedures. CNN's medical correspondent Meg Tirrell with more.

MEG TIRRELL, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, these drug shortages affect all different kinds of medicines. But in the survey of the American Society of Help System Pharmacists, they talked to 1,100 of their members, and by far, the category they said was affected most by critical shortages were chemotherapy drugs. These are drugs to treat cancer, 57 percent of the pharmacists in this survey said that the chemotherapy drug shortages are at critical levels.

I know, these are crucial drugs to treat or even cure many forms of cancer. And the fact that they're at critical levels means that these healthcare systems are having to ration care or delay or even cancel procedures for patients. Now, there were other categories of medicines also facing, you know, high levels of critical supply situations, critical steroids for example, also oral liquids, things like amoxicillin, you know, any parent of young children is very familiar with that medicine, it's commonly used for ear infections.

[06:35:00]

But these shortages really affect patient care, 85 percent of the respondents in this survey said that they did have to implement rationing procedures for medicines in shortage. That means really having to prioritize patients to figure out who should get treatment with the drugs first, 42 percent say that they had to delay care or even cancel treatment.

And so, these have real impacts on patients. A lot of attention is being paid to this problem, including in Congress. But experts say we are nowhere close to actually solving this problem. Amara, Rahel?

WALKER: All right, Meg Tirrell, thank you. So, what is it really like in the post-pandemic restaurant world? The "Food Network's" Bobby Flay joins a whole story with Anderson Cooper to see how the industry is adapting. Don't miss the new episode tomorrow at 8:00 p.m. Eastern only on CNN.

SOLOMON: And in the meantime, coming up for us, CNN gets rare access into a facility in New York where the city is struggling to house thousands of asylum seekers. We'll take you inside, next.

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[06:40:00]

SOLOMON: Welcome back. A team from the Department of Homeland Security is in New York to try to evaluate how the city -- and tried to help the city deal with the overwhelming migrant crisis. The office of Mayor Eric Adams says that over the next three years, the issue is expected to cause New York over $12 billion --

WALKER: Wow, and right now, about 60,000 asylum seekers are in the city's care. CNN's Polo Sandoval was given rare access to a migrant shelter, one of the city's approximately 200 sites being used to house asylum seekers.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TED LONG, SVP, NYC HEALTH & HOSPITAL: As we've seen the numbers of asylum seekers at the border go down, we've seen our numbers in New York City take the opposite direction and go up.

POLO SANDOVAL, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Senior city officials faced a grilling this week from city council members who were told that hundreds of adult asylum seekers had been issued 60 days notice to leave city shelters, part of a policy Mayor Eric Adams recently announced, yet, requires migrants without children who have been in city shelters for a significant amount of time to find other means of housing.

MAYOR ERIC ADAMS, NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK STATE: And we're on road to help those who are needed to move out of shelter and take their next steps forward.

DIANA AYALA, NEW YORK CITY COUNCIL: And it almost feels like we're sacrificing one group of people because we have a high-up responsibility to children and, you know, and families.

SANDOVAL: New York City officials insists they are completely out of options, and say all you have to do is look inside any of the city's nearly 200 shelters, like this one in a building next to New York's JFK air cargo terminals that normally serves as a postal facility. Now, it's serving as a temporary home for some 750 male asylum seekers, a space typically dedicated to sorting mail during the holidays, now, a massive dormitory.

The parking lot, bathroom and showers, a loading dock, a makeshift prayer room.

ZACH ISCOL, COMMISSIONER, NEW YORK CITY EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT: Initially, a lot of us coming here were from Venezuela, we know in a lot of these places have 12, 14, 15 different languages spoken.

SANDOVAL: Zach Iscol is New York City's Emergency Management Commissioner.

ISCOL: Every day, we have about 500 people, 4, 3 to 500 people that we're looking for room for, looking for places for. We can't open up sites fast enough. So, you see, this is sort of a lay-out here.

SANDOVAL: He offered CNN this rare look inside one of the city's nearly 200 sites currently being used to house about 60,000 migrants and counting. This particular site serves as a so-called respite center, originally designed to meet short-term and basic housing needs, but not anymore, warns the commissioner.

ISCOL: We modeled this after the emergency storm shelters we set up for coastal storms. Those were designed just to house people for generally, 48 to 72 hours. We now have folks that are staying in these facilities for much longer, upwards of, you know, a month, a month and a half.

SANDOVAL: Iscol admits the facility is not ideal for long-term housing, but with options running out, residents are making due, some skip the laundry mat and they dry their clothes. Then there's this makeshift barbershop on the main floor, only room for one client at a time. But none of this is sustainable according to Isco and his fellow city officials, finding migrant families private shelter space is a whole other challenge at the city's primary intake center in Manhattan.

We met Soleales Mistahe(ph), where she waits to be assigned long-term housing for her family. "We don't know where they'll place us", says the Venezuelan mother, like many of the nearly 100,000 asylum seekers who have arrived in New York since last Spring, the only guarantee is uncertainty.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WALKER: All right, that was Polo Sandoval reporting. New York is one of the few cities in the country that provides the right to shelter to anyone who might need it. And Mayor Adams is seeking to roll back that requirements.

SOLOMON: And still ahead for us this weekend, look up, and you might just catch a light show like no other. We'll talk to an expert on meteors about tonight's showers. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:45:00]

SOLOMON: Look up. Tonight, you just might happen to see one of nature's most stunning light display.

WALKER: Yes --

SOLOMON: The perseid media shower will reach its peak this weekend, and the showers will streak across the sky in one of the year's most anticipated celestial displays. And here to help us make sure you don't miss a thing is Janet Ivey; she is the president of Explore Mars.

Janet, I could see you smiling even as I was introducing the topic, so clearly, you're very excited about it. Great to have you. First, can you just help us understand what this perseids are, and what makes them so special seeing them.

JANET IVEY, PRESIDENT, EXPLORE MARS, INC.: Sure. The source of the perseid shower is common with tidal. And they basically fragment this comet, which orbits between the sun and beyond the orbit of Pluto once every 133 years. Which again sounds crazy, but the comet sheds bits of material every time it returns near the sun, and this debris keeps traveling along the comet's orbital path, creating kind of a river of rubble.

And every year, the earth passes near this path of the comet, and basically, the debris left behind by swift tidal shows up as meteors that are sky. And tonight, we're going to pass through the deepest part of that river of rubble. And we should be seeing about 50 to 100 meteors per hour tonight.

WALKER: So, Janet, what will it look like then and when and how should we be looking up?

[06:50:00]

IVEY: So what you want to do is find a great -- if you don't know where the constellation perseid is or cassiopeia is, finding a great atlas like sky guide or sky map, any of those great assets and help you locate it. And all you have to do is look up. The best time is going to be pretty much any time after 11:00 p.m., 12:00, 8:00 a.m. -- and until 4:00 a.m. Sunday morning.

And it's going to look as if they're actually coming or emanating from the perseid's constellation, when actually again, it's just from our perspective. If you want to kind of see longer streak and trails, talk about halfway away, and we'll see them broad sign on, but tonight is the best night. If nature cooperates -- I know a lot of places, maybe under cloud cover or rain, never fear.

The virtual telescope project can be streamed at space.com. But even in the next few nights, we have a waning crescent, so that means that if this is only going to be eliminated by about 8 percent. So, we're three days away from a new moon. So if you go ahead, happen to catch it tonight because of weather or clouds, you still have a few more days to look up.

But tonight is going to be the most brilliant display, the kind of bits of kind of like tiny grains of sand and pebbles are going to be striking the earth's atmosphere at a speed of about 40 miles to 60 kilometers per second. And they're going to create an incredible incandescent light show for us.

SOLOMON: Speaking of show, Janet, who is going to have the best seat at the show? I mean, if you are in the city, I imagine, you're probably going to be dealing with some light pollution. I mean, where do you get the best seat?

IVEY: If you can get out to the country, and to the darkest part of the sky where there's little light pollution, I know that's often hard anymore in our world. But if you can get through the darkest place possible, and again, we have a little bit of luck on our side because of that wany crescent, and the moon won't be so bright in our sky.

But go to the darkest sky -- the other thing to do is kind of like turn off all of your kind of like phone and any kind of other light source, so your eyes can really adjust to the night sky. And that will give you an even better way to view. You know, put down the binoculars, this is something all you're going to do is just look up.

WALKER: So, you know, I'm going to have to FaceTime you or something, you would have to hand me your cellphone number, Janet, because my daughter, my 5-year-old is going to want to see this, and she's going to have a million questions and I'm going to say, I don't know the answer to that, but I've got Janet for you --

IVEY: Yes --

WALKER: So, I would have to get your number later too --

(LAUGHTER)

SOLOMON: Go ahead --

IVEY: Any time, and again, you and your daughter might need the next mother-daughter combo to go to space, just like that beautiful Caribbean family --

WALKER: Yes --

IVEY: Just went to space on Virgin Galactic. So --

SOLOMON: That was incredible --

IVEY: Yes, keep looking up with your daughter.

SOLOMON: That was really cool to see, and Janet, I mean, really cool to have you today, I've learnt so much about perseid --

WALKER: Right --

SOLOMON: And hopefully everyone at home did too. Thank you Janet Ivey.

WALKER: You sounded like a pro by the way you were saying perseid, I'm like, oh, maybe Rahel knows what that is. See you in a bit.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:55:00]

SOLOMON: Welcome back. Messi-mania continuing in south Florida as he comes through once again.

WALKER: Yes --

ANDY SCHOLES, CNN SPORTS CORRESPONDENT: Yes --

WALKER: Andy Scholes is here with us, Andy, Messi has completely turned around the Miami --

SCHOLES: Completely, I mean --

WALKER: Everybody is talking about --

SCHOLES: Guys, Inter-Miami was having just a dreadful season before he arrived. But ever since they have not lost, and Messi has, you know, certainly given the fans there their money's worth every single time. He's scored in every game. He's played with Miami thus far, and Inter-Miami, they're hosting Charlotte in the quarterfinals in the league's cup last night.

Fans though, they didn't have to wait a long time for Messi going this one, 86th minute, Charlotte just giving up on this play and Messi buries this ball into the back of the net. That was his eighth goal in five games with Miami, Messi's squad winning 4-0.

They're not going to face Philadelphia in the semifinals of the league's cup on Tuesday. All right, the NFL pre-season kicking off this weekend with every team in action. This week's difference maker, CNN's Amanda Davis speaks with two times Super Bowl champion Osi Umenyiora, the former Giants and Falcons great who was born in London to Nigerian parents is on a mission to grow the game of football globally.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OSI UMENYIORA, FORMER AMERICAN FOOTBALL PLAYER: First and foremost, we have to understand that the amount of talented individuals that are in Africa, the people with the ability to play the sport at the highest level who just aren't having the opportunities. Like over here, you know, sport is -- you can use sport to really advance yourself.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What does your Nigerian heritage mean to you?

UMENYIORA: It means everything to me. I think being African, being Nigerian especially, we walk around with some sense of, you know, pride. It's anybody who is of Nigerian heritage or background will understand that it's mostly you have two options, you're going to be a doctor, you're going to be a lawyer, and if your parents have the ability to send you to school, that's what you're going to do.

Once they found out that I was able to get education, free education through this sport, I think that's when their attitude started to change.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How easy is it to attract young players into the NFL when you have the other sports?

UMENYIORA: I think it's going to get a lot easier once people start to see the level of success that we're having with the opportunities that these players are being given. If you look at what's happening with African players in the NFL or in college or in high school in America, you realize that there are a lot more opportunities for you to succeed.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Just tell us a little bit more in detail about the camp in Kenya, how it worked, what were your experiences?

UMENYIORA: It was incredible having the different countries, because we have players from Cameroon, Morocco, Senegal, Nigeria, Ghana, they came from all over the place as they're speaking different languages, they don't understand each other, they're grouped up, but they're competing against each other.