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Early Start with John Berman and Zoraida Sambolin

Major NYC Intersections Clear; Winter Storm Triggers Coastal Flooding In NJ; Candidates Make Final Sprint Before Primaries; American Airlines Flight Hits Heavy Turbulence; Asian Markets Up, European Markets and U.S. Futures Down. Aired 5:30-6a ET

Aired January 25, 2016 - 05:30   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[05:30:32] CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: The East Coast digging out this morning after a deadly winter storm paralyzed major cities and the headache is not over for many of you. Hitting the road this morning.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Down to the wire for the presidential candidates. Iowa just one week away and tonight, a CNN town hall in Des Moines. The candidates on stage together facing voters for the last time before actual votes are cast. A pivotal moment.

Welcome back to EARLY START, everyone. I'm John Berman.

ROMANS: I'm Christine Romans. It's 30 minutes past the hour. Let's start with the big story this morning. Millions of you digging out from one of the biggest snowstorms the Eastern United States has ever seen. Many face a daunting commute with officials warning of icy roads, not to mention reduced bus, train, and plane service. This morning, more than 1,200 flights have been canceled so far. So please check before you go anywhere. At least 16 people died due to the storm, a figure likely to rise. Snowfall totals come at record levels or close up and down the East Coast.

BERMAN: Glengary, West Virginia got the worst with 42 inches. New York, 26.8 inches, which is the second biggest snowstorm in the city's history. And they were saying like, ah, it's not going to be bad in New York City. It was bad. Washington got 22.4 inches. Commuters in the New York region looking at a tough morning. The MTA says service will be restored to only seven, the seven busiest branches of the Long Island Railroad.

CNN's Ryan Young with more on the clean up --

RYAN YOUNG, CNN CORRESPONDENT: John and Christine, 26.8 inches fell here in New York City. You look all around the city, you can see the big mounds of snow everywhere. In fact, one of the places we're standing is here outside Penn Station. That's where the Long Island Rail was shutdown for some time. We do know 80 percent of the service will resume Monday morning for those commuters. 300,000 people use that rail line. It's all a part of the city getting itself back to normal. Now we drove in from New Jersey. One of the things that we noticed is, most of the roadways were clear. And in fact, it was easy to get around most of the major intersections of the city. But all along the side streets, people were dealing with what you know that they were dealing with, which is the heavy inches of snow all over the place. It's going to be a long clean up effort all up and down, throughout New York City. Something that we'll be watching and paying attention to. John and Christine --

ROMANS: All right, Ryan, thank you for that. One of the hardest hit areas this morning, the nation's capital. Roads are still being plowed in Washington D.C., Virginia, Maryland -- federal government offices and schools in the region are all closed today. And the D.C. metro system running on a reduced schedule.

For the very latest from Washington, let's head to CNN's Jennifer Gray.

JENNIFER GRAY, AMS CORRESPONDENT: John and Christine, day two of the big dig is beginning today and we have a lot of snow still to clean up. The crews have been out all night long on the roads trying to get them clear and I can tell you, Pennsylvania Avenue even has a stack of snow on top of it. However, some of the major roads, a lot of the major arteries are getting plowed, are getting cleared, but even in the downtown area, some of these roads are still not. So that's part of the reason school was canceled again today. City of D.C., government office as well as the federal government closed down today as well. It's just going to take time to get the city back up and running. On top of that, we had a beautiful day on Sunday. Blue skies, temperatures got above freezing. We had a little bit of melting going on so it is going to be very dangerous, the morning commute. We're going to have a lot of black ice and so again, that's another reason why they cancelled school as well as those government offices. So it is going to take a while to get the city back up and running. We've been talking about these incredible snowfall totals. Dulles ranked number two as the snowiest snowstorm ever. Reagan ranked number four and so the storm definitely lived up to the hype. This was epic here across the nation's capital. Still a quiet scene in D.C. for the next couple of days. John and Christine --

BERMAN: All right, Jennifer, thanks so much.

The powerful winter storm brought on flooding during high tide in some coastal communities in New Jersey. This not only prompted evacuations, it certainly brought back memories from super storm Sandy even though officials say there was no major damage.

CNN's Boris Sanchez has that part of the story from Southern New Jersey.

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: John and Christine, the clean up continues here in Ventnor City, New Jersey. This is a coastal community and as you can see behind me, when high tide came through, it created a mess on the street. This is clear compared to how it was when the water was in the middle of the street, trash and ice strewn about.

[05:35:00] I actually spoke to a couple that tells me that this area does get flooded more or less every time there's a nor'easter. Part of the reason why is because, as we look on this side, there's a bay, there's a canal, that runs through this neighborhood. And coincidentally, as this storm was peaking, the full moon was in effect. So the tide was just that much higher. It was about a foot of water that came through this neighborhood. You can see the high water mark right there. The gentleman that lives here told us that his garage did get full of water, but fortunately, he was prepared. He made preparations and raised several of his belongings so they would not be effected by the water. Coincidentally, we did speak to some neighbors that did not really prepare for the storm. They did not put up sand bags or board up. We asked them why and they told us that essentially, the sand bags, when you live in a community like this, are useless. They say the water's going to do what the water is going to do. Fortunately, in this case, the water did not do much damage. You can imagine, this was an area that was seriously effected by super storm Sandy just a few years ago. Doesn't really compare to what's happening now but fortunately it does not appear that the water damage is as extensive as it was then. John, Christine --

ROMANS: All right, Boris, thank you for that from Southern Jersey. New information this morning about that huge traffic jam on the Pennsylvania Turnpike. Officials now say it was the collision of two tractor-trailers driving in the wrong lane, the narrow construction lane, during the Friday night blizzard, that forced the shutdown of most of the highway. That trapped motorists in roughly 500 vehicles, 24 hours. State officials have apologized. They are promising to learn from that debacle.

BERMAN: So what is in store for today? When is this snow going to melt? Let's bring in meteorologist Pedram Javaheri.

PEDRAM JAVAHERI, AMS METEOROLOGIST: John and Christine, good morning, guys.

(WEATHER REPORT)

ROMANS: All right. That sounds slushy by the middle of the week, to me. Slushy is the technical term I'll use. Thank you so much for that, Pedram Javaheri. Time for an early start on your money. The weekend's blizzard's going to be a costly one. Early estimates put the cost between 350 million and 700 million. That includes lost spending as people hunker down at home. It means lost wages, restaurants missed out on revenue, and of course, there's the cost of snow clean up. For example, cleaning up snow in New York City cost an estimated $1.8 million per inch of snow depth. That adds up.

But some good news, this is the first big snowstorm of the year. The whole season of wild weather is usually what it takes to really make a big dent in the economy. And experts say this, even though it's a lot of snow, it is not even close to the economic damage we saw during the cold wave of 2014. That cost up to 15 billion. You saw my other estimate, up to 700 million. That was 15 billion and first quarter GDP in 2014 shrank. That's because the cold weather lasted much longer and affected a larger area.

BERMAN: I will say this -- my back is sore this morning. ROMANS: Is it?

BERMAN: I wasn't expecting it.

ROMANS: So, you do have a snow blower, right?

BERMAN, Yes, but you still have to shovel the walkway. There's still a lot you have to shovel. And I did it very quickly and I thought it was all fine and I woke up this morning and you know, now I'm feeling old.

ROMANS: You haven't trained the kids yet to do that?

BERMAN: No. They've got to start earning their keep, I have to tell you.

ROMANS: Make them think it's something fun.

BERMAN: [05:40:01] All right. The democrats, they will face voters tonight in the CNN town hall. This is big, folks. Just one week before the Iowa caucuses. That is plural. I am contractually obligated to say that. Caucuses. What impact will this have on the big vote? Stay with us.

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BERMAN: It is just one week from today. Iowa voters, they will go to the caucuses and they will in fact caucus. That is what you do at the caucuses. The democratic candidates, they kickoff the final countdown. They have a town hall tonight right here on CNN. This is after a big day of campaigning around the state. Hillary Clinton, she got a couple of endorsements this weekend from "The Boston Globe" which is the biggest newspaper in New England, huge in New Hampshire; and "The Des Moines Register."

CNN's Jeff Zeleny with the latest on the final sprint.

JEFF ZELENY, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: John and Christine, one week until the Iowa caucuses and the democratic race is deadlocked. You could hear it in the voices of the candidates over the weekend as they traveled across the state urging voters to listen to their campaigns. Now Hillary Clinton is making a pitch for urgency. She's saying that voters need to be with her, embrace her experience. This is what she said on Sunday.

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HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Why the stakes in this election are so high and we have to start to move toward nominating and electing a president and commander in chief who will continue the progress we made, make sure it is not ripped away forcing us to once again be disappointed --

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ZELENY: Now Bernie Sanders is asking supporters to believe in their ideals, believe in the possibility. He made a slightly different argument as he campaigned on Sunday. He reminded his supporters that it's close, he can win if they come out and support him.

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SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (D-VT), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: [05:45:01] Today, we are locked in a very, very close race right here in Iowa and if we have the kind of turnout that I hope we can, we're going to win here in Iowa. And if we win here in Iowa, I think we're going to do very, very well in New Hampshire.

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ZELENY: Now Clinton, Sanders, and former Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley will be on campus here at Drake University in Des Moines, making their pitch to voters at the CNN town hall meeting tonight. After that, the campaigns are getting into overdrive, mobilizing their supporters that they've spent months and months cultivating. The question here is this: is it the inspiration from the Bernie Sanders campaign against the organization from the Clinton campaign that's actually going to win out here? The turnout is always important, but in this case in particular, will there be a big turnout like there was in 2008 for Barack Obama or a slightly smaller turnout as in previous years? That is going to determine who wins the Iowa caucuses and how long this democratic presidential race goes on. John and Christine --

BERMAN: All right, Jeff, thanks so much. Let's break this all down with political analyst Goldie Taylor. She is editor at large with "The Daily Beast". We've heard a lot about the democrats. Let's talk about the republicans because I have this fresh poll from Fox News this weekend which has Donald Trump with an 11-point lead in Iowa. 34 to 23 percent. That's a big jump over where he was. In the same Fox News poll, he was actually down, trailing Ted Cruz, a couple weeks ago. This shows Donald Trump on the move with one week to go in Iowa.

GOLDIE TAYLOR, EDITOR-AT-LARGE, THE DAILY BEAST: This is absolutely right but there are two things we have to pay attention to here. One is modeling. How these polls are taken, what kinds of questions are asked, what kinds of people are weighted more heavily than others. So that's important. The second thing we've got to pay attention to is ground game. How strong is Donald Trump's real ground game in Iowa? We're told that it's strong, that he has a very professional force out there on the ground. But Ted Cruz has a ground game that is really kicking into gear right now. We watched 2,000 people show up for him at a rally just, I think, night or night before last. And so he's got some strong, strong supporters. The question for Trump voters is, have you done this before? Will you stay all night if you have to? And we're finding with many of the Trump respondents is that, this is their first time in a very long time getting excited about a candidate enough to go out and caucus. This is for the experience. This isn't for the faint of heart. And so I'm wondering just how many of Trump's people will show up to the caucuses and will they stay?

ROMANS: He went to church in Muscatine yesterday, a Presbyterian church in Muscatine, and the minister was apparently giving a homily, a sermon about welcoming refugees, welcoming immigrants and people in the parish were excited he was there even though the message from the pulpit was not exactly Donald Trump-esque. Will those Iowans, maybe people who've never caucused before, will they come out for him?

TAYLOR: That remains to be seen. That's one of those things that I think is really sort of immeasurable. If you look at -- or unable to measure. If you look at the kinds of support that Donald Trump is drawing, he's drawing people who don't have a second choice. Their only choice is Trump. Those are the kind of people who tend to go out and people who tend to stay the night. And so, you know, this is one of those caucuses that I just simply can't call.

BERMAN: Interesting. So one thing is clear. I do think if you do look at all the polls, it may not actually show up in the vote, but he's trending upward right now.

TAYLOR: Absolutely.

BERMAN: Now there's another thing that's trending right now in politics: billionaires. We may get another billionaire in the presidential race. Michael Bloomberg, "The New York Times" breaks this big story, is weighing a possible third party run. He has taken polls, he's had his people give him presentations on what it would take to do it. Viable?

TAYLOR: You know, one thing can be said about Michael Bloomberg. He's smart money. People say he's looked at this before, he's toyed around with running for president before. But when he looked at it in prior times, he did not see a viable pathway forward. So he didn't put his money on the line. This time, he has charted out what he thinks is the most viable path and I do, too. If he sees a race that Hillary Clinton does not win the nomination and he sees someone like Donald Trump or Ted Cruz on the other side, that is the most viable opportunity for a self funded independent. You know, remember Ross Perot? If Ross Perot had these odds in '92, he would have won the race.

BERMAN: But do you remember how many electoral votes Ross Perot got? Zero.

TAYLOR: Absolutely.

BERMAN: As Bill Clinton says, it's hard.

[05:49:58] TAYLOR: Well, zero, it's a tough but uphill battle. But I think that this year, the lay of the land is quite a bit more fertile for the outsider. We're seeing it with Donald Trump, we're even seeing it with Bernie Sanders, who really wasn't a democrat until this election.

ROMANS: I know. Well you look at Iowa in 2008 and it basically elevated President Obama, Senator Barack Obama at the time, I mean it was very important -- and some of the folks who even endorsed Barack Obama then are now endorsing, like "The Boston Globe", Hillary Clinton, saying that she's a different candidate today than she was in 2008. Is she? I mean, how is she a different candidate today than she was in 2008 when she lost Iowa? TAYLOR: I've not seen the real difference in candidate, frankly. I haven't seen, I've seen her move maybe on a few issues and become passionate about maybe some others, but I think that's the presence of a Bernie Sanders being in this race. I think that's what Senator Sanders' presence does to a mainline establishment kind of candidate like Hillary Clinton. But at the end of the day, will that really take her forward in terms of winning the nomination today, and I think it's her nomination to lose. I think Bernie Sanders' best chance is to do a couple of things. Move her on the issues or hobble her for the general election. I think those are the two real outcomes for him so far.

BERMAN: All right. Goldie Taylor, great to have you here with us. I should say, one time we will see the shape of this campaign like no other time before is tonight in Iowa. There is a town meeting there. CNN town meeting moderated by one Chris Cuomo who joins us now.

Chris, tell us what's going on with that town meeting tonight.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR, "NEW DAY": Hey, my friends. How are you? Of course, we are here in Iowa. Tonight at 9:00 Eastern we're going to be throwing a town hall for the democratic presidential candidates. This will be their last best chance to make a face-to-face case with actual Iowa democrat caucusers here. Big questions -- can Hillary capitalize on these big new endorsements that Clinton got over the weekend, or is Bernie Sanders going to convince people to come out in a way that they never have before? Using the word revolution in every one of its senses. And also Governor O'Malley. What is it that he believes he can he do to make a move in this field that has been all but prohibitively a two-person race to this point? Also this morning, much of that East Coast obviously digging out from what is the worst of history you can make, boy, a blizzard record. Snowfall in several cities. Travel impaired. All the worst-case scenarios, you're seeing. You'll hear that it was averted. It could have been so much worse. But it was deadly. Why, and what has to be done now? We'll take you through all of it.

BERMAN: Notice, Chris, when the going got tough here in New York, you went to Iowa for the storm there. So well done.

CUOMO: I did. I bailed. I bailed like the Patriots, John.

BERMAN: I know. You know who looked great yesterday? The Jets. Chris Cuomo, we will see you tonight coming up on "NEW DAY".

ROMANS: All right. Oil prices are tanking. What does it mean for the stock rally and for Chris Cuomo in Iowa? We're going to get an early start on your money next.

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ROMANS: ISIS has released a gruesome new propaganda video containing what it claims are the final words of the nine Paris attackers including suspected ringleader, Abdelhamid Abaaoud. The tape seems to confirm the Paris attacks that killed 130 people were ordered by the ISIS leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. It also shows the names and faces of the nine Paris terrorists. Six of the nine are also seen executing people after they give their on-camera statements.

This morning, authorities are intensifying the manhunt for three inmates who escaped from a jail in Southern California. The FBI released a wanted poster and asked for the public's help, offering a $50,000 reward for information leading to their capture. Officials say the escape was well thought out, possibly planned for months. They say all three are dangerous. They were jailed for felonies including murder and attempted murder.

Investigators from Malaysia and Thailand are being dispatched to the Southern Thai coast to try to determine if debris that washed ashore could be from missing Malasia Airline flight 370. The large piece of curved metal was found by fishermen on Friday. MH-370 vanished back in March, 2014 while flying from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people on board. Severe turbulence forcing an American Airlines flight to make an emergency landing in St. John's, Newfoundland Sunday. Seven people: four passengers, three flight attendents, were taken to a local hospital with injuries. An official says the American flight headed from Miami to Milan, Italy, briefly encountered heavy turbulence and forced that diversion.

All right. 57 minutes past the hour. Time for an EARLY START on your money to start the week. Asian markets closed higher, but suddenly you have European markets falling, U.S. stock futures turning down and it's because of oil. Oil prices have turned lower here and so you have stocks in Europe and the United States falling. The price of crude has been very volatile in the past few weeks. It plunged below $27 on Wednesday. That's the lowest level since 2003. And then look, it turned around and bounced, had a big bounce to above $32 over the next couple of days, and now it's down more than 3 percent on concerns of a global supply glut. So watch for oil to be the driver here. If oil's weak, you're likely to see stocks weak as well.

Investors are gearing for a busy week in earnings. Big names like Amazon, Facebook, Apple, will report fourth quarter results. Wall Street is bracing itself for disappointing reports. How disappointing? Well, analysts are forecasting a 5 percent decline in profits for the companies in the S&P 500. If that forecast holds, it would mark the first back-to-back quarterly decline since 2009.

Twitter overhauling the leadership in a bid to turn that company around. The CEO, Jack Dorsey says, four of the social media company's top executives are leaving. Dorsey has been trying to revive the company he co-founded. Investors have been critical of the slowing user growth. Shares have lost more than half of their value since the IPO in 2013.

All right, a major clean up under way this morning after the weekend's deadly storm. A rough commute in store for many up and down the East Coast. Schools are closed, flight's canceled. "NEW DAY" has that and more starting right now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The big clean up begins.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The storm definitely lived up to the hype.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Four feet of snow, so, that's a lot to handle.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This will probably be our most expensive snow event ever. CLINTON: I'm going to do the best I can to make sure that I get the

nomination.

SANDERS: The American people do not want to see our nation move toward an oligarchy where billionaires control the political process.

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: This guy, Bernie Sanders, give me a break.

GLEN BECK: If Donald Trump wins, it's going to be a snowball to hell.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Way to go, baby! Way to go!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Denver wins a wild one, 20 to 18, earning the Broncos their eighth Super Bowl berth, tying them for the most by any team in NFL history.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[06:00:05] ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Chris Cuomo, Alisyn Camerota, and Michaela Pereira.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: All right, good morning, everyone. Welcome to your NEW DAY. It is Monday, January 25th, 6:00 here in the East. Chris is live in Iowa ahead of tonight's CNN democratic forum, and John Berman joins me here in studio.

So we begin with the dig out from the historic blizzard that dumped mountains of snow over millions of people from the Carolinas to New England. The storm crippling cities and smashing records. Getting around after the blizzard proving more challenging than many predicted and cleaning up several feet of snow could take days and it is proving deadly for some. So we have this dig out from this blizzard covered the way only CNN can, so let's being with Jason Carroll. He's live outside of New York's Penn Station as commuters try to get back to work this morning. That should be a challenge.