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White House Hosting Summit on Extremism; Denmark Shooter Made Pledge to ISIS; Egypt Launches Airstrikes on ISIS in Libya; Ukrainian Ceasefire in Danger of Collapse; Another Arctic Blast on the Way; 200,000 Without Power in South; Explosions After Crude Oil Train Derails

Aired February 17, 2015 - 07:00   ET

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

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN HOST: Good morning, everyone. Welcome back to NEW DAY.

Officials from more than 60 countries descending on the White House this week to try to find a strategy to stop terrorism at its root. The White House holding a summit with hopes of devising a way to deter radicalization and terror recruitment of young people around the world.

CUOMO: It comes as a majority of Americans lose confidence in the president's foreign policy and his handling of ISIS. So can the summit help or is it, frankly, too late for this sort of approach?

For the latest, let's get right to the White House correspondent, Michelle Kosinski -- Michelle.

MICHELLE KOSINSKI, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: That's right. You could take a skeptical view of this. I mean, it is just a summit talking about countering violent extremism. Also, this was planned for months ago originally and then was delayed.

But the White House wants this to be practical and useful. For a long time, we've heard them talk about how getting at the violent ideology is a key to ultimately defeating ISIS long-term. So we're going to see more than 60 countries participate in this, over three days' time.

And they're going to be looking at pilot programs in the U.S.: in Minneapolis, Boston and L.A. Getting a closer look at what is working, and what isn't, not only nationally, but internationally.

Now as you mentioned, this comes at a time, though, when according to the new poll, a majority of Americans now say they feel that the war against ISIS is going badly. And this growing disapproval over how the president is handling terrorism. Fifty-seven percent responded that they disapprove of how he's handling foreign policy in general.

So it's not as if we're going to see this summit be some kind of turning point. But the White House says they want it to highlight action and then be a catalyst for more -- Chris.

CUOMO: Michelle, it's understandable you have the discontent. Because we keep hearing about more and more acts of terrorism. And we have new details emerging about the Denmark shooter, this as Facebook is now posting -- a Facebook post that appeared to show him swearing an oath to ISIS.

So let's bring in CNN senior international correspondent Nic Robertson. He's in Copenhagen with the latest. What do we know, Nic?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Chris, in the last few hours, we've heard from the Danish intelligence services, PET, saying that they were aware of this man, the gunman, but they didn't expect him to go on a killing rampage in the way that he did.

Now why does it appear that they're saying this right now? There are several factors. What we've heard from the Danish ambassador to the United States in the past 24 hours is that it seems that the gunman, Omar Abdul Hamid el-Hussein, was radicalized while he was in jail. He'd been jailed. He was a gang member, had been jailed for a violent stabbing on a commuter train in 2013.

And then add on top of that, in the hours before the attack, he has posted to what appears to be his Facebook page a line of support, a message of support to ISIS's leader, al-Baghdadi. So putting all this together now, the Danish intelligence services saying, "Look, he was on the radar, had been bout to our attention, but we didn't consider him likely to get into an attack -- attacks of this kind" -- Chris.

CUOMO: All right. So let's look into who did it and then why it may have been done, because that's what you're touching on there, Nick. Any word of any accomplices? Or is this guy standing out right now as someone who was self-radicalized or just self-motivated?

ROBERTSON: You know, there do -- there does appear to be accomplices. Two men charged Monday, one 19, one 22. What the prosecutors are saying is, they had a prior agreement with the gunman to hide him after the first attack. Not only that, prosecutors say that they actually had his weapon. So they're now being charged as accomplices in the murder and attempted murders here.

So concern, are there more accomplices, more people in that circle of knowledge? Certainly, the police so far believe they've identified two such people -- Chris.

CUOMO: Now, you cover very extensively the same dynamic with al Qaeda, which is where bad guys just start reaching out to the brand of a terror network and pledging allegiance maybe during or even after they do something terrible like this. What are the indication here about this guy who is in jail for what, a stabbing? He was a garden variety thug. Somehow became then into terrorism. What do they know?

ROBERTSON: Yes. What we're learning here is he is a member of a gang. There were violent gang wars in this city over the past five or six years. He was -- he was a type of guy. I met somebody who knew him when he was in the gang, said that they had weapons in the gang, that they killed people as part of their gang warfare.

The gangs called a truce, but he was such a violent, uncontrollable member of the gang, they pushed him out of the gang. And what he appears to have done then is gravitated to another group, to -- essentially to radical Islamists and then coming more under their influence inside the jail.

So it's not an unusual path here. He never went to Iraq or Syria, according to officials; got his gun and weapons skills here on the streets of Copenhagen in the gangs; gets thrown out of the gangs; looks for another identity to cling onto, his radical Islam; comes out of jail; and we know the rest of the story -- Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: OK. Nic Robertson, thanks so much for all of that background.

ISIS appears to be expanding its global reach despite coalition airstrikes, including those from Jordan and Egypt. So where are the terrorists growing? Let's ask Bobby Ghosh. He's our CNN global affairs analyst and managing editor of "Quartz." Bobby, nice to see you.

Let's start with the areas that we know to be under ISIS control. We're here on the map, and we know those to be in Iraq and in Syria. So the red there are the portions that we believe ISIS has taken control of.

But let's quickly pivot to the next map, because given what happened this weekend, with the ISIS tape released of the more than a dozen Egyptian Christians being beheaded in Libya, what's happening with ISIS? Is ISIS now in Libya?

BOBBY GHOSH, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: Well, there's a group in Libya that's -- that has essentially claimed that it is loyal now to ISIS. It has pledged allegiance.

We saw this with al Qaeda in the last decade. We're now seeing it with ISIS. The more successful a terrorist group, you have groups around the world that say, "We want to be part of that. We want to -- we want to pledge allegiance to the leader of this group." The leader of ISIS is calling itself a caliph. That makes it easier for those who see themselves as religious-minded to pledge allegiance.

And so it's an appropriation of the brand. If al Qaeda was the dominant group, the same group in Libya would be saying, "Oh, we're al Qaeda." Now they're saying, "We are ISIS."

And they're learning the techniques. The thing to worry about is that they're not just embracing the idea, they're embracing the techniques: the beheadings, the burning alive, the videos, the parading people in yellow jumpsuits. This is the thing that's worrisome. There's a sense of wannabes here, and the worry is that each of these groups will try to outdo each other to prove that "we're badder [SIC] than those guys."

CAMEROTA: So you think that the people behind the beheadings that we saw, those were wannabes in Libya?

GHOSH: Yes. There has been a formal acceptance. In this particular case, ISIS has accepted them. Their name, the name of the group appears in ISIS online publications. So they are a little further down the road. They're a little more evolved.

But there are groups like this everywhere: Pakistan, Afghanistan, Egypt, Algeria, and of course, as we are seeing, with individuals in Paris, in Copenhagen.

CAMEROTA: You're making the point of our next map. And that is just the breadth and geographic scope of where these groups are now. So all of the red pockets are places that you just named.

So the fact that they went after these Egyptian Christians, is this a change in tactic for ISIS? Or is this just more of the same? To kill people for no other reason than that they are Christian?

GHOSH: It's an opportunity. They had these people, these Coptic Christians in Libya. There are quite a lot of them there. They're very poor; they're very vulnerable. Local authorities don't recognize their existence in some cases. They don't get the police protection they need.

So ISIS, sort of this group saw the opportunity. It's an opportunity- grab, if you like. They saw the opportunity, grabbed these most vulnerable people; and then they went and killed them.

CAMEROTA: I was troubled to read the pre-interview notes from you, where you say that the airstrikes, you believe, are only rattling the cage of ISIS.

GHOSH: It is rattling the cage. I wouldn't say "only." Rattling the cage is important. The airstrikes have worked in Iraq, certainly. They've stopped substantially the spread of ISIS.

CAMEROTA: OK. So they are effective geographically.

GHOSH: They certainly are. But that can only be one part of the -- of the grand military scheme. Ultimately, there's got to be people on the ground fighting these people. Who are those people going to be? Americans seem to be, as we saw with the poll numbers, coming around to the idea that this might be necessary. Arab armies, not so interested, Iraqi military excepted.

CAMEROTA: What about Egypt now? Now that they have crossed Egypt in this way, and Egypt is launching these airstrikes that we've seen for the past 48 hours, what about them getting more involved and even leading part of the coalition?

GHOSH: Well, Egypt is supposed to be part of the coalition, but they also have a large insurgency within their own country; and they've done a pretty poor job of dealing with that.

The Egyptian military, we were saying in the earlier block, is great at beating up on innocent civilians who don't have any arms and are protesting for political freedoms. They're not so great fighting against an armed and dangerous terrorist group.

This is true of all the Arab armies. The Syrian army, let's remind ourselves, was the largest, best-funded Arab army in the world, and they have essentially been fought to a standstill against ISIS on their own turf. I'm not wildly optimistic that the other Arab armies can make a great contribution here.

CAMEROTA: Bobby Ghosh, thanks so much for walking us through all of this. Nice to talk to you.

GHOSH: Any time.

CAMEROTA: Let's go back to Chris.

CUOMO: Another situation, equal problem: ceasefire in Ukraine. Question mark. Let's take you there right now. Decide for yourself.

CNN senior international correspondent, Nick Paton Walsh, joins us from eastern Ukraine.

Nick, we understand that you have some new video that shows the reality on the ground.

NICK PATON WALSH, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Chris, there's been so much debate, is the ceasefire holding? And you can see now some remarkable images shot by a Reuters crew. It seems on the road down to Debaltseve, the key town that everybody is talking about right now, quite what the impact of shelling, when it hits clearly there, a gas pipe really is. I think it takes moments like that where people really get brought home to how the violence is continuing, when you see that -- flames there in an area which should be under a truce right now.

Now we also know that in Debaltseve, the rebels claim, the separatists claim to have taken the railway station, parts of the east of the city. In fact, they claim to have taken even more of it in some pro- Russian media we're reading here, as well.

The Ukrainian government say they've lost five soldiers in the last 24 hours. The monitors are calling to be allowed in. And they're -- that's being echoed by France, Germany, Russia and Ukraine. To be allowed them to actually monitor the ceasefire. Well, frankly, Chris, moment by moment here, the fig leaf of a truce is disappearing quickly.

Back to you.

PEREIRA: All right. I'll take it here, Nick. Thank you so much. Tremendous reporting.

Breaking overnight, President Obama's executive action on immigration is on hold, thanks to an order from a federal judge in Texas. That order is temporary, but it gives 26 states more time to press ahead with a lawsuit to stop the president's action entirely. The first orders have been set to go into effect tomorrow. The Justice Department plans to appeal.

CUOMO: Four suicide attackers hitting a police station just east of Kabul in Afghanistan. The death toll now 20. There are reports the suspects were wearing police uniforms. So far, no claim of responsibility, but it will be cowardly murder by any name.

CAMEROTA: Take a look at this incredible video from the Austin Marathon. The Kenyan runner got wobbly and fell with .2 of a mile to go. Oh, my gosh. Suffering from dangerously low blood sugar. Oh, my gosh. But she managed to push and claw her way, crawling the last bit of the race, finishing in third place.

PEREIRA: Oh, my goodness.

CAMEROTA: The marathon director said it was the bravest race he'd ever seen.

PEREIRA: She is made of stuff that very few people are. That is incredible.

CAMEROTA: Oh, my gosh. Wow.

PEREIRA: Exceptional, exceptional drive.

CAMEROTA: And that's why I don't work out. Because you never know when you're going to teeter over from a blood sugar issue.

PEREIRA: Wait, what?

CUOMO: I will -- I'll give you this.

PEREIRA: You had me...

CUOMO: There is a question about how much is too much. We love people who push past their limits, but sometimes there's a reason there are limits.

PEREIRA: Oh, my goodness.

CUOMO: And we hope that she's OK, because sometimes the effects of something like that...

CAMEROTA: Can be delayed. You're so right.

All right. Let us know what you think about that incredible finish.

Meanwhile, federal investigators are on the scene of this spectacular train derailment in West Virginia. Fire and smoke clouding the night sky. We'll tell you why drinking water could be in danger.

CUOMO: And from the Midwest to New England, yes, winter weather watch. The worst "W's" that there are. Nearly 200,000 people without power in the south. Who's going to get the worst of the snow? How cold could it get? What can happen because of that? Those are the questions; we have answers.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PEREIRA: Baby, it is cold outside. At least it is for much of the nation. Snowfall and bitter cold hitting most of the Midwest, the South, even the East this morning. Incredibly, the big chill not over: another arctic blast is coming. Or if you ask our Chad Myers, it's still here.

We're tracking all the developments for you. We have a reporters dispatched around the states, beginning with Sunlen Serfaty. She's in D.C., which saw heavy snow overnight. We can see the Mall starting to get a little sunlight on it; not much sunlight, though.

SUNLEN SERFATY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Michaela. Lots of snow here overnight. And officials here in D.C. have just declared a snow emergency.

I want to show you some of the accumulation here. As you can see, about four, five inches of snow. And this light fluffy snow that came in, the kind that just sticks to the roads. And take a look here behind me of the iconic National Mall, as you can see, just blanketed this morning with snow as people start to wake up.

But this city really is a ghost town. The D.C. federal government is closed. D.C. schools are closed. And President Obama himself is not immune from the weather effects here. He landed. Take a look at the video last night. He landed on Air Force One in D.C. around 9 p.m. That was when the snow was just picking up. Really heavy last night. He was forced to motorcade back to the White House instead of taking Marine One.

But here the weather is not expected to go above freezing all day. And Michaela, a winter weather advisory is still in effect.

PEREIRA: Yes. That's important to keep in mind. Sunlen, thank you so much for that.

Let's turn to Boston, which keeps getting hammered. Snowfall records there have already been broken. Even more snow is on the way. Ryan Young has been braving the bitter cold there and has climbed to the top of his own mountain.

RYAN YOUNG, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I have. I'm on top of the world. In fact, this is one of the places where they store all the snow that they've been collecting. More than 50 inches has hit here. Guess what? Yesterday it didn't snow, which is good news, but more snow is coming.

Where I'm standing as you look around, this is more than two football fields worth of snow. It's a mountain that was hard to climb. It's more than ten feet high. And let me tell you something, it just expands all the way down.

Now they have snow-melters in the area that are constantly working to melt the snow. They have to get rid of it somehow.

Everywhere in this area they're also running low on salt. You know they need the salt to preserve those roads to keep them clear. People are trying to get back to work today. You can obviously understand the frustrations of the area. With snow like this, and record snowfall, you know the crews have been working extremely hard to keep the roadways clear and free for people to get around -- Michaela. PEREIRA: All right, Ryan. Big shout-out to all those road crews all around the northeast and the Midwest who have been working overtime. They're weary; they're tired. We appreciate them.

Don't think the south is getting spared. We're getting word that almost 200,000 people, power outages, rather, in North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia. Snow, sleet and freezing rain made driving really treacherous. Check that out. The driver of an SUV lost control and almost hit a news crew, but luckily, they were out of harm's way, although they seemed right in the line of it.

Ana Cabrera is joining us from Richmond, Virginia. And the situation there, we can see a vehicle taking its time right behind you, going by slowly. The roads look quite awful there.

ANA CABRERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Right. Very variable conditions here in the south, Michaela. You mentioned the snow, the sleet, the ice. And so the roadways are extremely slippery behind me. You can see it's really piled up here. More than six inches of snow here in Richmond alone. They anticipated even more, but because of the sleet, it helped to keep some of the snow levels down.

Still plenty of work for the many crews that are out and about. You can even see they brought out the heavy equipment across the street to clear some of the sidewalks. They've got the Bobcats. They've got multiple people shoveling; also working on de-icing, using the sand and the salt. We know that the state police have responded to more than 200 accidents since 2 or 4 yesterday afternoon, and the storm isn't over yet.

After the snow comes is the deep freeze. We know temperatures going into negative degrees in the next 48 hours. It may not get above freezing for much of any time until this weekend, Michaela, so people are starting to hunker down and prepare for what could come.

Still, especially as you mentioned, those 200,000 power outages for a lot of the folks here in the southern states, where it's frigidly cold for them for this time of year -- Michaela.

PEREIRA: Yes. We've been mostly lucky that there haven't been more power outages, more widespread power outages, but I imagine folks are hoping they can catch their breath, get some supplies and hunker down for this next one. Ana, our thanks to you.

And to those of you that are watching at home, if you have any good videos or photos of the snow, please share them with us. Tweet us @NewDay. You can also post them on our Facebook page, Facebook.com/NewDay and use the hash tag #CNNsnow, snowverit. Whatever floats your snow boat.

CAMEROTA: We love "snowverit."

PEREIRA: Ryan could almost make vertical snow angels.

CAMEROTA: Yes. PEREIRA: Because it's so huge. It's really important that -- you know, the scale of that. Where are they going to put all of that snow? I have no idea.

CAMEROTA: I know.

CUOMO: It's not going anywhere.

PEREIRA: More of it on the way.

CUOMO: That's the problem.

How about this one? Flames so bad all firefighters could do is watch them burn. Why did a train turn into this? We have the story behind the video, ahead.

PEREIRA: And Americans overwhelmingly are saying OK to using force to combat ISIS, that according to a brand-new CNN poll. John King is going to break down the numbers, "Inside Politics."

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CUOMO: An explosion and fire so bad it is causing a state of emergency in West Virginia. It all started with a train carrying crude oil. It derailed, and the situation just fireballs out of control from there.

Let's bring in CNN's Rene Marsh in Washington with more. What's the latest?

RENE MARSH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, at this point, Chris, this morning it is still a dangerous situation in West Virginia. People are still not being allowed to return to their homes, and there's still great concern about the drinking water in this area.

Oil from the derailed train has spilled into a nearby river, which is a source of drinking water. The water we do know is being tested periodically. Of course, this all started yesterday afternoon. A CSX train hauling crude oil from North Dakota to Virginia derailed. That was followed by multiple explosions. You're looking at some video there. And blasts continued into the night.

We do know one home was destroyed, one person injured and about 1,000 people displaced at this hour. Emergency crews are telling us even at this hour, Chris, fire is still burning. It is still too hot for firefighters to get close to the epicenter of this explosion -- Chris.

CUOMO: All right. So we know it's still burning, and we know that those who need to come and figure out what happened, and maybe how to stop it, aren't even there yet. So what are they looking at going forward?

MARSH: Well, we do know that federal investigators this morning, we -- they are on their way to the crash site. But when you look at those images there, it is very clear to know that it's going to take a while for things to cool down. Cool down enough so that it's safe enough for the investigators to get close to start the process of piecing this all together, figuring out what caused this derailment. That is still a mystery as we speak. They do not know what caused nearly 30 of the cars to derail. So that's going to be their image [SIC]. That's going to be their mission as they arrive there.

But the first part of this is securing the scene. and that isn't fully done at this point.

CUOMO: An obvious -- an obvious and big part of the challenge there, Rene, is that this fire has its own fuel source. So that's going to have to burn through. All right. We'll stay on it. Thank you, Rene, appreciate it -- Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: Well, a host of international leaders heading to the White House for a summit focusing on the battle against extremism. President Obama expected to address more than 400 officials and counterterrorism experts tomorrow. The goal is to find a strategy to prevent terror groups from recruiting and inspiring acts of violence.

PEREIRA: The gunman in the Copenhagen attacks apparently swore loyalty to ISIS on his Facebook page. And last year prison officials felt he was at risk of becoming radicalized. He served time for stabbing a man on a train; was released about two weeks before the shootings.

CUOMO: Testimony resumes today in the so-called "American Sniper" murder trial. Monday was the biggest day yet. Jurors heard Eddie Ray Routh's taped confession. Now, his attorneys say it shows the 27- year-old veteran suffered from mental illness when he killed Littlefield and Kyle. But the question for the jury will be whether Routh knew what he was doing was wrong.

CAMEROTA: The voice behind a teen classic has died.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

(MUSIC: LESLIE GORE, "IT'S MY PARTY")

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: That one holds up. It's so catchy. Singer-songwriter Leslie Gore was just 17 years old when she topped the charts back in 1963 with "It's My Party." Among her other hits, the feminist anthem "You Don't Own Me."

PEREIRA: Right.

CAMEROTA: Gore's partner of 33 years says she died of lung cancer at a New York hospital. On Monday, she was just 68 years old.

CUOMO: Too young.

CAMEROTA: Yes.

CUOMO: Too young, but what an impact.

PEREIRA: And some great music she left us with.

CAMEROTA: Yes.