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U.S. Troops to Secure Afghan Airport; Earthquake Rocks Haiti; Bocchit Edmond is Interviewed about Haiti's Earthquake; Dallas Schools Will Defy Mask Mandate Ban; Chaos at Kabul Airport as Afghans Scramble to Escape. Aired 6:30-7a ET

Aired August 16, 2021 - 06:30   ET

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

[06:30:00]

SUSAN GLASSER, AUTHOR, "THE MAN WHO RAN WASHINGTON: THE LIFE AND TIMES OF JAMES A. BAKER III": Essentially as this disaster unfolded yesterday.

But, you know, even in the statements last week, you had a real distancing and real sense of like, this is the regrettable cost of 20 years of failure.

I was surprised in April that Biden used essentially Trumpian rhetoric, embracing, I think, the kind of canard of, I'm ending the forever wars. And as we can see, Afghanistan's war is going to go on. The question is what U.S. participation is going to be in it.

So I'm glad you brought up those points because I really have been struck by the political nature of this. And, of course, it should have been a lot more focused on executing and the management of this situation.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: And can I just ask, Peter, we've been talking about the Afghan government that is now no longer. But -- but if it was able to crumble so quickly, if this 300,000 vaunted (ph) military disappeared as fast as it did, what was the point of propping it up? Is that an argument that can be made?

PETER BERGEN, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: You know, Afghanistan has been at war since 1978, even before the Soviets invaded. So if -- you know, 43 years of war. Afghans are used to changing sides. They want to keep their heads on their body. And that's why we saw people surrendering so quickly. That doesn't mean that we're not going to see a renewed civil war. There are elements of the anti-Taliban resistance that will reform. Ahmad Shah Massoud's son is already setting up a militia. Amrullah Saleh, who's the vice president, has publicly tweeted he'll never live under Taliban rule. So we're going to see a resumption of hostilities.

For the moment, people are just surrendering because they see that an overwhelming force has come in and they have no interest in dying.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: Look, we're watching this unfold as we speak and we certainly appreciate you, Susan, and you, peter, here to put this into context. It is a very fluid situation. Thank you to you both.

GLASSER: Thank you.

BERGEN: Thank you.

KEILAR: And, ahead, we're going to speak live with an interpreter who is desperate to get his family out of Afghanistan.

BERMAN: And we will go live to Haiti where the death toll rising tragically quickly from the powerful earthquake there.

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[06:36:24]

BERMAN: Widespread destruction and urgent lack of medical supplies. Nearly 1,300 people dead. This is the scene in Haiti this morning as the government there has declared a state of emergency after the 7.2 magnitude earthquake hit the country over the weekend. More than 5,000 people are injured but blocked roads and a shortage of vital supplies are making it difficult for many victims to get the help they need.

Our Matt Rivers is live in Port-au-Prince in Haiti.

And, Matt, obviously, a country that's barely recovered from the last earthquake, that just went through the assassination of its president. What's the situation on the ground?

MATT RIVERS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Not to mention the devastating hurricane that came through here, John, just a few years ago. This is a country that truly cannot catch a break. And, unfortunately, those numbers that you just mentioned off the top, they're almost assuredly going to go up as rescuers, as government organizations, as charities make their way into the harder-hit areas here. A lot of those people who are missing are, unfortunately, going to be counted among the dead at some point, especially as time goes on.

You mentioned nearly 1,300 dead. There are thousands of missing and injured.

We actually got a chance to travel to one of the hardest hit areas near the epicenter of this earthquake yesterday. We spent a couple of hours on the ground there. And you can see the damage. I mean it is tremendous. Some of what happened there, you can see just the destructive power of this -- of this earthquake.

We saw a luxury hotel that had collapsed, multiple stories high. There were still, definitely, according to authorities, bodies inside that hotel. Rescue efforts being hampered by locals there who had actually gone into the site to take away certain things like air conditioners. We saw a dresser being walked out of there. Mirrors that had somehow remained intact. It's a very desperate situation out there. And that is ahead of what we're expecting later on today, John, which is the arrival of what is a tropical storm system that is expected to bring, you know, winds that could gust up to 75 miles an hour, dump several inches of rain. That is going to make a complicated situation that much more complicated, John.

BERMAN: Matt Rivers for us on the ground in Port-au-Prince, where there is every reason to believe the situation is that much worse than we even see right now.

Matt, thank you for being there.

KEILAR: Let's talk now with the Haiti ambassador to the U.S., Bocchit Edmond, who is with us.

Ambassador, we are so sorry for the challenges that your country continues to endure and these pictures we're seeing are just terrible. Can you give us the latest on the number of victims there?

BOCCHIT EDMOND, HAITI'S AMBASSADOR TO THE U.S.: Good morning, Brianna. It's a pleasure to be with you this morning.

As Matt Rivers reported, the last report we have from the Haitian authorities, the toll is up 1,300 death and more than 5,000 wounded.

Now, I believe, yesterday, the prime minister and his team flew over the affected areas to assess the extent of the damages. But the report really shows that it's really bad.

But we do hope that now we are going to deploy more efforts to search. And yesterday we had a team from Fairfax, Virginia, experts who came in to help and hopefully we'll continue to search. If there was any survivors or, you know, to recover the bodies that's still under the rubble.

KEILAR: What is your biggest concern right now? And what help do you need from the international community?

EDMOND: Yes, the (INAUDIBLE) probably that, as we said before, probably that would be that hurricane or the Tropical Storm Grace that's on its way.

[06:40:10]

But hopefully Grace will be graceful enough not to, you know, to temper those efforts because I know if there is heavy wind, those will affect certainly the search. And what we need from the international community is we -- is we already started to see the reactions of some friends, the United States, Israel and Canada and Dominican Republic and so on.

So, I think we -- what we need to do now, it's -- we need to understand that the international assistance (INAUDIBLE) will come, but from our side, we are trying to organize those assistance in a coordinated manner because we just don't want to repeat some of the mistakes we made in 2010 when we were flooded with international NGOs. And so now what we need to do is trying to coordinate things, the actions, and make sure that there will be a better impact and the victims actually will be really helped.

KEILAR: Well, Ambassador, the victims are certainly on our minds. We can see what they are going through in these pictures. We really appreciate you joining us to talk about this.

Ambassador Bocchit Edmond, thanks so much.

EDMOND: Thank you for having me.

KEILAR: Cities in Texas are fighting back against the governor as coronavirus cases rise there. Why one school district is defying a state supreme court decision.

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[06:45:52]

BERMAN: New this morning, the Texas Supreme Court has sided with Texas Governor Greg Abbott, temporarily blocking mask requirements issued in major school districts, including the one around Dallas. This as the number of children hospitalized with the virus hits an all-time high.

Joining us now is Michael Hinojosa. He is the superintendent of the Dallas Independent School District. This is his first television interview since the supreme court order in Texas.

The supreme court banned mask requirements. You've got more than 100,000 students coming to school today. What have you decided to do?

MICHAEL HINOJOSA, SUPERINTENDENT, DALLAS INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT: Well, john thanks for having me.

We're going to keep the mask mandate in place. As that order was issued, it applied to Dallas County only. School districts were not mentioned in the order. My name was not mentioned in the order. And contrary to what our attorney general tweeted out, a tweet is not an order. He said that it applied to us. But it does not. We've had teams of attorneys looking at this and we need to protect the safety of our students. And so we are going to continue with our mask mandate, although, albeit, breaking news, I just got a threatening letter from a parent who says he's going to sue me this morning because of the mask mandate.

BERMAN: How do you intend to impose this mandate? What are you going to do if students show up without masks?

HINOJOSA: Well, we're going to be -- we're going to work with them. We -- we -- I have asked my people to be benevolent but be firm. Give them an opportunity to comply. Then have alternatives in place if they don't.

But we cannot risk, the way this virus is spreading all over town, we cannot risk students walking through our building without masks on. So, stay tuned. It's going to be quite an interesting day for sure.

BERMAN: You say you've been sued or you're about to be sued by a parent. What's the reaction been overall from the families and the students themselves?

HINOJOSA: It's been overwhelmingly positive. I've probably gotten -- it's probably been 95 to 5, 95 percent to 5 people in support from the elected officials, to parents, to staff. There have been a few. We had one teacher file a grievance and now we have one parent threatening a lawsuit. And so overwhelmingly supportive. And -- but this thing's going to continue to iterate as we go down this path.

BERMAN: And explain to me again, you mentioned the fact that the delta variant has caused this to be a completely new situation with new considerations. Explain to me the reasoning behind your decision.

HINOJOSA: Well, ten days ago this wasn't even on my radar. And then as things started devolving, the situation started getting more serious. And then I heard an attorney speak that maybe they may have a window to do something differently. And so then we just made the decision to try to protect our staff, students and families as best we could. And -- I may get $1,000 fine. I've had so many people volunteer to pay the first 1,000. We don't know if it's 1,000 per day or 1.000 per student.

But it doesn't matter what the consequences are. The most important thing is to -- as long as we can legally do it.

Now, once the supreme court rules that it applies to Dallas ISD, then I will comply. But, you know, we've won in the court of public opinion but we haven't won in the supreme court. And -- but we haven't even been heard in the supreme court. So we'll keep fighting until we can't.

BERMAN: You said stay tuned today is going to be an interesting day. What exactly does that mean? What do you anticipate? Given the supreme court did issue a full ruling on this case yet and you say it didn't mention you by name, but, I don't know, what if the attorney general or the governor sends in people to, you know, keep you from imposing the mandate?

HINOJOSA: Well, we'll cross that bridge when we get to it. They could sue me. A parent is going to sue me and that changes the game somewhat. But as of right now, I have the full authority to require the masks.

And so we had 20,000 students that were in the district last year, last week for the last four days and everybody complied. Every single person complied. Today, everybody else is coming. So now I've already been threatened with a lawsuit. So this could change the game. And I'll be in touch with attorneys. All Sunday afternoon, instead of being with my grandkids, I was talking to attorneys. That's the nature of our business at this point and it's very unfortunate.

[06:50:00]

BERMAN: Superintendent Michael Hinojosa, thanks for being with us this morning. Stay in touch. It does sound like today will be interesting.

HINOJOSA: Thank you.

BERMAN: This morning, the fallout from the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan becoming a diplomatic nightmare. We're going to go live to the State Department, next. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KEILAR: Breaking overnight, chaos at Kabul International Airport after gunfire erupted and Afghans flooded the tarmac in the hopes of fleeing the country in the wake of the Taliban's takeover. The State Department set to hold a briefing on the situation this afternoon.

And this is happening as the American flag at the U.S. embassy in Kabul is now down. It was taken down yesterday, marking a final step in the evacuation of the diplomatic compound there in the capital city. The U.S. now rushing 1,000 more troops to Afghanistan to manage this sudden departure of embassy personnel days earlier than initially planned.

[06:55:07]

Let's get straight to the State Department where CNN's Kylie Atwood is.

This is really the story right now, getting Americans out of Kabul and getting Afghans out of Kabul, which may prove to be an impossible feat even many of them are people who put their lives on the line for the U.S.

KYLIE ATWOOD, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Brianna, this is really a double-prong challenge for the U.S. right now. Last night a State Department spokesperson confirming that all U.S. embassy personnel had been evacuated from the embassy. What that means is that all those people headed to the Kabul Airport. They are trying to get on flights right now back to the United States.

But as that has happened, thousands of Afghans have also come to the airport hoping to get on flights. Scared to stay in the country because of the Taliban's control that they have asserted over Kabul and over the country right now. And so as that has happened, one of the things that the U.S. has had to do is prioritize getting out U.S. personnel. What that means for now is that there have been some flights put on pause for these Afghan interpreters, for these special immigrant visa applicants that the United States has been working to get out of the country.

Now, just last night, the State Department, the Pentagon said they are working to accelerate those flights. A State Department spokesperson said that they will continue in the coming days. But they have only gotten about 2,000 of those SIVs and their families out of the country. We know that there are about 20,000 who have applied.

Now, as all of this is going on, of course, the Biden administration is facing some heat because people are comparing the images that we are seeing as the U.S. chaotically evacuates the embassy, gets out of the country, they are comparing that to the fall of Saigon in 1975.

And I want you to listen to Secretary of State Tony Blinken pushing back on that comparison when he spoke with Jake Tapper yesterday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) JAKE TAPPER, CNN ANCHOR: With this troop surge to airlift Americans out of Afghanistan, aren't we already in the midst of a Saigon moment?

ANTONY BLINKEN, SECRETARY OF STATE: No, we're not. Remember, this is not Saigon. We went to Afghanistan 20 years ago with one mission. And that mission was to deal with the folks who attacked us on 9/11. And we have succeeded in that mission. The objective that we set, bringing those who attacked us to justice, making sure that they couldn't attack us again from Afghanistan, we've succeeded in that mission. And, in fact, we succeeded a while ago.

And at the same time, remaining in Afghanistan for another one, five, ten years is not in the national interest. You know the British were there for a long time in the 19th century. The Russians were there for a long time in the 20th century. We've now been there twice as long as the Russians. And how that's in our national interest, I don't see.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ATWOOD: Now, despite the secretary of state pushing back there, these images are early similar to what happened in Saigon in 1975. And from our reporting, we know that President Biden considered what happened there and that is something that he really wanted to avoid as he planned for the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.

Brianna.

KEILAR: Yes, sure did.

Kylie, thank you so much, live for us from the State Department.

Just ahead, CNN is live on the ground in Afghanistan as the Taliban tightened its grip on the capital of Kabul. CNN's Clarissa Ward is outside the embassy.

BERMAN: Plus, we're going to speak live with an interpreter who is begging the U.S. to help his family.

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