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New Day
Texas Rainfall Reaches One-in-100-Year Levels; Drought Persists Despite Flood Events; Arkansas Officers Removed from Duty; Ford Cutting 3,000 Jobs; Middle Class Black Americans Feelings on the Economy. Aired 6:30-7a ET
Aired August 23, 2022 - 06:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[06:30:00]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, UKRAINIAN PRESIDENT (through translator): But its future. The blue and yellow flag will flutter again at its home, where it's supposed to be by right, in all temporarily occupied cities and villages of Ukraine.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
DAVID MCKENZIE, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Now, normally these streets behind me would be with thrumming (ph) with people celebrating this public holiday and tomorrow's public holiday, but that isn't the case, John. They really are at a heightened sense of alert I would say. Not nervousness, necessarily, but preparing for worst case scenario of Russian strikes.
John.
JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, it feels like a different moment. Seven months into a war. I know it's strange to say there is a heightened state of alert. But that does seem to be the case this morning. David, we know you're watching it very closely. Thank you.
So, record rainfall that triggered once in a century flooding in Texas. Where that severe weather is headed next.
KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: And a new conservative non-profit just received $1.6 billion from a little-known donor. We'll tell you more about the dark money windfall ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[06:35:15]
BERMAN: Dallas is reeling from a summer's worth of rain in a single day. Torrential rains caused once in a century flooding. Rescue crews responded to calls for help from residents who have never seen anything like this in their lives. At least one death has been reported. And this morning, storms and flood threats, they're shifting to the east. So, let's get right to meteorologist Chad Myers for that.
Chad, where exactly?
CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Into Louisiana, Mississippi and even into Alabama by the end of the week.
Look at east Dallas, 15 inches of rain in 48 hours yesterday.
This weather brought to you by Safelite, your vehicle glass and recalibration experts. So let's get to it.
It's raining right now. It has moved away from Dallas, but it is right over Louisiana and moving off to the east again for today. By 11:00, still raining. Stretching out a little bit. At least not that bull's- eye that we had over Dallas yesterday for so long where it just would not stop raining.
Here's what it looks like for the next couple of days, couple of hours. We're going to see the rainfall shift off to the east, and then you see it sliding that way.
Yesterday, it was all across Texas. All across northern Texas.
Now, look at this whiplash, extreme to exceptional drought in almost every place that it rained. Flooding, drought, flooding, whiplash.
John.
BERMAN: All right, Chad, Chad Myers, thank you very much.
COLLINS: And joining us now to talk about all of this and the whiplash that Chad was just laying out is Bill Weir, our chief climate correspondent.
This is such an extraordinary circumstance because they're getting this summer's worth of rain but they've been having this drought. But as Chad was laying out yesterday, you know, it basically makes the ground like a ton of bricks. It doesn't absorb water very well.
BILL WEIR, CNN CHIEF CLIMATE CORRESPONDENT: Exactly. Exactly. Houston by itself is a big - basically a concrete bowl that fills up with water, as we saw in storms past.
But, yes, absolutely, the water cycle, this simple thing we learned about in seventh grade science now has turned into this monster, unpredictable, where you can have a one in 1,000-year storm at the same time as a one in 100-year drought.
It's sort of a tale of two states. West Texas, deep drought. A lot more water is coming in. The state climatologists just last year predicted that 30 -- that extreme events, 30 percent to 50 percent more than from the '50s through the '90s as well.
So, this is sort of, get ready, buckle up, because this is the beginning of a whole new planet. BERMAN: Why isn't it as simple, and I think as Kaitlan was getting at,
as saying, oh, there was a drought, they go a ton of rain so, hey, things are better?
COLLINS: Good for you, yes.
WEIR: Well, that's it, it's just too much too fast. You can't control it. And when it hits these hard infrastructures, it turns into runout, out in the deserts it can turn into really dangerous flash flooding. The scariest moment in my life was in a flash flood in Arizona. Not in a war zone.
So, it comes out of nowhere. It seems ironic as well.
But it might have some relief. About -- there was a worse drought back about ten years ago, when 90 percent of the state was in drought back then. Now it's maybe 60 percent. The reservoir is close to 70 percent full. So, it's not as bad as what we're seeing out in the southwest on the Colorado River.
COLLINS: Well, and I think one thing that scares people is, when this happens is, is, it feels like it's happening more and more often. And I know lately that we've had, in one week along, three one in 1,000- year rain events where in St. Louis, eastern Kentucky, Illinois, you saw these events happening. And so when people do ask, is this the new normal, what is the answer?
WEIR: Yes, this is it. This is what we've been predicting, that scientists has been predicting for generations now. And - and when you look at the data about how, you know, July is the hottest ever, that, you know, Austin and San Antonio just hit their all-time hottest records, you have to think about it, this is the beginning of a new normal. And adapting to this is as much of a challenge as mitigating the cause of it in the end.
But, again, while the storms are happening, 400 cities around Texas are on water restrictions right now. Uvalde County, which has seen their share of misery, they're trucking in water there right now. So, this is the kind of thing where we're all in this together. And the more communities can rally around the idea that this is the new normal, the less pain.
BERMAN: Well, we're all in this together around the world.
WEIR: Exactly.
BERMAN: It's not just a U.S. problem, it's a global problem.
And there's some new pictures that we've seen from the Alps, the Swiss Alps, where you can see some of the glacial melt over, what's the time span, 90 years or so?
WEIR: Yes.
BERMAN: Tell us what we're looking at as we put these pictures up.
WEIR: So, this is for the first time they will actually take old images and then reconstruct sort of visual timelines.
COLLINS: Wow.
BERMAN: Oh my.
WEIR: So, you're seeing those entire glaciers disappear. Lost half the volume in the Alps from '31 -- 1931 to 2016. That's about a chunk of ice the size of Manhattan every decade. Just trickled away. And, of course, these are the water towers --
COLLINS: Every decade?
WEIR: Every decade.
And so there will be a person -- the last person to ever ski a glacier on the Alps probably is alive today because we're looking at an ice- free Alps in the -- definitely our children's lifetimes, and probably in our lifetimes as well.
[06:40:08]
These aren't refreezing anytime soon. That's the - that's the thing as we get back to this is going to work itself out somehow. Even if everybody, you know, stopped burning fossil fuels today, magically, what's built into the system will take centuries to play out as the oceans sort of reach a homeostasis. So, Greenland's not going to refreeze. Antarctica's not refreezing. And it's just a matter of how fast this well effect sea level rises and, of course, water supplies in - across different continents. The same thing's happening in China on the Yangtze (ph). It's here.
COLLINS: It's devastating too.
WEIR: It is.
COLLINS: Bill Weir, thanks for bringing us that cheerful news this morning.
WEIR: I'm sorry.
BERMAN: Captain Happy.
WEIR: Thanks.
BERMAN: But it's important. Like, people need to listen to this.
COLLINS: It is.
WEIR: Knowledge is power.
BERMAN: Yes.
COLLINS: Yes, absolutely.
Bill Weir, thank you.
WEIR: You bet.
COLLINS: Coming up, there's more by the brutal beating by police that was caught on camera in Arkansas. We have new details about the officers who were involved.
Plus, some pretty candid comments from Senator Mitch McConnell about voter fraud and the need to protect democracy.
BERMAN: And Dr. Anthony Fauci stepping down. He says he wants to pursue the next chapter of his career. Dr. Anthony Fauci will be on NEW DAY live ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COLLINS: Officials have now released the names of the officers who were suspended after this video showing them beating a suspect went public. Officials say that Zack King and Levi White of the Crawford County Sheriff's Department and Thell Riddle of the Mulberry Police Department have been on the force for, quote, many years. All three have now been removed from duty pending investigation.
CNN's Omar Jimenez joins me now.
And, Omar, just the more we learn about this, we are seeing more officials in the state coming out criticizing them saying this is not what they were trained to do.
[06:45:05]
OMAR JIMENEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We are, Kaitlan. And we also learned that a federal civil rights investigation has now been opened into this. So that investigative scope has definitely widened.
Now, on what happened on that day, specifically, we've heard now from the sheriff there locally in Crawford County who said that they initially went up to this man, 27 -- this 27-year-old here, that they believed he had a weapon and that he told officers he had a weapon. But the sheriff added, he also believes the person handed over his weapon before all of what we've seen on video began. Of course, the kicking, the punching, all of that.
And police were initially called on 27-year-old Randal Worcester because he allegedly spit on a gas station clerk and threatened them. He was charged with first and second degree assault, battery and others, but he was released on bail. And his attorney says, regardless of what he may have done, the response from officers shouldn't have been what it was.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DAVID POWELL, ATTORNEY FOR MAN BEATEN DURING VIOLENT ARREST: We've all seen the video. I don't believe that the excessive amount of force that was used would be justified by -- if my client did in fact spit on someone. I believe it was above and beyond what the officers were trained to do and what they should have done in that situation. GOV. ASA HUTCHINSON (R-AR): This is not what our law enforcement
community represents. It's not the proper response. And they will be reviewed and appropriate action taken.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
JIMENEZ: And the local sheriff echoed those statements.
We've got investigations going at the state and now we know at the federal level, all circling around that central question, was this amount of force really necessary, especially with those three law enforcement officers.
COLLINS: Yes, and a lot of people saying it wasn't.
Omar, thank you so much.
Meanwhile, Ford Motor is preparing to cut thousands of jobs amid the shift to electric vehicles.
Plus --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Whew! The last two years have been really tough.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BERMAN: A CNN special report, how middle class black Americans feel about the U.S. economy.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[06:50:09]
BERMAN: Ford telling its employees the company plans to cut 3,000 jobs. The layoffs come as Ford turns its focus to electric vehicles.
CNN business correspondent Rahel Solomon here with he story.
Good morning, Rahel.
RAHEL SOLOMON, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Hey, John, good morning.
Yes, so Ford had been signaling that these cuts were coming, but the news coming down yesterday afternoon.
Here's what we know. Ford says that it is cutting 3,000 white collar jobs. Two thousand of those are salaried employees, 1,000 are contractors. The employees that are notified, the company says they're going not be impacted and notified later this week. Company executives saying in a statement that building this future requires changing and reshaping virtually all aspects of the way that we have operated for more than a century. It requires focus, clarity and speed and, as we have discussed in recent months, also saying that it means redeploying resources and assessing our cost structure which is uncompetitive versus traditional and new competitors.
So, speaking of competitor, Ford, guys, not the only automaker considering cuts or making cuts. Tesla, for its part, has announced that it is cutting 10 percent of salaried staff. GM has said that it is not considering cuts yet but is considering and preparing for the possibility of a recession. For its part, Ford says that assembly lines will not be closed.
And, guys, I should say that Ford has pointed out that these cuts are not cost-saving measures necessarily just in the traditional sense. It's more so a refocusing, a re-shifting of the company's priorities as it shifts to EV. Although I'm sure that's little comfort for the 3,000 employees who are being impacted by this.
BERMAN: Yes, that's right, it certainly does hit them hard.
Rahal Solomon, thank you so much for that.
So, the Justice Department issuing a new subpoena to the National Archives. A sign the investigation into the Capitol riot could be widening.
COLLINS: And new court filings reveal a dramatic near-encounter between Senator Chuck Schumer and a member of the Proud Boys on January 6th.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[06:56:17]
COLLINS: Following President Biden's signing of a landmark economic bill, some still feel that it falls short of the promises he made on the campaign trail. So, how do middle class black Americans feel about the economy under President Biden?
CNN's national correspondent Ryan Young went to find out.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
RYAN YOUNG, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: How tough have the last two years been?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Whew, the last two years have been really tough.
YOUNG (voice over): The pandemic and inflation have hit Americans hard, increasing long-standing disparities in some communities. And African Americans want the president's attention.
BRIANNA MEMBRES, FOUNDER CEO, SHE EDITS LLC: As a middle class black woman, I don't see the push for the black economic community like really exploding.
ELISHA MONIQUE, EVENT ATTENDEE: I think the message is being delivered, but I don't think the message is being captured in the way that we want it to be captured.
YOUNG: Black Americans account for $1.6 trillion of spending power in the United States, but often feel ignored.
MATTHEW GARLAND, EARN YOUR LEISURE: We want ours (ph). We need ours (ph). We need to have access to capital. We want action. We need action. We demand action.
YOUNG: Earlier this summer, Vice President Kamala Harris announced new public/private initiatives in underserved communities hoping to kick- start major minority investments.
KAMALA HARRIS, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: And I believe, given the breadth of the financial disparities in our nation, the public and the private sector must join forces to take on these challenges.
YOUNG: Thousands of African Americans traveled from all over the country to Invest Fest in Atlanta in hopes of learning the keys to financial literacy and starting their own businesses. This at a time when African American unemployment is nearly twice the national average. Those here tell me, creating jobs is a priority.
19 KEYS, EVO NETWORK: The black community has a pre-existing pipeline to prison, but we don't have a pre-existing pipeline to wealth.
YOUNG: Film, TV star and producer Tyler Perry and Steve Harvey helped headline this event, which is all about education and investing. It's the brainchild of these four men who helped create Earn Your Leisure, a financial literacy movement focused on helping black Americans.
TROY MILLINGS, EARN YOUR LEISURE: This is a movement. And we called it that very intentionally. Like, we grew up and heard things about the March on Washington, right, and the civil rights movement. And that had its time. But right now we're in the financial revolution.
RASHAD BILAL, EARN YOUR LEISURE: We need to figure out how we can actually attack from the highest level and build our own venture capital funds and have our own private equity firms and do international business and then we don't actually have to demand the politicians do anything. We can force them to do things. We force them to do things by money.
YOUNG: A recent poll found that 55 percent of black and 48 percent of Latino adults say they are currently facing serious financial problems due to inflation. For white adults, it's 38 percent.
DON PEEBLES, CHAIRMAN AND CEO, THE PEEBLES CORPORATION: The wealth disparity between blacks and whites was greater in 2018 than 1968. But everything we do needs to be focused on advancing opportunity economically.
YOUNG: Don Peebles beat the odds. His companies control more than $7 million worth of investments. He believes African Americans need more direct investment from the Biden administration.
PEEBLES: I know President Biden. I've known him for many years. He's a very good person. I believe that he is missing the mark on his most loyal and valuable constituency. Because without black voters he would be a private citizen.
YOUNG: With that midterms looming, Democrats will count on African Americans to turn out and vote but many are hoping for a return on their long-term investment.
19 KEYS: Poor people vote, rich people lobby. At the end of the day, if we want to get something done, we've got to vote with our dollar.
YOUNG: Ryan Young, CNN, Atlanta, Georgia.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COLLINS: And NEW DAY continues right now.
[07:00:06]
BERMAN: Attorneys for former President Trump taking their first legal action since
