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Wolf

Another Foot of Snow for Parts of Massachusetts; Boston Declares Snow Emergency; Parts of Ohio Under Winter Storm Warning; Saudis Try to Stop Militant Spread; Yemen Unrest Threatens Region; Saudis Face Trouble on Two Borders; Peace Talks Break Down; Huckabee and 2016

Aired February 02, 2015 - 13:00   ET

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

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WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, I'm Wolf Blitzer. It's 1:00 p.m. here in Washington, 6:00 in London, 8:00 in Kiev, 9:00 p.m. in Riyadh. Wherever you are watching from around the world, thanks very much for joining us.

Up first, here in the United States, the Northeast gets hit by a one- two punch of winter weather. Millions of Americans are now dealing with snow, sleet, even blizzard-like conditions. Massachusetts is getting pounded for the second time in a week. Parts of the state could get hit with another 14 inches of snow.

Earlier, the storm pummeled the Midwest, areas of Northeast Ohio, including Cleveland, they are still under a winter storm warning. A Toledo, Ohio police officer died while shoveling snow. Heavy snow is causing major problems for drivers. In Nebraska, two people died in car dozens on slick roads, and the storm is snarling air travel all across the United States. More than 3,500 flights were canceled today, that according to FlightAware.com.

In Boston, it's snowing now one to two inches an hour in areas around the city. And it could get up to a foot of additional snow before it's all over. It's making driving conditions pretty treacherous.

CNN's Brian Todd is joining us now. He's braving those roadways. He's driving just north of the city. What's it like up there, Brian?

BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, it's very treacherous and it gets worse just about every hour. What's interesting about this storm is even though it's less volume than last week's storm -- you know, last week, they had over two feet in many areas. This week, it's maybe between 10 and 14 inches predicted overall.

We're in a moving vehicle here on a side road just off the interstate, off Interstate 93 South. We're going to pull over here and show you from my camera, go out the dash camera here. As we head toward the interstate, we're going to pull over and show you what some of the road crews and motorists are up against. As we pull over here, you can see out my dash cam, there's a depot here where they're staging some vehicles from. I'm going to talk to the dash cam a second as our photojournalist, Khalil Abdallah, gets his camera out. This is a staging area.

But one of the things they're running into out here, Wolf, is, number one, visibility is really bad. Even though it's less snow than last week, the visibility, we're told, is worse. We've been talking to road crews all day along these roads. They say visibility is a lot worse than it was even though there's less this week than last.

Another issue, where to put the snow? You've got huge snow mounds all over the place here. There's really nowhere to go on the roads. If you get stuck, if you get in a jam and you think you're going to get stranded, there's really no place to get pulled over. These people pulled over here. This is what the police are telling us they don't want people to do. They got snowed over here. But we also just ran into someone who was trying to avoid someone coming in from a side road. Couldn't avoid them. Ran into a snowbank instead.

So, there's just nowhere to go. If you think you're going to get stranded, if you think you need to pull over, there's nowhere to go. And that includes on the interstate. They're telling people if you think you are having problems on the road, get completely off the interstate. Don't pull over on the side. It will complicate matters for the snowplow crews.

Massachusetts state officials, Wolf, tell us they have 3,000 vehicles on the roads right now, spreaders, plows, other things, just trying to get these roads clear. But, as you can see, it's still coming down at a rate that's a little too fast right now. It's coming down faster than they can clear it from the roads. So, that's a problem, Wolf, as we head into the rush hour, the evening rush hour. This is a snow storm, this day, that is affecting both rush hours. It was bad in the morning. It's going to be bad in the afternoon.

BLITZER: Yes, and there's more snow on the way. And just look what happened in that whole Boston-New England area. Brian, be careful over there. I know those roads are treacherous, very, very icy and slippery as well. And as Brian just said, Massachusetts, this week, is getting a lot more snow, this on the heels of last week's history storm.

Joining us on the phone right now is Peter Judge. He's a spokesman for the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency. Peter, Boston already has declared a snow emergency. So, what's it like now, coming on the heels of what you guys went through only a few days ago?

PETER JUDGE, SPOKESMAN, MASSACHUSETTS EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT AGENCY (via telephone): Well, it's been a challenge. Fortunately, we haven't had the really strong winds. Unfortunately, it's been -- visibility has been awful, as we just heard, simply because of the rate of snow, one to two inches an hour. And it will continue, I think, well into the home commute this afternoon.

BLITZER: Are you telling people to stay off the roads? I know schools in Boston are closed today. What's the latest on that front?

JUDGE: Right. Across the state, most schools have taken the day off. And we ask folks to stay off the roads if you don't have to be there. Take advantage of public transportation. This morning's commute really wasn't that bad because I think a lot of people decided to take a snow day themselves, maybe even trying to recover from staying up late last night watching the Super Bowl. But, nonetheless, we hope this afternoon, come the commute, it's not a disaster only because I think the number of vehicles on the road is not going to be your normal afternoon commute.

BLITZER: Yes, a lot of people are staying home which is smart. A quick question. Did you get most of last week's cleanup done before this new storm rolled in?

JUDGE: Not 100 percent. We were still working late into yesterday afternoon trucking a lot of snow out of the area, making every effort to get ready for this snow. I know the city of Boston is scrambling now because tomorrow, they planning on having a duck boat parade for the Patriots through downtown Boston and it's going to be a real challenge to get those streets ready for that parade.

BLITZER: All right. Well, Boston is strong, as we all know. So, let's see what they can do. Congratulations on that Patriots Super Bowl win, by the way.

JUDGE: OK. I'll take all the credit. Thanks.

BLITZER: All right, thank you.

All right, it's not just the Northeast getting hit hard by that winter storm. Martin Savidge is joining us, now, from his hometown of Cleveland, Ohio. Martin, give us an update on what's going on there. I see it's pretty bad.

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, it is, Wolf. As a matter of fact, it should be improving. The storm is actually moving away from us. It's been through here. It dumped about eight to 10 inches downtown Cleveland. But it's the wind that's proving to be really brutal. A wind that is now blasting directly out of the east. That's why I'm doing my radio announcer impersonation just to protect my side of the face here.

The snow and the cold are a one-two combination that's really impacting today. Just about every school up here has been closed. The roads are snow covered. They're still very treacherous because of the fact that plowing is made difficult by the drifting. It's also made difficult by the fact that it's still snowing.

And then, with temperatures this cold, the salt is not as effective as it usually is. Airports open but many flights delayed or canceled. And then, on top of that, just getting around on the streets, even on foot, is extremely difficult. We thought it was going to stop at around noon, apparently that is not the case. The snow is still coming down. The wind is still blowing. It's still a very difficult day here in the Midwest and especially in northeast Ohio -- Wolf.

BLITZER: Yes, the good news, though, is the folks in Cleveland, your home town, like the folks in Buffalo, my home town, they know how to deal with snow. They're used to it so they'll do OK. I'm sure. Be careful out there. I know it's cold and windy and snowy. Martin reporting from Cleveland.

Still ahead, we have new reports that the United States may start arming Ukrainian rebels. This as we get an inside look at the damage the war there has caused. Take a look at this. You're looking at the airport at Donetsk. Once a symbol of progress, now reduced, literally, to rubble. We're going live to eastern Ukraine for a report. Our own Nick Paton Walsh is on the scene.

And later, Republican presidential hopeful, Mike Huckabee, making headlines again, comparing homosexuality to drinking and smoking. We're going to talk about that. What's going on in Iowa, getting closer to those Iowa caucuses. Lots of politics happening here in the United States.

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BLITZER: The unrest in Yemen now spilling over into neighboring countries, including Saudi Arabia. And the Saudi kingdom is now strengthening its borders to try to keep out smugglers with an eye toward the possible migration of Yemeni militants and others.

Nic Robertson has a CNN exclusive report from the Saudi-Yemen border.

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NIC ROBERTSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Saudi border police on the gun. They're right next to Yemen. We're racing alongside the border fence. It's rare access. Yemen is falling apart. And Saudi Arabia is on the front line of the fallout.

(on camera): We just spotted a group of smugglers right over there. They're walking towards the border. And we just raced up here along the border fence with these gun trucks to try to catch them.

(voice-over): No one knows who they are, terrorists, gun runners, drug mules. Earlier in the day --

(on camera): So, you have a great view here back -- right back along the border.

(voice-over): Commanders take us to see how the Yemenis are crossing the border.

(on camera): You can see some people walking across the river there.

(voice-over): Saudis say they are spending almost $3 billion building new border roads, watch towers and high-tech surveillance. Their biggest fear, terrorists slipping into the kingdom.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: See the (INAUDIBLE)? Just behind.

ROBERTSON: In recent weeks, Iranian-backed Houthi tribesmen have taken control of Yemen's capital, creating instability that Al Qaeda is exploiting, threatening attack in Saudi. But high in the hills, the terrain is so torturous there isn't even a fence. (on camera): And it's not just this border with Yemen snaking through the mountains that the Saudis are trying to secure. To the north, the border with Iraq has come under attack from ISIS.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: These are life situations now.

ROBERTSON (on camera): What's happening?

(voice-over): Back at the border post, more people keep coming.

(on camera): Oh, there's someone right there. Here.

(voice-over): The camera operates and tells the patrol where to go. They move in, arrest the suspect.

(on camera): That man was picked up just down there where that van is coming around the bend in the road. And what the border police are telling us is that in the last three months alone, they picked up more than 42,000 people. And the problem is those people could be just anyone, smugglers or even terrorists.

They just brought us down to the one guy they captured that we saw on camera there.

(voice-over): He tells me he's poor, been sneaking into Saudi to work illegally for the past 20 years. But, recently, because of the security improvements, it's become much harder.

(on camera): Late in the afternoon, we've come to another base and they've told us they've captured some smugglers, some cat smugglers. These are -- these are -- these are children.

(voice-over): It turns out, the youngest is 10. The second time he's been caught smuggling in Yemeni's drug of choice, the stimulant, cat, leaves of a shrub which are chewed. He says he gets $50 per trip from drug barons.

(on camera): So, well, sir, what do you do with him?

(voice-over): The answer, send him back to Yemen. It turns out, though, their tiny haul is a drop in the ocean.

(on camera): Well, look at this pile of tusks (ph) right here. Huge.

(voice-over): In the past three months, he tells me, along the 500- mile border, more than half a million tons seized. Street value, close to $100 million.

Back on the dust chase with the gun trucks, the fleeing men are caught. They say they are poor Yemenis, unarmed, on their way home, only here to earn money. So for (ph) some say Saudi jail is better than freedom in Yemen.

(on camera): And how do you know if any of these men aren't connected with some terrorist group?

He tells me they get fingerprinted. If they have a record, the police will know right away.

As the sun sets, trucked off to a nearby police station. Minutes later, more young drug mules apprehended. This day, this night, tomorrow, next week and beyond, the desert kingdom threatened at its borders.

Nic Robertson, CNN, on the Saudi/Yemen border.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: And, Nic, thank you very much. Excellent opportunity to get some rare access to that very, very sensitive border, especially with what's going on in Yemen right now.

From one very sensitive area to another, when we come back, one Nic - and another Nick, Nick Paton Walsh, he's at a very dangerous part of Ukraine right now. The devastation, the war there, escalating. The U.S. now considering arming Ukrainian rebels. We'll go to the scene with Nick Paton Walsh right after this.

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BLITZER: Fighting has really intensified in eastern Ukraine in recent weeks and so has the rhetoric between the United States and Russia. The U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry heads to Ukraine's capital of Kiev later this week.

Meanwhile, the increased fighting between Ukraine's military and pro- Russian separatists has decimated several towns in the east. Our own Nick Paton Walsh is joining us now. He's in a very dangerous part of Ukraine.

Nick, first of all, tell us where you are, what you've been through, because I understand parts of that area, including that major airport at Donetsk, basically have been leveled.

NICK PATON WALSH, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, we've just come back from being in Donetsk Airport, an area not accessed by western media since its severe destruction in the fighting over the past two months or so. I was there at that airport seven or eight months ago. We took international flights out there (ph). We saw the fighting begin for it. And to go back today and to see quite what has happened to it in-between, it's held by separatists. It was held for a long time by the Ukrainian army. They used it as a stronghold. But the shelling has torn that building to shred.

We saw the bodies of some Ukrainian soldiers, who the separatists claim were left behind when the Ukrainian army withdrew in the past couple of weeks. It's a desperately terrifying place to stand. The shelling still land all around you, seven or eight, simply while we were there.

The separatists control it now, but they are still getting incoming artillery strikes from the Ukrainian military. And, Wolf, it's such a sad sight because that building had been a symbol of hope really for eastern Ukraine. It was built for a football championship, the European Cup of 2012, to welcome visitors. Now it is in absolute shreds. And, frankly, many are wondering quite, given the level of violence here, whether the victims will get any spoils at all. It's such a terrifying symbol for how Ukraine has been developing in the east, in the past few months or so.

Wolf.

BLITZER: I know one of the rebel leaders, Nick, says he wants to have a 100,000-man army ready to fight. You've spoken to experts there on all sides. How realistic is that goal?

WALSH: Well, I think it's hyperbole, really. I mean it's about the separatists trying to sound more confidence. They have a significant momentum now in their military moves. NATO and the western Ukraine would say that's because they've got a lot of the Russian army, actually, fighting within their ranks, with Russian military firepower and Russian state provided artillery too.

But this 100,000 figure will be tough, I think, for them to resource that from military aged males within the population of Donetsk now. It's been hollowed out by the violence. That city of only a million strong is very, very few in number at this stage and those behind are being hit at times by random, it seems, artillery strikes that land often in civilian areas, like we saw on Friday.

But Alexander Zakharchenko (ph), the separatist leader, is increasingly angry and aggressive in his rhetoric. They have turned their back on peace talks, blaming the Ukrainians for not sending adequately resourced people to be able to talk to them in Minsk (ph) in the past 72 hours. But since those peace talks fell to pieces, the real concern is that the violence has escalated. One key village being encircled (ph). We went there ourselves. It's called Bevalskava (ph). Artillery landing the whole time. People sheltering underground. The building they were in, just hit by shelling on Sunday. People fleeing constantly out of fear that town could be surrounded.

And the braid - the broader ambition of those separatists now, they're telling me, is to move across the entire Donetsk region, claim significant amounts of territory. The fear is, where does it actually stop?

Wolf.

BLITZER: All right, be careful over there, Nick Paton Walsh. We'll check back with you. I know we're going to have much more coming up later in "The Situation Room" as well. Nick Paton Walsh on the scene for us in Ukraine.

Still ahead, we'll get into American politics. The more controversial comments on same-sex marriage, they're raising some questions about what the former Arkansas governor, Mike Huckabee's strategy has been. Is he going to run for president? Is he trying to sell books? What's going on? The full discussion, coming up.

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BLITZER: So welcome back to our viewers in the United States and around the world. I'm Wolf Blitzer reporting from Washington.

Let's get to politics here in the United States. Right now we're just under a year away from the Iowa caucuses. That would be February 1, 2016. And if they were held today, the Wisconsin governor, look at this a brand-new poll show, the Wisconsin governor, Scott Walker, would likely be the winner in the latest Iowa poll. Without Mitt Romney in the contest, Governor Walker tops the list at 16 percent, Senator Rand Paul is at second with 15 percent, Mike Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor, is at 13 percent in third place.

Over the weekend, Huckabee, who is also a former Fox News host, stirred up emotions with a statement when he was asked about same-sex marriage. He was on CNN with our own Dana Bash on "State of the Union" and he referred to it as a lifestyle. He also made these comparisons.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MIKE HUCKABEE, FORMER ARKANSAS GOVERNOR: People can be my friends who have lifestyles that are not necessarily my lifestyles. I don't shut people out of my circle or out of my life because they have a different point of view. I don't drink alcohol, but, gosh, a lot of my friends, maybe most of them, do. You know, I don't use profanity, but, believe me, I've got a lot of friends who do. Some people really like classical music and ballet and opera, it's not my cup of tea. I'd like to think that there's room in American for people who have different points of view without screaming and shouting and wanting to shut their businesses down.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: All right, let's bring in our CNN political commentator, the Republican strategist Ana Navarro, and our chief political analyst, Gloria Borger.

He won the Iowa caucuses back in 2008.

GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: He did.

BLITZER: He's obviously got a strong following. What's his strategy now?

BORGER: Well, there's a - there's a short-term strategy, which is to try and win the Iowa caucuses again. And when you -- when you look at polls that have been taken in Iowa recently, 37 percent of people said that he reflected their values. That's a short-term strategy for him in Iowa.