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@THISHOUR WITH BERMAN AND MICHAELA

Undocumented Pulitzer Prize Winner Detained; Undocumented Immigrants Being Returned to Honduras; Did NFL Team Doctors Give Painkillers to Players Illegally; iPads Causing Rashes?

Aired July 15, 2014 - 11:30   ET

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


MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR: Alina Machado joins us with more details.

Alina, what do we know about this? Why exactly was he detained?

ALINA MACHADO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Michaela, we know he was detained because he simply does not have the proper documents to get through airport security. We know that he was using his Filipino passport. And at border facilities, at border towns like McAllen, the airports work kind of differently. You have a TSA agent usually at the TSA security checkpoint, and next to it, you usually have some sort of border agent who can ask you, are you a U.S. citizen, and if not, he can also look at your documents. So that's probably where things went south for him.

This morning, I want to show you a tweet that he sent out. He said, "About to go through security at McAllen Airport. I don't know what is going to happen" -- Michaela, John?

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: It's interesting. We had Jose on this show. We asked him, are you afraid of being so public. You've been going around the country saying you are undocumented. You talked to him about flying out of this very airport.

MACHADO: We were in McAllen all of last week and we noticed the strong law enforcement presence. We kept talking about it. You couldn't go anywhere without seeing a Border Patrol agent. And that's exactly what he noticed when he was there. He mentioned to my producer that he had to ask a Border Patrol agent for directions to get to where we were, and he was starting to get a little nervous. He definitely felt like he may have finally reached a point where it may be difficult for him to get out of an area.

I want you to listen to what he told us over the weekend.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOSE ANTONIO VARGAS, UNDOCUMENTED PULITZER-PRIZE WINNING JOURNALIST: I'm stuck here like, I got here on Thursday. We actually got here to document what is happening with the refugees, from the Central American refugees, these young children at one of the shelters here in McAllen. And because I don't have pieces -- I don't have any I.D. besides my Filipino passport, it's going to be hard for me to get out of here at some point when I decide to get out of here in the next couple of days.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MACHADO: You could see that he was already having those concerns last week, as soon as he got to McAllen.

PEREIRA: Alina, a skeptic might say, we know he's an immigration activist, was he trying to make a point, or were border authorities trying to make a point out of him?

MACHADO: You know, it's tough to say at this point what border authorities were doing other than they were doing their job. This is the way of life in these border towns. There's a very strong Border Patrol presence because they are looking for people who aren't supposed to be here. That's their mentality. That's the way things work down there. He has traveled all over the country, trying to raise awareness about this issue. Like he said, he's been out telling people that he's undocumented for two years, but somehow things have taken a different turn here because he has not been detained up until this point.

BERMAN: Alina Machado, thanks very much. Thanks again for all your terrific reporting at the border. Just terrific stuff from there over the last week or so.

PEREIRA: @THISHOUR, deportation under way for undocumented parents and children.

BERMAN: They are arriving back at Honduras, the country with the highest murder rate in the world. One thing is for certain, there will be thousands more people following it their footsteps.

Our Rosa Flores is in San Pedro, and she spoke with some people who are back from their long and dangerous journey to the United States.

ROSE FLORES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: John, Michaela, it's been a tough month for the women and children who have been deported from the United States to Honduras. A lot of them leaving San Pedro, the city dubbed the murder capital of the world. They hopped on trains. They traveled by foot to get to the United States, only to be sent right back.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

FLORES: We're at the migrant center here in Honduras. This is where all deportees arrive that arrive by plane. The center that you see is right next to the airport. So what happens is these deportees are loaded on to buses.

So we're here with the first lady of Honduras.

A lot of politicians say the solution is for all of the kids, all the families be returned to Honduras. Is that the solution? (SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE).

UNIDENTIFIED FIRST LADY OF HONDURAS: (SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE) FLORES: What she's saying is there is no simple solution. There is no simple answer. That it has to be a collaboration between the U.S. and all of the Central American countries to solve this issue. That it's not going to be solved overnight.

We've been standing by this barricade for about an hour and a half, and the flow of people has been interesting because only pastors have been allowed in, psychologists have been allowed in. We've only seen three women come out of this building. And one clue that we had that perhaps one of these women was a deportee was because her shoes didn't have shoelaces. And we've heard that story before, that immigration authorities in the United States remove those shoelaces. I talked to her briefly. She didn't want to talk to us on camera but she did say that she was ready to take a shower, to get home, and put this behind her.

The processing of these 18 families took hours. The barricades that you see behind me, they never came down. We never got access to the actual processing center until we actually saw the kids walk out with their mothers, get on this bus. Now the kids received balloons and other goodies, got on this bus, and now they are headed back into the communities that they left in the first place, those very same communities that we keep on hearing are filled with poverty and violence.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FLORES: Now we caught up with the woman and her daughter who were on that bus and the woman's eyes were swollen, the six-year-old girl told us that they slept in the forest. They saw monkeys and snakes. It was a scary experience. Surprisingly, a lot of the people that go through that voyage say that they will try again -- John, Michaela?

PEREIRA: Rosa Flores, we appreciate it so much.

We appreciate all of our team getting out there on the ground to see what the reality is for all of these people.

Coming up, no end is in sight. Why the swell of undocumented immigrants will continue. We'll take a look at that ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: U.S. officials predict another 30,000 migrants from Central America will arrive by October. That's in addition to almost 60,000 who have already made this journey.

PEREIRA: The president has requested $3.7 billion as soon as possible to deal with what is being called a humanitarian crisis. Two Texas lawmakers have come up with a bill but, so far, crickets from Congress. A long break for them, just 12 working days away.

CNN commentator, Ruben, is here with us.

I want to talk about what needs to be done and if there's an end to it. But first, can we talk about our developing news here. Immigration activist, Jose Antonio Vargas, has been detained.

RUBEN NAVARRETTE, CNN COMMENTATOR: I am surprised. I think my friend, Jose Antonio Vargas, was very surprised. I was coming to New York to do these spots for CNN. I contracted him before that, let's get together and have dinner while I'm in town. Then I find out he was in McAllen. He was surprised he was detained. He may have had a sense this was coming in the last couple of days or so. But this was someone who has traveled for the last three years to 200 different cities and all over the country. I think he sees himself as I am immune to this provision because the same passport that they say right now is not adequate to get him on an airport in McAllen has been adequate 200 other times over three years. Something smells funny about this story. I think they know exactly who he is and they are trying to make a point. I don't think it's Jose Antonio Vargas. That's making a point. I think it's the Border Patrol that is making a point.

BERMAN: It will be interesting to see what happens the rest of the day, if it continues beyond today or tomorrow.

Now let's talk about the broader issue right now. You've written a really interesting op-ed on CNN.com. Everyone take a look at it. You talk about the idea that we're all looking for an end point in this immigration crisis here, this border crisis here.

NAVARRETTE: right.

BERMAN: But there is no endpoint.

NAVARRETTE: Right. When a pipe breaks in my house, I call a plumber. I want to know how long is it going to take to fix it, and how much will it cost me. So give me numbers, estimates, a ball-park figure. The problem with this story -- you saw it earlier on the well-done story from Honduras -- you deport people, they are going to come right back. We have a revolving door on the border. As we send -- as we 40 down, 60 more will come up. There is no endpoint. This is going to be going on for a long, long time. The story that concerns me is not so much in Honduras, who is in the U.S., but who is in between? How many folks are in Mexico, having left Honduras, waiting to across into the U.S.? I have sources telling me it could be in the hundreds of thousands.

PEREIRA: And you say we can't fault Mexico because they can't keep up with it because we can't either.

NAVARRETTE: Yeah. We spent $38 billion, the U.S. on Homeland Security ever year. About 13 goes to the Border Patrol. I could imagine, in Mexico, they spend millions not billions. If those kids cut through our border security so easily, you know they cruise right through Mexico. Mexico has no chance to stopping these kids.

BERMAN: When you say there's no end point, when you talk about the need to address the big picture, the fact of the matter is, there will not be a comprehensive immigration reform this year. It is not just going to happen.

NAVARRETTE: Right.

BERMAN: So we need to start talking about what will happen or might happen. Is the $3.7 billion request from the president, is that a step in the right direction? Are the proposals being discussed right now about changing the 2008 law? Are these steps in the right direction? Because you have to take small steps instead of the big steps we won't take.

NAVARRETTE: I think half and half. I think the $3.7 billion is a step in the right direction. We should be wary of the president's attempted to do away with the 2008 law. He's gained some support from members of Congress on that. He wants to be able to do away with due process for undocumented, young, unaccompanied minors to get rid of them as fast as possible. This being an election here, the minors came at the wrong time. It's not a good time for us. For politicians, it's not a good time, because neither political party wants to face this come November, so there's a tendency to expedite the removal. That's very dangerous.

PEREIRA: Using the plumbing metaphor, if you have a leak, you are looking where the source of that water came from. We look to the source of where this is coming from, how much is being done on an international effort to look at the source?

NAVARRETTE: None. Virtually none. We're dealing with trying to plug the leak here but you haven't dealt with the conditions in Central America. We have to come to grips with something horrible that happened yesterday. We sent 40 women and children back to a situation where some may meet certain death. The fact that this happened in this country -- maybe it had to happen, but not so quickly. It was only six weeks ago that the president declared a humanitarian crisis. This worked way too fast. We need to slow down.

BERMAN: There are other people who say that things need to be sped up --

NAVARRETTE: Sped up.

(LAUGHTER)

BERMAN: -- and why there is a discussion right now, and why you all need to go check out Reuben's full article on CNN.com. And tell us what you think makes it worth the read.

PEREIRA: Thanks, Ruben.

NAVARRETTE: Thank you.

BERMAN: Ahead for us @THISHOUR, the use of painkillers in the NFL under investigation. Were players given drugs illegally to help them on the field?

PEREIRA: Your electronic could be the source and cause of that unexplained and embarrassing skin rash. BERMAN: Oh, that's what it is?

PEREIRA: We'll look at it. We actually won't.

(LAUGHTER)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: So did NFL team doctors give players painkillers illegally to keep them on the field? That's what the Drug Enforcement Administration apparently now wants to know.

PEREIRA: Yeah, the DEA's investigating alleged abuse of prescription painkiller and other drugs in the league. In May, you might recall a group of retired players filed suit against the NFL, accusing it of administering the drugs illegally to keep them playing.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JEREMY NEWBERRY, FORMER NFL PLAYER: A lot of times, the team trainers are giving out drugs. None of them got a medical degree. Some of them aren't even licensed. They're handing out drugs. They're handing out anti-inflammatories. They're handing out sleeping pills. They're handing out this stuff altogether. And then, you know, a lot of times you're on a team playing, and then you're washing it down with beer.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PEREIRA: Washing it down with beer.

The DEA's trying to track down how NFL doctors and trainers get access to those powerful narcotics.

BERMAN: More than 700 players have joined the suit against the NFL.

Joining us is CNN commentator and ESPN senior writer, L.Z. Granderson, back from Wimbledon.

I saw you there.

(LAUGHTER)

L.Z., let's talk about this.

(CROSSTALK)

BERMAN: We were talking about football and concussions for a while, now we're talking about football and painkillers in the locker room. How big a deal do you think this is?

L.Z. GRANDERSON, CNN COMMENTATOR: Well, it was a much bigger deal back in the 70s, '80s, early '90s. That's because of the raised awareness of players, raised awareness of the public, and also a raised sense of responsibility and not equating getting back on the field and shaking off a concussion with being a man. All those things are changed in terms of the NFL we look at today.

But the lawsuit represents the players of the past. There are a lot of questions to be answered right there in terms of who knew what, who gave what. And I think that this deserves the attention it's getting right now.

PEREIRA: Talk about that shared responsibility. Pressure to play, right, pressure to play from the coaches and the management.

GRANDERSON: Right.

PEREIRA: But as also as you talk about, you want to be a man, there's a financial incentive. Don't make me say it. What is it, can't make the club from the tub, whatever the saying is.

(LAUGHTER)

There's shared responsibility there.

GRANDERSON: It is. To me, it all begins with one basic fact of the NFL. And that is, the player contracts are not guaranteed.

(CROSSTALK)

GRANDERSON: You can see the big numbers and headlines, $120 million for this player, $70 million for this player. The truth of the matter is, any point the team can cut them without compensating that full amount of the contract. It's pretty useless actually. As long as that exists, you'll always have this pressure for players to get back on the field when they're not ready. You have this pressure on doctors to prescribe medications that maybe players don't necessarily need to be taking. Maybe they need rest instead of painkillers. But because the pressure to have those players on the field, and because contracts aren't guaranteed, and because of the pressure on the doctors to get those players on the field, you're not going to what's in the best interest of those players actually played out. Until the NFL addresses their contract situation, we will always have this conversation going.

BERMAN: That doesn't seem likely to change any time soon. But L.Z.'s right. You can get cut in the NFL and you don't get paid. If you're hurt and you're not playing, this can happen to you.

You know, you say, L.Z., this was a thing of the past. Is the union involved right now, looking forward? Is this something they want to deal with heavily?

GRANDERSON: It depends on what they think the end game is going to be. I've always wondered why -- you said the contracts with would never -- there's no chance the contracts would be guaranteed. I always wondered why the players never pushed harder to get those guaranteed contracts. I know there's an element of the challenge of fighting every single day for your roster spot. I get that sort of innate desire to want to prove yourself on a daily, if not a yearly, basis. But you're also not protected. As long as you're not protected, you're just setting yourself up for these types of lawsuits brought by the franchise, either consciously or subconsciously, and it's just not a good situation. So the players of the past, the McMahons, whose name's listed on the contract, they're famous, they're rich, but they're also victims. It's very hard to see them as victims but because of the situation of the contracts, they are.

PEREIRA: It's so true.

L.Z. Granderson, we love when you're here. Will you come visit us soon please?

GRANDERSON: I would love to come visit you.

(LAUGHTER)

BERMAN: All right.

Ahead for us --

(CROSSTALK)

PEREIRA: You can join, too.

BERMAN: Thank you. I appreciate it.

(LAUGHTER)

Ahead for us, we're going to change subjects here. We're going to talk about that bad rash. You know the one I'm talking about. Well, now there is an issue and maybe it was your iPad.

PEREIRA: No.

BERMAN: Yes. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: Nothing like a rash to go with your iPad.

PEREIRA: You're trying to tell me a little something here?

Apparently, some iPads contain nickel and that is one of the most common allergy causing metals. According to recent medical journal reports, doctors traced an iPad as the cause of a rash in an 11-year- old boy in San Diego.

Let's bring in our medical correspondent, Elizabeth Cohen.

How wide spread of a problem is this? Should I be nervous about the iPad in front of me?

(LAUGHTER)

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Michaela, if I were you, I'd only be nervous is you noticed you had a rash on your hands, or you have a rash here, you might be concerned about your cell phone. Apple says, look, this is so incredibly unusual and they put out this statement. They say" We've found that allergies like the ones reported in this case are

extremely rare. Apple products are made from the highest quality materials and meet the same strict standards set for jewelry by both the U.S. Consumer Safety Product Commission and their counterparts in Europe."

Now, I want to say, no one's accusing them of having substandard products. It's just some people are allergic to nickel.

BERMAN: When I heard some people's iPads were giving them rashes, there were a million things I thought of.

PEREIRA: Probably not appropriate.

BERMAN: Before nickel because of places people take their iPads and all that.

COHEN: Thank you, John, for that image. I appreciate it.

PEREIRA: Yeah.

BERMAN: But are there other devices that use this nickel besides the iPad?

COHEN: There are, there have been various studies that have looked at nickel in other products. This isn't really about Apple. This is if you find you have a rash on your hands or part of your face or other weird places you might use your personal devices, then you should go to your doctor and say, could this be nickel. There's plenty -- there's over the counter, hydrocortisone stuff that would help. So this is not really a big deal. You just need to be aware.

PEREIRA: And the case would protect you, right?

COHEN: Yes, great idea. Yeah, a case would do it.

BERMAN: OK. So I'm going to go back to my 12-year-old question here.

(CROSSTALK)

BERMAN: You guys don't go into the men's room and you don't see people talking on their cell phones --

PEREIRA: There's a reason we don't go in men's rooms.

BERMAN: -- and using their devices when they're at the urinal. People do it all the time.

PEREIRA: John!

BERMAN: Forget the nickel for a second. These things have to be carrying germs like you wouldn't believe.

COHEN: Yes, if you don't want your hands after you go to the bathroom.

(LAUGHTER)

BERMAN: Well, you can't wash your iPhone. You wash your hands but you're using your iPhone.

(CROSSTALK)

COHEN: Be selective about who you give your iPhone to. If your friend has a terrible cold, don't give them your phone. Wipe it off if you need to. Yes, it can carry germs, absolutely. Keep it clean.

PEREIRA: Absolutely. A good rule of thumb for our show as well.

Elizabeth Cohen, we love when you join us. Thank you.

COHEN: Thank you so much.

BERMAN: Thank you. My apologies for putting you through that.

PEREIRA: You reverted to 12. You really did.

BERMAN: No. That's what people think.

PEREIRA: I can always tell.

BERMAN: People do, I'm telling you.

PEREIRA: People?

BERMAN: I'll take you on a tour. You come with me, I'll show you.

PEREIRA: Got to go.

Thanks for joining us @THISHOUR.

BERMAN: "LEGAL VIWE" with Deborah Feyerick Starts right now.

PEREIRA: You are eight kinds of wrong, you know that?