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Ferguson Prepares for Grand Jury Results; Obama, Imperial President Say Republicans; Buffalo Snowstorm Deaths Climb; Jim Kelly Talks Buffalo Snow; Is College Education Worth it?

Aired November 20, 2014 - 13:30   ET

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


WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Let's go to Ferguson right now. Stephanie Elam is on the ground for us.

Stephanie, the indications are the grand jury will reach a decision as early as tomorrow, but there won't be any announcement for 48 hours, right?

STEPHANIE ELAM, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Right. That's what we're expecting. What we are expecting, Wolf, is that law enforcement and schools in the area will get the head's up, at least 48 hours in advance, so that they can take measures to protect children, to protect neighborhoods, to protect critical buildings, all of that being part of the plan is what we're understanding, which means that if they do make a decision tomorrow, then we would likely hear about it no earlier than Sunday.

Obviously, what plays a part into this is how the weather is going to behave. It's supposed to be pouring rain on Sunday. I've been here before when it's poured. The protesters do not care. They've been out in the rain no matter what the elements are.

Also, Wolf, I can tell you the people I've spoken to, the demonstrators, telling me they do not believe that Darren Wilson will be indicted. And they're saying that, no matter what happens, they're going to be out there. Even if he were indicted, they plan to be out there beyond when this ruling is made.

I can tell you if you go around to parts of Clayton, the county seat where these proceedings are happening, when you're there, the people of Clayton are fed up with a lot of the protests that have been there. I've heard people yelling from their cars, tiffs with people.

So in general, there's fatigue about this story here and there's a sense that people would like to move on, no matter what the decision is. As far as the protesters are concerned, they're not going anywhere.

BLITZER: I understand, Stephanie, that five protesters were arrested outside a police station there last night. What's the overall mood in the community?

ELAM: It's funny. It's sort of a tale of two different Fergusons, because you've had the protesters who are here, five people that were arrested, for blocking the street, for protesting and blocking traffic here on the street, that's actually right here behind us, so that happens but it's not every night that is happening anymore.

When you talk to people in the community, I've tried to get a lot of people to go on camera they will talk to me on the phone but they will not go on camera. They're very afraid of being retaliated against for whatever they'll say about the protesters. This is from people who are black and white. Not just white people here saying that. And they're afraid of being retaliated by protesters.

Another point, too, that I have to point out, that the protesters, the demonstrators are not all black either. It's a diverse group of people you see out there every day.

BLITZER: Stephanie Elam, we'll stay in close touch with you. She's there for us in Ferguson, Missouri.

Please be sure to tune in later tonight when Erin Burnett, "OutFront," speaks with the Ferguson police chief about the pending grand jury decision, the unease in his city. 7:00 p.m. eastern right here on CNN.

Meanwhile, a defiant President Obama ready to go up against Republicans on immigration reform. They say he's acting more like an emperor than a president. We're going to discuss what's at stake for both sides.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN.

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

"The imperial president, the autocratic leader," that's how some Republicans are describing President Obama. They're furious over his plans to issue an executive order tonight on immigration reform. The president outlines the plans in a prime-time speech later tonight, 8:00 p.m. eastern. CNN will have live coverage.

Our chief congressional correspondent, Dana Bash; and our chief political analyst, Gloria Borger, both chiefs with us today.

(LAUGHTER)

Gloria, what's behind the timing of the president's decision?

GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: I think the president put himself in his own situation. He had an opportunity early on in his presidency, the first two years when he had Democratic control of Congress, could have done some kind of immigration reform, did not do it, now he's got the Democratic base and Latinos saying to him, this is your opportunity, you have to do something now. It's obviously something he would have rather done through legislation. The Senate passed a bill and the House did not act on it. You put that together and this is a moment he believes in which he can use his executive discretion and do what he's going to do tonight.

BLITZER: The question I asked Congressman Mario Diaz-Balart, I think it's a fair question, if I say so myself --

(LAUGHTER)

-- why didn't the House act on it? They don't have to pass what the Senate passed. Come up with their own version. That happens all the time. Then, they go to a joint house/Senate conference committee. The House appointments some conferees. The Senate appoints some conferees. They go into a room, spend a few days, weeks, whatever, and they come up with something both sides can agree with. And then they go back to the floor of the Senate, they go back to the floor of the House, and they pass something.

BORGER: How a bill becomes a law.

BLITZER: And then send it to the president. Why didn't the speaker of the House even allow that kind of action to go forward?

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: 2014 election. He had promised. I've been in meetings with him and briefings with him, in public and private, leading up to 2014, he said he wanted to do it, he planned to do it, and then he just got so much push back, even from pro-immigration reform Republicans. Meaning, Republicans who wanted to go as far as to pass the citizenship, saying let's not rock the Republican vote before the election. And what happened? They actually grew the majority in the election.

The plan was, to get through November, this past election, and then to say, you know what, guys -- I'm the speaker speaking to the Republican rank and file now -- we have a presidential coming up, we can't, you know, push this under the rug again. We have to deal with this. That was his plan. But the White House simply didn't believe it. Who can blame them? They did not believe that even with, maybe even especially with this expanded Republican majority in the House and Senate, that the speaker was going to be able to convince enough Republicans to go along with anything, even a watered-down version, so that's why the White House set this.

BLITZER: It's not too late. They can do it in the new House of Representatives.

BORGER: Right, they can, but there's not --

BLITZER: They could do what the legislative process. I don't know, in the aftermath of what the president is doing tonight --

(CROSSTALK)

BLITZER: But they could come up with language the Senate could come up with language, jointly meet and come up --

(CROSSTALK)

BORGER: But they're not talking about the broad legislation that president really wants. They're talking about work visas, you know, more border security, but they're not talking about what happens --

(CROSSTALK)

BLITZER: It might not go as far as what the president wants but they could come up with something the president could sign into law.

BORGER: And let me say this, they need to come up with something. If you want to win a presidential election -- George W. Bush, had 44 percent of Hispanics voting for him. Mitt Romney had 23 percent of Hispanics voting for him. You cannot win a presidential election if you alienate an entire Hispanic community in this country, in states like Florida, Colorado, Nevada. All key battleground states.

BLITZER: Listen to this, Dana. I want to play a little clip, Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, quoting the roman philosopher, Cicero, on this issue. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. TED CRUZ, (R), TEXAS: When, President Obama, do you mean to cease abusing our patience? How long is that madness of yours still to mock us? When is there to be an end to that unbridled audacity of yours, swaggering about as it does now?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: That's a little far cry from "Green Eggs and Ham" as he recited involving the filibuster. But his point is what?

BASH: Remember back in 65 B.C., Wolf, the Catiline conspiracy.

BORGER: We all do.

BASH: Right. You covered that, right? I say that with love.

But look, he's trying to make the point that this has been an issue that goes back to the beginning and the birth of democracy, that you an emperor at that point, who was taking it too far and at that point the roman Senate was saying we want to reel you back in and there are parallels between that time 2200 years ago and now. He's trying to do it with lofty rhetoric but it goes back to the core of the problem that Republicans and the White House have and they are going to continue to have, which is a trust deficit. I mean, this really is the fundamental problem in that the president doesn't trust the Republicans, as we were talking about, will go at all far enough to do any kind of legislative immigration reform, which is why he's saying I'm just going to do what I can do, but Republicans, at the same time, are saying, you know what, we know that you're asking us to do this legislation but, at this point, you've angered us so much we're not going to do it.

BORGER: This doesn't go back to Cicero, with all due respect to Ted Cruz. It goes back to focus groups and polling that they took during the midterm elections in which the notion of an imperial presidency was either at the top of the list with Republican voters or number two. It ranked above Obamacare because they were making the point that the president, with the phone and the pen or whatever he was talking about, was overreaching. And this notion of executive overreach is very important for Republicans as they head into a 2016 election. He's making the case, as did Cicero, that the arrogance of this president causes him to overreach. And he's, you know, preaching to the choir right there. I mean look, people have already decided how they feel about immigration reform. And what you see in this country, by the way, is that most people support the president in what he's trying to do to get some kind of answers to this.

BASH: But now how he's going about it.

BORGER: But they don't like the process. They don't like the process. That's what Ted Cruz is talking about. The public with him on the process.

BLITZER: Guys, you will be here throughout the night covering all of this. We'll be covering all of this.

This note to our viewers, CNN will bring you live coverage tonight as President Obama unveils executive action on this major issue that's divided the nation. Our coverage of the prime-time presidential address to the nation begins 8:00 p.m. eastern later tonight.

An NFL Hall of Famer is one of the many Buffalo, New York, residents caught in a monster snowstorm. The former Buffalo Bills quarterback, Jim Kelly, he updated us on what was going on yesterday. He's coming back today, momentarily, with a new update. We'll speak with Jim Kelly in just a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: The death toll from a snowstorm in the Buffalo area has climbed higher. Authorities say eight people have died in the storm from heart attacks shoveling snow. Before the storm is over, which is likely some time tomorrow, parts of the city and suburbs could be buried under seven feet, more than two meters of snow.

Brian Todd is on the scene for us.

You've got more breaking news over there. What are you seeing, Brian?

BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, we have an active evacuation scene. This is the Garden Gate Nursing Home in Cheektowaga, outside Buffalo. They had to evacuate about 180 residents from the nursing home because they're concerned that the roof may collapse. I talked to one of the fire chiefs a moment ago. He told me that they are concerned that the roof could collapse because residents in the -- one of the dining halls noticed cracking in the walls, bowing of the roofs, and other possible compromises to the building. And then they brought in building inspectors who noticed the same things and decided they better get them out. You can see some heavy snow building up on the roof over there. They've already evacuated probably about, I would say, three ambulances full of elderly people and they brought in a bus to evacuate. There are no injuries, but this is the kind of situation you're facing all over the Buffalo area. Roofs are collapsing in this area throughout the region. And in a nursing home like this one, they've got to be safe, get these people out, fairly quickly -- Wolf? BLITZER: They're expecting a lot more snow in the coming hours.

Brian, we'll stay in touch with you.

The snow is certainly trapping many people in their homes, including one of Buffalo's most famous residents, Jim Kelly, the legendary Hall of Fame quarterback with the Buffalo Bills. We spoke with Jim yesterday. He's joining us once again on the phone.

Are you very far away from Cheektowaga? Where are you, Jim?

JIM KELLY, FORMER BUFFALO BILLS QUARTERBACK & BUFFALO, NEW YORK RESIDENT (voice-over): I am in Orchard Park, about five minutes from the stadium. And yes, I am right in the Snow Belt. So whenever you see the heavy bands and the six, seven, eight feet of snow, I have it right in my backyard.

BLITZER: Yeah. It's pretty -- yesterday you were giving us a gloomy picture. How does it look today? Has it changed much?

KELLY: Well, my driveway, to be honest with you, Mario Williams and David Kurtz, two of my buddies, plowed yesterday thinking it would help out, which it did, and last night, we got two feet of snow. And looking out my window, it is just as high as it was two days ago. We're in for probably another foot and a half of snow, from what I hear, until it slows down about 6:00, 7:00 tonight.

BLITZER: Have you been able to get out at all?

KELLY: Just on foot. I mean, being able to go out and, of course, try to get snow off of parts of like gazebos and some of my trees, bushes that are -- really you don't want them to snap in half and break. You try to get as much snow off as possible and trying to get a little exercise.

I'm blessed. I have my wife, who does her exercise outside, and my brother, Ray, who does a good job of doing a lot of things that I can't do, so -- but we're still -- we're having fun. We get back in, but there's a lot of other people out there not having fun in this. If you have kids, they get to go out and enjoy the snow, but don't let them out there too long.

BLITZER: A lot of us are worried about -- we saw Brian Todd's report of the nursing home in Cheektowaga, that they were fearful that the roof could collapse because all of the snow is on the roof. I assume you have a ton of snow on your roof at your house as well, right?

KELLY: Oh, yeah. I think everybody in the area where I am, you know, Lancaster, Lackawanna, East Aurora, all the areas that usually get hit with the heavy snow from the lake-effect snow, are used to having maybe two or three feet on the roofs, but not six, seven, eight feet. There's a lot of -- I worry about the people in the low-lying areas that are close to creeks, where once it does start to melt, those creeks will rise and a lot of flooding will start happening. So we might be going through a period of time with the snow right now, which is bad, but I think in two days, three days from now, it will be worse than we've had.

BLITZER: I take it that Sunday's game, the Buffalo Bills are supposed to host against the New York Jets, that's not going to happen in, right?

KELLY: No way. If it does, no fans in the stadium, because there's five, six feet of snow in each seat. And for them to remove it, what I understand it takes, for every foot of snow, it takes three days. They are in for a lot of work and a lot of people trying to shovel a lot of snow out of there. I don't see how they can play a game on Sunday in Buffalo, New York.

BLITZER: Please pass along, Jim, our best wishes to our fellow Buffaloians. They are going through a rough period. But we're with them and we'll continue the report this story.

Good luck to you, Jim, your family, and the entire Buffalo area community.

Thanks so much for joining us.

KELLY: Wolf, real quick, you know, if you look at my wife's tweet, she retweeted something of an article, pretty cool, a little tweet about what Buffalo is all about. So if anybody out there wants to see what Buffalo people are all about and just look -- I read it and it really hit me at home, Wolf. So -- (CROSSTALK)

BLITZER: What is the name of the Twitter account again?

KELLY: It's hjkforever. And it got --

BLITZER: Hjkforever. We'll take a look at it and read it, for sure.

And if you want to follow Jim Kelly, follow him at, @Jimkellyinc.

And we'll stay with you.

Jim Kelly, one of my heroes, led the Buffalo Bills to four Super Bowls in a row.

Still to come, college cost and student debt are soaring while opportunities for college graduates are limited. A new CNN film explores this important question, is college worth the cost?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: Tonight, 9:00 p.m., CNN explores the issue in a one hour special called "Ivory Tower," is college still worth the cost. Here's a preview.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Some universities are starting to look like resorts, with pricey amenities like spas, rock walls and swimming pools, and they're passing along the bill to students. Tuition expenses have risen more than 1,200 percent since 1978.

But Blackburn College in Illinois is keeping tuition costs low thanks to a little thrift.

(on camera): Life in college is expanding with a $2.5 million renovation project. But a novel way to pay for it, student work crews.

You can see where students, for years, have been literally laying the bricks.

HEATHER BIGARD, VICE PRESIDENT, FINANCIAL AND ADMINISTRATION, BLACKBURN COLLEGE: Laying the bricks.

We do maintain a pretty lean organizational staff structure and that's done with the expectation that we do use students to supplement those labor needs.

ROMANS: And it's not just construction jobs. 90 percent of the student body work 10 hours per week on campus in everything from gardening to security to administrative positions. In exchange, they get tuition credit.

(on camera): What do you say to parents who say, oh, I don't want my student to go to school to work? I don't want them to be distracted. I want them to go to spend four years to learn.

BIGARD: We do have that. We do have parents that question that piece of it. What we explain to them is this is an enhancement to their overall portfolio that will make them more marketable upon graduation.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: Don't miss "Ivory Tower," tonight, 9:00 p.m. eastern, only here on CNN.

That's it for me. Thanks for watching.

For our international viewers, "Amanpour" is coming up next.

For our viewers in North America, "Newsroom" starts next right after a quick break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)