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Massive Blizzard to Hit Northeast; U.S. Closes Yemen Embassy; Drone Found on White House Grounds; 2016 GOP Hopefuls Gathered in Iowa; Interview with Gov. Rick Snyder

Aired January 26, 2015 - 11:00   ET

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


KATE BOLDUAN, CNN CO-ANCHOR: It's being called a life-threatening and historic blizzard, and it's bearing down on the northeast right now, Boston and New York bracing for up to three feet of snow along with freezing rain and, I think could be the worst part, hurricane-strength winds.

We're tracking this monster storm for you.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN CO-ANCHOR: A drone infiltrates the White House grounds, so how big a risk does this pose, and with all the new drone technology out there, what can the Secret Service do to keep the president safe?

BOLDUAN: New demands from the terror group ISIS after it appears they've killed one of the two Japanese hostages they've been holding and demanding ransom. What are they demanding now? That and much more is ahead.

BERMAN: Hello, everyone. I'm John Berman.

BOLDUAN: And I'm Kate Bolduan. I'm back. Be it good or be it bad, I come back bringing bad news of a very big storm.

BERMAN: It is awesome, A, but we would have preferred a better show- warming gift than this storm, because it is epic. This winter storm for the ages, it's coming and it's threatening to shutdown much of the East Coast.

Many people call it historic, massive, disruptive but the most important term being used right now is life threatening.

BOLDUAN: The storm is now expected -- listen to this -- to impact millions of people in one way or another. Blizzard and winter storm warnings are in effect from Maryland to Maine and in Canada. People in New York and Boston could see up to three feet of snow. You're going to hear us repeat that over and over again by the end of tomorrow. Freezing rain and wind gusts up to 65 miles an hour will add to the mix as well.

Forecasters say that the cities that are no stranger to nasty weather -- there are a lot of them -- they're likely -- they likely haven't seen anything like this yet.

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, he's going to speaking live next hour about the storm preparations.

BERMAN: We're going to hear from all of the tri-state governors over the next few hours, and the mayor, Bill de Blasio, here.

Right now, Rene Marsh is standing by for us at LaGuardia Airport to talk about the travel situation. Here's a hint. It's awful, thousands of flights already cancelled.

Alison Kosik is at the Office of Emergency Management in Brooklyn where New York's mayor, Bill de Blasio, will speak soon.

And our meteorologist Chad Myers is tracking this storm's every move, he is outside here at the Time Warner Center in Manhattan.

BOLDUAN: Let's get right to it. Let's get straight to Chad first. New York's mayor, Chad, he's telling folks not to underestimate what is headed their way. So, honestly, what do folks need to know?

CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Well, you know what? I just got the brand new models in just a minute ago. And one model says for New York City, two inches, not two feet, two inches. The other model I looked at said 27 inches. And, you know, I hate it when models don't agree to that extent.

How can it be such a dichotomous forecast here in the same models with the same type of start and completely different finish? Here's the problem. I think we're going to see some spots that have 36 inches of snow. I honestly do.

I don't believe we're going to see snow in big cities like ,that although it's a possibility. Sometimes I can shoot eight over par, and I think that's pretty good. My normal game is somewhere between 20 and 25 over par. So it just depends on what kind of a mood my golf clubs are in.

I think it depends on what kind of a mood mother nature gets in when the storm gets offshore. It's not even there yet. Even though we wind up with the biggest part of the storm for New York City is less than about 12 hours away, it still hasn't even begun to develop or deepen into this "snowicane," if you will, a big weather maker with rain across parts of the Cape Cod area and a lot of snow into Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont and also into New York City.

Guys?

BERMAN: Chad, what kind of winds are we talking here, and is that connected to the snowfall estimates as well? Because what I've been hearing overnight is, look, the snowfall range may be varied, but you can expect winds 30 to 50 miles an hour and that in and of itself is plenty dangerous.

MYERS: Right. You may be able to see the ground in some spots and right next to that you'll get a seven-foot drift. And they don't measure drifts. They don't measure the ground that's bare.

They actually measure from a platform that is kind of protected from the wind and then they take it every couple inches and they sweep it off. They say, OK, there's two inches. What's the next hour? Sweep it off. There's two more inches. Sweep it off. So it's never going to pile up.

The official number is probably going to be somewhere in the neighborhood of 15 to 20 inches here in the city, but nowhere will ever be 15. You're going to get zero or you're going to get seven feet when that wind is just howling 50 miles per hour.

BERMAN: Chad Myers for us outside here, keeping an eye on this forecast, which is hard to pin down.

Chad --

BOLDUAN: I think the wind will be the worst part about this.

BERMAN: It's bad, period. And, look, officials here say be careful. If you want to talk alarmist and maybe justifiably so, the New York mayor, Bill de Blasio, says that city residents should be prepared for something worse than they have ever seen. Do not underestimate it, he says.

Alison Kosik joins us live from Brooklyn where the mayor will give us a crucial news conference in a little bit. We're going to cover that live. In the meantime, Alison, lay out sort of the mega preparations that this city is making for this megastorm.

ALISON KOSIK, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: And you're right about that. Mayor Bill de Blasio is certainly not mincing words when saying this could be one of the biggest snowstorms to hit New York City.

Now he did come out yesterday at a press conference and give a few details about how the city is prepared, namely the roads. If you ever had to travel to New York City, live here, and know about it, you know that that's really the biggest part of what can really just freeze this city.

So he talked about clearing of the roads. And he says 2,400 sanitation workers will be on 12-hour shifts ready to tackle this snowstorm as it hits. He also said that salt spreaders have been prepping the roads for what is already coming. We are already outside seeing that appetizer kind of hitting the streets.

Also, Governor Cuomo has said, as we get to the evening commute, that is exactly when the storm is really supposed to rev up, and the reality is, the governor said, that some highways could be shut down and major transportation, public transportation, subways and buses, could be closed as well.

Those are the major things that we're seeing city officials talk about at this point.

BOLDUAN: All right. Alison, and all eyes are going to be on Mayor de Blasio and kind of the handling of this. He faced a lot of criticism last year in snow removal and the fact that schools weren't closed. New York City schools are open right now while some of the surrounding states, they're already closing schools, so we'll see exactly how this goes. And we'll continue to watch it.

Alison, thank you so much.

She's in one part of the story. Now let's talk about the other big part of the story, air travel. More than 4,000 flights have been canceled already, ahead of the storm. The major airlines, they're waiving the fee for rebooking. That's, I guess, the least that they can do for flights coming out of the northeast -- in and out of the northeast.

BERMAN: Rene Marsh is at LaGuardia Airport for us. And, Rene, you must be surrounded by joy this morning.

BOLDUAN: Or not.

RENE MARSH, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: You know what, earlier this morning, I was able to ask do you want good news or do you want bad news? But as hours go on, I really don't have a lot of good news to offer you, because the cancellations and the delays, they are just building up.

I mean, compared to earlier this morning, I'm seeing a lot more red and orange, and those are colors you do not want to see if you're flying out of airports like LaGuardia where I am. But, unfortunately, we're seeing that word canceled, canceled, canceled pop up on these boards here.

And you're seeing a lot of travelers, they're doing just this. They're all just walking by and stopping because they want to know one thing. Is my flight going to go? Is it delayed or is it not?

We know at this hour between today and tomorrow we're talking about 5,300 flights canceled. There are some lucky folks like those folks standing in the distance there. That's the TSA checkpoint. Those people are the lucky ones who are able to get out.

But, again, as I said, as the hours go on, there are fewer and fewer flights that are actually able to take off. We do know that American Airlines, just heard from them, they are planning on suspending all flights out of their New York hubs as well as airports in Philadelphia, as well as Boston.

We also heard from United Airlines. They are suspending all of their flights out of airports like Newark Airport. So now we're not just talking about the domestic problems; now we're getting into international travel problems as well.

BERMAN: Ugly. Just ugly.

BOLDUAN: And the ripple effects begin already.

BERMAN: Rene Marsh, thanks so much. Really appreciate it.

If you want to stay up to the minute on this storm, you can do so. Set the CNN.com homepage to show conditions where you are. That's CNN.com/weather. Do it. BOLDUAN: Do it. Stay on top of it. We're going to be staying very close to that story, of course, but also this.

The Republican race for the White House has shifted into another gear. Potential candidates play to the party faithful in Iowa. But notably absent, Mitt Romney, Jeb Bush. We're going to look at who has the early momentum and also what's the message?

BERMAN: But next, how on earth did a drone end up inside White House airspace? Crashing or landing on the White House grounds? Serious security questions. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BOLDUAN: Some breaking news to alert you to, we have new information coming that the U.S. embassy in Yemen is now, they've just announced, is closed to the public until further notice.

This obviously comes amid resignations of the government of the Yemeni, president, the prime minister, and the cabinet. And in a statement coming out from the U.S. embassy, it says "because of these ongoing security concerns, the U.S. embassy is unable to provide routine consular services and will have very limited ability to assist with emergency cases involving U.S. citizens."

That's just part of the statement coming out there. It's been closed until further notice. And as we already have been discussing, been discussing especially in the last week plus, is that they have been removing some embassy staff, and now we continue to see the domino effects of the really unstable situation in Yemen. We'll continue to follow that.

BERMAN: Look, I think the State Department will say technically speaking the embassy is not closed or shut down, but it's maybe a distinction without a difference. it's effectively not performing any duties for Americans in that country right now.

BOLDUAN: Essentially meaning it's closed.

BERMAN: That shows you how dangerous it is there.

All right, meanwhile, a new alarming headline from the White House this morning, a device described as a small drone was discovered on the White House grounds. The Secret Service removed that object at dawn.

BOLDUAN: President Obama and the first lady, they are of course -- they're both away, traveling in India. It's not clear if the president's daughters were at home at the time of the incident. We do believe they were in Washington, but where they were we're not entirely clear at this moment.

Former Secret Service agent Don Bongino is joining us to discuss this. I mean, Dan, Dan Bongino. Dan, it's really kind of amazing when you look at how many instances do we need to see and what do these instances mean? First, you have someone breaking into the White House, getting through the north doors into the East Room. Now you have a drone crashing on the lawn of the White House. Does this surprise you?

DANIEL BONGINO, FORMER SECRET SERVICE AGENT: It doesn't surprise me, sadly. It was only a matter of time. These drones present some very serious problems. Make no mistake, this is a very big deal. You have a device here that has commercial applications that can transport a weapon or a camera for surveillance. Now, you have that also in obviously cars, but cars have been blocked off in front of the White House, of course, on Pennsylvania Avenue and you have that, of course, with planes as well. But typically a plane would present a warning. There would be a hijacking or something. You don't have that with a drone. With a drone you have a very small device that could appear over the White House in a moment's notice carrying a weapon or camera and this is a very serious problem.

BERMAN: Dan, there was a small plane that landed on the White House lawn back in the '90s and, of course, we understand there were some precautions or measures taken after that to better protect the airspace and the grounds there. You're a former Secret Service agent, I don't want you to reveal any top secrets that are keeping the president and his family safe, but are there systems? Do they have anything that might be able to be on the lookout for drones or for things coming in via the air?

BONGINO: There's a pretty robust air security network around the White House. The problem with the drones, John, is even if you did, it's very difficult to discriminate a drone from a pigeon. With some of these devices getting so small that literally they are the size of insects -- some of these devices, in the future they may be smaller than that -- it's going to be aolmost impossible to have some kind of a mitigation mechanism to stop these things. That's on the surveillance side. Obviously, a mosquito-sized drone you'd have a tough time carrying an explosive with that, absence of some significant technological breakthrough. So the surveillance part worries me, as well. It's very difficult problem for them to solve. They'll have to attack it from the communication side.

BOLDUAN: Do you think there is an element of there's much ado about nothing? That this was just some device that someone was playing around with that landed on the lawn? Or do you think if it wasn't a threat this time around, this exposes a weakness?

BONGINO: Knowing the Secret Service like I do, they war game everything. As we used to say, we get paid to stay up late at night so the White House staff and the president don't have to --

BOLDUAN: Right, but there have been a lot of problems recently showing that maybe someone hasn't been staying up late enough at night.

BONGINO: Good point. I think they realize that. They realize this is not great for PR. But I can assure you, they are war gaming this right now and figuring out some mechanism to stop this from happening again. No one is going to take this lightly, if it's the Secret Service I remember, and I'm sure it is. BERMAN: Flat out, do you think there's a failure here or is this just

an example of where the technology is changing so fast that it's very difficult to keep up with it?

BONGINO: You know, it's tough because I love the Secret Service. Of course it's a failure. I think they would say that, as well. I don't think that you can look at this as any kind of success. A drone landed on the lawn. You bring up a good point. Was there a way to stop this that was even technologically available? You can't shoot it down. You're in Washington D.C. Where is the bullet going to go? There are no easy answers right here. I wish there were, but there aren't.

BOLDUAN: Some of the answers I'm wondering is are they going to be able to track down who was behind this? They have the drone, if you will, how are they going to investigate this? They say they are, of course. And what will the fallout be? Dan Bongino, it's great to see you. Thanks, Dan.

BERMAN: Coming up for us next. We may make some big news here with the potential endorsement in the race for president. We're going to ask the question --

BOLDUAN: Maybe, maybe.

BERMAN: Also, we'll talk about the Republicans who want to raise your taxes. The Republicans who want to raise your taxes and are proud of it. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BOLDUAN: Welcome back, everybody. A very busy day here at CNN. Millions of people from Maryland to Maine are getting ready for a winter blast that could make history, and we're not blowing this out of proportion. This is what the forecasters are also saying. The nor'easter getting ready to bear down on the east coast could bring more than two feet of snow and wind gusts near hurricane strength.

BERMAN: The National Weather Service is calling the storm "life- threatening" and "historic." Please pay attention. New York's mayor making pretty alarming comments about the storm, as well. Bill de Blasio told people not to underestimate the storm. He will speak to the media within the next hour about the city's preparations. We're also expecting to hear from New Jersey Governor Chris Christie. He'll talk about how New Jersey is preparing. New York's Governor Cuomo will speak over the next several hours. We'll cover all of these events for you right here on CNN.

BOLDUAN: Let's get to this. The race for 2016, it got a jump-start over the weekend as possible GOP hopefuls tried to win favor at a conservative gathering in Iowa.

BERMAN: All of the big names were there except the biggest. Mitt Romney and Jeb Bush, they were no-shows. But Chris Christie, Ted Cruz, Sarah Palin, they all made a splash, as did a fast-rising Midwestern governor, Wisconsin Scott Walker. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. SCOTT WALKER, (R ) WISCONSIN: I think that sends a powerful message to Republicans in Washington and around the country. If you're not afraid to go big and go bold, you can actually get results. And if you get the job done, the voters will actually stand up with you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: Joining us to discuss this and much more, another Republican governor with 2016 chatter surrounding him, that's for sure, Michigan Governor Rick Snyder. Governor, it's great to see you. Thanks for coming in.

GOV. RICK SNYDER, (R) MICHIGAN: Great to be with you today.

BOLDUAN: Thank you very much. We want to talk about the 2016 political landscape definitely in one second. But first, I want to ask you about today. About taxes. Republicans all over the country are running -- when they're running, they say we're not raising taxes. We heard that again even last night from John Boehner and Mitch McConnell, your Republican leaders in Congress, speaking to 60 Minutes. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SCOTT PELLEY, CBS: From the president's State of the Union address, let me ask you, dead or alive? Raise taxes on the wealthy.

REP. JOHN BOEHNER, (R) SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: Why would we want to raise taxes on people?

PELLEY: I'll take that as a dead.

BOEHNER: Dead. Real dead.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: I don't think you can get much more clear than that, Governor. But you are pushing for a tax increase in your state to increase the sales tax. Why?

SNYDER: It's not about person ship, but it's about good judgment and making things to help people. During the course of my term in office, we have done some major tax decreases. We got rid of the Michigan business tax, the job killing tax, the personal property tax. But there's a case with roads. We need to invest more in our infrastructure. We have crumbling infrastructure, we're a northern state, we've had a lot of rough weather. You are talking about weather issues on the show today in the northeast. Sometimes you need to make an investment. This is about a smart investment for public safety to actually create more jobs long-term and to make a better place to live.

BOLDUAN: Governor, when you know - And I know you're going to tell me you don't want to make an announcement about 2016 right now, but there's a lot of chatter about you potentially running for president in 2016. With that in mind, how do you make the pitch and what do you say to other Republicans, especially Republicans in Congress? Are they being too stubborn?

SNYDER: I would say, again, I don't make decisions based on 2016 at all. In fact, I don't believe in making decisions based on partisan politics. This is about what's best for the people of the state of Michigan and making good sound decisions, and so you really have to step back from politics --

BOLDUAN: John Boehner and Mitch McConnell will say that's not partisan politics either. They think it's smart governance on their part to not raise taxes.

SNYDER: Well, I've give you a good illustration. In terms of the big picture, Washington has gridlock and they have major issues. In the state of Michigan, the first year I was in office, we did the important things. We balanced our budget, we put in a plan to pay our long-term debt, and we did tax reform. Now that we have got those in place, Michigan's economy has been doing very well. We're down five percentage points and our unemployment rate over 300,000 private sector jobs. And at some point, you have to say what's the next series of issues? And in Michigan it's infrastructure. We have crumbling roads and bridges that we've underinvested in and we have to make them safer.

BERMAN: Governor, you said that the willingness to raise taxes, to do these things, is just good judgment. That's the words you used. So therefore, would a no new taxes pledge -- the kind that candidates sign every time they're running for office, particularly for president -- Are you saying a no new taxes pledge is bad judgment, is foolish?

SNYDER: I'm not going to use those words, but I've never signed a pledge and one of the reasons I haven't is is because you have changing circumstances, you have major issues you need to address. You need to be thoughtful about having your options open for the long- term. And this is, again, a fundamental public safety issue where we have crumbling bridges, we have concrete that was falling off them, potentially on cars, so we had to put a plywood. We had big potholes that people are having to avoid. These are important things that need to be resolved. And in fact, they can help save money. We pay over $100 more on average than Indiana does for vehicle repairs due to road conditions. If you think about it, that can be a huge offset to help our consumers be more successful.

BERMAN: Governor, in 2012, you endorsed Michigan-native Mitt Romney in his race for president. You endorsed him prior to the Michigan primary. He's considering running for president now. Are you prepared to endorse him again?

SNYDER: That would be premature. Again, we're still figuring out who is actually running. We haven't had formal announcements from people. I think you could see a long list of candidates. What I said in the past, and I do believe this, is the best answer is likely to come from the core of governors. Governors have the experience and background to be most successful at potentially taking on the role of president.

BERMAN: But the fact that you endorsed him once and not ready to do it again, does that indicate some kind of wariness? Because someone could look at that and say you don't like him as much as you did then.

SNYDER: I wouldn't draw those conclusions. In fact, he hasn't formally announced he is running. It's premature at this point. And again, it's great to see people talking about it. What would I say from my perspective is I'm staying focused on making Michigan the very best state. It's tremendous, our improvement, over the last few years. We're at the bottom during the last decade, now we're a top- tier state.

BOLDUAN: On 2016, you're not tamping down speculation about your future, are you?

SNYDER: Well, again, I'm just staying out of the issue, generally, in the sense that there's so many good things coming on that Michigan's track record -- You were hearing from Scott Walker talking about achievement. In Michigan, our achievement is outstanding in terms of what we've done over the last four years and where we're looking towards the future. I think there's a great vision that I was excited to announce last week at our State of the State.

BERMAN: Governor Rick Snyder, thank you so much for being with us. I know you'll be cheering for Michigan's own quarterback Tom Brady in the Super Bowl next week. Great to have you with us.

BOLDUAN: Let's just focus on the Michigan football program and improving that.

SNYDER: They're coming back, too.

BERMAN: Thanks, Governor.

BOLDUAN: Thanks, Governor.

Coming up next for us, a blizzard bearing down on the Northeast threatening 20 to 30 inches of snow and maybe worse than that, hurricane strength winds handling the potentially historic storm. Got that ahead for you.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)