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Severe Weather in Central US; Two Mississippi Police Officers Shot at Traffic Stop; Islam-Related SNL Skit Examined; North Korean Sabre-Rattling; Obama Takes on Trade Pact Critics; Raoul Castro Visits the Pope. Aired 3-4p ET

Aired May 10, 2015 - 15:00   ET

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


[15:00:12] ANA CABRERA, CNN HOST: Happening now in the Newsroom.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right now a very pronounced funnel cloud and tornado in progress.

CABRERA (voice over): A wild weather weekend.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I haven't seen anything like this in a long time.

CABRERA (voice over): Damaging winds, floods, even blizzards in the plain and Ana hammering parts of the East Coast.

Plus two officers shot and killed in the line of duty.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The men and women who would go out everyday to make sure that we're safe we're turned on tonight.

CABRERA (voice over): A simple traffic stop turns into a deadly encounter and ripped the community apart.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thirty years ago was the last time this happened in Hattiesburg.

CABRERA (voice over): And a historic meeting. Raul Castro and Pope Francis have a private conversation at the Vatican.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Obviously this comes at the time of dramatically improving relations.

CABRERA (voice over): What did they discuss? Newsroom starts now.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: Hello again and thank you for spending part of your Mother's Day with me. I'm Ana Cabrera in for Fredricka Whitfield.

And let's get you to Mississippi tragedy this weekend in a community there that's ripped apart. Two police officers, one a rookie, the other an officer of the year, are gunned down and killed during a traffic stop in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. Three suspects are now in custody after a massive manhunt there. They will face a judge tomorrow. And CNN's Rosa Flores has been following the story, is joining us now in New York, Rosa?

ROSA FLORES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good afternoon. The Mississippi Bureau of Investigations in charge of this case and authorities tell us that they are interviewing people, collecting evidence trying to figure out why the three suspects allegedly killed these two police officers.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FLORES (voice-over): A traffic stop ended in a hail of gunfire Saturday night, leaving two Hattiesburg, Mississippi, police officers dead, and three suspects in custody.

Police say Curtis Banks and his brother, Marvin Banks, fled the crime scene, allegedly stealing a police cruiser and using it as a getaway car. Both were arrested hours later after a brief manhunt.

Mayor Johnny Dupre says the third suspect, Joanie Calloway, was driving the car at the time of the traffic stop and was arrested shortly after the shooting.

MAYOR JOHHNY DUPREE, HATTIESBURG, MISSISSIPPI: This is a horrific time for people around the nation when you have police officers that are sworn to serve and protect and this ruthless kind of action happens.

FLORES: Calloway and Marvin Banks are charged with two counts of capital murder each. Curtis Banks faces two counts of accessory after the fact of capital murder, according to officials.

DUPREE: If you commit a crime in Hattiesburg, we take care of you, but we want to ensure all the people of Hattiesburg and the surrounding areas that they are still safe in Hattiesburg.

FLORES: Authorities are tight-lipped about the time line of the night and the suspected motive. Only saying Officer Deen initiated the traffic stop, called for backup and that Officer Tate responded to the call. As for the families of the two slain officers, there is little comfort to be found.

Ronald Tate, the father of Officer Tate, expressed his grief on Facebook, posting several times throughout the night, saying, "Well, Lord, I had been praying that it was all just a mistake. My baby. I just need some kind of mercy right now." And later, "My heart has been ripped out of my chest and torn into a million pieces. I'm in a dizzy haze since 10:11 p.m. last night. I just want to be able to move again. Right now, I can't."

In a press conference, Dupree pledged to seek justice for both families.

(END VIDEO CLIP) FLORES: Now, I talked to Tate's father and he tells me that he had a wonderful relationship with his son. That his son was all about doing the right thing and that his dream was to be a police officer. Ana.

CABRERA: Thank you. Rosa Flores for the latest.

Thirty five million people are in the path of extreme storms today. Yes, it just keeps coming and these include again the possibility of heavy rain, large hail, more strong winds.

[15:05:01] Right now seven states are under a tornado watch and residents in the plains are also gracing for more possible tornadoes that could fire up in the next few hours. The region is already trying to recover from damaging twisters yesterday including this one caught on camera in Southeast Colorado, look how dark that cloud is.

Dozens of tornadoes were also reported in Kansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma, and Texas. A Lone Star State could be hit again. Already, people are cleaning up there from three confirmed twister yesterday. One of them striking the town of Cisco, which is about a 100 miles west of Fort Worth. One person died, another was critically injured and this storm brought down power lines, demolished houses, tore roots right off some of this other houses.

And forecasters are putting Northeast Texas dead center in the greatest tornado treat area today.

CNN's Jennifer Gray joins us from Cisco, Texas, again about a 100 miles west of Forth Wort. Jen, what are residents and officials doing to prepare?

JENIFFER GRAY, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Well, they're basically picking up the pieces today and hoping for the best as we go through the afternoon, because just as you said, more storms in the forecast this afternoon. That's the last thing you want to hear if you've already sustained tornado damage.

We are here in front of a field and you can see just one example of what the tornado had done. Unfortunately we can't get any further because the roads are impassable. We have trees down. We have power lines down, but just around this bin, we hear that about three homes are a total loss. There's other damage around the area as well.

This is a rural area as you mentioned. Cisco is just a couple of miles north of where we are and so we have had a damage about three quarters of a mile wide with a destruction path about 7 miles in length. And so that's a pretty vast area and unfortunately, we did have one person die, three others injured, one critical. Ana.

CABRERA: Terrible situation and deem so rural. I imagine it's tough to get some of those folks help.

GRAY: Yes, absolutely, you know, and especially when you have trees down, you have power lines down, and you can see we're on a dirt road and we had to travel on a dirt road for probably five or six miles just to get to this location. It's very hard to get to, of course, Cisco has sirens, they didn't go off because where the tornado was, was south of the city.

So people in this country/areas, they just have to rely on their knowledge. They have to be smart about the weather and they have to rely on their local meteorologist here. Unfortunately, you never want to hear of a death due to weather. That is what we got here, South of Cisco, though unfortunately, with another person in critical condition.

But like I said, more storms in the forecast for today as this people continue to pick up the pieces and we are looking at clear skies right now, but we have storms just to our east and the possibility of storms building in this location where we are in the next few hours.

CABRERA: We can see the breeze picking up there. Jennifer Gray, stay safe. Thanks again for joining us again from Cisco, Texas.

Let's bring in CNN's meteorologist, Tom Sater, joining us once again. I know you're taking a look at the bigger when we're looking at the tornado threat this afternoon. How is it shaping up?

TOM SATER, AMS METEOROLOGIST: It's going to be the fifth day. This started on Wednesday, Ana. We had 48 tornadoes on Wednesday, Thursday nine, Friday six, 45 Saturday and we've had 5 this morning, but those were in South Dakota where it's snowing on the western part of the state.

CABRERA: It's a hot spot.

SATER: It's amazing. Yeah, let's break this down. When it comes to the number of tornadoes on average, May gets the trophy 276, followed by June at 243. On average, we can see one to two tornado outbreaks during the month of May and there's no doubt that you can call this an outbreak.

Now, what has been added to this is this moderate risk from near Waco to just south of Dallas and that's where we're typically going to find the tornadoes that if they do develop could be long-track, very large tornadoes. Look at all the tornado watches. They ran all the way up to South Dakota down into Dallas, you know, right onto Rio Grande.

But let's start in Dallas, because this is where we believe south in this are where this tornado watch is in effect until 9:00 p.m. That's gives us all day and this where we think we'll probably find the most severe elements. I mean, we've baseball-sized hail, softball-sized hail in this. We do have -- here we go, a little -- looks a tornado warning for this little cell right here. We're going to be watching that, that just popped up moments ago, buts it's small in size. So that's a good news and it's in a densely populated region.

Now we're going to come back up. We're going to find areas of Arkansas, good line of heavy rainfall, flash flooding. Most of the rain this week, South of Oklahoma city, dropping as much as 17 inches of rain this week but we have a severe thunderstorm watch, includes Kansas City and then into Central Missouri. That'd be Columbia, Jefferson City, almost down toward Poplar Bluff, and then you get into the watches that are all the way up to the north, heavy snow. As many as 10 states have picked up a little bit of snow. There are plowing the snow on course field, that's right, in Denver because there is a game for the Rockies and the Dodgers. Look at some of these totals. Over 17 inches parts of Colorado, South Dakota, Nebraska 14, 10 at Wyoming blizzard conditions on these Mother's Day in some areas.

So what we're going to look at, the future calls for more heavy miles of rain. So flash flooding a big concern from Oklahoma east and the south, and then the thunderstorms with the severe elements of the large hail, of course the tornadoes, so really could be down of the south but anywhere where we have this tornado watches.

Just an idea, we lose the enhanced version of -- and our threats only a slight as we start the work week. So maybe this five day event will come to an end.

[15:10:26] CABRERA: I feel like Mother Nature though is sending me signs specifically because Denver is my hometown and they got hammered with snow. And then, of course we're tracking what was tropical storm Ana all weekend.

SATER: Right. Yes, stay put...

CABRERA: Yeah, and how is everything working regarding Ana?

SATER: Ana made landfall, heavy amounts of rain from around Myrtle Beach, to Wrightsville, go northward. Rain will move into around areas of the outer banks. It has been heavier at times but it looks like the system were slowly slide north, maybe close to Delmarva and then slide back northeast off the coast but at least the threat as far as rip current are there, we know there was a some rescues of course that took place but flash flooding will be the event with this.

CABRERA: All right. Well, in fact, it could been worse?

SATER: Yes.

CABRERA: All right. Tom Sater, thanks so much.

Still ahead, Cuba's President meets with the Pope at the Vatican. Coming up, why this visit was so significant and what it could mean for U.S.-Cuba relations?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CABRERA: A historic meeting between the Pope and the President of Cuba, and it's only the third meeting ever between the head of the Catholic Church and a Cuban leader.

This happened at the Vatican earlier today and during the meeting, President Raul Castro thank the pontiff for helping to thaw the relationship between the U.S. and Cuba. And joining me now is CNN's Patrick Oppmann, he is in Havana.

Patrick this was a private meeting but you're learning more about that was discussed, fill us in.

[15:15:11] PATRICK OPPMANN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Absolutely. And it's really just an extraordinary to see Raul Castro, the head of a communist government, meeting with Pope Francis, of course, who leads the Catholic Church. And not only they have an hour-long meeting on a Sunday but have the two men emerge and talk about each other in such warm terms. It really is an indication of the changing times and the increasing sense of reconciliation between Cuba and the Catholic Church.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OPPMAN (voice over): John Paul II and Fidel Castro made for an odd couple in Havana's Revolution Square in 1998, the first visit of a pope to Cuba. John Paul had helped to bring down communism in Europe. Castro, a self-declared atheist was trying to keep his isolated communist government afloat. The two leaders found common ground though as John Paul called for the world to engage with Cuba.

But it would take another 17 years for a sitting U.S. President to hold talks with the Cuban head of state and admit that decades of Cold War confrontation had failed.

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: After 50 years of a policy that had not changed on the part f the United States, it was my belief that it was time to try something new.

OPPMANN (voice over): The breakthrough was due in part the efforts of a new pope, Pope Francis who hosted secret negotiations between the U.S. and Cuba at the Vatican and urged President Obama and Raul Castro to make peace.

Then Pope Francis would follow John Paul's example and visit Cuba in September was welcome news to parishioners at Havana's cathedral.

RAUL GARCIA, CUBAN AMERICAN: Maybe he could have also pushed a little more these negotiations. I feel that he could make more positive ways for the Cubans as going more towards religion more than politics. I feel that it's going to be a very good visit, very beneficial for the country.

OPPMANN (voice over): Already, Cuba has seen benefits of the opening with the U.S. The island is set to the removed from the U.S.' list of nations that sponsored terrorism, and loosening of sanctions means more American visitors, even a proposed ferry service from the U.S. to the island.

But change takes time. After nearly five months of negotiations, there is still no date yet for when Cuban-U.S. relations will be restored. And when this building will once again become the U.S. embassy in Havana. Ddiplomats on both sides say the hardest part of the negotiations has been establishing trust with their former enemy, more bridges for a new Pope to help build when he comes to Cuba.

(END VIDEO CLIP) OPPMAN: And many people were struck by Raul Castro's comments following the meeting with the Pope that was he was considering rejoining the Catholic Church. He has never said anything like that before. Fidel Castro certainly has never said anything like that before. Both men are lifelong atheists. Raul Castro becoming a communist in his teens, and ever since then like his brother espousing atheism which of course for many years was the official state of Cuba that religion was discouraged if not banned.

So for Raul Castro, now at 83 years of age, to say that he has been so moved by the Pope that he is reconsidering joining the Catholic Church. For many Cubans, that is nothing short of miraculous, Ana.

CABRERA: It does stand out, that's for sure. Patrick Oppmann in Havana for us, thank you.

Now, just ahead. The U.S. has been focused on reaching this nuclear deal with Iran, right? Well, how that's left the door open for North Korea to pursue its nuclear ambitions.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:22:35] CABRERA: While the U.S. has been busy negotiating with Iran on a nuclear deal, North Korea is moving full speed ahead to develop nuclear weapons of their own and this also follows report of new missile tests by the North this weekend and yet another threat.

CNN's Brian Todd has details.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): A new blatant and aggressive threat from Kim Jong-Un. His forces will open fire on any South Korean ships moving into what he sees as North Korean waters. South Korea, a U.S. ally, is angrily vowing retaliation.

Threats like this from Pyongyang have kept America from being able to negotiate over Kim's nuclear weapons program like its trying to do with Iran. CNN has learned, during the two years of America's obsessive attempts to prevent Iran from building even one nuclear bomb.

DAVID ALBRIGHT, FORMER U.N. WEAPONS INSPECTOR: North Korea has been greatly expanding its ability to make the nuclear explosive materials that it needs to make nuclear weapons.

TODD (voice-over): Former U.N. weapons inspector David Albright says in those two years Kim Jong-Un's regime has doubled the size of the enrichment plant at Yongbyon which you can see in this satellite photos. Yongbyon is where experts say North Korea enriches uranium for nuclear bombs and Albright says that's not all they've done.

ALBRIGHT: North Korea has been spending its own money to build up its nuclear weapons program but it's also been shopping overseas to get the equipment that they need in order to build up their nuclear arsenal. TODD (voice-over): Why hasn't the Obama administration pursued talks with Kim Jong-Un's government as fervently as it has with Iran? White House and state department officials tell CNN they're committed to drawing down Kim's nuclear weapons and are open to dialog with Kim's government, but North Korea has to show a commitment which it hasn't done yet. Analysts say there are other reasons.

JOEL WIT, U.S.-KOREA INSTITUTE, JOHNS HOPKINS: I think we have rapidly approached the point of no return over the past five years. This program has gained a lot of momentum over the past few years and not much has been done to stop it.

TODD (voice-over): The result is ominous. Analysts say Kim's regime may well be able to fit nuclear warheads on missiles that can hit South Korea or Japan and are thought to be adding to their arsenal.

ALBRIGHT: North Korea could have 10 to 15 nuclear weapons now and it can grow that amount by several weapons per year.

TODD (voice-over): Possibly to more than 50 by the end of 2020. Analysts worry Kim won't just threaten his neighbors with nuclear bombs.

WIT: Very certainly will explore providing technology and maybe assistance to other countries and groups overseas if the price is right.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[15:25:11] TODD: Who would buy them? Analysts say Syria could be a customer, and there's a possibility North Korea could try to sell nuclear technology to Iran although U.S. negotiators will likely try to prevent that.

Brian Todd, CNN Washington.

CABRERA: Coming up. We're hearing some startling comments about the terror threat here in the U.S. Just how safe are we now. And how is it compared to after 9/11. We'll talk about that and the concern about ISIS in the U.S.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CABRERA: Happening now in the Newsroom. President Obama says Elizabeth Warren is flat wrong.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: ... on this one though, her arguments don't stand the test of fact and scrutiny.

CABRERA (voice over): He's going toe to toe with the democratic senator on the free trade pact. And Saturday Night Live takes on the controversy of drawing the Prophet Mohammed.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Your category is trend setters and here is what you'll be drawing today.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All right.

CABRERA (voice over): Live, Shaquille O'Neal calls the winner for the best Meme face plant. Newsroom continues now.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: Hello I hope you're enjoying your Sunday. Thanks for joining me, I'm Ana Cabrera and there is renewed concern today over just how safety U.S is from homegrown terrorism.

Earlier on CNN state of the union, we heard some startling comments about this lot of terror in this county from the man who was the first homeland security Tom Ridge, listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

[15:30:01] TOM RIDGE, (R) FORMER HOMELAND SECURITY SECRETARY: Their appeal to the lone wolves and we've seen them acting in Belgium and in France and in Canada and in the United States. So the threat vectors in the nature of the trench are far more complicated and far more serious today than on September 12th, 2001.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: Let's talk more about this. Joining me now from our New York Newsrom, Jonathan Gilliam. I know you were a Navy Seal, you're a former FBI special agent.

If ISIS is inspiring homegrown terrorists some would argue, you have to destroy ISIS to cut off this source of inspiration. Do you think that's the solution and is that even possible?

JONATHAN GILLIAM, FORMER NAVY SEAL: Well, it's absolutely connected. I mean here in the United States, if we have an issue with bank robberies for instance, that's a domestic, internal problem that we focus on here. But what we see is an international source for the recruitment and also infiltration of terrorists inside the United States.

And really what's happening here is a symptom of an overall cancer that we have created by not having an effective war plan, and not recognizing exactly what the enemy is.

CABRERA: What do you tell the average American about how to be safe against this homegrown terror threat?

GILLIAM: Well, you're going to be very interested in what I have to say about this, because first and foremost, we have to have good political leaders that know how to fight a war. And so when you go an vote for somebody, you may have a special interest but you really need to start looking at who is in office. And when they are in office, you need to start putting pressure on them because here's what happens, that threat is now here. So now you as an individual, just as what we saw on Garland, Texas, you may be faced with something on your own where you now have to, because of the lack of an overall effective war plan, you may have to really protect yourself.

And so awareness is the biggest, biggest key. I mean right behind me, this picture right here behind me is a live shot of one of the biggest critical areas in New York City, it's Columbus Circle. And it's not a critical area at 1:00 in the morning, 2:00 in the morning. But right now, in the afternoon in New York City, that's a critical area. So people, themselves, have to look at critical times and critical areas. And they need to be very, very aware and realize that this is a real threat that is here.

CABRERA: With us talking about it today, with the threat level raised at military bases late last week. It seems there is a greater awareness overall of the terror threat right now. But we can't seem to get ahead in this fight against terrorism. I know you are critical of the current strategy to combat terrorism, what's wrong with the current strategy and what would you do?

GILLIAM: Well, ISIS one of many different groups within fundamental Islamic Mohamadism. And again, I've said this yesterday, I'll say it -- I'll keep saying it, we're not at war with Muslims. We're at war with fundamental Islamic ideology. If you want to look and see exactly what's going on, look at 100 years ago. 100 years ago in Armenia, there were 1.5 million Armenians just disappeared off the face of this earth, they were murdered. Also, the Caliphate which is the Islamic State could grow.

Now, 100 years ago, they didn't have airplanes, they didn't have Twitter, they didn't have the ability to recruit all over the world. So, the motivation then was regional, now we're looking at a global motivation. And this is something that the world really needs to focus on together. There needs to be international plans to take on this entire global movement of fundamental Islam. They're -- and each country has to have their own domestic plan. They have to secure their borders. Our borders is not secure and then -- now, it's too late, we can't stop online recruitment.

So we need to start using that online movement of these guys to our benefits so we can track them.

CABRERA: So you're thinking fight fire with fire to some degree and we need to get into that online battle more?

GILLIAM: Right. Absolutely.

CABRERA: Yeah.

GILLIAM: We can use -- there's technology out now that we can use what they're doing to their disadvantage.

CABRERA: We will be continuing that discussion, of course, in the days and weeks, I'm sure, as we move forward. Jonathan Gilliam, thank you so much for your time today.

GILLIAM: Thank you.

CABRERA: And happy Mother's Day to the women in your life. We appreciate...

GILLIAM: Happy Mother's Day to my mother, yes. Thank you.

CABRERA: All right. Have a great one.

Well, being the wife of the President, Michelle Obama says it's a tough job. But being the first African-American First Lady presents it's own unique set of challenges. Hear what she told the class of 2015 next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:33:25] CABRERA: President Obama is calling out Liberal senator Elizabeth Warren, over her position to his free trade deal. And during an interview with Yahoo, the President personally challenged some of her assertions that the pact could allow a future president to undo some Wall Street reforms put in place after the 2008 economic down term.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARACK OBAMA, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA PRESIDENT: The truth of the matter is, is that, you know, Elizabeth is, you know, a politician like everybody else and, you know, she's got a voice that she wants get out there. And I understand that and on most issues, she and I deeply agree.

On this one though, her arguments don't stand the test of fact and scrutiny.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: CNN's Sunlen Serfaty is joining us at the White House. So what's the fallout from this battle among the liberal giants in the party, Sunlen?

SUNLEN SERFATY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Ana, it most certainly will ratchet up the fight that President Obama has been having with members of his own party. And it certainly underscores the deep divide within the Democratic Party over this issue. President Obama partnering with Republicans on Capitol Hill to try to get this authority and the trade bill through.

But keep in mind, this is a legacy issue for President Obama and he almost seems a little irritated by Warren's comments not only recently but in the last few weeks over this trade deal. The concern there of course that she has the potential as being this progressive icon in the party to woe some of the key democratic votes that they need to get the trade authority through and the trade deal through.

Now, Ana, this will be front and center on Capitol Hill this week. There's potential first test vote on this issue. Right now on the Senate, it's not even clear if they will move forward to because they don't know if they have enough votes to even move forward to a debate.

[15:40:10] CABRERA: All right Sunlen, standby. Let's bring in our political panel, Ron Brownstein is CNN's Senior Political Analyst, and Larry Sabato is the Director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia. Ron, you first. What do you make of this Obama-Warren (inaudible) of sorts?

RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: You know, it's really the latest manifestation of one the longest running divides in the Democratic Party. I mean if you go back to 1990s, this is almost an exact replay of the battle Bill Clinton had with Dick Kiphart when he was the leader of the House of Democrats over the North American Free Trade Agreement, and it was then known as fast track.

There are two ironies in this fight which is that in 2008, as a candidate originally, Barack Obama was more on the Elizabeth Warren side. He was very skeptical of free trade agreements. He said he would renegotiate NAFTA as president, but once he got in office like most presidents, he found that expanding trade is both in the economic and particularly geopolitical interest of the country.

The other irony, I'll just say real quick, is that the democratic base has been growing generally more supportive of a free trade as the blue collar white voters are most skeptical of it moving to the Republican Party. So while the institutions of the Democratic Party are more with Elizabeth Warren, generally speaking opinion within the party has been flowing slightly more to where President Obama has ended up.

CABRERA: And Larry, Ron said the President has sort of flip-flopped over the years. The President, we heard, during this discussion has said he has no more elections so he has nothing to lose and that this is not about politics to him. Do you think Warren's position is more politically-influenced?

LARRY SABATO, DIRECTOR, UVA'S CENTER FOR POLITICS: Well, there is always politics. You heard what President Obama said. He hurled the ultimate epithet at Elizabeth Warren. He said she is a politician just like all the rest of us. I don't think she necessarily thinks it herself that way but clearly, the Presidents irritated because he has a real fight on his hands. And he is expecting more support from his own party in this tough fight than he is likely to get.

Oddly, he has more backing from Republicans in the House and the Senate so far than he has from Democrats. I think he'll win the fight in the end but it's going to be a struggle. And this was a warning from President Obama to Elizabeth Warren that there's a price to be paid if she continues to oppose the President's legacy item.

CABRERA: I know he's gone on to say that he will campaign vigorously for those candidates who are currently in Congress who end up voting for the pact in the trade deal.

I want to really quick it to the First Lady in some comment she made this weekend, a powerful commencement speech yesterday at Tuskegee University and she talked about being treated differently because she is the first Black First Lady. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) MICHELLE OBAMA, UNITED STATES OF AMERICAN FIRST LADY: But, as potentially the first African American First Lady, I was also the focus of another set of questions and speculations; conversations sometimes rooted in the fears and misperceptions of others. Was I too loud, or too angry, or too emasculating? Or was I too soft, too much of a mom, not enough of a career woman?

Then there was the first time I was on a magazine cover -- it was a cartoon drawing of me with a huge afro and machine gun. Now, yeah, it was satire, but if I'm really being honest, it knocked me back a bit. It made me wonder, just how are people seeing me.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: I want to quickly get all of your reactions. Sunlen, to you first, is the White House reacting it all to the attention of the First Lady's comments have received.

SERFATY: One, I can tell you that I don't think that they're surprised by the attention they received. The First Lady's office tells me that they really -- she really wanted to talk about her role and her story and how these sorts of stereotypes can be overcome, you know, giving examples about how people have tried to frame who she is in the past. But I was struck by how candid and how revealing she was talking about race relations and how she was viewed in the 2008 campaign, I think really revealing especially in terms of a national conversation over race that we're having in our country.

CABRERA: Right. Ron, what do you think this says about the state of race in politics in American 2015?

BROWNSTEIN: Yeah. I think it's really striking, it's in parallel with President Obama, I think becoming more comfortable talking about issues relating to race than he was when he first came into office.

You know, clearly we are having a conversation about race in America that is focused on interactions between the African-American community, particular in the police. But what we're living through is much larger than that. I mean this is the first school year ever where a majority of our kids -- to public school system. Nationwide, all or our students, the majority of our students are non-white. This is the inexorable change that we're living through and I think this is something we're going to be grappling within our politics in many manifestations from many years to come.

CABRERA: Larry, do you agree?

[15:45:01] SABATO: Yes. So, absolutely, I think they were good words for that audience or really for any group of college graduate. You know, part of your comments, not necessarily replayed there, were "don't take the critiques too seriously. Don't let the criticism hold you back from what you can do, tune them out," as she said she did in the campaign about the New Yorker cartoon.

I was interested, and she mentioned that, we knew at the time the Obama's were very upset about that New Yorker cover. And it has stopped all this years. She still remembers it. So I'm looking forward to her book, the post administration book by Michelle Obama maybe more interesting than President Obama.

CABRERA: It could be interesting no doubt about it. Sunlen Serfaty, Ron Brownstein, Larry Sabato thanks to all of you and we appreciate the thoughtful discussion.

We have some breaking news right now. Weather related which we continue to track the severe weather threat that tornado threat in Denton County Texas has just been extended. So let's bring back Meteorologist Tom Sater now with more. Tom?

TOM SATER, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Yeah it looks like the tornado has been viewed and observed by law enforcement. This is south -- northeast of Dallas.

Denton is included in this warning. So as we take a look at all of the watches today, I mean from South Dakota over to Missouri, down into Texas if you're with us just a little while ago the real concern really is from Oklahoma, Arkansas down through Central Texas.

This is just northeast of Dallas. So a 135,000 were included in this warning here. They've trended back a bit now that Denton is no longer in the path of this tornado. But it's a good 10,000 are looking at this.

At least for another 20 minutes it's a small cell and it's only moving at 25 miles per hour. But it's been dropping almost golf ball size hale with this. This is going to be the first of several on it throughout the day we've had over 100 tornadoes since Wednesday.

And today hopefully will be the last. But it could be violent.

CABRERA: And so today even though it's already 3:45 here on the east coast we're still going to see things pick up.

SATER: Yeah, a lot of heating in the days although to be headed in the Midwest.

CABRERA: All right Tom Sater thanks so much we'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:50:42] CABRERA: Saturday Night Live is never shy about stepping into political controversy. And last night was no exceptions as the show took on the Prophet Mohammed carton contest in Garland, Texas this week.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TARAN KILLAM: Hoffmans (ph), you're up. Get up here Daniel. Come on, Daniel. Daniel, tell me how are you feeling.

DANIEL: Well I took a drawing class in college. I think I'm going to be just fine. SARAH (ph): Yey! Daniel.

KILLAM: Oh, love, support, confidence. I like it. Your category is trend setters and here is what you'll be drawing today.

DANIEL: All right. Wait I'm...

KILLAM: You're ready to go Daniel?

DANIEL: No.

KILLAM: OK. Don't take extra time on that clock.

DANIEL: No...

KILLAM: Go.

DANIEL: Wait...

SARAH (ph): Come on honey, you can draw it.

DANIEL: I can't -- I don't think I can. Maybe pass.

KILLAM: You cannot pass.

DANIEL: Oh, please.

REGINALD VELJOHNSON: Come on just draw something, dude.

SARAH (ph): Daniel, it's a million dollars. Whoever it is, just draw his face.

DANIEL: I don't...

SARAH (ph): Draw his face, Daniel.

DANIEL: No. I don't want -- I want to go home.

KILLAM: Oh that sounds means it's the half way beeper. Now, remember Daniel, if you want, you can trade with the teammate.

DANIEL: No. I want to trade on...

(CROSSTALK)

REGINALD VELJOHNSON: ... back time. You want to see how it's done? Fine, let me just read the clue. Oh, I had drop my pen.

KILLAM: All right. While we get Reginald a new pen, a reminder, if they don't win the million dollar prize, we will subtract the million dollars from the Hoffman's (ph) bank account.

DANIEL: What? Why?

SARAH (ph): Come on, Reginald, you can do it. Take the pen.

REGINALD VELJOHNSON: I'm not doing it.

SARAH (ph): You can do it.

REGINALD VELJOHNSON: Not doing it.

SARAH (ph): (inaudible) do it.

REGINALD VELJOHNSON: All right give me the pen.

KILLAM: Ohh, I'm sorry that's time. Sarah, you're final guess. What did they draw?

SARAH (ph): I don't know. The Prophet Mohammed?

(CROSSTALK)

KILLAM: Again the take away is these two men drew the Prophet Mohammed.

DANIEL (ph): No. We did not. We draw nothing.

REGINALD VELJOHNSON: (inaudible) sweet Molly, they are coming for me.

KILLAM: You bet they are, Reginald. They're coming. More Picture Perfect, right after this.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CABRERA: All right. Let's bring in columnist for the Daily Beast, Dean Obeidallah. He is joining me on the phone. Dean, I know work for Saturday Night Live at some point and you wrote in the Daily Beast today that the show would never intentionally stoke the flames of hate against any minority group. You call this a very smart, a very funny skit. So you're take is they nailed it.

DEAN OBEIDALLAH, COMEDIAN, DAILY BEAST COLUMNIST: I think they did a great job. I though it was funny. And what it was doing was poking fun at this fear many people have about drawing the Prophet Mohammed. It wasn't like they had some character -- they have a Muslim guy standing there with a gun or a knife saying, "if you draw, I'm going to kill you," that kind of stuff. It wasn't, it was playing on what many people perceive as a true concern about drawing the Prophet Mohammed. And I thought it was smart. I thought it was funny and clever.

And, you know, the bottom line, it made the audience laugh in that studio and they got it. They got the whole idea about the sketch was.

CABRERA: Well, it's interesting how you perceive and compare to how Erick Erickson, the Editor-in-Chief of the conservative website RedState perceived this. Because he weighed in on this as well. And I want to read you a quote. He said, "That last night's skit was a perfectly humorous way to point out the absurdity of radical Islam's refusal to let people draw Mohammed". Is that what you got from that skit as well? OBEIDALLAH: No. I don't think I ever could agree with Erick Erickson on anything on any issue what so ever. I think that idea was -- it wasn't about radical Islam per say, it was about a fear people have and that we see in the media, we saw it last week in Texas, and so obviously with Charlie Hebdo.

So it's not -- I don't think an attack specifically on radical Islam per say, as much as mocking the fears some people have. And you know in the Americas, it's truly almost unjustified except what we saw in Texas of two isolated men as opposed to 5 million Muslims who just shrug their shoulders and yaw when Pamela Gellar who's a very highly compensated, well paid anti-Muslim bigot did that whole campaign.

[15:55:18] This comedy wasn't about that all to me. It was about poking fun with people's fear and it was -- it made people laugh and that was free.

CABRERA: And Dean you're a Muslim yourself I know, comedy along these lines I imagine it is kind of tricky.

OBEIDALLAH: It can be and, you know, what they did it, they really approach it in a right way, when I work at Saturday Night Live, work there for eight years. And even since I've left some writers I know have ask me about catches (inaudible). And one is it accurate about Muslims or Arabs. And second it's offensive.

And I'm a comedian as well I'm a writer I'm such an advocate of freedom of expression. It's almost impossible to offend me.

The only time I get upset and not offended is when people really (inaudible) unitizing minority group and that's their intention or their goal. This is not that all. This was fun.

I think in some point two that we laugh sometimes is the issue that's scare people. If somebody breaks it down a little bit and make sure it is less scary. And that's really the key to this. So the same way we're actually held a few months ago made fun of ISIS and they were croup in practices.

And there were some push back against SNL for that. Actually it was amazingly perfect the idea of mocking ISIS, mocking radicals whatever they might be I don't care if they're far right wing Muslims, far right wing Christians of any group mock them and make -- it takes away some of their strength and their power.

CABRERA: Well on the fact and in this incident that Saturday Night Live did not actually draw the Prophet Mohammed. It seems like they handled the situation in a very respectful way to say the least.

Dean Obeidallah, we really appreciate you weighing in thank you so much.

OBEIDALLAH: Thanks for having on Ana.

CABRERA: We're back in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)