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CNN NEWSROOM

Race for 2016; Obama Speaks in Nairobi; Investigation into Louisiana Theater Shooting; War on ISIS; CNN Visits President Obama's Family in Kenya; Turkey Arrests Kurdish Militants in Daylong Operation. Aired 4-5p ET

Aired July 25, 2015 - 16:00   ET

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


[16:00:30]

POPPY HARLOW, CNN HOST:-Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

KAREEM ABDUL-JABBAR, NBA HALL OF FAMER: Well, it's my pleasure.

HARLOW: I'm glad you're talking about this.

ABDUL-JABBAR: Thank you.

HARLOW: Thank you.

Also, we want to tell you debuting on November 3rd on HBO, "Kareem: Minority of One". This is the first time he has ever participated in a documentary telling his life story - again, coming up, this fall on HBO. You won't want to miss it.

All right. The next hour of NEWSROOM begins right now.

(OPENING MUSIC - "NEWSROOM")

HARLOW: It is 4 o'clock Eastern. You're in the CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Poppy Harlow in New York.

Thank you so much for being with us and we do begin this hour in Iowa. That is where Donald Trump is campaigning and one place where he is ranking number two in the polls. This Quinnipiac University poll says he is behind Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker coming in at 10 percent and earlier, during his speech, he pleaded with the people of Iowa to help make him number one.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: He's the only guy that's ahead of me and I can't believe I'm in second place. I finally am at second place to Iowa but he's next door. But, folks, will you please put me in first place so I feel better?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: All right. We will see if they put him in first place.

MJ, are they going to do that? How was the reaction?

MJ LEE, CNN POLITICS REPORTER: Well, Poppy, as you know, Donald Trump is someone who loves to be in first place. He loves to be at the top. And in Iowa, he isn't that. At least according to one poll, he is trailing Scott Walker here in this state. But, as you know, he has been really leading some of the national polls in the last couple of weeks and he has been talking about that a lot and talking that up a lot here in this event in Oskaloosa, Iowa. He talked to the audience and asked them - sort of begged them to help them - help him be first place in this state and he also found an opportunity - it seems like - to go after Scott Walker in earnest for the first time.

Here's what he said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Can I be nice to Scott Walker? And you know, he's a nice guy. He came up to my office like three, four months ago, presented me with a plaque 'cause I helped him with his election. I liked that he was fighting, at least I didn't know what the hell he was doing but he was fighting and I like a fighter. Does that make sense?

And I'm being very nice to him. And then today, I read this horrible statement from his fundraiser about Trump. I said, "Oh, finally, I can attack." Finally.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LEE: So this does not bode well for Scott Walker, Poppy. We have seen how Trump can get when he is on the offensive. Lindsey Graham with Rick Perry. So if this is just the beginning for Scott Walker, it might end up being an intense feud.

HARLOW: Yes. It just might. It's going to be fascinating. Those Republican debates not too far away, at the beginning of August. We will be watching.

MJ Lee, thank you very much.

Also, overseas today, President Obama taking the government of Kenya to task on the country's official policy on gay rights. The president compared Kenya's anti-gay laws to forced segregation in America, saying "Bad things happen when people are treated differently because they are different."

The two presidents were upbeat on other issues like economic cooperation, on security, and also other presidents - President Obama's warm reception in the country of his father's birth.

In a few moments, you're going to see CNN's incredible trip to the town in Kenya where President's - the president's extended family including his half-sister live right now. Brooke Baldwin takes us there for an exclusive fascinating interview. That is coming up just a little bit later this hour.

Also, new details surfacing today on that horrific shooting in Louisiana. Funeral services will take place Monday to celebrate the life of Mayci Breaux, the 21-year-old college student who was one of two people killed in that horrific rampage at the movie theater Thursday night. Her boyfriend was one of nine wounded. Five of those victims still recovering in the hospital, one in critical condition, and we're learning more about the suspected shooter, John Russell Houser.

Court documents showing he had a history of "extreme erratic behavior". He also flew a swastika outside of his tavern in Georgia after he lost his liquor license. He used a handgun in the attack. It was a 40-caliber semi-automatic pistol that he purchased legally from a pawnshop.

CNN's Ryan Nobles joining me now from Lafayette.

What more do we know about what could have possibly motivated this attack?

RYAN NOBLES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Poppy, that's the big question that officials are trying to answer right now. I mean, we've seen that they've been able to connect quite a few dots about John Houser's background - his mental health problems, his run-ins with the law, his issues with violence and domestic abuse. But none of those seem to lead any closer to why he ended up here in Lafayette, a city he had almost no connection to and to why he would go to the lengths of shooting and killing people and wounding several others that he had no connection to at all. These were strangers when it came to John Houser.

[16:05:06]

Now, we did today get a close glimpse of exactly what this crime scene looks like. The theater itself is still shut down right now. But we were able to go right up close to the theater and actually see the door where John Houser attempted to escape from. We talked to a corporal with the Lafayette police department and he tells me what Houser found as he tried to get out that door.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CORPORAL PAUL MOUTON, LAFAYETTE, LOUISIANA, POLICE DEPT.: He exited out of this door right here which was the auditorium to "Trainwreck" where we had approximately 30 people that had bought tickets for that particular showing. As he exited, based off of witness accounts and information that we received from officers, it is our belief that based off of the response of our officers, he then reloaded and re- entered the building and did not flee to his vehicle which was (inaudible) in the parking lot.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

NOBLES: Now - right now, the theater remains closed, as I mentioned. It's probably going to stay that way until Monday. That's when they tentatively hope that they can hand the theater back over to its owners. They're not necessarily doing any investigating inside the building right now. Instead, what they're doing is combing through the hundreds of pieces of evidence that they have collected and if they have a question, they want the ability to come back here and learn more about exactly what they found. I will tell you that the corporal that we spoke to earlier today - he told me that the heroism of the one teacher who was actually shot during all of the chaos but found a way to go over and sound that fire alarm played a major role in getting police here in time. He said that it likely saved lives.

Poppy?

HARLOW: Yes. I mean, no question about it. Yesterday, on our program, I was speaking with one of their fellow teachers who said, "Look, those two teachers who helped save so many lives acted just like they always do - teachers protecting others." What about the other victims - the five people still hospitalized? What do we know about them?

NOBLES: Well, we've got some good news about some of those victims. Lafayette General Hospital - which is one of the hospitals that took in some of the people that were injured here a couple of days ago - we know that they've upgraded one of the patients that we were the most concerned about in critical condition - they've been taken out of the ICU and are now listed in good condition. Lafayette General also released another one of those victims from the hospital today. They still have another person aside from the person who was removed from the ICU.

Poppy? HARLOW: Wishing them all the best. Ryan Nobles there for us in Lafayette, Louisiana. Thank you very much.

Coming up, next, we're going to talk about Hillary Clinton, her campaign.

Also, more talk about when she will testify about Benghazi. Next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:10:01]

HARLOW: All right. Hillary Clinton's spending the day campaigning in Iowa. That is where Donald Trump (inaudible) today as well. A very important state in this election and every election.

While Hillary Clinton worked the crowd in Beaverdale, Iowa, more news came about her possible testimony over the terrorist attack in Benghazi that killed four Americans in 2012.

Let's talk about that with Sunlen Serfaty. She joins me from Washington.

So what do we know about this October 22nd hearing that we're now learning is on track to happen?

SUNLEN SERFATY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Poppy, we're hearing from the Clinton campaign, first and foremost, that her testimony will happen on October 22nd in a public hearing on Capitol Hill. But we're also hearing from the committee that this date isn't as set in stone as they would like to believe right now. The committee's saying that they want to make sure that the Clinton team agrees to the terms before hand and that there'll be no limits on questioning. So this really shows that there has been a lot of back and forth leading up to the day, at least points of contentions still continue. Of course, the issue of Benghazi and her role as Secretary of State

has really dogged Clinton throughout her tenure as Secretary of State and now really has flipped over into the campaign trail. This would not be the first time that she's testified on Benghazi. Back in 2013, she also testified and really defended her role saying that she did not have a direct role in the security decisions at these U.S. installations but it will certainly be interesting to see going forward, Poppy, how much this follows her on the campaign trail and to that potential testimony in October.

HARLOW: Yes. And how much the voters care versus the media cares? Right? 'Cause that's what matters on election day is how much the voters care in this primary.

Let me ask you about the emails. There's a lot of back and forth between this story first published in the New York Times yesterday about sort of the increasing attention to the emails that she is releasing from her - that were on her private server. Then the New York Times (inaudible) walk back some of that recording. Where does it stand now?

SERFATY: Well, Clinton really referencing yesterday in her event in New York then inaccuracies in that New York Times reporting, focusing the attention on that. And at first, the New York Times reported that was a criminal investigation. That turned out to be not true.

Now, here's what we know. The Inspector General's saying that some classified information that Clinton had on her private email server had classified information. They went through the 30 - some of the sample - 40 of the 30,000 emails and they found that four of those emails did include classified information. But the important thing to note is that it was not marked as such on those emails from the state department. So clearly, that's one issue they're going to have to look at going forward. But clearly, this issue isn't going away for Clinton as she embarks on this three-day trip through Iowa.

Poppy?

HARLOW: All right. Sunlen Serfaty, Washington. Thank you very much.

Coming up next, we are turning to terror and the biggest threat to our nation. Our Wolf Blitzer this week sitting down for a fascinating interview with the head of the FBI James Comey there, talking to him about what keeps him up at night and the terror group that could be America's biggest nemesis for years to come.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:15:01]

HARLOW: Well, Turkey's air force - this weekend - bombing targets on its border with Syria, targets that are linked to both ISIS and also a Kurdish group that has long been at war with the Turkish government. It is the first time that the Turkish military has hit ISIS and the PKK - that is the name of the other group - at the same time.

Turkey blames a series of deadly attacks last week on those two groups.

ISIS is "not your parents' Al Qaeda". Those words from FBI director James Comey, speaking this week in a one-on-one interview - a very revealing interview - with our own Wolf Blitzer. He talked about what he considers the single biggest threat to the United States.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

WOLF BLITZER: What keeps you up at night?

JAMES COMEY, FBI DIRECTOR: What keeps me up at night is probably these days - the ISIL threat in the homeland and I worry very much about what I can't see. If you imagine a nationwide haystack, we're trying to find needles in that haystack and a lot of those needles are invisible to us either because of the way in which they're communicating or just because they haven't communicated or touched a place where we can see them. And knowing that there are needles out there that you can't see is very worrisome.

BLITZER: Is that now a bigger threat to the U.S. homeland than Al Qaeda? COMEY: Yes. The threat that ISIL presents - poses to the United States is very different in kind, in type, in degree than Al Qaeda. ISIL is not your parents' Al Qaeda. It's a very different model and by virtue of that model, it's currently the threat that we are worrying about in the homeland most of all.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: Not mincing any words there.

Peter Bergen is our national security analyst. Kimberly Dozier is our global affairs analyst.

Peter, to you first. Comey said something else to Wolf Blitzer. He said ISIS is crowdsourcing terrorism through social media. You've got some pretty startling numbers about the amount of young western individuals jumping on board.

[16:20:01]

PETER BERGEN, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Well, the Director of National Intelligence (inaudible) recently released not pretty good numbers showing that the number of westerners have gone from 3500 to 4500 who are going to Syria. And Not all of those people fight with ISIS but the majority do. And in - and in this country, we've seen an unprecedented number of indictments in 2015. 50 so far this year, most of them related to ISIS. 21 of them involve - 21 of them involved some kind of attack plan, some of the more very (inaudible), someone more serious, some got through - as we saw in Garland, Texas.

HARLOW: So, Kimberly, what do you do? What is the most effective way to fight an organization that according to the FBI director is crowdsourcing terrorism? I mean, you can't crowdsource peace, right? I mean, we've been losing this propaganda war for a long time. But how do you effectively combat that?

KIMBERLY DOZIER, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: Look, that's what administration officials here at this Aspen security forum have been trying to figure out and basically telling the audience that there's only so much they can do. They've said that the way ISIS reaches out to young, disenfranchised people - sometimes, people who are rather disturbed and lonely. They specifically target that kind of personality, win them over, and then inspire them to go out and carry out attacks.

Now, the warning we kept getting here was that it's not going to be as deadly as a standard Al Qaeda attack would probably do but you could see something like a Chattanooga-style attack, small arms fire, small explosive devices proliferating across the United States. Perhaps, just as often as we're seeing - mass shootings like a school shooting or a theater shooting right now.

HARLOW: Wow. Do you - Peter, were you surprised at how direct the FBI director was in that interview? Comey? I mean, it didn't - it really stood out to me. I'm wondering as you've been tracking this for years and years, were you surprised at all by that?

BERGEN: Well, I think FBI director Comey is - for a start - can be - can correct me if she thinks this is wrong but I think, for a start, he's being much more public than Bob Mueller. Bob Mueller was a very - who was FBI director for more than a decade, usually has a 10-year term. (Inaudible) for another two years which is fairly extraordinary. But he had almost no public profile and I think FBI director Comey is getting out there, doing interviews, doing speeches, and as a - as a matter of journalism and also as a public good, I think it's useful for this senior law enforcement officer in the nation to be telling Americans in a kind of straight-forward way what the threats are and how reasonable we should be concerned about them.

HARLOW: Let's turn, Kimberly, to Al-Shabaab, another big threat to the west that has carried out very attacks against westerners. When you look at the president's trip to Kenya and to Ethiopia, a hotbed for Al-Shabaab, how much - how significant is it that the president is going there right now amidst such an increase in the global war on terror?

DOZIER: Well, it's definitely a symbolic trip showing that they can maintain security at least during his trip. But I wouldn't be surprised at all to see some sort of an attack in a week or so, afterwards. We haven't seen one during his visit right now but Shabaab has pledged allegiance to ISIS and it wants to - as a recruiting technique - carry out the kind of large-scale attacks that make it look like the powerbroker in the region. So it's not necessarily that they do a lot of damage but it is necessary that they grab media attention and make it look like the local forces are off- balanced. Now, the situation there was raised as one sort of example though

because - at least in Somalia where Shabaab is based. Local forces backed by African peacekeepers have been the brunt of the fight back against Shabaab and have reduced them from holding territory to now more of a traditional terrorist group.

HARLOW: All right. Kimberly Dozier. Peter Bergen. Thank you both very much.

BERGEN: Thank you.

DOZIER: Thank you.

HARLOW: All right. Just in to us here at CNN, I want to bring you some images if we can get them on the screen because this is a huge fire that was just contained - I do want to note, just contained but it broke out this afternoon on the pool deck there at the Las Vegas Cosmopolitan Hotel. That is on the strip. That is in Las Vegas Boulevard South. You can see the huge plumes of black smoke rising from that pool deck. The hotel has three different pool areas. This, of course, is just one of them.

Fortunately for everyone, the fire is out now. One person - we're told - was taken to the hospital.

Joining me on the phone is Matthew Mills. He was inside of the hotel when it broke out.

What is the scene right now, Matthew? And I assume you're outside of the hotel?

[16:25:01]

MATTHEW MILLS, WITNESS (ON THE PHONE): I'm actually just been pushed into the Aria Hotel which is right next door. It's pretty crazy - a mass exodus of people out in the streets and a smoke and - it was crazy, I mean, really crazy.

HARLOW: I mean, we're showing the video you shot on your cellphone. There it is - I mean, it is - the images are stunning. Any idea - I know it's early going but are they talking about what caused this? Is it electrical fire? I mean, where there things lit on the deck?

MILLS: It was right outside my room. As you could see, the film that I took, it started in one of the cabanas out by the pool. It looked like a light pole. It could have been anything. There's balconies above our rooms and somebody could've carelessly thrown a cigarette out and that - maybe it started that way. But as you can see, the flames are just - you could feel the heat. I mean, it's really weird. You could feel the heat just penetrating the glass and heated up the whole room. I was actually sleeping when it happened. I'm supposed to be at a convention this morning and unfortunately, I was feeling a little ill so I stayed - I stayed back and this happened, alarms going off and they evacuated us pretty quickly right after I shot that.

HARLOW: Wow. Wow. It's extraordinary video. Thank you for sharing it with us. I'm glad you're OK. I hope everyone you're with is OK. Again, we're hearing just one person taken to the hospital. Hoping for the best for them.

Matthew Mills, thank you very much.

MILLS: Thank you.

HARLOW: All right. We're going to take a quick break. We're going to be back on the other side with an absolutely extraordinary exclusive report from our Brooke Baldwin.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARLOW: President Obama is in East Africa this weekend. Tomorrow, he will become the first U.S. sitting president to visit Ethiopia. Today, he's in Nairobi, Kenya and he told Kenya's president and the world that Kenya's policies - their anti-gay policies - are wrong and he compared them to legalized racism.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

[16:30:04] BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: When you start treating people differently not because of any harm they're doing anybody but because they're different, that's the path whereby freedoms begin to erode. And bad things happen. And when a government gets in the habit of people -- treating people differently, those habits can spread.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: Well, President Obama's trip this week is unlike any other diplomatic visit for this president. It is his first trip to his ancestral homeland since becoming commander in chief.

Our own Brooke Baldwin went to Kenya for a week. She just got back. She sat down in a rural town in the western part of the country for an exclusive interview with President Obama's half-sister, Dr. Auma Obama. She even got to meet the president's only surviving grandparent.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You've lived all around the world. But this is home.

DR. AUMA OBAMA, HALF-SISTER OF PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: This is home. This is my ancestral home. We have a homestead.

(voice-over): President Barack Obama's half-sister grew up in Kogelo.

(SINGING)

BALDWIN: Auma Obama runs a foundation called Sauti Kuu in this village. She invited me here in this exclusive interview to show where the Obama family comes from. And ahead of the president's arrival in Nairobi, many here wonder if he will make the journey back to his ancestral home.

(on camera): Do you immediately go back to little Alma when you're walking along here? Do you remember being a little girl?

OBAMA: I do, but it's changed so much, and actually it's become -- like now, because of what's going to be happening very soon, you see all this. This was not here the last time I was here. The last time I was here was two months ago. They have put an actual road to come up to the doorstep of my grandmother's house.

BALDWIN: They are making it all nice.

OBAMA: They are made it all nice.

BALDWIN: Because why?

OBAMA: Well, they are making nice I guess in anticipation, you know, that people are going to come through since my brother is coming to Kenya. So in anticipation, you know, of having guests, having people come here.

BALDWIN: Do you think your brother will come all the way here?

OBAMA: I don't know.

I don't know what's been going on around us and our family. It seems there's an urge to make our home sort of like a place to come and see, and a pilgrimage.

BALDWIN: Is it pride here? Why all the changes?

OBAMA: I think, first of all, the community here just walks at least 6-foot taller just by the fact that he was standing to be elected and he won. I mean, it was amazing. It still is amazing. So, it definitely left a very big mark.

There's a lot of pride here. It's oozing out of us. There's a lot of pride from us. What Barack managed to achieve. And there's a lot of ownership, strong ownership.

(CROSSTALK)

BALDWIN: What do you mean ownership?

OBAMA: That's their son. They are very, very protective of him, very proud of him.

(CROSSTALK)

OBAMA: I've got so many -- I've got so many people who are related to me that I don't even know they are related to me because they just want to be part of it.

BALDWIN: All of the kids who are named Barack Obama.

OBAMA: Oh, there are so many, so many.

BALDWIN (voice-over): For most of Auma's life, she only knew of her bother as Barry, a son from her father's brief marriage with an American woman Ann whom he met while studying in the United States.

Barack and Auma met the first time in person back in their 20s, when he invited his sister to Chicago.

(on camera): You bristle at the idea of being referred to half- sister. It's just sister and brother?

OBAMA: Yes.

BALDWIN: How would you describe your relationship with your brother?

OBAMA: I love my brother. What can I say, you know? It's interesting that we met quite late in life. We hit it off. And, yes, he's my brother. That's why we don't do the half thing.

(SHOUTING) BALDWIN (voice-over): Auma then returned the favor, inviting her brother to come to Kenya for the first time. Decades later, their 93- year-old grandmother remembers it as if it were yesterday.

(on camera): Just reading your book and you writing about the moment that you brought your brother, Barack Obama, here for first time, what does she remember about those first few moments?

(SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE)

OBAMA: OK. It was a Sunday.

BALDWIN: It was a Sunday.

(SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE)

OBAMA: Her memory was that she had gone to the market to shop, and from there, the sack full of greens, collar greens, and she bought them and was going to take them to market, and that's when he helped her carry them.

BALDWIN: Did she know when she locked eyes with Barack Obama with you, did she know who he was?

(SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE)

OBAMA: She says that she knew him because -- he always got pictures. We had pictures of Barack all along.

BALDWIN (voice-over): The president traveled to Kogelo to begin to learn about his father, someone he saw his father for the last time when he was 10 years old.

[16:35:05] (on camera): Describe in a few words, Barack Hussein Obama Sr.

OBAMA: I think he was -- as everyone said, it really was the truth -- he was a brilliant, brilliant mind. He was very intense. And also I think he was in many ways misunderstood.

BALDWIN (voice-over): The president wrote about the trip in his book, "Dreams From My Father," writing this about his father's grave, quote, "I saw that in my life in America -- the black life, the white life, the sense of abandonment I'd felt as a boy, the frustration and hope I'd witnessed in Chicago -- all of it was connected with this small plot of earth an ocean away."

(on camera): Your father passed away when he was 43. You, at least, got some years with him. Your brother didn't.

OBAMA: Not at all.

BALDWIN: So when your brother reached out to you with a letter in the early '80s and you visited with him in Chicago and then you returned the favor and had him come to Kenya, what were questions he wanted to know about his ancestral family and specifically about his dad? OBAMA: It was really easy talking to my brother. We kind of hit it

off. And all the questions he asked I kind of anticipated them. He wanted to know everything. He wanted to know everything about us, everything about my father, everything about our family.

I took him to so many relatives. My brother wanted to know everything. I can't answer that question any other way. I think it's normal because he was part of finding about his own identity.

BALDWIN: When you got the letter to first meet Barack Obama, you thought it was your father's handwriting?

OBAMA: It was like my father's handwriting, definitely. Definitely.

BALDWIN: What do you think is the one thing your father would say to his son?

OBAMA: He'd be extremely proud and say, "Well done." But then he'd add, "But obviously, you're an Obama." He was very proud.

(LAUGHTER)

BALDWIN (voice-over): Auma has only become closer with her brother through the years.

(on camera): You are fiercely protective of your brother and your nieces and your sister-in-law, and I'm just wondering where that comes from.

OBAMA: A sense of self-preservation.

BALDWIN (voice-over): And even though they grew up half a world away, they share a passion for helping young people.

OBAMA: I'm proud of our name because my brother really has carried our name up there and made it real -- I mean, what can I say? It's really -- it's made its mark in the world, and that is special, and it's special for us and for our children and for our communities because it tells every child that if you work hard, you can do whatever you want in this world, you know. You can make your future?

So what I'm going to do here, he has done.

BALDWIN (on camera): He's been in the White House for seven years. What's your most proud moment of your brother?

OBAMA: Getting in the White House.

(LAUGHTER)

BALDWIN: Getting in the White House. Getting in.

OBAMA: Just getting in. He got in twice. I'm proud of that, yes.

BALDWIN: Did you see him break out into "Amazing Grace"? Have you seen that video? OBAMA: I did.

(SINGING)

(APPLAUSE)

OBAMA: I'm surprised he sang so well.

(LAUGHTER)

It was amazing.

(SINGING)

BALDWIN: What does she make of the fact now that now the name Obama is so globally recognized?

(SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE)

OBAMA: When big things happen, people are named after big events. She says that my dad used to tell her about my brother, you know that son of mine in America is going to do great things.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HARLOW: What an extraordinary piece from Brooke Baldwin. You can see more of it on Brooke's Facebook page on CNN.com about her visit to Kenya.

Well, this weekend's Louisiana movie theater shooting is all too familiar for this entire country but especially for those who lost loved ones in a movie theater shooting exactly three years ago.

Coming up next, I will speak with two parents who lost their daughter in the 2012 attack in Aurora, Colorado.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

HARLOW (voice-over): You may not have heard of propolis, but this resin gathered by bees to seal their hives is the inspiration behind a multi-national cosmetics company that now trades in 14 countries. It's all the result of a series of love affairs for Niki and Nikos Koutsianas with bees, with nature and with each other.

NIKI KOUTSIANAS: Well, different, completely different, but we are complementary to each other. This is the secret for the company.

[16:40:00] NIKOS KOUTSIANAS: Thirty-nine years married.

HARLOW: Their passion for science, innovation and experimentation saw an idea grow into a multinational business, succeeding in the fiercely competitive natural cosmetics sector, estimated to be worth over $10 billion. It not only survived but flourished during years of economic turbulence at home in Greece.

NIKOS: Now they have begun to prepare great products. HARLOW: Nevertheless, sales on home soil only account for 60 percent.

Very early on, the couple realized the potential of customers overseas. The couple maintained, though, it is passion, not just profit, that drives them.

NIKOS: We speak about how to improve ourself, how to improve our company. It's not only about sales. For me, is a way of business.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARLOW: It is hard to believe that it has happened again, a mass shooting at an American movie theater. Sandy and Lonnie Phillips lost their daughter Jessica Ghawi at the movie theater shooting in Aurora, Colorado almost three years ago, to the day of the Louisiana rampage this week.

Jessica Ghawi, you're looking at pictures of her right now. She was an aspiring sports reporter. She had moved to Denver to really get her dream job as a broadcaster. She was a talented journalist and her life ended much too soon.

Jessica's parents join me now.

Sandy and Lonnie Phillips, thank you for being here, guys.

SANDY PHILLIPS, LOST DAUGHTER IN COLORADO THEATER SHOOTING: Thank you for having us, Poppy.

LONNIE PHILLIPS, LOST DAUGHTER IN COLORADO THEATER SHOOTING: Thank you.

HARLOW: Of course.

Sandy, I want to read this tweet that you sent out shortly after the rampage in Lafayette this week. You wrote, "Theater shooting in Louisiana, number of injured unknown. Here we go again, America. Is this freedom?"

You are worried that we as a country, as a society, are becoming numb to mass shootings.

S. PHILLIPS: Yes, I'm very worried about it. I'm very tired of people having a moment of prayer and politicians asking for a moment of silence because it's their silence and their inaction that enables this to happen again and again and again. I've also heard people say well, only two people were killed. Well, if it was your two people, if it was two people in your family, that would be more than enough to have you be outraged.

And instead, we kind of shrug it off and say, well, only two people were killed. That's not OK. What's the magic number? Is it 400 in a movie theater? Is it 20 children in an elementary school because that didn't do any good?

[16:45:04] So, yes, I'm very worried about our country and the lack of action that our politicians are taking.

L. PHILLIPS: We're becoming desensitized.

HARLOW: Yes.

L. PHILLIPS: Just doesn't seem important anymore. Every time it happens, it gets talked about and forgotten.

HARLOW: So, one of the things, Lonnie, because I know you have said you're not surprised it happened again, and one of the things that you talk about are solutions. So, earlier on the program I had a congressman on who has put forth a mental health bill to talk about increasing family rights when it comes to dealing with family members, dealing with mental illness.

Do you think that that is just as big a part of the solution as changing gun laws in this country that I know you two have been working on?

L. PHILLIPS: There's a lot of elements in changing violence, gun violence in America. Surely, it's a part of it. Mental health is a part of it. Almost every time in both these shootings, mental health has played a part in it.

But it's not the most easy thing that we can do. The easiest thing we can do, we have already got a bill in Congress. We missed it by four votes last time. If that vote had passed after Sandy Hook, they would have been thousands of lives saved.

And just by four votes and by allowing that bill to die, it cost the lives of thousands of Americans since that time.

HARLOW: I think it's important for our viewers to know that you are gun owners, you are strong believers in your Second Amendment right but you want changes, namely you want universal background checks. In a scenario like this, it turns out that this shooter legally, despite being institutionalized, despite having multiple mental health issues, et cetera, legally bought this gun from a pawnshop.

How can things like that be changed, sandy?

S. PHILLIPS: It shows you where the weaknesses are in our laws and had he been entered into the NICS system, NICS, if he had been entered into that system with mental illness, he wouldn't have been able to buy that gun.

The shooter in South Carolina was able to get his guns because the FBI took too long to clear him and the store went ahead and sold him the gun after three days instead of having the moral obligation to say, you know, until you're past this background check, we're not going to sell you.

They took a loophole for profit. That's not OK. It's just simply not OK. This happens time and time again.

You were talking about mental health and yes, it's a huge part of this issue, but yet our politicians are the ones that keep cutting funding to support the mental health initiatives. So, it's not a one law fixes all things. It's several laws that need to be fixed so this carnage stops. It's going to take the Middle American that is tired of this happening time and time again standing up and saying enough is enough and getting involved. Not waiting on the sidelines until it hits them.

HARLOW: And as we have this conversation before I let you go, I want to show our viewers some of those pictures of your daughter Jessica again, just to remind everyone that all the attention that goes to the shooter in these cases should go to people like this.

Let's remember Jessica. Let's remember the 12 people killed in Aurora, the 70 injured. Let's remember the two young women killed on Thursday night. Let's remember the nine that were injured.

Sandy and Lonnie Phillips, thank you very much.

S. PHILLIPS: Thank you, Poppy.

L. PHILLIPS: Thank you, Poppy.

HARLOW: We'll be right back.

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[16:53:00] HARLOW: Turkey's air force this week bombing targets on its border with Syria, targeting both ISIS and also a Kurdish group that has long been at war with the Turkish government. This is the first time the Turkish military has hit ISIS and the PKK, that's the other group, at the same time. Turkey blames a series of deadly attacks last week on both of those groups and our Nick Paton-Walsh has more.

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NICK PATON WALSH, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: A series of rapid changes in Turkey's policy towards Northern Syria and just the last few days here, key. Just recently, Turkey officials talking about the potential for, quote, "a safe haven", safe zone in northern Syria presumably into which the hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees currently in camps in Turkey could perhaps return. That's more an ambition though, realistically one the Turkish officials talk about in the context of when and if ISIS is pushed out of those areas. Naturally, they would become safe enough for the refugees to return.

Complex ambition but one that they seem to be backing up here with the use of their planes, jets hitting ISIS targets but also targets of the Kurds inside northern Iraq and Syria, too. Key because while the Kurds and ISIS are totally separate groups, Turkey also perceives some Kurdish groups as a threat and are hitting the PKK. Now, it's complex because allies of the PKK, other Kurdish groups, are in fact the ground troops fighting ISIS with the cover of coalition airplanes at the same time.

But one thing is not in doubt. Turkish troops apparently also launch artillery strikes against ISIS inside Syria, is that Turkey has very much dropped its policy of laissez-faire that some critics said it had when dealing with ISIS. Remember, in the past months, ISIS has used Turkish territory to bring people and materiel into Syria where they set up their self-declared caliphate.

That's changed now. Turkey quite clear that their enemy, quite clear they're going to use their military against it. The scope of their ambition could require tens of thousands of troops. It would be a longer prospect potentially but it does now have the potential of one of the key neighbors of Syria, a NATO ally, being thrust head-long into this conflict.

[16:55:03] There are other elements here, too, that are important to point out. Nearly 600 people arrested in a terror arrest this week across all of Turkey. Turks officials saying they have had their eye on some of them for awhile, but others actually moving against them right now.

Also, the potential for U.S. forces to use a base in Incirlik, in the south of Turkey, too, that could be used for drones, could be used air strikes inside Syria, too. That could really speed the pace of NATO and American operations inside that area.

A lot's changing, but the key thing to look out for here is the potential for ISIS retaliation. Activists reporting speeches in Aleppo in which ISIS are encouraging people potentially to take the fight to Turkey. We could see instruments terror type attacks in southern Turkey. We saw one recently targeting in Suruc targeting Kurds. That could spread. That's the price Turkey may pay for its increased intervention here, but definitely those that used to claim Turkey was not off the bench in the fight against ISIS now are seeing a very stark change in policy.

Nick Paton-Walsh. CNN, Beirut.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HARLOW: Nick, thank you very much.

President Obama delivering a blunt message on gay rights to Kenya's president today. Kenya's president says it's a, quote, "non-issue". We'll have much more on that at the top of the hour.

Also, a huge fire breaking out this afternoon at a Las Vegas. Where did it happen? We'll talk about that next as well.

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