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CNN NEWSROOM
Trump University Settles Lawsuits; The U.S. Reacts to Trump's Picks; Hardliners Picked for Key Posts; Aleppo's Brutal Airstrikes; The U.S. Reacts to Trump's Picks; South Korea Protests Grow; Pope Francis Appoints New Cardinals. Aired 5-6a ET
Aired November 19, 2016 - 05:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENT-ELECT OF THE UNITED STATES: When I ran, they said why don't you settle up that case? I don't want to settle the case.
GEORGE HOWELL, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Now singing a different tune. The president-elect goes back on his word and settles the Trump University case.
NATALIE ALLEN, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): And a cabinet in the making. More controversial figures are poised to join the Trump team.
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HOWELL (voice-over): The image of a little boy in fear as reports say that more than 1,000 people have been killed in Aleppo since the cease-fire began.
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ALLEN: All ahead here. Welcome to our viewers in the United States and around the world. We're live in Atlanta. I'm Natalie Allen.
HOWELL: And I'm George Howell from CNN World Headquarters. NEWSROOM starts right now.
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ALLEN: Our top story, Friday was a busy day for U.S. President-Elect Donald Trump. He continues to assemble his team and tap hardline conservatives to fill key national security posts. We'll tell you more on who he picked in just a moment.
HOWELL: That's right. First, though, he is settling that Trump University lawsuit. It's a deal that is costing him, as Donald Trump would say, big league, $25 million. It covers about 6,000 former students of Trump's now defunct real estate seminars and it will keep the president-elect out of the courts as he prepares to become President of the United States.
Here's CNN's Paul Vercammen with more.
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PAUL VERCAMMEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Dan Petrocelli, the lawyer for Donald Trump, emphasized this both in court and when he came outside after, he said in no way is the president-elect acknowledging any fault or liability in this case.
He said this will allow President-Elect Trump to focus on the matters at hand, which is fighting for America.
DAN PETROCELLI, TRUMP LAWYER: We felt very confident in our position but, at the end, President-Elect Trump was prepared -- set aside his personal interests and focused on the monumental task that he faces in bringing this country together and fighting for the important issues and all the people that he represents.
He wants to spend his time and his energy, his focus, his talent, his ability on fighting for Americans.
VERCAMMEN: And many times leading up to this trial, for years, Donald Trump had said he would never settle but, again, his lawyer seemed to be happy with this deal and both sides were jovial during the proceedings and after the proceedings. It didn't seem for either of them that they had been bludgeoned into this move.
In fact, Jason Forge, who is the plaintiffs' attorney, a former hard- charging federal prosecutor, said that they were not going to require any payment from the plaintiffs. He also said that this would be spread out and that every single plaintiff would receive at least half of their money back from what they paid for those classes, Donald Trump University.
They said all along that they felt the university was nothing more than a sham. Now back to you.
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HOWELL: Paul Vercammen, thank you.
The president-elect also announced his choices for attorney general, for the CIA director and for national security advisor. CNN's Sara Murray reports they are all very conservative and highly controversial.
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SARA MURRAY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Donald Trump unveiling the first layer of his national security team, a trio of picks signaling the president-elect has little interest in moderating the hard-line views he campaigned on. TRUMP: We have to be tough and we have to be strong.
MURRAY: Trump announcing retired General Michael Flynn for national security adviser, Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions for attorney general and Congressman Mike Pompeo for CIA director, each one of them known for their unyielding and at times controversial views.
LT. GEN. MICHAEL FLYNN (RET.), FORMER DIRECTOR, DEFENSE INTELLIGENCE AGENCY: Yes, that's right. Lock her up.
MURRAY: Flynn has been lauded as a talented battlefield intelligence officer. But he could fuel concerns that Trump White House is a haven of intolerance. He's made a habit of voicing concern about Islam, which he once called more of a political ideology than a religion.
Sessions is known for his staunch anti-immigration positions in his two decades in the Senate, but he's also echoed Trump's calls for Hillary Clinton to face a special prosecutor for her use of a private e-mail server, a threat Sessions could turn into a reality if he's confirmed.
SEN. JEFF SESSIONS (R), ALABAMA: The evidence indicates to me that this should be fully investigated. I cannot say Mr. Comey has not completed a full investigation --
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SESSIONS: -- but it seems like he has not.
MURRAY: As for Pompeo, the House Intelligence Committee member has been a fierce critic of Clinton's handling of the 2012 attack in Benghazi.
REP. MIKE POMPEO (R), KANSAS: How come not a single person lost a single paycheck connected to the fact we had the first ambassador killed since 1979? How come no one has been held accountable to date?
MURRAY: The Kansas Republican arguing there was a cover-up surrounding Benghazi as the panel investigating the failed to find new evidence of wrongdoing on behalf of the Obama administration or Clinton.
Trump unveiling his picks with little pomp and circumstance, blasting out a press release with his selections as he remained ensconced in Trump Tower. The president-elect now set to hunker down at his gulf club in Bedminster for a weekend of nonstop meetings.
Among those on his schedule, 2012 GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney, former chancellor of the Washington, D.C., public schools Michelle Rhee and General James Mattis.
A source tells CNN Romney has long wanted to serve as secretary of state, but a Cabinet post in a Trump White House would surprise many, given the tone between the two men during the campaign.
MITT ROMNEY (R), FORMER PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Donald Trump is a phony, a fraud.
TRUMP: He's a sad case. He choked.
You know what a choke artist is?
MURRAY: The lingering question is whether Donald Trump would actually choose a more moderate Republican, a Democrat or even one of his former rivals to fill one of these top level cabinet positions or whether the series of marathon meetings this weekend is essentially just for optics -- Sara Murray, CNN, New York.
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ALLEN: Let's get some international perspective now on how the Trump presidency is beginning to shape up.
Leslie Vinjamuri (ph) is a senior lecturer on international relations at the University of London.
Professor, thank you for joining us. We are starting to see Trump, the president, emerge after the long campaign. And so far he is seeming to surround himself with those with hardline views as he reflected as a candidate.
Should anyone be surprised?
LESLIE VINJAMURI (PH), UNIVERSITY OF LONDON: You know, it's very interesting. This has been absolutely crucial as a signaling to the rest -- not only to Americans but to the rest of the world.
We've been watching intently to see who will Donald Trump choose to surround himself by. And I think these last three choices will create a lot of uncertainty and nervousness actually, especially externally.
We have got hardliners, we have people who have been very, very loyal to Donald Trump throughout the campaign. So these really are not people that are sending a signal that Donald Trump is going to reach out beyond that inflammatory rhetoric and choose a path to moderation in a quiet sense, a very different signal.
It shows that he's going to be very hard on Islam, that domestically we're likely to see a return to increased surveillance programs, very hard anti-immigration policy and kind of more closed America in terms of visas for foreign workers.
So I think the signals are not great. We saw the number of appointments still to be made, so we'll have to wait and see. But I do think that this will cause some to feel more unsettled.
And of course there's the question of the Iran deal. Two of the people chosen to head the CIA and the national security advisor have been very opposed to the Iran deal.
ALLEN: I was going to ask you which issues that are on the table that could be affected with this hardline stance. That's certainly one of them. VINJAMURI (PH): Absolutely.
ALLEN: There's, of course, the wars in the Middle East, to say the least. We do know, though, as we just saw in the story before you, that he is meeting with more middle-of-the-road, established Republicans like Mitt Romney, who ripped into him during the campaign.
But the question is -- oh, he's also talking with a female governor from the state of South Carolina. The question is, will he want a broad array of potential more of a diverse team or not?
VINJAMURI (PH): Yes, it will be very interesting to see whether he seriously considers somebody like Mitt Romney. They haven't had historically an especially close relationship. Romney is much more moderate but very statesmanlike and would suggest that he was going to have a broader camp of people in his administration.
But I think we -- we really can't place any bets yet on what will happen with secretary of state. He's mentioned John Bolton. A number of people have come and go in the last couple of days. That's definitely something to watch very, very carefully. And the rest of the world will be especially interested in that appointment.
ALLEN: Hate crimes and bigotry have increased since the election here in the U.S. The world is watching, of course.
What is happening here perhaps to see what might evolve elsewhere?
The U.S. is the country the world looks to stability and problem- solving.
So where do we go from here with what's happened in the U.S.?
VINJAMURI (PH): Very worrying, because I think the rhetoric that's come out of Sessions, who will be attorney general, and Mike Flynn, who will be national security advisor, has received a lot of --
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VINJAMURI (PH): -- criticism in the United States from the ACLU, from our civil liberties organizations and that -- that rhetoric throughout the campaign has sent terrible signals about America's respect for human rights and for different groups of people.
And, unfortunately, these appointments affirm that that language might continue to be acceptable. And so I -- again, we're going to have to wait and see who else is appointed. But it's not a good sign and people will be watching this, our allies as well as those who have not been our allies.
ALLEN: Right. Thank you so much, Leslie Vinjamuri (ph), from London. Thank you.
HOWELL: So we've talked about the main stories with Flynn, with Sessions and with Pompeo. But the big story today I think that will be a main driver will be the fact that Donald Trump is going to meet with Mitt Romney -- I mean, Mitt Romney, the same man who called him a fraud, a phony.
ALLEN: Our clips there --
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ALLEN: for Donald Trump that he's meeting with Mitt Romney --
HOWELL: What will that meeting be like?
Is it a head fake or could Mitt Romney actually be offered a position in the Trump administration?
We'll see.
ALLEN: Certainly will.
HOWELL: As for the incoming U.S. president, he will likely be a hot topic at the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Peru. The U.S. president, Barack Obama, landed there Friday night. World leaders are meeting in just a few hours to begin that summit.
ALLEN: Those leaders expected to ask Mr. Obama some pointed questions over free trade and trade agreements, which Donald Trump opposed throughout his campaign. Athena Jones has more for us from Peru.
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ATHENA JONES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: President Obama arrives here in Lima, facing some difficult conversations during this APEC summit. There's no denying that the White House expected a very different result from the election. President Obama said many times that he did not expect Donald Trump to be elected president.
Well, now that Donald Trump has been elected president, there's a lot of uncertainty about the direction that U.S. foreign policy is going to take in the coming years.
One thing we know is that President-Elect Trump has been skeptical of a series of international agreements. Chief among them is the TPP, the Trans-Pacific Partnership. He has called that 12-nation trade deal a disaster.
We know from congressional leaders on Capitol Hill that that deal is not going to come up for a vote in the lame duck session of Congress. That means that it is dead. That's a big blow to the Obama administration's efforts to rebalance foreign policy in the U.S. toward the Asia Pacific region, which is a powerhouse on the economic front and important militarily as well.
The White House says that the president will try to make the case that the U.S. should remain engaged in that region. But it's unclear just how effective he's going to be able to be.
We know that China stands ready to fill the void left by the failure of the TPP with its own massive multi-nation trade deal. The White House says that that deal would lower or eliminate tariffs but wouldn't have the same high standards, standards protecting things like intellectual property, the environment, labor standards.
It wouldn't have those same high standards that the TPP has. And it would leave U.S. companies at a disadvantage. So this is going to be potentially a difficult trip for President Obama, who is scheduled to meet with China's president, Xi Jinping, and Australia's prime minister Malcolm Turnbull during the trip. Back to you.
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HOWELL: Athena Jones, thank you.
This is a brutal scene. It's becoming, though, all too common in Aleppo, Syria.
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HOWELL (voice-over): It's a little girl that was found beneath the rubble after an airstrike. We will show you the video of that and what happened next.
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ALLEN (voice-over): Plus, a dying teenager gets her wish to have her body frozen for a chance at a future life.
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HOWELL: The crisis in Syria in Eastern Aleppo, the U.N. says rebel groups have agreed in principle to a relief plan there. But Syria and Russia, they have not given the green light to that relief plan; 46 people were killed on Friday alone, the fourth day of government airstrikes.
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HOWELL (voice-over): We want to show you some video that is just difficult to watch. These are rescuers who found a little girl in rubble. These scenes like these, these are brutal scenes; they happen day in and day out in Aleppo.
You see half of her body appears to be trapped. She seems to remain calm there, seems to be in shock and is almost emotionless.
Then she is rescued. Keep in mind, there are so many more who are not rescued.
CNN's Will Ripley is live in Istanbul, Turkey, following the story for us. Will, just talking about the video we just showed our viewers, you
really get a sense of the pain that so many of these families are enduring for so long.
WILL RIPLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It's their reality, day in and day out. Death and destruction surrounds these children. It's hard to find people in East Aleppo who haven't lost family and close friends and classmates.
And it happens, as you said, pretty much every single day. Just in the last two months since September 19th, when the cease-fire broke down, 1,086 people have died. And that's according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
We should point out those are deaths in rebel-held East Aleppo because of attacks by the Syrian regime and Russian warplanes for a time, although Russia now says they're not actually bombing East Aleppo but outlying areas in the countryside in Syria.
But those deaths also include civilians in government-held West Aleppo; rebel attacks are also hitting civilians. And both sides have accused each other of doing horrific things, war crimes, like using chemical weapons on people.
So this is a very sad situation. The relief plan that has been agreed upon by the rebel side but not yet by Russia and Syria would at least provide some assistance in terms of food and medicine.
There are some medications that are already gone, according to doctors that we're speaking with in the city. Markets are running very low. People are running out of food and the winter is coming so they can't grow food like many families have been doing just to survive.
HOWELL: Will, let's talk about the fact that hospitals, these are places where -- I just don't want this to be lost on people who are watching. You go to a hospital. You think you're going there to get treatment, to get to feel better.
But people go to hospitals in many parts of Syria, they find themselves the target of bombardments. These buildings have become death targets. Explain what's happening there in Aleppo and in other hospitals around Syria.
RIPLEY: People are afraid to go to the hospital right now, even if they are sick and injured. The hospitals have been targeted, especially just in the last week. At the beginning of the week, depending upon count, it was either eight or nine --
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RIPLEY: -- hospitals functioning inside East Aleppo. Now the consensus is that there are four hospitals operating and not even necessarily fully operational. All of the trauma centers have been put out of commission for now.
In the past, hospitals that have been damaged by these barrel bombs and airstrikes, they have been able to repair them and get them up and running relatively quickly.
But that is becoming more difficult because supplies in East Aleppo are running very low. And this is getting the attention of the U.S. State Department. The spokesperson, John Kirby, talked about these allegations that not only Syrian warplanes but Russian warplanes are targeting hospitals in East Aleppo and in other rebel-held parts of Syria.
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JOHN KIRBY, U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT: I can't speak for the Syrian military or the Russian military. I don't know whose airplanes are hitting these hospitals. What I can say is we've got credible claims from legitimate -- you know, well-established agencies that are reporting this and they are hospitals.
And they are patients; people that are trying to get well are, in fact, being bombed. And frankly, it doesn't really matter whose airplane is dropping the bomb. It's either the Syrians or the Russians or both. The fact is it's got to stop. It needs to stop.
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RIPLEY: And many people in East Aleppo feel that they have been forgotten about by the world because the focus is on the U.S. presidential transition.
And when you have these images coming out of the city, these horrific images every single day, George, people do get desensitized. They compartmentalize it and they think, yes, this is happening halfway around the world. But for the people in this city, more than a quarter million people, this is their reality.
HOWELL: That is their reality. Will Ripley, live in Istanbul, thank you for the reporting.
ALLEN: It's also been a reality in Yemen. People there, just like some people in Aleppo, have been caught in the middle for so long. They need food. They need other supplies. And we hear that there is a cease-fire.
Saudi state media reporting that a 48-hour cease-fire began in Yemen about an hour ago. The Saudi-led coalition declared the temporary halt, calling on enemies to stop fighting.
HOWELL: Reports say that the peace could be extended if the Houthi rebels and their allies honor it. We are hearing some humanitarian aid, though, might take to the -- some to the conflict areas during the cease-fire. So we'll continue to watch that.
ALLEN: We turn now to Mosul; the fight continues there. The United Nations trying to sustain aid operations for displaced citizens. They are stressing the need for more funding to keep going at their current rate to help people.
Meantime, the Iraqi air force says it killed 26 ISIS fighters near Mosul on Friday. The first strike hit an ISIS vehicle in positions near the town of Tal Afar, west of Mosul. A second strike hit south of Mosul.
U.S. officials have arrived in Australia to begin the transfer of hundreds of refugees to the United States.
HOWELL: The U.S. team will soon travel to the tiny republic of Nauru just off Australia's coast to assess asylum seekers that are being held in detention centers there. This is according to Australia's prime minister, who says no timeframe has been announced for when the refugees will be leaving for the United States. Most of the asylum seekers are from the Middle East and Southwest Asia.
Talking about blizzard conditions in the United States. Parts of the U.S. and the Midwest very difficult situations.
ALLEN: Right. Derek Van Dam joins us now to talk about this arrival of winter.
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HOWELL: Want to tell you about a British teenager who lost a battle with cancer but won her fight to have her body cryogenically frozen. She hopes to be revived someday far off, when there is a cure for her disease. CNN's Samuel Burke explains the legal case and the odd science behind it.
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SAMUEL BURKE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: A final wish from a young British girl just 14 years old, who knows she won't survive the rare form of cancer she is battling.
"I have been asked to explain why I want this unusual thing done. I'm only 14 years old and I don't want to die. But I know I'm going to. I think being cryopreserved gives me a chance to be cured and woken up, even in hundreds of years' time.
"I think that in the future they might find a cure for my cancer and wake me up. I want to have this chance. This is my wish."
The girl's divorced parents disagreed with each other about carrying this out, the father writing, "Even if the treatment is successful and she is brought back to life in, let's say, 200 years, she may not find any relative and she might not remember things and she may be left in a desperate situation, given that she is only 14 years old and will be in the United States of America."
Friday we learned the judge allowed the procedure to be carried out a few weeks ago. The girl's lawyer said it wasn't revealed to the public initially out of respect for the family.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Having a very experienced children's solicitor involved and in addition to that, the medical professionals and a social worker, who happened to be on the case already, enabled the judge to be confident that this was an articulate, intelligent girl, who had clearly thought very hard about what she wanted.
BURKE: To cryogenically freeze a body, the patient should be pronounced dead as soon as possible after the clinical death. So when this young girl died here in London on October 17th, the first step was to immediately cool the body using an ice bath.
Then the blood is flushed out and replaced with a special non-toxic anti-freeze to prevent ice crystals forming, which would damage the cells. After that, the body is packed in dry ice for transportation. And when it arrives at the final destination, the body is slowly cooled down to even lower temperatures over several days and then placed in a storage tank filled with liquid nitrogen.
Many experts say cryogenics has never been proven to work, remaining in the realm of science fiction.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE) cryonic (ph) patients are refugees from (INAUDIBLE) because they won't survive if they stay here. And it's a very uncertain trip to the future. But that might still may be better to be in (INAUDIBLE) future than being dead.
BURKE: There are only three cryogenic centers in the world, Moscow, Arizona, and Michigan, where this young girl's body is now, with her hopes that it won't be her final resting spot -- Samuel Burke, CNN, London.
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ALLEN: Glad she got her wish.
HOWELL: That's for sure, for sure.
CNN NEWSROOM continues after this. We are live from Atlanta, broadcasting at home and around the globe this hour. Stay with us.
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HOWELL (voice-over): Welcome back to our viewers here in the United States and around the world. You're watching CNN NEWSROOM. It is good to have you with us. I'm George Howell.
ALLEN (voice-over): And I'm Natalie Allen. Here are our top stories.
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HOWELL: Jeff Sessions, let's talk more about him. He comes from a small town in Alabama here in the southeastern part of the U.S.. Most of the voters there cast ballots for Donald Trump.
ALLEN: CNN's Gary Tuchman went there and asked residents about Sessions' nomination for America's top law enforcement job.
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GARY TUCHMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In tiny Heflin, Alabama, the cabinet nomination of Alabama's own Jeff Sessions is the talk of the town.
JEFF SESSIONS, FORMER UNITED STATES SENATOR: I was surprised but glorified. I'm just overjoyed with it. I think he's going to do us a great job.
TUCHMAN: Heflin, the county seat of Cleburne County, is where we came to talk about Sessions and other Trump cabinet nominees.
As of now it's been all white men named to be cabinet, is that OK with you?
NANCY BINION, ALABAMA VOTER: It is, yes.
TUCHMAN: But would you like to see a woman if she's qualified?
BINION: I would. Yes, I would.
TUCHMAN: But not necessarily if everyone's qualified they are all white men, that's OK with you?
BINION: It is.
WANDA SMITH, ALABAMA VOTER: I'm not a feminist. So it doesn't matter with me one way or the other as long as they know how to do their job.
TUCHMAN: 88 percent of Cleburne County voters cast their ballots for Donald Trump. So they are loyal to him as well as Sessions. But we had questions. Jeff sessions in 1986 wanted to be a federal judge.
PATRICK GRIZZARD, ALABAMA VOTER: Yes.
TUCHMAN: He was rejected by a republican committee because of racially charged comments he made. He called the NAACP, the ACLU communist inspired, un-American. Do you think that should disqualify him?
GRIZZARD: No. Because 30 years ago that was something common for somebody to say.
TUCHMAN: If he said something hike that more recently, few years ago or last year, would you think that would be enough to disqualify him?
GRIZZARD: Yes.
BINION: 30 years ago, I went to an all-white school or maybe longer than 30 years. But when I was in high school I went to an all-white school (INAUDIBLE) all black school. I was all for that because I didn't know any better.
TUCHMAN: So if you did know any better back then? BINION: Well, there's a chance he didn't.
TUCHMAN: If he made those comments today or a few years ago --
BINION: (INAUDIBLE) that would bother me. Yes, it would.
TUCHMAN: And what about the nominee for national security adviser, Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn?
MICHAEL FLYNN, RETIRED ARMY LIEUTENANT GENERAL: Lock her up. That's right.
TUCHMAN: Who was a fiery in controversial advocate for Trump on the campaign trail. He in the past has talked about Islam and he said Islam definitely hides behind being a religion. It's a political ideology did that trouble you?
AMANDA JOHNSON, ALABAMA VOTER: I don't think that's true. That might be his opinion, but I don't think it's true.
TUCHMAN: So does it bother you, should that disqualify him from being the national security adviser?
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TUCHMAN: He's acknowledged making those comments.
JOHNSON: Well, maybe he knows a heck of a lot more about it than I do.
TUCHMAN: And then there's the other nominee of the day Congressman Mike Pompeo for CIA chief. A few talk to know much about him but this woman feels the congressman may not have the proper experience to run the CIA. Does that trouble you?
CAROLYN LIMON, ALABAMA VOTER: A little yes, sir. If they don't have the experience, yes.
TUCHMAN: I mean, but Donald Trump picked him.
LIMON: Yes. Well, I might -- we can't agree with everything he does.
TUCHMAN: But in this small town there seems to be a general agreement that the presidential transition is going just fine. Do you think there are some people in this country, the political establishment, the news media who just don't get?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They never had it. I'm serious.
TUCHMAN: Gary Tuchman, CNN, Heflin, Alabama.
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ALLEN: Donald Trump flip-flopped on the campaign trail over which countries should have nuclear weapons. HOWELL: Soon, Trump will be responsible for the United States' nuclear codes. That has some of his national security critics on edge, as Brian Todd explains for us.
BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In about nine weeks, Donald Trump will take hold of America's nuclear codes. He'll be able to launch nuclear missiles with a single, momentary decision. And tonight, there are serious concerns about whether Trump wants countries like Japan and South Korea to have nuclear weapons. As a candidate, Trump said this ...
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT-ELECT OF THE UNITED STATES: Wouldn't you rather, in a certain sense, have Japan have nuclear weapons when North Korea has nuclear weapons?
TODD: A few days later, he went back on that, sort of.
TRUMP: Japan should have nuclear, that's what I said, supposedly. I didn't say that. I would rather have them not armed. But I'm not going to continue to lose this tremendous amount of money. And frankly, the case could be made that let them protect themselves against North Korea.
TODD: Anti-nuclear advocates say the uncertainty is dangerous.
JOSEPH CIRINCIONE, PRESIDENT OF THE PLOUGHSHARES FUND: Japan is in crisis, South Korea is in even in a more severe crisis. There are ultra-right, nationalists forces in both countries that want nuclear weapons. The president of the United States must be absolutely clear that we do not want them to do that. That is not the path for security in Asia.
TODD: We asked the Trump transition team to clarify the president- elect's position. We haven't heard back. Tonight, some of Trump's national security critics say they're outright scared about him having the nuclear codes. They describe him as quick-tempered, prone to lash out.
TRUMP: I would bomb the (BLEEP) out of them.
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: If your closest advisers don't trust you to tweet, how can you trust him with the nuclear codes? You can't do it.
TODD: Trump told NBC he'll be responsible with the codes.
TRUMP (via telephone): I will not be a happy trigger like some people might be. I will be the last, but I will never, ever rule it out.
TODD: The moment he's sworn in, Trump will have several potential nuclear crises to deal with. Tensions between Vladimir Putin's forces and NATO are escalating. North Korea's belligerent dictator Kim Jong- un already has nuclear weapons that can threaten his neighbors and tens of thousands of U.S. troops in South Korea. If there's an alarm, even a false one, Trump would have only a few minutes to decide whether to launch nuclear weapons or hold back. Pete Metzger is a former marine who carried the nuclear football, the (INAUDIBLE) with launch codes, for President Reagan.
PETE METZGER, CARRIED NUCLEAR FOOTBALL FOR PRESIDENT REAGAN: The result of a decision the president would make is so grotesquely horrible, so grotesquely horrible. It would change the face of the earth, it would change humanity, it would change mankind.
TODD: If the president decides to use the football and actually launch a nuclear strike, is there anyone in the chain of command who can stop that order?
The White House won't comment on that. But Pete Metzger and other experts tell us that unless there's a full-on mutiny, no one can stop that order -- Brian Todd, CNN, Washington.
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ALLEN: Ahead here, a satellite set to launch soon is expected to revolutionize the way we get our weather forecast. Derek's all (INAUDIBLE) over it.
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HOWELL: We have the story. NEWSROOM's back after this.
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HOWELL: Welcome back to CNN NEWSROOM. I'm George Howell.
Tens of thousands of people came together to protest in Seoul, South Korea, for a candlelight vigil. You see this image here, the street crowded with people for several weekends in a row now.
Demonstrators have been calling for their leader to either step down or to be impeached. President Park Geun-hye is embroiled in a corruption scandal involving a friend and allegations of influence peddling.
ALLEN: She's hanging onto her office so far.
HOWELL: She is, she is. A lot of people, though, are pushing back against that.
Let's talk now about Pope Francis. He has appointed 17 new cardinals; many of them have backgrounds in the type of humanitarian work the pope himself has promote promoted.
ALLEN: And something different from the past; several come from developing nations, which have never had representation at the Vatican before.
HOWELL: Our CNN Vatican correspondent, Delia Gallagher, is following the story live in Rome this hour. Delia, it's always good to have you. So let's talk about what this
signals for the direction.
DELIA GALLAGHER, CNN VATICAN CORRESPONDENT: Well, George, this is a really important way that the pope puts his stamp on the future of the Catholic Church. These men cannot only potentially elect a new pope but they could become pope themselves.
The pope has just finished giving a talk to his cardinals in which he said God turns away no one. He said, we are the ones who build walls and label people. And he called upon them not to shut themselves away but to be in the heart of the crowd.
That is really kind of the choice that he has made in choosing these new cardinals, men who are already in the heart of the crowd, who are working on the front lines with immigration, with the poor, with the issues on the environment. There are many, many cases that the pope has met personally and has been impressed --
[05:45:00]
GALLAGHER: -- by, as you said, places that don't normally receive a cardinal, such as Bangladesh, Papua New Guinea, the Central African Republic. There are three Americans, also somewhat of outsider choices there.
Blaze Cupich (ph) from Chicago, already a surprise in 2014 when the pope made him the head of the church in Chicago, there is also Monsignor Tobin from Indianapolis, who kind of butted heads with Governor Mike Pence over welcoming a Syrian family into Indianapolis, an issue which is important to Pope Francis.
And Monsignor Kevin Ferrell, who was formerly of Dallas and the pope is now bringing him over to Rome to head one of his new Vatican offices on the family -- George.
ALLEN: And, Delia, this is Natalie. It also signals a more progressive stance for the Catholic Church, one would think, with the backgrounds of these cardinals.
GALLAGHER: Yes, absolutely. I mean, one could say they are at war in the stamp of Pope Francis on those issues. Archbishop Cupich (ph), for example, was a special representative, chosen by the pope to come over here last year when he held that big conference on the family.
And there he was seen to be in the progressive camp on outreach to divorced Catholics and to the gay and lesbian community. So certainly some of these choices can be seen as a more progressive hope in Pope Francis to put his stamp on the Catholic Church.
But equally, again, to sort of highlight places that don't normally get a lot of attention and men who are working on those issues that are important to Pope Francis.
HOWELL: This pope has always been sort of nontraditional.
And making these progressive choices, is it causing any degree of friction?
GALLAGHER: Well, certainly there is a lot of debate going on within the Catholic Church, George, over some of the pope's pronouncements and some of the things that he is doing.
The pope has said time and time again that he likes the mess. He wants change. He's going to try and push for it in various ways that some people are obviously going to push back on.
But there is no doubt that, on a number of issues, Pope Francis wants to see some change in the church. And there are always going to be people who are not happy about that.
Now that being said, we have still got a college of cardinals which has been put in place by John Paul II and Pope Benedict. So there's still a good split between more progressives and conservative cardinals, as is the case with the church worldwide.
So certainly interesting times right now in the Catholic Church to see how it's all going to play out.
HOWELL: Indeed.
ALLEN: And we're watching them become cardinals right now.
Delia Gallagher for us, thank you.
HOWELL: Delia, thank you.
ALLEN: We'll be right back.
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(SPORTS)
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ALLEN: All right. We have new satellites launching from the U.S. today.
Guess who is really excited about that?
He's going to tell us why we all should care.
DEREK VAN DAM, AMS METEOROLOGIST: You should be excited about it, too. It's going to drastically improve the weather forecast you get on your iPhones. It's also going to improve accuracy of, let's say, tornado warnings. We're all family people here.
Your parents, you want to have more time to prepare for tornadoes, flash floods, violent storms. This launch of the satellite is going to increase those lead times for meteorologists. This is critical information. Show you exactly what it is. We got a behind-the scenes-look and we're going to show you at home.
It is called the GOES-R satellite. This is in conjunction with NOAA and NASA. GOES stands for geostationary operational environmental satellite. This is the Atlas capsule, this thing has four thrusters on it that's going to boost this thing about 20,000 miles into the sky. It's going to take 14 days to do that.
Inside of it is an $11 billion satellite that is going to improve the weather technology greatly. I'm going to explain just how with this behind-the-scenes look.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This spacecraft will impact 300 million people a day.
VAN DAM (voice-over): This is GOES-R, the next-generation of U.S. weather satellites that will revolutionize the way you get your daily forecasts. The information from this satellite will be like going from analog to ultra HD resolution with one flip of a switch.
This is what weather satellite imagery used to look like, grainy black and white images that were hard to read. And this is what it will look like now with this super high-resolution imagery from the GOES-R. The first weather satellite, Tiros I, was small and circular with two television cameras that polar orbited the Earth.
By the 1970s, NASA began the GOES missions, geostationary satellites that continuously monitored the U.S. instead of circling the Earth. Today's GOES-R satellite will also have an even more advanced sensor that will record images simultaneously in 16 different wavelengths, 11 more than our current GOES satellite.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In six months it will return more data than all the other U.S. geostationary weather satellites have downloaded in the past 40 years.
VAN DAM (voice-over): For several years it has been like we upgraded our forecast models to high definition but were still shooting with standard definition cameras. But now by starting with a higher resolution image, with more detail, the goal of prediction models meteorologists use will instantly improve.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's a severe storm somewhere in the United States over a 1,000-by-1,000 kilometer area they can take a picture every 30 seconds. So that means as you string those together, you can have almost a not quite real-time movie of a storm as it's developing.
VAN DAM (voice-over): But it's not just earthly disasters the satellite is protecting us from. The spacecraft also has a solar ultraviolet imager that will monitor what is called space weather or rather eruptions from the sun that can impact Earth.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Trillions of dollars of our economy is weather related or --
[05:55:00]
-- can be impacted by weather and the GOES satellite helps to provide warning.
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HOWELL: Wow.
VAN DAM: So I know that was a lot of information. But what I really want you to take from this is that satellites now, with the technology we have, takes pictures of the Earth every 30 minutes. You see the evolution of a thunderstorm or cyclone or hurricane forming.
But you have critical information lost in that 30 minutes. Now it's every 30 seconds. We can see almost a real-time development of severe thunderstorms; that means better accuracy, improved lead times for your family to protect yourself from tornadoes.
ALLEN: You got our attention with the before and after, what you see now from space, the storm, and what we're all going to see.
VAN DAM: Exactly. It's really going to improve. But there is big stakes here. A lot of nervous scientists. When this thing goes up today, weather permitting, 5:42 in the evening, Eastern Standard Time from Cape Canaveral, $11 billion program like this, a lot of nervous scientists out there.
HOWELL: The weather is looking pretty good.
VAN DAM: Sunny and 60s, according to your iPhone.
(CROSSTALK)
HOWELL: Let's talk about this next story.
ALLEN: We got one more for you.
What would the satellite think of this right here?
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ALLEN: This is Santa Clara, California. People there wondered if this was snow or an enormous bubble bath. It was actually fire retardant resulting from a system malfunction near the San Jose International Airport.
HOWELL: Giant blob of foam. It overtook the streets there. No actual fire, though. But it entertained a lot of people for hours.
(CROSSTALK)
VAN DAM: With his bicycle. I would have been that guy.
HOWELL: Yes, you totally would.
ALLEN: All right. We got to go on that one. Thanks for watching. I'm Natalie Allen.
HOWELL: I'm George Howell with Derek Van Dam. For our viewers in the United States, NEW DAY is next. For other viewers around the world the "BEST OF QUEST" starts in a moment. Thank you for watching CNN, the world's news leader.
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