19
First" Foreign Policy Vision; Brazil's President Fights Impeachment,
Talks Olympics; Facebook Just Keeps Growing; Drought Adds to
Venezuela's Economic Crisis; Dennis Hastert Sentenced for Abuse;
Indiana Primary Could Hold Key to Nominations; Trump Popularity Soars
in Russia; Former Afghan NATO Military Base Becomes Drug Rehab Camp;
Girl to Meet Obama Amid Flint Water Crisis. Aired 2-3a ET - Part 2>
Now let's switch over and take a peek at the Democratic race. Let me move out of the super delegates for now. This math is simple. Just pledged delegates. But there's a reason Bernie Sanders is laying off field staffers. Yes, he says he still has plenty of people for the remaining contest. But Hillary Clinton now 300-plus lead in pledged delegates. She believes game over last night. She wants to roll next week into Indiana for essentially an exclamation point. She won the state narrowly in 2008. She wants to win it again this time to shut down the Sanders campaign finally. In 2008, it was to keep her campaign going. If that happens, number one, she pulls out to here. Number two, the Clinton campaign believes that would take it through to the end, get her around 2,195, 2,200. Maybe not with pledged delegates to the finish line, but plenty of room to spare when you bring in Clinton's enormous lead among super delegates. She has 502 right now to 42 for Bernie Sanders, game set and match. In this scenario, she would win big-time. The one thing the Clinton campaign worries about, not that Bernie Sanders can catch up, but they do worry that somehow he could poll off a win in Indiana next week. There would be some indication that after all this talk that Hillary Clinton is inevitable, the Democratic Party has a little bit of buyer's remorse. That's why in the next week, expect her not to let up. She'll go for the Indiana win. And she believes if she gets it, she won't coast to the finish line but, mathematically, she's got a good case to make and that the final finish line more within reach.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CHURCH: Let's go back to the topic of Donald Trump. And interestingly, his popularity seems to be soaring in Russia.
Senior international correspondent, Fred Pleitgen, takes a look at why so many Russians seem to be on Team Trump.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
FRED PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It's no secret that Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin seem to feel a certain admiration for each other.
VLADIMIR PUTIN, RUSSIAN PRESIDENT (through translation): He is a brilliant and talented person, without a doubt.
TRUMP: And I like him because he called me a genius. He said Trump is the new real leader, Trump should be the leader and he's a total genius.
PLEITGEN: And many ordinary Russians are Trump fans as well. "The key thing about him is his willingness for a breakthrough in relations with Russia," this man says. "Maybe they won't get closer. But at least there will be dialogue."
And this man adds, "First of all, Trump is a positive guy and he spoke about Putin in a good way. He wants positive change in America."
In a recent UGOV poll conducted in the G20 nations, those surveyed in every country said they would take Hillary Clinton over Trump, except in Russia, where the Donald leads by a landslide.
While relations between Russia and the Obama administration have soured over Moscow's policy in Ukraine and Syria, Trump in his foreign policy speech, says he thinks he can work with Russia.
TRUMP: I believe an easing of tensions and improved relations with Russia, from a position of strength only, is possible.
PLEITGEN (on camera): Many Russians believe if Donald Trump were to become president that the U.S. would have a more isolationist foreign policy. They think that would lead to fewer disagreements between the U.S. and Russia, and ultimately to better relations.
(voice-over): A recent Trump campaign video seemingly lumping Putin in with ISIS as a challenge to America did lead to some anger in the Kremlin.
But Fyodor Lukyanov, head of the Russian Council on Foreign and Defense Policy, said Vladimir Putin still appreciates Trump's style.
FYODOR LUKYANOV, DIRECTOR, RUSSIAN COUNCIL ON FOREIGN AND DEFENSE POLICY: He basically likes those who are frank, open, and disregard political correctness. And this is exactly the case of Mr. Trump.
PLEITGEN: It's a style that propelled Vladimir Putin to several terms as Russia's prime minister and president.
While some believe Trump's frankness could carry him all the way into the White House, he still has a long way to go.
Fred Pleitgen, CNN, Moscow.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
[02:40:05] CHURCH: And Russia just launched its first rocket from a new Cosmodrome. This successful lift-off came a day after a technical glitch. Scientists sent an unmanned Soyuz rocket carrying three satellites into orbit on the new space port near China's border. This is Russia's first Cosmodrome. It currently uses a site in Kazakhstan. Wednesday's scrubbed launch did not sit well with President Putin, who flew thousands of kilometers to witness it. This was the latest problem to plague the Russian space program, which Mr. Putin is trying to revive.
Well, meantime, the private aerospace company SpaceX has set its sights on the red planet. It announced plans to land an unmanned spacecraft known as Red Dragon on Mars as early as 2018. Founder Elon Musk has said he hopes SpaceX will fly people to the red planet by around 2025. The Red Dragon would survey the Martian terrain and potentially collect soil samples. SpaceX says it will provide more details at a meeting of astronomers in September. Very exciting. Well, security cameras were rolling when a plane fell from the sky. It happened outside a towing company in Alabama in the southern U.S. The twin-engine Cessna slammed into a tree and burst into flames. Incredibly, the pilot escaped with just a cut on his hand and a pretty big headache.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RUSSELL SMITH, PILOT: She was on fire, and I was in a hurry to get out because I saw that I only have a few seconds. And I actually done a back tumblesault out of the cockpit door to get out.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHURCH: How about that? Russell Smith says he's been a pilot for 50 years and had never had an accident before. Federal authorities are investigating that crash.
A senior manager for the Transportation Security Administration claims he was ordered to target certain passengers at the Minneapolis airport. What he told a congressional committee. That's coming up.
And another war being fought in Afghanistan at a former NATO base. We'll explain.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[02:45:39] CHURCH: Welcome back to CNN NEWSROOM. An employee of the U.S. Transportation Security Administration claims his bosses told him to racially profile Somali-Americans. In a statement, the TSA said it does not tolerate racial profiling. But a senior manager at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport told a congressional committee his supervisor ordered him to run the names of Somali imams and community members through a terrorist data base.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANDREW RHOADES, SENIOR MANAGER, TRANSPORTATION SECURITY ADMINISTRATION: Additionally, my supervisor accused me of "going native" after attending a meeting at a local mosque. Those in the community in Minneapolis know I would never betray their trust by profiling them.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHURCH: Minneapolis has one of America's largest Somali populations.
We turn to Afghanistan now. And a former NATO military base is now being used in a different battle. It's a large and heavily fortified rehab center for the country's heroin addicts.
Nick Paton Walsh takes us inside Camp Phoenix. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NICK PATON WALSH, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Day one in a prison that might just set you free. These new arrivals are heroin addicts beginning rehab. Delivered by desperate families or grabbed by police from the street. Men who've hit rock bottom on Afghanistan's biggest export.
Cigarettes and phones are banned in the coldest turnkey imaginable.
"I have pain all over my body," he says, "and I'm so exhausted that if I had a knife I'd cut myself apart."
Take a step back here and there's one big oddity. They're getting rehab in what was once just months ago a NATO military base. Walls built to keep the Taliban out now keep addicts in.
(on camera): NATO left quite a bit of chaos in its wake but also many huge sprawling bases like this, places the Afghan army simply hasn't got the money to maintain in full. So there must be some comfort that the exorbitant costs of the NATO campaign here that didn't really make a dent in the problem of heroin in Afghanistan. Well, the resources behind it can get put to use to help ordinary Afghans.
(voice-over): Withdrawal could be deadly.
Here what once cost armies millions like fiber optic wiring can kill. The most desperate patients trying to hang themselves from it. Or even burn down their rooms. Sometimes they fight. Sometimes they just shiver.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In danger because opium traders, they give us warning because very bad effect on their economy. They'll be discredited. So that's why they are trying to enter inside the hospital.
PATON WALSH: Even in the wreckage of America's longest war, money is limited.
They just let out as many patients each day as they let in. Back into a country with its own sense of withdrawal, where the West's departure has left poverty and despair and the unknown.
Nick Paton Walsh, CNN, Kabul.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CHURCH: The city of Flint, Michigan, has been dealing with widespread water contamination. So an 8-year-old girl wrote a letter to the U.S. president. And we will tell you what she got in return.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(WEATHER REPORT)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [02:53:14] CHURCH: New Zealand has taken home top honors in a world currency competition. Its $5 bill was awarded best bank note of 2015 by the International Bank Note Society. The winning note features Edmund Hillary on the front and a native penguin on the back.
For months, people in the U.S. city of Flint, Michigan, have been exposed to potentially dangerous levels of lead in their water. So an 8-year-old girl, known as Little Miss Flint, decided to take action. She asked for help from the U.S. President himself, and she succeeded.
Dave Bondy, with our affiliate, WEYI, reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MARI COPENY, 8-YEAR-OLD FLINT RESIDENT: I am excited.
DAVE BONDY, REPORTER, WEYI (voice-over): 8-year-old Mari Copeny forgot that she and her mom, Lulu Brezzell, had written the letter to President Obama asking for him to come to town. It was this morning when Lulu got an unexpected phone call from a White House spokesperson with the big news.
LULU BREZZELL, MOTHER OF MARI: I'm like, really? He's coming? And he wants to meet her? He's like, yeah, he really wants to meet her, that's why he wants to come to Flint. Like, it was her letter that finally got him to come here.
BONDY: Part of Mari's letter to the president reads, quote, "I am one of the children that is affected by this water and I've been doing my best to march in protest, to speak out for all the kids that live here in Flint," unquote.
Mari already knows what she is going to say to Obama when it comes to the water.
COPENY: It smells like bleach and old fish.
BONDY: Obama wrote Mari saying, in part, quote, "I am so proud of you for using your voice to speak out on behalf of the children of Flint," unquote.
Mari's mom is excited but wants this visit to be more than just a photo op. She wants and needs the president's help.
BREZZELL: I hope that maybe with him coming here it will open his eyes to how bad it really is and how it's not just people blowing it out of proportion, that he can see for himself.
[02:55:05] BONDY: Little Mari is a bit overwhelmed with all the attention. The president will find out, just like I did, you never know what this little girl is going to say.
(on camera): If I'm the president sitting here, what are you going to tell me, if I'm the president saying, what do you want me to do, young lady?
COPENY: You sound nothing like the president.
BONDY: OK, I don't sound the president.
COPENY: Because you're not him.
BONDY: I know I'm not, and I never will be.
COPENY: He doesn't have that much hair.
(LAUGHTER)
BONDY: Are you going it say that to say that to him?
COPENY: No.
BONDY: OK.
(LAUGHTER)
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CHURCH: That girl's going to go a long way.
Our thanks to Dave Bondy for that report. Mr. Obama is expected to visit Flint on Wednesday.
Now, if the thought of running a half marathon makes you cringe, how about running one by mistake? A 12-year-old girl was supposed to run a five-kilometer race in New York. Her mum dropped her off near the starting line, and off she went. One problem. She found out later she was in the wrong race, one that was 21 kilometers. So she just kept going. Mom got pretty worried when her daughter didn't cross the 5K finish line. But a police officer found the little girl running the longer race. She was reunited with her mother and got a medal for her accidental half marathon. Everyone, very proud.
And you're watching CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Rosemary Church. I'll be back in just a moment with another hour of news from all around the world. Stick around.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(Byline: Rosemary Church, Jim Sciutto, Will Ripley, Christiane Amanpour, Cristina Alesci, Derek Van Dam, Ryan Young, John King, Fred Pleitgen, Nick Paton Walsh )
(Guest: Dave Bondy )
(High: Republican presidential candidate, Ted Cruz, has no mathematical chance of winning the Republican nomination for the U.S. presidency outright, but he has a running mate, and Cruz announced that former rival, Carly Fiorina, would be his pick for vice president. In a speech today in Washington, Republican presidential front runner, Donald Trump laid out his foreign policy vision defined by two words, "America First," and he immediately took aim at President Barack Obama, and also going after Hillary Clinton as secretary of state. A look at the international reaction to Trump's speech and fact-checking some of Trump's statements about foreign countries. Brazil's president says she will fight efforts to remove her from office, just days after the Senate elected a committee to vote on impeachment, and President Rousseff also talked about the upcoming Olympic Games. Facebook just keeps growing, and the company has posted stellar first quarter results after weak reports from other tech giants. The Venezuelan government is enacting a two-day work week for the public sector until at least the end of May to deal with its energy crisis. Former U.S. House Speaker Dennis Hastert was once a highly esteemed and powerful political figure, but now Hastert has confessed to sexually abusing boys when he worked as a teacher, and a judge has sentenced him to 15 months in prison for hiding money that he used to silence one of his victims. Voters go to the polls in Indiana this coming Tuesday, and that state could hold the key to the Republican and Democratic nominations. Interestingly, Republican front runner Donald Trump's popularity seems to be soaring in Russia, and a look at why so many Russians seem to be on Team Trump. A former NATO military base is now being used in a different battle, and Camp Phoenix is a large and heavily fortified rehab center for the country's heroin addicts. The city of Flint, Michigan, has been dealing with widespread water contamination, so an 8-year-old girl, Mari Copeny, wrote a letter to U.S. President Barack Obama and she asked for his help, and she succeeded.)
(Spec: Ted Cruz; Carly Fiorina; Indianapolis; Republicans; Donald Trump; Foreign Policy; Military; War; Barack Obama; Hillary Clinton; Russia; China; North Korea; South Korea, Japan; Thailand; Vietnam; South China Sea; East China Sea; Brazil; Dilma Rousseff; Impeachment; Olympics; Sports; Facebook; Apple; Twitter; Social Media; Internet; Technology; Business; Venezuela; Nicolas Maduro; Employment and Unemployment Economy; Drought; Weather; Utilities; Dennis Hastert; Trials; Prison; Youth; Abuse; Crime; Indiana; Democrats; Hillary Clinton; Bernie Sanders; Delegates; Polls; Russia; Vladimir Putin; Ukraine; Syria; Foreign Policy; Afghanistan; NATO; Camp Phoenix; Drugs; Heroine; Flint, Michigan; Toxic Water; Mari Copeny; Lulu Brezzell; Barack Obama; Health and Medicine; South America; Asia; Europe; World Affairs; Politics; Government)