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Some Miami Residents Refuse to Evacuate; Mass Exodus from Florida as Catastrophic Storm Nears; Some Florida Residents Are Determined to Ride Out the Storm; Tom Bossert Speaks at White House Press Briefing on Hurricane Irma. Aired 1:30-2p ET

Aired September 8, 2017 - 13:30   ET

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

[13:30:00] JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: So interesting to hear, Palm Beach, where Miami Beach was maybe a day, a day and a half ago. People told to get out.

You're right, Wolf. I talked to a man this morning, father of two kids. One 4-year-old, one 1-year-old, will ride it out inside his high rise on the 11th floor. He thinks he'll be safe. A lot of problem with that. One, the wind at the 11th floor to blow in windows. Two, Miami Beach could be cut off for days. They're very concerned about the storm surge. I'm standing three feet over sea level, maybe. A storm surge of 10 feet they're expecting, which will cover this area and go over that road into the stores and storefronts behind me. That's what the mayor of Miami Beach told me, expecting, even the best-case scenario.

If you're staying in Miami Beach you are in for days and days of agony. Not just the immediate moment of danger during the storm. Most people did evacuate as far as we can tell. An island, a city of 100,000 people. I hope more than half got out, but definitely still some are here, including in this area, parks that have a homeless population. There are still homeless people here. The parks officials have been out on ATVs trying to get people to safety. Tell them there is shelter. Telling them, no matter their economic condition, no matter how much money they have, we'll get you on a bus, they're told, and get you to safety. Safety might be a couple miles inland. Doesn't have to be that far. The biggest concern here, Wolf, as we've been noting, the storm surge, what can be deadly. You can't hunker down from storm surge -- Wolf?

WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: Miami Beach, and a lot of our viewers here in the United States and around the world have been to Miami Beach, South Beach, go up a bit along the coast towards the big hotels, the Fontainebleau, Belle Harbor, Hollywood Ft. Lauderdale. Is it pretty much evacuated? Are you seeing cars still staying put?

BERMAN: Look, it's nothing like it is if you come down here for a weekend in Miami Beach and you're used to the scene down here. It's nothing like that. But it's not empty. I mean, you see people jogging by. You drive down the streets and will see -- there's a guy on the bike, just rode by right there. You see people pushing a stroller from time to time. Nothing's open. In Miami Beach, nothing's open at all. None of these hotels are open. None of the restaurants are open. Couldn't find a single store open on Miami Beach. All closed. But there are still remnants of people here. And it could be a very difficult few days for them -- Wolf?

BLITZER: John Berman, we'll stay in very close touch with you as well. Stick around. Don't go far away.

A quick break. Up next, a brand-new forecast coming in from the National Hurricane Center. So where is the storm heading right now precisely?

Plus, thousands of thousands of people trying to desperately to evacuate Florida right now as this hurricane, Hurricane Irma, closes in. What many are facing, jammed highways, massive backups. A live report when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:37:27] BLITZER: They've been warned to get out of harm's way and thousands of thousands of Florida residents are taking that advice. The rush to escape Hurricane Irma triggered a mass exodus that could turn into one of the largest in U.S. history. In south Florida, Miami-Dade County, Broward County, they are home to more than six million people alone.

Our correspondent, Ed Lavandera, is on the road in south Florida.

Ed, update us on where you are, and what the conditions are like.

ED LAVANDERA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Wolf. We wanted to check out the evacuation routes through various parts of southern Florida just to kind of see and get a better sense how many people were hitting the road and listening to these warnings. And quite frankly, what we've seen at least down here from Dade County where we are now on the southern edge of Dade County, looking out on to the roads here this afternoon, from here through Broward County and into Palm Beach County, the areas we've focused on, and the roads, at least the major thoroughfares looked like this. These are the evacuation routes essentially. The highways you take to go from the very southern points of south Florida all the way north to get away from the impact zone and the worst of Hurricane Irma. That is the area that we've seen traffic running rather smoothly. We are approaching those final hours where people are urged, if you're going to move, now is the time to move.

I don't want to make it sound like this is the way, how clear, this is the plastic all the way to north Florida. Once you get closer to Orlando, Tampa, those areas, there is a fair amount of congestion. And it gets much slower. But at least down here in the southern part of Florida, in Dade County, Broward County, Palm Beach county, this is very close to what we've seen throughout the day here today -- Wolf?

BLITZER: Looks like still enormous, enormous traffic going in one direction and very little in the other direction.

Ed Lavandera, we'll get back to you.

As all viewers now know, mandatory evacuations in place for various places in Florida. Monroe County, home to the Florida Keys, for example, parts of Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach, Brevard and Sarasota Counties.

Congressman Ted Deutch represents the 22nd congressional district. including areas of Broward and Palm Beach counties. He's joining us from Boca Raton, Florida.

Congressman, thanks for joining us.

I know you're incredibly busy. What is your biggest fear now? We're only hours away from this hurricane hitting Florida.

[13:40:17] REP. TED DEUTCH, (D), FLORIDA (via telephone): Well, my biggest fear is over the things we do have control of, which is people's decision to follow or not to follow the mandatory evacuation that's in place for large parts of south Florida. People who live in areas that are subject to mandatory evacuation have to leave and can't leave until tomorrow, it might be too late and can't think they'll simply ride it out, and if there's a problem, emergency responders will come to them, because they won't. So that's my big concern. And beyond that, those working hard to take care of neighbors, everyone's chipping in. I just want them to do what they need to do to be safe.

BLITZER: It's not against the law for these people who want to ride it out to ignore the advice, and it's great advice, to get out, but to ignore the evacuation orders, right?

DEUTCH: But they're doing so at their own peril. The fact is, if they choose to stay, they're putting their, first of all, most importantly, their putting their lives at risk, but also have to understand that if there's a problem and they live in a mandatory evacuation zone, they can't expect people will come help them. That's why they need to come inland, come to a shelter. The shelters are filling up. In Broward County, for example, there are 23 available shelters, not all open yet, but there's room to accommodate people and their needs. That has to be the top priority now.

BLITZER: Have all the seniors, the elderly folks, retirees, some of whom can't move all that easily, have they all been evacuated as far as you know, at least in your district?

DEUTCH: Well, they haven't -- I can't say that they've all been evacuated. But I do know that there is an effort both at the government level and the non-profit level for people to get access to -- to helpers, to people who can help them pack up and take them to a shelter. So there's been an all-in effort to focus on especially the most vulnerable and we've seen a lot of elderly leave south Florida ahead of the storm. And also people that would have a really hard time getting throughs this are getting help.

BLITZER: Congressman Ted Deutch, of Florida, good luck to you, Congressman, your family, all the folks down there. We will still want to stay in touch with you in the hours ahead. Appreciate it very much.

DEUTCH: Thank you, Wolf. I appreciate it.

BLITZER: Still ahead, Florida's governor's warning that Hurricane Irma has the potential to bring catastrophic devastation to the state. Some residents, though, insist they will stay. We'll hear from one of them when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:45:55] BLITZER: Despite official warnings, mandatory evacuation orders, and the fact Hurricane Irma is the strongest Atlantic-basin hurricane ever recorded, some residents are determined to ride out the storm.

Our CNN correspondent, Rosa Flores, joins us from Miami Beach.

Tell us about the resident you spoke to who's insisting that, you know what, we can ignore these evacuation orders?

ROSA FLORES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You know, Wolf, he says that he has ridden through other storms before and he plans to ride Irma in his boat. Take a look around me. We've talked to at least two people. They live on this bay. And they say that they will be riding the storm here.

And as you said, we've been hearing from every public official in every level of Florida, and everybody is saying, evacuate, because this is such dangerous storm. So what do you do to prepare if you're planning to ride the storm in a boat? Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I grew up at the sea and been through a lot of storms. This I think will be the worst, but I think I'll survive. But I need to save my boat and home and will do the best I can.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FLORES: As we take another live look here. Hear the kicker, now. This man says that he actually took in a homeless person in his boat to ride the storm with him. He said it's a lot safer. If there was surge, he says, the boat will float.

So, Wolf, it's still very dangerous, as you know. Hurricanes don't just come with surge. Hurricane-speed winds as well, flying debris. You never know what a hurricane is going to do --Wolf?

BLITZER: Yes. These people should listen to advice and get out while they can and potentially save their lives.

Rosa, thank you very much. We'll stay in close touch with you as well.

FEMA officials reiterate it's no longer a question of "if" Hurricane Irma will impact Florida, but a question of how badly.

With us to talk about preparations, federal government response, virtual response by local and state authorities as well, Senator Bill Nelson of Florida. He's joining us on the phone from Rockledge, about 200 miles north of Miami. Senator, you and I have known each other a long time. You grew up a

little Florida's east coast. Are you concerned about Irma, more so than other storms?

Hold on a second.

[13:48:23]

SARAH HUCKABEE SANDERS, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: (In progress) -- historic destructive potential, and he's asking that everyone in the storm's path remain vigilant and heed all recommendations from government officials and law enforcement.

Our message to the American people is this: With gratitude for our first responders and prayers for those in the storm's path, we are behind you 100 percent.

With that, I'd like to bring out the president's homeland security adviser, Tom Bossert, to discuss specifics on the federal government's ongoing preparedness and response efforts.

And after, I'll be out to take your other questions. Thanks.

TOM BOSSERT, HOMELAND SECURITY ADVISER: Thanks, Sarah.

Thanks to each of you for being here.

I can't add too much more to that, so let me see if I can just jump in a little bit to my thinking here. As you've heard me say before, I like to try to categorize my thoughts into informing, influencing and inspiring, if I can.

In terms of informing, please recall the process here, that the federal government, under President Trump's leadership and the leadership of his Cabinet, is fully engaged, but they're fully engaged in supporting the governors.

Those governors at this point are engaged in various different forms and phases of what we consider incident management. So, as I walk through Irma, let me stop -- I'd be remiss if I didn't -- and talk about Texas and Harvey.

So, Governor Abbott and I have been in close contact and haven't stopped that contact, because his people in Texas and the people of Louisiana under Governor Edwards are (inaudible) involved in the early stages of what will be a long recovery effort. The people in the U.S. Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico and the other Caribbean islands affected by Harvey already are in the middle of acute life-saving, life- sustaining response operations. And what we're seeing in Florida and South Carolina and Georgia are the final stages of preparation for the beginning of a response operation.

So we're seeing all three play out for us at the same time. It requires us to juggle some of our thinking, but it doesn't require us to juggle our resources. So to be clear, the response operations had ceased life-saving and life-sustaining in Harvey, and we had an opportunity to rest and refit our forces, move them out and reposition them for Harvey (sic). We're right now employing them in the islands to save lives, and we will maintain a good footprint and posture to do the same in Florida, South Carolina and Georgia as the storm progresses.

So I'll come back to some of the path and the tracking forecasts here in a moment.

I'd like to see if I could reinforce that by suggesting we take this very seriously. It's not only a dangerous storm. We've already seen loss of life. The storm has taken lives already. It's going to take more, unfortunately, if we're not prepared. So please take it seriously.

I'd also suggest now, in terms of influencing, that people stop watching so carefully this track and start thinking a little more seriously about getting themselves into a safe place and out of danger.

And I don't want them to take that as a call for shadow (ph) evacuations. Please listen to your local authorities on evacuation orders. They're not only looking out for your best interest but they're carefully coordinating. This is a peninsula, and so people who need to evacuate from south to north, and that is a staggered and carefully thought through process.

But what I am suggesting is, at this point, this is a large storm. And whether it wobbles left or wobbles right, you need to at this point start thinking through your own personal accountability. So please make sure -- it's kind of a oxygen mask theory -- take care of yourself first so you can take care of others, take care of your loved ones and if you're able, please take care of strangers and others in need. I think that's something that we've seen in Texas, and I have every reason to believe that the people of Florida and South Carolina will show that same American spirit and value.

Lastly, if I can, there's been a lot of, kind of, coverage or Florida but not necessarily media coverage of the U.S. Virgin Islands. And if I can, I'll give you a brief update on where we stand there.

We are, as I just talked to the Department of State and the Department of Defense officials, engaging in this life-saving, life- sustaining operation in the following way.

Governor Mapp is experiencing loss of power, loss of water as a result, loss of communications and some other sheltering needs. And so what we're doing is sending in air operations and surface operations to evacuate citizens.

We're also doing that in St. Martin and Sint Maarten, the Dutch/French island that's been reported there are also American citizens there. We are currently in the final stages of operations planning to evacuate those citizens. There are numbers ranging from 350 to 6,000. That was our planning assumption parameter. Those -- those American citizens will be removed via surface and air means.

We've had to do some kind of planning adjustment for surf conditions for wind and for Hurricane Jose. As we look forward to that hopefully missing the United States, it's unfortunately still causing some havoc in the islands and our response operations, our evacuation operations.

So that's where we stand on that.

They'll begin executing those plans, if not already, some point soon today. And we'll see some of those American citizens and others evacuated as necessary, to include anyone with critical or acute medical needs.

So, that's where I would stop on the update, and then I'll take your questions.

(CROSSTALK)

BOSSERT: So -- and if I could come down here, sir.

QUESTION: Tom, one of the big problems with the Florida evacuation is that so many gas stations are -- are running out of gasoline. What, if anything, can the federal government do in the next 24 hours to assist in getting more fuel to people in Florida?

BOSSERT: Yeah. So there's a number of things that we've done -- I should stop and, you know, mention by name Governor Scott. Tremendous leadership, tremendous confidence.

He and the president have spoken. He and I have spoken. I've got every confidence in the governor and his emergency manager. They're demonstrating the same leadership resolve and skill and quality of effort that we saw in Texas a week ago.

What we're seeing in Florida, though, are fuel shortages. We saw those same fuel shortages in Texas, because people appropriately gas up their generators, their cars, their boats and so forth. So what we'll see here now is a need to pull in additional fuel, and that need will run up against the onset of tropical-storm-force winds. So what are we doing? We're bringing in as much supply of refined fuel as possible, and we've waived a particular statute that -- that allows for foreign-flagged vessels to help in that effort. So it's a little technical, but it's called the Jones Act. Some of you have reported on it.

What happens is the secretary of homeland security can waive that act. Until that's waived, only U.S.-flagged vessels can move fuel from point to point domestically. What we've done now is we've freed up that -- that prohibition, so now foreign-flagged vessels -- so as many ships -- tanker ships as possible are now being brought to bear on the effort to bring as much fuel as possible in to help Floridians regardless of their flagged vessel status. And that's the best we can do.

In addition, they're planning all the intermodal points to get trucks from those tanker ship port locations into the gas stations. So that's what we're doing.

QUESTION: The window's rapidly closing. How much more can you get in there?

BOSSERT: Conditions will dictate that. I don't think there'll be too much more that we can get in. At some point here they'll have to stop those operations.

And again, that's one of my messages here. It's not a tough-love message, it's just a message of clarity and honesty.

At some point, people are going to be on their own, so to speak, for a period of time, during which the flooding, the raining and the -- and the wind bear down on them. And they need to be prepared, if they are in that path and haven't taken some action to get themselves in a less dangerous position, to be ready for at least a 72-hour period -- that would be my advice -- for them to have enough food, water and -- and shelter before the government can get back in.

We have pre-deployed and pre-staged, but we can't actually get to that final point of care until conditions permit, so.

QUESTION: So the...

(CROSSTALK)

QUESTION: One housekeeping question.

For FEMA to have resources and no broken chain there, the president needs to sign the legislation the House just passed this morning. Any indication of when that's going to happen?

BOSSERT: So, I'd like to start by thanking Congress. They came in in a fast way to give us the emergency supplemental funding. I think that's what you're...

QUESTION: Yeah.

BOSSERT: ... alluding to.

First, FEMA still has the money that they need, so there's no break in operations. I want to make sure to qualify on your question there. But there will be a break in their operations if they run out of money. That's why that supplemental legislation was so necessary.

Thank you to the House and Senate leadership for bringing everyone back in and passing that so quickly and responsibly.

We anticipate -- honestly, this is a real-time event. The bill might be on its way up here right now. It requires signature by the speaker, signature by the -- the Senate leadership or the vice president, and then signature by the president of the United States. And so, I think that will happen today. But as soon as we get it, the president will take that seriously.

QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE) complication (ph) of the storm track -- and we (ph) don't know the wobbly nature, but it looks like it's going to cover the entire peninsula, running south to north. How does that complicate emergency management response as it moves up the state?

And to Floridians who are veterans of hurricanes, there is sometimes a tendency to say, "I can ride this one out; I've seen bad storms before." Could you address those folks?

BOSSERT: Yeah, of course.

Some people call it hurricane amnesia. Let's hope there's no hurricane amnesia.

But I would start by saying there are some people, probably some 20 percent of the population, that might not remember or might not have gone through the last big hurricane in Florida. It was probably 2004 or '05, right? There were four major hurricanes in 2004, Wilma in 2005 which was forgotten because of Katrina.

If you haven't experienced it, take it seriously and ask those who have. If you have experienced it, please recall that what I just described took place: You were without power, you were without comms and you were without water in some cases or sewer treatment and so forth for a period of time afterwards. So plan for that.

In terms of the track, there's three considerations.

The upper right, kind of, northeast quadrant of the storm packs the most punch, right?

The second consideration is, if the eyewall gets over land, it tends to lose steam a little faster. So if it stays over water, it tends to keep its strength a little longer.

So as this thing moves left and right it can affect our operations, because it can affect a different part of the state in a different way, wind or flood. What we'll see here over the next 24 hours is -- is going to tell us which one we're going to face. We're planning for all those eventualities.

I guess, maybe worst-case scenario is if it dips down, moves west and curls around on the other side of the state, because, right now, it's my belief that people haven't been planning for that.

I want to make sure I'm suggesting that that's going to happen, but it seems to be within the cone of uncertainty. So this storm at this point could (inaudible) from Tampa to Jacksonville and a direct hit on Miami.

So please plan for those things accordingly. Don't necessarily evacuate based on those eventualities. Listen to your local officials, as they're tracking it more closely. But do prepare to be in the storm's path, just in case.

So that's how we're doing it.

And then, lastly, to answer your question, Major, what we're doing is instead of pre-positioning all the commodities in places that might be affected by the storm, we continue to support operations to the islands. The FEMA logistics team have thought through placing those supplies elsewhere. (inaudible) up to Delaware and New York and elsewhere, so they continue barge operations in -- to support the islands and that the next storm doesn't affect the storm before (ph).

Hopefully that answers your question.

So if I can go here.

QUESTION: Thank you (ph).

The big question is, after the chemical fire that occurred in Texas and the fact that you all are being attacked (ph) with a second storm, are there any extra precautions that are being taken this time to ensure that that type of thing doesn't happen here? And how taxed is the system for this and for Jose coming in?

BOSSERT: Well, the system can be taxed in different ways. I addressed already the life-saving, life-sustaining operational capabilities that we have, all the US&R teams and so forth which are marshaled by the federal government but provided by the states. They're all rested and re-fit and ready to come back into the fight. Same with the Coast Guard and United States military, National Guard and Title 10 forces.

We're preparing for environmental losses, as we're -- as we should. I can't speak to each and every company's preparation efforts as I stand here. We can continue to monitor that and follow up with you.

There'll be steps that are taken, from setting down (ph) the nuclear facility -- the nuclear power facility to a position of safety.

[14:00:00]