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♪ ♪ ♪ we have a new look now at the epicenter of the devastation in maui, and also now are learning that only a handful of the 106 confirmed dead have been identified. any day now former president donald trump and his 18 co-defendants are expected to go to jail after being booked in georgia. we are live outside with the very latest. >> for the first time north korean officials say they are holding u.s. army private travis king. they claim he's seeking refuge because of racial discrimination, they say, in the u.s. military. i'm john berman with kate bolduan and sara sidner. this is "cnn news central." ♪ ♪ let's start with the new video coming out of maui.

a camera crew travelled in with fema to get a first look at portions of the historic town of lahaina that had been blocked off until now. the once-vibrant paradise now the epicenter of devastation. the death toll is that 106 people killed and only about a third of the fire zone has been searched by recovery crews. the governor says until now most of the remains were found along a seaside road and today they will be shifting their focus to begin searching homes. on monday, president biden, we have now learned, will see all of this damage first hand. he and the first lady will travel to maui to see what was left behind and speak with survivors who clearly lost everything. on the investigation into how this all started, there is still no official cause of these fires. there are a lot of questions remaining about whether power lines could have played a role. cnn has new video in that may show the moment a power line

explodes and moments later, flames are seen. take a look, this video was taken on another part of the island separate from lahaina. the video was capture at a sanctuary august 7th. you will see a white flash is seen. you will see the white flash and then we paused it so you can see it a little more clearly. very clear. in the following moments the camera pans around and then minutes later you can see the flames in the distance. we highlighted it there. the video was first reported by "the washington post," hawaii electric released a statement to questions put in saying this, we know there is speculation about what started the fires and we, along with others, are working hard to figure out what happened. cnn's mike valerio is on the main road into lahaina and is joining me now. today the road will reopen to the general public, mike. you're seeing these images. what is that going to mean for

the public now? >> you know, kate, so let's just sort of lay out what is happening here, and you're right. people are seeing these images and saying the general public cannot enter that area and that is exactly right. so the burn area, the historic town, the core of lahaina that is going to be sealed for the foreseeable future, but there is concern about what about the rest of the region? west maui, and this is the highway that will be reopening in the next hour and a half and there is the sense that the general public needs to access the western side of the island to help bring back the economic vitality of the island. this road was only accessible to first responders for several days. so this will make travel and commerce easier for everybody, not just supply convoys and not just residents of a specific set of addresses.

so there's reekt cconnecting th island and re-housing the island. to that point, we're seeing more and more people, moving from shelters that are run from the red cross across the island into more and more hotel rooms. this is a plan that's being put forward by hawaii's governor, josh green and this is essentially what is going to happen. 500 hotel rooms across the island of maui are going to be rented to house people from the epicenter of the disaster who have lost everything. 473 housing listings that were vacant. people who have lost all of their homes and there are images that you're seeing and they can rent those listings, no problem and a thousand airbnb listings. this is just a way to try to get people towards normalcy in whatever tiny steps they possibly can, kate? >> yeah. it is very clear from this new

video coming in, how long, long the road to recovery and anything resembling normal. thank you, mark? >> it is hard to house people because so many structures are gone. i want to give you a sense of the before and after and we had google images. this is around the lahaina beach resort and pay very close attention to this neighborhood right here. you can see this is the before, but look at the after. look at the after. that area is just gone, and we have a side by side look at it right now. again, this is that neighborhood before. over here you can see it's just completely gone. we have another view we can show you and this is a view from the port side. you can see these buildings with the green roofs there and here they are, so many of those buildings just completely gone. again, here they are in place, and now gone. here's the side by side. you can see the before and over here, just the devastation,

things just completely, completely flattened in that area right there. sara? >> those pictures in that before and after really tells the story well. we are now a week into the investigation into these fears and while the focus is on recovering the remains of the unaccounted for, there are still a lot of questions bubbling up about the response after the blazes were sparked and the preparation before the fires ever started. i am joined by the chair of the maui county council, alice lee. thank you very much for joining us at this very difficult time in your community. i want to start with this. we have seen this video that "the washington post" put out showing a spark by a power line and fire not long after that in one part of maui. what have you been hearing from the utility about the power lines and if they might have playeded a role in sparking these fires? >> we believe it's a little

premature to delve into completely into the causes of the mass destruction and the fires because we are still in search and recovery mode. somost of our resources are pointed in that direction and as was mentioned earlier, there are many, many more bodies to be recovered and identified. of all of the bodies that have been recovered so far, only two, actually five have been identified. two names were released yesterday. three should be released today. so this is how painstakingly slow the search and recovery is going. >> miss lee, do you have information as to why it has been so difficult to try to identify the 106 people so far that only five so far have been identified? >> well, the fire reduced

everything to ashes. so we don't necessarily have full bodies to look at. in fact, there is -- there is an operation for identification and we need dna from families. this in itself is taking a lot of time and then those going through the wreckage and the rubble are also exposed to toxic particles and asbestos and other types of chemicals and we have to be careful not only in our recovery efforts, but we have to take care of our responders, as well. ? just listening to that, how difficult it would be to get dna samples and bodies reduced to ash. it is just a horrible scene there and i am sorry that the community and you are going through this.

i do want to ask you about the concerns about the warning sirens. did the sirens not go off? were some of them broken? do you have any idea to warn people that the danger was coming? >> i really can't answer that with any kind of authority. people have been speculating on what could have happened. we will be heading an investigation by the state attorney general into this matter, a full and complete investigation. so at this point it's a little early to try and assess that. ordinarily -- this is ordinarily the sirens would go off for a fire that would generally go off for a tsunami. when the alert -- not the alert, but when the sirens go off for a

tsunami, people are expected to head inland, and certainly, this is not what we wanted them to do in this particular case. >> that's interesting to know. i want to the ask you about the state of hawaii who put out their emergency plan andest mated the deadly threat of wildfire saying it was quite low. will all of that change considering what happened in maui and what happened in lahaina and how quickly this all burned and how many people were killed. does there need to be a real change in preparation in resources towards wildfires? >> of course we all want to prevent this in the future. so there will be -- after we take care of the immediate needs of the people, we are going to have to spend an incredible amount of time figuring out what happened and how do we prevent it in the future because communication was actually,

probably the issue. communication was down, cell phones were down, power lines were down and that made it very difficult, even to this day some people do not have communication. they don't have television. they don't have internet, so it's still hard to communicate, but it's getting better. >> we heard at one .911 was down. i am so sorry you were going through this in your community. i am so sorry that the community is going through the heartbreak and the search is continuing all these many days after the fire started. thank you so much, council member lee for coming on cnn. i appreciate you. >> thank you. >> john? >> donald trump has to go to jail or at least report to one. new details on how the georgia case will proceed. mark meadows wants to move his case to federal court. this all turns on whether his

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at this jail with this granulated video, but this is the entrance to the jail in georgia to surrender. trump has not indicated when he will show up. the 18 other people facing indictments alongside him in the state's 2020 election probe face this very same question. rudy giuliani, for his part says he will turn himself in next week. trump's former chief of staff mark meadows isn't talking about turning himself in. what he's focused on is trying to get his case moved out of georgia and into federal court. either way, it seems clear a lot could happen between now and august 25th which is the deadline to surrender for all of them. cnn's nick valencia is live outside in the courthouse in atlanta with much more. nick, what is expected to happen when they do surrender? >> according to the fulton county sheriff, he is not going to treat the former president or his 18 co-defendants or anyone else different in fulton county.

fulton fulton county jail is infamous. none of the defendants have turned themselves in. they put out a statement saying the jail is open 24/7 so anyone can turn themselves if any time. we are getting a taste of the potential strategy, mark meadows has filed a former petition with his attorneys arguing that he should get his case removed from state court and into federal court instead and those atto attorneys arguing that they were charged with actions and they should have criminal proceedings heard before a federal court and here's what they are saying in part of this filing. nothing mr. meadows is alleged to have done is criminal, per se. contacting state officials on the president 's behalf. setting up a phone call for the president. one would exclusive the chief of staff of the president of the united states to do these sorteds of things. meadows will file a formal, longer complaint and meanwhile,

this matter is in the hands of a district judge in georgia. kate? >> thank you for being there. >> senior political commentator s.e. cupp and john avalon, friend, there is a republican presidential debate scheduled one week from today, if i'm not mistaken. i'd like to talk about this with you, john, here and s.e. over here. s.e. cupp over there, and i want to role play. i'm going to play the role conventional wisdom. john, i would like you to play john avalon and s.e., i would like you to play s.e. cupp. >> duly noted. me, donald trump should not go to this first debate one week from today. he is the front-runner in his campaign. he has nothing to gain by showing up. john avalon? >> oh, conventional wisdom. when won't you be wrong? that's exactly what political consultants would say. don't debate. it can only bring you down.

i would argue that these times are not normal and donald trump should go and be the leader of his party, right? he's going to go down to georgia. he will dominate the cycle and go there and answer your critics in person. don't let them punch up on a disembodied donald trump. this is an argument matt lewis said persuasively and particularly political consultants and it is incumbent to have a clear contrast and take a stand and dancing around donald trump if your name is not chris christie, it's dumbing down the country. >> s.e., first on the question when conventional wisdom says he shouldn't go. s.e. cupp says? >> listen, john avalon has great advice, but we should -- we should say at the outset, this is so unprecedented. the idea that we have a former president of the united states

who is facing four indictments, 90+ charges, 712 years in prison while he's running for president, that's one. and two, and is facing off against opponents who refuse to make this a thing? conventional wisdom, john berman, you're out the window, s.e. cupp and anyone we want, we don't know what is going to happen here or how this should go because nothing makes sense and no one is acting normally. i would point out, you are literally in the window for us. [ laughter ] i'm trying here, but no, no one can offer ill advice because none of these people are taking good advice. the people running against donald trump don't act like they want to run for president and donald trump doesn't take good advice as we obviously have

seen. he can show up and as john says look like a leader and be the tough guy that he is. he can stay home and not risk any bad moments or disadvantages. it's really up to the other opponents. the other would-be candidates to decide what they want to make of this debate. >> all right. let me play conventional wisdom. please, don't criticize me. i'm playing a role here, s.e. don't drag me down. >> and if you are a nominee, part of it now is that youio can't upset the trump wing and you can't mention the fact that he's been indicted four times. what do you say to conventional wisdom, s.e.? >> i mean, it is so ridiculous! the only way to win and become president is to beat the

front-runner and won't go after the elephant in the room, for the most part. it's absurd. for people like ron desantais, this is his last chance to turn his campaign around. for other people like tim scott and nikki haley, this might be the first time most americans have seen him debate, so it is an important opportunity for them, too. chris christie who has been swinging at donald trump over course of this campaign has an opportunity to knock him down a few pegs, but if all the candidates refuse to say to their audience, look, you like donald trump. i like donald trump, he's fine, but he's probably going to be in prison within the next year or two. let's elect someone else. if not, then we'll say that this is a complete fraud of an election and all of these candidate are running vanity projects. >> what do you say to conventional wisdom and s.e. cupp? >> i agree with s.e. there's this cowardly denialism that is seeping into the

republican party with a few honorable exceptions. campaigns are about contrasts. they're about showing the confidence to actually lead and that means confronting reality and making a reality-based argument for why he is a wounded elephant front-runner which he is. 91 counts and that's the more he was tiptoeing around and accepting his version of fall reality, an auction auction being it's not hard andy to take that and that is a first-class ticket to oblivion. >> if donald trump wins iowa, the conventional wisdom is over. >> what happens if the first couple of state, iowa, new hampshire where chris christie has a base of support, south carolina. if donald trump shows

vulnerability that could itself be a game changer. >> conventional wisdom, s.e. cupp. people don't need two dictionaries in this day and age and over your left shoulder we see two dictionaries. >> but they do need two bill hodges portraits. [ laughter ] >> i'm a writer, john berman! >> okay. okay. >> why are you picking on me? >> s.e. cupp, thank you very much. well-read, well-defined with two dictionaries there. thank you very much. john avlon. >> s.e. cupp and john avlon and conventional wisdom, i don't know where i fit into the relationship, guys? can i be alternative facts? that was great. much more to come including this. a step toward freedom for five americans wrongfully detained in iran and a call from the secretary of state, what tony blinken has told the families of

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secretary of state tony blinken held a private call with the families of the five americans currently detained in iran. the huge news broke last week that four wrongfully detained americans had been moved out of

the notorious prison joining a fifth in house arrest there. it's seen as the first step in a deal between the united states and iran that would include making $6 billion in iranian funds more accessible to tehran in exchange for their return home, a return that their families have been waiting for and fighting for for years. joining us now, two of those family members. neda shargi and tara tahbaz. emad and morad have been wrongfully detained since 2016. truly, truly, it's wonderful to see your faces. i'll talk about the call with blinken in a sec, but you were actually able to speak to your father since he was moved to house arrest. this is the first time that you're speaking out since then. what did he look like? how did he seem? what did he say? >> as soon as i saw that incoming video call coming in my heart sank because i knew that

this was a sign to see if he was okay, he was there and as soon as i answered the phone his face was there just smiling and your natural reaction. you always think you know what you'll react with, i wanted to cry. i wanted to smile. i wanted to laugh and i wanted to reach through the phone and touch him and know that he was there, but i think his spirit was so strong fighting to come home, but again, this was just one step. he's not home yet. i saw the hope in his eyes, but i also saw the fear that anything can go wrong between where he is now and when he gets home. you hear the speculation in the media, and i wish i could take a glimpse of that phone call and show the public there is a human on the other side. this is a father, a brother, they're sons, they're husbanding and it's been years, almost six years for us that we haven't seen them and it's so important, aside of all of the speculations, remember, they are human beings. >> a chance to see his face is

just -- i can only imagine the feeling that must have washed over you. you were able to see emad, as well. how did he seem? did he have a sense of everything outside obviously when he was in prison and now that he is in house arrest. did you get a sense? >> emad has been through a lot, six years, three months and 25 days since he was taken from us. when i first saw him on the phone call. whenever i'm nervous i do this awkward giggle and laugh and then i was silent and processing, but that's my brother and he went into typical big brother role asking me how i am, how my kids are, how our parents are and of course, his wife and his two daughters. it's -- we talk about -- we say the phrase wrongfully detained americans and it just rolls off our tongue as if it's just nothing, but it means something. it means these are innocent

americans and they've been taken because they're american. >> there was a call that you all were able to have with the secretary of state, with tony blinken. i was very interested when i saw the reporting of this because in our conversations over years, now, you have been asking for face to face. you have been asking for these kinds of conversations to understand what your family has been going through. what did the secretary of state say? what was your takeaway from the call? >> the call was really more of a check in. i think he probably realized the -- the, you know, the speculation out there and how much that must have impacted the families and he really wanted to see how we were doing and he wanted to get across that they're very serious about getting our loved ones home and that we just have to be patient because we're not there yet. they're not home yet. they're still wrongfully detained in iran. >> and there is a long road still. this was a huge step in knowing

that they're now in the worst of the worst places on the planet in prison is great, but when the news broke i had jason come on the show and for everyone out there, a reminder, he was also wrongfully detained in iran, released finally in 2016, and he talked about the challenges of the staged deal to come. he said from his perspective, his whole deal almost fell apart the night before he was released and he talked about how it can so easily go sideways. where is your level of confidence right now or what you and your family may have heard from the state department and others that your father will be released? will get out? >> as she just said there are speculations and we are optimistically being hopeful and trusting in our government that we're working as quickly as possible andy until then, we will be anxious until the moment

that we can greet them on u.s. soil. >> nothing is guaranteed still. >> cautiously optimistic are the words that we can use. we have no idea what's next. >> you both have talked about the speculation because along with the collective relief that the step has been taken and wrongfully detained american, a father, a brother could be coming home. you have seen the criticism of the u.s. engaging in any type of talks and negotiations with iran. an opinion piece by brett stephens that was out just yesterday in "the new york times," how much is an american hostage worth? >> republican senator wrote this. i think you've seen the statement. i welcome home wrongfully deta detained american, it provides a windfall for regime aggression. how do you respond to this? >> first of all, i have to say i don't know the terms of this

deal. i know others say they do. we certainly have never been briefed, so i'll start with that, and then, you know, the question is then what do you do? do you let an innocent american, an innocent american citizen who is a father, a brother just die in a foreign prison? do you do nothing to bring them home? you know, tara can speak for her father, but emad was in that prison right in the thick of it when the fires happened, when the riots happened, and he would have been killed, nearly killed and so my question then is what do we answer to this? how can we let an innocent american man perish in a foreign prison especially one who has been taken because he's an american, his passport. that's why he's in prison. >> how does it feel when you hear those things?

>> i completely agree with everything that neda just said, and i think first and foremost we need to bring americans home and it is never wrong to bring americans home and they were only taken because they hold a blue passport. hostage diplomacy is such a larger issue and national security issue and not just limited to iran and that is something that we do need to address and put this in place to deter this in the future and it's at the expense of her brother, my father and all of the other hostages in these prisons and then we will figure out how to deter this in the future and the priority is when they have a blue passport and they should be afforded the protection. >> my colleague spoke to another person who is still in iran. shehab dalili and she spoke to the family member and the family member after hearing the news of

your loved ones, she sent a letter to the state department ask included this line at the bottom. you are leaving my father to die. that is shehab's son. how does that feel knowing that there are more people? >> it's absolutely heartbreaking. i know first hand how painful it is to have a father for nearly six years that's wrongfully details and the details of that case should come from the white house. we only know our part of the details that includes her brother and my father and that's the depth and we don't know the other details or who else is included in this deal. >> one distinction, and shehab is an american citizen, four father, american citizen and the long road continues to get them home. thank you both so much. very good to see you here. sara? >> thank you, kate. protesters, you're looking at live pictures right now.

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policy! find out if you're sitting on a goldmine. call coventry direct today at the number on your screen, or visit coventrydirect.com. this morning frustration is boiling over among educators in arkansas. just days before the new school year there, state officials revealed that public high school students enrolled in a.p. african-american studies will not be able to receive credit for that class towards graduation like all of the other a.p. classes. several high schools including central high school in little rock, once the center of the fight to desegregate school his

planned to offer the course this school year. the school's district attorney and board member spoke to cnn. >> this course is an essential and important part of american history, but what it does is it provides students with original -- original documents so that they can learn the critical thinking skills to be able to interpret and make their own decisions about these topics. so it is the opposite of indoctrination. >> the education department's move comes just months after governor sara huckabee sanders signed an executive order that she calls indoctrination in schools. this isn't the first time african-american studies has been brought to the attention. teachers, students and community members marched in protest of changes made to the black

history curriculum there. cnn's carla suarez is there. can you give us a sense that in miami, what changes to the teacher of african-american history has people so riled up? >> well, sara, right now about 1 hun teachers, educators, activists and historians and people who live in south florida are protesting these changes. they took part in about a two-mile march from booker t. high school out to the miami county school district to protest the changes to the state's curriculum when it comes to the teaching of history in florida. many of them are holding signs that say teach the truth and that there was no benefit to slavery. that is all in reference to some changes that were made to the upcoming school year. the board of education is requiring that certain black histor history events including some

massacres that occurred florida, that they be taught as, quote, acts of violence that were perpetrated against and by african-americans. another part of the new education standards said that, quote, slaves developed skills which in some instances could be applied toward their personal benefit, and so as you can see, at this hour this group of people are upset. they would like to see this curriculum changed as we head into the new school year. this issue right now is very much still playing out with teachers across the state of florida deciding exactly how they're going to handle the new requirements of the education curriculum. sara? >> carlos suarez, thank you. teachers holding signs that say teach the truth and john. >> the family of michael oher inspiring the film "the blind side" is responding to his new

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this morning the family that inspired the film "the blind side" is speaking out against accusationings they exploited the man at the center of the film. the family took in michael oher when he was a teenager and he went on to become an nfl star, but now ohr claims the family lie d about adopting him and in the process kept millions of dollars from him. an attorney for the family calls those accusations outlandish and hurtful is and absurd. britaiynn gingras is all over t

story this morning. >> full spaj statement from the family responding to the statements. it's getting ugly. i want to read part of it. they are saying that michael oher is shaking them down. this season the first attempt he's done that. he's trying to get $15 million from them. and part of that statement reads, anyone with kmngs can see the outlandish claims made i by michael oher about the family are hurtful and absurd. the idea that they have sought to profit off mr. oher is not only offensive but ridiculous. it's getting little ugly. this story, trying to figure out what is going on here. but there's still a lot of questions. we don't know why michael oher came forward now with this lawsuit. we also don't know the details of that conservatorship. they admit in this statement that there was a conservatorship. yesterday we were asked what it was. they talk about conservatorship, but we don't know the details. were they still making money off

him? there's still questions we're not getting answers to. everybody releasing statements at this point. >> we keep saying it. it's sach to watch it play out publicly, but also there's a the lot more people speaking up and releasing statements. the actor who played michael oher in the movie is speaking out now too. >> everyone is just disappointed. this is just a heartwarming film and makes it feel tainted now. and that actor speaking out mainly because sandra bullock, the woman that won an award for playing the mother in the film, she's getting online hate for playing that role saying why didn't you research the role before taking it. the actor who played him says sandra did nothing wrong. that's my girl. she's going through a tough time. i really feel like they should leave her alone and stop trying to come at her. it's a sad day when we have to defend actresses also now that are playing in these roles. it's getting ugly. >> he's referencing the fact she

lost her long-time partner to als and she's mourning and people are coming at her for this. hollywood is not real. that's what we have learned. sadly, this is not ending the way the movie ended. thank you so much. thank you all for joining us today. this has been the "cnn news central." "inside politics" is up next. ♪ (upbeat music) ♪ ( ♪ ) woah. ( ♪ ) ( ♪ ) ( ♪ ) constant contact delivers the marketing tools your small business needs to keep up, excel, and grow. constant contact. helping the small stand tall.

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