which, by the way, if you live in appalachia, the best jobs in appalachia, middle class wages, health care better than anybody else's. pensions. which support teachers who reside and teach young people in appalachia and supports all the programs we depend upon. fire departments, police departments. and these miners are with me, plus all of those members of the umwa that we know are gathered up right now, and about six states, because they've been watching this debate that's ongoing, in the united states of america where people are constantly saying well, we were just going to do away with these jobs. so these miners who have families at home, these retirees whose pensions are at risk which is about 100,000 people, most of them in appalachia, are worried about this ongoing debate. it's hard for coal miners to have a voice in this country. many people look down their nose at us, and think, well, what in the world could somebody that mines coal have to say? and some people maybe we ought to keep our mouth shut, get out of the way, but as we have done for 100 years, we're not going to do

the result is a bright poor kid growing up in harlem or appalachipap lac appalachia will not have that on his resume. >> thanks to fareed zakaria. the special report starts now. i'm anna a cabrera. good night. >> announcer: the following is a cnn special report. >>> i'll find out tomorrow or the day after if i'm getting into my dream school. >> the unbearable wait of the 18-year-old chasing the college agreement. [ screaming ] ♪ how did it become -- >> operation varsity blues. >> you don't need to work anymore. you don't need to study horde or be well-rounded. you just have to write a check. >> a nightmare. >> coaches, entrepreneurs, and celebrities. >> it may have looked like a wheel hollywood premiere at times. >> lori, pay for my tuition, lori! >> i don't really want to go to school. >> what do you say to your fans, felicity? >> what prosecutors are calling the largest college admissions scam ever. >> crazed parents doing whatever it takes. >> it's unbelievable. it is so competitive to get your kid into school today. >> the parents are terrified. >> it's parents who are driving a lo

i said it to appalachia, and we did tremendously. said it to our great african-american community, i said what do you have to lose? you have the most crime, you have the worst education, you have the lowest home ownership. you have all these horrible statistics i'm reading, and then i said, what do you have to lose? now the african-american community has the lowest unemployment numbers in the history of our country -- [applause] they have the best employment numbers in the history of our cup. . -- of our country. they have the best poverty numbers in the history of our country in the positive sense. and i think we're going to do great with the african-american community and the hispanic community, which has its best numbers that they've ever add had. their median income, hispanic, median income is the highest it's ever been, over $50,000 per person. [applause] and all those people that came out and they came out to vote, they'll never be forgotten again. the democrats are trying to figure out where the hell did they all come from. [l

i said it to appalachia, and we did tremendously. i said it our great african american community.ay, "what do you have to lose?" you have the most crime. you have the worst education. you have the lowest home ownership. you have all of these horrible statistics, i'm reading. and then i said, "what do you have to lose?" now, the african american community has the lowest unemployment numbers in the history of our country. they have the best employment numbers in the history of our country. they have their best poverty numbers in the history of our country, in the positive sense. and i think we're going to do great with the african american community and the hispanic community -- which has its best numbers that they've ever had. their median income -- hispanic median income is the highest it's ever been -- over $50,000 per person. and all of those people that came out and they came out to vote, they'll never be forgotten again. the democrats are trying to figure out -- where the hell did they all come from? it was something. you know, a number just came out. i don't know if you saw.

it goes on -- [ applause ] >> so here he is, dirk laird, born and raised born, dirt poor in appalachia. by the time he was 6 years old, i think his family had moved ten times to different coal towns in pennsylvania, west virginia, ohio. laird loved school but was forced to drop out at age 14 in the depths of the great depression to help support his family. by the age of 16, he was an explosives expert, underground in a coal mine in ohio. all around him, coal mining in the depression was really, really dangerous work. he was made to feel grateful to have it, but his friends were getting hurt, maimed, his neighbors were getting killed. laird himself was in a number of really tough accidents and so he saw that his coal mining life saw that his coal mining life at appalachia, he wanted something better. and what was a safer alternative? u.s. army. he signed up and on leave one day he met the love of his life, rose, who i think is probably fair to say, i think both would say that they fell in lust before they fell in love. they had a child before they were married, which was really somethin

very widespread publication to deliver opioids on behalf of the drug companies against central appalachia and up into ohio and parts of iowa. >> there are so many questions that come out of that which are for instance why is it that we are only hearing about it now? one of the questions you address and don't totally buy that you obviously see a lot in this is this is a group of people dismissed as hillbillies. they are not in the inner city population people can stigmatize them one way or so but they are written off and this is a population who was sort of presumed to be wretched and so the prey to the drug companies is they don't have advocates that are going to look out for them. is that the issue that they are written off as disposable or how did it get to be that a single place could be that kind of an epicenter under the radar for so long? >> there's a couple of things that work. what is described in this country that didn't happen anywhere else if you go back to immediately after the civil war there were a lot of the soldiers that were very badly wounded and morphine becomes a commo

the problem here is still concentrated in places like appalachia, new england, the upper midwest, not out west yet. there's early indications from san francisco, there's some data from phoenix that's showing that seizures are up, so there's early indications that it is starting to infiltrate out west but not yet entrenched. the policy considerations are twofold how do we help areas that are swamped in fentanyl, at the same time how do we prevent it from becoming entrenched in places like san francisco, seattle, portland which have major heroin markets? this program could get worst before it gets better thinking of how many untapped markets there are. today's overdose crises is different than prior ones. this is driven by suppliers who are embracing fentanyl. it is much cheaper than heroin per unit of morphine equivalency per dose, much cheaper. users in the literature aren't asking for fentanyl. they are taking steps to avoid coming this contact with it. that may change over time as we're seeing in some markets fentanyl has completely displaced heroin in places like new hampshire. ove

at a small liberal arts college in the foothills of appalachia. [ church bells ] berea college only admits who have been excluded from our modern meritocracy. rich kids need not apply. you heard that right. berea will reject their applications. it doesn't want their money. this college is completely free. 98% of freshmen are pell grant recipients and come from families who earn an average of $28,000 a year. >> it's a radical ideology. >> these are some of the poorest kids in the country. >> had you heard of maria ahead of time? >> the president of berea, lyle rudolphs, believes this is one of the key ingredients to its success. >> no student feels stigmatized because all come from the same economic context. >> all students are required to work for the college at least ten hours a week. >> i know some students who looked up free college and found berea. >> this sounds fake. i was just like, there's a catch. >> thought it was a scam, there's no way. >> but there is a way. in 1855 the college was founded to provide an education for students excluded from elite colleges, including women and fr

the result is a bright poor kid growing up in harlem or appalachipap lac appalachia will not have that. the special report starts now. i'm anna a cabrera. good night. >> announcer: the following is a cnn special report. >>> i'll find out tomorrow or the day after if i'm getting into my dream school. >> the unbearable wait of the 18-year-old chasing the college agreement. [ screaming ] ♪

didn't matter, black, white, jew, gentile, protestant or catholic, whether it was baltimore or appalachia to fight for people. and again, he fought for the american people until his last breath. and people were saying, oh, he had oxygen, oh, he had this. it shows he was concerned about people. so what's next in baltimore, what's next for the state of maryland, that seat that congressman cummings had will remain vacant until a special election probably in january or february. >> you know, that -- >> and may he rest in power. may he rest in power. >> that sound bite that we just played, i think perfectly captures what april is talking about. he believed it was god's work. he believed that protecting the democracy was god's work and that when we're all dancing with the angels, you know, what will we be proud of for having done. >> elijah cummings was 68 years old. we'll be right back. lines. and now you can get it on our newest, most powerful signal. no signal reaches farther or is more reliable. get 4 new lines of unlimited for just 30 bucks a line. the♪lexus es... ...every curve, every inn

you discovered that there was a problem in appalachia i think you start out in a covering harry and lee counties in particular in rural virginia, is that correct? >> yeah, i didn't cover the oxycontin epidemic when it first developed in the late '90s, was the purview of the court. the reporters at the time, but when i wrote factory man, but to finish up around 2013, it's a book about the aftermath of globalization and henry county and martinsville and all of this stressed communities. and what happens to a community the jobs go away. i started to hear from policeman and other sources that so much of the drug crime in the crime and the communities was drug fueled. mostly by methamphetamines and heroin. i thought heroin, like heroin in rural areas how is that happening? sure enough it was. and i didn't understand at the time, how it had been or how heroin and oxycontin and other opioid pills were connected. i didn't understand the work chemical cousins that if people were initially to prescribed opioids, both of it be oxycontin or percocet or delighted, or whatever, once there addicted, a

it's big cities, it's rural appalachia, kentucky. service looks different in each of those communities, and that's fine. we want it to be locally driven. in some of those committees, the service years are being used to tackle opioids. elsewhere, it's how do we give people what we call opportunity youth, people who have been out of school a year or two, and open up service years to people who frankly don't look like me. the more we do that, the more tangible if i can take somebody, hypothetically, to toledo, ohio, or austin, texas, or east boston three years from now and show them this is what a community with universal national service looks like, that's going to make our case easier on capitol hill. the last thing i'll say is the teenagers in your life that probably frustrate you because they can be frustrating and they have very little trust and patience for their parents and grandparents. they're out on the streets marching. the other side of that coin is they feel the urgencies and have no patience and they want this. so what mig

you are out of appalachia. piedmont is a word that designates a topographic terrain that is halfway between the mountains and coastal plain. rolling terrain. it so happens that in this part of the piedmont, there is not much development. only a few small farms. a lot of ground that is covered by thick woods and brush. very bad and few roads. this terrain favors johnston and the confederates. once you find out what road sherman is taking coming you block it with troops, you stymie him. when sherman enters this zone on may 23, rain begins to distend, -- descend, turning the roads into rivers of mud. sherman is stuck. the second zone is the worst phase of the atlanta campaign for the federals. zone three favored the confederates. it took from may 23 until july 9. so, sherman is worried. he is worried johnston may use this delay to send troops to grant. that is why he orders a massive assault at kennesaw mountain on june 27. 15,000 troops, they don't even dent the confederate line, and he loses 3000 men in the proc

the heartland is represented and the the south and big cities and rural appalachia, kentucky and the service looks different in each of those communities and that's just fine. we want it to be locally driven. in some of those communities the service use is being used to tackle opioid epidemic and elsewhere is how do we give people the opportunity. youth that have been out of school for a year and an opportunity to change their career trajectories and to open up to people who, frankly, don't look like me. the more we do that, the more tangible if we can take someone hypothetically, toledo, ohio and show them that this is a community with the national service looks like and that will make our case easier and the last thing i'll say is the teenagers in your life, they probably frustrate you because they can be frustrating and they have very little trust and patience for their parents and grandparents and they're out on the streets marching. they feel the urgencies and they have no patience and they want that. so what must be frustrating in your personal lives is one of the main reasons

during the revolutionary war, soldiers from appalachia in western pennsylvania.there was no money to pay them. the continental congress gave them ious. for years, they were able to use that to pay their taxes to the state of pennsylvania. and then this guy comes along, robert morris. and water describes him as a protcgc. alexander hamilton as a protcgc of robert morris. morris pioneers that people can no longer pay state taxes with these ious. because of that, these people are forced to sell this script for 2-15 percent on face value. friends of robert morris, he says, wind up owning about 50 percent of the outstanding script. and then shortly after that, alexander hamilton and robert morris, with this idea that the u.s. government will pay all of this script in full. with six percent interest in hard currency, gold or silver. and they will tax the very people, these veterans who were forced to pay, forced to sell their script in order to get currency. washington goes and puts down the rebellion. but in fact, it's an unsavory - - >> we are going to leave it there

overturned the extreme protection rule which would have made it almost impossible to mine coal in appalachia the trump administration returned sanity to the clean water permitting process and is in the process of restoring the waters of the u.s. rule to align with congressional intent of protecting federal waters and not every stream, ditch, and gully across this country. but the jewel of the war on coal's crown was always the clean power plan. a sweeping rule to limit the use of coal in our power generation mix, the clean power plan ran roughshod over utility investments and states' rights to protect their taxpayers and ratepayers. in a moment of clarity, then-candidate obama acknowledged that under his vision for our power system, quote, electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket. the clean power plan, if implemented, would have made that vision a reality. energy is a top-line item in many of our families' budgets, and very expensive, and this policy would have grown these costs significantly. this plan is so disastrous and so clearly beyond the scope of e.p.a.'s authority that 24 state

let me ask you a couple of questions, that is in west virginia, and appalachia, we are decimated withthe opioid prices. we're trying to find ways of there be something. i'm going to go away they want their playing what are ways that we can provide some additional funding or something for non-opioid rehabilitationtreatment ? because we got incentives for using opioids but what about someof the other non-opioid ? when you all put together your rule, there's nothing in there about that non-opioid treatment and i hope that we can do that. and we work together on that? >> cms has worked with state medicaid programs to approve 26 states medicaid 1116 demonstrations which permit states to expand services for care or ,substance abuse disorders and institutions or mental disease and we been working to implement all the sections of the support that relate to the annex. and in relation to your question i will have our office of legislation reach out to you . >> .. >> .. it's a trick question here. is 21 days enough rehabilitation for someone? >> i would like to consult with their agency experts

from the cincinnati enquirer where a reporter was sent on assignment to go back to his hometown in appalachiand he wrote an excellent article about the strong support that he is finding. a few quick points. you posed a socratic question to the call recently about why the president focused in on biden and i wonder if you at the same skepticism with regards to the whole mueller investigation and the genesis of that and how the presidential candidate of the time, trump was being targeted both before and after he was elected. that's a question you might want to ask yourself. did you have that same skepticism without investigation is to mark host: what is your level of skepticism with the impeachment inquiry going on now? caller: extremely high skepticism. let me make a quick point about kasich from a governmental standpoint. ohio when governor of the whole gay marriage issue is being held in the supreme court. i'm not talking about the merits of whether someone can marry someone else, i'm talking about ohio had a constitutional amendment passed by a democratic process here in ohio and when he was

and after we joined forces, he said to me, "kamala, you know, appalachia loves this." it really made the point that the vast majority of us have so much more in common than what separates us. and i guess that's why i'm running. i do believe that to beat donald trump, but also to heal our country, we need a leader who has the ability to unify our country and see that the vast majority of us have so much more in common than what separates us. and i'll tell you, my mother was 19 when she left india alone. and she wanted to travel to learn science because her mission in life was to cure cancer. and so she arrived in california. she got -- you know, she was supposed to have an arranged marriage, but she got involved in the civil rights movement, she met my father, and that produced my sister and me. they got married. but when i was five, that marriage ended. but my mother convinced us that we could do anything. and so i became the first woman attorney general of california, the second black woman elected to the united states senate, and i will tell you, that's part of why i