our cairo bureau chief ben wedeman and chief international correspondent christiane amanpour have been waiting along with us. ben, did you know this was coming? it sounds really like a defense of the election commission more than the results itself? >> the results will come, jonathan, we need to stick in there. let me just stress one thing. this is part of the new egypt. officials feel obliged to explain why they acted in the way they did. and sort of lay it all out as much as possible to the millions of egyptians who actually cast their ballot. in fact, just a few weeks ago, we were waiting for a presidential debate, the first ever, that ever happened here in egypt before the first round. and it was the same thing. they explained to viewers on television why they had picked the candidates to go on this debate. what was the process whereby the decision -- the questions were drawn up. so this is really within the context of a new hopefully more transparent egypt where officials have to actually account for themselves. and account for their work. >> and i suppose, ben, also, this pain st

our cairo correspondent chief ben wedeman has been watching this unfold for ten months. ben, this is a stunning result. >> reporter: it is stunning, and it is a verdict that has pleased hundreds of anti-mubarak people outside the court. as soon as they heard he received a life sentence, huge cheers went up and now i see in front of me a group of people dancing, jumping up and down. earlier they were firing fireworks. now most of these people who i have spoken with actually were saying they wanted a death sentence. in fact, there are men walking around here with nooses to emphasize that point, but it does appear and you can hear it in fireworks. it does appear they are satisfied by the verdict. even by the tone of the judge, it did appear he was going to come out with a fairly harsh sentence, contrary to the expectations of others. i see clearly away on the other side of the peace barrier, there are other -- there are loyalists of hosni mubarak. they're waving around pictures of the president. obviously a different spirit over there compared to the celebrations compared to

cnn's ben wedeman is at tahrir square in cairo where it unfolded. an you tell me about the scene there, and what's the reaction to the verdict? >> reporter: well, what we have right below us, rob, is hundreds of people, perhaps thousands of people who have come into tahrir square to protest the verdict. of course, hosni mubarak and his interior minister got life in prison but mubarak was cleared of corruption charges and also of a variety of senior ministry officials here charged of any charge of murder for tilling can of protesters in the revolution that brought down the mubarak regime at the beginning of last year, and that really explains why people are so unhappy with that verdict. and, of course, hosni mubarak does have the right to appeal, and the feeling is the charges were not enough. that's why so many people are upset about this verdict. rob? >> what about supporters? there are some mubarak supporters. there have been calls for protests, but what have you seen? >> well, actually when we were at the court itself, we did -- there were about 1

ben wedeman, thanks so much from cairo. we are awaiting to hear the first remarks from the president-elect, mohamed morsi. when those comments come, we understand there will be some english translation. when they come we'll bring them to you as soon as we can. again another look at a very crowded tahrir square on a windy evening as you saw ben's hair blowing there which was a very hot day. perhaps these are indeed winds of change. >>> all right, the white house is reacting to egypt's election. it just released this statement, saying, in farther, "we look forward to working together with president-elect morsi and the government he forms on the basis of mutual respect to advance the many shared interests between egypt and the united states." >>> back here, in the u.s., tropical storm debby is strengthening off the gulf of mexico. the storm's path is uncertain but people living along the texas coast to the florida panhandle are all getting ready. louisiana is so concerned about the flooding, the governor has already declared a

ben wedeman. ben, what is happening right now? what happened? this is a stunning turn of events here. >> reporter: well, don, this was a decision, actually a pair of rulings by the constitutional court which on the one hand declared that a law that would have barred former officials from the mubarak machine from holding high office. that has been ruled unconstitutional. so ahmed shafiq, one of the two presidential candidates, will, indeed, be able to run in the elections that happens day after tomorrow. more important, however, is the decision from the constitutional court that the egyptian parliament has been dissolved because of irregularities and that the supreme council of the armed forces, the military body that took over from hosni mubarak in february of last year now holds full legislative powers. in addition to that, they also will be forming the 100-man body that's been charged with writing up egypt's constitution, because at the moment there is no constitution. in addition to that, raising the fears of many egyptians yesterday the egyp

cnn's senior international correspondent ben wedeman is in cairo live. >> reporter: when news first cameut that hosni mubarak and his interior minister had been given life sentences, the initial reaction was one of joy. but as soon as people heard that all the others who were accused, including the two sons of hosni mubarak, alaa and gamal, and all the interior ministers had been found innocent, the joy quickly soured into anger. many people feeling that there was a skewed verdict, an unfair verdict, a verdict that favors those in the old regime. hosni mubarak was transported by helicopter from this police academy where the trial took place to the prison in the southern part of cairo. apparently when the helicopter arrived in the prison, he refused to get off. ministry of the interior officials say an effort is being made to prepare his cell, but this is just one indication of how messy things are going to get in egypt with this verdict. ben wedeman, cnn, cairo. >>> to florida now where george zimmerman must report to jail by tomorrow afternoon. a florida judge has revoked his bond. it h

ben wedeman is in cairo with the intense reaction to the verdict. >> reporter: they greeted the verdictears. prayers and fireworks, a life sentence for deposed president hosni mubarak and his hated interior minister habib. that mubarak's two sons were also found innocent of corruption charges. they reacted to the verdict was one of joy, but that joy has soured as the details have sunk in. now they are chanting "illegitimate." during the brief session in the makeshift courtroom mubarak showed no emotion. his eyes hidden behind dark glasses. just a stone's throw way, relatives of those killed in the revolution waited to hear the verdict, many holding the pictures of their dead sons and daughters. he has kept the clothing his son was wearing when he was shot and called for divine justice against mubarak. his son was 11 years old. ben wedeman, cairo. >>> in other news of the world, in ghana, ten people were killed after a boeing 727 crashed into a bus after the plane land at kotoko airport. >>> in china authorities broke up a child trafficking ring and rescue per second 1 children. accordin

>> ben wedeman live for us in cairo. thank you, ben. well, the verdict comes at a turbulent time. the runoff happens june 16 and june 17. earlier i spoke with an egyptian journalist about what the verdict means for egypt. >> despite the life sentence that mubarak got, the fact that his sons were acquitted and all of the interior ministry officials wiere acquitted, on tp of that not a single police officer has been found gmt of killing the over 100,000 people who died during the revolution. all of that contributed to the anger you saw in the courtroom. the people weren't just chanting the fall of the regime. they're also very importantly chanting they want a cleansing of the judiciary. this is all part of a very corrupt regime that remains very much in place. >> she also says people are so outraged tla want go out in the streets and demonstrate what they consider a great injustice. >>> back to the state, george zimmerman could be back in jail as soup as today. a florida judge has revoked his bond and ordered him to surrender no later than sunday afternoon. his bond had been set to

cnn senior international correspondent ben wedeman is live at tahrir square where the crowd only seems to grow. ben, these demonstrations while very boisterous, a lot of people, considered peaceful? >> well, so far, yes, fairly peaceful. we see a steady flow of people coming into the square. earlier we did see them burn the poster of one of the two presidential candidates running in the runoff election in the middle of this coming month. he's considered a protege of hosni mubarak. so he's very much the brunt of the earning. many people were angry. there's a certain amount of satisfaction that hosni mubarak got life imprisonment, a sentence of life imprisonment. but the feeling is the senior officials of the interior ministry, hated interior ministry got off innocent, scott-free. the feeling was they were instrumental in the killing of hundreds of protesters during the revolution. by giving the interior minister and hosni mubarak a life sentence was not enough. they want to see justice done in the name of those hundreds of egyptians who died bringing down the regime of hosni mubarak. >>

let's bring in cnn's ben wedeman who joins us now from the balcony overlooking tahrir square. ben it is getting late there. however, it appears that the darkness isn't in any way disbursing that crowd. what is the objective here? [ no audio ] >> reporter: -- outside of cairo. hosni mubarak and his interior minister did get life sentences but cleared the corruption charges and the interior of ministry got off scot-free, that's krucrux of this and why people are so angry. remember, more than 800 egyptians were killed by government sources during this proet te protest and everybody responsible is getting away without any charges whatsoever. so that's really what is fueling these protests in cairo. fredricka? >> and so, ben, while we saw this very similar scene in terms of thousands of people in tahrir square last spring, at that point people were looking for democracy, looking for free and fair elections. now we've seen, they've had a democratic process in the elections which are about to go into a runoff. that coinciding now with this sentence or a lack thereof, based on what the

conversation here christiane amanpour, and our chief international correspondent, and she is alongside ben wedeman who is in cairo. and thank you both, and i don't know what question to ask other than how d you think this is going to come out? ben, let's start with you. tionhat the egyptians havehe been fixated on for qui some time. the results were supposed to be announced thursday, but that announcement was postponed because the electoral commission wanted the look into more than 400 irregularitieirregularities a critical turning point for the egyptians following the revolution. it is not necessarily the choice they wanted. they have a choice between ahd shafik or mohamed morsi, the candidate from the muslim brotherhood, and the people who pulled off this election didn't want either to do with the trends. >> and christian -- >> well, go ahead, candy. go ahead. >> well, i wanted to ask you, because the military has been in charge, and i wonder on the streets how much trust there is in the military when this announcement is made as to who won this election, won't we have one side not believing wha

now, let's go live to cairo where ben wedeman has the latest. hosni mubarak, who is said to be in a coma. what do you think is the most credible in terms of the status of hosni mubarak's health? >> well, piers, i don't think there's any question that hosni mubarak's health took a turn for the worst today. really since the 2nd of june when he was sentenced to life in prison for not stopping the killing of protesters during the revolution. clearly, he's had a very hard time adjusting to prison life. at first, it looked just like he was unhappy. but his heart has given sort of -- has suffered from it. and now of course he's been rushed to a military hospital by the nile. now, reports we're getting at this point would indicate that his condition has stabilized and he may be improving. what's interesting is really the lack of reaction from most egyptians to the news he was either dead or dying. thousands of people in tahrir square but they were protesting against what is seen as a military coup d'etat by the military forces. at the time, which is abo

ben wedeman, sanjay gupta, thank you. >>> back at home, the sandusky rain trial.ill will not say whether sandusky himself will take the stand. hiwife dottie sandusky did testify today and what she said she saw and heard when a young boy spent night at their house. look at the car! my dad's gonna kill me dude... [ male announcer ] the security of a 2012 iihs top safety pick. the volkswagen passat. that's the power of german engineering. right now lease the 2012 passat for $209 a month. visit vwdealer.com today. energy is being produced to power our lives. while energy developement comes with some risk, north america's natural gas producers are committed to safely and responsibly providing decades of cleaner burning energy for our country, drilling thousands of feet below fresh water sources within self contained well systems and using state of the art monitoring technologies, rigorous practices help ensure our operations are safe and clean for our communities and the environment we are america's natural gas. and clean for our communities and the environment you see

our ben wedeman is there overlooking tahrir square. it is nightfall. there are cheering crowds and fireworks. it is like a sea of egyptian flags there. people are feeling very celebratory. is it being punctuated by the words of the president-elect? do they get a chance to hear him as he is speaking right now? >> reporter: yes. you can hear that loud speaker putting out the speech. what's interesting. he is very much trying to stress that he is not addressing his supporters. he is addressing all egyptians. interestingly, he specifically addressed the army which he called my brothers and my son. he addressed the police, interestingly, these were the same police that jailed him under the regime of hosni mubarak. he said he was addressing the judges, the judiciary, which just recently dissolved the parliament that the muslim brotherhood was dominating. he is very much trying to address beyond the broad public but those specific parts of the egyptian state which he may well have difficulties with. this is for egypt a huge change. basically, he is a member t

ben wedeman is there in cairo. >> reporter: some in cairo call it a soft military koup de tas.led the parliament is to be disbanded due to irregularities in the election. a day after the justice minimum tree granted military police and military intelligence the right to detain and interrogate civilians. the country's military rulers, supreme council of armed forces have sweeping legislative and executive powers and hope that one of their own former head of the air force will defeat in the runoff presidential elections this weekend. in the words of one wit, this scenario is a remake of mubarak regime, without hosni mubarak. >> ben wedeman in cairo. important day. we will watch that as we go forward. >>> regardless of your own personal faith, you have heard the question, what would jesus do. here is the question more and more young people are asking. is there a god? more people under 30 doubted the divine power. 68%, compared to five years ago, 83% never doubted, said they never doubted god's existence. steven, an interesting question. some would look at the results and say more

ben wedeman is there. ben, let me ask you first of all, two scenarios. if shafiq is declared the winner, how will that be taken in the general populous in egypt, and what happens if morsi wins? how will that be taken? >> it's important to stress at the beginning, candy, that there is no reason to sort of trust the reliability of this report, which is on a semiofficial website but it's quoting unnamed officials. that's the english website. on the arabic website, they are still indicating the man who won the election is muhammad morsi. so there is complete confusion at the moment. somewhat like the earlier reports earlier this week that hosni mubarak was clinically dead whereas he's fairly alive and well at the moment. so what we know is that however there is a lot of concern among the security services that if ahmed shafiq is, indeed, declared the winner that many of these people -- these are tens of thousands of supporters of muhammad morsi of the muslim brotherhood in tahrir square. they've been here for days. the worry is that they, this protest will t

christian amanpour is the global affairs anchor, also with her is correspondent ben wedeman. let's go back to the moment this was announced by effectively the elections commission in cairo. tell me, ben, wareaction imdiate and joyous? >> reporter: it was incredible. we really heard a rouge roar coming uprom the crowd. the only time i've heard a louder roar was 6:00 p.m. last year when hosni mubarak's resignation was announced. what we saw -- it's a very hot, bright day in cairo. i'd say tahrir square was about a third full. within about 20 minutes, it just filled up and people continue to fill up in the square coming from all the parts of cairo. as the temperatures become to become a little more mild, i think we're going to hear more fireworks, more car sirens and see more and more people coming out here because this is truly a historic day for egypt where egyptians finally see those who were on the other side of the political equation coming into power. candy? >> christiane, there's so much work to be done. it may not be sp e,ut certainly not the last step. what is the next q

let's bring in senior international correspondent ben wedeman. "the new york times" david kirkpatrick. both in cairo. ben, the fact that parliament has been dissolved what exactly does that mean? >> really what it mean, it's quite a body blow to the muslim brotherhood, which had almost 50% of the seats. the brotherhood saw parliament as its stronghold and was looking forward to possibly getting the presidency as well. now it's lost that. it's got no guarantee it's going to lose the presidency. in addition to that, the supreme council of the armed forces said they will pick the constituent assembly that will write up the constitution. that was a body that twice the parliament tried to form but failed to reach a consensus on. so really the brotherhood suddenly finds itself with a lot less cards to play in the political game. now, the brotherhood last night put out a statement calling for a million man march to the ballot boxes. so they really do see this election that begins tomorrow as a critical step to try to maintain their foothold in the power

ben wedeman on the phone with us. is that massive crowd going to be there for that long, all night long? >> it's unlikely they'll spend the entire night there although it's sort of the hard core group probably will as has been the case. what we have often seen is when you have so many people gathered in tahrir with sort of a unity of message, and in this case, it's more anger than happiness, anger that all these senior officials in the interior minstr ministry are very widely hated by egyptians because of the use of torture and arbitrary arrests, people wanted to see those senior officials punished, punish eed harshly. i was at the court outside of cairo when the verdict was announced, and when people heard that mubarak was getting life in prison, even though many of the people said they wanted him executed, they seemed genuinely satisfied that he was getting a life term. however, they wanted harsher punishment for the others and of course, they worried among many that he will and in fact his lawyers have told us pres

let's bring in senior international correspondent ben wedeman.the new york times" david kirkpatrick. both in cairo. ben, the fact that parliament has been dissolved what exactly does that mean? >> really what it mean, it's quite a body blow to the muslim brotherhood, which had almost 50% of the seats. the brotherhood saw parliament as its stronghold and was looking forward to possibly getting the presidency as well. now it's lost that. it's got no guarantee it's going to lose the presidency. in addition to that, the supreme council of the armed forces said they will pick the constituent assembly that will write up the constitution. that was a body that twice the parliament tried to form but failed to reach a consensus on. so really the brotherhood suddenly finds itself with a lot less cards to play in the political game. now, the brotherhood last night put out a statement calling for a million man march to the ballot boxes. so they really do see this election that begins tomorrow as a critical step to try to maintain their foothold in the power s

>> ben wedeman live in cairo for us. thank you. >> 45 minutes past 5:00 on the east coast.ate on the top stories. christine romans has been busy compiling those. >>> mitt romney kicking off his every town countses bus tour today in new hampshire. he'll hit six states in five days. president obama is back in washington this morning after attending a pretty high profile fund-raiser in new york at the home of actress sara jessica parker. now, he and romney both made campaign stops in ohio thursday to trade jabs about each other's economic policies in that key battleground state. >>> it's the pentagon's coming out party if you will. the defense department planning an event to commemorate lbgt pride. president obama is holing a white house reception marking lesbian, gay, and transgender pride month. >>> a mexican reporter has been found dead in the state of halapa. he announced he was forming a commission to protect journalists, the governor was. vera cruz has been the center of a bloody battle for control of a trug trafficking route. nine journalists have been killed in vera cr

ben wedeman is there, we'll check back with you, thanks ben. >>> the verdict comes at a turbulent time for egypt. the presidential run-off happens later this month on the 16th and 17th. i'm joined by mona, what does this verdict mean for egypt? >> well, the verdict overall, rob, is seen by many people in egypt as the latest blow, the latest blow of injustice from the military party ruling egypt since they forced mubarak to step down on february 11th a lot of people feel there was forgery during the election, we have the run off coming up on the 16th and 17th as you said, they are dissatisfactioned with the two contenders. one is considered part of the old regime and one from the muslim brotherhood. people are looking -- putting this verdict in the middle of this whole big bag and saying this is just a big charade by the military junta and despite the life sentence mubarak got, the fact his sons were acquitted and all those interior ministry officials were acquitted and on top of that not a single police officer over the past 15 months has been found guilty of killing the almost 1000 pe

suzanne. >> thank you, ben wedeman.ion policy that allows hundreds of thousands of young illegal immigrants to stay in the united states is having an impact on hundreds of thousands of american families. we will have the reaction. they've been committed to putting clients first. helping generations through tough times. good times. never taking a bailout. there when you need them. helping millions of americans over the centuries. the strength of a global financial leader. the heart of a one-to-one relationship. together for your future. ♪ together for your future. you see us, at the start of the day. on the company phone list that's a few names longer. you see us bank on busier highways. on once empty fields. everyday you see all the ways all of us at us bank are helping grow our economy. lending more so companies and communities can expand, grow stronger and get back to work. everyday you see all of us serving you, around the country, around the corner. us bank. one of the miller twins has a hearing problem. but she got

thank you, ben wedeman.joined by president carter's grandson, jason carter who was in egypt for the runoff election and he will give us his thoughts about the road for egypt ahead. >> and the people of turkey are living in a tough neighborhood right now. refugees are spilling across the border and now one of their fighter jets were shot down, and now people are coming to in droves to try to escape the bloodshed in syria. ♪ ♪ [ male announcer ] its lightweight construction makes it nimble... ♪ its road gripping performance makes it a cadillac. introducing the all-new cadillac xts. available with advanced haldex all-wheel drive. [ engine revving ] it's bringing the future forward. >>> they were once friends but now syria and turkey are enemies. as you can see in the map, they share a vast border. and now refugees are fleeing into turkey to avoid the violence in syria. and now adding to the tension, syria shot down a turkish warplane. turkey says that the plane was unarmed and brought down over international wa

joining me is ben wedeman. also chief medical correspondent dr. sanjay gupta. ben, what's the latest right now on mubarak's health? what do we know? >> reporter: actually, we don't know very much. we've got two different narratives, one coming from the official middle east news agency several hours ago saying that president -- former president mubarak was, quote, unquote, clinically te clinically dead. his lawyer says he's in a coma. his health has deteriorated. he had to be resuscitated several times. he insists that he's not dead. now, we are awaiting -- we've been waiting for quite some time for a statement to come out of the supreme council of the armed forces. which will hopefully clarify the situation. but this is just one point of lack of clarity that we have. we have two presidential nominees or candidates who both insist they won in the recent elections. we have a parliament that's been dissolved but insists that it's still sitting. so these mubarak reports are just one tip of the iceberg of confusion that seems to be floating in the nile right now. and

ben wedeman joins us in just a few moments with the latest on this.ck to the u.s. you know the old y