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Remembering Civil Rights Champion Jesse Jackson; Hillary Clinton Accuses Trump Administration of Cover Up in Handling of Epstein Files; Roughly 10 Million People in the West Under Winter Weather Alert. Aired 2:30-3p ET

Aired February 17, 2026 - 14:30   ET

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

[14:30:00]

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: ... anything suspicious or who knows anything about the potential whereabouts of Nancy Guthrie, you're being asked to call the Pima County Sheriff with the number on your screen. You can also reach out to the FBI at 1-800-CALL-FBI.

Stay with CNN. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Community members and civic leaders are celebrating the life and legacy of civil rights trailblazer, the Reverend Jesse Jackson. He died this morning at the age of 84.

[14:35:00]

The NAACP, which Jackson organized for in the 60s, calls him a lifelong soldier for justice and a transformative leader. Adding, "Reverend Jesse Jackson was not only a civil rights icon, he was family to the NAACP. His work advanced Black America at every turn.

He challenged this nation to live up to its highest ideals, and he reminded our movement that hope is both a strategy and a responsibility."

Cornell William Brooks is a former president of the NAACP. Sir, thank you so much for being with us on this important day of remembrance. And Jackson is someone who frequently organized boycotts, economic protests. He founded Operation Push, the advocacy organization. How are you thinking about his legacy today?

CORNELL WILLIAM BROOKS, FORMER PRESIDENT, NAACP: Well, first of all, thank you for having me in commemorating Reverend Jackson. Yes, I'm really thinking about him as both a public pioneering figure and also as someone who was a mentor and a supporter and a role model for me in civil rights. What I mean by that is he's a pioneering figure in the sense that he transformed those things which seem radical and unconventional and made them regular and routine.

Namely, in his twice two campaigns for the presidency, he expanded the Democratic Party, practiced the politics of inclusion that many of us take for granted. But I also think about myself as a young man, hearing him preach in my church, in my small hometown, and him being the first minister of the gospel, preaching about the moral obligation to treat gay and lesbian people fairly with dignity and love. And that really inspired me in terms of my ministry.

So I'm thinking about him as somebody who would call me during my time at the NAACP and say, you're doing a good job, and who offered support in public and encouragement in private. So I'm thinking about someone who is a titanic figure, but also a colleague, a mentor, and I'd like to consider a friend.

KEILAR: And before you knew him so well, it's interesting, I know in an interview that you did in 2014, you talked about sitting in the pews of Bethel AME in Georgetown, South Carolina, listening to Reverend Jackson, and you said, quote, "I'm not sure how old I was, but I just remember the idea of the world opening up to me. It was a morally formative experience." I mean, that is a fascinating statement.

Tell us a little bit more about that.

BROOKS: So if you can imagine being in your early 20s, thinking about ministry, and I had not yet gone to seminary, and here's this global figure standing in the pulpit of your small hometown church, preaching about justice and love and the law and transformative public policy in this small church. And so for me, it almost removed these blinders on my eyes in ministry, helped me to be less parochial, less myopic, and to think about the pulpit as being nationwide, globally wide, and thinking about being truly impactful for justice. And so it didn't hurt the fact that he played football, and he played one of the high school, one of my high school rivals in football.

He was just really an incredible figure in terms of charisma and brilliance, but also someone who inspired other people, and particularly young people. And so when you think about someone who created viral moments before there was an Internet, right, someone who literally brought millions and millions of people into public service, into ministry, a global figure who strode across the national stage, certainly here in the United States, but someone who really was, when I say global figure, he received the Presidential Medal of Freedom here in the United States, but also the highest such award in France. And so for me as a young man, this is the kind of minister I wanted to be, the kind of leader I wanted to be.

KEILAR: This idea of inspiring other people and standing on the shoulders of those before you, I want to zero in on a really interesting exchange that our Abby Phillip, whose stellar new book, "A Dream Deferred," is about Jackson's political fights.

[14:40:00]

And she was talking to Georgia's first Black senator, Raphael Warnock, currently serving, about that journey from Jackson's presidential bids in the 80s to Barack Obama's successful bid for the Democratic nomination in 2008. Here's part of that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) SEN RAPHAEL WARNOCK (D-GA): There could be no 2008 without 1988. And even before that, Shirley Chisholm, her courage as a black woman to stand up. Change is not a straight line. It happens in fits and starts.

You make steps forward. Sometimes you have steps back. Sometimes the democracy expands.

At other times, it contracts. But Reverend Jackson's story reminds us that even those contractions serve a purpose. Any woman who's given birth will tell you that contractions are necessary for new birth.

We're going through one big contraction in this moment. But he would say to us, don't lose hope. Keep hope alive.

Keep the faith. And keep fighting for a nation that embraces all of us and gives every child a chance.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: I wonder how you draw that line and the ups and downs of it from Jackson through to the role of Black Americans in politics decades after his runs.

BROOKS: Well, his impact on the country really elevated the moral and political trajectory of America. And what I mean by that is both of his presidential campaigns literally expanded not only the Democratic Party, not only the country in terms of Jewish Americans, Arab Americans, men and women, poor people, middle-class people, farmers, environmentalists, the LGBTQ community. His campaigns radically expanded not only the base of the Democratic Party, but I want to make the case for Republicans who have come to understand the need for inclusion.

A lot of this goes back to his politics of inclusion, but also gospel of inclusion. And so the America that we know today in terms of an America where Barack Obama is taken as an article of faith by many young people, that America was really created by the politics of agitation, inclusion, and hope practiced by the Reverend Jesse Jackson. And so many of the things that we take for granted are really those things which were pioneered by him.

And the wonderful thing about a pioneer is that they make that which is radical and unconventional seem conventional and routine. And he did that in a way that suggests that we all owe a great debt of gratitude to his legacy, which lives on.

KEILAR: Cornell William Brooks, really great to speak with you today. Thank you so much for joining us.

BROOKS: Thank you, Brianna.

KEILAR: And still to come, Hillary Clinton accusing the Trump administration of a cover-up over its handling of the Epstein files and responding to the revelations in the documents. We'll have that and much more coming up on CNN NEWS CENTRAL. [14:45:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SANCHEZ: Former First Lady and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is accusing the White House of a continuing cover-up. At issue as the handling of the release of the Epstein files. Here's what she told the BBC while speaking at the Munich Security Conference.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HILLARY CLINTON, FORMER FIRST LADY AND SECRETARY OF STATE: I think everybody should testify who is asked to testify. I just want it to be fair. I want everybody treated the same way.

That's not true for my husband and me because other witnesses were asked to testify. They gave written statements under oath. We offered that.

They want to pull us -- why did they want to pull us into this? To divert attention from President Trump. This is not complicated.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SANCHEZ: CNN's Annie Grayer joins us now with her latest reporting. So what else did Clinton have to say?

ANNIE GRAYER, CNN SENIOR REPORTER: This is a really interesting interview, Boris, because it's the most extensive comments, we've heard from Hillary Clinton on her views on all this. And, of course, she doesn't mince words when it comes to her views on how the Department of Justice is handling this, accusing them of a cover-up, but she's also very critical of the Republicans on Capitol Hill, accusing them of singling her and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, out here, saying that others in this investigation who were subpoenaed were able to provide written statements under oath, which they did, but the Republicans on Capitol Hill insisted that the two of them appear for in-person depositions, and she's arguing that's not necessary.

Now, she was asked explicitly about the photos that we've seen from one of the Department of Justice releases of the former president in what appears to be a hot tub with a woman whose face is redacted, that the Department of Justice says could be a potential one of Epstein's victims, and she was asked if she knew any context around this photo. Take a listen to her answer there.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CLINTON: And it wasn't a hot tub on a plane. It was one of the stops they made to look at philanthropic and charitable work that my husband has done, saving literally millions of lives around the world. It turned out that was done long before there was any public awareness and certainly any conviction of any crime by Jeffrey Epstein.

If Bill and I had a penny for every person we've taken pictures with, we would be extremely rich today.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRAYER: Now, also in this interview, Hillary was asked directly twice if she had any regrets about her or her husband's interactions with Epstein.

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And she said, you know, I've never met Epstein, and she had only limited interactions with Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein's former girlfriend and co-conspirator, and said that her husband's interactions with Epstein are well documented and that neither of them had any knowledge of their crimes. So a lot to unpack from this interview.

SANCHEZ: Now, both her and the former president are set to appear for closed-door depositions in the House's Epstein probe later this year. She's pushing for those to be made public. What's the likelihood that that happens?

GRAYER: So we got some new insights from her comments in this interview as well, where she says that she will show up for her deposition, but she would prefer it to be an open hearing. Now, saying she's going to show up, I think is all Republicans on the Hill are looking for. They've said, we want to do this deposition first.

Maybe we could do an open hearing in the future. They haven't ruled that out, but it seems like all signs are pointing toward these depositions being on for the end of this month. Both Hillary and Bill Clinton are expected to appear separately, February 26th and 27th.

SANCHEZ: All eyes will be on those depositions. Annie Grayer, thanks so much for the reporting.

Now to some of the other headlines we're following this hour -- Brianna.

KEILAR: The U.S. military says that it struck three alleged drug trafficking vessels in the eastern Pacific and Caribbean on Monday night. According to U.S. Southern Command, all 11 people on board were killed. These strikes bring the total death toll from the U.S. campaign against alleged drug boats to at least 135, with several more survivors of the strikes presumed dead.

Also, a Virginia neighborhood is rocked by an explosion. Investigators saying it was caused by natural gas seeping from underground transmission lines. According to our affiliate WUSA, 41 homes had to be evacuated. A man inside the home and a neighbor were hospitalized with minor injuries.

And a powerful wave flipping over a boat riding along the shore in Santa Cruz, California. This happened in Steamer Lane. It's a famous surfing location just south of San Jose.

Two adults, four young kids were thrown into the water, but luckily you saw them there. They were near surfers who were able to help the family get to shore safely.

People in California are bracing for more storms. The second in a series of powerful storms that triggered flash flood warnings is expected to bring feet of snow to mountains in California. CNN meteorologist Allison Chinchar is tracking the threat.

ALLISON CHINCHAR, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Roughly 10 million people are under some type of winter weather alert out west in anticipation of that next round of storms that is set to arrive here over the next few hours. Here you can see we also have already a marginal risk for excessive rainfall. And the main concern here, this stretches from San Francisco all the way down to San Diego, is the fact that we're getting more rain on top of rain that's already fallen the last 48 hours, particularly of concern for some of those areas where we've had those recent wildfires and the burn scars.

Now, in addition to that, there is also the potential for some severe storms in the green shaded area that you see here, very similar to that other area that was marked off. It essentially runs from San Francisco down through San Diego. Damaging winds is going to be the main concern, but it's not out of the question we could have an isolated brief tornado with some of those stronger thunderstorms that would arrive.

Now, you can see as we head later into the evening, that next round really starts to settle in, especially across central and southern California. A lot of yellow and orange even on this radar, indicating some of those storms are expected to bring some heavy downpours at times. Also noting that once that slides through, we get a little bit of a break before the next round begins to arrive late Wednesday, and especially as we head into the day Thursday.

It will arrive in northern California first and then continue to shift southward and eastward in the coming days. Now again, back to back, having all of those systems means that there's going to be a lot of accumulation in terms of both rain and snow. Overall, for the rainfall totals, those will be heaviest along the coast, where we could be looking at three to five inches total out of all of the days.

Snowfall, as we mentioned, this is going to be measured in feet. Three to five feet is possible across much of the Sierras, but even as we spread out over into the Rockies, again, you'll notice a lot of these areas here could be looking at one, two, three, even as much as five feet of snow. It's much needed in a lot of those areas across the Rockies because they've been dealing with a snow drought, so having these multiple rounds of snow coming in is certainly going to help a lot of this region out.

KEILAR: Allison Chinchar, thank you.

And still to come, some new details on the DNA test results on a glove found near Nancy Guthrie's home. The latest on the investigation ahead.

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(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SANCHEZ: The Lunar New Year has officially kicked off. 2026 marks the year of the horse. CNN's Mike Valerio joins us with some do's and don'ts of how to start the new year off right.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MIKE VALERIO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We're here in Beijing at the Ditan Temple Fair. This is one of the largest Chinese New Year celebrations, and also, we are in the middle of the biggest human migration on the planet. But for celebrating Chinese New Year, there are some rules that you should follow.

Among them, red packets for family members. That is a must. Next, don't get your haircut on New Year's Day.

Make sure that you get your haircut before New Year's Day. That is an absolute rule. Also, make sure that you do your cleaning before the start of Chinese New Year, because say you're sweeping your floor on day one, that's like you're sweeping your luck out of your home.

You don't want to do that. Make sure that you take out the trash before the start of Chinese New Year as well. Also, wearing new clothes is the right way ...

END