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The Lead with Jake Tapper

Russian Forces Launch Full-Scale Invasion Of Ukraine; Biden Announces New Sanctions On Russian; More Than 1,700 Detained At Anti- War Protests In Russia; Russia Launches Large-Scale Military Invasion Of Ukraine; Russian Troops Seize The Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant; Three Ex-Officers Guilty Of Violating George Floyd's Civil Rights; U.N.: 100k Plus Ukrainians Flee "Violence For Safety" Inside Country. Aired 5-6p ET

Aired February 24, 2022 - 17:00   ET

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

[17:00:00]

MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: And I said, OK, so where are the Russians then? And he said, we're the Russians, which was incredible because it was -- we thought they were Ukrainian forces. I looked at their insignia, and suddenly realized that, you know, we had stumbled upon and we'd encountered that forward group of Russian special forces that had been put into that base.

Just a few hours before by helicopter had engaged in fierce fighting. And we're now facing a counter attack from the Ukrainian military, at that point we stepped away and witnessed this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHANCE: Keep in inside. Inside in here. Here.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Though that way?

CHANCE: Let's move down this way against the wall.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I need you to check our thing.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's OK. It's OK. Good job.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHANCE: All right. Well, that was, you know, a very dramatic outburst there. Gunfire added an enemy we didn't see. We assume it was, you know, some kind of threat that they felt from perhaps a counter offensive. I've been told by Ukrainian officials, there was a counter offensive underway just before we got there.

Remember that airfield, that airbase is absolutely essential if Russian forces are going to establish a bridgehead to bring in more troops, more equipment to encircle the Capitol and potentially take the entire city of Kyiv take it over, Jake.

JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: And Matthew earlier today, you called the idea of a military confrontation between the Russians and Ukrainians near the Chernobyl nuclear exclusion zone, you called it quote, quite frankly, terrifying, obviously, because of all the unknowns about what might happen. If that radioactive material were disturbed, who have any idea why Russia might want control of Chernobyl? Is it just another piece of territory? Or is there something more to it than that?

CHANCE: I mean, you know, I've been thinking about that a little bit. And it's difficult to say, but I mean, the obvious answer is the geographical location of it. It's not far from Kyiv, but it's also on the, the border of Belarus. So it's a bit of open territory, which even though it's contaminated terribly, of course, still with radioactive material, it is, you know, territory that that gives access to Ukraine, from the north, from Belarus.

There was also a lot of speculation in the Russian media, particularly before this invasion happened, that Chernobyl could be a potentially dangerous place where an ecological disaster could be sparked if there is fierce fighting around there. Russians were right about that. Ukrainians have been expressing their kindness of concern about that as well. That's why I said it was so terrifying that there's a potentially dangerous military confrontation around that nuclear reactor, which is currently housed in a sarcophagus made out of concrete, to try and, you know, limit any further damage that could be caused by.

Of course, if it does become the focus of a strong military confrontation between these two armies, that could kick up all sorts of horrific radioactive material, and, you know, cause that massive catastrophe to repeat itself all over again. And I think probably, it's fair to say neither side, one that.

TAPPER: Yes, I think that's fair to say. Matthew Chance reporting on the ground from Kyiv, Ukraine. Thank you so much.

President Biden today, promising U.S. forces will get involved if Russia pushes beyond Ukraine, and goes deeper into NATO allied European countries as CNN's Kaitlan Collins reports, the president notably would not answer why he is not preemptively sanctioning the Russian president now.

(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Hours after Russia invaded Ukraine, President Biden denouncing the unprovoked attack and imposing new sanctions to punish the Kremlin.

JOE BIDEN, U.S. PRESIDENT: Putin is the aggressor. Putin chose this war.

COLLINS: The president saying Russia's aggression cannot go unanswered and vowing that President Putin will pay.

BIDEN: Now he and his country will bear the consequences. Today, I'm authorizing additional strong sanctions.

COLLINS: The President cutting off Russia's largest banks and companies from Western financial markets and restricting technology exports that could hamper Russia's military capabilities.

BIDEN: Every asset they have in America will be frozen.

COLLINS: Biden also targeting Russian elites and their families, freezing trillions and assets.

BIDEN: These are people who personally gained from a Kremlin's policies and they should share in the pain.

[17:05:06]

COLLINS: Biden says sanctioning Putin himself is still an option but declined to answer why the U.S. isn't taking that step, following the Russian leaders full scale attack.

BIDEN: Kind of a bluff it's on the table.

COLLINS (on camera): Sanctioning President Putin.

BIDEN: Yes.

COLLINS: Why not sanction him today, sir?

(voice-over): The President said he is sending in more U.S. troops to Eastern Europe to bolster NATO allies on Russia's doorstep.

BIDEN: The United States will defend every inch of NATO territory with the full force of American power. And the good news is, NATO was more united and more determined than ever.

COLLINS: The President making his first public remarks since the attack and joining fellow world leaders in denouncing Putin.

BORIS JOHNSON, BRITISH PRIME MINISTER: This hideous and barbaric venture of Vladimir Putin must end in failure.

COLLINS: And perhaps his most chilling remark, the President warned that the Russian leader has his sights set on more than just Ukraine.

BIDEN: He has much larger ambitions and Ukraine. He wants to in fact, reestablish the former Soviet Union. That's what this is about.

(END VIDEO TAPE)

COLLINS: Now, Jake, we also heard from Senator Mitch McConnell, who said President Biden called the top four congressional leaders this afternoon to give them a personal briefing on Ukraine. When it comes to these sanctions that he imposed today that we've seen rolled out by the Treasury Department. Previously, the White House had been reserving them for in case Putin did what he did last night attacking Ukraine, as he is doing right now, saying that they potentially could use them as leverage to deter the Russian leader.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KAMALA HARRIS, U.S. VICE PRESIDENT: The purpose of the sanctions has always been and continues to be deterrence.

BIDEN: No one expected the sanctions to prevent anything from happening. Has to show this could take time.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COLLINS: See now today this afternoon, President Biden talking about them as punishment for the Russian leader now that he has attacked Ukraine, Jake. And of course, the big question given what President Biden said about this not being the end of the road for President Putin saying has his sets his sights set on more than just Ukraine is a big question of whether or not these sanctions once they start to go into effect, as President Biden was saying today, whether or not they changed that calculus of his.

TAPPER: Yes, that's a kind of confusing messages on the sanctions, deterring or not. Kaitlan Collins at the White House. Thanks so much. Joining us now to discuss former White House Chief of Staff for President Trump and retired Marine Corps General John Kelly. General Kelly, thanks so much for joining us.

Now we've seen what the U.S. is response to Russia is, what do you think, is President Biden going far enough to punish Putin? Do we had General Clapper on earlier who told me that he thinks it's time for the West to impose every possible sanction and punishment possible?

GEN. JOHN KELLY (RET.), FORMER TRUMP WHITE HOUSE CHIEF OF STAFF: Well, Heydo, Jake, it's always great to talk to you. Not being on the inside. I don't exactly know. But as I understand it, the sanctions already ordered are pretty considerable, affecting all aspects of the Russian economy and the oligarchs and the rest of the corrupt officials that run that country.

And I guess -- my guess is they're holding back some of the sanctions as kind of a as a follow on if Putin doesn't respond to the first ones. And if the Russian people, frankly, don't respond to the first set of sanctions that's the only thing I can guess, Jake.

TAPPER: When you see this invasion, the war that Russia has carried out so far, is this what you expected such an attack might look like? Or, I personally will observe that I kind of thought he would just take the Donbas region, the southeast corner. I didn't know that he was going to try to actually take the whole country which is what it appears is going on.

KELLY: I mean, from a military point of view, this is a standard, you know, attack procedure. The fact that they have attacked on three axes, major axes from the south, from the east and from the North. The fact that they have used airborne troops to grab an arrowhead close to the city so they can, you know, use that arrowhead for follow on helicopter fixed wing flights is exactly what, you know, any military would have done a follow up again with the eventually meeting up these various ground attack.

All of that of course preceded by missile strikes to take down their triple A, they're in a aircraft capability missiles primarily. So this is all standard stuff.

The one thing I would just emphasize, the Russians have never really paid too much attention to civilian casualties. You know, we in the U.S. and in the West try to limit casualties. Sometimes things go terribly wrong, but generally speaking, part and parcel of Russian military operations tend to be a complete who cares about the number of civilian casualties the amount of civilian destruction.

[07:10:10]

It's interesting thus far as I can read it on the TV recording that they haven't gotten into that yet. But I would just caution everybody to understand that once they decide to go at it, they don't really pay too much attention to civilian casualties to precise military operations, that kind of thing.

TAPPER: We've heard a lot of prominent Republicans, both in politics and in conservative media, praising Vladimir Putin, even calling him a genius. What's your response when you hear that?

KELLY: Disbelief. He's a tyrant. He's a murderer. He is attacked an innocent country whose only crime is that they want to be free and democratic. And they work in in that direction, and have been working that direction. They've been a cooperative country, they gave up on our word, they gave up the nuclear weapons that there's so old Soviet Union left behind. They participated with other U.S. NATO allies. They participated in operations, peacekeeping operations in Africa and Afghanistan, places like that. They were part of the Partnership for Peace with a -- although not members of NATO, they worked alongside NATO, and these various, you know, good operations.

You know, is Putin smart? Yes. I mean, tyrants are smart. They know what they're doing. But that's -- I can't imagine why someone would look at what's happening there and see it anything other than a criminal act? I don't get it, Jake.

TAPPER: Former White House Chief of Staff and retired Marine General John Kelly, thank you so much as always, sir. And as always, thank you for your service and your sacrifice that you and your family have made for our country.

Before Putin defied the world the French were key in trying to convince him to back down, they try to at least. Next, we're going to talk to the French ambassador to the U.S. about what now.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:16:17]

TAPPER: We have some more breaking details on the Russian invasion of Ukraine. We're learning that a key U.S. ally French president Emmanuel Macron spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin today. The first western leader that we know of to speak with Putin since he launched this invasion, this war on Ukraine.

Joining us now is the French ambassador to the United States Philippe Etienne. Mr. Ambassador, the Kremlin describes the conversation between Macron and Putin as serious and frank, can you tell us anything more about their conversation? Is there a diplomatic solution at all within reach?

AMB. PHILIPPE ETIENNE, FRENCH AMBASSADOR TO THE U.S.: Well, first thanks for having me, but also thanks for the reporting. You do you're doing in Ukraine.

TAPPER: Thank you. We have great brave reporters on the ground there.

ETIENNE: It's important. Our president called -- had a conversation with the Ukrainian president, President Zelenskyy. And after this conversation, and in consultation with President Zelenskyy, he called the Russian president to demand an immediate end to the Russian invasion. And he was just about to start the meeting of the European Union, heads of state and government and he confirmed the EU lags the U.S. would adopt a package of massive sanctions. So he did this in this context.

TAPPER: And did he get any word from Putin about his intentions or whether or not --

ETIENNE: Well, you have seen Russian react you can imagine.

TAPPER: Yes.

ETIENNE: That's it. We wanted to -- he wanted to directly make this call that many leaders in the world have been doing and doing it in the direction of the President of Russia. The Secretary General of the United Nations, many, many leaders asked him to stop this invasion.

TAPPER: So you heard President Zelenskyy and the Russian Foreign Minister as well say that they need Europe to kick Russia out of the SWIFT financial network, that that's really the most important -- one of the most important things that they can do. I know that there are sanctions going against Russian banks and the like, why -- President Biden said earlier today that Europe is just not there yet. You're not ready to kick Russia off the SWIFT network. Why not?

ETIENNE: Well, those are also very technical conversations that are very important. The two very important parameters are unity. And the massive sanctions the fact that those sanctions are massive. On the financial side, I heard this morning one discussion between you and an expert of finances and banking, saying that what we're doing with Russian banks with the access, all the impossibility of any more access of the Russian state and government financing is very, very powerful and as powerful as if we used SWIFT.

The philosophy of this package, first unity, because it makes it politically and technically stronger, and second, to have a maximum effect of sanctions on Russia, while mitigating or minimizing the effects of our economies. This is irrational and then beyond there are a lot of details and technical details. We have been preparing this message packages for weeks now in particular between the Europeans and the Americans, and now we're adopting them very, very quickly in a record reputated. [17:20:11]

TAPPER: 80 years of relative peace in Europe ended last night, I want you to take a listen to how the NATO Secretary General put it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JENS STOLTENBERG, NATO SECRETARY GENERAL: Peace on our continent has been shattered. We now have war in Europe, on a scale of another type, we thought belonged to history.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: I don't need to tell anybody in France, what that means, given what the last time there was war and such escapes (ph) to France. But what goes through your mind when you hear the NATO Secretary General saying that?

ETIENNE: Well, our President made a speech to the French people this morning. He said that what happened last night was a turning point in the history, and especially for Europe, and for our nation, like for all European nations, it is a reality.

TAPPER: And we're seeing these heartbreaking images, people trapped in gridlock traffic trying to get out of Ukraine, is France preparing for a refugee crisis, potentially?

ETIENNE: The EU as such is preparing all possible consequences. We know that some of our member states are on the front line, which has consequences for their security, but also for a possible influx of refugees. And we will also help those countries and we will also as European Union. You know France is holding the Presidency of the Council of the EU right now. We will also have to follow this very important aspect.

TAPPER: Merci beaucoup. The French ambassador to the U.S., Philippe Etienne, thank you so much. Appreciate it. Well, Vladimir Putin is conducting war against Ukraine, Russian police are also arresting hundreds of Russian citizens in Moscow for protesting. We're going to go live to Moscow next day with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:26:36]

TAPPER: And we're back with the breaking news in our world lead, amid Vladimir Putin's violence and unprovoked, unprovoked barrage against Ukraine a war. His government is now also cracking down on its own citizens arresting hundreds for taking part in anti-war protests. CNN's Nic Robertson joins us now live from Moscow.

And Nic, the government warning not to protest did not stop every Russian from taking to the streets and independent monitoring groups as more than 1,700 people have been detained across Russia today for protesting. You saw several demonstrators arrested right in front of you earlier. Tell us what's happening in Russia in Moscow right now. NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Yes, that was a pretty big demonstration by Moscow standards of recent times, given that there wasn't any time for people to prepare for this, Jake, because remember, citizens here just woke up like everyone else to the news of the war this morning. And normally normal times, people would have a little more organizational time, obviously, they have to organize these things sort of covertly on chat groups and things like that.

So, the figure of 900, more than actually 900 people arrested in Moscow is a relatively big number. And the police were pretty brutal about it. I saw one man being pulled by his face, people slapped up into the side of the police truck, their legs spread out rough handled into the police vehicles in some cases. And these were protesters who were doing nothing more at times, and just holding up a placard saying no to the war. Police were sort of searching their bags before they were being bundled into the police vehicles.

But the warnings from the government very clear, very stark. If you protest, you could get a criminal record. And that could haunt you for the rest of your life. I talked to some of the people who didn't get arrested. And I have to say it was a humbling and shocking to hear these young and an older Russians tell me just how much they're afraid. Why they're afraid. They're afraid because they no longer trust their leader. They didn't really trust him before, but now they really don't. They're worried about where the country is going.

One young lady said to me close to tears, she says I love Russia. I love Russia. But she says now I just want to leave the country. It doesn't feel right to me, she said, but with this leadership, you know, what else can I do? So this was really quite shocking to find this level of frustration, of disappointment of, you know, of not knowing what to do about the actions their governments taking.

I'm not quite sure how this bodes for the coming days or nights but it's very clear that Putin is cracking down heavily. That's his tactic. That's the way he does it. Because he wants to snuff out these demonstrations. The war won't be done in a day in Ukraine. And these protesters are likely to try to come back out again. So he's going in heavy, it seems early on, Jake, to send an unequivocal message. Keep off the streets.

TAPPER: Nic Robertson in Moscow. Thank you so much. Appreciate it. Let's discuss all this with CNN Global Affairs analyst Susan Glasser, Center for Strategic and International Studies vice president Seth Jones and CNN counterterrorism analyst Phil Mudd.

Susan, let me start with you, for months Putin has repeatedly claimed that he had no intentions of going to war with Ukraine. He reiterated this last week during a meeting with the German Chancellor. Were the diplomatic talks with the West real ever or was it just part of a strategy to buy time?

SUSAN GLASSER, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: You know, Jake, I think that the US Secretary of State Tony Blinken said the other day that, you know, they never really worked for real and that it was, you know, Putin's intention all along to invade Ukraine. He said that tragically, just a day before the invasion standing alongside the Ukrainian foreign minister here in Washington. And you know, it's my view that there never was a real diplomatic process, largely because Putin's demands were of the kind that it's impossible to negotiate with.

He set forth, essentially a demand that the NATO and the West turn back time and turn back time is not possible. You know, changing the constitution of Ukraine to disavow NATO membership, things like that. So I don't think Putin was ever serious about diplomacy here. And he certainly has a long record of lying to other world leaders that should make them very wary of being credulous when it comes to any commitments he gives to them.

TAPPER: Seth, the Kremlin spokesperson gave this bizarre and rather offensive explanation for the invasion, saying that the Russian forces are, in part, engaging in denazification of Ukraine, removing Nazis from Ukraine, even though there's zero proof of any Nazi like efforts, and we should mention the democratically elected president of Ukraine Zelensky is Jewish. How do you explain this? What do you make of this?

SETH JONES, VICE PRESIDENT, CENTER FOR STRATEGIC AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES: Well, look, I think this is part of the Kremlin's rationale, disinformation campaign to go in. But I'll tell you, Jake, what has me worried about that kind of language. And I'm already hearing from sources inside of Ukraine along these lines that the Russians are making lists of individuals. I actually worry that they'll start to conduct killings against individuals in Ukraine, government officials, members of the Security Services, and the military, particularly ones that have vowed to fight against Russia. And I worry about war crimes now coming up with those kinds of words.

TAPPER: And Phil, U.S. intelligence appears to have been pretty accurate when it comes to Putin's thinking in the lead up to the invasion, not to mention, just, I mean, it was yesterday that we were saying that the U.S. intelligence was -- they were warning Ukraine, it was going to be a full scale invasion, not just a partial one. None of this clearly stopped Putin. What more do you think the U.S. intelligence community is doing right now?

PHILLIP MUDD, CNN COUNTERTERRORISM ANALYST: We're missing half the question. We focused on the question of what the Russians will do. I remember back in the day, I used to support the CIA program to oppose the Russian invasion into Afghanistan. So let me take you into that piece of the puzzle.

Question one. From the intelligence perspective, how are the Ukrainians doing against the Russians? What are their strengths and weaknesses? Are there opportunities there that we're learning about in terms of Russian offensive to support the Ukrainians? There's intelligence coming in, I guarantee you on how the Ukrainians are performing.

Second and final question, looking at the perimeter in particular, Poland. If we want to support the Ukrainians, if we want to use the Europeans, including Poland, how willing are they to support us? How (INAUDIBLE) to back, for example, shipping of weapons through Europe? And what are the attitudes of political elites in Europe about providing military support to Ukraine?

So we focused on one piece, Jake, what are the Russians doing? Now some of the attentions got to shift to the other piece? Can we help Ukrainians? What are their strengths and weaknesses? And who's going to be with us if we want to do that, Jake?

TAPPER: Susan, we're seeing the Russian government arresting anti-war protesters in Moscow and throughout the country. We saw something similar during the 2014 invasion of Crimea. Does Putin care about this internal dissent?

GLASSER: Absolutely. You know, he is like many dictators and insecure dictator. And it's almost certain that this external aggression will go hand in hand with a further round of internal crackdown. And, you know, the evisceration of civil society and democratic small (ph) opposition has been fundamental to, you know, Putin's rule over these last two decades.

In fact, over the last year, you've seen a very significant crackdown by Putin, the arrest of Alexei Navalny, the most significant potential political opponent to him. Navalny is actually on trial, again, this very week, on trumped up charges from his prison cell. You saw the shutting down of memorial, the leading human rights group.

You know, the fact that so many people did come out despite this risk to themselves in the police state is I think notable, but that will be cause for further crackdown and paranoia on the part of the government. There's always been a connection between the internal cracking down of dissent in Russia and Putin's use of external aggression. And I think we're going to see that again this time.

TAPPER: Phil, multiple Russian government websites appeared to go offline outside Russia today. Cybersecurity experts tell CNN that the outages could be part of the Kremlin's own moves to pre-empt any potential cyber-attacks by, I suppose, the United States or others.

[17:35:06]

President Biden says the U.S. is prepared to respond to any Russian cyberattacks against us. What's going on here do you think?

MUDD: I don't think you can be prepared for that. Let's look at two dimensions to that. First is what we saw in the election campaign in United States last time around. If the Russians want to get involved in social media in the United States and try to influence people by explaining how this was a legitimate intervention, they can do that.

The second piece I would be looking at is if the Russians want to start intervening by sort of interfering with government websites, with government activity, for example, by getting into websites that are owned by Western governments, I suppose they can do that. I think they have one fundamental problem. And that is if you want to influence foreign policy perceptions of the intervention, you'd have to start with a basis where the foreign perceptions are able to be influenced.

And I think most people already have realized this is a Russian invasion. There's not much the Russians can do to persuade the West in Europe, the United States that it's not.

TAPPER: All right, Susan Glasser, Seth Jones, Phil Mudd, thanks to all of you. Appreciate it.

We're tracking the breaking news. Russian forces seizing control of Chernobyl, the side of the world's worst nuclear power disaster. Coming up next, we're going to talk to a congresswoman who operated nuclear reactors in the U.S. Navy about why that may be concerning. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:40:35]

TAPPER: And we continue covering the breaking news. In our world lead today, President Biden said the U.S. will deploy additional service members to Germany and redeploy some forces already in Europe to NATO eastern flank allies. Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Romania. The President continues to stick by his pledge that he will not send U.S. forces into Ukraine.

Here to discuss, Democratic Congresswoman Elaine Luria of Virginia. She is the vice chair of the House Armed Services Committee. Congresswoman, good to see you. You served as a Navy officer for 20 years operating nuclear reactors as an engineer. What is your biggest fear when you hear that Russian troops have now taken over and are controlling the site of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster?

REP. ELAINE LURIA, VICE CHAIRWOMAN, ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE: Well, Jake, thanks for having me again. You know, the site of the Chernobyl disaster that happened in 1986, you know, there's a lot of contamination, a lot of very difficult work went into encasing, essentially that exploded reactor core into a sarcophagus essentially encased in concrete. But, you know, this site itself could potentially be weaponized in essence, if there were an attempt to break open that sarcophagus allowed that contamination to escape out into the environment again. And, you know, we could see potentially something similar to the initial Chernobyl catastrophe that we saw which contaminated a very large region.

TAPPER: So I know, you can't reveal classified intelligence that you receive. But more broadly speaking, in terms of the Russian war against Ukraine, the invasion, what are you expecting will happen next? Will Kyiv be taken? Will Russia, in your view, occupy all of Ukraine?

LURIA: Well, Jake you know, I would say that it certainly appears that this all-out offensive is an effort to not just attack one area, but make a broad offensive across Ukraine, and there certainly moves, you know, towards Kyiv. I think that, you know, one of the areas of a lot of concern for me, you know, having been a naval officer for 20 years is looking at the Black Sea, looking at the fact that, you know, an amphibious assault appears to be planned or potentially, we don't know, the latest intelligence underway in the area of Odessa. And that Russia is likely at some point, to take over Odessa.

And, you know, access to the Black Sea is incredibly important. And, you know, where our U.S. and NATO ships, you know, reporting shows that U.S. and NATO ships have not been operating in the Black Sea recently, the last U.S. naval vessel, the USS Lee Burke (ph) left the Black Sea in December, but there is a huge, huge U.S. and NATO naval force operating in the Mediterranean, the USS Harry S. Truman carrier strike group from here in Virginia, as well as additional destroyers four based in the Mediterranean, four out of the east coast of the United States are operating in that region.

And one of my biggest concerns is, you know, the close proximity of these U.S. and NATO vessels operating near Russian warships and the opportunity for potential inadvertent escalation. The opportunity for, you know, these ships operating in such close proximity, and then those that, you know, are aggressive against other vessels. And then we saw recently, a reporting that a Turkish-owned merchant vessel was essentially struck in the midst of the conflict that's ongoing.

So what is the threat to (INAUDIBLE) maritime shipping within the region, and if the United States and NATO don't have a presence within the Black Sea, that, you know, also could be concerning.

TAPPER: The U.N. Refugee Agency says more than 100,000 people have moved within Ukraine. We're seeing some of them start to cross the border into Poland. This is clearly a potential refugee crisis. How concerned are you about that?

LURIA: I think we're all very concerned, you know, about the humanitarian effects of this and we've seen photos and videos of families who are essentially using subway stations as bomb shelters, apartment buildings that have been attacked and the traffic this morning heading less from Kyiv for people sensibly trying to flee the area of potential violence.

[17:45:08]

So, you know, this has the potential to become very devastating and already is, I'm sure for many people in Ukraine who have come under this attack from Russia. So that's something that we're watching very closely. I think that providing humanitarian assistance as well as military assistance to Ukraine is absolutely essential. And then working with our NATO partners, especially those countries that border Ukraine, to make sure that this flow of people trying to escape the violence, they don't have what they need.

And if they're Americans attempting to escape Ukraine, they arrive in Poland. The United States has forces there, as to our allies to allow them to evacuate safely to their home countries.

TAPPER: Democratic Congresswoman Elaine Luria from the great Commonwealth of Virginia, thank you so much. Appreciate your time.

We're also following breaking news out of Minnesota. A jury there has reached a verdict in the federal trial of three of the four officers, former officers now, who are involved in George Floyd's arrest, and his death. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[17:50:33]

TAPPER: We're going to take a quick break from our continuing coverage of Putin's war on Ukraine. To bring you some breaking news from the United States, a verdict in the federal trial of three former Minneapolis Police officers charged with violating the civil rights of George Floyd by showing deliberate indifference to his medical needs. As former officer Derek Chauvin knelt on Floyd's neck, killing him.

CNN's Omar Jimenez joins us now live from St. Paul, Minnesota. Omar, what did the jury decide?

OMAR JIMENEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Jake. So it took this jury about 13 hours of deliberations and specifically they found former Minneapolis officers Tou Thao, Alex Kueng and Thomas Lane guilty of showing deliberate indifference to George Floyd's serious medical needs as he was under the knee of Derek Chauvin. And found that at least officers Tou Thao and Kueng were guilty of willfully failing to intervene and stop Derek Chauvin.

Now prior to these deliberations beginning the judge laid out the thresholds that the jury would need to get to to find guilt in this particular case. And he said that the defendant needs to recognize that the use of force was unreasonable, and that the defendant had a realistic opportunity to prevent further harm from occurring, and didn't do it. That's on the willfully failing to intervene.

And on recognizing a serious medical need and not doing anything, the jury would have to find the defendant actually knew that Floyd had a serious medical need. And the defendant disregarded that medical need by failing to take reasonable measures to address it. Obviously, the jury found that threshold was met.

And when you consider the guilty plea from Derek Chauvin back in December, now, all four of the former officers who responded to George Floyd in May 2020 have either admitted their guilt or been found guilty of violating his civil rights.

TAPPER: Omar, were these three officers taken into custody? What happens next to them?

JIMENEZ: They were not taken into custody, they're going to continue their current bond arrangement. But, of course, we'll have to report back for when sentencing actually happens. And the sentencing technically allows for up to life imprisonment in this base on sentencing guidelines. We're not going to see that here. But what we will see remains in question at this point and is up to the judge.

We also have to keep in mind that these officers face state charges as well for aiding and abetting murder tied to, of course, George Floyd's murder. That trial is set to happen later on as well. And all those things of course are ongoing. But today, the big moment, the conviction of course of these three former Minneapolis Police officers.

TAPPER: All right, breaking news from Omar Jimenez in St. Paul, Minnesota. Thank you so much.

Putin's war is raging on. Will these new sanctions from the U.S. and the European Union do anything to stop the barrage of rockets raining down on the innocent people of Ukraine? Our teams are live across both Russia and Ukraine. That's next. Stay with us.

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TAPPER: Before we go today, we want to take a brief moment to talk about and consider the human impact of Vladimir Putin's unprovoked war against its neighbor.

That is the ominous sound of an air-raid siren heard in Ukraine's capital city of Kyiv, population, 3 million. Earlier today, the Russian invasion, forcing Ukrainians throughout the country to leave their homes and seek safety.

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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We try to be brave because we have children and we don't wanted to show them that we are scared.

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TAPPER: That's a family in Kharkiv, Ukraine, population 1.4 million, seeing praying this morning amid the growing threats. Despite the danger, many Ukrainians say that they're going to stay and they're going to fight.

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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: My mother who is 71 told she is going to stay in Kyiv and fight for Kyiv.

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TAPPER: More than 44 million people live in Ukraine. The United Nations estimates that more than 100,000 have already been forced to flee the violence. President Biden along with Western allies slapping Russia today with another round of sanctions against five major Russian banks and 10 Russian individuals. President Biden and others stopping short for now of sanctioning Putin personally.

President Biden also announcing today the deployment of 7,000 U.S. service members to Germany and the movement of U.S. forces already in Europe to the NATO eastern flank allies, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Romania. It has been a brutal 20 hours across Ukraine after Russia launched this full scale invasion this war by land, sea and air. We pray for the people of Ukraine.

You can follow me on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and TikTok at JakeTapper. You can tweet the show at TheLeadCNN. If you ever miss an episode of the show, you can listen to "THE LEAD" wherever you get your podcasts.

Our coverage of the breaking news in Ukraine continues now with Wolf Blitzer in "THE SITUATION ROOM." I'll see you tomorrow.