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Burning Man Festival Goers Stranded In Nevada Desert Due To Mud After Heavy Rain. President Biden Touts Economy In Labor Day Speech. Faces Mixed Polling On Economic Approval. NASA Astronauts Return To Earth After Six-Month Journey In Space. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired September 04, 2023 - 14:00   ET

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

[14:00:34]

OMAR JIMENEZ, CNN ANCHOR: A burning man mess. Thousands of festival goers, they're not going anywhere. After rain turned the Nevada desert into miles of impassable sludge, but organizers say there could be movement soon.

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN ANCHOR: And in a Labor Day speech, President Biden touting his handling of the economy with low unemployment and inflation trending down. He says Bidenomics trumps his predecessor's record, but new polls show most Americans aren't buying it. And welcome back to Earth. NASA astronauts splashing down after six months in space. New details about their 79-million-mile journey. We're following these major developing stories and many more all coming in right here to CNN News Central. We've got brand new video into CNN.

JIMENEZ: It shows a huge caravan of vehicles trying to leave the desert. You see how large that lineup actually is. That's in Nevada at the Burning Man Festival. The good news today, the sun is shining, which means the road to get out of the festival is drying. Officials have said that next hour they expect more people to begin to head out. Tens of thousands, though, have been stranded in the mud for days after two to three months of rain swamped the area. I talked to one attendee last hour, and here's what she said about the situation on the ground there.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANGELA PEACOCK, BURNING MAN ATTENDEE: There's a really, really long line trying to get out. Some people are leaving. I think mostly the four-wheel drives, the Subaru type vehicles, not the passenger cars yet. There are a few of those stuck. As you drive, you're going to accumulate mud on those tires and those feet and it makes everything harder, and you don't want to get stuck in this and then prevent other people from leaving. So, everybody's being really cool about it. We're just biding our time.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JIMENEZ: CNN national correspondent Nick Watt is covering this story for us. So, Nick, what is the latest that officials are saying about when these roads could reopen in a safe way to start getting people out?

NICK WATT, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, latest we heard, Omar, is in about an hour from now. They say that for the moment, the roads are still too wet and muddy for most vehicles, but not all. We have seen some four-wheel drive vehicles getting out late last night and also this morning. You know, 70-plus thousand people stuck in there.

And CNN has spoken to some of those who've managed to get out so far. And they describe a scene on Saturday, everyone waiting for that man to be burned, the kind of climax of this festival. The rain started, and initially, people were dancing in the mud, having a good time. And then gradually, there was a realization, hang on a second, we're not going to be able to get out of this. You mentioned that the sun is right now key.

What happens is that is clay. It's a dried-up ancient lakebed. The rain comes, makes it totally slick. The water just sticks on top, which makes it hugely problematic to get out. But also, if the rain, the water is still on top, that means the sun can dry it. And that's what we're seeing right now. You know, there is an ethos of kind of self-reliance around this festival. And a lot of people did bring in everything they needed to survive for a few days.

They were planning to be there and a little bit extra. But we have heard that some people were not so well prepared, and it got pretty terrible for people. Their camps were washed away. It's the desert. It got cold at night. And then, of course, Omar, there were some people who walked out, including a little clique of celebrities, including Chris Rock. I'll let DJ Diplo take up that story. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

THOMAS WESLEY PENTZ AKA DIPLO, DJ AND BURNING MAN ATTENDEE: He had his New York Knicks jacket on, and he just got up with us and started walking. And we walked about three hours in the mud. And he was happy it was me. I think Cindy Crawford walked with us, Kyra Gerber, Austin Butler, Randy Gerber, a writer, a couple of producers from TV, a couple of people that just wanted to get home to their children. And they didn't take -- no for an answer.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WATT: So, those walkers managed to get to an actual road out of the mud after a few hours. And a guy in a passing pickup truck apparently recognized DJ Diplo and gave them a ride. And eventually, they all made it to Reno. But during the day today, Omar, we're going to try and hopefully see the mass exodus, the 70,000-plus people coming out. But some people are going to stick it out a little bit longer because they plan to burn the man tonight. So, there are people who want to stay there until the end, and you know, they'll just be praying for no more rain. And there is no more rain in the forecast. So, fingers crossed, Omar.

[14:05:28]

JIMENEZ: Yeah. Star-studded walk from Diplo. But hopefully for the folks that are left behind, they get some relief very soon. Nick Watt, thank you very much.

WATT: Of course.

SANCHEZ: Let's get you a picture now of the situation on the ground at Burning Man with a festival goer, Cutter Palacios is on the ground there right now. Cutter, thanks so much for being with us. So, the organizers say that departures officially are set to begin in about an hour. I'm wondering what your plan is. Are you planning to leave or stick around?

CUTTER PALACOIS, BURNING MAN ATTENDEE: We're going to see the burn. I think it's great because they're doing all three burns tonight. So, the man's at nine. The chapel of Babel is at midnight and then the temple's at 1 a.m. So, this is awesome. We were hoping to leave by Tuesday or Wednesday. And the fact that we're doing it all in one night is going to be a huge celebration. And then we're going to join the mass exodus of people to stand in line maybe for hours and hours tomorrow. And then maybe get home middle of the night between Tuesday and Wednesday.

SANCHEZ: Nice. So, Cutter, for folks that are not initiated in the rituals and the ethos, the spirit of Burning Man, what is it that drives so many people out there to the desert? Because it kind of surprises me that you're saying this is awesome while it looks from the outside like a mess.

CUTTER: It's messy. Yeah. I think that's sort of the thrill of it. I mean, certainly people come out here and they're wanting the festival experience. But the majority of us are wanting to create community or wanting to create a city from essentially nothing. We bring in our self-reliance, our radical self-reliance. And a big spirit is gifting.

Last night we had a neighbouring camp because we're not part of a camp, but we had a neighbouring camp giving out pizza and they had vegan pizza. So, we just all sat around a fire eating pizza. I have a friend down at the French Quarter who was like serving up lobster, you know, which is a real treat.

And for those who are in need, we all help each other out. And that's just -- that's not something that you get to see every day. And you get to experience for an entire week, especially through these hardships. We really took care of one another. I think that's, that's incredible.

SANCHEZ: That is incredible, especially lobster and vegan pizza. It sounds like you have basic necessities covered.

CUTTER: Food, shelter, water. You know, that's really what you need to be out here. I did not plan for rain. I didn't bring a raincoat, but we were improvising. We use trash bags. There is definitely some footwear that was being improvised. Some people were going barefoot. Then there was like the plastic bag over the sock. No, no, no. It's a plastic bag. And then the sock. And then eventually the radio came out and told us it was a shoe and the sock over the shoe. I don't know about all that. I just went with a tried-and-true sock and then shoe over sock. And that seemed to work for me. So - SANCHEZ: I'm glad, I'm glad you were able to find a system to get through the mud. There were reports, though, Cutter. I want to ask you about this. There were reports that misinformation was spreading around festival goers, rumors, false rumors, I should point out about Ebola spreading. A SWAT team at one point was called in because a shooting was reported. Did you come across any of that?

CUTTER: I don't know about Ebola, I will say, and I don't know about the SWAT team, but we did get police vehicles coming through the walk in. We're out at two thirty and walk in, which is where there's no cars allowed. Police did, did respond very quickly to -- to whatever that report was. I think it's important to note, like in terms of communication, there's not a lot of communication out here. You have a radio, and they are doing the best they can to communicate accurate information from, from officials and from outside sources. But just listening to the CNN stuff going on here, that's more news I've heard since I've been out here for a week. (LAUGHTER)

Congrats to the astronauts landing. But yeah, it's word of mouth. And, and that's really cool, too. And you do the best you can. And one of the principles out here is immediacy. You know, it generally means that you see something cool, and you're called to go and participate in it and help out and explore and live life out here. And it also means that news and word of mouth, it's -- it's moment to moment as well.

SANCHEZ: That makes sense. We're really glad that you're doing well. I hope you enjoyed that lobster and the vegan pizza. And I hope you get to enjoy the burnings tonight and a smooth ride back home to you. Cutter Palacios, thanks so much for being with us.

CUTTER: Thank you for having me.

SANCHEZ: Of course. Meantime, Omar, we did confirm that President Biden was briefed on the situation at Burning Man. He is keeping busy this Labor Day.

[14:10:29]

JIMENEZ: Oh, yeah, yeah. I think I have a feeling they're having two very different Labor Days. (LAUGHTER) But even for those people, they're going to be back next year, even despite this experience.

Now, on this Labor Day, President Biden looked to push his Bidenomics message and bolster his union support. Now, it was during a speech in Philadelphia today, he got in some digs on Donald Trump.

((BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOESEPH BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: In fact, the guy who held his job before me was just one of two presidents in history. He was one of, but there's an important point, one of two presidents who left office with fewer jobs in America than when he got elected office. By the way, you know who the other one was? Herbert Hoover. JIMENEZ: Maybe a preview of what we might see on the campaign trail.

Now, Trump left office in 2021 during the height of the pandemic. But when it comes to Biden, despite low unemployment and rising real wages, most Americans are still unhappy with how he's handled the economy, according to polling. This Wall Street Journal polling shows that only 37% approve, while 59% disapprove.

Now, when you look at the GOP field, President Trump, former President Trump, no surprise. Way out ahead of everyone else, 58%, the closest Ron de Santis at 16%, that's according to a CNN poll of polls. And when you put Trump against Biden, they're both in a dead heat when it comes to a face-off, potentially, in a general election. But the key block right there, that undecided 8%.

And then a key issue between the two, President Biden in his 80s, Trump in his late 70s. Age is a big issue. The new polling shows 73% think Biden is too old for the job, while only 47% think Trump has too many birthdays under his belt. Now, 46%, let's look at the mental acuity, mental fitness part of things, partly related to, of course, the age considerations that 36% say Biden is up for the job, 46% say for former -- President Trump.

Now, the White House continues to push back on the age and economy questions, with one advisor saying, most Americans approve of the components inside Bidenomics, underscoring the challenges that they may have with messaging, especially as we get out into the campaign trail.

SANCHEZ: A challenge with messaging, certainly, Omar, is one way to put it. So let's dig deeper on this with economics and public policy professor, Justin Wolfers from the University of Michigan. Professor, thanks so much for sharing part of your Labor Day with us. So, let's break down the details of the economy, because there is this difference between perception and what is actually happening. You've got historically low unemployment, inflation that appears to be cooling, wages are going up, and yet polling indicates that the majority of Americans do not believe President Biden is properly handling the economy.

JUSTIN WOLFERS, ECONOMIC AND PUBLIC POLICY PROFESSOR: t's a puzzle for sure. So, I will tell you as an economist, I believe the hard numbers. The hard numbers tell us that the economy's growing and it's growing at a healthy rate. Where'd -- If you'd fallen asleep in 2019 and you woke up in 2023, you would discover pretty much the sort of economy you would have expected. And you wouldn't think to ask, hey, was there a global recession and a global pandemic in between? And I think that's really the President's great claim that things are as good or better than they would have been without a pandemic.

SANCHEZ: Yeah, it really is fascinating in part because we have been talking about the potential for a looming recession for the better part of nearly two years now. Do you think these numbers indicate that we've reached that soft landing that we've been talking about too?

WOLFERS: Well, never hang up the mission accomplished banner too soon, but Boris, I will remind you, I've been happily coming on CNN for all of that two years telling you that there was no recession and there hasn't been. What there has been though is a lot of depressed people. And this is where there's this disjunction between reality and perception that's as large as I've ever seen in my career.

The poll you were just describing about asked people, do you think the economy has gotten better or worse over the past two years? And there's no question on this, by the way, unemployment is down, inflation is down, economic growth is up, real wages are up, everything has gotten better over the past two years. Two years ago, was 2021, it was a miserable time. Yet only 28% of people say that things have gotten better over the past two years.

A big part of that is there's this enormous partisan gap. It's gotten to the point where it's almost pointless asking Republicans how they feel about the economy. Only 7% of them were willing to admit that the economy had gotten better over the past two years. So, I think when we ask these questions, people are no longer telling us how they feel about the economy. Really, they're telling us how they feel about the President.

SANCHEZ : Fascinating, it's like a Rorschach test. I want to ask you about the Fed.

WOLFERS: Absolutely.

SANCHEZ : Yeah, I wanna ask you about the Fed because their strategy with interest rates has contributed to the cooling of inflation. We should note it is still higher than the 2% goal that they have for it. Would you say that the Fed has been effective?

[14:15:38]

WOLFERS: I think the Fed's been remarkably effective. And this again is where you get one of these disjunctions. So let me tell you the fact. The fact is over the past year inflation has fallen from 9 % arguably a crisis level down to 3 % not quite down to 2 yet in public opinion. The same public opinion poll and they ask people has inflation moved in the right direction or the wrong direction over the past year. Remember it's fallen from 9 to 3. Only 20 % of people say it's moved in the right direction. So, reality has gone the right way. But for some reason public opinion is yet to catch up.

SANCHEZ: So, Professor would you predict then a potential easing of interest rates in the near future?

WOLFERS: So, I think seeing inflation move from 9% down to 3% is a tremendous relief. And your viewers I'm sure are feeling it and seeing it in their everyday lives. There though the Fed is looking to get inflation down to 2%. You can think about this as the last mile of the inflation problem. And I think the Fed remains very worried about how to knock that last little bit out of inflation out of the system.

And so, it looks like things are slowing. If you'd written if you'd drawn a picture of what a soft-landing looks like it looks a lot like the data, we've been getting. But you know economic data moves around a heck of a lot. It's always hard to see exactly what's going on. And so, there's still a chance the Fed may feel the need to raise interest rates maybe one more time.

SANCHEZ: We will be keeping a close eye on that. Professor Justin Wolffers please come back when those numbers come out and interpret them for us.

WOLFERS: I'll be I'll be here.

SANCHEZ: Thanks so much. Omar.

JIMENEZ: I'm gonna have to be there for that too. It's good insight. Now we've got a lot coming up in this show. Russia is accused of unleashing a drone attack targeting civilian infrastructure. Next, we're live from Ukraine with the latest. Also, ahead at a critical point in the counter offensive. President Zelenskyy fires his defence minister and nominates a new one. We'll explain the shakeup and later home again. Several astronauts splashed down in the Atlantic after spending six months aboard the International Space Station. You're watching CNN News Central. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:17:46]

SANCHEZ: Overnight, Russia launched what Ukraine describes as a massive attack on civilian infrastructure and ports in the southern Odesa region. It's also accusing Russia of trying to create a food crisis with attacks on port infrastructure over the weekend. Today, Ukraine says its forces are making further advances and liberating more areas along the southern front line where some of the heaviest fighting is taking place.

All of this coming as Ukrainian President Zelenskyy shakes up the highest ranks of his military. He fired his defence minister as his country enters the 19th month of this war. Let's take you now live to Ukraine with CNN's Melissa Bell. So, Melissa, walk us through this decision by Zelenskyy to replace the head of the Ministry of Defence.

MELISSA BELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, it comes at an extraordinary delicate time, of course, Boris. Rustem Umarov will take on what is arguably one of the hardest jobs in the world right now, trying to keep this war effort going, not just Ukraine's own defence industry trying to ramp up its production of weapons capable of taking this war to Russia, but also, of course, with many varied allies on board for the long term. Now, out goes Oleksii Reznikov.

He has been widely credited with shepherding the first few months of this war through fairly successfully. But, of course, his ministry, the Ukrainian Defence Ministry, was dogged by corruption scandals. There were allegations over procurement and -- bribes that may have been paid to certain people by people who are refusing not to go to service, a bunch of different allegations, corruption scandals. There have been sackings. There have been arrests. Oleksii Reznikov, I should point out, was never tainted by any of those. But still, this change, which came at the request, we understand, of Mr. Reznikov, does allow President Zelensky to draw a line under the first 18 months of the war. And, again, the man coming in is considered a widely capable man who

should be able to take on this formidable challenge of looking ahead to the next few months, this counteroffensive, and convincing the allies that he's going to need all the weapons he can get to try and keep pushing those lines forward, Boris.

SANCHEZ: And, Melissa, we also have some news out of Russia. A photo published for the first time since the attempted coup featuring a key Russian general. What can you tell us about that?

BELL: Now, General Surovikin, you will remember, Boris, it was back in October of last year that the hardliners had been put in charge, or rather become more prominent within the Kremlin and certainly in charge of Ukraine's war efforts.

And that included his appointment at the helm of the Russian special operation, as they call it, war here in Ukraine. He didn't last very long, just a few months in the top job. He was then demoted to deputy. But what really got him, of course, were -- was the attempted march on Moscow by Yevgeny Prigozhin, now deceased. You'll remember that at the time, there was a lot of speculation that General Surovikin may have had advance warning of it, may indeed have been a secret somehow member of Wagner. Now, many people around him denied that, suggested that he was simply resting.

Fact is, since that attempted push, there had been no sighting of him. He'd been nowhere to be seen. So, today, he's popped up on this telegram channel, apparently alive and well and in Moscow, Boris.

SANCHEZ: Melissa Bell, thank you so much for the reporting from Zaporizhzhia. Omar.

JIMENEZ: Well, NASA is welcoming home four astronauts after their successful return from a nearly six-month stay at the International Space Station. They were traveling at more than 17,000 miles per hour before the crew's Dragon capsule deployed its parachutes and splashed down off the coast of Jacksonville, Florida, just after midnight. Its exterior temperature got to 3,500 degrees, just in case you think your Labor Day is hot, as it sliced back into the Earth's atmosphere. The astronauts are from the U.S., the United Arab Emirates, and Russia. They conducted three spacewalks and oversaw more than 200 science and technology projects during their stint in space.

[14:21:49]

So we have a lot to talk about when it comes to space. That's why we got Leroy Chow. He's a retired astronaut. He flew on three space shuttle missions and spent more than six months on the International Space Station. So, Leroy, thanks for joining us here on Earth (LAUGHTER) for these questions. Now, look, I want to start with, there are oftentimes launches that capture the collective attention of the world, of the country, but there is a lot more being done in the day- to-day space work. And this mission strikes me as one of those. But give us a sense of what is happening day-to-day in places like the International Space Station. LEROY CHIAO, RETIRED NASA ASTRONAUT: Sure. Day-to-day aboard the ISS,

everybody on board has a full day. Your schedule is planned down to the minute, and you're doing a lot of different things. Certainly, you're conducting scientific investigations, but you're doing a lot of other very important work, like scheduled maintenance. You might have to repair things that broke down. You're doing logistics work. It's not all glamorous.

You know, you got to go find these things and put them in the right places. You're unpacking a cargo ship, or maybe you're packing an empty cargo ship with garbage to deorbit. So, every day is different, and it's all planned down to the minute.

JIMENEZ: And when you talk about just these types of tests, what types of tests are they doing? Is it on air pressure or, you know, whatever it might be? I'm not going to pretend to know exactly the range of tests. But, yeah, what types of things are they actually studying?

CHIAO: Sure. We do a lot of different kinds of experiments. So, in research aboard the International Space Station, certainly a large portion of that is devoted to biomedical examinations, both of the astronauts themselves, as well as experiments on cellular level and even some small animals. And basically, we're trying to understand the negative effects of zero gravity and that harsh environment, radiation and other hazards up there. And we're trying to come up with biomedical countermeasures so that we can send crews to Mars and places like that and have them stay healthy.

So besides that, there are also material science experiments, doing a lot of things up there that are difficult to do here on Earth. You're also doing some basic physics experiments, too, to verify different theories and parameters. And so, there's a whole gamut, -- a whole lot of different things that are going on up there.

JIMENEZ: Yeah. And, you know, someone like Elon Musk tends to be in the headlines these days for X or Twitter or Tesla. But SpaceX has at this point become a very instrumental infrastructure alongside NASA when it comes to space exploration. Is that private company government partnership going to be the new reality of space exploration, as opposed to in a previous era when it was more government led?

CHIAO: Absolutely. This is a new paradigm and it's working out very well. You know, way back in 2008, 2009, I was part of a White House committee that put forward this option, this idea of government commercial, you know, private aerospace cooperation. And that's how SpaceX and Boeing got the contract to develop their spacecraft.

SpaceX, this particular spacecraft Endeavour, this is its fourth flight. It's been extremely successful program and they have been launching astronauts now for nearly two years. They've been launching cargo even longer, many more years than before -- they got the crew up there and Starliner Boeing spacecraft will hopefully be flying sometime next year.

And so, this absolutely is the new partnership. This is the new model. NASA has gone out and used the same model to look for private commercial companies to co-invest, if you will, in space stations, smaller space stations that will take over the functions of the ISS once that is deorbited in 2030.

JIMENEZ: Yeah. And all this comes in the context of India being the fourth country to make a soft landing on the moon. China's space program jumping leaps and bounds a lot to keep an eye on. Leroy Chow, come back. I'm happy to talk about it all with you. Thank you.

CHIAO: Thank you.

JIMENEZ: Of course. Boris.

SANCHEZ: Still to come this afternoon, an update from the campaign trail. Republican candidate Nikki Haley doubling down on her call for older lawmakers to take mental competency tests. This comes after Mitch McConnell's second time freezing on camera in front of reporters. Details from the road next.