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VP Harris Addresses Florida's New 6-Week Abortion Ban; State Rep. Anna Eskamani (D-FL) Discusses Florida's New 6-Week Abortion Ban; Nationwide Pro-Palestinian Protests, Arrests Have Echoes Of The Past; Source: House GOP Leaders Plan To Kill Motion To Oust Speaker; Manhattan Prosecutors To Retry Weinstein's NY Case. Aired 2:30-3p ET

Aired May 01, 2024 - 14:30   ET

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

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KAMALA HARRIS, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Across our nation we witness a full-on assault, state by state, on reproductive freedom.

And understand who is to blame. Former President Donald Trump did this.

(CHEERING)

(APPLAUSE)

(SHOUTING)

HARRIS: Donald Trump handpicked three members of the United States Supreme Court because he intended for them to overturn Roe. And as he intended, they did.

Now many of you here may recall I served on the Judiciary Committee as a United States Senator. And I questioned two of those nominees.

To one of them I asked, quote -- I will quit myself --

(LAUGHTER)

HARRIS: -- "Can you think of any law that gives the government the power to make decisions about the male body?"

(APPLAUSE)

HARRIS: And it will come as no shock to everyone here, he had no good answer.

(LAUGHTER)

HARRIS: And that day, we all knew what was about to come. And it happened just as Donald Trump intended.

Now, present day, because of Donald Trump, more than 20 states have abortion bans. More than 20 Trump abortion bans. And today, this very day, at the stroke of midnight, another Trump

abortion ban went into effect here in Florida.

As of this morning, four million women in this state woke up with fewer reproductive freedoms than they had last night. This is the new reality under a Trump abortion ban.

Starting this morning, medical professionals like Dr. Ten (ph) could be sent to prison for up to five years for providing reproductive care even earlier in pregnancy.

Reality, under a Trump abortion ban, starting this morning, women in Florida became subject to an abortion ban so extreme it applies before many women even know they are pregnant.

Which, by the way, tells us the extremists who wrote this ban either don't know how a woman's body works --

(SHOUTING)

HARRIS: -- or they simply don't care.

Trump says he wants to leave abortion up to the states, he says, up to the states.

All right, so here's how that works out. Today, one in three women of reproductive age live in a state with a Trump abortion ban, many with no exceptions for rape or incest.

Now, on that topic, as many of you know, I started my career as a prosecutor specializing in crimes against women and children. What many of you may not know is why.

So when I was in high school, I learned that my best friend was being molested by her stepfather. And I said to her, well, you've got to come and live with us. I called my mother and my mother said, of course, she does. And so she did.

So the idea that someone who survives a crime of violence to their body, a violation of their body would not have the authority to make a decision about what happens to their body next, that's immoral. That's immoral.

And one does not have to abandon their faith or deeply held beliefs to agree the government should not be telling her what to do.

(APPLAUSE)

(CHEERING)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN HOST: All right, we've been listening to Vice President Kamala Harris there in Jacksonville, Florida, speaking as Florida's new six-week abortion ban goes into effect. Talking about those tightening restrictions for reproductive rights all across the country, we've been speaking with Representative Eskamani in Florida. I want to go back to her.

Representative, do your colleagues in the state legislature, you and your colleagues, do you have a plan to go after this ban, to take to counteract it in some way?

STATE REP. ANNA ESKAMANI (D-FL): Well, the reality is that our only option forward really is Amendment Four. So Florida voters are going to have a chance this November to restore a fundamental freedom in our state constitution.

This was a citizen-led ballot initiative. More than one million signatures were collected, 35 percent of which were signed by registered Republicans. And it will be on over the November ballot this year. And we need 60 percent to secure its passage.

[14:35:11]

When that happens, we will be able to go back to legislature and repeal these disastrous and dangerous laws to ensure that personal decision making on your pregnancy is once more restored.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Congress -- Representative Eskamani, thank you so much for being with us. We really appreciate your time today.

ESKAMANI: Thank you.

MARQUARDT: And next, some pro-Palestinian protests on university campuses are turning violent. We're following the latest.

Plus, Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene says that she will move to oust Speaker Mike Johnson. But does she have the support of her fellow Republican lawmakers? That's coming up.

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[14:40:29]

MARQUARDT: Columbia University has asked New York police to remain on campus for the next two-plus weeks. Officers moved in late last night, arresting some 300 people after clearing pro-Palestinian protesters from a building called Hamilton Hall, as well as the main campus encampment.

The move had echoes of the past. It came on the 56th anniversary of the NYPD taking the same action on that same campus around protests against the Vietnam War. Back then, hundreds of students were also arrested.

KEILAR: And in April of 1985, about 150 student demonstrators blocked the entrance to Hamilton Hall for weeks. They demanded that their university cut financial ties with companies that supported South Africa's apartheid regime.

They argued in court that their action constituted symbolic speech and was thus protected by the First Amendment.

Joining us now is presidential historian, Jeffrey Engel.

Jeffrey, thank you so much for being with us.

I always think it's hard to know, right? Wouldn't we all like to be able to see how this moment in time is going to age with history?

But I wonder, from a historical perspective, how you are seeing this moment at Columbia and at college campuses across the country?

JEFFREY ENGEL, PRESIDENTIAL HISTORIAN: Well, I think it's very important actually that you began with the idea of aging with history. Because one of the things that happens as we think about the past, is we tend to somewhat conflate how events unfolded.

So the Vietnam War protests, for example, which began in the mid- 1960s, really didn't start to have an effect upon politics for several years after they began.

And of course, it was perhaps eight years after the first protests before the Vietnam War actually ended. So, too, with the civil rights movement and so, too, with apartheid.

In each case, college protests, which contributed to a broader discussion of the issues, yes, also took years and years and years to have any policy effects.

So right now, we're still in the first weeks of at least confrontation over different protests on campus. As a historian, I would say there's a whole long way to go.

MARQUARDT: What about on the political side, Jeffrey? This war is hugely unpopular among young people. President Biden has really been dinged in his support among Democrats because he continues to support Israel's war in Gaza.

How do you think that this is going to play into the November election?

ENGEL: Yes, I think it could play out on two ways. First, disorder is never particularly good for an incumbent. That's just a rule of thumb. That when people look around and see that there appears to be things not being stable, that gives the challenger usually a leg up.

There's a couple of exceptions to that. But I would caution people, perhaps, think back to the election of 1972 when Richard Nixon, who was the incumbent, really tried to argue his same theme as 1968, that he was a law-and-order candidate.

And that the protests that we were seeing on campus were un-American, were from agitators that were going onto campuses.

And more importantly, those protests, I think, drove the Democratic Party further to the left in 1972, ultimately, to their nomination of George McGovern, who lost quite badly to Richard Nixon. So I think most of the people who were protesting the Vietnam War and

really wanting Nixon out actually winded up contributing to Nixon's reelection.

So I would encourage the protesters today, if they're thinking about their effect on presidential politics, to ask themselves, which of the two candidates do I think would do a worst job, from my perspective? And make sure I'm actually supporting the one who actually would do better for me.

KEILAR: Yes, that's a really interesting point.

This is all -- look we're in the age of social media as well. It's been very influential when it comes to how young people are communicating about and perceiving these issues.

And I wonder, Jeffrey, as you look at this moment, what you see that is different compared to other periods of protest?

ENGEL: There's two things I think are really fundamentally different. And social media affects both of them.

The first is, these protests or actually from a numerical perspective in a historical perspective. Still remarkably small. They're actually only a few, dozens of people protesting on even in the largest instances across campuses.

And what that tells us is it's going across campuses and seems to be amplified by social media. So that there is an appearance, because there's a camera everywhere -- there is an appearance that these protests are everywhere.

The truth of the matter is, compared to Vietnam, compared to apartheid, compared to civil rights, these are still tiny, tiny, tiny protests. But because of social media, I think we have the appearance, the sense that they happen to be much larger than they actually are.

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You know, and I think the second thing that's important about these protests as different, in a big part because of social media, is, in the 1980s, during the apartheid protests, it was really very unusual to find anyone on campus who would actually actively argue a pro- apartheid line.

People who supported apartheid typically didn't wind up speaking it on campus. And people who supported the American policy of not going against apartheid usually said, well, it's useful for the Cold War or there's geopolitics involved and we don't want to destabilize an ally.

There were really very, very few people that would stand up during that period and say, yes, I think systematic oppression of black people is a good idea. They may have thought it but they wouldn't say it.

That's different from what we're seeing today, where we see two different groups on campus really coming together and clashing over completely different visions of what the Middle East should look like. Well, Palestine and Israel should look like.

So we're seeing today a lot of conflict amplified by social media, I think, of groups on campus fighting with each other. Whereas, in the 1960s and to a greater extent in the 1980s, we didn't see a whole lot of groups fighting with each other on campuses.

We saw people simply protesting against a broader international issue that was far removed from the campus.

KEILAR: Really interesting perspective, as we are watching here live pictures from UCLA, as we see some students moving about.

And to your point, there are, I think, 34,000 students at UCLA. We see that encampment. It's created quite an impression but it isn't that many tents when you think about it in the scheme of things. So just an important reminder.

Jeffrey, thank you so much.

ENGEL: Thank you. Good to talk to you.

KEILAR: Here, we see people there. They've got water they're bringing in there to the encampment.

Just in, prosecutors for the Manhattan district attorneys say they will retry Harvey Weinstein's case in New York City. All of this coming after an appeals court overturned the Hollywood producer's sex crimes conviction last week.

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[14:51:44]

KEILAR: House Republicans are bracing for another speaker fight. Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene saying that she plans to force a vote next week to oust Speaker Mike Johnson.

MARQUARDT: CNN chief congressional correspondent, Manu Raju, joins us now from Capitol Hill.

So, Manu, what are you hearing?

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, we expect this vote to fail and actually happen on a procedural vote the first time that she calls for a vote early next week.

But soon after that, House Republican leaders plan to go to the floor and actually moved to what's called table, essentially kill that resolution. They are confident they will succeed.

Why? Because Democrats plan to join them in that effort. And a large number Republicans do as well.

I spent the day talking to a number of Republicans, including one of the Republicans who is supporting Marjorie Taylor Greene, Thomas Massie, about the expectation that this will fail.

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REP. THOMAS MASSIE (R-KY): I think the main thing that we'll get out of next week if we don't succeed is a list, a list that people can use when they go to vote in primaries and in general elections, those on the Democrat side and the Republican side.

REP. MATT GAETZ (R-FL): There are substantive critiques of Mike Johnson, are largely true and accurate. No one is taking much exception with those substantive critiques.

But in terms of the timing, I think we've got to be sensitive to the calendar and the realities. There's a reason I did this in a non- election year.

REP. WARREN DIVIDSON (R-OH): I will oppose the motion to table because I think a privileged question deserves an answer.

RAJU: Do you think he deserves to stay in this position?

DAVIDSON: I'll simply say that he would not have gotten the position by doing the things he has been doing.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

RAJU: That last comment coming from a Republican congressman who plans to vote essentially to advance this resolution further and joining Marjorie Taylor Greene, Thomas Massie and Paul Gosar, the Republicans who plan to vote to advance.

As we expect some Democrats also, they're not going to vote to kill this because they are concerned about Mike Johnson's positions, ideological position.

But overwhelmingly, we expect Republicans, including the ones who voted to oust Kevin McCarthy, like Matt Gaetz, who you heard from just there, vote to kill this because they believe it's the wrong time to move forward -- guys?

KEILAR: Yes. As he said, he did it in a non-election year. I don't know if he should be so self-congratulatory.

(LAUGHTER)

KEILAR: But nonetheless, he's saying there's a difference.

Manu Raju, thank you so much for that.

MARQUARDT: And just into CNN, prosecutors in New York City will retry disgraced Hollywood producer, Harvey Weinstein, after an appeals court overturned his rape conviction.

During a hearing that finished just moments ago, the prosecutor was adamant that they still had a strong case. And said that they want to retry it as soon as September, if possible. KEILAR: CNN's Jean Casarez was in the courtroom.

Jean, Harvey Weinstein was there. How did he react?

JEAN CASAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, the reaction was no reaction in court. However, his attorney said, Arthur Aidala, on the record, that when Harvey Weinstein was told that the case had been overturned, his response was, great, let's go into court. Let's retry it so I can prove my innocence.

The prosecution team was huge today. The defense team, the attorneys huge today.

One of the accusers from his 2020 trial, Jessica Mann, was there. She was in the second row. She had people around her. And the prosecution made note, Jessica Mann is here. There was conviction from her testimony, and she is here to do it again.

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The prosecution also said this case was strong in 2020, it is as strong today. And it was not reversed because of the accuser's testimony. It was reversed because there were prior bad-acts witnesses, because there was parameters on what the defendant could be asked in cross-examination.

Harvey Weinstein looked good. He looked really good. He was in a wheelchair. He was wheeled in. He looked frail. He looks like he's lost a lot of weight.

But as he was wheeled into the courtroom, his defense team and Jennifer Bonjean, who is in charge of his appeal in California, they were in the front row. He nodded to them. He acknowledged them. He seemed very aware.

And Arthur Aidala said to the judge, he has serious medical issues. However, he is sharp as a tack.

So the next hearing in this case is going to be at the end of May. But it'll be on a Wednesday to not interfere with the Trump trial, if that is still going on.

He is going to a medical unit at Bellevue Hospital. He will not be taken to Rikers at this point. Returned to the prison ward at Bellevue Hospital.

And the end of May is when we will see him again as this case is now proceeding to trial.

MARQUARDT: Jean Casarez, always appreciate your insights and observations. Thanks very much.

And we will have much more news. Stay with us.

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