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Interview with Rep. Dan Meuser (R-PA) on Walz-Vance Debate; Restaurant Owner In Hard-Hit Ashville Describes Devastation; FAA Speeds Up Air-Traffic Control Training; Attorney: 120 Men & Women To Sue Sean "Diddy" Combs. Aired 1:30-2p ET

Aired October 02, 2024 - 13:30   ET

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

[13:30:00]

REP. DAN MEUSER (R-PA): And I think the Harris campaign is looking for another opportunity to express platitudes rather than -- rather than engage in a -- a real policy discussion.

I mean, come on, you can commit yourself that the exposure she's given to the general public is far less than Trump-Vance. I mean, for crying out loud, I thought Walz was in Witness Protection for a few weeks before the debate.

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: She has done substantially fewer interviews, but it's interesting that you would argue that not doing another debate would actually benefit the Trump campaign.

Nevertheless, Congressman Dan Meuser, we appreciate the time. Thanks so much for being with us.

MEUSER: Same, Boris. Thanks.

SANCHEZ: Of course.

Next more than one million Americans have no power now five days after Hurricane Helene through the southeast. You're going to hear from a North Carolina restaurant owner working to feed people, even though her own business has now shut down.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:35:30]

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Here in minutes, we are expecting President Biden to take an aerial tour of the Carolinas to see firsthand the destruction from the deadliest hurricane to hit the U.S. mainland since Katrina back in 2005.

Helene has now killed at least 180 people across six states in the southeast. A seventh state, West Virginia, declared a state of emergency just yesterday because of damage from the remnants of Helene.

Now Biden is deploying 1,000 active-duty soldiers to help in hard-hit North Carolina. And you can see here that help is so dearly needed. Search and Rescue is still underway around the area of Asheville as

teams are still reaching cutoff areas. Many people are still missing now, even after days.

Helene tore up hundreds of roads. And the regional power company says it wiped away chunks of the power grid. More than 1.3 million homes and businesses in the southeast still without electricity.

With me now is Katie Button. She owns the restaurants Curate and La Bodega in Asheville, familiar I think to many foodies who have been to the city.

And, Katie, tell us, I know you're partnering now with World Central Kitchen. Can you tell us what you're doing, but also about the challenges that you're facing with water and doing that?

KATIE BUTTON, OWNER, CURATE & LA BODEGA RESTAURANTS IN NC AFTER HELENE: Absolutely, yes. So World Central Kitchen is just an incredible organization.

On Sunday, they we're reaching out to us. They we're already sending people down here to start setting up kitchens to cook for -- to cook meals for the community.

Sunday afternoon, we started prepping meals for the community. We're -- we're able to do it because World Central Kitchen is trucking water in for us to be able to use. They are just logistics geniuses. And they act fast.

So we have personally prepared at 20 of our restaurants, 2,400 meals so far. It'll be 3,000 by the end of today. And we started on Sunday. And we'll do at least 1,000 meals every day.

And then they have other satellite kitchens that are also producing meals for the community. And then they helicopter those meals to people who are completely cut off from road access. There's so many challenges.

KEILAR: Yes. I mean, you're helicoptering -- you're helicoptering meals. Can you talk to us a little bit about your staff and how long it took just to account for them because you we're cut off from them for days, right?

BUTTON: Yes. Yes. And our last contact, communication with them was Thursday evening because Friday morning all cell coverage in the whole area was out, as well as power. And we had no way of getting in touch with them.

It took us until Sunday to account that each and every one of our employees was safe. And we have got 160 employees in our company. And it was -- it was incredibly scary for those couple of days.

The road to recovery though is incredibly long. And I worry for them as well and all the businesses and Asheville. Some restaurants, businesses, homes, completely wiped away either by flooding or trees. And we we're fortunate we had power, which is why we can produce meals

here for the community and also our staff. But I think it's going to be weeks before we have water, running water in Asheville, in the area of Asheville.

Which I can't even imagine how we're going to make weeks without running water.

KEILAR: Yes. I see you thinking about it before our eyes here trying to kind of figure it out there.

Are you getting any feedback from people who are getting meals from you? What is their experience? Have they been, you know, struggling to get food up until this point?

BUTTON: I mean, particularly the people who are completely cut off. I mean, they may have had the food that they had in their homes, but after the weekend that is running out.

They're very grateful for the supplies. World Central Kitchen is also bringing them water because they don't have water.

So if you can think about food and water and shelter, I mean, those are the three things that we've really been struggling in this community to have access to. I can't even believe that we are in this situation right now.

KEILAR: So you have a good process going on with World Central Kitchen. You're getting meals to people. Do you feel like local officials and other officials understand the challenges that you are facing, both at the restaurant, but also on the personal level of your staffs -- of your staff members, so that they can help you guys recover?

[13:40:10]

BUTTON: I don't think anyone has thought through the magnitude of the impact of this disaster. I mean, being closed -- having our restaurant closed for could be a month, depending on -- we cannot reopen until water comes back.

The businesses can't reopen until we have water, restaurants in particular. So we're trying to figure that out.

And I don't think that they've realized the financial impact and also our employees and their livelihoods. And how are they going to continue to take care of their loved ones.

So I think we'll see what happens. I appreciate these kinds of opportunities to share that it is a dire situation here in Asheville.

KEILAR: Yes, it's dire. And it's such a shock. I think that's what we're hearing over and over, Katie, from people, is how shocked they we're ended up at this magnitude.

BUTTON: It caught us all completely -- I mean, we knew that there was a storm coming, but no one could have imagined the level of destruction.

And, I mean, I was in my home with my two children and watching the trees just all around it, praying one wouldn't hit the house. And we were very lucky that we didn't have our house hit with a tree. But it was an incredibly scary moment.

And then understanding being cut off with cell service, power, no water, and trying to piece those things back together. But knowing it's going to be a long time before most of western North Carolina gets power and water back. I mean, that is just unfathomable to me.

KEILAR: Yes. Well listen, we're so glad that you're all, all right. And it's amazing to see you guys overcoming these challenges to help out people in your community.

Thank you so much for talking to us about it, Katie.

BUTTON: Thank you.

It's really -- I say, and things like moments like this, one thing that is amazing is how everyone steps up to help one another, whether they're cutting down trees because they have a chainsaw or they're bringing meals to their neighbors or jumping in back to work with World Central Kitchen so we can feed people.

I mean, everyone's really -- that feels really good here.

KEILAR: Yes, it's amazing to see.

Katie Button, thank you so much. We do appreciate your time today.

Communities, of course, across Helene's 500-mile path of destruction are in need of basic necessities. You heard it there. And for ways that you can help go to CNN CNN.com/impact.

We'll be right back.

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[13:47:0]

SANCHEZ: In a new move to tackle the troubling shortage of air-traffic controllers, the FAA says it will now let college graduates skip right over part of its usual training and go straight into the hotseat in air-traffic control.

CNN's Pete Muntean has the story.

Pete, I don't know what your last semester in college was like --

(LAUGHTER)

SANCHEZ: -- but mine is a hazy --

(LAUGHTER)

SANCHEZ: Is this safe?

PETE MUNTEAN, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: There's a big question about safety here, and we'll get to that.

But it's really the shortage of air-traffic controllers that has the FAA making this really big policy shift.

You've probably been caught in the middle of this issue, just you might not really know it. The FAA's shortage of 3,000 air-traffic controllers has triggered flight delays and cancellations.

But it's also burning out controllers with some working mandatory six- day weeks of 12-hour shifts. That is the safety issue since fatigue has been a factor in some of those recent cases of near collisions on runways of major airports.

So this new announcement is a huge about-face from the FAA, which, for years, demanded that air-traffic controller candidates go through the FAAs training academy in Oklahoma City. That has been severely backlogged since the start of the pandemic.

So now the FAA says grads from two universities can bypass the FAA's own training program. They are the University of Oklahoma and Tulsa Community College.

New hires who graduate from those programs can now begin work as air- traffic controllers nearly immediately. You might say, Pete, those two universities don't really sound like all that much. But the FAA says this is just the start.

The goal here is to expand this program to deal with a shortage that's really not getting all that much better. Last month, the FAA says it hired 1,800 controllers this year, a big dent in that 3,000-controller shortage.

But the increase after retirements and attrition is really the most important number. In May, we reported that the FAA has netted only 160 controllers overall.

The good news is that the FAA is about to open its hiring window again next Friday. And the median pay, according to federal data, is $137,000. Pretty good scratch if you can get it. Never a been a better time to get into an aviation career.

There's a lot more out there than just being a pilot. And gamers are especially good at this. So if you know a young person who's really good at Xbox or PS5, get them off the couch and get them to FAA.gov to try and get hired for one of these jobs.

SANCHEZ: This guy should do more --

(LAUGHTER)

SANCHEZ: Pete Muntean, thanks so much.

MUNTEAN: Thanks. SANCHEZ: Appreciate it.

[13:49:40]

Next, there are dozens of new allegations expected against Sean "Diddy" Combs. What we know about these claims and the lawsuits that could soon follow.

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KEILAR: Embattled media mogul, Sean "Diddy" Homes -- Combs, pardon me -- could soon be hit with a wave of new lawsuits, this time from some 120 women and men alleging sexual abuse.

A Houston-based attorney says that he and another firm represent the accusers and that they plan to file civil lawsuits against Combs here in the coming weeks.

That's on top of 11 civil suits that Combs is already facing as he has sitting in jail awaiting trial on criminal sex trafficking and racketeering charges.

CNN's Elizabeth Wagmeister is here with more on this story.

Elizabeth, tell us about these new allegations. And so many of them.

ELIZABETH WAGMEISTER, CNN ENTERTAINMENT CORRESPONDENT: Yes, this is a huge number of accusers who say that they are going to come forward. This, all according to their attorneys who held a press conference yesterday in Houston.

[13:55:06]

One hundred and 20 accusers, 60 men and 60 women. Twenty-five of whom alleged that they we're minors at the time of these alleged assaults or incidents.

Now, these claims include sexual assault, sexual abuse of minors, rape, drugging, dissemination of video recordings and sexual misconduct and more.

Now, after this press conference yesterday, I spoke to one of the attorneys, Brianna, and he told me there are patterns here that he has observed from the allegations coming from his clients.

He said that many of these alleged incidents occurred under the promise of becoming a star. These people met "Diddy" at an audition or they we're told that the only way to get their tape in front of him, it may have been at a party.

And this attorney tells me that many of these alleged incidents did occur at parties that we're held by Combs.

Let's take a look at a moment of what this attorney told me.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) TONY BUZBEE, ATTORNEY: The people that were there that were -- that were allegedly drugged and then allegedly raped, passed around, woke up the next morning just completely clueless about what had happened to them and just utter shock and injured even.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WAGMEISTER: Now again, all allegations at this point. No lawsuits have been filed yet. But the attorney tells me that he plans to file these lawsuits within the month.

The youngest alleged accusers said that they were 9 years old at the time that they allege they were abused by Combs.

Now, I have reached out to Combs' team. They are denying these allegations. They say he looks forward to clearing his name in court.

And they say we'll see if there will be lawsuits and if this isn't just speculation.

Here's some of what they have told me, Brianna. They say, quote, "As Mr. Combs' legal team has emphasized, he cannot address every meritless allegation in what has become a reckless media circus.

"That said, he empathetically and categorically denies as false and defamatory any claim that he sexually abused anyone, including minors" -- Brianna?

KEILAR: All right, Elizabeth, thank you for that incredibly alarming new details there.

President Biden has just landed in South Carolina where he has gone to survey damage from Hurricane Helene. We're going to be heading there live next.

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