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White House Braces for More Damaging Testimony; Trump Met with Loud Boos, Some Cheers at UFC Fight in New York; New Wildfire Threatens Ventura County but Conditions Improving; Car Bomb Explosion Kills at Least 13 in Northern Syria; Mali Attack Leaves More Than 50 Soldiers Dead; Mueller Interview Notes Show Trump's Push for Stolen Emails; Washington Nationals Pitcher Declines Invitation to White House; World's Most Profitable Company Goes Public; Apple Enters the Video Streaming Wars. Aired 4-5a ET
Aired November 03, 2019 - 04:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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NATALIE ALLEN, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): A rough reception for Donald Trump: he returned to New York and was met with boos and jeers.
A deadly ISIS attack. Dozens are dead in Mali and ISIS says it is responsible.
Plus imagine owning stock in the world's most profitable company. Here's your chance. It's about to go public.
What do they produce?
We'll let you know soon enough here.
Welcome to our viewers in the U.S. and around the world. We're coming to you live from Atlanta. I'm Natalie Allen. NEWSROOM starts right now.
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ALLEN: The Trump White House bracing for another bruising week of administration insiders telling Congress what they know about the Ukraine scandal. The president himself insists he's done nothing wrong yet is indicating once again he may not cooperate with the impeachment inquiry. We get the latest from CNN's Jeremy Diamond at the White House.
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JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: On his way to New York for a mixed martial arts fight, the president declined on Saturday to say whether or not he would allow White House officials set to testify in the House impeachment inquiry next week.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) TRUMP: You'll have to speak to the lawyers. Nancy Pelosi has become unhinged. There's something wrong with her. If you look at what's happening, if you look at the poll numbers, if you look at the poll numbers in the swing states, they're saying, don't do this, don't do it.
I'm fine with it, we did absolutely nothing wrong, we had a totally appropriate, I even say perfect conversation with the president of Ukraine. Everybody knows it. The Republicans have never been this unified.
I'm at the highest level I've ever been at but the Republicans have never been this unified. And this whole impeachment scam, that's exactly what it is, it's a scam, it's a hoax. The Democrats are using it for political purposes to try and win an election that they're not going to win.
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DIAMOND: We should note there's no evidence to back up the president's allegations about the House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. What we do know is that this House impeachment inquiry is moving very fast. And it is getting closer to the heart of the West Wing and closer to the president.
On Monday, House Democrats have already subpoenaed two White House lawyers at the center of this Ukraine matter: John Eisenberg, White House lawyer for the National Security Council, who actually ordered the transcript of President Trump's call with the Ukrainian President Zelensky moved to that highly classified server, he and his deputy, another White House attorney, Michael Ellis have been subpoenaed.
It's not clear if they will comply with that subpoena. Additionally, the president is also facing the prospect of Robert Blair, an assistant to the president, a senior White House official, potentially testifying on Monday as well -- Jeremy Diamond, CNN, the White House.
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ALLEN: As Jeremy mentioned, President Trump spent Saturday night in New York at a mixed martial arts championship. When he entered Madison Square Garden he was greeted with a loud chorus of boos and cheers.
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ALLEN (voice-over): Mr. Trump is no stranger to this kind of entertainment. One of his advisers told us the president likes "a good fistfight."
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ALLEN: For more on the fight, Mr. Trump faces when he returns to Washington, we're joined by Natasha Lindstaedt, political analyst and professor of government at University of Essex.
Good morning to you, thanks for coming on.
NATASHA LINDSTAEDT, UNIVERSITY OF ESSEX: Good morning, thanks for having me.
Let's begin with the president arriving to a mix of boos and cheers in New York City, which reflects the mix we're seeing in the polls; in the latest "Washington Post"/Boston/ABC poll, 82 percent of Democrats think he should be removed from office, 82 percent of Republicans think he shouldn't.
America is half booing, half cheering Donald Trump. Is it interesting to you now under impeachment inquiry, he's attending public events, he was also booed at the World Series a few days ago.
LINDSTAEDT: I think it just is actually very characteristic of Trump, that he's attending these types of public events, because he loves attention. And there may be a part of him that doesn't really care if it's good or bad attention. He is absolutely addicted to publicity and whatever type of attention he can get.
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LINDSTAEDT: And as we're seeing with the different booing and cheering for him and as you already revealed with the recent "Washington Post" poll, the country is very divided along partisan lines. You have most Democrats wanting to impeach him, 82 percent as you mentioned. His approval rating among Democrats is incredibly low, 91 percent disapprove of the job that he's doing.
And somewhere around 57 percent of independents disapprove of the job that he's doing. If you look at Republicans, on the one hand he has 64 percent of Republicans that strongly approve of the job that he's doing.
But on the other hand 74 percent of Republicans approve. And that is a shift. That's a slight dip from earlier in his presidency, when he had higher approval ratings of Republicans.
For the most part we're not seeing much change going on between how the Democrats feel about him and Republicans feel. But there is a little bit of a dip coming from Republicans.
ALLEN: All right. As the impeachment inquiry moves, we heard about another White House adviser who will not testify on Monday, even though requested to do that.
What course will Democrats have if the White House continues to dissuade or disallow testimony?
LINDSTAEDT: What the Democrats said they're going to do is they will assume guilt if people don't come forward. And then they're going to accuse Trump of obstructing justice. And this could be an article of impeachment. They've already made that very clear. If he refuses to cooperate, that's the only way forward for them. And that appears to be what Trump is going to do. I don't think he is
going to cooperate, I think he's going to try to stonewall. That's really the only defense that he has because if he does cooperate and if these witnesses do come forward and cooperate, there's no good that's going to come of it for him because already all the information that's come forward has corroborated what the initial whistleblower already stated.
ALLEN: Right, there are eight accounts of a quid pro quo from people testifying in the inquiry, even with the White House not cooperating.
So that is mounting evidence, is it not, that the president used taxpayer money as leverage in a political investigation he asked of a foreign country. So as far as evidence mounting, it's not looking good.
LINDSTAEDT: No, it's not looking good at all but, as we mentioned, it doesn't seem to affect the way Democrats or Republicans feel. They already seem to have their mind made up. In that same "Washington Post" poll, most of the Republicans feel that the Democrats' impeachment inquiry is politically motivated.
And most of the Democrats feel that the Republican response is politically motivated. So we're not really moving things much one way or the other. But the evidence is mounting.
And if we look back to the Nixon case, eventually people started to turn. But for the moment, it looks like Trump's base is incredibly solid. And they're happy to believe all the various defenses that he's come up with, that there was no quid pro quo, that you can delegitimize the people that are coming forward, that it was OK to boldly ask China to investigate that we need to focus on the --
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ALLEN: China too, right. Let me ask you this, President Trump says he is the War Room, defending himself through this process, even though according to fact checkers at "The Washington Post" he has told 13,400 false or misleading statements since taking office.
That being said, he controls the message on Twitter and his base remains solidly behind his messaging.
Is he wise to handle this investigation on his own?
He, of course, is the communicator in chief on Twitter.
LINDSTAEDT: On the one hand, I think it's really unlikely that Trump is going to be impeached in the Senate, that there's going to be a conviction. There's just not enough numbers. Something really big would have to happen and change for the Republicans to change their minds on this. They have been pretty solidly behind him.
We saw the vote that took place in the House; no Republicans switched sides. But it seems like a terrible strategy --
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LINDSTAEDT: -- to compare it to the Clinton impeachment process, there was a huge war room designated in order to deal with these types of issues so Clinton could go about his job of governing the country.
Instead, this is a huge distraction for Trump because of trying to do it all by himself. It's a very chaotic response. He's just lucky that he has this base that is unwilling to move.
If he didn't have this base, who knows what would happen. But he's not managing the process well at all. But, on the other hand, his supporters absolutely love everything he says and does.
ALLEN: We appreciate your insights. We'll likely talk again, Natasha Lindstaedt, thank you for coming on.
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LINDSTAEDT: Thanks for having me.
President Trump's signature campaign promise, a border wall, is full of holes -- literally. The Trump administration has been replacing existing barriers along the U.S.-Mexico border with steel slats embedded in concrete.
"The Washington Post" reports that drug smugglers and human traffickers, using modern power tools, have been able to breach these newer sections with relative ease. The openings are then often camouflaged for later use.
The president was asked about the apparent flaws in his border wall design and here's what he said.
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TRUMP: I haven't heard that. We have a very powerful wall. But no matter how powerful, you can cut through anything in all fairness. But we have a lot of people watching. Cutting is one thing but it's easily fixed.
One of the reasons we did it the way we did it, it's very easily fixed, you put the chunk back in. We have a very powerful wall but you can cut through any wall.
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ALLEN: It is worth remembering that earlier this year the president shut down the U.S. government for a record 35 days when Congress refused to fund his border wall.
We switch to California now, where firefighters are finally getting the upper hand; 12 of the wildfires that the state says are still active are more than 70 percent contained now. Some of them are all but extinguished. The newest fire named Maria is still going strong, though, but, as Athena Jones reports, things are looking up.
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ATHENA JONES, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi, there . We're in Somis, Ventura County, about 50 miles north of Los Angeles. This is where the Maria fire broke out Thursday night.
The good news is that favorable conditions overnight and today have allowed firefighters to make some progress in putting out this fire. But you can see behind me the work involved in making sure that fire stays out. You can see in the distance firefighters are spraying.
That is because in this riverbed, embers from the larger fire flew into this riverbed and caught tree stumps and branches. You can see, as you look around, the trees are either partially burned or at least charred.
We are in the middle of an agricultural area. We are surrounded by avocado orchards on one side, citrus on another. This is the kind of thing firefighters have been working to protect, not just agriculture but also communications equipment, radio towers, petroleum equipment.
We have now nearly 1,300 firefighters who have been out fighting this fire, trying to make sure they get it under control.
We also have news on a possible cause of the Maria fire. Southern California Edison has informed the public utilities regulators that, on Thursday night, there was a high voltage line, 16,000 volts, near where the Maria fire began. They had just begun to re-energize that line about 13 minutes before the fire started.
We don't know for sure if that was the cause of the fire but these power companies have been shutting off power, de-energizing lines, to keep fires from spreading. They had just begun to re-energize that line when that fire began on Thursday night.
So we'll wait to hear what the final word is on the cause and watch as we hope to see firefighters make more progress. Back to you.
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ALLEN: Some of the firefighters risking their lives in California aren't firefighters at all. They're prison inmates.
Officials say around 400 prisoners are helping battle the Kincade fire in northern California. It's part of a program that gives eligible inmates the opportunity to get advanced firefighting training and possible job opportunities once they're on parole.
If they volunteer for the program, they can receive shorter sentences. They're also paid for the dangerous work but it is well below the minimum wage.
ISIS is creeping back into headlines in the weeks since its former leader was killed. Next here we have more on the latest attacks the terror group says it carried out in Mali.
Plus we learn who might have played a role in the Trump campaign's obsession with a debunked theory of Ukrainian meddling in the 2016 election.
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ALLEN: You're looking at the aftermath of what local Syrian officials say was a car bomb attack at a busy market Saturday. It occurred in a town along the border with Turkey, killing at least 13 people, wounding many others.
The explosion damaged several buildings and left piles of rubble in its wake. This is one of the towns that Turkey took control of in its offensive into Syria last month. The operation aimed to clear Kurdish forces from the border and resettle Syrian refugees into a safe zone, as they call it in the area. Turkey and Kurdish forces are blaming one another for the blast.
ISIS is claiming responsibility for a second and a third attack since naming its new leader, both taking place in the West African nation of Mali. With more we're joined by our senior international correspondent Sam Kiley in Abu Dhabi.
Sam, what are you learning about this?
SAM KILEY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I think the first thing, Natalie, is that, in both the Mali attack cases, the so-called Islamic State has not offered any kind of evidence whatsoever to support their claim of responsibility for these attacks. This is actually routine for the so-called Islamic State.
Prior to the killing of their so-called caliph, Baghdadi, by U.S. Special Forces, that they would claim atrocities that were not committed by them or even necessarily committed by people who were their followers. So we have to treat this with an extreme health warning.
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KILEY: In fact, there haven't been three; there have been several dozen almost claims by ISIS, various groups on ISIS, on social media, making these claims. But until there is proof positive, I think we should treat it with kid gloves because, of course, what the whole purpose of these attacks, whoever committed them, is to generate publicity for the brand.
At the moment there's a real brand squabble, a brand competition going on between so-called Islamic State and Al Qaeda, its predecessor. Al Qaeda never laid claim to the control over territory.
The big magnetic appeal of the so-called caliphate was it did manage, during a period of years, to establish itself as a caliphate, ruling over some 12 million people. But all of that is over. So they're desperate to get back into the game. One of the ways they can do that is making false claims for claiming responsibility for mass murder.
ALLEN: Right.
And as far as Mali goes, what is the infiltration of ISIS in Africa?
KILEY: It's a rather complex picture. There are a number of groups in Africa of a broadly violent Islamist nature. Some pay what they call bayat, homage if you like, to Al Qaeda. Some to, like the so- called Boko Haram, to ISIS.
The extent to which there's a material link to those groups is much harder to establish or prove, either by them or those that study them. So we have repeatedly seen Boko Haram, for example, unfurl the ISIS flag. And they do have what they call emirates, smaller emirates, sort of administrative areas that ISIS lay claim to across Africa.
Whether or not those actually materialize into anything real is much harder to discern, particularly up in northwest Africa, Mali, the Sahel in general, where the whole concept of so-called Islamic State or Al Qaeda is tied up with efforts to get tribal autonomy and indeed old-fashioned criminal activity.
ALLEN: We appreciate it, Sam Kiley reporting for us from Abu Dhabi. Thank you.
Michael Weiss is coauthor of "ISIS: Inside the Army of Terror. He spoke with our Michael Holmes about the evolution of ISIS across Africa and the Middle East.
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MICHAEL WEISS, AUTHOR: This is an organization that's existed for 16 years and has suffered already major strategic defeats. The last one before the collapse of the so-called caliphate about a year ago was 2010, 2011, when they were essentially just cast out of Iraq.
They had to repair to this sort of badland region of al Anbar province in sort of the desert, in essence. Then we saw in three years' time they came back with a vengeance and conquered an expansive territory roughly the size of Great Britain.
The caliphate was a rallying cry for jihadists around the world to come join up with this global phenomenon. But it has indeed become a global phenomenon. I call it the jihadist internationale.
They have a presence in Southeast Asia, a sizable and expanding presence in Africa -- you mentioned Mali, I audience Mozambique, Congo, Nigeria. Don't forget when Boko Haram pledged allegiance to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. That gave ISIS a strip of terrain in West Africa that was tens of thousands of square miles of territory. So this is indeed a worldwide jihadist phenomenon.
(END VIDEO CLIP) ALLEN: Michael Weiss right there with his perspective.
Coming up next, the Mueller report on Russian election interference filled hundreds of pages but a lot of interesting details were left out. We have now learned Ukraine was a hot topic in the Trump campaign long before the 2016 election. We'll have the story for you in a.
Also ahead here, Apple making a huge bet on streaming original content. We speak with an expert about the impact of Apple TV+ and the growing streaming services you're about to be bombarded by.
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ALLEN: Welcome back to our viewers here in the United States and all around the world. You're watching CNN NEWSROOM and we appreciate it. I'm Natalie Allen. Here are our top stories.
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ALLEN: U.S. president Trump has been pushing a debunked conspiracy theory that Ukraine, not Russia, was behind the hacking of Democratic Party computers ahead of the 2016 election. Now we know where he may have gotten such an idea.
This man, Paul Manafort, who had ties to Ukraine, was making that claim when he was chairman of the Trump campaign. It is just one of the fascinating details uncovered by then special counsel Robert Mueller but left out of his final report.
CNN has now obtained 274 pages of interview notes, emails and other documents collected by Mueller's team and there is much more to come. CNN's Shimon Prokupecz from here.
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SHIMON PROKUPECZ, CNN CRIME AND JUSTICE PRODUCER: The newly obtained FBI interview reports show how president Donald Trump and other top 2016 Trump officials repeatedly discussed how to get access to the stolen WikiLeaks emails, to interviews with former Trump deputy campaign chairman Rick Gates, details of discussions as the Trump campaign pursued damaging information about Hillary Clinton.
Now some of what these discussions show that Rick Gates had with FBI agents, he recalled a time on the campaign aircraft when Trump said, "Get the emails."
The interviews also show that Michael Flynn claimed that he could somehow use his intelligence sources to obtain some of these emails.
And then Rick Gates describes essentially in these interviews with investigators how several close advisers to Donald Trump and Trump's family members and Trump himself considered how to get the stolen documents and even pushed for this effort.
Donald Trump Jr., we're told, in family meetings, according to these documents, would have discussions about this. Michael Flynn was present for it. Jared Kushner, Paul Manafort and other people attached to the campaign, like Corey Lewandowski and the former attorney general, Jeff Sessions, who was part of the campaign at the time, all expressed interest in obtaining the emails as well.
So these 300 pages of documents that we obtained is just the start of more to come. CNN has sued for more of this and we're told that, every month, we're expected to get more as the Justice Department has been ordered to release these documents on a monthly basis.
And another important point here is that the documents also show how the Trump campaign -- the chairman, Paul Manafort at the time, erroneously raised the possibility that the Ukrainians, not the Russians, might have been the ones responsible for hacking the computers of the Democratic National Committee in 2016.
This is what Mueller was told by Rick Gates when he was interviewed. These documents are just the beginning of yet what more is going to come. Within the next few months, we expect more documents like this to be released by the Department of Justice -- Shimon Prokupecz, CNN, New York.
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ALLEN: The documents CNN has obtained from the Mueller investigation lend context to the Ukraine investigation now underway in Congress. It's too soon to say if Mr. Trump will be impeached but the risk of that happening seems to grow daily. We get more on this from CNN's Alex Marquardt.
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ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A roller coaster of a week, one that took the impeachment inquiry to new heights and set the stage for a historic showdown on Capitol Hill.
Democrats and Republicans in lockstep with their parties, as the deeply divided House of Representatives voted on Thursday to make the inquiry official. Two Democrats joined the Republican minority in voting against it, which the GOP claimed as a bipartisan victory.
REP. KEVIN MCCARTHY (R), MINORITY LEADER: The only bipartisan vote on that floor was against.
MARQUARDT (voice-over): While the Democrats, who won the vote, struck a somber tone and argued they had no choice.
REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D-CA), CHAIR, HOUSE INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE: This is a solemn day in the history of our country, when the president's misconduct has compelled us to continue to move forward with an impeachment inquiry.
MARQUARDT (voice-over): That will mean open televised hearings and transcripts from the dozen closed-door testimonies released to the public beginning as early as next week. One person ready to testify in public is the most senior U.S. diplomat in Ukraine, Ambassador Bill Taylor.
Taylor has already told lawmakers that he understood that U.S. military aid for Ukraine was tied to so-called investigations. He was told that, in order for the new Ukrainian president to get a meeting with President Trump, President Zelensky would have to go to a microphone and say he is opening investigations of Biden and 2016 election interference.
That was confirmed on Thursday by top National Security Council official Tim Morrison, who was on the infamous July 25th call between the two presidents, in which Trump asked for a favor.
Morrison was told by his boss to stay away from the shadowy parallel Ukraine policy led in part by Rudy Giuliani.
However, Morrison told lawmakers that nothing was wrong with the call, saying, "I want to be clear. I was not concerned that anything illegal was discussed."
The White House is already looking ahead, saying impeachment by the House is all but a foregone conclusion.
STEPHANIE GRISHAM, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: This has been set up to make the -- to impeach the president. So that's something that we're expecting but we can always hope that the Dems will again come to their senses.
MARQUARDT (voice-over): Democrats are more fired up than ever after a parade of longtime apolitical career officials have given damning testimony.
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MARQUARDT (voice-over): Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman, the top White House expert on Ukraine, who was on the July call, saying this week he was so convinced that the president was blocking $400 million in aid for political reasons, that Vindman went to the National Security Council's lawyers twice.
The top lawyer, John Eisenberg, who has been called in to testify, quickly ordered the transcript of the call be placed in a highly classified server, restricting access to it. And Vindman, according to a source, testified he was told not to talk to anyone about the call.
It was Colonel Vindman, along with Ambassador Taylor, who contradicted one of the president's main envoys to Ukraine, Gordon Sondland, who was appointed by Trump to be ambassador to the European Union. Sondland has denied pushing investigations into Joe Biden and his son in a July 10th meeting with Ukrainian officials.
But Vindman and his then boss, Fiona Hill, both understood that he was. Vindman said Hill even shut down a meeting over it.
Witness after witness compounding the evidence that the president had linked aid for Ukraine to investigations into his political opponents. The president declaring the Democratic-led investigation is "the greatest witch hunt in American history," but its leader, Adam Schiff, is seemingly undeterred.
SCHIFF: We're going to finish our investigation and the public testimony and then make a decision on whether the remedy of impeachment is warranted.
MARQUARDT: Even as much of this impeachment inquiry is set to go public next week, testimony behind closed doors will continue. The three committees that are driving the process are looking to hear from that NSC lawyer, John Eisenberg, as well as his colleague, Michael Ellis.
The big fish they want to get is former national security adviser John Bolton, who has said he will only appear if he is subpoenaed. Bolton compared that rogue Ukraine policy to a "drug deal" -- Alex Marquardt, CNN, New York.
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ALLEN: Saudi Arabia's crown jewel and the world's most profitable company is looking at a stock market debut. We have a live report next on Aramco's long-awaited initial public offering.
Also coming up, thousands fill the streets in Washington to celebrate a baseball first.
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ALLEN: Thousands lined the streets of Washington, D.C., Saturday to celebrate their baseball team's first-ever World Series title. The Washington Nationals beat the Houston Astros earlier in the week to claim the title of champions. CNN's Natasha Chen has more on the celebrations in the U.S. capital.
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NATASHA CHEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: There was a sea of people in red and white with not an inch to spare on the sidewalks along Constitution Avenue. They watched as buses went by with their favorite players. They watched them raise the championship trophy.
And then people came to this stage behind us to come up to the microphone and thank the fans; the players, the owner, the manager of the team. They gave a specific thank you to the fans who really did not give up on them. Because, at the beginning of the season, the Nationals were actually down 19-31.
The repeated message here was that they actually had a very small chance to get to this point. And so to defeat those odds is a really big deal.
Now, of course, we are in the shadow of Capitol Hill; of course, in Congress, there are political fights happening every day. Instead, on this stage, one of the speakers said, people may think that D.C. cannot be united but he said the Nationals have united D.C.
There were people in the crowds today who had spent 12 hours waiting there to get a great position. They said they have learned to tune out the politics in this town and just celebrate this moment that's 95 years in the making. The owner said good things come to those who wait and he said this was definitely worth the wait -- Natasha Chen, CNN, Washington.
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ALLEN: The team is set to visit the White House Monday but at least one player says he's not going to attend.
Pitcher Sean Doolittle tells "The Washington Post" he's skipping the visit because of Donald Trump.
He referenced some of the U.S. president's policies and divisive rhetoric, telling the paper, quote, "As much as I wanted to be there with my teammates and share that experience with my teammates, I can't do it, I just can't do it."
Saudi Aramco, the world's most profitable company, is moving ahead with its initial public offering. The oil giant has announced it will lift shares on the Saudi stock exchange. Plans were pushed back following that drone attack on its facilities back in September that briefly knocked out half the company's daily oil production.
It's not yet known when the IPO will happen but, when it does, it could be the biggest on record. For more I'm joined by CNN Business emerging markets editor John Defterios.
Hi, there, John. It may be the biggest IPO in history.
How much oil does this company produce?
JOHN DEFTERIOS, CNN EMERGING MARKETS EDITOR: Well, it is the crown jewel of the kingdom, Natalie. You rightfully suggest here, it's the most profitable company in the world. And for context, we consume about 100 million barrels a day; Saudi Aramco produces about 10 million barrels. One out of 10 barrels every day in the market comes from Saudi Arabia.
It's very profitable at this process. It produces oil at $2 to $4 a barrel, which is extraordinary, some of the lowest costs in the world. With oil around $60 a barrel, you can see why they're so profitable.
In 2018, they had about two times the profits of Apple. But three things to watch out for here.
Can they beat the listing of Alibaba in September of 2014 in terms of the raising of the money?
That target is better than $25 billion. I know the crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, had a target of $2 trillion for the overall valuation of Aramco. The market is thinking $1.25 trillion; I think they'd like to beat that.
This is also a climb-down from going public on the New York Stock Exchange, London, somewhere this Asia, like Tokyo, Hong Kong, Shanghai. Right now the chairman said there are no plans for an international listing.
But the CEO, Amin Nasser was proud to say, we look forward to the comparisons with the other international oil companies. Aramco has five times the reserves of the other major competitors in the market today.
Of the five international oil companies, Aramco has more reserves than all of them. So they're looking forward to getting this public listing onto the market here, likely to happen by the end of the year and only it seems right now in Riyadh.
ALLEN: OK, so let me ask you this. It was damaged by a drone attack and that cut down on its production.
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ALLEN: Has it recovered from those attacks in mid-September and could it be vulnerable to other attacks that might dissuade investors?
DEFTERIOS: This is a risk factor, of course, for Saudi Arabia. But the argument at the press conference today that took place in Riyadh is, look how quickly we recovered. They had 70 percent of the production within a week, now 100 percent of that capacity and the ability to produce that level on the market, nearly 10 million barrels a day. That's the answer to that.
It is extraordinary that, in less than two months' time, they're announcing the IPO after such a major attack on those facilities.
I also think we have to bring up the fact that, after the murder of Jamal Khashoggi in 2018, the arrest of over 400 Saudi businessmen at the Ritz-Carlton in late 2017, they see the IPO as a vehicle to move forward and not to move back.
Even, in fact, when I was at the Future Investment Initiative, their Davos in the desert, if you will, in Riyadh, they're not banging the drum, not shouting from the rooftops. They just want to deliver right now. I think this IPO is part of that process going forward.
ALLEN: All right, John Defterios live from London, thanks so much. Apple is taking its shot in the video streaming wars. Hear from a tech and media expert next as the tech giant takes on Netflix, Disney and Amazon. It's getting busy out there.
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ALLEN: The reviews are starting to come in for Apple TV+ a day after the subscription-based video service was launched in more than 100 countries.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Cue her.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Good morning. I'm bringing you some sad and upsetting news. And while I don't know the details of the allegations --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She's throwing me under the bus.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mitch Kessler, my cohost and partner of 15 years, was fired today.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You --
ALLEN (voice-over): A scene there from "The Morning Show," one of the new productions Apple TV+ is creating for $6 billion. It is banking on Hollywood star power from the likes of Jennifer Aniston, Steve Carell and Reese Witherspoon to draw audiences to win the so-called streaming wars.
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ALLEN: A critical time for Apple as it looks for new revenue in the face of slumping iPhone sales. Apple TV+ joins a growing field of streaming services with a wide range of pricing. Netflix has a monthly subscription cost from $8.99 to $15.99. Amazon Prime video is available with an Amazon Prime subscription, which costs $12.99 and has other benefits.
Apple TV+ is only $4.99 a month. Disney+ launches November 12th, will cost $6.99. Are you making notes here?
Then HBO Max from CNN's parent company, that would be us, Warner Media, it launches next year and will cost $14.99. Many of these services have discounts for annual subscriptions. Well, that's good.
All right, let's talk more about Apple's foray into streaming with media and technology expert Seth Schachner who joins us from Los Angeles via Skype. Thanks for joining us.
SETH SCHACHNER, MEDIA AND TECHNOLOGY EXPERT: Happy to be here, good morning.
ALLEN: Good morning. First, that's a lot of subscriptions to add to consumers' wi-fi and cable bill. It sounds like we're all going to be spending more money.
What is the reaction first to Apple TV's first venture?
SCHACHNER: It's been mixed so far. You know, there really -- it's early stage, so this is an ambitious thing they're doing. They're acting like a film studio, right?
They've hired a couple of Sony executives, there's supposedly I think a $5 billion, $6 billion production budget that's at play here. There's a long list of series that are coming, basically. I think just a number are out right now. But I think it's a little early to tell exactly how they're doing with it. But so far it's been mixed.
ALLEN: All right. So the subscription streaming landscape is about to become much more crowded and complex. Never mind figuring out what to watch on Netflix. Talk about who's jumping in.
SCHACHNER: Even on the list you've mentioned, there's quite a few you didn't get to mention. Obviously HBO Max is there, you mentioned the big incumbents out there. Certainly the networks have some of their players.
Viacom has something called Pluto TV. If you look more broadly out there, Jeffrey Katzenberg has something coming in that are mobile shorts. So there is a lot of offerings in the market.
And I think it is fair to say, at some point, if you're a consumer, how many of these things do you actually need?
How many of you do you really want to cobble together?
So I think that will kind of keep occurring in the market for some time until perhaps there's a bit of a shake-out or consumers decide they want more of one, less of the other.
ALLEN: Right. Katzenberg is doing for quick bites. It seems we're obsessed with making it shorter and shorter and shorter, thinking that's what people want. We'll also see what's called content bundles.
What will that entail?
SCHACHNER: I think that's the real thing sort of going forward. I think that's where entities like Apple -- and Disney is an incredibly important new service that will launch in a week and a half.
But what you'll likely see are different services bundled in for perhaps a better price point. There's been talk, nothing's been confirmed that Apple would potentially bundle in their music service when they use the handset heavily to promote. Perhaps their news service.
They have a pretty great new gaming service called Arcade that might be offered in a certain, I don't know, 13, 15 bucks. I think Disney could potentially do this.
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SCHACHNER: They could bring in ESPN or Hulu, which they control as well. They've now got the FOX catalog in there. So I think that's the type of thing going forward, content bundles, that you'll see in the market. That could be a pretty significant thing that could compete against Netflix.
ALLEN: Oh, so, let's talk about Netflix. They were the first. Remember when they said, we're going to have an original series and we all went, what?
They were the first to do it. We've come a long way since then.
Are we going to see some changes from Netflix if they feel threatened by all of this competition?
SCHACHNER: I mean, I don't think -- in my view, I don't think any of these things are Netflix killers per se. I certainly don't think the new Apple Plus is. Apple Plus is all about original content for now.
But yes, I think there will be competitive pressures on them. The major film studios are obviously rolling out their own products. So, sure, they may pull back some of their catalog. That could be potentially threatening for Netflix as well.
Every time Netflix raises prices, I think you should expect to see that there will be some subscriber drops. Some of the stuff here in L.A., Hollywood, with film exhibitors, with theater owners, it's a little bit of a back and forth with them right now.
For example, this new Martin Scorsese picture, "The Irishman" coming out, there's been quite a bit of a fight over the window, basically, that the film -- theaters will actually have, movie theaters, before it goes into Netflix.
So I think there's a lot of competitive pressures around Netflix. I still think they'll be a very big provider of original content, same with Amazon as well, and really, really critical players. So I just think the competition will ratchet up.
ALLEN: It's a new day. If people get too confused and bogged down, they can always watch CNN. How about a shameless plug? All right, Seth, thanks so much, Seth Schachner, we appreciate your helping us out.
I'm Natalie Allen. I'll be right back with another hour of news. Please stay with us.
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