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Republicans Show Unity Ahead of House Vote; Giuliani Claims to Uncover Fraud in Ukraine; Australian Boy Drives to Safety as Fires Close In; Formula 1 Heiress' Home Robbed of Jewelry. Aired 1-2a ET

Aired December 17, 2019 - 01:00   ET

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

[01:00:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

JOHN VAUSE, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Hello and welcome to our viewers joining us from around the world. I'm John Vause. Coming up this hour on CNN NEWSROOM, a rush of wavering Democrats fall line declaring support for impeachment. But even before a Senate trial begins, senior Republicans brags the fixes in. The President's acquittal is in the bag.

Boeing bites the bullet suspending production of the beleaguered 737 Max grounded now since March after two fatal crashes. And welcome to India unless you're a Muslim. After Prime Minister Modi's controversial citizenship law sparks days of outrage, he's now calling for calm and without a hint of irony, brotherhood.

The coming days could be the most consequential so far for the Trump presidency. If all goes to plan on Wednesday, for the third time in U.S. history, a sitting president will be impeached by Congress. That means the focus will shift from the Democrat-controlled lower House to trial in the Senate where Republicans hold the majority.

And there's no reason to expect that end the bitters in partisan fight between Democrats and Republicans which has defined this impeachment from the very beginning. CNN's Alex Marquardt begins our coverage from Washington.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER (D-NY): Conducting an impeachment trial in the Senate is enormously weighty and solemn responsibility.

ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN SENIOR U.S. CORRESPONDENT: The tables are turning. While Republicans, for now, control the Senate trial, Democrats today pushing their plan, which they hope will gain Republican support.

SCHUMER: Do they want a fair, honest trial that examines all the facts or do they want to trial that doesn't let the facts come out? Trials have witnesses.

MARQUARDT: In a letter to Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Schumer called for subpoenas to be issued for four witnesses who have direct knowledge of the Ukraine affair, Acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney, his deputy Rob Blair, Budget Office official Michael Duffey, and former National Security Advisor John Bolton, who allegedly called what the President's envoys were doing in Ukraine a drug deal.

SCHUMER: Each of them will have information to share about the charges made by the House, information that no one has heard at this point.

MARQUARDT: Sources say McConnell does not want witnesses. He's been working in lockstep with the White House counsel on the trial's format.

SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY): Everything I do during this, I'm coordinating with the White House Counsel. There will be no difference between the President's position and our position.

MARQUARDT: Enraging Democrats like Schumer who told me CNN there's a difference between discussion and working on the President's behalf.

SCHUMER: For him to talk to the president is one thing. For him to say I'm going to do just what the President wants is totally out of line.

MARQUARDT: Schumer hopes to model the trial on Bill Clinton's in 1999. To get his way and have more control on what happens during the trial, Schumer needs at least four Republicans to join Democrats to give them a majority. Seven moderate or retiring Republicans are being targeted including Utah Senator Mitt Romney, a vocal critic of the president's.

All this ahead of the full House impeachment vote expected on Wednesday. The Judiciary Committee which approved the Articles of Impeachment, issuing their final report overnight, blasting the president for betraying the nation through abuse of power which Democrats claim includes multiple federal crimes.

REP. JERRY NADLER (D-NY): This is a crime in progress against the Constitution and against the American democracy.

MARQUARDT: For the Senate trial, Chuck Schumer also told Mitch McConnell he would be open Republicans calling their own witnesses who can also testify about Ukraine. That, however, does not include Hunter Biden, Chuck Schumer said. He told CNN that the younger Biden would be a distraction. The two Senate leaders have not yet met face to face. A spokesperson for McConnell says that will happen soon. Alex Marquardt, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VAUSE: For more, I'm joined now by Political Analyst Michael Genovese. He's the President of the Global Policy Institute at Loyola Marymount University. Michael, thanks for starting us off. I want to begin with this request from Democrats to call witnesses during the Senate trial. Even though the Senate leader Republican Mitch McConnell has essentially ruled that out, you know, it never hurts to go back and ask one more time. So Senator McConnell, here's the question. Should witnesses be called during an impeachment trial? Here's the answer.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MCCONNELL: Every other impeachment has had witnesses. It's not unusual to have witnesses in a trial. The House managers have only asked for three witnesses. I think that's pretty modest.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: Yes. But that was back in 1998. A Democratic was being impeached, a Democrat president. For the record though, the three witnesses were allowed to appear. They were called. On this impeachment, Republicans has reached a level of hypocrisy rarely seen in politics. Are there long-term consequences here?

[01:05:12]

MICHAEL GENOVESE, POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, in politics as in life, where you stand depends on where you sit, and the Republicans have simply changed seats. This affliction is an equal opportunity affliction. Democrats and Republicans both suffer from it. It simply becomes more obvious when the Republicans are in charge of the trial and they're making all the decisions that are contrary to what they've been saying in the past.

And so it looks worse. But this is something that both Democrats and Republicans are engaged in at this point. I think it's baked into the human capacity, maybe even the human need to occasionally be a hypocrite. It's part of the kind of the DNA that we all have.

And having said that, I think Mitch McConnell has gone way, way over the edge, way over the top. I mean, he is the errand boy for the White House and he makes no bones about it. Now that's kind of outrageous. His -- in the trial, his thumb is not going to be on the scale, his whole body is going to be on the scale.

And so from the looks of it, I think Mitch McConnell is incapable of humiliation. I think it's all about the power and I think he's played the game.

VAUSE: With that in mind, it's not just McConnell who's made no secret that he's, you know, he's working with the White House on Trump's defense. The Republican Senator Lindsey Graham also on the record saying he's already decided what the verdict will be in any impeachment trial. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R-SC): I am trying to give a pretty clear signal I've made up my mind. I'm not trying to pretend to be a fair juror here.

BECKY ANDERSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: It wasn't at any doubt at this point.

GRAHAM: I want to end it. I don't want to legitimize it. I hate what they're doing.

MCCONNELL: Everything I do during this I'm coordinating with the White House Counsel.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: So with that in mind, there is an oath of affirmation for senators who will be saving the President's fate. Here's part of that oath which is from the impeachment of President Clinton back in 1998.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You will do impartial justice according to the Constitution and laws, so help you God.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: Senators don't take no for any other major vote, be it judicial appointment, declaration of war, only impeachment. And yet the leader of the Senate and the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Lindsey Graham intends on violating that oath.

GENOVESE: Well, what's a little oath among friends? And, you know, this is what people find so disturbing about politics, that it is so superficially hypocritical and so easy to see. They're transparently hypocritical. And again, this is true for both sides. It just happens to be that that Lindsey Graham and -- is out in the front as is McConnell.

But you know, I wish this were surprising. It is not surprising in politics, but it's also not that surprising in life. You know, we human beings are not consistent. We are not pure. We are not as pure as the driven snow. But in politics, it becomes so blatantly obvious and so pathetic. And in the Fox-Trump ecosystem, politics, this is politics as usual and that's a sad, sad commentary.

VAUSE: One thing on the Democrat side, especially with House Democrats is essentially firming up their base. There's has been this rush of Democrats who are in sort of these moderate districts that Trump had won back in 2016. They're publicly declaring their support for the two articles of impeachment.

On the flip side of that, the Republican presidential candidate Carly Fiorina, she has come out publicly supporting impeachment as well. Here she is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CARLY FIORINA (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I think it is vital that he be impeached. Whether removed this close to an election, I don't know. But I think the conduct is impeachable.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: So here's the question. What about that core group of Republican senators? You know, will they stand together? If one breaks ranks, a Mitt Romney, will the others follow?

GENOVESE: Will Republicans defect? Well, will I win the Miss America contest? 1I think the answer is no. We'd love to say yes. And in a perfect world, it would be yes. There would be eight, ten, 15 Republicans who turned on Trump because the evidence is so overwhelming and what he did is so clearly wrong. But we're not in that world.

We're in the world of politics, and we're in the world of power. And parties are about winning elections. As long as Donald Trump convinces Republicans that siding with him wins them elections, they will side with him. It is not the Republican Party. It is the Trump party. It is the cult of Trump. And their loyalty to Trump is based on their belief, and I think it's an accurate one, that's the base will follow Trump. As long as that's the case, Republicans will not falter. They will be right behind President Trump.

VAUSE: Michael, thank you. Michael Genovese with us there from Los Angeles. We appreciate it very much. Thank you.

GENOVESE: Thank you, John.

VAUSE: Well, Boeing's beleaguered 737 Max is set to be grounded well into the New Year, much longer than the company had actually expected. And as a result, the production of the 737 will be suspended from next month. The plane was taken out of operation worldwide after two fatal crashes back in -- back earlier this year, in fact, that was back in March when it was grounded. And there's no indication when the Max will be recertified.

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STEVE DICKSON, ADMINISTRATOR, FAA: How many times have you heard me say that we're not on any timeline? We're going to follow every step of the process however long that takes. There are about ten or 11 milestones left to complete.

I understand that a company, a manufacturer, in this case, has a project plan with milestones and is devoting resources towards moving things forward. But again, I've made it very clear that Boeing's plan is not the FAA's plan.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: This is the first time in more than 20 years Boeing has suspended production of its 737, and the ramifications will ripple across the airline industry and beyond. For more on that, we're joined now from Denver, Colorado by David Soucie, CNN's Aviation and Safety Analyst and former FAA safety inspector.

David, it's been a while. Good to see you.

DAVID SOUCIE, CNN AVIATION AND SAFETY ANALYST: Hello. Good to see you. VAUSE: OK. Even though the 737 was grounded back in March, Boeing has continued production of the plane. This big flight test past of this 737, this is a test plane which has been used as part of the safety certification. It's been regularly flown over the Seattle area which I kind of found surprising in a way. I don't know why, but it just seemed odd that it was going off on a regular basis.

But with this recertification dragging on, Boeing now says, "We have decided to prioritize the delivery of stored aircraft and temporarily suspend production 737 program beginning next month." So here's the thing. There's nothing that Boeing statement which would indicate they do not expect the 737 to return to service.

But let's say if it doesn't, all of this review continues to stretch out and drag out like this, we'll have a situation with 400 new planes and storage plus the 400 already in service which are out of commission, 800 commercial passenger jets doing nothing. More than $100 million of plane, a $1 billion worth of aircrafts sitting in a hangar doing nothing. Can Boeing absorb that kind of cost?

SOUCIE: Well, they must be able to because the fact that today they paid dividends again to their board members. So, you know, there must be some profit going on somewhere in it. When I was up there, I was up at Boeing earlier in the month, and you can see that the 777 line in the 787 production line, they're full. They're at capacity and they're really moving forward with those deliveries. The 737-9 has deliveries and they're still manufacturing those. So it's just the 737-8 line. And I think that somehow they're able to afford this. I don't know how.

VAUSE: Have they quarantine essentially the problems with the 737 Max, quarantined just to that plane and has it impacted any other operations?

SOUCIE: No, it is just for the 737 Max 8 and it has very specific things to do with the (INAUDIBLE) obviously, that that was tied to the crashes of the Lion Air and the Ethiopian Airlines. But there is no tie to any of the other manufacturing lines.

VAUSE: And you know, officials with Boeing have reportedly indicated that they think that Max will be back in the air sort of mid-February. Seattle Times reported that the FAA has warned Boeing, the CEO particularly to back away from making those kinds of public statements.

You know, there was a lot of criticism that the regulators and Boeing's relationship before that was just too incestuous, is too close. Is this a sign that the FAA is putting some distance in that relationship?

SOUCIE: I would hope that it is. You know, there needs to be distance there. And there's two different perspectives there. One is obviously a profit. The airline has to make profit and how they do that is by setting schedules and knowing how many people they have to hire and when they have to have plans. So those are just like -- those are plans. And as Patton said, plans are only as good until the battle starts.

And that's where we are now. The battles on and we'll have to see how long this battle is going to rage. And I believe that Dickson, I'm very pleased with the position that the administrators taking on this, saying, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter what Boeing says. We have controls on this. He also has the controls on it. Many other foreign regulatory bodies have control on it and Boeing doesn't.

But Boeing still has to plan. It's up to know what's coming up and what they can do and that's what they're doing. I don't think it's going to be in February. I don't think it's going to be in March. I think we're looking into April to return to service.

VAUSE: So it will be out of commission for more than a year by the time it's back in the air. That's a long time for granting of a plane, right?

SOUCIE: Yes, it certainly is. It's nothing I've ever seen before. It's totally unprecedented.

VAUSE: David, thanks for joining us. David Soucie there in Denver, Colorado. I appreciate it. Unrest continues to sweep across India in response to a new law, which specifically makes it harder for Muslims to become citizens. More on that in a moment. Also head, a football makes a pitch for human rights. China says he's been taken in by fake news.

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PEDRAM JAVAHERI, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Good day to you. I'm meteorologist Pedram Javaheri CNN WEATHER WATCH and we watch the pattern across the Americas here. Well we do have a massive spell of colder air over the next couple of days. Back behind a strong frontier that has prompted some significant severe weather in the southern portion of the United States.

In fact, some 26 reports of tornadoes along the Gulf Coast and the northern tier of this particular resurgence kind of pushes right through the northeastern United States and brings with it a shot of quick-moving snow showers that could see some decent accumulations. But notice this, the cold air is here to stay at least for a couple of days going in towards this weekend, and then we kind of moderate things back out a little bit.

But notice in Chicago dropping down to five below by Wednesday afternoon, Minneapolis nine below for an afternoon high, even New York City on in two areas around Boston beginning to see temps dip below the freezing mark here over the next several days.

So, yes, the first day of winter officially arrives on the northern hemisphere on Saturday and temps just in line with that here. Just a few degrees below average but it does look like starting off winter 2019 into 2020. Eventually, a slightly warmer trend might be expected across that region. How about Winnipeg, Canada? How about 21 degrees below zero, in Los

Angeles nearly 20 degrees above with partly cloudy conditions. And the tropics could see a few thunderstorms pop up in say Havana, generally into the afternoon hours.

Mexico City, not too bad, about 22 degrees. Chihuahua climbs up to around nine and noticed the frontier pushing right through the Gulf Coast with some rainfall.

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VAUSE: India's prime minister is appealing for calm but there is no sign that the deadly protests against a controversial citizenship law is letting up.

An opposition leader from West Bengal state march with thousands of protesters Monday, condemning the measures which are anti-Muslim.

Sam Kiley joins us now from New Delhi with the very latest. Sam, there's a couple things here, the first response to this protest by security forces within the government seems surprising in basically that violence and the brutality, but also the response from India's Muslim population, which has kept quiet. And were other measures have passed up until this point.

SAM KILEY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, it's not just the -- I think you put your finger on something very interesting, which is that it's not just India's Muslim population that is responding to what is now being perceived as a much broader attack on the secular constitution, the secular elements of the Indian constitution that have underpinned the world's biggest democracy now since independence.

And so, we are seeing these demonstrations focused mostly around students and universities, John, right across the country. And what this is, an objection to is a new act which effectively means -- well doesn't effectively, absolutely means that citizens from Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Pakistan who arrived before 2015 or individuals who arrived before 2015, can apply for citizenship for India, so long as they are not Muslims. And that is the key element here.

[01:20:20]

So, Hindus, Christians, Muslim, Jains, they're fine. But if you happen to be a Muslim and arrived here from -- perhaps as a refugee from this war in Bangladesh, for example, particularly explosive issue, you have no chance under this new legislation of becoming Indian, even if you've spent your entire life here.

So, in that context, this is being seen as much wider effort by Mr. Modi, the Prime Minister's BJP party to Hinduize the entire constitutional structures of this country of a billion and a half or so people. Remember, about 14 percent of people in this country are Muslims, John.

VAUSE: Yes, if it's OK for the Muslims, right? But, Sam, the situation with the other population, yes, 14 percent Muslim, 80 percent Hindu. That 14 percent is still 200 million people. And this is a sizable number of people, sizable number which are being prosecuted, blatantly.

KILEY: Well, there is -- at the moment it would be seen more as sort of legislative pressure rather than outright persecution. Although, people do recall here that the beginning of the 2000, 2002 in Gujarat when Mr. Modi was a senior government official there, there were Hindu nationalist programs effectively against the local Muslim population.

And there is a real sense of fear among many Muslims in this country that they could face a further legislative persecution down the line. There has been for example a suggestion coming from the interior minister here that they want to apply a nationalization test, which was recently used in Assam to the entire country.

Again, which would mean that, effectively, Muslims will could be excluded or recently arrived -- relatively recently arrived Muslims could be excluded from Indian citizenship or that perhaps, all Indian Muslims would have to prove there somehow their Indianness.

So this is a highly explosive issue that periodically has resulted in violence. But for the time being, the effort is in terms of the demonstrations against it to try to remain nonviolent in the face of pressure from the central government, John.

VAUSE: And we should note that the law passed both houses of parliament quite easily and that was last week.

Sam, thank you. Sam Kiley, live for us there in New Delhi.

Lebanon's caretaker prime minister wants to delay naming his replacement until Thursday. Saad Hariri wants more time to form a government. He resigned in October less than two weeks after anti- government protests began, but he's expected to be named the prime minister.

Again, police fired tear gas and rocks throwing protest in Beirut on Sunday. Demonstrators blame the political elite for years of corruption and the country's worst economic crisis in decades.

Arsenal Mesut Ozil has been officially invited to Beijing to visit the Xinjiang province. The offer was made after Mesut criticize the treatment of minority Muslim Uyghurs. Beijing says Ozil who is Muslim has been blinded by fake news.

According to U.S. State Department, China has detained up to two million Uyghurs in Xinjiang.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GENG SHUANG, SPOKESMAN, CHINA'S MINISTRY OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS (through translator): We also welcome Mr. Ozil to come to Xinjiang and take a look. As long as he has a conscience and is able to distinguish right from wrong and adheres to the principals of objectivity and fairness. He will see a different Xinjiang.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: Chinese state media pulled television coverage of Arsenal's English Premier League game against Manchester, City on Sunday. It comes after Ozil's social media comments had called for increased action.

To impeach, or not to impeach, decision day will soon be here for U.S. lawmakers and what is up, it's a no-brainer. The president has done a few other things (INAUDIBLE) still struggling with that.

Now, also ahead, a stunning revelation from Rudy Giuliani, while President Trump's lawyer say he wanted to remove the former ambassador to Ukraine, that's ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[01:27:56]

VAUSE: Welcome back everybody, I'm John Vause for an update on our top news this hour.

The whole U.S. House is expected to vote on Wednesday on whether to impeach President Donald Trump. The move is widely expected to pass on party lines, in which case, the Senate will then decide if Donald Trump should be removed from office.

Republican leader Mitch McConnell wants a short trial, no witnesses, but Democratic leader Chuck Schumer wants at least four witnesses who have not already testified to appear.

Boeing will suspend production of its 737 Max jet as the process to recertify the plane will drag on into the new year. The model has been grounded worldwide since March following two fatal crashes. The government did not say when production will resume.

Protests are spreading across India against a controversial new citizenship law. Demonstrators say the measure which fast tracks citizenship for certain religious minorities is anti-Muslim. It's the latest move by the Hindu led government which is raising fears of a shift away from India's secular foundation.

With the whole House vote on impeaching Donald Trump just a day away, a few lawmakers are choosing sides, it's not an easy decision especially with Democrats in swing districts that have voted for Donald Trump in 2016. Like Elissa Slotkin in Michigan, she has announced publicly she will vote yes on impeachment.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. ELISSA SLOTKIN, (D-MI): The thing that was different for me is this very, very basic idea that the president of the United States would reach out to a foreign power and ask for an investigation for personal political gain. While we may not agree, I hope you believe me when I tell you that I

made this decision out of principle and out of duty to protect and defend the constitution. I feel that in my bones and I will stick to that regardless of what it does to me politically because this is bigger than politics.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: At least two Democrats are expected to vote against the articles of impeachment including New Jersey Congressman Jeff Van Drew. He's intended to switch parties from Democrat to a Republican.

So what about House Republicans in swing districts? How are they making their decisions? CNN's Jake Tapper has more.

[01:30:00]

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: While many in the political world are focusing on House Democrats in swing districts and how they may vote on impeachment --

REP. COLLIN PETERSON (D-MN): I just don't agree with it. You know.

ELISSA SLOTKIN (D-MI): So I will be voting "yes" on obstruction.

TAPPER: Less focus is being giving to House Republicans from purple districts and how they might vote. The reason? As of now Republicans appear united against impeachment.

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The Republicans have never been so united as they are right now, ever.

TAPPER: In order to justify that position, many Republicans simply deny reality, as seen here by Congresswoman Debbie Lesko of Arizona.

MANU RAJU, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Why is it ever OK for an American president to ask a foreign power to investigate a political rival. Why do you think that's OK?

REP. DEBBIE LESKO (R-AZ): He didn't. He didn't do that.

RAJU: He did.

TAPPER: He sure did do that. Trump himself has said he asked Ukraine to investigate the Bidens.

TRUMP: If they were honest about it, they'd start a major investigation into the Bidens.

TAPPER: Denying facts and evidence has become the rule of the day.

REP. JIM JORDAN (R-OH): Ukrainians, sir, didn't know that the aid was held up at the time of the phone call.

TAPPER: Congressman Jordan of Ohio making that claim despite this testimony from a Pentagon official.

LAURA COOPER, U.S. DEPUTY ASSISTANT DEFENSE SECRETARY FOR UKRAINE: A member of my staff got a question from a Ukraine embassy contact asking what was going on with Ukraine security assistance.

TAPPER: It may be difficult for the public to imagine these same Republicans tolerating these same offenses from a Democratic president.

And that was the task laid out in 1974 by Illinois Republican Congressman Robert McClory (ph), who initially support President Nixon and then changed his mind.

ROBERT MCCLORY, FORMER ILLINOIS REPUBLICAN CONGRESSMAN: I've heard it said by some that they cannot understand how a Republican could vote to impeach a Republican president. I cannot and do not envision my role in that dim light.

SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R-SC): I'm Lindsey Graham from South Carolina --

TAPPER: Then House floor manager Lindsey Graham asked the same basic question during the Clinton impeachment in 1998.

GRAHAM: If the Republican president had done these things, were the Republican delegation going to tell him to get out of town? I hope so.

TAPPER: Flash forward 21 years, and Senator Lindsey Graham got his answer.

GRAHAM: I am trying to give a pretty clear signal I have made my mind up. I'm not trying to pretend to be a fair juror here.

TAPPER: Jake Tapper, CNN -- Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VAUSE: President Trump's personal lawyer has admitted he was pushing for the removal of Marie Yovanovitch, who was the former ambassador to Ukraine. Rudy Giuliani told the "New Yorker", believed that it needed Yovanovitch out of the way. She was going to make the investigations difficult to everyone.

Trump's pressure on Ukraine to investigate former vice president Joe Biden and his son Hunter is why he is in fact (ph) facing impeachment. But that has not stopped Giuliani -- hasn't slowed him down a bit. He recently wrapped up a trip to the region just simply to keep driving the narrative that the President is seeking dirt on his rival as part of an anti-corruption campaign.

Mr. Trump said Monday he knew little about what Giuliani was doing, but he had nothing but praise for his personal lawyer.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: He's a great person who loves our country, and he does this out of love. Believe me, he does it out of love. He sees what goes on. He sees what's happening. He sees all of the hopes that happens when they talk about impeachment hoax, or the Russian collusion delusion.

And he sees it and he is a great gentleman. And he was, again, the greatest mayor in the history of New York, and probably the greatest crime fighter in the last 50 years. He knows what he is doing.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VAUSE: For a lowdown (ph) on Giuliani's trip we have CNN's Fred Pleitgen reporting in from Moscow.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Rudy Giuliani's continued effort to dig up dirt on the Bidens in Ukraine are disgusting some anti-corruption groups in that country .

DARIA KALENIUK, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR ANTAC: It's not a search for truth. It's actually continuing to spread misinformation, in the best tradition of Kremlin.

PLEITGEN: And it is music to the ears of Putin-controlled TV in Russia who are eager to paint themselves as innocent despite the U.S. Intelligence Committee conclusions about Russian election interference in 2016.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It turns out the State Department is wired to remove Trump's power and to stop the case of corrupt Biden of from investigated, as Giuliani says.

[01:34:39]

PLEITGEN: Giuliani, who spoke with Trump last week after returning from a supposed fact finding mission to Ukraine and other eastern European countries, tweeted this weekend a string of clips from pro- Trump right-wing media outlet OAN, claiming to lay out his findings -- which he says proved fraud by the energy company Burisma, which employed Joe Biden's son Hunter, and alleges that then vice president Joe Biden had the Ukrainian prosecutor general investigating the case, Viktor Shulkin, fired.

RUDY GIULIANI, TRUMP PERSONAL ATTORNEY: He will testify that he was investigating Biden's son. He will show you the documents that prove he was investigating Biden's son.

PLEITGEN: There is no evidence that Biden did any wrong, and Giuliani is also refusing to acknowledge the clamor by European and American leaders alike at the time for Shulkin to be fired due to his alleged corruption.

Ukraine's main anti corruption action group ANTAC, which has also been in Giuliani's crosshairs, tells CNN there was broad consensus that Shulkin was ineffective and provided us with documents apparently showing that he actually hindered large parts of the investigation into Burisma.

KALENIUK: Under his leadership, prosecution is not reforming. And actually he is blocking the attempts to do the reforms, and to perform proper investigations.

PLEITGEN: ANTAC says the same goes for Ukraine's next prosecutor general, Yuriy Lutsenko, another one of Rudolph Giuliani's proclaimed witnesses. Neither Shulkin, nor Lutsenko replied to CNN's efforts to contact them.

KALENIUK: Giuliani continues surrounding him with the most notorious, corrupt people in Ukraine, with bad reputation, who are helping to feed (ph) this disinformation.

PLEITGEN: And Kremlin-controlled media is clearly gobbling up the message, portraying America as weak and Ukraine in disarray. But President Trump as the winner.

Fred Pleitgen, CNN -- Moscow.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VAUSE: Home alone, and surrounded by raging bush fires. Next up, how an Australian boy, made a daring escape.

Also who actually $50 million of jewelry? A high-profile target in a wealthy London neighborhood taken down by pickpockets and some believe it maybe an inside job.

That's just ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VAUSE: When the bush fires are moving in, a man's got to do what a man's got to do, even when he's 12.

Kamin Gock (ph) from Channel 9 has the story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KAMIN GOCK, 9 NEWS REPORTER: This is what 12-year-old Lucas Sturrock was faced with last night. Alone, sheltering on his family's Wheatbelt property, was forced to flee a fast-moving fire. The schoolboy driving a car across paddocks (ph) in a run for his life.

IVAN STURROCK, FATHER OF LUCAS STURROCK: Just worried, just knowing where he is or who he's with.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Didn't know where he was, what he was doing, where he went.

GOCK: Lucas' dad and older brother were out fighting the blaze at Mogumber, north of Bindoon (ph) .

STURROCK: I said if anything happened he was to go down to the orange tree. GOCK: But when they went to find him, he was not there with nearly

8,000 hectares up in flames and the blaze ripping through dry paddocks at 11 kilometers an hour. The family desperately called for help.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was very chaotic, you know, lots of smoke, lots of smoke.

[01:39:59]

GOCK: Lucas drove about two kilometers away from his home, and was waiting here. But the blaze wasn't far behind. That's when he made the split second decision to drive around the hill and find the main road.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Look, it was pretty scary environment. Lots of smoke. Visibility was very low. You could see the flames, they were quite high. It was an active fireground. Now where he was parked up was a good position to be but probably ten minutes after that, that road was under direct threat.

GOCK: In an hour, he was discovered by volunteer firefighters and police.

Lucas, too shy to talk to us today, but rescuers are full of praise.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Now, he did a pretty good job. He could drive the manual car pretty well, probably better than me since I haven't driven a manual for about 20 years. So he was a smart kid.

GOCK: With a very relieved dad.

STURROCK: Very emotional, yes. It was just one relief, a big relief. There was a few tears there for sure.

GOCK: Kamin Gock, 9 News.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VAUSE: A manhunt is underway for three men, suspected of stealing tens of millions of dollars worth of jewelry from Formula 1 heiress, Tamara Ecclestone. Her father, former racing boss Bernie Ecclestone reported to the police it was an inside job.

Details now from Scott McLean.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SCOTT MCLEAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: If you were thief looking for an easy target, this is probably not the neighborhood that comes to mind. Yet police here in London confirm that just after 11:00 on Friday, they were called here for a report of a burglary.

The house in question, which is just down the road here, belongs to Tamara Ecclestone. She is the daughter of Formula 1 CEO Bernie Ecclestone. Her spokesperson called this a home invasion and said that her and her husband were left angry and shaken. According to the British tabloid "The Sun", the couple had just left the country hours earlier for a vacation. And that the thieves took millions of dollars worth of jewelry, including a single bracelet worth more than $100,000 U.S.

The obvious question is, how would thieves get inside a highly-secure complex like this one and stay undetected long enough to steal that much jewelry. This post code is one of the most exclusive in all of London, probably in all of the world.

You're not even allowed to take pictures on the sidewalk. There is this gate post here 24/7, and the house is literally across the street from Kensington Palace.

Plus, to get from where I am standing to the home just a couple of hundred yards down the street, you have to walk past two heavily-armed police officers, who are on guard outside of the Israeli embassy, just a couple of doors down.

What makes this even more puzzling, is that the latest police statement says that the call came from an internal security guard who reported three male suspects inside. Police here in London say they are reviewing security footage, and there is probably a lot of it. But so far, no arrests have been made.

Scott McLean, CNN -- London.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

VAUSE: Thank you for watching CNN NEWSROOM.

I'm John Vause.

Please stay with us. "WORLD SPORT" is up next.

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("CNN WORLD SPORT")

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